THE ED MYLETT SHOW - James Dumoulin: Authority Hacking & Growing Your Platform

Episode Date: June 9, 2026

He posted 400 times on Instagram with 50 followers. Most people would have quit. James Dumoulin just kept going.  I've been waiting to have this young man on for a while, and he did not disappoint. At 23 years old, James has built something I genuinely did not think was possible at this age: 21 million followers, 200 million views a month, 70 employees, and 48 billionaire interviews including Tom Cruise, Tom Brady, Will Smith, and Reid Hoffman. He built all of it from scratch, starting as a Chick-fil-A employee who saw TikTok as a marketing engine before anyone else did. James is the co-founder of the School of Hard Knocks, and what he has learned sitting across from the wealthiest people in the world will hit you in the best way possible. In this conversation, we go deep on what it actually takes to build something great when you have no connections, no credibility, and no one betting on you. James breaks down the exact strategy he used to get into rooms most people will never see, including how he cold-approached Mark Cuban at South by Southwest with nothing but nerve and a borrowed title. We talk about what the wealthiest people in the world actually have in common, whether money buys happiness, and why your age, your background, or your starting point is not the obstacle you think it is. James also gets honest about the moments where it almost fell apart, including the day their revenue dropped from $30,000 a month to under $5,000 overnight and what he did to rebuild. This is one of the most practical, fire conversations I've had in a long time, and James is the real deal. Here's what you'll gain from this episode: The Authority Hack: How James borrowed credibility he didn't have yet to get in rooms most people will never see, and how you can do it starting today with what you already have. Billionaires Think in Decades: The single mindset shift James observed in every billionaire he's interviewed, and why your obsession with the short term is the real thing holding you back. Concentration Builds Wealth: Why trying to do too many things too early is the silent killer of most businesses, and what the wealthiest people actually do first. The Rejection Blueprint: Why James says "no" just means "not yet," and how posting 400 times with 50 followers is what actually built a business doing $700,000 a month. Are Billionaires Actually Happy? What James has witnessed behind the scenes with some of the most successful people in the world, and the one thing the happiest ones all have in common.  This is one of those conversations that changes the way you think about what's actually possible. Don't miss this one! Try QUO for free PLUS get 20% off your first 6 months when you go to ⁠https://quo.com/mylett Get your choice of a healthy free protein staple like chicken breast for a year or ground beef in every box for LIFE PLUS $20 off when you go to https://ButcherBox.com/mylett 👉 SUBSCRIBE TO ED'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL NOW 👈⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   → → → CONNECT WITH ED MYLETT ON SOCIAL MEDIA: ← ← ←  ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠INSTAGRAM⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠FACEBOOK⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LINKEDIN⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠WEBSITE⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Edmunds show. All right, welcome back to the show, everybody. So I wanted to have this young man on for a while. You may be the youngest person I've interviewed, or at least one of them. You're one of the youngest we've ever had on the show, and also one of the most impressive. And so because you've done something that I think,

you've turned what could be a weakness in your life, which is your age into a great strength in what you built. And I want to talk about that. Let me tell you what he's built. Once you see him, if you're on YouTube watching, you'll recognize him. But some of you may not know his name. His name is James Duhlund.

He has a program called The School of Hard Knocks. Just to give you guys an idea of what this young man's done at 23 years old, okay? 21 million followers on all platforms combined. And he does about 200 million views a month, a month, everybody, not cumulative. And so he's built something absolutely remarkable, and he's become a celebrity. And he's done it at a very young age. And he's had a big impact in the world as well. you're going to learn a ton of lessons about how to build something even though you might not think you can.

James, welcome the show. Thank you for having me on. And I also want to add in there this last week I just interviewed my 48 billionaire. Arthur, the founder, Home Depot, owner of the Atlanta Falcons. So 48 billionaires in counting. I'm waiting to find out if I can figure out anybody who's interviewed more billionaires than me. I think it is you, brother. It may be.

Arthur Parks' boat in the harbor near my place, my island in Maine. And so, yeah, he certainly is a multi-millionaire. So, and you're probably going to be too, right you're going. If it's a byproduct of what we're doing, I'll be happy to make it happen. All right. So here's where he starts, you guys. Take me through here. You're working at Chick-fil-A.

Yes. Everybody just get ready if you think you can't make your dreams come true. You're in high school. You're working at Chick-fil-A. You're doing a little construction. Right? So you're just, you're high school kid. Yeah.

Right? What the heck happened? How did this start? Where'd the idea come from, et cetera. Yeah. So you said it best. You know, first two jobs I had growing up was working at Chick-fil-A and working construction. Going into my senior year of high school, I discovered TikTok, which is now, you know,

the largest search engine in the world. And this is back in 2019. Nobody really took TikTok seriously, right? It was the dancing app at the time. But I saw this as the greatest organic marketing that ever existed because you could have a thousand followers, 500 followers, you could put out a piece of content and millions of people could see it overnight. The only way that you could have millions of people see your content without having a massive brand at that time was paying hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars on ads. And so I discovered TikTok. And during COVID, it was from 2019 to 2020, I started to post content, get really familiar with the algorithm, how social media actually works. And before I knew it, I grew a personal channel on TikTok from zero to 800,000 followers.

And just learned that was my skill set. The one thing that got me to where we are today is I mastered short form viral content. Now, I've learned a ton about business since then, but that was really my first, I guess, segue into entrepreneurship. Did you know anything about it? I didn't know anything about it other than the fact that, you know, one of my favorite things is that going viral is like hitting the lottery, but creating consistent content is like investing in your future. So I just, it didn't matter, it didn't matter where I was, you know, during COVID, you know,

right before I was getting ready to move out to Austin to go to the University of Texas, I was posting every day. It doesn't matter if I was on a train, a plane, if I was on a boat, three times a day, every single day for that entire year. And that's how I went from zero to 800,000 followers. Now, as I grew the channel, I started to learn a ton of lessons and was able to scale, you know, other channels prior to scaling, you know, the big one now, which is the School of Hard Knocks. But I didn't know anything about it going into it other than, you know, with time went on, I learned how to pivot. I learned hooks.

I learned all these different things to really help me go viral and build a brand. What would you say to somebody who, because you're your high school kid becoming a college kid, right? So if I were you, I would be thinking, well, what, would have anybody? They want to listen to me, right? And I think that's what most people think. They want to get on social media. They want to post. But what I always hear from people is they go, I don't have anything to say.

I'm not interesting. I've not made it yet. So, Ed, I know why you did well on social. You were already a very wealthy guy, so you had credibility. I'm working at Chick-fil-A or I'm doing this or that. What would you say to somebody who thinks they have nothing to bring to social media? Because you hear that, too. 100%.

You know, when I started the school of Hard Knocks, it was initially me, my brother and a childhood friend from the DC area. where we were just making content about business. But we came to the realization early on and growing the channel that nobody gives a shit about three young 20-year-old kids talking about business and giving business advice. So we're like, you know what, let's take our pride and ego out of the way. Let's be the ones to go extract from the most successful people in the world, their lessons, their insights, their knowledge, their credibility, let's borrow their authority. And let's interview them.

Let's get their insights. Let's get in rooms that most people didn't think were possible to do, which is exactly what we did. So we kind of borrowed that authority. But then I have another saying that I love, which is that information can change, situations only through implementation, and that's what we did. We're spending so much time with all these multimillionaires and billionaires guys that are running 10, 11, you know, figure businesses, and we started to actually implement, you know, the things that they were teaching us. I love the saying that most people are addicted to education, but allergic to execution, right? A lot of people,

like, you'll host events and there's a lot of people that will go there and be tactical, or they will consume your content, will consume my content, but a lot of them won't do anything about it. And so I tried to get very knowledgeable about how to actually kind of execute and like build businesses around things which is what we've done you know a lot of people think that we just do street interviews but we've got 70 employees now you know we've got are you serious 70 employees a couple of different verticals and businesses change you're serious you have 70 employees yeah at 23 years old 23 years old yeah oh boy that's impressive yeah I mean really that's congratulations I mean I told you that when we met off camera congratulations and we still run super

lean too like that's that's the thing like we you know you said something there that I my first mentor is a very successful guy and I remember him looking at me and he goes you know I give this information to everybody, he goes, I need you, Eddie, to be coachable at the speed of instruction. Wow. I'll never forget that phrase. And it's sort of what you just said. It's not just being coachable. Yeah.

But it's almost like suspend disbelief. Actually, even suspend having to understand why I'm telling you to do this. Just execute. I'm further down the road than you. I think there's all the, don't you think that people have all these filters of, well, I need to understand it. I need to know how it would fit for me. You don't know where I live the market's different or my age or this or that.

I think people build in these filters, but you left success leaves clues. I keep hearing this from people that are proficient on social media. I obviously built, you know, several million followers myself and then sort of backed away just out of fatigue and age and health. But I'm still on there, everybody. But you said post three times a day. Is that sort of a, I hear Gary say this often, too. Is that the number or is there some random reason that's it?

So this is a great question right here because I think it actually changes with each level of social media. I'm at a point now with the school of hard knocks. I have not posted a single video on Instagram and since April 2024 that has gotten under a million views. Since April 2024, we're now April 26. So in the last two years, I've posted just about every other day, have not had a single video hit under a million views. Everybody can back check that as well. I've never bought a view or anything like that. Like a lot of other people, there's a lot of other people that do do that, unfortunately. And they ruin the algorithm by doing it too. It's crazy. And it's like, it's, you might as well just start a new channel once you start to do that. But at the beginning when you're on

social media, I like to say that quantity breeds quality. The more you post, the more data that you get, which kind of tells you, hey, you should continue to create that type of content. I like to say people should have three to five different pillars when they're making content. So if you're trying to build a personal brand or even if you're trying to create content for your business, it's like part of it could be founder stories, your individual stories and coming up with the product or the service that you're ultimately selling. Two could be testimonials where you're talking about, I took this person from here to here. Third could be things that are just relevant knowledge. You know, I think you mentioned Gary V. Gary V gave me one of the best pieces of advice when it comes to content

creation, which is PAC. Okay, PAC is platform, algorithm, and culture. So PAC or platform, that's the first one. P. Be on every platform. Content diversification is huge. A lot of people, like, I make more money off of Facebook than YouTube. Then all the platforms combined, I make more money off of Facebook than any of the platforms combined. And people are like Facebook. Yes, yes, Facebook. Go look up what happened in 2020. That was the first year that Facebook ever stopped growing. So then they're like, okay, how do we get the biggest creators to come to our platform where we're going to pay them more than everybody else, which is exactly what they did. It's a platform. Beyond all the platforms, you hear Gary talking a ton about Snapchat, making sure that you're, and the beautiful thing

about that is you're able to build audience, you know, in all these different demographics. If I'm on TikTok, I'm appealing to a much more of like the, you know, high school to college. but if I'm on Instagram, it's 25 to 35 and then Facebook, I could be having people that are 40, 50, 60, 70 years old watching our content, which I love. I was just in London all last week, you know, doing some interviews out there. And I had people from high school, people that weren't even in high school yet, all the way up to people that were, you know, in their 60s that were coming up to us saying, hey, we love your content. And I was like to ask, hey, where do you follow us from? You know, and it's all different platforms. And so that's the first one is platform, then algorithm.

What's going on right now? okay, Instagram just launched. Now you can do up to three minute reels. Test some of that longer content out. See how it performs. So she'd always be trying to learn about what the algorithms are pushing then and now. And then the last one, which is the most important one of me, which is culture. And this is what Gary V talks about.

The biggest cheat code with content is finding the things that are like the most trending. I'll never forget this. Just because I'm very like analytical about business content, whose content I think is like doing really well. but I remember and just a figure in the entrepreneur space that's been very relevant for a long time. It's like Grant Cardone. And Grant, obviously, from an engagement standpoint, does really well. But I would say on average, he gets a couple hundred thousand views on his videos. Occasionally you have a video that pops and does a million views or so.

The day that Charlie Kirk was assassinated, you know, when he was murdered, Grant Cardone posted a video, I think, an hour after that news broke out of just a short 20-second clip of them on stage. 48 million views on Instagram. I think it's probably pinned to his profile. But that's just an example to put into perspective that if you can like tap in and be one of the first to create content around like a relevant something trending, whether it's in the business space, fitness, you know, no matter what industry you're in, if you can understand like the platform, algorithm culture like that is such a cheat code. Now back to kind of what you were saying. I don't want to go too far off about quantity versus quality. Early on, I think it is all about volume.

I really, really do quantity breeds quality because it tells you it's going to give you the results right there. If you're making different types of content and there's clearly a winner out of the different pillars that you're making, double down, triple down, 10x, that type of content. I think the bigger you get the mistake people make is they do start to post too much. I think when you were at that realm where you have a couple million followers, you should not be trying to post two, three times a day. You already have your authority built. Focus on the content. Like, this is crazy. I have 8 million followers on Instagram.

If I post a video and it gets a million views, I lose followers off of that. So I'm only making content now with the mindset that it's like this has to be such a good piece of content that it could get three, to 10 to 20 million views on a video. So it shifts from quantity to quality, I think, as you build the brand up a little bit more. By the way, I really appreciate you sharing tactics. A lot of times you get people on the show, it's just generalities and philosophical stuff.

So I appreciate that. By the way, those you that are listening right now or watching, you're going, okay, I'm not a big social media person. We're about to shift gears in a minute because you maybe have interviewed more billionaires than anybody in the world. So we're going to talk about their mindsets in a second. But I want to put a bow on the social.

I want to unpack a couple things he just said that, you know, with my 10-year experience, on there that I totally agree with. One is this idea of posting more when you're smaller and letting the market tell you which content it likes. That's why when you're putting three or four posts out a day and you're doing it multiple days, the market will tell you, oh, your whiteboard content where you're writing on the screen, that works, or the green screen behind you, that's working, or this topic's working. So I want to acknowledge that. And then also this notion of not relying on one platform. If I made a mistake in my branding, it was that I really took off on Instagram.

And maybe it was just being a middle-aged guy already, but I neglected TikTok. I neglected Facebook. I neglected X. And I didn't want to, I thought, I don't want to rebuild on these other ones. I certainly podcast-wise, blew it on YouTube. I just went audio forever when the future looked like it was YouTube. So you're right. Be on all the platforms. LinkedIn is powerful as well. LinkedIn's popping right now. We got over 100,000 followers. in like two months, they're pushing that short-form content now for sure. Okay, this is so good. All right, you've interviewed 48 billionaires.

You're going to interview me soon, so we'll add to that list a little bit. But is there a through line at all? I mean, because there's different types. There's the new age sort of social media person who's built big brands and all that. Then there's like the quiet billionaire next door dude that you catch walking out of a restaurant and he's got flip-flops and a t-shirt on and you'd never know. and isn't on social media. So they're in all these different businesses.

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plus $20 off your first box and free shipping always. That's butcherbox.com slash my let. Don't forget to use our link so they know we sent you. When it comes to like the commonalities. Yeah, personality traits, mindsets, anything like that. There's so many. I think one of my favorite sayings is that billionaires think in decades, not days. Wow.

And the reason why I love that one is I'll never forget. I was interviewing Reed Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn. He sold LinkedIn to Microsoft for $26 billion. And I was asking him, I was like, Reed, if you were to start from zero and you had one year to make a billion dollars, what would you do? And he stops me, goes, I never play a one-year game. It's a 10-year game minimum. Todd Graves, the founder of Raising Caints, worth over $20 billion off of selling chicken tenders. I asked him a similar question.

He goes, you know, I'm worth $20 billion today. But what if I can be worth $30, $40, $60 billion, and I can help more people? What if my kids one day can continue to grow that? So he only thinks in generations. And that is such a common thread that I've seen in the most successful people. And I love this idea of macro patients and micro urgency. So in the macro patients, you have to understand that this is, to build anything great, this is going to take a long time, right?

You know this from building companies, all the people, your friends and the people that I've interviewed. And even just in us and building a eight-figure business office street interviews, Our first three to four years, we, you know, like Ilama says, you have to eat glass and entrepreneurship is like eating glass and staring into the abyss. There's a couple years where, you know, you're going to have to eat for a while. And that's exactly, you know, what it was. So we had that belief in us that it's going to take a long time, but we have to be patient. You know, one of the things that my generation struggles with is instant gratification. They see people on social media driving a nice car, I want to mean, I got to get that.

I got to get that. But it's like, it doesn't just come overnight, especially. if you're going to bring, if it comes super, super quickly, chances are it's going to be gone like that. You're right. Or there's something isn't great necessarily involved with it. But then micro urgency going back to what we were saying. Can you say that quote for me again about being coachable? Coachable to the speed of instruction.

I love that because in the short term, it's taking massive action every day. And that's another commonality. I have so many billionaire contacts in my phone. And Matt Isbiyah, who's the owner of the largest mortgage company in the world, he owns the Phoenix Suns, great guy. And when I ask him what he notices about all his billionaire friends, they all text back instantly. They all respond instantly. You could email him, text him.

He's responding instantly. And I feel like, you know, that is something that I have noticed that if I shoot them a text, they'll let me know within John Morgan, Morgan and Morgan, like, very similar thing. So I think that. Bro, you're so brilliant for 23. I have to tell you. My son's here, you know that. And he's about back there, wowing because whether my net worth is being. or just close or whatever.

It's getting there. And it's one of the traits that I pride myself on most is I get back to people. And I actually can't go to sleep at night until I've replied to the people I'm supposed to reply to. And so these little macro things,

can I tell you one thing I observe about you? First off, people listening would forget that you're 23. Right, with this level of wisdom. And by the way, I ask a question, it's reflexive. This is not stuff he's got to dig deep for. Like, he owns this stuff now. Speak to this just for a second.

Even though these are just pocket meeting, Some of them are in your phone and you're knowing them. Here's what I see on you. I believe proximity to somebody changes your frequency with them. Meaning, I believe people, let's just take business. You're interviewing successful business people. No, I don't know whether they've got a good family life or not. That's a totally different situation.

So I'm not saying these are people to emulate one way or the other. Some probably yes, some probably know. But when you get into proximity to other people, their vibrational frequency, the way they think, the way they live, the way they operate impacts you. just through association, there's a piece of this. When I look at you, I'm like, I can see the associations having poured into you. So from a confidence standpoint, you're a guy who grew up, part of your life, like as I read it, you're kind of a military brat.

You grew up overseas for a while. This is not a dude who grew up in Palm Beach with money. Now looking at it, you look like a rich guy. You got a rich guy's haircut and all that. But the truth of the matter is you didn't grow up that way. So has just been being in the proximity of these people, do you think? think unknowingly, maybe even unconsciously, change the way you view you in terms of your confidence level?

100%. You know, I like to talk in sound bites like I think you do as well. I love the saying that the world is overly cruel to shy men and it rewards the courageous. I think that when it comes to being able to attach yourselves to successful people, they can tell whether you're kind of like hesitant versus like that confident person being able to approach them. And in a sense, the hyper-successful people, they can see part of themselves in you. you, but I think it has definitely had an effect on me. But I think it does stem actually from an

early age. I would see that's one attribute that I've kind of always had and may have been a big reason why the channel became so successful in a short amount of time is because I was always really confident to approach people. You know, my dad, he ran the largest overseas military base in the world. Awesome. He was the garrison commander at Camp Humphrey. So from an early age, I was there six to ten, I was, you know, going to these events where he was speaking at, you know, town halls and in the city in front of thousands of people. And, you know, I was meeting a lot of the people he was meeting because, you know, with the military oftentimes, you know, their families come with them.

And so I think that from an early age, you know, I had to realize that the way that it's the right way to act and also observing my dad and the way that he interacted. He was a great leader, very respected on the military basis that he was kind of running. And so that had a big effect on me. And then another thing was is another thing that I do growing up. I was in Boy Scouts. So I became an Eagle Scout. And I learned public speaking then and how to communicate.

You know, my scout troop that I was in in the DC, Virginia area was ran by a bunch of ex-marine guys. So I had those little, you know, ounces of experience between observing my dad and interacting with some of the top military people, government officials that he was, you know, bumping elbows with, shaking hands with, and then also in scouts. And so that kind of, I think, translated to us being able to build the channel and knowing how to interact and operate the same way that I feel like successful people. Really great insight, James. Yeah. So is there a hack? those people listen to go, hey, I'd like to meet some successful people and bring them into my life. Or is there a, you're walking up to Tom Brady.

You're walking up to Will Smith. And I don't know how many of these are orchestrated or not. I'm sure some are. And some are random. Walking up to some billionaire walking out of a lunch place in South Beach or whatever. Is there something you do or say? Is it a body language thing? Is there anything you would teach somebody to appropriately approach somebody whom they'd like to kind of draw into their world a little bit?

but don't know how to do it. Such a great question and extremely, I think, useful for people because I think that that is the ultimate cheat code in life, right? I like to say mentorship is like wisdom without the wounds. If you can attach yourself to just a couple very, very, very successful people, that is more valuable than any college degree than any sort of, you know, general education that I think people can get, right? Just all it takes is a couple, you know, hyper-successful people to kind of get in your corner

and be willing to pour into you. But I think it starts with a couple of things, right? Like when we started the channel initially, we didn't have any connections, right? My dad was a military guy. He wasn't connected in the business world. And so it was us literally organically just going up to people cold approaching them off the street. The first billionaire that we ever interviewed was at South by Southwest in 2022. It was Mark Cuban.

And I went up to him after he was speaking at an event with my brother. And I said, hey, Mark, my brother and I, we started a channel at the University of Texas where we're just interviewing success with people trying to get advice to the younger generation. Now, what did I say there? I started a channel at the University of Texas. Why? I'm borrowing that authority because it's bigger than me, right? So if you can find a way to borrow that authority, and a lot of people will see my interviews now where, you know, yes, Tom Brady was a set up interview, Tom Cruise was set up interview, Will Smith was a set up

interview, Shaq, set up interview, right? And a lot of our stuff now is definitely a lot more set up. But I'm a big believer in keeping the main thing, the main thing. The thing that got us here was that off the street content. So for example, I went out to London last week. I didn't set up a single interview. I went right to Mayfair, which is the wealthiest part, and just when up to probably several hundred people within a week, just getting some incredible content. Nothing set up. Probably more rejections than actual interviews. And the reason being is because people love to see that content.

And a big thing that people see in our interviews that they love, whenever I get feedback from people that love my content, they say, I love how you're able to reel them in. They don't want to do the interview at first, but then they want to do it. And if you notice, like one of the things that I'll typically say is I have a channel with 21 million followers I've interviewed X amount of billionaires in the last four years. We just need one minute. I'm a huge advocate that credibility kills. all bad attitudes. That's probably my favorite saying ever. Credibility kills all bad attitudes.

Like I remember, you know, Tom Brady, Michael Rubin, you know, a year before I was able to interview them, it was either a rejection or they took it to them and they didn't want to do it or it was just crickets. But then when you interview a Tom Cruise, now it's like, okay, now we can talk. Now we'll get in front of you. So I think that is a big thing for people. Like don't necessarily get discouraged if like the first time it's a rejection or a no in business, whether it's you're trying to do a podcast or anything, trying to get a prospective client, it may not just be the right time. Maybe you need to kind of work on yourself more. Maybe you need to build up your credibility a little bit more.

But I think that that's ultimately one of the things to do. Now, if you're somebody that has no credibility whatsoever, right? In our case, we started just attaching ourselves to the University of Texas. Hey, we started a channel here. Then it was, okay, now we could attach ourselves to millions of followers, X amount of billionaires interviewed. So we don't necessarily struggle with having to cling to that. But I always like to tell people, and I'll just use Tom Brady,

the example. Tom Brady's the greatest football player of all time. Can I add value to Tom Brady's life to become a better football player? Absolutely not. But maybe there is something, maybe it's content. Maybe there is something that I could disproportionately do better than Tom Brady. Maybe it's somebody playing the piano. Granted, maybe Tom Brady has no interest in learning how to play the piano. I'm just trying to put it in perspective for people that if you have some sort of like skill set that is like very, very unique and you can double down and become one of the best in the world at that, you can attach that to people. In our case, one of the reasons why we're we were able to attach ourselves to so many people is attention.

That's one of the most valuable things in today's world. A lot of rich guys, like, they have more money than they can do. Now they want to give back. Now they want legacy. Now they want attention. Now they want media. So that's kind of been our unique skill set that we've been able to add on to other people. And I think that this is very important as well because, you know, another one of my favorite interviews I've ever done is Robert,

the shark from Shark Tank. Incredible interview. It's such a nice guy as well. And I remember asking him the question, Robert, what do you think is more important? What you know or who you know? 95% of people are going to tell you who you know is more important. But he said the biggest piece of, and again, I don't like to cuss, but I'm going to say verbatim what he said. The biggest piece of bullshit advice that he's ever heard people say is that who you know is more important.

Because you and I both know that if you are on a high level at all cylinders, you're a busy guy, you have all the opportunity in the world. You are not just going to give your time to somebody unless they have some sort of like value that they can offer you. Now maybe you do meet that, you know, young person. You can see the fire in his eyes. and you can see that he's got a lot of potential. Maybe he's seen somebody to pour into him or her, and you ultimately do that. But 95% of the time, it's like you're going to ultimately be with people

that are going to make you better, you know, add value to your life. And vice versa, you're going to do the same. Life gives to givers and it takes from takers. So big advocate in giving back and giving to other people. But the lesson there was that you have to be, if you become the brand, if you build it, they will come, right? If you become super successful and great at something, people are naturally going to come to you.

And then it's like you don't have to worry about, you know, who you know. So I know that was a bit long window. No, I actually think there was brilliance in there. As frankly, every answer you've given, that idea of associative credibility, University of Texas in the very beginning. Now it's the size of the show. But it could also be a cause you affiliate with, you know, that you're American cancer or whatever it might be or the Make a Wish Foundation.

So if you have associative credibility, if you don't have it yourself and creating that, we even do that in branding in my companies now when we get to a certain. level we'll associate with the PGA tour or NASCAR so our associative credibility you can do that on a small scale as well authority hacking it's this is such a this this is such a good well you've mastered this bro like no one's ever said that on the show and it's actually one of the best answers ever because it is true this this idea of it by the way once you get one as you've said hey you know i've got a show with blah blah blah viewers we interviewed tom cruz we interviewed ed my i should put myself in that category we've interviewed gary v we've interviewed whoever so you're right

finding a way for that. There's another thing you do, I think maybe you don't even give yourself enough credit for. Most people, including me when I was your age, I had an allergy to rejection. I mean, it just, I was afraid of it, and it destroyed me when I would get it. And I think if we were to cut out all the crap, why don't people post more on social media, why aren't they starting a show, why aren't they writing their book, why haven't they started the business, or why isn't the business growing. Why aren't they selling more if they're in a sales business? It is fear of rejection. Endo story, right? Full stop. Do you have that? And whether you do or don't, what have you done to mitigate that fear? Yeah. I think it's important that everybody knows this, right? A lot of people,

they see our channel now, they see that we've got millions of followers. But what they don't see is, I posted 400 times on Instagram and had 50 followers. Wow. I posted four, now we have 3,000 and post an 8 million followers on Instagram, but I posted 400 times on Instagram. I still have the screenshot of it and had 50 followers. How many people do you know would keep kind of posting after that? Most wouldn't. Most wouldn't. So I would say I definitely do not have a fear of rejection. You don't have the fear. I don't have the fear. Now there have been times where like I've been rejected and it's been very discouraging and kind of like where I've maybe lost a little bit of sleep over it to be completely honest with you. But I would say I definitely don't have the fear.

Again, I go back to the worst thing somebody can say is no. You know, I interviewed a gentleman. recently who just sold a roofing company for high nine figures in Dallas and he said that you you can't take rejection personal they're not rejecting you they're just rejecting your offer and so I feel like if the more that you can kind of just not take the rejection personal and again I go back to that idea of like there's been so many like countless times where there's people that had said no to an interview at first or it went through and it was initially a no I just again just means you got to try a little bit harder it means that you know doesn't mean never it just means not yet and so I've really taken that to to my heart honestly. And I think that this is one of the most important things that people need to learn how to

overcome is that fear of rejection. You know, again, I'll name drop him again because it's true. He talks about this a lot, but Gary V said it is literally a pandemic as far as people worrying about what other people think about them. It's crazy. You know, they're worried that, oh, they're posting content. They're wanting to grow their brand and somebody from back home is going to see it and send it in a group chat and clown them behind their back. It's like, who cares about it? those people those aren't even your real friends and oftentimes especially when you start to kind of take off and become a little bit successful that's when it gets the worst because people are like because you're doing something that they know that they could never see themselves like ever doing

and that hurts them and therefore you know they're going to project their own insecurities and things on you as if like you're a bad person or you know that you're a corny or that you're a clown so again i love this idea that nobody else's thoughts ever paid my bills which is it's so true Bro, you know you doing a good interview? When my guy's behind the scenes, I'm watching multiple times, I've gone. Yeah. Seriously, that's so good. Yeah.

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That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com slash ed for free shipping and 365-day returns. Quince.com slash ed. Do you worry at all that you, by the way, I say this with respect when I say it, but do you worry at all that potentially you are projecting to young people?

or people watching your content. You know what I mean? That social media thing, it's every guy walking into a Lambo or whatever. Do you worry that people begin to think that someone like your father, who served our country, who made a huge difference, who's clearly a stud and a leader and his major influence on people? But he probably didn't become a billionaire working in the military, right?

Do you worry that content about rich people, and that's not all your content, begins to pervert or morph people's view of what success is in the world. Yeah. Do you ever think about that? It's a very, very valid question. I've never actually been asked it before, honestly. I can see it on your face. That's a really good one.

Thinking about it now, I think it definitely does have the potential to do that. I think that it probably does a bit more good in the sense of like people can genuinely feel expired and they can be exposed to something like hearing the fact of like people that had come from rock bottom or had lost it all and were able to make it all back and what their mindset was in that moment, whether it was clinging on to faith, whether it was, you know, finding a loved one that was able to help them or just really grinding. So, look, I mean, I'm a huge advocate and believer that, you know, especially we're going to need people that go in the military. We're going to need people that

ultimately work jobs. And I think every job is a great job ultimately. Like if you can, you know, make a living for yourself and your family, like not everybody's able to do that. So it's a really good question. I'd love to see at some point, dude. But by the way, I ask that question, believing what you do is great. Sure. Just so you know. And I believe people want to be on the inside of watching people of accumulated wealth, including somebody like me.

It's why people probably listen to me a lot of the time as well. But so I'm not saying that. I mean, to put you on the spot, I just wanted to hear your heart about it. And I wanted the audience to hear. I shook your hand when we first met. You have a ton of humility. I can tell you come from a good place. And I don't think you think wealth is the only means of success.

And I just wanted to give you the chance to actually express that. That's the only reason I asked you. No, I appreciate that. Just so you know. Are they happier? So you're only getting these moments, but some of you've got to know. Tell us, you know, is a guy worth 600 million or a lady worth 600 million or $800 million or a billion or $1 billion? Are they any happier than your dad or a schoolteacher?

Or are they less happy? Or would you say the money parts irrelevant? People are people. I think it really comes down to the person. You know, I've been able to meet and spend a lot of time with these people behind the scenes. And I can definitely tell that there is definitely a lot of emptiness in a lot of them. You know, for example, like a Will Smith per se, he talks about this idea of cliff top. You know, there's rock bottom and then there's cliff top, right?

And he says, cliff top's the worst thing in the world because you can be at like the pinnacle of success. But it's like you come to that realization that it's like like where else kind of do I go from here. Especially for that person, you know, that feeling of like never, ever getting comfortable and never getting satisfied. They're always chasing something. It's a blessing and a curse because from a business standpoint, from a success standpoint, it's always great to have that mentality. Mike Rapoli, one of the favorite, you know, guys that I've been able to interview. I mean, that guy, just the way that he thinks is incredible, just a raw obsession about business

and success. But he talks about when the big guy, you know, when the big entrepreneur on top starts to get comfortable, the starving entrepreneurs are going to come up and eat their lunch. And so that's why I feel like a lot of them, it's important for anybody that I think have that mindset. Like if you want to build a great business, you do. have to realize that it's like, okay, when I get to a million followers, it's just the beginning. You have to keep on going, keep on going.

But understanding that there is definitely a lot more to life than just the financial means of success, like having that, I've noticed that the people that I've interviewed when they do have a very healthy relationship with their family, with their good relationship with their kids, like, again, you can't worship God and Mammon, right? And I had an incredible conversation recently. It was actually yesterday. I interviewed Tim Tebow recently and one of his business partners, Scott Donnell, just gave me a call just checking in and said, hey, anytime you need five or 10 minutes to kind of talk, I'm happy to. And he goes, he goes, do you know what what Maman is, right? And he was saying that how most people think Mammond is just money. And he's like, no, mammon is just the idea. It's like wanting more of something. Constantly wanting more, wanting more. And so when he said that to me, it kind of like just made me think a bit about that. And it's like, it's very true. So this idea of like having to kind of like, render yourself to God as far as that being the most important thing. And kind of about like the

humility thing, the reason why I think that's so important is because even though we've had, you know, I say we, because it's me, my brother and a childhood friend that are all partners in this thing together, we've had tremendous success in our early to mid-20s. I still have that realization that like I'm extremely insignificant in the sense of like there's ultimately a creator that's much bigger than me that is running this whole thing. And at the end of the day, we don't take any of that money with us. And that's the one thing that I would probably challenge a lot of these guys that are, you know, worth billions of dollars and that are that successful. It's like, do they really think that like this goes on forever? Right. Because it doesn't. And so I think that the ones that

do have that humility and that belief and understanding that, hey, this is great. I'm going to leave a legacy. You know, I created a great company. I did this. But at the end of the day, there is, I think, a lot more to life and from a fulfillment standpoint that these people can have. So I think a lot of the happiest ones are the ones that actually have great relationships with God and have a belief in a higher power and a creator, honestly. I'm proud of you, bro. Great answer. Timmy's been on the show a bunch of times. He's one of my good friends.

Tim Tebow? He's a good guy. He's just on a few weeks ago. And Gary's been on and Rob is about to be on. We're about to interview him. What's it feel like? So take us inside. You got a dream and it started to happen.

What's that feel like? I think a lot of people would just love to know, like, do you, when the dream starts happening, because I know how it was for me, but I'm not being interviewed right now. I'm asking the questions, but like, is it, oh my gosh, this is happening? Or is it completely different than you imagined it? Is it the pressure of not losing it? Like, oh my gosh, this could go away. What's the feeling like as a dream you have at one time starts to materialize itself in your life?

And then you're walking through your life. Is there a part of you that's like, I can't believe I just talk to Tom Cruise or what's the whole process feel like as a young man going through it? One of the things that I've really had to instill and myself along the way with my partners as far as with all these things that we've been able to do is to take time to celebrate the little wins. I feel like oftentimes, especially when you're building something great and trying to achieve something, oftentimes people forget to look back and feel a sense of, you know, proudness for themselves. and just to really think about your blessings and be really thankful for like what's happened. So we've tried to be a lot more intentional of like we close a big deal or, you know, we land a huge interview and we do it and it goes well. Then, you know, ultimately like we try and take time to really take that in and think about it.

I also think that one of the most important things for anybody is to understand this idea of momentum. You know, like last, like last year I was probably on 100 to 150 flights probably beyond the amount, if not more this year, just continuing to go all over. And the reason is because, you know, with over 20 million followers now, like, I want to, and again, it's, it kind of does go back on some of the things that I just talked about. But it's like, I have the understanding that, like, if I do stop, somebody else could easily come up. And I'm like, I want to continue to just build this moat. I want to continue to just grow this thing as big as I possibly can and take advantage the momentum that we do have. So if that means, like, you know, I'm going to interview another

huge NBA team owner out in New York next week and, you know, just continuing to do all these, you know, great things and awesome collaborations, it really does feel amazing. It does, and I'm very thankful and blessed for it. But I also do, I think, have that part of me that, like, feels like there's so much more to still do, honestly. Good. Yeah, you do. We're much as given, much as expected. Actually, after meeting you, I'm glad you're one of the, young people that has influence in the world. Thank you. I think it's been, you have a stewardship, you know, man, there's a lot of people that look

up to you that are going to continue to look up to you. If you come back and do the show with me here in a couple years, you're going to have 50 million. And you just will, right? Because I don't think, I think you understand momentum when it's a very fickle friend. And if you don't keep feeding momentum, it can go away. Momentum makes a guy like me who's pretty average seem a lot better than he is. And that momentum is a magnifier and you want to do everything you can once you get.

it to feed it. Most people do the reverse. They get some success. They start to think it's them. They cool it. They start to sabotage themselves and then it goes away. Sustained success is understanding momentum is a blessing and continue to feed it. So I'm really grateful that you said that. Okay, two more things. And I wanted to ask him in this sequence because I opened up with this. But you did something unique. I opened up with he took something that could have been a weakness and he flipped it into a strength, which is your age. Yeah. A lot of people think, I've got this, this isn't going to work because I'm middle

age, this isn't going to work because I'm too young. It's not going to work because I'm not rich. It's not going to work because of my career or whatever. But I actually think if you were a 50-year-old dude who started this channel and started walking up to random billionaires, I think that part of a successful person who wants to pay it forward wouldn't exist. So I actually think your age, do you agree, in an odd way, was an advantage walking up to these more senior people because it was almost out of respect in looking up and looking

for advice. Would you give someone advice to say, look at what you think your biggest efficiency is and it might actually be the catalyst for your uniqueness as well? Yeah, I 100% agree with that. I think our differences do make us stronger. And I do think that this idea of reverse mentorship is so powerful. And I learned this from a gentleman named Mark McLean. He sold a company to Oracle for hundreds of millions of dollars.

And he now is, he started and is the CEO of a publicly traded company. I think they're called CellPoint. They're worth several billion dollars. And he's actually based out of Austin, incredible entrepreneur and a great leader as well. And, you know, he talked about this idea of like one of the most important things that they do at his company's reverse mentorship where he knows that, hey, even though I'm an older gentleman, a lot of these younger guys can actually come in here and teach me a lot about the new technology, about the new, you know, branding side of things.

Whereas I have a lot more kind of skin in the game. I've been around for a lot longer. years of experience in business, you know, can certainly teach them. So I do think that that idea of reverse mentorship is very true. And look, I've probably been turned down by a lot of people also because they didn't see enough gray in my hair. And that was probably definitely a very real thing. So I do think that it is important to understand where people have their strengths and weaknesses. But yes, those weaknesses, whether they think it's their age, whether they think it's their gender. Some people think, you know, it may be color of skin for some people, right? And I think

that people can ultimately, you know, maybe utilize those to advantages in some ways. Find a way, because it actually may be true that it's, that your age was going to hinder you doing this, but you found a way in the way you approach, University of Texas, the way you leverage that weakness into a strength. I think it's a key. I did it in business too. When I was very young and I was coming up in business, I thought, no one's going to take me seriously. So I had to become so good at what I was doing that all of a sudden, oh, he's a prodigy. He's a prodigies aren't 60. Prodigies are young.

So the fact that I was very good at what I did and very knowledgeable and young was an advantage. So I became a prodigy instead of just a young kid who didn't know what he was doing. So there's a way to flip that. What about AI? Do you worry about what AI is going to do to the influencer space, the branding space in general? I, behind the scenes everybody should know, my peers who, you know, are influencers or

business people or self-improvement are concerned that they could be replaced by AI somehow or that it's going to change monetization or things of that sort. Virtual mentors, if you will, on social media stuff. Because you're at the cutting edge of this stuff. You're talking everybody. What are your thoughts about that? It's also honestly a really great question, very relevant questions. We're talking about that culture right now, that the packed platform algorithm culture, you're leaning into that, which I love. When it comes to AI and content and just kind of the future of that landscape. Personally, I would first of all advise people that if you think the AI created content for a personal brand is going to do well, no. I'm not a fan of people using AI to duplicate and clone

themselves and create content. I just don't think it's up to the standard in terms of like that being better than an actual person creating content. So let's first kind of do that and establish that first of all. Second of all, I think with AI coming up, it is going to make it incredibly much harder. And this is why, like, this is a great time for you to ask that question and people to listen. Because if you think it's hard to go viral on social media now, you wait for the next three to five years. Because think about it this way. With AI, you're going to be able to start posting 10,000, 20 pieces of content at once. So think about how, like, when I think about it this way, right, I started posting on TikTok when pretty much since it's a couple months after its inception, when it really started.

to take off. Like 2020 was the year TikTok just over over to Google. That's the number one search engine. But 2019 was when I started to post. So right before I would say most people started to get on it. And I would I would tell people then you could post anything then and go viral. And I'm not kidding. Like some of the stuff that even I posted or that went viral then, like it was way easier to go viral compared to like now. Like I'm being transparent and honest. Like you have to put out great content in order to go viral. Let's be very clear where social media is heading, it's going to, it is, it already has become, but I think it is increasingly becoming less about the amount of followers that you, and I genuinely, genuinely mean that. Why?

Because some of the biggest business creators in the world, like I see they have millions of followers on TikTok and some of them are, their last 10 posts are getting 20,000 views on TikTok. I notice it too. So, which is crazy. And that's the majority of them. Like, let me say it. Like, it's not like it's like one or two people. It's like, no, that's the majority of them. I think Instagram's done a bit of a better job of where if you have the audience and community, your stuff will tend to perform a little bit better on there. That's why I think TikTok is like the best test of like a content that's like viral and like like a great piece of content because TikTok's it's not necessarily about the audience that you have. It's about how great that

constant is. And that's why it's never been like a better time to focus on pouring into and building that brand because I do think that even three to five years from now with AI coming onto the scene, it is going to make it a bit harder to build a brand and stand out with people being able to, where now, and a year ago, you're only posting one piece of content or two or three pieces of content at once for different channels. Now with being able to clone accounts, like some people are probably going to be putting out 10,000,000 pieces of content a day on behalf of their brands and whatnot. Think about what that saturates the hell out of a, you know, social media feed and whatnot for people. So I think it is very important to get in now.

I think you're right. I think also the other thing you said that's true is like it's more important now the content's good. Oh, 100%. And the crema will always rise to the top. And our human being putting out great content organically, I think will always do better than some AI generated content. And by the way, when I see AI generated content now, I know what it is when I see it.

I can even tell when people are reading content that's AI generated on their podcast and stuff now, too. It's like it's made people very lazy to be creative. And I think the space is going to open up even. bigger for creative people. Well, exactly. It's like you don't want to take the human element out of things. Right.

Because you can tell. Like, nobody wants to listen to somebody who's robotic. Right. You know what I mean? And no, you don't get me wrong. Like, I do think that using tools to your advantage to come up with creative ideas, strategy for punchy, bold things, sound bites and whatnot. Like, absolutely big advocate in using it for things like that.

But I think for the most part, it's like, it does make people lazy for people that are writing copy for their ads. Like, you can tell when somebody is using. you know, AI-generated stuff. You know, the other thing, too, is like, humans evolve. And so right now, the stage of AI, it's still pulling from what already existed. So, like, even when I ask AI, what would Edmite, let's say about self-confidence? It tells you what I would say about self-confidence three, four, and five years ago.

Not what I would say about it now, as I've evolved and learned more and had more experiences. What is the biggest thing that you would change? Like, like, like, three years ago, Ed versus now. Great question. How you're being in the interview. Well, no, I want to know this. Well, I think that I used to believe that self-confidence was exclusively about keeping the promises that you make to yourself. I now think that self-confidence is stemmed a little bit more

in my own case from intention, meaning my confidence doesn't always just come from my ability, but my intent to serve. So like when you and I are done with this interview, I'm about to go speak to, I don't know, 7,000,000 people right in this arena that we're doing this in. I'm going to go out there as a confident expression to myself. I'm not going to go out there confident because I think I'm the greatest speaker in the world. I'm going to go out there because I've attached my confidence that my intention is to make a difference for these people. My intention is to serve them. And so I can't control the result of it.

So Wayne Dyer said this to me when he was alive. I met him at one point and we became dear friends, but he said to me, Ed, you're going to change the world. And I'm sure he said that to tons of other guys. But to me, I was the only guy he ever said it to. And he said, and it's not because of your talent or the fact that, you know, God gave you a pretty deep voice or your smart guy or whatever, of which I'm not.

He said, I just think you have a beautiful heart and you intend to serve people. You intend to make a difference. You're a good man. It was the first time in my life, James, that someone gave me a compliment, I believed. Because I didn't think I was very talented. I don't think I'm that smart. But I do think I'm a decent man. And when he attached my ability to do something to my intent and not necessarily the skill, I believed it.

And so he said, all your life, if you'd attach your confidence ed, when you walk in a room to your intentions. That's what I picture in you, James. When you walk up to Tom Cruise, even though that one was staged, but whoever it is anywhere, I don't think you're walking up there confident, like, I'm a badass, I'm the best ever.

I think you're walking up there with an intention to learn about them, an intention to learn yourself, an intention to transfer that information to your audience. So I think your confidence is stemming from, I'm here to do good. And so I think confidence is more of that than I used to.

I love that. I haven't heard that before, but I love the idea about it being from like an intentionality standpoint. Yeah. Well, and then the reason that's important, then I'm going to ask you a last question, that means anybody can be confident.

I'm not saying don't get great at what you do. I mean, I've worked very hard at being a speaker, right? That part's the little leagues. But the question is, how do I walk out there is the best expression of that practice so that the A game comes out, not the C game? I think when you watch a great athlete when they're expressing their craft,

they've put all the work in, but I think the confidence comes from, I've put the work in. I've kept the promises I make to myself. And my intention is to win here. My intention is to dominate. My intention is to serve. If I play for the Red Sox, win for the fans, win for Boston.

So I think intention matters. That's just my piece. But you're not interviewing me. I'm interviewing you. Last question. By the way, this has been a great interview. Thank you. Like a 10 out of 10.

I just want you to know that. You don't need that acknowledgement. But I love when I'm doing something that I know is going to make a difference in the universe, which is what you did today. So thank you in advance because I'm going to have a last question. It's a simple one. Most people listening to us are watching us right now want to be happier, want to be wealthier,

want to make a bigger difference, right? They want deeper relationships. Basically, they have dreams that they want to make come true. Most of them won't. Most of them won't. You are. So what advice would you give to them that currently aren't making their dreams come true

as a place to begin to actually turn that around and be a little bit more like you've been? I love it. A couple things. Number one, you're not a tree, travel, go see the world. You can only grow to what you're exposed to. I'm a big believer. Before the time I was 20, I went to 20 countries. And what that did from my mind and my perspective, seeing the world. I remember when I was nine years old, I was nine years old, I was nine years old, floating around in like a river in Cambodia. And I, like, looked out and I saw this little boy who was floating over, like, the country who was floating around. around in a trash can lid, arm cut off and a snake wrapped around his neck. And I was like, what that did for me then, seeing that at 10 years old now is like, I often think about that whenever I'm like stressed or worried about some big problem that I have. It's like, you don't have problems, dude. You don't have problems. And so that was healthy for me. I think traveling, being exposed to different cultures is very important. Get out of your hometown. If you're not

in an environment or a place that, where you have like-minded people that are wanting to achieve more for themselves. I like to say that the best decision I ever made was moving from the Washington, D.C. area, to Austin, Texas. Growing up in the D.C. Virginia area, I'm very thankful and blessed. It was a great community that I grew up in, you know, great schools that I went to. You know, my dad was at the Pentagon towards the end of his career, so that's why we were ultimately there. But all the people around, you know, D.C. is it structured. It's centered around government jobs, contracting politics, defense. Everybody's top level of success to them is going to get $100,000 government contracting job. I didn't want that for myself. And so when I

moved out to Austin to be with my brother at the University of Texas, I'm exposed to people that are authentic, people that are like-minded, that are young, they're building something great, and it causes you to want to do the same thing. And that was a very important decision. So I would tell people that if you're not in an environment, it's going to cause you to grow. You know, you talked about proximity and the frequency that that leads to in yourself. But yeah, that proximity is power where you can go in a coffee shop and you can see a guy sitting down who just sold a company for $400 million. And he's in a t-shirt and flip-flops. And so I think that, that was very, very important. You know, people will take you places that money can't. I think that it is very important to, you know, build up a solid network of people from a, they can help you mentally, they can help you from a business standpoint, that can help you from a spiritual standpoint.

I think that's very important. I think especially as you are starting to grow in your business, it's important to have, you know, people around you that can help keep you grouted and give you those insights that it's like, hey, when you start to feel this type of way, just remember this, go pray about this, go reflect on this, and they can relate to you,

and they can kind of instill in you and pour into some of those lessons. And then I would, you know, kind of end by saying that we're in a skill set-based economy now. You know, I just interviewed one of the random guys I interviewed out in London was a guy who was an investment banker, you know, owns a hedge fund now. And he was talking about how, you know, again, it goes back to this idea of like what you know versus who you know. And he's one of the few people that will tell you what you know is more important. And he said years ago it was what you know. But he was saying that one of the governors of like the big banks out in London is complaining that his daughter can't get a job anymore. Now, 20 years ago, that wouldn't have happened because of nepotism.

Like, he would have made a phone call and this person got a job. But if you have connections and you don't have anything of substance to offer those people, those connections are worthless. So I think that that's a very important thing. You know, find that skill set. And me, it was constant. I became one of the best in the world at content. I was able to grow my own brand, then grow other businesses, and then kind of also help attach that to other people, which helped me build relationships with people. So become, you know, great at one or two things, you know, the wealthiest people, they, you know, I mean, some of them now they have a diversified portfolio.

But like the myth that the average millionaire has seven streams of income, it's, it's not true. You become great at one or two things. And then eventually, you know, you diversify. Like one of my favorite sayings is that concentration builds wealth, diversification keeps it. I just bought my first piece of commercial real estate right in the middle of Ohio State, $5 million building it out there. It's kind of like a shopping center there. So it's right next to the highest grossing pot belly in the country. And again, that was the byproduct of, again, concentrated so hard for a couple of years.

We're able to build businesses on the back end of what we were doing and monetized in a way where we weren't done with our money to where now it affords you to diversify and make those investments to where you'll be getting paid every month for the rest of your life. So I think that that's a good one. And last one, because you got to end it off with one more soundbite. I interviewed a gentleman out in Houston named Deal Woods. And I remember him saying this. He said, stay small enough, long enough, and you'll be big enough soon enough. I took that with me because when we were making $30,000 a month off of just Facebook ad revenue, that was our first stream of income on Hard Knocks.

It was $30,000 a month off just Facebook. Didn't have any businesses at the time. But one of the commonalities that I've learned from hyper-successful people is this idea of reinvesting back into the business, reinvesting back into the company, back into the company. So we were making $30K a month in profit. my partners and I were only paying ourselves $2,000 a month. But that was important because even to this day, we still do that. Now, what's important about the lesson about the 30K a month is that 30K a month went to less than

5K a month because we got demonetized on Facebook. And that's why it's also important. That as a content creator, you do not own the content that you post once you posted on that platform. Instagram owns it, TikTok, own it. They can decide at any time to ban you in your content. That's why that diversification piece is very important because, again, you can't control what happens to your content if you get a content violation or a strike. So you need you need to

understand that and realize that you need to find a way to monetize. Like you can't build a business off and just add revenue. But what that lesson there did was because we were so good and diligent during those couple months of making only 30 grand and paying ourselves two grand just to cover our expenses and put everything back into the business is it gave us a couple months to go back to the drawing board and then figure out an appropriate way to kind of like monetize that made sense. And, you know, even to this day where our businesses do one to one, 1.5 million a month in revenue, we do about 7 to 800k in profit. I still pay myself less than 20k month. I'm so impressed. And everything else is going back into the business, hiring, expanding,

buying, you know, investment, you know, cash flowing, appreciating assets. So that's it right there. You're an impressive young man. Thank you, sir. I please stay this humble and confident at the same time. Thank you. Yeah. That was a great conversation today. Thank you. I appreciate you having me. Oh bro. I'm glad I did. This is my pleasure. This is James Dumlin, you guys. School of Hard Knox. go check him out share the episode today this is one of those that'll go go very viral god bless you everybody max out this is the edin myland show