Are you out there grinding looking for work daily and coming up with nothing? Is your future looking more and more insecure as the days go by? With the government in turmoil, the job market in the trash can and with colleges teaching out-dated information at an inflated overpriced rate what are young people going to do about the future of America? I haven’t received a W-2 since I was 18 years old. What that means for you non-entreprenuers is that I have been self-employed for pretty much my entire adult working life. There are pro’s and con’s to being an entrepreneur. I have found myself explaining this concept to many people over the last month, and once it had come up a number of times, I feel as if the world is telling me that I should write about it and share the experience with an audience so everyone can partake in the learning process.
It has always been my dream to live in a place of abundance where I would always be in a position to help people. Never have I felt more satisfied than when I owned my company and I could employ people helping them to earn a living to support themselves and their family. When I started my first business, it was not my intention to help people get Jobs. I was just trying to survive. I was way in over my head, and probably to young, and to inexperienced to be operating my company, but I forged through it and even though I made many mistakes, I managed to have success with it. What I found was that it was the need of my employees that at times became even more important than what I was trying to do for myself. Let me give you an example. One of the saddest days of my business life was shutting down my brokerage firm when the market tanked. Not only was I in for some serious financial strains, but the guys I had to let go were depending on me to keep the doors open. Unless you are an owner, you will never understand what it’s like going to bed at night knowing that what ever decisions you make with your company good or bad will positively or negatively affect the lives of those who are working for you. It’s a lot of weight to carry and at times I have questioned even my ability to take on so much responsibility.
You see, in the beginning I believe everyone’s intentions are good, but when you start adding the loss of money in the equation, coupled with lots of opportunities in a market place and a lack of overall work ethic, the loyalty starts to dwindle, and people start betraying each other. No one understands this more than I do. I consider myself to be “old-School,” and what I mean by that is that I still live by the values that my fathers and grand-fathers generation showed my through hard work and loyalty. I watched my dad (who was a doctor) get up and go to work 5-6 times a week commuting back and forth from LA to San Diego waking up at 4 in the morning to beat traffic at times. He did that for more than 35 years running 4 medical practices. Sometimes the thought of working as hard as he did just seemed impossible for me to do. As I grew up a little more, and started my first company I learned real quick why my Pop’s put in 60 hour weeks. It wasn’t just about him, he had a family to support and people who depended on him like his employees.
These videos describe exactly how I feel, they are entertaining, but also very scary at the same time!
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTjMqda19wk
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YR4CseY9pk
So what are we going to do about? Well, I know what I am going to do, but do you. That’s the real question. The American Entrepreneurial spirit is the single greatest asset I believe we have ever had. It was born out of the idea that the framers of the constitution had about starting a free nation where capitalism was the model and politicians feet were truly held to the fire. So what do you call a bail out, socialism, or to me the same conservatives that demonized disadvantaged people for taking government subsidized money doing the same exact thing. There is no difference between a welfare check and bailed out money, it all comes from our tax dollars.
The sad fact is that sometime in the last 10 or 15 years, we just stopped caring about what important. We got lazy, allowed ourselves to go in to debt, allowed elected officials to run our country in to the brink of economic collapse while the super rich took advantage of the middle class widening the gap between rich and poor. By the time a few of us woke up and tried to do something about it, it was already to late, the damage was done. These days I find my heart bleeding out to those who will listen trying to get as many people as I can to be at least knowledgable about what going on and how they can do something about. Unfortunately, most people are to beat down and hungry looking for work and trying to figure out how to just survive day-to-day that they forgot all about the fact that the system they are trying to operate in is completely and catastrophically Broken!
Until we are ready to stop complaining, get off our asses, and do something about it, we’re screwed and it’s only going to get worse. Working in Multi-Level-Marketing for such a long time I have seen just how un-interested the younger generation is to doing hard work. Most college students believe they are going to make 100k + per year after college when I know the 85% of them will be moving back in with their parents after college. We cannot fix a problem until we admit there is one. I admit, there is a problem, when a guy like me, a self started that has had years of experience in business successfully is having a hard time putting deals together, I know how bad everyone else is struggling. You can’t find jobs because guys like me who create jobs are having an incredibly hard time forging through a broken market to create new or innovative industry to give you employment. That coupled with older generations unwilling to leave the work force due to their own lack of financial security is making for another economic melt down. Not the fake one you saw 5 years ago, but the one that is about to ensue when the job creators and entrepreneurs of this country decide to leave seeking fortunes elsewhere because of how broken everything is here.
The Zombie apocalypse had already happened, if you don’t believe me, just go to your local mall, sit in the food court for an hour and watch all the people go through there. If you’re not convinced by then, that’s because your one of time 🙂 At some point, I have to assume that the city has been over run by zombies and that it is time to save myself! I cannot help anyone who doesn’t want it, and God knows I have tried over the past couple of years.
I will continue to fight for you until you wake up. However, I will not die trying to fight for you if you don’t care. If that’s the case I’m moving to Bali and you can all be on your own out here. So wake-up, because the Calvary isn’t coming, the government is not going to fix this, it’s not your parents responsibility to fix it, a college degree won’t help, or a masters, or a ph.D. Stop tweeting, stop posting funny videos on Facebook to distract the masses from paying attention to what really matters and get out and do some F%&*%^ work. Good old fashion Entrepreneurial American handwork like your gramps used to do.
So if you want to learn more about what makes me tick, and more about what I wrote here, check out my latest book.
Ok friends, we have a lot to cover here. I promised you all a blog about social media and so here it is.
Facebook is an incredible anomaly for my generation. Through the use of the Internet Facebook has literally changed the way in which the world communicates. Some people may or may not know this but Facebook and it’s ability to allow people to communicate quickly an uninhibitedly has been an integral part of successful revolutions in 3rd world countries. It has allowed people to organize, trade and share ideas and basically made the world smaller and more accessible to hundreds of millions of people all over the world.
Personally, I love it, and I spend a probably an hour or two per day on it. It is how I stay connected with the friends I have met all over the world. It is a place where I can introduce new ideas to my network for validated learning and feedback. It is an experience where I can share about my life with the world and make real connections with real people. Not to mention it is the best way to “vet” a new person that you are dating or to find out a little bit more about that new business acquaintance you are thinking about getting in to business with. Bottom line, it is how the world communicates. 500 million active members, 50 percent of whom login each day. The average user creates 90 pieces of content each month, and the average user is connected to 80 community pages.
So what happens when it back fires???
In the last week I have been hypercritical of Facebook posts coming through my news feed. I was watching very closely to see how much of the content was negative bullshit where people were just complaining about non-sense. Sometimes I wish more kids from Cambodia or South Sudan would post about the problems they deal with on a daily basis because that would put it all in perspective. This video conveys it well.
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN2WzQzxuoA
Do us all a favor, and start updating your status with positive and uplifting things not to be confused with ridiculous self-affirmations to the world (aka Facebook). Affirmations only work when they are backed up with real action.
I mean for this post to be a reality check on what is really important. Just think to yourself, if you didn’t have Facebook, would you really go in front of a room full of people who are your friends or that you are acquainted with and say something like “Do you remember when there was only 1 Angry Birds game? I feel like a hoarder with the sheer number of these games sitting un-played on my phone lately.”
Well, no I don’t remember, because I thought angry birds was a game that little kids played on their parents phones, but thanks for that insightful and profound contribution.
Look, if you don’t know what to say, you could always find someone well-known like Albert Einstein or Tony Robbins and just quote them. I Guarantee you will get more likes than if you write some bullshit about what happened on American Idol last night, and the people looking at your wall might even get a little smarter, more enlightened or maybe they will even start following you because you are posting good content.
Now about Spam
I have worked in the Multi-Level Marketing space for about 6 years now and nothing, and I mean nothing screams that you are an Amateur MLM 1st timer by posting something like this on your Facebook or linked in page:
“I just got involved in a multi-million dollar international company that’s rapidly expanding and looking for motivated people to fill positions of this ground floor opportunity. If your interested, please private message me.”
NO! NO! NO! Just stop your whole life. If who ever brought you in to the business told you to do this, run away from that person because you will NEVER make an income in our industry with bullshit pick-up lines like the one above.
This is about as lame as saying something like “Are you tired, because you have been running through my mind all day “ trying to pick up on a girl who you met at Starbucks. It’s embarrassing, misleading, and it gives our industry a bad name, not to mention, it DOES NOT WORK.
You would be better off standing on a street corner flipping a sign that read “Join My Pyramid Scheme, Positions at the top available, call 555-5555 to find out more.”
Look if no one has taught you anything about prospecting, Facebook should never be the main source of new prospects or lead generation and posting scammy posts on your wall will make you lose friends quicker than Sarah Palin lost the 2008 election. Keep it real, and keep it classy.
I have always thought of my Facebook page to be a virtual representation of myself. What I mean by this is that instead of trying to make myself look better on Facebook, I try to do better in real life and then post my results on Facebook. When people see the results that I am having as a result of what I am doing in my life it begs the question of “WHAT ARE YOU DOING????” When a person asks you something like this specifically, than you now officially have permission to talk business with them.
People have always joined my network marketing business because of me. At the end of the day, if the person does not like me or trust me, than they will never get in to business with me. No one likes to be sold! No one likes to feel pressured! People like to feel special and treated with respect, and if I am just throwing nets out in the general public to try to convert a couple of cold leads, you are in for a very hard road in an MLM or any direct selling or marketing career. Instead, trying going for quality not quantity. Think about what got you in to the industry, did you feel like a number, or like someone actually took and interest in you and gave you the time of day to build a friendship/business relationship with you before they ever spoke about the business.
Here is a short little video of MLM legend Tim Sales explaining this subject
httpvh://youtu.be/A6E3SL3ePRM
Now that you understand that (hopefully), what did you take away? I hope what you took away is that there is no such thing as a cold lead, or prospect that will ever follow you or join anything that you do just because you simply made it know that you do it. You must engage that person, find out what he or she likes or dislikes and warm them up to the idea before you can even get in to talking about any kind of business. This formula is true in any kind of sales or customer acquisition business. When you post linear scammy business posts on Facebook, you forget that everyone who is seeing it knows you, and if they know you as Johnny the kid who delivers pizzas and makes 35K a year, they will find it comical that you are talking about making a 100K + income.
You would have been better off telling the truth. Maybe something like this….
“I hate delivering pizzas and making 30K per year so I went out looking for something better and met _______________(a successful person) who makes way more than I do and seems to have all the time freedom in the world to do what ever he/she wants to do. I am going to a meeting this week to learn more, anyone interested in going with me???”
And the truth shall set you free.
I hope this was helpful, now go out there and apply some of the things you have learned here, and if you see someone posting some ridiculousness on Facebook, please do us all a favor, share the link of this blog post, and send them to school.
I am 29 years old and live in America. I was born in Los Angeles, grew up with two parents (who haven’t gotten divorced) that both have college educations and raised me to never depend on the government to get by.
Over the past couple of years as I have struggled to keep business’ going and find new ways to create jobs and security for myself and people I work with. I can’t help but notice the decaying archaic system that we live in.
First let’s do some comparisons.
Education
In 1970, a year of tuition at a public university cost was $1207 and the most recent year of data available, 2007, a year of tuition at a public university cost$11,034. That represents an annual average increase of 6.2%, which, if you applied it to the 2007 price, gives you an estimated 2010 cost of a year of education as being $13,216. That’s a 994% increase in the cost of a four-year degree.
Housing
The median price of a home sold in the United States in January 1970 was $23,600. The median price of a home sold in the United States in January 2011 was$240,100. That’s an increase of 917%, one on par with the jump in education prices. If you live in California, you will be able to pay off your house when you are 140 years old 🙂
Medical / Dental
Well lets put it this way. 3 months ago, I got injured in Bali Indonesia. I hit the Reef surfing, got bit by a money, fell off a motor scooter, and got my neck tweaked doing jiu-jitsu. I spent 1/2 a day in the hospital, got a rabies shot, stitches, bandages, antibiotics and saw a chiropractor to adjust my neck.Total Coast – About 1.2 million rupia or about $120 U.S.
2 weeks go I had to go the hospital and spent 3 hours there to be treated for my tonsils swelling , I was given two I.V. bags of saline solution, a steroid injection and some pain meds. Total Cost $6,800 and $2,200 to me after insurance paid for it! By the way, I have full coverage medical insurance @ $154 per month which has increased 20% every year, and this was the first time in 5 years I have ever been to the hospital. I’m in perfect health, don’t drink, smoke or do any drugs.
I went to see the dentist a week ago for a teeth cleaning. Turns out I needed 4 fillings, and a crown, they estimated it would cost $4,100!!!!!!! But 3 months ago I was in Lima Peru, and had a dentist re-do 4 fillings and it cost me $90. So I think I’ll head down to mexico to get my teeth done there.
By now your probably trying to come up with 100 excuses why were still the best country in the world. Well depending on where you’re at, that statement is subjective. If all my friends who are 50+ years old and have worked their whole lives are doing ok now if…..
-They have saved some money
-own some property
-Have a skill set or job that will not become completely replaced in the next couple of years.
Older people are not making ANY new investments, because they have no expendable cash now and if they do have cash, the amount of risk they would be taking now is GREATER THAN EVER BEFORE. Not to mention, if they have kids, they are trying to support them because there is far less work out there then when they were young.
Time for a reality check…..
America is not getting better. The same people who collapsed this economy in 2005 are still running shit. That’s why nothing is different. Rich people will continue to stay in power and get more rich not because they are taxed more or less but because they have money to invest, and you DON’T. You also have no way to attain wealth because there is no school or education that you can get that is going to 100% guarantee your success. The barrier of entry is simply 1000 times greater than when my generations parents were growing up.
Politicians are crooks (generally) and don’t give a shit about anything except getting re-elected and taking care of their own. If you think going to the polls once a year is going to help, let me know how that working out for you.
Bottom line is that were way over due for a revolution.
The saddest part is that my generation and all the ones behind me a brainwashed. If you don’t believe me here is the test…..
Answer these questions to yourself.
1. Who is Brad Pitt Married too?
2. Name 2 current supreme court judges. (There are 9 total, just name 2)
3. What was loud obnoxious girl on the Show “Jersey Shore” who was kind of fat and always talking shit?
4. Could you file your own Tax return with no help from a CPA?
5. Who won American Idol last year?
6.Who is your local district congress person?
7. What statement is the rapper Lil John best known for?
8. How is your FICO score generated?
9. Whats the hottest night club in Vegas right now?
10. Do you know the requirements to obtain a mortgage to buy a home and how much you would need to put down on that house?
11. In the last year, have you bought a Starbucks, Flat Screen TV, gaming system (Wii, X-Box etc.) or have cable T.V.
12. In the last year have you saved 25% or more of your income, invested in your retirement or some kind income producing asset?
Answers:
If you could answer all of the odd questions, congratulations, your part of the problem. They mean absolutely NOTING. If you know the answers, it will never help you in life what so ever and the fact that you have spent time learning these things and absorbing that information shows how brain washed and conditioned to learning useless information that you are. More importantly, that useless knowledge has consumed valuable space in your brain that could have been allocated to some shit that actually matters. Stop watching TV, throw your Xbox in the trash, save the money your spending on cable on $6 coffee’s at Starbucks.
If you could answer just 1 of the even questions, you’re doing better than 95% of current youth of America. If you could answer 1/2 of the even questions correctly, you have a chance, and if you got them all, you might just be able to make a life for yourself and will probably even survive the Zombie Apocalypse if we have one.
The fact of the matter is that I bet you knew all the answers and possess all kinds of knowledge about a bunch of stuff that doesn’t matter. It’s not entirely your fault, there is a ver y calculated, sinister group of elitist rich people who have found the best possible ways to keep you distracted from anything that matters. If you are one of the few who have figured this out, congratulations, you have my respect, support and friendship.
The even questions cover the following.
–The people who decided what is and is not constitutional.
–Everyone will have to file Tax returns every year for the rest of your life. (So why didn’t they teach that in college)
–Your local congress person is the only say that represents you on a state level, if you don’t even know who that is, when you don’t like something about where you live how do you intend to change that?
–If you have credit cards, debt, a lease, car payment or loan including school loans, you have something called compounding interest getting you further and further from ever generating wealth guaranteeing that you will never retire, you will be a slave. The government wants this, who else is going to pay off the 16 trillion debt that we have racked up over the past ten years.
–Again, if buying a house is a part of the American dream, why don’t they teach that in College too. Simple math, Median Home price in California is $417,000 meaning that if you were ever going to buy some thing you would need to have a 680 or better FICO score and about $85,000 to put down. How much money do you have in the bank right now.
–We are only taught to get in to debt, no one teaches us how to save money. This is why you don’t have the 85K you need to put down on a home to buy 🙂 They don’t teach how to do this is college either, I would know, because I went there.
So in summary, I agree with this dude…. And I think I’m relocating to Bali Indonesia REAL SOON! But if your serious, and you want to learn a new way, or your sick of struggling and want to learn how to fight the system back and make money despite all of the bullshit, Contact me here.
The last couple of weeks have been rough for me. I’ve been working O.T. trying to salvage an organization, plan for the future while tackling some personal challenges I have been faced with. It’s funny how when you get so busy with your life you tend to forget where you came from and how bad you have had it in the past. Not to mention, other people. When I’m having a bad day, sometimes shit really happened, and there is nothing I can do about it, but for the most part, my bad day is attached to a serious lack of gratitude on my part.
I mean come on, if you have read my blog, you have seen some of the places I have been too, do humanitarian stuff for people who are really in a bad way. Most of my problems these day are very quality problems compared to most of the world. When I say quality, I mean that there has been a day in over 12 years where i have not had food, shelter and clean water to drink. More than 50% of the world currently doesn’t even have those basic needs met.
It’s one thing to say this, or know it, and it is a completely different act to actually believe it in the moment when you’re looking at your bank account wondering where you are going maker enough money to make your house payment or car payment for the month. I mean even if you lost your house, you would have a place to go. If you lost your car, you could borrow one from a friend or from your family. Have you ever really gone hungry??? Were the most over fed country in the world, trust me, Americans with over 2/3 of the population over weight are not going hungry.
The point is that unless someone is dying, going to jail, or in serious danger, the problem is really not all that bad, and most importantly it can be fixed. So how de we no spin out and remain grateful when we get like this??? Great question, here are some of the things I have done that have help me remain in a place of gratitude when I get lost and spun out.
Volunteer at a homeless shelter
Buy a homeless person lunch
Tell people you encounter in your daily life that you appreciate them coming in to work!
Prayer and meditation
Random acts of kindness
Call a couple of your friends and ask them how they are doing in their lives and tell them that you appreciate their friendship.
Let people who work for you know how much you appreciate them (This could be your mail man, garbage man, house keeper etc). This is also great to do with your loved ones and significant others. DUH@>!<W?><@
Story of my own.
Yesterday, I was pissed off because work had been stressing me out, I have been looking for a new place to live and I am short on money for the month, then my tire goes flat and needs a patch. I have been down and out the last couple of weeks dealing with some medical issues and other work related fires I had been putting out. Feeling sorry for myself, I went and patched the tire and drove off to the gas station to put air in the tire. As I pull in to the air machine, I notice a man sleeping in his beat up old pick-up truck next to 2 dogs sleeping inside. I walked in to the gas station to break a dollar and walked back to the machine.
As I walked back to the air machine, I noticed my brand new BMW next to this old pick up which was stacked to the gills with what apparently seemed to be all of this mans belongings. As if he had been evicted from his house, or wife kicked him out or something. As I filled up my tire on my brand new car, I couldn’t help but have a sinking feeling about the situation. Here I was pissed off about piddiley little bull shit when this man had no place to go, and no work to do as it was 3 pm on a Monday afternoon.
No one wants to end up like this. It was a bad run of life situations for him and this is where he had ended up. Instead of judging him, I took a moment to get grateful for what I had, then I took $5 out of my wallet and hid it in his gas tank so when he went to put gas in his truck he would be pleasantly surprised and that good things can still happen no matter how bad life seems to get.
The $5 was for the life lesson he taught me, he earned, it wasn’t charity. Him simply being there for me to witness was enough to snap me out of my funk, and I feel lie I should have given him $10. Either way, I hope it helped and It made me feel good to help someone else in need. I believe if we all spent some time doing this that the world would be a much better place.
As a result of this, I have made it a goal of mine to do something good for humanity at least once a month. Something a little bigger and more impactful than a $5 donation to a passerby. I’m going to call it, my monthly random act of Kindness, and each month I will be blogging about the experience.
Join me if you feel inclined. I think you will be delighted with how it makes you feel.
Hope you enjoyed the blog, please subscribe and re-post if you enjoyed the content.
This is whats Tattooed on My Collar Bone. So I never forget 🙂
One of my favorite books of all time is “How to win friends and influence people” by Dale Carnegie. Today, I am going to break this down for you Steve Wolf style and add my own little Part to the series, we will call it Part 5) “How to crush the competition and kick ass at life!”
You could go out and read the entire book, but I promise you what you are about to read is way more fun then the book that was written in 1936. But when you are done reading the blog, if you still want to buy it, I’ll post an amazon link at the bottom.
Ok, now were we go, my little summary + Some!
Part 1) Fundamental Techniques in Handling People
1. Don’t criticize, complain, or come off being a whiney little B^%$* No one likes that
2. Give honest an honest and sincere appreciation to the person, and even if you think what they are talking about is total bullshit, try to find the best part of it and work with that.
3. Make the other person WANT to get to know you better. (Hint*** This is done by being interesting, if you are not interesting, get to doing some interesting stuff with your life so you have something to talk about. Just don’t be boring because no one want to hang out with boring people.)
Part 2) 6 Ways to make people like you
1. Genuinely be interested and give a shit about what people tell you!
2. Smile, and not in a weird creeper way
3. Remember the person’s name. Hint*** Say it to yourself 6 times and then bring it up 3 more times in the immediate conversation and you will never forget it. It works for me 99% of the time. For example “So Doug, that’s an interesting name, why did your folks name you that, was it after some one famous???”
4. Listen for god sakes!!!!! Let a person just talk about themselves, they will tell you everything that you need to know to get them to do what you want them to. If you give them long enough, they will tell you their dreams, goals, ambitions etc.
5. When the other person brings up what their interested in, find common ground and ask them questions about that. For Example “Oh you skydive? Me to!! How many jumps do you have and what got you in to the sport?
6. Make the other person feel important, and do it sincerely. This is the most important, if you master this, you can almost skip steps 1-5
Part 3) Win People to your way of thinking
1. Avoid argumentation at all costs. Probably helps if you don’t mention Religion, or Politics, Sex is ok sometimes given the right circumstances.
2. Respect others opinions and viewpoints even if they are absolutely ridiculous. Do you want to be right, or do you want to win?
3. When wrong, admit it quickly and apologize.
4. Get the other person to keep saying “yes” and them let them keep talking and thinking that the came to the conclusion or idea of the conversation themselves.
5. Put yourself in their shoes, and see the world as they do!
6. Throw down a challenge.
Part 4) Be a Leader: How to Change people without offending them or arousing resentment.
1. Begin with Praise and Humility all the time. Remember where you came from!
2. When calling attention to others mistakes, do it indirectly, and talk about your own mistakes that you have made before you go it to their shortcomings.
3. Ask questions instead of giving orders as to get buy-in from the person or people.
4. Always let the person save face and praise them for even the slightest improvement. DO NOT bullshit this either, they will know, do it genuinely or not at all.
5. Give the other person a solid reputation to live up to. Use encouragement and make all faults seem easy to correct.
6. Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest.
Part 5) — My Part — How to Crush the Competition and kick ass at life.
Quick note if I may… What I am about to share with you is from my own personal experience meaning that I have done these things myself and live by them. I would never tell you or suggest anything to you that I have not done time and again mastering the skill!
1. Study your competition / enemy.
2.Live as they do, model them
3. Find weakness’ and take notes
4. Plan the attack carefully and collectively and set aside any emotion, pain, or fear associated with the task at hand.
5. Execute
6. Fight till you die, and if you’re not willing to die for it,(or see it through to the end) it’s not important to you and should go back to playing video games because you’re not ready to play in the big boy’s game and you’ll get hurt or worse.
Note*** When you get to the point in your life where your own “self competition” in your head is greater than any real competition in the physical world, you are truly unstoppable. If you’re not there yet follow the steps above until you are.
Now on kicking ass at life, here is 10 awesome ways.
1.Never give up
2. Always finish what you start.
3. If you want to be the best, then you have to work harder than whom ever is the best currently. Meaning if the “best” trains 3 hours a day, I need to go 3 hours and 1 minute.
4. Never walk away from a situation feeling like you should have said or done something but were too afraid to speak up. The emotional pain lasts way longer than the physical pain that might ensue in a situation like that.
5. All you have is today. Fuck the past, it’s not who you are, and fuck the future because it hasn’t happened yet. BE HERE NOW, this is the ONLY day you have.
6. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. What almost kills you makes humble, and what kills you, kills you, so don’t get killed.
7. Sometimes in life you have to eat a shit sandwich, so if you do, eat it fast and have a good attitude about it.
8. 99.9% of the time you can be right or you can be happy. So choose wisely, and remember that 0.01% odds are really shitty!
9. Choose your battles very wisely.
10. Eat well everyday, Sleep at least 6 hours per night, have sex 2-4 times per week and tell your friends and your family that you love them and appreciate them at every chance you get
Now go out there and apply some of this information that you have learned. This shit works for me and I want it to work for you, in fact I want you to come up with better stuff so I can log on to your blog one day and read about how something I wrote motivated you to do something different and great, and then you took it a step further, innovated on something I wrote, did, or said and made it better. It’s 2013 ladies and gentlemen and the world is not going to slow down. It will only get faster, and the more you feel left behind, the worse off you are. So get up, dust yourself off, and get back in the fight because we have a revolution to start.
I challenge anyone to apply these principles for the next 7 days. Record a 1-3 minute video of how utilizing these steps helped you, and I will feature you on my blog and I will give you a $25 -$100!
Here are the submission Requirements:
1. Upload the Video to You and link it to This blog post. (http://aefwolf.wpengine.com/?p=679)
2. Include my name and your name in your video and what steps you utilized in a specific situation to help you
3. Send me an email with the link to your Youtube video. email to [email protected] (Make sure to also send me your Pay pal email SO I CAN PAY YOU!)
4. I will pay you $25-$100 based on the creativity, story, and hits on your youtube. Any video that has over 300 hits before July 10th 2013 will automatically get the $100
5. I will pay out unlimited money for all good content. There will be no limit to submissions. So keep em coming.
I’d tell you good luck, but I don’t believe in luck, so go do it and get PAID SON!
If your interested in training on these things and joining forces with me on the application of these steps in your daily life as well please contact me through my blog and lets see what we can do together.
If you want more in-depth information like this, stay tuned for the podcast that will be starting in a couple of weeks or go check out my latest book “The Young Entrepreneurs Guide to Life” which can be found in the “Store” section of my website.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and I am looking forward to hearing your stories!!!!
Sincerely,
and if your still interested in reading HTWF&IP Here is the Book Link if your still interested
These past couples of weeks have led up to a defining moment in my young adult life. Shortly upon my return to the U.S. after my trip to Bali I walked in to a shit storm. Unlike most working professionals, the industry I have worked in for the past 6 years of my life has a way of creeping in to ones personal life. The line between professional and personal life gets very blurry because in the Multi-Level-Marketing industry, it is a relationship business, and at the end of the day, people have gotten in to business with me because they respected me, and they trusted me not just in business, but also in a personal way because they saw how I lived my life.
This is me last week 🙂
It’s sad how in desperate times, people who are the closest to you can hurt you the most. Not because that was their intention, but because when a person gets scared, they tend to do what is in the best interest for themselves and their family. In this past week, I watched the top guy (master distributor) in our company, someone who was a close friend and mentor of mine completely screw our mutual owner of our company and engage in the most below the belt tactics to get a group of distributors to follow him in to a different company.
The weekend leading up to this, I was in Las Vegas attending MFest with my buddy Cody. I had gotten news that a couple of groups in my organization had left to go to other companies. I had a feeling something bad was brewing and felt that I should get my ass to Salt Lake City to get to the bottom of it.
In my industry, when people start leaving, it’s because they have lost faith and feel that they cannot achieve their dream with our company. As a leader, when faced with this I have to ask myself some very hard questions, this is usually how they go:
Was my distributor unwilling to take the necessary steps for him/herself to be successful?
Did I fail as an “up-line” or leader because I didn’t support them accordingly?
Did they leave because the company’s inability to offer value to this individual?
Is our culture broken or not a culture that evokes growth and retention?
The distributors that I lost were not people who sucked, in fact they were very good friends of mine and some of the top people in my sales organization. Their departure sent me a clear message that they were done and fell in to one of the categories listed above. They explained that I didn’t fail them, but the company and the culture did, and although that made me feel a little better, I still lost them.
In the weeks leading up to my trip to Salt Lake City I was waiting to hear back from our master distributor on a possible investment in to out company. He told me that there were some promising people who were looking at investing in to our company. Sick of waiting, and having been told all kinds of things before that didn’t end up happening I decided to give him a deadline to come through on some of the promises that he was making.
The Deadline was on the Friday that I was on the way up to Vegas and the day after I suffered the loss of those two groups from my sales organization. After speaking with the Master Distributor, I felt as if he was bull-shitting me again, and buying time, something he is a master at. I took it upon myself to drive out to Utah and get to the bottom of it because I felt that I was just never going to get a straight answer over the phone. When I got there, I discovered that there were in fact NO investors and quickly realized that our master distributor and my friend and mentor Bryan was planning a strategic hostile takeover of the RevvNRG distributor base.
I was faced with the fear of my own loss, thinking to myself if this is successful and I end up on the wrong side of it, I’ll be broke and the 5 years I spent building this business will have gone to waste. I also thought about all of the relationships and promises I had made to people over the past 5 years and how my character and integrity would be questioned. I realized very quickly that I had to make a decision and do it fast as time was not on my side. It’s times like these that can confuse a person what the “right” thing to do is. I mean, here I have my friend and mentor in one ear telling me that I should follow him using every single persuasive tactic in the book to get me to get behind him. I was conflicted because I had a feeling that our mutual owner had no idea what was happening. When I asked Bryan if he had gone to Scotty (Our owner) and told him what he was planning, Bryan tried to dodge the answer in his usual style answering with out a simple yes or no, but basically explained to me that he hadn’t in fact discussed any of this with Scotty in a very eloquent way.
I have been alive long enough to know that if I act without integrity, I may get away with it for a while, but eventually the lies and deceit will catch up to me. This is why I live so rigorously honest today. Doing the right thing, especially when no one is looking is a matter of life and death for me personally. When I got sober almost 13 years ago, I was a liar, cheat, and a thief. It took me years to get honest with myself and to make all of the amends to clear the wreckage of my past. Eventually, after year’s sobriety, hard work, dedication and rigorous honesty with my fellows, and myself, I achieved what few people in life ever do; I was even with the world. I had paid back all the money, made all of the apologies and lived my life in a way where I would work carefully at all my endeavors as to not create new wreckage, and when I did make mistakes, I would correct them immediately preventing those shortcomings from festering and eating away at my soul.
I watched many men fail to do the right thing ultimately leading them to drink again, wind up in jail or just live a miserable existence filled with guilt, anger, and shame. I vowed a long time ago to NEVER end up like this. My mentors were gleaming examples of the type of life you get to live by always acting with integrity.
They led by example and would always tell me that serenity won’t come from a pile of money but from the respect of your peers. Perry P would always say, “you can’t be one guy in one area, and another guy in another area, a scum bag is a scum bag even if the guy does some good things too.” Perry always made it black and white, he’d say “You either tell the truth or you don’t kid, there’s no in between.” My other mentor Mike W. used to tell me that by standing aside and doing nothing when I could bring someone or something to justice by telling the truth was just as bad as the guy lying about it to begin with.
The bottom line is that I was in a position where I had knowledge of something happening that if brought to the right people, the lies would be exposed and something potentially harmful and hurtful could be stopped. I called a couple close friends who were long time Multi Level Marketing guys and sought some council with close friends. Just as my mentors would have advised, told me go forward and expose the lies.
I broke the story to our owner Scotty and called my team to action to help me prepare a conference call the field explaining and trying to prime them for what was about to ensue.
I began to get attacked from all angles and the shit storm commenced. I began to see how much or how little influence I had on the group as a whole. Even with factual empirical evidence people still believed what they wanted too. It was as if I was telling them the sky was blue and they still didn’t believe me even though they could walk outside and see it with their own eyes.
As each day went by I kept finding out more and more bad stuff about my former mentor and master distributor Bryan. Turns out that he had quite a few back door deals, and that his current financial situation didn’t seem to add up to what he would have me believe. Allegedly, there were large sums of money MISSING, and outstanding debts from prior lawsuits that were being paid off. Money given to him as an investment that was meant for opening international markets for RevvNRG never made it to the intended recipient.
After watching this drama unfold I couldn’t help but feel relieved that I made the right decision, but I felt remorseful towards Bryan’s wife and kids who I had come to know over the years and probably had little to no knowledge of what was happening. I also began to feel really bad for all of the distributors that were caught in the middle of this and made a quick decision based out of fear because they felt they were going to lose something or not achieve their dreams without Bryan.
I spent the next week on the phone with our owner Scotty trying to come up with a solution that would save the company. A couple of days after the siege, Scotty and his wife sue were feeling the pressure and it was time to stand up and make some tough decisions.
Within days of the fallout, the sides were divided and the people left on our side quickly got to work on a solution. Within days we put our heads together and aligned ourselves with the right people coming to a solution that would not only fix the current situation, but in one fail swoop eliminate and take care of some future and past problems that we had as well.
The moral of the story was that truth, and doing the right eventually paid off as it always has. There is no such thing as a short cut, or luck, you make your own way, and if you do it dishonestly or burning bridges along the way, eventually there will be nowhere or no one left to work with or help you out in a time of need. The RevvNRG brand lives on and is about to be 10 times bigger and in 11 new countries 😉 hint hint!!
As I finish writing this it is close to midnight and is technically my birthday. I’ll be turning 29 years old today, and even though I’m far from home and have been stressed out over the past couple of weeks, I’m going to sleep well tonight knowing that I have a clear conscious, a bright future and a hell of a lot of people who love and respect me. That’s a whole lot of things to be grateful for.
I am excited to see how the next couple of weeks unfold, my prediction, EPIC!!!!!!
For more information on the what’s happening in my MLM business, stay tuned to this blog and my Facebook page as I will be posting videos and blogging about the big news coming!!!!
In the great words of the late Perry P. (my friend, mentor and role model in the later part of my formative years) he told me: “Steve, In life, believe none of what you hear, and only half of what you see. ”
I have been in business for a long time now. In about two weeks I’ll be 29 years old. I haven’t work a “W-2” type job taking a paycheck since I was 18 years old. First it was my clothing company All Else Failed Ind., I built that company out of front room in my little dingy apartment in South Los Angeles. Everyone told me it was a stupid idea, my partner Justin ended up quitting 6 months in to it, but by the end of the first year, I was selling my clothes in 35 states and out in the UK.
When I was 20 years old, I got in to the financial services business breaking off and starting my firm in 2003, I built that little brokerage in to a company doing 10-15 million a month in transactions. During that time I published my first book about my life growing up which I have now sold thousands of copies of.
When the industry crashed in 2008, my life fell apart. My mentor died, I lost my business leaving me about $140k in debt, parents were struggling, broke up with a girlfriend of 2 years, my best friend at the time screwed me over and a con-artist posing as roommate stole my last $10,000 that I had.
I realized that when I lost all of the material stuff, and my status and prestige was taken from me when life humbled me, the only thing I really had left that mattered to me in my life was my honor, loyalty and integrity. I watched fair weather friends disappear when the money was gone. I lost people who I thought were my friends over money and women. I lost hope at times and was furious with god because I couldn’t understand why he would take such innocent people away from me.
When I finally came in to acceptance about the reality of my life, I began to question everything, the meaning of my life, who my friends were, who I thought I was or was supposed to be, and generally everything.
I made a commitment to myself that no matter what happened, no matter how bad it got, that I would never sell my integrity. My idea of success changed. Instead of wanting to get money to be rich, I started to pursue happiness, and serve the truth, defy the lies, and get willing to be in a place where I was willing to sacrifice anything including my life to stand up for what I believe in.
When I made this decision, life got simple. It was easy for me to determine what people were good for me, and what people I needed to cut of my life. In business, I found a company and built an organization in to the 1000’s to watch it fall apart by some unscrupulous people. Then I got in to another company, built it in to the 1000’s again to watch it fall apart one more time by some unscrupulous people. I have learned now more than ever that no matter what someone says to you, the only way you can really judge them is by their actions. I have been sold the world by people. People I’ve been in business with have promised me the world and were really nice to me up until the time I disagreed with them. Perry P. was right all along. I should have only judged by actions, trusted my gut an intuition, but that’s been hard to navigate when your young or new at something or trusting in the success of the edified people. Regardless of the inequalities that I have felt, and putting behind all of the times that I have been lied to, or stabbed in the back in my personal and professional life, no one can say I was dishonest. No one can say that I told lies or mislead people with malicious intent. Basically, through thick and thin and like Perry, and all my other mentors, I remained honorable.
I am at another one of those transitional times in my career. It’s exciting to me because I know things I didn’t know before and I am finally going to get a chance to prove myself. In order to see if you outgrew your Sensei or guru, you must challenge them, if you win, than your right, you became better, more enlightened, but if you lose, you’re a fool. So if your going to go at it alone, you must be ready to accept all of the consequences that come with it, and further more be ready to humble yourself if you did in fact bite off more than you can chew. In my case, I’m as ready as I’ll ever be in this moment and it’s time to start a new chapter. This is the only moment I have, my conscience is clear, my side of the street is clean and I’m ready to put a dent in the world!
Today, Im a free agent again. I am young, single, healthy, well-educated and street smart. I know more now than I ever have before in my life. To me, I have found true serenity in the way I live because I realize that despite all of the injustice in the world and all of the suffering, I choose to be a part of the solution. NO ONE GETS A WAY WITH ANYTHING, eventually the world has a way of correcting the imbalances.
I will be giving a really big update this week, so stay tuned to this blog, I’m going to change the world, and I’m taking as many people who want to go with me.
Do you ever think that you were meant for so much more than what you are currently doing?
Throughout my life I have found that most people have a large gap between what they want to be and
A Shit Sandwich
who they are. Most time, these people fall in to one of two categories of why they believe their life isn’t where they want it to be:
1. They make excuses. They are simply unwilling to admit that the reason why they aren’t where they want to be is due to some life circumstance, or some kind of outside force that is preventing them to achieve what they would like to do or accomplish.
2. They have become so ingrained in their daily routine and patterns that they have either forgotten their dreams all together or simply have accepted the fact that they may never come to fruition. Almost as if they missed it, or it wasn’t in the cards for them in this life.
Over the years I have had the opportunity to hang out and learn from some incredible individuals. People whom at one point in my life I thought to be inaccessible by me. I used to be scared when I was in the presence of such greatness and success because I felt so below them, so far away from what they had accomplished in their lives. As time went on and I gained more confidence in myself personally and professionally, interacting with these people became easier. One day it clicked and I realized that no matter how famous or well put together the man or woman standing in front of me was, they, like me were human. They ate, slept, and put clothes on the same way that I did. At times in their careers, they too struggled and failed miserably. They experienced love, loss, sadness, victory and all of the other emotions that I too had felt.
I realized that no one, and I mean no one is untouchable or immune to life. The only difference that I experienced among the haves and have-nots was their reaction to what life threw at them. When life hands you a shit sandwich, some people refuse to eat it, and avoid it at all costs even when it means that by not eating it, they will never realize their dreams. The shit sandwich is a metaphor that I have come to use when trying to explain the hardships of life. Successful people, eat the fucking sandwich, and they eat it quickly because they realize that if you are going to get anywhere in life that has some substantial value, that there is no way to avoid eating some shit sandwiches and the faster you just eat it and get it over with, the closer you are to where your going. Not to mention all the time and energy that is wasted complaining and dreading about doing some hard things one doesn’t like to do. Bottom line is that a shit sandwich already sucks and is disgusting; now imagine waiting days, weeks or months to eat it, and how much more disgusting that sandwich is going to be when you finally come to the inevitable realization that in order to move forward, you must eat it.
Successful people are never victims, they take bad things happening in stride building the muscle of resilience knowing and having faith that no matter how bad things may seem, they will always get better if you are willing to work for it and persevere through bad times.
To win is a choice, to lose is a choice, and the outcome has nothing to do with circumstances, it comes down to who was more willing to set aside their circumstances and excuses to beat the person who chose to be a victim of those things.
To me, I feel like I have gotten so good at dealing with shit happening and tacking it up as just a standard and normal part of life it’s almost as if a shit sandwich doesn’t even phase me. I look at it, I mentally prepare, and then I eat it quickly so I can get back to having fun. I refuse to let it ruin my day or waste any more time than it has too.
Mastering this skill has become one of my greatest strengths, without it, I would not be where I am at today. Anyone can be happy when everything is going well, but the people I respect and want to align myself with are the people who can keep calm and focused with a positive mental attitude when things a falling apart all around them and it’s raining shit sandwiches.
After a little over a month in Bali, I am returning home. The beautiful sunsets, amazing surf, and sipping coconuts under palm trees while meditating about life are going to come to end.
A part of me is toying with the idea of just staying out here. I love it so much and there is everything I need out here to be happy. I know that I will return again and I have been looking in to just buying a place out here so I can just live out here a couple of months out of the year.
The only draw back is that out here is life is so slow and easy-going that I would imagine it would be hard for me to get things done. It is such a quality problem. When you live in paradise and you have everything you need, there is not a lot of motivation to work and strive for new things. It’s like a never-ending vacation for those who live here, and that’s the seduction of this place. Bali has a way of taking you out of your environment, and then slowing you down to the pace and way of life here. It is the only place on the planet that has been able to do that to me. I am an A-Type personality full of passion, motivation and an undying sense of urgency to get things done. After about a week out here, all I am motivated to do is Surf, read, write and meditate. With the occasional outings with friends and hitting a club here and there; a good time to me is sleeping in, surfing, reflecting, and then just enjoying a good conversation with some interesting people, and this place has no shortage of them.
People usually ask me what I miss about my country when I travel, I always have to stop and think about it because I have conditioned myself to live in the moment for so long I usually don’t find myself ever missing a place, instead, I always end missing the people who I have met over the years throughout my adventures. California is my home though. I was born and raised there and it is a part of me. It’s not a bad place to end up and compared to a lot of the places I’ve been to in the world, and I am extremely grateful to come home to San Diego where I reside currently.
The world is getting smaller. Technology allows me to stay connected with all of the people I have met all over the world and when you break it down, I can get anywhere I want to on this planet in about 2 days (unless your going to the middle of Siberia). Everything is a plane flight away. This makes me extremely grateful, because the ability for common people to travel to far corners of the earth has only been around for about 70 years. 100 years ago, if you wanted to go to Europe from America, you were going to have to take a carriage or car to a boat and then embark on a 1-2 month voyage just to get to some place. Only people who were rich were able to afford such a voyage. To be able to scale that amount of time down to just a couple of days and couple thousand bucks to leave for months at a time is fucking amazing to me. I mean I hop on a plane in LA, and 6 movies and 10 cranberry juices later, I am half way around the world immersed in a foreign land where everything is different, and to me that experience alone is one of the most exhilarating and fulfilling things I have ever experienced in this life. If you are a traveler, you know exactly what I am talking about, and if not, maybe it’s high time you spin a globe, pick a destination and get out of your comfort zone.
Paradise is defined as “a place or state of bliss, felicity or delight.” It is not necessarily attached to a location and although it can be, I believe that Paradise is found within ones soul. Buddhists call it Nirvana, Christians call it heaven, Jews call it Shamayim, but to me, it all means the same thing. Like I had mentioned before about living in the moment, I am not terribly concerned with what will happen to me in the after-life or even the future really. I have subscribed to the concept of living as if I were going to die tomorrow and planning as if I am going to live forever. Spending a massive amount of time pontificating about the unknown afterlife and future can be fun an enlightening at times, but the idea of dedicating a continual amount of time to this is both boring and unfulfilling to me.
The truth is that I am alive now. Time is made up, safety is an illusion, and although some humans claim it, I have never been 100% convinced that were going anywhere but 6-Feet under when we die, and we will die, the day will absolutely come so no need to fear that either. The hypothetical clock is ticking and has been for a long time. So, instead of worrying about all that noise, I just live every single day to the fullest seeking to find truth and experiencing every single person, place, thing or idea I can immerse myself in while my soul occupies this body.
My beliefs and principles are negotiable, and as a result of that I have been able to experience and do things that I don’t think most people get to in their lifetime. I studied world religions for years, went to Israel, read the Koran, hung with Pastors and Spiritual Guru’s, traveled throughout South East Asia and was open to the idea of adopting any belief system that got me closer to my understanding of God. The funny thing is that after all that, my underlying spiritual belief remained the same. It was the simple belief in a Higher Power of my own understanding, a principal introduced to me at the age of 16 years old through a 12-Step program I came in to while getting sober from Alcohol and Drugs.
My path to spirituality has been long, vast and downright tedious at times, but I have approached it with the same enthusiasm and tenacity that I have with everything else in my life never getting to caught up on any one thing and being open to it all believing that all religions and people for that matter are basically good and mean well. To deny or discount anyone’s beliefs would make me just like the people who are shut off, or unwilling to be open to a new understanding, and ultimately will not allow their belief system to be questioned or negotiated no matter how much sense logic makes in spite of what they believe. To me, those are some of the scariest people on Earth; they are the type of people who start wars over that kind of shit.
What this all means is that Paradise, to me at least; is being completely ok with everything exactly that way it is in this very moment. The more I realize that I cannot change anyone and the only real control I have over anything is how I react, and the example I set as a human being, the more easier my life gets. I do want to effect change and help those who want it to reach this kind of spiritual enlightenment, but you cannot force those who don’t want it and to judge those people for not wanting it would be hypocritical, because I spent a large part of my life in that same place.
What ever you believe is totally cool. You don’t have to conform to anyone or any religion’s or societies’ belief system if you don’t want to. You are free to do what you want; after all it is your life. If you are an atheist, agnostic, spiritually conflicted Catholic, or you simply don’t know where you stand, I would urge to seek truth in places you never thought to look before. That’s where I found my faith, and my faith is in no way shape or form affiliated to any one religion, if anything I have taken the teachings and traditions from many religions and use what I like leaving the rest behind. This is how I have found my paradise, my state of Nirvana. I don’t need to be in Bali, or some incredibly beautiful place to reach it either, it is in my soul. Besides, it has been my experience that in the darkest of times when I really needed to tap in to this place and ask my higher power for direction, I’m usually not on vacation or in a place like Bali, I’m in life, dealing with real shit, real problems that need solution. That’s when my faith has counted the most.
One final note, when I do die, which could be tomorrow or in 100 years, I have no fear going to where it is I will go next. To me, that is the ultimate adventure, the one true great unknown besides space. I have lived each and every day to the fullest, I have no beef with my fellow-men, there is no wreckage from my past that has not been cleaned up, there is nothing that I haven’t done that I have wanted to do to this point. Everything I dream up I attempt it no matter how crazy it sounds, I never live with regret or say some bullshit like: “someday I will” or “Ill try,” I only dream and them get to turning that shit in to a reality for me as quickly as possible. This has allowed me to see and experience things I never could have imagined to be possible, and for that I am extremely grateful.
Never let fear dictate your life, if you can dream it, than it’s possible, so never give up hope and continue seeking truth.
Are you out there grinding looking for work daily and coming up with nothing? Is your future looking more and more insecure as the days go by? With the government in turmoil, the job market in the trash can and with colleges teaching out-dated information at an inflated overpriced rate what are young people going to do about the future of America? I haven’t received a W-2 since I was 18 years old. What that means for you non-entreprenuers is that I have been self-employed for pretty much my entire adult working life. There are pro’s and con’s to being an entrepreneur. I have found myself explaining this concept to many people over the last month, and once it had come up a number of times, I feel as if the world is telling me that I should write about it and share the experience with an audience so everyone can partake in the learning process.
Facebook is an incredible anomaly for my generation. Through the use of the Internet Facebook has literally changed the way in which the world communicates. Some people may or may not know this but Facebook and it’s ability to allow people to communicate quickly an uninhibitedly has been an integral part of successful revolutions in 3rd world countries. It has allowed people to organize, trade and share ideas and basically made the world smaller and more accessible to hundreds of millions of people all over the world.
First let’s do some comparisons.
