John Hope Bryant (52:57)
I ask failure, what lessons do you have to teach me? And I was there to be the writer of my last chapter. What about you? So, going back now to your lessons. Okay, here's some stuff I want you to spend some time on and understand. Number one, well, here's some useless emotions. Guilt, shame, blame, judgment. His Bible suggests, don't throw rocks in the grass, glass house, you might hit yourself. Right? So guilt, shame, blame, judgment. Who has a right to judge you? That's between you and God. There is no perfect. I started out by saying that. So, like, people want to judge you. Like, consider the source who's talking to you. If somebody's going to give you some. Some critique or criticism, consider the source. Are they successful? Right. We often spend our time trying to model or impress somebody. We don't even want to be like, who's telling you that you can't do it? Did they do it? Who's telling you can't succeed. Did they succeed at the. At a high level? Who's telling you can't be a homeowner? Do they own a home? Who's telling you can be a business owner. Do they. Have they had a successful business? Who's telling you can't buy a business, make a business and sell it on Wall Street? Have they made a business and sold it on Wall Street? Or on Main Street? Or on any street? Consider the source. I tell people all the time, I like what I'm doing much better than what you're not doing. That's right. I like what I'm doing much better than what you're not doing. Right. Criticism is a cheap sport. People standing on the sidelines throwing rocks cannot get in the game and play themselves. But they are professional critics. I don't need a chief criticism officer. I need a partner. I need a contributor. All right, hustle over everything. See my T shirt? Hustle over everything. That's what I'm talking about. Perfectionism, right? You're waiting to be perfect. You'll wait forever. There is no perfectionism. There is no perfect. This is the best you can do. So become perfect in your imperfection and leave the rest of that stuff alone. Just relax. I used to walk around my rear end tight all the time. I just wanted to be trying to be perfect, but give myself hypertension and anxiety, like, just chill, right? If you're going to pray, why worry? You're going to worry, why pray? Number two, you have fear of judgment. You care too much about what people think. That fear will trap you. Are we having church yet? Come on now. Talk to me, talk to me now. There are some people who have an imposter syndrome, right? They fear that they really are not who they purport to be. Well, without God, without a higher power pouring into us, without us having the humility of understanding that we are enlightened because we have been set in the light. We've been given a gift and we got to do something with it without help from the universe. Yeah, you might be an imposter, but if you know that you're God's child and you're special and you're here to make a difference and you got gifts to share. You're just catching up with your potential. That's all you're doing. But imposter syndrome is real mentally, particularly if you have depression, low self esteem, and a lot of people will leave. I was talking to a lady today when I came in the airport. She was my greeter and she was saying she's in a relationship and she just feels like her partner. Everything's going well. Her partner's trying to almost like destroy the relationship. She can't figure out why things are going so well. I told her it's imposter syndrome. That brother probably comes from an unstable family. Unstable situation, doesn't know what stable looks like and it scares him. And before you can leave him, he's going to leave you. Before you can leave him, he's going to create an environment where that is unsustainable in a relationship so he can't be disappointed, so he can't be hurt, so his heart is not broken. Doesn't that sound crazy? But people do this all the time. Hurt people, hurt people, hurt people, hurt people. It's an old Southern saying. No matter how much I love you, my son or my daughter, if I don't have wisdom, all I can give you is my. My own ignorance. And so out of love, we pass down habits from bad habits from generation to generation. If I don't like me, if I don't like me, I'm not going to like you. If I don't feel good about me, I'm not going to feel good about you. If I don't respect me, don't respect me to respect you. If I don't love me, I don't have a clue how to love you. And if I don't have a purpose in my life, I'll make your life a living hell. Whatever goes around comes around. So this, this, this dude who, he loves her, but he doesn't love himself, right? I asked a friend of mine years ago, why does a genius like John Belushi or Marilyn Monroe, these were, you know, for those who are not like movie buffs or entertainment celebrity buffs, these are heroes. And she rose of, you know, the 80s and 90s or Marylands before that 60s. Why did Marilyn Monroe and John Belushi go out like that, take their own life? And she said she was a rose. Catherine Pinkney was her name, is her name. Friend of mine, she was at an executive at a studio. She said the same thing that gives them creative genius, tears them up on a sunny day. They just can't handle normal. They need drama. This is deep. But when you're emotionally unstable, you don't want things to be normal. You need the drama of it all, which is going to ultimately destroy you. So it gives you brilliance. But that candle that's burning is going to burn you up too. So I need you to get into Your dharma head to heal your pain. 3. Overconfidence. Smart folks believe they can't lose, but they forget to prepare. They also failed the Andrew Young test of men and women. Fail for three reasons, he said. Arrogance, pride and greed. I'm dealing with some folks right now full of pride and arrogance and probably greed too. And they can't help themselves. They can't get out of their own way. And in my opinion, they can't help but fail even though they're really smart. So you got to step over mess and not in it, right? And always treat people as you want to be treated. And be gracious and kind and loving even if it costs you something, right? You want to be able to look yourself in the mirror. And I go to life. I go to bed. I go to life. I go to life too. I go to bed every night completely comfortable, well, reasonably comfortable with my own skin. But I sleep very well and you should want to do that too. So you want to have confidence, but you don't want to be overconfident. You want to be arrogant or cocky or you want to be light, right? Carry your gifts lightly and again. Treat others as you have them, as you want to be treated yourself. That's actually biblical. Number four, not asking for help. Pride will bankrupt your progress. Number five, ego and identity. Being smart becomes your identity. So failing feels like you are, you are the failure, right? Because that is your identity. It goes back to what I said before about low self esteem. You can actually have high confidence and low self esteem. Happens all the time. Or you have these tech geniuses from the Silicon Valley with a blind spot, some of them, some of them with a blind spot called people. Or you have also financial geniuses. And they think because they're tech geniuses or financial geniuses, they're literally geniuses. That means they are successful or genius. That means that they can translate that success into every other part of their life. That because they're smart there, that means they know everything else not true and they will fail massively. You can have high IQ and not have a high eq, right? Am I getting too deep here? So you have to have. You really have the humility. And knowing what you don't. Acknowledging that you don't know some stuff actually brings you credibility. A friend of mine is Sam Altman who I think is a modern day Steve Jobs. And when he talked about artificial intelligence, I asked him about the upside and the downside. He said, well, the upside is we may cure cancer in 10 years. The downside is Something really bad might happen and I don't know what it is. He said so that, I mean, that was humility. That took humility. For him to say that, that made me trust him more, not less. He's the founder of OpenAI or the CEO of OpenAI. 6. Overthinking analysis is paralysis, right? Action is the cure. Stop overthinking stuff. Stop. Stop navel gazing. Stop admiring the problem, right? So smart people fail because they think their brain is the tool, right? But it's the bounce back that builds wealth, power and purpose. So I tell people all the time, don't let the perfect become the death of the good. Just get up and do something. Why do you think your phone has. My phone is an iPhone and my phone is a 16 Pro. But the software upgrade that I last checked was 18 point something, which means every time you get that phone, within weeks of you getting it, there's a patch, a software upgrade they're doing because it's not perfect, right? It's just good. It's a good phone. It was good enough. They got it to market. They wait for it to be perfect. They never would issue a phone. They issue the phone, it's really a computer. And then they send you a software upgrade, a patch every few weeks. And you do it without thinking about it. So why aren't you treating yourself the same way? Understand you're in this world, God puts you in this world, right? He put you in the game. Don't wait for the perfect. It's not coming, right? Just get in the game, do the very best you can and keep getting software upgrades. Keep reading books, being nosy, keep learning. Listening to the podcast like this, realizing God gave you two ears and one mouth so you listen twice as much as you talk. Be humble, be nosy, be curious, be fascinated. Be a contributor, be a net giver in life. In life with opportunity. Okay, I'm almost wrapped up here. I hope you're enjoying this. Here are some practical tools and habits for you to build resiliency. And I hope you're enjoying this. Normalize failure. Expect it, don't fear it. Learn from it. 2. Reframe the story. Instead of I failed, say that was a lesson. What next? Again, I take no for vitamins. Number three, Keep a learning journal. A learning journal. Track mistakes, extract value. 4. Take micro risks, small bets, daily discomfort. It builds confidence. 5. Share the journey. Vulnerability invites support. People want to help those who are real. I ask for people all the time to help me. I don't understand this. I don't understand that. Can you help me figure this thing out? I'm nosy, I'm curious. I'm always trying to learn. And I go to experts who may know something more than me. And that asking if you. Somebody told me earlier today, a friend of mine who I really respect. If you. Phil Griffin's his name. If you ask for money from somebody successful, they'll give you advice. But if you ask for advice, they may give you money. Right? And that is really true. Right. That's another podcast for another day. But that actually is a crib note. That's like a cheat sheet. That's really true. People, you want to turn me off, come to me and ask me for money. Like just complete turn off. I mean, it's simplistic also. And also. And it just. Anyway. And yeah, just don't do it. Have genuine relationships and genuine interests. Number six, build a circle that checks. That checks you. Iron sharpens iron. Your brain needs a crew. Hello again. If you hang around nine broke people, you'll be the tenth. The opposite is also true. Number seven, detach your identity from your results. You are not your resume. You are your resilience. Number eight, play the long game. I can't say, I can't stress this enough. You make money during the day, you build wealth in your sleep. It's another Tony wrestler quote. Play the long game. Zoom out of your life. Zoom out. Stop obsessing on this thing in front of you. I walk through life constantly oblivious of most things because most things just don't matter. Zoom out. This failure you're obsessing on won't even register on your life's map. In five years, if you keep going again, making this, bringing this back home. What did my friend Tony say? If you don't quit, you can't fail. So if you're listening to this right now and you failed recently, good. That means you're in the game. The smartest thing you can do is to stay in the ring, keep swinging, and keep learning. Remember, the smartest people don't win because they're smart. They win because they're stubborn. They're stubborn about the vision and flexible in their approach. I want you to tell people about this podcast. Encourage them to subscribe. Get my book, which is now out. I'm now out in paperback. Financial Literacy for all. It's still a number one bestseller a year after its issuance, so thank you everybody for that. Financial Literacy for All. I have six books in total. Go to Operation Hope and tell them I sent you. They'll offer you a $1,000 coaching scholarship good for 12 months at an operation. Hope. Hope inside location, near you or online. This is a thousand dollars that will help you, like a private banker, wrap around you, wrap all the support around you, one on one coaching and counseling. Get your credit score up, your debt down, your savings up. So a bank can tell you, yes, bank, credit union, a credit provider of prime credit gets you in this game, in this opportunity economy. And I really run out of time here and I really should shut up because I've talked way, way too much. But I also want to leave you with some practical hope. So let's say you've been laid off from a job or you're one of the people that's been fired from the federal government or whatever, and you're trying to figure out how you're going to replace that income and how do you reset your life at 30 or 40 or 50 years of age? I'm going to give you a couple real practical examples you may not be thinking of. Did you know, and I'm gonna do a social media post just on this. Did you know that there's a massive need in the, in the age of artificial intelligence, there's a massive need for, by 2030 of almost a million plumbers and electricians. And you're like, John, did you save all that your breath to tell me that? Hold on, watch, check this out. There's a 6% projected annual growth rate for plumbers. There's a need of about 40,000 plumbers a year because people are aging, they're leaving the job. You know, there's not enough immigrants and young people coming up to take the positions, which is why we need diversity and immigration. That's a whole other conversation. Electricians, not a very similar story. 11% annual growth rate, 80,000 job openings every year. Same sort of situation. And you're like, I'm not interested in being a plumber or an electrician. Really, check this out. Because you, you can't AI your plumbing can't AI electric, your, your electrical grid. These are things that we're going to need forever and these needs are going to expand. And so check this out. Entry level plumber, about $52,000 a year. Hello. You can get, you can get a trade certificate for this. You don't need to go to a four year university or college and make $25 an hour. A journeyman plumber, 64,000, 65,000 a year. A master plumber, median income, hold on. $110,000 a year overall median income for a plumber, you know, $61,000. I mean, that's solid. Middle class electrician, entry level $58,000 a year, about 28 bucks an hour. Intermediate plumber electrician, two to four years of experience $68,000 69 almost $69,000 a year. A senior electrician, 46 years of experience. It's like going to college, right? But this is practical experience. You're making money while you're learning. $74,000 a year. This is like ball and middle class. Oh, and you're your own person. You set your own schedule. In many cases, you have your own business. The overall median for electrician $61,000 a year. Now, it could be more than that, less than that. But the point is, there are options everywhere. Just again, as my brother Tony said, never ever, ever give up. If you don't quit, you can't fail. John O'Brien this is money and Wealth. I'm Foreign wealth with John O'Brien is a production of the Black Effect Podcast Network. For more podcasts from the Black Effect Podcast network, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
