Why We're Doing This Podcast

I think the most interesting topic. All right, well, why don't you kick us off, Andrew, and let's just get into it.

You know, the one thing that I wanted to talk about was, Jesse, I know your schedule, it's super backed up. Why are you— why do you want to do a podcast now? Why do you want to start this off?

Oh man, it's a great question. I think there's a few reasons. I think the number one reason is I've been on a really interesting journey with Dave. Over the last 7 or 8 years, and it's changed my life and it's changed my family's life and it's changed everyone I work with's life. And I want to share it more broadly. And I think there's— I meet entrepreneurs every day on social and in our accelerators who, who are where I was in 2017 when I first met Dave or earlier than that. And I go, man, I want, I want Dave and me. I want this story to be out there. I want people to have this content in the world. And Dave and I are a magical pairing. And so I think when we do this together in it, but it's in a broader context, it'll be really powerful. And I want that. I want that to exist. So that's number one. Number two is I love Dave and I just like to talk to him. So that's, that's always a bonus. And number three kind of relates to number one, but I think Dave is like the next Tony Robbins. And so I want the world to know. I want them to see what I see. Dave, what about you?

What are we trying to do here for you?

Well, first, I'm just touched by hearing you say that, Jesse. I love you too. And I'm excited to spend any time we get to spend together. And I appreciate what you see in me and helps me see myself more expansively. So thank you. For me, I love supporting our entrepreneurs. I think there's such bravery and courage in stepping into that arena of creating something from nothing, and it's really challenging. And, you know, my view is that the startup is one of the best personal and spiritual growth dojos on the planet. And that's not the experience or the way most entrepreneurs are experiencing it. So I feel really excited to help create a context where the startup experience becomes this profound personal and spiritual growth journey and support that.

Sorry, instead of seeing it as a dojo, most entrepreneurs see it as what? Instead of seeing it as a practice exercise room to get better?

As a whipping room?

Say it again, Jesse.

A whipping room? A way to beat themselves up and—

Roller coaster is a good metaphor.

I think I like The Whipping Room, honestly. Whenever Jesse, whenever Jesse talks about other entrepreneurs who want to beat themselves up and operate off of fear, I love it because I feel heard and seen for the first time. Popular television doesn't get me. Other people, when they talk about their vision for changing the world, I get that for sure. But when he goes, they operate out of a whipping room, I love that. In my head I go, yes, that's in my head all the time. Whipping room. That's a good phrase. He nailed it. He knows me so well.

I want to go do something that's going to make me feel worse about myself.

Because it's going to make me want to do even better. Because if I whip myself, then I'm going to finally get to run faster than anyone else can imagine. And do not take— do not take that away from me.

I think the other thing that Dave and I have talked about a lot over text is we— I don't think there's anything like what we have for the vision of this, of this show. And the vision for this show is there's a lot of leaders who are starting with their hearts or starting with people, many of whom worked with somebody like Dave or Dave himself. And I think showcasing that as a, you know, as a way to do it. When I started GatewayX, I wanted to prove to myself that you could be ambitious and do it from heart and do it from love and do it from positive, like an uplifting way. And I think the path out there of starting an Amazon or an Uber where you beat people up to get really successful is very well worn. That's, that's a, that's an easy— it's so well worn that all of us think that's the way we have to do it. And I think this other path is just not well worn. It doesn't have, it doesn't have the same, uh, sort of reputation. And I think this is the beginnings of creating that for people.

Dave, is it because it just doesn't work? Like, maybe it's really nice and it's soothing for rich people like Jesse who could afford to have love in their lives, or for people who are looking for a calmer, less successful life. Is there an example of somebody who is loving, doesn't whip themselves in their brains, doesn't whip their people, who's still doing well?

Gratefully, yes. First, let me just riff off the— what Jesse's pointing to. I think Most leaders, most entrepreneurs motivate themselves from fear and lack. You know what I've been calling dirty fuel. And this idea that I could let go of the fear and lack and still be motivated is kind of a new idea. I ask clients like, are you willing to accept yourself and your startup for being exactly as you are and it is? And they're like, Absolutely not. That's crazy. You know, then I'll just— what would motivate me to do anything? And that's sort of the default context that most founders and leaders and businesspeople are in. And so this idea that there's this other way to motivate yourself and your people is pretty novel for most, most people, most founders.

Let's go back to 2019. And Dave, you may or may not remember this. I'm sure you have this conversation with a lot of people, but I was, I was the person Dave was talking about. And I said, I was like, dude, if I don't, if I don't create bigger goals for myself, if I don't tell myself something's broken in this moment, how do I get to the next level? That's exactly what I do. Like, and you say this to me today, Andrew and Dave, you know, he took it in an interesting direction. He said, really? You really think that's what happened? And I was like, he's like, what are you afraid is going to happen if you don't have those things? He's— I was like, I'm going to watch Netflix all day. I'm going to go to Vegas and just gamble like an idiot. I'm going to, you know, I'm just, I'm just going to do nothing. And he was like, all right, let's try it. So, you know, he asked my wife for permission for me to go to Vegas and to do Netflix and not watch the kids and everything. I tried. I just did nothing for like a while. And honestly, by day 5 or 6, what happened? I started like, I calmed down a little bit. I enjoyed it. I had my fun. And I was like, ooh, I have a cool idea. Like this would be a cool thing in the world. I want to go do this. Like this would be fun. And what ended up happening for me, and then we came back as we did, and Dave was like, did you really think that the creative energy that's inside of you, Jesse, would just disappear when you stopped giving yourself these, you know, negative forms of motivation?

About whipping yourself.

When I stopped whipping myself. And my answer was yes, I actually did. And so it was actually valuable to prove to myself that that wouldn't happen. When I actually let in to what the fear was that I had. And instead I was like, oh, so there's this other part of me, this creative guy inside of me who wants to build things and enjoys that. And, and it became the beginnings of the flip for me, which was that I can use this other energy, this, this like clean fuel, as to use Dave Kashen's analogy, to motivate myself. But it took— I mean, it took— that was like probably 2, 3 years into coaching. And then even that specific experiment, which was a really important experiment to be able to prove to myself that, that what my fear of letting go of whipping myself was not going to actually come true. But Andrew asked for someone, Dave, who's, who's the best entrepreneur who you feel like is motivated by the—

well, I have a client coming to my mind, Wes Rowell, who runs Fetch. They're, I think, on a tear, you know, kind of the unicorn startup that many, many others would like to be or like to emulate. And we've been working together for a while and I, you know, there's no perfection, right? But he's really committed to being a conscious leader and he's grown tremendously. And the biggest— yeah, he's really shifted from motivating the team from fear. So just to be practical, hey guys, if, if we don't get this right, this bad thing is going to happen, right? We're not going to be able to raise the next round, right? That was his MO, as is many, you know, many entrepreneurs, to motivating them from vision and inspiration. Hey, if we do get this right, here's how these amazing things that are going to happen and we're going to serve all these people. And like, I've seen just a dramatic shift in that. And the entire culture is uplifted. People are excited. And I love the word you used, Jesse, creative energy. Like the level of creative energy is really sort of been unleashed and they were coming up with new ideas. I mean, they came up with a new idea that literally doubled their business overnight.

Right.

And those are the kind of things that are not in the local maximum that we can hustle our way to.

Right.

They only happen when we're in this sort of more expansive, present, creative mode. So he's— that's a great example.

Yeah.

I mean, I had an interesting—

Dave, I had an interesting experience. You may remember this because I started working with Dave because of this deal that had not gone as well as I wanted to. But interestingly, you know, the guy who invested in his company, Rick at Red Ventures, he's another example of a multibillionaire who is motivated to help people. He's home for his family every day. He never loses perspective. I mean, he's a human, so I'm sure he goes, deals with fear and below the line all the time. But in general, Andrew, like he took 20 years to build Red Ventures to a, you know, $20 billion company, by the way. And then that might be part of this, which is it might not happen as fast or there may be other trade-offs that you have to make. But he's another example in me who he is genuinely motivated to help the people around him, to do things more creatively, to be motivated by the clean fuel, not the dirty fuel. And by the way, I got lucky, you know, talk about the universe because I had Dave coaching me. By the way, Ambush did not get any more valuable for 5 years from the time these guys invested to the time we sold it. And the old Jesse would have been like, that's the worst thing that could have ever happened to you. And in many ways, I had Dave coaching me and I had Rick as an example for this. And those two things really conspired to help me open up my eyes. And if nothing else, man, I'm happier and more peaceful. And I think that is worth a lot.

Okay. All right. And I do see your point, by the way, when, when you bring up Rick, the reason I see your point— sorry to interrupt, Dave— is because he's not someone who's talking about this much. And there are others like him who are doing this, who are living this, who are not talking much. And I guess the mission you both coming to this with is how do we talk about our experience here and then see if we can talk about others and ideally bring them on here. And have them talk openly about their experiences so that when we think about entrepreneurial go-getterness, we don't only think about Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, but we have other models. And if nothing else, we've expanded our menu. What were you going to say, Dave?

I had a mentor who said, consider the most successful business people are either the ones with the most fear or the most love. Its extremes. And because human beings are wired for fear, that's more of our default. That's much more natural, right? And so that's, I think, partly why we see more examples of that. It actually takes way, way more energy and intention to overcome our default, you know, wiring toward threat and fear and operate from a place of love and presence. And even just saying that word, like, I noticed a little you know, just a twinge of reticence, like, oh, are we allowed to talk about love, you know, in business and startups? Like, what are people going to think of that? Right. And how crazy is that? You know, it's, I think it might be the most common word in human, you know, language or at least in, you know, music. And we all want to love and be loved. And yet somehow it's like a bad word in business.

And if you get any founder alone in a quiet moment, none of that— very few of them go, I would— I want fear, right? So what they would say is, I think I need the fear to be successful. That's why I'm using fear, because I think I need it to be successful because of the story, because of the examples of, oh, you have to beat everyone up in order to be in human history. Is that's how government started. That's how historical civilizations work with fear, fear, fear. But if you— so you go to someone, you go, wait, so you don't want it? Andrew, you're a great example. You don't want it. You have 3 beautiful children, you have a very comfortable life, and you're like, dude, I want to feel peace and I also want to be successful, right? I want both those things, but I just don't believe that's possible. Yeah. And therefore I shall choose fear. It is possible.

I literally inhaled to disagree with Jesse until he made that the rest of the point. Like, okay.

All right.

So let's take this into a specific situation. Jesse, you walked in here saying that something bad is going on with your office and that you are somehow tilted or impacted by what happened. And let's see if you and Dave could talk through it the way that you would if you were in private.

Yeah, I mean, I could— I don't feel— I don't— well, I could talk about it and maybe it's an example of the results of Dave and my work together. I think I was 10 minutes late to this call, to this pod for our first, our first ever recording. Because I've subleased a space in St. Louis from some company that's gone under and gone dark. They've like just disappeared from the face of the earth. And the landlord called me and is a father and a son, and the son is like my age. And he's like, oh, you know, we want to figure out a good solution. The dad is this old real estate guy. He's like, I want to be heard. Let me be heard. You can't stay in that space another day. You need to be out tomorrow. You need to be out Monday. And I, you know, and I felt anger. I felt a charge come through me and I was like, you know, who the fuck does this guy think he is? Like, you know, and felt all the thoughts. And I took a breath, which I probably wouldn't have. I might have exploded on this guy or gone and lawyered up and whatever. And I just kind of took a breath and I said, listen, I'm trying to be a good player here. Like, I'm trying to be a good actor here, but I don't appreciate the way you're speaking to me right now. If you're telling me I need to move out of space quickly, I will. But, you know, I'll talk to my attorneys also, and I'll do this in a way that's going to work for everyone. But I'm not going to be intimidated and I'm not going to be— and I don't appreciate the way you're speaking to me. And his dad is, you know, you kind of— you could feel him lay off. You know, I imagine there the dad and son are on the phone and the dad— the son says, go away. He was, hey, we don't want to be hostile, Jesse. We're not trying to— okay. And then son is saying these things. We don't want to be hostile. You've been helpful. And the situation sort of got resolved. Now, I think we need to move out quickly, and I don't feel that— I don't feel fear around that. But there was a moment there where I think fear, anger, ego would have taken me over and might have led me to go, well, I'm going to show this guy and I'm going to go spend money on lawyers and I have a sublease. Look at my document. And, and I've been in much more, you know, frustrating situations like that. But, but that one, I think what I would describe it as is like I felt my anger through as it was coming to some degree. And I was candid and I spoke for my truth. I didn't hold it back and I didn't I didn't make it personal either. I didn't speak about, you know, what Dave and I would call unarguable language. I said, I don't appreciate the way you're speaking to me. I don't like it. I'm going to be helpful. But I didn't say, you're going to be, you know, whatever. I just didn't. It just didn't go off that road.

You shouldn't speak to me that way would be an arguable way. Don't speak to me that way.

Who do you think you are? How dare you speak to me that way? Or you shouldn't speak to me that way. Be like, well, I'll talk to you this way. I'm, you know, and then they kind of calm down and said, we're sorry. We're really frustrated. We're getting you know, we've lost half a million dollars on this. I totally get it, guys. I want to help you. I want to— I don't want you to be frustrated either. I'm sympathetic to you. And I'm going to need 30 to 60 days to move out. I'm not going to move out tomorrow. Sorry. Right. And they didn't agree because they're not going to agree. But they, but they kind of agreed. Right. They're not going to—

I love that.

Why did you say, Dave, that you shouldn't— or what's the difference in the language that he used?

So most people speak in a way that's arguable, like they share the thoughts that are arising in their mind as if they're the truth. So you might have the thought, "He shouldn't speak to me that way." And then you might verbalize it, "You shouldn't speak to people that way," or "You shouldn't speak to people, to me that way." And that's, that's not true. Like, who knows how someone else should or shouldn't speak? So when you state your thoughts, or sometimes I say your stories, the stories that your mind makes up as if they're true, that's speaking arguably, and it creates argument because then he's going to feel attacked and say, well, I'll speak to you how I damn well please, you know, or as opposed to speaking unarguably is simply revealing the thoughts and feelings and wants as they're arising. So, you know, Jesse's example, I don't want to be spoken to that way. I don't appreciate it. That's just a reveal. It's unarguable that Jesse doesn't want that or that he doesn't appreciate it. Right. There's nothing to argue with. You know, he doesn't have to honor it, but it's a very different experience than you shouldn't do it this way. And if I, if I could even extract that out, most people communicate to control.

Right.

They're trying to control other people, the outcome of, you know, what feelings people feel or don't feel. What Jesse is describing is communicating to reveal. Here's my experience. I'm just in real time. Ooh, when you said that, I felt angry or scared, and I don't like being spoken that way, and I don't want to move out. And, and Jesse also modeled conscious listening.

Right.

Oh, I hear you guys are upset. I hear you're frustrated. You know, wow, you lost half a million dollars. Yeah, frustrating. And I want to help.

So I think that the— Andrew, you love this story. And again, all of this is thanks to Dave. Dave is a great teacher and I'm a great student, by the way. I'm a top student. But, you know, using unarguable language in my marriage reduced conflict by 80%. And the best example I always tell everyone is it's Thursday afternoon, we're talking about the weekend, and I go, oh, we should go to Andrew's party. D, we should go to Andrew's party. No, we shouldn't. You know, we have too much stuff going on that day. And Andrew didn't come to our party last time and it's 45 minutes away. No, but, but, you know, I'm going to know a lot of people there and we're shoulding. We're both going back and forth on the should question.

Who's right? Who's right?

Who's right about whether or not we should go to the party? That's what the discussion becomes about because arguable language is used. The flip of it is like, I'd really like to go to Andrew's party this weekend. I'd like— oh, okay. It's a little busy that day, but, but okay. Like, I think maybe I can take it, you know, take the kids or I'll go to the gym at this time. Like, all of a sudden we're working together to figure out how we can go do the thing I'd like to do, or I'd like to do these 3 things. And she's like, I'd like to do these 3 things. Awesome. Let's work together to figure out how we can get that done. So I'd like— no one can— again, the funny— I always use this example. No one— she can say, no, you wouldn't like to go there. She can say, no, we shouldn't. Jesse, you wouldn't like to do that. Well, she's not going to. That's impossible to argue what I would like to do this weekend. And so it's a, it's a tiny little tactic, but man, it is a total game changer, by the way, for me at least, not only for people around me, but for my brain also, because I'm less dug in when I think we should go. Then I start to go down the right path mentally versus when I say I'd like, I'm like, This is what I want to do, but I'm not holding it really tightly.

The teacher in me wants to highlight the 4 categories of speaking unarguably. So there's the facts, right? Like what actually occurred, the stories or thoughts that you make up or have about the facts, your feelings, and then your wants. And Jesse is specifically pointing to wants. So facts, thoughts, feelings, wants. And it's, I think of that as a menu of things you could communicate unarguably. Oh, when you, you know, I'll use your marriage example. Oh honey, when you told me that you don't want me to go on this trip, I felt sad. And I make up a story that you're trying to limit me from doing the things I want to do selfishly. I really want to go.

Right.

You know, that might still be a tense conversation, but it's a very different conversation than, you shouldn't tell me what to do. You don't care about me. You're selfish.

Right.

That, you know, that's just going to lead to argument.

I have this memory of Jesse's birthday when we were out in a park, beautiful park in St. Louis. I didn't know that St. Louis looked like this. Jesse had said something. And I thought you were going to disagree with him, Dave. And instead what you did was you go— and I literally remember you taking a breath and you go, "Yes, and..." And then you said the thing.

And that is how Dave disagrees with people.

Yes. And so here's the thing. It feels a little manufactured, like manufactured support as a way of not irritating the person instead of saying what's on your mind. And is a lot of this therapy stuff really a way of manufacturing language so that you can dance around what you really want to say.

Well, let me— can I take a stab at that one, Dave? Sure.

And then I have a few thoughts as well.

So, so the first couple years of doing, of doing this conscious leadership stuff, my wife would be like, you sound like a robot. Um, and, and to be fair, in her better moments, she'd be like, well, at least you're talking about feelings. Because prior to that, I didn't even fucking talk about feelings. I didn't know. I didn't know what I was feeling other than maybe anger, right? I didn't even know I had a feeling other than anger. And what Dave would say to me, and I think what you learn, there's two things I think that were just— this just hit me, Andrew. One is like, look, to learn how to play tennis, you got to manufacture the strokes. Like in the beginning, it's not, it's not normal. Like, yeah, that's— I don't know how to hit that thing. I got to, I got to practice that thing. Right. But then the second thing that— and as I've gotten more mature in it, and I think Dave told me this would happen, is like, I don't use the language as often. Because my heart, like, it's— you can use the language and be totally frustrated and below the line, right? And mad. And you could say, "Yes, and, and you're an asshole." Like, it does—

it's—

it doesn't— the language doesn't work if it gets weaponized or if you're not— your heart isn't truly there. The flip of it is you could say "should," and if you can— if your heart is in the right place, you can say "should," and that's not the end of the world either. You might not say it, but you could. And So I think what happens is it's kind of like the— you learn how to do it and it does feel a little— I think it can feel manufactured at times, and at times people do weaponize it and use it that way. But it's part of— it's sort of part of the learning process, I would say. And it doesn't replace what's in your heart. The language can't change. You know, if you're actually disagreeing and you say yes and, then yeah, it's not— it's not real.

I have so many thoughts. One is, I like your point, Jesse, that it's scaffolding or training wheels. Like there is, by the way, my wife also hated for many years, like, oh my God, just be my husband. Like, stop trying to coach me when I would use language specifically from conscious leadership. So need to be mindful of how you practice and create containers and context for practicing. Like when I said to her, yeah, I'm, I'm practicing this new thing. I'm going to sound weird and clumsy. Is that okay? And she gives me permission or we have an agreement around it, then it's not so weird when I do it. I love Jesse, your point that the way you put it, you know, where you're coming from, where your heart is, matters more than the language. So even speaking unarguably, I could say the story I make up is you're an asshole and you don't care about me. It's obvious that I'm attached to being right about that story, even though mechanically I'm naming that it's a story. So it's the attachment to being right in that example. That's the essence rather than the mechanics of the language. And, you know, I suspect we'll dig more into conscious leadership and Above and Below the Line. But the really simple version is you're either in a state of presence or in a state of threat. And when we're in a state of threat, we just tend to want to be right and get defensive and get reactive. And so that is the essence of the, at least the Conscious Leadership work. And, you know, the work that I spend a lot of my attention on with clients and sometimes using the training wheels or the scaffolding can help you shift, right? Even just by saying it this new way. It's like a, it's like a pattern interrupt because your default way is to be in threat and be in ego and get reactive. So even just hearing yourself say the words, well, my story is, it's like, oh, you're triggering yourself. This might just be a story. I might not be right about it. So that's, those are a few thoughts.

It works well for me. Like language shapes my reality and back and forth. And so it's been really helpful for me. And I think, Andrew, I think the— again, if it's disingenuous, I don't think Dave was being disingenuous in that moment. He was saying yes, he was agreeing, and he wanted to make some other point. But I think you can disagree. Like, it's not— it's not to say you shouldn't disagree.

Agreed. Like, I agree. It's totally okay to disagree. And I'm going to parlay this to a point I wanted to make earlier, which is one of the things I love, Jesse, about the example you gave with the landlord is love can be fierce and strong. And a lot of people hear the word love and they think, oh, I have to be soft and nurturing. And that's what Jesse's saying. I don't appreciate being spoken in that way is him coming from love, right? He's standing for his truth. Or that's not okay with me. Or, you know, I use examples sometimes if my kid's about to walk into, you know, a street and doesn't see a car coming, I'm not like, oh honey, oh honey, maybe you want to, you know, I'm like, stop.

Right.

So, um, and a lot of, there's a, you know, Jesse mentioned anger. There's a lot of, I think, misunderstanding around anger because most people's experience of anger is that like reactive, violent anger. But anger, yeah, I think all emotions, I think of it as like our love through a prism. Anger is part of love, right? Anger is just boundary energy. And I think it's one of the most misunderstood of the emotions. And I have found even recently I had a big breakthrough around my ability to feel anger, and I'm able to literally sense more quickly when my wants or needs are not being met and stand for them.

Like what? Give me like a non—

I got a good one. Here's a story for you. So Dave Kashen and I have been working together for 7 or 8 years. And we're like friends, you know? I mean, like, we've blurred the lines as much as you could blur them between coach and person. And he taught me how to ski for 3 days a few— a few— a year ago. And as you both know, I struggle with my calendar and working and getting better. And it's been a problem forever, as long as I can remember. And, and I woke up one morning and I was like, oh shit, I got, I got something with my wife at 6. There's no way I can't take the day. Hey, Dave, can we move the time the morning of? And he did this breakthrough with anger and he was like, I feel angry that you're asking me to move this or whatever. I forgot what he said. And I was like, oh man, Dave's important to me. And then I was like, well, I think— he's like, why? I'm like, I think I need a better EA and I need to address this issue. This is a real thing for me. And he was like, well then will you please address it or something like that? He's like, get a better EA. And Andrew, you know, in the last week I've gotten a better EA and I'm really excited about her. And like, and he's like serving me and helping me get my shit together with scheduling.

And it was served through anger.

And honestly, he's a really like nice guy and he's not usually an angry dude. And, and like even the feedback I've given him is like sometimes I want him to be tougher on me as a coach. And he was— and that actually helped me a lot. And lots of people have told me that, but he's one of the most important people in my life. And for him to feel that way, I'm like, okay, yeah. And give me a week and I've got a local EA now and she's supposed to be the best EA in St. Louis and here we are. And so his anger really served me.

He's tearing.

It's fierce love. Yeah, I think I said, oh, did you just find out you had this conflict later today, Jesse? And you were like, no.

I was like, well, I was like, I'm not on top of my calendar and I don't have good support. And he was like, all right, well, will you fix those two problems, please?

Like, and we have an agreement for you to give me 24 hours notice, and I want you to honor it.

All right. One of the things that Jesse does whenever we start something or build something is he goes, Andrew, what is your DFS, your desired future state? What is it? So I'll ask you both. And then I want to ask you something that I always— that comes to mind for me whenever I come up with a DFS. So how about we get Dave first and then you, Jesse? What's your DFS here, Dave? Oh, the podcast.

For the podcast.

Hmm.

I thought you were going to ask me to explain the concept.

You want to do that?

Maybe I'll do that and then I'll—

What is that?

And then what is it yours for this?

So DFS, just, yeah, Andrew mentioned, stands for Desired Future State. But the importance of it and where it comes from is shifting from dirty fuel to clean fuel. So I'll go here for a quick second. Most, most people intuitively sense that tension is a powerful motivator, right? This is back to what we were talking about earlier. So they motivate themselves by creating tension based on lack and fear. This is our earlier discussion. Lack, not good enough. Things aren't the way they should be. Fear, uh-oh, things might go terribly. I'm going to end up scared, hungry, and alone if my startup fails. And so I better get myself, you know, back to, back to work. And the alternate to that kind of tension is creative tension, which is generated when you're present to current reality and your desired future state, DFS, at the same time. So that's where this comes from. It's like, oh, can you accept reality as it is now and then imagine your DFS?

And, and as a cool example for that, like that I always teach when I teach this, Andrew, is JFK going, we are going to put a man on the moon. It's 1969. It's 1960. We haven't even gotten anything off the ground, much less anything else. And what he didn't say was, um, we're horrible. Oh, you know, we're losing to the Russians. We're losing to the Russians. It's going to be terrible.

We'll never make it.

At this rate, we'll never make it. He was like, he gave a desired future state that was inspiring and galvanizing, and he didn't lie about where we were. We've never launched anything. He didn't make it wrong either, which I think, Andrew, you do that, a lot of us do, oh, where we are now is wrong because we want something in the future. We want a $10 million business and today we're at $1 million. That's wrong. That's bad. As opposed to, no, how awesome would it be if?

Right. The way I sometimes say it is we sometimes collapse the desired future state into the present and wish we were already there. Like, oh, I have this beautiful vision. You know, I'll talk about myself, you know, for expanding beyond one-on-one coaching and impacting thousands and millions of people's lives, but I've only done 2 courses that have impacted like 50 people's lives, you know, outside of my one-on-one. And I could then use my DFS as a weapon to say, oh God, what's wrong with me? Why am I still only at, you know, 50, 100 people when I imagine impacting thousands or millions? The specific thing that JFK said if I remember correctly, is, "We will put a man on the moon and return him safely to Earth by the end of the decade." Right? So who will do what by when, right? It was like very clear. And he used declarative language. We may drop into this more later. Most people think of language as, and you alluded to this, Jesse, as a tool to describe reality. And what they miss is that language is also a tool to create reality. And he's literally created a different reality in his speaking, in that declaration. So that's the power of DFS. So I honestly hadn't thought about it, but I'll think about it now.

Um, I'll throw a couple things out.

The—

okay.

I think like I would love to have millions of listeners, like a million listeners, I'll say, in the next 3 years. I think having someone, having people regularly come up to me and Dave and saying, I thought I, in order to have a successful business, I had to use fear. And now you guys have shown and taught that I can do it without that. And I can instead tap into something much more powerful and long-term. And that becomes a normal part of the conversation in entrepreneurship. I think that'd be the second thing. I think the third thing would be like, we have a lot of fun and we meet some cool people.

Do you like that, Dave Kashen?

I love all of that. Yeah. Expand, expansive reach and profound impact. So I would add, I think you alluded to it, Jesse, but I would just clarify. I really want for the people that listen to this to receive the energy and the teachings to kind of open up to them, to let them in such that it makes a profound difference in their actual everyday experience of life and being a leader and being a founder. That they experience life differently because of something that they got from these conversations.

All right.

And Dave has like conferences with like 10,000 people raving because he's the next Tony Robbins, you know, and there's all these people are like, Dave Kashen. Yeah.

Have you been to a Dave Kashen? I'll speak to that for a moment. Thank you, Jesse. I do sometimes I have recently felt some frustration when I have this thought, if they only knew what they'd actually experience in coming to my event or course, they would have signed up already. So what am I doing wrong that I'm not able to communicate or that they're not able to believe or understand what's possible? So yeah, to to that point, Jesse, I would love for people to just have a real sense of what's possible for them through powerful coaching, teaching, and be able to choose with full understanding and knowledge, you know, to engage in different programs that I or other, you know, great coaches offer, but with a real sense of understanding what's possible. Because I think most people the real reason they don't sign up is they don't actually believe or even have a sense of how much more is possible, like how much more successful they could be and how much more fulfilled and alive and joyful and loving, you know, they could be. And so I love the idea of kind of busting some limiting beliefs around what's possible so that people are like, well, now I know it's possible. Okay, I want that. And then, you know, to be able to avail themselves of all different ways to create those experiences and shifts. Okay.

You both have said what you want. There's a vulnerability in showing that you don't have it, that you're not as big as you'd like to be, Dave, that Jesse, that you just started a podcast when your friends have gotten podcasts to be millions of people subscribing to their YouTube channel. You're just aspiring for 1 million and this thing will have a number on it on YouTube. It might be 68 views and it may also completely stop because you're experimenting. Here's the problem with DFS. We keep creating these DFSs for stuff and a lot of it we say, okay, it didn't work out. I'm gonna close it 'cause it didn't work out from the world, or I have other stuff to do. And you've left this trail of telling your team, telling like who, Brandon is watching us live on Dave's team. He knows what Dave is trying to do and if he doesn't get there now, how do you not look like a failure to the people around you because you didn't hit the DFS on this thing?

What's wrong with looking like a failure, Andrew?

Because then people don't support you. I've seen the emails that Jesse gets from people because he's left a trail of success behind. They will work with him for free. They will fly to St. Louis, which— who's in St. Louis? People fly to be in St. Louis to work with him, right? Yeah, Jesse, exactly. You're pointing to the right thing. And because he's got this success with AMPush, success with these other companies, they want to be around it just to absorb some of it, to work with him so they could learn it. Now, if he has this podcast that doesn't do well, and then let's see, he has another DFS for another thing that doesn't go. Don't you have the inverse of that where maybe Brandon goes, why am I working with Dave? He's a wannabe Tony Robbins and doesn't have more than 68 viewers on YouTube. And, you know, like all these other stuff. Doesn't that make you feel like I shouldn't take too many DFS shots here? I should just pick one and be quiet until I get closer to it.

I love you, Andrew. I have a couple on this. You know, I think one thought I'll say is I think some people are wired differently and it's a device that can be helpful or not helpful depending on the individual. Some people like to set things and beat their goals and that's what motivates them. And other people like to create a stretch and an exciting future. And, you know, there's always that story again about the JFK thing where the janitor's mopping the floor and he goes, well, what are you doing? And he goes, I'm putting a man on the moon. Right. And that's how he related to it. So look, it's a device. And I think if you make it— I think part of what's happening, Andrew, is, you know, I think attachment, you get attached to this thing and it's a helpful guidepost to go, this is what I want. And by the way, to ensure that we all want the same thing and that that thing is actually, if we accomplish it, it's the thing we want. Right. So it would be silly for us to like, what if we had this conversation and Dave was like, well, I want 10 really devout listeners. And I'm like, I want a million listeners. And him and I are so misaligned. So it's an alignment mechanism. It's a motivation mechanism. It's an exciting— it's a, it's a, it's a tool that we use to make sure we're running in the right direction. So you're not saying, I want to go on a, I want to go on a diving trip and I'm saying I want to hike a mountain. Those are two very different DFSs and we want to get to the same DFS that enables that. And then from there, you know, Bezos has that quote where he says he goes stubborn on vision, flexible on the details. And what he means by that is Dave and I still want that, that DFS regardless. Now this podcast is details. It's one way of accomplishing that. And there may be other ways to accomplish that, but I don't think it's— I don't think our DFS is going to change, meaning broadly in broad strokes, like Dave wants, you know, he wants to have that impact on people. I want lots of people to know that this exists in the world, and this is one way we're trying to accomplish that.

I'll add to that. Well, first, I just noticed I was really appreciating you, Andrew, for your incisive questions. So thank you. And there's this paradox around attachment that I want to speak to, which is the less attached you are to an outcome, the easier it is to create. So this is some of the dance. It's like, have a clear desired future state, but don't be attached to it. And what creates attachment is the belief or story that your well-being depends on that future coming into being.

And my well-being depends on that happening because otherwise Brandon is not going to respect me enough to stick around and the next person is not going to want to fly to my town to work with me.

I mean, that's a bunch of stories.

You know how much shit I failed at, dude? T-shirt businesses, a high school Facebook, like you don't even know about them. And it's like an asymmetric thing. You know about the thing that was successful because I've talked about like Keep going, Dave.

Yeah, that's also true. First, just notice, yeah, your mind just making up a bunch of stories about what will happen if you fail in the future. And they're just bullshit. I mean, if you talk to people who've actually failed, first of all, you know, failure is not final, right? That cliché. It's not like, you know, if you're devoted to something, you don't— this is Jesse's point about the details— you don't just stop. Because this one thing didn't work, right? You're just going to keep trying different things. Hey, I often use the metaphor of like a roadblock on a road trip, right? Like you're on a road trip to go somewhere and you hit a roadblock and you're like, oh, I'm just a loser. You know, I'm never going to get there. Forget it.

Right.

You just—

my kids won't look at me anymore.

Reroute. So I like that metaphor because it's It's sort of how we relate to failure. You know, there was this— it was like a sportscaster that said, I can't lose. I either win or I learn. So I think that's a healthy way to relate to failure. But specifically to your question, the paradox and the irony is the less attached you are to the outcome, the easier it is to create. And the problem is you can't fake it. 'Cause believe me, I've tried to be like, no, no, I'm not attached to that happening. That's just, you know, that's just my preference. But I, you know, my body can sense it and I'm attached and then I get, you know, scared around it and I'm not showing up as creatively or confidently or with as much energy. So, you know, the state you're operating from is ultimately what determines your results. And the state is affected by your attachment. If you're attached to the outcome, you're not going to be coming from as resourceful and creative and energized a state as when you are detached. So you're less likely to achieve it. So that's—

what was that, Dave? There was a quote, this Ram Dass quote where he says like, when you get on the train with baggage, like the baggage just makes the trip more difficult and arduous, but it doesn't get you anywhere different. Like you're going to get there anyway. It's just a question of whether you get there and make it hard on yourself or not.

Yeah, I love that.

I feel that.

Often said to clients, like, my guess is you're going to end up successful. You're probably going to end up selling this company for some number of hundreds of millions of dollars, if not more. So, you know, if you think about the matrix, like, you could either stress out you know, be attached, make it hard, right? Struggle all the way right up to the finish line. Or you could do it with ease and joy and creativity and lightness. Probably you're going to get, you know, the lie is that I need that stress and heaviness and struggle to get there. And maybe that's your point, Jesse, about the baggage. That's just not true. Yeah.

All right.

There's a lot more that I want to hear here. I'd like to see this with other entrepreneurs to see other perspectives. I'd like to challenge you both on some of the things that you believe, like in being present. Why should I be present instead of being in my desired future state all the time and just keep working my way towards that? But I do like these conversations because when I challenge you, you're not coming back to me as, oh, this Andrew doesn't really believe, he's being cynical and skeptical, and then you cut me off. We get to have an interesting conversation. In the end, I get a better understanding of how I think and about how you think. And then I get to pick instead of going with high school Andrew who went to Brooklyn Tech and traveled through Manhattan and saw all these rich people and wasn't liked by anybody. And I was determined to be like the people I wanted to be like and determined to people to be— to show the people who didn't like me. And so I'm kind of reverting sometimes to the old way instead of picking where I want to go. And I like that you two are picking where you want to go. All right. We'll see how this goes. Brandon, you will either love me and respect me or I will be a complete failure based on how this podcast goes. So please, Brandon, tell your friends. And if you're listening to us, tell a friend or two.

Andrew, I have one parting thought for you.

Yes.

Which I think I've— I don't know if Dave and I have ever really— I'm sure Dave has told me this, but I've now, like, triangulated it from my own religion, from, like, spiritual books, from coaching. And I noticed, Andrew, that you get after yourself for being this way, right? So you meet your frustration or you meet your, your fear with like frustration. That's what I noticed. That's a pattern I noticed with you. And having done a lot of this, because you get mad at yourself for it, you're like, why am I like this? Why am I this way? And in all of this work, like, and all the stuff I've done, it's like, you know, it's the MLK quote where it's like, light You know, darkness does not get rid of more darkness. Only light can get rid of darkness. And so a lot of the things what I would tell you is don't worry so much about the negative parts of this and instead just bring more light into your life. And a lot of this stuff falls away naturally and you can't actually undo those things. Like that's what I've learned about myself even, is that with more light they feel more faint. But I still, I still, you know, look at other people's success and feel like they don't go away, but more light just in some sense blocks them out or like it, it overdoes them. So for you also, just think about bringing more light in and less— and not, not trying to—

not the work I need to do tomorrow, but am I excited about instead?

Yeah, I might translate.

Believe it or not, I am trying.

All right, gentlemen, you try.

Hey, I need to add one thing. I want to add one thing. I might translate the word light to acceptance. Like radical self-acceptance, which I think Jesse is what you're pointing to. But the risk of light is some people start to think, oh, so joy is good and sadness is bad. And, you know, excitement good, fear bad, right? Anger bad. Like, as if those are dark. Those are not dark. And it's actually the acceptance of all the parts and all the feelings, right? Love is unconditional by its nature. I don't think there's such a thing as conditional love. That's not love, that's manipulation or, you know, dependence or something else. So to me, the path is about becoming increasingly unconditional, which I think is closer to our true nature. But that's—

this is all really nice, but you both stepped on my call to action at the end. Like, we end it with the call to action. Brandon was about to go check on his friends and tell him to listen, and instead he's like, interesting, Andrew does need to work on this. I wonder how episode 2 ends up. Instead, guys, thank you so much for being on here. Thanks anyone who listened. And please, you're like one of the early listeners if you are listening. So email, don't email Jesse. You're more likely to get a response from him, but you'll overcrowd his inbox. Email me at my special email address for this. It's a@bootstrapgiants.com or go find Dave Kashen before he becomes whatever he's about to become here. He's already known by a lot of the, see, this is the thing that I think that in my world, you're known by a lot of the best CEOs as the CEO coach. And so I would, I wonder how many people go, Just leave that, that, who needs the riffraff of the million people? Go for like the, the dozens of people who already know you. And all right, we'll talk about all that and more in the future. Tell your friends. Bye everyone. All right, do not hang up on this.