[Music] if you had to start all over today you're dead broke what would you say it'll sound crazy what I'm about to say I found myself high and drunk in a stolen car in a cop chase this is Dan Martell serial entrepreneur angel investor and best-selling author he's an ultra high net worth individual who scaled and exited multiple companies now he teaches other entrepreneurs how to get out of their own way his Mantra you don't have a time management problem you have a self-management problem how do we use time to get better and to do better people that struggle with creating success it's because they spend time to save money but the people that create the wealth spend money to save time I had a handgun and a backpack sitting next to me cuz I told myself if the cops caught me I was going to pull the gun and let them take my life and I went for the [Music] gun welcome to front row seat I'm your host Ken Coleman this show is a conversation and it's meant to help you get better level up and Lead well now there are a lot of interview shows out there but I believe a really good conversation has the ability to change your life and my life so the people in this room today are a representation of you wherever you're watching or listening so I'm going to get it started but anyone in here has the power to join in at any time ask a question and then we're going to see where the answer takes us today I'm really thrilled Our Guest is Dan Martell he's an award-winning entrepreneur very successful investor the bestselling author of the book buy back your time and coaches over a thousand business owners and I got the feeling he's just getting started everybody please help me welcome Dan Martell thanks K good to see you manab it's an honor this is so I want to get to what I think is the most impressive thing about you and you've got quite a list of accolades and you've done some great stuff thanks but what drew me to you is an unbelievably difficult childhood um born in Canada uh don't know the specific details but in foster care as a child and uh I believe at the age of 15 a pretty unbelievable shocking experience happens to you that it feels like set the course for where we are today it's your story and so I want you to pick us up there at that young age you're kind of mid teen years and something bad happens take us to that what led to that and what happened that day when I go back to the 15 16y Old Dan he was definitely angry um a lot of demons I grew up in a a home with an alcoholic Mom Dad wasn't around very much traveling in sales a lot of lot of uh hyperactive I mean you know it was diagnosed with ADHD I think when I was 11 put on riddlin so there was like a perod just right off the bat where I felt broken I think as a person and I got introduced to drugs when I was 13 and that's when my life spiral kind of out of control one one decision led to another bad decision to a series of bad decisions and I found myself high and drunk in a stolen car in a cop chase at uh 16 years old luckily um which at the time I didn't consider lucky I was uh as I was trying to make a make get away um I had a handgun in a backpack sitting next to me because I told myself the cops caught me I was going to pull the gun and let them take my life Wow as I was in this neighborhood in this highspeed Chase I tried to take a turn going way too fast and I smashed into the side of this house and I went for the gun and for whatever reason as I pulled on that that handle it just the gun got stuck next thing I knew the cops open the door and grabbed me and throw me in the back of the cop car and I woke up sober the next day in a jail cell wondering what my life was going to look like and um there was a point where I just thought maybe life would just be easier if I took my life like I there was suicidal thoughts and I didn't feel worthy of breathing the air taking space honestly so anyways I um eventually had a guard sit me down and look at me and just for no reason other than he felt I need to hear the words he said you don't belong here and if nobody's ever told you I believe in you wow do you remember his name yeah what's his name his name was Brian Brian yeah and he said you got to get out of here you he goes you I've been here for 10 years I've seen a lot of kids there's a lot of kids out there you don't belong here and I at first I was like well what does he know he doesn't know me but it planted the seat of some kind of believe I'm like he could get in trouble even just pulling me out to tell me this he wasn't my case worker he wasn't you know he had no reason to tell me this and I kind of started to believe it a little bit did you walk out of there wanting to prove him right because he was maybe one of the few people who believed in you that that was the thing that shifted like prior to that and look maybe there there were other adults in my life that were also trying to speak that what was different about Brian and this is where I've learned over the years that the messenger matters because of who he was and L he pulled me out of the hole I was in solitary confinement he grabs me out of this place I was there for 3 Days walks me past the door of the the cell blocks where we stayed into the next door which was the guard unit that no inmates supposed to be in to sit me down and say this and I think because of who he was it landed and I think that's one of the most beautiful lessons I've learned since then is that sometimes when other people believe in you even if you don't have that belief there's this part like you said that I just I figure if he saw that maybe it's there and I just don't want to let him down you know I got out like I did the work and then I got released I didn't want to go back but it was 11 months of doing like a couple times I ran down that driveway saying I'm out of here I turned around I've seen you talk on social about some of the things you learned in that time and uh I love that about your story you come across a coding book if I if I recall totally yeah what makes you dive into it the way that you did it was a long day it was summertime cuz I I asked to stay a little longer cuz was I just I was I was scared I mean the thing about recovery is it's really easy to be sober when you're in an like I was hundreds of miles away from where I grew up in the woods on a lake it an old church camp so I asked to stay longer to help Rick the maintenance guy kind of I don't know just just get a few more reps you know I was I was not living there anymore but I was nearby and I was helping and so I I remember the day cuz I was cleaning out this camp and I don't know there was just something about when I opened that room and there was a like kind of a built-in desk into this little room in one of the camps or cabins and there was an old computer dusted we' been there for a few years nobody touched it I mean nobody been in that room for probably six seven eight years and it was an old 486 computer and this Y and it was like a bright yellow book on Java programming sitting right there and I never we didn't have a computer growing up I just opened it up thought it would be like super cryptic and it read like English so I was just like oh I'm honestly I was probably trying to kill time you know like I don't want to keep lifting we were moving there was like an old gym set and desk and Furniture yeah I was like I'm going to sit here and see if I can get a game start or something but I just I just followed the instructions of that that book and you know 20 minutes of tap tap tapping and just reading it and just hit enter and it says hello world at that moment I remember thinking to myself like maybe my brain maybe the reason I got in so much trouble is cuz my brain works different than everybody else and it's not that I'm broken it's just the way the world is I'm different and this might be my thing so I remember telling my dad about it and I you know I kept playing around and I remember I had two passions at the at that point one was botney plants if you can imagine why yeah the other one became computers and I remember my dad saying to me he goes you should have a garden as a hobby this computer thing is what you should focus on this is 96 97 98 so I mean the internet this little thing just started and there's this great quote I heard my buddy Chris tell me the other day I forget who said it but he said you know the ironic part about life is you can only make sense of it looking backwards but it has to be lived forwards oh I love that but like so like when I look at my life perfect sense sure at the time what a mess this show is sponsored by better help you've probably heard people talk about different kinds of flags in relationships red flags green flags even beige Flags it's hard enough to keep track of what they're all supposed to mean much less keep them in mind when you're trying to balance relationships with health family and work so here's a tip don't waste time on arbitrary labels just focus on the values you share with the people in your life stuff like Faith honesty communication and work ethic and if you're not even sure what your values are therapy can help you figure them out find what you're looking for in your relationships and decide your non-negotiables that's why I recommend better help better help is 100% online therapy with licensed therapist that means you can talk with your therapist when it's convenient for your schedule just fill out a short online survey to get matched with a therapist plus you can switch providers at any time for no additional cost so whether you're dating married finding friends or just working on yourself do it with help from betterhelp visit betterhelp.com Ken to get 10% off your first month that's better hp.com slen speaking of living forward as a part of your story you speak to young men in prison now all the time all the time yeah and that's what I'm curious about what are you speaking to these young men about you can speak to them about a lot of things and I'm sure maybe you do but what is the message that you really want to get across to these young men that are behind bars every time time I go in I always reenter cuz I understand when I go in there I know what I look like and unfortunately I don't look like those kids and that's one of the first things I say I know what I look like so I always kind of get grounded in my heart and remind myself that I'm no different that I was those kids and and like I remember sometimes I bring my team my assistant last time you know my assistant was there and she just she never seen that side of my my world at that level and she was almost in tears just walking around this place she's like what this is how they live and I'm like yep she's like are they that bad I'm like no they just made bad decisions so when you ask me what do I tell them I share some some some things but what I want them to feel from me is I'm no different than you yeah it's it's a form of you just transferring belief to them I want them to know that they're actually so equipped to just come back into the world and just absolutely take advantage like they're the most entrepreneurial kids they've got all the streets they every skill set that they had that caused them to be there is actually the exact same skill set applied differently to give them the the tools to be successful they just didn't have anybody to show them that yeah I want to get a quick comment on this and we'll move into some other topics but uh it was widely reported a couple years ago we have about 7 million men that are young men working age that are not in the workforce they're literally not working and as you break down the numbers Dan you see that they are leaving the workforce the major reason is because they feel like they can't accomplish what they would like to accomplish they feel as though there is a lid if you will and the greater percentage of these men are not college educated now I believe it's not because they need a degree but Society has told them they need a degree to be successful which we now know is a bunch of garbage what would you say to those young men because I think there's going to be some of these men that are listening to us and watching I also think we've got parents and loved ones of these men that are listening and watching it it'll sound crazy what I'm about to say but this is what I tell my own team and I tell these young kids anytime I have the opportunity to kind of like Express a perspective especially because the education one comes up all the time I do a program called Kings Club in these it's 15 to 22 and every time I do it hand goes up what do you think of University or even high school and here's my my thoughts on it and I got this from Jim ran back in the day is wake up every day and work harder on yourself than you do on your job and I'm sitting there to my teams and I'm telling them I need you to work more harder dedicated on you than the work and they're like confused because they're like well you're paying me to do the work this is my bet if you spend more time on you you'll be better which means your work will be better and I'm okay paying for some of that if you do it during the hours because the long-term play is you will be better for everybody else and that's a winning proposition and I think that is actually what maybe University and education used to be and and unless you want to be an engineer a doctor a lawyer go go work on you so I just like what did you do today to be better if we as Leaders understand what Dan just said and this is huge if we can help our team our people get better they're bringing a better version of themsel to work I mean they are not robots who check in and check out that's one thought I've said this many times before um and I think for these young men Dan what what really bothers me is that they're products of a education system that is absolutely flawed it's the system not teachers and principles so when I say this don't be offended folks be provoked to think our education system Dan is creating test takers not Pathfinders yeah so what we're doing is we're only teaching people how to answer questions and we beat the Curiosity out of them so they leave this K through 12 setting they go to a college setting which isn't much different they're partying but now they got this unbelievable vice grip pressure to pick a major that gives them a good job and a good life and they realize oh I'm not ready for this and then we put them out into the real world and it's been years since they asked a question who am I MH what am I good at what lights my heart up I think that's the challenge yeah yeah what are your comments on that I can just speak to my own experience and you know the unfortunate part about life is you can't split test it right so it's not like I can run 20 years with one child this way and 20 years a different way so few things I believe every kid is homeschooled so whether the parents are awake to it or not I think most parents spend more time figuring out where they're going to go on vacation next than what their kids are learning in school I learned it firsthand and my kids are in you know one's in kind of a monstory school the other one's in a different school and I remember when they started emailing us curriculum I'm like oh wow like I didn't choose that that's like it actually never occurred to me until I had my own children start in school that there's a group of people that sat down to outline what it is they're going to learn and that I don't even I was never consulted nor did I influence it so when I started realizing that and then then I started taking accountability to help shape the at least the home side the Curiosity and then I would just ask them like when you know two years ago when Chad gbd came out I asked them are they teaching AI at school they go what well that's fascinating so so how about I do that and even the idea of like postsecondary education I mean unfortunately I think that most school is nothing but government subsidized babysitting and again it's not the teacher's fault that's right they're part of a system but the the whole structures changed like why like even the summertime off like I know that it sounds fun but that's because of a farming structure that we don't do anymore and then you know to your point with Pathfinders which I love that language my kids know when they're done high school I'm buying them a one-way ticket to some place in Europe and you're going to go you're going to go find yourself somebody goes well how do I figure out what what I what I'm supposed to be doing in life and I go the same way you figure out what ice cream you like sample when I go to the gelato place and I've never been there before and I'm looking at all these cool flavors I'm like I want to try that one that one that like I apologize before I even get to them see me next I apologize for the million questions and samples we're about to go through way how am I supposed to know what's my favorite ice it's so silly if you think about it right so I've already I've already kind of sketched that thing for them and then because I have that context and they they hear this stuff well okay I've got to go travel the world well how am I supposed to get back we go figure out how to create value like for me the world rewards those that create value period full stop whether you like it or not you live in a world it's called capitalism it's how Society rewards people it's not who works the hardest cuz the guy that built that cement wall or puts that roof on a house he worked harder than I did so that's not what it is it's did you become more valuable so I ask my kids every night when I put them to bed what value did you create today and they have to scan their brain and they go H I didn't do anything today did you help anybody well I help my friend Max all right cool but again I think questions are the programming language of the mind I agree so I'm very intentional about my questions like one of mine for just personal happiness is the question how do I how do I appreciate even more God's grace and guidance in this moment I I ask myself that question dozen times a day right tremendous perspective reset yeah really love that yeah all right we got a question Dan your story is really personal to me um you know you've had experience being locked up using drugs four years ago I came home from prison spent a lifelong using drugs and have really thrown my life into to community service working with nonprofits trying to keep kids out of trouble set a positive example and I actually got elected back in May to our local Board of Education you made a comment about I didn't even choose this I don't even want my kids to learn this at the Board of Education locally we don't either right like the state has some say in it and the federal government does so my question to you is if in alternate universe you were appointed to a local public Board of Education like knowing what you know with your personal experience and your business experience what would be the first thing you would try and do to create some better health outcomes or just can I do anything if you think it'll work what would I do is first off I would restructure the curriculum to a what do kids actually need to learn because memorizing things in a world of Chad GPT makes zero sense to me I would tuck in what they learning or need to learn critical thinking so that's what like when I think of the skills that my kids need to understand emotional intelligence critical thinking value creation Etc I would do that and I tuck in the curriculum into a passion area cuz nobody told me to write code I wanted to write code anytime you see a problem you got to look at the incentive structure and usually you'll find out why it's like that and then you got to undo the financial incentive structure because people do what they're incentivized for that's good thank you man love that 70% of Americans I read some data on this 70% of Americans say they want to be self-employed do you want to take a guess at what percentage of Americans are what do you think it is I think the number I I mean I'm guessing you know 12 to 15% no six is it that low right but I wanted to set you up to talk about that because I think that the want to and the do there's this massive Chasm and I think it's got to be fear and doubt I define fear as I'm just worried something bad's going to happen if I move forward I Define doubt as I don't believe something good will happen if I move forward I want to hand that to you and if it's in line with where we we been talking well first off I want to inform everybody that fear gives bad advice so how about we don't check in with fear the other thing is I think that people that want to be self-employed a lot of time it's because they feel like that's their path to success you know and I always I call the big dog syndrome you know these people that work somewhere and they want to be the big dog until they're accountable for somebody else's mistakes hello yeah everybody wants to be the boss you know until all of a sudden you have to deal with the downside of those people that you hired and you trained and they didn't they fell short so it's I get it um but I also know you can create a lot of wealth partnering with other people so really to me it's it comes it comes down to fear gives bad advice and you are you are more valuable so it's not even about self-employment it's just about pure value you'll never get a penny more than you think you deserve like the reason why people don't have more is cuz don't believe they're worthy of more and I can prove it if you got on a scale tomorrow morning you know what you should read and that thing read 25 pounds heavier you would probably make a different decision throughout the day about what you eat and how you work out that day that's because you have a belief about what your weight should be your bank account's no different if you believe and I mean I know people that are entrepreneurs that are poor they are self-employed and they have no money because they don't believe they're worth more so what does that mean it means that they make bad decisions to lose their money they don't put themselves in position to take advantage of the value they created they allow other people to either take advantage of them I mean I was coaching this kid in Kings club and I was like he's like what do I do and I said just honor your time you don't believe your time's worth much and I said you're you're doing 300,000 a year and you're 19 you got to treat your time like it's worth more and then all of a sudden you'll force yourself to then hire somebody else and train them because you can't be doing all the work all the time what one Bal neck he says I don't have enough people to do the work and then after we go outside to do a little car show we do and I listen to him one of my friends has a big building and he says to the guy he goes I I should you your your windows he goes It's funny enough I've been looking for somebody to take over our guy we're not too happy he says I'm one of the best here's why I'm the best and my buddy goes man you sound like really tuned in because he was talking about the different products they use and how it works and he's ready to buy and the kid goes you know what I'll do it for free now he's not paying me to coach him so I shut my mouth okay Lighthouse not a tugboat but I will tell you I was very disappointed CU he did not fight for what he thought he was worth he should have charged my friend 10 times more yeah and do the work and knock it out of the park and get the referral fascinating right it's really fasc so it's not the the self-employment is an interesting one because if it's for the purpose of monetary gain I would argue that the fastest path is actually selfworth not the vehicle that's really good that's a mouthful well you're talking about time so I want to go there obviously the book right here is still really chugging on the charts it's number one I think right now in entrepreneurship time management productivity on Amazon which is well you just you just gave us the reasons why buy back your time obviously is the book I wanted to ask you because we have people that are here in this room people that are watching and listening that care very much about making the most out of their life and so I think we all kind of feel like we're really busy but we could find in an audit mhm that we waste a lot of time yeah so on time my question is how do we use time to get better and to do better first off the way I look at time it's kind of cool is that we all have the same and the difference between me and Elon mus Jeff Bezos or the person that's suffering is an allocation and unfortunately people that struggle with creating success it's because they spend time to save money but the people that create the wealth spend money to save time so the equ they just have not been taught this equation right you can't if you want to build a million-dollar business it's impossible to do it off $10 task not enough hours in a day like you can't work that many hours and produce that kind of outcome you have to learn to let go the problem is if you finally give yourself permission to value your time that Letting Go part is going to surface a bunch of trauma I call it the trauma Trust barrier having somebody else that you've given something that you consider very important the responsibility of doing that task embracing yourself I've seen people break out into hives have shingles go into depression letting go oh yeah sure makes sense control oh I'm happy when I control it I don't I'm not you see the physicality I feel it when they talk to me about it I just hir an assistant and I I'm not checking my email they're just waiting for the bomb to go off that has nothing to do with their email that has to do with something back there so the interesting part about the book which is I consider and and I know because I studied all the books and why I wrote this framework is I a I need it for myself first I think all all content is first for the author so 15 years ago I had to learn this framework that I teach to help me keep doing without creating chaos in my life but the more I've caught it the more conversation I've had about buying back our time I've realized that it is it is a byproduct of the inner work if you don't learn to value your time you won't fight for it and if you don't learn to let it go you'll always be at the mercy of having to do that's that's a great Mantra almost to look at every day every day MH all right let's uh go to the back row here let's get a question so Dan you you talked about how you can't really succeed longterm by yourself that it takes partnership it takes support Etc and this I'm curious if you agree with the following statement which is how do you have high standards and low expectations right off the bat people don't buy your presence they buy your standards so a lot of people think they're selling their presence doing the work coaching whatever it is but if you have a team they're buying your standards but they're not buying the standards you you hold for yourself or you hope you hold they're buying the standard that you enforce that you accept is a better way to think about it so what I would say is I get the philosophy of I'm going to show up and give 100% And if other people don't that's okay in regards to my emotional response to the situation it doesn't forgive underperformance so that's where I say I have a standard and the truth is if you want you know and John Maxwell talks about the law of the lid like if you want to knock the lid off you got to grow in my book I have a very people have taken it and run it it's 80% done by somebody else is 100% freaking awesome here's the followup I didn't write that I should have and if that's not okay go get better because a lot of people they the 80% they need is the standard they're communicating but they're not good enough and then they're upset for everybody else around them them falling below and I'm like you're not good enough yet like you don't communicate clearly enough as a leader you don't show up consistently and then you're mad some people that say my team this my team this my team that show me in your calendar where you've trained your team on that thing you just said you're upset about Legette tells me won't find it so when when we talk about standards to me it's I hold them I've communicated them and I've and I've hold people people to a standard so I always default the process first if something happens process problem it's not a people problem I hired them I trained them process problem once I notice and I look and I fix the process and I get agreement then I know I have a people problem quick example for everybody and everybody this is group participation here okay if if I go to a Chick-fil-A right here in Franklin and I order a sandwich tonight and I say to the 16-year-old kid thank you what are they going to say to me my pleasure my pleasure if I fly to Dallas Texas tomorrow morning and get a breakfast sandwich and I say thank you to the kid what are they going to say the Kathy set a standard of how we're going to treat people and the process was we train you that every time the customer says thank you if they say thank you three times in the interaction you say my pleasure my pleasure that's a process coming from a standard I you really scale at scale um all I want to switch gears um one of my favorite quotes on wealth is by a legend Warren Buffett yeah he famously said wealth is the transfer of money from the impatient to the patient which is a great statement you're a guy who if I when I did my research at 23 you said you were 20,000 in debt and 12 months later you're making a million dollars there's a lot of content on your soal and on your site about making money fast I want to give you the platform here for the cynics out there for the people who in this current economy right now are going come on Dan is Warren right are you right talk to me he's not wrong it's also the business model he chose so if you choose to invest in the kind of assets that he does then being patient is actually an incredible great way to create wealth it doesn't mean you can't create wealth fast and I would say like there's a difference between wealth and Rich so you can get rich quick but one of my mentors taught me when I started off he said making money is easy keeping it hard yeah but I think if you have a million cash in your bank account and you're in your 30s like cool winner winner but I think the opportunities are there if you're willing again people hear that story at 24 starting that company and a year later I'm doing a million in Revenue after two failed companies I was 17 when I started as an entrepreneur I had I I and I was in a side hustle this is Dan Trine luckily my parents were just happy I was sober as long as I wasn't relapsing back in prison they were like keep it up so I just code code try stuff didn't work it wasn't until I was 27 that I personally had a million in cash so it's a decade so all I'm trying to do in that video is saying okay I'm GNA get take a decade of learning compress it if I had to do it over and we can this is what's crazy anybody that's had some kind of outcome business success or whatever if you ask them to give you the map to do it faster they'll tell you because you don't have to learn those lessons so all I do in that 12 month that 12-month period is I just show you 10 years compressed into 12 months so literally a decade into a year and the truth is is like Warren could make a $100 million in six months because because of 40 years of experience so you can make money quick but you got to remember most people don't have that experience okay we got a question right here when you look at um motivation willpower discipline and you kind of couple all those together like do you lean on any one of those more than the other I work with a lot of people personally who they just quit soon they quit early do they do they need more willpower did they need more discipline did they need more motivation what what is that combination in in your opinion it's actually question quite fitting we're in Nashville because there's an artist that I absolutely love named Jelly Roll and he just came out with a new album and he has a song on that album called winning streak and it's a beautiful song about recovery so it's near and dear to my heart and the whole the chorus essentially says nobody came in here on a winning streak and I share that because my answer would be discipline in the sense of consistency when I look at my life of all these moments that I I was in pain trying to improve things the thing that I was lacking was the consistency without consistency and habits you cannot build confidence confidence is the byproduct of keeping keeping the commitments that I made to myself when nobody else is around to myself in private so I don't like motivation my habits take over when motivation it it wanes right I don't want to wait till I'm inspired so my whole philosophy on my life has always been about stacking consistency because consistency becomes the foundation for winning and it's interesting that you gave us three words motivation willpower and discipline I agree with you discipline is actually the thing that we're that's where change happens now it's interesting I did all this research on motivation several years ago for the assessment the G clear assessment and I studied the intrinsic motivation from psychology like there are the six drivers there's some School of Flo that says there's seven but what i' really figured out was intrinsic motivation it's not this talk yourself into it and look in the mirror and all that garbage it's real motivation is actually somebody doing something because they want to and then it almost moves to have to yeah and I think that's where you're getting to the discipline piece you've got to get a clear reason that's what intrinsic motivation is I get up at 5:00 a.m. why to work out why I want to change my life why do I want to change my life cuz I want to be around at 80 for my grandkids if if it's to lose weight or something so when I learned all that it was it's the clarity piece that then gets us to a place of discipline one of my philosophies is to die young as late as possible like that so to do that you have to be physically available so when I started thinking and I heard this I heard there's two things that are measurements of like high quality of life and muscle density is one of them because and you know these people that are like our parents or friends of our parents where they stumble off a step and go down yeah and then they they fracture a hip and then because they don't have the muscle density then they go for the operation they're they're not mobile then they don't work out and then the body just essentially the the body will eat the muscle and then you're frail so you it compounds and I remember seeing an expert talk about the correlation between a a near hip injury to the blood thinning medication to the data that shows you that eventually you're going to have a it's just like crazy how these one incidents oh and then he said then most people start drinking too much and then they have heart problem it's just yeah because they couldn't brace themselves when they tripped right but because we cuz you weren't disciplined yeah they did they didn't have I love what you said able to take a hit I call it hard to kill like I don't want to be easy to kill I want high quality of life die young as late as possible which meant work on the zone two which widens the pyramid okay so it's what's cool is I every morning I get on treadmill I put it to whatever 15 25 whatever the treadmill will go an incline three and a half miles per hour and I walk and I get a sweat on that's Zone to it's not it's not a like some people think it's a Sprint and a massive you know three mile run it's not it's literally just you can do whatever you got to do crank some emails and get a sweat on and then for me macr based nutrition so that was a big idea I learned micronutrient dictates how you feel calories burn per day dictates your weight macronutrient dictates your look your body composition so protein fats and carbs so once I understood macras nutrition and then I understood Progressive overload training style which is probably what you're doing at the gym which essentially is just volume movement weight how many reps and I track everything in an app and it tells me if I'm getting stronger if you lift the same which you look around the gym 90% of the people look the same year later they're going to look the exact same lift the same if you lift the same you look the same so Progressive overload literally says you have to get stronger or you will not develop muscle and it is harder after 40 is is harder that's why the 20-year-olds that start going to the gym oh yeah it's like well I don't have that naturally like whatever is going on in your hormones right that's not me so I got to oh yeah I really got to crank over trust me I see it every day I got a junior in high school he's playing football and he's he's they look at a and they get a bicep really Dad you're working out he goes take your shirt off I'm like hey hey easy he has no body fat you know not fair I want to get back to Americans more than ever they want to make more money things cost more money and guys like you have a big platform if you had to start all over today starting from scratch you're dead broke yeah take it all away it's all gone all of it and I still believe I can make money okay and and prosper let's call it that what would the mindset be you were coaching that person to say all right you're starting from scratch here's what I need your mindset to be or is there a fundamental thing you just gave them one thing what would you say run as fast as you can to sell something to somebody you don't know so sales it's fast as you can right I literally if you used to ask me that question and we were actually out in the parking lot I would go what can you what value can you add what do you know what do you got what do you like to do cuz not even what you got you can sell something you don't own like I'm talking like right now like if you were a young person in the parking lot outside and you ask me that question we're walking across the street to that house or stopping the person that's walking in the building I don't think young people default to action enough that's the mindset default to action I don't believe there's any limits to anything you could possibly want the only limit is you you've added value the question you're asking your kids every night i' love that you shared that because there you can get your identity kind of started to get it back CU when you're when you're broke you're absolutely confused yeah there's no Clarity in your life and you don't feel worthy of anything like trying to sell something even if you don't own it requires you to be confident enough to try to communicate and if you just think right out of the gate I couldn't even sell that you just you literally just beat yourself up you even try so if I'm there and I'm trying to sell a point I that's what I call myself a professional point of view it's like which one do you need povs I'm selling points of views the point of view I'd want to sell you is that nothing happens until a sale is made and you have the power to sell that's that's we're showing up right here because the the statement about we don't default to action enough I mean that's not just young people that's everybody yeah and my goodness all right we're going to go to the front row right here I was on maternity leave with my second and um I started to see so much chaos in a household and how I was spending my time and then I went back to work read your book concept of a house manager got one she works for me 6 to 8 hours a week and it's amazing so what's one thing that you would say to moms who feel like they just have to own everything and don't have time to to think about their physical health their mental health because they just have so much to so much to do from a household standpoint I mean my wife is the best one to answer this but I can tell you our journey because everybody's got to go on their own journey and trust me right off the bat having a stranger in your home that's a thing right I had a client his uh his wife wasn't on board with even having a cleaning lady and I and he's how do I how do I help I said well I need to understand her values and and I said oh I got it she care she's a community person she hases a lot of community says okay ask her if she likes to create jobs say why is she taking somebody's job problem solved three years later now you could not that that that person who's now started as a clean lady now is kind of elevated into house manager is part of the family you know because now because what people don't realize is the person that might come to you know clean your car clean your you know clean your house do wash and whatever eventually you have a party Christmas party dinner then you ask them can you help out could you run some errands could you and now they're just they're just part of they're part of it you know that person you got for six to eight hours I mean I'm sure you like them because you wouldn't keep them some in your home so personal all that being said it comes back to them valuing their time and really themselves I mean moms have the hardest job because they are default programmed to nurture like it's it's really beautiful and at the same time it breaks my heart because wow if if you put yourself first put your own mask on you'd have so much more of you for the 2-year-old the kids the husband themselves like so again I I don't want to sound like a broken record but that personal selfworth is where I would start and really get them to understand I think most people actually have a lot of time that they're not using properly and it's tough because I understand emotions and some days you're off and sometimes I don't feel like it but if you just got honest with yourself and put stuff in your calendar and just honored the calendar like just you said you would just go do it it turns out that that muscle will start to get you into a place where you're like cuz here's the problem okay if I paid somebody to come in to clean my house so that I could go to the gym but I don't go to the gym when I say I'm going to go to the gym so help them with that I would tell these these these moms that what matters to you matters just back to what he's talking about the values piece you value yourself then you begin to value your time and boy that was just really good and I think that what a great message you know freeing ladies up to go hey if this matters to me then it matters I don't have to justify it and I think that's and and you're better for everybody so I remember one time one of the hard lessons it took me a long time to learn my mentor T taught me was just even the idea of vacations I didn't like vacations I like I like momentum I like creating I like winning winning turns out to be a lot of fun and vacation felt like the opposite and he said to me he goes what you know what's your thing Dan I said well I do a lot I like snowboarding like Mountain B he goes okay snowboarding when you go away snowboarding let's say you like treated yourself and went away for 5 days what's the the best no I oh H you know so H Back Country when you come back are you a better version of you yeah yeah I'm probably like I'm I'm he okay does your team deserve a better version of you could you create more if you were a better version of you I was like yeah does your family get a better version of you yeah then you need to build those rhythms and it actually turns out I'm not saying go to Thailand for 6 weeks I'm saying figure out your Rhythm of Life and that Rhythm like you and my wife we have a weekly meeting we have a quarterly Retreats we do we have a rhythm we figured out like what's the right amount what's you know kind of three little bears and I think that that even that idea of giving myself permission to go on vacation so that I can recharge and reset like a lot of like I know my wife like the first time she went away without the kids and I was there I knew she had a hard time like my like you get it I it was physical she's like are they okay I'm like I'm not that incompetent Daves I run big companies like we got help they're going to be here don't worry do you want your mom to come too and then you know three of us in the home like um but just you know the disconnect the the the the guilt of giving giving herself some time alone with her friends to go I think it was Scott sale or something like like go start go so it's it's it's a little thing and then to get there I got I want to show you something two pictures this is the first one and this is if you follow Dan on social media and this is just a print out but tell us how old you are in this guy who is that guy that's you how old are you and how much did you weigh I'm 2020 I'm 21 2021 and I weigh 265 lbs and well that's extraordinary I look I look into those eyes and I see a goofball like the goofiest goofball I'm not that guy just so y'all know yeah now there's a question here but I got to show you the second picture and this is for our audience because I mean dude when you put in this work every dude wants this picture thumbnails there we go there's this guy it's the same guy let's go how old is that guy this guy's 44 44 now the reason I show the pictures to the audience this way 21 is because I've seen you say this before I love what you have said on this that you decided that big guy decided to change his brand talk about how you change CH the way you thought about yourself which allow you to change your body I will I will share this cuz again 21 to 44 is 23 years of time and what you'll see if you if you go back even 10 years ago 2015 is probably the last time that I I I put on some weight it's you know two three years in my my new kid my you know my newborn and so I struggled with my weight my whole life if anything though it just it just kind of went like this so it was up and down up and down up and down up and down up and down were you eating medicate we know you're I'm a drug addict so sugar eating Comfort um I don't I don't do like a lot of people have like um some kind of Outlet like I don't play video games I don't I'd say extreme sports racing cars snowboarding snowbiking wake surfing and then food was kind of another way to do that especially if I traveling was always hard for me and there was different phases you know sometimes I use racing as a way to get in shape but that's that's short live cuz if I didn't have a race then i' put on a lot of weight and then I'd feel shameful because everybody sees it I mean the thing about weight is that it's visible You Can't Hide You lost weight you look good you don't you put on weight oh geez what happened so I had several spikes and downs throughout my life and there was even a point I hired a guy named Adam to just coach me on the mindset of of food you know what he helped me understand that nobody I've never shared this but I want people to understand this I was married and I was traveling a lot for work and shared a story about a man who had a hard time drink quitting drinking now I wasn't drinking no he quit drinking because it occurred to him that if he didn't quit there was a chance because he drank that maybe he would cheat on his wife and he just was so scared to doing that that that fear got him to stay sober cuz he traveled and he goes Dan is there a chance that you you won't let the weight go and I was like oh man I never thought about that and then he tells me a lot of women do that because of stuff they that have happened to them it's a protective mechanism to keep people away my goodness so that helped me actually get to a a new level right and then I started running and crossfitting IR man the the difference between that photo in 12 months prior so that was March of this year let's say oh it was only 90 days actually I did that transformation 9 days was a decision of essentially I want to I want to look the part I worked out way too hard to not look the part that was the identity shift you changed that identity shift and I think that's powerful y so I started how does an athlete live decision so so what's funny is I wrote down in my morning miracle Journal okay for 10 years I'm an Iron Man I couldn't swim and I didn't do it I did it a lot like you'd think that after writing it down for three or four times you would think you should probably start doing something that looks like an Iron Man I didn't I just was like I was getting ready to get ready I'm an Iron Man athlete I'm an iron manth I'm an Iron Man just write it down I'd write down like I'm a billionaire I'd write all this stuff down and and I remember I just like it started with Sprint Triathlon and then it started it started with you know so I had to do a 600 meter swim which sound like the end of the world right because if you ever try if you can't swim you try to swim that far I remember the first time I went across the pool I stopped I screamed back at my buddy I was like how many of those we got to do he's like 60 I was like I'm gonna drown like this is hard the the shift in that was understanding the power of identity is I shift and I started writing down I'm a bodybuilder that's that's that's that's I'm a bodybuilder yeah I'm glad you said that cuz I was going to ask you what went from writing all these things down to the action part and it was changing what you were focused on 100% I went from uh Iron Man athlete I went did a Sprint an Olympic eventually a 70.3 half then I did a full and now I've done I'm actually signed up for 70.3 in motron blond next year so I've done probably six or seven iron man I will tell you my buddy Nick who I train with a decade ago I was coaching him and he did a vision board and on his vision board he had an Iron Man logo like the Iron Man logo okay my buddy Nick was like so sloppy like he just and he wrote that down there and I'm a big thinker I actually tried to convince him to be realistic yeah hey Nick this is a bad idea I was like Nick dude you're never going to do an Iron Man like you're so silly like I love you other stuff's great but like just be realistic like don't set yourself trying to be a good friend dude this guy since we started doing it he's done seven more than me full distance Iron Man I'll never ever ever pull somebody down from their Vision ever again and he gave me that beautiful lesson cuz I remember the first time we finished the fold we finished it together and I pretty much said I'm sorry wow I love that okay I do want to get to uh right here in the front row we often talk about buying back your time and making your time more um efficient my fear as a parent is that I'm giving my three sons a very much easier life than what I had we have somebody to clean the house we have somebody who does all this stuff I'm concerned that I am not inviting enough hardship into their life yeah what do you do being a dad to make sure that you are not making your children's lives too easy well let let me tell you how silly I was for a while because I believed that and I was scared to do that um I would force my kids to sit in the back of the plane by themselves which is illegal just so you know like they were hey okay I'm in business they're behind me and Coach I fly private now so I have my own plane and I didn't want them to fly with with me like so then I'd have to fly commercial when they were with me and then take my like s like Silly Willy stuff like um there's just so many things and I'll tell you what changed for me is realizing that the world is hard enough on them if you allow it without me having to like drive out into the middle of the Wilderness drop them off and say figure it out boys and run home cuz that's what I thought I'd have to do cuz like what's the right of passage I know what I went through my buddy Ben Greenfield actually did this with his two 13-year-old twins turns out he trained them for 13 years how to be Savages so like they you know when he did the drop them off in the woods they were like yep see you and they figured it out um but it was it was when I was bringing them to uh daycare early days and my my sister-in-law own the place and I would watch all the parents do all the stuff for the kids like like the little booties the little gloves zipper the kids just sitting there like this and I'm watching my two boys getting ready and I'm like what are you guys doing and it was funny cuz I'd have conversations with the dad when you know mom's on I be like I was like dude I bet he could do that himself he look and I go just Just For What It's Worth CU my kids are 11 months apart arh twins so like and he would see that and I remember grade one maybe even preschool but I remember we had to go do the teacher thing so we went to the class I remember sitting in those little I forgot how small stuff was when I was a kid so I'm sitting in the little desk you know knees up here and this little thing and the the the preschool teacher is talking to all of us as parents is you know and she goes and by the way you have to let your kids pack their bag in the morning you cannot parents look at me she created an AG I love it she created an agreement it she looked in every one of her eyes promise me promise me promise me because I'll tell you what if you don't then I'll have to I don't have time don't make it my responsibility for you to and I was like everybody we're not going to clap for this we're not doing a standing ovation like what are you guys doing that is beautiful and I'll and I get it I get that moms want to show love my my wife's love language is act of service she loves to make the kids breakfast in the morning if you met my two boys and asked them has your dad ever made you breakfast ever in the history of Universe of time the answer will be no do I love them more than the universe because I love them is why I let the world shape them so the cool part is you can be as wealthy and affluent as you want if you also let the world so do I buy my kids anything they want no what they need I buy what they want I go 5050 easy math they want whatever they want go figure out a way to create value in the world so that's that's the way we've resolved it in our household is just allow them to go through the feelings be there for them when when they're struggling The Bullying will happen the you know the girlfriend I'm sure the heartbreaks are coming you know they're they're but I'm going to be there but I'm not I'm not solving stuff that's not my job my job is to be the example to create the support and let them learn those those lessons having money I can say this cuz I know a guy that doesn't have money and when I went to his house I opened up a door in his basement and there was a room the size almost half the size of this room full of toys dude you have no money what is all this stuff well I mean it's Christmas time I get them stuff and it piles up dude we get them like one present two medium presents two fi done separate the I need to do this for me from the let's let the world shape them kind of stuff this is very personal but this will help a lot of parents I think you've given the advice to a lot of young people don't go to your parents for advice and I I remember doing research for this conversation I was like slow your rooll Dan I got a 18-year-old in college right now I'm hoping he's coming back to me for advice you know I've learned a few things so I was like all right I'm going to tee this up what do you mean by that and then what's your posture that you recommend to parents who hear that talk to me I think that the challenge is parenting is a beautiful reflection of your selfworth and the need to feel useful and I've studied a lot of really successful young men my one of my mentors he has two beautifully incredibly well adjusted he worked for Bill Gates he's worth about four 500 million and I asked him these questions like how do you set the stage like how did they end up that way he said a few things back to the previous question which is he told me he's like don't don't hide the world from your kids so what does that mean Ken he goes the world is a certain way show them so we've never pretended like there weren't homeless people there weren't people that didn't have the resource we went to Haiti when they were five to work on a project we we are involved in our unhoused community we go to CH we literally go to church with the homeless people in our city every Sunday and we do we break bread with them and service and it turns out that when most children are 13 14 15 they start to go outside the family unit to find their their identity and the best thing we can do as a parent is make sure they're surrounded with other adults that we trust that we know will shape them so you can't fight it because that's what a lot of parents will do they'll just try to fight at the fact that they started dyeing their hair like I don't know I you know I did it I don't know if you guys did but you know 14 15 and and then and then know that okay they're going to ask other people the other thing is I say that is you know don't go to your parents for advice if they didn't do the thing you want to do I'm not a video editor when my son got into video editing I I introduced people I knew that were incredible humans that were video editors and said anytime you need anything call these people I didn't let him do that I shaped it like you know what I mean like I you got to set the playing field a little bit and that's what I tell people unless if you want to if you want to build you know unless your dad's the person that you want to be like Elon Musk or whatever cool but my gut tells me that you know my kids are going to have aspirations for things I've never done and asking me for advice is actually not the right move cuz that's not what I do if I want to get something done I go say who are the top five people in my city that have done this I go ask them I don't ask my brother he's well-intentioned but well-intentioned is actually dangerous sometimes it can be harmful and they don't mean to do oh you squash a kid' dreams without even knowing it I've taken those calls yeah the kids hear everything you say through a megaphone whether you like it or not well we all gathered here today to learn those of you that are watching those of you that are listening you came here because you want to learn because you want to get better you want to level up and and if you get that opportunity you want to lead well and so I want to model the way for us I hope you took notes I hope you rewind there's so much Dan that you gave us today that I think is extremely applicable uh but there's one thing that I'm taking away and and uh and something I'm going to do with it and you can let this challenge you or you can come up with your own but I I think back to our conversation where Dan was challenging us all to value our time after we valued oursel and and I and I can think in my life if I'm not where I want to be physically mentally emotionally spiritually pick the category of your life pick an a of your life where you're just not happy with it and I can I can draw from that Dan that I'm probably not putting the right amount of time into it if I've got some chaos or some some some some deficit I've got to be focusing on that that takes time and so the takeaway for me today is is to do an inventory and get to why I'm not valuing myself in that area that's the takeaway for me I've got some value but I also have some values and it's all out of whack and it's showing up in my time that was really good for me and I'm going to apply that I hope you will as well uh Dan I I got to tell you I um I knew you were going to make us all better you've made me better we know you have very limited amount of time and you chose to spend it with us and for that we're better so hey everybody join me in thanking our friend Dan Martel [Applause] [Music]