The School of Greatness - The SECRET To Winning Negotiations, Making More Money & Believing in Yourself w/Dan Lok EP 1096

Episode Date: April 12, 2021

“Action takers are money makers.”Today's guest is the King of Closing himself, Dan Lok. Dan’s content has been viewed over 1 billion times for his expertise on achieving financial confidence. He’s both a celebrity influencer and venture capitalist currently serving as the chairman of DRAGON 100 - the world’s most exclusive advisory board for entrepreneurs who want to create generational wealth in the age of disruption.In this episode Lewis and Dan discuss the key differences between those who make money and those who don’t, why you need to start developing your skill set, how to develop self-belief and overcome self-doubt, and so much more!For more go to: www.lewishowes.com/1096Check out The Smart Challenge: www.thesmartchallenge.comCheck out his website: www.danlok.comDaymond John on How to Close any Deal and Achieve Any Outcome: https://link.chtbl.com/928-podSara Blakely on Writing Your Billion Dollar Story: https://link.chtbl.com/893-pod

This is episode number 1096 with Dan Lok. 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.

Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Dave Ramsey said, you must gain control over your money or the lack of it will forever control you. And Dale Carnegie said, develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success. My guest today is the king of closing himself, Dan Locke, and Dan's content has been viewed over 1 billion times for his expertise on achieving financial confidence. He's both a celebrity influencer, personal brand, and venture capitalist currently serving as the chairman of Dragon 100, the world's most exclusive advisory board for entrepreneurs who want to create generational wealth in the age of disruption.

In this episode, we discuss the key differences between those who make money and those who don't. Why you need to start developing your skill set today. How to develop self-belief and overcome self-doubt. How martial arts has taught Dan the keys to business success. How to close any negotiation in business and life, the most important factors of thriving in business and your relationships, and so much more. I love to ask people questions that they normally don't get and share things they normally don't share. And that is definitely something we did here today with Dan. He opens up on a lot of things

that he normally doesn't talk about on his channel or his site anywhere. If you're inspired and you get value from this, make sure to share this episode with someone that you think would be inspired as well. You can copy and paste the link wherever you're listening to this right now, or you can use lewishouse.com slash 1096 and text that to a few friends or post it on your social media. And if this is your first time here, then welcome to the School of Greatness. Click that subscribe button right now on Apple Podcast or on Spotify. Leave us a rating and review and share with us the part of this episode that you found the most valuable from Dan. Okay, in just a moment, the one and only Dan Lok. Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness podcast. Very excited about my guest. Mr. Dan Lok is in the house, the king of closing.

My man, good to see you. My man, good to be here, and I'm excited. Let's unleash some greatness. Let's do it, baby. I'm curious because you had a number of failures as an entrepreneur, many failed business attempts, which your failures were probably other people's successes. So I want to caveat that for a minute,

that you probably succeeded even though it was a failure to you. I didn't know how to make money until I turned 25. I never thought I'd be an entrepreneur. I thought I'd be finding somewhere to be a part of a team and helping like build a mission with someone else. And I was really a team player as an athlete. I wasn't the quarterback. I wasn't the rah-rah leader. I was more like, throw me the ball. Let me make a play with the skills that I have. Let me do my thing. I don't want the pressure of being a leader and all that stuff in sports. But out of necessity, I needed to learn how to make money because of a number of instances in my life that occurred. I'm curious for people that have never thought of themselves as an entrepreneur, excuse me, who've never thought

they were an entrepreneur, but they really want to be. Like myself, I didn't think I'd be, but I wanted to make some money. What advice would you give to starting out if they have no skills as an entrepreneur, if they've never made money before, they're not sure if they can even do it, what advice would you give? Should they even try? Or maybe are they not the right fit for that? This may not be a popular answer. I used to believe that entrepreneurs may not be born. But now I think as I'm a little bit older, a little bit more gray hair, a little bit more mature, I think for some of us, we are actually born to be entrepreneurs.

That we want to do our own thing. It's just until some incidents happen, it didn't ignite that within us, right? I don't think entrepreneurs, you can acquire certain entrepreneurial skills, but I think it's in our DNA. There are certain people, they just want to create, they want to innovate, they want to build something.

It's in our personalities and our DNA, it's in our blood. So I don't think that someone, if they just work harder, that they would become an entrepreneur. If you look at the kind of the small businesses, you know, that some say 90, some say 95% of small businesses fail in the first five years. You look at in, let's say, take US example, right? 30 million businesses. Only 4% effort exceed $1 million a year in revenue. So 96% of the businesses never get past that 4%, right? Never get past the $1 million in revenue. So if you're $1 million in revenue, you're listening to this, you're watching this, you're already the top 4% of entrepreneurs. If you're doing $10 million a year, you're 0.4% of the entrepreneurs, 0.4%. So that's a tiny, tiny percentage. Just

like, brother, think about an athletic world, right? How many athletes could get to a certain level? Yeah, it's like there's millions in the high school level, and then to get to college, it's 3%, and then it's 3% of 3% to get to professional level, yeah. So is it talent? Maybe. Is it just hard work? Maybe. But there's so many other factors. But I think they either have it or they don't. The difference is just the skill. And for me, again, I didn't have it until a number of instances in my life forged me to become one out of necessity.

Where I was like, I'm broke. I have no money. I got to figure this out. And it was almost like it made me be entrepreneurial out of necessity. Otherwise, I'd have been just as happy like, hey, someone else has got all the pressure and all the financial headache and the stress of losing it all. Let me just catch the ball and score touchdowns.

Yes. That's a fun job. You don't have to just score touchdowns. Yes. You know, that's a fun job. You don't have to just score big plays, you know. And then when, I think entrepreneurship, it teaches us something about ourselves, right? Through this journey, we learn about our own weaknesses. We learn about who we are. We have to deal with a lot of like the inner demons,

the inner conflicts and a lot of issues, right? Even now, all of us, people look at us and say, oh, you know, Lewis has no problem. Dan has no problems. Believe me, we have problems. I did a five-hour therapy session this last weekend. There you go. Going into some dark stuff that I thought I'd already recovered and healed,

but realized, oh, it's still coming up for me in a different area of my personal life. It manifests, right? And it's important for me to always have coaches. I know you're always investing in training and coaches and mentorship and leadership around you to support you. What is the biggest demon that you still face today on the inner world that you have yet to fully overcome? Maybe you started working on it years ago, but it still comes up. That dark shadow or whatever you want to call it still rears its head in situations, whether it be personal life or professional. Ego. Ego.

I say that our ego is not our amigo. That when we are, it's easy to say, hey, we have accomplished a degree of success and we feel like oh we know it and we don't want to listen but it's always having that beginner's mindset I think ego but ego is not just

it's not arrogance it's our blind spots our own biases I always know how closing works I always know how marketing works I know how leadership works but there are always new things that are coming down the pipeline. There are new things that we should learn. So I think ego, it's keeping that in check all the time. And what would you say is your

biggest insecurity still? Even if you've overcome it, it's still a little bit there. My, I would say because, I mean, let's look at it in terms of mainstream, right? That with what I do, there aren't many, if you call that influencer space, let's call it influencer space, or however we want to define that space, there are not a lot of Asian faces, right? It's just a fact. You look at the one guy that kind of made it, quote unquote, but that's still there. And I still face that.

I mean, I remember in the beginning of building my social media following, I could tell you, Louis, most of the hate and negative comments, they are more leaning towards racist type comments. Really? Yep. Yep. Yeah, most of them. I think the first big chunk of it. It was just what?

Just saying stuff about your race? It wasn't even commenting on the content. It was just Asian whatever. Yeah, not the content. Yeah, but that kind of stuff. Yes. Interesting. And I still face that. I still face that.

In some less, but I still face that. Does that affect you when you see that? Or you kind of just brush it off now? No, no. In the beginning, it affected me a lot. Because it was like, oh, I'm creating content. I'm building my followings. And because of, I'm also, as you know, my personality, I'm very direct, right?

So it rubs people the wrong way it could be not that i i want to be rude i just that's me i just i'm you're honest personality i'm just yeah it's just my personality i don't i don't so because of that i think today it's less it's like there's a difference right in the beginning it's like who the hell are you you know who are you and this and that and it's like and it's like you're no good and then when you are good like when you are good enough that people can't denying that then it's like okay they kind of accept that you're good but they're still there's still a little bit of that like hey you know so they'll they'll try to find they can't criticize your content but they they'll criticize your ethnicity or your hair or something.

Yeah. Yeah. I get all that. Baby face. I get all that. I mean, now I laugh at it because some of them are quite creative. They're actually quite funny. They are quite funny, I have to say.

It's interesting. I used to defend pretty much every negative comment and, I don't know, negative review that I would get in my first few years, years ago. I would try to defend and get people to like me who were saying negative things about me. And I remember one of my coaches saw this when I responded to some negative comment online, and he called me. He said, you're just giving these people your power. He's like, just say thank you for the feedback and move on. Or say nothing and move on. Because putting energy and attention into the 1% of people that are leaving nasty comments is not supporting your mission.

And the bigger the following, think about if we have, let's say, a million followers. Well, if 10% hating you, that's like 100,000 people. If you think about putting 100,000 people in a stadium, that's a lot of people. That's just a lot of people, right? And we can't control how, and people don't hate us, they hate themselves anyway. Like it's something that we say, something that we do,

who we are, it triggers something within them. And the truth is most haters actually don't know us. Like they don't know you, they don't know us. They don't know you. They don't know me. They don't know us. They came to the conclusions or they make a quick judgment based on a five-second video. That's how they do it.

And that's all part of it. So it used to bother me, but now it's like, no, I don't think there's a problem with that. Yeah, man. I'm curious about it. I want to talk about money for a while. What do you think are three things that poor people do that the rich people don't do that you notice? I think, first of all, poor people have a negative association with money.

I'll give you a perfect example from just last week. This has happened to me, literally, like in real life. I was driving, me and my wife driving the Bentley, right, to downtown, and passed through a not so good neighborhood, kind of like, it's called Hastings in Vancouver, kind of like the hood, okay? Because we're going to Chinatown. We stop in the red light.

There's one guy that came to my car, spit on my car. Pshh, on the window. Yep, on the window, rightsh, on him. No way. Yep, on the window, right? And then gave me the finger. Wow. And then walk away. So, so.

You didn't say anything, you didn't do anything, you didn't. It was just that, it was just a car, just a car, right? So you would see a lot of people, they think, they say, I want more money, hey, Lewis, I want to have more success, I want to have more wealth, but deep down, actually they have a negative association with money. Because I always do this exercise with my students. So imagine this, imagine you're walking down the street,

you hear this loud engine sound, and then you see like a black Lamborghini, just drives by, right? What's the first thing that comes to your mind? Now, most people would say, oh, he's an. Like, what a. If it's a woman, oh, she's a gold digger. Or if it's a young person, oh, this is probably from,

you know, the daddy's money, like all this stuff. Like, they can go through this very, very quickly, all the negative stuff, right? And then, a small percentage would be, oh, that might be an entrepreneur, right? And then a small percentage would be, oh, that might be an entrepreneur, right? That may be actually a father of three, right? That he's a hardworking entrepreneur. He's been working hard and this is a little treat that he gives for himself and he only drives it, you know, maybe on the weekends. That never comes to mind. It's all the negative that comes to mind.

I would say that negative association with money, consciously or subconsciously, they don't even know it. Yeah. When you resent someone with money or you resent money, why would money come to you? Or people with money. Right. Why would you be surrounded by people who have money

or why would you attract more wealth into your life if you're resenting it, right? Yeah. So that's like even the, so that's the first thing is poor people have negative association with money. The second one is they don't talk about money. Gosh, I say this all the time, man.

Tell me more. Yeah, they avoid conversations. It's like a taboo subject. Oh, why do you talk about money all the time? Like, oh, we don't talk about, it's like we don't talk about that at dinner table. You don't have conversation with your kids about money. You don't have conversation with your kids about money. You don't have conversation with your spouse about money.

It somehow is a bad thing, right? It's like this. And think of money, the best way to describe this is think of money as a person in your life. Treat money as a person. So imagine if you think about... We don't talk about that person.

We don't talk about you. And in fact, I think you're the root of all evil. I think you are greedy. I think you're not that important to me. Do you think this person will stay around? I don't think so. They would be like, I don't want to be around. But money is not that important.

Money doesn't grow on trees. There are other more important things than money. Like all this stuff, right? Then money is not that important. Money doesn't grow on trees. There are other more important things than money. Like all this stuff, right? Then money is not going to stick around. So if you think of it that way. But on the other hand, if you talk about money, you cherish money. Not to be a slave of money.

That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about, hey, you know what? I value you. I value money. I save you. I invest you like you know intelligently right like you would think of it that way then money's like okay you treat me good i'm gonna stay around yeah right you think of like that it's almost like a lover i love you right oh yeah that's good i'm gonna love you back oh i don't like you you know and i'm not going to like you. You know, I'm not going to like your back. So that would be the second one. Okay, and the third?

The third one is, it has to do with value. So poor people want money without delivering more value. Versus you and I, we understand. The marketplace cares about one thing, it cares about value. It doesn't care about our sobbing stories, it doesn't care about our victim mentality, it doesn't care about how hard we work.

It doesn't even care how much experience we have or how many years we're in business. The marketplace doesn't care. The marketplace has no emotion. The marketplace only cares about value and what determines our value is our skill sets. So think about this, where if someone is very motivated, they think positively, but they've got no skill sets to offer to the marketplace,

they're not gonna make money. On the other hand, you've got someone with like, let's say someone comes to you, Lewis, it's like okay attitude, but he's saying that, hey, Lewis, I can help you with a Facebook ad. You can spend a dollar, I can give you $5 back. If he has a skill set like that, you'll be like, okay, I'm gonna give you some money to help me with my ads.

So it's the skill set I think a lot of people are missing. They don't understand that it's the mindset, which is what you teach, combined with your skill set. Then you've got something that works. So I would say those are the key. Those are powerful. I'm curious about, I want to follow up on this. Skill set, there's a lot of people who have all the degrees and credibility in the world but don't have the self-belief. So what is more important?

Skill set, actually being skilled at something. to believe in yourself with the skill set and coupling the two or the ability to package your skills to transfer for money in exchange? Because a lot of people can't position or package and then sell. They might have the skill set, they might have the belief and confidence, but they don't know how to package it to transfer money. Which one of those threes, those three are more important? I would say I used to believe it's the mindset, but now I would say I'm leaning more towards the skill set, and I'll explain why. Because let's say you're a digital marketer.

I'm going to use an example. You're a digital marketer. You don't really believe in yourself, but let's say you know how to close, you know how to communicate your value, and you're good at what you do. Well, and someone comes to you and says, hey, Louis, you're so good at digital marketing, let me give you

$5,000 a month retainer to do my social. Well, that changes your belief system very quickly. Right? So,

I almost like to use that as an environment. It's like, I teach all my students, if you have not made a dollar closing or you have not made a dollar copywriting,

whatever that you do, make the first dollar. Make the first dollar. That's the best feeling, that first dollar, man. That million dollar copywriting. Whatever that you do, you make the first dollar. You make the first dollar. That's the best feeling, that first dollar, man. That first dollar, man. It's like podcast. Oh, you've never made a dollar,

any money from podcast, just make the first dollar. That's the difference, what's the difference between professional and amateur? Professional gets paid. Make your first dollar, now it changes, okay.

Maybe I could do this. Maybe I'm pretty good. Maybe I could get better. Maybe I can do this full time. Maybe I can make a career out of this. It's easier to use the environment to shift our beliefs than try to change it just within ourselves. That's what I believe in. Like our environment is infinitely more powerful than our willpower. Way more powerful. Our environment in what way? If you want to get fit, hang around with people who are fit. You'll eat better, you will want to exercise.

If you don't smoke, you hang around with all your friends that are smokers, guaranteed you will smoke. You don't do drugs, you hang around with people who do drugs, you do drugs. We can't help but influence by the environment. So I say, why not put ourselves in an environment that is supportive of our goals? I'm very, very careful with that.

Very careful. And I say the same thing. This idea of entrepreneurship has been a sexy, you know, word and idea, especially in the last five years with social media

and everyone kind of flashing this lifestyle, Gary V, talking about it a lot and everything. But as you know, it's hard for a lot of entrepreneurs to make a lot of money and sustain it. It's hard to get there, but then it's hard to sustain it for a while. When a pandemic hits or something else, people aren't prepared for that. Do you think it's possible for people who have great skills, who are part of a great team, a great company, that never want to start their own thing and be an entrepreneur, but are valued, are part of a team, are growing with a company, making an impact in this company and the mission that they have? Do you think it's possible for people that aren't entrepreneurs to become wealthy? And if so, what are the strategies they need to be applying right now in order to start having their money work for them as opposed to only working for money?

I love that question. I've never been asked that question and I have a very good answer. One thing I learned from my mentor, he said, Dan, you don't get rich on income, you get rich on equity. You don't get rich on income. So for someone with the skill sets, think about a ship, right? There's only one captain.

We're going from here to there. So you look at Jack Ma who started Alibaba. Yeah, Jack Ma is very successful. Well, but the initial founders, they didn't do too bad either. So you have the people who maybe you are the founding members, the founding team with a startup that is going places

with the right visionary, with the right founder and CEO, which by the way, that's also, I think only certain people fit that profile. That's what I believe in. Okay, that's what I believe in. And I learned that from Through Culture Index, which is like a survey that people take

to see what personality that fits. So only certain people are fit for their CEO profiles. But everybody else, they can still contribute, and if they have equity to participate, they can still do very well financially. In fact, it's like, if naturally they know they're not the CEO personalities and materials, if they just try to be that, it doesn't work anyway.

It just doesn't work. But it doesn't mean they're not valued, yeah. I mean, to me, I play a role in my company because I have certain skillset, right? But I cannot do what I do better than what, you yeah i mean to me i play a role in my company because i have certain skill set right but i cannot do what i do better than what like my team they have certain skills that are way better than me like just this morning we had we had a technical challenge it's like my team could fix i don't know how to handle it i just we're trying to set up zoom before this yeah yeah like i'm like i have

no idea i like i have no i joke aside, I actually don't know how to turn on a camera. There you go. I literally do not know how to turn, I don't know where the button is. You know how to do the iPhone though, so that's easy. That's easy, an iPhone I can handle that, but this, the XD stuff, I cannot handle.

So what I'm saying is, you look at that, that if they participate in a vehicle, in a good market that's growing, trending, and if they could be part of their founding members, they could get equity early on, they could do very well. And what if they can't get equity, or they're not early on, and they join a team after 100 employees, and it's...

And not as good, so it gets the timing of it, right? The timing of it is, you want it to be too early, higher risk, too late, that means you don't get is you want it to be too early, higher risk. Too late, that means you don't get as much upside. And also depends on your skill set, right? What's the skills that you bring to the table? But they could do very well. It's called entrepreneurship, right?

Entrepreneurship, yeah. And what are some things that people could do if they say, oh, that's not me, but I'm making a good salary and I'm going to be making more money. What could I be doing with my money so that it earns me more? What would you suggest? Every one of us needs to be an investor. It doesn't matter how we make the money. I teach a concept called the wealth triangle, right? Which is kind of got three parts. The first part is what I call high income skills. And high incomes, I define high income skills as skills that could make you more than $10,000 a month. Okay?

$10,000 a month. Because I noticed something about human beings. Whenever we get past that six-figure mark annually, something shifts. That I rarely see someone go past six-figure and go back to $50,000 a year. It becomes a new comfort. It's like once you know how to get there, you could stay there. It becomes a very... It's a fascinating thing to see.

So I think that $10,000 a month, $120,000 a year, high income skills. And then the second part is what I call a scalable business. A scalable business. Not just any business, but a business that is scalable.

Such as a software business, an influencer business, or an e-com business. A scalable business. And then you have what I call high return investments. And I define high return investments as investments that would give you a 10% return year in and year out. 10% return or more. So you look at this wealth triangle.

Now here's the thing. If you have high income skills, you're already earning income. Your scalable business gives you profits, and your high return investment builds your net worth. Wealthy people talk about net worth. They don't talk about income. They talk about net worth.

So you look at this, now, let me ask you this question, Lewis, if someone who is like, I'm making $30,000 a year, I want to get into some real estate stuff. You're like, mm. You don't have money to put into it yet. Yeah, do you have high income skills? No.

Do you have a scalable business? No. I want to buy some properties with no money down. Kind of risky. Kind of risky, right? Because if you follow this, the first thing you got to focus on is increase your income, meaning develop skill sets that the marketplace will value.

Do that first. Now, with a scalable business, you can start one, or you can also invest in one. It doesn't always mean you have to start one. So you can invest in one, that throws off profits, and then you've got your high return investments. See, when it comes to high return investments, it's about the preservation of the capital. It's not about getting the maximum return.

We don't need it to get 50%. I just want 10%. Because I'm making money with these two things. Right. You just don't want that sitting in a bank and not making anything. That's right. That's right. That's right. So now that we turn off capital,

off investment, not just on investment, now you're making more income. You're becoming more valuable. Hopefully, your income increases every year. Your profit goes up. You take extra cash. You put in higher return investments. Gives you more peace of mind.

Then you, this is the same wealth triangle goes a million, 10 million, 100 million. It's actually the same. Yeah, then this is the same world triangle goes a million, 10 million, 100 million, exactly the same. Yeah. It's exactly the same. If you're looking at a 21-year-old, 25-year-old who's about to get started in whatever, a job, an entrepreneurship endeavor,

and you're looking at them and you have a 20-minute conversation with them, what would you say is the number one sign that they would be successful? What would they have to embody, talk about, not talk about? In order for you to be like, you know what, this person is in the next two or three years, I want to watch them because it's going to be a trajectory, or at least they're going to be growing in some way. What would be that sign that someone would be successful? Someone who has the obsession to learn.

Because I remember many years ago, I was attending a two-day workshop on digital marketing. At the time, it's funny. Don't laugh at me. But it was a workshop and the instructor was teaching how to do pop-up on a website. We're talking many, many years ago when it was a big thing, adding a pop-up.

And I remember day one he taught us, okay, if you want to get more opt-in subscribers, add a pop-up to your website. And this is how you do it, okay, great. So it's a few hundred of us in the hotel room. So then I went back to the hotel room and I talked to my coding guy, said okay, let's add this piece of code,

we'll capture more opt-in on the website, great. And then we were getting more opt-ins, like just that evening. So day two, the instructor comes back and say, hey, so I taught you how to add opt-in and stuff, how many have you done it? No one. I put up my hand, opt-in and stuff. How many players have you had if you've done it? No one. I put up my hand.

I thought everybody did it. But no one did. And I was like, this is kind of fascinating. And then I share. I said, yeah, it actually works. We added the power yesterday. We get more subscribers. It's awesome.

And that's when I learned something about myself that I'm very eager to learn, I'm very eager to execute. Very eager to execute. If I want to look at someone who's 21 years old, if they, whatever that they, wherever they want to be, if they have that obsession to learn and execute,

the action takers, action takers are money makers, right? That I would say, you could see it in his or her eyes that they are action takers are money makers, right? That I would say, you could see it in his or her eyes that they are action takers. Not like, I'm making excuses. I don't know. I'm not ready.

Timing is not right. I'm not good enough. And no, they just execute. Yeah. I think it's not about being afraid. It's about just being willing to take action even when you don't know what you're doing. I think a lot of people, they don't know what they're doing and it cripples them.

They say, oh, I've got to figure out what to do first and then when I feel comfortable, then I can go do it. But I feel like when you're talking about it, it's like, I didn't know what I was doing. I was just like, I just need to make some money. Let me go figure this out and embarrass myself and make mistakes and make a couple bucks. and embarrass myself and make mistakes and make a couple bucks. I say that you want to act as if all your dreams have come true

and then you challenge your reality to catch up. It's much more powerful when you act as you already did. Think about this. I'm going to ask you this. When you had the idea for the podcast, not the Lewis House today I'm talking about in the beginning, right? Not the followers like for the podcast. Not the Lewis House today I'm talking about in the beginning.

Not the followers like in the beginning. At the time, there's no credibility. You were just getting started. There's no name. It's like you try to get people on the show.

Well, I don't know if I want to be, right? All that stuff. But now people are honored to be like, they would knock on your door and say, hey, Lewis, can I be on your show?

Right. But think about all these years in the very beginning, at least from my observation, correct me if this is wrong. I saw that you were already acting as, Hey, you know what? I'm a brand. I'm going to, my show is going to have tens of millions, hundreds of millions of downloads.

Absolutely. I started investing in my design and my brand to be like, what is the example that I would want to look at if I would book this person, if I would go on their show, if Oprah would call me, if Ellen would call me, what would I need to look like? And Ellen did call you. Exactly, yeah. There you go. What would I need to look like to be a New York Times bestseller before I wrote a New York Times bestseller? What would the branding need to look like? And Alan did call you. Exactly, yeah. It's like, what would I need to look like to be a New York Times bestseller before I wrote a New York Times bestseller?

Like, what would the branding need to be? What would the messaging need to be? What would the results need to be in order to get there? And I just started acting with that vision in mind. And it kind of goes into this, segues into the law of attraction, which I'm curious your thoughts on the law of attraction when it comes to manifesting money, when it comes to manifesting your dreams, manifesting goals,

the dream partner, whatever it may be for someone. In your opinion, how does the law of attraction work and in what way does it work best for? Money, business, health, relationships? What do you feel? I'm a very strong believer in law of attraction. I made a video on YouTube about this as well. But law of attraction, it's basically thoughts of things, right? Everything is energy. And you become what you think about.

Essentially, that's what it means. But that's just one of the laws. You have law of gravity. You have laws of cause and effect. I think whatever we do, we need to learn and understand these other laws exist. Law of action, so it's not just law of attraction. It's like you're trying to do a math equation,

you only know a plus. But there's minus, there's equal sign, there's a lot of things that bracket, there's a lot of things that bracket. There are a lot of things you could use to make an equation work, but that, oh, I only know a plus sign. So when you've got, it's like, when you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Right, and people just utilize that, and they don't look at everything else. So I believe in it, I believe in having the vision board, but also believe in having other things like where you think about even the law of realism, right? Even the law of cause and effect, all these things. So yes, I believe in it, but it's just one, it's like, think of it as like one or 2% of the equation. Yeah. But that's just the rest of the equations. How have you seen it work for your life or business, the law of attraction?

So, perfect example. Many years ago, I had a dream of getting my first, I was young, 20-some-odd years old. One of my dream cars was at the office. A couple years ago? A couple years ago. A couple years ago. Thank you. I appreciate that.

I appreciate that. I hope I stay young then. Like, you know, like that. But what was my dream car? I was driving the Master 3 at the time, the hatchback. My dream was to get a Master RX-8, like the rotary engine. Young guy want to get a sports, my first sports car. So I had that on my vision board.

Like I cut out the poster from an ad and I would look at it every day in front of me. And then what I would do is I would go to dealerships and test drive the car, okay? And I would go to different dealerships because you don't want to go to the same dealership to kick you out, right? So I got to go to different dealerships. And I would drive the car and I would visualize

what is it like to drive the car. So I would visualize I'm in the car. I turn on the ignition. I can hear the engine. I can smell the leather. I know the color of the red, like everything. I know exactly what I want. And I pictured so many times.

And I test drove it so many times. So here's what happens. When I made enough money, I went to the dealership. I said, I want the RX8, these are the features, and these are what I want. And the sales guy was like, well, you know, Mr. Locke, let me take you to a test drive, and I said I don't need that.

Well, let me talk about the features, I don't need that. I don't need any of that. So I said let's do the paperwork. He said it's the fastest clothes he's ever done. He's never sold a car this fast. You knew exactly what you wanted. I know exactly, because I've seen it a gazillion times in my mind. So here's what's fascinating.

I got the key. I did get a bit of work. I drove the car off, picked up the car off the parking lot. They happen to have the model right there. I drove off the parking lot of dealership. And guess how I felt? The exact same you thought beforehand. Calm.

Yeah, the exact same before when you were imagining it in your mind. That's exactly like, it's like in my mind. Like you were supposed to be there. Yeah, it's already in my car. And I was actually months ago talking to my friend when I saw like the RX8 people, like a car drove by, I said, oh that's my car.

And my friend just laughed at me, said that's not your by, I said, oh, that's my car. And my friend just laughed at me. He said, that's not your car, Dan. So I said, that's my car. Like, I'm not lying. It's just in my mind, it's my car. It's done. Like, it's done. It just hasn't got to me yet.

It just hasn't got to me yet. Now I've got the key. I drove it home. I parked it. I didn't feel a thing because it's already done in my mind. Yeah. And that's one example,

but I did it so many times in my life. YouTube channel. When I started my YouTube channel, you know what my wife Jenny said? She said, who's going to watch this? Wow. Seriously,

who's going to watch this? Who wants to watch you? She sees you every day, so she's like, who wants to watch this? She's teasing. She's teasing. You know? And I said, no, you don't understand. I said like, who wants to watch this? She's teasing, she's teasing. You know?

And I said, no, you don't understand. I said, I'm going to build my YouTube channel. Who are, like, no. It's saturated, it's not going to work. Listen to me, I'm going to get my first silver button. 100,000, yeah. 100,000. I cut out the silver thing, right,

put it on my wall vision board. I said, I'm going to get the silver thing, right, put it on my wall vision board, I said I'm gonna get that. And then when I hit it, my wife is like, ah, that's it, man. I'm gonna get to the one million subs. She's like, nah, who's gonna watch this shit? You know? And I had that goal, and the same thing happened.

Again and again and again and again in my life. So now I have the new vision. I want to build a unicorn, right? A tech empire. I do exactly the same thing. I have my vision. I know. And then now I'm attracting the people that can help me do that.

Like now I'm looking at deals. I bought a couple of deals already, like going to that direction. So I act as if I'm already there. Then everything else falls into place. The people, the context, the relationship, the capital. Skills, everything, yeah. They just come. What's the amount of money that maybe it doesn't scare you,

but let's just hypothetically, what's the amount of money that you're like, man, I don't have that yet, but that's a big number that maybe your billionaire friends have or whatever. You're like, gosh, that's a big number, and it's not in my net worth yet, but that's a big number that maybe your billionaire friends have or whatever. You're like, gosh, that's a big number. And it's not in my net worth yet, but what is that number that scares you? A billion. A billion.

What do you think it would take for you to get there in the next three years? It would take me to do something quite very different from what I'm doing now. I remember when I was making six-figure income as a copywriter.

20-some-odd years old. That's good. Six-figure. It's great money. It's good money. I was happy, but then I knew in order to transition to the next level, I had to let go of what I have. What got you here won't get you there. So actually, I fired all my cooperating clients overnight, one night.

That's it, all gone. I'm going to focus on developing my own online business. And I did it probably a few times in my career. Every single time I have to reinvent myself, I have to let go of what works. See, this is what's difficult. You have to let go of what works. So my biggest strength right now, what I have

is my social media presence. That's not going to get me to the B. Really? Nope. Grant's getting pretty close. Yeah, raising capital. It's just like influencer, right? Right, right. I think he raised like 500 million, I think, from his...

That's good. That's a great model. That's a great model, right? And something to Emily, but I'm not doing software, though, right? Right, right. I think he raised like 500 million, I think, from his- That's good. That's a great model. That's a great model, right? And something to Emily, but am I doing software though, right? That's the only difference. Right.

So I know it's not doing this, it's leveraging this could be okay, but I need to change what I do to get to that. You need to let go of something. You can't make YouTube videos all day and expect yourself to get to a billion, unless you're Mr. Beast. Yeah, and then the business cannot be a billion unless you're Mr. Beast.

Yeah, and then the business cannot be just about like just me. It needs to be something else. You got to scale yourself. Yeah. Gosh, isn't that interesting? The thing that like is allowing us to build and generate more wealth and revenue and opportunities is the personal brand. But it's going to have to like separate some or scale around, right? And so it's like this. My biggest strength is,

my biggest skills is my ability to close. But if only I could close and my team can close, I can't scale. Can't do it. So I need to have a closing team. So my biggest strength, once I get to the next stage, becomes my biggest bottleneck.

And the same here. My biggest strength that got me to here will become my biggest bottleneck as well as the next level. So I'm aware of that, and I'm already saying, okay, what do I need to do? What do I need to shift in order to get there? And I'm okay.

I'm totally okay with that. If you had a hypothetical scenario, someone came to you and said, you know, I'm going to, I get a little morbid at times, but I'm going to shoot you in your head and everyone you love and everyone you know that you care about in three years if you don't reach a billion-dollar net worth. What would change your mind now to let go of certain things? What would you do in the moment from now into those three years in order to make sure that happened?

If you had to. Obviously, you can take as long as you want, but if it had to be in three years. I would probably, I'm already doing it, but I would speed up the pace of me letting go of things, the current operation,

with the transition. I would focus 100% on the acquisition investment side because that's the only way to get there from my perspective. Acquisition meaning acquiring software companies that you can then feed? Acquiring companies, yeah, and then put a group

and then you go from there. Interesting. You're already doing it, but you would just if you had a gun to your head, you'd do it faster. I'll do it faster. I would do it faster. Interesting. Yeah. What do you think is your biggest fear over the next 5 to 10 years

as you go for the billion dollar mark and beyond and everything else you want to do? Not so much the fear of business, the fear of like, or like life stuff. I don't think I have a lot of that.

Where I think I also manage the balance quite good. Not a whole lot of fears. Because I'm not attached. It's not like I get in three years, four years, five years. I don't really care about that. It's a challenge, as you know. It's more the, hey, I set the goal.

Can I get there? Who do I have to be to get there? But it's also a little bit like, can I do it? Like, what's my potential? I think I could, but could I do it? It's like YouTube. You know, I think I could hit a million. Could I actually do it?

Okay, I could, but can I get to the next level? It's more like that. Yeah. I think I could hit a million, but actually do it okay. I could, but can I get to the next level? It's more like that. How does someone overcome the identity of imposter syndrome once they've reached the six-figure mark of copywriting? Oh, but how could I get to half a million or a million? I could never do that, or I could never get to 10 million or 100 million or a billion. How do we overcome that identity of imposter syndrome

that so many of us put on ourselves in the transition of life? I'll share with you what works for me. It's interesting because when I was making Six Figure, my mentor Alan, my first mentor, he invited

me to a mastermind group. It was like five, six guys. I was the youngest guy And it was like five, six guys. And I was the youngest guy, like I was young. And all these guys are like millionaires, successful business guys, way older than me. And I felt, you want to talk about imposter syndrome, I felt like, well I don't belong here.

Like I'm young, I'm not experienced, my business is only a few hundred K. Like I shouldn't be here, I shouldn't be here. So I would be like, almost like a mouse. I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't be here. So I would be almost like a mouse. I wouldn't speak. I would just take notes and they would talk and all that. And after a while,

I was like, something clicked in me. I started taking notes. I started hearing the problems. I see how they solve problems. And just one day, it clicked for me. These guys are just like me.

They're not 10 times smarter. They don't work 10 times harder. They're just like me. And when I had that shift, suddenly the imposter syndrome disappears. Now I'm more vocal and I'm sharing. I'm like, oh, Danny's got a good idea. Like I'm sharing.

And they naturally pull me up. They're natural. And now before you know, now looking back, not today, looking back, that mastermind group, the very first mastermind group I belong to, those guys, and we're still friends, by the way, after all these years. We're still good friends.

What they have done in business, now looking back today, right? I'm looking at, okay, wow, like, that to me now is a small business, right? So the same thing here, I'm looking at, okay, wow, that to me now is a small business. So the same thing here, I'm looking at that next level, hang around with people at that level, and something will click for you, it's like, you know what? They're smart, but they're just people.

There's nothing they can do that I cannot do. It's just like you met billionaires, you've met a number of them. What are your thoughts? You see them at first like, oh, maybe they are like super crazy intelligent, right? But after you hang out with them, what are your thoughts?

They all have fears and doubts and a lot of them are much older and so they have a lot more time to be able to get there. And so I'm just like, okay, they've had time to get to where they are. And you always have something that most of them don't, if they're much older than you, and that is you have time. They have more money, you have more time. And from what I've noticed, they almost admire the ability to be kind and curious about their success.

They admire and appreciate the curiosity that someone can bring to them because they want to be able to share their story, their success, their skills. They want to be able to give it back, like you said. So I think when I come from a place of just gratitude and curiosity, I recognize, okay, these are usually older individuals who are 20, 30, 40 years older than me, and they don't have the time. Honestly, I could die tomorrow, but they don't have the youth like I do. And there's a mutual respect in the sense that, okay, I'm hungry.

I'm going after something. They've done it. And as long as I have humility, they usually open up their fears and insecurities just like that I might have. Yes. And do you find that, do they, are they like have three arms and four legs? Do they have 10 times more IQ?

No. They all had challenges and adversity they had to overcome. And they all had to. Usually they do very well in one sector, right? Yeah, absolutely. And they all kind of talk about what you said. They had to let go of something that was working at some point and reinvent to get to the next level. And always be scaling up their thinking, not holding on to old beliefs, but like scaling up to new thoughts, new processes.

And it's always been about a team of people. They never did it alone. Most of them, they had bigger companies with thousands of employees or hundreds of employees to get there. So it's not about... Whereas probably me and you in the beginning in our 20s was all about, how can we develop a skill and do it on our own? And that can only take you to so far. That becomes a bottleneck, right? Exactly, exactly. So it's exactly that. I think that's how we kind of eliminate or cure that imposter syndrome.

When you hang around with people like that, you're, oh, they're just like me. They have the doubts. They have the fears. They have the struggles. Okay, like it's normal. And once we normalize it, then it's like, okay, I could see what are they doing? What are the models? What's their views of the world?

I want to learn that. How they see the world, how they make decisions. And the more we do, then we'll get closer and closer. I got this from when people look at, like let's say in our world, influencer space, right? You have the friends, the colleagues we hang out say in our world, influencer space, right?

You have the friends, the colleagues we hang out with, right? We all know, right? That's who we hang out with. And we've been hanging out in here for a long time, right? When I joined YPO, when I hang around with executive CEOs

of like massive companies, like when I have these two worlds collide, first of all, they don't know each other. In fact, they don't even speak the same language. It's have these two worlds collide, first of all, they don't know each other. In fact, they don't even speak the same language. It's like they're speaking two different languages. And I notice,

this is fascinating. I'm kind of in the middle, like two worlds collide. I see the finance, I see what they do, I see the leadership, the management, I see the marketing,

the creativity, the innovation from here. I see these, I'm like, this is powerful. And I kind of Like I see these, I'm like, this is powerful. And I kind of take both worlds. I'm like, what if this world knows more about this world, which they don't,

and this world knows more about this world, wouldn't that be more effective? And I could see the potential of that, to be able to do that. Taking something, a product, but you infuse it with digital marketing, branding, social media, but you infuse it with digital marketing, branding, social media, how powerful that would be. But they don't talk to each other. So I see an opportunity there. That's how I see it. If I can marry the two and then do something

from there. You've been around a lot of wealthy people. What would you say are the three best habits of wealthy, rich individuals? The myth that wealthy people are greedy. The wealthier they are, almost all of them, almost all of them, they are the happiest, most humble, and kindest people I have met. I've never been by people in this.

I have been a lot by people in like with no money. Right? Like seriously, these guys, they don't need to. So they are like a just, they are nice, they are kind. One of my right hand desk men, he lives in West Bend, which is a very wealthy neighborhood. He was just looking at the houses, and then a guy comes in, he was talking with a guy,

just chit chatting, and the guy invites very wealthy, like we're talking $20 million mentions, right? The guy invites him, hey, let me give you a tour of the house, let me have a drink. It's like, these are good people, it's incredible. And so I think first one is they're actually very humble. They're actually not like, oh, yeah, I know everything. No, they're like, they have this curiosity about them. They want to learn something.

Oh, tell me a little bit more about what you do. Oh, that's interesting. They have this curiosity thing about them. They always want to learn more. Beginner's mind. Beginner's mind. Even they know maybe they're very good

at what they do but they know like, oh, I don't know that. Tell me more about that. How do you do the podcast? How does that work? Like, I remember one time

I had lunch with, dinner, dinner, with someone who has had like 20 exits, 20 exits of company.

Very successful guy, okay? And I was like, oh my God, I'm going to pick his brain. It's going to be great. I learned a lot. You know, Lewis, he joined a meeting, like just you and I. The first thing he pulled out is a notebook.

He wants to ask me how I do things to take notes. I'm like, no wonder he's successful. No wonder he's successful. It's incredible. So humble, curiosity, right? And the second thing is they think big. Yeah. They don't think about measly little problems.

They think about how to solve, like, you solve what? A friend of mine who is the landlord of this building that we're in, he has a company, a public company, that sells solar windows. So you put these windows, like these panels on your windows, it's invisible, but it can capture some of your- Solar invisible window. Yeah, so you can turn it into electricity, right?

So he's working on stuff like that. He wants, yeah, I want to put this in all the buildings in North America. Crazy. You know, they think about stuff like that. He also has a company that's developed, like, skin repair, like, kind of stuff. Like, it's some crazy, crazy things that he's into. And I'm like, I'm not thinking about that.

Yeah, okay. So they think big. They think big, okay. The third best habit. And the third is they always, what you just said, they always put their people first. They never say, I did it. It's my team. It's this.

It's, you know, they're very, very, very, it's one thing I learned from them, and they taught me this. Don't use the word I, just use we. Let's say a certain project went well, it's not my YouTube channel, it's our YouTube channel. But it's not my project, it's our project.

We did it. So from a leadership perspective, I learned to eliminate the word of I did it, it's just we. Even if I finish a speaking gig, we finish a speaking gig. It's not I finish a speaking gig, or I was on. The team is excited, they say, we are going on Lewis Howes podcast. Oh great, oh that was awesome.

The chat is blowing up, right? It's not, oh me, I'm going to Lewis. No, no, it's we. So I think those are the three things. What do you believe is your greatest leadership quality and your weakest leadership quality? My, I'll talk about the weakest first. My weakest leadership quality is I

trust people too much too quick. And that has cost me tens of millions of dollars. No joke, tens of millions of dollars. A lot of the people problems that we have last year, and I'm transparent, like last year, like I lay off a lot of people from the company too, that because I was trusting them, oh yeah, I think they would do a good job and I don't check.

So does that mean like a lack of training or proper onboard training to make sure that everything's up to what you your standard? Not even training. I should have delegated a little bit more systematically, not like, hey, here you go.

There you go. Here's what it is. And I don't go back and check. Check the work. Check the work, the quality control, and see if actually, is it the right person in the right seat? I thought they have a good attitude. That's cool. That's great.

So it's like people say, hire for attitude and train for skills. No, I don't believe in that anymore. I said you better hire for skills. You want someone who's done it, who come in with skills. Because if they come in with no skills, chances are you're paying for their education.

Yeah. So I would, let's say if I want someone to grow my podcast, I want someone who's built, like who's done that. Who's already done it, yeah. Who's already done it. Like, oh, I work with so-and-so,

I work with so-and-so. I grew the podcast to this many million downloads. Okay, you're hired. I would say. The challenge that I've found, correct me if I'm wrong, maybe you found something different. The challenge I've found is when it's almost like you have to hire for skills and attitude because I've had some people come in with great qualifications,

skilled, do an amazing job, but in a sense, not the right culture fit. And pulling some people away from the vision or whatever it may be. So it's like you need both, which is hard to find. Hard to find. Hard to find.

And I don't even want to use the word attitude because it's not exactly accurate. It's the skills that fits the culture. Because when they come in, if they can be molded a bit, then it works. Some people think you cannot

even do that. It just doesn't fit. It's like, it's possible to fit into the culture. I'm not looking for like, fits like a glove they want. Perfect, but it's hey, it's good enough. It's good enough. It's like, you know, get to know us. We work together. You know, we'll get along.

Sure, sure. Okay. Yeah, I would say so. And your greatest quality? I can coach. I am very, in my opinion, I'm good at looking at people's talent and how to bring that out of them. Because I'm a mentor to so many. So I could take someone who's, but I can groom them. So that, and I've done it for so many, so I could take someone who's, but I can groom them. So that, and I've done it for so many,

so I could see, and I could probably see it better than they could see it for themselves. I always have someone, a young guy come in and say, he totally lost, I said, with your talent, your personality, you should focus on copywriting, or you should focus on this. Like, I'm very good with that. I would think that that would be my biggest skill.

How do you think we can develop the skill of self-belief more? I think a lot of people don't accomplish what they want because they doubt themselves so much that they don't take the actions that are required to accomplish what you want. What do you think we can do to build more self-belief and overcome the doubt

that the conversation is in our head? It's the, it's not just self-belief. I think it's self-esteem. And it's not self-confidence. They're two different things. So the self-esteem where most people actually have low self-esteem because of the way that we were brought up, for most of us, right? We don't have high self-esteem.

So, and when we don't have high self-esteem, we go into any scenario, anything that we do, want to start a career in business, we go in with the mindset of, oh, I don't know if it's going to work, maybe it doesn't work. What if it doesn't work?

But then what I'm going to do, right? All these things that's in our head. And personally, I found the best way for me personally, at least to do it, is to get small wins. I need to recondition my mind to believe. I know my mind doesn't believe. It's like my mind is very skeptical. We all have this survival brain, right? The crocodile brain.

It's skeptical. Like, oh, I want to get, you know, I want to make a million. I want to make 10 million. I want to get a to get, I want to make a million, I want to make 10 million, I want to get a million subscribers, I want to get a million downloads, podcasts, whatever it might be, right? Well, if we set that goal, and it's good, but it's like, well, how am I going to get there? Well, let's get your first download.

Let's get your first 10 downloads, your first 100 downloads. Like, I need, it's almost, I need that validations to strengthen my belief. So then I strategically, how can I create those validations to strengthen my belief? So it's like playing a mind game with yourself. It's quite fascinating, right? How do I trick my brain to believe that I can do this? In other words, right? So how can I bench press like, you know, So how can I bench press like 200 pounds, I can't do that. Let's do 50.

Oh now I can do 60. Oh maybe I can do 70, who knows. Oh my friend can do 180, what the hell, maybe I can do 100. It's this kind of tricks that we play and I love to do that because over the years it's worked so well for me. So I want to have those wins. It's not if I cannot bench press 150, I'm a failure.

No, we never stop. And we don't take the time to acknowledge ourselves and say, 50 is good. It's good, right? Good. Give yourself a pen in the back then do a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more. How do you

show up in life without comparing yourself to where everyone else is at? Where your friends are at, your successful entrepreneur friends, or people who are certain, you know, have a six-pack, whatever it is. How do you develop the small wins but not be like, ah, but I'll never be like that, or that person's got so much more money, or whatever? I am very competitive, and this used to bother me a lot. It's like a feel for me.

As an athlete, you get it, right? It's like, yeah, you need almost like a target. You know what I mean? I'm going to beat that. I'm going to be better. And I found that works to a degree as a motivation and your feel.

But it's actually, it's like diesel. It's not very healthy. It works, but it's not very healthy. Versus electricity, right? It'll get you there, but it's not clean. It's not clean. It's not clean energy. It truly is not clean energy.

But it would be, like sometimes, how many of us want to become more successful because we want to prove somebody wrong? Right? That was me my whole childhood. There you go. We want to prove someone wrong. Or we want to show that we're better than you think. Right?

You underestimate me. Or it's like a revenge thing. It's okay. Not a clean energy. It's okay. And I found that it works. It could get you there, but it won't feel good. It won't feel good. And I found that it works. It could get you there, but it won't feel good.

It won't feel good. And it's actually very destructive because you probably self-explode or self-sabotage to a degree. And I found that it works. And then later on, can I be very transparent? Yeah. Okay, I'll be very transparent.

When I set up to do YouTube, I looked at Tai, Tai Lopez, I looked at Grant, I looked at a, Tai Lopez, I looked at Grant, I looked at number of influencers. I said, I want my followers to be bigger than that. For YouTube. At the time, I had like, I don't know, 100,000, whatever. Not as many. I said, I'm gonna bypass that.

I said, I'm gonna bypass GaryVee, I'm gonna bypass this. That was my target. I'm just being very transparent. Yeah. And guess what, now let's say my YouTube bypassed them so freaking what how did it feel

when you passed them with the energy with the not clean energy of you know I felt first of all nobody gives

like dude they don't give a shit I don't really care I don't like I thought I care a lot once it's oh okay like maybe oh we did it okay then what so who cares They don't give a shit. I don't really care. I thought I care a lot. Once it's, oh, okay.

Like, maybe, oh, we did it. Okay, then what? So, who cares? And then I realized, actually, nobody cares. Your customers, your clients don't care. Your competitors probably don't even care. You kind of care a little bit, but by the time you hear that,

you don't really care either. So the whole thing is just kind of a meaningless thing. So once I get down, like, this is just silly. Like, why? Like, why compare? Like, it's great. If anything, I was in Clubhouse, and Grant joined the call.

Some people would say, oh, Grant and I, are we competitors? I don't see that at all. I study Grant's materials, right? I buy the 10X growth recordings. I read his book, I love it. I bought probably, I don't know, 50, 60 copies of his book to give to people.

So I don't see that at all. I admire what is done to accumulate the social capital, convert it into real estate assets. No one's ever done this before. This is brilliant. I can learn something from that. I can learn something, look. I can learn something. Look at what Ty is doing,

what Gary Vee is doing, what all of them are doing. I'm like, I don't see that. And it's like, hey, we all have our own paths and it's not like, it's all ego. You have more subscribers,

you have more downloads. The truth is, your audience doesn't care. No one cares. It's just our own little ego cares a little bit. But when you do hit it, you don't care either. So it doesn't care. No one cares. It's just our own little ego cares a little bit. But when you do hit it, you don't care either. So it doesn't really matter.

Yeah, and when we focus on what I've learned of the hard way, it's when we focus on running our own race and becoming the best version of ourselves and reaching our vision and our potential, we don't have to be constantly saying, well, how do I beat this person or that person? We're just becoming the best version that we can be with our goals. And we will

never be happy because you can always find someone who's higher. Much higher. And there's no finish line either. There's never a finish line. So then it's not healthy. Then we don't enjoy the moment. That's why I say

it's one kind of energy, but it's not very clean. It's not very sustainable. Convert it into electricity. It's better. It's cleaner, and you'll be happier. I learned that the hard way. Truly, I learned that the hard way. Me too, man.

It took me 30. When I turned 30, I realized, wow, I'm doing this the wrong way. I was able to get results and accomplish goals but never felt good inside because I was always doing it to prove people wrong or to compete or to be the best. And the problem is because it works to a degree. It does. It's like this. I know it's not clean energy, but it kind of works.

I'm accomplishing stuff. I'm getting stuff done. But then long term, it doesn't work. It doesn't work. I want to ask you about martial arts. I know it's a big part of your life. Oh, yes. I love that.

What would you say are the three biggest lessons you've learned from your entire martial arts journey, whether it be from your first lesson that you took as a young buck or this morning in the dojo? What's the three greatest lessons that you've learned? I mean, I love martial arts. And a lot of my business philosophies today, I learned it from martial arts.

Bruce Lee, of course, I'm a huge fan of Bruce Lee. I'm a huge fan of Bruce Lee. And I would say the three big things that I've learned, this is going to go deep. Let's see if we're going to go deep. I'll talk about the first one. So in first one, in martial art, in anyone that's learning a style like karate, taekwondo, boxing, whatever it might be,

at first we have to learn what they call the form. You've got to do the form, how you do the forms, how you do a punch properly. And that's great. But then after a while, we have to learn it, master it, and then we have to forget it. Because when you learn it, when you execute, when you're in a sparring, in any kind of scenario, when you're using it, you can't be, oh, he's gonna punch me this way, then I'm gonna do this,

and he's gonna do this, and I'm gonna do this. It doesn't work, it doesn't flow, right? So the first lesson is flow, don't fight. How do we flow with the movement? And you don't come into any scenario predetermined. Oh, you're going to throw a kick, then I'm going to block, and then I'm going to hit this way. It's never going to be like that.

It's just like a business. Oh, what is the blueprint? Well, there's no blueprint. Because it depends on how the marketplace will react to your offer, to what you do, the customer. This is dynamic. By looking for a blueprint, you've already failed. Because by definition, it's about

never ending problem solving. Yeah, adaptability, yeah. Yeah, it's all about solving bigger and bigger and bigger problems, right? It's a blueprint. So I think that would be number two, to flow, don't fight. And the second one is this, I learned from Bruce Lee, I'm gonna say it in his quote,

I'll do my best to rephrase it, he said this, before I learned the art, a punch is just a punch, a kick is just a kick. After I learned the art, a punch is no longer a punch, a kick is no longer a kick. And now I truly understand the art, a punch is still just a punch, a kick is just a kick. a punch is still just a punch, a kick is just a kick.

So, a punch is a punch and a kick is a kick? What did he say at the end? After I truly understand the art, a punch is still just a punch, a kick is still just a kick. Got it. So what he's saying is that in the beginning, when you don't know anything, you learn something, I don't know how to punch, now I know how to punch. And then you learn different ways, oh, I didn't,

like if you don't know anything about a shot, you just, I'm gonna punch like, you know, sucker punch. But now, you put your hand this way, you know how to jab, you know how to uppercut, how to cross, how to hook, you know combination, you know how to bob and weave, you learn how to kick, you know how to do all this stuff. But then once you learn so many things, just like in business, just like in life, you've got so many techniques, but then there's no attributes behind the techniques, right? You and I can throw the same punch, we can throw a jab, Mike Tyson

can throw a jab, well Mike Tyson's jab is a lot more deadly, still a jab, but the power, the speed behind the punch is completely different from all of us, normal people. So what Bruce was saying is, you learn all these techniques, but ultimately, how do you simplify what you do? So knowledge is daily increase, but wisdom is daily decrease. So how do you learn?

You don't know nothing. You learn a lot. And then you narrow down to not knowing a whole lot. And now you know, so from not knowing anything, now I know a hundred things. Now I just need to know these five things that work. Simplify.

Simplify. And simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. That would be the second big lesson I learned in martial arts. It's like now when I close someone, before, many years ago, I would have 50 ways to close a sale. I have now one. One line. What's that line?

What would you like to do next? That's it. So before you learned every strategy and technique. Oh, would you like it do next? That's it. So before you learned every strategy and technique. Oh, would you like it in blue and red, alternative clothes, puppy dog clothes, you name it, right? No, what would you like to do next? It's very simple, very elegant, but then there's the stuff behind the stuff. So that simplicity, I love that. Like you could, on a closing call,

you could take control with just the first line. I'll demonstrate, can I demonstrate? Yeah, please. Yeah, so if you, instead of saying, hey how are you? That's, you know, how are you sir, how are you, you know. I teach, when I teach, when I do this, I said, instead of doing that, a simple line is,

what can I do for you? Now, a very simple line, but that simple line, I can deliver it with different tonality. So let me demonstrate. This is fun, this is gonna be fun. So I'm gonna do it in, I'm gonna do it wrong, then I'm gonna do it the right. Let's do it in different, so first one.

So imagine if you're on the phone, I'm a closer, right? So you just, Louis, tell me like the feeling that you get from like just raw, whatever comes to mind, okay? First one, first one. Hey, what can I do for you?

Desperate. Desperate? Desperate. Excited. Desperate. Passionate. Passionate. Anxious a little bit. Anxious.

Little bit salesman. Yeah, very sleazy. Sleazy, salesy. Little bit salesy, right? Okay. So, second one. What can I do for you? Nervous, scared, unsure, uncertain.

Yeah, not believing yourself. Okay, let's try the third one. What can I do for you? Not credible. Not credible. Not credible. More like, I don't know, happy go lucky. But fake.

A little bit fake, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. A little bit fake. Okay, fourth one. And I'll do the last one. Fourth one. What can I do for you? Not caring.

Not caring. Don't care about the job. Don't want to be here. Don't want to be here, right? Yeah. Okay, last one. What can I do for you? Certain,

clear, calm, trustful, trusting. Yeah. So, it's one line. It's the same punch. It's the attributes behind the punch. So, we're not talking about different closing

lines or scripts or even how you close. I'm just talking just the opening. I have lost or made a sale with just one line. Wow. Right? Just with my tonality. I haven't talked about your needs. I haven't talked about budget.

I haven't talked about anything. If I say, hey, what can I do for you? I've already lost the sale. I don't need to continue 45 minutes for the rest of the I do for you? I've already lost the sale. I don't need to continue 45 minutes for the rest of the call. I've already finished, I've lost the deal. So just that's attributes. One simple line.

So that's where the depth that comes in. It's a jab, but it's a Mike Tyson jab, or just a regular Joe jab. That's the difference. That's powerful, that's a good distinction. Yes. Okay. And then the last one, what would be for, so as Bruce Lee talks about that,

and then I love his philosophy and his very famous, famous quote. He said, be water my friend. Be water my friend. It's about emptying the cup. And we notice in martial art that, and that's why I love Bruce Lee's martial art philosophy. It's the jikendo, that's his martial art style,

means the weight of the intercepting fist. It is not about, hey, you have a Japanese karate style, Korean kicking style, or Thai boxing, or whatever. It is about learning these things, accumulation, and then strip away what doesn't work, what works for you, and then you combine that together. So it's not like I'm a judo guy, I'm a kickboxing guy. No, like I can kickbox, but I can also do judo.

So it's like this, I am not a copywriter. I can do copywriting. I am not a YouTuber, but I know how YouTube works. I'm not a public speaker, but I can speak. So I see those as skill sets. It's not my identity. It's just a skill set that I have. And I can combine all those.

So you see how what I do, like martial arts fits into everything I do. Absolutely. Absolutely. I want to talk about identity for a second because I think this is a topic that can hold a lot of people back or it could propel them forward. How should we be thinking about our identity in terms of the words we use, the attachments we have to a self-identity, the things we do, or how should we be unattaching to identity? What's your philosophy about identity in general? I have an Instagram, one of my most popular Instagram graphics, a cartoon. It's a picture of a person and then with a chain ball in the back, right? And the quote is, most people don't become who they want to become because they're too hurt. You cannot become who you want to become because you're too attached to who you were.

You're too attached to who you were from the past. And I think our identity changes with us. Right? So in the beginning, maybe you see yourself as an athlete. And then you see yourself as an athlete. And then you see yourself as an entrepreneur. And then you see yourself as a podcaster. You see yourself as an influencer, as a celebrity influencer. I think it changes with us.

The key is making sure that the identity actually serves us and is who we want to be. And I like the identity to be just a little bit, a couple steps ahead of who. It should make you feel a little bit uncomfortable. What's your current identity? So you talk about branding or you're talking about my own personal? Personal, business, life.

What would you, how would you identify if I said, hey, who are you? What do you do? What would your identity response be? I love that. I love that. So the branding-wise is king of closing.

That's what closing in person, in print, online, offline. That's what I focus. That's what people like to pitch and hold you. You need to give them something to pitch and hold you. Just like a school of greatness, right? People need to pitch. Once they get to know you, they know your situation much more than that. But they need something to grasp, to latch on to.

In terms of self-identity, it's really the CEO of a tech investment firm. That's how I see my identity. But I know the gap, and I know, okay, what do I need to do to become that? So how I see myself, which is very different from looking at just what I do now. You can see, right? What was the hardest – what was the identity that was the hardest to let go of at a period of your life? Whether it was, I don't know, copywriter to entrepreneur to single to married or no kids to kill like what's been the most challenging thing to let go of identity wise for me it was athlete like that was my whole life and then when

it ended i didn't i was like what do i do with the rest of my life this is my life and now it's gone and i had to learn to let it go and reinvent. I would say it is from... I think it's from a marketer to CEO. That's probably the most difficult. Yeah. Why was that challenging? Because it's like,

this is what I'm good at. This is what I've been doing my whole life. That's why you make your money. Yeah, this is what I make money. This is what I know. Right? And to transition that to being a CEO where you don't, actually you don't want to be

the best marketers for your company. You don't want to be the- It's hard to find a CEO where you don't, actually, you don't want to be the best marketers for your company. You don't want to be the- It's hard to find someone to replace you. Yeah. Like how do I find someone? No one knows it. And especially for us, it's our personal brand. It's even harder. Who knows how to promote Lewis House better than Lewis House? Yeah, it's so hard, man. Right? Like how do you do that? So I think transitioning that, that was the most difficult, but I'm glad I made a transition. But that transition was hard.

And I think I'm still transitioning. Not done yet. Not done yet. But it's better. We'll probably always be marketers in a sense. We'll always be marketing. But maybe we won't always be marketers. Yes, exactly.

It's like we'll always be using marketing to generate leads and sales, to build something that we want to build, whatever it might be. It's our personal brand, tech, software, anything. Yes. It's tough. It's a good distinction. Yeah, that's tough. Because it's such a powerful skill.

And then to transition to leading, to have other people perform those skills that you know maybe for you and i jump in it's easier it's easier it's no i can't do that to scale no man that's a struggle it's how do you remove yourself and empower marketers have an army of marketers an army of marketers and and we in the reality is we could only do so much Like we cannot do create content and then optimize the content and YouTube and Instagram and Clubhouse and pay ads and funnel and

emails and I mean, you know, you name it. Right? It's too much. With 10 new social media apps coming out a year, it's hard to be everywhere. It's too much. And then we don't want to miss out, right? We want to kind of be on it. But then every single one of those things

takes bandwidth like it just takes time and you still need to grow the business and you still need to manage the team and lead people and take care of your health

and you know and you still want to be healthy and take care of your health and exercise and the relationship where you still want to spend time

with your loved ones and your family and it's this it's not easy This is not easy. It's not easy. It's crazy. But I did learn something, though. A few months ago,

I had my friend, Brian Scudamore, from 1-800-GOT-JUNK-CEO. He came to the studio. I asked him this question, and I think you'll love this. I said, Brian, talk to me, man. Talk to me. I want to know, right?

So his company is now doing almost half a billion dollars a year. Half a billion dollars. And I said, tell me the truth. Running a company is half a billion dollars, right? Tell me what's it like? And he said on the interview, he said, Dan, running a $500 million company, it's way easier than a $50 million company.

Really? He said running a $50 million company is way easier than a 50 million dollar company. Really? It's running a 50 million dollar company, it's way easier than a five million. And five million is way easier than 500K. Wow, because you're doing it all on your own at 500K. That's it. I said, no, at first I said, nah, there's no way. It's almost like I don't, I'm a little bit skeptical,

I'm like, I don't believe that. Tell me a little bit more. Show me your schedule. So he showed me his schedule. So go to the office how many days a week? Come on, tell me the truth, man. You sleep in the office? No, I go to the office one day a week.

I said, what? One day a week. What happens the other days? Well, you know, most days he works in Starbucks, right? Starbucks before the COVID. A few hours a day he takes like three days

two to three days off a week he takes a two months off a year I'm like what the heck he said yeah cause

I've got the team I've got the people I've got everything it runs I'm like bingo that that tells me it probably took him decades to train the team and find a team

and build the culture and systems and processes. I mean, that's the work. He would say, Dan, when I was doing a million dollars a year with 100 Got Junk, it's him hauling the trucks and moving junk. He said, now it's like we do a couple million a day. I'm not doing nothing. I don't know. I'm not doing nothing, yeah, yeah. I'm not doing nothing.

I'm not, and he's got a very strong integrator, like very strong, like president running the company. So he's like, he makes all the decisions. He just, he does his visionary work, strategies. So we hang out here for half a day. He talks me to me, and then won't ask me about social media. It just says that's his job. I mean, it's awesome.

I learned from that. I'm like, okay like we that's that's a goal that's a role model so bigger is actually easier they have more time off it's not a hustle hustle hustle kind of thing so that's what i learned i hope that's useful yeah that's good what's a belief and a thought that you have in your mind maybe it's a little thought or a that you have in your mind? Maybe it's a little thought or a little belief. It's not strong all the time, but maybe it's still there, a thought or a belief that holds you back. Again, maybe it's not like constantly in your mind always, but it's there. It's still there.

It still lingers. It still tries to hang out with you. Maybe it's a little bit of the, I'm not ready. Ooh. Yeah, I'm not ready. Not the, I'm not good enough. I handled that a long time ago. It's, I'm not ready.

Like, am I ready? Right now, we're looking at a tech deal, right? It's pretty sizable. I'm not ready. Like, am I ready? Right now, we're looking at a tech deal. It's pretty sizable. I'm like, we could pull the trigger, but am I ready to run that? Because it's a tech, it's got a CTO. Am I ready for that, to make that leap? It's like, that would be the big one.

I think that one is the one that's holding me back. Otherwise, I would have gone faster. When do you think you'll know you're ready? And when should people know when they're ready for anything in their life? I don't think we'll be ready. One thing that I do say that my mentor taught me is that then you'll never be ready. You just need to be comfortable. you just need to be comfortable. You just need to be comfortable enough to make the decision to pull the trigger.

So I'm looking and I'm like, I don't think I'll be ready until I'm in it. Just like, you won't know you can have a podcast with so many listeners until you kind of do it. Until you first show your 10th episode to 100th episode, right? Then it's like, oh, I can do this. It's that.

It's like now we are setting up on the investment side, like raising capital. Am I ready for that? How would the world perceive that? What would that look like? Now you're dealing with regulations and all that stuff, it comes with it, right? Am I ready for that? I have that. I think that would be the one that's holding me back. And when you have a negative thought in your mind, whether it's that or just a limiting thought, maybe it's not negative, but it's a limiting thought. How do you let it

go? How do you not let it consume your mind and really hold you back in that moment or in your life? Go back to, I need the validations from the environment. So then when I feel that little bit of, oh, am I ready?

So then I would call the people, like my mentors and all that, they have colleagues, advisors, they have done it. And they would be like, ooh, am I ready? So then I would call the people, like my mentors and all that, they have colleagues, advisors, they have done it, and they would be like, okay, why do you think you're not ready? Well, you know, I'm not so sure about this, what about this piece is going to run this, with the product after I buy it,

would it tank, what if it's, I don't know, if it is some technological stuff that I'm not aware of, I mean, that would be a big problem. Well, just have a CTO do the due diligence, that they would kind of bear left brain and say, do this, do this, and this. Are you okay?

Are you comfortable with it? I'll be more comfortable, right? Well, what if you do the deal in a way that you do some down payment, but then you do an earn out, so you know the guy will stay for at least a year, year and a half. Would that give you more comfort? I said, yeah, that would give me more comfort. So they would teach me how to use techniques and business acumen to make me more comfortable, right? Yeah. So it's that kind of thing, which I may, may not be aware of, or even I know, but then they would tell me, maybe you never thought about it in this way. Yeah. And

that helps a lot. So that's how I need to do it. Like I'm not a guy that sits and then suddenly from not knowing or from no belief to belief, I need those micro things that move me forward. It's as little as, I know it sounds so silly, like I talk about the investment fund.

It's as little as, let me talk to a lawyer and start the paperwork. Like, it's that. It's just doing it. Yeah, let me do the first step, right? Forget getting all registered. Let me just do the paperwork first, the first step of paperwork.

Let's do a name search of the fund. You know what I mean? Like, little things. Let me talk to someone who's running a fund that's this size. What's that like? Like, that little thing. I need to do those little things. Let me talk to someone who's running as fund as this size. What's that like? Like that little thing. I need to do those little things for myself. So small wins.

Small wins. Just small. Come back to small wins. I could do that. I won't hesitate to do that. And it's no big risk. Right. Let me buy the domain name.

Let me get the Instagram handle. Let me get a logo going. Let me get a logo going. Yeah, exactly. It's that. It's that. I'm curious. I know it sounds silly. I know it's that. It's that. I'm curious. I know it sounds silly.

I know it sounds silly. It works, though. It works, yes. I'm curious. Who was the most important figure in your life growing up, and what was the greatest lesson that they taught you? My mom. It would be my mom.

There's no comparison. No comparison. Just because my mom, single mom, really being here sacrificed so much, raising a kid who I was very rebellious, right? And being entrepreneurial, not wanting to go to school, not doing well in school and say, I'm gonna be entrepreneur, I'm gonna do this.

And my mom is the furthest, like my personality and my mom is like the opposite. She cannot believe I'm doing what I'm doing. And she's, cause she's an introvert, very kind, humble, but that,

that would be the, from a personal perspective, you're talking about from a business perspective, like business figure, Jack Ma. It would be Jack Ma. One of my dreams, someday I can interview him.

Have you met him? No, I have not. I have not. He would be on top of my list. He seems very inspiring. Some of the videos I've seen of him, he seems a wise human being. Yes.

So what was the greatest lesson your mom taught you then? My mom, my mom is someone that has no enemies in life. Like she is, like she would go to like buy groceries and she would get to be friends with everybody. Everybody, her name is May,

like English. May, everybody would know her. Everybody likes everybody. Everybody. See, her name is May. Like, English. May. Everybody would know her. Everybody likes her. And, like, it's, there's something about that. And she has very life, like, long-term, long-term friends and relationships. I'm like, yeah, that inspires me. Because sometimes in business, we're so focused on, hey, goals and all these, you know, things

we want to accomplish and goals and all these things we're going to accomplish and big things and build things. We're like, maybe we don't take the time to nurture the relationships. I'm guilty of that. I'm guilty of that just as everybody else. And I think that I could do better in that. That she would be my role model. And what's your advice for people that want to make money and want to build their business but also have an intimate relationship, whether it's be married or not be married but be with a partner and thrive in life?

What are some of the questions you should ask before getting in an intimate relationship in order to know if your financial success will happen or not? That's why you're the best. You ask the best questions. Seriously. Seriously. You will only be as successful as your spouse allows you to be.

Ooh. Tell me more. So if you are an entrepreneur, you better have that conversation day one. You better not sugarcoat it. You better not. So one thing, when I met my wife, Jenny, so many years ago, we're now together 13 years.

First month when we were dating, I said, Jenny, I'm an entrepreneur. I'm kind of a workaholic. I'm not a typical boyfriend. Like, a lot of stuff that you think a boyfriend would do, I just won't do, or I don't have time to do. This is my dream, this is my goal. I laid it all out, like in a dinner table.

But I said, what's your goal? What are your dreams? And at the time she told me I wanted to go to Disney, I made a whole list. I said, baby, these are all your dreams. I promise you I'm going to make all of them come true. That's my close. Every single one.

Take care of your dad, take care of your family. I'm going to do all that for you. But at the same time knowing a lot of stuff I cannot do or I'm not good with that. Are you okay with that? I'm not a typical boyfriend or husband. And Jenny did a little, just a couple months ago at a virtual event we did for my students. She was roasting me in a funny way.

She's like, yeah, I'm like not romantic. I forget her birthday. I forget the anniversary. Like it says like that kind of stuff, but it's better to communicate that up front because you cannot have a spouse that is not 100% on board. They would destroy your progress.

You would self-sabotage. Imagine you're doing your thing. Hey, I'm growing a business. I'm building something. Well, you don't care. How come you don't spend as much time with me? How come you're on the computer all the time?

Or how come, it just doesn't work. Why do we need so much? Imagine you have a spouse, say, oh Louis it's okay, you already have a lot down on your system, you don't need to grow, it's okay, I'm happy. I don't need more, don't get more from me. You're like, that's not helping. That's not helping me, honey.

This is not helping at all. Like, I'm going through a lot of shit. Don't be telling me that. It doesn't help me, right? So if the spouse is not 100% on board, it's just not going to work. This is hard. This is hard.

This is not a 9 to 5. This is hard, man. This. This is not a 9-to-5. This is hard, man. This is not 9-to-5 of, oh, we get off work Friday, let's have a drink, and Saturday, I don't even think about what I do. No. What's a weekend? Yeah, like 24-7, man. It's 20...

Is it Sunday? Is it Monday? Who cares? I don't know what days are... Yeah. Who cares? The marketplace doesn't what days are, yeah. Who cares? Like, no one, the marketplace doesn't care. So, the spouse, be upfront, tell them, better than sugar-coated, and then later on,

they find out their expectations are not the same. And if you, and if you want a lot of money, like, I mean, you want to have wealth, and your spouse has negative association with money,

or they don't like money, or they don't want a lot of money, you've got a problem. You will have a big problem because this would, I've seen it again and again. What are a couple of questions you should ask the other person when you're, you know, getting ready for commitment and whether it be together as a boyfriend, girlfriend,

or just marriage, what are two or three questions you should ask to make sure you know financially this is the right thing? I don't know what is the perfect question. Here's what I asked. Yeah. Just what I asked. I said, what's your ideal life? What would the ideal life look like? And if she said, my ideal life is my husband being home half the time and being around and, you know, coming back at four o'clock every day a little early.

And I want you to disconnect and just spend time with the kids and don't, okay, that's not going to work. Yeah. It's not going to work, right? I also ask, what's your ideal, like, husband? Like, what would you expect from a perfect ideal husband, right? All that. And then I also ask her, what's your ideal husband? What would you expect from a perfect ideal husband?

All that. And then I also ask her, what's your, we call that your landmine. What's something that I won't go there and I won't touch? And she knows mine and I know Jenny's and that's why we never go there. Like there's certain things where you will never say that and she'll tell me, never say that to me.

You go there, we're done. It's gonna be bad. So I never say certain things. Ever. We can be arguing, we could be, you just never go there. And that's why we don't argue. That's the minefield, that's my life,

we don't touch it. We just don't go. Like example, I know a friend of mine, his thing is with a spouse, he hates when the spouse walks away. Like a woman's like, I don't want to argue, I just, I don't want to talk. His thing is like, when that happens, he just, he flips.

Explodes, yeah. He just explodes. But she just doesn't want to be, she just wants some distance, but he just explodes. So when they communicate, it's like, don't ever do that. Then she doesn't do it, and they're okay.

What's the thing you appreciate about her the most in your life? Being such a supportive wife, because I am, to me, I'm not a good husband, as far as I'm concerned, quite frankly. Like, it's just,

Valentine's Day. Recently, yeah. Nothing. No flowers, nothing. I don't, it's, we were driving. It's like, oh, I see flowers. What's it? Oh, is it?

Oh, February 24th? Oh, happy Valentine's Day. Oh, happy, okay. Like, she doesn't get mad. She's like, Oh, happy, okay. Like, she doesn't get mad. She's like, like that to me, it's, I really appreciate it. I'm just not good with those things. It's not, but our relationship is great

because she understands. Like, I will show my love and care in a different way. In a different way. Not the, because my mind is occupied so much with other things that I just, I don't spend time with, I don't spend time

thinking about those things. But that's, I think, one thing I've, and we actually, we work in a business together. So we're 24-7 together all the time.

So we see each other, we live together, we work together 24-7 for like, I don't know, how many years now, right? And we don't, we're good.

Like, we don't get tired of each other. That's good. You know, so that's, I'm grateful. You're both aligned. You're both aligned with the expectations. Yeah, yeah. Like, I don't need to, oh, I need to get away from my spouse. I need to get away from, like, we don't have that.

And when do you feel the most loved in your life? When, because, you know, the five love language, you know, the affirmations. Gifts. Touch. Yeah, service. So service, mind and service. Mind and service, active service. So that's when I feel most loved.

So when she's supportive, when she's helping me and that, then I feel her love. In the last year through, it's really been a year now since the pandemic started, when was your heart the biggest? When did you feel the most

warmth, the most love, the most intensity of your heart expanding the most? When it would be when I made a decision to let go of some of the people on the team and the existing

team members was very supportive because I thought it would disrupt the company a lot. You think about like the morale, the spirit, what that is like. We're talking maybe 40% of people. Well, let them go.

Yeah, that's a big cut. And to be able to do that, and then finding the team actually more united, better connection, happier, and just like, that warms me up. It's incredible. Because with what we do, I spend more time with my team than with my family,

because in business all the time. So we're very close, and to be able to see that, and they, because they could easily be, oh yeah, now I'm just, I'm not demotivated, I'm this, and they could go very wrong, right? But not one person, I mean, not one person did that. That was just incredible. That motivates me even more and say okay, we gotta grow.

Because I could grow so I could be able to reward them even better. And what's one thing that you're proud of that most people don't know about you? Maybe it's not public information or it's not talked about that much. One thing I'm most proud of, that most people don't know about you? Maybe it's not public information or it's not talked about that much. One thing I'm most proud of.

I'm trying to think. It's not in your bio. It's not in your about me page. I think some people know this, but the proudest moment would be, I share with you at 17, my mom and dad got divorced. At 16, and then my dad went bankrupt at 17.

So he stopped sending us money at 17 years old, when I was 17. My mom has never worked a day in her life, so we were living off of whatever little savings that we had, and that's how I got into business, because I wanted to make money, right? And I had a lot of resentment towards my dad at that time. Actually, I didn't talk to him for a few years.

I didn't even talk to him. He would send me faxes, fax machine, and I'd never reply. Because I was pissed off, basically. Why did you, why you divorced my mom and you don't send us money? What's wrong with you, right? Right?

At the time, I didn't know what he was going through. Now I know him, but at the time, I was very, I was 17 years old. Sure.

Teenager, right? And afterwards, I talked to my dad again and many years later, and I was making more money. So there was, this, we're talking many,

many years later. I'm like, way 10 years later, more than that. And I was making more money. So there was this, we're talking many, many years later. I'm like way 10 years later, more than that. And I know my dad was struggling financially. So I was in Hong Kong. I remember I took him. So now we're okay. Like we, he saw me, he was like hugging me, kissing me.

And by the way, my dad never kissed and hug anybody. Like he's kind of an Asian father. Like, yeah, like, but he was hugging me, kissing me, crying. I'm like, what the hell is going on? Was that the first time you'd seen him in a long time? Many, many years. His hair is great. It's many, many years.

And I took him to Hong Kong. We were walking. And I said, hey, I said, dad, you see that window there? I said, yeah. I said, there's that window there. I said, you, I mean, you see that window there? I said, yeah, yeah. I said, is that window there? I said, you see that right there? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. And I pulled out a set of keys from my pocket.

I said, Dad, that's your unit. Wow. I put it on his hands. And I never forget the look. The first person was shocked, but he was like just speechless. Wow. Because think about that. He wasn't supporting me. You know, he made some mistakes. And now going back now, it's like to him, I'm guessing, but it's like, to him, I'm guessing, but it's like, don't worry, your son is fine.

I take care of mom, I take care of you, don't worry. And then my dad, all he did, I still remember, he was right here, he put his hand on my shoulders, right? He was on my shoulders like this. He's looking at me, he's like, let's get lunch. That's all I need is here. And there was, and a few years later, then, you know, fortunately he passed away. But that was a very special moment that we had. I'll never forget that.

That was the proudest thing, more than anything I've ever done. Any, doesn't matter, none of that. That, that was. That's beautiful. That's beautiful. You gave me chills just hearing that. That's beautiful. That's beautiful. You gave me chills just hearing that. That's beautiful, man. What's the one thing or one question you wish more people would ask you that they don't ask you?

It's not so much a question, I'm trying to think. I would wish more people would get to know me more is... how should I describe that? It makes me reflect, that's why I'm taking the time. It's the... I wish people would see beyond and actually get to know me more. It doesn't matter if the content, doesn't matter what it is. I don't know what is the question, but I wish more people would know that. What do you wish people would get to know more about you

beyond what they see online? That I'm a teacher at heart that I'm a teacher at heart that's my passion and we talk about this is accomplishment but I think at the end of the day I'm a teacher at heart that's my passion and that's what I want to do that's my purpose right

doesn't matter how big my company gets I still want to allocate part of my time teaching. That would be it. And if they would be, if they need help and they're willing to learn, I just, I wish they could see that. Doesn't matter if it's closing and skills, doesn't matter, but there's something,

because I could see what I've done for so many, there's something that I saw, maybe something I could do, I don't see a lot of people could do, that's a little bit different. That's a little bit different. A lot of my students, they call me Sifu, because Sifu is like sensei in Japanese martial art. Sifu is like the mentor in martial art term, right?

In Asian martial art. So they all call me Sifu, so it's like mentor. And I take that word very seriously. So I wish more people could see that. Yeah, that's cool. Well, I'm learning a lot from you, man. I appreciate you sharing, and I've got a lot to learn from you for many, many years. So I'll be learning whenever you share. I'm learning from you, man.

It's mentor learning from mentor. Of course, man. Yeah, and hopefully we can hang more soon in person and uh can pick your brain more um just a couple questions left for you uh before i before i ask them i want to make sure people check you out on social media i mean you're everywhere millions and millions of followers dan lock uh or dan lock official on different platforms uh youtube millions of followers instagram facebook all that So I want people to follow you. You also have a – what is it?

The smartchallenge.com. Create your personalized roadmap to an unbreakable business in five days or less. I'm assuming it's a free challenge that people can go through for five days. Do you want to share more? So the smartchallenge, we do this live. We just finished one. We do this maybe two to three times a year, which is a five-day. I take them through everything, kind of what I am doing to be more recession-proof and pandemic-proof.

Because it's one thing to be recession-proof. It's a whole other thing to be pandemic-proof. So I walk through the business model, how I do social media. Basically, it's this. In the five days, I teach, how do you use social media combined with a scalable business model, and how do you scale with a remote team? That's what that five days is about, right?

I love it. And it's like, I think it's 40, 50 bucks for the challenge. So not free challenge, but 50 bucks to get it live. And every single time we do it, we get a huge, huge response. Awesome. Just love it.

There you go. TheSmartChallenge.com for that, to help you for your business in the future and now in recession or pandemic or any time, to really just become more bulletproof really as a business. And how else can we support you before I ask the final two questions? I would say is if there's anyone listening to this, if they're entrepreneurs, if they're in a tech space, if they're looking for capital and looking for partners,

that's what we're growing. That's the space that we're in. So if they're software founders, if they feel that there's some synergy, just contact us. I'd love to hear from them. Yeah, and do you know Dan Martell? Yes. He's in the SaaS world. I'm not sure if that's

part of the tech SaaS world you're looking at or more tech. It is. It is. Dan actually coaches me on two of my SaaS. Oh, there you go. He's a smart guy. Yes. But if you're in the tech world, reach out to you. Dan actually coaches me on two of my stats. Oh, there you go. He's a smart guy. Yes. But if you're in the tech world, reach out to you.

So I'll have people do that for sure. Okay, this is a question I ask everyone at the end. It's called the three truths. So I'd like you to imagine a hypothetical situation that it's your last day on Earth many, many years away. You get to live as long as you want, but eventually you've got to turn the lights off, Dan. And you have created and accomplished everything. Business, relationships, life, everything you've ever want to put out and make, it's happened. But for whatever reason, hypothetically, you've got to take it all with you to the next place.

You've got to take this interview, your books, your content, your courses, the businesses, they go with you. So no one has access to this information anymore or any of your written word or audio or video. But you get a piece of paper and a pen. You get to write down on the last day of the three biggest lessons that you would share with the world or what I like to call three truths. What would you say would be those if you could only share three things?

Wow, that's a deep one. Wow. It makes me reflect my whole life. My mind is like spinning. Yeah. Wow. That's a good question. I got to learn from that.

That's such a good question. As an interviewer, holy shit. So I can only write down a piece of paper to communicate to the next life. To the world. This is all they would have left reminded by you as you're a teacher at heart. So what would the next to the world this is all they would have left to remind it by you as your teacher at heart

so what would you share with the world these three truths three lessons and this is it they don't get anything else okay so the first one would be the first one would be, the first one would be, you are not your business. I would say you are not your business.

Okay, that's the first one. What does that mean? Okay, that's the first one. What does that mean? Meaning that business is an entity that gets you from point A to point B. It shouldn't be too attached to it. You build it, you leverage it, you work within it, but it's not you. You're not your business.

Okay, that's number one. Number two? You're not your business. Okay. That's number one. Number two? You're not your business. Seek fulfillment, not accomplishment. Because that would be the biggest mistake that I made. Already probably in the first 30 years, like when I hit 30 years old. Yeah. Seek fulfillment, not achievement. Yeah.

The third? And the third would be act as if there's no limit to your abilities. Act as if there's no limit to your abilities. That's what I could come up with today, but maybe when I'm 10 years older, it's something different. But my current state of mind. Of course.

Of course. Those are powerful, man. I appreciate that. Well, Dan, I want to acknowledge you for a moment because it's been fun to watch your journey over the years continue to evolve and transition in your identity and reinvent and serve people. Obviously, you're a successful business leader,

but you're in service of helping others in your business, which I think is the greatest business to have is when you're helping people, teaching people, giving them tools, skills to improve the quality of their life. And I want to acknowledge you for being a renaissance man. I love meeting people that are interested in other things than just the main thing. You're interested in martial arts. You're interested in other areas of life. And I appreciate the qualities of learning different disciplines and acknowledge you for being a master than more than one thing and focusing than more than just business and money. And also for your joy. I think when we think of business leaders at times, we can think of these joyless, driven to succeed, money hungry types. Yeah, yeah. Corporate leaders

with no soul. But we've connected a few times in person and obviously online and you bring joy. And even with the suit buttoned up and clean and sharp looking, you can still bring the joy and the humor and the inner child out, which I really appreciate and acknowledge. So I want to share that with you and acknowledge you. And my final- Can I just say that, Luis? Sure. I also want to say that you are an inspiration to me.

You may or may not know, but even so many years ago, I listened to your podcast. You inspire me. It's this vice versa, the respect, seeing you grow, seeing... I think I would resonate and understand you more because I could see what you've gone through, the brand, and the identity, and everything

that you've gone through. This is not because I'm on your show. I'm just saying I just want to acknowledge that, like to be able to do that. I don't know how many athletes want to transition to entrepreneurs and do it well. Very few. I appreciate it, man.

Thank you. So I just want to say. I appreciate it, man. Brings the greatness within me as well. So you inspire me. Of course, man. Well, I'm excited to do more stuff together and continue building the friendship, man. I'm appreciative. Final question. What's your

definition of greatness? To become more than you thought you could be. There it is. Dan Locke, my man. Thank you so much for being here. Appreciate it, brother. Love you too, man. My friend, thank you so much for being here. Appreciate it, brother. Love you too, man. My friend, thank you so much for being here, for listening to this episode, for gaining value. I hope you enjoyed this. I hope it was powerful for you and your life right now. Is there one thing that you found interesting

that you could apply, that you could use to improve the quality of your life? If so, start taking action on that right now and post a review over on Apple Podcast. Let me know what part of this episode was the most valuable for you. Post a rating and review on Apple Podcast and click the subscribe button right now to stay up to date for the latest and greatest on the School of Greatness with some of the world's most fascinating human beings to help you unlock your inner greatness. As well, if you want to get on my secret texting list, my community

of people that are getting updates, weekly inspirational messages, motivation, and behind the scenes content, then text the word podcast right now to 614-350-3960 to get on my community texting list. And I want to leave you with this quote from Ellen DeGeneres, who says, I say always follow your passion no matter what, because even if it's not the same financial success, it'll lead you to the money that'll make you the happiest. It's always fun when you can make money doing something you love. And typically when you love something and have passion and enthusiasm for it, you find ways to add more value to that thing. And ultimately, you'll end up making more money down the road. I want to remind you today, if no one's told you lately,

that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great.