← Tom Bilyeu's Impact Theory
Loading summary
Transcript170 lines
- [00:01]
Glenn Stearns
This summer, don't squeeze in. Spread out. Find homes big enough for your whole
- [00:06]
Tom Bilyeu
guest list on vrbo.
- [00:08]
Glenn Stearns
That's vacation rentals done right.
- [00:11]
Tom Bilyeu
Book your stay now.
- [00:15]
Glenn Stearns
When you manage procurement for multiple facilities, every order matters. But when it's for a hospital system,
- [00:21]
Tom Bilyeu
they matter even more.
- [00:22]
Glenn Stearns
Grainger gets it and knows there's no time for managing multiple suppliers and no room for shipping delays. That's why Grainger offers millions of products in fast, dependable delivery. So you can keep your facility stocked, safe, and running smoothly. Call 1-800-GRAINGER Click grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done.
- [00:45]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
You don't want to just not save any money. You got to be strategic with it. There are three reasons why you should be saving money. You save money for an emergency. Save money for a big purchase. You want to buy a car. You want to buy a house. You need some cash to do that. Save money for an investment. If you're not saving money for one of these three reasons, you are saving your money the wrong way. And your savings are literally making you poorer. Each and every day, while your friends
- [01:07]
Tom Bilyeu
were spending their money at a party, you're spending money on building a business.
- [01:11]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
Right.
- [01:12]
Tom Bilyeu
Like that fundamental difference of spending it on fun shit that goes away, or equity, in this case, your own company is a world of difference. So I just want to anchor everybody back around to those money habits. You've got what my mom would have called pissing money away. Right. Literally an alcohol. You're just pissing that money away or putting it into something that's going to go to work for you. In your case, it was a business, it was real estate.
- [01:37]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
Yeah.
- [01:38]
Tom Bilyeu
If people can just grab that fundamental difference, like, of, hey, start thinking about the world in this different way, they're going to be a huge step forward.
- [01:47]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
And it's all a learning process because I don't drink, I don't smoke, I never drink. But for me, it was the only. It was. It was a hustle, right. It was the only way that I knew to kind of start making some money. And so it's how you start and you learn. And each one of the things that you kind of do, you're going to learn something new and you're going to be able to apply that to the next thing. And it really is that shift. You know, I call it the minority mindset. Thinking differently than the majority of people because it's doing something different. Most of us are taught just to be consumers.
- [02:16]
Tom Bilyeu
We're taught time for money, go Buy cool things to flex.
- [02:19]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
Exactly. And that's it. We're never taught to do anything else. And I mean, think about the last time your teachers taught you about the importance of investing your money.
- [02:26]
Tom Bilyeu
They don't know how to do it either. They couldn't hope to teach me.
- [02:29]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
And so that's where you have to be willing to go out of your way to learn how some of these things work, because if you don't, you're just going to be a pawn in the system. And it's very unfortunate. It sucks. And, you know, this is where I'm trying to help provide that education, because these are things I never grew up learning. These are things that I wish somebody would have told me. You know, I see it in so many people. I used to guest teach in Detroit public schools.
- [02:53]
Dave Asprey
Whoa.
- [02:53]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
And, you know, these are good kids from rough areas. A lot of times don't have two parents in the home. Sometimes don't even have a parent in the home. There were some kids he didn't have, or his mom is not around. He was raised by a gang just because there's no parents. And so they provided him shelter. And it. It's crazy because you get stuck into a system, a cycle, because you don't have any way of learning or seeing anything else. And, you know, like, one of the first times I was there, I asked the kids, how many of you guys have a job? Most of them raise their hand. Most of them have an income, and they're in high school. Right. They're going to school and they're working. And next question is, how many of you have a bank account? Nobody, not a single person had a bank account.
- [03:40]
Tom Bilyeu
Jesus, man.
- [03:41]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
So I was like, so how do you guys. What do you do with your money? They said, we get a check. We go to the liquor store, we cash the check. Now the liquor store owner is going to take, you know, 1 to 10% of that check.
- [03:50]
Tom Bilyeu
Oh, God.
- [03:51]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
And then what are you going to do? You're going to buy candy, you're going to buy a pop, you're going to buy a bunch of dumb stuff on your way out, and now you're left with only half of your check. And now what do you do? It's just, I like to call it net zero, thinking where if I have cash, I need to spend it. I have $500 in my bank account. I got to make that zero. If I have $1,000, I got to spend it. Because we think, oh, my God, if I had 10 grand, I would go on this nice Vacation. If I had 50 grand, I would buy this car. We think in terms of, it's that consumer mindset of if I have this money, I need to spend it. But this is where we have to break out of that and understand what can we do differently. And instead of just spending all of this money. And it's much more difficult now because of the, the higher cost of living, but it's so much more important now than ever where you got to create this margin. I call it like an equation where you know, your, your wealth is really you, you take your income minus your expenses, and that's equal to your investments plus your savings. So you take your income, whatever money you make, you subtract your expenses, your houses, your, your home, your clothes, your car, whatever your expenses are. And if you have some money left, either this money is going to be saved or it's going to be invested. Well, if you have some money left, you're already, you know, doing something that a lot of people are not doing. You're more than the majority of people right now. I just read a study yesterday. Seven out of ten Americans across the board are living paycheck to paycheck. 50% of Americans that are making $250,000 a year are living paycheck to paycheck. That's crazy. It's not how much money you make, it's what you do with the money you make that is so important. And so now if you, if you have a buffer, you're already better than the majority of people. Now the question is, what do you do with it? Well, we're taught save it. Save all of it. So your investments are zero and your savings, you're trying to grow that thinking that you're going to become wealthy, but you're never going to be able to out save inflation. Your savings are literally making you poorer each and every day. However, you don't want to just not save any money. You got to be strategic with it. What I like to say is there are three reasons why you should be saving money. You save money for an emergency, have somewhere between three to 12 months worth of expenses, depending on your risk tolerance. Save money for a big purchase, you want to buy a car, you want to buy a house, you need some cash to do that. Save money for an investment. If you're not saving money for one of these three reasons, you are saving your money the wrong way and it's making you poorer each and every day.
- [06:12]
Tom Bilyeu
Now, you didn't say save for retirement.
- [06:14]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
Invest for retirement. You know, you talk about retirement. We're about to face a big retirement crisis. Because traditionally retirement was what people like to call a three legged stool. You had your Social Security, you had your pension, and then you had your own investments or your savings. What a lot of people like to do. Well, pensions are something you only read in history books anymore. They're a thing of the past. So those don't exist anymore. Social Security is running into a very, very, very big dilemma. Because right now, if you are, you know, under the age of 45, the Social Security money that you're paying isn't going to go to fund your Social Security income. It's going to fund somebody else to retire. Because the Social Security program has much bigger expenses than income. And so it is on the path of being completely dried up, of just running out of money.
- [07:06]
Tom Bilyeu
Is this because the younger demographics are just a smaller cohort than the older or.
- [07:12]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
There's a lot of reasons for it. It's how the Social Security money is spent. It's how many people are requiring Social Security money, how long people are living for, how long these Social Security checks have to go out for a lot of bad calculations, bad investing. And so the Social Security fund is now drying up. And so now everyone says, well, I'm not worried about it because the government can just print more money and do bigger Social Security checks. That's what we're seeing this year. We saw between 2021 and now the biggest Social Security raise ever is between 5 and 6%, something in that range which one is already not keeping up with inflation. So yeah, you got a bigger Social Security check, but oh no, it's not buying you as much as you could have last year. But then the second issue is, just think about that for a second. If the government is going to print more money, which means the Fed is going to print money, give that to the government to give you bigger Social Security checks. What does that mean? You got a bigger check, great. But now the cost of things have grown even faster than the growth of your check. You cannot outprint inflation. It just creates more inflation. And so, you know, so you had the pension that's, that's essentially gone. For the vast majority of people, Social Security is not going to be able to fund your retirement, which leaves people with the third stool, which is your own investments now traditionally uses, oh, I'll save some money, save 10% of your income. That's not going to do it. Your savings are going to make you poor each and every day. And the second thing is your 401k and you know, it's a great start for the average investor because now it is like automatic putting a little bit of money into some investments. However, your 401k was never, ever, ever intended to be your sole investment plan. The founder of the 401k even came out and said that the 401k has gone awry. It is a monster because now so many people are hoping that they're going to be able to rely on their 401k to retire, and that's not what it's intended for and it will never be able to be enough for you. And so a lot of people have this false hope that, okay, yeah, whatever, Social Security will give me a little bit extra, but my 401k will take care of me. But that was never the plan. And so now what does that mean, your 401k? Just think of that like as if you invest in your 401k, your IRA, that is the absolute base. Your savings are not going to do it. This is where you have to go out and invest yourself. And that's where. Oh, my God, how do I do that? We're never taught how to do this. We're never told how to do this. We're never given direction on how to do this. So you have to be the one now to go out of your way to start learning this. And thank God for YouTube, because now we've decentralized education. But the question is, now you have to be willing to do it and you have to understand who your teachers are, because there's crap on YouTube. There's also good stuff on YouTube and we're never taught how to learn. We're usually just taught what to learn. So. So now we have to be willing and go out of our way to become smarter to one, start learning and understand how do we learn the right things and then apply it. Because the downfall with investing is it's risky. You gotta be willing to get punched in the face. You have to be willing to lose money because it's a part of the process and it sucks. It sucks losing money. I made a video on my YouTube channel, Minority Mindset, where I went over my worst real estate deal ever. And the reason why I made it is so you can see, look, every real estate investor has got at least one bad deal. And to date, that's the only deal that I've ever lost money on. And I'll walk you through every single bad thing that I mean, because everything that could have gone wrong went wrong, plus a whole lot more and it is one of the biggest headaches of my life. But my goal is, you know, yeah, you can laugh at me, make fun of me, but you're going to see, like, holy cow, things can and will go wrong. So just anticipate it, because that's your real life tuition. You gotta be willing to learn. And, you know, it's a price to pay. And it's one of those things where, you know, just like with entrepreneurship, everybody wants to be successful as an entrepreneur. Everybody wants to be rich. How many people are gonna be willing to get punched in the throat and keep going, keep getting back up and keep doing it? It's very difficult. Which is why, you know what? Not everybody should be an entrepreneur. Try it. But it's not for everybody. But everybody can work to own this equity, right? This ownership, these assets that everybody needs to.
- [11:17]
Tom Bilyeu
How much did you pay for your first share of ford Motor Company?
- [11:22]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
$2.
- [11:24]
Tom Bilyeu
So this is what I want people to hear, and I'm glad it's coming from you. I was very honored to have Wall Street Trapper on as well, because I want people that are, I know, minority in the name of your program isn't about being a literal ethnic minority, but it's about thinking in a new way. But having people that are minorities, at least in, say, like, hey, if you do the right things, you're going to be able to change your circumstance. What do you say to people that either think, well, it's okay for other people, but for me, either because I'm poor or I'm a minority, it's never going to work for me.
- [12:01]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
So I'll kind of give you the story of my family in that sense, because the reason why people come to America is because of opportunity. You have the opportunity to own something, own a home, potentially own equity in companies, build your own company. You have the opportunity to build something which is something that you can't do in a lot of other places in the world. My grandparents were refugees. They had some land, and in 1947, the state of Punjab was severed. And when that happened, if you were Sikh, which is the religion that I am, and you're on the west side, either you migrate east or you're going to be killed. So now my grandparents, literally all they had were the clothes on their back and a sword in their hand, and they ran. During the process, my grandfather was attacked, and he had to literally fight for his life. He saw his uncle get his head chopped open in front of him, put him on a horse. That was the last time he Saw him, he got to the new east side of Punjab in India and didn't even have shoes on his feet. Didn't have a place to sleep, had literally nothing. Now, from there, you gotta start, right? You gotta start now, all over from scratch. And there's a lot of political issues, you know, unfortunately, over there. And so that's when my parents, my dad, you know, my mom were like, we wanna get out of this country. We wanna go somewhere. We have better opportunity to come to America. We don't speak the language, don't know the culture, don't know the people, don't know how life is. I mean, India is a very different world. It's a beautiful place, but it's very different than here. And you start over. Why?
- [13:43]
Tom Bilyeu
As a minority.
- [13:43]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
As a minority, just for the opportunity. Because that's all, you know, there's risk, but you see the opportunity there.
- [13:49]
Tom Bilyeu
And do you think, looking back now, do you think that. Because it. I often think that what we refer to as being an ethnic problem is actually just there is an element of what I call school of fish. Like you're just. You're gonna group up with people that look like you. It's just so embedded in the subconscious. But I think a bigger thing is just. It's either majority or minority. Right. Because globally, the Indian ethnicity is massive billions. Yeah. But when you come to the U.S. now, you're a minority. Do you think that the trade off of going from being the majority ethnicity, I mean, everybody in India basically is shifting. I know there's religious differences, but then coming here and being a minority, does the opportunity that America provide outweigh whatever detriment there is to being a minority?
- [14:41]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
You know, again, if you're willing to work, you have to be willing to work and kind of just break out of whatever. Anytime you see a majority, kind of just group think, you have to be willing to question that. But, you know, the opportunity you have here in America, is it more difficult now than before? Absolutely. Is it more difficult for some people than others? Absolutely. However, it's the best opportunity you have in the world. And, you know, that's why literally even till today, you have people that are willing to risk their lives to come to this country. And I mean, actually risk their lives. And so, you know, you have that aspect. And I can speak for me, where Sikhs, the religion that I am, they are a minority in India. And, you know, there's a lot of issues that come with being a minority anywhere. But again, where do you know, here you have more opportunity than anywhere else. And so the way I look at it, for me personally, so my parents came to this country with next to nothing. So I got nothing to lose and everything to gain, right? And so this is the place where that opportunity exists. But now you have to be willing to work hard, but you also have to be willing to work smart. I can't stand when people say, work smart, don't work hard. But to me, that's all completely.
- [15:44]
Tom Bilyeu
Because you have to do both.
- [15:45]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
You have to do both because if you're not willing to work hard, your smart working is effectively worthless. You have to be willing to apply both together. And I had none of this financial education, right? For me, it was, dad, I want to go invest in real estate. You're stupid. Go become a doctor. You know, I had to do all my entrepreneurial stuff in secret. The first, my parents didn't even know that I was doing this business stuff until I was on the news. I was running a different soc company. And this is now, you know, a couple years after, and we were doing well, and we got featured on the local news. Now, my parents got a call from a family friend and they said, oh, we saw your son on the news. And my parents were like, oh, God, what did he do now? And they're like, no, no, he has this company. He's doing really well. They're growing. My dad was like, what? And so then, you know, he sits me down. He's like, what the heck is going on? And that was the first time. They were like, okay, you can actually do something with this, right? And it was like, you have to. For me, it was like I understood what I wanted. I knew that. I saw this, like, really, I wanted to achieve success. And I knew I was doing it for good intentions. I knew I didn't have, like, bad intentions with what I wanted to do. But the question was, you know, how do I get there? Because it was like, if I know if I try to convince my parents, it is like, it's going to be extremely stressful for me. I'm going to stress them out. It's just not going to work. So I'm just going to try to figure it out myself. And if I fail, well, guess what, I'm in school. So I kind of had that backup. But for me, like, I. Like, I went to law school as well. The problem was I wasn't the best student in school. In law school, particularly, I did well on the bar exam. I loved learning. And so for me, like, you know, I knew I needed to pass the bar. And so I studied hard, and I actually did really well. But in the classes, I was not very good, except for the couple of the business ones, because I really enjoyed that. But for me, it was just like, I just need to get the degree. That way I can, like, be done with this. Because I went to law school because my parents found out that I wasn't going to be a doctor. They're like, you got to at least become an attorney to keep pride in the family.
- [17:42]
Dave Asprey
And.
- [17:43]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
And so I was like, all right, well, if I go to law school, I can go to law school part time, and if I go to law school part time, I can work on me and my business full time. So that was my mindset with it. And, you know, but I knew that, yeah, if I graduate law school and things don't work out, I don't even know how I'm going to work as an attorney, because I have no idea. I don't know how to file a lawsuit. I have no idea, like, what to do. So if I graduate, like, I'm going to have to, like, start all over and figure it out after I'm done. And it used to give me a lot of anxiety, but I was like, you know, this is why I have to figure it out. It was a mission because, one, I wanted to do to give back to my family and myself. And second, I wanted to do it because I wanted to prove a lot of people wrong. And I remember when I used to talk about this, everyone's like, oh, you shouldn't do it out of spite. Don't do things because you want to prove someone wrong. I was like, you don't understand. You don't get some of the, you know, the. The things that you hear, the things that you see. And sure, you know, maybe it can't drive you forever, but it can take you. I mean, that pain of seeing the things that people say. Because, you know, in between, I started a sock company. And when I was doing the sock business, this is when, you know, people started to be aware that I was an entrepreneur. And I wasn't, like, super successful. I was doing okay. And that's when I got on the news. But, you know, just think about this. I was supposed to be a doctor. Now here I am selling socks on the Internet, and everybody is like, oh, so you left. You know, this idea of becoming a doctor. Now you're just selling socks. And, you know, hearing that for years is like, one day I'm going to have your kid want to work for me. That was like in the back. I never said that, but I was like in the back of my mind, your kid's going to want to work for me one day. And it's like that driving force where I knew I'm going to prove this person wrong. I'm going to make this person, like, really, like, see that, hey, I am worthy, I can do something. But it takes a lot of work. You know, going back to that. But it's, it's, it's be with anything. Being willing to try, being willing to take risks, being willing to make mistakes and being willing to learn from it. Because, you know, like I said, you know, for me, I was willing to be dumb or stupid. I never saw that risk until more recently because for me, it was just like, I know this is what I want. And so the risk really was never even on my horizon. If I had a business idea, I would start it like that same night. Because for me, it was like, I just got to, I want to do this. I want to figure it out. Books weren't were kind of giving me an idea. My teachers weren't teaching me this. I don't know who to turn to. My experience was my teacher. That's how I learned how to be an entrepreneur, how I learned to start investing. That's when I started learning about money. Because, you know the whole issue with the money stuff, I mean, this is something that we're never ever even remotely talking, taught about. And it's now becoming a real pressing issue.
- [20:27]
Glenn Stearns
When you manage procurement for multiple facilities, every order matters. But when it's for a hospital system,
- [20:33]
Tom Bilyeu
they matter even more.
- [20:34]
Glenn Stearns
Grainger gets it and knows there's no time for managing multiple suppliers and no room for shipping delays. That's why Grainger offers millions of products in fast, dependable delivery so you can keep your facility stocked, safe and running smoothly. Call 1-800-GRAINGER Click grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done.
- [20:57]
Dave Asprey
If you work in university maintenance, Grainger considers you an MVP because your playbook
- [21:02]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
ensures your arena is always ready for tip off. And Grainger is your trusted partner, offering
- [21:08]
Dave Asprey
the products you need all in one
- [21:10]
Tom Bilyeu
place, from H vac and plumbing supplies
- [21:12]
Dave Asprey
to lighting and more. And all delivered with plenty of time left on the clock. So your team always gets the win. Call 1-800-GRAINGER visit grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done.
- [21:27]
Tom Bilyeu
You have to be willing to try. Learn risk, failure. You are going to fail. I always try to get people to understand that failure is the most information rich data stream that exists. It sucks, it hurts, it can be costly. But one, in triggering the parts of the brain that have to do with pain, you trigger the parts of the brain that have to do with memory and focus. So you're more likely to really look at that thing that you don't want to happen again. To figure out why that happened, Memorize it, and then you're gonna get better the next time. And to your point about having a chip on your shoulder and people telling you that you can't do something and thinking, one day your kid's gonna ask to work for me, it probably is a primary driver over an extended period of time. Like you said, it'd be a little caustic to the soul, but it's so powerful in terms of. So you've got light energy and dark energy.
- [22:14]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
Right.
- [22:14]
Tom Bilyeu
Just to be all star wars about it. And if what I have found in my own life is that the hardest times, the light energy will only get me so far, and then I'll hit a brick wall and I'll want to stop. And it's only when I tap into the dark energy of like, I will not let this person be right about me. I am not going to back down because I know they're just waiting for me to fail, that it actually does give me another boost. Now I try to split it, call it 80, 20, where I'm spending 80 of my time in the light. The beautiful things I want to do, the people I want to help. Yeah, but dude, let me tell you, 20% of the time I'm thinking of that. The person that really wants to tap down to my grade.
- [22:53]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
It gets you going, right?
- [22:54]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, 100%.
- [22:55]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
And, you know, I found the same way because for me, in the beginning, it was just figuring it out. I went from business idea to business idea to business idea, because for me, I was just trying to figure it out, hop it from one idea to the next. But then, you know, you talk about the light energy. For me, it was my really driving, my passion and my mission and my purpose. And that became more of the light energy. Because now, you know, after a certain point, you're like, the money doesn't drive you. It just is what it is. Right. It's just like, I'm fine. Like, I. I'm not a very materialistic person. I don't really care, you know, about brand names, designer names. First time I made a million dollars, I was driving a $500 car. Right. It just doesn't Matter, like, sure, it provide some sort of benefit, more comfort, more value, but after a certain point that money is not a driver. It's now what is my purpose. And for me, you know, that minority mindset where rich and started making videos. I wasn't doing it to make money. I did this as a hobby because I got scammed in that sock company and just talking about things that, you know, I wish somebody would have told me when I was younger, like, having to do with business, having to do with money. So I did it as a hobby. And people will say, you can't just do that as a hobby. I'm like, dude, you don't understand. I didn't invest any money into it. I was making videos off my phone. I bought like a 30 or maybe $35 tripod off of Amazon, and I was just making videos for fun. And, like, my friend asked me, and I think I was around 10,000 subscribers. And he asked me, he's like, how much money are you making off of YouTube? What do you mean? How much money are you making from your ad revenue off of YouTube? I don't know. What do you mean? He goes into my YouTube backend with me. And this is before YouTube had requirements of, like, you gotta have X number of videos, X number of subscribers. Anybody could monetize any video. He's like, dude, you haven't even turned monetization on. Click one, click. And now you can start making money off your videos. I was like, oh, I didn't know that. I really enjoyed it. For me, this was, like, really fun and something that I loved doing, which is why I did it. And then minority minds started to grow, try to make some money. And I was like, oh, I can actually, like, do this. Like, I can work on just spreading this. This purpose.
- [25:01]
Tom Bilyeu
What is it about what you guys publish that people respond to?
- [25:03]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
It's one email, right? It's a newsletter. And you know, it's coming, what time is coming, you know where it's going to be every day. And so people want to open it. We don't need to have a. The world is ending, you know where it is. And then we just break down what's happening.
- [25:16]
Tom Bilyeu
This is where I really fell in love with the book, is the concept of necessity. Because this is something I talk to people about and specifically in the context of obsession versus passion.
- [25:28]
Brendon Burchard
Yeah.
- [25:29]
Tom Bilyeu
And you really went into it, not because you're probably gonna get some flack and pushback on that one, but what you said, I was like, that is the absolute truth.
- [25:37]
Brendon Burchard
Yeah.
- [25:38]
Tom Bilyeu
So Explain people. What's the difference between the two? What is the role of obsession?
- [25:42]
Brendon Burchard
Well, we found it so in high performance habits. What we did, like you mentioned, we did the world's largest study of high performers data from over 190 countries from what essentially turns out to be people who are in that top 15% of whatever they do. And we found that there was basically the personal habits and social habits. And the personal habits was seek clarity, generate energy. And that third one was raise necessity, which was something I didn't even know really was a thing psychologically as important as it turned out to be. And necessity is kind of short for performance necessity or what we call psychological necessity, which means there is a moment in which you are serving people or you're trying to achieve your goal or your dream, in which now it is not a preference, it's a must, right? But to use better languaging, it becomes necessary for us to excel in this. Like it's not a hope anymore. It's not. It should do it. It becomes so necessary that it connects with our identity that we feel. It is necessary for me to deliver with excellence here because that is who I am. It's necessary for me to deliver with excellence here because somebody needs me to do well. It's necessary for me to do well here because this topic, this thing I'm doing, I'm passionate about this, I care about this, I want to master this. I'm obsessed with this. And it's necessary for me to do well because the time, it's a deadline or it's go time. And when all those come together, so that personal side of this is my identity and I'm obsessed about it. And that other side, where it's like somebody needs me and there is a real deadline right in the middle, that's performance necessity. And when we hit that, game changer, game changer. But it is uncomfortable because people don't want to exude that much passion in which it becomes obsession because they're fearful of their obsessions. Well, if I'm obsessed about this topic, it's going to take away from my family, from my time, it's going to introduce a lot of fear or unknown to me, so they back off. But I tell people all the time there is a difference between passion and obsession. And high performers have obsession about the topic. They are obsessed about the topic in which they're trying to learn, master, grow into. And so that obsession is real. And I tell people the difference. Here's how you know the difference between the two when you're passionate, everybody cheers you on. They're stoked for you. Oh, you found your passion. Awesome. Follow your passion. Live with passion. Be passionate. Chase your passions.
- [28:20]
Dave Asprey
Everything.
- [28:20]
Brendon Burchard
Like passion, passion, passion, passion. Passion's good. Like, the world's gonna be like, yay, passion. Right? When you're obsessed, they're like, why you gotta be so crazy? Why can't you be satisfied? Why do you always gotta get things so perfect? Why you spend so much time here? When you're obsessed, people think you're nuts. So it's different. And it's like I always tell people, if no one thinks you're crazy, you're not yet operating to the outer limits of your potential. You're not there yet because somebody in your life should say, man, you really care about this in, like, a crazy way. And when you get there, you know, you found your thing. And not everybody finds that. I think that's also why it's scary. Some people go, well, I'm passionate or I'm happy, but I don't really obsess about anything. You know, most people obsess about, you know, their shows on Netflix more than their life. I know people who obsess more about their, you know, thread count in their sheets at their house than they do about the impact they're making in the world.
- [29:17]
Tom Bilyeu
Why do you think people can slip into an obsession over Netflix or whatever or thread count, but they don't do that for something that could really change their life?
- [29:26]
Brendon Burchard
Feedback.
- [29:28]
Tom Bilyeu
That's interesting. Not what I expected you to say. What do you mean by that?
- [29:31]
Brendon Burchard
Because, you know, buying something or getting pulled into Netflix, being obsessed about something that gives you no feedback is not scary. A real obsession, like trying to make an impact in the world, you're getting feedback. You try to make a difference in somebody's life, they're going to tell you, that doesn't resonate with me. Brendon, you try to make a difference in a nonprofit. You try to change the world. You try to start something like this and the views come or they don't come. There's feedback and people are terrified. It's one of the four central fears we all have, is rejection. We're terrified, like, to be rejected and think about if you really want to make an impact, you're going to get a lot of judgment, you're going to get a lot of hate, and ultimately you're going to get rejection. People are going to, like, just diss on you. People are going to say, that's not good enough. People are going to Say, who do you think you are? And people are so worried about that that they stop. And so it's easier. Things that don't give you feedback. Watching Netflix don't give you no feedback. It's easy. There's no disappointment there. Even if you don't like the show,
- [30:33]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
what do you do?
- [30:34]
Brendon Burchard
You just go on to the next show. There's no disappointment there. I think trying to make an impact, there's a lot of disappointment and fear and potential for rejection. So people don't get obsessed about making a difference and making an impact because it can hurt.
- [30:49]
Tom Bilyeu
Go deep on identity. So you've talked about how one of the scariest things about an obsession is the way that you tie it to your identity. High performers do that. They put themselves at risk. They say, like your own story, I am a writer. And the day that you decided you were gonna own that, you said that that comes with a risk. 1 Explain to people what that risk is and then how did you overcome it? And how can other people do that?
- [31:11]
Brendon Burchard
Yeah, well, imagine like last night, I'm going on the stage, right? If my identity says, I am a public speaker and it is important for me to be excellent at this, and then I go on stage and I bomb, what does that say about me as a person? So we've got about 50 years of work in psychology, the field of psychology, saying, do not tie your efforts to your identity, because that risk of disappointment or rejection, you know, if the task fails, you shouldn't take that as a defining moment in which you say, I am a failure.
- [31:48]
Glenn Stearns
Right?
- [31:48]
Brendon Burchard
So that's the risk. And that's what psychologists tell us to be wary of. Except it turns out that high performers flip that on its face and go, well, actually, no, I do get bothered if it fails. I really get upset about it. I am attached to, to the process here. I do care if it turns out well. I mean, that's why they obsess about the details. That's why they care about excellence. No one obsesses about the details or cares about excellence unless it means something to them. And there is a risk. The risk is you over attach to the process or the outcome with your identity so that if the process or outcome goes bad, now you feel bad about yourself as a human and now you stop your progress. But I also tell people there's a balance there. I actually wish more people would attach some identity to what they're doing. They wouldn't go through the motions as much. I mean, I think what the world needs less of is half Interested parents who don't have an identity that says, you know what? I'm going to be an excellent parent. I think we have a lot of CEOs or business people or entrepreneurs who they've never stepped in and said, you know what? I'm a CEO. I own this business. I am responsible for paying the bills. I am responsible for making the money. I'm responsible for all these people's mortgages who work for me. I want them to own the identity of a CEO. Because most of them, if you ask them about their identity and their business, they're kind of like, you come to find they're kind of approaching it like, not even hobbyists. And it's like, if you want to win, your identity has to be tied into that thing in which you are trying to succeed at and give to. And that takes a lot of guts to put yourself all in for something. But who's ever contributed something with tremendous impact without being all into it? I've never seen it. So I think the message of the book, you're right, I'll get some flack and see if it's. A lot of psychologists say, don't tell people to tie more of their identity. Or my friends who are Buddhists will say, but attachment is the form of all suffering. Brendan, have you not read your spiritual texts? I'm like, look out. Calm down. I've hung out with the Dalai Lama. I'm totally cool. But what I'm trying to tell you is even the Dalai Lama has a connection with himself as a spiritual leader. His identity is still there. That people, you know, assume that, you know, we have to release ourselves from having any attachment to something. But I'm like, I think we all want to be present and engaged fully in the things that we are doing in our lives. And that's going to require us to say, psychologically, you know what? I. I am all in this. That's what I'm about.
- [34:39]
Tom Bilyeu
What I loved in the book is you were open on the journey of writing. It took you about three years, if I'm not mistaken. So doing all the research, you've collected the however many millions of people that are in your ecosystem, and then you start systematically actually researching the data. And you can feel that in the book that you were open to being surprised. You were open to changing your thinking. You talk about going through and trying to find disconfirming evidence and not just wanting to be in a vacuum. And some of the surprises in the book were really, really great. And in that whole concept of obsession I loved it because it felt so real. You tell your followers one, you have to take ownership, right? So you gave a great example about you're in a relationship with somebody. Whatever energy you guys are creating, you're creating that. Like, don't think that it's just objectively them. Like, you guys are doing it together. And I love that, love that in the talk about how obsession can be useful, because so I'm like, that's really important to me. And I want people to understand, if you want to achieve at the highest level, you. You're gonna have to tap into obsession, period. And you put a quote in the book that I think sums it up perfectly, which goes like this. And by the way, the quotes people choose for books reveal so much. And I just kept taking one after another after another out of your book. This is from Einstein. Only one who devotes himself to a cause with his whole strength and soul can be a true master. For this reason, mastery demands all of a person. Yeah, I love that.
- [36:10]
Brendon Burchard
All in. You have to be all in. And it's the hardest thing to do because if it fails, then you can feel like a failure. You know, I think of this idea of performance necessity. Two stories kind of come to mind. One is I was working with an Olympic gold medalist sprinter, and we're in the tunnel and we're going out, and he's talking about the competition, and we get out to the blocks. And I said, he was really worried about the competition. I said, well, how do you even gauge, like, who's gonna win? You know, in his particular race, people are winning, but by 1,100ths of a second, tenths of a second. I mean, these are really close sprints. And I said, well, how do you know? I said, who would you even bet on? And he says, you know, I would bet on the guy who gets down at the blocks, gets himself settled, looks at the finish line, then says, I gotta do this for my mom. And I was like, ooh, that's good. His performance necessity in that is it's necessary for him to win that race for his mom. I think of, you know, when I started my career, and I really decided to go all in with writing and online training. This is like 2,000, probably six. I'd gone broke, completely bankrupt, and failed. I left my corporate job. I had this cushy kind of corporate job as a consultant. Good job. Left it to write. And I didn't know how to make it as a writer. I wanted to do seminars, workshops. Didn't know how to do that. So I was pretty much a hot mess. Ran out of money. I got nothing to my name. Nothing. Kind of. No positive prospects. No one's calling me except the guys who want the money. And one night I'm writing, and the apartment's so small. On the bed, I had all my bills, my vision boards, all my research, all my journals. Like, the bed was basically the desk, the extended desk. And my lady comes in, Denise. And she walks past me, but she sees I'm, like, trying to write so she doesn't want to disturb me. She goes. She crawls under the covers of the bed. And I'm just typing, kind of casually typing away. And I look over and I see my woman sleeping under my bills. And it was just like, you know, because none of us want to see our, you know, our families suffer because we are not performing. And I was just like, I gotta figure this out. And I'm telling you, I wrote more that night than any night in my entire life. Next day, I wrote more than ever. That Bird Life golden ticket, which gave a bestseller. And 18 months later, because I was like, I'm gonna figure out this online thing. I'm gonna figure out marketing. I'm gonna figure out how to teach. I'm going to figure out how to train and get paid for it. Because I'd never really been paid for those things. I said, I'm going to figure out this industry, and I'm going to make it. Eighteen months later, after her crawling under the bills, I made $4.6 million online. Total transformation. People like, how did you do it? I'm like, she gave me. She was my necessity. I was not going to let my woman be in that situation.
- [39:39]
Dave Asprey
I'm.
- [39:40]
Brendon Burchard
And she believed in me, she supported me, she married me, but she was my drive. And the second part was I went all in with my identity. I said, I am going to be a great writer, and I am going to be one of the greatest online trainers there ever was. As you said in the intro, we've graduated. Over 2 million people have taken our online courses, video series. Now, I don't think it would have happened if I hadn't had the guts and maybe no other choice to say, this is who I'm going to be, and I'm going to build into that, and it is necessary for me to become that person. So let's go.
- [40:22]
Dave Asprey
And this is what I figured out through my journey, that I was always great at providing a void, and I'd fill it. But the void that I created usually was promises that I Made. And I worked really hard to do it instead of work really hard up front to provide value, create that void. And then what I got really good at was getting rid of the ego guilt. And I learned to ask big, right? I learned to ask, like, attract someone like Tom in my life so that I could sit and reach millions of people with him and inspire them to help other people and learn that when you give, the universe doesn't know size. So it knows, I believe, that it's just as good for somebody to put a cart back at the grocery store or pick up trash and throw it away, or provide a healthy food to somebody that it is to give a million dollars. The universe is not. These are human things. This is a lower. And so you might as well do as many good deeds as you can, open as many doors, smile as many people, hug as many people as you can. And then when you create your void of giving and service, ask big. In this human vibration, this pragmatic world, ask big. Ask for it all, because it will come to you. And that's, I think, something I did subconsciously when I was 25, right out of law school. And it's something I do consciously, subconsciously and unconsciously now. I asked to empower 75,000 people. I want to change the world to make people happy.
- [41:44]
Tom Bilyeu
And who are you asking that of the universe?
- [41:47]
Dave Asprey
So whatever you believe in, whatever you believe in, I don't care if it's God, Jesus, Muhammad, Joseph Smith, the 12th man, if you're Seahawks fan, I don't care. But ask, ask the universe. Ask who you think put it out there. You know, there's three ways you got what you think, say and do. That's one way to put it out there. Subconsciously. There are no pathways in your mind. 40,000 of the same thoughts put it out there. And then finally your energy, your DNA, your fingerprint on life, that's what truly puts it out there. And that system of conscious to subconscious to unconscious is what allows you to truly attract rapidly and accurately what you want.
- [42:25]
Tom Bilyeu
So interesting, because I'm guessing if we flashback, let's call it 20 years, and I ask the same question, I get an equally valid answer. Because it worked, right?
- [42:33]
Dave Asprey
Like both work hard, you would have got work hard, don't quit, you know, all of those things. And look, I was an honest person. I just had my values a little bit screwed up as they got bigger and bigger, but I was, you know, working really hard. I just felt like I was in control of everything. And now I've completely surrendered doesn't mean I don't work as hard.
- [42:55]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, I was gonna say, I watch your content, and there's definitely, like you said, I'm gonna ballpark it here. But, like, I don't go to bed, I pass out, and I work until my energy runs out. And I thought, yeah, I get that. And so it's so interesting to see. Yeah, not a conflict at all, actually. It's just. It's such an interesting way to come at it. So you've got the. On the one hand, it's the more traditional, hard driving. You know, I'm going to make this happen. If I'm creating a void, it's a void of what I'm looking for people to, you know, pour into. Hey, I've given you something. I'm expecting something back. And many and many and many a person have built insanely amazing careers doing that.
- [43:35]
Ken Honda
Right.
- [43:35]
Tom Bilyeu
So I know that it works. But then over here, now, you've done both, and it's like this totally different way, but yet you still really pour yourself into what you do.
- [43:44]
Dave Asprey
Providing value.
- [43:45]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, it's super interesting. So, like, I was watching one of your pieces of content. You went to this event and it was during spring break, and so there was only, you know, I don't know, a handful, 30 kids there or something. And you said, oh, these are the ones that'll make it. Why are they the ones that'll make it?
- [44:00]
Dave Asprey
You know, I believe in being more interested than interesting and that providing value,
- [44:04]
Tom Bilyeu
that define that for people. I know what you mean, but, like, really put a point on it.
- [44:09]
Dave Asprey
You know, for me, it's almost connected to the zero effect of life. And I think there's a consistency that makes people successful. And what happens is we lie to ourselves. And I'll use health because you're an expert at it, but I see this in nutrition and in exercise. People will tell me after one month, gosh, why did I get incremental results or no results at all? I said, because you zeroed yourself out. The kids that showed up during spring break to the event that I had that the ones that were there and they had a lot of other distractions, they're the ones that don't zero out. They're the ones that get the exponential power of the universe, meaning if I do something every day, day one, I get X to the first, day two to second, third, third, fourth, fifth. Most people, when it comes to nutrition, they're always day six, they zero themselves out, then they start over for a second, and during a month, they May zero themselves out three or four times at the end of the month. They didn't get the exponential results. If you stick to something every day, this idea of being more interested, really asking the extra questions, going the extra mile, which is completely empty, in my opinion. If you want no competition in your life, go the extra mile. 99.9% of the people are zeroing themselves out. They're doing 28 days a month, not 31.
- [45:29]
Tom Bilyeu
How do you help them with that? Because I'm a psycho for this. The level of clarity that you have to have.
- [45:33]
Dave Asprey
Yeah. You know, I start very pragmatically. I have certain things that I think can change someone's life. Number one, student of your calendar. It might sound silly, but I believe focus. There's a whole field of intention, and that the pragmatic way that we figure out what we're doing in a day. Because I look for productivity and excess accessibility. I study my calendar. On the way here, I was studying my things. Your awareness rises when you're looking at something and start thinking, all right, I'm gonna be with Tom. What? What should I ask Tom? This is all being more interested than. And it goes from there. And then another quick philosophy is, do it now. Whenever I'm doing anything, I have a simple question. Can I do it now? Because if I can do something now, number one, I save myself a minimum of half the time. It'll take me twice as much time to do something if I don't do it now. And two, exponentially, it becomes less successful. If you don't do something now, you can forget it. You have to go back. I mean, it just turns into a mess. So about 85 to 88% of the things that I'm approached with I can do now. Hey, you got a referral. Yeah, hold on. Sometimes it's a little weird and quirky during a meeting, but I do it anyway. Someone asked me, I literally make the introduction. I cut our conversation, and, hey, you need to know this guy.
- [46:49]
Glenn Stearns
You.
- [46:50]
Dave Asprey
And so these little tips of time, and then the other side. So I give time tips because I believe time's a construct. Everybody has 24 hours a day. It's how productive and accessible can you be in 24 hours? And then the other construct is ego. So the two ways I help them is I teach them gratitude, empathy, accountability, and effective communication to help them get out of their own way. Because that ego and time will be two things that will reduce all the resistance in their lives and allow them to attract what they want. And if you Understand ego and you understand time. You can have faith to be of service.
- [47:25]
Tom Bilyeu
So help me understand ego. How does it stop?
- [47:27]
Dave Asprey
Most people, ego is that voice, that little voice inside of you that I use. Cancel, clear, connect for that. It's all these needs. You know, guilt is a big one. Fear is a huge one, anxiety. So when I can teach young people to identify when they're thinking with their ego, when they're in their own way, there's only one thing that stands between you and what you want. And when I say what you want, let me be very clear. I believe that all people want is to be happy. And in order to make them happy, if they get what they want, health, you know, money, a Ferrari. No, it won't maintain the happiness if you get what you want. But the key is if you can rapidly get everything that you want, learn from it, keep what keeps you happy, dump what doesn't, and then keep moving on. You're going to live a happy existence, a fulfilled existence. So the ego is the only thing that stands between you and what you want. And when we can identify it, which is the first step, we can start working through, why do we feel this way? That's one of the biggest questions that I ask. I still get scared, you know, I still fight certain things. I don't know what percentage of the time anymore, but I just try to get better. I try to pursue my potential of living at the highest vibration of the truth without my ego, you know, still, I mean, every time I talk to my mom, I fight my ego because it's such an emotional relationship. I fight my ego of all different things that probably carried from the time I was in the womb. But energetically, the more I work through it and the better I feel, the more I'm able to manifest not only for myself, but for others.
- [49:06]
Tom Bilyeu
And so I've heard what you've said about your mom, that she has a third degree black belt Jewish guilt. So knowing that, what does it mean to work through it? Is it finding your center? Is it just having the compassion for her? Understanding that she only wants good things for you and this is just her best attempt. Because I know there are so many people watching this that they have the same relationship. So what do they do mechanistically, what do they do to work through it?
- [49:31]
Dave Asprey
So what I started doing is I realized that there's only two things my mom really wanted from me. One was to know that I loved her and two, appreciated her. That's my mother. And I got that by asking her questions. And so what I decided to do to change our relationship was to make sure every day. So I have this philosophy of doing stuff every day. Give it a minimum amount of minutes. So I gave my mom a minimum of one minute a day to make sure that she loves and appreciates me. And meaning I would call, text or email her and simply sometimes say, hey, Mom, I was just thinking about you. I got back from China today, and I just wanted you to know that I totally love you and appreciate you. I live this extraordinary life, and I'm so grateful. You know, I'm one of six and all the things then I work through it and say to myself, why do I still feel this way? Why. Why do I feel inferior to my siblings just because they all went to the Ivy Leagues and none of them got a b? Why? I'm 50 years old. I have my own beautiful family. Why do I have this energy about me that I literally know? It's not easy for people to say the truth that I know enough. Here's the best thing about it. My brothers are super. They're super accelerated like humans. They're amazing, right? Harvard, summa cum laude amazing. And what's funny is we. My brother went to Harvard. He was extremely enlightened. He's a rabbi now. You know, I said to him, hey, man, I just. I'm working on feeling good around you. And he was like, pale. He goes, that's funny, because I was thinking the same thing about you, you know, like that in fear. And I go, and I hope you take it as a compliment, because I just think the world of you, and I want you to think the world of me. Those type of effective communications, this can open up and allow you to work through why you feel certain ways, because it transcends. If you feel that way with your siblings or your parents, it's worse for people you just met. You're trying to prove yourself. One of the energies I carry that ruined me was I had an energy that I was stupid, and I projected it, that I was smarter than everyone else because I carried a core energy because of my siblings and the way I was raised and my grandma telling me, only stupid people get bored. Smart people think of things to do that I literally projected this insecurity that caused me to oversell, back end, sell, lie, manipulate, and not feel good about myself. No matter how much I had, I still needed more, and it was for myself to prove that I was smart enough.
- [51:58]
Tom Bilyeu
That's so incredible. How did you get to the point where you could take accountability for all of that. Like that is. I love, love your thoughts on accountability, by the way. Extraordinary. But what I find is the people that can take accountability often have to really overcome something like that thing they really don't want to talk about, and they still have to take accountability for that. How do you face that?
- [52:25]
Dave Asprey
It was taking accountability for going bankrupt because to me, everything in my life was about being rich. It was about having that money. My whole identity was that success. And so to let go of that identity and to be radically humble and confident and faithful and just say, I am accountable. I mean, it was a bad time that I went bankrupt. It was 2007, 2008. Everybody was losing money. People were blaming me, and there's lawsuits and my ego is in the way. And the minute I said, you know, hey, you know what? I could have done this, I attracted this. Yes, my wonderful wife is correct. I surround myself with the wrong people and the wrong ideas. I'm accountable 100% and I'm going to tell everybody about it. I'm not going to hide. You know what? Take the energy. There's a great author, David Corbin. He wrote a book called Illuminate. And I read that book and he became a friend of mine because I had to search him out after I read it. And he used an example about illumination. He said, I was doing business, and there was a guy that was convicted of a white collar crime, felony. And first thing of every business call that he said, he said, look, before we get started, I want to let you know I was convicted in 2001 of a white collar crime for doing this. I served six months in jail. I'm completely accountable for it. But I learned what I learned. And I just want to tell you up front before we do any business, that this is me. And if you're not comfortable doing business with a felon, I get it. 90 some percent of the people trusted that person more than somebody else. And then two, you know, 100% of the people, especially because of technology and access to information today, eventually you're gonna find out and you lose 100% of the people when they find out after. And, you know, for me, that was a friend of mine said, I love this statement, David. I would rather people hate me for who I am then love me for who I'm not. I'm the exact opposite of you. I love that when he told me that, and that was part. I wanted everyone to love me. And you can't.
- [54:32]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, that's easier said than done. That's really, really interesting. And the doing the work of identifying it like you were talking about, whether it's ego or what it is, but just recognizing that it's there and then being able to process through that, find your center, and then move forward with intention, it's really, really interesting. And as I think through that and I think through the steps and how meticulous you have to be, why are you such a good negotiator? What is it that you do? Is there a process like that? What is it?
- [55:03]
Dave Asprey
Absolutely. I think it's part of being more interested than interesting. So what I do is I explore the reasons that you want what you want. I want to explore the impact that it has and the capabilities that you currently have that you want to have and that you actually need. And then I align those with the reasons that I want to do the deal, the impact that it has for me, and the capabilities that I have, want or need. And when I figure that all out in negotiation, I actually can make a bigger hole than other people. I'm dealing, Hey, I could give you this, you could give me that, and we both really win.
- [55:40]
Tom Bilyeu
From things that I've heard you say almost just off the cuff, the thing that seems like your superpower from the outside is that you go into everything with an open mind, not knowing what the answer might be and looking for ways that are completely outside the realm of even what I would think to ask for. And is part of what is anybody's power in a negotiation, being able to make the ask?
- [56:08]
Dave Asprey
Yeah. So there's three things. One, people buy on emotion for logical reasons. So you have to address the emotions. And so that's that open nature that you feel and see. And from knowing me now, the other two is not only an ask, it's an attract. So I believe there's four mediums that you can ask and attract on the first, in person. So being more interested than interesting, we were going to meet in person today. I know that I strategically, for the benefit of both of us, have asks and attracts. Right. One of those simple asks was, you know, I really wanted you to sign something to put into my studio. Right. Because everyone I do, that's just a simple one. But I'm thinking about that. So in person, ask and attract. Then on the phone. Every phone call I receive, not push out. Right. I'm on the defensive in my life. I'm attracting. Right. I'm allowing things. So I know that I'm going to receive phone calls today. I'm going to have ask and attracts. And I know that because Unconditionally, I ask people, is there anything I can do for you? How can I be of service? And they'll either tell me or not. And invariably, they're almost forced to by the laws of nature, to ask me what I want. I have an ask and attract.
- [57:19]
Tom Bilyeu
Talk to me about meditation. How are you leveraging that in your life?
- [57:24]
Dave Asprey
Meditation for me is 20 minutes every morning. First thing that I do and what it does is it finds my center. That's all. For me, it's almost like baseline testing for a concussion. Because what I've learned is that life is like the big tall hill in San Francisco with a car on top. That's your center. When the car is up there, you can hold it. You know, a truck you can hold with your finger when it's sitting on top of a hill. The minute this thing starts rolling downhill, you got to put it back up. The longer it goes downhill, the harder it is to get back up. What I used to do during the day is I'd let that truck keep flying down the hill and trying to react instead of act by going back to center.
- [58:05]
Tom Bilyeu
And is this emotional? That's how I think of it. I think of it as anxiety, stress, emotion. Those are the things I'm trying to bring back to center.
- [58:12]
Dave Asprey
Correct. So anything that takes you off of peace, oneness, wholeness, that feel, peaceful feeling, if something moves me in that direction instead of reacting, talking, yelling, all the different things that are throwing things, whatever you are, go back to center.
- [58:29]
Tom Bilyeu
So you had this really cool story about, hey, my daughter, at the time, I think she was 16. If she said, dad, I want a Ferrari. You'd be like, cool. How do we go about getting it correct? And I found that really interesting because it's so pragmatic. But what I want to do now is. Is really collide the two things. Cause I think you're uniquely capable. You live in the real world. You've built real businesses and been very successful. And there's so much tangibility to what you do. And maybe this will be a breakthrough for me. I wanna know how those two coexist. How do you manifest? Which I imagine just means essentially daydream, right? And then how do I reconcile that? Then I have to go do something for it.
- [59:04]
Dave Asprey
That's the biggest conflict that I had too. People told me about manifestation. I roll my eyes because I didn't understand it. Manifesting is commanding, which means working with the word. Work is in there. You got to take action. You got to make it happen. You can't Sit at home high on your mom's couch, manifesting the Publisher's Clearinghouse to come to your door. You know, it would drive me crazy. You know, this secret I'm on to Transformational Leadership Council. I'm like the most pragmatic sports agent weirdo on there. But those are all the people that created the movie the Secret. And I told them, drove me crazy when the guys you're teaching the masses sit there and dream about your Ferrari. And this was during my transformational time. And I sat there, it put a pit in my stomach. I'm like, do you know how hard I had to work to buy my Ferrari? Like it was a dream of mine. But I wasn't home high on my mom's couch dreaming about having that thing. I was out working and doing all the things that I needed. That combination to me, the commanding, the commanding of the universe, working with it. And that includes working with others. So I only, even in my business ask me, you want to go to do something? You want to come to the studio today and get involved and meet you? Because there's, you know, I saw the posse that came. That's because they asked, okay, how are we going to do it? What value are you going to bring to the table? Oh, I can drive, I can do this. The same works with the universe. You know, I want to raise a hundred million dollars to give to people. And I hear the universe tell me, okay, how are we going to do it Now? It takes action, takes alignment, action adjustment, but it does, it takes. I have to create a plan. I'm not just going to dream about it, but I believe that it's very important to still think about it, focus in on it, dream about it. That all these things, the conscious, subconscious and unconscious all work together. But without conscious action, it probably won't take place.
- [60:59]
Tom Bilyeu
Talk to me about planning. How do you come up with a plan? How have you? Like, this is the thing, when I really sit down and try to break down for people what you need to do to be successful, there's certain places I stop because there's nothing universal to give them. And the plan is one of them, right? So I'm just ridiculously psycho about people. People need a goal, a hyper specific goal and a plan. So my thing is identify the gap between where you are and where you want to be. And that gap is a gap of skill set. And now you have to go and get those skills. But most people can't identify what skills actually lie between where they are and where they want to Go. They get it like from the end result, but they don't know how to plan that out. And I'm not like, I don't even understand other than just sort of by intuition how I'm doing it.
- [61:45]
Dave Asprey
So here's what's cool, because this is going to throw you way back because it's completely pragmatic monetary solution to the problem that I tell young people with what they want that they need it to figure out. One, a direct path to that. That's your goal. What's my direct path to revenue? Forget the business side. If you have an idea for a business specifically, what's my direct path to revenue? And when you stay focused on the direct path to revenue, you only need one more thing to stay in business every day. And so if you have one objective to stay in business and then two, a direct path to revenue. And understand that my job is to align with as much as I can, being more interested than interesting. Learning these skills, knowledge and maintaining desire, you're guaranteed success. Let me give you one of the coolest things that I've learned. And this is about anything in life. If somebody could tell you, give me your dream and you're 25. No's from your dream, 25 failures, losses from your dream. How excited would you be when you got the first? No way. Way. How about when you get your 25th one?
- [62:54]
Tom Bilyeu
I'd be over the moon.
- [62:55]
Dave Asprey
But for me, this is where faith comes in. I believe that I live in the favor, like in the favor of the universe. I believe that everything is mine. There's enough of everything for everyone. I just truly believe it. And I don't know if it's 25, but I know it's the same philosophy. So I take on the energy and perspective of good news. First failure. I was wrong again. Good news. And then the 25th comes. I'm like, oh gosh, I know I'm closer than I was. This is great. Where like so many people cannot maintain desire and they get to the 25th time and they're this far away. You know the don't quit poem that. I love that poem because that explains this perfectly. You're done, man. You're gonna get there. I don't know how long. My favorite book. I was blessed to do a book with Jack Canfield, Chicken Soup for the Soul. Half a billion. He was rejected 200 times by publishers. Said it was a stupid idea. 200. But if I told him that he would be rejected 200 times before he had the best selling book of all Times and a half a billion sold in a whole brand that lasts for legacy of a lifetimes of people. How happy would he have been when he got to 150? And so to me, to teach people, you need skills. Integration of skills, knowledge and desire. Maintenance of desire. You need a direct path to what you want. But you need to stay on course every day. It's every single day. The only thing that stops you from being successful in business, for example, is you run out of money, you go out of business. How many businesses do we know that have evolved? I'm sure your business has evolved from where you started, right? I know Google did, Facebook did. Right? They all were not set out to be, but they all had a direct path to what they wanted to do and they stayed in business every day.
- [64:41]
Tom Bilyeu
How do you maintain desire? I've wanted to ask that from the second you said that. That's super powerful.
- [64:47]
Dave Asprey
It's the literally, to me, it's the consistent, persistent enjoyment of the pursuit of my potential when my outcomes. I have goals, people all the time. Well, how can you do that? But I change my goals that are a little different. They don't create voids, shortage and obstacles. Meaning someone will tell me, I want to be a millionaire by the time I'm 30. I said, can I give you a piece of advice? Why not double the amount of money you make as fast as you can. You're not playing with linear time anymore. Time's a construct. What if you made it way before 30? You've cheated yourself. You're creating resistance. So for me to stay inspired, it's every day enjoying the pursuit of my potential and truly focusing in on man. I love that my real enlightenment came when I got my butt kicked and walked out of there going, wow, that was awesome. Where no ego, right? It's just like, I just learned so much. I must be so much closer to what I want because I just learned a ton. And yes, I got my butt kicked. And where the old Dave would have been like, what a jerk. You know, he doesn't know anything. No, I don't know anything. And I'm here to learn more.
- [65:52]
Tom Bilyeu
Did you ever. Because you're dyslexic. So I imagine that that wasn't easy to establish a mental vision of yourself that was positive. So did you ever worry that you weren't smart enough to pull this off?
- [66:05]
Glenn Stearns
All the time. Okay. And what happened was whether it was being young and, you know, again, just take failing fourth grade. I can look at two things. Worst thing that ever happened to Me, it's embarrassing. I'm at the age where everybody knows I'm a dummy or, wow, I got whole new friends, you know, I've got this whole new set of friends which ended up happening to me, which in two weeks I'm going to have 45 of them come out to my ranch. This is from 8th grade, so I'm still friends with these people, Right. I have a child in 14. Worst thing in the world. So great, right? Oh, my God, my life is over. Or, wow, I've got a beautiful young child, you know, and it's about how
- [66:43]
Tom Bilyeu
you think, you know, to think of
- [66:44]
Glenn Stearns
it like, I didn't think of it like that in the beginning. That's my point.
- [66:48]
Tom Bilyeu
When did that change it?
- [66:50]
Glenn Stearns
Just as life went on, I realized what I thought was horrible became wonderful. And why do I spend energy on things I cannot control? I had a fail 4th grade. Why am I going to be upset about it again? I think about this after the fact and realize, don't spend energy on things you can't control. So as my life got, as I moved along, I started wasting less energy on things like that and then realizing, find the silver lining. What good came out of this issue, you know, And I've had a lot of them, right? So, okay, so I can't change the things that I could probably cry over. So what, what lesson did I learn, you know? And then, and now my life in the last 15 years, 20 years, has been really focused on all the learnings, you know, and not the woe is me stuff, because we all got those.
- [67:47]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, that's a pretty radical transformation. So I really want to make sure that people don't look at you as the after picture and think this is the before. So obviously we've talked about the hardships. Dyslexia is an ongoing thing. So how do you think about your weaknesses and address? Because speaking for myself, so my biggest fear was that I wasn't smart enough to be successful. Like, that was at some points in my life, almost crippling. And so I really had, for me, I had to learn about the brain. I had to learn about brain plasticity. And that gave me the get out of jail free card of not needing to tell myself that I was too dumb anymore. Because it was like, well, maybe you are too dumb right now, and that's fine because you can get better. Do you have a strategy for dealing with someone something like dyslexia?
- [68:35]
Glenn Stearns
I think you look at the whole scarcity and abundance kind of concept, right. And I found that When I would. Instead of focusing again on the fact that maybe I'm not the best reader, maybe I don't retain all. A lot, very, you know, a lot of things. Well, instead of that, the fact that if I find smart people, and it's very cliche, but it's very true, and I surround myself with them, that I end up looking smarter, right? Because. And you watch some people, and I can give you so many examples of people, but I won't, okay, that. That are in fear that if I surround myself with someone smarter than me, it'll make me look dumb, right? And. And so they surround themselves with people inferior. And then your whole company or division or whatever you're in fails, right? Versus people that have enough confidence to say, wow, you can fill in the, you know, the blind spot I don't have or my weakness. And you fill it all in, and your whole company rises or whatever you're doing. Your whole project rises because all of you combine to make this Uber, you know, quick, fast, smart project go, right? And so that became pretty evident to me because I didn't have a lot of the skills that. Why don't I let those people do it? You know? Why don't I bring in more people? And the more talent I brought in, the quicker we went, you know, and the less time we wasted. And I went, all right, I think I'm onto something here, you know? And then to admit it, hey, I'm not the smartest guy in the room. You know, I'm the chairman of my company. I hate running the meetings. I don't. I don't like being the one that has to tell people what to do. I'm not good at that. I have. I like the vision, right? I like. I got an idea. Let's march up this hill. That's fun to me, but the details. Let's let people like to do that better than I do do it.
- [70:53]
Tom Bilyeu
It's interesting. I would put you into a certain category of entrepreneur if I didn't know what you did on Undercover Billionaire, because there are people that have, like, a really extraordinary ability to galvanize a team, to gather talent, to surround themselves. And then it's basically like, all right, hey, I'm the one that sort of raised the money and put everybody together, and now you guys go and actually build this thing. But you have that very striking ability, but then you also have the ability to create a vision, to march forward, to put very strategic steps into place. Take us back to the beginning of Undercover Billionaire. You're sleeping in your truck, you're not even sure what business to do. How did you begin to cobble those ideas together so that you can actually get something done?
- [71:43]
Glenn Stearns
So let me take you back a step on that, too, for a second, if you don't mind. So here I am doing my business for a long time and become fairly large and successful and all the things I thought were wonderful. And then I get hit with cancer. And at that point, my focus became a completely different focus. What's the most important thing? Right? And that's my family. So I said, I'm going to sell my business. And I sold it to a very large private equity group, and I focused on the family. And by doing that, I was then able to realize that when I got back into business, the problems weren't very large in business, no matter what they compared to cancer, compared to your life. Right? So now it's just problem solving. Right? So let's get in the room. Let's figure it out. And then if you look at it, because I remembered 2007 and 8, which was the worst financial crisis in our lifetimes, and I was dead center of it. And when I got cancer, because I used to say I never in my life want to go back to that. And when I got the cancer, I went what I would do to go back to that, because that was fun. I just didn't. I wouldn't have called it fun back then. Very painful. We're going to lose everything. But it was all about getting in people's faces. Let's figure this out together. Going to New York and all the Wall street guys and all the. Every lawyer and everybody that was out there, but it was living, right? It was doing things. So when then you take that and you realize we're not dying, it's just problem solving now all of a sudden, the fear, I guess that business had on me for a while, lose everything, you know? You know, and I don't know if you've ever had it. You know, you build something and you're feeling great one day, and the next day, you know, these lawyers are going to come and, you know, and there's always what can cripple us, what can bring us down. Well, once that went away and I started realizing that's just part of the game, then the fear of that went away. So now I can go out and create and do things. So when it came to Undercover Billionaire and I went out, what had happened was people kept asking if I wanted to do a show. My wife and I did a show. 15 years ago. And by luck, someone called. If we wanted to do it, we did it. It was called the Real Gilligan's Island. I ended up winning it. She came in second place. Long story. But for years after that, people kept calling, hey, we want you to do another show. Do you want to do a show? And I said, look, I'm a business guy, you know, I did that for fun, but it's okay. I said, I'll tell you a show I would do. Strip me from everything. Take away my name, my money, my contacts. I bet I could rebuild it again, because I was getting tired of hearing that, you know, that the American dream was dead and whatnot. And I also wanted to do it because I wanted my children to see that you, life is not easy. That when you do get into a hole, it's not about laying there and feeling like the victim. It's about getting up and pulling yourself up out of the hole and figuring it out. And so I wanted that. And I would say, if you want to do a show with me, strip me of everything and throw me in the middle of nowhere. And I would do that over and over again to these production houses that would call me. And then Discovery called back and said, if you really want to do that show, you put your money where your mouth is. I said, sure. And they've put some little constraints around, well, how about 90 days? I'm going, well, that's kind of tight, you know. I said, well, how about if we start with like, $5,000? Is it? How about a hundred dollars? And it kept getting tighter. And I said, okay, let's see what happens, you know? And so off I went. I did it. I didn't think much, right? Which is the story of my life, right? I didn't plan. I just thought, I'll just show up and see what happens. And I like that, you know, I like having my back against the wall, and I like that feeling. And we all. I think we all do well at. At being successful, right? We walk around, we give our money to charity, and, you know, we. We do things that make us feel like we're good. Who are we when everything is taken away from us? And in 2007 and 8, when everything was taken away, in that moment, I was in the darkest hole, you know, and looking around and thinking the whole community and industry is looking at me. Who am I now? I kind of like that feeling.
- [76:33]
Tom Bilyeu
Why?
- [76:34]
Glenn Stearns
Because that's the real you.
- [76:37]
Tom Bilyeu
That's interesting.
- [76:38]
Glenn Stearns
It's. It's when. When you are not built up on the fakeness of money and people kissing your ass and all those things. Who are you as just a human being? And so that moment when I was at my darkest in 2007 and eight, literally, it's a longer story than we have right now, but I stood up and said, let's go. And literally went in front of everybody's face, never hid and said, how are we going to get ourselves out of this? What do you mean? It's your problem, Glenn. I go, no, you say, owe you 30 million, Bear Stearns. I said, how are we going to get out of this? Because I don't believe I owe it to you. And we would go over battles over the loans. Let's say I gave them stated income loans. They said, it's my problem because they failed. How am I supposed to check the income when you told me it was a state? So we would battle over the stuff and little things like that would happen. And instead of digging my head in the sand, it'll go away. Let's just fight it out right now. And so we did that on everything, and it worked. And so when it came to now we move forward and it's Undercover Billionaire. I said, I want to be stripped of everything and I want to be in a hole again, and I want to show my children what it's like to climb out. And I will tell you, in the middle of that hole, I didn't realize that there'd be millions of eyeballs on me. Like, I didn't think that part out. And I can see myself when I've watched the show staring off, and I'm realizing at that time, I know exactly what I was thinking. Like, maybe I can throw this show, as in, it'll never be on because I am going to fail and the whole world is going to watch me fail. Which means what I did in the past was luck. It was all the things you fear in life of going, you know, am I really that good or was it luck? Right? And so it was a moment where I said, I want to run, I want to hide. I don't want to face these demons and these things because I'm going to look bad. And. And again, that was the moment when I go, this is the time to stand tall, right? And so digging out. And it worked really well. And everything turned out to where I'm very proud of the show. It became probably one of my proudest moments of my life. Because the fear and having that devil on your, you know, give up, give up. Just, you can throw this. You can you know, they. They won't ever have to make the show. All those kind of things. We all face that in our lives. It's just not with millions of people watching. Right. It's just we. I don't. This job wasn't what I thought it would be, but the job over across the street's better, the career over there is better. And people hop because they don't stick to it. They don't go through the pain, they don't go through the fear. And then they end up in a cycle that goes over and over and over again. Right? And the ones that are successful and I don't just again mean financial, but the successful and fulfilled, they fight through the pain, they stay later, they work through it, they sacrifice. And then they feel proud because it works. It will work when you do the right thing and you struggle and you don't give up. Right. And so it all became very meaningful because my children then got to see this and that's all I cared about. And then when it got bigger than that, and then the whole world have had thousands of people say, wow, it was so inspiring. Thank you. It got me to think about what I need to do. I didn't even dream that that would happen, you know, And I'm so thankful to hear other people who have been touched by that.
- [80:26]
Tom Bilyeu
That's so incredible to. It's so easy to look at somebody else and think, well, they could do it, but I wouldn't be able to do it because they don't have the kind of fears or the self doubt or the limitations that I have. And that's part of what makes your story so incredible is a. You're honest about like I was actually thinking about taking a dive and just like making sure that the show never came out and then you don't. And I want to know, is grit something that comes naturally to you or have you developed tenacity over time?
- [80:57]
Glenn Stearns
I would say that it has developed over time and I didn't understand it in the beginning. You know, I didn't know what would was happening to me. Right. Again, all of the hard things that happened in my life I'm very grateful for because it did lead me to a place where now it doesn't seem to be that hard. And so I happen to have a podcast called Grit Happens. Right. And it's very. But it's about that grit and it's about the determination, not giving up, feeling that you're not alone and what you touch on, I love that's the best part of why I like to tell my story. I don't like to lead with success. I like to lead with vulnerability. Right. I like people to go, God, if that guy can do it. I got a 2.1 in college. I did a little better than he did. Right. Or whatever.
- [81:53]
Ken Honda
Right?
- [81:53]
Glenn Stearns
Or I didn't go to college. Okay. You know, I barely went to college. You know, I mean, you know, I learned about paying the bills through college. I didn't really learn, you know, much in terms of, you know, economical statistics or whatever.
- [82:08]
Tom Bilyeu
You know, how do you.
- [82:09]
Dave Asprey
Your.
- [82:10]
Tom Bilyeu
You've got the mental fortitude that you're building up over time. You're learning really powerful lessons at a time. This is mostly, I'm sure, pre Internet. So you're cobbling all of this stuff together yourself. How then do you begin to get what is on display in Undercover Billionaire? Where you're pivoting, where you're asking things like, who's my buyer? Instead of just what business do I find interesting? Like, when do you begin to learn these business lessons?
- [82:39]
Glenn Stearns
Yeah, there's been a lot of hardship in my career as well as successes. Right. And so when I look back on everything that happened to me, I always thought this was the end. And then there was. Aha. Right. And then something would just take me to another level, you know, And, I mean, a million things. I would sit in a meeting with the government, with all of these contractors, and I would be one of the contractors, and they'd be complaining, we can't do this anymore. Because they would all be yelling about some little, you know, issue. And I'll give you an example real quick. They were. They would notarize deeds. They said, we cannot notarize the government's deeds anymore unless the government comes and signs in front of us, and this is illegal. And they would just, you know, and they're all complaining. And I. Yeah, I agree with. And I thought. So when the meeting ended, I got up and said, why don't I bring my notary in every day at lunch to just sign the deeds? So we end up signing tens of thousands of deeds a year, making all the money. And I paid her, you know, an extra, you know, whatever to come in on her lunchtime, right? And our company thrived off of that. It was just, there are these little things that other people see as problems, and you can go, but it's pretty clear that there's an opportunity right here.
- [84:07]
Tom Bilyeu
That's one of the more interesting things to me about your mentality is so it's like with investing they say when there's blood in the streets, that's when you buy. And when other people are just trying to gobble things up, that's when you sell. At a time where everybody else was closing down, you were opening up. How do you find the opportunity?
- [84:27]
Glenn Stearns
I've always ran into the fire. Literally, when I was a kid, I remember my sister ran into the laundry room in our. Because they would, like, five times, they caught the laundry room on fire.
- [84:42]
Tom Bilyeu
Whoa.
- [84:43]
Glenn Stearns
And one time, my sister had run in there. She was like, three, and I was out there, and everyone was like, the fire was coming out of the building, right. And no one was doing anything about it. And I ran in there and crawled on the floor and found her and dragged her out.
- [84:59]
Tom Bilyeu
Whoa.
- [85:00]
Glenn Stearns
And it would be like, why didn't anybody else do that? Like, I did. I remember always, for some weird reason, running against the crowd. I don't know why. Right. But I would just go the opposite way I can. You know, my dog ate the little, you know, electric cord, and it was flopping around, and everyone ran. They were afraid. And I ran over there, and I pulled it out of the wall, right? Like, I'm going, why doesn't anyone else. They always run away. And I don't know why. But then I began to like the fact that when people ran away, I'd run the other way. And so then business, that would happen. And it became very clear to me when everyone dove out the window, I thought, look at all of this opportunity. Look at all this talent. Nobody's gobbling up this talent. I could never get these people in normal world. And So I opened five offices of failed companies. November 07, opened five more with each. With, like, 20 to 50 people in each office. And I did that the next year. And then we shot to the moon, you know, because everyone else had sat on the sidelines for two years, and I gobbled up all the talent.
- [86:12]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, that to me. So it's very interesting that that started out very early for you. That definitely did not start early for me. But you do begin to realize, okay, in. In disruption, there is opportunity. And one of the things that, given the way you talk on Undercover Billionaire, I'm guessing that this is true for you as well. What Ray Dalio calls principles, that you do something in life and you realize, okay, that worked. That didn't work. And so you begin to formulate these things. The next time I encounter this, I will act in this way. And one of the hard and fast beliefs that I have is, in disruption, there is opportunity. So you want to look for that moment where everybody else is either annoyed that a change is coming along. So think of social media. So one of the key elements to my success was recognizing social media was a business tool when everybody else just thought it was a distraction. And so when people get annoyed or pissed off about something, it's like, that's the very thing I want to go look at because there's something that's causing a disruption in their life, which is why they don't like it. Let me tie this to the Horatio Alger Award that a you're a recipient of, but you're also part of that committee that looks for people that have overcome extraordinarily difficult situations, people that can see an opportunity in difficulty. To me, that's like the thing, right? Like I said earlier, the only belief that matters is that you can pull it off. So somebody that's in that gnarly, gnarly, gnarly situation, what is it that allows some people to see the opportunity and stops other people from seeing it? Because I know that you guys have had, I don't know if you call them students, recipients, whatever that they did well, but their brothers and sisters imploded, right?
- [87:54]
Glenn Stearns
And we have studied that, tried to figure out why. Why in the same family, you'll have three brothers and sisters that are in jail or die of drugs and one that just uses education as their way out or and they say, I don't want to be anything like this family. What is the difference? They've gone through the same hardship they've been and endured so much adversity. Why do they stand out? And I don't know if we've ever found this answer yet, you know, but what I do know is that person, that young person that has said, I'm going to take tools that and better myself to get myself out of this situation. I want to invest in that person. And so that's where I put my energy personally. And the Horatio Alger association does that, right? We get 40,000 applicants a year to help. And these are all people who have gone through a lot of severe adversity. And we help maybe 35 to 34,000, 3,500, 4,000 students a year by giving them scholarships to college. And then we have a, when we go through our award ceremony, we have about 110 or so scholars that are national scholars that we bring in and we meet, we mentor, and we spend three or four days with them every year in Washington, D.C. and then my wife and I have gone and done Other events with them outside of the association. But I'm fascinated with that person. I feel like I've led a similar life, but I did it by accident, right? Like, I didn't say education was my way out. I fell in the education, barely graduated. But I learned lessons along the way, right. I learned how to get a Pell Grant, how to, you know, these kind of things. These kids are determined that these kids are focused on knowing that, you know, if I, you know, can get myself a good education, I will be able to get a great job and I'll be able to live a different life. And so I absolutely am fascinated by those people and they'll be tomorrow's leaders because they also, you got to think right when I've had a many friends, but one especially that I can tell you, he never touched adversity. His family, you know, had really helped make sure he had a very easy life. And at the age of 40, leading his business, it had a very big turn and he couldn't get out of bed for two weeks, right. And thought the world was over. And yet once he got through all that, he really got some thicker skin and he learned that, you know, he had lived a pretty extraordinary life never to face any real adversity. And here are these kids that face so much adversity early on that when they hit a business issue or something, it's going to be like, yeah, this is. This is nothing.
- [91:01]
Tom Bilyeu
What are some of the tenets of Zen? So I studied Zen. I got really hardcore into Taoism when I was younger, like, way hardcore. Which led me then to studying Buddhism. I would definitely never claim to say that I practiced it, but studied Buddhism a fair amount. Zen, I found maybe the most intriguing but confusing. What are some of the core tenets of Zen?
- [91:25]
Ken Honda
So I had this opportunity to meet my mentor later. His name is Wahed Takeda. So when I asked him to teach about money, he said his first lesson is forget about money. So I was so confused.
- [91:41]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, one of the things that I found super confusing and people. So where I was going is the notion of a Zen Cohen. And this is something that people probably in the US anyway, be tangentially familiar with. The most famous one we talk about is what is the sound of one hand clapping? And there are many Zen Cohens which are, like, beyond confusing. And of course, the idea is once you understand sort of the absurdity of the question itself, and of course I'm doing this from a logical perspective. And Zen is, I think, meant to be very different than that. But Just to give people an anchor point. Once you understand the absurdity of the question, then it's like you're a step closer to enlightenment. So when he said forget about money, what was he trying to get you to like, what does that mean? Because obviously it's not truly. Forget that it exists.
- [92:30]
Ken Honda
Yes.
- [92:30]
Tom Bilyeu
So what does he mean?
- [92:32]
Ken Honda
So I think he meant about where I focus. Because if you want money, you have to forget about money. You have to. You have to forget about what you can give to other people, how much service you can give out to the world, and then you receive money. So he was telling me not to focus on money because money is the end result of what we get after serving the world. So instead of focusing on what you get, you have to really focus on what you give. And our life is in the middle of giving and receiving. So unless we receive well, unless. Unless we give well, we can receive. So we are in this cycle of appreciation or resentment, either cycle you're in. Your life exists. So if you start appreciating your life about everything, including money, your life will be filled with money and appreciation. If your life will be filled with resentment, anger, and fear around money and also around life, your life will be also surrounded by fear and resentment and anxiety. So he taught me how to focus instead of just getting the end result of money. And he was very well respected because he was talking about philanthropy. So I'm teaching about happiness and money ever since.
- [93:56]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, the idea that he's been so incredibly successful obviously lends a lot of creative credence to the things that he says. And one of the things that I wanted to understand better about his teachings to you and your teachings you've written so prolifically. What is it like? How does it get that big? How does the topic sort of expand so far? What is it that people are getting wrong? And what are some of the universal principles that are going to lead people to? I'll say wealth, and it's probably worth defining. How would you define wealth? And then we'll go back to those two questions.
- [94:33]
Ken Honda
In my mind, wealth is an emotion. It doesn't really matter how much you have or how much you make, because I've interviewed. Over the course of my career, I've interviewed many millionaires and billionaires, and some of them are very unhappy and very upset with everything. I'm sure you've met some happy ones and very unhappy ones. And also among the people who are struggling with life, there are also happy people and unhappy people. So I think wealth is an attitude. If you feel like you're so happy and so content with what you have. You are already wealthy. But if you have to struggle every day and you cannot find happiness either in your business or in personal life, I think you're not wealthy even if you have billions in your bank account. But that doesn't mean that you don't have to have money.
- [95:30]
Tom Bilyeu
That's what I like about your approach, is there is a recognition. So part of the reason that I think that people continue to strive for money, I lived the nightmare of money can't buy you happiness. I had heard a thousand people tell me that money wasn't going to buy me happiness, that pursuing money outright was going to end up being a problem, and I still had to do it. And when I ran into the wall of oh, really, truly, money cannot buy you happiness, how is it that I ended up here? When all the people told me that this was going to be the outcome, why did I have to walk this path? Like, why couldn't I just accept their wisdom? And I realized that one of the things that people don't talk about is that money really is powerful. Money is. You call it energy, I'll call it power. Like money gives you the ability to close your eyes, imagine something that you want to create, and then open your eyes and actually be able to do it. And if you have the skill set, of course, and so there's real utility in money. And when people talk about, and I've heard you say before, I don't want to get too spiritual. Like, I want to keep this grounded. And I think that that's really important because if you tell people, hey, forget about money, because money doesn't matter, there's going to be a turn off. But if you tell people, hey, forget about money, because it's going to reorient your mindset, it's going to change your behaviors. It's going to align your behaviors to something that's actually going to allow you to generate actual money. Then I think that it draws people in a little bit more. So with that context, I want to go back to the two questions. So what are the mistakes that people make? And what are some universal things people need to understand if they actually want to be wealthy in the way that you just defined?
- [97:02]
Ken Honda
So I think most of us, the biggest problem, I think especially today, is that we are so afraid of money. And so as much as we want money, we are so scared of it.
- [97:14]
Tom Bilyeu
So why do you say that? I think that that hit me as very counterintuitive. Why? Why do you think people are scared of money?
- [97:21]
Ken Honda
It's because of our money trauma. I call it money wounds that we, we've had since our childhood. We used to have some unless your parents are perfect. And unfortunately it's not the case in any, any culture. So we've been scolded about money. You know, we spend too much, we waste the money. Or we denied karate lesson or soccer lesson or ballet lesson or piano lessons because it's expensive. Some of my friends were taught, you are not worth it. That's a big blow. So we've been denied so many times around money. So that's why as much as we want money, because we feel money can buy happiness, or money can buy at least freedom, but at the same time, money have been abused us for so many ways. So as much as we want to get close to it, but if we get too close to it, we get burned or like hurt. So for a lot of people, money is a mystery person.
- [98:27]
Tom Bilyeu
So how do they begin to change that relationship? I'm assuming some of this is going to be just narrative around how they talk to themselves about money. What do you advise people on?
- [98:36]
Ken Honda
You have to start watching your language. My mother used to say that. And then around money especially, a lot of people say like, you know, I was ripped off. So there are so many negative language around money. And my mentor Wahe said, you have to use positive words around money, otherwise money will not like you. And I really, I thought it's very cute, you know. And then in my book, I talk about what if money were a person, who would it be? Like, is that person a gentle person or angry person? So just, you know, you have to pay attention to how you relate to money. If you just feel like money is just a thing, like you don't care. But if you don't care, you know, you end up being in debt. So you have to be very careful and respectful for money. Some Japanese people, actually one of my students made huton bed for a wallet. It's so cute to show respect while I rest. Please money and credit cards, please rest here too. So it's like a little bed, like a cat bed. And then you're supposed to put your wallet into the bed. So it's just a metaphor. But unless you show respect to money and the money coming in, money going out both ways, you cannot feel peaceful around money. Especially this hard time of economy. You have to really pay close attention to your emotions. Most of us are so controlled by anxiety and fear and money. That's why do things which are not really true to us in order to survive. So we feel like if we have no money, we cannot survive. That means your death. So the funny switch is turned on. I think it's our survival Mechanism. You know, 200 years ago or 300 years ago, everybody was a farmer. Nobody, you know, probably don't use much money. But now, unless you have money, you cannot buy food. So money and survival are so tied in your system.
- [100:59]
Tom Bilyeu
So as people begin to tell themselves a new narrative, they build the futon bed for their wallet, they think about who that person is, and I'm guessing a lot of people are going to think of that person as abusive or they wander off and they don't have a good relationship with that. So how do they begin to change their mindset around that? How do they begin to turn that narrative? Do you tell them to imagine somebody who is kind or gentle? What is that process?
- [101:30]
Ken Honda
So since we've been abused, we feel like we've been abused by this person. We are a little scared of this person, right? So I think the first step is actually the step that my mentor Wahe Takeda taught me, that is arigato yo amani, thank your money. When money comes in, either in a form of government check or a salary or commission or whatever the money you receive, you say thank you, arigatou, thank you money for coming in. Because in these days, it's so rare to find you and pay you. Somebody pays you, right? Either could be government or your husband, wife, or your clients. There are so many other people who do the similar job that you do, but they chose you to pay you. So, like, there are millions of reasons to appreciate for the money. So when money comes in, just say thank you or arigato or idanke or whatever your language or mercy, you know. And then when you spend money, also arigato, you know, because you're getting something for the money. And Wahei said, arigato in, arigato out. So it's almost like a karate kid teaching, you know, walks in, walks out. So he said, arigato in, arigato out. If you do it for two months and then come back. So, like, oh, I wanted to have some stock tips or like investment tips or I expected something different. But the thing I got is arigato in, arigato out. And I practiced for two months and I felt genuinely happier. So I recommend anybody just try it at least, because it doesn't cost you anything. And once you start appreciating money coming in, money going out, you start Appreciating about other things. So this arigatoing, arigatou out opens a door to a new life which is full of appreciation, and I think we definitely need that. Wahei said, appreciation means melts fear and anxiety. So if you start and if you keep appreciating money coming and going out, you cannot worry about money at the same time, because a human mind can focus one thing at a time. So Wahei has a very interesting, unique trick of sort of changing our wire in our brain. So once you start appreciating, it's so funny because one of my students said, oh, gee, Ken, I forgot to worry about money for a week. Because you focus on appreciation.
- [104:09]
Tom Bilyeu
Yeah, I think this is really powerful, is a very important first step. And when I think about my own journey, I won't say that I had a negative view about money. And if you had asked me to describe what money was, I probably would have. Whoever I could think of that was, like, glamorous and exciting and powerful. Like, that was my vision of money, which is why I was chasing it so hard, ultimately coming to understand, okay, I'm making more money than I've ever made, but I'm not happier than I've ever been. And the neurochemistry that I want to feel like this is not taking me there. And so I began to what. What I began to do was change my behavior. So I changed my story about money. That what I flipped over into was, the only thing that matters is feeling alive. So I'm going to stop chasing money. I'm going to start thinking about value. And so I had a very negative connotation around money. And I just said, look, I'm going to set that aside for now, and I'm just going to pursue fulfillment. I'm going to do things to add value to people's lives. I'm going to work to improve myself. That was a huge part for me, was always wanting to get better myself. And what I found was I needed both. I needed a change of mindset. I needed to stop thinking money was going to solve my problems. But I also needed to change my behaviors. And ultimately, I don't. I. No one is ever going to think their way to success. I think that you have to think in a new way that is advantageous, but you have to act in a new way that's advantageous. So after, you know, when you do the wax on, wax off, like, eventually we do find ourselves in a karate tournament, and we really do have to fight.
- [105:45]
Minority Mindset (Jaspreet Singh)
Fight, yes.
- [105:46]
Tom Bilyeu
So what does that look like especially now in this crazy economy that we're going through right now. Let's get, let's go to that next phase. So people are, they're arigato money in, arigato money out. They've got the futon for their wallet. Like they're in a Zen place. Like they're doing good now. Like you retired at 29, not just because you were thinking, you retired at 29 because you ran businesses. You got very thoughtful about how to generate money and save it. How should people be acting with their money? So we get now how they should be thinking, but how should they be acting with their money?
- [106:18]
Ken Honda
Thank you, Tom. I think it's a beautiful question and I think that's exactly what we need to learn. Because once you start appreciating, your life shifts too. For example, one of the readers on my book, she was a single mom with a low paying job. She was working as a secretary and then she came to me and she used to complain about her low paying job. But after reading my book, she changed her attitude and she started appreciating about life and boss. And she realized that she didn't have a college degree, but she was hired as a secretary. So that's a big reason to appreciate her boss. Before she was always complaining about him. And I think the feeling really probably came across to her boss and she got a big raise in a few weeks. So once you start appreciating, I've heard so many stories, I can even write few books on this. Once you start appreciating your boss, your clients, they appreciate you back. So in my 20s, the reason why I was successful was I was little unique in so many different things. For example, when I was doing accounting consulting, I divided my clients to two groups. One I do regular job, the other I always bring something whenever I got to meet them. Just herb tea, Japanese tea, like a book, or just not super expensive. So in six months I got so many referrals from the gift giving groups, I didn't ask for any clients, right? But they gave me so many referrals. And the second group, not so much. So I recommend everybody to start giving more, something a little extra, not like 30% more, but something to show your appreciation. And it doesn't really matter if you're a florist or cleaners or business lawyers or a dentist, if you start giving something, you get more. So this is the law. I think if you give more, you receive more. And then there is one more extra reason to appreciate about. So your life would shift so your whole energy would be so different and so content. And I think people want to do business with happier people. People don't want to go with people who are very depressed. So the people with radiance of appreciation often attracts more people and more opportunities. So this is not a new age or spiritual thing. It's a practice to. To appreciate more. So what you appreciate, appreciates. And I think it's so simple. So start appreciating about money is the first step. And then second step is start appreciating what you have. And if you start sharing what you have, I call it gift. All of us have gifts. I've written probably like half of my books, 20 books on how to discover your gifts and monetize them. Because we are born, each of us is born with a special gift and something to be shared with this planet. And if you can find it and if you can improve it and you can polish it and just share with society, I think that translates into money. So I wrote a national bestseller. Do what you love and make sure money follows you. So it's very important. You have to have both.
- [109:57]
Glenn Stearns
When you manage procurement for multiple facilities, every order matters. But when it's for a hospital system,
- [110:02]
Tom Bilyeu
they matter even more.
- [110:04]
Glenn Stearns
Grainger gets it and knows there's no time for managing multiple suppliers and no room for shipping delays. That's why Grainger offers millions of products in fast, dependable delivery, so you can keep your facility stocked, safe, and running smoothly. Call 1-800-granger. Click granger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done.