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Habits and Hustle
Episode 512: The Best of Habits&Hustle: Jordan Belfort (Wolf Of Wall Street)
01:35:18
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- [00:01]
A
Hi, guys. It's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits and Hustle. Crush it.
- [00:06]
B
I'm just gonna go right into it. I don't have to do a whole. I'm gonna put your name up. They're gonna see who you are. I don't have to do a whole. Like, I have the Wolf of Wall Street, Jordan Belfort. Google him, by the way. I am, like, this is one of the podcasts I've been, like, very excited for. And I said it off the camera. No, you didn't even know who I was.
- [00:25]
A
You probably Amazing podcast. I'm excited.
- [00:27]
B
Well, I'm just saying that you're so fascinating to me. I swear, like, everything about you. You also look. You guys, the guy looks. He's Benjamin Button. He's, like, aging backwards. How old are you?
- [00:39]
A
61.
- [00:40]
B
Okay. And no surgery? No plastic surgery, no nothing?
- [00:43]
A
No. No air dye. I have a few gray hairs here and there, but I've had them, you know, for a few years. Like, it doesn't really get worse, you know? Well, it's not even bad for have gray hair, but I don't have really gray hair. And I'm just. Listen, I have. My issues are more inside, like, I look at the outside of riding away in the inside. No, I got muscle play, played a lot of sports stuff. I wrestled when I was in college, and I did a lot of weightlifting. So I have, like, my, you know, shoulder. I, you know, have a artificial replacement here, and I tore my cuff recently, so I have to get more surgery then this has got arthritis. I got problems. My hands from golf and tennis. You. I mean, so. But listen.
- [01:16]
B
But that's more wear and tear.
- [01:17]
A
It's wear and tear. Yeah. I've done some, like, I overdid it, especially my 50s. I was playing tennis for two hours a day with, like, one of the top players in the world. I just destroyed my shoulders, so. But it was worth it, I think in the end. I had so much fun and kept me fit and. But, yeah, you know, but listen, you look amazing, too, and about 60, though. I'm just looking for the fountain of middle age at this point.
- [01:38]
B
I mean, I'm telling you, it's beyond with you. Like, whatever you're doing, I want to actually start doing.
- [01:43]
A
I mean, I've done stem cells. That's the only thing I've done.
- [01:46]
B
But stem cell. Yeah, but that's more for an injury.
- [01:48]
A
No, I've done my face, too.
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B
Oh, you did it for your face? Yeah. What did it do? I've never.
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A
Oh, it's subtle. It's not like plastic. It's very different than plastic.
- [01:56]
B
Tell me what it. Tell me what.
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A
They just like, they do like this micro. And they put the stem cells in. It's supposed to enrich the collagen, but, I mean, I think it works. I mean, I don't know. It's. It's not like where you're like. You're like, oh, my God, the next slot doesn't work, maybe in six months. It's subtle, but I think it's refreshing. And. And, you know, I love. I do anything I can. My own blood. I love that using my own.
- [02:15]
B
Oh, you mean prp.
- [02:16]
A
You did no stem cells. I go to Costa Rica. I don't do it. I go to Costa Rica to do it, so.
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B
Really?
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A
Yeah. And I had stem cells in my neck and my hands and my. I do it. Stem cells. That's great. Stem cells.
- [02:26]
B
So did. Did it hurt to get in your face? Like it was it just asleep?
- [02:31]
A
Yeah. And they. They gave me. And that's, you know, listen, I was a drug. You know, I was a drug addict.
- [02:35]
B
Yeah, I know.
- [02:36]
A
So I got sober 97, but it's a long time ago. And I was really. Before that, I was like, just unbelievably like, you know, in every. I never met a drug I didn't like, basically. Right. So now my only high is I get to go to the doctor. If I have to get surgery, I get. Give me the anesthesia really slow. I want that Valium in the arm. Give it to me a little. I want to remember. I don't want to forget, you know, So I got anesthesia, so it didn't hurt at all. But yeah, you get a couple, like, a little bumps for a day and it goes away. And then you don't see results right away. But then over like three to six months, it builds more collagen and, yeah, it works.
- [03:09]
B
I think I want to see like a before and after just to see if there's any. Like. It's probably so like you said, subtle.
- [03:14]
A
It's subtle.
- [03:15]
B
Yeah. It's not like.
- [03:16]
A
It's like going to surgery.
- [03:18]
B
Pull your face up.
- [03:19]
A
Yeah.
- [03:19]
B
By the way, you just said something that's so crazy because you. You've been that movie even though it came out in 2013. First of all, occult favorite. My favorite movie of seriously all time, the Wolf of Wall Street. I was. I am obsessed with it. I think I've seen it like 25 times. I'm not joking.
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A
People love them. I mean, I love It. And I love the first half a lot better than I love everything up to the end.
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B
I was going to say until the end. Right.
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A
But then it ends on an up note, which is really interesting because when I first. When they first were going to do the movie, it was 2007 and it ended with me going to jail.
- [03:52]
B
Yeah.
- [03:53]
A
Because that was my life. And then it got delayed because of the writer strike. And over that six year period, I rebuilt my life and a comeback story. So Marty and Leah, like, we gotta change the movie. They made it a comeback story to reflect my new life, which was going around the world teaching people about entrepreneurship and sales. I think it made it a much better movie because it was suddenly it's like, oh, my God. The guy came back from the. Basically being like a downer and was like, oh my God. And he came back from it. So. Yeah.
- [04:17]
B
Well, what was interesting though, because it came out, what you said 2000. I thought 2013.
- [04:22]
A
13. It came out December, Christmas, 2013.
- [04:24]
B
2013. But that movie, like that was your life so many years before. 30 years ago.
- [04:31]
A
I was just telling this to someone so people like would say, wow, you like just did Stratton like what, 10 years ago? No, it was like literally 30 something years ago.
- [04:39]
B
That is what's so crazy. Because if you're like, okay, so you're.
- [04:41]
A
You're 35 years ago. Right.
- [04:43]
B
So that's like you were like. That was. You're a whole different person.
- [04:45]
A
Yeah, it's crazy.
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B
Like you've had like five. Five different lives since then.
- [04:49]
A
I have for sure. I've definitely had at least three lives, you know.
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B
Oh.
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A
It's because it was a life up to Stratton. Then Stratton started and my life was literally insane. Balls to walls for 10 years. 10 years. Then I had this like, you know, five year period where I was, you know, indicted, waiting to go to jail. Worst five years of my. Like, you're dying in slow motion, literally. Jail wasn't even the bad part, by the way, but it's when you're waiting to go to jail and your life is slowly. It's like the Roman Empire is falling and burning and burning and you're like sitting there watching yourself die in slow motion.
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B
Yeah.
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A
And I still was living in a giant house. It's like your possessions being stripped away one by. It's a fucking worst. Right. When I finally went to jail and I lost everything, it was liberating because I hit bottom. I mean bottom. No more money left. Right. Separated from everything. Even my kids. Was the saddest part of all, right? They were 9 and 11 at the time, right? But once I got to jail. So who's my bunkmate? Tommy Chong from Cheech and Chong. We're sharing a cell together. They put us in the same cell.
- [05:47]
B
Are you serious?
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A
And that's how I began writing. So he was my cellmate, and we were like, you know, he's a great guy. He's amazing. And, you know, I would tell him stories at night, and he would be rolling on the floor. Second night, he's rolling on the floor. Third night, he's rolling on the floor the fourth, and he goes, you know, I thought you were making all this shit up, but my wife Googled you, and it's all true. He goes, you have to write a book about this. So I'm like, really? You think my life is crazy? Like, I didn't think my life was crazy because it was mine.
- [06:12]
B
Right?
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A
You know, your life happens to you, and you're like, I just. I guess shit just happens. I didn't look at it. I mean, I knew my life was a bit absurd, but I didn't think it was like, write a book. He's like, just do it. So I started writing. I'm very difficult. At first, my writing was terrible, and I taught myself to write in jail. I spent about a year teaching myself how to write by reading another book I love called Bonfire of the Vanities.
- [06:32]
B
I remember that book. Yeah.
- [06:33]
A
Classic, but one of the best authors in the world. And I used the book like a textbook. I had yellow underlay. I kind of cracked Tom Wolf's strategy for writing, and that's how I learned to write in jail. And then I came. I wrote maybe 50 to 100 pages in jail, but I ripped them up because I didn't think they were good enough. Came out of jail. And that's when I started really. I took out the laptop and started writing. And, you know, very quickly, long story short, I, you know, an agent read it, and he was like, holy. Holy crap. And sold it to Random House. And that was. That's how it started.
- [07:02]
B
So you actually wrote that book?
- [07:04]
A
Everyone else, I mean, every word of every book I write. That's why I just wrote that book. I wrote every word, and I hate writing. And by the way, I know you talk about biohack when you also talk about success and empowerment, right? And succeed. Just feeling not just monetary, but succeeding in life. And I think one of the things. There's one piece of advice that I could give to anyone, and I Think what a lot of people miss is that there's typically a specialized skill required to do what you need to do. If you want to do something and you really want something, you have the desire for it and you want to achieve it. Right. It's like people are often willing to do the hard work, but not so much the preparation. Like, I did what I did. Like I wanted to write a book, but I didn't know how to write. I spent a year learning how to write. Like without that skill, I could have wanted to, you know, tell my story and. But I didn't own the skill. And I think with a lot of businesses that people go into and a lot of things they want to accomplish, they, they, they have a great idea and they would work really hard at in making it work. But they didn't do the. There's a skill. They needed the process. There's a hard. There's hard. And people, you know, are very good at doing the things they like doing. But so much of success is getting yourself to do the shit you don't like doing every single day, even when you don't feel like doing it most. Right? Right. Consistently. If you, if you can train yourself to do the stuff you don't like doing. That's what I think I'm really good at. Like, I hate writing, but I spent one year, 17 hours a day myself, writing this book. And I wrote this book. It's on how to. It's how to make money in the stock market the right way.
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B
And, you know, good information, actually, for everybody. It's like the layman's version too. For any average person.
- [08:33]
A
Yeah.
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B
Who you know. Cause you get screwed so often. Cause you don't know what you don't know. But we'll get into that after.
- [08:38]
A
No, the advice there is amazing, but the point. The point is I was able to make it accessible and funny because, you know, the information's out there. Right. But if it's boring and try, people don't read it. So I think whatever you want to do in life, you know, there's going to be a set of specialized skills and probably one skill that's most important of all and what you want to do. And if you want to do the hard work in that, even though it doesn't feel good while you're doing it, it opens up everything else.
- [09:00]
B
Absolutely. So how do you even get yourself disciplined enough to even go through that year of the process of even learning to write? Or, or like you said, with anything. Right. Like someone doesn't like to do something, there's resistance, they don't want to do it.
- [09:14]
A
So procrastinate. So. So for me, I think there's an overarching strategy with this whole thing, right. About the inner game, the mindset of success right now. It has to do with your belief systems and things that happen when you're very. Usually when you're younger. Right. So for me, the linchpin moment in my life of success was at the age of 16, I had this big hit financially. I went down. Where are you from? From the east coast or west coast?
- [09:36]
B
Yeah, I'm from Canada.
- [09:37]
A
Okay. Okay. So there's a beach in New York called Jones Beach.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Right.
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B
Okay.
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A
On a hot summer Sunday, there's a million people on Jones beach. And it's a very wide beach. Long walk to the concession stand. I'm 16 year old kid, minimum wage back then is $1.35 an hour. It's 1978. Right. And I notice everyone's bitching and moaning walking up to the concession stand. It's like 90 degrees. Right. So what I'm saying. I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to get a cooler, white Styrofoam cooler. I'm going to load it up with ice cream and ices and I'm going to get some dry ice and walk down to the beach and sell it for a buck apiece. That was my idea. Right. Went down to it next morning to a distributor that's all Good Humor ice cream. I load up my cooler. The full cost of the cooler is 20 bucks. Right. I go out and sell it out in one hour. Made $120 in an hour in 1978. Right. Wow. Than my parents making my flight anyone My parents, my neighbor were making.
- [10:25]
B
Right.
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A
And what happened is that the next day I went back and made $500. In the first summer I made $26,000. Second summer, 50,000. So I. I made big money. And what I realized. So what happened in this moment? I linked up in my brain that if I work my fricking ass off, I can get the. I was. I wanted money. I didn't grow up wealthy. I grew up lower middle class. All right? We had everything we needed, but not what we. What I wanted.
- [10:49]
B
Right, Right.
- [10:49]
A
And had this burning desire for whatever reason. Right. But I realized in that moment that if I work harder than everybody else and I'm willing to do what everyone else is not willing to do, I could make just like, you know, so. And. And it became a very. It became A cornerstone belief in my mind. A, that I'm the hardest worker, B, that I'll do whatever it takes. C, I'm an entrepreneur. You get it? So I had, so I had these beliefs that were so strong that I did it. I did this job for five years, right? And then I took. Put myself through college and sold ice all through college and drove a nice car, had money in my pocket, right? So. So that was the start of it. Okay, Is these beliefs then, then let's miss the middle of my life for a second. Let's go to jail now. So I already have this rise and fall, right? But I'm that guy. I'm still that kid that did that at 16. I never got in trouble in my life before Scratton or after Scratton. There's one thing I did, I was like, I came from the best family ever. No one ever got in trouble, right? So it was just so. So I had. But I had these beliefs about money and success and hard work, right? And that if I do the right thing, I make money, right? Or I have success, right? So now flash forward, I'm in jail. I'm in the worst moment of my life, right? Everything's stripped away. You're with the so called losers of society because everyone is lost at the game of life. You're locked up with no money, no power. You're just like the lowest piece of pond scum on the totem pole, right?
- [12:05]
B
Right?
- [12:05]
A
And I get this idea from Tommy Chong, who I love and credit for starting this whole thing of writing this book, right? And I'm trying to write and I suck at it. I can't write. And I'm reading this Tom Wolf book and I'm trying to improve my thing and I'm using. I paid one kid four cans of two, and I said, go through this book. And every time he compares a person to something else, like a metaphor, a simile, write it down for me. So I was. That's how granular I was getting. And trying to crack Tom Wolf's code, right?
- [12:29]
B
Wow.
- [12:29]
A
And it was, it was months in the beginning, I say, about month, three, four, five of trying to write where like, I honestly felt. I just can't go on doing this. Like, it's not working. My life's disaster. I know I'll make money again as a salesman. I'm not going to end up poor because I know how to make money. But like, just the idea of trying to be empowered while locked up, right, Was just, It was just too much. And in those Moments. And the worst moments were at night, you know, when you're alone with your thoughts. You're in your bed, right? And you're lying there. Like, all the mistakes you made, the people that you hurt, right? All the stuff you did wrong, it's terrible, right? And in those moments when I felt like I couldn't go on, couldn't keep writing, I closed my eyes and I'd imagined the faces of my two children. And that was for me, that was my why. Like, why do I want to come back from failure? Why do I want to write a book? There's many ways to go out and succeed again. After you get locked up for a couple of years, you can make money. But I wanted to do something. You know, I guess that was about, like, I didn't want to hide from my mistakes. And I had this idea that I was going to, like, tell this story that I thought could be pretty amazing once I started writing it, but I just couldn't write it. So anytime I felt like I couldn't go on, I said, you know, my children, like, just, I let them down. I'd hurt them, I'd embarrass them. And, and I, you know, not. They didn't love me anymore. Right? I'm super close with my kids. I saw my son.
- [13:41]
B
I was going to say, I saw.
- [13:42]
A
My son this morning for breakfast. He's like, we're like this. My daughter and I speak every day, you know, so I'm very close to my children.
- [13:49]
B
Did they see you while you're in jail?
- [13:51]
A
Yeah, they visited me in jail. Joint visit with Tommy Chong was hysterical. Yeah. Yeah.
- [13:55]
B
So you guys, like, you never missed a beat, really, with these guys.
- [13:58]
A
I mean, it's very fortunate that, that and I moved out to California for that reason. They were in California at the time. Right. But anyway, so that for me, like, I think that what people often miss is when you're trying to find your so called why, it's like a. It's a self development cliche. Know your why, know your why. But the truth is, if you really know your why at the deepest level, it is freaking powerful. And, and, and here's the secret. It's not going to be about you. It's not about what you can get for yourself. It's about someone that you love unconditionally or a cause that you truly believe in. Like, you have kids, right?
- [14:30]
B
Yeah.
- [14:31]
A
Okay, so let's say there's a fire in the house here, right? And you're alone in the house. You run through the flames you're like, oh, shit, that's hot. You're like, fuck, that's hot. Is there. What if your kids were on the other side of the fire yet? Would you even think for a second to rescue your kids? No, not even for a second.
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B
Right.
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A
You'd run through the fire, burn yourself, hug them so they ain't burn and run through. And if you died to save your kids, you wouldn't think twice. Right. You love them more than yourself. It's a type of unconditional love or even a cause you believe in. And people do awful things. Look what happened in October 7th.
- [15:00]
B
Yes.
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A
What people will do for a cause. They will do disgusting, horrible, terrible things in the name of God or they'll do amazingly wonderful things. Mother Teresa.
- [15:10]
B
Exactly. So it's not a higher purpose.
- [15:13]
A
Exactly. And people miss with this is when they try to say, I want to get rich. What's my why? I want a beautiful house on the hill. I want to retire young. It's not about you that this power is. That's more goal oriented as part of your vision statement. Yeah. But the real power of your why is going to be much deeper and more profound than that. And once you tap into that power, you become unstoppable. I believe that if you're willing to do the hard work, it can't just be. That's. So there's always like this yin and yang. There's the inner game, which is mindset, and then there's the outer game, which is strategy. So you have to be willing to do the hard work and learn the specialized strategies to execute. So, but those two, if you reconcile those two worlds, you become unstoppable.
- [15:52]
B
But like you're also. And first of all, I have so many questions for you. I'm gonna be going all over the place here. But like you're considered to be like the best salesman in the world, right? Like best sales trainer in the world. What would you say to people, people who don't have kids or a big purpose? Like, what would be the number one sales strategy or how to get people to be a better salesperson? Like, what would you say? What do you teach people?
- [16:12]
A
Well, I wrote a book. My last book was called Way of the Wolf. Right. Which is a massive three books now. Four.
- [16:17]
B
Four. You have four.
- [16:19]
A
The Wolf of Wall, she was in. It was catching.
- [16:21]
B
Oh, yeah. The catcher. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
- [16:23]
A
And catching was the late, lowest performing one because it got released like the day after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt. And like there was like no difference. No one was buying anything. You couldn't get any talk shows. There was no podcast back then. Right?
- [16:36]
B
Yeah.
- [16:37]
A
So that one, it's so late. Better later on. But like, it was like disaster.
- [16:40]
B
Yeah, well, it's not your fault.
- [16:41]
A
Even this book by the. The beginning, because it came out like right after October 7th. So all did. Yeah, like, so I was on Talker, but it had to be like 60 days later because he couldn't talk about. No one was talking about investing. Every single major news. So, you know, so some is fine. But you know, listen, you don't release a book, I don't care. It was a bestseller. But, you know, it's not why you do it. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not for money because it's so hard to write a book.
- [17:04]
B
Oh, trust me, I know.
- [17:05]
A
And I write it myself. And I hate writing.
- [17:07]
B
How long does it take you to write this book?
- [17:08]
A
A year. More than a year.
- [17:10]
B
And then of course, it takes another year to come out.
- [17:11]
A
And all the other stuff, it's a. For me, it's a grueling experience. But I do it because I think it's important. I think this book was, on some level, most important things. It answers the question, what do you do with the money that you have saved? Like, and people just get taken advantage of by Wall street and stupid investments in short term trading. And this is really the truth about how you put right.
- [17:30]
B
And also you talk about also all the fees and how do you know when your financial planner is taking advantage of you? I think these are all like so important.
- [17:40]
A
Financial health, right?
- [17:41]
B
It is. It's financial.
- [17:41]
A
It is.
- [17:42]
B
Financial health. It is. And I think that now people get very overwhelmed because there's so much information they don't know. They listen to this person, they listen to that person.
- [17:50]
A
They watch Jim Cramer and get this financial.
- [17:52]
B
I know, because we have to talk about that. You hate Jim Cramer.
- [17:55]
A
Not as a human being.
- [17:56]
B
Not as a human.
- [17:56]
A
But you don't like carnival barking ass clown. Because. Because he basically is. And everyone knows it. Like, everyone, anyone in finance laughs at the fucking guy. I mean, he's funny as shit, by the way. But I mean, like, that's your. If that bloviating sense of humor is your cup of tea, not mine. But he's funny and he's smart. He knows his shit. Jim Craven, like, for him. But like, the advice he gives is the most toxic financial advice. Like to think that you can actually make money by trading out of this, going into this, timing the market, sell this, buy this. Oh, this is going. Who the fuck what does he know? Human beings are the worst stock pickers ever. There's like five people in the world that actually can beat the s and P500. And guess what?
- [18:35]
B
What?
- [18:35]
A
They're not taking your money.
- [18:36]
B
Exactly.
- [18:37]
A
They have hedge funds that are closed. They trade for themselves in the largest institutions, like Ray Dalio, like those people like that. Right, okay, so. And you know, historically he's an amazing, brilliant guy. But also what happens with the hedge fund and the mutual fund industry, but especially hedge funds, is that they're all like the Ray Dalios or Warren Buffett or, you know, you know, some tepper, right?
- [18:56]
B
Yeah.
- [18:57]
A
Unbelievable, brilliant people that can beat the market. And then you have like this five, those and 6,000 people that are the also rise that bathe in the afterglow of these people. And when you look at their returns, after you subtract their fees and performance bonuses, they don't beat the index. They're underperforming the index. And the mutual fund industry is even worse. So it's so simple to build yourself a massive retirement nest egg by investing the way I explain here, which is low cost index fund, some money in a certain type of bond fund, some cash and saving some for speculation. A little bit though, because you want to have fun speculating. Because speculating is fun. And if you don't set aside a defined amount of money, you probably will speculate with too much money. So better to say I'm going to speculate with 5% or 10% of my capital, but the 90% is going to be in investments that I know. And unless the world blows up, then who gives a fuck anyway? But as long as the world keeps trucking along, the S and P has been compounding at 10%, 10.5%, including dividends over the last like 90 years. And it's like it's not always up, it goes down. Last year was a great year. So I look at genius was up 25% last year. But that's a relic luck that it was. I could have, it could have been down 25%, it doesn't matter. But on average it always trends upward over the long term. So. But, and then you engage in what's called long term compounding. And there's certain things you want to do, and I go through it step by step in the book. It's so simple. And you don't need Wall Street. Like Wall street is there as like this fee machine complex to like basically rob you blind. But Wall street does create value. So you need Wall Street, Wall Street's necessary. But you don't have to play in their corrupt casino. You could extract all the value they create by buying into these certain types of funds that have no expenses, no fees. Right. So you get all the value they create and none of the bullshit.
- [20:39]
B
But if you're someone who doesn't understand any of this at all, could you. You say basically you don't believe in even having a financial planner like Financial.
- [20:47]
A
Planet can be good for things like tax planning.
- [20:51]
B
Okay, all right.
- [20:52]
A
Setting up certain type of retirement accounts, education accounts. Right. Nothing wrong with that. But as soon as they start trying to direct you into certain investments, unless they're saying to you, you should buy this S&P 500 index fund, there's some very ethical ones that will do that and guide you into the right type of investment in vehicles when they start going to complex annuities and all this shit. But you don't need it historically. And this is not even. This is not my information. All I did was I gathered all the information, what everyone knows to be true on Wall Street. And no one will argue that I'm writing this book. I'm right, it's the truth. So I didn't invent these strategies. A guy named Jack Bogle is really responsible for creating the index fund. But in terms of like, you know, how do you really build a portfolio? It's known everyone knows how to do it, but Wall street advertises it their way into. Into the hearts and minds of people and gets people convinced that they should be engaged in short term trading, trying to time the market that, you know, you can actually have a stockbroker who's going to beat the. It's ludicrous. It doesn't work. And every academic study going back since the 1920s has proved it. So all I did was wrote it in a. Very funny. So the book is funny? Yeah, it's fun because I said if I don't make the book funny, no one's going to lie, no one's going to read it. So the idea was to make it really funny and accessible, but teach you a step by step strategy of how you do that and secure your retirement. And trust me, you read the book, you'll be happy, you'll be thanking me. Thirty years later, I'll still be alive. Probably because I'm aging. Yeah, exactly.
- [22:16]
B
You really are. You're going to be alive to your 270.
- [22:18]
A
That's the story.
- [22:26]
B
I'm all about finding sustainable ways to optimize performance. The kind of work that actually moves the needle on how you feel and function. And that's why I really need to tell you about Prolon's five day program. Most of us are chasing quick fixes that never get to the the root of the problem. And the result is sluggish energy, brain fog and bodies running below its full capacity. But Prolon changes that by triggering your body's natural repair and renewal process at the cellular level. It's not a cleanse or crash diet. Prolon is the only patented fasting mimicking diet developed at USC's Longevity Institute. It's a plant based program with soups and snacks and drinks that nourish your body while keeping you in a fasting state. The benefits are backed by science. Deep cellular rejuvenation, fat focused weight loss, no injections and better metabolic health and energy. Plus improved skin and even reduced biological age. And here's my favorite part. It's a complete reset in just five days. No willpower battles, no extreme restrictions. Just a structured plan to let your body do what it's designed to do. Repair, renew and optimize. And right now, Prolon is offering 30% off site wide plus a $40 bonus gift. When you subscribe to their five day program, go to prolonlife.com Jennifer Cohen and use Jennifer Cohen to claim your discount and bonus. That's prolonlife.com Jennifer Cohen and use code Jennifer Cohen. We'll get to the sales. Actually, let me just. I wanted to go back because you're talking about the movie and of course I'm like obsessed with that movie. Was it. How accurate was it of your real life?
- [24:23]
A
Very accurate.
- [24:23]
B
It was like. How much? 90%, 80%.
- [24:27]
A
Well, so I was much worse than that. You were. Oh yeah. Like with the drugs and then the. And the hookers. I'll admit it, you know.
- [24:34]
B
No, I loved it.
- [24:35]
A
Not my life today, right? But we were. I was insane and we were. And then the thing was, best of all is the Jonah Hill character, right?
- [24:42]
B
Oh my God.
- [24:43]
A
His real name is Danny. And the best thing about. I love Danny. Right? And the best thing. Everyone needs a Danny in their life.
- [24:48]
B
Oh my gosh.
- [24:49]
A
You know why you need a Danny? Because as bad as I was, I look at Danny and say, when I'm as bad as this fucking guy, then I know I got a problem.
- [24:56]
B
Exactly.
- [24:57]
A
He was doing more drugs. I don't got. He's got a problem.
- [25:01]
B
Right, Exactly.
- [25:02]
A
He's a great guy.
- [25:03]
B
Are you friends still?
- [25:04]
A
Yeah, yeah, we still. I don't see him that much because we don't live in the same area, but got nothing but praises for.
- [25:09]
B
What is he doing now?
- [25:10]
A
He's wealthy, I'm sure he's. He's very. Was a great salesman. Smart guy. Came from a very successful family. The father was a famous doctor. His mother was an educator. Very well respected educator.
- [25:20]
B
But they were like upper class. They were like rich rich.
- [25:24]
A
They were exactly.
- [25:25]
B
Yeah. They're upper class, correct.
- [25:26]
A
Yeah.
- [25:26]
B
And so he was able. Like what? Like does. Does he have money money or just.
- [25:30]
A
Like he has my money money?
- [25:31]
B
He does.
- [25:31]
A
He does have money.
- [25:32]
B
Like what did he do after? What did he like. I don't know, he's a medical.
- [25:35]
A
Medical supply business or something. I don't know exactly what he did, but he's in medical supplies. Maybe some pharmacies. I don't know exactly what he did, but he made some good money. He's not poor by. He's not. He's not. He's very wealthy.
- [25:47]
B
He's not just trucking along.
- [25:48]
A
No, he's doing well.
- [25:49]
B
So you'd say the movie was actually.
- [25:52]
A
Underplayed, your life underplayed the insanity. Like, you know, there were some scenes that had to be cut out because the movie would have been X rated.
- [25:59]
B
Really?
- [26:00]
A
Right.
- [26:01]
B
Oh my God. Like what? Tell me.
- [26:02]
A
The bachelor party scene.
- [26:04]
B
Okay. Tell me. Don't. Don't feel like. Can't say it because I'm a girl. I want to know.
- [26:07]
A
No, no, no. There's some things I can't say because they just. They're just too depraved. I'll tell you a funny story. So when I was writing the book, okay. Right. And my editor from Random House was a female Daniel Perez. Great, very smart lady. Right. And I'm sending the first chapter and it was like really, you know, raunchy, right. And I'm like, wonder what she's going to think, you know. And she sends me back a note. Like back then it was by. Before everything was digital. I sent her a chapter. She FedEx it back. Be like notes, check mark. Oh my God, it's so great. You're such a bad boy. Keep going, right? I'm like, I'm like, wow. Okay. I'm like, I'm emboldened by that. Right? So next chapter, I said, there is like something else, you know, crazy happened. Like, you know, four hookers and this. And I'm like, wonder what she's going to think of that one, you know. So I sent it out. She's like, oh my God, this is amazing. I showed it to Erwin Atbound and he was Rolling on the floor. I'm like, fuck. I'm like, all right, here we go, right? Next chapter was even worse in Switzerland. Just pure insane, right? So I'm like, I just keep getting worse and on and on. Finally, I get to the chapter where I have my bachelor party, right? And we flew 100 Stratonites. They were called them right out there. And what do you call them? Strat nights. They were called stratites, right? And, you know, equal number of hookers of all shapes and sizes. And we. And we like the movie. It's true. We rated them like stocks. We had blue chip hookers, the best. We had, you know, NASDAQ hookers. And then we had the pink sheets with the bottom of the barrel. We took those, too, because we wanted to punish ourselves, right? But we did, and we flew them out. Then we hooked up with counterparts in Vegas. We know the 50 to 100 hookers from Vegas, right? Anyway, the bachelor party is just spiraling out of control upstairs on the, like, there's like the 22nd floor of the Mirage, and it's like Sodom and Gomorrah on the 22nd floor of Mirage. And that was the hotel back then.
- [27:49]
B
Back then, yeah.
- [27:50]
A
And it's just absolutely raging away. There's animals, there's cocaine out on bowls, Quaaludes everywhere. Everyone's high, and there's hookers, sex going on out in the open, the whole nine yards, right? You know, just complete insanity. Anyway, I was downstairs with this guy named Elliot Levine, who was this. Who was the CEO of Perry Ellis back then.
- [28:08]
B
Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah.
- [28:09]
A
And this guy was the biggest degenerate of us. He was the guy that was the king of any brilliant. Like, this guy was a brilliant businessman, as smart as they got during the day, and wild gambler, drugs. I mean, just. We were all crazy. He was like. Literally, I was like. He was like, wow, he's amazing. He's like the best of the bad. He was just unbelievable, right?
- [28:31]
B
Wow.
- [28:31]
A
So. So I'm with him with gambling, and he's. And we're all coked out of our minds and quailed out of our minds, like, just on massive quantities, right? And he's up like a. Like 2.5 million. I'm up like a million dollars for 700,000 playing blackjack, right? So we decided, let's go upstairs to the bachelor party, right? So we, you know, I cash out, get my chips. He leaves his there, right? Because he wants to keep gambling. We go upstairs, right? We walk in the door, and as we got There, down, you know, turn the corner to the hallway. There's like two police guarding the bachelor party, right as we walk down there. Like, Mr. Belfort, you don't want to go in there. It's like. It's like you really. I'm like, I have to. I have no choice. I must. You know, it's beyond my control. And we go in there and it hits you like the whole thing is just complete insanity. Music blasting, you know, hooker's dancing this way, in that way. People just engaged in sex. And. And we get to the back of the room and there's this. You see the scene in the movie, by the way, where there's a snapshot of one scene with this pink sheet hooker and there's like a line of guys, and one guy is having sex with her, right? And I'm watching this, like, disgustingly vile laugh. Anyway, long story short is, something happens. I can't say it's just too, too disgusting, but something happens, like after the guy pulls out. And, you know, you can't imagine what. What the woman looks like after that. And it's like this really the most disgusting vagina in. It's like the world's most polluted vagina basically ever to exist on planet Earth, right? It's that.
- [29:50]
B
Wow, right?
- [29:51]
A
And we're all looking at, like. And you have to look. There's a morbid, morbid curiosity takes over you, like, you just want to take a look. Oh, my fucking God. And this guy was like number eight on the line of 20, right? Okay. Can you imagine this? Right? Yeah. All right. I'm not this. I'm not this guy anymore. I'm, like, married. I'm happily married.
- [30:09]
B
I wouldn't have to clip that because people are good. This is why people like to hear, though. They like the morbidity. They like this stuff, you know.
- [30:17]
A
What can I say?
- [30:18]
B
You know, it's so interesting and fascinating and it's like, people like. That's why people like to look at, like, a bad accident or like. Or they don't have a life.
- [30:26]
A
10 year train wreck.
- [30:27]
B
But by the fact that you're not dead is unbelievable.
- [30:29]
A
I know. And I look pretty good, considering that's what I'm saying.
- [30:32]
B
The drugs, nothing.
- [30:33]
A
Even, like, testament to the human liver, right? So if the liver stays intact. I didn't drink a lot. I think that was the big thing. I didn't drink much. I had a little bit. Not much. That wasn't the big thing.
- [30:43]
B
It was mostly just drugs.
- [30:44]
A
Drugs. You love the quails and Cocaine. Yeah. Were the big ones, right? And a lot of Xanax and Klonopin and morphine because it was cool and awesome. And I just did massive quantities of drugs, right? I never met a drug I didn't like. Right? And the whole lsd. Not much. Right? But anyway, the story.
- [31:00]
B
The bachelor party. Yes.
- [31:01]
A
Anyway, so we were all looking at. Elliot is next to me, the most depressed of us all, and. And he. He goes and grabs a bottle of champagne, shakes it up, and then something happens, right? Something so disgustingly vile that it tore through the fabric of space time. Like, all of a sudden, everyone just stopped. Like in. Like. Like everyone just froze. And you're looking at this thing, you're like, I can't believe it. Right? And then he's like. He's. It's like he's gargling anyway, but then, like, I'm like, I have to go. I can't watch this. It's just too disgusting.
- [31:31]
B
What was it?
- [31:32]
A
I can't say it, but it had to do with, like, a champagne bottle and drinking it, you know, And. And the whole thing, you know? Vagina.
- [31:39]
B
Yes, I understand. I get it. I get it.
- [31:41]
A
I don't want to say it, okay? Because it's just too gross, right? And he drinks and goggles, and everyone's, like, frozen in horror. Like, frozen in horror, right? And then I. I'm like, I gotta go. And I walk out and I leave the party. I go downstairs, take like four or five Xanax and go to sleep. Because I'm just disgusted by the whole thing, right? Next morning, I wake up and I put my. My. I had like 2 million, a million 8. And the money I brought down, like a million 7. A million plus. I 1, 700, put it in the safe, right? I wake up next morning, Elliot shaking me awake, right? And he's like, we got to get out of here. This place is too depraved. I'm like, you're telling me it's too good. He's like, let's go, let's go. He's like, all right, let's go. He said, we got to go. The jets wave. The jets were. All right, we're going to go, we'll go. I go to the safe, my money's gone. He took my heat. Not only did he lose his 2.5, he took my 1.7. He ended up losing, like, $40 million gambling, this guy. It was like an unbelievable ins. So anyway, I write this over 40 million that he lost that night. Like, probably 4 million, but over the next six months, everything, he was like just the Ned lost his job and he came back to again and became rich again with Jordan jeans. Brilliant garment though. This guy, like no one, he was brilliant, but so self destructive, really. But unbelievably smart and talented. Charismatic. Right? But anyway, so this scene that starts when we fly there with all the hookers, right? And someone gets shot in the knee along the way. No big deal. New York cops are with us, protecting us. The whole thing's just like. And I write the whole thing. It's like 22 pages in excruciating detail of everything that happened, all right, down to Elliot take my money. And then imploding. And then he drowns in my pool and I save him. It's a whole thing, right? And I send the pages to my publisher, Diane Perez, and I'm waiting, what is she to say about that? You know? Right? And then maybe you're like five, four days later, I get back with that ex and I open up, she's on the front page. I just don't think other human beings will understand. And then I go in there and look at. There's an X here, an X there, and the whole thing. So in my first book, the Wolf of Wall street, right?
- [33:39]
B
Yeah.
- [33:39]
A
There's like this part where I walk, I describe the bat in detail. I describe this whole story. We'll up the money because it's a true story. Yeah, it's vetted true.
- [33:48]
B
And nothing's 100 witnesses to this.
- [33:50]
A
No, there's 300 witnesses. No, nothing is exaggerated. 300 witnesses, right. So the whole thing, we won all this money, he took everything. But in the middle, I say we walk to the back of the room, okay? And it says, I open the door and there's the bachelor party. And it was so depraved, I had to walk out. Like, there's the whole thing cut out of the thing. You get it? I went downstairs to it. Like she said, wow. And if you read it fast, like, oh, it was depraved, but. But the whole thing was described, you know, wow.
- [34:19]
B
And no. And it wasn't in there.
- [34:20]
A
That wasn't in the book. So then when Marty the movie, I'm like, marty, you want me to. He goes, yeah, I want to see this pa. So you saw the pages, and I think the first version of that was they had to cut because it would have gotten NC17 get out. So they said for that little still shot, you know, that kind of said something happened with a guy screwing a.
- [34:39]
B
Right, right, right. It was still pretty, like, raunchy for, like, a movie. But it was still. It could have been. That was like. It was like, watch. It's like the Smurfs compared to what really happened.
- [34:49]
A
You know, the problem with the whole. Why these things happen, you know, like, these insane things, right, Is that we were like action junkies, you know?
- [34:56]
B
Like.
- [34:57]
A
You know, and it's like, almost like, what's next? It's like you keep looking for a higher and higher cliff to dive off of in a shallower and shallower pool to land in. Because what was the first thing we did that was we thought was insane? We shaved someone's head to $10,000. And we're like, oh, my God. But then, you know, three months later, head shave is $50. Like, it doesn't have the same impact. So let's. Let's shave a girl's head this time, right?
- [35:19]
B
Because you get to always up the ante, right? And it never. It never gets to that place. But then. Okay, how did you even get Leonardo DiCaprio? Were you able to pick him?
- [35:28]
A
I picked him. Yeah. I picked him in Scorsese.
- [35:30]
B
How did you get that chance? Like, tell me, like, how it worked. What was the process?
- [35:34]
A
And this is where I would say, like, the hard work of writing. So I spent a year teaching myself to write. Really happened is I came up with a style of writing where I took what was nonfiction and wrote it, like, fiction. And my book reads like a novel, but it's. But it's. But it's true. Okay, it's true, but it reads like a novel, which is different from almost every memoir that you would read, because usually the person has a ghost writer. Yeah, okay. Or if they write themselves, they didn't spend the amount of time I. I taught myself to write as if I was a novelist. Like Tom, because Tom's a novelist. He started off as nonfiction, but. And by the way, that's the beauty of Bonfire, is he wrote, you know, nonfiction, but it was almost like it was. He wrote fiction. It was fiction, Bonfire, but he wrote it like nonfiction. Like. Like, he did so much research into stuff, right? So it was so believable. I did the opposite. Using his style, I wrote what was nonfiction, and it read like fiction. So. And I spent so much time. And I think. And I. And I. I did do a very good job writing that book. Everyone loves that book. And when. So when Leo read the book, he was like, holy shit.
- [36:43]
B
Was it a massive seller before you got the movie deal? Before you even got the movie deal?
- [36:48]
A
Yeah, well, no, it wasn't out before the movie.
- [36:51]
B
That's what I say. I thought you got the book after.
- [36:53]
A
So tell me.
- [36:54]
B
Give me the chronological.
- [36:55]
A
So Leo. Leo read the book before it was even. It was a manuscript. It was just a manuscript. It was an edited. So the editing was done, right? It was. The original version was 1500 pages. And my editor and I whittled it down to like 538 or something like that, right? So a lot of stuff got cut, Right.
- [37:11]
B
Wow.
- [37:12]
A
I overwrote the book, Right. So when that was a manuscript, my producer, a woman named Alexandra Milshan, one of the sharpest ladies I know, you know, brilliant producer in Hollywood, right. She slipped that manuscript to Leo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg. Right? Ultimately. And Wahlberg loved it, too. He was. He wasn't quite as big a star yet. Now he's massive, right? And he's done great, too. I love Mark Wahlberg. But at the time, it was. Came down to a. George Clooney was too old. He would have played the FBI agent, right? So it came down to Leo and Brad Pitt. Both wanted the book. There was a bidding war between the two of them. So, like, over a weekend, that was. Bidding went up and up and up. Each side said, whatever they pay you, will pay you 10% more. So the book, the price of the sale kept going up and up. And finally Leo calls. It goes like, I have Martin Scorsese cash. He's going to direct. Marty read the book, loves it, too. He'll direct. I was like. And I. And by the way, the truth is, I always loved Leo. Like, I thought Leo was the perfect person. You know, I love Brad Pitt, but Leo was at the.
- [38:09]
B
You did perfect.
- [38:10]
A
Right? And so I sold it to Warner Brothers with Leo on behalf of Leo and Marty, right? And then a man named Terence Winter, a brilliant screenwriter, adapted the book. We spent a lot of time together, and he took my book and, like, put it into a format that became the movie. There's many changes after, but it was the movie that. That first script. And everyone loved this first script so much. It was in 2000, and the book hadn't even come out yet. The book was slated to come out in September, and now we're like, in June, and everyone loves the script. I get a call from Leo's manager, Rick Yohan, saying, dude, we're green light in the movie. Warner, bro. We're going to go. We're looking for soundstage. I'm like, what? Like, it never happened. Like, when someone options a movie, it's a very slim chance it ever gets made. It like it does, usually doesn't get made, right, people? It goes on forever, right? But Leo loved the role, moi, loved it. They. The whole thing worked out. And then the writer strike hits. The 2007 writer strike and the movie. And it's not. The script is not ready. All of them put their pen down. Leo and Marty go off and do Shutter island because it was ready.
- [39:11]
B
Yeah.
- [39:11]
A
And the window closed. And one thing about Marty, who's the one most talented directors in the world, amazing, but he moves slowly when he's with a picture, he's with it for years. It's very slow. So now it became the brutal wait for Marty to be ready again. And like, Leo's easy because he does a movie, he's next, next. And so. So we're trying to get it done and we just. The stars could not get aligned. And on and on it goes. And then 2008, the financial crisis hits, right? And I can't sell another book because no one's buying anything. I'm completely broke again. I'm freaking out. And with my then wife, I was, you know, my partner, Commonwealth, but she's like my wife. And. And I'm like, I hate writing and I hate writing so much. And like, I can't even sell anything right now. I was working on another book, but no one would buy it because no one had money. Right?
- [39:57]
B
Right.
- [39:58]
A
And I'm like. She's like, what do you want to do? You know, maybe I should go and try to be a speaker, you know? And I'm like, well, let's do that. And I remember this moment. I called my book agent, his name was Joel. And I. And I said, joel, listen, you know, I really want to go and try to do some speaking events. He's like, oh, my God, you're a great speaker. It's great. Just, you gotta wait till the movie gets made, then they'll come for you. And I'm like, what did you say? He's like, you wait for the movie. I'm like, are you. I'm not fucking. Wait. I got so. And I liked the guy, but I was like, I was like, that is how you go out and become success. Wait for the movie. I could be waiting the rest of my life for the movie to get made. And I slammed the phone down. I said, I don't give a fuck. I'm gonna do this right? And I went out and I started with giving free speeches at colleges. The first Speech was free. Some girl, you know, was a big fan. I want to bring you to my college. I went for free, did a few free speeches, and when I did the first free speech, the kids went wild. And my. What? Anne was like, holy Christ. Like, it's like something that comes naturally to me, right? They went crazy, right? And then the first person that booked me was like, a $5,000 event for some entrepreneur thing. Never even fucking paid me. And I flew to New York. They put me in a tiny little room the size of a fucking railroad car, right? I mean, I went through. And I was just getting started, right? And then I was just talking about the inner game of success. I wasn't even teaching sales yet because, you know, I had created so much mayhem with my last time I taught sales. Like, I don't want to talk about sales anymore, right? Because I have my own negative answers about it, right? But then something happened and some. I was at some event in Australia, so I had already a big following from the book around the world. So I did a tour in Australia, and I met a guy there. He goes, I want to take you to England. It was only the inner game of success. No sales or business, right? Just, you know, mindset, right? But it was really compelling. There goes, dude, I got to bring you. People are going to love this stuff in England, right? And I went to his company. I flew me to England. I went to his company, England, and he had a phone room, like. Like 20 people on the phone because he was doing some stuff with me, trading, right? And he had. They were selling trading programs, right? And I listened to his salesman like, did your people suck? I'm like. He goes, I know. They're the fucking worst, right? He goes, that closing rate is just, like, horrific. I said, if you want, I'm happy to train them for. I'll teach him the straight line. He goes, what's that? I said, I'll show you a straight line. So he calls all his people into a room. All right? The name of the company was called Knowledge. The video is still around Knowledge to action right now. At the time, I had my first shoulder surgery already. So I was actually in a. I think for the second one, I was actually in a sling. For me, I rotated a couple of pair, right? But anyway, so I calls people. He calls people in, all right? And they had this big. They had this script. That sales manager wrote this fucking script that was like a big piece of oak tag in a circle. It was the most toxic piece of shit, right? It was like the Opposite of the straight line. It was a circular bullshit, right? And I took a blowtorch and lit it on fire in front of like, 20 people. All right? I said, guys, this is the biggest salesman to see, right? And I start teaching the straight line system, which is what I invented, to teach all these. And the guy who was a seminar promoter is like, holy. When I was done, he's like, why the fuck are you talking about the inner game of success? Because this is the most. I never heard. This is. There's nothing fresh in the world of everything. Everyone's saying the same shit again. And no one's ever said this before. This is like, when this. I said, well, this is what I taught. He goes, dude, you're going to make billion dollars on this thing. Yeah, this is. You, like, don't stop. Fuck that, right? So I was like, really? And it's still. I was like, I don't know if I want to teach sales. He's like, buddy and I. And we. I went back three days, and what happened is he was closing about 20 sales a month with his. From his room. The next month they closed like 328 sales.
- [43:26]
B
Really?
- [43:26]
A
Oh, yeah. Yeah. And massive fucking success blew up his biz, right? And. And what happened was I still didn't want to teach it because I was like, oh, last time I taught it, you know, people lost money. It was terrible. I just. I was. I really wanted to just give value and I didn't want to teach something I thought would hurt people because I made some huge mistakes. There's no doubt, like, now, in hindsight, I can feel great. I've redeemed my life and, you know, and the whole thing, I've been. I've had this. But I still, at the time was very new. And I. I felt terrible. People lost money. I wasn't happy about that. And I was. I wanted to come back and rebuild my reputation. I said, I'm never going to do anything again. If people don't get a. If I charge $1,000, I want them to think they got 10,000 in value. That was on my mind. And I didn't want to teach things that might hurt people, right? So I wasn't in the straight lines. Really fricking powerful.
- [44:08]
B
What is it? What is the straight line system?
- [44:09]
A
Incredibly powerful system of sales and persuasion. And there's. You can. I sell courses now, but, like, you can get enough. I give enough stuff away for free. You don't need to buy my courses. If you want to buy my courses, you can buy them and it's very organized, but you don't have to, like. I don't. It's not how I make my money. And, but. And I love teaching it. And there's so many videos on. You can't suppress stuff that you. It's always on YouTube if you want.
- [44:30]
B
Yeah, I want to go watch it.
- [44:31]
A
Want to pay, will pay, and they can go buy. And it's amazing.
- [44:34]
B
The course give me, like, the basics of it, of how it would work.
- [44:37]
A
But what it is really is that, like, if you. If you ask the average person, like, you know, a salesman that. That's not trained, but they might be a decent salesperson. Right. Like, you know, what do you do when you sell? Like, what's actually happening? If I ask you, you're. You're probably a very good salesperson. You're a good communicator. But I asked you what. What do you do when you sell? Like, you know, what would you say?
- [44:56]
B
Are you asking me?
- [44:57]
A
Yeah. What would you do? What is it? What is selling to you? What do you do? What makes you a good salesperson?
- [45:01]
B
I don't know if I am. I mean, I think you are.
- [45:04]
A
But what do you do?
- [45:04]
B
What would I do? I would tell you all the benefits of what it is.
- [45:07]
A
Okay.
- [45:08]
B
And how it would help you.
- [45:09]
A
Okay.
- [45:09]
B
I would be focused on you. Not about that. Not right.
- [45:13]
A
No. Well, it's right, but there's a bigger answer. Like, it's not. It's not incorrect. Yeah, of course you do that. You're also very good at building rapport, right?
- [45:20]
B
Yeah, very good at that.
- [45:22]
A
I think your energy, you can match energy really well, right?
- [45:24]
B
Yeah.
- [45:25]
A
You come off as a figure of authority. Right. So people will listen to you because you're an authority. All these things you do. Right?
- [45:30]
B
Right.
- [45:31]
A
But what's. What's really. What really happens, what sales really is at the highest level, it's the transference of emotion. And the emotion you're transferring is certainty that if I'm going to buy, like, for example, if you're going to be selling me whatever it is, this slate. Slate.
- [45:45]
B
Which is, by the way, amazing.
- [45:47]
A
Slate. Right? Okay. Right. So it's slate. Right. So, okay. How sure are you? How sure are you? This is amazing.
- [45:53]
B
Well, I love the taste. I'm very sure, incredibly sure. 100% sure.
- [45:57]
A
1 to 10, where are you? 1 to 10?
- [45:58]
B
10.
- [45:59]
A
Okay. Right. Where am I?
- [46:00]
B
You're at zero right now.
- [46:02]
A
Really? No.
- [46:02]
B
1, 2, 3, who fucking knows, right?
- [46:06]
A
How could you know?
- [46:06]
B
I don't know, but the moment I.
- [46:08]
A
Looked at this can. I landed at a seven and a half. Why? Yeah, okay. The packaging looked good. I trust. I've trusted you. So immediately, everything I know about energy drinks, coffee, whatever, Frank's Fenella. Immediately my brain will take all my experiences and put me somewhere because I'm from Earth. Whether you're selling cars, homes, slate, books, the person that you're trying to sell to, the moment they know what the product is, their brain will take everything they've heard, seen, experience their prejudices, good, bad, and land somewhere on this scale of certainty. Right. But where are you? You're a 10. Why? Because you know how awesome it is. So what's your job now? If you want to get me to that level of absolute certainty? Because, listen, where do you want me on the scale that I absolutely love? If I'm at a three or four, am I buying this stuff? No. Right. If I'm at 9 or 10, good chance.
- [47:01]
B
Yes. Right. So what I would do is. And what I would naturally do is. Because it's the truth. That's why I can only really sell things.
- [47:07]
A
It tastes great, by the way.
- [47:08]
B
It tastes amazing. There's 20 grams of protein, zero sugar. It's 110 calories. It's way better than all the other junk out there. And if you're into health or fitness or wellness, you would rather have this 100. Like a bunch of junk.
- [47:22]
A
Totally. Right. So, okay, so those are all. Those are all features. Right. And then the benefits could be how it made me feel. But the point is, is that if you're the salesperson, whatever you're saying.
- [47:33]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [47:33]
A
The salesperson needs to enter at this level of absolute certainty, and then their job is they want to transfer that certainty to the person they're trying to sell to. Right. To make them hopefully as. Or close to as certain as they are. Right?
- [47:46]
B
Right.
- [47:46]
A
So let's say you do that.
- [47:47]
B
Okay?
- [47:48]
A
Right. Let's say you do that. Right. And when you're done giving me the features and benefits and you do a great job, and I'm like, wow, this shit's really good. I'm like, wow, this stuff is really Good. It's a 10, right. Question, will I buy? Will I buy?
- [47:59]
B
Yeah.
- [48:00]
A
The answer is not yes, and the answer is not no. The answer is maybe.
- [48:04]
B
Right? I said, yeah. Yeah. Like, I want to hear what you're going to say.
- [48:06]
A
Maybe I will. Why is it maybe because what if in the process of you making me certain, you did it in a way that made me not trust you or not like you? What if the way you talk to me, it offended me. And so, so, yeah, I. You convinced me. It's great. I'm like. But I don't trust this person. Am I going to buy from you?
- [48:25]
B
No.
- [48:26]
A
Right. So it's not enough that they love the product. They also have to trust the salesperson or the person who's presenting them with the product. Right? So let's just say those, let's say you did that well, right? Would I buy now? The answer still is maybe I would, maybe I wouldn't. Why? Because what if I don't trust the company that manufactures the product? There's something about this. It's an unknown company. I don't know how they are. I don't really know how. And sometimes that can be very profound in certain industries. Sometimes it's less important. But the bottom line is this. It's not enough for any one of those things. What you're doing as a salesperson is you're aligning all three of those elements. You're trying to increase someone's certainty for all three of these things. They want the product yourself, the company that stands behind the product. Right? And then the goal is to get them to that 10, 10, 10 in a single moment in time, and then you ask them to purchase. Right? Now, there's more to it than that because there are all these rules of persuasion, for example, so let's say, you know, you have to line those three elements up. Well, the million dollar question is how, how do you go about doing that? Right? Well, there's another side to this that has to do with how you're initially perceived. And then we got, we get back to how I invented the straight line, which was back at Stratton when I had this situation where I was closing at a very high level and so was Danny. We were killing it, right? I invented a new. I found a niche in the stock market, right. An untapped Mitch. Right. And what happened was I was closing at 50%, Danny was in the 40s, 40%, right. And my 12 kids who had the average IQ of Forrest Gump on three hits of acid, right? Not the sharpest tools of the shed. No Ivy League diplomas. They were like the, you know, basically no members of the lucky sperm club, right? They were 18 to 20 year old kids that barely clawed away at a high school. Kids that were never told by their parents they were capable of greatness. And any greatness they had in them naturally was beaten out of them since the day they were basically born. Right? Right. So those are my People, Right?
- [50:18]
B
Right.
- [50:18]
A
And I already taught them a system of how to close average moms and pops on penny stocks. $500 trades, easy to do. And my system worked. But when I found this new system which was selling 5 to $10 stocks to the richest 1%, we didn't call people that. We were all multi millionaires. We called. Right?
- [50:36]
B
Yeah.
- [50:36]
A
So I was able to do it. Danny was able to do it. And these 12 kids a month later hadn't closed a single account. I was making millions of dollars. Danny was making millions. The kids were making zero after a month. Right? So I'm like, how is this possible? We're calling the same people using the same script, right? Same stock, same everything, same leads. I'm at 50% closing rate. Daniel's is in the 40s, they're at zero, right. And for a month I couldn't figure it out. And I was already considered to be like an amazing sales trainer at this point. But something was missing. Anyway, long story short, I stumbled on it one After a month of just like banging my head against wall reading every book about sales, I tried everything. Nothing worked. Nothing could get these kids to close. And finally one night, it was like this. I was giving a marathon, like five hour training session at night to my 12 guys, right? And I looked at them and guys, I don't get it. You know, I'm doing it, Danny's doing it. I know you can do it too, right? And like, what's the problem? They started yelling, there's too many objections. One guy goes, there's a thousand objections. Someone says, yeah, there's a thousand objections. Another guy goes, we can't even get our pitches off. They keep cutting us off. The rich people are assholes. Someone says, there's a thousand objections. Great. I'll tell you what. And I whiteboard bombing. Let's write all thousand objections down, right? So come on, let's call them out, right? And I said, so it's a long story to keep going here.
- [51:53]
B
No. This is fascinating. So like, is it like the takeaway clothes you do?
- [51:57]
A
No, nothing about that. Nothing about that. Nothing.
- [52:00]
B
Okay, so what do you guys go on different, right?
- [52:02]
A
So. So I said, guys, write them what, that call out. Someone goes, they want to call back. I said, great. What else? They want to think about? I wrote that down. What else? They want to call their wife. What else? Great. Bad tummy up. They paused. I'm like, what else? Silence. My guys, that's four objections. There's 996 to go. Let's fucking Go right? And on and on. They went on and on. They're calling out every conceivable objection they could think of. And at the end of the day, the board was filled with objections. You know how many? Fourteen fucking objections. Not a thousand. Fourteen. And half of those were repeats of two. It was like, I want to speak to my wife, my partner, my business, my. My lawyer. Or it's a bad time, it's Christmas time. It's back to school time. It's fucking leap year, Groundhog Day. I want to speak to Santa Claus, the fucking tooth fairy, right? And in that moment, I got so pissed off, right? And I looked at them and I'm like, you guys are unbelievable. You're whining about these thousand objections. There's 14. And even half of them are repeats too. But you know what? Even those don't matter. I'm like, don't you guys get it? And suddenly this thought pops in my head. I'm like, every sale's the same. And they're like, what? Like, I mean, every sale is the same, you know, See by their expressions. Every sales, different people have different needs, different values, different pain points, different experiences. They say different things, right? They're like, every sales different. Like, guys, every sales the same. Watch. And this idea pops in my head and I'm like, it's a straight line. And I draw a straight line across the board for the very first time. I put a big thick X on either end. I say, this is your open with the sale begins. This is the close. And then I start teaching the system with a straight line. Then I said, I'll make. I'll leave it out. And you go and see this on videos on you. It's all over YouTube, right? And then I said, said now, guys, when you were selling penny stocks and it was easy, every once in a while you get an easy lay down sale, right? That doesn't happen anymore. What's happening is this. And I realized something. It hit me. They were saying they kept getting cut off. People were. The rich people were assholes. They couldn't even get their pitches off right? Now guess what? I was not getting cut off. People never cut me off. I was getting the same objections they were getting, right? But I was getting them at the end after I asked for them to buy. That's why I asked for the order. They were getting cut off in the beginning. And I'm like, there's something like. It just hit me. It was so profound. I'm like, wait a second, I'm not having Trouble getting my pitch off. People listen to me, and I'm like. And then it hit me. I said, guys, when you're speaking to smart people, when you're speaking, everyone's smart. Now we all got smart bros, right? When you're speaking to people smart and educated, you have four seconds to establish three crucial things. I'll tell you what they are. Number one, you must be perceived as being sharp as attack. Number two, enthusiastic as hell. And number three, most important of all, an expert in your field. You got four seconds to do it. Because people judge books by their covers, we seize people, we size them up, we make a snap judgment. And here's what happens if you're perceived the right way, sharp on the ball, enthusiastic, and most importantly, an expert. What do you do in the presence of an expert? You defer. You let the expert control the conversation. We've been conditioned since we're yay big. When we're kids, you're sick, where do you go? Parents take you to the doctor. The doctor dresses a certain way. Even your own parents defer to the doctor, right? When the doctor says to you, so how long this been? You don't say, well, how long has hurt a doctor? You answer their questions honestly and forthrightedly, right? So we have been conditioned with coaches, tutors. If as adults, you need advice on taxes, you hire an accountant. You want to in trouble, you hire a lawyer, right? We seek out experts to help us solve our problems. And when we're in the presence of an expert, what do we do? We defer. We let them control the flow of the encounter, right? But when you're in the presence of someone you believe is a novice, what do you do? You try to take control, right? What was happening is I was a natural born closer, all right? As was Danny, right? And I taught Danny something about sales, but he took to it like a fish to water, right? So when people would hear my voice from the second I opened up my mouth in the first few seconds, they're like, this guy's sharp. This guy's an X. I sat. I was coming off a certain way.
- [56:04]
B
Yeah.
- [56:04]
A
And they weren't. I was using certain and million dollars. So how do you do that? Is it the words you say? Well, it really can't be, right? What could you say to someone in four seconds, right? I'm sure I'm an expert. I'm an enthusiast. I swear I'm an expert. No, so you sound like an asshole, right? So it's. You do it through unconscious communication, tonality, body language. There's certain tonalities you use in person, body language. And what happens is people, you fall into this, you hit this box in their mind that this is an expert. So what do they do? They defer to you. In that moment when they defer, it opens up the possibility to make every sale the same. See, if you're in control of the sale, you can now run a strategy. You, let's say I say intuitively I knew there were these three things. See, I knew these three things had a lineup. I never thought about it before. I did it automatically because it was natural born closer.
- [56:52]
B
Right.
- [56:52]
A
I was doing all of these things that were like perfection in sales. I closed out, closed anyone I ever went up against. When I was very young, even naturally, I just knew what to say. And there are other people around the world that are natural born closers, but most people aren't.
- [57:05]
B
Right. So how do you teach it?
- [57:06]
A
Well, what happens is what the straight line does is this visual. And you see it play, you're like, oh my God. And I break it down into each of its components. And I give you a step by step formula. And it always starts with this. You must learn how to take control of the sale to be perceived the right way as an expert. Once you learn how to be perceived as an expert and sharp on the board, it opens up a universe. Because now you can actually say, all right, I'm going to do this first. You have a logical progression. And if you know what things have to line up, you can then line them up the same way. And that's what I was doing and when I taught this. And there's much more to it. This is a very. I've gone for three hours of this. Right. I teach this around the world, three days at a time. Right?
- [57:48]
B
Right.
- [57:48]
A
But the point is, is that when someone that is and which most people like, there's a spectrum. Some people are just awful. Many people are decent, some people are talented. They don't understand strategy, but there's a spectrum. When they learn the straight line, it's like a mana from heaven. So you could take someone that's terrible at sales and make them good. Not like me. You make them good, it's not going back. Right. You take someone who's good and make them amazing. Take someone who's amazing, they'll be one of the top closers in the world. So it works for everybody in every industry. And it's easy to learn, easy to learn.
- [58:23]
B
So I think what really did the 12 men learn? The 12 people learn that.
- [58:28]
A
So they hadn't closed the sale in 30 days. That next morning we came back and they went on an account opening spree of such biblical proportions, they were all millionaires in 90 days. And Stratton became the largest firm in the country, selling five that we had 3,000 people. That was the success of Stratton was based on the straight line. It was the straight line that fueled Stratton, not the stocks.
- [58:49]
B
Right, right, right.
- [58:49]
A
The problem was is that the mistake I made was I didn't understand enough about creating the better, better company. So like my ability to sell outfue my ability to create the right stocks right now the problem is. And then of course, you know, it doesn't help when you're doing six quaaludes a day and snorting cocaine and, you know, partying six nights a week in the city. And it became like, you know what it was? It was like, it was like the most fun place. It was before, like, you know, people had smartphones.
- [59:12]
B
Yeah, absolutely.
- [59:13]
A
Fuck you want, you know. Now you be deep shit, right?
- [59:16]
B
Of course.
- [59:17]
A
But it's different time, different social rules, you know, and we had our own set. Even within those, you see how things are now. So things were different then, but even then we had our own alternative universe inside the four walls of the boardroom. Like all things, people would walk in there whenever they walk in the border, what the fuck. See animals running around. Not hooks, but, you know, girls and minis.
- [59:39]
B
I can't even imagine. Okay, so by the way, we got kind of off.
- [59:43]
A
I know.
- [59:43]
B
Although that was very fascinating and I, I actually want to know how you would, how you would sell that. I'm curious. How would you get someone to attend? What if, if you were selling Slate or, you know, Farisage or whatever, what would. Like, like this is what I would do.
- [59:58]
A
I'll tell you. Because there's a great. If someone wants to watch a video.
- [60:01]
B
Yeah.
- [60:01]
A
Of me selling. There's a great video of me doing just this thing. It was in Australia and it was selling a financial services package to some guy, right. CEO. Right. It was actually staged, though. It was staged by a psychology company that was trying to understand a straight line and break it into psychological components. They spent a lot of money, paid me a lot of money to do this. This was like in 2010. And what they did is they gave me what are called critical incident scenarios, right? And it's where they, they hand you like a dossier, right? And they say, okay, here's a fur coat company. And they give you like this big all things. And these are your customers. Go prepare. And then we're going to film you. How would you sell it? Right. I did it for a few things. Fur coat company, automobile. And then they did this thing with this financial services package.
- [60:45]
B
Right, right.
- [60:46]
A
And they gave me this. This big dossier. It was about a milk company, dairy company, right, okay. That was big in Australia, and they wanted to expand into China, and they were looking for better banking relationships and so for blah, blah, blah. And they get. They said, okay, you got, you know, 15 minutes to prepare, right? And then we're going to call this an actor who's a CEO. And we want you to close with the cameras. Everyone, like, just like this. Lights, cameras, right? We want to tape it and see how you go about doing it. I'm like, all right, great. So they hand me the dossier, start reading through it. I'm writing some shit down. I'm looking for the whole thing to find facts about the company, right? They come in, like, 20 minutes later, and they're like, are you ready? I'm like, can I have more time? Like, yeah, sure. Take as much time as you want. I said, great, thanks. I kept writing, look at my stuff, planning it out. Right? 30 minutes. I'd like, are you ready? I'm like, just give me a little more time. All right, no problem. 30 minutes more. Ready? No, just give me 15 minutes. Well, finally, after an hour and 45 minutes. Right? So, okay, I'm in, Right?
- [61:37]
B
Yeah.
- [61:38]
A
Psychologists sit down in the corners. The cameras are rolling. The guy comes in, he's the CEO, right? He's playing the. He's really talented act, this guy. I mean, he was, like, fucking really good. He. He acted like the CEO and knew everything about the company. And we start getting into this, you know, sales, right on. On camera. And I'm using the straight line at a very high level, right? And I'm using all the things I, you know, know how to do. And I'm, you know, moving them down the straight line, so to speak, right? And then I find it's really going well. I asked him to buy, and he wants to think about. And I do what's called looping. And I loop back. I do another thing, blah, blah, blah. All these things that you would learn with a straight line. And I asked for the order again, and I have. And he's close, and he's like, nah, nah, just. That's that. Let me, you know, let me just speak to my partner first. And then I do another loop again, and I pull out one of My most powerful language patterns, right? And I guide him into this perfect close. Like, it's almost. It's impossible him to say no, right? And he's like, nah, I just. I can't do it. So I'm like, all right, double secret probation. I do one more loop, back again. I raise this call this pain threshold. Another impeccable rap I give him, right? And I asked for the order again. Just believe me, you will not be sorry. Does that sound fair enough? He's like, fine, I'll do it. And he's. And he puts his head down, he starts cracking up. And the psychologists pop up. Everyone's like, what the hell just happened? I'm like, what? What? What? What happened? They're like, we paid him to say no. He wasn't allowed to say yes.
- [63:02]
B
Are you serious?
- [63:03]
A
Yes. He goes, we told him, you cannot say yes under any. The guy's like, you were too compelling. I couldn't say. I felt like an idiot, and he couldn't. Okay, now, so. And then they go, but that's not even the craziest part. I'm like, what's the craziest part? He goes, we tested 50 other people on the same scenario. No one closed the guy. I'm like, okay, well, that doesn't surprise you? No one spent more than five minutes looking at the material. Wow. I'm like, what? They're like, no one spent well. They just skimmed it. And the guy came in. You studied for an hour. I'm like, of course I did. I couldn't sell this to you. You said, you know what I would do? I'd say, give me all the fucking. And I would come up with the most perfect way. Why? Because I know I have to learn three tens. I have to sell. I need three or four ways to sell you on this product. Logically and emotionally. There's certain I want to know features. I want to. I could. I could wing it and do a decent job because I'm good at this stuff. But to really do it, I would sit there and prepare myself for a couple of hours and write it all out. So I had it basically sort of met. I wouldn't have a script for it, But I want to know. And in my own mind, I know exactly where the sale was going to go before I would take immediate control by coming on like an expert. You be.
- [64:11]
B
Because you were an expert by that point.
- [64:12]
A
And also, I just like my ability to use tone. But here's the thing. I can sound like an expert even if I'm a novice. With something I've trained myself. And you can now, I don't suggest this, but one of the biggest problems with salespeople is they feel like they're just getting started in a certain career with a certain product. And they don't feel like they have the confidence. So they don't want to sound like an expert. That you can't do that. You have to future pace. You have to act as if. So you can sound like an expert even when you're not. There's many people out there who are fucking experts and they sound like novices. So it's not really what you are. It's what you sound like. Now I'm not that. Now that might sound unethical.
- [64:47]
B
No, it's so true.
- [64:48]
A
But here's what I don't. I'm not saying you should pretend to be an expert and just do that. No. While you're closing the knowledge gap, you should be studying your ass off every day becoming an expert. But there's no reason you can't sound like one day one. You get it? So the first thing I'm selling, I sound like I know more about it. And I'm very good at putting words together as a natural talent. So some people struggle a bit more. Maybe they'll close a bit lower than. But anybody with practice and hard work can become an expert. And you can learn to sound by using certain tonalities.
- [65:19]
B
That's great though. I mean, that's. I agree with that. Because if you do, the more information you have, obviously you're going to be able to be better.
- [65:25]
A
How are they going to close this guy. I was able to. I was saying to these things to this guy about his business. He didn't know. He didn't read the thing.
- [65:31]
B
I read the book. He didn't read what he said.
- [65:32]
A
I read every fucking story statistic. I had things about like the difference in the current space of China to the one and swaps. I was. He was like. His eyes were rolling around. He didn't know what to do. That and he just. I mean it was so much that he felt like if he said no, he'd be an idiot. And that's what he said. He was like an idiot if I said no.
- [65:47]
B
And is this in this straight line?
- [65:49]
A
It's on YouTube.
- [65:50]
B
I'm gonna watch it.
- [65:51]
A
Jordan Belfort selling live. And at the end, everyone. You just see everyone standing. It got cut off and they all stood up at the end. But that they were like laughing and that's. I don't know why they were laughing, right? Because the guy was paid. They paid him to say no.
- [66:02]
B
Wow. I want to take a quick break from this episode to thank our sponsor Therassage. Their tri light panel has become my favorite biohacking thing for healing my body. It's a portable red light panel that I simply cannot live without. I literally bring it with me everywhere I go. And I personally use their red light therapy to help reduce inflammations in places in my body where honestly, I have pain. You can use it on a sore back, stomach, cramps, shoulder, ankle, Red light therapy is my go to. Plus it also has amazing anti aging benefits, including reducing signs of fine lines and wrinkles on your face, which I also use it for. I personally use Therassage Trilite everywhere and all the time. It's small, it's affordable, it's portable and it's really effective. Head over to therassage.com right now and use code BEBOLD for 15 off. This code will work site wide. Again. Head over to Therasoge T H E R A S E s a g e.com and use code BEBOLD for 15 off any of their products. So then you were doing this. You're starting the whole speaking circuit before the movie was even.
- [67:34]
A
Yeah. So that. So this is the best part of all.
- [67:36]
B
And you were getting better at it.
- [67:37]
A
So I built this huge business.
- [67:39]
B
Like, how much were you. How much were they? How much was your fee to even go speak?
- [67:42]
A
By the time before the movie came out, I was getting over a hundred thousand dollars.
- [67:45]
B
So you were like. Like a super successful speaker.
- [67:49]
A
Yes. The same people who were promoting Tony were promoting me around the world. Right. And I had this massive. So it wasn't. Listen, it wasn't nearly like it is today.
- [67:56]
B
No, obviously.
- [67:57]
A
Right. But, but like. But back then I was doing really, really well. So what happened was there was this four year gap.
- [68:05]
B
Okay, wait, the movie came out in 2013. But.
- [68:08]
A
And I. They bought it in 2007.
- [68:10]
B
Yeah.
- [68:10]
A
So when the first script was written, it ended with me going to jail.
- [68:14]
B
Yeah.
- [68:15]
A
That was the end of the movie. There was no sell me this pen and there was no commercials with the straight line in the straight line. That didn't exist because I didn't teach the straight line on TV before. But they. But what happened was when. When four years passed, Leo comes to my house. Now, when he came to my house the first time, I was living in a tiny little house. Okay. Like a little tiny house and an apartment. Like it was probably 2,000amonth. Right. And four years later, I'm coming over, let's celebrate. He comes over and I'm living in a beautiful mansion in Manhattan beach on the water like a 15 million years. Like, what the fuck happened to your life?
- [68:45]
B
That's hilarious.
- [68:46]
A
I'm like, I'm like, oh, no, I rebuilt my business in four years. He's like, what do you do? I'm like, I do these seminars. I teach skills. Show me. So I put the video up of, you know, Frank Kern of that name. Exactly. He was an old Internet market back. He's very popular. Many years ago. Right. I had his Frank Kern that I did. Everyone loved this tape. It was me on stage teaching the Straight Line. And I show Leo. He's like, oh my God, wait till Marty sees this. He goes, we're gonna change the whole movie. He goes, it's gonna be a comeback story. I can't hold. You just gave me the. Give it. You gave me the biggest gift. This is gonna be 10 times better movie now because it's gonna be like up. And then Marty saw this and was like. He became obsessed. I sent Marty 50 videos on the straight line. There was a four hour cut of the movie before the final cut that was shown to some people privately that had like 10 times as much love the sales stuff because there was so. They said so much about what really happened.
- [69:36]
B
100%.
- [69:37]
A
Right. It had a cut up because it was just too long. But what happened was it created a. Those scenes where I come back with a. Where I'm giving seminars.
- [69:45]
B
I love that part.
- [69:46]
A
Which is funny. Right. And I get arrested. Right. And that was fictionalized. Like I wasn't teaching the Straight Line, but they loved it so much they put it in there. My new life and the old. And then they end the movie where I go to jail and ends up with me selling the pen, which is this iconic scene at the end. So really I rewrote my own life story while it was being made into a movie. I changed my own ending through hard work, perseverance, and some luck too. But mostly hard work and perseverance, you know what I'm saying?
- [70:13]
B
That is so amazing. So when did they actually start filming?
- [70:16]
A
2012.
- [70:17]
B
Oh. And they turned it around that fast?
- [70:19]
A
Very fast.
- [70:20]
B
So that. Okay, then how much did you sell the script for Complex?
- [70:24]
A
So I sold it originally for an option. So I got back a total in the beginning I got before it was bought. I got about $700,000 for the just option money.
- [70:32]
B
Oh, just option. Okay.
- [70:33]
A
And then when the script was bought, about a million One more and then.
- [70:37]
B
Did you get any back end of the movie?
- [70:38]
A
No, no.
- [70:39]
B
Are you serious?
- [70:41]
A
But. But there's something. I mean, I'm in litigation. I can't talk about it right now. But there's some things happening right now because that's like.
- [70:47]
B
I'm sure no one thought probably how that movie was is like literally one of the most popular movies of all time.
- [70:54]
A
Yeah, it's amazing. And, you know, it's funny.
- [70:57]
B
And Girls and Boys.
- [70:58]
A
I'll tell you the interesting thing, which is. Which is really what it's been so amazing for me in terms of my business, because when the movie came out this 2013, right, kids during, you know, high school, and I have fans of all ages up to like, your mother would love the movie. I mean, that's the things.
- [71:13]
B
Women love it, men love it, kids love it. My sister was telling me her little nephew.
- [71:18]
A
I know, right? So. But like, here's the interesting thing, though. So in 2010, as a kid, let's say he's 16 years old, right? He's in high school, and he's just. He's probably a junior or something, right? Maybe, you know, he's a freshman or so sophomore. All right? He watched the movie, he loves it. He sees it three times, he sees it five more times. In college, he gets out, he goes into the workplace, he sees it 10 more times, he strikes it rich as a businessman. What does he do? He hires me to come speak and consult at his company. So all these kids, eight that will watch them, they were nice. They're all hiring me now.
- [71:51]
B
I was gonna just, you know, those.
- [71:52]
A
Things, they age up and I. And to teach them the straight line. And I teach this very ethical version that like, you know, really empowers people, make sure they sell ethically. So I teach this ethical version. And my business gets bigger every year because kids aging up.
- [72:04]
B
No, I swear. I was just thinking, like, I want my son Dylan, who's 11, to take a picture with you because he doesn't know you now. Right, but in a year, he's gonna watch your movie. You know, in a couple years, maybe.
- [72:14]
A
Now, I gotta tell you, I have. You have no idea. Like, sometimes I'm shocked. Like, I was on the. I used to live in the Strand. I live in Miami now, but I used to live in the Strand in Manhattan Beach. And one July 4th, I'm with my then wife and we're playing backgammon. Like our house is right, we're on the Strand. So people are walking by and we're playing Backgammon. And, you know, we're just like maybe five, five feet off the strand in our little. Just one chairs and. Excuse me. And I look and it's a kid like this big. He's like 7 years old. He goes, are you the Wolf of Wall Street? I'm like, yeah. He goes, I'm your biggest fan. I'm like, where's your mother?
- [72:47]
B
That's hilarious.
- [72:48]
A
I was saying, you're. He's like, yeah, I read the book. I'm like, yeah, movie too. I'm like, what the fuck?
- [72:55]
B
See, I would. You get recognized all the time, everywhere.
- [72:58]
A
Yeah, he should like, no, like, like I came like tsa. Like, it's funny, right? I can't go through. If I go to an airport. I can't like TSA every customs.
- [73:07]
B
Do people go crazy for you?
- [73:08]
A
Yeah, people are very. They're always. The people could not be nice. And I've never refused a picture with one person that's ever asked me.
- [73:15]
B
Do people freak out?
- [73:16]
A
Because, like, so people like, like, why are you here? I'm like, I have to be somewhere.
- [73:20]
B
That's 100.
- [73:21]
A
Like, last night I went out with a friend of mine to a club. Here was a floor or something. And I don't go to clubs, but he's, he enjoys. We went there late, right? And it's one girl. She's like, oh, my God. Oh, my. I'm like, well, I'm here. I have to be somebody, but I'm here.
- [73:33]
B
You have to be somewhere.
- [73:35]
A
Why? What are you doing here? Oh, my God.
- [73:36]
B
I just told him I could, I would think even more than like a celebrity because it's like they saw that your life story.
- [73:42]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [73:43]
B
And your story. Like, they saw your life story and it was so compelling. And like, it's just. I think it. That's why I was like, so. How. I am so excited. But, but then. Okay, okay. So then like a movie gets made. So then you said that you have. You can't talk about all of it, but you sell it, you make a million one.
- [73:59]
A
No, I can talk about that. But like, I ended up having to sue them because the people that made.
- [74:04]
B
The movie, I was going to say the Malaysian people, the golden. The Goldman Sachs were the finance.
- [74:09]
A
That's why I was. For the last four years, I've been in litigation with them to get some rights back. But we're going to settle.
- [74:14]
B
So that's the part that I need to ask you about. So basically, who found them as the financiers for the movie? So that. To tell them who they are. The. The guy right now, Jolo.
- [74:25]
A
This guy, Raza Aziz. Right.
- [74:27]
B
There's a major Netflix movie on them right now.
- [74:30]
A
Yes. Called man on the Run. Right.
- [74:31]
B
Yeah, man on the Run.
- [74:32]
A
Billion Dollar Whale was them too. Right. So it was the prime minister of Malaysia's stepson.
- [74:38]
B
Right.
- [74:38]
A
He was the founder of Rigmator. Right. And they came in with gang, like, money. Like, and it was a poll. Everyone. They were telling everyone was oil. It was like, Saudi oil money. And they were. Right. So no one knew. Right. And at the time, I didn't know. No one really knew, you know? And so, you know, I met with them, with the CEO. I met with the production people.
- [74:56]
B
You did? Or did Marty do it?
- [74:58]
A
No, we did. No, we did. I did. Leo did. We had big lunch. Right.
- [75:01]
B
So you were involved with the production of the movie.
- [75:03]
A
No, this was just to buy the movie.
- [75:05]
B
No, that's what I mean. You were involved. Like, after you sold it to Warner Brothers as an option and all the other stuff, it just.
- [75:10]
A
No, it just sat there for, like, Right.
- [75:12]
B
Forever.
- [75:13]
A
When they. When they finally got. When they finally. When I had this meeting with the Malaysians. Right, Right.
- [75:18]
B
But wait, hold on. Let's go back a second. So then you still. The option, then you get the million when. Once.
- [75:21]
A
The movie's now greenlit, being made from the Malaysians.
- [75:24]
B
Oh. So, okay, go ahead. I thought what would happen is Warner Brothers then gave you some money. They would take care of it.
- [75:31]
A
Option expired. I got the movie back. So I got two. Twice. They paid me option money twice. But they never exercised the option. I got the property back. Then Leo and his manager found these Malaysians. And at the time, no one knew they were crooks.
- [75:46]
B
No.
- [75:47]
A
Right. You know, they were just super rich. And then they spent money. I'd never seen people spend money, so I thought they were. At the time, I was like, this is just like the old scam of raising money and spending it like, you know, happens.
- [75:57]
B
Totally.
- [75:57]
A
Venture capital. Like, yeah, you raise a billion because they were spending money like, crazy.
- [76:01]
B
Crazy.
- [76:01]
A
But he didn't know. Stolen money. You thought it was just. They were milking the Irish.
- [76:05]
B
It was insane, right? They had so much money.
- [76:07]
A
Right? Yeah.
- [76:08]
B
So.
- [76:08]
A
So I sold them the script thinking was legit. Everyone thought they were legit.
- [76:12]
B
Everyone.
- [76:12]
A
And then right around the time the movie came out, rumbling started happening, Right. And, like, the money may have been diverted from. At first, I was like, whatever. It was upsetting. But, you know, and over time, it built and built. Eventually, you know, they they had to pay $60 million. Right. They disappeared. You know, one of them got indicted. The CEO of Red Grad. The.
- [76:31]
B
Yeah.
- [76:31]
A
Got indicted in Malaysia. Jho Low went on the run, whole thing. Right.
- [76:35]
B
Did he get a facelift to change his face?
- [76:37]
A
That's what I heard. He got a chance. You could be Jolo, by the way. Yeah, I could be, but I'm not your Joel. Yeah, you're not Jolo, are you?
- [76:44]
B
Oh, we caught you. Yeah.
- [76:46]
A
So anyway, I think he's in China, but that's the word, but.
- [76:50]
B
Oh, really?
- [76:50]
A
Yeah. So what happened was the rights, they. So the rights got sort of frozen and that's what it was. We should have made a TV series and done all this stuff. And. And that's why I got into litigation with them to try to get the rights back. And. Yeah, so I don't want to talk about any more about that. But. But. So, yeah, and those guys are. You know, one guy, CEO of Ray Granite is like. I think he's. He didn't go to jail, but like, whatever, you know, he didn't. He paid some money and that's that. Right. And then. But his father, this prime minister, is still in jail. He got sentenced to 12 years. I think yesterday. They reduced it to six. He was getting out soon, in a year. Jho Low never found. He stole away. Got away with the money in China somewhere.
- [77:25]
B
Wow, that is so crazy. Who distributed the movie, though?
- [77:29]
A
Wasn't it domestically? Was Paramount and then different companies all over the world.
- [77:33]
B
I can't even believe that. By the way, do you still talk to Leo or do you still talk to.
- [77:37]
A
I know I speak to Leo. Yeah. And like, he's amazing. He's the best.
- [77:40]
B
I mean, you picked the best. I mean, he crushed that movie.
- [77:44]
A
He's the best.
- [77:45]
B
That movie is like, he should have.
- [77:47]
A
Gotten the Academy Award.
- [77:48]
B
I cannot believe he did not get that.
- [77:50]
A
I mean, he got it the next year for the Red videos. I had to freeze to death and fucking gathered at the Gun Academy Award. I should have got it for the wolf of wolf.
- [77:57]
B
100%. Like, so how did it. Like, so when that movie came out, how did it really change your life, though, in a real way?
- [78:03]
A
Well, in stages. So what happened was. Here's the interesting thing. So the movie comes out.
- [78:08]
B
Yeah, it's a huge hit. And it.
- [78:10]
A
Right off the bat, right to shit. Right.
- [78:11]
B
Did anyone expect it to be even close to that?
- [78:14]
A
They did. People who saw it, we knew it. When I saw the movie the first, I was like. I mean, everyone that saw it was like, what the fuck?
- [78:21]
B
No, it was. Oh, Margot Robbie. Who picked her up?
- [78:24]
A
Marty. Marty. I only picked Leo and. And I picked Leo and Marty. And then everything else was Marty after that.
- [78:31]
B
So who was it between? Was it anyone between her?
- [78:33]
A
It was a few other actresses up for the role back then, but she was just head and shoulders, the best beyond. She's so talented and she's a beautiful.
- [78:40]
B
Human being in the world.
- [78:41]
A
She's the nicest person everyone says that you'll ever meet.
- [78:45]
B
Like, seriously, like, can you believe that you had, like the.
- [78:49]
A
I know. Like.
- [78:49]
B
Like the biggest of the biggest in. Like, you had Martin Scorsese doing Leo decap. Like, you didn't have, like, B listers on this thing.
- [78:59]
A
Like, you know, but I. But I go back to one thing about that. So. Yeah. I mean, some. Of course it's lucky and some love, but it goes.
- [79:05]
B
You make your own.
- [79:06]
A
It was the hard work.
- [79:07]
B
Yeah.
- [79:07]
A
Of the writing. It was writing. It was the skill. The time I put in to learn how to write, which made. Allowed me to tell a story in a very compelling way that I wouldn't have been able to do otherwise, no matter how good the story was, if I didn't know how to tell it the right way, structure it, and put together the words in a way that people would laugh and turn the page. It didn't matter how great the story. So I made. I served it to Leo on a silver platter.
- [79:28]
B
Totally.
- [79:28]
A
And then he saw it and then he. Of course he. And it was Leo's. And Leo was the one that drove it forward. It was Leo.
- [79:33]
B
Well. Cause he's such. He's such a.
- [79:35]
A
It was his passion project and he knew. And it was. Leo believed in this so much, you know, so he really gets the credit for what? Scorsese came in at the. He was there in the beginning and then was. He was less, you know. Well, yeah, he just didn't. He always liked it, but it was like he had other. He had his passion project, which was, I think. What was that movie he made without the. The priests going in. Whatever was a Silence. He was desperate to make this movie. Silence. That was his passion project. Right. So. So he didn't. Nothing. Didn't like it. It just wasn't his passion. But then once he started. Here's what Leo said. I ran. It was like maybe six months ago. Leo and I were in Cannes Film Festival, right? We were on a boat together and we're having dinner. Like, when he's sitting. He's sitting next to me at Dinner. Right? And he goes, you know what? I'm gonna tell you this. He goes, I have never seen Marty Scorsese as happy and carefree as when he was making the Wolf of Wall Street.
- [80:23]
B
Really?
- [80:23]
A
He was smiling every single day like, you never. And that made me happy to hear that. And I think also it reflects in the movie, like, how happy he was. And he was like, this light. You know, he just had this, like, this poem to. It was light and it was fun.
- [80:38]
B
Like so many of his movies. I know. He's phenomenal.
- [80:40]
A
And a great darker, right?
- [80:41]
B
Yeah. Not even that. Like, they're. They. They're. They're. They drag a little bit, you know, like this one. Like, it hooks you the second it starts, and it doesn't. You don't let go until the end. Like, it is such a good movie. Like, in terms of, like, from the beginning to the end, you know, like, the whole thing.
- [80:57]
A
He's a. So, I mean, listen, you know, the script was amazing, but a lot can go wrong. A lot can go wrong. And, like, he just took that script and we polished it. I mean, I polished every word that. Terry wrote an amazing script, but I. I worked myself at least 50 hours on that script. Also. After Terry wrote it, I wrote the book and I didn't write this. He wrote the script. He has credit. But, you know, I was. I made sure every word was authentic. And Leo did, too. Like, Leo painstakingly over every fucking word. So really, it was. Oh, my God. So, like, Leo. I spent a year with him. Like, he was so intense in getting this right. Like, so as he's talented, of course.
- [81:34]
B
Yeah.
- [81:34]
A
But he works his ass off.
- [81:36]
B
That's what I was gonna say. It sounds like.
- [81:37]
A
No, he, like, he's like. Like preparing for this thing. Like, you know, it was unbelievable.
- [81:41]
B
How come they always work together, those two? I feel like they're like a pair. Well, they have.
- [81:45]
A
For example, I think it's. There's others pairs, but they're one of the top dinero. And Scorsese as well. But what it is for an actor like Leo is a bad director. Could up a movie.
- [81:56]
B
Yeah.
- [81:56]
A
I mean, if you could be the greatest actor in the world if it's a. A bad director. So for Leo, it's almost an insurance policy. So Leo will only work with real, like, really. Like Tarantino. He's very careful, Leo, with who he works with. Right. Because, you know, he is talented as he is. The wrong director could fuck up the movie. Right. Yeah. And I think the same thing goes for a Director is like, you know, like, they're great, but if the actors can't bring it to the table.
- [82:19]
B
Yeah.
- [82:19]
A
So it's a comfort. So I think that's why has any.
- [82:23]
B
Of this, like, you know, it's funny, like, I feel like what happened with the, with, with jail and everything else, it doesn't seem like it, it affected you and it would. Most of other, like, it didn't. You bounce back, I think incredibly well and fast beyond anybody else. Again, how, why, how did that happen?
- [82:40]
A
It affected me, but in a positive way. So I think what, what happens. It was so important for me to go to jail. It was so important because. So here's People say, you know, how did you turn your life around?
- [82:51]
B
Yeah. And also nobody, even. I feel like we. Not that we forget, but it doesn't affect your reputation. Like, people don't. That's not the first thing that I think of.
- [82:58]
A
Right. Listen. There's always some people who want to be assholes and let them have their good. Good for them. They're entitled to feel what they want to feel. But 95% of the world feels the opposite. And that's fine with me.
- [83:07]
B
Right, Exactly.
- [83:08]
A
But here's, here's the truth. So, like, I didn't like, have to change into becoming a good person from becoming a bad person if you're leaving good and bad people or bad people doing good things. But I. What happened was I had to change back into the person I was originally. I was originally a really good kid. I never got in trouble. Wasn't like, that wasn't my life. My parents never. I was raised by the most legitimate family. Everyone went to college. My brother's a top lawyer. My two first cousins are doctors from Harvard. You know, famous surgeons like everyone. No one got in trouble in my family.
- [83:43]
B
Also, you were just ambitious. Like, I feel like you didn't.
- [83:46]
A
There was an ambition that went off the walls. Right, Right.
- [83:48]
B
But that's, that's what. But that can happen.
- [83:49]
A
By the way, ambition turned into greed. Okay. And. And with massive drug abuse attached to it. Right. But I don't blame the drugs. All the drugs did was help me quiet the critics. So, like, after I was doing shit that I should have been doing because drugs make you feel better about it. Right. But it wasn't the drugs. It was really greed. And also I have this thing. I want to be the best at anything. So if I'm doing something bad, I gotta be the best at doing something terrible. Right. But what, what jail did is it. It like it was a Recent. Like I need to become what happened to me? What did I do? What were my values? That like. So example one, if you would have asked me at the age of 26, you know, what's the purpose of a business? I'd say the purpose of a business is to make money as much as you can. But in reality, that's not the purpose or the function of a business. The function of a business is to monetize value. So you have something of value and you build a business that allows you to deliver that value to a lot of people in a cost effective way. So you make a profit. The more people you help, the more money you make. But it's not like you go into. You don't go into business. I'm gonna make money. It's to monetize something of value. Yeah, Right. So today, like when I go out, from the moment I left jail, I've been engaged in one transaction, done one deal, or brought something to the market that I didn't think I was giving a lot more value than what I was charging for it.
- [84:59]
B
Wait, are you allowed to do any financial stuff?
- [85:02]
A
Of course I do. Yeah.
- [85:02]
B
You. So you weren't like, you weren't banned?
- [85:04]
A
I wasn't banned from trading or anything like that.
- [85:06]
B
You weren't?
- [85:07]
A
No.
- [85:07]
B
So you can still do any of that stuff?
- [85:09]
A
I do, I trade all the time. I don't trade, I invest. I don't, I don't believe in short term trading, but I invest in the stock market. I have some bitcoin. I do a lot of venture capital.
- [85:17]
B
Are you allowed to have like your own private equity firm if you wanted to?
- [85:20]
A
I wouldn't want to, no.
- [85:21]
B
But are you allowed up to a.
- [85:22]
A
Certain amount of investors? Oh, but I could not have. Anything was regulated. But what I can't do is own a brokerage firm.
- [85:27]
B
You cannot?
- [85:28]
A
I cannot.
- [85:28]
B
But you know what?
- [85:30]
A
I want to.
- [85:30]
B
Nor would you want to. But you didn't even go to jail for anything that actually people are not doing right now.
- [85:35]
A
Which is crazy.
- [85:36]
B
Which is the irony.
- [85:36]
A
I think what happened was, is, I think people's view of me changed after 2008, where they're like, wait a second, like, what they did on Wall street was so much worse than what I ever. I mean, listen, what I did was wrong. I never want to minimize that. Right, I understand, but I didn't bankrupt fucking Iceland.
- [85:51]
B
No.
- [85:51]
A
Or Greece. Like, no. Wall Street. Like, I mean, wow. When that came out, like I remember there was. Blew up the world economy through complete fraud and greed and insane Selling shit products to institutions and pension funds and everyone's 401. Right. It almost destroyed the world.
- [86:07]
B
Olga, do you know who Michael Milken is?
- [86:09]
A
Yeah, he's great. He's amazing.
- [86:10]
B
Okay, right. And he. He got. He went to jail for.
- [86:13]
A
No, he was. He did nothing, this guy.
- [86:15]
B
I was gonna say like. But I'm saying it's like. It was like something so like minimal and nominal.
- [86:19]
A
Yeah.
- [86:20]
B
And what in the. In the grand scope of what happened?
- [86:22]
A
He's.
- [86:23]
B
And he's. I mean, he's like a legend, right?
- [86:26]
A
He's amazing.
- [86:27]
B
Isn't what you did though, like, it was pretty nominal compared in the grand.
- [86:30]
A
Nominal in the grand scheme. But still, I never want to say that what I did wasn't wrong because it was wrong. But yes, the amount the. Listen, you know, listen, I wish no one would have ever lost money from actions I took. But when you compare it to what happens it's nominal to. The amounts are tiny compared to what happens every day. It's insane. And that's kind of what the book. I wrote this book about like, you have to avoid.
- [86:50]
B
I wanted to ask you a couple questions about this.
- [86:52]
A
Well, you have to avoid that whole. This book shows you like what to do to avoid all that shit.
- [86:57]
B
I was going to ask you a question though. What do you think of crypto, bitcoin, all of those.
- [87:00]
A
I love bitcoin.
- [87:01]
B
But isn't that considered to be like, we don't know what's going to happen? Well, tell me your opinion first and.
- [87:06]
A
Then I love bitcoin. Right. As a very long term investment, not to try to trade bitcoin to make money. All right. Bitcoin is 100% legitimate right now. It's all the biggest institutions own it. You have big ETFs. Okay, so it's legitimate now. It's decentralized. Okay. Maybe still manipulate a little bit here, but not in an organized way. It's legit. I didn't think that many. I was a very, very bearish on bitcoin. I thought it was the biggest scam ever.
- [87:35]
B
Yeah, that's right.
- [87:36]
A
I thought so. Right. But I just. It was my gut reaction. It was back then. It was being manipulated in the beginning it was. But the idea, the coding was so brilliant that some people who are more insightful and sort than me obviously, you know, got involved. And ultimately it was like the lie became the truth.
- [87:53]
B
Yeah.
- [87:53]
A
Okay. So now there's enough large players and it's. I believe it's totally legitimate. I own a lot of it and I Think that over the next five to 10 years, it's going to go much, much higher. Now, I don't think you should. And I feel very differently about crypto. Rest. The rest of crypto.
- [88:09]
B
Okay, I was going to say, so that part you're okay with, but the.
- [88:11]
A
Rest of it, I really. I'm not saying they're all bad, but most of those coins or tokens, they have no function other than speculation. So if you want to speculate, that's fine and have fun and buy dogecoin if you want to do so, that. But just know you're probably going to lose all your money. But that's okay. If you have fun, maybe you'll make money, but you're probably going to lose a lot of money. Right?
- [88:33]
B
Right.
- [88:33]
A
So. But I think people should speculate because it's fun to speculate, but 95% of your capital should be in the type of investments I talk about in the book, which are these sort of, these, these index funds, which are the safest and the most. They outperform everything else. Okay. And there's a lot of. And there's reasons why. And also, you don't need a lot to start. You can start even if you're not rich. You can become rich over many years if you're smart and you just stay the course and not listen to the Jim Cramers of the world and all these people who are convinced you to buy this, sell this shit.
- [89:05]
B
You know, you're never gonna go on that on CNBC or whatever.
- [89:08]
A
They did not invite me on cnbc. They used to invite me. I knew this book by Time on cnbc, but I've been on other stage. I'm going on Fox a bunch of times. I'll be on Gutfeld soon, next week, two weeks from now. He's great. You know, so I go on. I love going on tv, I love doing podcasts.
- [89:23]
B
But people, because you're such a great entertainer, like, when you speak like you, like, you're so enthusiastic, it's like a pleasure talking to you.
- [89:30]
A
I love making people laugh because I think it's great and I love educating people. But I think people learn more when they're laughing and they're engaged.
- [89:38]
B
Yeah.
- [89:39]
A
So when I'm doing my events or whatever, I try to mix, you know, humor and stories with actual learnings. And at the end of the day, that's been a very, you know, a very profitable formula for me and incredibly, even more valuable for people who learn these things. I can't tell you how many people walk up like, you changed my life. You changed my life. You change all. Everywhere I go, you change. No one ever says, you fuck me. Everyone's like, you changed my life. So it's like, that's. And they go through life like that. What a great way to go through the rest of my life.
- [90:04]
B
Well, yeah, because you're actually giving people, like, actionable things that they can. Like, they can do. It's not just you yammering on and on, but there's, like, things that they're like. It's compelling, and it's things that people can take away.
- [90:16]
A
Exactly.
- [90:16]
B
Is that how you spend your. Like, how do you spend your time? Time you're doing Mostly speaking. Smoke Speaking.
- [90:20]
A
Mostly consulting for companies.
- [90:22]
B
Oh, you do that?
- [90:22]
A
And some companies I own myself.
- [90:24]
B
What do you own? Tell me what you own.
- [90:25]
A
Different companies in. In. In the different spaces. I don't want to get into particulars. Right. Because a lot of stuff I do is behind the scenes. Because when you're a celebrity, it almost takes away from stuff I don't want to. Like. Some stuff is good. Other stuff is like. It's just like. It's about the product, not about me.
- [90:41]
B
Okay.
- [90:41]
A
So. But I. I do consulting for all different types of company. You name it. I've consulted for the. In the industry, that's probably 60 to 70% of my business. Touring is probably 20%. And products, maybe 10%. Like, you know, like the online products and stuff.
- [90:58]
B
I would imagine that you would be, like, called from Every major Fortune 100, 200 companies to go in and just train their sales teams.
- [91:06]
A
I've gotten. So that's interesting. So I've gotten about, I would say 30% of them, but the 7 to 70% are like. You use the word fuck too much, you know, really.
- [91:14]
B
Even though you'd be effective for them.
- [91:15]
A
Yeah. So what they do is they buy my courses. I'm sure all the salespeople do. Like, for example, where was I in. Did an event in New York. And I would say every major. Had sales from everywhere. Not all of them have hired me, but their salesmen, they say, yeah, go use the stuff. But, like, I, you know, I am. I admit that, you know, I am not for everyone. I think there's a lot of companies whose values, like, I just, you know, I'm much more out there with the cursing and the.
- [91:39]
B
Yeah, but it's entertaining.
- [91:41]
A
I know. So the people love it. But sometimes it doesn't get by the. A lot of times, like, I get hard and the HR kills. It happens sometimes. And I get that. You know, and that's fine.
- [91:48]
B
Well, you know what it is? We're living in a very woke liberal world. Right. Which is not my cup of tea.
- [91:55]
A
Don't even get me.
- [91:56]
B
Don't get me. I could talk a whole podcast about this.
- [91:59]
A
Get me. Don't start it.
- [92:01]
B
Believe me.
- [92:02]
A
Because I'm like the anti woke police. I fucking hate it.
- [92:04]
B
You and I both. Both. Okay. And so I think because of that, companies have to shy away from anything that would be controversial or non PC, which is a bunch of nonsense.
- [92:15]
A
Yeah.
- [92:15]
B
You know, like I'm not a fan of what's going on in the world right now neither. Yeah, it's like a whole.
- [92:21]
A
It's the opposite of empowered thinking and living.
- [92:24]
B
It's the. It's the antidote of that Victim.
- [92:26]
A
Victim.
- [92:29]
B
Exactly. Like why this is not happening. I am enough culture, like God forbid that you like. It's. It's a. I know. We're going to wrap it up. Can we do this? I know he has to go. Will you come back on this podcast.
- [92:40]
A
Any time you want?
- [92:41]
B
No, I'm ser. We could do like another one. Like double. Like, we can do like part two.
- [92:44]
A
And I'm coming back here in March. You are 100% for sure. For over a week.
- [92:49]
B
Because this is like. I'm like just love. This is like my, my. You're my cup of tea. Like, everything about you and that sales piece, I think I'm gonna have to like clip that in some way because I think a lot of people will find that. So this is actionable stuff that people can act really. If you're an entrepreneur. I'm talking to people. If you're an entrepreneur or someone who's like starting a business, like, this is 101 what you need to do. Because if you're not a good salesperson.
- [93:15]
A
Good luck makes it really hard to do anything else that's like.
- [93:18]
B
That's like the. The foundation. It's a linchpin skill of starting businesses. And that's the person at a company that is the most valuable. If you don't know how to sell, you're fucked. Period.
- [93:30]
A
Right.
- [93:30]
B
So, okay, so, Jordan, where do people find you? The new book is called the Wolf of Investing. I highly recommend it. It's like all his other books, so easy to digest.
- [93:41]
A
Understand this information is really important too. So you can go to jordanbelforth.com, wolf of Wall street, on Instagram, on TikTok, on Twitter, and you'll find me. You'll find me on every.
- [93:52]
B
Everywhere he's everywhere. And if you don't know who this guy is, you're living under a rock.
- [93:57]
A
You don't watch. You go out.
- [93:59]
B
Yeah. You don't go out and go watch the movie if you haven't. Please. I mean, you never know. People could be very young watching. So, anyway, thank you so much.
- [94:06]
A
My pleasure. This is awesome.
- [94:07]
B
Okay, bye.