Bedros Keuilian Podcast Show - 027. 17 Life Lessons for Young Men

Episode Date: April 4, 2023

In today’s episode of the Bedros Keuilian Show, I share 17 pieces of advice that I wish I knew when I was a young buck. These nuggets of wisdom could've saved me years of struggle, reduced anxiety, and put me on a faster track to success. And if I can pass on the wisdom that took me more than a decade to acquire, you'll have a 10 or 20-year head start that I wish I had. JOIN MY FREE 6-WEEK CHALLENGE https://bedroskeuilian.com/challenge

Most people are a part of some kind of herd. They see what the herd is doing, and they do what the herd is doing. And the reality is, and Tony Robbins says this, he says, if you want to be successful in life, watch what everybody is doing and do the opposite. Welcome to the Bedros Koolian show. Back when Q was rolling with Lorenzo and a Benzo, I was banging with a gang of instrumental. Hey friends, welcome to the Bedros Koolian show. My name is Bedros Kulian, and I want to lead off by telling you this one thing right now, and that is that you guys, are helping us grow this show on YouTube faster than ever.

We are currently adding about 1,300 new subscribers per day on YouTube. So thank you so much for all of you that are watching and listening to this on YouTube. And I appreciate you guys subscribing. I don't know if you know this or not, but about 74% of you, according to YouTube stats, are not subscribed even though you're watching this. It would mean a lot to me that if you would watch this, I've always told you that I will not advertise anything that I do not personally sell on this show. What I mean by that is I will not take other people's money and promote their shit on my show just to sell you stuff that I don't believe in.

Everything I sell, which is really nothing on the show because the show was free for you, is all my stuff. I wear, fuel hunt and I will always be rocking fuel hunt. I create a trueling supplements. I started the Fit Body Boot Camp franchise. I run the modern day night project. And if you're going to do any of those things, I back back back guarantee because it's the finest quality of everything, from ingredients to material to service to whatever.

So again, all I ask for is a subscription if you're watching this on YouTube. And then if you're on the podcast platforms like Spotify and iTunes and all the other platforms, thank you so much, man. We are growing so quickly the Bedros Kulian show. And it's because of you, the tribe, the Bedros Kulian tribe. And I am massively, massively grateful for you guys. So with that said, we're going to kick off this show. And this show was really about the advice that I would give to young men, right?

So my advice that I would give to young men, and I started thinking, if there was some advice that I could have gotten between the ages of 15 to 25 that would have put me on this success trajectory faster with less frustration in my life, with less time wasted, with less anxiety, with less friction, what would that advice be? And I came up with 17 pieces of advice that I want to share with you here. And so if you're 15 to 25 years old, this is what I would share with you as a young man. To me, you're a young man if you're 15 to 25. And the things you do now in this phase of life will determine how your 30s, 40s, 50s, and beyond look.

Like if you want to live a life with no regrets, you want to make it to your deathbed and be like, fuck man, I lived a life well lived. I would start with these 17 things if you're a young man. And by the way, this doesn't mean that it doesn't apply to you if you're beyond 25 years old because truth is, I started getting my shit in order when I was in my early 30s. And really after 38 years old, I really dialed in these things that I'm telling you about. And my life got infinitely better. But if I can give you a decade or two decades of advantage that I didn't have, then I want to give you that advantage. So let's get started. So thing number one, I want to share with you is to

wake up early and stack wins, right? Wake up early and stack wins. What I mean about waking up early, that doesn't mean you have to wake up at 4 a.m. But if you're waking up at, you know, 8 or 9 a.m., consider waking up at maybe 5.36 o'clock in the morning. And when you do, I want you to stack wins. The first win is going to be to not hit the snooze button, right? The second win is going to be to maybe drink 30 ounces of water. And I'm just kind of describing my morning routine to you. The next one is going to be to not dive into your social media, but instead to shower and, you know, get, get to your next thing that you're going to do. What I mean is we need to start stacking little wins.

Most of you out there think that success in life is a byproduct of big wins. Like I got to make that deal. I got to get that sale. I got to start that partnership. And the big wins are important too. make no mistake about it. But I'm here to tell you that the little wins stacked every day, every hour, over time, over days, weeks, and months make you a fucking gangster of a human being.

So I want you to wake up early and stack wins. And what that does is it begins to compound and helps you with thing number two that I'm about to share with you, which is to build confidence, right? Thing number two is to build confidence. And how do you build confidence? To me, it's simple. You keep the promises that you make to yourself. others. All confident people are is there are people that have high reputations with themselves.

And so if you're the type of person that says, well, I'm going to wake up at five in the morning. And so you set your alarm to wake up at five in the morning. But then you hit the snooze button when the alarm goes off. Guess what? You lied to yourself, right? You didn't keep your promise. And so you are eroding your confidence with yourself. You are reducing your reputation. Like if you had your own credit score with yourself, your credit score going down is the equivalent to your reputation and your confidence going down. So if you can make the promises and keep the promises, you will find that you start stacking wins and as a byproduct confidence begins to soar.

And why I say that is if you are a confident person, something else happens. You gain competence, meaning when you have to learn something new, when you start a new job, start a new business, take on a new partnership, go into a new relationship. A competent person is going to have a better run at it than someone who is not competent, right? Like, who wants to be incompetent? That's kind of stupid. Well, low confidence people are incompetent in many areas of life. High confidence people are competent people in many areas of life.

And when you're competent and you have confidence, you become the type of person that no longer seeks the approval and validation of others. Thing number three, my advice to young men. would be to exercise daily. Listen, you have got to exercise daily because when you exercise daily, you begin to train your muscles. You begin to train your cardiovascular system.

But above and beyond that, you begin to get results. Those results are more wins that you're stacking. And those results are a byproduct of discipline, of consistency, of effort, of focus, of delayed gratification, right? Because you and I both know this. One awesome workout is not going to give you the result. you want. One week of awesome workouts won't give you the results you want. One month, you might start seeing some results. One year or six months? Dude, now you're seeing some

results. And what did that teach you? That taught you that even if you're not feeling like it, even if you're not motivated that day, you are going to go into the gym, you're going to hit the trail, you're going to do your exercise routine even if no matter what because you are a disciplined, consistent, focused individual. And that individual is a confident person who stacks wins, and that's what you want. Thing number four of my advice to young men would be eat clean. Listen, I treat myself like an athlete. I'm an entrepreneur, but I treat myself like an athlete.

And an athlete exercises daily and eats clean. Think about how much self-control it takes to eat clean. What does eat clean mean? Eat clean means eat in a way that you are showing respect to your body. Imagine this for a moment. If I said, I'm going to buy you one car that you're going to own the rest of your life, you don't have to buy this car. I'm going to buy this car for you.

However, you're going to own this car the rest of your life and there's no other car that you can have other than this one car. Wouldn't you then maintain that car well? Wouldn't you make sure that you rotate the tires, change the oil, if there's any dings in it, you fix the ding. you're always looking after that car, you're washing it, you're vacuuming the inside, because it's the one car that's going to last you the rest of your life. Guess what?

That body and that beautiful brain of yours is the only one you get. So how do you eat well? Eat high protein foods. Eat foods that are also green, like fibrous, right? Keep your carbohydrates to somewhat of a minimum to moderate, and then keep your fats low. Google macros. Like how do I track my macros and learn to track your macros? If you track your macros, your proteins, your fats, and your carbs, and you knew exactly

what your macros should be. In other words, how many carbs, how much fat and how much protein in grams you should get per day to maintain a fucking sexy stellar body, then you would be a confident, competent person who respects himself and therefore you would get respect from others as well. Advice number five for young men is to develop core values. When you develop your core values, you now have non-negotiables. Like for me, I won't stay awake past 10 p.m. Now I get it.

If I'm doing the project, obviously we're going to be awake around the clock. If I'm doing my annual suckfest experience where I'll hike 30 miles from sundown to sunup, obviously I'm awake past 10 p.m. But outside of that, I have core values and non-negotiables. And by having core values and non-negotiables, like I know I'll never put myself in a position to go against my core values, right? It's almost like having lanes in your life. You ever hear people say, hey, man, stay in your lane.

Well, stay in your lane also means have your core values so that if someone drank and they're going to drive, I'm not getting in the car with you. You want to party after 10 p.m.? I ain't the one to hang out with. Oh, you got a joint? I ain't smoking that. Not anymore. I'm done with that, right?

Oh, you want to sit around and gossip about things. Part of my core values is I don't gossip. Oh, you want to complain about things. Part of my core values is I don't complain. I just solve problems. And so because I have core values, the people I hang out with, they share similar core values and allows me to eliminate the negative people that don't belong in my life, that I don't want to influence me. So when you have core values and when you have non-negotiables, you have lanes in life that you can stay in, which really guide you to a better place in life. You get to a higher trajectory of success faster.

Thing number six is to dream big and to protect those dreams. I'm telling you right now, not everybody wants to see you win. And the reality is the bigger your dream, the more they want to shit on it. But that doesn't mean everybody wants to shit on it. You might have a tight group of family members or friends who really root for you. But beyond that, most people that you share your dreams with, they're going to be so intimidated because you're going to have to change and become your higher self. If you have this big dream, you're going to have to change and become your higher self to achieve that dream.

You're going to have to become different. You're going to have to have to have more commitment. You're going to have to dedicate more time. And that means more time away from them. And that's why most people are like the crabs in a bucket. They want to pull you down and they want to hold you down because they don't want to see you thrive because you are now going to have to disassociate from them. You better set big dreams. You better set big goals and you better work like a fucking monster to chase those big dreams down and achieve them.

Otherwise, you will have a lifetime of regret. Thing number seven, go the other way. Most people are a part of some kind of herd. They see what the herd is doing and they do what the herd is doing. And the reality is, and Tony Robbins says this, he says, if you want to be successful in life, watch what everybody is doing and do the opposite. And you will be successful in life. And I'm telling you right now, go the other way more often instead of blending into the herd.

And you will see that, yes, you will stand out. Yes, they will think you're weird. Yes, they will call you out. I've had all of that happen to me. My whole life I've been the black sheep because I stand out. I did things differently because I listened to an audio CD of Tony Robbins back in the 90s, like in the late 90s. And I was like, holy shit, this guy's speaking the truth.

And the truth is most people are intimidated by people that have big goals, big dreams, and want to do big things. And if I have big goals and big dreams, that I have to do the opposite of what everyone else is doing. And if you're doing the opposite, you're going to stand out. And you know what they say? The nail that stands out gets hammered. I'd rather get hammered for having big dreams because all the hammering does is forge me into a stronger human being. Number eight, avoid vices and addictions.

I'm telling you right now, if you're watching the show, then you know, especially if you've been watching the show for any length of time, that you know that I gave up even social. drinking on November 12th, 2022, I gave up social drinking. I'm talking drinking three to four times a year, having two cocktails at each one of those events. I gave that up because I was like, you know what, I'm not going to have any level of dependence on any outside chemical, on any outside drug. And so I gave up social drinking because I was like, you know what, I don't need to take the edge off just so I can socialize with people. I'm a grown ass man. And I'm going to figure out how to socialized with people without taking the edge off. And it was one of the best things I did. And I'm asking you that if you have vices and addictions, I don't care if it's pornography, if it's gambling, if it's

infidelity, if it's vape, if it's weed, if it's alcohol, whatever that vice and addiction is, kick it, stop it, give it up. It is not going to serve you in your trajectory to become a higher level human. It's simply not. Thing number nine that I want to share with you in my advice to young men is to develop the high income skills, right? There's four high income skills. There's several, but we're going to stick to the core four here for a moment. If you can develop one or all of these high income skills, you will literally put yourself in a position to be able to print money. And high income skill number one is to be able to market. Learn how to drive leads and market and get leads to a business. If you know how to get leads to a business, whether you

own your own business. So it's Facebook ads, Instagram ads, YouTube ads, building social media platforms and building a brand of yourself. Like this information is out there for free if you Google it and you YouTube it, you will learn how to drive leads, get traffic, get more customers, eyeballs or lead eyeballs onto your website. But if you're not doing it, you're leaving a lot of money on the table. Number one, number two, even if you don't own your own business, all of these four skills that I'm going to share with you, like marketing, sales, copyrighting, leadership, right? Every single one of these are going to help you in your business if you decide to start a business or if you decide to work for someone, all four of these high income skills will allow you to make more money than just good or average, right? Think about it. If you're a marketer and you're driving leads, you're going to get paid some kind of a salary plus some kind of a bonus on top of your performance. If you're a salesperson, you might get a base plus commission. In fact, there's a salesperson in this very building in my headquarters. He's so good at what he does that he made half a million dollars last year in 2022.

That is fucking awesome, right? And he's a young dude. He's under 30 years old. And I share this with you because if he didn't master that high income skill of sales, he would not have done that. And so I want you to put yourself into position, whether you own a business or you're going to work for someone, learn to market, learn to sell, learn to write copy, as in sales copy,

words that influence and persuade and learn to lead. Number 10, do not complain. I'm telling you right now, no one likes a complainer. If you're the type of person that complains, man, I'm not having a good day. Things didn't work out for me. This went wrong. That thing happened. Listen, bro, don't be a complainer. I don't care if you're 15 or 25 or anywhere in between. Complaining is like kryptonite, man. It repels people away from you. Be a problem solver. Be an optimistic problem solver. Be an optimistic problem right you know how to be optimistic you know how to solve problems you know how to figure things out the sad truth is people want to half the people are going to give you some bullshit sympathy when you complain and the other half of the people are going to be secretly happy for you

when you complain about your life's problems and I don't want either I don't want bullshit sympathy and I don't want I don't want people to be happy for my misery so why complain if you are having life problems, don't complain. Instead, learn to solve problems. Learn to ask for help. Learn to figure things out. Learn to show up as an optimist and not a pessimist because the optimistic problem solver who can figure things out is going to be like honey, man, you're just going to attract good people to you. And then the pessimistic complainer, the person who complains but never does anything about it, you're like kryptonite. You just repel people away from you. You're going to repel hot chicks, you're going to repel awesome dudes, you're going to repel future business partners,

you're going to repel great karma, you're going to repel everything from you if you're a fucking complainer. Thing number 11, don't marry and don't date crazy. I'm telling you right now, the number one influencing factor to a man's success or failure in life is who they choose as a spouse. So if you're not going to choose a crazy woman to get married to, then you're I wouldn't be dating any crazy women, right? Why would I want to marry someone or date someone who is constantly, emotionally, unpredictable? They are mentally unstable.

They constantly require savings. And if you're one of those guys that, like, you're like, man, I like chicks who need to be saved. I'm a captain save a hoe. Don't be a motherfucking captain save a hoe. Because when you get married to this chick and when you try and start a life with her, she's going to constantly be this tornado of problems each time you're trying to do something big

and you're going to realize I can't start that company I can't make those millions I can't transform people's lives I can't serve humanity because each time I try she is taking a massive shit on my life and then I'm going to tell you when you're going through a divorce 10 to 15 years after marrying crazy chick Hey bro remember on that podcast when I told you so So I'm telling you right now

Don't be a captain save a ho. Don't try and save crazy. Don't try and save someone who is unsavable. Instead, find someone who's equally yoked. Find someone who shares your core values. Find someone that will back you up. Find someone that will say they believe in you. They will advocate for you.

And when you do, be so fucking awesome to her that all she wants to do is support you and be your one woman pit crew. And if you can do that, I'm telling you, man, you will force, multiply the impact and income that you will make in life. Number 12, impulse control. Fellas, listen, if you are the kind of dude that can impulsively reach for the vape, stop working, let me see what's happening on social media, don't be that guy.

If you make a plan, execute the plan to its full completion. I know so many dudes that have started these half-baked ideas across many things, either a relationship, diet plan, workout plan, business plan. And guess what? They don't execute the plan. They got all these half-baked plans because impulse control takes the best of them, or lack of impulse control, I should say, gets the best of them. And before you know it, they're now going down another path because they impulsively thought

this would be a good idea. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I've never known anyone who has impulsively made a decision and that decision has serve them well. Most people who make great decisions and who have great ideas are the type of people that put impulse aside and they logically, pragmatically, pro and con a situation and then make the decision that's best for them. Number 13, fellas, make a bunch of money. One of the first episodes of the Bedroskoolion show, we talked about this and we said make a bunch of money and get jacked,

right? Which effectively means if you're healthy and fit and you're making a lot of money, you're going to be an asset to humanity. You're not going to be a liability where people have to take care of you. If you're making a lot of money, you're not going to be dependent on the opposition. The opposition being mainstream media, corporate media, being social media, being big government, being the IRS. If you're making a lot of money, then you put yourself in a position to have financial sovereignty. You put yourself in a position to be able to be generous with that money and be able to help people who need it. I think the most selfish thing any day, you know, dude can do, any human can do for that matter, is to go, I only need X amount of dollars. I only need to

make $400,000 a year. I only need to make $500,000 a year and I'll be set. Me and my family will be set. Really? What a selfish fucking move that is. So what about your neighbor whose house burns down? What about if your mom or your dad get dementia like my mom did or your dad has a stroke like my dad did? You're going to be like, oh, well, I'm going to put them in an old folks home. Are you going to be able to pony up the money to get the experimental medication they need so that they don't die of Alzheimer's instead my mom will die of old age right because if you know anything about dementia it eats away the part of the brain that controls breathing and the way you die of dementia or Alzheimer's is by by your you're you're basically suffocating to death

I don't want that for my mom and so I was able to get her experimental medication that has been helping her and slowing down the erosion of her brain and being that she's in her mid 80s she'll die of old age instead of suffocating to death. Think about that. Number 14, find out what you're passionate about and go all in on it. Listen, man, you only get one run at life. And there's one run at life, you might as well find your passions and go all in on it. Not every passion you have to make money with, by the way. You might find a career that is fulfilling to you. And then you might be like, hey, I also like this, right? Like, I have several passions. I love working out. I love

riding the one wheel with my son. I love going on vacations with my family. I love playing ping pong with my son. I have a lot of things I love doing. There's a lot of passions that I have. One of my core passions is drumming. I'm a drummer. I'm not on some fucking in some band. I'm not going to be on some fucking rock tour. However, I'm a pretty decent drummer. It's a passion that I have and I go up into my guest house and I'll drum because I'm passionate about it. And I love my career. I love what I do. but I also have a passion that is very fulfilling and therapeutic for me. And I'm telling you, whatever your passion is, if you can, make it part of your career. Make it something that you can literally make money from and serve humanity with.

But if you can't, still chase that passion, man. Don't just be that person that works for money, comes home and watches TV, like Groundhog Day, goes to sleep, unhappy, wakes up with no real sense of purpose or meaning, repeats the same day over and over again, that is fucking slavery. That is slavery to the system. Like, there is no lower form of vibration than just having this groundhog day of a life. And you're like, yeah, but the economy, the inflation and the government and what about big pharma and the world, world financial, whatever they're called, the world financial forms. You know what? Listen, listen, if you can solve problems, you can make money. If you have a passion, you'll find a

to experience that passion. If you don't find a passion, you don't find a way to make money, you don't find a way to have health, you don't find a way to eat clean. Because you can also give me that same objection. Well, I can't eat clean. It's too expensive.

Really? Have you checked the price of bad health? If you don't eat clean, have you checked the price of bad health? Have you checked the price of shitty medication, shitty medical services? You know, most people go into hospitals these days and unfortunately never come out.

I don't want to fucking go into a hospital. For that reason alone, I'm going to take care of my body. My health is my passion. Find a passion and go all in on it, man, because if you don't, this life on this planet becomes so monotonous and boring. Number 15, that if you're a young man, is to learn to communicate.

Learn to tell stories. Learn to articulate a message. Learn to draw a word picture. And if you're like, man, I don't know how to speak well. And I'm not a public speaker. And I don't know how to articulate a message and draw a word picture and storytell. let me remind you that I'm a foreigner to this country. I came to this country speaking Armenian,

not English. English is a second language for me. I not only had to learn the language, I had to lose my accent, then I had to learn words that allowed me to draw word pictures, influence, persuade, and get people's imagination activated because it was only then that I could impact lives. And so if you can't communicate, you're going to be that person that's always frustrated. You're gonna feel like, man, they just don't understand me. People don't get me. Even with your spouse, if you can't communicate well with your spouse, with your girlfriend, with a friend, you're gonna be frustrated all the time because they don't get me,

they don't understand me, they don't see my point of view. Well, that's because you are not communicating a message well. You are not storytelling. You're not articulating your feelings. You are not transferring your feelings. And so if you want to be a better communicator, go to Toastmasters International, learn how to speak, right? Go and start reading books.

I'm not just talking about listening to audiobooks. I'm talking about start reading books because when you start reading books, you start learning words that you never knew. And those words later get used in your vocabulary as you're speaking. When you read books that are well written, you will also develop this pattern, a pattern of speaking that actually makes sense to people. Instead of being everywhere in your ideas and people are like, fuck, bro, your words are confusing me. get it. So if you don't know how to communicate, you're doing yourself a disservice. Thing number 16, show respect to everyone. I'm here to tell you right now, as someone that didn't have respect for the law, as someone who didn't have respect to my fellow man, you know, carjackings,

who the fuck was I to steal someone's car from them? Who the fuck was I to do home invasion robberies? Who the fuck was I to run away from the cops after doing something bad, right? I had no respect for people. And because of that, I always felt like I had to watch over my shoulder. I always felt like something was going to happen. I always felt like the other shoe was going to drop. And I always felt like the whole world disrespects me. Of course the world was disrespecting me.

If I put out disrespect for humanity, aren't I going to get disrespect back? Right? So start showing respect to people. Like don't be that guy that walks around in the gym, shouldering someone. Don't be that person that walks into a store and doesn't hold a, door open for the next person coming in. If it's a guy or a gal, it doesn't matter. Hold the fucking door open.

How about you smile and give a nod, right? How about you make eye contact and shake hands? How about you say, hi, how are you? When you have these signs of respect, then all of a sudden you start getting respect back. And that's a good feeling. But if you don't show respect and you think you're some hot shit right now, telling you right now,

there's someone that's going to humble you. I've been humbled plenty of times in my life. And I'm here to tell you that that didn't need to happen. Use my examples as a cautionary tale to become respectful for everyone because someone out there is going to humble you and it's going to be a very, very awful day for you. Finally, thing number 17, your reputation matters. Listen, my advice to young men, if you're between 15 and 25 years old, here is your chance to build your reputation. Your reputation is how people think of you. Your reputation is what people feel about you.

Your reputation is what people say about you when you're not around. What is your reputation? One of my favorite quotes from Warren Buffett is, it takes 20 years to build your reputation, and it takes 20 minutes to ruin it. And I'll give you an example. There's plenty of jacked people on Instagram on social media. By the way, hey, if you're not following me on Instagram, we're going to make sure we dropped a link to Instagram in the description box down below.

Follow me on Instagram, where I post a lot of good shit. for you. But a lot of fit people on Instagram. Obviously they work out hard. Well, as it turns out, a few of those big fitness influencers out there were using fake weights or we're loading up one side of the leg press machine with a whole bunch of plates but not the other side and catching the angle the camera from a really good angle that makes them look buffer and stronger than they are. How fucking stupid is that? And then when that video came out that was unedited, that reputation was gone. Everything they sold is now not going to sell. Everything they promoted will not be promotable. And people now have lost respect for them. And so I'm asking you, what is your reputation?

How are you going to maintain it? What are people going to say about you behind your back? And how are you going to be introduced to others? That's your reputation. It takes 20 years to build your reputation. It takes 20 minutes to fuck it all up. Guys and gals, thank you so much for watching and listening to this episode of the Bedros Kulian show. I really appreciate you guys leaving the comments in the YouTube section, subscribing to this channel on the podcast platforms. Thank you for a review. Take a screenshot, share it on social media, and tag me on it so that I could

reshare those as well. And remember this, that average is the enemy, that success is your responsibility and your life could change in an instant for the better when you decide to flip the switch. We'll see you next time. Benzo, I was banging with a gang of instrumental.