Dan Jourdan

Okay.

But. Yeah, but it's really Jordan. But what happens is it's, you know, I moved to Georgia, and so, you know, from Daniel Jordan, it turned into Dan Jordan. So I'm happy with Dan.

It worked for Michael. Yes. You know, I'll call you Dan Jourdan. I always call you Dan Jordan or the sales Energizer bunny. And Jason, our producer. So cool. If you are watching this on YouTube, you're gonna see all the cool stuff that Dan's doing is that I got vaccinated picture up there.

Dan. Oh, well, I don't get. Actually, I just got kicked out of my office because I'm not gonna wear the muzzle. So absolutely, it's open to work.

Yeah. My wife is not. She is totally against vaccination, but we won't even go there because this isn't. This is a podcast about attitude. This is a podcast about sales. This is a podcast that is helping people bridge the gap from where they are to where they want to be, from who they are to who they want to become. Dan, tell me this. What advice can you give our people in both of those areas? What's your secret? Getting from who you were at 21 to who you are now. How did you bridge the gap?

Wow. I was thrown into it, as most people were, but I realized it's not. I was always looking to become a certain person, and I followed people that had certain values that I appreciated. And so there's three main values that my family and I, we have written on our wall, and it's our big thing that we do. And there's three values. One is gratitude, the next is courage, and the next is kindness. And so if we grateful courageous and kind, and things get rolling from there, that's the kind of person that I wanted to be. When you have that, when you know that where you want to be, you just figure out a way way to get there.

That's what it is. I love it. I think those are three. Three good mantras for everybody listening and to step back and say, really, how grateful am I? Let's. Let's give them.

Well, that's my thing. So the first thing to do when you wake up in the morning, if somebody's looking for a specific habit to get them on the right path, just try to say thank you. When you wake up in the morning, just thank you. First thing, wake up in the morning, say thank you. And not to anyone or to anything, but just the act of saying thank you puts you in a spirit of gratefulness. And the next Question you ask yourself, because most people listening to this are human. You don't have many lawyers listening, do you? But if you're human, if you're human and you're listening and you say thank you, you're going to ask yourself, thankful for what? What am I saying thank you to? And then you find yourself looking for reasons to be grateful, and it just. It just changes your whole day.

I love it. I love it. And so then let's delve into the courage end of things. Tell me about what does courage mean to you? Is courage in fact an attitude? And how do you teach or reach courage?

Yeah, well, step one, as in everything is you need to want it. And so you ask yourself that question. Zig Ziglar said it best, is what I'm doing now getting me closer to or further from my goals. And so that question that you ask all day is what I'm doing now exhibiting courageousness or something other than courageousness. And I always think that anything other than courageousness is an obstacle. It's a brick wall in between you and wherever you're trying to go. Being courageous to get the know. Being courageous to ask a question. Being courageous to. To walk in unannounced. Being courageous to love. Being. Being courageous to hurt. Being courageous to risk. I love it. And I just find that's where. That's where. That's where life is. You know, I give speeches, I give presentations and people and, you know, in front of people, keynote speeches. And it's a big risk for. For the people hiring me because I tell them, I'll tell you what the outcome is. People are going to leave this audience, they're going to feel better about themselves, they're going to be better employees, and they're going to love you for hiring me. But how we get there, I have no idea. I have no idea what I'm going to say. That's your risk.

And so obviously you customize stuff, but I'm sure you probably have some pattern, but you really go in more of an impromptu type of thing.

Dan, when you're speaking, I'm the ad lib speaker, baby. I have a million stories. I'm terribly dyslexic, so I remember things in stories. And so, like if you, you know, if you said, you know, cobweb, I'm going to come up with a story about cobwebs.

Right, right. I got you now.

I'm challenging myself now.

Let me ask you this. Tell me, what is your definition of attitude?

Well, it's. I actually unplanned for, I have the perfect definitions for. It's control. And it's the only time you're in control. Everything else happens to you. Your attitude comes from you. And it's a magic pill. It's a magic bullet because you can control people with your attitude. I'm from New Jersey. I live in Atlanta now, but I'm from New Jersey and New Jersey. People are just mean in New Jersey. I mean, not because they want to be mean. It's just they have to be. I went home for my, like, 30 year high school reunion. I saw a guy, Robert Buxbaum. I saw Robert Buxbaum. I haven't seen him in 30 years. Here's Robert Buxbaum. He goes, hey, Deej, come over here. You know who was asking about you? I said, who? He said, no one. People are just mean, you know, in New Jersey. But I used to play this game there. I used to play that. If I'm walking down the street and I see somebody, I smile at them and say, like, you. You smiled back. You smiled back. Not because you wanted to, but it's the law. I forced you to smile. So when I did that, I win. I get a point. I never lost in New Jersey. I came here to Atlanta. First day I'm here, I'm walking down the street, somebody's walking to me. They say, hi, how you doing? I lost the first time.

Why, because they beat you to it?

Yeah, they beat me to it. And so I said, I gotta move here. That's what happened. But, yeah, you can. With your attitude, you are in control. And with that control, you can affect the lives of others. And quite frankly, that's your charge in life.

I love it. Now, talk to me. Who was your first attitude coach?

Oh, my dad, of course.

Right on. Talk to us. What was his name and what did he teach you?

Oh, Monsieur Henri Jourdan, la fille de. Yeah. Anyway, so Daniel Jourda, la fille de Henri de Paris. My father's from Paris. All right, so a quick. Just like Jason. So I. Okay, I'll tell this story if you want to go there. All right. So my dad lived in war torn France, in Nazi occupied France. We're Jewish. And so he had a rough. When he was 13, lost his dad in. In the Holocaust, you know, in Auschwitz. I don't get into it. But he. Anyway, this is where he's coming from. So he came to America. And my dad never had a bad day. I mean, not one bad day. And one day I was. I was. All right, you're gonna get it. One day I was in my bedroom and I was upset about something at school, something that happened, and I was probably 13, 14 at the time, something like that, and blowing something out of proportion. And he said, what's wrong? And I said, I'm having a bad day. And I went to tell him. And so he had never done this before. He never told me stories about anything before. He goes, bad day, huh? Let me ask you this. Have you ever just walked out on the street one day and you had your friends come up to you and they said, oh, they. They got him. They got your dad. And. And you go and you find out that he was taken right off the street. I mean, out of nowhere, just taken right off the street and put into a. A camp. And from that camp, they were going to put him on a train and take them to a concentration camp. So you go to the camp hoping that you're going to see him, but you never saw him again for the rest of your life. But you did see a guard, and the guard was wearing the family ring that he never took off his finger.

Yes.

He said, tell me, tell me about your day. You having a bad day, right? You know, put everything in perspective. He said, Danny. With his little French, Jewish accent, he said, danny, in this country, on your worst day, they don't throw babies in the air and catch them on pitchforks. So I'm like, I'm just like a, you know, melting. I'm just like a mess. Totally put things in perspective. And every day it's so easy to fall into the trap of the world around you. But every day you just have to cleanse. I go through a cleansing thing in my mind. I almost imagine putting an oxygen helmet on a deep sea diver would use. And I turn on the oxygen, and in here is the only fresh air, and out there is all the poison. And I breathe in the fresh air and puts everything back in perspective. And I learned that from my dad, too.

I love it. Well, your dad's legacy lives through the Get Attitude podcast. Certainly, we talk about the unprecedented times and all that. And again, yeah, the worst day in America is hardly, hardly compared to what your father went through. So I think that's a. It's a great story. It's an important story to tell, and it's an important story for our gappers to hear. So when they wake up, their perspective changes. And when you wake up and you open your LinkedIn, Dan's LinkedIn post, you, like, rocket, like it's 6:30 in the morning, it's early. Or is it the same time every morning that you do your sales energizer? Tip of the day.

Yeah, I realize in terms of sales, I'm a fan of consistency. I think consistency outweighs skill all day long. And so I'm, I'm a pretty obsessive compulsive person. And so I'm consistently doing. I mean, it's why, you know, people think that I'm a drinker or I do drugs. I've never tried drugs. Not because, you know, I'm a goody two shoes. It's just that, you know, I know I'd love it. I mean I'd be the biggest, it would be crazy. But I can't do it. So yes, I wake up early and I like to be productive all day. So I'll wake up at 3:30, four in the morning. I get up, I'm in the office at 5:15, 5:30, 8. And from 5:15, 5:30th, I do my stuff until about 8 and then 8 o' clock people start coming in and then we can start the day. But by the time people are just getting going, I'm in my full stride. And you know, one of the things about sales and life and keeping a good attitude is always one of the harmful things that can happen with one's attitude is when you're always catching up. You know, you're always running just a little bit late, you're always just fighting to do it and you're never doing your best and it eats at you on the inside. And there are some easy wins that you can to help yourself, you know, be take advantage of everybody else messing up. And one of the easiest wins is to wake up early. Man, I just wake up early.

Well, that would indicate that you go to bed early too.

For those of you, nine o', clock.

Right.

But I don't just fall asleep, I collapse. You know, I give a hundred percent and I collapsed. I'm exhausted. You know, I love it. Fall asleep in about, you know, two seconds.

Dan, what do you think? You talk to a lot of people and you're in front of a lot of people. What, what's the biggest attitude mistake number one of people or the public in general, which maybe you've hit on. But number two, because I believe everybody's in sales, I don't care, I don't care who you are, what you, your profession is. You're always selling. What's the biggest mistake people are making in sales today or in their attitude today?

Yeah, people kind of Exaggerate what they could do long term and minimize what they can do today. Like, they don't. I'd never be able to do all that stuff today. But you know, if I stay on this path, I'll get it in a long time. They think, you know, they set their goals all messed up. I think people need to set daily goals and activities to change your mindset into thinking instead of all the different things you have to do. I take into there's two categories of things. There's money making activities and non money making activities. And I'm talking directly to salespeople right now because money's an important thing. Cause like, everything is an activity. Sleeping is an activity. It's just not a money making activity. Unless you could do something like Amazon live. But so with that in mind, and by taking your calendar and really like studying it, you could see where, where you're being busy, where you're doing busy work and where you need to improve. But the number one thing a salesperson needs to do to improve their attitude is get rid of that white space. I mean, put something in there. You could put thinking time in there or what have you. But you got a but. You want to find the devil. You know, you want to find the devil. You just, you have a couple of days with no appointments. I mean, you start questioning all your life's decisions. You know, you start beating yourself up. You start thinking thoughts about yourself that you would never impart upon somebody else. That's where evil exists. In the white spaces. Control. Control that calendar.

The great title for a book. The Devil's in the White Space. Hello. Check that dot com. We'll see. I love that Dan. That's so, so powerful and so, so good. Tell me about the greatest sale you ever made.

Came to Atlanta to visit a friend. Takes me to a party, meets some girl, blond hair, southern accent, you know, bakes pies. I'm thinking, this place is great. You know, I went back home, moved here two weeks later, asked the girl to go out with me. She says no. What? I'm like, I moved here and she's like, well, I have a boyfriend. What are you gonna do? And so I'm like, I don't know what I'm gonna do. So I said, well, let me see what I can do. So I found, like, I had an event to go to. So the next week I called her up again. She says, no. And I said, I said, all right, well, I'll talk to you next week. And it was. I kept calling 26 times. On the 27th week, six months, she finally agreed to go out with me. I had really great tickets to a Met game at Fulton County. Well, brave game, I guess. Whatever, right? And so we went out and had a great time. I got a ball from Doc Gooden. I still have the ball.

Oh, my God.

Right there. I got a ball from Doc. He was on. And it was kind of funny. I ran up and called my dad, tell him about it, but. And then that girl. And so, you know, 25 years later, we're still married with two great kids, and it worked out well. And I asked her. I asked her early on, I said, why did you finally agree to go out with me? And, you know, we were married and all this stuff. And she said, well, I figured if you were willing to work this hard to get me, you'd be willing to work equally as hard to keep me.

I love it. That is cool.

That was my. But by the way, she hasn't baked a pie since, I'll tell you that. But. But she. Yeah, that was by far. By far my best sell. And I have to earn that sale every day.

I like it. That's called repeat and referral business on a daily basis, people, every day.

My dad gave me some advice on that, too. He said, danny, in this country, when you get married, if you expect 50, 50, you get divorced, right? He says, Danny, you give 90% and hope you get 10% back, right? And to his credit, he said the same thing to her. And so, you know, it seemed to work out. But that's how sales is, and that's how businesses. If that's what I want to do, I give 90. If you give me $10, I'm giving you $90 back value. That's how. That's how good I believe my product is. And if a salesperson believes that their product is that good, if you have the cure for cancer. Dude, I got the cure for cancer. I'm not interested. Are you out your mind? I got the cure for cancer. You know, if you believe that about your product, that it's that valuable, you're not taking money from them. You're giving them that mindset. That attitude shift changes the whole equation. Because as our friend says, people hate to be sold, but they love to buy.

The great Jeffrey Gittamer. So tell me this. I want to know the worst business decision you ever made or the worst sale that you ever lost.

Well, every entrepreneur has a story like this. So this isn't something special, but I've lost a million dollars twice. And so you're constantly. My problem with. My wife always says, why do we always have to start from zero?

Right, right.

But. So I make those decisions. But those are business entrepreneurs, investment things, whatever. But the biggest sale that I lost, and it's totally, totally my fault. And by the way, that's how I handle mistakes. Totally my fault. Let's move on. I don't waste any time on the why. You know, people talk about, don't worry about your what. Worry about your what. I couldn't care less about the why.

Me neither.

Why is done. I worry about what.

Yeah.

If people would know what they want. If you ask people, what do you want? Half of them don't know. 90% of people don't know.

Right.

If you don't know what it is, you'll never get there. So just worry about the what. We'll figure out the why later. I know your why. You want to help people. You want to be, you know, statute. I know the why.

Go ahead. Go ahead.

The sale. Yeah. I'm like Mr. Tangent, but I'll always come back. It was. It was a. It was a subsidiary of AT&T. And I had a staffing company at that time, and I had been working on them for two years. And the lady loved me, and. But she's like, we got a contract. I can't do it. We got it. And she's. We were a smaller company. They were with a bigger company. She goes, I might be able to work it in, but, you know, we're coming up for a new contract. And I said. And so finally, out of the blue, she calls me up, she goes, now's the time. Give me a proposal with an email. She sent that to me. And so I sent it to my. My assistant, Ginger. I said, ginger put together a proposal, and, hey, we're finally got a shot at this. Let's make it look good, blah, blah, blah. This is a big account. I don't know if, you know, let's see if we can make it happen. And so she sent me the proposal back. I read through. It was very good. And then I forwarded the email with all those remaining emails on it with my correspondence with Ginger. And the lady got it. And she's like, no, yeah, I blew it because I forwarded it instead of just making a new email. Laziness, right?

Yeah. Lack of attention to detail. Hey, great sales tip. Be careful when you forward. There's no.

That was. That was a. That was a $250,000 a year account.

So let's talk about, you know, love adversities. Number seven on the attitude boosters, right? You mentioned that you lost a million dollars twice. We have gappers. We have people who have lost jobs, who've lost family due to Covid, who have lost their money, that have lost period. Talk to me about your attitude, your perspective on loss, how you came back from it. What was the formula? Because look, you lose a million bucks, you gotta restructure, rethink and create some strategies. What do you tell our people who are dealing with loss right now? And how did you come back from it?

Well, you're always still coming back. But first thing is take care of what you still have. And so when we going through those trying times, step one was maintain a marriage. And so I was, listen, I got to take care of this home thing. I mean, if you in America, another one of my dad's things. Danny, this country, America, you can make a thousand business mistakes. He says, america will always give you a second chance. He goes, you make one or two bad personal mistakes and you pay for them for the rest of your life.

Man, is that good.

Marry the right woman. And so remember what you have. You got to take care of the family. So we. That's step one. Step one is come home. Total honesty. Chach. That's what I call my wife. Chach. I did it again.

Oh, shit.

I mean, that's a tough. It's a tough thing. What are you talking about? We're on the hook for that piece of property there. It's $400,000.

Oh, it was a real estate deal.

Well, it was. I lent money 2008, you know.

The greatest time in America.

I co. Signed for somebody and then he ran off. Okay, so you know that. You know the story. But, but okay, so that was take care of now. I'm now on my level playing field. All I ever hope to do is to start from zero. See, in this day and age, you could whistle right past zero. I mean, you could just fall a million dollars below zero. I don't care. Just get me to zero. And now I can put my feet somewhere I can go. My mindset is always, is that if you're not growing, you're shrinking. It's Tony Robbins. If you're not growing, you're shrinking. If you're not climbing, you're sliding. There's no in between. It's like you're never all set. The day you say to yourself, I just want to get, you're automatically putting a limit on yourself, on where you could go. So that's never the goal. The goal is to continually, to continually excel and grow in the spirit of abundance and all that and productivity. And so when you're, when, if that's the mindset, you're never really stopped. You're never really stuck. You're not against the wall with that mindset. You're always in motion. And those, I'll just call them vibrations without sounding too metaphysical, but the energy, you know, called the sales energizer, the energy that you put out just with a simple idea has to go somewhere. And once those, when those hopes and dreams and, you know, vibrations and put you on a different plane, eventually it all comes back, but it's, it's always motion. So you. All right, I'll give you this. So this is what happens when you provide enough value. I mean, real value, the type of value like doing daily videos for people, inspiring people and motivating people, which has to be done daily because it's like brushing your teeth. The effects of it don't last. You got to keep on doing. But when you provide enough value, you create a void in the universe as a hole in the universe. And because the universe always has to be even Steven, it fills in. So it just happens. So if I give you value, Glenn. Bill, I have no expectation, I mean, zero expectation that I'm going to get anything back from you. I have as much expectation that you're going to repay me as I will see Godzilla walking down the street. It will not happen, but I have full expectation 100% that the universe will pay me back.

Sure.

In multitudes. And so it's, it's all about motion. When you're, when you're stuck or when you're feeling that, that sense you could, I don't know, I'm talking about my dad so much that you got me started. But here was, see, he only had a sixth grade education, so he didn't, he didn't give me much advice. But the stuff that he gave me, I always remembered. But one of them was this. Danny, in this country you could work or you could worry. Can do both. So motion, motion, motion.

I love it. Well, you know, it sounds to me like even though you lost a million dollars twice, possibly my guess would be we've all lost our parents. The loss of your father, probably the biggest loss, right, ever in your life. How did you get through, through that? There's people that are listening to us now who've had just as influential relationships, right. With their parents or grandparents. Remember that time. Can you take yourself back to that time. And how did you get through it? Or what was your thought or attitude when that all occurred?

Sure. Well, my dad and I really did. I guess everybody has a special relationship.

And he was crazy.

Don't get me wrong. I mean, my mom and dad got divorced, and probably for good reason. By the way, in this book, I have a whole section in the back, sales of Papa Isms.

Oh, I love it. That's good. So that is sales Proverbs, wisdom from the ages. Make sure you guys get it. I'm sure you can get it on Amazon. Wow, there's a whole bunch of them.

Yeah. Well, I mean, this is a. What would. What are you gonna do about it? That was another one. I'm just reading this. But anyway, so my. My first business was a deli. DJs Country Deli.

Yes.

And I took my college money that my parents had saved, but I was mad because they got divorced. And so I said, screw you guys. I took the money and I bought a butcher shop and I turned it into a deli and did well. I had it for seven years, and finally I sold it. And I was 25 years old, and I sold it for $170,000. More money than I ever seen.

Crazy.

And I took all that money and I put it in an investment account. And my proudest moment is that money. I didn't take any of it. That money paid for my father's retirement for the rest of his life.

Oh, my gosh.

Yeah, that was my thing. So my dad, and then his last nine years, he lived with us for a while and their nursing home. So with my dad, nothing was left unsaid. So when he finally did pass, it wasn't. I mean, it was. I was actually on stage. I was on stage giving a presentation. There were 300 people there. And my son Matthew, who was maybe 13 then, ran up on stage. Give me the phone. I'm gonna cry. Forget it. Anyway, so that.

That's a big yes.

So. But. But, you know, he said to me towards the end. Can't believe you're doing this to me. He said to me towards the end, because I was. I said, dad, you're giving up. I mean, what's going on here? You know, he's like. He was being depressed or whatever he was, and he was kind of losing his mind. But in one of his kind of lucid moments, he said to me. It was like the most rational thing. He said, danny, I've got a daughter. She's married, has two kids. I got a son. You're married, got two kids. Everyone's healthy. What am I doing here?

Unbelievable. So cool.

And so that was. That was Papa. And so he was crazy dude. Yeah. So how do you overcome it? Hopefully the end. You're living your life to the point that it's the natural occurrence of things and then you move on as a, you know, and honor the person who died by living a good life.

That's cool. And you've certainly done that on our podcast today. It's great. Maybe you're going, what the hell? I ended up just a podcast about my dad. But I can tell you this. Everybody that listens to the Gap has a dad. Everybody. Not everybody that listens to the Gap is a dad. But I think there are. This has definitely been a unique interview. It's been fantastic. You've been dropping bombs. You have been just giving so much of yourself and so much of your heart and your mind that there are lessons to be taken from this podcast today. And I hope that our Gappers have enjoyed the great Dan Jordan. And we are going to be back after this sponsorship message to go into knowledge through the decades with the great sales Energizer Dan Jordan.

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And we are back at the Get Attitude podcast with the one and only Dan Jourdan he is the author of Sales Proverbs, Wisdom of the Ages. Dan is one of the best sales trainers and sales speakers that there are in America. He's on stages everywhere. His website is danjordan.com he has a live show on Amazon called the Pitch Man. And if you need an attitude boost, if you need an energy boost, if you need a sales technique, income boost, if you just need a boost, this is a guy that you want to follow. You can reach him @danjordan or dananjordan.com Dan, welcome back. It's time, bro. We're gonna walk through your life and do knowledge through the decades. You ready to go?

I'm actually mildly nervous. That's good.

I love it. So here's the deal, actually.

I love that. I love that little feeling you get right before when you're sitting in the chair waiting for, you know, to walk up on stage. You know, that little. When you forget everything. Yes, I love that.

It's something I always say. It's as close to playing football as I could ever get to. So here's what we're gonna do. This is fun. This is highly edited, so if you screw it up, we'll just cut it. Don't worry.

They don't call me one Take Jordan for nothing.

I love it. I love it, man. This is my, my brother from another mother. This is my Jewish brother. So good.

All right.

So, Dan, when you think about childbirth, when you think, I don't know if you remember being born, but if you did remember being born, what is the attitude of a newborn baby?

Oh, my gosh, talk about purity. The attitude is totally at one with your physical body. Wake up when you're done sleeping, go to sleep when you're done waking. It's the part eat when you're hungry. Kids, don't overeat. You gotta be grown up to do that stuff. They're perfect. You're perfect at that time. And just to get back that, imagine if you only ate when you were hungry.

Hello. I mean, that's like attitude booster number nine. Eat right and exercise. And when we mean eat right. How many times have people said, and I've done this, I'm not even hungry. And then they put down a pound of macaroni and bacon, Right?

I know. And it's because it's, you know, it's 6 o' clock or it's 7 o' clock or it's whenever you eat. And you know, what if, what if that. See, time is a man made construct. We don't have time for this. I got, I got good stuff. But that was the other part of the podcast.

Go ahead, you can tell me. It's fine.

We're good. Time is a man made construct. It doesn't know. Your body doesn't know. It's Tuesday. You know, your body doesn't know. You have, it's Wednesday. You gotta have, you know, potluck dinner at church. It doesn't know that stuff. The universe doesn't know. So you're, you're making that, you're putting that, you know, those limitations or those barriers or those, those margins in your life. You can create whichever ones you want. It's just like your attitude. You can decide, I'm gonna eat when I'm hungry. And you'll find out that all of a sudden you're not hungry when everybody else is eating.

It's so true. I love that. So, Dan, now what I want you to do is walk back. You're in third or fourth grade in New Jersey, right? Tell me, I'd love to know who your teacher was. Just to give her a shout out. If you remember what was your attitude lesson when you were 10 and what was going on in your life and what did it teach you being 10?

Ms. Morgan. And she was hot. But. Third grade specifically, I remember the horror and the fear because we would read and everybody would read a paragraph. We were learning how to read from a book out loud. And I would like, see all the paragraphs that everybody's reading and try to get mine and practice it ahead of time before it came up to me because I was, I realized I was terribly dyslexic and everything's upside down and spinning and backwards and crazy. And to take it from, you know, from the page to my brain and then out my mouth was a. You know, it's a devastating process. And I had, I thought everybody was like that. I just thought it was, you know, I just thought it was difficult. So I had to, to really work at it. And I. It was third grade in Miss. Did I say Miss Morgan or Miss Phillips? You know what happened? She got married. She two timed me and she got married and changed her name. But yeah, I realized that it was gonna take work to get this out. I also realized, I remember my first joke in class, it was in third grade and was someone that. They went to the. It was some bathroom joke or whatever it was. But I remember I got a laugh from the whole class.

Yeah, baby.

And till this day, I'm 55. I remember how it felt to have that laugh.

Every speaker's dream. The room roar. I want to just rabbit hole this dyslexia thing. First person on our show that's had this and look it, it's prevalent. It's out there. There are parents that are dealing with learning disabled kids. I was, you know, look it, they didn't do anything for me except be up and throw me in a closet and the nuns would hit my hands. They thought that would cure the ADD and learning disabilities, but it didn't. But it did get my attention. Talk to me. Or if you can talk to the parents or the people out there that maybe what you went through, how you fixed it and who helped you through it, and if you ended up having a kid like that, what's the best thing you can do to help a kid with. With dyslexia?

By the way, this is the best podcast I've ever been on. That's a great question. That was just awesome.

Thank you.

And I'll answer it because my son too, it was terribly just like me, even worse than me. And so I could share exactly what I did and how I dealt with Matthew and what an option that really everybody can take. And so I'm in sixth grade in the bed, Matthew at 4:30 in the morning, because that's when his brain worked. And we're doing homework and reading at four in the morning and we're reading the book and, and, and the same word. I mean, it's just say. I go. Can you not see that? He says, yes. And. But he sees the different word.

Sure.

And, and so he was. It was so frustrating and it's heartbreaking when your kid, you could tell he's trying and you know, he's fake yawning and all this stuff to just to stop doing it. And finally he looks at me with resolute in his eyes, stares right at me, looks up and says, daddy says, I'll give you 12 years. I am not going to college. He said this in sixth grade, you know, and I said, good, well, what are you gonna do? Which is like one of my dad's lines again. Okay, that's fine. What are you gonna do about it? Not mean like, hey, what are you gonna do about it? It's just, you know, what are you gonna do? He says, I'm going to start a business. Then remarkably pretty soon after that, we had this terrible storm in the neighborhood. Trees down, carpet out on the streets, all people milling about, one of those fun kind of things. And so we're walking around the neighborhood. Matthew Looks at me, says, daddy sees the carpet. He says, I bet you they pay us 100 bucks to take that to the dump. Next thing I know, the punk is knocking on their door. I get a load of carpet in the back of my truck. He earned $100. I'm like, what? So we're driving to. We're driving to the dump. I watched his brain like smoke coming out of his ears. And he was like, building a business. And he came home and he made flyers. And I follow him like a goofball in the truck. And he's knocking on doors his first day out. He's picking up like, lawnmowers on the side of your house. A couch, an old chair. First day out here in $250.

There you go.

I said, matthew, this is crazy. He looks at me, says, daddy, you just don't understand. I'm like, all right, boy. He's 11. He's 11. I said, all right, boy, you know, enlighten me. He says, daddy, you think these people are giving me their old chairs and couches and lawnmowers because they're, because they want to get rid of their chairs and couches and lawnmowers? And I said, duh. That's what they're doing. He says, no, Daddy. He says, they're giving me these things. 11. They're giving me these things because it makes them feel good to do business with an 11 year old.

That's why they buy. Right?

Bastard. You see, he innately, while he can't tell the difference between and, and the. He at that age and your kids at that age, they know their value.

Yes.

They know their gift to the world. It takes school to beat it out of them, right?

Amen. Ain't that the truth? Right. And so, and so to, you know, bring that I guess question to a close, it sounds like, like, get them busy. Yeah, get them busy. Identify, appreciate, encourage, and trust that the vibrations of the world maybe can tell them and that they can hear those vibrations. This is what I meant to do, not to freaking stand up and read a damn paragraph of a book. Yeah.

Go towards that, which you're naturally good at.

Nice.

And he had a friend who, wonderful little girl, and she wanted to be a lawyer. And she was really trying to convince Matthew, you know, go to college, I'm gonna be a lawyer. And Matthew just looked at her and he said, you know, I want you to go and become a lawyer and become a good one. That way when you come back, I can hire you.

Yeah.

By the way, he did Go to. He got the scholarship here in Georgia. They have a Hope scholarship. He got the scholarship. He did go to college one day. He went for one day and then he went through the administration office and he called me up, it was like, it was the funniest phone call. Called me up, he said, daddy, he had already quit by the way. Daddy, you knew I was going to quit eventually. He goes, why don't we do it now and save the money?

Oh, I love it. Oh, that's so good. How cool is that? Well, let's, let's move on from the 10 year old Dan Jordan. Let's go to age 20. I don't know if that's when you bought your sub, your sub shop or whatever, but where were you at 20? And what was the attitude lesson from 20?

Gosh, you're just hitting the right ages. So I had bought my deli when I was 18 and so when I was 20, 21 through that year, actually 22, about the 22 time I'll stay there because it's a better story. My friends were coming home for college and I'm like, you know, I think I missed something because I didn't go to college and tell me all these stories and did something that I had always wanted to do and I set the store up with a manager and I took off and I went hitchhiken across the country with the idea to find myself. Took no money. The idea was to get jobs all along the way, meet as many people as possible and turned out to be eight months. I was gone for eight months out of the road, doing all I have to do, staying at hospitals, hostels, getting jobs and, and I learned from that experience sales lessons that I still use today. It was a time where I was the most alive. I've had several life changing moments, but I'll tell you about one. I was in Texas. And by the way, Texas is, it's just big. It's big on the map is big. And I was. Some days you just wanted to walk because you just wanted to kind of find yourself. I eventually got picked up by a guy one day in Texas and he stopped the car and he looked at me, he goes, son, the only reason why I'm picking you up is because I saw you on the same road this morning while I was going to work. Like eight hours later I was still on the same road but I was there in Texas and I'm walking and I had a backpack and all that stuff. And I just want. Sometimes you just wanted to think and so I was doing that, and all of a sudden I just, like, hit a virtual wall. I don't know what it was. And it was just like I couldn't move. And I felt like there was a. Like a pin. I haven't thought about this in years. A pin in the top of my head. And it was like pinning me to the ground through my body. And I broke down in tears. I didn't know what was happening. It was just like I was, like, stuck. And then there was a moment. There was a moment of clarity. Everything made sense. It was like I saw it all. And if the world ended, if all the total conveniences, if everyone was gone, the deed was gonna be just fine. I think I saw God that day.

That's cool. So what was the moment of clarity? Can you. I mean, are there words to describe it, or was it just like this feeling or like a blessing or. You know, it was.

It was fresh air. It was lacking of any obstacles. There was no fear. There was no anxiety. There was no insecurity. There was no need to be right, need to be wrong, need to be rich. There was no need. It was just. You're part of the whole thing.

Wow. That guys, that take right there. Make sure we excerpt that one. One is quite possibly one of the best attitude lessons our people could get. So that's great. So now all of a sudden, you're becoming a man and you're 30 years old.

Yes.

Talk to me about where you were at 30. Were you married? Were you having your kids? What was going on at 30? And what was the attitude lesson that you took from 30?

Yeah, well, you heard the story about my wife. I was 30 when I got married.

Okay.

And so that was the year. And I had taken the lesson from my parents and I. So I told my wife, Chach, I said, I. You know, finally she's saying, when we get married, what's going on? And I wasn't gonna marry her because I wasn't gonna get divorced. I thought I said, I am not getting divorced. I went through, I am not getting divorced. And I'm annoying. Like, I know I'm annoying. I mean, it's cute and funny. At the beginning, you got all this stuff going on, but then, you know, after you think it's gonna end, you know, it doesn't end 25 years. Yeah. I mean. And so I wouldn't get married until she hated me.

Right?

Until, you know, you saw me at my worst and you just kind of hated me. And one day that happened, and she's like, you're so annoying, you know, like that. And then I said, now do you still want to get married?

I love it. Oh, that's so good.

Yeah. And so I was, I was. I think by 30, I had come into my own. I knew what I wanted. I wanted, you know, a good woman. I wanted a few kids and I wanted. At that point, I wanted. I wasn't a dad yet, but I sure wanted to be one.

Yeah, well, I can tell how proud you were talking about your son, that you're an awesome dad. Let's go to 40. That's almost when you met Glenn Bill at the Gitamer thing. I think you were maybe mid 40. I was about 10 or 11 years ago. I came. I can't even.

Was it real?

Can you believe that? So what do you remember? Did you. Do you remember you having your 40th birthday party? What was going on in your life and what was the attitude lesson?

Yeah, I don't remember the 40th birthday party. I think, you know, at that point you're in, you're in the game. You know, you got young kids and all that stuff, and so you just fly and flying. Deceiving parents. I remember the big fear was that I would die before my kids would remember me. Like, that was. That was a fear. I wanted to get both kids. I wanted to get both kids to age 7, you know.

Cool.

And so let's say when Sophie was born in 2000, I guess. I guess I was. That would have been about 40. Yeah. So my attitude at that point was somewhat relaxing.

Cool.

I think I had done my job there. I remember. Oh, I do remember this. I remember jotchin. My wife and I would. You know, many people have date nights, and so we would have date nights to do. My in laws lived very close by. And so funny story about my in laws, they both, they got divorced when my wife was two and they both had separate marriages and then their spouses died. They got. They've been together now they've got back together. Isn't that crazy? But I remember telling my wife, I said, if I were to die today, I would have had twice the life that I had expected.

Yeah, that's awesome.

So I started my journey of gratefulness. I think about that.

Yeah, that's good. That's good at 40. I love it. So now 50, you're double next. Nichols, you remember five years ago, you started this fifth decade where I am too. And tell me if you, you know, when you look back five years ago, where were you five years ago? Where you hoped you were. What was your attitude? What was your thought process when you hit that big five zero number? That attitude?

Yeah, I think five, 50. I was just coming off the second big loss.

Oh, shit.

I was just coming off that thing. But I remember the excitement. I've always wanted to be 50, right? I kind of loved that age. I love to be able to say, I'm 50. I like 55 now, too. It's a cool age. But I was like the 50 number. It got to a point where more people were calling me sir. I kind of like that I have gray hair now, but I started getting a little then. And, you know, the good thing about getting some gray hair is that you can tell women that they're pretty without them thinking you're hitting them.

Amen, brother. Right.

You know, because you like to do that. You like to make people feel good. But I think when I remember when I was a stockbroker, early on, we would always be looking for clients that were between 50 and 55. Kids were about to move on to college. Their life changing was happening, probably earning more money than they've ever earned before. And so I remember thinking, I'm in a good swing right now. And really, that kind of feeling hasn't left.

Right. The old sweet spot. I love it. Well, this has been one of the more entertaining knowledge through the decades. Dan, that was awesome. We really appreciate you being here, giving your heart, giving your mind, taking us from the purity of a baby, maybe taking us to 10, where you wanted to work, to 20, where you felt alive and found yourself, to 30 when you gained clarity, to 40, when you began to relax and began to start your path towards gratitude in 50, where you hit your sweet spot. And maybe it's all coming together for you. And I hope that our gappers enjoyed. Dan, I think he gave us a lot of lessons. His father gave us a lot of lessons. This is a fantastic podcast to share with people you love, because I think there's a lot of love that was communicated in this podcast. Dan, you knocked it out of the park, my brother. Tell me.

Only for you. I bring my best for you.

You are the man. So here's what I'd love you to do, is talk directly to our audience. Talk to that person that's had a financial reversal, a personal reversal, an employment reversal, a sales reversal. What's the message from the Deej that they can take as we close our podcast?

Yeah, that's great. Well, listen, every day really is another chance. I love the business of sales and the reason is it's one of the few things where you could start with nothing and make something. You find somebody who needs something and you find someone who has something, and you put them together and you've created something. And for those of you who think you're not a salesperson, you're probably married. And I want you to think about that. It's not a small thing. You convinced another person or you attracted another person to actually say to themselves, not only am I going to spend the rest of my life with you, but I'm going to forsake everybody else on the planet. And there's like seven and a half billion people and they decided you're the one. You figured out the way what to do to attract, to continually offer value and continually be the one for them to stay with. Baby, everybody's in sales.

Amen.

Everybody's in sales.

Amen. And make sure, guys, that you deliver the love and be about the love. And his three words, which I thought were great. Be gracious, have gratitude, have courage, and most of all, let's be kind to each other. Dan, Jordan, thank you for being so kind to our gappers today. It was great to be with you and God bless. Thank you. This is Glenn. This is Glenn Bill from the University of Attitude and the Get Attitude podcast saying that I will see you later. And stay positive, my friends. This podcast is a part of the C Suite Radio Network. For more top business podcasts, visit c-sweetradio.com.