The School of Greatness - 445 The Art of Creating Surreal Experiences with Summit Series Founder Elliott Bisnow

Episode Date: February 13, 2017

"Adventures only happen to the adventurous." - Elliott Bisnow If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes, video, and more at http://lewishowes.com/445

This is episode number 445 with Elliot Biznau. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Welcome everyone to a special edition of the School of Greatness podcast.

I am excited because I've got a good friend on. His name is Elliot Buznau and he's the founder and managing partner of Summit. Now, Summit is the owner of Powder Mountain Resort in Eden, Utah, where the company is headquartered. Summit hosts dozens of gatherings a year, including Summit at Sea, which is where I first experienced this incredible organization. And Elliot is the advisor to the Summit Institute, whose mission is to apply creative solutions to real world challenges related to the environment,

education, the arts, health, and social innovation. And he also served on the United Nations Foundation Global Entrepreneurs Council and co-founded the Get Well Soon Tour. Now we talk a lot about really how to cultivate and attract the world's biggest leaders and bring them together for a surreal experience. That's right. We talk about the art of creating surreal experiences. And I first met Elliot on a cruise, a cruise with the world's greatest leaders, celebrities, influencers, and tastemakers. And it blew my mind what he was able to put together in his mid-20s to bring these people together to create an experience that literally transformed the way I thought about business and life and relationships. It still is the greatest event that I've ever been to.

is the greatest event that I've ever been to. And I learned so much about how to create experiences based on what they did a number of years ago. What we cover is why he and his partners bought a mountain in Utah and why they are building a city there. This is unbelievable what they did. Also, the best way to build relationships with highly influential people,

why he dropped out of college to pursue his mission, and how to get A-list influencers to speak at your event. Also, the power of letting yourself dream as big as you can dream. Guys, I love this. Elliot's a great storyteller. He's got a great mind. He's so positive.

And what he is creating and building is unbelievable. Not many people his age have created and cultivated communities the way that he has done. So without further ado, let me introduce to you the one, the only, Elliot Biznow. Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness podcast. We've got a great guest on today, Elliot Biznow. How are you doing? Good to see you, brother. Super excited about this. I met you, I want to say 2010. Was that the first Summit at Sea?

2011. 2011. And I'll always remember because it was the greatest three days of my life, probably. because it was the greatest three days of my life, probably. There's only a few three-day experiences that I can remember and talk about with such level of enthusiasm, and I still talk about that three days as a catalyst for so many opportunities, connections, and just one of the most unbelievable experiences. I remember 3 a.m., there's a laser show,

and there's a couple hundred people on the deck or in the middle of the ocean and like Pitbull is performing with DJ Irie and Axwell and some other stuff was happening. It was just like, what is going on? And it was such a cool experience. So I want to go back to kind of how it all started, Summit Series, and this vision for you and creating these influencer events. Cause I think I read that you spent 65,000 on

credit cards to throw your first kind of influencer events or dinners or events or parties. And how old were you when that started and why did you want to do these events? So I'll start in the middle. Okay. We have a company, there's about a dozen of us. And our biggest achievement to date is we did a conference right before Summit at Sea. And it was in the nation's capital. And we'd had about 700 people attend. And it was a nice business conference. We'd achieve good speakers and great people coming. And we actually all huddled together and we said, we want to do something different. We want to do something.

We're actually thinking about what to do. I actually met someone and they asked me a question one day. They were sitting down with me and I was kind of telling them about Summit and the vision. And they said, let me ask you a question, Elliot. Do you keep it real? And I was like, me? Of course I keep it real. And and they're like everyone keeps it real you need to keep it surreal and so we had this little business had been a few years we had this conference that we've done in

the nation's capital and we said you know what we're done we're going to do something radically different and we chartered a cruise ship and it was about a million dollars to make the deposit because it wasn't a hotel. We actually had to put up the money up front. And we literally took all of our collective savings, all of the company's savings. I mean, I don't know how close the bank account was to zero, but we were talking for weeks. We were like, look, if nobody comes, we're going cruising. We are going cruising. we're going cruising we are going cruising

and I think the cost was more actually of the ship but that was kind of the down payment but we said look we want to do something different I mean there are lots of business conferences how can we keep it so real so we chartered this ship and we had this vision we want to create

a content music and arts festival on a cruise ship on a cruise ship in the middle of the ocean. With our own private island, right? That went to, on day two, stopped at this uninhabited island. I remember this. Richard Branson was one of the speakers and the roots were the house band. And there were about 1,200 people from across the globe who came.

And it goes to that mindset. It's okay if maybe 10% of the people don't get it or it's too far out there. It's over the top or they're offended. That's okay. As long as 90% of the people are blown away. I think it's why, you know, Burning Man has had so much success. It's like for all the people that don't like Burning Man, that's okay. There's 80,000 people a year who say this is the greatest experience of my life.

So that was our moment was we're going to do Summit at Sea. That was game-changing, man. It was life-changing for so many people. It was just no one had ever heard of an event on a ship and turn off the connectivity. Yeah, there was no Wi-Fi. There was like talked about like, hey, you guys have Wi-Fi, but there wasn't any that weekend, which was beautiful because we actually connected with each other. Yeah, we told everyone.

We said, yeah, I'm sure they'll be fine. Everything's fine. It turned out there would have been if there weren't like a thousand people trying to get online at once. The biggest tech nerds of the world. There was one person that demanded to speak to the captain of the ship.

No way. I heard that he finally got to the captain. He said, we need to turn the ship around. Shut up. That's hilarious. All right, so back back up how did we get to that point to that to that ship with those 1200 people so i went to the university of wisconsin um i feel i was very normal actually definitely below average why wisconsin um well i grew up in washington dc and i just thought it was so different i wanted to do something really really different and i um it looked really fun i didn't get into any of the six schools i applied

to i have a list of all my rejection letters georgetown or i applied to like ridiculous schools i didn't go that high but i remember they're like i think i applied to princeton um and i didn't get into any so i had zero acceptances. And I have all my letters. They're actually all ripped up. They're like all... But I somehow in... I don't know if a year later I found the ripped up letters,

but somehow I saved them. And I went to Wisconsin. I actually played tennis growing up. And so the main reason I went there was tennis. But it just seemed like a really fun, great place. I loved it. What a cool spot. I didn't even know you could be an entrepreneur when I got to college.

It wasn't even a word I'd heard or associated. I had kind of this moment where I saw someone screen printing t-shirts when I was a freshman, I said, and I asked them who they worked for. And they said, I started my own business. I said i said i don't understand but who hired you to start the business i kind of went through that whole thing called my parents was like what does this mean who does he work for i had this um i had this very humbling moment on the tennis team where the year before i'm i went to wisconsin i went to visit and i met like the cool seniors and then i was there freshman year and the seniors came back and now they're in the workforce. And I remember this one senior is like, stay as long as you can at school. You don't want to go out there to the real world. It's bad out there. It's really bad. And I just, I got this entrepreneurial drive. I started kind of, I started a little t-shirt

company freshman year and sophomore year, I started a little creative marketing company. company freshman year and sophomore year, I started a little creative marketing company. And obviously, those didn't work. We poured our hearts and tears into them for two years, one on each business. And I took all my savings. It wasn't very much savings, but I kind of plowed it into those. But I was learning and getting into the groove and figuring things out. And at the beginning of my junior year, I started a business with my dad called Bizna, after our last name. And it was basically like a business insider or tech crunch of commercial real estate. So it's kind of the who's who, people magazine, business insider of what's happening in commercial real estate.

So what's commercial real estate? That's every building you've ever been in that's not a residence is a commercial building. So your yoga studios in a commercial building. The restaurants you go to are in commercial buildings. There's this huge industry all over the world of people who build commercial buildings, the developers and the architects and the brokers and the contractors and the financiers. And nobody wrote about it. And my dad was a writer and he started writing about it and just started in Washington, D.C., where we're from. And I said, Dad, maybe I could sell advertising. So he signed me up and I got my dream job. My first day ever was July 1st, 2006, commission only, 20% commission on anything I sold. And I got to be the advertising salesperson.

And I was like, this is it. Amazing. I couldn't believe it. And I started waking up every day at like five in the morning. And I would hit the phones and I would cold call. I couldn't believe it. And I started waking up every day at like 5 in the morning. Wow. And I would hit the phones and I would cold call. I became like, you know, the cold calling king. And I was like, this is it. And I got my first sale on July 20th, 2006. I went into a real estate firm in Washington, D.C.

It was a summer break before my junior year of college. And I put three packages together for $4,000, $6,000, or $10,000 because I'd heard they'll always pick the middle package. And sure enough, you pick the silver package, $6,000. I got 20%. And I remember leaving the meeting like, this is crazy. And by the end of the summer, I'd sold like a hundred, by the end of the summer, I'd sold $40,000 of ads.

And by kind of the end of that first semester of junior year where I was approaching a million dollars of sales. Wow. And I was really just getting the groove of it. And I remember I had this day where I got, I used to get so excited walking to class because there are these thousands of people walking to class. And it was just, it was, it was a great energy. It was like walking to class because there were these thousands of people walking to class. And it was just, it was a great energy. It was like walking to a stadium, you know, I would go to the football games and you feel like you're on this team with all these people.

And so I'm walking to class every day and I just love it and this energy. And one day, I don't know why I had this moment. I just turned around and I like looked at all the faces, the thousand faces like streaming by me and I started walking the other way. And I'm like, how am I ever gonna be different if I'm just the same? Like if I'm just part of it, like think about how many amazing students

there are everywhere. I mean, if I'm gonna be a student, I need to be a different type of student. And for me, I said, you know, I got so much out of school. I really had a great experience. I started my business there. I met some great people. I said, I don't? I got so much out of school. I really had a great experience. I started my business there. I met some great people.

I said, I don't think I'm going to achieve my dreams if I keep walking with everyone else. Where they're going, I'm going the other way. And that was it. I mean, I left. Did you go to class that day or did you keep walking? I don't remember. But I remember I called my mom and I was like, you know, mom, you know, I know. I've always said I'm not going to drop out of school. And she's like, are'm not gonna drop out of school and she's like are you gonna drop out of school i'm like no no no no no no yes actually yeah you know i'm gonna take a break i want to talk about

this thing called a leave of absence where you just take a semester you see how it goes anyway yes i dropped out of school right um but it was with a real, you see how it goes. Anyway, yes, I dropped out of school. Right. But it was with a real purpose. People try to sometimes glamorize dropping out of school. It wasn't that at all. I mean, I was Mr. Discipline, super dedicated, up at 5 a.m. every day. Wow. I didn't drink. I was just really focused. And I dropped out for a reason. I said, school is to help you get squared away after high school, you know, when you're living in – up until high school, you're living with your parents. So college is to get you – you know, is to help you grow up and it's to help you further your education.

And I said, it really helped me grow up. And my education is the school of life. And my education is I want to be great at business. And I'm getting that right now. But I want to go 15 at business and i'm getting that right now but i want to go 15 hours a day on it and so that was it was a really thoughtful decision and um and i left to start this business with my dad and to pursue and continue the business just cold calling selling ads and i just hit it it was years we actually we got an office so i went back to washington dc i got an office it was this garbage office space

but the address it was a shared office like where you can and I had a little interior office I would sleep in the office a lot of nights but the address was 1601 Pennsylvania Avenue

and the White House is 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue that's pretty cool so it was lit and it was actually across the street but I would tell people like hi this is Elliot Bisno

I'm here at our global offices it's 1601 Pennsylvania Avenue yes yes yes the White House is across the street, but I would tell people, like, hi, this is Elliot Bisno. I'm here at our global offices at 1601 Pennsylvania Avenue. Yes, yes, yes, the White House is across the street. You know, I want to talk to you about one time we were at the shared office. One of my co-workers, I remember we were sleeping out. One time we got locked out at night. Like, we were sleeping in the office and locked out, you know, in our boxers and t-shirts. One time we thought it would be a good idea to cold call the directory of other companies in the shared office. That was a disaster. One time I had this spreadsheet.

I would meticulously keep this spreadsheet of all the companies I was cold calling trying to sell advertising. And they had like really kind of ruthless notes. Like, you know, Lewis is amazing. Definitely a hot prospect. You know, Sarah is this, John is this. And it was, but it was all the notes accidentally sent a prospect my spreadsheet instead of the PDF. We didn't have, you know, Uber or anything then. So I did advertising deal with a limo company and I got free limo rides in exchange for advertising. So I was just like, I was kind of just working like anything I could, selling ads, building the business.

And yeah, and then basically, Summit Series, which is what that ship was, kind of spun out of that. So I was at that point, I'd been out of school for a year and a half and I'm about 23 years old and I didn't know anyone. And I said, in order to build this business, what I really need is I need relationships. I need contacts. I need ideas. I'm kind of like an island. I'm like silent. I think there's other islands, but I can't find them. And so I was just, I don't know why I was into cold calling but i started reading about people in different magazines and newspapers not a lot being being an entrepreneur nine years ago ten years ago was not a thing not a thing like uh i didn't know anyone in my high school

who ever started business well certainly zero people started businesses in high school i don't even know anyone in college who started a business except this one person I met. But this idea, I'm going to cold call people that I'm reading about. I read about Tom's Shoes. They'd only given away 10,000 pairs of shoes and I literally cold called Blake,

the founder of Tom's Shoes. And I read about Vimeo, which had just started in college humor and Thrillist. These are all just around. I just cold called the founder and said, hey, I started a business.

I know you guys started businesses. Why don't we do this trip? I called it the Under 30 CEO Summit. That was my best name I could come up with. And I said, I'll actually pay for all your flights out and I'll pay for the whole thing. Because I didn't think they would come otherwise. So when I talked to Ricky Van Veen, one of the co-founders of College Humor and Vimeo, he actually thought it was so crazy what I was doing. He has this ongoing joke with his business

partner, Josh, that when they get someone who calls them who's so insane, what they do is they actually tell the person, they say, this is amazing.'re really on to something and i can just tell you right now get your pen out my best friend and business partner josh would love to speak to you and so they uh he actually literally did that to me of course at the time i didn't know and i was like amazing wow this is awesome i talked to josh i somehow convinced them they ended up pranking me on the first trip the guys from college humor do all these pranks they ended up pranking me on the first trip so we're at this big dinner i'd like meticulously planned that i'd never done an event before and um and uh and and here we are it's like my big moment. I'm 23. I have these 20 people here.

And I go to the restroom. And while I'm at the restroom, they apparently travel with this beautiful white printed card. And on the card, it says, your attire is not appropriate to the standards of the club. And we ask that you change immediately. And there's like a little dash. It's like management. I have had that card before okay so so i come back and i guess they told the whole room yes everyone being on it they told like the head you know maitre d or waiter and then i come back and i sit down and i'm like holding court and

of course i'm dressed just fine and they hand me the card and go sir i'm i'm sorry and you know hand me the card and walk away and i think that's the whole gist of the prank is that they're not there to answer a question you just get this card it's like you don't know who to talk to you talk to other people in the room they're like dude you better go change right like i can't change i don't have anything i don't have any extra clothes what am i gonna do in the middle so actually when we did that trip it was uh i forget the total cost it was like ten to thousand dollars and i actually got sponsors to pay for most of it so i lost a little bit of money but i had this idea if i get these people to come i'll get i got a venture capital

firm and a real estate brokerage firm each to kick in a little bit of money that covered most of the first trip then we went on to the second trip and that was 60 people everyone from the first trip invited a couple people and after the second one was 60 the next one was 120 250 750 was dc and then from there about three years after the first one was summit at sea one yeah i remember getting invited actually he's either the first dc event or an event before that i remember getting invited and i was like yeah i'm good right now it wasn't good enough yet. I'm sure it was great, but I was just like, eh, it just didn't appeal to me yet.

The DC event I was actually going to go to, but I had some other commitment already, so I couldn't go. Then Ryan Holmes and Dan Martell were like, dude, they're doing this thing on this cruise ship. You should come. I was like, all right, cool. I'm in. It was mind-blowing, man. It was crazy what you guys did.

Yeah, I think just what started with just getting 20 people and then 60 and you get some speakers. I remember someone's like, one thing you should really add to the events are content. We're like, content? What were you doing before that? Just like dinners and hanging out and like? Yeah, I mean, I didn't have any coach or anyone to teach me.

I actually, it started because I actually never got invited to an event. I read about other events. And I was like, I don't know how to get invited to that. So this is almost 10 years ago. Like, I just didn't, I didn't even know what an event would be like. I didn't finish college. So I wasn't educated enough to know.

There were no TED Talks. There's not, I mean, TED Talks wasn't a, you know, wasn't a video series yet. And so we just tacked it out. And then people would come and they'd give advice. And after a couple of years, we started putting in content. But then we started making the content deeper, more progressive, more thoughtful. We started having really cool panels. Like early on, we had John Legend, Mark Echo, Michelle Reed,

Chancellor of the D.C. School District, and Wendy Kopp, founder of Teach for America. And we would do an education panel. We had early on seven NASA astronauts came. Or Ishmael Beah, who wrote Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. Sean Parker came. We had Mark Cuban came. These are all in the early days. I got Ted Turner to say yes.

And then Blake from TOMS interviewed him. And I interviewed Russell Simmons at one of the early ones. And so we were getting like really interesting people. How are you getting these people? You know, it started with just from the 20 and then the 20, someone introduced me to this person to this person. And, um, at a certain level, you can't cold call anymore. So you have to actually get introductions. Um, you know, you, you actually need people who can validate your work because you can only cold call kind of people who are your peers or maybe a little bit up or maybe if they stay, are trying to prank their friend in like the college humor example. But otherwise,

you need to get introductions. So we just built this great product and people really love the event and they knew, hey, when Summit Series does an event, they deliver, they take it seriously. You know, there's incredible execution, and I know the people that come are the real deal. You know, it's people like yourself who are there, and so the speakers say, yeah, I want to be a speaker to an audience of that caliber. And we always said, you can only speak if you attend. We didn't want people kind of parachuting in. So yeah, but it was hard. It was one at a time and momentum got momentum actually at that one right before somebody see Bill Clinton actually came. It's crazy. I remember

hearing about that. Yeah. That was the easiest speaker we've ever had. Like most people, they have their advanced teams, they have all this nonsense, and they need a confidence monitor. I'm like, what's a confidence monitor? I can't afford that. And they're like, that's like two screens that show the things in case they forget. I need all these seats reserved. I need this type of water. And it's literally this crazy list of demands like you'd expect from a professional DJ.

Well, I was prepared when President Clinton spoke for, you know, get the teams ready, whatever he needs. And I remember talking to Zisaneke saying, all right, tell me about President Clinton. What does he need?

And they're like, well, he just needs to come through the back because he's the former president with Secret Service. But as long as he comes through the back and there's a nice route,

all he needs is a microphone and a glass of water. And I'm like, right, right. But like like what else like you know what kind of stool does he want what does he want the room layout what does he want the lighting what about how much time's like yeah you just get to the front when you want to stop you do like that and then he'll wrap up in five i'm like but okay does the water does he need ice and

does he care about the coming yeah just a mic and a glass of water and just call him out he's really excited that's i'm like wow and that was one of the best speakers amazing i'm sure i've ever had and it was just an interesting thing because sometimes you have these speakers and like they're not high profile at all and they're just who are they how are they even speaking their list of demands and yeah we had someone who was traveling once like stopping at us on international trip and asked us to to hold their wine that they bought and i'm like what this is crazy now how did you land uh uh president clinton what was that like did you have to pay a huge fee or was it more of like a relationship thing or okay so what happened was that about a year and a half before that we did an event

uh with president clinton to raise money for the clinton foundation and so we got connected to president clinton um and we got a chance to set up an event which is pretty wild again i was like 23 years old at the time and got connected to them because they'd heard about our earlier events. Someone connected us. And he was just interested in connecting with the Facebook, Twitter, YouTube generation, right? I mean, that's all new at the time, eight years ago. And he was really interested in connecting with them. And so we had this opportunity to curate people to meet President Clinton. And so we actually had a chance to pick the host venue. So we said, look, if we're going to host President Clinton, we so we actually had a chance to pick the host venue. So we said,

look, if we're going to host President Clinton, we want to decide where it's going to be hosted, and we want to set up the whole thing. So we actually decided, you know, we really want Russell Simmons to host. And so we reached out to Russell Simmons. He was super interested in hosting. And then we wanted Tom Colicchio from Top Chef. And so my co-founder, Jeff, actually went to Central Park and literally at like a multi-thousand person cook-off, just like screamed Tom's name, Tom, you know, till he like came to the fence. Wow. And he was like, do you want to cook for President Clinton at Russell Simmons' home?

And he's like, yes. And so he made this amazing meal. And we had all these incredible folks. And we brought about 75 people to meet, you know, president Clinton and hear remarks from him. And, and, uh, and then like a year and a half later,

as we were doing this DC event, we reached back out and the time, the time worked for him to speak. And, you know, it's just each event has truly, um, built momentum off the last event.

So from that, we had, we actually had the people. And then going back to that earlier story, Ari, we want to, we don't just want to now do a the last event. So from that, we actually had the people. And then going back to that earlier story, all right, we don't just want to now do a 1500 person event or get better speakers. Let's keep it surreal. Always got to change it up, right?

Yeah, the path up isn't always more revenue or bigger names. It's not always the perceived path. The path, in our case, the path up and forward was just a radically different conference. Like how are we gonna stand out in the business conference world? I mean, come on, there's already so many business conferences. But on a ship in the middle of the ocean,

Summit at Sea, its own brand, like that, and that changed everything. Like I don't think we appreciated the time, but like giving it its own brand, Summit at Sea, and there's something just crazy about it. Really, people going on a music festival and art cruise ship.

Insane. It was insane, man. Insane. It was amazing. So the dinner you did with Clinton or the gathering you did, you essentially raised money from the 75 people. You donated that to the-

To the foundation. Foundation. Then he came back to speak because of that yeah yeah actually and we also we also made we also made another donation there got it got it um yeah yeah yeah it's amazing man who's been the uh the most interesting person you've had come through over the last eight ten years as a speaker or performer or because you've met a lot of interesting people. You've met presidents of other countries. You've had the biggest celebrities. You've interviewed Kobe Bryant to music stars,

to legends, to everyone. We always have, I'll give a bunch of like really funny examples. So one time we're doing an event and someone's like, the president of Georgia wants to come. I'm like, University of Georgia? State of Georgia? Country of Georgia? Like the country of Georgia.

I'm like, interesting. I think I was there. There's Tahoe, right? Yeah, they're like, he actually was going to go to Davos, but he heard about this summit thing. He likes the energy and he's a young guy. And we're like, like yeah that sounds amazing we didn't understand like what it meant to have a president of a country and he literally showed up

with like a straight up you know armed security force i remember here it's like dozens of people with like machine guns and like i guess we thought there'd be some security and hold the fort and it's like no there's literally literally people with insane weaponry. And then who's been amazing? So I went last year. I interviewed Kobe Bryant. There's just this gravitas that he brings. You can just feel it.

It sounds like when you interviewed Tony Robbins. There's just certain people. They bring this energy and this presence that you can't just create in a moment. You create it in a lifetime of hard work. I imagine if you met with a cultural icon, you can just feel the weight of the room. We had Harry Belafonte in a conversation with John Legend a year and a half ago. And you can just feel the weight. Civil rights icon Harry Belafonte, you can just feel the way, you know, civil rights icon Harry Belafonte, you can just feel it in the room. Like, we had Herbie Hancock this year, and he actually

went through and was listening to, he had pre-picked his favorite songs. We're in like a 1500 person theater, and he'd pre-picked songs, and he would listen to the music in your seat with Herbie, like, Herbie, you, walk, he's like nodding, listening, and then you're hearing him describe the music that he'd written. And there's just this gravitas. So with Kobe, we go to China, he's, if not the biggest, one of the couple biggest celebrities in China, someone said, you know, be ready for 50,000 people could show up. And, you know, what struck me about him was that his answers to his questions were answers i hadn't even fathomed could be real so i'll give two quick examples number one i always thought that

pressure and success under pressure is about embracing pressure like you realize there's pressure everyone feels pressure embrace it the great people know how to deal with that and pressure creates diamonds i asked him how he dealt with pressure and he just said, pressure is not real. Pressure is your ego. I haven't dealt with it since I can remember. And so it's just, it changed my entire reality. And the other was, I asked him about, you know, how do you deal with hard times? And I just always thought, including for me, that the best people just got through the hard times. Keep your head up. Stay positive. Get through it because you know what?

All storms run out of rain. Get through it. And I think that's a very valid point of view. But his point of view was just, it never even occurred to me, which was, if you want to be great and you really want to learn when you're in the hard times, I know they're hard. You just, you have to be fully present and embrace those hardest moments why what led you to get to that really hard moment you know now that you're here maybe you don't ever want to be back in that

hard moment like what what put you there and to actually like be present and i mean when i'm in hard moments i'm just trying to get out of them. And I'm like, this is, I'm coming out of the reasons. This is my fault and I got to get through it and I'll get done. And I just embrace it, feel it. Why did this thing get screwed up? Why did you get to a really unhealthy place with your diet? Why did you get to a bad place with your relationship? Just feel it and let all the weight of that hard moment sink in and embrace it. And he was just like, growth only comes from embracing hard moments. So sometimes you get these people and you're just like, wow. They really have.

And you can tell it's not just like a quote. It's like this deep, deep knowledge that they've built on for a decade or more. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. An awareness. And that's cool that he goes through that during those hard times. Now, I'm curious.

You went from 20-person dinners to bigger events to doing something surreal like someone at sea to building that up. And then all of a sudden, you decide you want to buy a mountain and build a city on top of a mountain. How did this come about? Why? And why in Utah? Yeah, so about six years ago, a little bit less,

I had a crazy meeting. And I met with someone who'd been to Summit events before. His name is Greg Morrow. And we just met up for a coffee. It was actually right here outside of Los Angeles. So we met up for a coffee, just like, you know, the idea, never eat alone. Like meet with interesting people, get to know people.

And I went for a coffee. And he told me, he's just like, I get Summit. I get the community. You know, all events and communities have a brand. Like you're building something really special with School of Greatness and you have your own unique ethos, value system, culture, and what you're building is unique to you. And what Summit's building is unique to Summit. And what Coachella built is unique to Coachella. And what Burning Man built is unique to Burning Man. And what Ted built is unique to Ted. And everything is about owning and embracing your unique ethos and value system.

And that's what we had done with Summit. Like we had this, you know, it was, you know, you could say almost like, you know, the Woodstock meets, you know, business conference meets, you know, Burning Man style event. And so I'm meeting with Greg and he really understands Summit. He says, you know what we really need to do? He goes, we have an opportunity. We could build place. Like there's actually really good precedent for building place.

And I guess I kind of thought about it, but we started mind-melding. And this idea, like think about where we live and walk and go and all the towns we've been to. Like why do they exist? Why does Brooklyn exist or Park City or, you know, you know, the west side of LA or the east side of LA or the hills or downtown, you know, all these different places, these different energies and ethos and vibe and values. And why do they exist? And who built them? And either it's like a group of people just kind of moved to a neighborhood and it started to happen, you know, like you could, and, or as maybe an individual or

group that set out to build something. And so we started mind melding in this idea of building a place. And he said, you know, one of the most beautiful places I've ever been is called Powder Mountain in Utah. It's less than an hour from Salt Lake City airport. It's an 80 minute flight from LA or San Francisco. There's a dozen flights a day, literally on the hour. It's the West Coast hub of Delta. And this place is stunning. And Powder Mountain is this 10,000-acre mountain range. This is in 2011. He's telling me it's basically the bottom of the recession. He's like, it's for sale. A private equity firm bought it. They need to sell it. And he's like, he's like, I've been thinking about, you know, wanting to buy it. And he's like, you know, it just occurred to me, it could be with you guys. It's like, you know, my entire background is,

you know, it's venture capital, it's private equity, it's finance. You guys have built this community that is spectacular. We could partner and build a place. Crazy. Crazy. And what's crazier is I said, okay, let's go. During the coffee meeting? During the coffee meeting. You didn't even have a conversation with your co-founders or anything? You just said... Well, I said, okay. We talked for eight hours.

So our meeting turned into eight hours. So you got every question possible. We went all over town. The meeting went to like six locations. And then I did, of course, I talked to my co-founder. I said, hey guys, I had this crazy meeting. But I think we should buy a mountain. Yeah. I think we should buy a mountain. I mean, I really do. And what's crazy is that the other three of them, they were like, yes, we should. So what's even crazier is we flew there the next day. Like we didn't delay.

We literally got on a plane and we just flew the next day and we met him there. And we just, you know, we, he picked us up at the airport on that trip. Winter or summer? Was it snowing? No, that was summer. It was mid-July. Mid-July of 2011.

We get there, and he just picks us up in the car. We don't have any contacts. We don't know how we're going to buy a mountain. We have no background buying a mountain. We didn't know anyone at the mountain, but we just drove and we drove to the mountain. If I was like, oh, let's look at real estate properties, and we just drove up and there's some chains down,

up and we just walk past and we just started scouting and we saw the view and we're like, you know, up, and we just, like, walk past, and we just started scouting, and we saw the view, and we're like, this is really interesting. This is, like, it was crazy. And you were 20 what? 26? 26, 26. So, we get there, and we literally, just from that moment on, I think we stayed overnight at his house and we just went into mind meld mode of like, how can we buy it? And so the thing is, it's how much was it? The offer, I guess. Yeah. So all in, we ended up buying it for about $40 million.

But here's the thing. So it's really easy to end a deal end a relationship kill a deal like end an interview like our interview if you want to end the interview you're just like elliot the interview's over and you take the headset off and you walk out or i'm like the interview's over i'm leaving that's it it's that yeah anything can be ended in like under 30 seconds it doesn't matter i mean literally you know almost anything you want to end a friendship? It's like, hey, look, it's been great being friends with you for 20 years, but I've decided I'm going a different way. So it's easy to kill a deal, kill a relationship, end anything.

The hardest part is like dreamscaping it and ideating. And we just went into this like ideation mode where I think everyone in the room understood like, guys, this is crazy. If it doesn't work, we're just like, hey, we tried our best for a couple months, didn't work. So we just went into full dream mode. You know, I imagine again, it's like starting a band, you want to start a band, if the band isn't successful, you just dismantle it after six months. That's the easiest part. The hardest part is just going for it. So we just went into this dreaming mode. the hardest part is just going for it. So we just went into this dreaming mode

and we just went for it. Like we're in his little house in Eden, Utah, and we start going out there all the time. This is over a period of a couple months and he's coming to visit us and just all night, all night. Like my three co-founders and I, you know, all night, we're just literally 1 a.m., 2 a.m., 3 a.m., 4 a.m. We're ideating, coming up.

And meanwhile, we're like, well, you know, we're trying to meetam, 2am, 3am, 4am. We're ideating coming up. And meanwhile, we're like, well, you know, we're trying to meet people going back to cold calling. We're like, all right, who knows the best land planners? Who knows the best this? Who knows the best architects? And we're starting, who knows the best lawyers? So one funny story is one of my co-founders, Brett Levy, after college, he went and he worked, believe it or not, in, he worked in land sales. That was the only job I guess he could get after college. We all have stories. You're saying you're – yeah, we all have these stories.

He worked in land sales, commission only in Virginia, like Northern Virginia, he was a land salesman. And he was just – I think he left after like nine months. He was like, this is insane. Like why would I ever want to do that? What a, like, crazy. So he hadn't thought about it in like six or eight years. And so we're like, how are we going to figure out

how to buy 10,000 acres of land? And he was like, actually, I used to be in land sales. Like, I could call my old boss. Wow. So he calls his old boss who came on and advised us. And we just started, in the same way as that original summit and cold calling people,

we started putting together the pieces, albeit at a bigger scale. And we came with a financing strategy. How are we going to buy this mountain? We came up with a plan. Here's the amount of money that we need. Here's how we can raise the money. Here's how we can develop a town.

We had this idea. We want to build the most progressive, beautiful designed town imaginable. What Tesla did to cars, we want to do to a town. Want to build this beautiful, just inspiring place for people from all over the world to be able to come. And how is it now? Amazing. So it's been a few years. It's been almost six years. You got roads. You got houses. You got like a downtown.

You got like a Soho. You got like everything in there, right? It's not that far. So we own a Powder Mountain Ski Resort in Utah. It's 10,000 acres. It's the largest skiable mountain in North America. We've put in three new chairlifts. There's four restaurants.

During the season, there's 300 incredible people that work on the mountain. And then we've partnered with the county. We've built about five and a half miles of roads, water, sewer, power, about a half a million gallon water tank. We have approaching 150 families that own home sites. We have eight homes that are under construction. And then hopefully we'll be breaking ground on a few dozen homes this summer. We have LOIs with hotels. And we're literally moving month after month, nonstop,

building a city, a town, a boutique town, a small town at Powder Mountain. How many homes will be on there in the next five years? In the next five years, probably a couple hundred.

A couple hundred homes. Yeah. On top of the mountain? Yeah. So the mountain, when you get to the top, it actually cascades. There's these cascading plateaus, and it lowers about 400 feet in elevation. And so you're in this secluded valley at the top of the mountain. And so you're in this like secluded valley at the top of the mountain.

So you have these incredible, you know, incredible four state views because you're in northern Utah. So when you look to the north, you look to Idaho and to the east to Wyoming. And when you look west, you're looking to Nevada because you're kind of in this, you know, northeastern Utah. So, yes, stunning views, stunning land. And you're skiing, ski out. And we've built 25 miles of mountain biking and hiking trails. We have this outdoor land art museum we're building. We have this vision to build the largest land art museum in the world. So it's just about, we have this expression we use called facts on the ground. So a fact is every time you do something, that's a fact. So we're just trying

every day or every week or every few days, put a fact on the ground. So putting a piece of art or putting a new ticketing system on the mountain or changing a logo or putting new signage or getting a cabin started, like everything's a fact. And eventually when you have dozens of facts, then hundreds of facts, it starts to become something. And that's been something we've applied that term facts on the ground to everything it's like one day you had zero podcasts and then one day you had five and then ten and then a hundred and then you know the rest is history like but everyone started one day Tony Robbins had never done a seminar before and it just started with one so whether it's like a town or a podcast for Tony Robbins like it all starts with and I

love that term facts on the ground. It's just like you start by doing. What's your vision for it? The vision is to build the most progressive, beautifully designed town in the world and build a boutique center of thought leadership, a place around entrepreneurship, a place around family values. And we've done a bunch of unique things. So we capped the size of the homes you can build. So you can't build a home bigger than 45 visible square feet. And the average homes are closer to 2,000 square feet. So there's no mega mansions there, right? Almost the entire project is actually an urban walking town.

So we have 10,000 acres of land. You actually don't want to put stuff over 10,000 acres. You basically want to make almost all of the land, you know, effectively beautiful, conserved, you know, landscape and let it be natural. And then you want everyone to be kind of in this clustered kind of Soho in the mountains. So this idea, you know, build this place where you can retreat to, you can meet inspiring people, eat healthy food, and you can replace and be, we can be a place that speaks to a new generation

and ethos and mindset of people. Amazing, man, amazing. So you're creating another surreal experience. Surreal. Now, how do you, you've gone from one thing to the next over the last almost decade, it sounds like. Is there a time where the mountain will no longer be surreal and you'll have to one-up it and have like a whole state that you buy or something? I don't know.

Or a country that you buy. Like is there ever like a limit or have you – you know, what's the next step? Have we not gone that far? Yeah, I don't think – we're just really focused on this one thing. So like we're, we're basic. We're just, I think the vision, so the thing about real estate, the vision to build a town is such a long project. So one of the things when you plan real estate is you, you plan for seven generations. And so here's the interesting thing about real estate, like the best companies, the best in history lasts for like 30 years or 50 years occasionally you hear about a company

that's like 100 years old but that's basically never right like the best companies of our time that we see are going to be like 30 years or 40 years so towns last for a hundred cities last for hundreds of years like new york city is just, right? And it's how many years old? You know, 400 years old, you know? Like, you know, these towns and places last hundreds of years, but the challenge is they take decades to get going. So you can't just throw up a splash page and have a beta product in 45 days

and you're humming in six months with, you know, a couple hundred grand of seed money like it's a big upfront cost and it takes you know a decade to have something amazing but once it's there it's generational like when people buy homes about legacy this has been around for a long time yeah when people buy homes they have them for their kids and their kids kids and you know that's the biggest purchase people make in their lives who are some of the people that have homes or land plots there that you're allowed to talk about or that are public? Yeah, so the big vision is, again, we're building a public town.

We want to reinvent what an amazing town could be. And people who have been coming to Summit events, people who are part of the Summit community, have bought home sites and are part of the community. So we've had anyone from Blake from Tom's Shoes to Tim Ferriss to Richard Branson and his family. So we have over 100 families. Yeah, it started with all home sites. So now we're actually starting to develop homes, but it started with all home sites. And then these folks will build, you know, really boutique, beautiful cabins or homes. Like the average home is, you know, 2000 square feet.

And a lot of these folks are building, uh, 1200 or 1500 square feet or 2,500 square feet. So amazing. That's so cool, man. And do you have a home up there yourself? Yeah. I have a little cabin that's almost ready that I'm hoping to move into at the beginning of the summer. It's 1500 square feet. And, yeah just being in nature being in a place that can preserve nature being in the wild being there's just something that you show up and you just breathe the air and you're like i feel creative i feel alive i feel amazing yeah um tell me about i think it's inspiring it's amazing what you guys are doing. And so congratulations on that. And I remember when you guys announced, I was like, how are they going to pull this off?

And you're doing it. So it's incredible. I'm curious about building relationships. You've had a decade of experience building relationships with the highest level of individuals. And what is it about connecting with people that most people fail in doing? Because a lot of people are reaching out with influencers or people to come speak or be on their advisory board or invest or whatever it is. What's the formula for making it work for you where most people fail at building relationships? And what's the best way to network moving forward?

Well, my favorite piece of advice I ever got was listen. And so unless I'm being interviewed, I try to actually ask questions probably three quarters of the time. So I'm generally just not talking very much. And I'm generally trying to ask questions. I'm trying to listen. And I would say it goes the same thing in building relationships, in building relationships, listening to people's, not just their needs, but also just like listening means understanding them.

Like who are these individuals? Like understand at a high level, understand if someone's in a really busy phase of their career or is in a family phase of their career or is in a wanting to meet a certain genre because maybe they want to invest in something. And if you listen and you get to know people, you can have the right approach with interacting with them.

It's like hands off and give them space. It's, hey, let me help you with this. It's knowing when to email and when to hold back. But just it's all about being super respectful. I remember someone told me this great quote about michael jordan which was like basically you're either friend or fan like and as soon as mj realizes you're a fan you're done you're cut out it's over forever like if there's any inkling you're a fan you're out and you know you i think you know you just have to make that decision. Are you

going to be friends with people? And like a friend means you genuinely care about them. That means if you're a friend with someone, you're not trying to monetize them. You know, you're their friend. If you're a friend with someone, you're not trying to, you know, build your social profile by even forget posting on social, even name dropping them and name checking them around town. Like if you're a friend, you protect at all costs. If you're a friend, they inherently know you would do anything for them to take care of them, to look out for them. And when people say anything about them, you're there to defend them. So I think that like value of the word friend, like I love to think about friend or fan

because like that real definition and value of friend, if people know you're that person and you actually want to get to know them, it's very different than when you're like, all right, like guess what? All these successful people, they know that everyone wants something from them because they have so much to give. And when they get any inkling that like so-and-so is hanging around because they're waiting for that ask, they're waiting for that going to make a sale or get their company, they're going to get that company in the door. That's of course, they're more successful than we are. So they probably have a better intuition than we have. Right. So I think so. Yeah. And how do you manage and keep all the high level relationships you have? Because you have so many people,

thousands of people in the Summit community now. How do you stay on top of it and stay in touch with people and make sure you're not trying to – make sure they don't have that feeling like you're trying to get something from them but you're just being their friend? What's your process for that? I think the best way to stay in touch with people is your product speaks for your – is your engagement. So I often think of Apple, like, I don't need someone from Apple to like, call me and check in on how I'm doing as a customer, because the product speaks for itself. And I think of like, often my the things that I have and use. And, you know, you know, the thing, the place that I go, maybe it's a great restaurant, I don't necessarily need,

you know, a check in or a major your waiter waiter to ask because it's just such a good experience. And I think for us, like I'm always trying to maintain relationships, but everyone has their product. So your product is how you go about your day and business and life. It's, it's your social profile. It's, it's what you actually put out as a business and making sure like everything you're doing holistically, you know, 360 degrees reflects you and your values so that because people are hearing your name a lot more than you're able to touch base with everyone, making sure everyone's always hearing your name in a really great context. So I'm obviously trying to reach out to people trying to stay in touch, you know,

keeping lists of the people I really care about making sure send them a text and email, try meet up, be in their cities. But I think for the most part, making sure that like my values and who I am is reflecting that. Because if word gets out, you know, Elliot lost his way, Elliot lost his values. The Summit product has, you know, isn't at an A plus. It's, you know, oh, that thing fell off. That's going to affect you way more than like checking in because you check in and be like, yeah, good to talk to you again man and secretly they like have heard you know three bad things about you right right got it i like it what's something that's missing in your life more wild nature like i really have fallen in love the last couple years with wild nature and i have that a lot in uh at powder mountain in Utah, but I just love nature and wildness. Like I was coming here, um,

and, you know, looking at the Hollywood Hills and, and I wonder if anyone's ever said this to you in your entire life, but I felt sad that those Hills used to be filled with mountain lions and used to be just wild and like what this place used to be, you know? And, um, and I think there's something innate in each of us that is wild, right? And you can get it surf, you know, surfing in the ocean, you can get it being outside, but just, I think what I'm missing is I want to connect like one of my goals for years. I want to connect more to wild nature. So that's, that's, that's cool. That's cool, man.

Well, we got to play ultimate Frisbee a few weeks ago and it always feels good just to be in the grass. And for me, you know, as being in a city, it's like you're never in grass. And whenever I get to play in grass, even just run in there to just put my feet in,

it's like, wow, you know, you forget sometimes what it's like. So it must be beautiful when you're just out in your cabin every day and you look out and you're in the mountains, you can do whatever you want up there. So that's amazing, man.

What is it you want people to know about you? I love playing pranks. Okay. And I love being silly. And I love being super exuberant and doing really crazy things like I'm always like like if I meet a random person

I'll like buy them a and they tell me their dream I'll try to like fulfill their dream so like I'll meet someone they haven't gone on a vacation in 15 years and I'll like send them on a vacation or I'll like get from like stuff like that to like getting someone a book that I know they like get from like stuff like that to like getting someone a book that I know

they want or like I'm always trying to like glean little tidbits or if someone needs like a spark of magic in their life I'll orchestrate

like a one month like crazy prank on them wow this is like some game like from the game I don't know if you've seen that movie no I

have you seen the game no I haven't seen it where a guy like needs more adventure in his life so he pays an extraordinary amount of money to this company

it's like okay for the next month your life is going to be changed and he goes on like this wild like chase where he's getting

like shot at and there's like all these actors involved and it's like a huge prank at the end of the day but

wow what's about this like whole other level of experience in life well life is so serious like life is so serious.

Life is so serious. There's no way about that. I'm super on the ground, aware of everything that's happening. There's no way in the day and age we live in to not be disturbed and frustrated every day, all day, if you let yourself be that. So in no way does anything I'm doing trivialize the reality of what's happening every day. But I think you have a choice to go through your life being super positive and exuberant and bringing the best out or getting sucked in. It's just really hard to get sucked in unless I'm listening to, you know, to Lewis all day. You know, it's hard.

You know, the media just, you know, know the Facebook feed it just pulls you in so that's cool that's been really fun and for me and inspiring people around me bring the people around me together I like that

did you get inspired by Buried Life in any way those guys are amazing yeah I definitely I met them at someone at sea

and I've become friends with them and yeah but they did that on the show where they were like trying to make someone's dream come true. Yeah, it's amazing how easy it is to do in your day-to-day life. What they do is more elaborate than anything I could ever hope for.

But pulling those little things into your life and into the real world we're in is, it's really powerful. Yeah. With everything that you know, all the people you've met, all the stories you've heard, all the adventures you've been on, you've been to how many countries now? How many have you been to? Like 70, a hundred countries, something like that. All the experiences you've had with the smartest people in the world, the most entertaining people, the most athletic people, the top, top, top of people in the world. What's the biggest lesson you'd want to share? Adventures only happen to the adventurous. And I apply that quote to all aspects of your life, not just like, you know, a trip adventure. It's, this is like my life mantra. It's all adventures because everything's an adventure.

Like if I hadn't come to LA to be here with you, like this is an adventure, like coming up here and, you know, coming to the studio and meeting, you know, meeting your team and spending, you know, time with you. Like who knows where this can now manifest itself out and what could come from this. And so unless you're willing to,

like if you don't go on the adventures, you hit a cap. And so unless you're willing to, like, if you don't go on the adventures, you hit a cap. But when you go on an adventure, what's on the other side isn't just a little bit better or even two times better. It could be exponentially better. Because when you go on an adventure, that's like, I just got married this past summer. Like, that's how you get, like, fall in love. And then that's exponential. Like, you can't quantify the adventures because the adventures lead to new best friends they need to new ideas so it's like there is that element of like it's not just 2x when you open yourself up and you go on the adventures all these things

happen i got to powder mountain you know i made the cold calls i turned around instead of going to class you know i did summit at Sea instead of a regular conference. All those things, the adventures only happen to the adventurous. That's a good one. I like that. What's the question you wish everyone would tell you or more people would ask you? Sorry, the question you wish more people would ask you? I don't know. Is there anything you wish people would ask you more about or that you wish you could share more of?

I guess just living your best and truest self, being your most authentic self, best self, and opening yourself to those adventures. I think living exuberantly and positive, that's just kind of me, but not everyone has to be that, but the adventure part, like everyone can go on adventures

and can open themselves up to the possibilities in their life and their work and their weekends. Right. At any moment, yeah, at any moment. I guess asking, ask me about adventures. Okay, okay.

What's the craziest adventure you've been on then? Besides the last 10 years. Or if you had one moment in the last 10 years. It's like when people ask, who's your favorite guest you've had on? For me, it's like they're all amazing. So I understand because you've had probably a lot of crazy adventures. But is there one that stands out? Yes, there is.

There is one. So about two years into the founding of Summit, I had these three co-founders. And we read the four-hour work week. And it changed our entire life. We didn't know that you could do that. And, I mean, we'd gone on, like, family trips, but I'd never really left the country. And we just said, hey, we're going to go to Costa Rica.

We're going to go work from the road. We're going to go for a couple weeks. We were planning one of those events before Summit at Sea, and we went for a couple weeks. We just rented a house. It was super affordable, and we were doing all of our work. We were surfing in the mornings, and we were there for a couple weeks, but we kept hearing, you've got to go to Nicaragua.

You've got to go to Nicaragua. So we rented a car, and we just drove across the border and we drove from costa rica to nicaragua and you got this little surf town san juan del sur and we posted up there for like a month and a half and uh i mean we'd never been outside the country for that long ever i mean my like 10 days the longest i've ever been on a family trip and And it was like a couple of months outside the country. And I would say that was like one of the big defining points of my life that it broke that barrier. Like we were so close.

I didn't have to read the four-hour work week. After I read it, I could have said, you know, we're not going to go anywhere. I could have gone to Costa Rica and then come back. But to just go there and then rent the car and then kind of continue that journey and to know I got back, everything was still around where I got back. It was transformative. It was really, really transformative. I'm a really big believer in travel, in conscious, aware, immersive travel to change your life. And it doesn't have to be out of the country. It can be getting in a car and driving up the PCH. It can be

driving, you know, from where I live, you know, I live at Powder Mountain in Utah. I can be in Southern Utah and Zion in four hours or Glacier National Park in 10 hours. Or you can go to the Salmon River in Idaho in five hours. Like, you know, every weekend is an opportunity. You know, I'm like the person where it's like Friday at 5 p.m. And I'm like, all right, guys, we don't have anything till Saturday night. Like we have 36 hours. Let's go to Joshua Tree. Let's go here.

I mean, anything. Like, how do I get to Catalina? How do I, whatever. I don't know. I mean, whatever, you know. So I think for me, that was, it wasn't always like that. And that kind of opened those possibilities it's like i remember starting that trip and i'm like i can't be gone for this

long what if i just see a doctor you know it's like ah there'll be a doctor subway yeah you know and um like i when we went on our honeymoon we're thinking what should we do for our honeymoon we just went to africa for a month and um we went to south africa for two weeks in kenya for two weeks and we just we went deep we went you know And we went to South Africa for two weeks and Kenya for two weeks. And we just, we went deep. We went, you know, we rented a car. We went all the way. And it's like, you know, I live in America. I don't live in Africa.

I want to explore new places. I want to meet people. People everywhere are amazing. And when you go on these adventures, you make friends, you make connections, you get ideas. I love it. That's great. Okay, final couple questions.

This is called the three truths. And you may have already answered one of them. But three truths is if this is the last day for you many, many years from now, and everything you've created is erased for whatever reason, it's gone. Everything you put out there, content, books, the city, it's all just gone for whatever reason. And you have a piece of paper and a pen. You get to write down your final three truths or the lessons that you would share with the world.

And that's all that the world would have to remember you by, at least three truths. What would be yours? Well, when I was 12, my tennis coach for my birthday gave me a book, Jonathan Livingston Siegel. And in the book was inscribed, for he who believes all things are possible. And I mean, I couldn't, that's like my first motivational quote I ever got. So that would be that would be quote one. My second would be the word listen. And my third would be the word listen.

And my third would be, you are the sum of the five people you spend the most time around. Those are great, man. Great reminders, great lessons. I like that. Before I ask the final question, I want to acknowledge you for a moment, Elliot,

for your incredible ability to dream. You've dreamed so big for the last decade and it's impacted millions of people's lives because of your ability to dream and your ability to connect and your audaciousness to go out there and do the things that you can think of and figure out how to put the pieces together and inspire a movement along the way. And I think it's really cool, everything that you've created and I'm really appreciative that it's all happening to a good human and your heart is well intended

and every time around you, it's always like positivity that you bring positive energy to the world. I've never seen you get like angry at anyone no matter if we're playing Ultimate Frisbee or you're interviewing President Clinton or whatever's happening. I remember going up on the mountain with you and they were breaking the roads and you were just so excited about the possibilities.

So that childlike passion, that dream, and that execution that you have is something to be acknowledged. So I acknowledge you for all that, my man. Thank you. Yeah, of course. Where can we connect with you, Summit Series, learn more about everything that you're up to? If someone wants to attend Summit Series, how can they get involved or, you know, all that?

Yeah, everything is at summit.co, S-U-M-M-I-T dot C-O. Awesome. They can get a ticket for the next event, which is going to be like a town you're building in Los Angeles or something and all this other stuff's happening, right? Yeah, the next event is in November of this year in downtown Los Angeles. We love the possibilities of downtown. We thought we could actually do something more surreal than Summit at Sea

because of just the amount of venues and options there, the amount of theaters and spaces and warehouses and fields. Amazing. Yeah. That's cool. So summit.go, go check it out. I'm telling you it's going to be a life-changing experience

if you guys go and learn more there. Now the final question is what's your definition of greatness? Achieving your purpose and your dreams. But it's not, it's very specifically not about making money. And it's not about how big something is. And if your purpose and dreams are at any scale, as long as that's your true purpose.

I also believe in inherent good and inherent evils. And I think, you know, ensuring that your greatness is on the good side and that you're really doing something good in the world. Elliot, thanks so much. Thank you. There you have it, guys. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to share it with your friends.

lewishouse.com slash 445. Tweet it out. Post it on Facebook. Share it on Instagram. Tag me, at lewishouse, on Instagram story when you're listening to it, and let me know what you're thinking, and I'll reply to you over there as well. Guys, people need to hear this one. This is a powerful one.

So make sure to give Elliot some love by sharing it out. Again, if you're on your podcast app, you can just click on the share button on iTunes or on SoundCloud or Stitcher and tweet it out, post it on Facebook or the direct link is lewishouse.com slash 445 and let me know what you thought. I want to hear your thoughts about this. And let me know the biggest takeaway you got as well. That's right. I hope you guys enjoyed this one.

It doesn't matter how young, how old you are, how little experience you have, or how much experience you have. If you can dream big and you bring passion and energy to every decision that you make, you are going to attract people into your sphere. You're going to attract people into your movement, into your being, and you're going to be able to use that to create something magical, something surreal, like Elliot talks about. And the more surreal experiences you can create for others, the more people are going to be attracted to you and your message and whatever it is you're looking to create, to sell, to deliver to the world. It doesn't matter. But what you've got to have and what I love about Elliot is he's got this mind of possibilities. It doesn't matter

if it seems crazy to buy a mountain. He did it anyways. It doesn't matter if it feels crazy to create a new city of a city that he dreams of what could be the ultimate city to live in he's doing that it doesn't matter how crazy your dream is the key is to dream as big as you can and then go do it attract the people the resources the tools you need to take action this This is only one life, guys. Only one time right now. Don't waste the next year or five years or 10 years when you think you're going to be ready. You're never ever going to be ready to do something outrageous. The time is now. Step into it, lean into it, and take massive action with a positive mind and attract what you need to make it happen.

I love you guys so very much. And you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great. Thank you.