We Study Billionaires - The Investor’s Podcast Network - TIP192: NBA Owner Lives w/ Monks, Jesse Itzler (Business Podcast)

Starting point is 00:00:00 You're listening to TIP. On today's show, we bring back one of our favorite guests, Mr. Jesse Itzler. Jesse is an owner of the Atlanta Hawks basketball team and he's a highly successful entrepreneur across numerous ventures. For example, he created a highly successful jet card company called Marquis Jet, which was later sold the Warren Buffett's Net Jets. He's part founder of the Zico Coconut Water Company, and he's also the founder of the 29029 Mountain Climbing Challenge.

Starting point is 00:00:27 When we first had Jesse on the show, he had written a book called Liffett's NetJets. Living with a seal. And in this book, he talks about testing all of his physical limits by hiring a Navy seal to live with him for 31 days. This time around, we bring Jesse back on the show to talk about his newest book, Living with the Monks. He learns what turning off his phone and living in deafening quiet taught him about happiness, gratitude, and focus. So without further delay, we bring you the funny and ultra-inspiring Jesse Itzler. You are listening to The Investors Podcast, where we study the financial markets and read the books that influence self-made billionaires the most. We keep you informed and prepared for the unexpected.

Starting point is 00:01:20 All right. So here we are with our good friend, Jesse Itzler. Jesse, so awesome to have you back on the show. Thanks for taking time out of your day to be with us. This is the perfect way to spend my day. Thanks for having me. Stig. This was like insane, right? This book was really a lot of fun. After reading about Jesse and like then interviewing him and kind of feel that that dude can't surprise you anymore. He writes this book and you're like, huh, I really didn't see that one coming. I mean, hey, what comes? Well, Jesse, I saw the title of the book, you know, living with a monk. And when I saw the title, I immediately shot Mark a message and I said, Jesse has got to come back on the show.

Starting point is 00:02:06 I've got to get a copy of this book because I really, really want to read this thing because I know this is just going to be awesome. And so we really appreciate your whole team of folks and Mark helping us out getting the book in our hands and doing this interview with us, Jesse. This is just awesome. So let's go ahead and start asking you some of these questions here. So what in the world was your initial motivation to do this? Like, where did the idea come from? Talk to us about, like, your conversation with Sarah or family members or whatever. Like, what in the world made you think to do this?

Starting point is 00:02:40 Well, you know, I did the physical side with seal and living with the seal. And I got so much out of it. I realized that I learned much better through experience than I do through reading. I have a hard time comprehending. And I'll read a whole book and be like, who was the author? or what was the name of the book. But I got so much out of it physically. With Seal, I wanted to explore the spiritual side.

Starting point is 00:03:04 You know, I just realized that, like, I woke up. I'm turning 50 in a couple of months. And the last decade went by, like, in a flash, literally. And as you get older, there's a percentage of your life. Time just flies so much quicker. And my whole thing, Preston's dig, you know, a big part of me is about building my life resume and just not looking at time, but looking at moments.

Starting point is 00:03:29 And I decided that I just wanted to get, you know, this should be an unbelievable experience. I can explore the spiritual side, learn about myself, but really just get away from my phone. I just felt like really overwhelmed like we all do. And, you know, I wasn't going to go take a vacation and sit on a beach. I've done that 9,000 times and come home and nothing's really changed. I'm relaxed for an hour.

Starting point is 00:03:51 So I just said, where are the spiritual masters? And I said, I'm going to go a little bit of the monks. So you do such a awesome job. I'll tell you, having read, I feel like quite a few books, you are great at putting the person in the moment. And so like when I read the story when you arrived with the monks and you show up and just the silence, you talk about it. Explain like what was it like when you showed up because it was nothing what you expected. Well, first of all, I was with eight monks that had been on the property. Four of them have been on the property for 50 years.

Starting point is 00:04:29 And they lived on a 500-acre wooded, isolated monastery. And intentionally, I didn't do any research really into where I was going. I don't want to have any preconceived notions. I don't want to read any blogs or have anyone else put their experience into my head. So the only experience I had with monks was really through watching movies. or any kind of articles or stories I'd heard. So I thought monastery equaled, you know, 160 to 100 people on a property,

Starting point is 00:05:00 walking around in sandals and just silence and meditating all day. And it was nothing like that, at least the monastery I went to. There were eight gentlemen, eight monks. They weren't Buddhist. They were Russian Orthodox. They had their hair. And a big part of their day was built around manual labor

Starting point is 00:05:19 and keeping the lights on at the monastery. and spirituality and reflection was a big part of it, but it wasn't the only part of it by any means. And it was quiet, man. I have four kids, and I live in a world of ding beeps and buzzes on my phone and Skype and this and that. And it's just a really fast-paced life like most of us live.

Starting point is 00:05:41 And this was the exact opposite. Time stopped. And it was really, really quiet and really slow. And when you have no access, despite the urge to check your phone, you know, check the news, you know, listen to the radio, turn on one of the 10,000 options on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, all that stuff, when you lose the ability to do that and you're forced to just be alone, a lot of amazing things happen. I went in there with the attitude of like, well, how can I apply some of the principles of this 1500-year tradition? of monasticism of what the monks do and live their life. How can I apply that to my modern life? You know, like, what are the takeaways? And one of the things right away was like, I realized recently before I went to the monastery, I lost my superpower. And my superpower

Starting point is 00:06:37 was being in touch with my gut. I've operated on instinct around people, business, everything off of pretty much gut. I guess that's what happens when you don't break a thousand on your SATs. You got to rely on like your gut. And all of a sudden, I wasn't making the same good decisions, not like terrible decisions, like, you know, but just decisions in the past that had guided me in the right direction and be like, you know, not that I got lucky or luck found me. I put myself in those positions to get lucky by following my instinct. But I was so bombarded with like responding to people and like it was dominating my time that I lost that instinct. And I believe the only way to really get in tune with your gut is to be alone and to think and to free up mental energy.

Starting point is 00:07:26 And at first, I was bombarded with thoughts because there was nothing to do but think. But afterwards, you know, some really, really powerful things happen. Jesse, you mentioned the idea of time kind of standing still and I noticed that this was a really common theme throughout the book. Talk to us about this idea because I found this really profound and kind of, of really important to the underlying point that you're making in the book. Yeah, well, when we think of relationships, we think of relationships in terms of people, like, oh, my relationship with my mom or dad, or my wife, or my kids, or we think of relationships, you know, really in that way as it relates to our human relationships.

Starting point is 00:08:06 But very often, we never really think of our relationship with time or our relationship with money. And those are two big things in everybody's lives. And my relationship with time, I'm very aware of my relationship with time, especially as I turn 50. And it's not a mid-age crisis or anything like that. It's just, I'm just aware that the average American lives to be 78 years old. That's a fact. And I'm turning 50. So I hope I'm not average.

Starting point is 00:08:34 But if I am, I have 28 summers left. You know, I just climb out Washington. I told you guys that story. There were no 70-year-old guys on the mountain. And I just ran this crazy race. And there were no 70-year-old guys in the race. And when I think about it that way, well, then, yeah, from 70 to 78, 70 to 80, you can't probably do what you can do in your 40s and 50s.

Starting point is 00:08:58 And so if you look at it that way, well, then I really only have 15 or 20 really relevant or prime years or quality years in the sense of doing the things I want to do. I sleep a third of them. and a lot of my weekends are taken up with responsibilities. And when you think backwards, you realize that, like, wow, my window is shrinking fast. And even in your 30s and 40s, like, that's why you wake up. You know, if I were to say to you guys sit and press the men, what did you guys do April 18th? You're like, I don't know.

Starting point is 00:09:32 Exactly. That was six days ago. You're going so fast you can't remember how long, you know, one thing that I realized for myself is like my parents are 80. They're older and they live in Florida. Most people don't live that close to their parents. Do you live close to your parents, Preston? No, they're in Florida. How old are they?

Starting point is 00:09:51 Around 60. And how often, how many times a year do you see them? Once or twice a year. Okay. So if you see them once a year and they're 60 and they live to be 78, you don't have 18 years with them. I mean, you do. But really, if you look at it in moments, not in time, you only have 18 visits with them. When you look at time that way and you're like, wow, I might only see my parents 18 more times.

Starting point is 00:10:18 That might not be acceptable and you might make changes. You understand what I'm saying? My parents are 88. If I see him twice a year and they live to be 92, I only see him eight more times. I'm like, I'm being on a plane to see my parents when you start to think of it that way. So my point is, I'm very aware of time, very aware of it. You know, there's not a day. Now, one single day when my head is the pillow at night, when I don't look back and take a little inventory of, did I waste the day, did I maximize the day, you know, did I do my best today, did I spend my time with the people I want to spend it with doing the things I want to do? And that's sort of like my thought process. You hit a hot button.

Starting point is 00:11:05 Time is a hot button. No, serious, time is a hot button for me because everyone's like, oh my God, Like, you went so fast and I can't believe I'm turning 40. This is, oh my God, my kids all growing up because we don't stop to take inventory of amazing moments. You and I shared an amazing moment. We climbed a mountain. But I was very aware in that moment that this was happening. That like this is going to be something. We have a relationship now that's different than it was.

Starting point is 00:11:35 But part of that is because we were both aware that something amazing was happening. and I take inventory when that stuff is happening. There's a great moment. I'll take a minute and be like, wow, there's an appreciation. And then it registers. And then I do know what I did April 18th, because it's not just like happening so fast and I'm flipping the calendar.

Starting point is 00:11:57 So when I went up to the monastery, time stopped because there were no other options. You know, when you get out of your routine, time goes slow. When you're in your routine, time goes fast. And I was so out of my routine and had so much time to think that you start to realize what it is that's important to you. But more importantly, how much time you spend on things that aren't that important to you. You know, Jesse, I really like your point about moments and building these awful moments. Now, I didn't share one of those moments with you guys climbing a mountain.

Starting point is 00:12:37 One of the many reasons is that I don't have the same negotiation skills as you do with your wife. Yesy was a fascinating story in itself. But I do want to share one moment with you that I never share with anyone else. And that's about our next question. And the moment is the first time I ever say naked pool discussion in my entire life. That's the moment I'm sharing with you, Jesse. So people might be sitting out there and be like, what is steak rambling? about you tell this amazing story about how a businessman had a profound impact on you when you

Starting point is 00:13:16 when you're 20s and it involves around a very naked full discussion. So I just said it for the second time in my life there just because it could. So please tell that story, Jesse. I was in the music business and I didn't get picked up for a second album and I moved to New York City from California with very little money at the time and I was living at my friend's couch and my time had run out and he told me as of Monday his roommate really wanted the apartment back and I had to find a place to live

Starting point is 00:13:44 so that weekend I was at a bachelor party in New Jersey and I was at a bar with my friends and ordering a drink and a girl came over and we just started talking and she asked me where I lived and I told her actually as of Monday I have nowhere to live and she took out an napkin and she wrote her

Starting point is 00:14:02 address down and she said hey if it's truly an emergency you can come stay with me I just met her. I never met her in my life. And I laugh and I said, is that a real offer? And she said it is. And Monday morning I woke up and I'm like, this is an emergency. I don't have anywhere to live. I took out her address and I literally showed up with my one bag of stuff. And I live with her for six months. And during that time, I continued on in the music business from her couch. But I was at a really critical junction. I just wrote a song for the Knicks that had caught on, a theme song. And other

Starting point is 00:14:36 teams were calling for me to write demos with the hope that if they liked my demo, they would buy this song for themselves. But I had no money to go in the studio and make all these demos. So I couldn't grow my business. So I went to a music manager and he said to me, you know, look, I'll give you $10,000. I'll lend it to you in cash. But I want 10% of you, like forever. Like I was a stock. And with no money in 21 years old and this guy had some connections, I was like, Absolutely. This seems like a great deal. But before I did that, I went and talked to my roommate, this girl's dad, who was a big businessman and had some entertainment connections, but really, really successful guy, like ultra, ultra successful. So I go to his apartment in New York City and I walk into the apartment. We had a morning meeting and he's got all these amazing, like, I'm not into art, but I could tell that this shit was the art. Like, you know, names I read in books on the walls and all this amazing furniture. And I go into his room where he was,

Starting point is 00:15:44 he had like a little, like a bedroom he was in this penthouse apartment. And he comes out of the pool for our meeting naked. He had a swimming pool, a lap pool in his apartment. And he came out naked, which was, you know, I didn't really know him that well, but no problem, starts talking to me. And he puts on these little skimpy shorts and starts running on a treadmill. And talking to me, and I tell him my situation, and I have no money. I have maybe $100 at the time or something.

Starting point is 00:16:14 And I told him this guy to offer me the money, what would he do? Got off the treadmill, and he said, you know what, Chessie? I would trade everything, except my kids, everything that I have, the art, the pool, the private plane, for the one thing that you have. And I was like, me? I'm broke. What are you talking about? I said, well, what's that?

Starting point is 00:16:38 And he looked me dead in the eye. And he said, youth, the process, to be able to go through the entire process of figuring it out and not knowing and being able to take risk and failing and winning and making new friends and the whole process of what you're about to go through. I give it all back. And that really stuck with me. And then he said to me, he gave me like the litmus test.

Starting point is 00:17:05 He's like, would you bet everything, the farm, everything you have, your whole life, your name, your reputation, everything, on the fact that you will make this project work? And in your heart, get past the ego of wanting to. Can you make this thing work? And I said to him, I think I can make it work, yeah. And he goes, no, you can't think. Will you make this project work no matter what? look into the future, look into your heart, like look past, again, your ego. And I really look deep into myself and I'm like, I will make this work without question.

Starting point is 00:17:44 Then he was like, well, fuck the 10 grand, go do it, figure it out, start the process. And that was the start of my entrepreneurial journey. I was like, you know what? Keep your 10 grand. It might kick me a little longer, but I'm going to enjoy the process. And I have ever since, you know, when things go. bad when I had to, I was reading the audio part of my book the other night. I had a deadline, so I was going to be in the recording booth for nine straight hours. This is after seven hours,

Starting point is 00:18:12 the past two days in this little tiny booth. And all of my friends were going to go watch the NBA playoffs. And everybody was going out. And I couldn't. I had a deadline. And I just said to myself, this is what I signed up for. This is still part of the process. And this is what being an entrepreneur and this is what, you know, trying to get this project done and complete it to my satisfaction is all about. But this is what I signed up for. And there'll be other basketball games. Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors. All right. I want you guys to imagine spending three days in Oslo at the height of the summer. You've got long days of daylight, incredible food, floating saunas on the Oslo Fjord. And every conversation you have is with people

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Starting point is 00:22:34 sign up for your $1 per month trial today at Shopify.com slash WSB. Go to Shopify.com slash WSB. That's Shopify. dot com slash WSB. All right, back to the show. Thank you so much for sharing that story. And the very first time that we had you on, yesterday you talked about loving the journey.

Starting point is 00:23:01 And you talk about like being a rapper. And being a rapper was not about receiving awards. I mean, yeah, that might happen to some. But it was like all the hustling. And you got to love that. You got to love the journey. And it's really been inspiration for Preston and me speaking to students and speaking to a new professionals going into the finance industry and they're

Starting point is 00:23:22 asking what can we do to really, you know, advance and really like be successful in this. And I always refer them to your response. Do you love the journey? And, you know, you probably won't be surprised when I tell you that a significant part of the people who come and ask us, they do not like the journey of being in a financial sector. Like, yeah, they might like finance, but they don't like the long hours, they don't like the sacrifice. It's all of it. You have to immerse yourself in the entire experience. I agree.

Starting point is 00:23:52 I think everybody has a different definition of success. You know, one definition is sort of what I said earlier. You know, you wake up in the day and say, I'm going to give it my all today. And at the end of the day, you look back and say, I did. You know, is success effort or is a success result? Or is it both? Or is it happiness? I mean, there's so many ways to grade it.

Starting point is 00:24:13 One thing I've been very, very fortunate, and I hope my kids get this message, and I hope my friends, I hope those around me get this message. It's like, there's only one script. You're born. We're all dying. Some might die faster. Some might live longer. But I'm pretty confident that in 110 years from now, nobody on the planet right now, our age will be around. And a lot of the worry and things that we do day to day, it won't be relevant to the next generation.

Starting point is 00:24:43 I mean, I love my grandma, but I don't think about her struggles. I think about my struggles. Her journey, it's ended. And I think that if you go through that one script without rewrites to make it the script that you want, you could look back with a lot of regret. Now, I understand everyone has to make a living, and I understand you have to sometimes take jobs that you don't love, but to stay in a situation like that long term without trying something differently at night or working on something at the side or trying to make a change or

Starting point is 00:25:17 downsizing and taking something that you do like but living differently which might make you happy. You know, that's a really tough place to be in. And I have a ton of friends in finance that make a lot of money and are miserable. I mean, obviously, we all know money is not the end all means to happiness. But I know a lot of people that are miserable in what they do and they just stay in it. And then all of a sudden they're 60. And they think they're having fun or they have fun, but they don't even know what fun is until they experience fun. So when you have an appreciation for the process,

Starting point is 00:25:52 even the bad things that happen, the bad days as an entrepreneur, I have plenty of bad days. And plenty of things come that I can't control that I have to deal with. The toilet might overflow one day. I got to deal with it. My wife looks at me and says, fix it. I didn't plan on that.

Starting point is 00:26:10 But my point is that I agree with you, Stig. I agree with you. And I want you to have that mindset shift to it's all about gratitude, you know, to be grateful to be in the position, even go through the process. Look, you guys started a podcast. I'm sure it wasn't easy. It still isn't easy.

Starting point is 00:26:28 Find guests. Grow your audience. You want to put content out there that people enjoy. That's probably your mission statement, right? You want to give content that that's what you guys. are doing. And it never really gets easier, but you still have the love for it. And that's the backbone and the foundation of anything that you do. So, Jesse, in the middle of the book, you have a quote that you published there that Brother Christopher had said to you. I don't know if you can recall which

Starting point is 00:26:54 quote I'm referring to, but you're talking about this experience and he said something really profound to you. Can you tell us what that was? Yes, I do. I think you're referring to when he said to me when you talk, you're only repeating what you already know, but if you listen, you may learn something new. And, you know, he said that to me early on, and it made me realize that I'm not a great listener. And very often, just by observing and listening at the monastery, for example, I learn so much. And usually I'm a talker. I'm a seller. I want to talk and it's about me. and it's just, I realized I had a lot of work to do and I could really grow, which is why I was there. I invested these days per personal development and to get better, that I really needed to become a better listener.

Starting point is 00:27:47 And when I became aware of that and started just kind of slow down, even when I got back and even now, I even noticed in the opening of this podcast, I was so eager to jump in. And I was like, Jesse, listen to Stig and Preston and enjoy the intro. There's just a tremendous amount of growth that comes from listening. Yet I realized that I struggled with that for 40 years of life. You know, I don't want to listen. So I can totally empathize with that. And you know what was a game changer for me personally was doing the show.

Starting point is 00:28:22 When we had to go back initially and we had to listen to ourselves, the first thing, and sticks laughing because he knows exactly what I'm talking about. The first thing I noticed when I had to listen to myself was, oh my God, I interrupt people so much and it was really annoying. And so then after you do the show 200 times or whatever, you really start to understand how important it is to just shut up and just listen to the other person. And it was a very hard transition for me. So, you know, reading the story in the book, when I read that quote, I was just like,

Starting point is 00:28:54 wow, that is really profound and just such an awesome quote. Yeah. It's still something I'm working on. And it's hard. But when you become aware of it, And now I find that I can learn, and this is kind of what his message was, by listening, you can learn from anyone or anything if you allow yourself. And I never allowed myself.

Starting point is 00:29:17 But now I'm like really, you know, I really, I have slowed down, sort of, but I have an understanding and awareness to listen and become more aware of my surroundings, of people, and not just experts. I think that was part of his message too. You don't have to always necessarily seek out experts. There's lessons all the time everywhere, every day, if you allow yourself to listen. And I did.

Starting point is 00:29:48 It's very interesting what you talked about earlier, about what is success, what is the right thing for you and what's right for you, Jesse, might not be the same thing that Max, Preston Tech. One thing that is so popular these days is really talking about happiness, which in many ways is probably kind of concerning because that probably means that thing that's missing in our life. But in your book, you told the monks two stories about events that took place in your own life. Would you mind sharing those stories with the audience?

Starting point is 00:30:20 Sure. So, I mean, I was explaining to the monks at some time that we had together that my first job, this is crazy, but my first job was as a breakdancing. I grew up in New York in the 80s when really hip-hop and breakdancing, like, was really emerged. Jesse, how old are you at this point? I see. I was like 14, 15, sophomore in high school and like, when it really started to get momentum. I'm not even talking about like pop radio momentum. I'm just talking about like momentum on a street level. So I decided that I wanted to go to Washington, D.C. to break dance because I'd figured there's no way the kids in D.C. could be as good as the kids in New York.

Starting point is 00:31:01 Like, we invented this shit. So I convinced my sister who just got her driver's license to drive my friend Myron, who's part of my crew and myself down in Washington, D.C. to break dance. I'm like, well, you know, make some money and we'll come home. So we go down there. And the whole time down there, I'm struggling with, like, you know, nervous. But if no one shows up, And we're all the way so far from home. We show up in Georgetown and we go to this little parking lot in a bank and we have our boombox in a cassette. We set up the boom box and we push play and a little crowd eventually starts to show up

Starting point is 00:31:37 and then a bigger crowd shows up and I do my thing and I pass it to Myron and he does his thing and he sends it back to me and we go through our whole routine and then we do it again. We only had like a 30 second routine. So we did it like, you know, 40 times. I took off my hat and I started passing it around, collecting money. And at the end of the day, we had collected around $2,60,70, something like that. And we gave my sister the gas money for the trip down.

Starting point is 00:32:04 And then we took out money for food and money to get home. And then we had about, I think it was $82. We had $41 each. He starts counting all the singles, you know, all the way to $41. And then he puts it in his pocket and he sprints over to me. And he gives me a bear hug. And he looks at me and he goes, Jess. we're fucking rich.

Starting point is 00:32:24 We have $41 each. And I told the monks that story. I said, well, you know, fast forward about 20 years later. And I got a call for my partner and we were selling our company, Markey Jett, to Nets to Warren Buffett. And I was explaining to them that I wasn't really much happier at that moment than I was is this 14, 15-year-old kid, probably 15-year-old kid that made $41. And the obvious answer is that, you know, money's not going to bring you happiness.

Starting point is 00:33:00 But I realized that it was like, if I worked hard at something that I liked and offered something that was positive to the world, my wife always says you find your purpose at the intersection of what it is you love to do, what you're good at, and something that you're offering to the world that's positive. And in that little breakdancing moment, it was something that I loved to do. I was decent at it and people were reacting positively and I got rewarded for it. It felt amazing. And at the Marquis jet experience, yeah, I mean, I got this amazing, you know, it changed my life.

Starting point is 00:33:34 But the passion, like, I never really loved selling time on airplanes. I just didn't. I didn't feel like I was put on earth to sell time on airplanes. private jets to people that could afford it. And I just never loved it. And even though the end result was way different, like, I was, it didn't swing me this windfall all the way in the other direction.

Starting point is 00:34:00 Love it. Yo, it's just like, a quick thing. It's just it really reminds me of the story that Tony Shea talks about in his book Delivering Happiness. Whenever he sold his first company to Microsoft, and he was like, yeah, I was like eating this burger with my roommate.

Starting point is 00:34:15 made and business partner and we sold it for. I can't remember like it was a few hundred million whatever. There's a lot of money. He was like, huh, okay, let's do something fun now. It was kind of like this story you're saying, because it's not about the money. I guess it was just not the thrill anymore. I recently took my son who's eight to climb out Washington, which is freezing. We camped outside in the winter and the snow and it was minus five degrees and we had this crazy sleeping bags to keep us warm, blah, blah, blah. And I went with my friend Kevin, who's a police officer in Suffolk County, New York, and his daughter. The four of us went. And when we get it to the top of the mountain or where we were camping out, I mean, it is so cold, I can't even

Starting point is 00:34:55 explain it. So we're all in our sleeping bags, bumbled up, you know, and Kevin is a blue-collar guy. He's a police officer. He's been doing this forever. He doesn't come across a guy that's focused on money or accumulating money, but he's one of the happiest guys I ever met. I said to him, said, Kevin, how many these trips do you take a year? Like, you love a year. How many trips do you take a year? He goes, well, every year I take a trip with my high school friends. We've been doing it since we're 21 years old. And I'm like, gosh, I need to do that. I don't do that. I want to do that. And then he goes, I take probably six other trips a year, like one time, one weekend, every other month, I take a trip. I go to L.A. to run the marathon. Maybe I go hiking

Starting point is 00:35:37 with my family. Maybe I'll drive to the canyons, whatever. But I put it on my calendar every other month. I call it the Kevin rule. I don't think of myself, if I can't take one weekend, every eight weekends to put something on my calendar that makes me happy or creates a quote unquote moment like we were talking about, then the script is broken. I got to rewrite it because Kevin can work seven hard weeks or whatever, but he knows at that eighth weekend, he's going to do something he loves with the people he loves to do it with. And it's so simple. Yet, We barely ever do it. We live in a world of, you know, on vacation time, I think a week off, and that's it.

Starting point is 00:36:20 But we live in a world of, but all these opportunities and weekends, everybody, you know, and most of the things that we do, or he did, does, and I do, it doesn't cost them. Mount Washington, it costs nothing. The parking is free. You parked for free. Yeah, you have to buy a sleeping bag. You got to get some boots, but it's not like you're flying first class to Europe and staying at the four seasons.

Starting point is 00:36:43 And it was more fun. So my point is he's got this five, I call it the Kevin rule, this five, six weekends a year. And it helps. Those things help. So you're talking about simplicity here. And this was another major theme that I saw in the book was when you're living with the monks, they were just really simple in everything and every way that they do anything. And they keep a very systematic schedule.

Starting point is 00:37:09 It's almost like a programmed kind of schedule. Yes. After you went through that, why? What's the advantage to that? Is there an advantage to that? What's your thoughts on it? Well, I think I'm going to answer to two ways. For starters, you know, I live in a world of multitasking. So I'm constantly doing multiple things at once or all. Spend five minutes here. Jump to the new list. Cross that off. Go back to work. Talk about my kids. I'm always multitasking. They monotask. They are so focused on quality over quantity. And they don't put like really have time restraints around when they're going to finish. They're finished when it's done to perfection. So if their job was to clean the church, it was like, oh, I'm going to go clean the church for 50 minutes. I'm going to clean the church and I'm only going to focus on the church and I'm going to be done when the job is done.

Starting point is 00:38:02 But it wasn't so much centered around time as it was around quality and completion. So, for example, you know, let's say Brother Stavros would be like, this morning, I'm going to clean the church. It wasn't like, I'm going to clean the church, I'm going to do this, and here's 15 things on my to do list. And when I'm done with that, I'm going to go to the next item. But I'm done with that. That's done. Off my list, and it's done to perfection. And like every single task they did, they did with every ounce of their soul.

Starting point is 00:38:34 I've never seen anything like it. It could be organizing the books in the library. I'd stack them up. They would stack them up and push them in and make sure they were in size order. And then they would come back and look at it. Then they would clean the books. Then they would write the number on the books.

Starting point is 00:38:48 And it was like, wow. Well, is it the culture that made them do it that way? Like, how can we extract that behavior into our own lives? Like, what is it that they have that made them that way? Is it just the culture? I think it's a little bit of the culture. And the culture being that everything is theirs. So, you know, they have pledged all their possessions to the monastery.

Starting point is 00:39:08 They own nothing. They own a driver's license. And if the bookshelf, when they clean up the books, those are their books and their bookshelf. And they treat it like it's theirs and their bookshelf. And, you know, there's a really strong sense of community. What's great about the monastery, too, not to jump around or dodge the question, but I learned the community is so important. It's just so important.

Starting point is 00:39:32 A hundred years ago, well, not even 100 years ago, 50 years ago, my father lived with three generations in one house. And I think a lot of people, you know, the 1900s, early 1900s, 20s, 30s live that way. And if there was a problem, they shared it collectively. If there was an illness in the family, they shared it collectively. Now, with planes and everything and look at us, we both said, you live away from your parents. I live away from my parents. My brother lives in Colorado. My wife's brother lives in California. Like it's very spread out. Our support system is scattered. Yes, we access them through Skype. We can access them through FaceTime and email. But it's a little bit of a different world. Their support system is together. So the responsibility

Starting point is 00:40:17 of one becomes the responsibility of seven. So if the toilet bowl breaks, seven people can fix it. It doesn't all fall. If the toilet bowl breaks and there's no running water at my house, it's my responsibility. On the monastery, it shared seven ways. And that leads for a really interesting in different existence. It takes a lot of pressure off you. You don't want to let anyone down. You know, so the bookshelf, like, I'm cleaning the church, you better clean the bookshelf. And it just leads to a really efficient system. And like anything, like any business or anything else, it starts at the top. Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors. No, it's not your imagination. Risk and regulation are ramping up. And customers now expect

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Starting point is 00:44:15 All right. Back to the show. Jesse, talk to us about the Friday night, hashing it out. What was it like 10 or 5 minutes that they had the opportunity to basically, say their gripes to the community? Yeah. Every Friday night they got together and it was sharing. They would just basically get anything off their chest or shoulders that happened during the week and put it to dead. So they didn't walk around with resentment. They didn't walk around with harboring any kind of anger or angst. And they would just literally talk about each of the brothers,

Starting point is 00:44:48 each monk would get up. And I didn't share in this. This was their own private thing. But they would go up, they told me about it, and they would talk about it and anything that happened during the week that bothered them. And they would discuss it and put it to bed. And I was like, wow, I want to do that with my wife. Because very often, I don't, like, I won't even say anything. I'm like, you know what, I'm just going to let it go. And then you let the next thing go. And then you start to have resentment. And then you get mad. And that you can't go revisit it because it was a month ago, but it's built up and it's happened five times. And I said to him like, well, why do you guys do that? And he said, well, if I'm going to live with Brother Thomas,

Starting point is 00:45:22 Why would I want to live in peace? And if I'm committed to a marriage, why when I want it to be the best that it could be? Or if I have a relationship with my kids, why when I want it to be the best it can be? So why want I tell my son, look, I'm disappointed in the way you did something or I'm proud of this or if something I did bother, you tell me. And it's like so simple and obvious. But nobody, you know, we don't really do it or we don't have a system to do it. And I felt like, wow, you know, five minutes, you know, once a week with my wife. And we could be like, can I do anything this week that pissed you off or can I do anything better?

Starting point is 00:45:56 Yeah. Changes the whole relationship. It's a relationship change. I think you said the magic word. It's systematic. You know, they've built this as like almost a protocol into the way that they operate. And I think that's the thing that I'm taking away from the book, at least, is to develop those protocols that really kind of optimize your life so you get everything that you want out of it. Without question.

Starting point is 00:46:18 You know, we have mission statements for business. we write mission statements, but very few of us have our own personal mission statement. And very few people really write out like, well, what is my ideal day? What is my ideal life? What does it look like? You know, and if you were to script it, it probably wouldn't be like, I want to see my parent, and I'm not knocking you, I want to see my parents one time a year. I want to work, you know, 90 hours a week.

Starting point is 00:46:42 It just probably wouldn't be like that. And little shifts can really make a big improvement. But it starts with an understanding like exactly what you do. just said of they wrote out they chose the life they wanted to live theirs is one of simplicity and they map out the day according to what that looks like and that's a combination of social labor community meals prayer and reflection and it's really like we all have those components in our life except our pie chart is a lot different it's a little out of balance in how it's skewed. And theirs, to me, was a little bit more imbalance of what I wanted. Now, I don't want to go

Starting point is 00:47:27 live on a monastery. One of my takeaways is I love my life. I don't want their life. But I want components of their life to come into the way I live my life. So, Jesse, what happened whenever you came back from the monastery? Because I'm sure, like, we all the time that you had, all the silence, and with all the good habits that you learned. What happens? What happens? whenever you come home and people perhaps expect you to like go into the same loop as you used to. But now you have all these new tools in your life that you would like to implement. How does the world react to that? Well, it was hard for me coming back in because remember, I came back into a world that

Starting point is 00:48:12 hasn't changed at all. But I come from a world that was completely different. So reentering was very difficult for a little bit of time. It was a transition period for me. But here I am. A lot of time has passed, and 90% of my life is back to where it was. But there are 10% of these kind of changes and things that you guys mentioned, listening more than talking, mapping out more of the lifestyle I want, spending five minutes a week with my wife talking it out,

Starting point is 00:48:45 having my own mission statement, having my own contract with myself of what my non-deliverables are and all that kind of stuff and being way more present and monotasking. I'm way more focused on and it's been way more efficient, realizing that it's okay to not, I could have a long to do list, but let me operate out of quality in the things that I'm doing. So I started implementing a lot of the things that I learned and it's been super helpful. And part of it for me was writing the book. It was a hard process for me. It took a really long time.

Starting point is 00:49:19 It's very different than the seal book, where there was one character, I had his voice, there were multiple characters. There was a lot of silence. There was a lot of reflection. So I wanted to write like a personal development book, but with a little bit of a different twist,

Starting point is 00:49:34 a little bit of humor, a little bit of insight into a world, a spiritual world that not a lot of people have time or the ability to access and share some of those takeaways with the reader So they could spend three or four hours in my book and not 15 days on a monastery. So, Jesse, I really like this story in the book. You said that you were there having dinner with some of the monks, and you proposed a question

Starting point is 00:49:58 to them, and you said, if you could have dinner with three people, who would they be? And talk to us about the way that they reacted to your question and then tell us your story as well. Yeah, I was at a dinner party before I went to the monastery. and the host of the party asked everyone there to go around and name three people that were alive that they would want to have dinner with. And it was a great exercise. But most of the answers were the obvious ones, you know, maybe Warren Buffett or Obama or Clinton or Oprah. But when it came to me, all three of mine at the time were truly were rappers. And the reason was I wanted to meet the three artists that changed the trajectory of my life as a kid growing up in New York as a

Starting point is 00:50:43 teenager, I wanted to thank them. And I wanted to find out how they marketed themselves in an age of no internet, how they wrote their songs. And so after the dinner, I was like, you know what? I'm going to invite the 10 most influential artists in my life to come to my house for dinner. And they all came. And people like, well, how did you get them to come? And I was like, I asked them. I only knew two of them. But I asked them in a very two-way pitch. Most pitches are one way. You know, you ask for something. And it's like a one-way. asked. I positioned it, which I think is very important in how you position things, obviously, as an opportunity to almost like a summit go over business ideas. How can we all help each other?

Starting point is 00:51:26 And you haven't seen a lot of these guys in years. I'm putting this together for you guys, as much as it was for me. And they all came. And I told the monks this story. And the monks were all religious figures, many of which I hadn't heard of. But it's a really good exercise, you know, to think about. Because we live in a world. where you can have virtual mentors. You know, many of the people that I look up to, I've never even met. I follow people on Instagram, like, with just amazing stories and it's just fascinating to follow and super inspiring.

Starting point is 00:51:56 And they don't even know who I am or we have no personal relationship. So when you think about, you know, who are the people and who are the people that, like, are most like you in your world where, you know, you'd really want to spend time with? And how do you get them? You know, how do you get to know them? The reason I liked your response so much is because I think for a lot of people out there, they might answer that question by picking three people that could help them. And that's not what you did. You picked three people that you would want to thank and show gratitude towards.

Starting point is 00:52:28 I didn't even read this in the book, but based on what you just said, and you wanted to help them in return. I really did. And so that's what's so profound about your response. And I think that's why it resonated so well with the monks is because there's an undertone to your response there that I think is really deep and profound. And I think that it really kind of, for me, it's the key ingredient to networking in general. And I know that we're kind of stepping into a different discussion there. But so many people want to network and they go about it in a manner like, hey, what can I take from you or how can you help me? And that's their pitch, right? You know, you're right. And you know what? I've never even, I've told that story a lot of times. And I never realized, you're right.

Starting point is 00:53:14 I really did want to help them. And I still do. I never really looked at it that way. But you're 100% right. You know, I really got them together and I wanted to offer something to them. But I was rewarded way more than that. Yeah. It was your reciprocity, right?

Starting point is 00:53:30 It was your way to give back because they gave you so much. So I don't know. I really like that story. And I think it just speaks so much on so many different levels. I thought it was such a cool point in the book. So, Jesse, the next question that we have for you is really something that we've been looking forward to because I think it's evident for everyone listening to the show how much life experience you have.

Starting point is 00:53:51 And I also think how much you question common norms. You know, we read this amazing book by Oprah Renfrey. And it was a book called What I Know for Sure. And the title really came from, she was guest on the show. And then the host asked her this profound question about, what you knew for sure and she simply didn't know how to answer it. So my question to you is, like, looking back on your life and also forward, luckily, what do you know for sure? Oh, my gosh.

Starting point is 00:54:24 I know for sure that one day my time is going to run out. And like we said, I'm very aware of my relationship with time. And I know for sure that I want to collect as many. I want to build my life resume during my journey. So I know for sure that that's what makes me feel the most alive. I know for sure that that kind of extends my days, keeps me young. And I know for sure I want to spend as much time with the people I want to spend it with, doing the things I want to do.

Starting point is 00:54:57 And that might not be every second of every day. But I am aware that that is the most important thing other than health, my family, you know, to me right now. Wow. So specifically about this experience living in the monastery, what can you take away from that that you now know for sure that you didn't before? Really how important it is to spend time alone. And for me, I'm not into meditation.

Starting point is 00:55:24 I'm not against it. I love it. I just don't, my form of meditation has been running alone. I've ran pretty much every day for 25 years. I've run 36,000 miles, 10,000. thousand hours and that has kept me you know really in tune with my gut i think just in today's world constantly you know having my phone attached to my hand it's really important to spend time alone and keep that one superpower we all have that's free and that's intuition and i think that really

Starting point is 00:55:57 are the only way to exercise that muscle and have sharp good instincts and clarity is to spend some time alone and free up. Like, we only have a limit amount of energy in our head. And if it's constantly bombarded and under attack, I think the average American makes like 35,000 decisions a day or something. You know, when you free up some of those decisions, it gives you room to be creative. It gives you more energy to do tasks, et cetera, et cetera. Jesse, last question here.

Starting point is 00:56:26 We know you always have something brewing in the background. And we know you're always up to something. So what is that something? Well, I have a great event. Preston, you, Stig! I got to get you to this one, man. We're doing an event again. Well, we're doing Everest again.

Starting point is 00:56:46 For anybody that wants an amazing challenge, come join me. And maybe Preston and Stig will come too. Similar to what we did in Vermont, where we rent a mountain, the entire mountain, and you know, you hike up and take the gondola down. We did that in Vermont and was called 29029. You go up, gondola down, up, gondola down, until you climb the equivalent of Everest.

Starting point is 00:57:08 We're doing another event. We're doing that in October. And we're doing another one called Donali. It's the equivalent of Mount Denali, the highest mountain in North America. And we're doing that in August at Snow Basin, a resort that we rented, a mountain we rented in Utah. We bring in tents and all this stuff. And you have three days to do it so you can hike, walk, sleep, hike, walk, sleep. but I love challenges like this because it really resets me and it really helps me.

Starting point is 00:57:38 There's an old Japanese ritual called the Masogi. And the notion around the Masogi is you do something so hard one time a year that the benefits last the entire year. And I try to do one or two of those a year. And this August and this October we'll be doing it again. And it's an amazing weekend. So if anyone's interested, can I give a free shameless plug? Absolutely. We'll have a link in the show notes too. Go ahead. Okay, thanks. Yeah. Just go to jesseitzler.com, j-es-s-s-se-I-T-L-E-R dot com and check out the experiences.

Starting point is 00:58:14 And we'd love to have you join me. Preston, we had an amazing time last time. So hopefully you guys, Stig, you're more than welcome to come as my guest. We'll summit, talk. Enjoy the altitude. I'm debating on whether I bring my wife. That's my question now. not whether I go, it's whether I bring my wife. Because I think she wants to do it. I'm bringing my wife to both. Oh, and then I have this.

Starting point is 00:58:36 Preston, you guys love this, dig. So I'm turning 50 this year. So I'm bringing in, you might have to get me on one more time. And if I'm so lucky, I'm bringing in 50 experts and 50 things that I always wanted to learn how to do. So like one a week for the entire year to come to my house. and I'm going to learn how to wakeboard, drive a stick ship, be a master chess, play ping pong. It's unbelievable.

Starting point is 00:59:08 This is the best part. It was like he completely forgot that that was something that was happening. Like he wasn't even going to mention it on this show. And he brings it home. Oh, my God. You're out of control. You're out of control. I freaking love it.

Starting point is 00:59:22 All right, Jesse, we will definitely take you up on that. Yes, we definitely need to talk about that in the future. We'll have a link in the show notes to Jesse's page there. Please click on it. I can tell you from firsthand personal experience doing the Everest climb was just epic. Leading up to the event, for me, there was so much gain happening in my life during that period of time, kind of just training for this that whenever I did the event, the event was just incredible. But then when it was over, I had like this setback in my life. I don't know if I would call it a setback, but you could just feel like this.

Starting point is 00:59:58 energy loss. You know what I mean? Like there was just like this energy loss. And so absolutely epic. There's no other word for it. Check it out. Jesse, thank you. Thank you guys so much. Man, I really, you guys have been great to me. I really appreciate it. And thanks and good luck with everything. Good luck with all the new ventures ahead and the podcast. And, you know, thanks for giving me this opportunity as part of my process. I just really appreciate you guys, man. And I'm not just saying that. I really do. So thank you for always. helping me out, guys. All right, guys.

Starting point is 01:00:30 That was all that Preston and I had for this week's episode of The Investors Podcast. We see each other again next week. Thanks for listening to TIP. To access the show notes, courses, or forums, go to theinvestorspodcast.com. To get your questions played on the show, go to AsktheInvesters.com and win a free subscription to any of our courses on TIP Academy. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making investment decisions, consult a professional.

Starting point is 01:00:59 This show is copyrighted by the TIP network. Written permission must be granted before syndication or rebroadcasting.

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