Next Level Pros - #49: Playing The Long Game: Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly

Episode Date: November 6, 2023

What happens when your sense of identity is intertwined with your company to the point where stepping down feels like losing a part of yourself? That's the journey I embarked on after my nine-figure exit. This week, I sat down with Sean Kelly on "Digital Social Hour" to share the personal struggles I faced in the aftermath of stepping down. I had to rediscover my purpose and learn to appreciate the beauty and balance in life. Understanding the significance of masterminds, mentors, and the right circle of influence can be a game-changer. I give a peek behind the scenes of my journey, from attending masterminds that altered my life to building a team and facing the challenges of relinquishing power. Through a personal, life-threatening incident, I want to remind you of the power of appreciating the simple moments in life and the significance of cultivating gratitude. Join us on this enlightening journey that challenges us to reevaluate our definitions of success. Highlights: “And I think that's what people really want. They want authenticity, they want somebody that's done it.” "I think the biggest thing that I've learned is that you have to be willing to take risks.” "Nothing bugs me more than some self-help guru that is like 22 years old and never done it. Timestamps: (0:00:00) - Founder's Journey (0:01:47) - Transition From CEO to Chairman (0:07:50) - Harvard's Elite Owner-President Management Program (0:13:23) - Masterminds and Building a Team  (0:22:57) - The Power of Resilience and Gratitude (0:27:24) - Overcoming Comparison on Social Media  (0:31:45) - Gratefulness and Reflection on Life's Challenges Live Links:  Join my community - Founder Acceleration https://www.founderacceleration.com Apply for our next Mastermind https://www.thefoundermastermind.com Golf with Chris https://www.golfwithchris.com Watch my latest Podcast Apple - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-founder-podcast/id1687030281 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/1e0cL2vI1JAtQrojSOA7D2?si=dc252f8540ee4b05 YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@thefounderspodcast

I want to talk about an incident you had recently with a drunk driver. Yeah. 120 miles per hour. Yeah. He came out pretty much no damages, right? Yeah, man. It was crazy. The only thing I have, I don't know if you can see on camera,

little scar right here, that's from an airbag. But yeah, head on with a drunk driver who's coming at me 120 miles an hour. I was driving my Tesla. I had my two boys in it. We were coming home from a wrestling tournament on a Saturday at 3 p.m. This guy was blast wasted. It was a two-way road had a semi truck coming at me in this lane i'm going this way this car gets in my lane and i see him cross this line of the shoulder and i had a decision to make welcome back to the show guys digital. Digital Social Hour. I'm your host, as always, Sean Kelly. Got with me a fellow podcast host, Chris Lee. How's it going?

Good, man. How are you? I'm good, man. Can't complain. I love the kicks. Thank you. Excited to be here and glad you noticed I'm a big shoe guy. Yeah. How many sneakers you got? Oh, man. I probably got 150 pair. Damn. So you go to all those sneaker conferences uh no not that big you know i i'm more of a uh just spend uh full uh full resale you know kind of guy and but uh yeah not not traveling to the conferences but i but i do like my my sneakers i know the founder of

sneaker con so i'm gonna put you guys in touch cool i like to always give back to people that come on my platform nice i am every uh guy that's trying to sell sneakers perfect dream perfect so so outside of sneakers let's talk about what you're doing yeah man got uh got a lot of stuff going on with the uh the podcast recently uh exited my business and yeah which business rocking and rolling so uh we sold a private equity so company uh my company i founded on my garage sold you in power uh, we sold a private equity. So company, uh, my company that I founded on my garage sold you in power. We, uh, we sold it off to private equity a year and almost a half ago. And then, uh, and then I recently, uh, about six months ago, I get bad with time, but five,

five or six months ago, I stepped down as the CEO, took the chairman role. And so not, uh, actively involved in the day toto-day anymore there. Got it. Yeah. So you stayed with the company when you sold? Yeah, yeah. So typically with private equity, they want their investing in founders, investing in the guys and the structure and whatnot.

And so we got paid a bunch of money, rolled some equity forward. It was a nine-figure exit. Wow. And so rolled it forward. so i still have some equity there but uh just no longer involved in the day-to-day that's crazy man yeah i just had a alex mayor on yesterday okay and one of the things he was telling me was after he sold zeus for nine figures he felt kind of lost yeah did you experience that so um he probably left right away i didn't feel lost until i stepped down as the CEO right and it's

probably one of the most difficult times of my life frankly yeah I've gone through probably like four different like real low points of my life that was it that was that was the most recent and probably the lowest which is crazy you know plenty of money plenty of different, great things to be thankful for. I have an awesome family, wife, everything like that. But my identity shifted and, you know, I had attached it to this business that I had born, right? Like it started in my garage, you know, six and a half years later I'm stepping down and, yeah, it was tough. Yeah, it's almost like your kid at that point. I mean, yeah, exactly.

You view the employees that you're interacting with day to day as like your family and no longer being involved with them and having that same purpose. It's difficult. And I did it for all the right reasons. I did it to spend more time with my kids. I did it to spend more time doing acquisitions of other businesses and investment portfolios and stuff. But, you know, you can only dedicate so much more time to your kids. Like I didn't have – if I tried to go and dedicate 60, 70 hours to them, like that's too much.

Like they're just like, Dad, you're annoying. You're around too much. There's a balance. Yeah, there's a much. Like, like there's like, dad, you're, you're, you're annoying. You're around too much. There's a balance. Yeah. There's a balance. Absolutely. And so, um,

yeah, we struggled for probably about six weeks, six weeks trying to, trying to find purpose. Wow. That's actually on the shorter side from what I've heard other founders, but still that's, that must've been a bad time.

Yeah. So after six weeks, is that when you started the podcast? Um, so I, I had, uh had made the decision to start the podcast beforehand. And I was like working towards getting it going. But yeah, man, but it was like it was hard to find motivation. Yeah. And hard to like because I was just still stuck where I was previously, you know.

So money doesn't fix everything. No, absolutely. Money is simply a magnifier. Yeah. Because you probably couldn't even find out what to spend with all that, you know. You know, and you can only spend so much until it just doesn't become fulfilling, right? A car becomes a car after about a week of driving it. Right.

A boat becomes a boat about a week after driving it. You get used to the stuff. Yeah, man. It's like, you know you know more watches more cars doesn't change anything yeah yeah i went through a weird phase i have five watches right now and i only wear one of them right so it's like why did i even buy the other four yeah that's exactly right so i got out of it decently quick but it i like spending money on experiences yeah travel is like my favorite absolutely i'm a big travel guy. My wife is a little bit more difficult.

She doesn't like traveling as much. She'd rather be home. Really? Yeah. I love traveling. I mean, we have a pretty awesome house. We've got 23 acres. Wow.

You know, it's a little retreat. And we've really customized it a lot to fit our needs and wants. But, yeah. So she would rather be there. Yeah, if you've got 23 acres, I can't imagine traveling anywhere better than that. Yeah, so we've got some cool stuff. Yeah, so you mentioned three other low points along your journey. Have you ever talked about these points? Yeah, yeah, talked about them for sure.

Like my bankruptcy was a big low point in my life. 2011 filed bankruptcy for 2.2 million. That was after I started my very first business at the age of 24 in 2008. And you know, two and a half years later found myself no way out, no, no way to pay the bills, know bad partnerships, bad decision making a lot of personal choices that I had made to really screw things up and so you know having to go to my father-in-law and let him know that the money he invested

in my business was gone and also for my dad they both invested and my dad was a school teacher so he didn't have a lot to invest but he put about half his life savings in it. Ooh. Yeah. That must have been tough.

Yeah. So it was, you know, that was definitely a low point. Yeah. So did you end up paying them back eventually? I did. Nice. So that must have been good. Yeah, yeah.

Those were some of the highlights. Yeah. Yeah, I would have done the same because that would have been eating at me if that happened to me for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Your own parents, man. Yeah. That's why I try not to raise money from family. Yep. No, I'm, I'm the, I'm the same way. I steer clear, but I was young, young and dumb initially. So no, no longer do I take on family members as investors. Uh, you know, we, I've done some, I've done some real estate deals with my dad and stuff, but they're like secure deals. Calculated. Yeah.

Real estate's, you're not going to make crazy money. It's more of a preserving wealth. Yeah. Yeah. And you went to Harvard, right? Yeah. So I, I've done a Harvard program. It's called OPM. It stands for owner president management. It's a three-year program. I'm actually in the middle of it. Just finished year two. Wow. And so it's a very elite program. They take 160 owners or presidents of businesses throughout the world. They have thousands of applicants that get into it or that try to get in. It's very awesome. Like out of the 160 people that are part of my group, probably about 25% of them are billionaires. Holy crap. Yeah. I never heard of this program.

Oh, yeah. It's a very elite, very low, like they're not advertising it to just anybody. Because when you think of Harvard, you just think of the normal classroom setting. Yeah. No. So there's definitely a classroom aspect to it. So we do what's called case study, which is similar to like an MBA program. Right. to it so we do what's called case study which is similar to like an MBA program right but you're doing it with this group that has experience real-world

experience running and you have to hit like certain thresholds like the minimum application you have to be doing 10 million a year to apply in revenue yeah yeah and so but I mean most the people that get in are doing well over that. One of my roommates from Dubai, love this guy. We became really good friends because we live together. We live together for three weeks and you live in this living group and you eat together and you study together. You do these case studies together. Wow. He does $3.6 billion a year. Holy crap. $3.6 billion.

And so – and like – and he's not even the greatest. Like we got the second richest guy in the world. His oldest son is part of our group. Will.i.am is a part of our group. Damn. You got all kinds of really cool things. It's an awesome program. So I just got back from that a couple weeks ago and I'll finish it next fall dude it's now on my bucket list to get in there one day

that's awesome yeah you'll love it being surrounded by 160 guys on that level must be super inspiring yeah and it's and it's 160 people that don't have time they have time for three weeks so it's literally three weeks in a different area? Three weeks. We live on Harvard Business School campus. In Boston? In Boston. Nice. Yeah, it's phenomenal. Wow.

I wonder if other universities offer this. I don't know. I don't know. I haven't looked into it. But, you know, Harvard is the name. And, you know, they got some of the best professors. And the cool thing is their professors a lot of times have real-world experience. Like our negotiation professor, he did private equity for 20 years sold for a couple hundred million and then decided he wanted

to teach dude that's sick i actually just had a harvard professor on the show last week that's cool yeah awesome never made it that far but it's cool to say you're doing it now yeah i i was uh i'm actually a college dropout i don't i don't have a degree wow and now when i when i graduate from harvard i will actually be granted uh har Harvard alumni status and all that stuff. And, but still a college dropout. That's sick. So you were not good in school. Um, I was actually phenomenal in school. I just, uh, it wasn't from, so I, I had 165 credits. You need 120 to graduate. I was planning on being a doctor and, uh, I had a 396 GPA. Damn. And, you know, did all those things.

But once I decided the school was no longer serving me, I dropped out to start a business. Wow. Because I went there for education. I didn't go there for a degree. You know, and that's the problem with today's children in society is that they go for the paper, not for the actual learning. Right.

It's very rare to see entrepreneurs do that well in school like I'm very shocked that you were valedictorian pretty much yeah close but yeah I actually I actually really enjoyed school I enjoy learning of all different types so yeah and is that when you had your caffeine addiction those school days man I know my caffeine addiction has actually been more recent. I recently gave up caffeine about two weeks ago. Oh, brand new. So brand new. I was drinking about 600 milligrams a day.

Holy crap. Is that like 12 coffees? So I actually don't drink coffee. What do you mean? I don't drink coffee at all. So it was all like pre-workout and energy drinks shit yeah so that's probably even worse even worse even worse so man i you know so part of my religion i i don't drink coffee don't drink tea don't drink alcohol or any the the main addictions but you know i i justify drinking energy drinks but recently gave

it up so man i'm i i I try to be as pure as possible. I don't, I don't eat sugar, white flour, fried foods. Damn, that's hard in Vegas. It's hard anywhere. Yeah, that's true. Wait, you mentioned religion. What religion? I'm the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. So LDS, most people will call us Mormons. Mormons. Okay. You know what? I like Mormons. Yeah. I never was exposed to them growing up in Jersey, but I went to Salt Lake to visit my friend like five, six years ago. Yeah. And I was like, what is a Mormon? And then I got around the people. They're all super respectful. They don't drink, do drugs. And that's sort of how I live too. Yeah. Yeah.

It's cool. Yeah. That's how I grew up. My dad was a convert to the religion. My mom was part of like the early days. Like her ancestry actually went and settled Utah. Wow. Yeah. That's fascinating. So you were going door to door? So I've done door to door, yep. I was a two-year missionary for my church in Oklahoma, learned Spanish and also a little bit of Marshallese.

What's Marshallese? It's from the southeastern Pacific or southwestern Pacific. Interesting. It's an island language. So would you contribute your success to just being very good at learning? I would say most of my success is based off of, one, putting God and family first, and then, two, being very education-centric. And so for me, it's just like having a real purpose behind what I do. You know, my purpose has never been money. Money is a derivative of value created. And so I love

creating value. And so, you know, and I feel like I am a lifetime learner and I'm always looking for ways to be educated. So I, throughout my career my career, um, at least once a corner, I'll go spend money to go to a mastermind. Um, a lot of times I'll speak at masterminds, but I don't count those. I actually want to learn from others as well. Um, so, uh, you know, and, and a lot of times it's surprised people. I've gone to like 20, 25 person. I'm like, you know, very in there in the room, like one of the most successful people, but I'm there to actually learn from them. And so that is just something that I'm dedicated to.

I want to be the best version of Chris Lee possible. Dude, I love that. Yeah, something about masterminds, just powerful. Like it changed my life. I joined a mastermind when I was 21. Cost $100,000 to join, right? Was dance cool dance cool yeah solid dude i'm actually going to his event tonight in san diego but uh dude i was 21 spent half the money i had to on that mastermind so i only had 200k back then and it changed my life yeah and ever since then i go to

at least one mastermind a year that's awesome yeah so you know some some people look at events as master i love to be in a room where there's like 10 to 12 of us and we're just discussing the things that are working and not working within our businesses personal life those type of things right and like using each other's minds to be able to overcome and like that's my network is is definitely absolutely been where where i've been able to grow yeah i love that i had david guillem on last month he owns mary ruse organics supplement company and he's similar so he has group chats uh there's one if you're doing 10 million 50 million 100 million and he said all they do is help and critique each other's businesses it's like 10 to 12 guys in each chat love it yeah and when he told me that like, yeah, I'm not surrounding myself with the right people to get to the next level.

Yeah. Because I've been stuck at the seven figure range for three years now. Yep. And I can never crack that 10 mil range. Yeah. Usually the people that are stuck at seven figures is because they're like phenomenal solopreneurs, right? Like them, maybe a couple of VAs, a couple of team members or whatnot. And to really get to the next level is typically a process and a team thing, like actually building out a management team in order

to get there. Like that's, that's really what, what worked for me is I've, I've always been able to recruit, always been able to cast a great vision. And as I've casted the great vision, I've been able to attract people that are more talented than me to come be a part of my team. And so, um, you know, that, that was one thing that, that I learned and grow in my business. We built it from zero to 1300 employees in five and a half years. And, and we, and we did that all organically without acquisition. We did it without outsider invest, outside investment, all bootstrapped, you know, and it was it was because we got people bought into the vision. That's crazy. And we were willing to relinquish power

and let other people have control over certain aspects of the business. No, you're spot on with that because I am a solopreneur, maybe one person max, and that's probably why I've been stuck at seven. But also there's some comfort in that too. Yeah, yeah. Because once you start hiring, I feel like there's increased responsibility, right? Like did you have a lot of pressure when you were hiring fast?

Absolutely, man. But, you know, for me, I think the reason why most people are unwilling to get out of the comfort zone is because they're solely focused and nothing against you. Nothing against you, but just the population in general is like they they don't want to take that next step because it's so much about the money and they feel like that they're gonna lose control of the money and they might lose everything right where for me like building a team has always been about the team and the and like the story and like doing incredible things and like when you can rise above that above like the money and the control and everything, everything else, like it's no longer scary because like I'm here for

the experience. Like I, I just want to experience something that I haven't done before. And, and, and the only way I'm going to get there is I got to be around people that have done it before, right? Learn from them, mimic them and go and do it regardless of my fears. I mean, no, that's spot on. No, I appreciate that criticism because my thing is I go all in. So I'm not building myself a safety net where if the company fails, I could fall back on. So I think that's sort of my issue. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I go all in, but I'd really see this podcast, you know, taking off. Yeah, man, you've been doing an incredible job building this thing up. That's awesome. If I can get to that next level and put the right team around me, you know, taken off. Yeah, man, you've been doing an incredible job building this thing up. That's awesome. If I can get to that next level and put the right team around me, you know,

I mean, I love your show too, man. You got on some special people. Thank you. And I want to ask about, um, first, how are you getting these people networking with them and who have some have been your favorite guests? Yeah. So the founder podcast, for those that aren't following me, um, it's, it's phenomenal that it's been a phenomenal experience. I launched in June and, uh, all of my people have come organically through my own networking. Um, you know, a lot of people have higher outside agencies or whatnot to go and do it. I'm just like, no, it like for me, this is a networking tool. And if I can't, if I can't offer value by reaching out and whatnot, then it's not worth it. So Grant Cardone, I first got connected with him in 2013.

Wow. And a friend of mine had been to one of his like small conferences of like 30 people and got his personal cell phone number, gave it to me, and I started reaching out to him. Oh, you just cold texted? Yeah, I just cold texted. And so I, you know, I read his book and in his book he had 10 X rule. He had talked about like, always like reaching up and I'm like, dude, this is me reaching up. And I'm like, I'd love to get to know you. I'd love to get to, you know, and so then we, we just started interacting over the years and it was just through text messages. I would send him, you know, one of my, one of my networking hacks is I will always send a video of myself through text interesting and so so that someone can actually see my face hear my

voice as if we're without actually having to dedicate a time to be on a call with me right and so that's usually if i'm going to cold contact somebody that's how i'm doing it is with a voice i'm going to call them by name so they know that this isn't just some random blast text. I'm going to quote something that they're involved in so it's actually about them. And then I just let them know. I'm like, hey, I just love to – and I don't ask for anything up front. And so over the years with Grant grant it was just texting um being involved in things like hey man what kind of investments you got available that i can invest

in because i knew he he was raising capital like oh how much money you got you know and so it was just like oh this and so then you know we had built 10 years of a texting relationship and we had facetimed a few times and and other dude never met the guy face to face and and so then it was just like one day when i was launching the podcast was did a video reach out like hey grant recently exited my business this is what i'm doing love to have you on he's like dude let's do it dude you know and so and so it was just like you know the ask was after 10 years of work 10 years and alex or mosey i've known alex for four years we met at a mastermind we've kept in contact we do

dinner at different masterminds every time that we get together and so we worked on this relationship so then go and ask him for alex to be on my show not a big deal you know and uh so so like that for me and then and then from then every time I get connected with somebody or reconnected with somebody, I ask them, hey, who else would be a phenomenal guest for my show? Smart. Can you three-way text us on? And then when they three-way text, guess what? I individually text them a video. This is Chris.

This is this. Smart. And so, you know, and because of that, man man i've been able to land some freaking phenomenal people i mean people that are doing big things in the world and and uh yeah it's it's been a been a great run so far i love that 10 years before and ask i mean the patience it's just insane yeah you know i play the long game most people don't play the long game right you know i'm 39 years old and i've had a lot of success in 39 years, but I've also been at it for 20 years. Right.

Right. And I will continue to play the long game. Like I don't need to ask. And like, you know, one thing I've learned over the years is like just never even ask. Like always serve, always give, always give, always give. And then they might ask to have to serve you. And then that's when you can potentially capitalize. And usually even then you push it off one more time and then you ask later.

Love that. I always try to give more than I ask. Yeah. And I try to do it like at an 80-20% ratio. That's awesome. So that's served me well, man. Like for real. You know, and there's ways I need to improve.

Like I need to create a better system for the way I network. I don't have an incredible system. I need to spreadsheet it out and see when I've contacted them or not. And I, and I've seen some really cool reels on it. Yeah. But you know, like that, that's where I need to improve. No, I love that. And I see your show just, I think you'll be top five. Appreciate it. I mean, between the people you have on and your experience,

the problem with certain podcasts is the host isn't knowledgeable enough. Right.'ve been through the trenches yeah you've built sold companies you know and i think that's what people really want they want authenticity they want somebody that's done it man i'll tell you nothing bugs me more than some self-help guru that is like 22 years old and never done it she does every day oh my goodness like it dude it, dude, it bugs me. And it's just like, and so that's, that's the beauty of what, what we have is like, I've, I've done the work, I've done the effort, I put it in. And, and so now I'm starting to capitalize on it. Now, how did you train your mindset to think long-term? Cause in the day of social media, where everything's just such a quick win, it's very hard to think that way.

Yeah, man. I always try to remind myself, you know, Thomas Edison didn't find success until he's 67 years old, right? Like after it was like his a thousand, uh, just over a thousand, uh, uh, inventions that he had before the light bulb came and hit, you know, and I actually, so there's, there's three entrepreneurs or three, three, uh, American history guys that I have signed documents for them that hang in my office. One is from Thomas Edison because he was the entrepreneur that never gave up. And then I have one from Nikola Tesla because he was the dreamer. He always thought bigger and better than everything else.

And then George Washington, the freedom fighter. And so I have a signed document from George Washington. And for me, I try to remind myself like, dude, Thomas Edison didn't hit until he was 67. Colonel Sanders didn't hit until he was in his 70s. Like, so the rule is more – is later – like the exceptions – all of us want to base what we do off of exceptions rather than the rules. The rules are success happens later in life after many years of grinding, after throwing roots, roots, roots, roots, roots, and then you see growth, right? The bamboo tree, right? That throws roots down for like, I don't know, 12 months, two years or whatever. And then all of a sudden shoots all up in like 30 days. Like that is the standard. That is the rule,

not the exception. Like we've got to stop thinking that we're an exception to the rule. We're not. We aren't. And the only way that you can become an exception to the rule is live by the rule of success. And then maybe, just maybe, you might get lucky. Right. You know? And so that's for me is like, man, I have rules and principles that I base everything off of. And I don't work for fruit. I work for growth. Right?

And so fruit is like literal fruit on the end of trees, money, feeling, a result. I don't work for those things. I work to become better every single day. And if I get the fruit, then phenomenal, fantastic. Right. And so that, that's what I always have to remind myself is like, I'm not the, I'm not in this game for fruit. In fact, it's the reason why I love fruit trees. I have 23 acres, nine acres of cherry trees. Like some years there's things that happen that are out of my control. The weather damages the cherries, whatever else, like I can't control that, But I did everything possible to raise that tree right.

I fertilized it. I watered it. I sprayed it. I mowed it. I did everything to make sure that tree was able to produce. But it didn't produce fruit in that season. Most people in that scenario, they give up. They chop the tree down in real life, right?

If I go and I put all this effort into making money and I don't make money, I just chop the tree down and try something different instead of realizing, man, I just became an incredible tree that has the potential to bear fruit. And if I just take care of it one more season, I'm going to get fruit. Man, that's so powerful. You know, and so like that's for me. That's what keeps me motivated is like I ain't in this. I ain't in this for the fruit. i ain't in this for the fruit i ain't in this for the results i'm in this to become the best version that chris lee can be and it's not me against sean it's not me against grant cardone or alex or mosey or you know because

what happens is when you compare against somebody else right you either one you're way overly satisfied because you're like man at least I'm not that person. I'm kicking, I'm kicking butt. Right. Or you feel unmotivated, man. I wish I was this guy. I have no control or whatnot. Instead of being like, am I better than Chris yesterday? If that's the case, then I'm trending in the right direction. It's all about trends. Can I be trending in the right direction regardless of the fruit? Right. That's so powerful. And most people I would say compare themselves.

Yeah. So just to reframe that mindset to just be better than you were yesterday, like Kaizen is a powerful message and it's hard to, with social media, it's so easy to compare yourself. You know what I mean? Yeah. So how do you, do you even use social media? I do unfortunately, and I spend way too much time on there. But I do it more for market research. I like to see what other people are doing, what's working, what's not working.

Okay. And, you know, when someone's having success and I feel myself feeling some hint of jealousy or whatever else, I have trained myself like to like snap out of it and like, and like clap my hands for them. Right. Like that's the thing I have to remember is like, I've got to, I got to celebrate the success of other individuals and I got to be grateful for where I'm at. Gratitude is like the number one thing that you have to start with. As long as you're grateful for your current circumstance, your current blessings, your current family, whatever else, then it doesn't matter what anybody else has. Yeah. Right right and so like start with

there remind yourself and that's usually what helps me powerful yeah i keep a gratitude journal yeah it's awesome every day the past three years it's it's really kept me grounded awesome yeah i want to talk about an incident you had recently with with a drunk driver yeah um 120 miles per hour yeah you came out pretty much no damages right yeah man it was it was crazy the only the only thing i have i don't know if you can see on camera little scar right here that's from an airbag but yeah head on with a drunk driver he was coming at me 120 miles an hour i was i was driving my tesla i had my two boys in it we were coming home from a wrestling tournament on a saturday at 3 p.m this guy was blatant blast wasted it was a two-way road had a semi truck coming at me in this lane I'm

going this way this car gets in my lane and I see him cross this line of the shoulder and I had a decision to make and so I decided to bail off into this this farm field because we were kind of out in the country and we both bailed at the same time he He hit me right here behind my rearview mirror and shredded this part of my door, and then right behind me was completely destroyed. If you go on my social media, so ChrisleyQB on Instagram, you can see images of that car. It's just completely demolished, and I had a sun in the back without a seatbelt.

Whoa. Yeah, and luckily because it was an electric car it didn't flip it turned because it's really weighted in the bottom yeah from the battery and so it pushed him against the door that didn't get destroyed and this one was complete like my wheel axle everything else is gone holy crap and uh that car they hit us rolled four times all three of them weren't wearing seat belts they all walked away it's crazy all three of them weren't wearing seatbelts they all walked away it's crazy all three of these drunk these drunk kids oh they were all drunk all drunk and then my son in the front dude we all walked away son in the back without he had a uh fat lip and a uh you know he was bleeding a bunch and i thought like he was in trouble but it was just it was just a fat lip

and man we we walked away you know praise, praise to God. That's so nice. Do you believe everything happens for a reason? Absolutely. Yeah, so I'm a big believer in Christ, and he's my savior, and, you know, definitely religious. And so I think that everything in this life is for our experience and uh you know i knew after that day that i had something more to to finish some other calling or work to do here on on this earth and so um i was preserved in that point and it's definitely given me a whole new uh meaning of life it's it's actually one of the main motivators that uh got me to to step down as the ceo of my business and take on the chairman role

and spend more time with my kids spend more time doing the things that I love. And yeah. Yeah. You realize life is so short, you know, moments like that. You see people in their thirties, forties passing away from cancer. Yeah. It's crazy. You're like, wow. You never know when your time's up. Yeah. I mean, literally, I mean, you couldn't, you can, you potentially won't wake up tomorrow. Yeah. You know, we, at any point i've seen people pass away in their sleep cancer all the things man it's crazy yeah and a lot of people in that moment would dedicate their lives to putting that other person in jail yeah but did you even care about that no yeah in fact like the i don't know if i even know the guy's name you know i think they the da is

trying to press charges against him because one of the passengers was injured and so they're pressing for that passenger got it you know you think about a situation i actually was just talking about bradley about this situation like this you think you're going to be angry and i think i was absent of anger and i'm a and i can be very angry i'm not a i'm not a nice person. And a lot of times in scenarios like this, but like that scenario, I was just, you know, initially in a little bit of shock and they just so grateful to be alive. So grateful that my kids were there with me and that like I had another chance. Beautiful. Yeah. I love that. Chris, it's been a great episode. Anything you want to close off with or promote? Man, uh, you know, I just,

I just say, just say appreciate it. Thanks for having me on. Absolutely. Thanks for watching, guys. I hope you got inspired from that, learned something new. And as always, I'll see you next time. Peace.