Unlocking Market Theory: A Human Approach to Business | Lechon Kirb

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Welcome to another edition of The Profitable Creative, the only place on the interweb where you will learn how to turn your passion into profit. I am your host, Christian Brim. Special shout out to our one listener in Greenwood, Indiana. No idea where that is, but thank you for listening. Joining me today, Lashawn Kerb of Market Theory. Lashawn, welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

Absolutely. All right. So tell us what market theory is. I mean, I know what market theory is, but what's your market theory?

Yeah, you know, um, it's, that's a great question. Let's just start with this. There's a way that people do business and usually how they function with it is like talking about products and services. And in many cases, they really kind of lose the connection of why they're doing it and who they're truly serving. And so we wanted to take a bit of a different approach, really a human approach where we have clarity between like how we're taking care of people and what it really means to take care of your market. It's not a, you know, a market that's outside of you. It's really tapping into your community. So really being in the people business is really what we're doing here.

Okay. And so what is— who is it that you work with?

We work with a lot of industry experts, creative entrepreneurs. Essentially what we're doing is we're helping them take their knowledge and their understanding and turning it into scalable systems and products so that they can share their knowledge in a way that allows them to expand themselves, but not really steal their time and effort to do so. Everything you do is really kind of an exchange of every other thing that you want to do. And so We want to reduce that risk and kind of like reduce the time that it takes you to kind of get to the life that you desire. So yeah, we deal a lot with that.

So do you have an example of what that looks like for like one of your clients?

Yeah, I mean, I have lots of examples of what that looks like, but I think probably a better way to serve you would give you, you know, it's kind of giving you a little bit more context. About this and, and why we think about it this way. But let's start with your question. Like, do we have examples of what this looks like? Most people, when they start a business, they start the business either selling products and services, and they're, they're gonna go out there and try to serve their market in, in whatever way that is. And just because you do that doesn't necessarily mean that you are compensated to the degree that you deserve because who you're serving, their, their goal really is to acquire your talents, right? In most cases for the lowest common denominator or lowest dollar they can get it for. Right. So they're gonna acquire your talents, but you're actually solving in most cases a high value problem. But just because you're solving a high value problem doesn't mean that you're compensated to the degree that, that you deserve. So we really hone in on what that means and how do you do that in a way that once again, doesn't steal from your time. Now, one of the channels that we do that with is like online courses or paid communities, virtual summits and things to that degree. But essentially, we're showing people how to productize that. And if all things are aligned, learning how to essentially get traffic from other people's sources.

So what you're describing sounds a lot like to me, I mean, this may not be correct at all, but really pricing in this sense that like you have an understanding of the problem that the customer has and you understand the value of the solution that you bring and you price your services accordingly.

Was that part of it? I think that's probably part of it, right? It's fair to say that, um, people price their things and they, and they solve a problem. Let me give you an example, right? Um, let's say that you had a video production company and a, and someone comes to you or an organization comes to you and they said, hey, we want you to do video services and we're gonna pay you whatever your rate is to do those video services. If you're looking to get business, you might say, that's a great deal. Thank you. Right? But it really depends on the context of how it's being used.

And, mm-hmm.

Right? So they are hiring you for video services, but essentially depending on the impact of that video, we don't know if it's gonna have like a lot of impressions or if it's going to be used in their marketing efforts. Is this gonna be used for lead acquisition? Is this gonna impact what their revenue is and their bottom line? And for how long is that gonna is that gonna be in play, right? Mm-hmm. Um, so it's really hard to assess that in the beginning, especially when you're selling the services. And if you don't have the context to think about how this is gonna apply to how it's being used to that organization, it's really hard for you to price yourself accordingly. So yeah, pricing is probably part of it. Um, but in alignment with that pricing is really the way that you're positioned. If you're not positioned as like a subject matter expert or someone that people trust and they were kind of seeing around, they're not going to perceive you as someone that they have to work with or they're choosing to work with, right? Before that, you're kind of a commodity. They're just looking for video services, right? So you have to create some distinction between how you communicate that, and a lot of it starts with how you perceive it. So yeah, pricing is definitely a part of it, but there are other parts that probably make a bigger difference for you.

Yeah. Really? Because I mean, my thought is that in business, and for creative entrepreneurs, this is definitely true, that pricing is probably the most powerful lever you have to grow your business profitably.

Yeah, I mean, it's incredibly important. Let me back up and give you some, you know, a little more info so it It makes sense for what we're talking about, right? Okay. Um, in probably 2015 or so, I was, uh, starting to really kind of lean into consulting. We had a product, it was probably about $2,500 or so, and we felt like, hey, this is priced well. And how we kind of arrived at that pricing is we kind of looked at our general competitors and what they're doing.. And we sold a few here and there. Okay. No problem. But we thought the pricing was good. And eventually, you know, because I go to like network events and stuff like that, I'd gone to this event and we got invited to this business mastermind and which is great. You know, however, I found out who was supposed to be a part of the mastermind. It's probably about 30 pretty high-level entrepreneurs, 7, 8, 9-figure entrepreneurs. We— I wasn't there at that stage, but somebody liked me enough to invite me. And then I got the bill for what it was going to take to, to go there, and it was about $10,000. I had never paid for anything like that, certainly not in a ticket to an event, um, and invested in, in that, in that realm at all for myself. And so I had a bit of sticker shock, I guess you could say. Um, but I was pretty clear that if I was in the room I could meet the right people. I could be connected to the right people. And if, if all things go right, this is going to help me a lot, right? I didn't have the money. I sold everything of value to actually go to this thing, right? Matter of fact, I didn't even have enough to get back. So, so my mind is I'm going to go there, I'm going to apply this and it better work. You know, I go there and I'm there for probably 30 minutes before I realized that my $2,500 offer didn't even compare to what everyone else was selling. Now, in terms of pricing, it compared very closely to what they were offering and what they were doing to solve a problem. But the closest offer to mine was like $25,000. In my time, in my— when I heard that, like, I had obviously another shock, but the biggest shock was like, who are you guys selling this to? I don't, I don't understand. What are you doing for that amount of money? And who's going to, who's going to buy that? I didn't understand at the time enough about marketing and audiences and positioning and all that, but that was where the gap was. And they really kind of helped me reframe my thinking around where I'm creating value and what that really means. And so I took a bet really and said, okay, well, I want to price ours at $25,000 and see what happens. We sold the first one within that first week.. And so once that happened, I was never really the same again, but it was like a big lesson because a lot of it had to do with the framing.

Let me interrupt and ask a question because I'll forget it. Did you change anything else, like who you were pitching it to, or?

I changed nothing else. Okay. I changed nothing else, which is interesting because we were aiming at the right market and the right people and the right audience. But our positioning was really off because I was making it look as though we offer a much lower valued solution based on the pricing. And that was a money mindset thing I had to get over. So yeah, I mean, it made a difference.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think every entrepreneur at some point runs into that fear around charging enough. Right? But one of the things I've said consistently on this show is that pricing actually impacts the perceived value that someone receives, right? And if it's kind of like if someone offered you a Rolex for 10% of what the retail price is, your reaction is going to be, well, that's not a real Rolex.

What's wrong with it?

Yeah, exactly.

It's a real one, right?

And, and so people come to the table with an expectation most times, not always, because sometimes they're buying something completely new, like you bought that $10,000 ticket. Like, you had no context for that because you'd never spent that much. But, you know, if, if someone's looking for a solution and they're looking around and it's X price and you're giving it at half of X, it's not an incentive like, oh, well, I can get this for half price.

You're half as valuable. Maybe that's exactly right. Maybe you're going to cause me more problems and I need to do this for more, right? 100%. Exactly.

Yeah. Uh, so you mentioned a money mindset and I, I talked about that a lot on this show, but not recently. So What was the money mindset that you grew up with? Like, what, what, what did you learn before you got into business? Hey listeners, are you ready to turn your passion into profit? Then grab a copy of Profit First for Creatives. Click the link in the show notes to purchase a copy. And if you're not ready to make that Full Commitment, you can download a free copy of the first chapter. Check it out right now.

I don't know that I had a defined money mindset, uh, growing up, but I definitely had mindset, you know. Um, I think the big thing that I noticed though as, as a kid in, in for anyone that is kind of tuning in, I grew up in Pittsburgh. I really, my younger days were kind of pretty difficult. I played hide and go seek in a dumpster. I sold my sister's shoes for food at one point. I would go to school and go to sleep to get food or go home and go to sleep if I didn't have anything there, right? It was just really kind of difficult. But my mom had a really interesting view around all of this. She never made it mean anything about her value or not. Mm-hmm. Which was, I think, a really powerful gift to give someone or pass on to someone if they're, you know, having financial struggles or economic hardships. Right. So I never really adopted a mindset that made it seem or feel as though I was lesser than because I needed more resources and more support. And so I will say, yeah, we didn't have a lot of money. But my understanding of what that meant for me, I didn't apply it as a limitation in any way. It was more of a challenge and an opportunity.

Yeah, it reminds me of the quote from Dave Chappelle talking to his dad, and he was complaining about not having any money as a kid. He said, why? You know, something about being poor. And his dad came back and he said, You know, we're not poor, we're broke.

Very, very clear distinction, right?

Poor is a mindset, right? Yeah. Broke is a state of being, like you can change that.

Yeah, right. And you know, it, it definitely, if you, if you don't have that distinction, it can really harm you. Um, because one is achievable, the other is needs to be fixed. You know, um, within yourself. You know, it's very similar to how people perceive, um, dealing with failure or failing at all, right? In, in most cases, people, if they try to do anything that is challenging in any capacity, you, you are going to fail. Now, you may not fail for the entire time, but you're going to meet that failure. What people often do is they make themselves I am the failure, right? However, that isn't necessarily the case. What's more likely is that you didn't take proper steps. You didn't have a really good plan. You didn't have all the resources. You didn't get support. You didn't ask for help. You didn't have a strategy, right? And these things can cause you to fail over and over again. They don't necessarily make you the source of the failure. And so it's very similar to that to me. And if you can get to the point where you can manage that, and obviously your words have a big part of how you perceive it, you can make a difference. To me, that failure is the toll that you pay to get to any level of success.

I like that, toll you pay. Yeah, because it is a cost and learning is a cost. I had this conversation strangely with my 76-year-old mother last night, um, that the real lessons only come with a cost. You know, you, you don't really learn anything from success. Um, and I love the idea that you said reframing it, because if you think about it, no one sets out to make a bad decision. No one sets out to— well, I mean, like, they just don't know it's going to go as bad as it goes, right? As an entrepreneur, you, you make a decision with the intent of being successful, not to be— not to fail, right? Um, but to your point, there's a lot of things that you may not know, and so you make a decision with the information that you have. Um, and it doesn't work out, that, you know, that's why I don't even really like the word failure because it's not. It's a learning experience if you'll take it as that. Like, if you'll take it as an opportunity to learn and grow.

Yeah, I mean, our words are so powerful, right? They're so, so powerful. I mean, they really govern everything that exists for us and everything that we perceive. You know, we meet people every day and when we meet them, they've been through, you know, they've been through so much stuff. They've been through hardship, they've been through difficulty. And, um, it's virtually impossible to see the layers of which they've faced to get in front of you, right? Unless you have enough curiosity and enough context. And this is why words are powerful, right? Because they really define the filters of which we see the world. They define everything. If you were to say you are a failure, you will experience everything about being lesser than. This is why when I get in conversation, sometimes people will say to me, because this is my interpretation, right? They will call me humble. Now, I'm not humble because I don't perceive myself as being lesser than or putting myself beneath others. However, I am I'm excited about people's greatness. I'm happy to celebrate them and lift them up and, and really, um, just really get behind them and champion everything that they're up to because I believe in humanity, right? But that's very different than being humble, uh, you know, you know, it, it— so the words really matter. And you mentioned something about like, they don't know. And you know, there's this interesting framework that I commandeered and discovered, you know, when I was doing a Landmark Forum. Are you familiar with the Landmark Forum? Have you heard of this before? I have not. So this Landmark Forum is like, uh, it's a training and development program really geared toward mindset. But essentially what it does is it helps you understand the filters of which you see the world and then how they impact you, um, so that you can be more powerful in your own life. And I, I took this training in probably 2012. Um, it was incredibly profound. Uh, it really changed everything about the way that I see things and, um, even see, see things about how things that already occurred. Let me give you an example. When I was in, uh, first grade, as I told you, my mom was struggling financially. We had moved around many different times trying to figure it out, right? Um, however, this one part of that stage, she gets an opportunity to go work for Aerojet Space Community in California, which is an awesome opportunity on the missile program. Big opportunity. She's going to make a lot of money. Great deal. However, she doesn't have enough resources to take me and my sister with her, and so she arranged for us to go stay with my aunt in Buffalo, New York for a little while while she goes to figure it out, right?

She's gonna come get us back.

That's awful Buffalo? Uh, well, yes and no. Like, it— the most awful part is I had to go to church all the time because my aunt was a pastor. Um, but it was also really good because we sang, we learned things, we ate all the time. It was great.

I've never seen more snow in my life than in Buffalo.

Like, and you never will. It's insane. It's brutal. It's, it's insane. Um, shout out to Buffalo. But yeah, so, so my mom goes away and she goes to take this opportunity. That's essentially, that's all that happened is that she has to take this. However, our perception of what happened at that stage was that we are discardable. She's going to live a life that she loves and now we're throwaways. And so obviously that's not true, but that is the filter that I developed from that experience. And so when she came to get us back, which wasn't that much time, she never got me back the way that I left. I never— I was now a newfound person with the perception that this person that discarded me is trying to pretend they love me now, right? And now it becomes this gap in between the relationship, and it stayed that way for probably 30 years.

And so how old were you when this happened?

What's that?

How old were you when this happened?

—when I moved to Buffalo, first grade. This is first grade. So the majority of my years after that were a perception that this person is trying— she had to try to win back the connection. And it never— it really didn't work till I was like fully a grown adult, which, you know, so there's a lot of cost there. But this happens to all of us all the time when we develop these filters. And then there's an impact that we're not even aware of. It's outside of our awareness, but still you know, causing us problems. And so, yeah, the words matter.

Absolutely, they do. And I think what any good entrepreneur will do, and I think entrepreneurship is the perfect vehicle for this self-growth, is, is will ask themselves, why? Why am I doing what I'm doing, saying what I'm saying, believe what I believe? Because to your point, there's a lot of baggage that we bring in, I think, in terms of beliefs. What you described was— you could describe that as a belief, but it's also like this story that you tell yourself. Like you fill in the gap with your understanding.

Right? Yes. Um, your understanding and your comprehension level, right? Your level of awareness at that stage, right?

And, and, you know, I don't know if you're a parent. As, as a parent, I am. I, I, my children are all grown. You know, you start out with really great intentions of like, I'm going to be a great dad and I'm not gonna I'm not going to have my kids experience what I experienced, right? And at the end of the day, you look back and you're like, damn it, I just gave them a completely different set of problems to unpack, right?

That's— yeah, I mean, that's really the challenge of parenthood, right? Like, it's such an impossible job. You can't do it perfectly. You can just do it. Yeah, 100%. Yeah, you're right. You can definitely equip them with a different set of problems than the ones you're trying to avoid for them. 100%.

And it's also fascinating to kind of going back to what your point was, is having conversations with my adult children. It's fascinating to see the perspectives because there are things that stick out in my mind that they don't even remember. Right. And there's things like I thought were monumental things that were influential to them. Right. Because from my perspective, that's what it was. And they're like, I don't even remember that. Right. And then, and they'll, they'll flip it and they'll, they'll say, well, you remember when you did this or you said this? And I'm like, no, I have no recollection of that. Right.

They're having a completely different experience. They really are. I have a stepson, his name is Devin, and I learned recently that he hated my cooking, which I am pretty terrible cooking. But like, I, during the years that he was young, was just trying to make sure he was fed something I didn't have regularly as a kid. And so I would go and make it even though his experiences, it's terrible. My, my ramen noodles are gross and sloppy or whatever. Once again, I'm not good at cooking, guys. Um, but my intention was like, you're taken care of, you have everything you need. I'm going to make sure you're good. And his experience is like, these are horrendous.

Like, what's going on here? Well, yeah. And, and, and what's, what's interesting about it as, as you age, you understand, not always, but most of the time, your parents were, were doing it with the right intent. Right? Like, they didn't have malintent. And, and the things that they screwed up, it wasn't that they did it on purpose. Um, well, hopefully they didn't.

Mine— well, no, some do, right? Mine didn't. Say that.

Yeah, no, there, there are— there are definitely bad actors out there. But yeah, uh, ultimately what I realized was that what I was looking for from my parents was something that they couldn't give me, and no parent can give, give you. Um, they can give you love, but it's imperfect love, right? And until I understood the perfect love of God, I, I didn't understand that this standard that I'd set up for my parents or my wife or anybody else was a fallacy. Like, you're—

no one can live up to that. 100%.

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All right, so what did you do before Market Theory?

Well, I've done lots of things, but I think most relevant to this conversation is that—

Yeah, more of like, how did you get to this?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I always kind of grew up really creative, creative household. Um, I took off to the Marine Corps in 1999, and I eventually, I met a buddy of mine who sold me this old, like, film camera. And I started taking this camera with me on, like, training missions around the world and things like that when I was in Marine Security Forces. And it became this, this kind of thing that I do, kind of documenting our experience. But when I, when I left, I realized that it just kind of like laid a different kind of creative seed for me. And, uh, I really embraced it. I was doing more, you know, the kind of the beginning stages of multimedia, but there were a lot of things I wanted to learn. And so I ended up going to school for multimedia. And as I started kind of perfecting my craft with cinematography, photography, branding, web development, all that kind of stuff, some of my projects started getting picked up by larger organizations, Red Bull, VH1, Centric, BET, and getting lots of impressions and all that. I started getting some deals going, but there was one massive problem, and that was I didn't know anything about business. I knew about, um, becoming really good creatively, but I didn't really understand how to position that, and I didn't understand how I was going to make it make sustainable money. They— I understood they were getting a lot of attention on my stuff. It's on TV. I was on TV, was on billboards and magazines, right? Um, but I wasn't making very much money. And, and so I had one buddy— apparently I have a couple buddies that have has come into my life at various points and dropped some nuggets on me. But I had this one guy also very much into like video production, had a really nice production studio. He also had a software company. And with the software company, he was making like millions of dollars a month. And I had a conversation with him one day. I said, you know, you're making millions of dollars a month and you don't know any software. How are you doing this? And he says to me something I would never forget, and that was, I don't need to know any software. I need to know some brilliant people that know software, and I know some very brilliant people. And it completely shifted my mindset about what I thought I individually needed to be in order to do extraordinary things. Because here he is making tons and tons of money doing this thing that he has no idea how to do, but he is very, very good at like connecting with people, Putting the right people in the right positions and then creating leverage with those things that he could turn into money. And it was all very scalable. And he said that if you can start figuring this out, you can start making money in your sleep. And I never stopped looking at that point. I, in fact, I changed how I was looking at all of it entirely. Because I don't think prior to that conversation I ever even thought about people were making money in their sleep. And so it raised a new line of questioning, which is like, If they are, how are they doing it? What's going on here? And that changed a lot for me. Yeah.

Yeah. I love that because there's, I think one of the fundamental shifts as an entrepreneur, you know, moving into entrepreneurship is we're stuck with this paradigm of I have to work to make money. Like it's the equivalent. You, it's like you keep the old mindset of an employee. Right. So I'm paid for my time. Yes. Critical mistake. Right. But like master-level entrepreneurs, like the guy you were referencing, understand that it's, it's not even like the skills I have. It's how, how am I going to solve this problem and what are the resources that I need to bring to bear to solve the problem? What I see a lot of creatives struggle with is they see the opportunities through the lens of their skills. So if I'm a videographer, I make video, I edit video, I, you know, find set locations and whatever it is, right? But that limits all the problems to that skill set. Wonderful. If you're instead looking for the problems and then trying to solve them whether or not you have the skills or not. It's not like you have to go learn them. You can find somebody else that knows them. Yeah, because the ultimate entrepreneur makes money off of other people, not off of their efforts.

And that's a big, that's a big, big, huge point. Um, most people, when they run into a scenario where they get close to this, they start to think, what can I individually do to get all the skills that I need to do. Well, the problem is to get to the level that you really need those skills to function at, it might take you another 10 years of your life, you know, and, and so that, that impacts your age, that impacts your health, that impacts your time with your kids, that impacts your resources and where you had to go to the super expensive school. Right. It really just slows down your progression. And I believe at this stage that you're better suited to leverage what you can. It's more about gaining access to the skills than it is personally development. Now I'm a glutton for learning things. I love to learn things. I love to individually stack my own skills. I do it all the time. However, it's definitely most certainly not the most greatest use of my time. It's helped me a lot, but also, um, it's slowed me down a lot. So, mm-hmm, now I spend a lot more time just really getting clarity around how I solve these problems and what resources that I have access to, to bring to to bear to solve these problems and really use the right lenses to assess them through.

Yeah, I kind of, I don't know if this is a true quote, but it was attributed to Al Capone. And evidently when the IRS came after him, they had a lot of trouble because he didn't own anything. Everything was in someone else's name, right? And, and his statement was, it's not It's not about what you own, it's what you control. 100%. Yeah. Right? And so I don't need to be a financial genius. I don't need to know how to do my taxes or my accounting. I can hire somebody to do that. I don't need to know that knowledge. Yeah. And I go back to this statement that I've put in the book and preach on this podcast is the Pareto principle, or otherwise known as the 80/20 rule, which is 20% of your efforts produce 80% of your results. And the quicker as an entrepreneur that you figure out what that 20% is, the faster you're going to achieve what you want because you got to get rid of the 80%. You can't do it.

Yeah, I will second that 100%. And you know, really what I lean into is like highest leverage skill, highest leverage skillset. For me at this stage, it's really my ability to connect with people, my interest in genuinely building with them and seeing them thrive and really kind of just synthesizing What doors that I can open that make it easier for them to reach their desired goal, you know, their desired dream life. And so, um, that's— it's more being a human than it is a skill set. But, you know, you would think it's a skill set. And I don't know that it's, it's something that I've learned is more of a muscle or like it became like an adaptive thing because I went to 14 different schools before I got out of high school. So for me, That's a very— it feels very natural, even though it's probably, you know, some kind of mutation of how I deal with people. But like, when I, when I build with people or I'm connecting with them, my goal really is to be truly present with what's going on, truly able to move things that are or could be potentially in the way or in the space out of it so that we can have a direct connection, we can have a direct conversation. And I'll do the extra steps that allow you to go deeper. Like I'll check on people, I'll shoot them a message. If they're, if they're celebrating something, I'm gonna celebrate with them. I'll go outta my way to make sure that they're seen and appreciated and valued. And it has a, it has a large impact, you know? And so, yeah, sure. To me at this stage, it's, it's one of my highest leverage skills. And then how I use my words, but even, even that is just kind of a reflection of being hyper-present. If I don't have the words yet, I'll, I'll wait. I'll allow myself the space to, to have the words show up for me and then be in a conversation.

Yeah, and I, I think as entrepreneurs progress in their journey, they'll find that more and more the, the most important thing that they do is make people decisions. And that's not necessarily employees It can be relationships with customers. It can be relationships with influencers in the industry, whatever you do. But you realize more and more the power of leveraging people decisions, not even strategic or tactical decisions.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, for me, it's, uh, it's kind of a mixture of congruency and alignment. You know, we talked a little bit earlier about like words and perceptions of things and filters and beliefs. And essentially, if you, if you're really clear on like what your beliefs are and you're able to convey those beliefs and those thoughts and those words in a way allows people to kind of know where you stand and if they're aligned with you or not. And if you can find that alignment, all of a sudden you have congruency. You're gonna have people to say, absolutely not, I don't agree with that, I can't stomach it, right? And then you're gonna have people to say, absolutely, these are my people, how can I support you? How can I build with you? We have resonance, right? And so Because of that, you're able to multiply your output. You have now access to other people's resources and opportunities and things like that. Like, I've been to the Grammys. I'm not a Grammy Award-winning artist, you know, I just have been invited by people that see the value in building with me. And, you know, there's really a lot that you can do there. So yeah, congruency and alignment, I think it creates velocity. When you want to build with people, for sure.

Yeah, absolutely. I was thinking of something and then I thought of something else, and now I can't remember what I was going to say. Sorry. No, no, no. It's part of being a host. You got to, you got to think on the fly. You got to talk on your feet. Going back to the people thing, I think I remember now what I was going to say, that there is this belief that you have to appeal to everyone. And there's this fear of entrepreneurs of like, well, I can't narrow my solution or my focus too much because I'm going to lose out on opportunities. And what you said is spot on. Like, what you do, who you are, should be so crystal clear that it attracts the right people and repels the ones you don't. And it should, it should be that word, repel. Like, oh shit, LaShawn, like that, I'm nothing to do with him. I don't, I'm not down with that. But, you know, in this, in this age of digital media, it's, it's like, Well, don't upset anybody, right? Like, and I'm not talking about being confrontational or negative in any way. I'm just saying be your authentic self and you'll attract the right people.

Yeah, agreed. It does take courageousness. Yes. You know, it takes a willingness to be seen. For the you that you truly are, you know, um, but the, the swing, the momentum that you get from really defining that is powerful. And this is why I think, um, words and perceptions are important, because I find that a lot of times people haven't defined it for themselves yet. A lot of how they perceive themselves themselves. It's through the lens of how other people have painted it for them, where they went to school, where they grew up, what their family's like, what their race is, what their religion is like. Right. And very rarely have they taken the time to choose and decide who they are, who gets to say, I mean, essentially you, you're using your words, you're channeling the words and the energy and you get to say, but if you've never defined it, It makes it easy for people to ride the fence because they don't really, they haven't, they haven't put a stake in the ground. They haven't made any claims like, this is what I believe. This is what I feel. This is real to me. This is what resonates with me. It takes courageousness. And that is in a lot of ways, uh, giving up the idea that you're going to be liked by everyone, even the concern that being liked or disliked is, is a thing, right? And it doesn't mean that you have to be disruptive, but by nature, being powerful in your perspective is disruptive. And it's okay to attract and repel whoever comes across that message.

Yes, I couldn't have said it better myself. One of my business coaches' most powerful questions he asks me periodically, situationally, what do you want? Exactly. And the funny thing about that question is most people really never sit with it. And the way I was brought up, for whatever reason, I thought that what I wanted was less important than what others wanted. Right?

Like people pleasing, falling on the sword, right? Right, right. You get a life of it. Yeah.

And when you start asking that question, it was funny. It was in the context of our marriage that I was first asked that question by my business coach. He's like, what do you want from the marriage? Right? And once I worked on that, and he goes down, I go, go tell your wife.

Courageousness shows up again, right? Okay. Right?

And so after I communicated to my wife what I wanted from the marriage, and this is after 28 years, 29 years of marriage, I asked her, what do you want? And like, there was this blank look. And it took me asking that question multiple times. And being patient and giving her space to really think about it before she could answer it, because she'd never thought about it for herself.

Happens all the time. All the time. Yeah. And it's a powerful question. In fact, all questions are powerful because they command something from answers. Any question that you ask— who are you? Any question that you ask is incredibly powerful. I'm actually very sensitive to when people ask me a lot of questions, and it's not for any other reason than I understand the power that it compels you to take an action and respond. Right. I was speaking at an event a couple of days— yesterday, a couple of days ago. I was in Atlanta yesterday. Speaking at the Military Influencer Conference, and I'm meeting lots of really brilliant people that have done extraordinary things. And this lady starts talking to me and a friend, and she asked me a question, and then she asked me a second one. And then I then found a way to push those questions to someone else because she was trying to sell me financial services. I don't have a problem with that if I needed or whatever. Please sell it to me. Right. But I could just tell the way that she had been trained in using her words, these, they were kind of attacks, you know, they weren't, it wasn't about building, it was about excavating. It was about taking. And if you're not careful, you can use questions to do that. You know, I use questions to drive curiosity and to reveal things. Which is not the same as taking. This is more about shining a light on things. Um, but I notice it because I, I pay attention to people's words and their energy and their intentions. So fascinating stuff.

Yeah, because I, I think a lot of people— and I, and my— I've been guilty of this too, where you ask questions and the way you ask it and, and what you're asking is really you're actually implying something. Yes, like there's a narrative, right? Yeah, I'm, I'm asking the question because I want you to, I want you to see something and I want you to answer it this way. Um, but that's, that's not to what you, you're saying genuine curiosity. It's, it's, it's a mechanism, right?

It's, it's a, it's a leverage point. Like, how can I pull this engagement so that I can present the thing that I want to present to get what I want, right? Which is very different than like, what are we, what are we having a conversation for? Like, who are you? What do you want out of life? You know, right? They don't have— they don't all have the same amount of magnitude or impact.

So yeah, yeah. I had a guest, I don't remember who it was, he, he said, you know, it— I, I want to make sure I'm asking the right questions. Yes.

Yeah, or at least the correct ones. I, I very rarely feel the need to be right about anything, but I want to be correct, you know.

And I, I think the way he was using right was like impactful.

No, no, like, like, I know, but like the words matter. Absolutely right. No, the words matter. And it's like, like we use them loosely because where we use them all day long, but we're not in general— I'm speaking in general right now, um, mostly when we're having conversations as people, we're not on guard for everything that we're saying or everything that everyone else is saying. But they all have power. The entire time there's this power dynamic and power exchange. It's either empowering you or disempowering you. It's very rarely neutral, right? So if it's not within our awareness of what it is that we're saying or not saying. For example, if I were to say right now, I'm tired, I have now commanded the experience of being tired upon my body with the word, you know, and it doesn't live anywhere. Where is tired? Tired is a descriptor, but I can have the full experience of what I know tired to be regardless of that. And If I said to you, I'm ready to get some rest. Now, you know, that's a very different thing. I'm choosing how I'm going to experience this thing called rest my body, which is not the same thing as being underneath the power and the, you know, the weight of, you know, this oppressive feeling called tired. But people use them interchangeably like they're the same thing and they're really not.

Right. Tired could be I'm emotionally tired, I'm intellectually tired, I'm physically tired. It could mean a lot of things. But to your point, when you start saying I'm tired, then it becomes I am tired.

I am this bad feeling. Right. And that's a very powerful command.

Lashawn, I love this conversation. I wish we could continue, but unfortunately we're at time. Uh, how do people find out more about you and Market Theory?

Yeah, I mean, you can find me online. Um, just look up Lashawn Kerb. Uh, I talked a little bit about Market Theory. What I think what might be helpful as well to add is I'm recently the director of partnerships for TEDx Orlando. So, um, for any brilliant voices and minds that want to share ideas or considering like how to like elevate what they're doing. Uh, look us up. But yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn. I'm very active there. Um, just Leshon, L-E-C-H-O-N-K-I-R-B, Leshon Kirb. And, um, Instagram, Facebook, anywhere that socials are, are found, you can find me, and I'm active there. Perfect.

Listeners will have those notes, links in the show notes, if I can use my words. Speaking of words, uh, if you like what you heard, please rate the podcast, share the podcast, subscribe to the podcast. If you don't like what you heard, which I don't understand why you wouldn't have, but you have a better idea, shoot us a message and we'll consider it. But definitely we'll get rid of Colashawn. Until next time, ta-ta for now.