The School of Greatness - The Real Truth About Getting RICH In 2024! 3 Steps To Make Your First Million | Codie Sanchez

Episode Date: October 14, 2024

I'm thrilled to bring you this special segment from our Summit of Greatness featuring the incredible Codie Sanchez. Codie's an award-winning journalist and the founder of Contrarian Thinking and Unconventional Acquisitions. In this electrifying talk, she breaks down the real truth about getting rich in 2024. Codie shares her journey from earning $37,000 a year to building multiple successful companies, and reveals the mindset shifts and strategies that can help you achieve financial freedom. Get ready for some hard-hitting truths, actionable insights, and a powerful call to become an owner in today's economy. This episode is a game-changer for anyone looking to level up their financial game and make a real impact.Buy Codie’s book for yourself and a friend! Main Street Millionaire How to Make Extraordinary Wealth Buying Ordinary BusinessesSummit of Greatness is back in Los Angeles in 2025! Get your tickets NOW! IN THIS EPISODE YOU WILL LEARN:Why taking smart risks and moving fast is crucial for building wealthHow to shift from an employee mindset to an owner mindsetThe importance of solving valuable problems to increase your earning potentialWhy focusing on your local community can lead to significant wealth creation opportunitiesHow to use leverage and scalability to exponentially grow your incomeFor more information go to https://www.lewishowes.com/1680For more Greatness text PODCAST to [phone]More SOG episodes we think you’ll love:Jaspreet Singh – https://link.chtbl.com/1644-podAlex Hormozi – https://link.chtbl.com/1537-podTony Robbins – https://link.chtbl.com/1218-pod

And so today, we're going to talk about the real truth about getting rich in 2024. Cody Sanchez, an award-winning journalist, and she's the founder of Contrarian Thinking and Unconventional Acquisitions. She has the recipe for getting rich. The wonderful Cody Sanchez. When you work for somebody else, you are uplifting their dream, unless they are one who holds hands as they climb. Do other people want people to be great? Sometimes. Except when you're a little bit greater

than they think that they can be. You become this mirror, this reflection of all the things they could have been, which allows people to grow, but also becomes excuses as to why they haven't. Fun little fact. That guy that pushed me out of that company? Guess who's got a bigger bank account now?

Those mother who try to tell you what to do all the time, who try to make you think that you need them, that without them, you're not capable, they are scared of you. Guys, give it up one more time for Cody Sanchez. I've sort of determined there's three things we need to make a lot of money, and I wish somebody had told me earlier, so I'm going to share my lessons with you.

Give it up for Cody! This is so beautiful. I just want you to take a moment and think about what you crazy humans are doing. You're deciding, 4,000 of you, flying in from all over the country because I got your messages, to be in a room with one idea. To become great. Which in a world we live in today, do they really love greatness? No. Do other people want people to be great? Sometimes. Except when you're a little bit greater than they think that they can be. You become this mirror, this reflection of all the things they could have been,

which allows people to grow, but also becomes excuses as to why they haven't. And so I just want to take a moment to say thank you. In this world around us, the most beautiful thing that I have ever seen is a human who gets to stand before God at the end of their days and like Emma Bombeck says, say, I have nothing left to give. I've left it all. I'm wrung dry. And that's what you guys are doing. And in fact, I want to call out one human in here. Is there a Kevin Hebert in the audience? If so, stand up, Kevin, or yell. Kevin, do you see him? Anybody? Over here. Okay, give Kevin a round of applause when you hear what I have to say about Kevin. Kevin is 19 years old. Kevin flew on his very first

flight today here to this room to be with all of you. He paid for his own flight, he paid for his hotel, and he paid to be at this event at 19 years old. You know, I don't know if you guys know, but we've got this presidential election dumpster fire going on. Anybody seen this? And sometimes I worry about the future of our country. And then I meet people like Kevin and people like you guys. Exactly. And I remember that the few on high can never beat the many.

And that is why I'm obsessed with this idea of financial freedom and why I want to make so much money it becomes almost meaningless. Because you know who's really hard to control? The people with the pocketbooks. They don't want you being owners. They don't want you being rich. They want to control you. They want you to think that you need somebody else. But you don't. And Kevin's a perfect example of that. And yes. And so today, we're going to talk about the real truth about getting rich in 2024. How to do it. And I don't know too much about many things. But what I do know about is that by the time I was 30, I built a billion-dollar and asset center management company in Latin America. Well, thank you.

I built a nine-figure holding company, but the truth of the matter is that I've also been fired, been pushed out, lost millions, and failed a ton. And I bring that up because it's the truth. There's no only silver lining. And so I want to think about how can you make an ungodly amount of money even if you're not this guy. But he did leave LA, so we got some issues there. Now, you don't actually have to be this. You just have to know a few truths.

Truths that I wish somebody had told me before, but they're not that politically correct. Is that okay if I share some hard truths with you guys? All right, Lewis gonna kick me off the stage? I don't think so. The truth of the matter is, we're going to fill up from three levels today. I've started to determine there's three things we need

to make a lot of money, and I wish somebody had told me earlier, so I'm gonna share my lessons with you. The first one is mindset. Kind of straightforward, you think? except most people don't have it. The second is zero to one. How do you actually break through whatever your wealth level is? The last one's really important, which is contagion. How do you become so good that your money becomes magnetic and it keeps going back and bringing friends with you?

This one's really important today because I think actually we live in a time of massive abundance. Think about it. It's never been easier to build a business than it is today. In fact, more businesses have been built since 2020 to today than ever in history before. Think about that for a second. We have massive abundance. It's just that we've kind of become a cog in a machine instead of even the machine or learning how to own the machine. And that's where I want to get to. There is one word that is more near and dear to my heart than anything else, and that is this word owner.

So I heard something the other day that stuck with me. Somebody said to me, when you hear the truth, you don't just hear it, you feel it. It's like a tuning fork. You guys ever felt that? Inside of you, right? And so when you hear something that you think sounds like truth today, I want you to yell it for me. We'll get a little gospel up in Los Angeles. What do you think about it?

So when you hear something that you think sounds like a little bit of truth, I want you to go, truth. Cool? You want to try it with me? Truth. Yeah, I like it. Because we are in a world where people have forgotten the word. It is a five-letter word that has become a four-letter word. And I want to bring it back and own it for us.

All right. So let's talk about that. We're first going to start with mindset. So I don't know about you guys, but for a long time, I worked for other people, and they determined my worth based on hours sat at a desk. You guys ever sat in a job that you hated so much that you wished your life would end like a minute or two earlier, so it was five? Just me? Okay. And they're like, truth, yes, right now. I, in my first job, made $37,000 a year. I know. And at that time, I actually thought I was super, super, super rich. I, in my first job, made $37,000 a year. I know. And at that time, I actually thought I was super, super, super rich.

And I was, compared to what I was earning previously. But one day, I was at a financial firm. And everybody else was from fancy schools, like USC down the way and Stanford. And I went to the Harvard of the West, which is Arizona State. Anybody else from that school with me? All right. You're not supposed to laugh at that. Yeah, but it's not known for its academics. And so I was struggling.

I was like one of those ducks where I seemed calm on surface and under the water was paddling like... And I remember I came up with this idea for a business, for a company, and was like, all right. I was at a big company called Vanguard, and I came up with an idea. And I was like, God, I think the company should do this in Latin America because they weren't yet. I brought it to my boss. The boss came back to me and said, this is a good idea. I think we're going to move forward with this at the company. I thought, amazing. And I said, well, if you like the idea, can I be a part of the implementation? He said, of course.

So he comes back a week later, talked to the bosses on high, and he sits me down. And I'm excited. I'm like 21 at the time. And sits me down and says, instead of, Cody, you got the job, he says, Cody, what do you think your colleagues think of you? And I was like, I'm not sure why this is relevant, Ron, but I don't really know. I was like, I'm not sure why this is relevant, Ron, but I don't really know. And he said, they think you would leave dead bodies behind you to get ahead. I was like, well, that's not great. Like physically, because I'm kind of tiny. Mentally. And what he said was, well, we expect you to show up at the parties, to when people come to your desk, hang out, go out to lunch

with the group. But if you guys ever been struggling quietly, or like the idea of doing anything besides working you couldn't even fathom because you could barely do the thing you're supposed to have already known how to do, that was me. Truth. And I was there in that moment, and that's when I realized, when I told him that, he said, well, because of that, we are going to implement your idea. But this woman, April, gets it. And I was like, the f**k does that work? But at that moment, he did me a huge benefit.

Because what he taught me in the moment that was super painful, let me leave a company that would have stopped me. And I did something that a lot of people don't talk about today, but which I think is true. Do you guys see how many years I was at most of these big institutions? Right about two years, right? That's what they say about us youngsters. We don't stay, we don't work hard, we don't whatever. I left the moment I knew they weren't going to let me promote any faster. The moment they said, our speed, not yours, I said, no, no, no. I'm the architect of my fate. You're not. Truth.

And people will not tell you this. They will say that you're ungrateful, that you should stay, that you're selfish, and you have to say lovingly, bye. Bye. And that's my first truth. The second truth is this one. I was sitting with a guy who's worth a couple hundred million bucks. Anybody know this guy's name? His name's Bill Perkins. All right. Bill's the man. He wrote a book called Die With Zero. Now, I asked Bill, I'm like, Bill, you've built like multiple billion dollar companies, really huge endeavors. You've been

successful in so many ways. What's your secret? And he told me something that stuck with me for just about ever. He said, I realized that while most people wait, I move really fast. By the time somebody else has thought about an idea, gone to investment committee, pondered it, I've already started, made three mistakes, and found a better way. He goes, the only difference between me and them is speed. What if you don't have to be smarter? What if you don't have to be richer? What if you just have to move a little faster? And I found a lot of freedom in that. Now, this one is really unpopular on the internet. But the truth of the matter is, is that it doesn't always have to be from a place of love.

We were just hearing a song from what two minutes ago? Gladiator. Do you think he operated from only love? Was there a little anger there too? Truth. The truth of the matter is that all emotions can have some reason to exist inside of you. So why not build when you're angry too? So you might think this looks nice.

I'm on a cover of a magazine, right? How lovely. Well, this is one of the companies that I got pushed out of. One of. I got pushed out of two companies. I do think I'm rather unemployable, so it's not totally their fault, to be honest. Give me an amen if anybody here is also unemployable.

All right, all right. Yeah, we're kind of hard. We're kind of awesome. What happened in this business was fascinating. Have you guys read 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene? Incredible book. Rule number one. Anybody remember? Don't outshine the master. And I did that. I was on a cover of a magazine. How dare I? But I forgot the golden rule, which is when you work for somebody else, you are uplifting their dream unless they are one who holds hands as they climb. And so I got pushed out of this company for this reason. But without that, I wouldn't be standing in front of you guys. And I think about this right here, which is what if the thing you got fired

from, the thing you wanted more than anything, the painful secret that you don't really want to share with mom and dad, brother, sister, husband, is what could fuel you? Because fun little fact, that guy that pushed me out of that company, guess who's got a bigger bank account now? of that company, guess who has a bigger bank account now? One of my favorite sayings of all time is you have many scoreboards in life, right? You have a scoreboard of health, Lewis' 24 pack and those two guys, whatever they're doing over here. You also have a scoreboard of relationships. Maybe you have a scoreboard of giving.

And there's a beautiful game that is a scoreboard of money, which doesn't mean that you have to be Lambos, Bentleys, etc. I'm not really that into it. More power to you if you are. But it does mean that it's a tool. So the more money you make, the more you get to say scoreboard. And I just think there's a lot of power in that. Truth. Truth. in that. Truth. Truth. This one you might have talked about a little bit today with Joe Dispenza. I had this kind of interesting realization. So I'm in Austin, Texas, which is, yeah, little Texans. There we go. And in Austin, Texas, there is a group of people from the PayPal mafia. Do you guys know this group? So what's fascinating about the PayPal mafia, there is a group of people from the PayPal mafia. Do you guys know this group?

So what's fascinating about the PayPal mafia is this is a group of people who all came together to build PayPal. There's some big names on there. Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, billionaires across the board. And I've interacted with a few of them. And one day, and I won't say which one, I'm at a dinner party. And I'm kind of gregarious. And so I go over and talk to a guy who I don't realize is one of these guys. And so I'm like, hey, man, how's it going? I'm at a dinner party, and I'm kind of gregarious, and so I go over and talk to a guy who I don't realize is one of these guys. And so I'm like, hey man, how's it going? I'm Cody, what do you do? If you can imagine this, there's a group of like six other people around the table.

I'm walking over, and I'm smiling, and I say this to this man, and he looks at me. So I go, how do you, what do you do? What's your story? And he goes, And he looks at me. So I go, what do you do? What's your story? And he goes, I'm talking 30 seconds. I about died. I about died.

And like somewhere between 30 seconds and three years, I was like, what's your deal? Like, are you just staring at me? Do you not speak English? What's happening? And just, you know, kind of blurted out of my mouth. And he said something really profound to me. He said, well, I only have so much energy in a day and I only have so many words to say. And so I try to make sure I measure them carefully. And I was like, rude. But when I thought about it more deeply, when I thought about it more deeply, I was like, this man reprogrammed his entire world. He says, no, I'm not going to play this small talk game.

And in fact, I don't have to. And I found that fascinating. So where can you reprogram you? The next truth, as we sit in the shadow of USC, so sorry, Trojans, I'm just all over your beautiful school over here there is no doubt that sitting in an academic environment is beautiful and that this idea of the teachings from the wise to the youth is beautiful but here's the problem they don't teach us anymore they teach us what what to think, not how to think. And they also do this.

They charge us more for four years of regurgitated exams than our auto loans and our credit cards. It is a calamity. And I should know, I paid it. This is little Cody Susie Sunshine at Georgetown, happy as a clam, getting all their credentials. But the beautiful part about this world and all of you guys out here is we're not woke, we're waking up. And yeah. And you want to know how I know? Because look at this. I really like cuss words. Listen, cuss is a noun, it's a verb, it's an

adjective, it's a pronoun. It's really just efficient. It's just efficient and that's why I use it. But what you can see here is this yellow line is all of you guys deciding you don't get to make my parents mortgage their retirement, make me mortgage my future house, lock me into student loan debt that I can never get rid of in order for you to imprint your ideas on my head. No. You guys are pushing back. That's right. And so instead, we're teaching ourselves summit of greatness. You are part of the movement. And in fact, vocational schools all over this country are opening up, and that's why I started one too, because I said no more.

There is a tough truth, though, and that is that we don't always get to do what we want. Sometimes we have to do what is required. My team backstage, they hate this line because I use it a lot. But the truth of the matter is that we live in a society these days that tells us what? Follow your... How many times has your passion led to millions? That sounds great on stages like this when we get to tell people sweet lies. Sweet, sweet lies, not inconvenient truths. Because the truth of the matter is, look at this America.

50 to 80% of us hate what we do for a living. This single place will spend more time than anywhere else besides sleeping we hate. But why? I think it's because we're telling ourselves a story. We're telling ourselves to listen to the anxiety inside of us that says that we can't, we won't, it's not impossible, but for you it is. And in fact, I think your anxiety is lying to you. That if you really think about it, you made it this far, probably not likely you're going to die because you start a startup. Probably not likely you're going to die because you buy a business. Probably not likely that that thinking side that feels primordial,

like you're not going to make it if you do it, is going to kill you. In fact, very little will. And if you get past this, then you get to something kind of special. This is where you start to break through, zero to one. Now what happens to zero one is it starts becoming a lot more on us. I heard this line from a really good mentor of mine. You guys ever have a to-do list that's like, right? So I have a to-do list like that often. And I remember saying to one of my mentors, like, I got too much to do and I have to do this and this and this. And he looked at me and he said, with all due respect, you just don't prioritize very well, do you?

And I was like, again, rude. But was he true? And he said, you don't need more time. You need a deadline. And if I look back at my career, just to open it up so you guys can see, this is 10 plus years of building other people's castles instead of mine. It's closer to 15 plus years of not betting on me. So if anybody in here feels like it's too late, I don't know if I can, I'm stuck in a corporate job, I don't think that's actually true. But I do think there's a cost. For every moment that you wait, your net worth

waits right along with you. And the truth of the matter is that your lack of action is your biggest competitor. Your waiting is the competition. There is no other. What happens when you make the move today that you should have made five years ago? You make more money. Now, a good example of somebody who made a lot more money is somebody who said this line, being a professional opportunist. This is my favorite investor of all time.

Do you guys know who he is? Who do you think? Warren Buffet? Let me give you another little crumb. He bought a business for pennies on the dollar, sold it for $39 billion right before the market crash. Anybody know who? Mark Cuban? No. No, also good.

We got some investors in the crowd. Sam Zell. Now, what I love about Sam Zell is nobody knows who this guy is. Unless you're an investor, one of the richest men in the world, one of the greatest investors of our time, we don't even know his name. Why? With all due respect, we put T-Swift on billboards, and we put celebrities on billboards, and we listen to them when they don't know what your life is like. When was the last time a celebrity even could name a banana? Have you guys ever seen

that from Bill Gates? Incredible. They go, how much do you think a banana costs, Bill Gates? What do you think he said? He's like, right around 20 bucks. Like, that mother, if I should take his immediate advice right now for how to fix my life, no. What's interesting about this guy, because you learn a lot from watching the playbooks of billionaires, not from listening to them from a peak too far removed to even see the valley we're in. What's fascinating about this guy is he used to say, the only reason that I make money is because when the entire world goes left,

I think, could I go right? And I asked myself that question again and again to find professional opportunity in the world where people are scared. And he's like, I do this so much that I have a physical activity to remember it by. This is Sam Zell on a motorcycle. How many billionaires and hedge fund managers look like this guy?

Zero. He had a motorcycle gang, as much as like a 70-year-old dude could, called Sam's Angels. And why I love this, Zell's Angels, excuse me. Why I love this is because he had to remind himself, even a man worth billions, had to remind himself to take risk and to stand out. Do we do the same? This is a hard one, friends. You are paid exactly as much as the problems you are solving are worth. This is where people get real mad on the internet,

and they go, what about teachers? And I go, I know. Everybody calm down. My mom was a special education teacher for 30 years. But do you want a sweet lie, or do you want the truth? Do you want me to stand on stages and tell you that my mom is somehow miraculously about to make millions by being a teacher?

Because that's what they'll tell you all. Instead of saying, well, if you want to be a teacher and you want to make millions, go build a school. That is the difference and the truth. And so I want you to look yourself in the eye and think about this for a moment. Love myself a graph. The average income of the top 1% versus workers. What do you see there? A big, huge difference. Now, the difference between me and the media is the media is going to go, let's stake them, the rich, let's tax them all.

those on high pretending that they're going to redistribute them to us. But how many people in the U.S. own a small business? What percentage do you think own a business? What percentage of people? 3%. 3% of people in the U.S. own a business. So who is actually taking the risks? Very similar to how many people in this country are part of the military to protect a nation? 3%. 3% protect the many, 3% determine the profit. So if you want to get in the game, go where the game is played. Because look at the difference in workers' compensation versus CEOs. What does this tell you? That CEOs are greedy? Maybe. Does it help you to know that CEOs are greedy? Will you get richer by having that mindset? No. How will you get richer? You become the CEO. You build. That is how you get richer. You become one of the three percent,

and that is how you make money. Because I was just like maybe many of you that don't have a business. 37K to multiple, to multiple, to multiple, to multiple. Why? Through the power of this beautiful thing that I hope they never steal from us, but they well try. Which is the most even game we can play, even though it's not perfect and it's called capitalism. we can play even though it's not perfect and it's called capitalism. It is the thing they will take from us first because they will pit those who have versus those who don't against one another. We have to push back. Truth. Truth. And anyone who tells you differently wants to take and that we have to be careful about.

Because the truth of the matter is, more money isn't more problems. In fact, I think you should have every right to chase relentlessly your first million dollars. They used to tell us for 10 years, they had one study that said happiness peaked at what level? Do you guys remember the amount? $75,000. What did we find out just last year? The real level is $500,000. They use a study to tell us, no, don't earn, because what is money? Money is evil. That's what they tell us. You all are different, though. Because what we find when we understand the game of money and ownership is the difference between addition and multiplication. Let me

show you what I mean. On the left-hand side, we have addition. 1, 3, 5, 7. This is what happens when you earn. When you earn for somebody else, you make on average 3 to 7% increases a year. When you own, you multiply. Which means you never acquire a client one by one. You acquire them in chunks. And this is how you are able to go from a game where you don't make very much, one of my first startups, Threads Refined, to a game where I made a lot for another people, to other games where I own the entire business and the audience.

You look for where you can multiply instead of add. But the truth of the matter is that I wish somebody would have told me that getting rich looks nothing like these guys. Neither does aging, by the way, just so we're clear. clear in fact getting rich kind of looks like this it looks like long days and long nights repeated again and again truth but the other truth they didn't tell us was that it's not enough to just work a lot right you could work a lot at the wrong thing and still stay poor. So what's missing? It's this one word, risk. We think about risk in a bad way, right? I was born in an immigrant family. Anybody else here an immigrant family? Yeah, there we go. You guys are the heartbeat.

I was born in an immigrant family, and immigrant families do not like risk. Like, if you were to ask my Latina mom about debt, she's like, no, no, no, no, no, no, not good. But the truth of the matter is, if we don't take risk, look what happens. Without you guys even realizing it, without me even realizing it, the government has slowly stolen our money

year after year, day after day, until it is worth a fraction of what it was in the beginning. See, what's fascinating, truth. What's fascinating is at the very top, 1913, the Fed, the Federal Reserve Act is enacted. And ever since that day, we've seen our dollar be eaten, eaten, eaten, eaten, eaten away continuously. And this is where the crypto bros, we got any of you guys in the crowd? Yeah. This is where you guys who are smarter on all that than I am come to play.

But what I do actually understand here is that I sat with, again, my mentor that I told you about before, Bill Perkins, one day on his, like, giant, you know, sort of mansion in Austin. And have you guys ever had a really big idea and then gone home to like your partner, husband, wife, and you're like really excited for the idea to tell them and you go to tell it to them and they just like, just like kick it right

in the face. They just like tell you how awful that idea is. My husband sometimes calls it Captain No, which is me. And so anyway, so I had this big idea. And then I go to Bill. And I'm like, Bill, listen. And then he looks at me very nicely. And he goes, do you think that you've been around small business for so long that small has infected your thinking? Rude. And yet, he was right. And with that one question, he made me realize that the risk I was taking would never give me the reward I asked for. Are you guys taking the right level of risk? Because the only way to get to contagion, where your money starts making so much money it becomes uncomfortable for you,

is for you to take more risk. Because you can actually tell your bank account from the problems that you solve, from the risk that you take. Anybody know who this guy is? Truth. Anybody know who this is? We got one. He probably got a pretty big bank account. He's got his button down on. I can just tell this guy's going to make it. Joe Lonsdale is another billionaire. He started a company called Palantir. He's become a friend of mine in Austin, Texas. Two things I like about Joe.

He's not afraid to say the quiet part out loud. He's not afraid to be hated. And he's not afraid to build. This guy has had $8 billion companies he has co-founded and yet guess what? One person in here knew his face. Who are they telling you to look up to to get the thing that will equal freedom? Not the right people. Truth. Because the truth of the matter is, if you want to make massive amounts of money you can't play small. And I want to kind of end on this and then fast forward through a couple things. I have a saying for all the CEOs in our

portfolio company, which is your product is either scalable or your CEO is miserable. Does anybody know how this guy, Chamath, became a billionaire? It's not SPACs. I'll just say that for anybody who's followed his investment track record. Sorry, Chamath. Not great. He came up with one idea at Facebook that led to this company being one of the most successful companies at all time. It was called Seven Friends in 10 Days. He found out, and every business has this, by the way, he found out that if he could have a user connect with seven friends inside of 10 days, they never left the platform. One metric to

solve them all. And that equated to this thing called scalability, which led to more money than Chamath knows what to do with, more money than Zuckerberg knows what to do with. And an ability to literally change what news comes to Americans. You see, that's the thing they don't want you to know. Is that money isn't really just about your own power. It is about power over all. Truth. And so I actually had this one CEO that I'm going to share with you. This CEO, his name was Jim. And so I actually had this one CEO that I'm going to share with you.

This CEO, his name was Jim. And I remember he was the other CEO that wanted me out of a company unless I did it his way. And I respect him for it. Because when you're the CEO, you've taken the risk. I hadn't. So I remember we were walking on the beach together. I wanted to run the business this way. He wanted to run it that way.

And Jim said to me, Cody, something along the lines of, with all due respect, if you want to stay at this company, you can either get in the boat and row or get the out of the boat. And he said this line to me, which I'll never forget. He said, at this company, we get rich quietly. And I thought about that, and I understand the reasons why, because people hate rich people, and it's scary to be out in public. But I decided at that day that I would get rich together instead. That I would never allow another human to tell me that we have to not share others this thing that is massively abundance. Can I get a little truth? And so I want to fast forward through a ton of these and go to one for you.

And that one I think is more important today now than ever, and I'm going to tell you what it is. It is this, that all around us in this world today, we are like ants in a jar. Have you guys heard that? Have you guys heard of Sam Bankman Freed? Anybody know that name? This guy does. We're like ants in a jar where they're trying to rile us up, right? There's this story about two ants in a jar, black ants and red ants. When you put the ants in the jar together, what happens? What do you think happens?

They fight. Actually, nothing. Nothing. The ants just coexist. They're like anting, carrying leaves, whatever the ants do. But if you shake that jar, what do the ants do? They rip each other apart. They rip each other apart. They rip each other apart.

And I think that might be where we're at today. Because I think the world is actually getting pretty tough. I think you can already feel it, that there's like a recession coming. That it feels hard out there. That it might not be as easy this year as it was last year. Does it feel that way for anybody? A little bit of truth. You see, I think that all around us, we have the signs of this recession. And a wild thing happens

in a recession, which is the things that felt easy before now make us angry. And so what does that mean? It means we actually have to do a little bit more with less. And this is something that I'm preaching across all of our portfolio companies today. In fact, there was a very famous speech by Andreessen Hoyerowitz and Sequoia. They gave two different ones back in the day, two of the biggest venture capital companies in the world. And they said that at this time, this was in 99, it was the death of Silicon Valley startups in many ways.

And just this week, we came out with a different version of that. How many of you guys have heard of founder mode versus manager mode? Anybody hear this in startup land? Again, this guy. What's happening is the VCs always signal downturns first. Why? Venture capitalists. They signal the downturns first because what do VCs do? They take a bunch of money and they pile it into hopes and dreams, right? So they're highly leveraged dreams with no revenue and with no profit. So when things start to fall apart, what do you think falls apart first? Things with no revenue and no profit. And so they're starting to sing this siren song

of things getting hard. But I want you to take heart in a few things. Look at this graph with me for a second. This is called an expansion and a recession chart. What you're looking at here is a period of expansion, so that's when the line goes up, followed by contraction, followed by expansion, followed by contraction. This is a normal market cycle that they've made us scared to be in. The truth of the matter is, a lot of companies will die, but look at what happens to those that live. We see that companies that survive a downturn are anywhere from 9x more profitable to 3x more revenue. So while the world is scared, I want you to focus on this one word, which is survival. Because those that survive thrive.

In periods like this, you probably shouldn't listen to people who tell you, go all out. You should listen to the person that says, in this time, take the smart risk. Take the smart risk because the truth of the matter is, if you're young and broke, remember, every billionaire I've talked to you about today would still trade places with you. I don't see, I don't know if there's any billionaires

in the crowd, I see a young crowd. I see a young crowd with a lot of time. And if you have time, you have the most precious commodity to apply this one thing. How many of you guys have heard of Archimedes? So Archimedes had a very famous quote, which was essentially this. He said, give me a lever and a fulcrum, give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world. He started this idea in venture capital and audience of, what if it's not just working harder, smarter, and taking more risk? What if it is about applying leverage?

And I want you to take this with you, because as I think about the world around us today, never been easier to start a business. More businesses started now than ever before. More ability for you guys to not have to listen to those on high and execute outside of universities. This is what they don't want from us. Can I get a truth? How much harder are we when we are united in one way, shape, or form?

And I don't know about you, but I was sitting in the back getting my hair done this morning. I don't know if you could tell from all the face paint, but I don't typically look like this. And they were doing my hair and makeup, and I reached over to, they give you this little like to-go thing to like fix the face paint when you sweat it off, like I'm doing right now. And so she gave me this little face paint kit, and I opened it up, and inside of it is a little piece of paper. And I'm like, oh, that's cute, business card.

And as I opened it up, you know what it was instead? It was a Bible verse. A Bible verse inside this little face paint kit in Los Angeles. Yeah, and I listened to that and I felt something that I think maybe you guys might be feeling too. There's a lot of darkness in the world today. Do you guys feel that? There's a lot of things that have made me start to feel like maybe that word evil is real. And yet, whenever there's a lot of darkness, you kind of know that eventually light comes. And whether that is a religion that I believe in, Christianity, whether that is whatever religion

you believe in, whether that is just your belief in humanity, I think the world is starting to wake up. Because the truth that I know more than anything else that I've told you about today is that the American dream starts with all of you. Truth. That's true. And I don't want you to think for a second that it's dead. Look around you for a moment. In a room like today, many people come to rooms like this and they ask, what can I get? You know people like that? What am I going to get from this?

What is Lewis going to give me? What is Cody going to give me? But you know who gets the most out of it? The person who gives. It's this weird law of the universe that if you ever meet most really wealthy and successful people, they're really giving. And I'll kind of end here with a story. I met Louis, as one does in Instagram DMs. And when I met Louis, you know how they say never

meet your heroes? You guys heard that before? I met Louis, and I had listened to Louis for a long time, right? I've only been on the Internet for three years or so. And so I listened to Louis, and I had met a lot of other Internet people. And they're not all great. Let's just say that. And when I met Louis, it kind of weirded me out. Have you ever met somebody where they're just, like, too nice? And they give you too much, and you're like, what do you want? You know, you're like, just tell me what you want.

And so I kind of felt like that with Lewis at first. I was like, what do you want, man? And I kept asking him, like, what can I do for you? What can I do for you? And he kept saying this one thing. If you look through our texts, you can see it. He kept saying, I just want to serve. I just want to serve others. I just want to give. And I sat with that for a second, and I might impress upon you that same idea. 4,000 humans who are here to be great, who believe in the we instead of the me, who are not just looking out for I, but are looking out for this big country that was created with one wild idea.

For the people, by the people. Truth. A wild idea that I'm not sure we will be able to do, but I think we might. Because the truth of the matter is, what we are doing when we make money is bigger than profit. It is way bigger than profit. And let me tell you why. Because have you guys ever sat around with nothing to do, no purpose, nothing to pursue? Have you felt what that feels like over a period? Do you know why most veterans commit suicide? Because they feel like they don't have a sense of purpose anymore. So when society is telling us, labor's bad, work's bad, quiet quit, don't make money, money's the root of evil,

what are they actually telling? They're trying to say, let me take your dignity from you. And this group of humans, by choosing to labor in a world that wants to get instead of give is the ultimate pushback. Yes. Because the truth of the matter is, what I want you to remember above anything else is I want you to remember that those who try to tell you what to do all the time,

who try to make you think that you need them, that without them you're not capable, they are scared of you. True. They are scared of every single human in this room who knows what I do. That the way to take back our society is through this one idea. It starts in the community. So I have a, I've become good friends with a woman who's the daughter of a guy, Jordan Peterson.

Anybody in here know Jordan Peterson? And I remember the first time that I heard Jordan speak. And he said something that I thought, oof, that sounds like truth, my tuning fork. And he said, before you clean up the world, clean up your room. And yet, what do we do? We say, no, let me go save the planet while I let my community burn. No. Have you guys looked around L.A. lately?

Are there some problems here? But are there 4,000 people who maybe could bring the dignity back to Main Street in your communities? You don't have to save the world. You've got to clean up your room. And I think if we realize that every time we go to a Starbucks instead of a local coffee store, every time we go to a Walmart instead of a local grocery store, we are doing the opposite of cleaning up our room. So I have made it, yes, I have made it my mission. A funny story, you guys. My team, literally the driver, I have a sinus infection, whatever.

And so if I sound nasally, that's why. And so I needed a coffee, like bad. You guys ever had that? I'm late. We're coming in hot. I need a coffee. The driver goes, only thing is Starbucks. The team all looks at me in the car.

They're like, is she going to do it? Because we have this rule at our company, you're not allowed to pay for big corporations on our credit cards. You can pay for it, but the company is not paying for it. So we found a local coffee shop. Okay, fine. And the point of this is that I believe there is a generational wealth creation event happening with the small business boomers all over this country transitioning their businesses to people like you. Except most of their kids want to be on TikTok instead of opening a plumbing company,

even if that plumbing company makes millions. Truth. And you guys are the answer to that. So the reason I won't shut up on stages like this, where friends of mine like Louis give me the microphone, is because I think without all of you, we become a country of neon signs and big corporations and government ownership. And I refuse. So, I want you to do one thing with me. This is for you. I want you to do two things for me. One,

I want you to go get a piece of the game. I want you to get ownership. I want you to do two things for me. One, I want you to go get a piece of the game. I want you to get ownership. I want you to ask for equity. I want you to take some risk. I want you to get skin in the game, even though it's going to be the hardest thing you've ever done in your life. And I want you to tell me about it.

I want you to be like Kevin's mom, who says, I'm taking the risk. I'm buying the ticket. I'm going across the country because I want to learn. That's what I want from each of you. And then I want you to do one other thing for me, which is I want you to stand up. I love this. And at this point, typically people yell out stuff like Lewis or Cody or greatness.

But I want you to etch one word on your soul instead, which is owner. And instead of celebrities that do stuff like this all the time, I want you instead to chant with me, owner. Because the scariest thing to those who think they own us are a bunch of people who can push the back. All right, on the count of three. Yeah. One, two, three. Owner, owner, owner, owner, owner. Yeah.

Thank you, guys. You guys enjoy this from Cody? Cody's got a new book. I don't know if the slide is up. We put the slide up. You guys can check it out. When's it coming out? December 3rd.

December 3rd. You can get the book. This is the only copy. I have access to it right here. Louis got the first copy of the book, too. Did I? You know that? Yeah.

Right here. Is this the first one? Yeah. I didn't get it at the interview? No. That was a fake book. That was a fake book. That was a fake book.

So make sure you guys get a copy of the book. You can pre-order it right now. Follow Cody. She's just been exploding online over the last couple years. So our interview was amazing. If you haven't seen that interview yet, make sure to check it out as well. We bleep the cuss words, I promise. It's okay.

I'm so sorry. I'm not. She's an owner. She's owning it. I like it. Other than that, make sure to support her. If you have any thoughts about being an owner or building your business, make sure you guys get this book.

A lot of great information. Other than that, guys, give it up one more time for Cody Sanchez. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode

in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I wanna remind you, if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.