Adel Sayegh: Lessons From The Man Who Lost The World, But Gained His Soul

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Hey, friends, this is Ryan Daniel Moran. Welcome back to the podcast. I was recently at an investor meetup for a business that I'm a participant in and I met this man who I had never met before. And one of our mutual friends was chatting with him and we had a little nice conversation and it took about six minutes for me to invite this man onto the podcast. His name is Adele Sage. And I asked Adele, within a few minutes of meeting him, how quickly can you do an interview? And he said, well, Ryan, I've never.

Done one before, so I guess now.

So about a day later, he and I got into my hotel room and we recorded this interview. So just so you know, the audio isn't the best on this podcast because.

I said, I want to record this, like right now.

I don't know if I'm ever going to meet you again. And this is the most fascinating life story I have ever heard. I have done hundreds of interviews in my time and this is top five. Immediately. The reason why I wanted to introduce Adele Sage to all of you who listen to this podcast is because this is a man who had everything, everything that you and I pursue when we wake up in the morning and we wish that our lives looked like X. Adele had X. He had everything that we all pursue in this relentless chase that we have as entrepreneurs. And he lost it all. And he talks about what happened and what he learned on the other side, and most importantly, what he came out believing about life on the other side of having and losing everything. Adele says something in this podcast where he says that he would not trade the losing of it for any amount of money in the world because of what he learned through this process. This is a fascinating conversation with a man who gained and lost everything and came out the other side with life lessons for us entrepreneurs to benefit from without having to go through the pain of loss that he went through. I know you will find this podcast inspiring and life changing, and I can't wait to hear your feedback. Please enjoy this interview with Adele Sage.

So, Adele, I think it's important to start with the context that you and I just met.

Yes.

But we feel like we've known each other for quite some time. We do. You were starting to share your story with me, and I basically said, how fast can we record?

I remember that they were like 10 minutes after we met.

And I was hoping you could give a little bit of context to start about the business that you were running a few years ago. Sure. And the exit that you were about to have, could we start there?

Absolutely. So in 1996, you know, fresh out of the Marine Corps, I wanted to do something bigger than I thought I was going to do. And I started out with RFID technology, which was so far advanced of its time. And then I got into the security component. I started in my garage.

Designing security tax for the clothing. And before you know it, you know, I, I, I'm getting a little bigger and bigger. And I was just innovative. I took the company from zero in my garage. My wife and I owned 100% of it to a valuation of $340 million, which Stanley, Black and Decker had offered me October 2014.

And you got. It wasn't like phony valuation. You got an offer of $340 million.

That is correct. And what we were trying to get is a billion dollar valuation at the time, but we might have been a, you know, a year two from being able to exit a billion dollars.

And you and you own 100% of it, you and your wife.

Yes.

Okay, so you're right on the, on the cusp of this, like, heads down, making a go in it.

Absolutely.

Work is your life at this point.

Work was my life. And, you know, I'm living out of a suitcase 80% of the time. I'm traveling all around the world, meeting with all these accounts, and we're bringing on some of the biggest names, you know, I was competing against starting from my garage. I don't compete with multi billion dollar companies. It was an easy challenge, but now I got accounts like Macy's. Norse giving me exclusive contracts saying I don't want to deal with no one else but you. It was probably one of the most rewarding feeling at that time.

Okay, well then what happened?

Then.

I wanted to give myself a very special birthday. I was turning. I was going to turn 50. I was 49 years old. I was training for Ironman and that was going to be my birthday gift. Right? I was going to go at 50? Yes.

Oh, cool.

I was going to do. I've never done it before.

Ironman is the marathon 100 mile bike race and the two mile swim.

Something that is correct.

Okay, you're going to do that at 50?

Yes. And that was gonna be my Adele. I was actually at that time I was in better shape than I was in the Marine Corps at 50 or 49.

At 49, while traveling 80% of the time and building a billion dollar company.

Absolutely.

You were the rare CEO with abs.

Yeah, I don't know if I had the abs, but I certainly had the passion.

Okay, so you're training for this marathon. You're the Ironman. You're in the best shape of your life. And then on top of the world.

Listen, houses. I mean, God had blessed me more than I could ever imagine. I mean, my life was set. My kids life was set. My great, great grandkids was set. I thought I had it all figured out. You know, houses, vacation places. I was buying cars. The most exotic cars you could ever imagine. I had it all. I thought I had it all right. I had it all figured out. And then I got a knock on the door. And when I opened it says, Adele, I don't care how powerful you are. I don't care how much money you got, I don't care who you are. I'm pancreatic cancer and there's no escape with me. And you could just imagine. I've known a lot of people that have pancreatic cancer. I don't know anyone that had lived the term. I had an uncle of mine, was just two weeks earlier was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Given three to six months, only survived less than a week. And it was still fresh in our mind. So for me to get this call was pretty traumatic.

Same diagnosis. He was pancreatic cancer.

And you had also pancreatic cancer. And I was pancreatic cancer where the chances of survival was less than 4%. I had more surgeries than I could ever count.

I was in and out of the hospital for 18 months.

I.

Every week I would go in and they had to do a procedure because I was leaking more pancreatic fluid than anyone ever recorded. We had universities, John Hopkins, MD, Anderson, City of Hope.

USC, UCL, all trying to understand why was I leaking so much pancreatic flu. No one understood why, but in the process, it was causing more chaos than you can imagine. If I wasn't in the hospital, just medicated, I was at home. And if I was at home, my kids were still all teenage. Everyone had to set an alarm every hour and an hour. They had to get up, change my bandages, change my bags, you know, if I was sleeping. Because a lot of times I didn't have the energy or power to be able to do a lot of that myself. So it was very chaotic to go from thinking, I have it all to I'm facing the unthinkable of this is it. And while I was going through all this, I was actually given my last communion. Three separate occasions where the priest came in, gave me my last communion. Family came to to say goodbye. Of course, I was refusing. I. I knew what was happening, but I didn't allow anyone in my room that wanted to. To say goodbye or have any sympathy. I didn't want that. I didn't want any empathy. I didn't want anything. I just wanted, if you love me, come and give me a hug and give me a kiss and just support me and mentor me. Don't cry, don't feel bad for me, because I'm going to beat this.

You believed you were going to get better.

Oh, I knew I was going to.

Get better the whole time.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Because the way I found pancreatic cancer was actually by a fluke. And I was scheduled to go get a brain cast. I was having a lot of sinus issues, especially when I sleep. I was just having a really hard time. Dr. Chang.

Orders a brain cast scan, and when I went in, they gave me, you know, a bunch of stuff to drink, lay down on the table and drop your pass. I said, drop my pass? Wait a minute, buddy.

I think I'm hearing about brain cast scam, but I don't know if that has to do with dropping my pass. And he looks at the paperwork, he says, adele, no, you're actually scheduled for an abdominal cavity. I said, I'm download cavity. No, I'm here for brain cascading. He checks the paperwork, he says, no, you're not. You're here from downward cavity. He goes, Mr. Sage, I cannot change the order. What would you like to do? And I said, who ordered this test? He says, Dr. Chang. I said, she's my ear, nose, throat. He goes, I cannot change the order. What do you want to do? And Ryan, for the first time in my life, I've always been. You know, I've always been a. My upbringing was in a Christian family. You know, I'll go to church, you know, just holidays, whatever. I knew. I prayed every night. I had what I thought was a special relationship with God. And that was the extent of it that I thought was where I wanted.

You're good.

Okay.

Kind of lost my train of thought there. And that happens, unfortunately, every now and then.

I guess I didn't stop there. Okay, keep going for it. You're right on track.

So.

When.

So when. So the scan came back.

You had a scan? Yes. So the scan came back. And the next morning, 7:59. So that was the first time I truly felt God's intervention. And I took the test. 7:59. The next morning, my wife and I having a cup of coffee. And I can completely forgotten about the test I had taken the day before. But this just slipped my mind. It wasn't even on my mind because.

It was the wrong test.

It was a wrong test, and I wasn't expecting anything back in return. And it was my doctor, Dr. Raisin. And he calls me adult. He says, so that was my 9 11. If I was to say, ryan, hey, you know, where were you June 5, 2015? And I don't know if you would know, but if I would say, where were you 9-11-01? Most people remember exactly what they were doing because the emotional attachment to that day, that was my 9 11. And she's like, I have good news and I have bad news. Okay? He says, the bad news is there's a. We found a massive tumor on your pancreas, and it does not look good. I don't know what you got scheduled for the week. I need you to cancel everything. I scheduled for barrage of tests, and I. My knees just turned rubbery. I could just feel like I was shaking internally, not externally. My wife was there. I'm trying to, you know, hold myself together.

And I said, okay, what's. What's the good news? He said, we found a tumor in your pancreas. I looked at the phone And I said, Dr. Raisin, how could that possibly be good news? He said, dough we ordered the wrong test.

And that's when it really dawned on me that My life was happening for me, not to me. I felt like my life was being guided and knowing that and growing my faith is when I believed I'm going to overcome anything. Because God wanted something to happen to me. He would. I would have not found it. I was so determined to, to, to win. And that's, that's what I did on a daily basis. I actually had you hear this but I had literally visual account. I would every morning, like in months, sometimes three, four times a day, I would just close my eyes and one of my favorite movies was Gladiator. I must have watched it 100 plus times and, and I loved the movie. And I used to see myself in a gladiator outfit with, with, with, with my sword in, in two people walking into the ring, right into the Colosseum cancer which was 100 times stronger and bigger than me. And there I was, the little guy with. You know, it was almost like the David and Goliath. And I was literally. I knew there was only one person that could come out of that ring. And I knew it had to be me because I had something so much bigger to live for than I was. I was beginning to realize and you know, going through the medical and going through these surgeries and going this. That it's no longer about me. And the moment I realized that life was not for me and it's life is happening for me and it's so much bigger than me is the minute I defied all medical odds. Every doctor that told me that I'm sorry, there's nothing we could do. I wanted to prove him wrong, to show them how strong faith is. And today the doctors are still in amazed, you know that, that I recovered the way I did.

Why do you think you got better?

I listen for me, I know why I got better. It was because of my faith. You need something in your life and if you don't have something solved for me was guidance. You have to have something to fall back on. Something's true, something that's real. And science were not going to determine who I was. I was not going to be a statistics that somebody was going to throw on the wall. I'll leave that for the other 96% where.

Whatever the doctors tell them they want to believe. I believe that no one will ever take care of you better than the way you're going to take care of you. And knowing that.

And earlier I'm gonna share something with you that happened earlier. Tony Robbins is a good friend of mine. I've known Tony for quite a Long time. Way before his fame. And I love the man to death. And he was truly off stage. He is genuinely 100 times even more beautiful than he is on stage. And you can't not love him on stage. So that's how genuine and real he is. And we're in Fiji. And I shared with Tony a lawsuit. So when I was growing, all these big companies wanted to buy me out, and I had no fucking interest. I wanted to grow my company. I was like. To me, it was like a legacy. And one company had the balls to come in and say, adele, you know, they made me an offer. I said, listen, I'm not interested. A week later, they said, hey, the CEO executive team would love to come out. We love your company. Do you mind if we just take a tour? And they wanted to meet you. And not knowing, you know, they're about their attorneys. And they actually gave me an offer in a letter. He says, why don't you take a look at this? And it was a very, very generous offer, but I was not interested in selling. And the attorney says something stupid to me. She says, you know, we think you may be violating some of our intellectual property. And, you know, we don't want to get involved in lawsuits. And that's when I asked him. I said, you know, I think our time is up. I got another meeting, and I excused him out of my office. Week later, I'm hit with a lawsuit, A boost, you know, some of the most bullshit lawsuits you could ever imagine. You know, that they were just made up and they just kind of threw on the wall knowing that they're billion dollars. They have an entire legal team on payroll. And here I'm a little guy, you know, trying to make it. I don't. 100% of my company was financed by myself and my wife. And I'm telling Tony, you know what? I feel like I have no other option. And he says, adele, no other option. That's not an option. That's suicide. He goes, go out and create options. It didn't mean nothing to me when he said it to me at that time. Maybe it did. But consciously, it wasn't something that I walked away with or remembered or did anything with. But when the doctor said, adele, I'm sorry, there's nothing we could do. There's no other option.

I knew it was like Tony was just right in my face saying, adele, go on and create options. And that's what I did. I went out and created options. I learned more about pancreas and the surgeries and the Procedures all around the world than anyone else. And Dr. Fung, the number one doctor surgeon in the country, known all around the world as being the pancreatic specialist. You know what he said to me? I had a half hour meeting with him and he ended up being two and a half hours. And he says, adele, I'm gonna move my. Goes to his nurse. He says, move my schedule. I want to spend more time with Adele. He says, it's so refreshing to finally meet someone who's taken the level of interest in themselves as you did.

Most people don't when they're in that scenario.

Most people unfortunately want to become a statistics. There was actually a study done a number of years back.

Where people that were given diagnosed with terminal illness, they went back and 86, like diagnosed with terminal illness, died within a week of when they were told. So they were said, you know, again, you have a month to live. As an example. They died like in three weeks to five weeks. So they died a week earlier. But 86% died within that, within that range. And the other 14% survived. So when they did the study, then talked to the families of the deceased, this is, you know, Harry, Sally, they kind of gave up. They were okay with it. They accepted it. They know, they knew it was the next chapter in their life and they just moved on. And then went to the other 14 and says, the ones that survived, they said, who? Who are they to tell? I don't have an expiration date. Who the hell they know? I have so much to live for. You know, I want to walk my daughter down the aisle.

I want to watch my kids graduate. And again, I read the article. It meant absolutely nothing to me until I was in that moment myself and I started recollecting that. You are. If you want to be statistic and you want to listen to what people will tell you and you're worried about what people judging you, which happens to all of us in business. We're all worried about what people think and what I'm going to say. The only opinion that ever should matter is your own opinion. And if you come from a place of kindness, if you come a place, from a beautiful place of humbleness, of trying to make this place better than you found it then, how could you possibly make any mistakes?

I love that now. It wasn't just the health stuff that was going on when you got the diagnosis. Your team didn't think you were coming back.

So.

So things got really, really ugly for me. So my last surgery, which was, you know, if I didn't do it. My choices was if you do no surgery Max, you're probably looking at three months. It just. If things were got really awful and my body was started shutting down, virtually every organ started shutting down at that time. And.

I get a call, and when I answer the call is the president. And I'm thinking, you know, the priest is there, my family's there. And I'm thinking, you know, he's just calling me, check up on me and just wish me well.

The president of your company?

Of my company. He's only been with me at that time, I think eight months or so. He's just new into my company. He says he does the unthinkable and this is what, looking back, was pure evil. But you will never believe what he tells me. Says, adele, I know you got a lot on your plate, buddy, but I got an offer by your competitor who offered me $150,000 more a year and a $500,000 on the back end bonus. And if you can't match it tonight, I have to submit my resignation. I will start with them tomorrow.

Jeez.

This.

You're like, scheduled for surgery at this.

Point at 5 o' clock in the morning, which 96%, the doctors and everyone, they all prepared me saying, understand my family was already an understanding that 96% I was going to new morgue and not. And not coming home. And he gives me that call. I had no choice. What do you do? I was like, done. I just want to get through my next phase in life. And I felt like he'd take care of it later. And while all this happening, I had a great board, external board. So I had my internal plus an external. My internal was made up of my executive team, who unfortunately were sending us reports, sending my board reports, sending me reports that looked incredible. As a matter of fact, my board, external board said, adele, your company's doing so well, so much better without you. Once you just stay home.

Insulted a little bit. I was hurt, like, man, that's my baby. But at the same time, honestly, it was the greatest feeling. I felt like, free, like, wow. I get to be in the owner's block and just kind of watch my team on the field. What a great feeling. And then reality set in when I got the call that I need to revisit my financials, had a forensic team come in behind the scenes just to give me a peace of mind. And we found the unthinkable. They had embezzled more money than you could possibly ever imagine. Borrowed money on my credit card, my Line of credit, forging my, I mean, doing the unthinkable to me. And this is like my executive vice president. She was with me for 14 years, attended. She saw the birth of my kids. She attended every event that we had from baptism of my kids to graduations to picnics. I took her Hawaii. She was a part of my family and she was in the executive team and she was a mastermind behind, you know, how to embezzle and, and we were doing investigations. I wanted to sit in because I wanted to understand. I was in awe. I was in denial. I didn't want to believe that this could happen. When, when I, even then, when the FBI was telling what was going on, I was like, no, there's no way. It's impossible. You guys got it wrong. This is, this is my executive team, man. This is the one I took care more than anyone else I would have taken a bullet for. There's no way they will ever do anything like this. And they did. And I started liquidating assets. I haven't even recovered. I'm still in recovery. I could barely, barely walk. I was on crutches, you know, on a cane.

Massive amount of drugs. I mean, I was on Dilaudid, 300mg, which is unheard of. I mean it was just. And now I'm dealing with the unthinkable. Where I thought I was here I was telling my wife and my kids how every perfect everything is and how they're sat and I'm dumping all this money. And the next thing you know I'm being advised by everyone else that the problem was so much bigger than any of us had anticipated because they really did a good job on cooking the books that I ended up.

Having to file bankruptcy of my 25 year old company. That was virtually zero debt. When I left. We had more on the balance sheet and it was, it was a tough decision at that point. You can just imagine your whole life just coming at you. You got the medical, you got what you went through. You're trying to survive on a weekly basis. You deal. Am I going home? Am I going to no morgue? And then you're thinking you're surviving it, you're going to be okay and come back to your baby and just relax and be able to live life on your terms.

And now that's just been pulled from me. Everything I ever built was literally now hanging on the line.

And in their mind they thought you weren't coming back. And so they just milked the company for everything they could.

And that was the heartbreaker. So when I was in these, you know, investigation, when I was sitting in and they asked the question why? And that's. That was the part that probably ached me and hurt me more than anything else is when they said no one thought Adele was coming back.

And when they said that, that's when I realized for the first time there's evil out there. I never really realized what evil was until I saw what I witnessed at that time.

And you say evil because they just. These people that you trusted so much lost their faith in you and then betrayed you.

Yeah. And not only me. They weren't betrayed in me. They were trained. My wife, they were trading my kids, my teenage kids. The whole life depended on them. My house now had a mortgage. Everything had a mortgage. Everything was on. And my family was dependent on them. And they would have welcomed them. And all they wanted to do is take that away from my kids, my wife, and just give it to themselves. And that was. I can't think of anything more evil than that.

So, Adele, two years prior. You're in the best shape of your life. 49.

Yes.

You have a 3 to $400 million valuation on your company cash offer. You're working your way towards a billion dollar exit. You're on top of the world. And you literally lost the entire business. It goes to. It goes to zero. You lose the people who are closest to you outside your family. And you are. You almost lost your life. You lost your health. You are from. You are now at stage zero again.

Correct. You say materialistically, I am a stage right.

But.

You'Re now 5 years cancer free.

As of last week.

Yes. Congratulations.

Thank you.

And you are a very happy man.

I'm beyond happy. Let me put it this way. If somebody came to me and said, adele, look, what I went through was very traumatic. There's no denying what I went through. But today, let's just say somebody comes out of the blue and says, adele, you know what? Here's $10 billion check, tax free. You don't have to pay all your taxes. Everything's been paid. This is your gift.

10.

$10 billion. And you get to do whatever you want. You want donate it, you want to build it, you want to build an empire, you want to buy businesses. Whatever it is that you want to do, show money, do whatever it is that you want to do with it. But the condition is I would have to turn the clock back. And you never got sick and you never lost your business.

So I'm gonna make you whole. I'm gonna give you $10 billion, but you never got sick and you're not allowed to see a business. Would you do it? And the answer would be absolutely not.

You wouldn't change it?

Absolutely. Absolutely nothing you can pay me enough money to change. It.

Does not compute. I need you to unpack that. I mean that. So what you're saying there is that there's something on the other side of that.

There is.

That was even greater than what you had before.

Absolutely.

And even better than having all of that, plus $10 billion.

Absolutely.

What is that?

What we all strive to for. We all get in the. In the. In the rut race of working and trying to make a billion, thinking $1 billion going to make us happy. And we're going to be doing all these wonderful things. And the reality is I am so much more happier now than I ever been in my life. I have more inner peace now than I ever did in my life. I have a better relationship with God than I ever had in my life. And I truly am a heart of hearts. I feel that. I know my life is being guided. I know life is happening for me, not to me. And knowing that and feeling that and knowing that my life is being guided, that makes you fearless. Imagine going through life feeling that you're just. You have like an armor on you. Right. Like a bubble where no one could hurt you. Wouldn't you be doing things that you would not normally do?

Yeah.

And that's the man. That's. That's why I would not exchange it for anything. I know billionaires, they still see psychiatrists twice a week.

Sure.

I know a lot of people that have more money than. And they're so unhappy because what happens is that the most beautiful things is right in front of them. But sometimes we just get too carried away and lack of better words. I say sometimes we get just too stupid to realize that because we're looking so far beyond that of where we're supposed to be, where we think we're supposed to be based on our education, our upbringing, our background that we forget sometimes our wife, our kids, my health, their health is the single most important thing. And you know, I shared this story with my brother who struggled financially back in 2008. You know, when he was built, he had a mechanic shop, but he was growing it. He had, you know, he wanted to create a franchise and, and God bless him financially at that stage. And he had blueprints. He wanted to build his house. You know, it's like 7,000 square foot. He was just all for it. 2008 comes in and all the money that he has saved, he starts, you know, re advertising and branding and doing all the things, because that's what he always did. You know, business go down, you advertise, business comes back up. Well, 2008 was a kind of a unique year for the US and actually the world. And none of it worked. And he had lost everything that he had built on my parents house. And he's sitting on a couch.

Whining about how miserable life is and how, you know, he doesn't think life is worth living and on and on. The kind of stuff that if your brother said to you, I have no doubt, right, you would get up and slap the shit out of him.

Because I wanted to. But my brother is so much bigger than me, he'll kick my ass.

I didn't dare do that. But you know, he had been trying for 14 years to have a child. And they did, you know, they went from the US and even went abroad to trying to have a baby. And you know, they tried everything that you could imagine, you know, but it wasn't. And you know, it wasn't happening. And he finally said, you know what, God, it's not meant to be. And I was okay with it. And then they had a boy. Eleven months later they have another boy. Eleven months later they have another boy. But here is, here he is a couple of years later. You know, his kids are like 2, 3, 4, and he's talking about how life is not worth living. And I love John. He says, hey, listen, do you mind? We always role play. I says, do you mind if I just role play with you? He said, yeah, yeah. I said, let's just pretend I'm a genie, right? And I can make any wish you want come true. He says, okay, I'll play that role. And we're just standing on the couch. I said, all right, listen, I got this magic wand and you wanted to build this house, right? How big the house? He goes, I want seven. I said, dude, I'm a genie. That's all you want. I can build any house you want. He goes, oh, I, I, I want a 20. I said, I'm a genie. I want, I want, I want the mesh and I want this. And he started describing it. I could see him kind of lighting up, you know, And I said, okay, bank account. He goes, you know, I'd be happy with a billion dollars. I said, a billion dollars? I'm a fucking genie. What do you want? $100 billion? And he's telling me about all the cars that he wants and all this. And he, man, he's coming alive all of a sudden. He's just, that's what I want. That's what I want.

This is me.

He's telling me, this is me, man. This is me. I said, all right, listen, I told you I was a fucked up GD earlier. And if I did, I'm fucked up GD because here's what the genie is going to do. You have three beautiful kids. And I says, please don't take this the wrong way. You have everything that you want. You sound like you're happy and you got the life that you want. He says, absolutely. I said.

Michael'S your oldest son. I said, let's just say God forbid, you know, he gets diagnosed with an illness that no insurance is able to cover it. Nothing in the world would be able to save your son. And the only way you would save him is to sell this mansion of yours. Would you do it? And he's like, dude, why are you asking me stupid questions? I'm just asking because you know, I would. I says, okay, would you give up your, your bank account? And he started like choking. He just wanted to give. He said, why are you doing this? I said, I'm asking you a question because right now I really don't know. And he goes, but you know, I said, I don't know because you know, I would. I said, would you do your car? She goes, he started like, start brawling. I'll give up everything. I will live under a bridge. I will live on underpass with a cardboard box with my family. I've got to save his life. And you know that.

And I said, is that what has to happen for you to wake up? Is that what. And a lot of times we get our priorities screwed up. The most beautiful things are right in front of us. But our business mind and our entrepreneurial drive alters that. And I'm not saying don't be motivated. I'm not saying don't have the drive, don't have the passion. Because for me, your attitude will always dictate your altitude. Attitude is everything. And if you have a great attitude about life, about being happy, about being fulfilled, look what it would do to your business. Look what would do to the interaction, the relationship that you have with your business partners, with your employees, with your co workers or with other people that you engage.

Amen. A frickin men.

Amen.

The realization that I have had glimpses of is that when I operate from that place I can have everything else that I want, but I don't need it anymore.

Correct.

It is the sense of. If I'm obsessed with the house or the car or the status, it's not even the stuff. It's like the status and the money and the safety. If I'm obsessed with that, then I ignore all of the great things that are in front of me. But if I notice all the great things in front of me, then the status and the stuff mean less and I can have them. And it's just a choice. It's.

It.

It's what I believe that Jesus meant when he said, seek ye first the kingdom. The pagans run after all these things. They run after the money and the status and the. And all of the. All of this, the external things that we use to fill an internal void. But if you seek the kingdom first, then all everything else is added to you as well.

Absolutely.

Adele, do you have to almost lose everything in order to find that?

And that's the beauty of it, and that's the question is you don't See, for me, I had an awakening. And the only way I could describe it, the best way I could describe it, imagine, you know, driving through life and you got your windshields, you're in your car, and life is coming at you. Mud, grime, dirt, bugs is coming from every direction. And that's just life, right? And. And you got these little pinholes, and you're trying to navigate life. Is it green light? Is it a red light? I go faster? Do I slow down the pedestrians? And you become so inefficient because you just trying to navigate. And imagine somebody comes in and Windex is your windshield, and everything becomes crystal clear. That's what happens to me because. And everyone could have that clarity without having to lose a business, without having to have a child that's ill, without you having to have, you know, an illness or anything traumatic in your life because the beautiful things are in front of us. And the only way for you to know that is to start your morning with a ritual. Look, I have a ritual that I do every single morning. I love my Christian music, and I meditate. And not in a sense, in the. You know, the meditation. That doesn't do a whole lot for me. My mind wanders a little too many places. But the meditation of gratitude. I start my morning from a place of blessing, that I am so grateful for what I have. I'm so grateful to be alive. I'm so grateful that God gave me an opportunity to still make a difference. Because the kingdom you know, the heaven that everybody talks about and you know, listen, if heaven is anything like the movies, you know, where everything is white and everything else, I want nothing to do with heaven. But we all know that's not it. And heaven is eternity. It's not a hundred years or a thousand years, a million years, a billion years. It's eternity. And our place, our time on this earth is nothing more than a blink of an eye. And my favorite story in the Bible is talking about the parables. And everyone is given these talents. And you know, my challenge to your audience and everyone listening here is, you know, we're given these talents and when the day comes, which everybody is going to have, the day is going to come. And if you're Christian, we believe in heaven or afterlife. Would God be proud of you? Would he look down and says, man, I gave you all these talents and what did you do with them? What did you do with all those talents? Did you go bury them? Did you just make it all about you and you having the nicest houses and the nicest cars and your ego and your rating and your social media and all that stuff and showing everything? Is that what would make God proud of you? Because to me, I don't care about what other people around me today think, whether they're proud of me or not. The only person that matters for me to make proud is God. And if that is the choice that I make, think about it this way, Ryan. Look at every decision I make on a daily basis. If my goal is to make God proud of me, look at every deal, business transaction I make. It comes from a place of love. It comes place of unconditional love. It comes from a place of kindness, humbleness. And the people that you interact with will see through that. And they want to deal with a real person. They want you to succeed. And the good people, always cheering the good people on. And the ones that are envious of everyone else, they want everyone else to fail. And those are the ones that when you're comfortable place, you'll be able to see them a mile away and avoid them and keep them out of your life. And that was my mistake with my executive. I didn't have that eye. If I was to go back in time, I probably would have never hired him in the first place because they didn't fit the model of the world the way I see it. And there are good people the way I see it now.

Yeah.

And the only here's a great way for me to say, and I think this is a great way that everyone could probably relate to. Imagine putting on a set of glasses. And those glasses change your perspective from the way you see the world today to seeing it from God's point of view. So when you walk by that homeless guy or that person that's irritating you or that person that just doesn't fit your model, you know, they may be obese or cookie tea or just. Just, you know, sometimes you just don't want to associate with them. If they approach you, just, you know, hey, get away from me. Just. And, you know, sometimes we say, look at these bums. They make these choices. But if you're looking at it from God's perspective, you no longer see the external.

Beauty of a personal ugliness of a person. You kind of now look through their soul. And when you look through their soulmate, I'm so amazed at how many people I'm able to connect with and who are struggling. And in some cases, they're actually sharing with me that how they were thinking about committing suicide. And, you know, here I'm talking to them about life and everything else. And I realized one thing. Everyone I talked to, Ryan, that wanted to commit suicide or even thought about being depressed or anything else, here's the one common denominator. You want to know what it is? They're so focused on themselves. That spotlight is so on them. It's me. My life is shitty. My life is this. This always happens to me. This happens, you know, my marital problem, this problem, this business problem. They're so focused on them and only them, that my life becomes depressed. Now I'm just comparing myself to the Joneses. I'm just living life here. I'm supposed to be here, and I'm here. I'm supposed to have all this, but I don't have this. You know, I got kids coming. I. That's just. Who needs that?

Who needs that? We all find ourselves in there, but we don't have to be in there. We. The only one that could rob you of your happiness is you. The only one that could rob me of my joy is me. No one could ever listen. They could take away my house, they could take away my properties, which they did. They could take away my business, which they did. They could take my bank account and savings account. They could take everything away from me, but two things that they can't take away from me. The single most important thing that no one could take away from me is my relationship with God. No one could ever take that away from me. And a second thing that I know no One could take away from me, but me is my joy and my happiness. And if you want to live a fulfilled life, a life of fulfillment, and that's what we all do, right? We work so hard, we get up in the morning, we go through we do shit that we really don't want to do.

I'm sure so many people, like I was living out of a suitcase and, you know, hoping and praying. Keep your ambitions and keep your education and keep fighting and keep getting up every morning. But do it from.

A.

Do it from a place where you know you're making God proud of you that day.

Do it from the. Like the. Do it from the kingdom place.

Do it from the kingdom place.

Because then ambition, it fuels you.

Yes.

And I have experienced myself and I've worked with many entrepreneurs who are trying to expend and drain the battery, like expend the energy so that one day they can have freedom.

Correct.

So they're trading now and next year and next year and next year so that one day they can have freedom. But the truth is that you can find that now and then everything that you do is from that zone, from that place. When you mentioned the parable of the talons, I thought about how.

I think about the natural gifts that I have and how happy I am when I'm in that natural place, just that place of who I am, that alignment with myself. And I think about how unhappy I am when I am doing those same exact things, but doing it hoping to get a result, to get more downloads. Like if we take this podcast, for example.

I know from experience that when I am myself, the audience grows. But the minute. The second I start trying to make content, to make the audience grow, it sucks.

Amen. And you know why? Cause people are real. They see through all that.

That's right.

Right. They know when you're genuine and you're real.

That's right. And when you're real, it awakens the real part of other people. Like, when you are yourself. Why do we like being around people who are themselves? Because it makes us feel like ourselves. Absolutely. It gives us permission to be ourselves. Absolutely. That's why we like doing business with happy people.

Absolutely.

That's why miserable people hang out with other miserable people and happy people hang out with other happy people. So the way that you change, like the way that you change your friend.

Group is change yourself first, 100%. Listen, you're every result, success or failure, was as a direct result of you. Of your actions that you had taken. Right. The actions you had taken Produced the results. The life that you live today.

The only reason you live your life today is because of the decisions that you had made. And every decision was an action that you had taken. And every action began with a thought. Don't change the end result. Don't focus on the end result. Focus on your thoughts. You change your thoughts, you change everything. Listen, there's times where I'm in the middle of a prayer and I get these awful thoughts like, oh, my God, where did this come from? And there was a point in time that used to scare me. I would question, like, man, am I not worthy? Am I. Am I not a good person? Am I this? Or, you know, are you engaging? You're doing something with someone and it's like, man, you know, was I trying too hard? And the one thing I realized is, stay out of here. Stay out of your mind. This thing will fuck with you every single day. It will question you. Do I have enough? Do I have what it takes? Am I good enough? Am I really that nice person? Am I a true Christian? Am I this? And even in the middle of prayer, man, you get these stupid thoughts. And you got to remember those are just thoughts. They're passing thoughts. You have the choice to either dwell and focus on them or dwell and focus on other things that are good and beautiful in your life. Miserable people choose to be miserable.

You and I were talking about the other day about, you know, example, if you're driving and somebody cuts you off. You know, you're in traffic and somebody just abruptly cut you off, almost hits you, makes you swerve. The first reaction is, what?

Fuck that guy.

The window goes down, screaming. The international symbol, right, goes up. And it sometimes ruins your day. It may ruin it for a minute or five minutes or an hour. Some people even take that to work. It's like, you're not going to believe this. Some bitch can cut me off. But the reality is, here's my question to you and everyone listening to this podcast. What if there was an angel.

That whispered in your ear the moment he cut you off? He said, hey, that guy just cut you off. He's on his way to his daughter's, his only daughter's car accident where they just pronounced her dead? Would we still be rolling down the window and shouting and giving him international tell him what to go do with himself? Or would we be so understanding and just like with our eyes, just saying, man, I am so sorry. I'm with you, man. Not a problem.

The person that cuts you off there was the angel, says, hey, you know, this guy is on his way. His wife just diagnosed with terminal illness after 35 years and she was only given weeks to live. Would we still want to roll down the window and tell them what we think that cashier would come up to? That is so rude. And doesn't, you know, doesn't want to talk to us and you can just. She's got an attitude.

You know, sometimes we get the urge to tell her what we think. How should she do her job? Or maybe better yet, call her supervisor and says, hey, let's do something with her. I'm no longer going to shop here. What about if that angel said, hey, she's been betrayed by so many people that she's actually planning to go home tonight and kill herself. Would you still want to complain to tell her how to do her job or call her boss? Or would you want to engage her and. And just make her smile and make her day different or give her a compliment?

You make those choices. And if you come from a place of your heart, look, your first organ in your body, right? It's your heart, man. Stay true to your true north. If you operate from your heart, and I truly believe you know, your heart hasn't failed. It hasn't failed me, it hasn't failed you, and hasn't failed anyone on the podcast or there was no. No one will be listening. But our hearts hasn't failed us. And if you stay true to your heart and you invite for me, I invited the Holy Spirit and I'm not here to convert anyone from any of what their belief says. I'm just sharing my belief. The minute I accepted the Holy Spirit, it's like I got a download and that's when I got my clarity. Having God in my life, he's my rock. He's what I fall back to on a daily basis. My life is far from perfect. It doesn't mean I don't have bad days. It doesn't mean that shit doesn't hit the fan. It doesn't mean I don't stress out, but I don't dwell on it. It might last a minute too. And it's like a muscle, you condition. It's like going to the gym. You can't go to the gym and do one workout, expect you're gonna have the perfect body, right? You know, it's like a muscle and the same thing here. If you train yourself to always default to your true north and stay the fuck out of your mind because it will fuck with you all day long.

And what do you say? About tapping into and cultivating that true north. The reason I ask is because I've had glimpses of what you're talking about, Adele. I've had times where I feel so tapped in to love and compassion and service, and that's me on my best day. And I don't need anything. And I love speaking from that place and creating from that place and writing from that place. Everything that I do is intrinsically satisfying from that place, right? And I have days that I wake up and I'm like, this chair and fuck that wall and fuck that hotel and fuck that beautiful ocean, right? And.

And.

And all that service and love stuff that I was talking about yesterday, right? And in those moments, I crave the glimpses that I had previously so much, but I. But I don't feel like I can find them. So what do you say about cultivating that and building that muscle? I need that advice.

So I know you work out. I work out. I'm in a gym at least six days a week. And I realized one thing. If I want to have a great body, I got to put good stuff in there, right? I can't just be eating junk. I got to be eating healthy. So I have to put good things into my body in order for my body to behave good and feel good. And the same true with. With my mind. If I allow junk and if I allow shit and I allow that wall and that chair, fuck this and fuck this. Guess what happened? You're gonna have one of those fucking days.

And if you come from a place of going to the gym, right, it's getting started is the hardest thing. Getting started is the hardest thing. But once you do, you're going to love the gym. And if you can pair up with someone else to make your partner. So when you have one of those days, fuck that day. Fuck that day. That kind of pull you out and get you there. It's a great place to be. But for me, it's my morning ritual. Look, if you begin your place from a place of gratitude.

You know, your kids, your wife, your future, your business, things that you're truly grateful for, your mom, your dad, your brother, your sister, a friend, a companion, a pastor, someone that said something to you meaningfully, someone that gave you an opportunity or break, that made you who you are today or made you more successful, if you start from that place of gratitude and a prayer where you're praying for them and you're just feeling so blessed that fuck this and fuck this, we'll wind down. It doesn't mean it goes away. But your ability now to jump out of bed and say, man, I'm so lazy, fuck the gym, I don't want to go to the gym. But man, when you're conditions, what do you do? You still roll out of bed, you put on your shoes, you put on your workout clothes or your running clothes and you go do it. And once you're in there, you're no longer complaining. You just got to get yourself out of the fucking bed. And most of us want to stay in bed and roll in bed and come up with a million excuses. And your whole day as a result ended up the same way, full of bullshit excuses as to why you don't want to get up. Oh, I'm too tired. I'm this, I'm this, I'm working bullshit.

You're tired only if you stay in your mind. Your mind is the one that's saying it's hard. Your heart is saying you gotta have something that pulls you, right? And if there's one thing, the single most important thing to remember, the only reason sometimes we feel as awful as we do in depressed and shitty and fuck this, fuck this, fuck this, is when we're making it about ourselves. Yeah, it really is. And the minute you realize that this is so much bigger than us, I mean, think about it for a second. You know what, what is truly our purpose?

What is our purpose? And do you know your purpose? Because you don't know what your purpose. You know, it's like. It's like trying to, you know, to go to.

From California to New York without a gps, you're probably going to get there, but you may not be so efficient. And if there's any detours, it's going to really screw you up because you may be going north. And no matter how far north you go, you'll never get to New York. Or no matter how south east you go, you never got to get to New York, or no matter how far west you go, you're never going to get to New York. And the reality is, that's what happens a lot is we don't, you know, we don't have a destination in our gps. What we need to do is understand what is that destination.

Okay? And plug it into our gps. Because that minute that destination is not about you and you make it so much bigger than you, meaning that you are fulfilling your purpose. What is your purpose here?

So, Adele, I want to ask here because oftentimes when people think about the destination or the purpose, it's about the. The pursuit of Something external.

Correct.

And that's like, that's a false God. Oh, absolutely.

We'Ve established that.

Yes.

So there's such a big difference between that, that destination of making the billion dollars and the destination of.

Well, help me describe it.

How do you describe that real internal destination?

Absolutely. So imagine. So imagine getting out of bed, right? The example where some days you wake up and you feel you're on top of the world. You're so pleasant, so grateful on that day, fuck this wall or this chair.

What was the only difference? Why, why would you have a day like this and a day like.

My perspective?

Yes, your perspective of where you're supposed to be. You know, things are track and are you. Numbers are coming in, are you getting great calls, right? Because it's about you. It's back about you and your ego, you trying to get to that billion dollars. But the minute is no longer about you. So if your purpose was, if I was to ask you, you know, why do you want a million dollars? What does a million dollars do? And I do a deep an understanding. And he said, look, the only reason I want a billion dollars because I want to change the lives of this orphanage, not change the life of the world. There's this orphanage I passed by, there's like six kids. This is not be just one kid. And I am so committed to changing that kid's life. I really want to do something with that orphanage. I want to do something with that person's life. I want to mentor young kids that don't have a father, don't have a mother, don't have an opportunity like I got. And when it's that, when you have something pulling you as strong as that, I promise you, you will never get out of bed saying, fuck this chair, fuck this. Because it's not about you now. It's about that orphanage that you want to save. It's about that kid, you want to make a difference in his life. And I always say, you want to do something good, you don't have to get on stage and change billions of people, 100 meals or a thousand people. All you need to do is just change one, one life. Because when that day comes and God says, well done, my son, is he really proud of you? Is he going to say, well done? Because that life that you change, think about it. It's a domino effect, right? You know that life, that person essentially gets married, has kids, he's look at the domino effect. And if you're going to be an eternity, right, you spend attorney, don't you Want to have a whole lot of friends. It'd be so boring just to have a handful of people's life that you've barely changed. In some cases you didn't change.

And, but even, even from a non Christian perspective, like the, the, the internal satisfaction of making it not about yourself. I've never had a bad day when I was genuinely giving to somebody else.

And it's so true. Look, I. Honestly, part of me is selfish, but it's like a drunk. The more you do the you, the more you want it.

But, but it's a renewable drug and.

It'S a renewable drug and it's a great drug and it's, it's, it's. Man, there's nothing that makes you feel better than when you truly, when someone walks up to you and just hugs you and says, man, thank you for changing my life. Or, or thank you for that great advice. Or I really appreciate 20 years from now says man, the words of wisdom that you gave me was more meaningful to Tony. Tony. I love Tony. I love Tony then. I love him and adore him more now just because he had that conversation with me 10 years ago that who would have ever thought. And he gave me advice that I would attribute this as he saved my life. It was the, it was wise advice because when everything started falling apart, I said, you have no other option. I went out and created options. And Tony talks about changing people's life. Well, but we all could be Tony's. We all could change people's life. It only has to be just one.

And it's been my experience that our own life experiences, our unique experiences, shape what we perceive as important to us and then define our purpose. It's like right now, I see you as very on purpose sharing the discoveries that you've made through your trials. And I feel very on purpose when I'm working with an entrepreneur who wants to give up and I can free them up to be able to create the change that they want to have in this world. Because that's my context for the world. Those are the challenges I went through. Those are the things that I wish that I had. These are the messages that you wish you had 25 years ago before. Before you had to lose everything in order to get it correct. And so our experiences, our, our context, our perspective is enough for us to have the purpose that keeps us going for the rest of our lives.

Absolutely. Absolutely. And listen, if your purpose is to make a billion dollars because you want to make a difference, you're going to do it. But you can now. You're going to do it on your terms. You can do it without getting out of that bed saying, fuck this chair. Listen, I truly believe. And honestly, you've been around me a couple of days, you say I've never in my life been this happy. I lost. I lost everything materialistically and gained everything.

You did the opposite of what Jesus warned against, which was you. You lost everything and gained your soul.

So true.

Well, Adele, I'm so proud to introduce you to this audience. I can't wait to see what. Like, what are you focused on now that the business. I don't even know if that business still exists anymore.

Does not.

It doesn't.

So what are you focused on for the next chapter of your life? Like, you're in.

You're in.

You're at halftime in your mid-50s. Right. You're happier than you've ever been. Correct. You've got decades left. What do you plan to do from here?

Leave this place better than I found it. Every day I want God to be proud of me. Based on my engagement and people that I talk to.

And I engage. Sometimes as a five year old kid that I'm sitting down and talking to, and sometimes as a 97 year old person that I'm gaining wisdom and learning about life. I give everyone my unconditional.

Attention. I'm always present and sometimes I think that's the audience I used to get stuck in. I was so worried about the next thing that I wasn't even present. Sometimes I'll walk in and say, hey, baby, how was your day? And you know, as she's telling me, I'm watching the TV. Yeah, go 49ers.

Right? Presence is so important, man. And when you're present, you're really present. And you know, we're talking about unconditional love. And that is absolutely, you know, it's one of the most important thing that I learned from all this. I met my. My wife. A week later, we're engaged. Two weeks later we're married. That was 25 years ago. Four kids later. And when you know, you know. And it's not. It's far from perfect. But we work on it every day. It's like going to the gym. It's like a muscle. And the more I. The more I give her unconditional love, meaning I expect absolutely nothing in return, the more she gives me something.

Amen.

And you know, that would be.

My words of wisdom is just come from his true north.

I love that word. Unconditional. Unconditional love. Love without expectation, unconditional work, work without attachment to result. Like, can you be unconditionally happy? I love that word. Adele. Thank you, my friend.

Absolutely. Before we go, I don't, you know, I've had the pleasure of meeting you just the last couple of days and like I told you earlier, the gift that I was given, the awakening that I went through, the clarity I have is my ability to truly see through people's soul. I could literally look at a person and see right through their soul. I instantaneously, from the day that God gave me this gift, I have not yet been wrong. And I have to tell you, you are, bar none.

One of the most unique and special people that I have met. And I mentioned this to you and I don't know if I ever mentioned to anyone else, but you're truly greatness in the making and you just don't know it yet. You've done so. You've done so many wonderful things and I see your engagement and you are so smart, by the way, one of the smartest people I know and I'm impressed with you. But when I look through your soul, man, you are truly, genuinely a beautiful, beautiful sorrow that's caring and loving and want to make a difference in the world. And I know what your true path is. I know what your true north is. And I just want to say it is truly an honor to meet you, someone genuinely as beautiful a soul as you are, because you're given a lot of beautiful talents.

Thanks, Adele. Appreciate that very much. Thank you.

Absolutely. My pleasure.

That's a wrap, my friend.

Good one.

I fucking love you.

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