Security Is An ILLUSION and It’s Keeping You Stuck w/ Chris and Lori Harder

So if you're choosing between two scary situations.

Yeah.

Choose the one where you're not going to end up with regret.

I absolutely have been in that situation where all of a sudden you wake up and you realize there's more that you want to do, but then your reality doesn't match where you want to go. Your family's opinions, their ideas, their ideals. There's such an unspoken conversation that we're in that if you go and do something different, you don't. We don't know if we'll be accepted.

Own your future. Because if you don't, someone else will. Welcome back to Own youn Future podcast. I don't have one, but I have two amazing guests today. You get two for the price of one. They're an amazing power couple. They run several multimillion dollar businesses. They love giving back to the world, to the community. They love impacting others. And next coolest part is again, I get so lucky to be here with friends. We get to catch up on camera. So it's cool. Friends doing amazing things, who know how to own their future, who. And they're going to share some powerful things today to go from that self doubt to marketing to sales. I got some great questions for you guys and for you at home. Thank you. Our podcast has been in the top three of our category in the world since we launched. Because you guys are sharing it, because you're liking it, because you're subscribing it. Share it with others. So thank you, thank you, thank you. And without further ado, I'm so excited to be here with Chris and Lori. Harder. What's up?

So excited to be here.

What a privilege.

Seriously. I've been putting off doing a podcast like this for five years. My friends always like when I'm like, it's not, not time, not time. And then finally I've, I, we've had so much to share. There's so much that the world needs in these crazy times that I'm really glad. So thank you.

So how did you know that it was time, by the way?

You know, I really believe, I mean, this is what I do. I'm in this space all over. Not necessarily a podcast, but I just think we're in such a time of uncertainty. I know that's an overused word, but I mean, things were a little shaky and then we went into Covid and then Covid brought out so many different emotions and feelings and now we're at a place with politics when everybody's telling us we should hate each other. And be separate, and we're pulled apart. And I just want to be a part of anything that can deliver people capabilities to live a better life and to bring people together. Because I don't care if you're super liberal, super conservative. I don't care what side of the island and care what religion, what color. If you come here, you get to meet cool people and learn cool things. Yeah, Right. And if. And if you could take what serves you from these interviews, throw the rest away, but if there's one thing today that one of them went through that can help your business, your life, your. Your family, then. Then we're doing our job. Right? So truthfully, it's like, I think the world needs all of us collectively. You have amazing podcasts and you're in similar industry. They need all of us to share what we've discovered so collectively we can grow.

Needs everybody that has a voice and has a message. Somebody out there needs it.

Yeah.

So I don't care if you're shouting it to 5 people or 5 million people, it's your responsibility to amplify that voice.

It is. And I think what the last couple of years has done as well, is it shut a lot of voices up too, because you're afraid to say anything. What if I say the wrong thing? Yeah, if I say the wrong thing, even if that's what I feel in my heart. It does, you know, and I think we can get back. I am an optimist, and I think. I think it's got pushed so far one way. I think the more we speak up just from our heart doesn't mean we're right. But the more you speak up, I think it's going to rebound, and at least that's my hope.

It gives a person who's watching, it gives them the courage to speak up if they see you speak up.

So, yeah. So I want to start with this. This is what I've been doing with the podcast. I think it's really important because I think everybody looks through a different perspective. We call. Call it the own your future podcast. Tony and I did a challenge a couple years ago, called on your future and went viral. And I think it's because if you really think through it, if you don't own your future, if you don't, who will? Right? The old beliefs on your future do limiting beliefs on your future. Does your boss own your future? Does a bad relationship own your future? Does repeating the past on your future? There's a million ways to go. You can go down the emotional side Or a physical side, like, yeah, that man doesn't let me, you know, take my kid to school in the morning. I can't. Somebody else owns your future. So before we get started, what does it mean to you to say, what's it mean to you to own your future?

Lori, you're bringing me back to a time when we did not own our future. So owning your future, to me means being willing to take the risks that allow you to become the person who knows that they can handle rejection, who can handle failure, because the more that you do that, the more you're going to find the thing that wins. And I feel like now we've become the people who truly can be willing to go and find something that works.

I would just add that, like HSBC bank, as great of a company as it was, they owned my future for many years until all of a sudden I was kind of forced out when that last great recession hit it. I know what it feels like to not own your own future, to be cruising down the freeway, even if you wake up one day and say, God, I don't know how I got here, but I don't see an off ramp for miles. I don't know how I'm going to get off. And not everybody is blessed to be booted off. Although it didn't feel good at the time. Not everybody is blessed to be booted off and have to start over and get to choose again how you want to own your future. But that's how we ended up here, was Great Recession, lost everything. And when you're stripped of everything, Dean, the positive of that is you're a blank chalkboard. You're a blank whiteboard, and you get to write whatever the heck you want going forward.

Yeah.

That's how we started to own our future.

Yeah. And you know what I see? I've been in this industry for 26 years, and I'm blessed that I get to be the spark, just ignite the fire under some people, give one capability, something to shift from our multiple. Right. But what I'm noticing more than ever, and I want to share this with both of you, feedback, is two things. One, I think some people don't realize it when they go to school and then maybe university, college, and then they go into a career. There's this different mindset around a career without realizing. Sometimes it's, be quiet, do the job, make everything great, and maybe you'll get the promotion and get the significance and the respect you deserve. And then people transition to do their own thing, and they don't realize they got to be the complete opposite person. They got to be outgoing. They need to stand out. And I think people are stuck in this career mindset sometimes trying to own their future without bringing a little bit different skill set. Does that make it a little like. Like, I feel like I'm going down this rabbit hole. Like, oh, my God. I never recognize. I'm trying to get you to speak up, stand up, be yourself, be strong, be bold, and be courageous. But you've been taught your whole life, be quiet, do your job, things will go good. It's like, oh, my God. Right?

Spot on.

And then I think the second thing. I know I'm going to say two once. The second thing I've seen more of that is those of you watching or listening right now suffering in silence. Meaning you have the good job, you have the decent car, you have a nice house, you have two kids, you have a family. And the outside world is like, man, she's got it dialed. And inside, you're suffering in silence going, this isn't the life I was supposed to be in. Like, my mom, my cousin, my husband, my friend. They think it's good. And I'm sad, I'm lonely, I'm scared, and I have goosebumps. You can see the hair stand up in my arms. Like, that's what drives me. Say, why I do a. I want to help that person. I want to help the person suffering in silence know that they don't have to. I want to help the person that wants to go into a career or go into a business and strip that career mindset. All these things is what drives me. I'm probably putting more time in now at 54, when I don't need to anymore than I've ever had. Because you get this under your skin, which I both. I know both of you have. So let's help those at home. I want to share just my goosebumps. I want to share some outcome. Those two things I said is the. The career versus the kind of the entrepreneurial mindset, or if you don't like that word, I guess it's not as classy as it used to be. What do you. How do you shift that? And then secondly, the suffering in silence.

You know, I can speak of the first one because I came from corporate America, and like you were saying, in corporate America, there's many great things about it, but one of the things it does not do is encourage you to be your wildest, bravest, most outlandish individual.

Innovative.

They want you innovative. Right. They want you to kind of fit into the corporate culture and to their agenda and their goals. And so I remember being there at the world's biggest bank at the time and wanting to, like, bring self development into the teams that I led and wanting to, to put together these meetings and bring in special speakers and not having the courage to. To quite go that far, even though it probably would have worked great because it didn't quite fit necessarily what the agenda was at the time. And I always felt like an oddball. I was like, I want them to read these books, I want them to listen to this person. But other people weren't doing it around you, so you're kind of afraid to stick your head up. And I gotta admit, I wasn't brave enough to stick my head up. I kind of did once in a while. I did some good things, but I was afraid to stick my head up. And now when I'm in this world where I don't have to fit into anyone's agenda other than our agenda, let.

Me ask you, did it take a little while to shed that skin though, right? Cause now you're saying, okay, if I stick my head up, sometimes you get shot. So let me just keep my head low. Yeah, And I'll cruise and I'll get the 3% raise and a little more time and maybe I'll make partner or whatever that is. And now all of a sudden it's like, okay, that's dead, because you got the world changed now, like, I'm going to do my own thing. Did you. Do you still feel that timidness? I've never worked for anybody. I started cutting firewood at 17, so I've never had a job in my life.

I was terrified when I left hsbc. I was stripped of not just our finances, but my identity. My identity at the time was, how big is my team? What is my title? What's my next promotion? And all of a sudden, none of that mattered. And so not only was I lacking confidence at the time, when I left there, on top of that, I knew I wanted to get into coaching. I knew I wanted to do some entrepreneurial things. Like that seed was always in me. But I felt this sense of fraud, this sense of, who am I to coach anybody? I just lost my job. Who am I to shed light for anybody? I'm the guy who just is starting over financially. And it held me back. This was not like, oh, great new opportunity, blank chalkboard, I'm going to be this. It held me back from speaking up and taking the steps I wanted to do for a handful of years. In the beginning, I got to credit her. She's the one that gave us momentum.

I could see that. I could see that for sure. Yeah. You know when they say the better half, I'm just saying, like, just.

No.

Before we go into the next question before, what advice would you give for somebody right now who's saying, maybe I am. Career mindset. Trying to wedge into this innovative, creative new world. And maybe that's what's holding you back. How would you have. If someone had given you advice, you said you took years to shed it. What advice would have helped you shed it sooner?

I would have actually taken a step back and realized the worst case scenario.

As you go back to where you.

Were, is where I was right in that moment. Right. Not doing anything and being broke.

So, like, what's worse, I was already in the worst case.

So stick your head up, take the risk, because it's not going to get worse. It might look differently, but it's not going to get worse from where you are in that moment.

God, that's so good. That's so good. Any thoughts on that?

Well, I was just thinking you were talking about the person who's suffering in silence. I. I absolutely have been in that situation where all of a sudden you wake up and you realize there's more.

That you want to do or whose life is this?

Life? Yeah, like, how did this happen? But then your reality and doesn't match where you want to go. Your family's opinions, their ideas, their ideals. There's a. There's such an unspoken conversation that we're in that, that it's like, you know, if you go and do something different, you don't. We don't know if we'll be accepted. So when I woke up in that situation, it was like, what is my family going to think? I had a religion that was not that frowned upon, you know, going and doing bigger things or going and doing outside things. So I was that person that was like, how do I figure this out when I feel like if I go and do the thing I want, I'm going to be reject from the people that I care about the most. And so what I started to do is just find the places where it would be normal for me to talk about who I really was and how I really felt. And I slowly started spending a little bit more time there than in the other places. And what that did was it allowed me to find my voice. It gave me enough time to kind of find who I was. And my voice and what I really believed and what I really felt. And it made me get strong enough to be the person who could maybe go back and have these small conversations. They weren't all at once.

Not only having the conversation, but don't we have. At least I know I experienced this. Don't we have this, like, feeling that we not only have to start to share, like, we almost want to convince them that what we're doing is right. And they go, lori, be the brave soul. Go start your own business. I know your husband lost his job and you're going to go online and teach people. I don't know what you're doing, Lori, but I'm proud of you. Like, we're waiting for that, and most of the time, we never get. Yeah.

I remember telling my parents, so here's the order of things, right? Hsbc, recession hits, lose that job. So then I take a partnership with a mortgage bank, and I'm not happy. Although it's going well, and I want to get out. And I remember telling my parents I wanted their approval so bad. I'm like, hey, I'm going to leave this mortgage bank. You got to trust me. We're blowing up Lori's brand. It's going to work. And I remember them saying, why would you leave something that is so secure and it wasn't. It's an illusion. Nothing is secure. Right. But why would you leave a path already?

Oh, my God. No, keep going.

I want to hear the jump anyways. Because I knew I could bet on her.

Yeah, well, thank. That's what I said before. I'm just. No, I'm kidding. But let's unpackage that word secure. As you said that, I had, like, my stomach tightened up because secure, man, I. I bet to say people listening right now, if I keep saying the word secure, it probably you can equate, like, right across to the right of it. The way my brain works equals handcuffs.

Yeah.

Or handles locked in. Like, the last thing. The last thing you ever want someone to say is, I know this is not your dream. I know you feel like you're living someone else's life. I know you're suffering in silence, but you're secure. Stay. Like, imagine the end of your life and you get a chance to meet your maker and God's like. So you took the secure route, dude. Huh?

How secure was that?

Oh, boring. Wow. Huh? How's that feel now?

Yeah.

Here, let me show you a quick video. Who you could have been.

Yeah.

Oh, how's that? You're going to start that app to help people with lending. But you didn't want to be secure yet. Nobody got those loans. Yeah, nobody. Nobody got to listen to your podcast. Nobody felt like an empowered woman. Nobody got in better shape. Because I'm glad you lived a secure life. Next. Like, no, no. Can I get it back, please? Can I go back?

I literally can't imagine that.

Secure is an illusion. Right. I worked at the time for the world's biggest bank, and I kept getting promotion after promotion every year. So, like, I was the favorable golden boy. Like, everything was secure until all of a sudden it wasn't. And I thought I did the right things. I bought rental properties and I put Money in our 401k, and all of those things kaput. They were gone. And I came home and I told her, and she thought we were secure. I came home and I told Lori. I said, babe, I lost my job today. And we kind of knew it might be coming one day. I lost my job today. And the worst part is we have to sell absolutely everything. We have to short sell the house. We have to walk away from a couple rental properties, and we have to start over. So secure is an illusion. We weren't secure until she said, remember what you said to me?

I feel like you tell it better.

I will never let this happen again. Imagine going home telling your wife, like, hey, babe, living beyond our means. Money went away. Got to start over. And she was just quiet for a while. She didn't blow up. And you looked at me and you said, I will never let this happen again. And she, by taking our future into her hands, saying, I'm going to be a producer, that is what made us secure now. Wow.

We had gone bankrupt as a child, so I had already experienced this. I remember it so vividly. And I had this moment of this pattern is going to repeat itself over and over again. Unless we become different.

Yeah.

Unless this pattern stops right here with us. And it was, like, visceral. And I just remember, like, it's almost like you stop caring about it's. Everything just went slow. And it was like a moment of, what if you can do your whole life over again, what would you do? Like, how will you bet on you this time?

Yeah.

Instead of betting on everyone else.

Thank God you had worked on yourself. You have that emotions. Because it could have been the blame game. Well, it's not. It's the bank's fault, the recession's fault. They printed too much money. Inflate. You know, there's a million things we all have lots to blame, and we can let the outside world control us, or there's a moment in life and you just go, I'm, I'm adjusting this temperature. This is on me.

I think at that point in our life, in our relationship, that's really the thing that we learned is there's, there's the life that you can just go, like, life will give you a life. There's no arguing that. You can wake up. You can live a life. It'll look like a life, but like.

Floating down a stream on a tube and wherever the. It'll take you somewhere totally.

But you'll never actually feel like you lived.

You know, I, I, I said this twice. I said it a couple weeks ago. We had a big audience, and I watched it hit. I said, imagine. And I'll say this every week. It's like, how often do you have to go to the gym consistently? How do you obviously have to work on your mindset consistently? I don't. You have to work on your marriage every day.

Every day.

Right. It's not like you hear it once. It's like, yeah, you're at once, but you're still not doing anything different. But I was saying, if you were, if you got to the end of your life and, and your maker showed you the man or the woman, you could have been. Right? That feeling, like when people say, I'm scared in the moment to take a chance, I'm scared to go against what my family thinks. Isn't it scary? Scary to get to the end of your life and realize you missed it?

Right?

And then I said, I said, you'd like I missed it? And I said, I asked. We had lots of people, hundreds of thousands of people on. And I said, in that moment, if you had one wish, what would it be? And everybody's, go back, go back, go back, go back, go back, go back. Tens of thousands. And you know what I said? Wish granted.

Exactly.

Starting now.

We're here today. Yeah. When's the best time to plant a tree? 10 years ago. What's the second best time?

Today?

Today. Today. So maybe this is the podcast today where you go, screw it. I felt just like Lori. I felt just like Chris. I've been in the same exact situation, but screw it. Today's the day. I'm saying, I don't, or I do. I can't, I won't. I, I have to. It's over. Or let's start or let's reinvent, like, at any moment. It's the reason I love Doing this podcast, I love this interview is what if today's the day one of the thousands of people who listen go today. Right.

I think it's because. So when I'm thinking of the. The thing that I was most scared of because I knew that I would have to walk that journey alone, I think the transition, there's always a transition with someone right now who's listening, who's like, yeah, but they don't realize I'm going to have to be alone for a year or two years or leave my family or, you know, I don't have anyone on this journey. I totally get that. But you will find the people and the craziest thing happens, even if your family is so against you in the beginning, because definitely have experienced that. And yes, I did walk that path for about three years on my own without having communication to a lot of my family. They end up coming back when they see what your real intentions are. Most of them. Most of them. And not only have they come back in such a beautiful way because I am different. It's like they didn't even have to change. I just changed. It's like now I get to help them as well. And now they're learning how to help themselves. And that could have never happened if I didn't say, I'm going to have faith. I'm going to trust that if I do this, and this is truly my calling and God wants me to do this, I'm going to trust that even though this looks bleak, this feels rough, right now they're telling me I'm a bad person and I'm selfish. I trust that if my intentions are good and I walk this walk and I obey this calling, that it's going to turn out, and it has turned out so beautiful and they have learned to help themselves and we have, like, been able to help them, something we could have never done if. If we didn't get brave enough to walk alone for a little while.

Thank you for sharing that. I know that that's. Some of those things are so deeply personal, right when especially it's family. And I think all of us take that walk at some point. You know, I remember you just brought back just feelings in my own life that I haven't shared in a while. But I remember taking a walk 20 something years ago when I was going to move out here to Phoenix. I lived in New York. I had a collision shop, a tow truck company, a used car dealership, and I owned apartments and I was building houses from, you know, being a broke Kid and went from cutting firewood to worked my way up to all that. And for the little town I lived in of 5,000 people, I was like a big fish in a little pond in my 20s. And then watch damn Tony Robbins on an infomercial. I listen to it. I'm like, this guy gets to make a living.

Yeah. For helping people.

How cool, right? Like, you get that bug. You guys are in it. I know behind the scenes, when no one's watching, how much you care about changing lives. It's. It's what Tony and I do. It's what we help people at Mastermind with. Right. But 27 years ago, I listened to an infomercial, bought his product, and I'm listening to him going, I gotta do this. Is that calling, like, for me? It's like, I, I gotta do this. I know. I was literally doing. I was literally during the day fixing cars, painting fenders, and at night writing down a course that I wanted to share with people. Right.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

And remember your first course? I do, I do, yeah. It was helping people make money with cars. That's how I got started. That's how I got started. I totally flip cars. So literally, in my collision shop, I had two phones. I had one on the desk for car people that want to buy a car and get their car fixed and one for this new business. But the reason I'm sharing is I start getting a little momentum and I'm taking everything I'm making from apartments, flipping houses and cars, and I'm putting it in. This is before the world had social media. There was no Internet. In 1996, if I wanted to sell what I knew I bought off a Tony's infomercial, I had to do an infomercial. So I had to come up with 100 grand for an infomercial, 50,000 for media. I had to buy courses and put them into a warehouse. So it's 250 grand just to see.

We're never allowed to complain about social media.

Yeah. Yeah. So it was 250 grand before I sold one. How to book media three months in advance. How to get a call center to take every call. How to put 20,000 courses in a warehouse where people package them.

And the first world.

Yeah.

That is a huge gamble.

Yeah. So think of that gamble.

Yeah.

And I'm a kid that didn't go to high past high school, barely got out of high school, had dyslexia. So now I'm taking every dime I have, putting it into this. Well, I Didn't. Wasn't smart enough to raise money. I just put every dime. I. When I ran out of money, I. I applied for, like, six extra credit cards at the same day so they wouldn't see all the applications. They all got approved. I had 100 grand on credit cards. Pulled that out. Cash advance in two minutes. Now I'm 250 in. Didn't play it yet. So when somebody says to me, oh, my God, I've been running an ad for two weeks. We already spent a thousand bucks. It's not working. I'm like, oh, boohoo. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm old school, bro. Yeah, Like, I had it, you know? So my reason I'm saying this is my sister, who I love dearly, drives from Virginia to. To new. Upstate New York, where I live, to sit me down. Like an intervention. Literally sat me down and said, enough's enough, Dean. The whole family's proud of you. You came from nothing. You have a collision. Was. Dean. Collision center. I had my own collision shop. I had a tow truck company. I was building house. Like, we're proud of you. You are going to lose everything. You're going to go broke. It's not going to work. Stop it. Like, literally, stop being. We love your adventurous soul, but now you bit off more than you can chew. And the reason I'm saying that, because I had a definitive moment in my life. I remember taking a walk. I was taking a walk down this road by where I. I would spend most of my childhood at my grandmother's house. And I was taking a walk down this road because it felt like comfort food. And I remembered, and I want to ask you guys about this. I remember distinctly two crystal clear voices. Now, when you're in the moment, it's not something I thought, I'm going to remember this moment so I could write about it in a book or talk about it in a podcast. I just remember having a walk going, my God, your sister's right. You barely got out of high school. I'm not freaking Tony Robbins. He's 6 foot 7. He's dynamic. He's friends with all these wealthy people. He helps presidents. I'm a guy that fixes cars, and I have grease under my fingernails. Who the hell do I think him. Oh, my God. I just spent 250 grand. I'm gonna go brokers. Before it came out, I'm gonna go broke. I'm gonna lose everything. And literally a millimeter away, there was another conversation going, no, no, I was meant for More. Screw that. If I stay in this town as a collision shop guy, I'm dead already and I don't even know it. And these two voices, I mean, literally going back and forth. And my decision wasn't, God damn it, I'm going for it. It was like, I think I have to go for it, or I like. It was like, I still think back. It wasn't so crystal clear. It wasn't. They were so close to each other that I still could be in that little town and Dean Collision center would still be driving. Like my dad. My dad was in collision business his whole life until he. Until I retired him. But I only share that extra story because I know you both know it so well, and there's so many people listening and watching where you're walking that tightrope.

Oh, yeah.

Do you remember those moments in your life where you had that decision?

I absolutely do. And I would. I kind of frame it this way. When you're at that decision point, I think people are waiting until it feels like, bad road, good road. Take the.

Never happens.

It's not. It's usually. It's usually one crappy, scary choice or other crappy, scary choice. And one of them will bring you possible fulfillment and maybe monetary gain and, you know, purpose. Like no other. And the other one is just going to kind of keep you where you are or less. So if you're choosing between two scary situations.

Yeah.

Choose the one where you're not going to end up with regret. That's my best advice to everybody.

I just, I. You know, as a young kid, I've always had the. The ability to fast forward into, like, what will this look like? Like, the pain. And I've always used that pain as a motivator, actually. So it's like, if I don't do anything, what is my life actually gonna look like in five years? And I had a pretty good picture of what that would look like. Cause I could look around in my family and in people who were all around me, and I was from a very small town, and it was. It was just pure struggle. There was no getting out of that. So I think for me, it was always, I can. It's very easy for me to keep choosing this and get more of this.

Yeah.

But as a young kid, I was like, I don't want more of this. Like, I need to go figure out who has more of what I want.

And just do what they do.

Yes. Like, what is. But what is that secret? That was. That's what I spent most of my Life trying to figure out.

Yeah. And you know, I'll tell you it. What? Looking from the outside, you guys are amazing couple. I know how you care about each other when no one's watching, which is compliments. Why my wife and I were so, you know, attracted to you guys, because we feel that way too. We don't have an Instagram marriage. We work on the crap behind the scenes. Right. And don't get me wrong, I went through a divorce, so I know what it's like to also screw one up. Right. I'm not doing that again. But if you follow, and you should be following both of these guys on social, and especially watching you, Lori, on how you empower women and you set such a great example. And you see you guys on your boat in the summer in your summer house, and you're wakeboarding, which I always wish I could do, and I can't. I just fall on my face. So you see this. And sometimes when you watch social people like, God, I wish I was strong like Lori. I wish I had it all dialed in like Lori. Like, she's not afraid of anything. She's fearless. And, man, I got the. I think we all don't feel better with somebody else's misery or worries, but we feel more human. Go, oh, wow, Lori gets to do that. And she still has something. So the question I love to ask you what is something that scares you or a fear or something that almost held you back that most people wouldn't know that you still deal with even with all your success?

Do I have to pick one?

Okay, yeah, exactly. Hold on. Do we have a two hour podcast here today?

I actually talk about this a lot on my podcast because it's very real. I want people to know no matter how much, kind of like, no matter how much work you do, it's not necessarily that your fears will go away. Maybe some of them can go away, but I very much have just learned how to support myself through them. So public speaking for me, my fear and anxiety is so real, it can drive Chris absolutely crazy. It's that bad beforehand. He's like, how can you still be this way this many years later? He's like, you're doing this to yourself. I'm like, I swear I'm not.

I swear. Swear.

So I've learned how to support myself through that. Also just doing new things. Like, I. I'm a person who loves new things, but when you go into new territory, you're a beginner again. So learn. I've learned how to support myself in being A beginner. And in that feeling of when I feel like a fraud, I just remember, okay, this is the feelings of beginners. Like, go surround yourself with people who have done it before and go talk about it. If there's something I'm afraid of, I no longer stay quiet. Like all of my girlfriends, all of my friends, they're gonna know exactly what I'm dealing with. And ask Chris, they're gonna know 10 times over. Because I need to talk about it now. Until I know that if I haven't, if it's not going away and I don't feel supported with it yet, then I haven't talked about it enough.

Wow. Wow.

Maybe that just means, you know, I can annoy my friends.

But I would add to that, you know, everybody, I don't care what it looks like, everybody is navigating some tough things at any given time. You know, we've been trying to have kids and it just hasn't worked out for the past several years. We're navigating that right now, regardless of seeing us on the invisible every day.

In the invisible.

In the invisible. As you know, I'm raising capital right now for this peer to peer lending app. It's going to change the world. But you know what my fear is? What if my friends invest? What if people I care about respect invest and doesn't pan out? For some reason it doesn't pan out is that the end of me is at the end of my reputation. But you can't let those things stop you from trying to change the freaking world.

Yeah. Wow. I think today I'm so glad we're going down this path because I hear it now more than ever. And when you have so much uncertainty out there, I mean, what's going on with the US Dollar? What if I make dollars and then all of a sudden it's not the world currency anymore and it's devalued? Should I even do that? Should I start my own business now? Should I wait and see where it goes? And I know in my experience that so much gets lost in the hesitation, right? In the contemplation, the overthinking, right? How many great ideas die. You know, I. I was in this little town that I grew up in and I was. I went and saw my grandmother and grandfather. They're in this old school cemetery in this little town in upstate New York. And I'm walking through it and I'm like. And I ended up shooting a video in there because I had this feeling. I'm like, this is the Wealthiest place on the planet. How many dreams died here? Wow. Right? And that's just what I felt. I don't know if I heard that someplace, but it hit me while I was there. I was like, how many dreams? How many desires? How many new inventions? How many, how many speakers? How many in today's world? You'd say a podcast, a book, an innovation, of course, a coach. How many died here because of self doubt or old stories?

Never saw the light of day.

Never saw the light of day. They lived in here. I mean, my mom has had such amazing ideas, but she went to school, had dyslexia. That's probably why I have it. And she never found a way to have the confidence. And my mom is so innovative. She's so beautiful inside and out. She's so creative. Never in a minute, she wouldn't even share her ideas with her friends because she's like. Like, you felt when you left, could be a coach, she had it magnified. How many, how many people today do we want to just shake and go, no, no, you were meant to impact a certain group of people. You were meant to be a better version of you. Speak up. Be bold, be brave. You know, and. And I think that's why I love what you guys do and I love I get to do this. That today just sparks a little courage. Then we did our job. Then we did our job.

I love this because I. What, what we forget is that the people who we, you know, we all have these, like, networks that we desire, these friendships that we want, that we're like, oh, what would it be like to be in that room and have vocal those conversations and be around those people? And once you become the person who's willing to take the risk, who's willing to take the leap when those people start coming into your circle, the people in those circles, I've learned now that I've been able to be in them. They respect you for taking the risk. They respect you for the courage. Not for if you win or fail.

For taking the risk, not for the security. Yes.

In fact, some of the people who I look up to the most have had some of the biggest failures. But the fact that they are in the arena with you, like, that's what you want. You want someone who is not like, oh, everything they touch turns to gold. It's like, no, I, I want to just be with the person who's willing to take that dream and be like, I put it all out there, I gave it my all. And yes, it had to pivot or yes, it looked this way. And I think those are the ones that we draw the most wisdom from as well.

So. So just remembering that, that becomes a common bond. You know, you probably have people say, how do I get to be friends with you and Tony and all these people? Right.

You fail, you really want to say.

Take the risks and be real and vulnerable and authentic. You're not friends with people because they've had wins. You're friends with people at high levels because you guys have all taken risks.

Putting yourself, like, recognizes, like, you know, and. And I love the conversation between resourcefulness and resources. Yeah, Right. So you guys are working on having children. And I know whatever it takes. I'm pretty sure that's going to happen. Whatever you guys got to do. If you could leave your children, child, a massive amount of resources or nothing, and left them with a mindset of resourcefulness, which one would you leave them all day?

Resourcefulness.

We talk about mindset.

Like, how do you raise a kid if they're raised in a family that's doing really well? Let's say raising a family, a kid in privilege. Right?

Yeah.

How do you give them grit? How do you give them resourcefulness? How do you give them strength? How do you give them that toughness and that grit? It's a real thing all day long. I'd rather give them resourcefulness.

That's owning your life. Resourcefulness. If I could put it in a word, that's.

I mean, think when people say it to me, I'm like, okay, so go Google the statistics on someone got handed a big pile of resources in the lotto. How does that work out for them? Right. They didn't have the resourcefulness behind it. Right. And who do we respect? You expect grit, you respect challenge, you know, risk takers. But if you really boil it down, you respect those that were resourceful as hell. You lost everything and you found a way to get that person to lend you money to do. And you came. Oh, my God. Right? It's the resourcefulness we respect in others, but we also respect it in ourselves because it is a horrible feeling to go, I would do this if someone would lend me the damn money. I would do this if someone became my partner. It's like, do you respect other people that say that? So be careful what you say. Say it in the mirror and go, no, no, I respect people says, I don't have it. But because I don't, I must, because here's what I know. Whatever you think is the thing holding you back. You could Google it and Find somebody who actually used that as the fuel. Absolutely. I. I don't have any money, so. Yeah, I didn't have any money there, so I did this. I had dyslexia, learning disability. Yeah. So someone did this, right? It's like, they use it. So what if today you thought of the things that were your disadvantages and you just decided, shit, what if that could be the wind behind my sale.

Oh, my gosh.

I.

So I didn't graduate high school, so do you know what? I do know what. I literally did this just. This is, like, all coming together for me right now. I remember being like, what is a career? Even though I loved fitness, but I looked up what is a career that didn't require me to have a diploma? And I went all in on fitness because I was like, oh, they don't make me, like, have to show them anything. If I start my own gym or I could get a certification and. And kind of be graduated within that. And that's so funny. And that fitness changed my whole life and career. Isn't that funny? Like, that's so resourceful. I was like, who doesn't need. Who doesn't need a diploma from me?

Yeah, you didn't need the degree. You just needed a way. Yeah, you carved it out.

I love that. This is an amazing conversation, guys. I'm having, having a blast, hanging out with you guys and catching up. We got it. I know we're catching up with the microphones on and the camera's on, which is cool. So I want to. I want to switch gears a little bit. I like talking about this because my belief. And you guys know this about me is. And I know it about you, is that selling is truly service. Right. But selling, especially maybe the women who follow you. I've just been to women Events with 5000 women in the room who are all badasses. Business owners are on their way to business owner. And I'd say, who's ready for more? Who's ready for this Shift their mindset, limiting beliefs. And then I'd say, who in here has a little apprehension or doesn't like selling? And 80% of the room always raise their hand and go, yeah, right. And I will spend so much time shifting that, like, if you're selling a bad car to an elderly person and taking the last money, you're just a bad human. Sales aren't bad. He's a bad human. If you're selling drugs to a drug addict, you are a bad human. It's not the selling mechanism, because if you Go to a great movie, you eat an amazing meal, you read a good book. What do you do? Oh, my God, Chris. Dude. If you have not read Ogmundino's book, World's Greatest Salesman in two and a half hours, Holy crap. If you haven't eaten at the Italian restaurant up north, the spaghetti meatballs. Oh, my God. Right? This Chianti that I found at 27 bucks, it is. So what are we doing? We're selling and. And when we're selling that, what are we doing? We're. We're lit up, our shoulders are back, we got a smile because my wife said it best when I first met her. You guys know my wife, and she's amazing. Did incredible. She had her own hair salon and did insanely well. And she's like, I don't really like selling. I'm like, you're full of crap.

Yeah.

You don't make 400 grand a year as a hairstylist and you're not selling. She's like, no, you're a walking saleswoman.

Exactly.

And what she said to me, she's like, no, I just love making women feel confident and look beautiful. I want them to leave with a skip in their step. I'm like, so you're servicing them? Yes. And how do you service them? Well, I sell them. Two thousand dollar extensions. Okay, so you're not really selling, but you are. But she never thought of herself as a salesperson because she thought, no, I'm just making these women look more beautiful.

Right.

So even though we can say that, and that's how I look at it, I mean, when people say, how do you stand up and sell Matthew McConaughey's course live? It's like, because I watched that guy work eight months to put a course together to change the world. And it should have been a thousand dollar course. And he's like, now I want everybody to have it. Can we charge less than half? When I see that dedication and commitment, how can I not get like, I'd be doing a disservice to people. Even though I say that there's still people right now going.

A lot of people.

A lot of people. Should you really sell or should. Can I really sell? So how do we help people through that?

I have.

We have so much sand this.

So I fully struggled with sales in the beginning because it was such a. I think it was just new. It was a worthiness thing. I still had some money things around it. But looking back over the things that have transformed me the most, and anybody listening, maybe you're listening to a podcast. Maybe you've spent money on a book. Maybe you've. Whatever it is. Like, I have found that the only time that I choose to show up is if I put something on the line, like, if I've paid for it.

True story.

And I think of this all the time. So if you are not charging for something, you're not even asking that person to commit to you at all, nothing is going to happen.

A gym membership for free. Nobody's going now.

It's a true. It's just how the universe works. It is an energy, energy exchange.

And I love.

A lot of times the best thing that works is for me to go, I'm going to give you this in return. I want the transformation, but what happens is people get afraid of. What if they. What if they don't get the transformation from what I'm giving them? What if they don't feel good about it? This is where I found, like, just a few conversations have helped me get through it. Like, when I first started really doing sales and we were doing network marketing, at first my sales sucked. I was like, wait, why is this so bad? Like, I suck at this. And then I realized there were just a couple things that if I followed. Like, I wrote myself out a little script for it.

Yeah.

And I tweaked these things, and I was like a 90, 95, 98 closer of everyone that I would talk to after this. So what I did was I said, where do I get stuck? And for me, it was, I'm afraid that. That this product I'm selling them won't transform them. So all I had to do was.

Insert the product or know you got a product that works.

Insert a sentence. I knew the product worked for me, but I also had proof that some people were like, I don't know if this problem works well. But I also knew maybe they didn't use it right. So I would say, hey, I know that up until this point in your life, you haven't had a transformation because you haven't committed and you haven't put the money down. And I believe I'm here to break that pattern. So just trust me on this one. Like, lean in, trust me. And there's a full refund if you don't get what you want in one week. If you don't like it, great, no problem. We part ways. We're good. But if you do it and you transform, it's because you said yes to this. It's because you're breaking that pattern, because you did Something different. But that one sentence for me was my freedom phrase. It let me off the hook.

Yeah.

And so from there on out, I became the best saleswoman because it allowed me to stand in my power. But also, give me that one little sentence that's like, look, if this is not for you, great, we'll part ways, and then we'll be good.

I love that. And. And I want to hear your thoughts on this, Chris. What? For me, most people will say, oh, my God, I do pretty well on sales. Yeah, right. And. And people say, give me the secret. I think people are looking for. Well, it's the hook. You say this thing. It's this tie down. It's a blue button, it's a red button, it's a green button. But my number one answer is, I care. Like, the truth of the matter is, especially the last decade, is I fall in love with my product so much that I feel bad if people don't have it. When people are. That you could take sales training and have a perfect script, but if you don't believe in. In what you're selling.

Yes.

If you don't have the essence, you'll back off. You'll be shy. You watch people on stage. They're all excited about their teaching. They get to the pitch, and our mouth goes dry. They got cotton mouth like you. I'm like, they don't love what they do. Like, I was so excited, literally sitting right here with Matthew McConaughey. I saw what he did. I love this course so much that I was literally getting antsy. I'm like, I want to sell this.

Yeah.

I can't wait. Because when people get this. So in my head, everybody's like, you get nervous. Like, no, I couldn't wait to. To do it, but it took years of. This is service. And if I don't get you to say yes, you're gonna suffer in silence. You're gonna be stuck on old patterns. You're not gonna change your life. And maybe my voice doesn't work. Maybe my partner, Tony Robbins voice don't work. Maybe you two don't work for a certain person.

Yeah.

But McConaughey could.

Yep.

Totally.

Yep.

So if I get him to get McConaughey. So the only reason I'm sharing that is because I want to give people the freedom today, because some of them are stopping themselves from becoming a coach, launching a course, writing a book, doing a podcast because, oh, what if I got to ask for the money? Just fall in love with what you do. Like the movie, like, the book like my wife helping women look beautiful. She didn't have to sell, but she had to serve them. And the byproduct was she actually sold. And. Right. So what do you. What advice you got on this?

I'm sitting here thinking, I know why you are so good at sales, because I've known you for a while enough to know that you love people. You care more about getting a good product in someone's hands so that their life will change than you care about your own ego of being worried about, wait, what if someone doesn't like that I'm selling? And. And that's what makes somebody good at sales, by the way, is you're choosing to sacrifice your fear of what if someone doesn't like that I am selling? And instead leaning into, I'm going to work really hard to interrupt this person's normal pattern of decision making so that this one time they made the right decision that'll change their life. Sales is a loving act because you're putting their outcome over your ego or your protection.

I love that. I love that. And I think people, I think we all, they have to hear it over and over because there's so many of you right now on the edge of your company exploding or just starting. But you're what happens when I see when people don't like sales, they focus on everything else. Their product is perfect, their CRM is perfect, their. Their logo is gorgeous, and they're doing all these things. Then they go, it's time to sell. I'm gonna go add a module. I'm go with fall colors. Like, like, I'm gonna encourage you today to take the uncomfortable action to say, am I being honest with myself? And fall in love with your product. Fall in love with selling.

Put somebody else first instead of you being uncomfortable. The last thing I'd add about sales, because I think it's really important is, you know, sales is like money. If you have good sales skills, it's like having a lot of money. It's going to make you more of who you are. So to be a good salesperson, if you are at the core someone who wants to change lives, it's going to amplify that ability to change lives. So if you're doing everything you said, I'm going to perfect my colors and my branding and everything else, but you don't work on being a good salesperson. It's like saying, hey, I want to help some charities, but I got no money. You need that currency, which is being a good salesperson in order to truly show up the way you were meant to show up.

I couldn't agree more.

I watch you launch everything from this podcast right. To the moon, Tony, you and Tony. To the moon, you and McConaughey. To the moon. What are the one or two things that make your launches go so dang well that other people aren't doing?

Really, really Great question. Wow. It's a lot of answers. First off, I spend more time on marketing and sales and living inside the mind of the person's life. I want to change. What are their thoughts? What do they feel? Probably more than most. I read more comments than most people. I really want to meet people where they are. Most people don't realize you create something that you feel they need, and you're trying to convince somebody to do something that's not already there. And one of the things I think have really helped me is I want to enter conversations already going on in your mind, not try to change your conversation. Subtle difference. Yeah. Right. And I watch people do that. They create something. I'll watch somebody and because I've been doing this for almost 30 years, and I'll go, wow, that's a great product. But they're not going to sell it.

Yeah.

They're living inside their product. They're living inside their head. So we must live inside the mind of the people we want to serve.

Right.

Answer their questions, finishing their sentences. Right. Secondly, I'm not afraid to go big. I know that might sound like, oh, Dean, you've been, Yes, I have. But I shot for the stars, as when I was broker than crap. Right. Like when. When. When Tony and I decided to do this first challenge, I'm like, I'm shooting for a million people. The biggest I'd ever heard was like, a hundred thousand. Yeah.

Wow.

Right? And we. We didn't land in a million. We did 920, 000.

Pretty darn right.

Like, but. So I think the combo was really, like, I love what I do, therefore, I obsess on the product, therefore I obsess on the client and how to get them to say yes. And I am persuasive as hell in something that I know could change someone's life. So I think focus more on marketing, and if you can do it at a thousand, ten thousand, one hundred thousand, I would really just look at the metrics and go, is it the same profit at a thousand people as it is 100,000? Well, if I do the metrics, it's the same as a million. And I just meet even people that are our friends. We get to have some great circles and they'll give me their metrics. I'm like, why didn't you spend five times as much? Like, I don't know. Because sometimes it's our beliefs, our limiting beliefs that hold us back.

I heard two things in there that I really want to call out. You know, the first one is you've heard people say, ask a better question, you ask a bigger question. Instead of taking a hundred thousand to two hundred thousand, how do we take it to a million? So you're just asking a bigger question and therefore you get bigger results. And the second thing people should know, like the other night you stayed up late into the night reading over a thousand true story real time comments as you and McConaughey were doing, doing the launch so that you could speak to what people really needed, not to what you thought they wanted. Most people aren't willing to stay up and read a thousand freaking comments.

Yeah, I was a little tired. Next day. But it worked. But it worked.

It worked. Okay. So he kind of segued into a question that I have for you. What do you do to make sure you stay ahead of the curve or own your future? What questions are you asking yourself constantly?

Yeah, that really great question. I love that Wayne Gretzky quote on why he was good at hockey.

Right.

He's like, I think everybody skated to where the puck was. I tried to figure out where this puck was going.

Yeah.

And I, I don't know if it's intuition at this point, but if you really listen and I'm going to go back, I did start in the infomercial business. I had to. There was no other way. People like, how'd you do an infomercial? What else was there?

Right?

Smoke signals, carrier pigeon. Like I'm old. Like I started in the 90s. Like newspaper. You were in fourth grade in the 90s. Like you don't even know a life without the Internet. I was, I had the first cell cell phone. It was a bag phone. And then the flip phone that the antennas would always bend, you know. But I would say is what being in the infomercial world did is think about this. Think of how your marketing would change today if you couldn't target your ideal client. Think about that. You don't even know a world without targeting. You wouldn't, you wouldn't run ads that today for 77 year old men who like golf, would you? I mean, would you run it for a 13 year old boy who's into soft, into baseball yeah, right. You're looking for your demographic, Right. When you're in an infomercial, there's no demographics. Back then, you played on Discovery Channel, cnn, Fox News, everybody's living room. So you had. I had to get an innate feeling of the conversations going on in a America in 1997. What was the conversation going on in 2002? What was the conversation in 2007 when every other house was going through foreclosure or bankruptcy or for sale? What were they feeling? They're feeling not prosperous. They just wanted a life preserver. And then when the economy takes off, what are they feeling? I want aspiration. I want the second house. If I'm not living inside the mind of the client, I would die on infomercials. And I was on for 20 years. And the coolest part is Tony was my. My muse. And within five years, I never met him. Within five years, him and I were fighting for the number one infomercial.

Wow.

Right?

You had never met him at that point.

I never met him at that point. And then he went off the air for a long time. And then we met and became friends and started companies together. But I say that what that taught me. Great question. I've never been asked that question for what I think it taught me is I read those comments and I feel. Because I want to feel where people are going collectively, we all have our own unique thoughts, Right? But it's really collectively, if you ask a thousand people, super liberal, super conservative, moderate, down the middle, we're all feeling kind of the same stuff right now.

Kind of want the same.

We kind of want the same thing. Like, we still all want to live into our full potential. We all know we are meant for more. We want our kids to be better than we were. We want to leave a better planet than we were on. We want people to be fair. We want, you know, no separation. We want people. We all want that. I don't care what religion, we all want that. Yeah. So why aren't more of us leaning into that collectiveness? And I think by reading the comments, by looking what people say, but getting a sense of what people feel collectively, I get to live in where they are. I think that's the best answer I have. I love that. That's awesome, guys. How do people find you?

Well, podcast is earn your happy. I love that.

I love that.

Love doing the. You know, the podcasts are just such blessings. They really are. They've changed my life and now it's so cool to be able to do it. And be on yours. This is incredible. Bucket list moment. And yeah, just all Instagram handles, social handles, Lori harder.

Yeah. And I'm at Chris W. Harder for all my handles. And every morning that I wake up, I send out a money mantra or a positive business perspective. And I've been doing it for almost a couple of years thanks to her. And I do it to thousands of people totally free. No catch. So if you want to jump on that list, all you gotta do is just text me the word daily to 310-421-0416 and I'll add you to the list.

Awesome. Well, guys, this has been so much fun. Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm glad we got to catch up on camera. So it was so good seeing you guys. For you at home, thank you for all you're doing to make this podcast shoot to the moon. We're here just to help serve, give people some capabilities to own their future. So if you like it, you could say thank you by subscribing, liking. Share it with someone you know, share it with three friends and go back and listen to the last few. The last two were fire. Thanks for joining. Appreciate you being here. We'll see you next time.