Digital Social Hour - Why Taking Vacations Can Skyrocket Your Business ROI | Jim Dew DSH #1127

Episode Date: January 19, 2025

Discover why taking vacations isn't just about relaxation—it could be the secret to skyrocketing your business ROI! 🌴 In this episode of Digital Social Hour, Sean Kelly sits down with financial expert Jim Due to unpack the surprising benefits of stepping away from the grind. From uncovering networking opportunities on vacation to sparking creativity in unexpected moments, this conversation is packed with valuable insights you can't afford to miss. 💼✨ Jim shares his journey from building a thriving business to helping entrepreneurs avoid common financial pitfalls. They dive into the importance of hiring the right team, creating systems, and mastering work-life balance. Plus, hear incredible stories about persistence, mindset shifts, and how being “lucky” might just be a skill you can develop. 🧠💸 Whether you're an entrepreneur looking for inspiration or someone seeking practical tips to level up, this episode has it all. Watch now and subscribe for more insider secrets. 📺 Hit that subscribe button and stay tuned for more eye-opening stories on the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly! 🚀 #digitalmarketing #digitalmarketingagency #businessroi #benefitsofvacations #growthmindset CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Intro 01:40 - Annual Pitch Frequency for Jim 03:00 - Origin of WealthAbility 05:40 - Today's Sponsorship 08:20 - Work Obsession 11:36 - Cultivating Luck 14:15 - Hiring the Right Talent 17:20 - Relating to People 19:50 - Self-Made vs Inherited Wealth 22:10 - Embracing Risks 24:10 - Importance of Adaptability 26:40 - Skills and Talents as Security 29:44 - Four Stages of Entrepreneurship 32:57 - Significance of Money 35:58 - Impact of Earnings 38:20 - Jim's Personal Hobbies 38:55 - Entrepreneurs and Economic Growth 40:48 - Government Inefficiency 43:26 - Finding Jim Online APPLY TO BE ON THE PODCAST: https://www.digitalsocialhour.com/application BUSINESS INQUIRIES/SPONSORS: [e-mail] GUEST: Jim Dew https://www.instagram.com/jim.dew_/ SPONSORS: SPECIALIZED RECRUITING GROUP: https://www.srgpros.com/ LISTEN ON: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/digital-social-hour/id1676846015 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Jn7LXarRlI8Hc0GtTn759 Sean Kelly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmikekelly/

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BED-MGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. You know, it's funny, years ago there was a very wealthy person that I knew and he said to me, I said, do you have any tips for a young guy like me? He said, take more vacations. And I didn't exactly know what he meant then. It seemed like he didn't know what he was talking about. And often on vacation, you'll meet somebody that actually can help your business

or help your life in some way that you never would have met had you not taken the time to go do something like that. Absolutely. Oh, all right guys, Jim Do here, my financial advisor. Thanks for coming on today. My pleasure, nice to see you, Sean. What's new with you, man?

Oh man, busy. I mean, this is a busy part of the year for us near year end, doing things with clients, trying to carve out a little extra time off with Mimi, who you know, my wife as well, but things are good. Yeah, you're all over the place. You're in like seven masterminds, right? I don't know about seven, but I get around.

Yeah, that's where we met, Fleishman's, right? 100 million, you spoke there. That's exactly right. Yeah, and now we're working together. And you guys have saved me a ton of money, helped me buy my first house. Tax planning has been great, so it's been a pleasure. Thank you, man. Absolutely.

It's been great working with you. I remember when we met, we had a long bus ride together at 100M. You were educating me on crypto a little bit. You're like the crypto expert. Did you get any? Yeah, I own some crypto. Okay, you're chilling now.

Yeah, I mean, not enough to where my life's gonna change one way or another, but enough to where the move in the last couple of weeks is significant. Nice, that's cool to see you adopt to it, because I know a lot of people were like, kind of iffy about crypto. Yeah, I still see it as speculative. Like I don't, it doesn't pay a dividend.

You know, I don't know. So far it's been like like just moves with the stock market just more dramatically in the recent history. But it's a thing, it's a real thing. And I think when there's a real thing, even if it's speculative, carving out a little piece of your portfolio makes sense. I'd assume hundreds of pitches, right, for investments.

Oh my gosh, yeah. Our team probably sees 600 private deals a year. Jeez. Yeah. And what percentage of those actually make it to the end? About 50. So like 8%? Yeah. Geez. Yeah. And what percentage of those actually make it to the end? About 50. So like 8%. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. And what, is it industry specific usually or? No, I mean, everything from private equity, private debt, oil and gas. Sexy stuff. Venture capital, real estate deals, you know, all the above. Yeah. Cause making money, your clients are good at

Investing and saving it's a whole nother. That's exactly right And that's what I struggled with because I was good at making money, but I would lose it all happen to me twice Yeah, so I feel much I could sleep better at night with the team behind me now. Yeah, I appreciate that Yeah, it's you know having the structure and having people it's like I like to quote Richard Feynman one of the smartest physicists who ever Lived he said principle number one structure and having people. It's like, I like to quote Richard Feynman, one of the smartest physicists who ever lived. He said, principle number one, don't fool yourself. And you're the easiest person to fool. So a lot of us tend to think, oh, I know what I'm doing. I'm a smart guy, whatever.

And the truth is no one's that smart. I mean, even Warren Buffett had Charlie Munger by his side. Smart people know that they can trick themselves into believing things that aren't true. And I think that's why you're successful because you found an issue that entrepreneurs are dealing with. They're good at making money, but you probably saw

a lot of them lose it or invest in dumb stuff. Oh yeah. You provided a solution for them. Yeah, exactly right. Is that kind of how it started? Just going to events and seeing people's problems? Oh, well that was farther down the line. I mean, originally Mimi and I saw the problem for ourselves.

So the problem that entrepreneurs have, whether it's investing or taxes or anything else, is they have what we call a financial flat tire. And what I mean by that is over an entrepreneur's lifetime, they pick up an attorney, an accountant, an insurance agent, a banker. If you picture those like spokes on a wheel, they're usually not all A players. They're not talking to each other. They're not, no one's holding them accountable. But the worst part is the entrepreneurs in the middle of that wheel trying to manage that team when the entrepreneur doesn't speak the languages of tax, legal, insurance, and investment. So that broken wealth wheel causes all kinds of issues for the

entrepreneurs like paying too much in taxes, making dumb investments, not having good asset protection, paying too much for insurance even when they don't have the right coverages, on and on, that type of thing. And so that was really the problem that Mimi and I were experiencing as entrepreneurs. You know, we started our business 25 years ago, and then we learned what billionaires do, which is that solution called a family office.

I love it. Yeah, shout out to Mimi, man. You guys have been rocking for a while now. Yeah, she's incredible. We met 35 years ago on a blind date. No way. And married for 32 Mimi, man. You guys have been rocking for a while now. Yeah, she's incredible. We met 35 years ago on a blind date and married for 32 years. Blind date, how did that work? For her it worked average, for me it worked spectacular.

When I met her, I was like, oh, this woman is beautiful and smart and funny and all those things. And I think she was more like, eh, you know, he's all right. She settled. I would like to say that she didn't settle, but at the time she was not really looking for a serious relationship. And she had just gotten out of a serious relationship.

We were both in college. She had a lot more opportunities and options than I did. Really? But I pursued her and I was... Have you ever watched Seinfeld? Uh, episodes. I was super young, but yeah. Okay, well, Seinfeld, there's an episode where George Costanza, one of the characters... Looking for the ultimate online casino experience?

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to find the talent you need. So go to srgprose.com right now to get started. That's srgprose.com. Specialized Recruiting Group, a tailored approach to hiring. He does the opposite because the other character was on the show saying, you know, it seems like you always make the wrong decision. Just do the opposite of everything

you think you should do. And all of a sudden his life turns out like amazing. He just, every time he like he sees a woman, he's like, I would normally not approach her. But he walks up to her and he says, I'm unemployed and I live with my parents. And she'd say, oh wow, you're interesting. So his life turns around.

So I always joke that I was like the George Costanza for her to date because all the other guys she dated before me, they came from, you know, they had money or they dressed well. They had nice cars. They had a certain thing. And I had no money. I had a crappy car. I dressed horrible.

I'd get my hair cut down at the barber shop. I didn't care. I just was not at all ready you know, ready for prime time. But she saw that that kind of attracted her in a way that like this guy's kind of different. But then we had very deep conversations early in our dating. I was always kind of an old soul. So even in my twenties,

I would have deep conversations with her and she'd always say, gosh, you know what we are early dates. We talked about all these real things, these deep things, these important things. And she's like, in the past when I dated guys, they're all like, let's go party and all that kind of stuff. So that was, I think, I mean, she'd speak for herself, but I think that was what made her interested in me. And then I just kept being a nice guy

and pursuing her and showing up and making her laugh. That was an important thing. And then eventually she was like, I think this guy, I'll give him some time. That's beautiful, man. What a story. Well, that's how you know she's a real one too though. Yeah, she's, they don't make them like her.

I would say if I could live a thousand lifetimes, I don't think I could ever meet someone as well paired with me or that I believe in that I want to make a life partnership with as much as my wife Mimi. Yeah, that's awesome. I'm very grateful. That's your soulmate right there. Yeah, it is.

The more impressive thing to me though is you guys work together. Yeah, that's a whole nother story, you know, and I think anyone who works with their spouse can attest to some of the challenges. Oh yeah. And I think what we learned in the very early days is to stay in our lane.

And anytime we get in each other's lane, that creates lane. And anytime we get in each other's lane, that creates problems. And so we stay in each other's lane, and we try not to disrupt that. And then when we talk about work, we try to set boundaries. Because I love my work. I love what I do.

I could talk all day long every day. And so sometimes it'll be a Saturday, and she'll say, OK, last conversation about work, and then we're done. I love that. I'm the same way, though. Even in bed. I'll be talking about work she'll say, okay, last conversation about work and then we're done. I love that. I'm the same way though. Even in bed, I'll be talking about work in bed. You know what I mean?

It's nonstop on my mind. Exactly. I'm like, oh, I need to get back on the podcast. And that's how you go great. That's why you succeed is when you're constantly obsessing about something. I think people who casually want to be successful. I mean, there's no successful professional athletes

who are casual about it. And same thing with business owners. I mean, you's no successful professional athletes who are casual about it. And same thing with business owners. I mean, you have to be almost obsessive to a degree with some balance. You know, I think you can overwork, as I'm sure you and I have done in our past, right? You can overwork where you have diminishing returns and the extra effort is actually working against yourself.

But that being said, I think there's some obsession. Anyone I've known that met great success, I don't mean comfortable success, but great success, obsessed at some point in their life about something, probably in a way that was a little bit unhealthy. Yeah, I've had to find that balance. Definitely had burnout. My first five years of entrepreneurship

worked 16 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week, no vacations, and that was not healthy. My health was terrible. I was collapsing. I had panic attacks, physical health. I was a twig. No one wanted to even talk to me. So yeah, you could definitely take it extreme.

Yeah, now everybody wants to talk to you. But look where you've gotten. And part of that is because of that obsession, right? Yeah, I mean, so there's some of that. And then you start noticing things like health problems or relationship problems. And then you go, hey, I better get my life a little more in balance.

Yeah, now I take weekends off, which is crazy to even say all out. So awesome. I think it's needed though, cause you study the top guys and they take time to reflect. For sure. They're not working all day. For sure.

So that was a switch for me. Cause I was pretty stagnant when I was working 18 hours a day. There's only so much you could do physically. Yeah. Time to think about it, reflect, maybe go out to dinner or something. Right. You know, right. Yeah. You know, they say who was the famous, I forget the person cause I like to always give quotes to who they're

attributed to. But, uh, uh, she said, the time to quit working is when working isn't working. And sometimes it's hard for an entrepreneur, especially to notice, Hey, you know what? I don't think any more work is going to make this thing go forward anymore. And I know some of my best ideas for our business have come in moments where I was doing nothing related to business, where I had moments of quiet, moments of relaxation, and then all of a sudden out of nowhere, this idea comes in like a lightning bolt. And that was only available because I freed my mind

from all the stuff that I was thinking about. Absolutely, some of my best ideas have come on vacation actually, it's weird. Every time I go on vacation, I think of something crazy. You know, it's funny, years ago, there was a very wealthy person that I knew and he said to me, I said, do you have any tips for a young guy like me?

He said, take more vacations. I said, what do you mean? He said, well, every time I take a vacation, I make more money. And I didn't exactly know what he meant then. It seemed like he didn't know what he was talking about. But just what you said, I think that's true. I think when you take a vacation, you give yourself some space to be creative and think about things. And often on vacation, you'll meet somebody that actually can help your business or help your life in some way, whether it's, you know, sitting in first class or on a private jet

or in an exclusive restaurant or somewhere you might bump into someone that you never would have met had you not taken the time to go do something like that. Absolutely, and that's important to converse wherever you are, whether it's the gym, sometimes I'm in the sauna, sometimes I'm on a flight, wherever it is, you never know who you'll meet.

Right. You know, grocery store even. Yeah, there was actually a study done decades ago about I'd say, being lucky. And what they did with this survey is they, this experiment, they took and they asked a bunch of people, are you lucky or are you not lucky? And the ones that said 10 out of 10, I'm the most lucky person in the world, they put those in a group and the people that said one out of 10, I'm the most unlucky person in the

world, they put those people in a group. And then they ran them through all these experiments that they didn't know were happening to them. So one, just to give you an idea was they told them to meet at a certain place individually, one at a time. And then when they got there, they said, Oh, we gave you the wrong address. Go to this other place. And by the way, it's walking distance.

You can just walk over there. And then they planted a $20 bill on the side of the sidewalk and just they said We want to see who gets lucky and notices finds the $20 bill and it was shocking that a huge percentage of the people that said I'm a 10 out of 10 lucky found the $20 bill and a very small percentage of the people that said I'm a 1 out of 10 I'm unlucky found the $20 bill and they went through all these different Experiments and they kept finding out that the people who felt they're lucky kept getting lucky and that people felt that they were unlucky kept getting unlucky.

But here's what they concluded. People who feel they're lucky, they look around the world, they talk to people, they're engaged and they see things. Whether it's a $20 bill by the sidewalk or whether it's making a new relationship in a coffee shop, it's cause they're outward looking in the world. They're looking at the world as, hey, I'm lucky, what can I find in the world outside me?

The people who feel they're unlucky, they're looking inside. Like, woe is me, I'm never lucky, nothing good happens to me. And when they're walking, they're probably looking at their shoes. They're not even looking around in the world. So anyway, that's an interesting experiment that was done

that makes you think that maybe luck and lack of luck are more than just what actually happens to you, but how you see the world. Wow, that is fascinating. So you can kind of control your luck in a way. It's all perspective and mindset. And in our hiring, because hiring and recruiting is big for our company

to get the right advisors in, we adopted a question that Elon Musk's, Elon Musk asks when he's hiring. And that is, do you feel lucky? Wow. That's the question he asks. I love that. Because if people say, I feel lucky,

you wanna hire those people. The people who say, I don't feel lucky, you don't wanna hire those people. And why? Because people who feel lucky, they're winners and winners win more, losers lose more. And people who lose a lot, they feel they're not lucky. People who win a lot, they feel they're lucky.

It also shows a little bit of humility. Because if you say, I feel lucky, it's not like, oh, everything that's happened in my life is because of me. I'm amazing. And that's also a quality you want in an employee is someone who is humble, but they feel they're lucky. So they're outward looking in the world. Yeah, I couldn't believe your hiring process, man.

I remember the last mastermind, not the one that just happened, but before, you had some guy talk about how you guys hire employees. And it was like a thousand people apply and it gets down to one. And just the whole system was insane. Yeah, that's Justin, our CEO. He's unbelievable at building systems. And when we first hired him, our biggest bottleneck, because we have more demand than we have supply for what we do.

Our biggest bottleneck was hiring and training the right advisors to deliver on the work that we do. And so when he first was in the hiring process, he said, oh, I'll fix that problem for you. And I said, really? I said, how are you gonna fix the problem? He said, well, first of all, you're thinking about it wrong. You're thinking that you have a problem with HR

in hiring and training. You don't have a problem with HR, you have a problem with sales and marketing. You have to think of attracting and hiring the right people as a sales and marketing problem. And the same way you have funnels and all the stuff that you do for sales and marketing, you should do for hiring in your HR department. And that kind of blew my mind. And then he came in and built this, as you saw, right, this funnel with all these things that happen the same way you would build a funnel to make sales for your company. And by doing that, now you're treating the hiring process the same as you treat the marketing and sales process.

And people spend so much time on sales and marketing for their company, which you need to. That's a huge component of how much success you're going to have. But they also need to do the same thing with hiring the right people. Because really when it comes down to it, there's two things that are gonna grow your business, your systems and your people. If you don't have systems, you can have great people and they're gonna look bad in a bad system. But if you have great systems and bad people, then they can actually execute. So you need great systems and great people.

And so that ties together. You need great systems to hire the great people to then grow your company. Right, yeah, you were having them take I think three personality tests, it was crazy. Yeah, we've got a cognitive, we've got a personality. The cognitive is important because in our industry, with what we do, you have to be able to learn quickly

and pick things up very fast. And if you don't have that cognitive ability, no matter how hard you work, you can't do what our advisors do. Wow, so you gotta be able to adapt. We carve that out, we find those people If you don't have that cognitive ability, no matter how hard you work, you can't do what our advisors do. Wow. So you got to be able to adapt. We carve that out. We find those people who can think quickly, learn quickly, and that's who we have to hire.

Now they have to have other skills, obviously, but if they don't have that cognitive skill, we will bump them. We'll kick them out of the process because if you can't think and learn quickly, you're not going to be successful at our firm. Wow. I want to take that test, see what I get. Cognitive test. You'd probably get a high one.

You're a pretty smart guy. My IQ dropped a lot, man. I think it's TikTok brain. I took the same IQ test I did in college and it dropped 20, 25 points. Maybe you were too smart. I don't know. You know, some people are too smart

and then no one can relate to them. So maybe it brought you down. That's definitely not me. I wouldn't be able to do podcasts. That was my dad though. Was he? 150 IQ. Oh wow.

Yeah, he was way too smart. Yeah, I've known people too smart for their own good. And if they don't find that little niche of where they're great, they struggle. Right. I mean, you can be too smart or too dumb to succeed in the world. You gotta, yeah, find that niche.

Also you need people to relate to, which gets really hard. Cause when you're that smart, you're one out of 10,000 people. It's so true yeah I think that's a skill too is to be able to find ways to relate to almost anyone which is why you're so good at what you do and that's a lot of people aren't so good at that you know I mean any more in the current world we live in the ability to be flexible and to get along with all types of people is really important and

I think more and more people are starting to see the world as you you know, A and B people and I'm an A person. So I don't like the B people. And I don't think that's fair because people are more complex than that. Right. There's a lot going on with every person. And I've found even people that I think, God, that person's an idiot. What they believe in this one specific space, you know, you might say politics. Right. But then if I spend time with that person, I hear their life story, it makes sense. And in some ways, a lot of times I change my perception

and I say, well, guess what? I disagree with them in that one area, but there's a lot of good about this person. And there's a great story there. Anyone who's achieved anything has a great story. And I was just the other day, I was at, Mimi was out of town, so I went to our club to have dinner up at the bar. And I'm sitting next to this guy and he's in his seventies.

And I just started asking him like, Hey, what's your story? And I asked him, you know, he said, where do you live in the community? And he has two homes. One's like a 15,000 square foot home. And he said, it's great views of the Valley, but it's too big for me and my wife. So I bought a second house in the same neighborhood.

That's only 7,000 square feet. So he starts telling me all of his stuff. I was like, how did you get where you are? And that was the story. Grew up in LA. His dad was an iron worker. When he was 16, he moved out of the house to make money because they had no money. And he said, he did the most menial jobs. He said, I don't even want to try to describe the jobs. I did the most menial jobs you can imagine. At 18, he took a job selling cars. First three months, he sold a few cars. He goes, hey, I'm pretty good at this. One day he looked up, he saw the glass enclosed office in the dealership and he said to one of the other guys, who's up there? And he said, oh, that's the owner of the dealership. He looked up there and he said, I said to myself, that guy has nothing I don't

have. I'm going to own a dealership in 10 years. So he gave himself a reasonable time, right? He didn't say next month. He said in eight years, he owned his first dealership. Now he owns 12. And now he said, you know, I've got more money than I know what to do with. I've got 12 houses, I got all this stuff. He goes, it's too much.

But the story was what interested me. And a lot of people would probably see that guy and think, oh, this is just some rich dude. No, this is a guy who has a life story and he worked incredibly hard, and he built up this fortune from nothing. And most wealthy people are from nothing. Very few wealthy people have inherited their money.

Very few wealthy people were anointed in some way. But that's what we think, because we think somehow you see someone driving a fancy car and in a fancy house. And by the way, some of those people aren't rich. Some of those people just spend their money. Yeah. Right. So it's important to understand people's stories

and that's how you do such a great job on the podcast. Thank you. Yeah. Congress being able to converse is an important skill to have in any industry. Yeah. You know, and I'm sure you see it with your clients. What percentage of them inherited it versus self-made?

I'm sure it's a lot of self-made. Yeah. I can't think of anybody that we work with in our company who's not self-made. Wow. Wow. Yeah. And that's what I noticed with all the people I meet too. I met thousands of self-made millionaires

or like just millionaires in general. And the percentage of them not inherited, I can maybe think of a handful. Yeah, that's true. And it's a misunderstanding by a lot of people who don't have money. And the great thing about America is you're not born into a class in America.

You get to choose your class. You know, I mean, now you have to choose the right path. Like I was a, my first job, I was a high school math teacher, right? So if I would have stayed in that career, there was only so much wealth I was going to create. So part of it is the career or the path you choose, but then part of it is how hard you work, how willing you are to be creative, how willing you are to change and take risks and do different things, but you get to choose your path. You're not stuck. It's not like some class country

where whatever you're born in, you can't get out of that class. In this country, you get to choose if you get out of the class. And it took me a long time to even understand the utility of money or to wanna be wealthy because I never wanted to be wealthy when I was a kid. Which that statement is controversial.

You get to choose your class, but I think you're spot on. You know, I think a lot of people have a victim mindset with that statement. But I think if you surround yourself with the right people, consume the right information, you could change the odds at least of elevating classes. And it depends what you want for your life. Because I mean, if you look at like taking Elon Musk,

for example, he had $180 million after PayPal and he said, okay, I'm going to start this electric car company and I'm going to start SpaceX. And he said, I give those maybe a 10% chance of success. So he goes, I'm going to put 90 million toward those endeavors, but I still got 90 million. That's a lot of money. Then what happened? He burned through the 90 million. So now he's like, okay, now I have a decision to make. And then what happened? He burned through the 90 million. So now he's like, okay, now I have a decision to make. Do I just say that didn't work and keep my 90 million or do I take the rest of my money

and pour it into these companies? And he put all his chips in. Had those companies failed, he'd be broke. Instead, he's worth 250 billion, the richest man in the world. So why did that happen? Because he had the courage to take $90 million and put all his chips in the middle of the table. Now, a lot of people aren't willing to do that. I can tell you, I wouldn't do that.

I would go, I'm good with 90. I tried those things, didn't work out, but that wasn't him. So there are certain things that you have to do to get to certain levels. And I'm not saying everybody can be Elon Musk, but let's say you just want to have a home debt-free, you want to be able to live your life and not have to work all the time and those kinds of things. That's a different level and I don't know anybody who tries and works hard who can't get to that level in their life. You know it's different if you say you know hey I want to be able to drive

Lambos and wear fancy watches and have five jets and all this stuff. That's different but if you want a certain, if you say hey I'm poor and I want to be able to have a paid off home and income and a good lifestyle, I've never met anyone in my life who really worked hard and put effort into that, who didn't attain that level of success and that change in their class. Anyone I've met who's remained poor for decades has made bad choices. And I'm not saying they're bad people. I would love them to make better choices.

But if you make decent choices and you work very hard, this country will reward you because you know, one great thing about this country is most Americans, in my experience, want to help other people who are trying hard and working hard. They want to give them a leg up. But often people are not putting themselves out there in a way that's going to attract someone to want to help them. Right. Yeah.

I'll say this. I think to get to the 1%, there is some risk involved. Absolutely. I think you need to take some chances. I don't think you're going to get there easily. You got to make what is it? 400K a year to be top 1% something like that. Yep.

It's four. It's a little more than that. Yeah. But yeah, yeah, but it's between four and 500,, puts in the top 1% of income earners in America. So you gotta make some risks, you gotta go through periods where you might not make any money at all, you might have to lose some friendships, whatever it is. And I think that's really uncomfortable for most people.

Yeah, we, Mimi and I were facing, struggling with the company in 2003, so we started in 1999, so that was four years in. And we reached a point where we were losing money from the business and we were faced with this, okay, if this goes on a couple more months, we're going to either have to sell our house or we're going to have to shut down the business. And we said, you know, what would we do? What are we going to do if that continues?

And we just said, we'll sell the house. We'll go rent somewhere. So that type of a decision or even putting myself in a position to where we could lose everything or have to sell our house, which is all we had was the equity in the house, a lot of people aren't willing to do that. My dad grew up in the Great Depression, he's since passed away.

And when we started our company in 1999, my dad thought I was out of my mind. He said, well, wait a second, you're leaving that company where, don't they pay for your office? Yeah, dad, they pay for my office. Don't you have that good assistant? Yeah, dad, who pays for that? The company't you have that good assistant? Yeah, dad, who pays for that?

The company. And like you have computers and stuff, right? Yeah, dad. Well, who pays for that? Well, yeah, the company, dad. Well, then who's gonna pay for all that stuff now? I said, well, we are. And my dad's just like, oh, I don't know.

Seems crazy. But that generation, right, you worked for one company your whole life and they gave you a rocking chair and a watch and you got your pension, right? But today is different. I think if you're stuck in one place because you think there's security,

the only security in America today financially is your skills and talents and your willingness to change and adapt as things change and adapt. You know, like they talk about the coyote. The coyote, the United States declared war on the coyote in 1920, I think it was, because coyotes were eating livestock

and doing things in out West, farmers and ranchers were mad. So the US government said, anybody can kill a coyote anytime they want, anywhere they see a coyote. A hundred years later, coyotes have now expanded. They're up in Canada, they're down in South America, they're everywhere.

They're in my backyard where we live here in Scottsdale. And they say the reason why is because coyotes are one of the most adaptable animals in the world. So they like to eat during the day. If they can't find food, they'll eat at night. They like to eat little rabbits and things. And if they can't eat those, they'll eat roots and they adapt. And they are very clever about how they work together and hunt together. My point is this, your ability to adapt and to learn and to grow, that's your security. If you think your security is because you have a good job with a good company, that's gone. You can get wiped out tomorrow, companies can get sold, all kinds of things can happen. So my dad was right for his

generation, he was wrong for my generation, certainly for your generation. That doesn't mean though that you need to start a business and risk selling your house. That's like another extreme. But if you want to get seriously wealthy, you probably need to own a business because about 95% of who I would call seriously wealthy in America, and I define that as Americans who have more than $20 million of liquid net worth. I'd call that seriously wealthy. 95% of those people owned a small business. So now you have a few like LeBron James, you could be like a professional athlete or CEO of a Fortune 500 company, but a vast majority of the wealthiest people in America or seriously wealthy anyway, own small businesses. So if you want to be seriously wealthy, you should think about owning a small business. But guess what? What that doesn't tell you is all the small

business owners that lost everything and failed because we have survivorship bias. So we go, oh, I know all these business owners and former business owners who were rich, but they don't see all the people who had to sell their home like we almost had to do. Yep. 95% of businesses fell, right? Yeah. It's a huge percentage. And most of the successful business owners had multiple iterations. Yeah. I've had quite a few.

Yeah. You try something, it fails. And that's, I think, the difference because entrepreneurship has gotten this almost like this halo around it in the last years where everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. And I would say, be careful what you ask for. It's almost like years ago, I used to train a lot in different things. And there was a guy by the name of Willie Shoemaker, and he was a full contact fighter. And he was this good looking guy, six foot three, and all the other guys wanted to be like Willie. And so they would go, Willie, I want to be a professional fighter too. And Willie, he had the same answer every time. He said, okay, well,

I'll tell you what, let someone punch you in the face as hard as they can. And if you're okay with that, then maybe you can become a professional fighter, right? You have to be okay with that. And I think the idea of being a professional fighter and the reality is different. And so a lot of people want to be entrepreneurs. It sounds cool. Be your own boss. You're doing your own thing, right? But the reality of it is very hard. I mean, all the years Mimi and I slogged through that we could have been making way more money if we just took jobs. And so year after year after year, making less money, struggling, trying to find a way, you have to feel like that's your only path. Like to us, the fact that I remember I had a friend one time when we're really struggling and he said, are you going to close down the business? This was

about the time we might have to sell our house, right? I said, are you kidding me? No way. Like I'm never closing down this business. You have to have that attitude. Like this is the only way for me. If you start to think, well, I'll start a business, but if it's bad, I'll go get a job. You're probably not an entrepreneur. Absolutely. Cause an entrepreneur can't like, I am unemployable. I could not work. I seem like a nice guy, but I can promise you, I could not work for anyone. I would cause problems.

I would question them. I would argue with them. I'm, I'm unemployable. And that's the kind of person that becomes an entrepreneur. You gotta be all in, but you're right though. It's definitely glamorized on social media entrepreneurship. And that's not the way it should be perceived. No, it should be the hardest thing you'll ever do.

And you'll ultimately love it if you can get beyond all the trials and tribulations. We call them the four stages of entrepreneurship that I can kind of walk you through if you're curious. Yeah, please. The first one is the eager entrepreneur. That's when you start your business. And that was us in 1999.

You're saying, oh my gosh, I'm going to be my own boss. I'm going to own my own business. This is the coolest thing. And then you realize you have no clients or no customers. So you have to hustle market, sell hustle market, sell. And when we were eager entrepreneurs, Mimi and I thought if we could just make a million dollars of revenue, all our problems go away. Cause that number sounded so huge to us. Well, when we started making a million dollars revenue, we realized that our problems didn't go away. We actually had a lot more problems. That's when we moved to what I call the overwhelmed operator. That's when you might have a few employees that that's when you have employees

that are making more money than you are working less than you are. It's a very stressful time. And that's when you start to think, at least we did as an over overwhelmed operator, I really am working so hard for my money. I wonder if I could get my money to work for me a little bit. That's when you first start to have that insight. Then if you have a good business model and you can work through that very difficult time as the overwhelmed operator, then you move into what we call the secure shareholder. Like the book, the E-Myth, you start working on your business instead of in your business, you become the owner instead of the

operator. And that's when you not only think about multiplying money, but you think about protecting what you're building. That's when you not only think about multiplying money, but you think about protecting what you're building. That's when you can actually think creatively and start building the future of that company. That's the secure shareholder. The level above that, which we hope all entrepreneurs get to, is the influential investor. And as the influential investor, this is when you start thinking, how does my money matter? Why am I doing this?

What am I going to do with all these things that I've created and that are now coming my way? Because as an entrepreneur, I believe you're way underpaid for years, and then you're way overpaid for years, when you actually figure it out. And so Mimi, for Mimi and I, when I met her in college on that blind date,

she was working three jobs, she had no support from her household, from her family, and it was very, very difficult. And we always said, if we ever somehow make money, we would love to give back and help kids like her who have the attitude and the aptitude, but don't have the financial resources. And so we thought we're going to create scholarships. So this last year, we created two scholarships for kids who exactly that have the aptitude and the attitude, but they don't have the financial resources. We awarded it actually to two girls in a very bad part of Phoenix.

One of these kids, just to give you an idea, six people live in her household. Total household income for the year, $24,000. Whoa. Anyway, that's our way to make us matter is, you know, getting kids out of poverty through education, but it doesn't have to be that, you know, and we also feel that through what we do with entrepreneurs like you, we help entrepreneurs become wealthier. And guess what good people do when they become wealthier? They give more away, they make a difference, they serve their kids, they create jobs so people can have good jobs, good paying opportunities. And so we feel like

that's one way our money matters. And then also doing things like through these scholarships. So whatever it is for you, if you're listening on this podcast is think about something bigger than you. It's got to be outside of you. It can't be just like, I want a Lambo or whatever, something outside of you. That's much bigger than you of how your money's going to matter. And if you really envision that, like we did, it will pull you forward in the hard times.

Cause during the hard times, it's sometimes it's tough to go, uh, maybe I don't want the fancy car. Maybe I don't need the fancy house, you know, but that's all internal. The things that drive people the most are external things about people other than you. And you'll know that if you ever get to the point where if right now you don't have money

and all of a sudden you get a lot of money, you're going to realize there's cool stuff for yourself. But then you realize the things you can do for other people. That's the most powerful thing and the thing that drives people. And that's why you see people like Warren Buffett giving away 99% of his wealth when he passes is because that matters more to him than enjoying the wealth through stuff he could do for himself. Because after a while, you know, that gets old. Wow. He's giving away 99%. Is that to charity or his kids? Not to his kids. I think it's all going to charity. I think most of it's going to the Gates foundation. You know,

I won't get into any political stuff, but I think he's good friends with Bill Gates. And I think he liked the way Bill and Melinda were running the foundation. And so he said, why am I going to try to do this? I'm just going to name them. And let, so last I heard that's the way it was, but I know he is very much does not give his kids and grandkids money. And some people would say almost to the extreme, like he won't help them with college and stuff like that.

But he believes that money does not help young people and money hurts young people. And I would say to an extent, I agree with that. But if you have the right young person with the work ethic and just needs a little help, that's where, you know, I'm more like case by case. I don't think it's a set formula. Absolutely. Like depends on the mindset of the child for sure. Like it could destroy some people I've seen.

We've both seen that. And I feel sorry for kids that are being raised in a family where they get to do what they want, how they want, when they want. There's no real trials and tribulations and the parents are protecting them from struggle. Because struggle is where you learn the things that will eventually make your life what you want it to be. I mean, the struggle gives you the lessons

that make your life fulfilling. Absolutely, I used to try to run away from my problems, run away from my struggles, and that does not work. You cannot run it. No. I know there's a hike we do because we go to Park City every summer to get out of Arizona for obvious reasons. And there's one hike we do in Brighton. It's a beautiful hike. You go past a couple of lakes and then there's this place, Sunset Point. Well, there's a place right before you go to Sunset Point that's most of the way up. And I've seen people there with like their three-year-old kid and flip flops. I was like, what is going on?

How do these people get up here? You know, I've got my hiking boots on and all that stuff. Turns out there's a parking lot that you can drive to, to get to this point. That's not all the way to the top because the next piece is pretty challenging but it's most of the way to the top and as I was thinking about that I thought I can promise you it doesn't feel the same to the people who drove in the parking lot and walked for you know 100 yards versus us hiking that whole thing it doesn't feel the same not at all and that's the thing about life if you get something that you didn't earn, it doesn't feel that good. It's why rental cars, no one takes care of rental cars because nobody

cares. It's what you earn that matters. And I think that's true of relationships too. I mean, the fact that our marriage is successful and because we've really put the time and effort in and we've gone through the hard times because no relationship is great without, you know, because really trust is built on difficult times. That's when you build trust with someone, right? 100%. You see it in sports all the time too. Like the guy will have natural talent,

but he'll cap cause he doesn't have the work ethic. And then the guy with work ethic will surpass the naturally talented athlete. It's so true. I've seen that. Every sport. And same with entrepreneurs. Some people are talented in certain things.

And there's people very talented at podcasting, but they don't do it with your effort and your zeal and your attention. And that's why you leave them in the dust. Going for the world record man. Are you? 2500 episodes I got a hit. So wow. Rogan has the current world record as of November 15th. We'll see if he's still there in three years, but I'll be in the mix in three years. I love it, man. It was always my childhood dream to get in the Guinness Book of World Records. I used to read every single one. I might be too young for you to even relate to this. No, I know the Guinness Book of World Records. No, but you know the big-ass ones that are colorful?

Yeah. I used to read all of those. Those were my jam in elementary school. That's cool. Well, you know what? I'm glad because if you weren't trying to get 2,500, I probably would have been cut. You know, if you're doing 10 podcasts, I don't think it'd be on the front.

I've been trying to get you on for a year. I know. Busy. I know. I'm busy. You don't come out to Vegas often, huh? I know. And the times I've been to Vegas, there's always like so much business stuff going on.

But yeah, I've been wanting to get on your podcast too. That's how it should be though, or else you'll end up gambling at 2 AM in the casino. That's how Vegas gets you. That's true. That's how it should be though, or else you'll end up gambling at 2 a.m. in the casino. You know, that's how Vegas gets you. That's true, that's true. Well, I always say gambling is a tax for the mathematically ignorant. Yeah, the odds never, because we're both logical, so when you see the numbers, it just doesn't make sense.

Yeah, I would rather go out to dinner with my wife and buy a $500 bottle of wine than go gamble $500 on a craft table. Just because I know what I'm getting, I see value, I know the exchange, but with the casinos, when I go in there, I'm like in the car looking around and I just say to myself, I wanna own the casino, I don't wanna gamble at the casino.

And so I know the odds are in their favor. So why do I wanna put money towards something that I feel is a losing venture? It's against my nature. So I don't gamble when I go to Vegas, I'll go to shows, I'll go out to dinner, do business stuff, So I don't gamble when I go to Vegas. I'll go to shows, I'll go out to dinner, do business stuff, but I don't gamble. What's your hobby then?

Pickleball? I'm not really into pickleball. I mean, exercise is a big thing to me. I mean, Mimi was very into exercise and fitness when I met her. And so I said, well, I better keep up with her. So I work out six days a week, I watch my diet, I try to stay healthy. And so that's, I work out six days a week. I watch my diet. I try to stay healthy.

And so that's, I guess you might call that a hobby. We love hiking. We love going to movies. We love shows like when we're in New York, going to Broadway, stuff like that. But the truth is, I like reading too. But the truth is my biggest hobby is business. I just love all things business. I like hanging out with other entrepreneurs and learning what they're doing And I really believe that the entrepreneurs in America Everywhere really but entrepreneurs drive the economy 100% and I've seen statistics like half of jobs created or small businesses Well, I would argue with that I'd say a hundred percent almost because you got government jobs, right? Which maybe those will be they'll be fewer here in a year or two. Yeah, yeah.

Maybe, I know, definitely there's a, there's waste in government, I believe a lot of waste. Doge. But if you take out those jobs of private sector jobs, I'd say a hundred percent are created by small business owners. Why do I say that? Because Apple was a small business at one point. IBM was a small business at one point.

Like all these companies were small businesses. At one point, someone started the business and then they become large businesses. So I'd say almost all jobs you can track back to small business owners. And that's the great thing about this country is the ability for entrepreneurs to start companies out in nothing. And today, you can start a business without money, without employees, without a place to, you know, an office. It used to be you had to have all this money to start a business. Now you don't have to.

You can start online business tomorrow for nothing. We have to be one of the best countries in the world for entrepreneurship, I'd imagine. No doubt. I remember hearing this date me a little bit, but I heard an economist speak in the 1990s. And he was reverting back to the 1970s when we had terrible inflation, we had the oil embargo,

we had like all these issues. And he said, if you would have told me in the 1970s that I'd be standing here reporting on an economy in the United States the way it is today, I would have told you, and so would other economists would have told you that's impossible. Whoa.

He said, there's only one way I can explain it, American entrepreneurship. And I've always thought, well, okay, that's our hope. Like with the deficit and the debt, the only hope is American entrepreneurship to get us out of that. And that's why I think it's great that we might have some entrepreneurs

actually looking at government waste because that's been my biggest claim all my life really is the government waste. I think politicians on both sides and I definitely don't want to get into politics, but the one thing that I say we should all agree on when I talk to people, because I have friends that are on all extremes. When I talked to him, I say, can we just agree on this one thing? Forget like, should we pay more or less taxes? Who should pay taxes? Forget that.

Don't you think there should be accountability for the way our government spending the money we're giving them? And a hundred percent of people say, yeah, there should be accountability. I say, what's the accountability? I can get audited by the IRS. Like I'm accountable. How do we audit the government? How do we make sure that they're accountable for where all this money is going? These trillions of dollars, where is it all going? Right? It makes no sense. You'd never run a business where you're like, oh yeah, well I send money to this department. I don't know what they're doing with it, but I guess it's fine. I'll send them more next year. And so I finally see like people are paying attention a little bit.

Like we need some accountability on our government. And I bet you, I bet you if we really dig into it and find out how much waste there is, there's plenty of money going to the government to do everything that we want to do, but what happens is governments get bigger and bigger and bigger, that's what the founders were afraid of. And then this bureaucracy gets huge. government to do everything that we want to do. But what happens is governments get bigger and bigger and bigger. That's what the founders were afraid of. And then this bureaucracy gets huge. And then you're just feeding the bureaucracy. You're not actually doing things that help the people.

Yeah. I'm very interested to see what you London and Vivek find. Yeah. I think it's going to raise a lot of, I got to imagine it's not going to be hard, hard to find a lot of ways. Cause when no one's looking at it for decades, uh, you would think when you go in there, you're going to find a mess. Yeah. I mean, I hear from every government agency that they just waste money.

Even the military, I'm not trying to call anyone out, but I had buddies in the military, if they had any leftover ammo or explosives, they would just go in the desert and shoot it all, just so they wouldn't get budget cuts. Yeah, I know. Yeah, I've got a friend who works for one of the largest suppliers of military weapons, the US government. And he says, you know. Yeah, I've got a friend who works for one of the largest suppliers of military weapons

of the US government. And he says, you know what's funny? Every year we just add 20% to what we charge to the government and the government pays it. He's like, I think someone should be probably showing up and asking us like, why are all these things costing 20% more? But no one is because it's just like everybody's,

it's the whole thing about the Fox and the hen house, right? Everybody's in this thing together and no one is served or no one is incentivized to go. Wait a second We're wasting, you know Taxpayer money and that thing is taken way too lightly in my opinion I mean I work very hard for my money that I give to the government and I expect they should handle it with care Not recklessly the way they have for many absolutely because we're giving them, you know 40% of our money, of our profits. We worked very hard for that, hours, and we don't even know where it's gone.

That's exactly right. It's crazy. Well, Jim, where can people keep up with you, man? Where can people find you? Yeah, well, our website is dewwealth.com, D-E-W-W-E-A-L-T-H.com. I'm around and about on social media. You can kind of find me a little bit. I'm not a big social media influencer.

That's why I can't blast this out to 10 million people. I wish I could. But yeah, I'm around. I do speaking and podcasts from time to time. We'll link your stuff below. Thanks for coming on, man. Great to see you. Yeah.

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