Sean Stephenson's Secrets of Becoming A Highly Paid Speaker on Bacon Wrapped Business

Okay, this is Bacon Wrap Business with Shawn Stevenson, episode number awesome. Hey guys, this is Brad Costanzo. Welcome back to Bacon Wrap Business. I've got a special video episode for you here today. I am interviewing my friendor friendmentor, the Shawn Stevenson who you can see on the screen if you're watching the video. If you're not, by, by the way, if you're listening to this on the audio only podcast, you can go to baconwrappedbusiness.com Sean Stephenson. I'll put a link on the show notes here so you can go check it out. If you want to watch the video on YouTube, etc. Highly recommend it. But for all of those of you who are checking out the show right now live, I like to do these video interviews. I don't do them enough, but I think it's a great way for you to see the interaction between me and my guest. I called Sean a friend because he started off as my friend. He became my mentor. He's kind of back to my friend and go back to him for mentoring whenever I need it.

I think. I mean, I need to weigh in on whether that's even true, but keep going.

Yeah, he doesn't like to claim that he's my friend, but I keep, I keep convincing him of all the benefits of being my friend. And I said, I'll be your bff. Anyway, for those of you who don't know Sean, for a lot of you, he needs no introduction. But for those of you who aren't familiar, Sean is a world renowned public speaker. He shared the stage with the Dalai Lama, with Richard Branson, with some of the top speakers, industry leaders, politicians in the world. He used to work in the White House under President Clinton. He's got one of the most impressive Rolodexes of contacts you'll ever meet. And he's also one of the most impressive people. Sean, you might want to put on earmuffs because I don't necessarily want your head to get any bigger than this.

Are you saying my head's big?

Yeah, a little bit. Little big for your body. Well, that's okay. I'll take that. That being said, let me continue to blow up your ego. For those of you who are fortunate enough not to know you, Sean is also one of the single best, if not the best, public speaker that I've ever heard in my life. And I come across Sean just through some of his public appearances years ago. I was fortunate enough to meet him once more about maybe four or five years ago at another event. And Then another event, we just kind of kept in contact. And after several years of chatting back and forth, I actually hired Sean to help me with my, with my public speaking in his apprenticeship program. And I know Sean is, you know, you're probably very disappointed in me right now. You're probably thinking, man, you're making me look bad. You said once or twice. That being said, I'm really fortunate to have you on the show. This is kind of a funny show. You and I have been sitting here talking offline for, I think about two hours now, just bantering back and forth, BSing and whatnot, because we are friends. And I really wanted Sean to be on here for a couple of reasons. One of them is that, Sean, I believe that you have a, you know, an incredible message to deliver. And folks who have any inclination to be a public speaker. Why is my audio going? That's exactly what it is. Are going to be really excited by an event that you are hosting in just a couple weeks. It's kind of last minute, but on November 13th through 15th, we'll get into this. You're hoping 13th through the 16th you're hosting an event for public speakers. And I mention this right now because if you're listening to this and you don't have the chance to go check it out, if you happen to jump off the line before we get to it, you'll be doing yourself a disservice. So we'll do the plug right away. Go to Sean stevenson.com 10k get all the information just to make sure that people aren't, you know, people don't miss this, but we'll get into that. That being said, Sean, welcome to the show. It'll. It's going to be fun to wrap you up in bacon and take you home. All greasy, greasy sizzle. Fry you up in a pan dam. Yep. So once more, we've been chatting for a while here. Serious is not as much fun as b essen. So, okay. Usually on the show, and I know you've probably listened to every single episode three or four times, transcribed them and, you know, read them every morning when you wake up. So as you very well know, we like to share what we call bacon wrapped strategies, which is anything that is, you know, hot sizzling, hot things people can't get elsewhere. Tasty sizzling boom.

On just this podcast, just bacon itself is so powerful that I have met vegans or been Portman that have meetup groups to eat bacon.

Vegans, they eat bacon dot com.

Yeah, something like that. But there are meetups of vegans that eat bacon and they're like, they just, they don't care. They know it's not vegan. They know it's not right, but damn it, they love their bacon.

You, you can't blame them. Yeah, I, I've had several people tell me they found my show and two of them, like, use the exact same verbatim words. When they emailed me and they said you had me, I was scrolling through the itunes. You had me at bacon. Well, that's why I'm a marketing genius, because I figured I may not be able to dazzle them with my brilliance, but I'm going to bring them in with a bacon.

We're gonna get into marketing.

Yes.

Which is one of my claim to fame. And we'll talk about that in depth in a moment. But have you sent bacon to your advocates?

No. However, I have. My assistant, Nancy has been researching some of the best gourmet bacon providers for gift, like gift basket type bacon. And we are going to have a taste off. Like, we're going to get some and we're going to taste them. I think she may have the best job in the world because she's going to be paid to eat bacon.

And because what you need to do is when you have guests like me on, you need to send them bacon and you need to have bacon at the same time. We can just sit here, eat bacon and talk about.

And that's going to be amazing because when people have their headphones in, they're going to hear us smacking our gums and if only they can get that smell. Yeah. By the way, do you, you. Have you heard my. Have you heard the jingle? Yeah. In the very, very beginning. It starts off with the sizzling sound of bacon.

Yes.

So, but enough about me.

Like, I. Can we talk about bacon for a moment?

We can talk about bacon.

Okay. I don't normally eat bacon, but when I do, I eat turkey bacon usually.

That's kind of sacrilege, by the way.

But go ahead, hear me out because you'll, you'll understand. When I go back to having a pen of regular bacon after eating turkey bacon, I am like, what the hell have I been doing?

Yeah, there's a big difference.

Crappy turkey bacon. Like, turkey bacon is like taking turkey and like just drying the hell out of it. Thin jerky. But when you have really good, good bacon and you cook it up right crispy, even fans are like looking, getting other people to look the other way so they can just shove it down their throat.

That's Great. That's great. Well, I'm. Yes, it is on my. It is on my to do list for my advocates. And we'll talk about those guys in a second to. And all also my guests to get a. Just a incredible slab of gourmet bacon in the mail because everybody likes mail order bacon. So let's talk a little bit about squirrels. I know, I know. No, I just hate squirrels because I was thinking add. I was trying to switch the topic back to something that people are going to get a lot out of. Although I like just BSing with you. But there's a lot that we could talk about and it's kind of weird that we are friends. We talk about a little bit of everything.

We should not talk about on this program because my mom might listen, most likely.

And I saw. I saw Pop walking around. So he's in town right now eavesdropping.

But dad knows pretty much everything.

That's true.

He went to college with me.

You're not gonna. You're not going to pull much. So does he have two degrees then?

No, because you didn't do a damn thing when I was in college.

Oh, he just sat back and he sat back at.

In the cafeteria, read the newspaper.

That's awesome.

He was basically on a stakeout to make sure his son didn't kill anyone or get any girl pregnant.

That's great. I love it. The. I love your dad too. He. He's awesome. So he's your business partner, right?

Yep.

That's awesome.

Family business for like 1996.

So the. And the family business, that is. I mean, you are, you do a lot of things. But I mean, would you say that keynote speaking is really your bacon? That's how you bring home the bacon.

That's how I bring home the bacon. Well, and we're transitioning out of it.

Right.

But it. For nearly two decades. Well, 21 years almost now, because I didn't. 1996 was when I got my first paid speaking engagement, but I was speaking before then. So I say I've been speaking for 21 years, but I've been paid to speak for like 17 or something years. And, you know, it's hard to compete in my world with making 10, 15, $30,000 in an hour. You know, like, I, I see my buddies, they work their asses off for these launches and after they pay their affiliates and after they pay for their advertising, you know, their Facebook ads, their Google Ads, and after they, after they. All their costs are done, you know, they may make 150 grand.

Right.

If there was a good launch, you know, that's.

It's the myth of the. It's the myth of the launch.

Yeah. And I don't have to kill myself. I go to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and I sip on a coconut, and I get dressed, I go down the elevator, I get up on stage, I do my thing, I get a standing ovation, and I walk off network with people that love me, and I go home first class.

Yeah.

And I'm not. I'm. I'm saying that partially to brag, but also partially to offer the. Just a vision to the listener that that's possible for people. You know, I. I gotta be honest. I'm a very lazy person. And so, you know, I used to fight that.

I. I per. Like, I've always thought that you probably, you know, can get up and walk around, and you're just so lazy you like to sit in that chair.

No, what I did is I decided at a very young age that walking looked like a lot of work.

You're like, I'm just gonna sit here and tell everybody I'm gonna fake it.

Here's why I decided to become a keynote speaker. I decided to be a keynote speaker because I wanted to be able to charge the maximum I could for one hour of my time. And then I had to work for months.

Yep.

And you know, when. When you charge 10, 20, $30,000 for an hour, you don't need many engagements if you don't want to live like a rock star. If you just want to live nicely, you don't need many engagements a year at third, you know, 20 to $30,000 a gig. And so my. My joke to my buddies are I want to finally figure out, you know, like, how can I get to the 150k for one hour? Just do, like, two to three speeches a year, and then just call it good.

Right.

Work three days a year and make more than I would if I busted my ass as an online marketer, you know, and so keynote speaking. What I loved about it is. And I still love about it is if you do it right, and we'll talk about the four aspects that it takes to master. I call it my MDMA formula. Wait, wait, wait, wait.

Mdma. Nice. That sounds. Sounds amazing.

It is. It will take you to great places. Message delivery, marketing, and attitude. We'll go into that later. But when you really dial in on those four key components, you can charge almost anything you want if you. If you have those dialed in, you know, within reason. But, you know, I've seen people go from not ever being paid to speak to their first engagement being five to $10,000.

Right.

And that's a big leap that most businesses. You did your first launch, you, you, you don't, you have to have a big enough list to make a good amount of money. You, you can't go out, you know, with three names on your email list and, and book $10,000 worth of products more than likely. But we're speaking if you have the right message, the right way of delivering it, the right marketing and positioning it, and you have the right attitude in working with the client and yourself. You know, like I think you would even you and I even talked about how, remember the first time you saw me speak in San Diego?

Right.

What if I had come up to you and said that was my third speech ever? Would you feel like you got cheated because you thought I was a pro?

No, I would have thought that you were superhuman, first of all. Because if anybody could speak that well on their third speech, like I'd be blown away.

Right. So people don't care how long you've been a speaker.

Right.

All they care about is the results get when you're on stage.

Yep.

Speaking is unlike any other format. You get the right message, the right delivery, the right marketing and the right attitude. You can come out the gate making good money because people don't care how long you've been in it. It's not like an investment banking or many other fields. They're going to want to know how long you've been doing it because they're going to be worried about putting money in. But if one YouTube video clip of you speaking blows people away, they go, just do that again. If you could do that again, we will happily pay you.

Yep.

And that's what's awesome about keynote speaking. And plus, I mean what I have loved about my 21 years of doing this is I traveled the world. You know, I've seen 47 states, I've seen probably going on 15 to 17 countries. I've been in every major US city in the United States. I've stayed in almost every five star resort on island somewhere in this world that you can imagine. And I haven't had spend a dollar to do that travel. And I got buddies. We have a friend we were talking about earlier, he Facebooks a lot. Right. He loves to travel, but he's shelling out thousands of dollars a year in travel. I don't get on an airplane unless somebody's paying for that.

Right.

And I'm so snobby that I don't get on the airplane unless they're paying for it. And they're also paying me.

Yeah. And first class.

And first class. Oh, absolutely. And so that sounds arrogant. And it was, it didn't. I didn't start out, of course, but it got to the point in my career where I realized that vacation was getting to stay home.

You're right.

Vacation was not having to stay in a hotel. You know, people will try to call me up and they'll say, sean, we don't have a speaker's budget, but we're holding it in Atlantis and we're gonna fly you first class class. And they're like, so that should be enough of an incentive. I'm like, I've been to Atlantis three times. I. I don't need Atlantis to wet my appetite to go to a free speech, you know, And I, I hope that I'm not coming off like I've got it all figured out and I'm perfect because that's. I make a lot of mistakes. What I'm trying to get across is that this is a really fun industry to be in. You know, I also had the pleasure of meeting some of the most amazing people.

Oh, yeah.

What I do, I mean, I got to spend one on one time with the Dalai Lama. I got to spend one on one time with US Presidents. I got to spend one on one time with some of the Fortune 500 company CEOs, Steve Forbes, Richard Branson. I mean, I got to learn in people's private homes, people that you could never access even with money, celebrities, athletes, musicians, all that I got to meet through speaking. And it's, I think of speaking, not just doing it live on stage, but this is speaking right now. You and I are speaking, right? Speaking is impossible. Podcasts, it's in webinars, it's been, it's in any format where your voice resonates out to an ear. And if you know how to speak in a way that people find it enjoyable to listen to and to learn from and to be entertained by, then you really have your speaker, your speaking, your message, your delivery, your marketing, your attitude dialed in.

I love it. And, you know, the, the misconception. And I definitely think your message, especially with your mission right now, which is to help people become world class speakers, really needs to make sure that you don't confuse people to think that they, that the only benefit to what you teach them is to become a keynote speaker. But you just hit on it right there. Like speaking, it can be your entire business. But it can also be a critical component of any business, whether you're speaking to large stadiums or, you know, a thousand people in a corporate auditorium.

Most people that I. I'm working with and I will work with probably will not address More than 500 people in live seminar in their life.

Right.

Maybe even less than 100. Very few. Very few will get to address thousands. And it's not because they aren't going to be good enough. It's because they, they will find that there are other avenues of speaking other than just traveling and doing live auditoriums, that they're. You know, I did a webinar or maybe about a year ago with a couple thousand people, and that was a small webinar compared to some of my friends, the old webinars. But on the webinar There was like 2500 people and I was in my pajamas, you know, and. But I was speaking and I created a little animation we just put up. You see the animation?

Which one?

In the draw shop?

Yeah, I did. That was good. That was good.

Cool. And it was just another way in marketing. Right. Just another way of telling what I'm telling right now.

Yep.

Which is you can't just be a good speaker because that's just about delivery and you can't just have a good story. That's just about message. You can't just have slick marketing because that's just marketing. You can't just be a nice guy because that's just attitude. You gotta have all of it. Can't just be a nice lady. You have to have all four components. The mdt, you know, mdma, all four components have to be firing all four cylinders.

Absolutely. And, you know, and you can, you can craft that. Everybody thinks you have to be a born public speaker and you have to be slick. And in a minute, I want you to go over something, I'll tee it up for you. Because it was one of the most impactful parts of our training together. I even heard you mention it on Joe Polish's podcast the other day. And I was like, ah, that's cool. He actually mentioned it. But so many people get petrified of public speaking and they're, they're so nervous and they think that I'm not good enough. People are going to laugh at me or I'm gonna choke. And they're really, really worried because they're worried they're going to look stupid. Right. And they get this fear, the butterflies turns into fear, turns into pet. You know, they become petrified and it's very natural, I think, for anybody to get those butterflies before they're about to go speak. And I know I do. I actually get a little bit excited before I get to go because I do enjoy it. Maybe I'm just an attention whore, I don't know. But you had. You shared a mind shift with me that has made 100% of the difference every time I speak, whether it's on a podcast like this, whether it's in a, you know, a room of small people or big people, and I want you to share that with right now. Small people like you. Yes, exactly like you. Because I speak to a lot of people who look exactly like you. It's almost like. It's like looking for Waldo in a crowd. Well, you blend into the crowd very easily. That said, do you. You know where I'm going with this? The mind shift? That. Yeah, that. If, if I recall. Right. And I'll let you. I'll tee it up, let you take it home. But look, if you're. I think I remember you saying, look, if you're, if you're nervous, if you're really nervous or fearful, you're being a selfish prick, you know, so go ahead and explain this concept because if, if you listening to this, get anything else. Get. Take nothing else from this. This is, this is profound. But, you know, explain the mind shift that happens that removes the fear.

All fear of public speaking is really an issue of selfishness that you're worried about what other people think of you. You're worried about if you look bad, you're worried about you're going to screw up. You're worried about will they like you. You're worried about whether they'll buy from you. You're worried about you, you, you, you, you. And when we get all tied up in thinking about ourselves, it creates drama, it creates fear, it creates paralysis. Whereas.

Because we're thinking about us.

Right. Whereas what you have to realize is the audience isn't there for you. Even. Even with big names like Tony Robbins, Les Brown, Wayne Dyer, you know, the giants of the speaking industry, as much as people think that they're going to hear them, they're not. They're going to hear something that that person says that they idolize to then go use on themselves. And so I'm just trying to distill the truth, which is no one's ever listening because they love Sean Stevenson. They may even think that's why there was listening, but they're not. They're listening because they love themselves, hopefully, and they want to Figure out some aspect of life they want to solve some problem they're going through, they want to create some kind of dream, they have something they want to work on, they want to gather some kind of stress relief technique, something they want to acquire from listening to my speech. So I have to remember they're not there for Sean Stevenson, they're there for them, right? And so I don't have to worry about what they think of me because they're not thinking of me, they're thinking of them. And so that, that's a harsh reality of like, yo, you're not there because of you, you're there because of them. And when I get my best speeches, it's not when I'm even talking to them. Here's where it gets really funky. My best speeches, I think any pro would tell you this. Or when I'm actually talking to myself, right? Because that's the only time I listen up. If I'm talking to Brad cuz dad about bacon rap business that is like sunshine up my ass. It's not real. If I'm like, whoa, dude. Okay, let's have a serious conversation for just a moment and let's talk about some, the hardships I've had in my speaking career. Let's talk about what I've had to go through. Let's talk about how I've earned where I'm at. And let's talk about some of the things that if I had learned them, I could have shortcut a lot of problems in my business. And now I'm talking to myself about my own authentic trials, tribulations, and talk about the things that I'm proud of. And when I'm talking and I'm using message points that relate to me still to this day, that's when I'm present because I have to be. I'm absorbing as much as I'm, as much as I'm delivering. But if all you're doing is delivering and you have no interest in absorbing your own message because you don't think, you think as soon as you think you're above the ground that your, your mission is, is above other people, they feel it.

Yeah, yeah. And that's so profound. And I just remember thinking, because if you do care about what you're speaking about, and hopefully if you're speaking, you do, you give a crap, right? So if you care and you, your main goal should be. And this is the way that I interpret that too, and why it helps me, there's a, there's a room full of People out there who need the information that I've got. And if I am, like you said, if I'm, if I'm worried about the way I'm gonna look and if I'm gonna say or ah. Too many times or if I'm not gonna give the best delivery, then I'm doing them a disservice. I'm robbing them from the content they need so much. And on the other side of that, I've seen speakers not deliver the best mechanics of it, but they were passionate about it and you could tell they cared about. And yeah, you forgive them because they care enough, because you could tell they're putting the passion in it and they are doing it for the audience.

Some of my favorite speakers get up on stage with notes and they pace back and forth and they're goofy and they talk in tangents, but they are so authentic and their material is so like Joe Callan. He's not a speaker that a lot of people know that are outside of the industry. But man, he gets on stage and I just, I'm enamored. Not because he's got the best delivery or he's got the best message, but he's so clear on who he is and he's so cares about delivering the value to me, the listener that I think it's adorable. He's holding his notes.

Right.

It's not because he's not holding the notes because he needs notes, because he doesn't know what he's gonna say. He's got notes so that he knows how to stay on track because he got so much to say. So the notes are like playful.

Yep.

It's. It's not, it's not about, it's not about one single technique. It's not about one single thing. It's like back to the days of when you and I used to teach men how to get women. And we would say to guys, it's not the pickup lines, it's the intention and energy underneath it. Because I can teach you the best line. If you're gonna be awkward and creepy about it, you. You'll creep the girl out. But you could also go up with smooth energy and totally sure of yourself and say anything and the girl will like you.

Yep, yep. It's all, it's all in that authentic delivery. And that's, you know, one of the things, as I said, I went through, I think it was a three month apprenticeship with you. And for some folks who think, oh, you're going to teach people how to. Exactly how to hold their hands and exactly how to be the most polished. It's really nothing about that. It's really about how to deliver that authentic message, but also how to craft the message in a way. You gave some amazing techniques about. And we won't go into this right now. These are just the little antics, but like the block method that you use about how you story block things in order to. If somebody's. If you've got an hour and then they. All of a sudden, you went from an hour speech, they said, you've got 15 minutes. How do you recover from that? And you've got really an amazing technique. And what I really liked as well is it wasn't just about building the content and building the delivery, et cetera. But you talked about the marketing. You talked about the attitude, the business, the relationship side of it. And I've studied a decent amount about public speaking, although not as much as, you know, other topics. But I have not seen people really who know what they're talking about the same level you do. You've been doing this for a very long time. You've seen a little bit of everything when it comes to, you know, speaking.

And I've watched a lot of people fail.

Right.

And I don't mean fail, like make mistakes, because I made a lot of mistakes. And I don't mean, like, have a bad story speech, because I've had bad speeches. I mean, like quit. I mean like not get hired and go broke.

Yeah.

I mean, like, you know, throw everything away because they didn't get it handled. So every year the National Speakers association has about a thousand people at least come to the national conference. They're all speakers. So you can. It's not the National Listeners Association. There's no one's. No one's listening.

Yeah, everybody's in there thinking about this is how I would speak.

Everybody's talking over each other. And at least a third of the room, at least, Brad, a third of the room will not be back the next year.

Really. Because they just can't make it because.

They don't master mdma.

Yep. Yep. And then. And that's like you said, that's. That's message delivery, marketing and attitude. Right?

Yeah. And if I could for a moment, you will find. And any of us will. Will find programs to really get good message. You'll find good programs about the delivery, find great programs about marketing. You'll find maybe some good programs about the attitude of how to handle the client. But the reason why I'm doing what I'm doing Is I haven't found a boot camp, a sales program, like a training that teaches people all four aspects. And that's what always upset me. I would go to these trainings, and I'm not putting down these leaders. They taught me a lot, but they got really good at one of those four components, and then that's pretty much all they felt it's took. You know, they would just be like, oh, oh, you just gotta market the hell out of yourself. Yeah, that's great. Market the hell out of yourself. Have good, shiny brochures. And that's. That's gonna get you a lot of first dates. But if you don't have a good message, then you suck at delivery and you got a bad attitude to work with. You are not getting a second date.

Right.

And if you think you're gonna make it in the industry of speaking without second dates, damn. You're gonna choose to climb uphill every single day.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's. It's those relationships that you build that keep paying dividends over and over. I'm sure there's multiple companies that you've spoken for. They bring you back.

They are staples in my business.

Right. You know, and so they bring you back time and again.

Yeah, several times.

Yeah.

You know, and. And if you get really good, you can just call them up and say, I got something new that I. I know your team's gonna like, when can you book me? And they say, sure, what do we. You know, when do you want me to send you the money? And that's when, you know, you got it dialed in right. When you can call them up and say, are you ready to pay me again?

Yeah, that's it. And that's got to be a great feeling just to get to book a speech and just get paid for, I mean, an hour of your time, which is more than most people make in a. You know, in a month.

Yeah, well, it's very humbling because my sister works her butt off music teacher in elementary school, and I make. Like you said, I make more in an hour than she might make in a couple months, two to three months, and. And that's hard for her to handle sometimes.

Yeah.

But I'll tell you why. It's not because I'm better than her. What she does is she's way better as a teacher than I am. She's way better than with kids than I've ever been. The only difference is there's a lot of demand. There's a lot of supply of teachers, and when there's A lot of supply. The demand and the way that you're able to charge is not going to be there.

Right.

Whereas a speaker. There's a lot of supply of speakers, maybe, but there's not a lot of supply of good speakers. There's not a lot of supplier of speakers that master the mdma.

Yeah. Well. And I think the real reason that you get paid so much is simply, you know, because you're in a wheelchair and you look different than most people, and that's your advantage. That. I mean. That's right. That is the advantage that you have to have in order to be a speaker. You have to be a little different. Right. Isn't that what some people think?

That. That's what a lot of people think. But since you read my sales copy closely, I know you're teeing me up for a good response.

Yes.

Which is. That's what most people think.

Yeah.

And the issue is that there's 56 million people in America with a disability. Do you know how many of them go on to be professional speakers that are successful?

Very few.

About a dozen.

Yeah, you shared. I remember the first time you shared a story. It was Awesomeness Fest several years ago when we first really kind of connected. And I love this. And I've heard you talk about it on stage a couple times, and it's one of my favorite stories. I'll let you recount it here. But I think you were saying that you went out back in Chicago with some friends of yours and you went to a nightclub and. You know where I'm going with this. Go ahead and finish the story, because I think this alone illustrates just not only this point, but a lot of points when it comes to the attitude part of things.

So a buddy of mine, when I would go out my single days, now I'm happily married and nightclubs annoy me, actually.

Yeah.

But back in the day, they were like.

Because nobody can dance like you.

Well, that is true.

I mean, you need competition.

Well, when I dance now, I demand at least a million people to watch.

Sometimes four.

Sometimes four. Yes. But only in the first week.

That's true.

But what I had happening back when I was young and single and younger and single is I would go out and I would get a whole group of women around me dance. And my buddy got really jealous, and he was like, I don't understand why all these women give you their attention. It's probably because you're in a wheelchair. And it's the same excuse people use. Oh, that's why. That's why you. You built a business the way you have. Because you look different. Wheelchair. Okay. All right. So I tell my buddy, I'm gonna go out tonight. When we go dancing. I'm not gonna act like Sean. I'm gonna act like a three foot tall man in a wheelchair. And so I actually had to stop and ask myself, how does a three foot tall man in a wheelchair think? Yeah, I don't think that. Like, I think like Sean Stevenson, a guy. Like, I have the reverse problem of most people with eating disorders. I don't see myself worse off than I am. I see myself better than I am.

Yeah, but you're like. You're like the little dog who thinks he's a rottweiler. Right?

Right.

Yeah, Totally.

Don't mess with Chihuahuas. So anyway, we go out, I acted all shy, sheepish, afraid of my own shadow. No girls wanted to dance with me. No girls wanted to look at me. They walked around me like furniture. My buddy completely running over. He's like, sean, Sean, I get it, I get it. It's because of you and your energy and your attitude. You bring the party. It's. It's through who you are as your energy behind it all. Now, can you please bring the girls back? And. And, you know, it was in that moment that he realized, I'm just making an excuse for why I'm not coming out of my shell to be as confident in Sean's acting, because confidence is what's attractive on stage, in a nightclub, anywhere. I believe that when you people, People will always throw at me the excuse of why I have what I have because of my disability. I've had people, literally, I had publishers, big name book publishing, say to me, well, we think the only reason why you got to work in the White House is because you were in a wheelchair. And they needed somebody in a wheelchair to look good. And I'm like, they have thousands of applicants a year. They take a small number of applicants, and they rarely pick somebody with a disability. You think it's because of the disability? No, it's because I worked my ass off first. I became a congressional intern, and I. And I worked for a congressman, and I got great remarks from my congressman. It's because I worked going door to door as an alderman in my ward and understanding politics on the local level. And then I understand in my poli sci degree, I got incredible marks from my professors. And then because I got a personal letter from the president who had worked with me in another organization, and said, you know, to the. To the committee, like, yes. Sean is somebody who would be perfect to work in our administration. Like, I busted my ass for that position.

Yeah.

But no different than race or gender or sexuality. If somebody wants to point a finger and say the only reason why this person has this is because you're not going to argue with them now they're.

Making excuses for their own get it?

No explanation will do. For those that get it, no explanation is needed.

Right. And when they, and when they can come up with an excuse like that, it, it frees them from, yeah, it frees them from having to take the next step and to work on themselves because they just go, oh well, that's a barrier I can't get over. I got, I got two.

This is why people still this day hate on me and my wife. Marriage.

Yeah.

You know, like they'll come out and they'll be like, the only reason why she's with him is because he's rich. And she's like, wow, how dumb two things. How dumb do you think I am that there's a lot of rich guys out there. Why would I take a little dude in a wheelchair? You know, I can pinpoint that guy right. When I could have taken him much easier road.

And your wife's beautiful. That's not like.

Right. I mean, and it's insulting me, cuz it's like saying there's no other reason why somebody would want to be with me.

Right.

And it's like, wow, thanks for totally not acknowledging that I'm a human being that has charisma, confidence, a focus, a purpose, a mission. All things that women find attractive. But as soon as they can shoot down the, the reason that they think that, you know, is the, it's the magic behind the curtain. I, I responded to somebody and this is off topic for a second, but it's okay. I wrote somebody on, on Mindy's blog, my wife's name is Mindy Kness. And on Mindy's blog she was like tearing into Mindy. You know, there's no reason why you're really with him other than for the visibility and the money. Blah. And I wrote her and I'm like, what are you trying to accomplish here? Are you trying to play TMZ and, and like, and like overturn the truth about what's going on here. Can I tell you? You know, most of our days we work as entrepreneurs, we spend in our pajamas, we watch Shark Tank together, we read our Kindles in bed until, you know, 2:00am we have cereal at about 2:30 in the morning. Morning you know, we curl up, we have wonderful sex life, we absolutely have each other's back, and there's no one else in the world that we care more about than each other. That's the truth. If you're gonna try to find something else, you're wasting your breath, your time, and you just look stupid.

Right, right. It's, you know, the. The. The haters out there. It's I. And I. And I know you've talked about this. This before. I mean, you know, used to take it personal, and now it's. He takes sympathy on him and.

Well, I know that. That the hurt. Hurt and the healed heal.

Yeah.

You know, and it's like, when people are hurt, the way that they deal with it often times is they go with the knee jerk reaction, which is, I'm in pain. I want you to be in pain.

Yeah. Misery loves company.

Well, yeah, Misery loves to see somebody else in more misery.

Yeah. Because it makes. Yeah, exactly. It alleviates them.

Why do you think people watch Jerry Springer?

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. You know, and that's. And that's important for people to really understand is that it's not. It's not who you are or. I'm sorry, it's not what you look like. It's not the things that have happened to you that made you a successful speaker and somebody who can engage an audience and grab them by their earballs and just not let go. It's the craft that you've perfected. If it's the message, it's the passion in your voice, it's what you deliver. And the fact is, there are thousands of highly successful speakers in perfectly average, normal bodies that prove it's not anything special about physical. It's all what's inside. And that's what you deliver better than most people I know.

I believe it's our story.

It's your story, Brad.

If we took time on this podcast, and even a white guy like yourself who grew up without any major battles, you know, in comparison to, say, somebody grew up in slavery or whatever.

My parents were pretty strict, though. I don't know.

Well, yeah, your dad was tough. Right. But if we looked into your past, we would find things that people would be like, wow, I don't think I would want that problem.

Yeah, everybody has it.

I don't think I want to go through that heartache.

Yeah.

Like, let me ask you, can we. Can we get real for a moment?

Let's do it.

Okay. What is one thing about you, one pain or challenge that you faced in your lifetime that no One would ever guess you had to go through.

Wow. So that's a good question. And I'll. And I'll say that. Right. You sob pulling me, putting the spotlight on me on my own show. So I'll be the first to say that I did have a happy. I've had a happy life. I've had a happy childhood. That's not right. Exactly. So I will. Yeah. So I'll say that I haven't had any dramatic pains that I've had to overcome. Yeah.

What is the one thing that was difficult and challenging that no one would ever expect you had to go through?

So. And I. And I kind of want to talk this so I don't have dead air because this is a show, people are going to think, oh, wait, the recording stopped. What is something I went through that was extremely challenging and painful? Yeah, it is in there.

Yeah. A better way of asking it is what would you not wish on people that you love that you would.

That's a. That's a good question. I like. You're good at this therapy stuff. You're. Now, you're not only a speaker, you're. You're a doctor at this stuff. So I would say that the hardest. I'm not being a good subject here because I'm having a brain fart. That might be, but it's also not coming straight to my head. So. And I may have to think about this and we'll come back to it, but I don't. But I don't want to sit here and mumble around, you know. Well, and I'll say this, and it might be because I don't have any of those. Super. That's possible. It's possible. And I think. I don't have any super acute pains. Well, I was about to give you kind of an answer. Well, the answer I was going to give you is this. I have. I'm actually very good, like maybe you said, dumbing down the pain. I'm actually very good at moving away from the pain and putting it in perspective and looking at something and saying, I'm just going to continue on. Right. And this was the hardest part, honestly, about my apprenticeship training with you and God, this to me, I would think, oh, yeah. Poor baby lived a charmed life. He can't think of any dramatic pains that he's had. But this honestly was the. I know. But this was the hardest part about coming up with my story for you. Right. So, you know, the hardest thing that I probably dealt with going to kindergarten.

On you right now.

Cool.

You're a kindergarten kid. This is how I would talk to a kindergarten. What hurt for you to go through?

So the most painful thing that I've probably gone through was when I was in. I graduated college and I decided to. I decided to leave home and I moved away to Florida. I left St. Louis, where I grew up. I moved to Florida and I actually worked for Walt Disney World for minimum wage right after college, college degree and everything. And I felt as though I was just kind of breaking away and doing something like taking charge of my own life and having some fun, etc. And my dad was completely non supportive, to say the least. It caused a big rift in between us. And the hardest part about that was that he and I had a good relationship. And then all of a sudden I had always thought of myself as a good kid who did. Right. I never got in too much trouble, the ordinary stuff. And then all of a sudden it was almost like I had just let him down more than. I couldn't believe it. It kind of blindsided me. Right. It blindsided me in the lack of belief and the lack of support in what I was doing. Now granted, everything I was doing kind of didn't fly according to his paradigm of the world and whatnot. And I get it. I put myself in his shoes. And actually maybe one of the reasons that a lot of this stuff doesn't hurt as much as I went through several years of neuro linguistic programming training and I've dealt with all of my issues to a degree where I'm able to see the positive intent that he had for me, trying to protect me, trying to make sure that I didn't mess up. And doing it in the only way he knew how, which was to show his disappointment. Say, I can't be a part of this. I can't support what you're doing. Yep.

You realize more people go through that than breaking 200 bones like me.

That's true.

So when people tell me the bullshit that, oh, my story is not as compelling as yours, it's only the way you're looking at it.

And mine's more relatable.

More relatable. So I have to turn it in a different direction. I have to say, essentially without saying it directly, but I went through this, this, this, this. But I did this, this and this and this after I got through that.

Right.

So mine is I was here, now I'm here. Where can you go? That's kind of been my thing.

Right, right.

For you, it's the format of you and I, we have a lot more in common than you might think. And you have to take the approach of, you know, I'm not, I'm not going to say that I was in. I survived an airplane crash. I'm not going to say, say I'm a survivor of sexual assault. I'm not going to say that, you know, I saved 10 kids from a burning building. I'm going to say I'm a kid that grew up with brain, great parents.

That one day the support was revoked.

That one day he didn't feel like he had. He had a good connection anymore with his parents. It felt like he lost a big part of his identity. And how many people in here have ever had a separation in some ways where they didn't feel supported by their family? Hands are up.

Yeah, that's a good point. And you.

When I'm working with my coaching course clients that are speakers, I don't look at how can I make you little knees? You're not taught stuff. It's just today in our banter.

Yeah.

What drives us nuts are gurus that make carving copies of themselves. God, I hate that.

Yeah.

And sickens me. I know what's going to happen. Only the guru gets rich.

Yep.

The carbon copies look like idiots.

Yeah, that's true. And I, and I, I do want to, because my father may very well be watching this, but I do want to say that the, the relationship. So, yeah, the, the relationship was strained for a couple years and I took it. Really. And I, and I do want to, because my father may very well be watching this, but I do want to say that the, the relationship. So the, the relationship was strained for a couple years and I took it really hard.