Kind: captions
Language: en
when it comes to making decisions about
your money do not let yourself get
sidetracked from your goals today I'm
going to be breaking down how to form
habits maintain focus and how to build
the expertise that will allow you to
trust your own decision making and how
all of that relates to finding success
in the financial world let's get into it
growing up most of us are told some very
detrimental lies about money and I get
it it's what people have been taught
before them so of course that's what
they're going to pass down but what
people don't understand is money is a
great facilitator money doesn't say
anything about who you are as a person
it doesn't mean that you're good it
doesn't mean that you're bad and that's
one of the biggest lies that people are
told people are told that money is the
root of all evil that definitely is not
true money is the great facilitator this
is why the greatest charities in the
world what is the thing that keeps them
alive money so money can do incredibly
good things it can also do incredibly
bad things that's why I just say it's
the great facilitator I'm not saying
whether it facilitate something good or
bad but what you do with it is going to
determine its power money is potential
once you understand that money is
potential now it just becomes a question
of what exactly is it that you're trying
to do with the money and so getting
people to get out of their own way
around what money is is critically
important and so I want people to really
understand that it is the currency that
facilitates things when you think about
your own life would you go into work for
free
and the answer is no matter how much
good people want to do in the world to
eat to have a roof over your head you're
going to need money to get other people
to do the things that you want them to
do whether that's make food for you
whether that's fixed roads whether
that's to create an after-school program
all of that requires money it's just
what we as a civilization have decided
we're going to use as a way to manifest
value to store value to transfer value
across time and space and so money is
the way in which we sock away our energy
and efforts so you go to work you work
really hard that's where you're putting
your energy and effort they then give
you money that allows you to carry that
energy and effort across time so that as
time passes you have a way of planning
for the future so that that could buy
you a loaf of bread tomorrow it could
buy you a house in five years whatever
the case may be but understanding that
money isn't something that was made up
recently by the government in order to
hold people back or to allow quote
unquote rich people to take advantage of
other people what money is fundamentally
is it is an entry in a database
that allows you to store your efforts
across time and space once you
understand that then you understand why
say that it's the great facilitator now
the other lie that people are told about
money is that
if you have a lot of it you have either
done something bad to acquire it or
you're a bad person for acquiring a lot
of it but if money really is the way
that we allow value to be carried across
time and space than somebody who's able
to leverage their time well in a way
that can be put into money and carried
across time and space they have shown
that they have a level of efficiency
with how they spend their time and
energy because the way that you get
money for doing something is by making
things more convenient by solving a
problem for somebody by making something
easy that was previously difficult you
in essence if you're getting money you
have created something in the world that
somebody would rather have that thing
than that money so for instance in my
own life
when we were building Quest what we were
trying to do is say okay there are
people that want to eat cake cookie pies
ice cream but they want to stay in shape
and so they want somebody to make food
that they can choose based on taste and
it happens to be good for them now the
problem is that's very difficult to do
and it's very difficult to do at scale
and it's tremendously difficult to do at
scale in a way that's shelf stable and
so we put 18 months just into
formulation we put an ungodly amount of
time energy and money into actually
building equipment and then we had to
hire people train them how to actually
produce the product how to package it
how to distribute it all of that and how
to do all of that at a price that it was
cheaper for people to pay us the two and
a half dollars or whatever to get that
meal effectively that they would rather
have that product that we had created
than that money that money was actually
worth less to them or equal amount to
that product and so now for us to do all
of that work to do all of that research
to pay all of those employees to
negotiate all of those contracts to be
consistent to learn about health
standards and practices in manufacturing
food we did all of that and turned it
into something where people are like
word I would gladly give you this money
in exchange for that product and
understanding that ultimately what
you're doing is you're entering into a
voluntary transaction where you've
created something that people would
rather have than their money and so
understanding then that somebody that
has accumulated a lot of money has added
a lot of value to the world now of
course that's not always the case and
there are things where we're right to
question whether that is something that
we think is that valuable or not but if
it's happening on the open market the
open market is saying yes it is that
valuable that's why we're willing to do
that
and so the area where people get most
upset is in the area of finance and so
people look at Bankers they look at
people that make money on Wall Street
and they say that isn't fair now what I
would say about that the reason that
people equate that or that they've been
told to lie that those people are evil
that they're doing something that's bad
is because they don't feel like they
have access to that same system and that
brings me to another part you're not
just told lies the other part about
money that becomes problematic is people
aren't taught basic financial literacy
and there was a quote I forget who said
it but they said this is somebody very
very wealthy one of the famous names
unfortunately I don't remember who it
was but one of the famous names in money
and they said that if people understood
how money actually worked they'd be
rioting in the streets
and that's because the way that the
system of money works is people are kept
in the dark about how money enters the
system how money exits the system how
assets work how liabilities work and
because people are kept in the dark
about that then other people are able to
use their Superior knowledge in an Open
Marketplace to Garner more of the money
or even worse if the government is using
money to either inflate the currency
or to
redistribute money which basically is
stealing from one person and yes I'm
using that word very intentionally to
give to other people that have not
earned that money that creates all this
contention about how the money should be
used where it should be going right
there were people that were up in arms
when the airline industry was bailed out
or the banks were bailed out in the 2008
collapse
but how many of us knew that the banks
have actually paid that money back and
the government's actually made money off
of the loans that they gave to the banks
so most of us aren't taught the ABCs of
money we don't understand how investing
works we don't understand the the fact
that money is your own ability to store
your energy and effort and your
efficiency your intelligence all of that
across time and that you're getting paid
in direct proportion this is an Elon
Musk quote you get paid in direct
proportion to the difficulty of the
problems you solve so we have all this
going on money's amazing it's the great
facilitator it allows you the ability to
carry your your problem-solving
abilities across time and space but yet
it's all wrapped up in this system where
if you're not educated in the system
then there are other people that are
getting ahead way faster that are making
decisions about money that you don't
understand that you're not consulted on
and so you feel Bamboozled you don't
feel educated and you've been told lies
and so you're missing out on your own
own opportunities and so one of the
things that makes me the saddest is that
people don't even understand that
essentially what you're doing is trading
time for money and so the ability to
trade time for money is great I'm glad
that we're able to do it but if you
understand that that's what you're doing
then you begin to understand that
there's actually larger opportunities
for you that go beyond just trading time
for money so at quest for instance we
weren't trading time for money anymore
what we had done was create a system
that was making us money in our sleep
so the bars would get produced they
would get into a distribution Channel
they would go out into grocery stores
literally all over the world and people
would be buying those whether I was
awake asleep sick whatever it didn't
matter if I didn't go into work that day
we were still making sales now most
people are in situations where if
they're not going into work then they're
not making money especially if you're a
part-time employee or now is the gig
economy it just becomes massive
you don't even have a salary that you
can count on or sick days you can count
on when you're not able to come into the
office or you choose not to go into the
office that you're not generating money
and so you're in this very precarious
situation where it really really is this
one for one of trading time for money
now once you know that you're trading
time for money and you recognize that's
only one way to do things and that there
are other ways which I'll get into in a
second now your horizon begins to expand
and if for reasons of low risk you just
want to trade time for money fair enough
but what I'm hoping people understand
money is just a great facilitator it's
not evil and that people that Garner a
lot of it are the people that have
created the best system they have traded
the most value so now instead of just
trading time for money which is one way
of exchanging value for money your time
is valuable so you exchange that time
for money there are other ways to create
value for people people that isn't just
trading time for money or maybe it's you
trade time for money once but then over
time it's not just that so I'll walk you
again through how I generated my own
wealth so it starts at Quest recognizing
that there's a hole in the market so
there's a problem people want food that
they can choose based on taste and it
happens to be good for them but those
products are difficult to figure out
they're difficult to manufacture they're
certainly difficult to manufacture at
scale they're difficult tremendously
difficult to manufacture at scale in a
way that's shelf stable Okay so we've
got all of that going on we recognize
that then we did all the difficult
things to make sure that we could
deliver on that which was incredible it
took a lot of time took a lot of money
resources learnings decades worth of
learnings coming into building all that
stuff finding experts convincing them to
work with us all that stuff
and so now not only is that making money
while I sleep but it's also creating
what's known as Enterprise Value so the
company itself is becoming valuable to
other people that would want to buy that
company for whatever reason that might
be and now we get into how
interconnected money is and this is very
much a quick nutshell but just to give
you an idea of why it's so important to
be educated about money to not be just
rejecting people that make money you
know oh these evil overlords of taking
advantage of me
learn about money Master the game so
that you can play it very well so the
way the Enterprise Value works is this
if you have a company and they're trying
to grow their revenues a big reason one
of the biggest reasons why somebody
might want to grow their revenues is
that they want their stock value to go
up now the reason they want their stock
value to go up is that the value of a
company is predicated on the value of
their stock so how many individual
shares of the company exist this is
assuming it's a public company how many
individual shares of the company exist
and what are people willing to pay for
those shares what's the going rate that
at literally that moment because these
fluctuate by the second but in that
moment all of what what are known as
outstanding shares so all of the shares
that exist are and out in the world if
they were to sell all of them how much
would that be worth now a company can
not only sell if they hold some of those
shares they can sell them on the open
market and earn money that way but they
can also buy borrow against that money
and so they're able to bring on debt in
order to finance growth in the company
which could be adding new product lines
it could be expanding into different
regions whatever you could use that
money for a lot of different things but
people that really understand the
financial game at a high level are able
able to use debt as leverage okay and so
debt is often actually referred to as
leverage what they mean is maybe for in
the case of stocks equity
same thing in exchange for the
outstanding the value of the outstanding
shares they can borrow against that and
so now just by building a company that
other people want to own a piece of
they're able to borrow money right so
they didn't do
um more things the collateral is the
value of those outstanding shares and so
now they're able to grow their company
even more and so they build around their
company what is often referred to as a
moat because it's very hard to compete
with a company that has a massive value
because of the amount of money that
they're able to generate off of the
value of the stocks okay and so that's
just one way and I don't even consider
myself super educated on the way that
money Works to be completely honest this
has been a journey I've been I've always
known how to not always in my
professional career I have learned how
to make money but investing money is
actually a totally separate thing and
the more I learn about investing money
the more I'm like how are they not
teaching them us this stuff and it is
complicated but it's very learnable and
so the more that you believe this idea
that people that have a lot of money are
evil that money itself is the root of
all evil then you willfully remain
ignorant and now as you willfully remain
ignorant the people that are like yo I
know how this works they're going out
and they're garnering all the extra
resources and now the Divide between the
rich and the poor just gets wider and
wider and wider and wider and that's how
we end up here but if you like me go hey
I because remember I started out broke
I did not want to remain broke forever
and so I was like I'm gonna have to
learn how this game is played so first I
learned how to make money and now I'm on
the Journey of learning how to invest
money and the more that I learn about
this stuff the more I'm like oh my God
anybody can do this literally if you
meet a minimum line of intelligence
which if you're watching this I promise
you do if you meet a minimum line of
intelligence you're going to be able to
figure this stuff out and honestly it's
the most basic stuff that you want to do
ETFs index funds don't try to time the
market don't try to become a genius
just do really basic stuff and now
you're able to take advantage not just
of time but intelligence efficiency all
that stuff that you can remember sock
away into money and now that money
whether it's cash gold
stocks bonds whatever you decide to
invest in that's going to carry that
value across time that's so important to
understand and that's really just like
that level one of getting ahead of the
average person who's just training time
for money and then as you go you're
going to find that there's levels to
this stuff but the more you understand
the more control you have in your life
the more you're able to generate money
the less you have to worry about money
problems now money is not going to solve
anything but money problems and that's
something that's very important to
understand but as you learn to master
the game of money you really can get
ahead so please don't buy into this
narrative that money is evil that rich
people have done something wrong to get
that money they just understand
something that you may not yet
understand
there are almost certainly a lot of
things that you're doing that are going
to keep you broke the first is what we
were talking about in the last question
it's all about financial literacy do you
know how money actually works as
somebody who came to this game really
late I understand how easy it is to be
educated to be dare I say intelligent
and still not actually understand how
money actually functions and so you want
to make sure that you're taking time to
get financially literate the next thing
is and some of these are going to be so
basic and people don't do them
you need to stop spending so much money
most people live paycheck to paycheck
even people that are making six figures
live paycheck to paycheck it's something
like two-thirds of people that make 250
000 a year still live paycheck to
paycheck so the goal is instead of
flexing on how much money you make you
want to make sure that you're living
below your means if you want to
dramatically reduce the amount of stress
in your life and set yourself up for
Success you want to make sure that
you're living below your means now as
you begin to live below your means first
the first habit you're going to want to
introduce is that you're going to start
saving some of your money so of course
there's going to be amount that you're
going to allocate towards your living
expenses your house payment or your rent
your car payments Insurance all of that
stuff food but then you want to make
sure that automatically you're saving
money if you're not automatically saving
money then you're walking down the path
of remaining broke so you want to make
sure that you're living below your means
and you want to make sure that you're
automatically saving money now once you
have saved up enough money that you have
somewhere between 6 and 12 months
of emergency cash on hand
if you get sick if you hate your job any
of that stuff is exacerbated a thousand
fold if you're living paycheck to
paycheck because now you've got nowhere
to go there's no way for you to be able
to weather that storm and so it's what's
known as a threshold event everything in
your life may seem like it's going well
until you hurt your back and you're
unable to go to work for uh two months
and you were living paycheck to paycheck
and now you're in financial ruin or God
forbid you get a diagnosis and you end
up with medical bills and you go
bankrupt from that that happens so
frequently so you want to make sure that
you have six to 12 months saved up now
once you have six to 12 months saved up
now we want to start thinking about
investing now if you're not investing
you're going to be getting eaten alive
by inflation now a lot of people are not
thinking about inflation
and the reality is even in a good
economy
you're looking at inflation being around
two percent now right now as we're
recording this inflation is about eight
and a half percent so you don't want to
count on it being as low as two percent
because that's not always going to be
the case now the crazy thing is most
people don't understand what inflation
actually is so inflation is your ability
to buy something goes down every year
that's the same as losing money every
year so imagine if you have a hundred
dollars inflation if inflation is eight
point five percent like it is now the
next year by the next year because it's
happening every day by the next year you
don't have a hundred dollars even even
if you saved it didn't touch it it's
locked away in your bank account you now
have the equivalent it'll still say a
hundred dollars but that hundred dollars
now only buys you the equivalent of
ninety one dollars and fifty cents okay
that's inflation so you're buying power
even even though the number stays the
same the buying power is going down so
as of right now as we're recording this
you would need to make
eight and a half dollars every year in
order to stay at the buying power of
your 100 okay so saving money even
though I just told you to save six to 12
months
you want to make sure that you
understand that you can't just sock all
of your money away and think that it's
going to stay and this doesn't haunt
anyone more than me I get it because
investing is nerve-wracking but if you
don't invest you're not going to be able
to keep up with inflation if you don't
keep up with inflation you're going to
be losing money over time and if you're
losing money over time that nest egg
that you're going to Hope takes care of
you at the end of the day isn't going to
be there for you and so you really have
to be thoughtful about how you invest
what is up my friend Tom bilyu here and
I have a big question to ask you how
would you rate your level of personal
discipline on a scale of one to ten if
your answer is anything less than a 10
I've got something cool for you and let
me tell you right now discipline by its
very nature means compelling yourself to
do difficult things that are stressful
boring which is what kills most people
or possibly scary or even painful now
here is the thing achieving huge goals
and stretching to reach your potential
requires you to do those challenging
stressful things and to stick with them
even when it gets boring and it will get
boring building your levels of personal
discipline is not easy but let me tell
you it pays off in fact I will tell you
you're never going to achieve anything
meaningful unless you develop discipline
right I've just released a class from
Impact Theory university called how to
build Ironclad discipline that teaches
you the process of building yourself up
in this area so that you can push
yourself to do the hard things that
greatness is going to require of you
right click the link on the screen
register for this class right now and
let's get to work I will see you inside
this Workshop from Impact Theory
University until then my friends be
legendary peace out
now I'm going to give you the most basic
advice on investing now why am I giving
you basic advice because all the
smartest investors in the world are
saying if you don't know anything about
investing this is what you want to do
and because I do not consider myself a
good investor this is the only advice
that I feel like I can give you that's
actually sound advice and that is to
invest in passive things so you're going
to be investing in ETFs uh in index
funds now index funds are the easiest to
explain an index fund is a group of
companies so rather than you saying I'm
so smart I know what companies are going
to do well I would say don't do that
because even the smartest people that do
this for a living have a hard time being
right over a long period of time here is
a fact that most investors don't want
you to know most investors over a
10-year period are going to lose to an
index fund so the really smart people
with all the algorithms they're all
going to lose to just picking a big
basket of companies and investing in
those and not touching the money
and then doing something called dollar
cost averaging so rather than thinking
that you're so smart that you're gonna
beat the market right I'm going to time
it I know when the bottom is right
because the best advice on investing
you're ever going to get is the
following
Buy Low
sell High
now I I don't mean that as a joke that
really is the best advice you're ever
going to get the problem is most people
can't do it and the reason they can't do
it is they get emotional or they don't
have enough knowledge and so I see so
many people making these big bets
because it's sexy it's cool and when it
hits you feel like a king the problem is
The House Always Wins and the odds of
you on a long timeline winning like that
are virtually zero and Ray dalio made
this really clear to me so Ray dalio
runs the largest hedge fund in the world
it's called Bridgewater and Associates
and he says Tom look I'm spending
hundreds of millions of dollars on
Research I've spent probably even more
than that building the best algorithms
in the world
I have a talent pipeline where I'm
recruiting the best and the brightest
people from across the entire world I
have fiber optic cables that allow me to
make transactions that are measured in
milliseconds
and you're competing against me if
you're trying to actively trade in the
market
and so that's why people like him who
understand how this system works are
saying for the average person that's not
the game that you want to play the odds
of you losing border on 100
but if you go with something like an
index fund which is there's one called
the S P 500 the S P 500 is effectively
the 500 biggest companies on the stock
market now the odds that you become one
of the biggest companies on the stock
market and stay there you're going to
stay there for something the average
company stays on the S P 500 for like 16
years right now now it's been declining
but still that's a long time and the way
that the S P 500 works is when one
finally gets down to the bottom and it
gets booted off then they replace that
with another one and so you always have
the top 500 companies in the stock
market at that time and there's a whole
bunch of different index funds it could
be growth stocks it could be stocks in
foreign markets and whatever one you're
comfortable with but at least it's a
basket of stocks and your dollar cost
averaging in which just means that every
day or every Wednesday or whatever
you're putting in a certain amount of
money that you want to invest and you're
just going to leave it you're not going
to panic when the market goes down and
you're not going to when prices are up
you're not going to buy into the
Euphoria now why would you not want to
do that
the reason that you don't want to buy
into the Euphoria is because when price
when people are euphoric prices are
going Sky High now in those moments and
I have now lived through my first cycle
where I was really paying attention to
the market and it got euphoric so now I
know what it feels like and what it
feels like is it's always going to go up
that you're a genius you're making all
this money hand over fist now the good
news is when it all crashed I didn't
sell I didn't buy like a fiend it was
going up and I didn't sell when it went
down which means that I don't have any
realized gains or losses now of course
when things are going up if you want to
take money off the table by all means do
that you then bought low and you sold
High makes all the sense in the world
but the last thing you want to do is buy
like crazy as the price is going up and
then Panic as the price drops because
now you've bought high and sold low but
that's what most people do because the
Euphoria is so exciting and people feel
like oh there's no way that I can lose
and then when the bottom falls out they
feel like oh my God it's only going down
this is all going to go to zero and the
reality is it might
but if you follow the principle of never
investing more than you can afford to
lose then you can ride out the market
and if you're in a passive fund like in
the S P 500
then it's just your dollar cost
averaging you're just buying at that
steady interval now when the price drops
you might buy more right if you know
what a good deal looks like like hey if
the S P 500 is down 20 then maybe what
I'm going to do is buy instead of my
hundred dollars a week I'm going to put
in 150 or 200 if you have the capital of
the spare now you're getting things at a
discount right I've heard it said I
think it was by just Bree Singh that a
recession is basically just a Black
Friday deal for assets because now
everybody's panicking
prices are falling but if you've been
passively investing into something as
stable as the S P 500 now you're just
able to get more of that at a discount
it can be very advantageous and this is
why they say more millionaires will be
made in a recession than in any other
time because all of these assets are on
discount now the question is
what's an asset and so this is another
habit that keeps people broke is they're
not learning about money they're not
taking this time to figure out the
difference between an asset and a
liability people are spending all of
their money death habit number one
you're spending all of your money on
liabilities and not assets so the key is
to understand what an asset is to
understand what a liability is and to
buy appropriately an asset is something
that when you buy it's going to go up in
value and not cost you money or even
pays you money more money obviously than
it costs you
if you have a liability it's the exact
opposite so the classic example of a
liability is a car payment the second
you drive a car off the lot it's going
down in value and with very rare
exception it is never going to go back
up so it's going down in value and
you've got to keep making those payments
so you've got money going out while
value is declining another one that
people often think of as an asset but is
usually a liability is your own home now
the reason that your own home is so
frequently a liability is odds are you
have a mortgage odds are it's the most
expensive thing in your life and it's
not like you can just get out from under
that liability especially if the bottom
falls out you're gonna have property tax
depending on where you live and you're
going to have upkeep no matter where you
live so now you're pouring money into
this thing and maybe the value is going
up but maybe not always and between the
property tax and the upkeep you may be
paying more than the value is going up
over time
especially if you account for
opportunity cost so the odds of your
house after taxes fees uh upkeep all of
that being a better use of capital if
you're living in it being a better use
of capital than taking that same money
and putting it into an index fund or
something like that
a diversified portfolio let's say the
odds of the house returning more on that
are very low unless obviously if you get
into rental properties and things like
that and you're not living in it so now
it can actually generate cash flow well
then it's just a math equation this is
how much I spend on average per month
for
um Insurance uh property tax upkeep all
of that and if on average the rent that
you're getting is more than the money
that you have going out then it's very
simple every month I'm making more off
of this property then I'm losing cool
now you've got an asset so that is the
difference if you're paying for
something it's a liability if you're
making money off of something it's an
asset now most people don't have the
discipline to buy assets because
liabilities are usually the fun things
it's the cool clothes it's the car it's
the fancy house all of that stuff and so
people get themselves into a difficult
situation because now the vast majority
of their capital is going out and this
is how people end up
in a position where they're living
paycheck to paycheck okay another thing
I want to talk about that's a bad habit
is that people are on a career path
now why is that bad you ask I have so
many people around me at my company that
are on a career path and they're amazing
people but the people that really
make money are the people that get so
good at something that they can solve
the most difficult problems that the
company faces so rather than thinking oh
I am an editor and so I'm going to get
good at editing and I'm going to work my
way up that way you can basically
predict what your salary is going to be
you're more or less going to get a two
to five percent raise year over year
there'll be a couple times where maybe
you're promoted into a role within that
lane that has more UH responsibilities
and therefore you get paid more money
but you can just look at that career
path and say what is the person that's
the highest in in this chain that I'm
working my way up what do they make
that's what you're going to make plus
the sort of annual increases
on the other hand if you look at who's
the person in the company making the
most money full stop now you begin to
understand that just following that one
career trajectory is not necessarily
going to be as lucrative as solving
those very difficult problems that the
highest paid people in the company are
solving so I'll give you one example if
you want to get wealthy in a company go
into sales
I mean that's just like the classic path
to making money because now if you're
getting a commission off of what you
sell you're only hemmed in by how much
you can sell and the price of the thing
that you sell so now you've got a lot
more flexibility so be very thoughtful
as you're exchanging time for money
don't forget that you also want to be in
a position where you can exchange skill
set for money efficiency for money all
of those things allow you to break the
basic time for money equation and that
is going to be far more lucrative and
now as you're making that extra Capital
if you keep your costs of living low now
you're able to invest into those assets
and as you invest into Assets Now you're
kicking off either cash flow or you're
building up wealth over time and
something that can be sold for way more
than you bought it for okay if you do
all of that you can finally break these
habits that are keeping you broke there
are certain habits of basically all
wealthy people have in common that you
guys can put to use in your life
and the first one is going to be the
most controversial but I could not feel
more strongly about this they make no
excuses they take total responsibility
for their lives in fact many people
that fall into that category will take
responsibility for things that clearly
don't even have anything to do with
themselves
I have said many times arguably the most
controversial thing I've ever said but
I'm telling you if you adopt this in
your soul and act accordingly it will
change your life forever you will become
an Unstoppable machine
if I Tom bill you were hit by a drunk
driver I would blame myself
not because I don't think that the drunk
driver caused the accident because
blaming the drunk driver gives all my
power away and I can't do anything about
them I can't stop people from drinking I
can't control the way other people drive
but I can control whether or not I'm on
the road I can control how good I get at
defensive driving how much I pay
attention and looking out all of that
all of those things I control so if you
take control of your life and make no
excuses
now you're in a solution-oriented
mindset and people that get wealthy let
me tell you right now all they think
about are solutions how do I solve this
problem because you are if you're
wealthy you must remember your parent
you're paid in direct proportion to the
difficulty of the problems you solve and
if that's true you better get very good
at solving very difficult problems and
if you have something that's holding you
back like I'm not as smart as a lot of
people and that really pisses me off but
the reality is pissing and moaning about
it is not going to make me any smarter
all I can do is go make the most of what
I have I can go learn now I can get
pissed off at my mom I can be angry at
my dad but the reality is that I am
where I'm at from either uh how I was
impacted as a kid in the developmental
years how it's impacted in the womb my
genetics all of that stuff but it's all
done the Dias cast there's nothing I can
do about it but there's 50 of my life
that's completely malleable and so I'm
going to focus on that and I'm going to
like other wealthy people be obsessed
with learning you've got to be obsessed
with learning so you're not making any
excuses you take total responsibility
for your life and one of the ways you
take responsibility for your life is
even if circumstances are against you
even if you really haven't dealt a bad
hand you know that you can get better at
things you have the only belief that
matters the only belief that matters is
if I put energy and effort into getting
better I will actually get better now
why does that matter
because skills have utility now why does
that matter because skills that you do
something other people can't do and that
thing that it lets you do is solve
problems that people want solved what if
I said like eight times in this episode
that people will pay you in direct
proportion to the difficulty of the
problems you solve so going out learning
getting skills that have utility allows
you to do things other people can't do
you're going to be able to get money
other people can't get that is something
that wealthy people understand maybe
it's not fair but who gives a [ __ ]
nobody's coming to save you nobody's
going to solve these problems for you
and if you're turning to people for a
handout all you will ever get is what
they're willing to put in your hand
but if on the other hand
you're willing to go hey what's the
hardest problem you have to solve I'm
going to make that problem go away for
you and all I ask in return
is money
and I'm going to ask the amount of money
that's either equal to the exchange for
you or less so that you're tripping over
yourself to buy this thing and that is
precisely how you end up breaking the
time for money equation because wealthy
people understand
you just can't charge enough for your
time in order to make it worth it so as
you can imagine there are people that
offer to pay me a lot of money for
one-on-one coaching but I don't do it
and why don't I do it because unless
you're willing to give me equity in your
company to do it I just can't charge
enough to make it worth the time
so you have to break that time for money
equation you have to be getting
ownership in something and that's
another thing that people understand
wealthy people
that real wealth is going to come from
owning something
you own something that other people
consider extraordinarily valuable that
is going up over time now the reason
that ownership matters is because you
want to buy low and sell High the reason
that entrepreneurs end up making a lot
of money in success obviously is because
they start with something that's worth
nothing and they get very clever and
they build something that over time goes
from worth nothing to worth whatever the
market values it at so to give you an
example in my own life talked about this
earlier we took quests from a product I
couldn't give away literally I know that
seems ridiculous now but when we first
launched
I would stand at trade shows and tell
bodybuilders who ended up becoming like
the most Ardent purchasers of quest and
I would say
free protein bar
it's a free Quest Bar I will give it to
you right now we didn't even in the
beginning we didn't even ask for an
email all you had to do was extend your
hand grasp bar that was the sum total of
the payment that we were asking for and
people wouldn't do it
so we had to take it from figuring out
the formulation building out the
manufacturing all the things that we've
talked about
convincing people to try it and we went
from that to something that people were
willing to pay a billion dollars for
but in the beginning it was worth
nothing and so the amount of money that
we had to put in to get profitable and
then we reinvested all that money and
then ultimately we were able to sell it
for that extraordinary sum of money and
it was a huge win life changing for all
of us involved
because we started with nothing and we
owned it and we built value in it that's
the key you have to own something that
goes up in value over time so whether
you bought low and you're going to sell
high or whether you were the one that
created all the value and so you didn't
even have to buy anything you just
created value in this thing that later
people wanted to own so ownership is a
huge key for people that end up
generating wealth you want to own you
want to hold and so
um Warren Buffett talks about this a lot
selling makes you rich holding makes you
wealthy now what does he mean by that
if you want to sell something you can
get that influx of cash and you will
have whatever that cash is now but now
you're fighting against inflation right
so you've got the money but what the
hell do you do with it what are you
going to do with it that doesn't allow
it to get shipped Away by inflation
you're going to have to find somewhere
to put that money that's earning you
more money than inflation is taking and
so that's why holding really becomes the
ultimate play if you're holding the
right thing because it's going up up up
up up up over time and then you can
either borrow against that and this is
something that wealthy people understand
you can borrow against your assets you
don't even have to sell them you use the
asset as collateral you go to a bank and
let's say that you're collateral sorry
it is your collateral but your asset is
what I meant to say your asset is going
up let's say
five percent seven percent year over
year and inflation is two percent or
like right now eight eight point five
percent is the current inflation
hopefully by the time you watch this
that won't be true uh and your assets
going up by 10 percent so now you're in
a situation where even though inflation
is chipping away at most people's
ability to buy and whatever you have in
savings is going down by that amount
amount of inflation
you've got this asset that's going up
more than that cost now if you've got a
bank that's willing to give you a loan
with that asset as collateral and the
loan is let's say three or four percent
but you're making five seven percent off
of that money that you're either using
to reinvest in your company or buying
stocks or whatever you're doing you have
to be very careful buying stocks on debt
which I'm actually I advise people not
to do but just so you understand how
money works
wealthy people that know how to use debt
effectively that's what they're doing
they don't sell the asset they borrow
against the asset and as long as there's
a Delta between the cost of the loan and
the amount that the asset goes up you
now never have to sell the asset you can
just keep borrowing against it this is
how real wealth is made real
generational wealth so yes you can sell
the asset you can make that money and
you will have to do that uh over time in
order to pay back the loan and all that
stuff but again there's a Delta so even
as you're selling pieces you're making
more than you have to pay back it's
really crazy and it's freakish how long
it took me to understand even basic
things like that so trust me when I say
I deeply empathize with people who are
hearing that for the first time
so understand that they understand they
have to own something they have to own
something that goes up in value over
time that they want to own something
ideally that they can borrow against and
so that's how selling makes you rich but
owning and holding can make you truly
wealthy
all right those are the habits if you
follow those habits you really can turn
things around in your life be hyper
careful about using debt that's like the
the advanced level stuff but just by way
of making sure you understand how the
system works it can be a very powerful
tool in the right hands
I know a lot of people are asking the
question do I have a spending problem or
do I have an earning problem now the
great news is you've identified the only
two levers that there are you can either
spend less money or you can make more
money those are your two options but I
would say that most people have a
problem with both the odds that you're
spending too much money are virtually a
hundred percent unless you're really
able to Sock away money week after week
month after month year after year and so
the easy way to figure out is how much
money more money do you have at the end
of the year than you have at the
beginning and if that number is going up
and it's going well amazing now remember
the goal isn't just to save a ton of
money you want to save six to 12 months
beyond that you want to be finding a way
to invest now look there are certain
economies because I feel bad saying this
right now knowing that I have a huge
portion of my wealth right now in cash
so some of this has to do with Seasons
the reason is I think that we're in a
very bizarre period of volatility right
now that I don't expect to last I am now
beginning to look more seriously at
different assets because I do think that
things are relatively depressed right
now be aware though I am not a financial
advisor this is not Financial advice you
should be very careful you take
Financial advice from so when it comes
into the specifics I would say go find
somebody that knows way more about what
I'm talking about but just getting you
to understand I was feeling weird not
admitting that right now I have a ton
more uh in cash than I would normally so
anyway there are different seasons but
for the most part you don't want to have
a bunch of money in cash you want to
have your six to 12 months and then you
want to have the rest invested in
something that is very passive you're
not in there actively trading going up
against people like Ray dalio
um you're taking a basket of things
you're not trying to time the market
you're not trying to outsmart the market
you're saying this is how I say to
myself I'm not smart enough to pull this
off so I'm going to take a diversified
approach to buying low selling High AI I
can't time the market so I'm in a dollar
cost average in and then I'm just going
to make sure that my assets are going up
over a long period of time I'm not going
to panic about little blips so and I'm
talking like three to four year
movements so I'm not worried about
something going down over a three year
period I'm just thinking okay I want to
make sure that I have a very robust
Diversified portfolio and that it's
going up over longer periods of time and
just look at historicals how is it
performed historically there are no
guarantees of course but if something is
done well over the last hundred 120
years odds are that you can roughly
count on something like that moving
forward and so that is
um the very basic approach that I would
take you want to make sure that at the
end of the month that you've got more
coming in than you have going out and it
really is that basic and then just
remember there are two levers to pull
you can either spend less which is
always an option don't think yourself
cool because you have a fancy car our
fancy house fancy watch fancy clothes
none of that I buy most of my clothes on
Amazon
obviously I could afford a lot more but
I just don't tie I actually do tie
myself to my sense of style which I
actually do like but I don't tie that to
whether the clothes are expensive or not
and I remind myself constantly I could
wake up broke tomorrow so don't tie your
identity to that don't be afraid to pull
back your expenses as just free seeing
has said many times if you can't buy
something five times don't buy it once I
think that is very good advice so be
super thoughtful about your spending and
then go crazy on figuring out ways to
make more money because personally I
couldn't live in a world where all I was
doing was saving I want to be excited
about my potential upside opportunities
and so for a lot of you figuring out a
way to invest in yourself to take a
chance on yourself as either having a
side hustle or being a full-blown
entrepreneur will be the greatest
journey of your life even if it doesn't
end up paying off financially it will be
an incredible journey and if you love it
you love that Hustle as long as you're
not investing so much money into the
bank that into the into the business
that it becomes stressful if you lose it
then hey that first one fails try try
again until you find one that succeeds
successful entrepreneurs almost always
have a Litany of failures behind them so
don't stress yourself over that just
make sure that you're in a position
where you don't need a lot of money to
survive then you can do a lot of cool
and exciting things the most important
question you can ever ask about money is
can money buy happiness and I'm begging
you and pleading with you over the next
however many minutes please pay
attention so that you may learn easily
what I learned with great difficulty
money can't buy happiness I'm sure
you've heard that a thousand times but I
want to tell you why it can't buy you
happiness but why people keep chasing
money because people are always going to
chase money and the reason people are
going to chase money is because it is
extraordinarily powerful but it can't
touch how you feel about yourself
so I think that people have been told
lies about money like we were talking
about earlier but one of the lies that
you've been told is that money isn't
powerful it's not going to make you feel
the way that you want to feel and the
truth is it isn't going to make you feel
better about yourself but it is a great
facilitator and so if there's something
that you want to build money is going to
unlock that money can make you feel
amazing that you can do something
incredible with your uh your time your
opportunity your knowledge you can build
something extraordinary that is this
economic engine that serves people I
think entrepreneurship is turning your
potential into skill set in a way that
allows you to build this ongoing
economic engine that allows you to
create something that improves people's
lives that to me is entrepreneurship and
that's awesome that feels amazing
so money's more powerful than people
think
but it doesn't make you happy what makes
you happy is striving to add value to
people's lives to improve every day
those are the things that are going to
make you happy so even if you're
pursuing trying to create a business and
that business fails and you end up not
only not making money you lose money
the failure will suck don't get me wrong
but when you're going all out every day
and you're improving and you're helping
people and you're bettering their lives
and you're sincerely pursuing getting
better so that you can serve people in a
way that feeds you and gives you more
energy than it takes that is the juice
the greatest thing that life has to
offer you is the following okay this I'm
telling you this from the position of
somebody who's made a lot of money
the greatest joy life has offered the
highest amplitude joy that life has to
offer is the following
you are working very hard you were
scaling a mountain and that mountain is
incredibly difficult I know meaning
literal Mountain you're building a
business you're working to become a
great athlete whatever you are working
your ass off it is hard you were on this
Mountainside you have frostbite in your
fingers you can barely hold on but
you're going you can't believe it you
look down it is a terrifying drop if you
fall you die it's nerve-wracking man the
stakes are high but you decide you're
going to keep climbing you're going to
keep climbing and the moment where
you're working your ass off but you can
see the ledge you're about to get to it
it's all working everything that you've
been busting your ass it's actually
happening oh my God and if I get to that
top and I push myself up it's you know
it's it's success it's a buffet it's an
orgy it's whatever it's something
incredibly exciting that you have just
been so amped to get up there to
that is way more exciting than the
success the having of whatever it is
that's on your Mountaintop
it's that moment there where you're
clinging to your fingers you're clinging
to the side of the mountain with your
frost bitten fingers
and it looks like it's going to work
but it hasn't paid off yet but if it
does pay off it will be extraordinary
that dream that moment it's all working
and if I pull this off my dreams come
true that's better than your dreams
coming true
why
because the way the human mind works
you can never eat a meal
so satisfying that you're never going to
be hungry again
you can never drink a drink so thirst
quenching that you'll never be thirsty
again
you can never have sex so good that you
never want sex again it's just not the
way that it works
we have this internal hunger that nature
has given us to make sure that we keep
going and we keep getting fed and we
keep
getting water and we keep procreating we
have to keep doing all this stuff so you
have from an evolutionary perspective
buried inside of you an insatiable drive
to keep going so you can't ever have
that thing even happiness is fleeting
you can't have happiness you can't hold
on to it it's never going to be yours
forever
it will come in and out of your life
but the things that create happiness
Improvement
sincere Pursuit
doing something you're passionate about
helping other people
those are the things that are going to
make you feel the way that you want to
feel
now
the master trick that money pulls is one
because it's useful in the way that we
talked about the great facilitator it
allows you to build
people will chase it forever
when people get it they get all these
signals of success and because
people often struggle with money
problems they look at that and they
think oh my God if I had all those cool
things I would feel about myself the way
I feel about that person and all of my
stresses would go away the reality is
money will make money problems go away
it really will do that and it's
incredible and it will alleviate a ton
of stress in your life
but it will never make you feel about
yourself the way you feel about that
person
because you have misattributed
being in awe of that person
with the money
the reality is what you're in awe of is
that they were able to translate their
efforts into tangible success
now that you should be in awe of that
you should strive for and that striving
even if you're never able to achieve the
level of accomplishment that you want
that's striving that Improvement that
translating
your potential into actual usable skill
set
that will make you proud of yourself
that will give you self-respect that
will give you self-worth
don't worry
about the championship ring
worry deeply about becoming capable of a
championship performance
because nature will reward you for that
that's why
it feels so good to make progress nature
only has two levers Pleasure and Pain
Nature's job is to ensure that you stay
alive long enough
to have kids that have kids
that's all nature cares about and she
doesn't care about you nature doesn't
care about me nature just cares that we
stay alive long enough to have kids that
have kids the selfish Gene hypothesis
if that's true
then we know that it's going to use the
two levers that it has Pleasure and Pain
it's going to make pleasurable the
things that it wants us to do more of
that are going to Keep Us Alive long
enough to have kids that have kids and
it's going to make painful the things
that put us in jeopardy
and one of the things that is likely to
Keep Us Alive long enough to have kids
that have kids is this pursuit of
improvement so that we can get better so
that we can acquire skills that allow us
to hunt better gather better support the
tribe better fight better whatever but
we need to constantly be improving
because skills have utility it lets us
do things other people can't do lets us
protect the group but let's just protect
ourselves it lets us stay fed it lets us
survive a famine it lets us survive
Warfare all of that stuff it lets us
convince somebody to mate with us
skills have utility
and so nature had a hard wire
the acquisition of that Improvement and
make that incredibly joyful to make it
feel good that's also why Nature Made
that moment where oh my God this is
going to work feels so good
so you'd keep going so you would do
those things so you would reach that
Mountaintop
maybe there were greener pastures more
animals better berries whatever
but you had to have that incentive
money can't make that feeling
inside of you money's never going to
give you that
but becoming the kind of person that's
capable of being so talented that they
can solve problems that people are
willing to pay for that will make you
happy
so the two end up coinciding when you
have the right mindset when you're doing
it for the right reasons when you put
money in the right box the great
facilitator it won't make you respect
yourself all of your insecurities are
still going to be there
but it will eliminate money problems it
will allow you to build and the pursuit
of the things that people will give you
that kind of money for will turn you
into the kind of person that you'll be
proud of
that's the truth about money I was once
asked if I only had a thousand dollars
to invest how should I go about doing
that
all right so number one when I was
actually in that position all I did was
spend my money on getting myself
educated so knowledge may be the right
answer here but since that's not as cool
or tactical uh as what I'm about to go
through I would just say that learning
is always going to be the right answer
make sure no matter what you're doing
that learn as much as you can that's
going to be the thing that will move you
forward uh far more than any finite of
money amount of money in any kind of
investment is going to return knowledge
is the thing that monetizes forever so
money spends once knowledge monetizes
forever okay now having said that I will
say there are three things that if I had
a thousand dollars to invest that I
would do now again I don't consider
myself a master investor so take this
for what it's worth the first thing that
I would do and the bulk of what I would
advise you to do with your money this is
actually not what I did I did the first
thing I said which is learn like crazy
and then the third thing which I will
tell you when we get to that's where I
put the absolute vast majority of my
money but the first thing that I would
do in terms of giving other people safe
advice not knowing how good they are how
diligent hard-working all of that good
stuff I will say number one is to buy a
very safe asset something like the S P
500 something where you're just gonna
dollar cost average into the stock
market like we talked about something
that has a long track record of success
uh that it's very hard for people to
beat the market and that's just sort of
the The Benchmark right is the market
you at least want to be hitting that so
I would do that a nice Diversified
portfolio dollar cost average and that's
where I would advise you to put the bulk
of your money knowing that I'm going to
fully confess at the end what I actually
spent my money on uh the second thing is
while I would say there should be a much
smaller part of your portfolio I would
do something that is a future facing bet
now the reason that I think that you
should do this but make it a much
smaller part of your portfolio is the
odds are that you're going to be wrong
but I think it's very important for you
to force yourself to come up with a
thesis about the future that you're
actually willing to put your money on
and maybe you come up with a few things
and so you hedge your best and you put
it on a couple things the big bet that
I'm making about the future right now
knowing that I could be wrong but man I
can't convince myself that this is wrong
is
um cryptocurrency so I'm just an
absolutely massive believer in the
blockchain and so I think that it's
going to transform everything and I'm
saying this in the middle of a bear
Market I have not sold a single Satoshi
so I have put a substantial portion of
my net worth into that but not more than
I could lose without being stressful so
I want to be very clear I never advise
anybody even somebody in my position to
invest more than they're willing to lose
now because of that that we're in a bear
market right now I don't really care as
long as my long-term thesis is intact
which I think the world is going more
and more digital I think people are
going to digitize more and more things
and money for sure is going to be one of
those things it so happens that I think
as of right now the two safest bets
because I'm actually quite risk averse
until we get to number three where you
see I'm a total psycho for risk but for
most things I am totally risk averse so
I've only invested into two things that
I hold currently I had three at one
point in any major way I think I have
some minor things here and there but
very minor and that's Bitcoin and
ethereum so now do your own research if
your thesis on what the future is is
totally different that's the key that
you're forcing yourself to come up with
a thesis about where the future is going
and you're going to clock it and see if
you end up being right so my whole thing
is I don't know that I'm right about
this I want to see if if I'm right so
I'm making a bet on the future not so
much it would be stressful if I lost it
all and I'm going to see how this plays
out now as I begin to trust myself more
this is where you just take a call it
the risk bucket so the first bucket is
the as low risk as we can and still beat
inflation bucket and now we're going to
take a slightly higher risk bucket I'm
still like trying to be really
thoughtful about what's the within this
riskier
um category what's the safest bet so I'm
going to play it that way but it is
riskier but I'm doing it to really learn
can I read the future or not so the
wrong way to say it can I create an
informed enough enough hypothesis that
I'm right enough to beat inflation right
that's always the name of the game so
again I'm only investing as much as I'm
willing to lose and then I watch and I
learned something about myself and I
don't lie to myself or trick myself if I
end up being wrong I need to own that I
was wrong and figure out what was it in
my thesis that fell apart so that I can
get better over time and and also I'm
being very thoughtful about who I listen
to right not something that you really
want to do as you're investing this
money who are you going to take advice
from right so being really thoughtful
about that and then checking their track
record are they able to beat the market
okay now the third bucket remember what
I actually spent my money on when I was
in a position to be asking this question
was learning and then this final thing
which is myself
and I have
irrationally bet on myself in life now
it ended up paying off at least so far
and so we can be tempted to say
survivorship bias or to not recognize
that it could be survivorship bias right
there could be a million universes in
which betting on myself was the worst
thing I could have ever done and so I
way overextended myself on the bed of
myself portion of this bucket
but that was always my strategy was I
wanted to
invest in myself knowing that I had to
get so good that I could do other things
that people couldn't do that I had to
take complete and total ownership of my
life I couldn't make any excuses I could
never say oh this is somebody else's
fault and if I ended up homeless there
was no one to blame but myself now I was
very comfortable with that so you have
to be really thoughtful about how
comfortable you are with that and what
is your worst case scenario look like I
have the very good fortune of when I was
in my young days and I really didn't
know how I was going to put food on the
table that I knew I could always go back
and live with my mom and I used to say
that to myself and not everybody has
that but I was like well worst case
scenario I'm not going to starve to
death I just need to save enough gas
money that I could drive back home and I
was like okay I know I can't ever go
below the gas money it would take me to
give back to my mom if you don't have
that kind of safety net you need to be
really honest about that and so you know
where are you how much would you need to
save up before you can start betting on
yourself like that and maybe you need to
do it in smaller increments so you're
betting on yourself but in this side
hustle and only when the side hustle is
making more money would you leave your
steady paycheck
so that was a big thing for me and then
obviously over time I was very
thoughtful actually about making sure
that I wasn't burning my ships at the
shore and so I had a steady paycheck I
was making sure that I was going to be
able to at least keep food on the table
but when Lisa came into the equation now
I felt like there really is somebody
else that I have to think about and so I
actually became a little bit more
risk-averse I still have a massive risk
tolerance uh a a what would probably
distress most people
um but I have found that if you can
really check yourself so that you know
okay this isn't working you're not lying
to yourself you know when something is
going in the wrong direction you're
willing to stare nakedly at your
inadequacies you can trust yourself to
invest because you know at some point
I'm just going to have to admit this
isn't working I need to scale back pivot
whatever the case is and so I definitely
trust myself to do that and given that I
have Lisa who is just a wicked
entrepreneurial mind that I've got
somebody else that's going to be able to
gut check me and say okay this isn't
making sense but I think having a bucket
but you have to consider that betting on
yourself is the highest risk bucket so
you want to be very very careful you are
the oh God what's the phrase
um
you never want to fool yourself and
you're the easiest person to fool and so
you have to be very careful knowing that
your whole job is to be honest with
yourself be able to accurately
self-assess and that the thing you're
probably the worst in the world at
assessing is yourself so you have to be
very very thoughtful that it's going to
be all too easy to convince yourself
that you're a sure bet I had convinced
myself that I was a sure bet but you'll
notice that I didn't give you the same
advice because I know how insane that is
and that the fact that I was able to
convince myself to do it
even though it worked out like I try to
be very realistic about
like you want to be really really
careful and so I would not advise other
people to do the very thing that I did
so all the things that I've talked about
today are the things that I strongly
encourage you to do I do not advise you
to you know be crazy high risk don't
burn the ships to the shore be very
thoughtful protect your downside which
is definitely something that is between
the lines talked about but I'm glad that
I'm saying that now explicitly you want
to protect your downside be very careful
make sure that you have an exit do not
put yourself in a position where you
don't know what your way out of this is
going to be don't get yourself so
overextended that there's no way to back
out right don't be getting so many
liabilities so much debt
that there's no way out of that stuff
because that is when you're not going to
be able to bet on yourself now there's
all this pressure and all this stress it
has to work out gun to your head ships
have been burned to the shore
I don't know about you but that does not
feel like a fun way to live my life
so
those are the things that I would do if
I were you I would learn as much as I
can I would get invested into a very
safe asset
I would figure out how well I'm able to
read the future and have a smaller
bucket recognizing that it's a risky
bucket but protecting myself against the
Dallas side in that one and then
because you never want to leave
something out in the field you want to
make sure that you push yourself as hard
as you can bet on yourself even if
that's
switching jobs taking a lower paying job
because it's going to be a better
long-term career that kind of thing you
don't have to be an entrepreneur to bed
on yourself but find a way to bet on
yourself but make sure you recognize
that as the riskiest basket right guys
learn how the game of money works you
really can't master the game you do not
have to be beholden to anybody I started
out broke and I completely turned my
life around and I did it by mastering a
set of ideas and those ideas are
available to you we talked about them
many of them today and may they serve
you as well as they have served me until
next time my friends be legendary take
care peace
all right if what I just told you about
how the game of money works you were
definitely going to want to watch this
next clip about how to get your mindset
right it will help you play the game
even better
each and every one of you at some point
in your life you are going to hit rock
bottom
the question isn't will you hit rock
bottom the question is what are you
going to do with yourself when it
happens
and for me I was teaching film and I met
these two buff Rich guys and I thought
oh my God six-pack abs and well
I've got to follow these guys it's
literally like I was meant to meet them
and they said Tom you're coming to the
world with your hand out
and if you want to control your art if
you want to control your life you've got
to get rich
so hey come on
we're starting this technology company
we need a copywriter you'd be perfect
for the job
so I went and I did it and I said but
don't think of yourself as a copywriter
understand this is a startup you can
have any job in this company that you
want you just have to become the right
person for the job
so I took them seriously
and I started working my ass off to get
better
to focus on the things that I needed to
do in order to get good to grow and be
able to execute
and I got so good
that by the time we sold that company I
was the chief marketing officer and
they'd given me 10 of the company just
based on performance so imagine giving
somebody something that amounts to
millions of dollars just based on how
hard they've worked
that was the kind of Blood Sweat and
Tears that I put into it but when I came
into it we all thought it was going to
take us about 18 months to sell the
company
eight and a half years later
in the depths of despair
I realized something had to change
and I went to my partners and I quit
and I said guys here's your Equity back
I don't believe I should get anything I
don't plan to cross the finish line
I'm gonna go do something that makes me
feel alive
and let me tell you right now I said
that from the position of being in a
place where I had ownership in a company
worth millions of dollars
I was making more money than I'd ever
made in my life
I was standing in a beautiful conference
room overlooking the Pacific Ocean in
the house of a company that we had built
that was winning Awards and I was so
fundamentally unhappy that I finally had
the first of what would become a string
of very profound and important
realizations and that is the game you
think you're playing is money
but I promise the game you're actually
playing is brain chemistry
if I gave you four billion dollars
tomorrow but inside you felt suicidal
and you felt worthless
what would be the point of the money
conversely if I gave you three dollars
but you felt fulfilled and like you were
contributing not only to yourself to
your family to other people you felt
alive inside what you're doing meant
something to you and you felt that you
had significance
what does the money matter
anybody ever read the poem Richard Corey
I read this poem when I was like nine
years old and it left a lasting
impression on me and it was about the
best looking richest guy in town the
guys wanted to be him and the girls
wanted to be with him and the poem ends
with Richard Corey going home and
putting a bullet in his head
That's The Human Condition how many
people have you met in your life you
think they're spectacular they're
amazing
and yet they're so fundamentally unhappy
that they're in the grips of depression
we're living through a mental pandemic
right now
it is almost ubiquitous to know somebody
who has depression and or anxiety
and the reason is people don't
understand the game they're playing the
game you're playing is a game of
brain chemistry it's chemicals that flow
through your brain it's a mindset once
you understand that then you can begin
to structure your life in a way that
actually makes sense
this is a long ass quote but I'm going
to read it all to you because these once
you understand this
you will understand everything you need
to know about life
to those humans
who are of any concern to me I wish
suffering desolation sickness ill
treatment and dignities I wish that they
should not remain unfamiliar with the
profound self-contempt the torture of
self-mistrust the wretchedness of the
vanquished I have no pity for them
because I wish them the one thing that
can prove today whether one is worth
anything or not
that one endures
that's life
That's The Human Condition
most people think that Charles Darwin
said that it's the survival of the
fittest Darwin never said that it was
said years after his death what he did
say and burn this into your nervous
system
what Darwin said was
it's not the strongest of the species
that survives nor the most intelligent
but rather the most adaptive to change
the reason human beings are the apex
predator is because what we are good at
is change what we are good at is taking
a stressor a stimulus and changing our
body look at the people around you look
at homie over there Jack to the nines
Tommy shredded
they were not born like this
okay I grew up in a morbidly obese
family I'm not supposed to be lean
we adapt because we force ourselves
through something that is painful and we
endure
what was Tommy talking about the
takeaway from Angela Duckworth's book
that really stuck with him many people
start but few endure
it's not interesting whether or not you
guys have a dream I don't care if you
have a dream I am so uninterested in
empty dreamers I can't see straight what
I care about do you have the fortitude
to fail and what do you learn from that
failure do you get back up do you keep
going do you force yourself to recognize
that this is a question of adaptation
you simply have not done to yourself
what you need to do
in order to be good enough to succeed
and it really is that simple once you
accept
that the thing that separates you from
the rest of the animal kingdom
is an unimaginable ability to become
you have an unimaginable ability to
become something
in 2014 private companies averaged eight
percent annual growth
after I went into my partners and I said
I quit
and I'm gonna go do something that makes
me feel alive they were totally shocked
and I got all the way to my house and I
was on the phone with my wife I did it I
had been unhappy for so long
and I said I did it I told him I quit I
gave back the equity here I am and I'm
pulling into the driveway at my house
and my phone rings
and it's my partners
they say come out to dinner with us
out of respect and love I went out to
dinner with them
and they said the now famous words
we could do this without you
but we don't want to
and that gave me what I needed to
connect to something other than money
it reminded me of the Brotherhood it
reminded me that I'd fallen in love with
these guys as human beings that there
was something more than money there was
something more than being a clever
marketer
that I remembered for a second who I am
the things that make me unique that I
have a desire to connect that I actually
enjoy communities that I'm not a guy
with a Killer Instinct I'm not
interested in stepping on my cons my
competitors next that's just not how I'm
wired I'm wired to build something I'm
wired to see people shine I love seeing
other people win I think it's incredible
now that doesn't mean that I don't want
to win I want to win at the absolute
highest level I want to be the greatest
of all time
I want more people to write about me
going to Mars because they're terrified
to try to match my intros
I want that right and I hope each and
every one of you wants to play at that
level I hope each and every one of you
looks at the greatest of all time and
says if I'm willing to break myself and
have to get there I could do it
but being honest with who you are being
honest that if there's something else
that you want to bring to the table that
you find a way to do that and so I said
guys I will come back and work with you
on one condition
I will never
prioritize money again
my highest value in business is
camaraderie and at the time that was
sacrilege we had made a pact with each
there was three of us the three of us
had made an actual pact that we would do
whatever it took to make our technology
company more profitable and if that
meant skipping a family vacation if that
meant waking up at 2 A.M on a Saturday
to meet and brainstorm we did it both of
those stories are real we did things
like that I would go away with my wife
for Christmas to see her family in
London and I would literally take a
camera with me so I could watch
the company
back in La I've never switched off I
didn't take days off I was working no
matter where I was I was working seven
days a week I didn't take a real
vacation meaning that I wasn't actually
working while we were on it for six and
a half years
so if I'm gonna go back to that this is
going to be in service of something that
I can believe in this is going to be
something that makes me feel alive this
is going to be something that I'm
passionate about it's going to be
something that I actually feel like I'm
contributing to the world that I would
be willing to do all of that with a
smile on my face and I said the only
question I will ever ask again in the
context of business is this
what would I do
and love every day
even if I was failing
if you guys can get on board with that
if we can build something from a
position of wanting to bring value and
not worrying about the money then we can
work together
and so they said that they felt the same
way and we started this crazy protein
bar company Called Quest Nutrition
everyone told us that we were out of our
minds I was talking to Ben earlier about
imagine you're a 15 year old who wants
to play in the NBA and all you hear all
day long is kids you're never gonna make
it
and to have the fortitude as a teenager
to push through that and believe in
yourself so what I call the arrogance of
belief I was so on fire with the notion
that now I was going to do something
that I believed in now I can think about
my mom and my sister every day my mom
and my sister both morbidly obese I knew
they were going to die too soon if I
didn't do something about it I believed
it was my problem to solve I believe
there was nothing I couldn't do if I set
my mind to it
and armed with that armed with the
passion to know that I'm showing up
every day fighting for my mom and my
sister I'm not thinking about money I'm
not going to make decisions based on
profitability I'm going to make
decisions based on what is metabolically
real what is the actual answer to the
question of how do you end metabolic
disease
and I play a game called No [ __ ]
what would it take
no [ __ ] what would it take to end
metabolic disease
and the answer is you have to make food
that people choose based on taste and it
happens to be good for them
that's the only way it's going to happen
on a global scale
and so that's what we set out to do but
when you're armed with the notion of I
want to end metabolic disease not I want
to get rich not I want to sell my
company
I want to end metabolic disease and you
let that be your driver now you know
what your why is
and we'll get to that more in a minute
by putting that mindset at the Forefront
from 2010 to 2013 alone Quest grew by 57
000 percent
comparative companies were growing by
eight
we grew by 57 000. I'm telling you right
now saving the world doing the right
thing thinking about your customer
wanting them to win wanting them to
shine wanting great things for your
employees it's big [ __ ] business
[Applause]
at Quest we made more in a single day
than our previous company made annually
all by putting the customer first
all by saying we're only going to do
what's actually metabolically
advantageous because how does it serve
me to make a product that doesn't when
my mission in my opinion was to save my
mom
and I would ask myself of every decision
tough decision that we had to make
which decision actually helped save my
mom
and then we would make that decision
we hit number two on the Inc 500 list we
were officially a unicorn company we
were a startup that bootstrapped believe
it or not and made it all the way to
evaluation of over a billion dollars all
right if you guys want to have success
in your life and I don't care what it is
that you're trying to do there's going
to be two things you need to do we're
going to talk about the first one now
which is develop your mindset we'll get
to the second one later which is build
your business but we'll get to that for
now let's just talk about your mind the
most important thing
is your mind make no mistake about that
right now the only thing that is holding
you back I promise you and whatever
excuse you're telling yourself it's
[ __ ] the only thing that's holding
you back
is the way that you think about yourself
in the world
that's it flat you have not built the
mechanisms in your mind that you need to
free yourself from the Matrix and boys
and girls The Matrix has you
who knows David Foster Wallace
you all have an assignment to do and by
the way if you don't do this
don't think for one second you actually
want to be successful stop [ __ ]
fooling yourself and go do something
easier
because this video is like 18 minutes
long it's one of the most profound
things you'll ever watch David Foster
Wallace this is water
in the talk what he makes clear is the
fish is the last one to realize that
it's in water think about it from a
human perspective we had to discover air
we had to discover gravity they're so
ubiquitous you literally don't see them
you take them for granted as just being
there and that's how people take their
belief system
right now you think you're capable of
certain things and incapable of others
and that is your water
and until you can identify it until you
can see that you're telling yourself
lies and they are disempowering Lies by
the way because I am not some Grand fan
of the truth
I'm a grand fan of doing and believing
that which moves you towards your goals
do and believe that which moves you
towards your goals that's it once you
put that belief at the core of your
being you will be amazed at what you're
able to accomplish when I say take the
red pill what I'm talking about is
waking up to the way the world really is
the amount of potential that you have I
always say is nearly
Unlimited
but I only say that so I don't have to
get into stupid arguments with people
about throwing absolutely ridiculous
things out just to try to defeat the
notion
and that's somebody who wants me to be
wrong but ask yourselves right now if my
message is you can do anything you set
your mind to without limitation don't
you hope I'm right
and even if I'm wrong how much farther
will you go simply because you were
willing to believe humans lead with
belief humans lead with belief you won't
take the first step down to any path
unless you believe you can actually get
where you're going and this is where
people get stuck in The Matrix
you don't push yourself hard enough you
don't make big enough demands you think
small you dream small you make small
demands of yourself if you want to see
what big demands look like look at David
Goggins anybody know David Goggins
for those of you who don't let me tell
you a quick story David Goggins is a
Navy SEAL he wanted to honor Fallen
seals to do that he wanted to pick the
hardest thing that he could think of it
was a 135 mile race the person who put
on the race said you can't enter my race
unless you run 100 miles in a 24-hour
period have you the answer was no he
said there's one four days from now if
you can complete four days to weigh 250
pounds in four days if you can complete
a 100 mile race literally running around
a high school track think about how
torturous that would be if you can
complete
a hundred miles
in 24 hours then you get to run my race
and raise the funds for your charity
so David decides he's going to run that
race
he wasn't prepared he was overweight
by mile 70 he had broken both of his
feet
he had shin splints his calf muscles
were beginning to tear off the bone he
sat into a chair because he literally
had nothing left to give
he urinated on himself blood
because he couldn't move he couldn't get
up to go to the restroom so he defecated
on himself
and as he's sitting there in the chair
peeing blood in total Agony with
feces on his back
the only question he had was what do I
need to do to finish the remaining 30
miles
and so he taped his feet so that they
would go numb and he would stop feeling
the pain of the broken feet he ate
something so that he would have the
needed energy to keep going
and he got up and he started walking
and he walked for I don't remember how
many miles and his wife said at this
pace
you're not going to finish
and so he ran the remaining 19 miles
broken feet
stress fractures in his Shins
blood
excrement and he finished on time
that's what a human being is capable of
we limit ourselves and it's only us
there's nobody else that's doing it to
you you've chosen to adopt those beliefs
and once you've pushed yourself outside
of that comfort zone what becomes
possible is absolutely miraculous now I
choose to believe that my potential is
Limitless and because of that I've gone
from scrounging in my couch cushions to
find enough change to put gas in my car
that is a true story to building a
billion dollar business
all right how do you do it if this is
about building your mindset how
to me it's about mind the gap there is a
gap between who you are now and who you
need to become and that Gap is a gap of
skill set plain and simple remember
you're an adaptation machine your job is
to place yourself under stress
and then force yourself to grow
so back to Mr yoked
you don't get those muscles by looking
at the weights you get those muscles by
going under the weight and not stopping
when it hurts you stop when you can no
longer recruit the muscles enough to
move the weight that's when you're done
and when you're able to do that what
you're actually doing is tearing down
the muscle fiber
and a lot of people when they begin
working out they don't realize that's
actually the name of the game the name
of the game is to break the muscle down
and then the body comes and builds it
back up
the conscious part is tearing it down
your job is to put yourself in stressful
situations your job is to push yourself
to the limit of what you think you're
capable of and then go past that and
when you're able to push yourself past
that when you're able to get into the
Goggins reps as I call it when you're
able to exist in that zone long past
where it started hurting long past when
it got boring long past when you were
terrified that you'd never be able to do
it that's when you'll begin to adapt
because you're telling your body adapt
or die
that's how you're going to get where you
want to go
now I love the movie The Matrix as was
made very clear in the intro
the real question is what is your kung
fu
you've got to figure that out
right this is a path to execution we're
talking about right now path one is
about the mindset
so what is your kung fu my kung fu is
business
I knew that I was gonna have to learn
business in order to control the
resources in order to control my art
and this is how you're going to develop
your kung fu one always be reading the
most important mathematical formula you
will ever encounter is right there I I
equals IO it stands for ideas in equal
ideas out
if you want to solve a problem in your
business that's become particularly
tricky you need to be taking in a ton of
data so that your unique mind your
unique worldview your unique life having
grown up the way that you grew up the
way that your brain is wired all of it
you will come up with ideas that nobody
else is going to come up with
but you first have to be getting that
stimulus now I doubt I have to over
preach that one to a bunch of people
that have come to a conference like this
these are literally the kinds of ideas
you want to be encountering two open
yourself up to being changed I can't
tell you how many times I've recommended
people my list of books which by the way
you can find on impact theory.com Tom's
reading list it is the 25 books any
human being that wants to excel should
read in order
and before every book say a little
prayer and the prayer goes like this
I am open to being changed fundamentally
and for the better by this book
I am open to being changed fundamentally
and for the better
from this book
you've got to go into the book wanting
it to be right you've got to go into the
book hoping that it gives you some piece
of knowledge remember everyone everyone
is your Superior in some way
and once you learn to check your ego sit
at their feet with absolute humility
and be open to their ideas especially
the one that contradicts what you
believe today then you'll get somewhere
and I've got some really amazing news
for you guys
your current skill set
has already taken you as far as it's
going to take you
if you don't put yourself on a path to
learn and very aggressively where you
are now is where you'll be in five years
the key is crossing that Chasm of skill
set
all right realize what you believe is a
choice
this is something that's really hard for
people because they think some things
are objectively true and other things
are not and that's simply a lie and
that's why
The Matrix is the perfect metaphor think
about this for a second
your brain
is locked in total darkness it never
sees light
your brain is locked in total silence it
never hears sounds
what your brain does is take stimulus
the agitation of the air and it
transmits it into chemical electrical
signals it does the same with photons
falling on your eye
But ultimately this thing that you're
experiencing the distance that you feel
from me it's all happening in your mind
there's actually two dime-sized blank
spots in your field of vision where the
optic nerve connects to the eye and yet
you don't experience it it's right in
the center
so why don't you experience it because
your brain is insanely good at guessing
what should be there and filling it in
that's when I realized my brain is lying
to me
now I may have all the best intentions
in the world but make no mistake your
brain is making [ __ ] up
and is making up a lot of [ __ ]
and so you've got to choose what to
believe who here has a negative voice in
their head that tells them to be careful
be safe you probably can't do it this is
all going to go wrong
now do you believe that voice to be
objectively true
okay so that voice is lying to you as
well now it has great intentions it's
trying to make sure you don't get eaten
by a lion in the bush
that doesn't happen a lot in modern
society so maybe a little less useful in
today's day and age and then the really
protective one is trying to make sure
you don't get ostracized by the group
which in years past would have meant
certain death but now
you don't need the group you can survive
just fine there's a grocery store around
every corner you can get shelter of some
kind
it may be lonely as hell but the chances
of you dying from being ostracized are
virtually zero so you've got outdated
software outdated algorithms running in
your mind
your job is to develop what I call an
OverWatch mechanism
the OverWatch is the emotionally sober
part of you
that distrusts every signal and impulse
that your brain gives you
and once you can get over that in fact
there's a great quote from Da Vinci the
greatest form of control is control over
oneself
so the reason I love Star Wars is
because it's all about mind control
but not mind control over other people
don't worry about that mind control over
yourself
being able to tell yourself these are
not the droids you're looking for
that's when this gets really powerful
all right so believe is a choice we're
gonna talk about that more be an eternal
student we've talked about that and last
one become anti-fragile
all right we're gonna go really deep on
anti-fragile so I won't belabor the
point and develop grit all right how do
you become anti-fragile this is probably
one of the most important things you
guys need to learn becoming anti-fragile
was literally the thing that changed my
life and I remember the day that it
happened
I had just started working for my two
partners
they were very smart clearly much
smarter than I
and I had built my self-esteem around
being smart and being right and now all
of a sudden I found myself these two
Incredible Minds that could process data
more rapidly than I can so I'm not going
to place a value judgment I'm not going
to get into an argument about how
valuable IQ is I will just say that a
high IQ in my opinion means that you're
processing raw data faster than somebody
else so you can run through the list of
possible scenarios for instance that
could be very helpful going into any
negotiation you've just thought through
all the possible permutations
so they made me feel badly about myself
so as you can imagine I didn't always
want to be around them and the times
that I was around them I wanted to find
some way to be right
and so we were arguing about something a
way to do something in the business and
I had an idea and then they threw out
another idea I recognized immediately
that their idea was better and yet I
kept arguing for mine
ever come across somebody who does that
I promise what's happening in that
moment is they're feeling insecure
you've triggered their insecurities and
now they're going to fight for it
because it's theirs
because if they can at least win that
argument while they may not feel smart
they may get reflected back to them that
they were smarter than you in that
moment they could convince you of
something so I had this moment of Crisis
because I actually convinced them and I
convinced them that my way was right
even though there was a voice in my head
screaming it's wrong dumbass you know
it's wrong what are you doing it was
insane I was literally heading in this
collision and I couldn't stop myself so
at the end of it I asked myself what do
I really want
because I tell people I want to get rich
but my actions say I want to feel good
about myself
and I had a moment of Crisis because I
realized I need to feel good about
myself
everybody needs self-esteem
in fact what suicide is is when somebody
no longer believes they'll ever feel
good about themselves ever again
and if that were true it's not but if
that were true suicide is actually a
reasonable option why would you want to
go on living if every day you're
miserable and there really is no way out
of that
so I knew I couldn't give up my
self-esteem I couldn't accept some weird
role where I just was always the dumb
ass sitting in the corner
right
so in that moment I realized if I'm
actually going to move towards my goals
I've got to pick something to build my
self-esteem around that's anti-fragile
now this is a term that comes from
Naseem taleb in his book by the same
name and in the book he points out
something that is resilient something
that is strong something that endures
they are all defined ultimately by their
breaking point they still break they can
just take a lot more abuse before they
break
anti-fragile on the other hand is
something that the more you attack it
the stronger it becomes
so think of it this way if I pride
myself on being smart and you tell me
I'm dumb and you put up a pretty good
case for it that's going to damage my
self-esteem
my self-esteem in that situation is very
fragile
if on the other hand you tell me that
I'm dumb and I build my self-esteem
around being the learner
now I'm going to say thank you please
tell me in what way that I'm dumb
because you will open my eyes to
something that now I can address and I
can go learn about that thing and I will
have a new skill and I can go out and
push and execute against that skill
that's anti-fragile the more you try to
tell me I'm dumb the more areas that you
point out that I'm weak the more things
you tell me I need to learn about my
eyes are open to something that if true
I'm going to go down that path and I'm
going to learn how to do that and that
is absolutely critical
all right identifying as smart as a
deadly trap as is the notion of being
right one of the most powerful things
that you could do
is become the person that admits that
you're wrong
really fast and it's crazy how much
credibility you'll earn with people
simply by admitting I was wrong like 30
seconds ago I was fighting so hard for
something I was really fighting for my
position and then somebody says
something and I realized that's actually
better imagine that you're you're in the
meeting you're going die hard because
you believe it you should stand up for
what you believe and you should fight
for it but when you find somebody that
when they actually because they actually
listen and they hear holy [ __ ] like
that's actually a better idea and they
say it in real time
and not just say it but like oh my God
that's a great idea I'm totally amped
I'm on that now I'm going to be the
energy for that idea
it was crazy when I started doing that
people would actually come to me with
their great ideas because they knew if
it was right I would get so enthusiastic
about it I would give them all the
credits I did not pride myself on owning
the idea I prided myself on recognizing
the idea
and so people would keep coming to me
with these great ideas because they
wanted me to be the energy and so even
though all I would do is try and point
out whose idea it really was in like
every breath that I mentioned the idea
talking about the person who actually
came up with it I would get credit for
it because I was the one actually moving
it forward
because at the end of the day only
execution matters
you can build an amazing reputation for
yourself and one of the best ways that
this plays out is that time when you
hold steadfast and you refuse to bend
people know you're not doing it just to
argue for your own idea because you've
shown a thousand times as soon as
somebody gives you a compelling idea
that you think is better you'll move on
it
and that there's no ego in it
all right how do you develop grit if
grit is as important as we say it is
sustained interest over time that's
really what grit is
and a lot of people talk about in fact
the title of my speech is supposed to be
about how you develop a passion which we
will talk about in a little bit but this
is going to be one of those things when
you have passion one of the things that
comes out of that is you've got the
ability to sustain your interest over
time do the hard things
do the hard things I can't emphasize
that one enough
put yourself in uncomfortable situations
just to find the mental tactics that
you're going to need to deal with the
hard things it's getting those tactics
who knows the Stanford marshmallow test
all right for those of you that don't
this is one of the most breathtaking
examples of The Human Condition in the
Stanford marshmallow test they bring in
I don't know they're five or six years
old they bring them in and the person in
the white lab coat says here's a
marshmallow I'm gonna go out of the room
for a minute I'll be back in just a few
minutes if you wait till I come back
I'll give you a second marshmallow so
essentially double your money
not bad
now what the kid doesn't know is the
researcher is never coming back and all
they want to know is how long will you
wait before you eat the marshmallow some
kids have literally gobbled it up before
they even get to the door
other kids are like singing to
themselves putting their head down
getting up dancing around the room some
of them bite like the underside and try
to put it back so you can't see
and here's what's scary
they followed those kids for 25 years
and based solely on the length of time
they were able to wait before they ate
the marshmallow predicted their level of
success in school
predicted their level of success in the
job market the people who waited the
longest got into the best schools got
the best grades went on to have the
highest paying jobs
just your ability to delay gratification
your ability to find tactics that work
to get your mind off something
there's no greater control than control
over oneself
anybody here ever done a three-day water
only fast not intermittent fasting
three days
do it you will learn something about
yourself and it will be profound and
what you're going to learn is that your
body is manipulative
and I did a three-day fast just a couple
weeks ago
and I had the flu right before so there
were cough drops laying around
and every time I walked by those [ __ ]
cough drops
my brain was like eat one
I was like [ __ ] like
you know I'm fasting
and I literally couldn't believe like
how consistently every time I walk by
those damn cough drops that my body like
gave me this really intense impulse
and that's when I realized like the
notion that there are multiple voices in
your head by the way is very very real
and I will give you one quick example
who knows what the corpus callosum is
all right the corpus callosum is the
thick bit of tissue that connects the
left and right hemisphere of your brain
If you sever that you will get people
that have literal multiple personalities
one in the right one in the left some of
the most intriguing stuff is one of them
will be devoutly religious and the other
will be devoutly atheist in the same
brain and you can talk to them
differently
absolutely crazy
but the multiple voices notion is real
there are multiple
factions if you will pieces that your
brain is broken up into and by the way
you have the equivalent of a cat's brain
in neurons just in your digestive tract
so the whole notion of gut instinct
think of all the cool [ __ ] cats can do
and you've got that
in your digestive tract neurons
it's literally the same material that
your brain is made out of is in your
digestive tract it's utterly fascinating
so we have all these competing things
that we want
but inside if you think of that
OverWatch that one person that's you
that's meant to say I have goals and I'm
going to act in accordance with my goals
I'm never going to sell out what I want
most for what I want right now I wanted
a cough drop right now but I wanted to
get on the other side of a three-day
fast and say I did it and I wanted that
more
and in learning what your tools and
tactics are so for me I welcome hunger
like an old friend and I literally
people must think I'm schizophrenic
because you'll walk into the room and
I'll literally be like pinching and
poking at my fat going hunger thank you
I'm so glad you made it back it is so
good to see you I'm glad you're here I
know that you're oxidizing my fat and
I'm very grateful for that so thank you
and in doing that I reframe it not as
something that is unwanted or painful
but it's something that is doing exactly
what I want it to do
and learning those mental tactics that's
the game learning those mental tactics
that's the game that's how you're going
to get good at whatever it is you want
to do if you want to start a business
learning how to deal with your employees
is absolutely critical but let me tell
you right now if you lash out
emotionally your employees will lose
respect for you
but it's just like the cough drop moment
now if somebody had seen me walk by the
cough drop they wouldn't know that I had
it literally had to stop myself from
lunging at a cough drop
they didn't know that because I have
control of myself
I've practiced things like that I do
three day fast I do what I call Bright
lines
so I have a bright line
during the week I don't eat my second
meal before 11 30. under any
circumstance
my wife one time brought my food 30
minutes early I Was preparing for an
episode it was so sweet of her
but I don't eat before 11 30 under any
circumstance so the food literally sat
on my lap smelling so good and I was so
hungry and I said hunger thank you so
much for showing up because you're
giving me the opportunity to prove to
myself what a badass I am because I'm
gonna smell how delicious you are
knowing my stomach is grumbling and
tying itself in knots because I want to
eat so badly and I'm not going to
and in those moments you earn
credibility with yourself
I hate working out
absolutely despise it it's why I do it
first thing in the morning
and the reason I hate it the weights are
heavy
and your muscles start burning when you
get into the supposed good reps so that
just seems shitty and backwards
so it is not in any way shape or form
fun for me
but I earn credibility with myself
because it is something that I don't
like
I earn credibility with myself showing
up every day and it also reminds me how
much I can transform my body it's very
easy for me to show you my before and
after picture I used to be 60 pounds
heavier it's very easy for me to show
you when I was heavy and then show you
six pack abs you get it
but what you don't see is the body's
just a reflection of the Mind
what really happened
was I changed my mind and I had garnered
skills I had garnered tactics the things
that allowed me to not eat the coffee
drop were the things that allowed me to
not eat the things that I wanted to not
have a bowl of ice cream to not indulge
in things that are wonderfully delicious
but instead ask myself what are my goals
and then back in with my behaviors
all right
the thing about grit that I really want
to highlight
is boredom
boredom is the thing that I think kills
most entrepreneurs
it's not lack of funding it's that 90 of
the things you're going to do suck
they're tedious I actually had to get in
a fight with the IRS to get my EIN
number for my most recent company
that [ __ ] was boring like I can't I was
flying into a rage because it was
wasting so much of my time I literally
had to get an advocacy group to help me
go through the process that's how
painful this was and I literally I
remember stopping and telling my team
this is where entrepreneurs fail right
here like it is so tempting just be like
peace everybody go home I'm not dealing
with this [ __ ] anymore I'm gonna go get
a job like that would be so much easier
let somebody else deal with this
it's the boredom that erodes people and
to get through the boredom you have to
know what it is that you want when you
know what you want
then you're going to have the energy to
get through now to have that energy
you're going to need passion the number
one question I get asked the number one
question I get I get asked this question
multiple times a day every day from all
around the world I've had people in
Australia UK Germany uh Netherlands
Brazil Paraguay I mean literally
everywhere
they all want to know
how do I find my passion
asking how you find your passion makes
the assumption that your passion has
been lost somewhere
your passion has not been lost your
passion has never been developed
passions are created they're constructed
they're developed
and it starts with interest
you want to identify an area of Interest
so if you've ever wondered like oh man
that person is so lucky like how do they
get lucky to find their passion so early
and now they get to do it and live like
this amazing life
and you're searching inside your mind
for that thing that's going to be like a
lightning rod that's hidden under like a
lampshade somewhere in your mind and
you're like there it is I finally found
it
but it doesn't work like that it starts
with these areas of interest and if it's
something that you're trying to turn
into something that you can monetize it
starts with ideally overlapping areas of
Interest so you've got multiple
interests coalescing and it coalesces
with can money be made here but even
that is not enough now once you have
that you've got to start going deep into
gaining Mastery and it's in the process
of gaining Mastery that you're going to
find out if that interest turns into a
love then turns into a passion
people who are passionate are willing to
fight through the boredom think about a
musician if you want to become the
greatest musician of all time let me
tell you how many hours literally days
weeks months years of your life will be
dedicated to playing a scale
all day every day the fundamentals
blocking and tackling
and what makes people great and I know
Ben will back me up on this one what
makes the greatest basketball players
they walk out onto the court at 4 a.m
and they say I'm not leaving until I've
made 2 000 shots from the perimeter
simple period it is what it is they put
in the work now they're not doing it
thinking oh my God this is so much fun
they're thinking I want to win I want to
play at the highest level and I am
willing to break myself in half and this
is the thing that I cannot get
entrepreneurs to understand if you want
to be great I promise you as Tommy said
you already have any what you need
which is the ultimate evolution approved
ability to adapt
so you can change to get great you can
change to become whatever you need to
and if you're leveraging an earlier win
so much the better if it's something
that you have that little spark of early
talent and now you're just putting the
work on top of that fantastic but it is
the people that are willing to literally
break themselves and have to get the
result that they want
research Michael Jordan
the absolute symbol of being the
greatest
his work ethic
is way more impressive than what he did
on the court
if you haven't read Tim Grover's book
Relentless read it
and what he talks about
Michael Jordan has darkness in him
and if you've ever watched his induction
into the Hall of Fame speech he just
lays that [ __ ] out
Michael Jordan's a dark [ __ ]
but as Star Wars taught us
there's power on the dark side
and understanding how to leverage that
but what I want you guys to understand
is intensity is required
putting in the work is required
doing more work than anybody else is
required for greatness
there are three things that you can do
work hard work smart and work long hours
most people get real weird when I say
they should work long hours but Tom if
I'm working hard and smart why should I
work long hours I'll tell you why
because I'm also working hard and smart
and I'm working long hours on top of it
so I will beat you every time
right because I'm willing to do all
three but why am I willing to do all
three because I believe in what I'm
doing I know why I'm doing it it isn't
about the money
it's about knowing where you're trying
to get to
and this is how you build your business
we live in a very very new world
that new world has been defined by
social media
for anybody that in the last year has
spoken ill of social media
get rid of that Matrix style belief
immediately
it is the greatest revolution in
business ever
it is the reason that you're going to be
able to build a business without
Gatekeepers being able to tell you yes
or no social media has completely
democratized access to Consumers
think about that for a second back in
the day you had to pay for radio ads or
you had to be on TV that was it those
are your options and it was so expensive
and that's exactly how the big companies
wanted it because they could keep you
out so you may have a superior product
but the world's never going to know
because they have a way to ice you out
that is gone like really think about
that and I'm seeing some young faces in
the crowd you may not realize it didn't
used to exist
it didn't used to exist you to get to a
mass audience you had to pay hundreds of
thousands millions of dollars
potentially to reach those people and
they made you buy in bulk it's not like
you could do one commercial and see what
happens they made you buy in bulk they
made you commit to Big dollars
now not anymore not only that when I was
growing up
commercials had to be high quality
now you can film [ __ ] with your iPhone
be like what's up girl
and you can sell product doing it
Michelle Fan you guys know who that is
built a multi-hundred Million Dollar
Empire by doing vlogging with her phone
on YouTube
the world has changed and thank God it
really puts the power in your hands but
you have to understand exactly what kind
of company
it's making room for
in a hyper connected social world
everything is different
and the reason that Quest grew as fast
as it did
besides us having yemeni you guys will
get a here speak tomorrow
the reason that we grew as fast as we
did was because we understood social
media before anybody else in 2009 when
everyone was saying that Facebook is
just a distraction how's it ever going
to be good for business
and we were preparing to launch our
company
we realized that it was a megaphone and
it gave people the opportunity to
comment on your company within minutes
of an interaction with you to a global
audience and if we put value creation at
the center of our company then we had an
opportunity to get you to say something
powerful and so we said we'll never ask
you to say anything in particular if you
love it say you love it if you hate it
say you hate it but please just say
something and then our job is to make
sure we do the really hard work of
making sure that that product kicks ass
that it is actually delivering results
that for people that are trying to lose
fat that they're going to lose it
they're going to be excited that it's
delicious
but understanding that generation
Millennials and Generation Z
they want impact they have an inherent
distrust of companies
so right now and let me tell you because
I've been through this
what's going to happen first you start
as the Undiscovered band and the first
people that find you they love you like
no other you can do no wrong they'll
follow you like in the van on tour
they'll stay at the same dirty filthy
motels that you stay at just to support
your product
then you start getting big and
everybody's like yeah I discovered them
first I knew these guys before anybody
else
and then you get really big and you're a
[ __ ] sellout and now I don't want to
hear your music that shit's played out
I'm on to the next looking for the small
guy because what you failed to take into
account
is they want to know what kind of impact
they're going to have by using your
product
sometimes that's the product itself
Quest having the mission to end
metabolic disease really got people to
understand what we were about as human
beings the fact that we were investing
millions of dollars of our own money
into cancer research because we believe
that it may be a metabolic disease
that let people know who we are who we
are as people
me starting to do a show and stepping
out front and coming and giving talks
like this so people can look me in my
eye and ask me questions
which by the way every time I do a talk
I will stay and answer questions until
there are no more questions to answer
I've done it for eight hours straight
before
so at the end of this talk even if they
kick us out we'll do it on the parking
lot whatever it takes I will answer
every single question that you have
that's the world that we live in when
you're a servant to your customer when
you understand that that's the level of
obligation that you have if you want to
build a real community
that's the new way of doing business and
I now get people that write to me every
day saying that I've changed their life
imagine building a company and having
people write you from all over the world
that you change their life that their
life is fundamentally different and
better because of you and your products
it's an unreal time that we live in that
you can get that kind of feedback and
interaction all right who knows Simon
sinek
oh yeah all right Simon sinek wrote a
book called start with why
this is one of the most important things
if you're looking to build a business I
promise you and this is it'll happen
tonight even though I'm gonna say it
right now I know it's gonna happen
tonight one of you is going to come to
me and you're going to start describing
your product you're going to ask me how
you should Market it and all you're
going to describe to me are features and
benefits
and I'm gonna say no no what's your
mission
and you're going to say we want to make
computers faster
that's not a mission that's a feature
and benefit what's your mission
we want to empower entrepreneurs with
faster cheaper computers so that even
low-income entrepreneurs can launch
companies okay helping low-income
entrepreneurs launch companies that's a
mission
the faster computer thing is the path
and understanding the difference between
a path and a mission is critical I'll
give you an example the mission at Quest
is to end metabolic disease
what if we found that food is totally
irrelevant to that what would we do
well our mission wasn't to make protein
bars our mission was then metabolic
disease so we would change as we got
deeper and deeper into cancer it looked
like
this whole high protein thing may
actually be really dangerous in a cancer
environment you may have to go high fat
and so even though everybody considered
us the high protein low carb company we
started investing massively into high
fat
everybody thought it was crazy what's
going on what are you doing
but we were looking at the data we were
looking at what just metabolic truth was
showing us
so don't ever be married to a path
but be deeply convicted about your
mission
and Choose Your Mission carefully it
needs to be real it needs to be
something that sits at the heart of Who
You Are
there's an awesome quote often
attributed to Mother Teresa no one will
act for the many
but people will act for the one
I showed up every day thinking about my
mom and my sister they were very real to
me there were people that I know that I
love that I see frequently that I will
be mortified to my core if they were to
die
so it was very personal it was very easy
to fight and push because when you know
why you're doing what you're doing when
you have your mission and you were
hell-bent to make that come true when
things get boring when things get tiring
you're still gonna do it
and when you have that thing you're able
to take advantage of one of the king
makers
transparency
there are two new king makers we're
going to talk about both of them the
first one is transparency social media
allows you not only to reach people but
it allows you to reach them in a super
transparent way where you can tell them
who you are what you're about what your
mission is and let them see your company
from multiple angles and see if you
actually hold to what you say you're
about
and don't get me wrong in some ways it's
actually harder to build a business now
because there's no corporate veil
right if you've got a billion dollars to
start a company you were way better off
before it was so much easier oh you
could just hide things and lie and tell
people what they want to hear and put
out marketing messages anybody the
cigarette industry I mean it's
unbelievable how well it worked and for
how long it worked those days are over I
promise you the bullet has already been
fired that's going to kill the old way
of doing business they're bleeding to
death and they just don't realize it yet
now you're going to have to be
transparent now you're gonna have to
tell people what you stand for and the
thing you stand for better be the
creation of value
don't think about profits focus on value
the reason you want to focus on value is
it's the only thing that you can sell
sustainably you can trick people with
clever marketing don't get me wrong but
it's always going to be short term the
only thing that lasts is something that
actually adds real tangible value to
somebody's life
when people write in and say
dear Quest I've lost 150 pounds using
your products you've changed my life my
wedding day which I never thought would
come is now just two months away I
couldn't be more excited here's a
picture of me and my fiance we would get
stuff like that all the time
because we were focused on making a
product that was actually real
finding your passion for something and
building a product that's better than
what anyone else is doing
all right leverage technology to connect
people get really lost like I'm not a
digital native I didn't grow up with
this stuff but once I understood what it
was really allowing me to do in fact
many of you came up and you saw me
sitting out there and it looked like I
was working on my phone but what I was
actually doing is engaging with my
community
because if you ever get a response from
me it's actually me
so you can imagine I'm writing and
replying to people a lot
but I do that because the technology is
meant to facilitate that connection once
you understand the building the
community is the thing that gives you
power and I'll give you an example
at Quest we had a decision to make do we
go to retail first which are known as
the traditional King makers a retailer
can make a brand if you get into Walmart
you can go from nothing to 100 million
in like 12 months
same with Costco they can pluck you from
obscurity and make you a big brand
almost overnight
so do we do that first or do we go
direct to consumer
we decided to go direct to Consumer
because we wanted to build a community
we wanted the power on our side we
wanted customers going into retailers
and saying why don't you carry quests
so we said no to retailers for a year in
fact we ended up hiring somebody just to
say no to the retailers in a nicer way
true story because we didn't want to
burn that bridge but the contracts they
were sending us were so one-sided so
aggressive in the favor of the retailer
that we never would have been able to be
profitable and that's how Walmart puts
companies out of business that have been
around for 115 years they're squeezing
your margins so tight they become so
much of your business
that one misstep and like the cost of
Lids or something which is what I think
killed what was it vlastic pickle or
something they've been around for over
100 Years Gone
so you have to have the power going into
the negotiation and you're living in a
time where you can build a community
that believe passionately in you and
your product and you can mobilize them
to go in stores and start asking for the
product you can even do it region by
region think about that for a second hey
we wanna right now today guys it's gonna
be Phoenix we want everyone going into
whatever use whatever store you would
sell into we want people going into the
Phoenix area going into the store and
asking for this product
and they'll do it it's absolutely crazy
to get nothing for it other than the
pride of being in that Community because
you've done something positive you've
sold them something of value that's
touching their life it's making their
life better you're transparent you're
stepping out front they know who you are
they'd recognize you they feel like
they've looked you in their eye and you
do things to go above and beyond for
them
all right this is the face of
authenticity my friends this is actually
an Instagram post that my wife and I
posted every year we go sit on Santa's
lap
and I thought hey we really do it it's
really a thing for us so share it with
the community and it's stuff like that
as embarrassing that it is it's stuff
like that that lets the community feel
like they know you
and in today's world you need somebody
in your company that people will warm to
that they will feel connected with
because what's going to keep people from
losing faith in your company as you get
bigger is feeling connected to a person
companies aren't nameless faceless
organizations
and you don't want them to feel like it
our customer support department had
their own Instagram
just so people could see the people that
they were talking to
all right don't Market build a community
that's critical how do you build a
community it goes like this at the top
there are thought leaders thought
leaders are the people that when you
hear them talk you don't understand what
they're talking about
neuroscientists all the people that are
publishing papers doing if they've ever
done an abstract then they are very much
a thought leader
influencers in the middle
that's who is listening to the thought
leaders they understand what they're
saying but they have a way of making it
accessible to the masses the masses
ultimately are who you're trying to sell
to but if you're going to find the
people that you need to find you're
going to get to them through influencers
they're called influencers because a lot
of people listen to them
your job is to get a thousand screaming
fans the way that you do that is by
partnering up with influencers who
already have the trust of those people
now when most people think of
influencers they think of people like
this
but really you should be thinking of
people like this and I'm guessing most
of you don't even know who they are but
I'll give you one random example this
woman here Jenna Marbles anybody know
Jenna Marbles
all right Jenna Marbles has a reach of
over 20 million followers a day
a day that's prime time TV numbers
one person can reach 20 million people a
day
now how do you get social influencers
how do you create momentum with them so
first of all you need to identify them
you need to add value to them in their
community and you need to go above and
beyond so Jenna Marbles is somebody that
we actually worked with
and how did we get Jenna Marbles
to post a photo of huge stacks of our
bars
we Center knitted sweaters for her dogs
and she loved it because she felt like
we understood her that we'd gone above
and beyond she felt a sense of
obligation to post that photo because
she was so touched by what we had done
and we did the research to find out what
she really cares about she loves her
dogs always talking about how they're
cold because they're so skinny and they
don't have fur and so we knit them
sweaters she loved it and then staged
that whole photo for us took the picture
which was huge for us
because it reached such a huge audience
and you do that and start turning those
relationships into Partnerships and
beginning to work with them Cassie ho
anybody know Cassie ho
so Cassie Howe was one of the first
influencers that we started working with
she has a total social following
somewhere in the neighborhood of five
million people just absolutely massive
and getting her coming in and first it
was just a paid relationship but then as
she got to know us and know everybody at
the company we actually turned that into
an ongoing relationship where we've
teamed up and partnered now to the point
where my wife and co-founder in Impact
theory is actually creating a podcast
with her and just goes to show that when
it's authentic real connections that you
really can transcend the normal sort of
day-to-day sterile nature of a business
relationship and not being afraid to
recognize that the times really have
changed following some of your vendors
on their social feeds and getting to
know them can be a really interesting
way to spark interesting conversations
to feel more invested in them as people
and I can't stress that one enough
and then at the end of the day if you're
using social media you've got to publish
you've got to be creating content
who here has a Instagram account for
your work
Instagram account Facebook all of that
okay the only thing I will tell you that
you're doing wrong and I don't even have
to look at your account you don't
publish enough
the consistency of publishing is what
it's all about every time I do an
Instagram story I get
30 inbound requests on my feed
just got to be putting it out there now
it's got to be value-add but you want to
be publishing publishing publishing all
right how do you grow your community so
now you have them how are you going to
breathe life into them and really get
them to go somewhere you've got to be
where your customers and fans are I
routinely get asked Tom which platform
should I address
and the answer is wherever your
customers are if they're on all of them
you need to be on all of them and I know
that that means it's a lot more work and
it's redundant and yes Snapchat and
Instagram stories are basically the same
and maybe Snapchat is going away maybe
it's not
but if your fans and customers are there
then that's where you need to be and by
the way this stuff is going to turn over
every two years it's going to be
constantly on the Move constantly
different maybe Twitter pulls it off and
they race back to the top maybe Facebook
makes a misstep and they've gone too
heavy into video and something else
comes up you've got to be there and as
much as you can be an early adopter so
much the better
because it's always the early adopters
that win so keeping your eye on where
the technology is going is absolutely
critical
all right be true to the platform every
platform is different I'll give you one
just quick example even within a
platform how different it can be so
first of all do Facebook versus
Instagram on Facebook if I'm gonna do
live content I do live content with
three cameras on a beautiful set and we
switch between the different cameras so
that the live feed feels like a live
television show when we do that on
Facebook we get huge numbers if on
Facebook I were just putting the camera
phone on a tripod and talking to the
camera my number's a plumbing
but on Instagram if I just grab the
phone and hold it right in front of my
face and talk to all the people coming
through in the feed hey Bob hey Sally so
good to see you oh my god oh hey what's
up everybody oh we've got Denmark in the
house do that kind of stuff my numbers
just keep going up up
so understanding what each platform is
looking for how they want to be talked
to how they want to interact with you
Twitter right one-on-one communication
rapid Real Time news based
now Instagram even within the platform
there are different ways you want to
interact so I'm very formal for the most
part in my main posts but my stories are
playful and a little bit more intimate
look into my life
and they perform well like that if I
take something that feels right on the
story and I put it in my main feed it
won't perform well if I put something
overly formal in my story then it
doesn't perform well and this comes from
publish a lot pay attention look at the
data you've got to be really really data
driven
all right and boost what works
so once you find what's working then you
want to put some ad dollars behind it
okay and add dollars gets very tricky
you don't have to throw a lot of money
at something to get a big result because
what you're going to do is do a bunch of
free stuff and look at what pops and
when something pops and it's
outperforming all your other stuff which
both Facebook and Instagram will tell
you this is performing better than 95 of
your other posts well that's probably a
good candidate to put some money behind
also partnering up with other people in
your space to do crossovers or
um trade shout outs things like that
all right what if I told you your
customers hate your content
hopefully you will believe me because
chances are that they do because what
most people are trying to do with their
contents are trying to sell
don't try to sell with your contract try
to add value your content in and of
itself should be a value ad so a quest a
lot of what we do is cooking cooking
with the products sometimes not cooking
with the product but really trying to
think what does the consumer want what
would be value-ad for them what are they
looking for
and those are the things that are going
to allow you to continue to build that
Community out
high value content it's all about
value-add you're living in the era of
value creation so not only does your
product have to be amazing but your
actual Marketing in and of itself can't
feel like a commercial it's got to be
true to the brand it's got to be true to
the brand ethos
but it has to be
in and of itself interesting and
valuable so rethinking that moving away
from traditional features and benefits
by this
all right I mentioned this earlier only
value is sustainable the only thing that
you're going to be able to sell over
time is that so you guys need to be
having meetings in your company talking
about value what is the value of this ad
what is the value of this marketing what
is the value of this product you have to
know why that thing is valuable that is
absolutely critical
and execute at the end of the day only
execution matters
you all have a dream that's why you're
here there's something that you want to
do there's something that you want to
create
but at the end of the day
the only thing that matters is your
ability to execute so get really good at
that Crossing that Chasm of skill set
and I can't say that enough
the only thing that stands between you
and executing on your dreams at the
highest level is skill set it's getting
good at something
all right have very clear goals it
always freaks me out most people stop at
the first sort of vague notion of what
they want to do I'm going to punch
myself in the mouth if somebody comes up
to me again and says I want to help
people
that's rad that comes from a beautiful
place like I totally get it but that's
like coming to me and saying I want to
win an Olympic gold medal awesome winter
or summer
fantastic swimming or tennis
swimming excellent
backstroke freestyle like at some point
it's got to get so specific because you
have to know what skills you need to
acquire you have to work backwards from
the goal and the goal has to be hyper
specific so if boredom is the number one
killer of entrepreneurs that they're not
able to make it through the next one is
they don't have clear goals and the
worst part is they think they do
that's the part that terrifies me the
worst part is they think they do
until you know exactly what your mission
is and exactly what your business model
is and what problem you solve what very
concrete problem that people are
freaking out to have solved until you do
that you don't have the necessary
ingredients to build your business all
right don't be romantic be pragmatic
look at the data the data will tell you
what to kill the data will tell you
what's working and what's not
this was the single best piece of advice
that was ever given to me and I ignored
it for three years I'm so embarrassed by
that that I always make sure any talk I
give people hear this
know more about your product service
industry whatever than anyone else
than anyone else
if you guys have ever seen my interview
show
the reason that it's doing as well as
it's doing is I know more about the
guest one guest actually said this I
know more about the guest than their
mother
I just put in more work than their
mother
that's the truth
I go out and I research and I read
everything and I watch every video that
I can and so I know so much about that
person I know I'm going to give a
different interview than anyone has ever
given before because nobody's done that
level of research not only does it Blow
the guest away and totally endear them
to me
but it gets us to the point where we can
give an interview that has unique value
so know more about what you're doing
than anyone else in the world and grind
baby grind for two years for two years
that's what I look like every day
hairnet lab coat gloves
put in the [ __ ] work
put in the work and this is where the
rubber meets the road this is where
you're really going to separate the
people that are entrepreneurs from the
people that are real entrepreneurs
you've got to want to grind you've got
to learn to love that you've got to
learn to love to put in the work to be
proud of yourself that you showed up and
put in the work to be proud of yourself
that you taught yourself how to suffer
to be proud of yourself that you're
developing a mindset where you believe I
can do anything I set my mind to and by
the way
once you believe
that you can do anything you set your
mind to without limitation how you spend
your time
becomes a spiritual consideration
how you spend your time becomes a
spiritual consideration because you
could be doing something if you want to
end Hunger and hunger what's stopping
you Bill Gates is actually going to end
malaria he's going to do it because he
had the tenacity to generate the
resources and because he has a mind that
allows him to work on the infrastructure
and figure out how to actually solve
that problem
do not under any circumstances make Bill
Gates or anyone else extraordinary to
let yourself off the hook
don't [ __ ] do it don't sell yourself
short and this is where I see people go
wrong all the time they look at somebody
who's amazing
and they say Well they're just naturally
gifted
I could never do that
you couldn't do it because you believe
you can't and because you believe you
can't you don't start putting in the
work
Michael Jordan got cut from his high
school basketball team
he wasn't exactly showing all the
promise in the world my own mother when
I left for college quietly assumed I was
going to fail and didn't admit that for
years
I showed no early signs of promise
I actually have a version of this talk
where I show photos from my childhood
and people like yeah [ __ ] you
just look stupid
and it's true I used to dress like a
clown and I mean that almost literally
so my waist was size 36 and I wore a
size 54 pants
I wore literal Jester hats
um I had one of those big chains that
connected to my belt uh I had shoulder
length hair I did not exactly look the
part and I didn't take myself seriously
it really is a game of transformation it
really is a game of understanding that
you can become something so even though
I didn't start with the requisite skills
even though I wasn't a born entrepreneur
which is why I start this tale with that
even though I wasn't a born entrepreneur
I could acquire and did acquire the
skills that were needed to execute
it is a very long road
that leads you here
right now
most entrepreneurs in the world are
thinking about one thing
winning a championship ring
once you understand the difference
between wanting to win a championship
ring
and wanting to be capable of a
championship performance
then you'll have the Breakthrough that
you need
because most people are okay
winning a ring while sitting on the
bench
I am not
that holds no interest for me I don't
want to win the lottery I don't want
something handed to me that was why when
I quit I gave the equity back I didn't
want it
if I didn't do it if I didn't earn it if
I didn't make somebody's life better if
I didn't force myself to actually
develop my potential which for me the
very meaning of life write this down the
very meaning of life is to find out how
many skills you can acquire that have
utility and then put that utility to the
test
in service of something bigger than
yourself
say that again the very purpose of life
is to find out how many skills you can
acquire that have utility and then put
that utility to the test in service of
something bigger than yourself if you do
that not only can you build a big
business that adds tremendous value to
people but you'll have what's called
technique you will have something
beautiful a skill that you have fought
hard for that can help someone else and
that my friends is fulfillment and going
back to the game that you're actually
playing which is brain chemistry it is
not money it is not accolades it is not
number one on the Inc 500 list the game
that you're playing is being proud of
yourself
the game you're playing is being able to
look yourself in the eye and go
damn you left it on the field
you really played to your full potential
and you're prepared to go back to the
gym to get better when you know that
about yourself
Everything Changes
like people always ask me Tom you work
so much when are you going to take a day
off
I'm like I'll take a day off whenever I
want one I've earned it
I'm not conflicted I know how much I
work
but I didn't take a day off for six and
a half years at the beginning of my
journey
because I didn't believe I'd earned it
some part of me was guilty because I was
still fighting my own mindset I wasn't
always doing the things that I should be
doing
once you get to the point where you know
you leave it out on the field every day
take a vacation whenever you want
it won't even be a second thought for
you
this is the most fundamental belief that
I have
hired drug dealers
I've hired former gang members at one
point the staff at Quest literally I had
Bloods and Crips working the same
production line it's a true story
because I told the neighborhood I don't
care who you are
all I want to know
who do you want to be
and what's the price you're willing to
pay to get there
boys and girls
I promise you
once you answer that question for
yourself
once you know exactly who you want to
become and you're willing to pay a price
that is higher than anyone else is
willing to pay you will win
that's the only path to success
think about what you know about humans
your job in building a company
is to get people to feel so bonded to
you so bonded to your company that you
Dazzle them
and have you ever dazzled somebody
by lowering their expectations and then
comfortably delivering more
the phrase that makes me want to break
something under promise and over deliver
[ __ ] that if you tell me you want to
under promise and over deliver you're
dead to me I don't even want to talk to
you because I know what you're trying to
do is manage my expectations you are not
trying to be the greatest of all time
you are not trying to be capable of the
extraordinary you will happily win a
championship ring while sitting on the
bench I'm not looking for that what I'm
looking for is somebody who knows who
they want to become and they're willing
to pay an extraordinary price to become
that because all that matters to them is
becoming capable of the extraordinary
and when you get to that point the only
way you will know how to act is to set
the bar ridiculously high so high you're
almost embarrassed to say it out loud
and then my friends you're going to
surpass all expectations
thank you
if you want Financial Freedom click
right here for millionaire habits if
somebody is starting from scratch what
are the traits skill sets that they
should be cultivating in order to up the
odds of their success
they should focus on one thing in
general rather than lots of different
things that you're not sure about