Podcast Summary: Slay The Gatekeeper

Episode: Bill Perkins Reveals the Success Pattern He Sees in Every Billionaire

Host: Courtney Johnson
Guest: Bill Perkins
Date: November 25, 2025

Episode Overview

In this episode, Courtney Johnson welcomes Bill Perkins—entrepreneur, investor, and author of "Die with Zero"—to dig deep into the “cheat codes” and mindsets he’s seen in the world’s most successful people, especially billionaires. Together, they explore the often gate-kept patterns of agency, courage, risk tolerance, intentional living, and how to create true fulfillment beyond wealth accumulation. The conversation covers everything from practical career strategies and risk management to life regrets, relationship “cheat codes,” and why you retire on memories—not money.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Success Pattern Shared by Billionaires: Agency and Rapid Execution

• Agency and Action: Bill identifies that elite performers and billionaires possess a deep sense of agency—they have an internal belief they can act, and they move quickly on their ideas, regardless of uncertainty.
  • "That sense of agency to enroll people in their vision and execute on their... enroll themselves on executing on their own vision is one of the things that I see constantly.” [01:46, Bill]
• Speed Over Perfection: Speed in execution, rather than waiting for perfect conditions, sets successful people apart.
  • “They're already moving at a pace faster than 90 something percent of other people because they lack that fear of failure.” [02:24, Bill]
  • reference to the Michael Jackson “ideas are ether” story—creativity must be acted on before it moves on to someone else. [03:08–03:49]

2. Courage as the Great Divider

• The “Toe Dipper” Dilemma: Many people hesitate, “dip their toe,” and never go all-in due to fear of failure and judgment.
  • “The reason why you don't give 100% of your effort is because you're afraid of failing... you're being a pussy, and you know it.” [05:09–05:36, Bill]
• Brutal Honesty & Future-Self Framing: Bill admits to his own moments of fear and shares his internal process for overcoming resistance—asking whether his future self will be proud if he avoids risk.
  • “It's either done or not done, attempted or not attempted.” [06:38, Bill]
• Practical “Cheat Code”: Visualize yourself at the end of life and weigh regrets—will you regret trying and failing, or not trying at all? [07:38–08:39]

3. The Myth of Catastrophic Failure

• Risk vs. Ego Risk: Most people confuse “real” risk (catastrophic, life-threatening) with ego risk (fear of looking foolish or unworthy).
  • “If it's not catastrophic, you can always come back, right? Like, if you're not going to die, you still have your health, you have your wits about you, you can come back.” [11:12, Bill]
  • “Mainly because of the ego risk, not because of the financial risk... that form of cowardice is the biggest one. And the Most paralyzing.” [12:58–14:04, Bill]

4. Human Desire, Death, and the Motivation to Live Fully

• Fear of Wasting Life > Fear of Failing:
  • “I think it's a combination of a fear of wasting my life and also want to have the most fulfilling life possible.” [16:18, Bill]
• Intentional Living Over Autopilot: The mature drive is less about achieving what’s “advertised” and more about what’s genuinely meaningful.
  • “I realized that the most fun I've had was correlated with the quality of my relationships and... doing something versus the amount of wealth that I had.” [19:46, Bill]

5. Relationship 'Cheat Codes'

• Integrity and Vulnerability:
  • “My biggest relationship cheat code is integrity and vulnerability. Those two together.” [21:03, Bill]
• Depth Over Breadth:
  • “...having too many people knowing... starts to degrade the quality of your closer relationships.” [21:03, Bill]

6. Risk Tolerance and Ego

• High Risk = Low Ego:
  • “The more you step out there, the bigger your goal... the more you will be judged as a lunatic... the mission matters more than their ego.” [24:00–25:06, Bill]

7. Don't Care About Others' Opinions—Mission First

• Disconnect from Public Judgment:
  • “Fuck the haters. Fuck everybody else. Even fuck your current self.” [26:30, Bill]
  • “Mission first. Mission first.” [27:18, Bill]
• Radical Accountability: Accepting feedback and being accountable changes your trajectory.
  • “It's just radical, radical, radical accountability for your life, for your actions, how you feel, how you react to things, et cetera.” [33:08, Bill]

8. Personal & Career Growth—Always Be on Interview

• Be Indispensable to Start:
  • “Make myself indispensable in a field at a low... whatever position I could in a field I wanted to be in, to start accumulating capital.” [08:49, Bill]
  • “You're kind of always on interview. Always.” [09:48, Bill]

9. Investing in Personal Development

• Paying for “the Room”:
  • “You have to spend a lot of money to get in the right rooms to get coaching. Personal development, self development, business development. And not everybody understands that... that's a requirement.” [29:41, Courtney]
• Find Free Wisdom:
  • “Now every person who's been successful, they'll go on podcasts... and they just spill the beans. Yeah, right. They will spill the beans.” [30:13, Bill]
• On Coaching:
  • “It will be expensive in terms of the amount of pain you will have to go through in order to change. I mean, rapid change is painful.” [31:33, Bill]

10. Spend When Memory Value is Highest, Not Just When Net Worth Peaks

• Timing Life’s Experiences:
  • “Each period of your life has certain activities... that belong in that period of your life. They don't transfer well to the next period.” [33:58, Bill]
• Building “Memory Dividends”:
  • “Those memories, they pay dividends for years and years and years... you will be the summation of all those experiences and all those memories.” [44:24, Bill]

11. Regret Minimization and Self-Awareness

• Desires vs. Societal Programming:
  • “Take inventory of what we actually desire versus what society is giving us to desire.” [37:20, Courtney]
  • “It takes a lot of introspection and... quiet time alone. I think you keep coming back to it and then you keep pulling on those strings.” [37:31, Bill]

12. Global Perspective and Challenge

• Cultural Shocks and Growth: Japan as a worldview-challenging destination.
  • “Japan... is culture is completely different than any place you go... It's Japanese and they're very much...” [39:35, Bill]

13. Money is not the Meaning

• You Don’t Retire on Wealth, You Retire on Memories:
  • “Money is a tool to build a life, your life isn't a tool to build money. And so the fear... is to wasting my life.” [42:25, Bill]
  • “You don't retire on money, you retire on memories.” [43:02, Bill]

14. Intentional Living

• Bill’s Core Message:
  • “My message is all about intentional living.” [00:00, Bill]
  • “...your time is all you have... your wealth, your health, and your time are tools for you to build your own fulfillment, and you should take that seriously.” [45:46, Bill]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Courage & Ownership:
  • “You lack courage. You're really being a pussy, and you know it.” [05:36, Bill]
• Risk Perspective:
  • “If it's not catastrophic, you can always come back, right?... you have your health, you have your wits about you, you can come back.” [11:12, Bill]
• On Growth and Agency:
  • “Nobody's coming to save you. You have to do it and you have to decide what success means to you... Fuck the haters. Fuck everybody else. Even fuck your current self.” [26:30–27:10, Bill]
• Haters and Failure:
  • “People like a success story, but they love a failure. And the reason why is because it validates their own cowardice.” [14:11, Bill]
• Accountability:
  • “It's radical accountability. At a religious level. Yeah, Literally, it's like a level sometimes, even now, I can't accept it.” [33:08, Bill]
• On Life Regret:
  • “If you're going to fear anything, it should be wasting your life.” [42:25, Bill]
• Memory over Money:
  • “You don't retire on money, you retire on memories.” [43:02, Bill]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Agency & Action: [01:46]
• Speed & Execution: [02:24]
• Courage & Self-Honesty: [05:09]
• Future-Self Visualization: [06:38–08:39]
• Risk & Ego Risk: [11:12–14:04]
• Regret Minimization Mindset: [16:18, 37:31]
• Relationship Cheat Codes: [21:03]
• Mission First, Ignore Haters: [26:30–28:12]
• Coaching & Personal Growth: [29:41–33:08]
• Spend for Memory Value: [33:58, 44:24]
• If Not Now…: [34:48, 36:03]
• Japan as a Mind-Opener: [39:35]
• Memories > Money: [42:25–44:24]

Final Thoughts & Bill’s Vision

• Bill’s Dream:
  • “I would like [people] to have the most fulfilling life possible for them in their circumstances... get off autopilot, think about what they really want in each stage of their life, and actually do it.” [46:46, Bill]
  • “You will have such a... more adventurous, fulfilling life if you go out intentionally and try and make it happen, whether you fail or not.” [47:44, Bill]

Resources

• Bill Perkins Book: Die with Zero
• Connect with Bill: Twitter: @BP22 | Instagram: Bill Perkins

For more personal development “cheat codes,” see the full episode of Slay The Gatekeeper with Courtney Johnson and explore Bill Perkins’ work for practical frameworks for intentional, regret-minimized living.