Ep14 - Tom Hopkins

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This is Glenn Bill with the Get Attitude Podcast and man oh man, do we have a guest coming up for you on our latest gap. And it is the one and only the legend, Tom Hopkins, the global sensation, the number one global how to sales trainer. Tom, tell us what we are going to learn.

You are going to learn people skills and disciplines that have been applied by some of the highest income earning people in the world. And I literally mean the world. So I so hope you'll take advantage of what we have to share.

What is the roadmap to defeat self sabotage, negative thinking and learned helplessness in these unprecedented times? You must get connected, Get Growing, Get Certain and Get Attitude. The Get Attitude Podcast. If you're looking for a boost, if you're looking to find answers on how you can bridge the gap from who you are to who you want to become, and if you're looking to bridge the gap to find the answers from where you are to where you want to go, we have one of the most esteemed public speakers and sales trainers in the world. We are with a true legend. We are with the host, Glenn, Bill's very first mentor. I was 18 years old driving around trying to figure out how to sell real estate and I got ahold of these tapes called the Official Guide to Success. And before I could become a real estate killer, which I was because of this man's training, he taught me how to become a success in my mind and in my heart. First, I'm going to read you a little intro. Our guest today has earned the reputation of being America's and the world's really number one how to sales trainer. Over 5 million salespeople, entrepreneurs and sales managers on five continents have benefited from his live training event. He has perfected his selling skills during his eight year real estate career in which he received numerous awards. He was in his last year selling real Estate, closed 365 homes, one home every day, something that was unheard of at the time and rarely has been matched. Since that time. He has developed and customized proven and effective selling techniques and skills for over 350 companies. And I'm talking big companies. He has authored over 20 books on subjects of selling success, including my favorite and something you need to get out and buy right now because it's still relevant. The official guide to success, which is all about how we think, which is your attitude, and it also talks about how you act when you are in success mode. Over 2.9 million copies of those books have been read by sales pros and entrepreneurs all over the world. He is also the 20142013 recipient of the lifetime achievement award from the national academy of best selling Authors. And he has been acclaimed as the number one sales guru two years in a row by global gurus. He has dedicated his life to helping sales and marketing professionals improve their communication skills and increase their sales and sales revenue. So it is with such enthusiasm and such honor that we introduce my mentor, my personal mentor from day one. Finally, on the get Attitude podcast, though legendary, the great Mr. Tommy Hopkins.

Hey, Hey. I know you go back a long way when you say Tommy.

I know. I hope I. I hope that doesn't offend you, but, you know, that's. That's. That's who you. That's who you were, right? You were Tommy Hopkins back in the day. Tom, it's so great. Yeah. Isn't it wonderful? I mean, we've had such a relationship. I have personally attended over 30 Tom Hopkins training seminars. And Tom, as you listen to my source of sales program that I do, you're going to go, hey, hold on. That's Tom. So I always want to make sure we give Tom credit for me plagiarizing and copying. I don't think I did it too much, but such beautiful, beautiful stuff. Tom. I mean, gosh, I don't know where to start, but, man, did you have. Well, I mean, you had a little bit of a rough start, and so I think as great of all that stuff that we've heard. Let's go back to when you were a poor, broke salesperson, and what was in your mind when it clicked? What was number one? What I really want to know is what does attitude mean to you? And when did your attitude change to become the person you've become?

Well, first of all, let me say this, that throughout the time I share with you, there'll be a lot of examples of this thing called gap, because that really will be a major part of how I've been fortunate in my life, is to find ideas and people to bridge the gaps that we all go through in our life. So this would be wonderful. I'm excited about it. So you just fire away. And I'LL be ready with the answers.

All right, let's start right here. What does attitude mean to you and what is your definition of attitude?

Well, first of all, I think I have to go back a little bit. I really believe that, you know, I have four words that I felt have always been critical. And if I could show a graph, I would say that your whole life is built on basically four words you develop in your life. Number one is attitude. And I believe your altitude of flight and success will literally be determined on a day to day basis on your thinking process as to your attitude. And the second word is enthusiasm. I really believe that you have to be excited with what you do in your life. The people I have found, Glenn, that have become the most successful are always excited. They are pumped on life. They're pumped on the fact they woke up another day. They have this radiant attitude of, hey, I'm going to have a blast today, helping people, serving people. And then, of course, the third word is discipline. And I feel the people that achieve most, besides attitude and enthusiasm, develop what I call life's disciplines, which are certain things we'll talk about in our time today. And then, of course, the last word of the four is goals, to where a person has fundamentally learned the art of short term and long term goal setting. And so those four words, attitude, enthusiasm, discipline and goals, have always been foundational in my life. And I'll go through some of this as I talk about later on the different decades and what happened that I think caused my personality, my temperament, my achievements to happen. And so there was a lot to it. But I really feel we all have, I think, defining moments in our life where a sentence, a phrase, a person can have a tremendous effect to determine where your attitude is. And this happened to me when I was very young. I wasn't a good student in school. I didn't have much more than a C B average ever. And my mom and dad, of course, my dad especially was the old school guy who said, tom, you'll never be anything if you don't go to college and get a degree. Well, of course I said, fine. And I went to College. And after three months, 90 days, I realized the academic setting was not for me. And I quit college and came home, Glenn. And I was there in the living room when my dad came home and he said, what are you doing home? I said, dad, I made a decision today and I quit college. And my dad was a strong man, Glenn. And I never really seen him cry, but I saw tears kind of fill his eyes. And he said, and I was Tommy back then. Believe it, yes. He said, tommy, because you're my son, I'll always love you. Even though based on your decision today to quit college, I can assure you, and I know you will probably never amount to anything. And that was the first time I think anybody ever smacked me emotionally with I wasn't going to become a success because I didn't go to college. And I was so darned down. I went in my bedroom, sitting there depressed. And that night, my uncle Don Hanson, he was coming to dinner, and I'm sitting there depressed on my bed, and Uncle Don walks in and he goes, tommy, tell me this isn't so, that you quit college. And I said, uncle Don, it's not for me. I barely got out of high school, let alone am I going to get out of college. I quit. And he said, well, what are you going to do for your living? What are you going to do? You know? I said, geez, I don't know. And he said, well, you know, I'm the general manager of Bethlehem Steel in Los Angeles, one of the largest steel companies. And he says, we've been given the job to build Dodger Stadium in Chavez Ravine, and we need iron workers. And if you want, I'll give you a chance to come out on the job and carry steel. And Glenn, I don't know how many folks joining us know what an iron worker is, but most of them have seen a swimming pool put in, where they put in a bar like this all along the bottom, because concrete has no tensile strength without reinforcing rebar. So in a swimming pool, you'll see a bar like this, which is about a number four. They're every six inches on center. And then they pour the concrete. Well, on a Dodger stadium, the main bar was a number 11 bar, which was inch and 38 in diameter, versus this.

Yeah, that's a big bar.

Yeah, they were 60ft in length. They weigh 200 pounds. And the only way you got them from the truck to the deck was men, like animals carried them. And I, because I was just a young kid, just turning 8, 18, 19 in that area, they knew I was the nephew, the general manager. And so they really worked me hard. I always tell my audiences at a seminar I carried steel like an animal for a year. And you can see I'm 5 foot 7 while I was 6 foot 2 when I started carrying steel. Not true. But anyway, I carried steel for a year, and my dad came over to my little apartment. I'd moved out In North Hollywood, California. And he came to my apartment and I hadn't talked to him for months. And he said, tommy, I came to see you because uncle Don has let me know that you were probably one of the hardest workers on the whole bridge deck carrying steel. And he said, I'm really happy and proud of you. Which I never heard him say. And he says, well, what are you going to do? How long are you going to carry steel? And I said, dad, I don't know. I mean, I'm making pretty good money for a kid, but I don't know. He says, well, you know, Tom, you got a nice way with people. You're communicating. People like you, they trust you. Why don't you go to real estate school and get a license?

How smart was.

You have to pass an exam to get a real estate license? I couldn't do that. I could never pass. And he chided me, he said, give it a try. And my uncle said, why don't you enroll? Well, sure enough, I went to the real estate school in California. And sure enough, I failed the real estate exam three times. Now I'm thinking I'll probably always be a construction worker. Luckily I went back and the fourth time, through just a lot of memorization, I passed the darn exam and got a real estate license. But then again, this is how fate is, you know, here I'm a teenager, which was very unheard of in real estate back then. It was, and I don't mean to offend women, but it was a middle aged man's business in the real estate residential field, which is not true today. Women pretty much dominate the residential real estate field in this country. But the challenge I had was, number one, I didn't have a car. And you need a car to sell real estate. I only had a motorcycle. Number two, I looked young. At 18, I looked very young. And I'd walk into brokers after working in a steel field all day covered with dirt. And I'd walk in and say, you know, I got a real estate license, Would you give me a chance and hire me? And they'd laugh and say, where's your car? I'd say, well, I don't have a car, but I got to get into real estate. And finally one broker said, I'll give you a chance.

What was his name?

Hang my license.

What was it? What was his name, the broker?

Oh, gosh. Oh gosh. Ben Brooks, I think was his name. It was, you know, 50 years ago.

Yes. Do you remember what?

That's crazy. It was coldwell Banker was the company. And anyway, I. I'll never forget. Oh, also back then, Glenn, most people don't know this, but there was a kind of a dress code in real estate. You know, today it's very casual. Like I'm here at home and casual. And probably if I went out to show homes, I'd be casual because that's the way the industry is today. Back then, though, you were really supposed to wear a suit and tie. Yeah, which, that was my next problem. The manager that hired me says, well, show up here Monday for our meeting at 8 and we'll give you a chance. And of course, you know, bring your suit and tie. And that was my next problem because I didn't own a suit. And the only outfit I had was this band uniform because I played in the band and I had this kind of a purplish band uniform that I wore with velvet collars. And so I drove my motorcycle to my Monday morning meeting and the manager had maybe 15 salespeople sitting in front of him. And I walked in the back door and he stopped the meeting and saw me in this band uniform and heard my motorcycle, of course, driving. And he goes, everybody, I want you to know our newest agent. This kid's in his teens, doesn't have a car and look at that outfit. But we're going to give him a chance. And so he let me come to work and I didn't do well. I was so young. I was a baby. And I think in my first six months I earned an average, I think $42 a month with the one little sale. And my money's almost gone from construction. I'm scared to death because I got. I don't want to go back to steel. And I went to, I spent the last, God, last hundred bucks or so what I had in the bank and I went to a seminar that was up the street from our office. And the guy was so good, I can't even remember his name. But he said, you must find a mentor to emulate and to copy. And he said, I'll give you the best idea I can today. Go back to your company, find out who the highest income earning salesperson is, then go ask, beg, do anything to see if they'll let you follow them around, listen to what they say, how they handle a telephone. And so I was so desperate, I went back to the company and sure enough, the highest income person was a woman named Rose Lane. And Rose was their top producer. Well, here as a teenager, I call her, you know, Mrs. Lane. I'm Tom Hopkins. I just joined the company, and I was taught at this seminar to find the best producer in the company, beg them to let me watch and listen to them. And she was so great, Glenn. She said, listen, young man. And she met me and she liked me, and she said, sure. So I'd go on listing appointments with her and just sit and listen. And she would show Holmes and introduce me as the new trainee, and I'd watch her. And I just started listening to how she came across, how she showed a home, how she handled objections. And I literally, Glenn, started copying and writing her words. And we didn't have recording devices really yet back then. I had no money to get one anyway, if they had them. But I literally copied Rose Lane. And sure enough, all of a sudden, I started making transactions. And all of a sudden I thought, you know what? I can do this. And sure enough, I worked hard. I took three Christmas days off in my first three years in real estate. I was always the first one in and usually the last one to go home. But I was so desperate to prove my father wrong, I was going to become something. And sure enough, after another year or two, I was just the top person in this Coldwell Banker company, which had. In that area, there was 3, 400 salespeople. So all of a sudden I started tasting and I started getting this attitude of, you know what? I'm going to do this. And of course, I started not only investing in ideas on selling, I went to see some of the great trainers, J. Douglas Edwards, who was the guru of closing the sale, and people like Art L. Letter, who back then was in the seminar business, and Dr. Norman Vincent Peale and his wife Ruth. Well, I just started going to all these people and became like a sponge. And I just literally started filling my mind with their concepts, their ideas, their philosophies, and started imitating and creating. And all of a sudden, I. I'll never forget the. In fact, that year you were talking about, it was November 15th, and my manager at the Coldwell Banker office calls me in and he says, tom, are you aware of what you're doing and have done? And I said, well, I'm having a ball and I'm making some money. I finally got that car. I mean, yeah, I'm loving it. He goes, but are you aware that I added it up and averaging. You're averaging one home sale a day, and I don't think anyone's ever done it. And if you can do that between now, November 15 and the end of the year, and we can attest that you close 365 home sales. Your life will never be the same. Rumors will get out, the phone will ring off the hook and you'll have no idea where you're going to go. Well, it wasn't only for that, but I was having such a good time and the interest rates had dropped from 18%, believe it or not, down to six or seven and buyers were coming out of the woodwork and I just worked my tail off. And sure enough, about two days before the end of the year, I turned in my paperwork for my 365th sale. And of course the general manager of our company, he was one of these guys that touted our, he was a recruiting guy who, he let everybody know how well our company was doing and sure enough he put me in the paper. My picture said this kid, I think at that point I was 23. This kid at 23 sold 365 homes. If he can do it, so can you, right? And so they kind of used me as a recruiting tool. And sure enough the Los Angeles are, the real estate commissioner called me and said we're having our national convention in la, we'd love you to come and speak. And of course here I am, a 23 year old kid scared to death, never spoke, didn't even know I could do anything. And sure enough I went to the convention. Now there was 5,500 people attending the convention. I was going to do a one o' clock breakout session for 150. Well, I put my shirt and tie on on my little speaker badge and I'm standing there in the wings and Thomas Peters, who wrote the book the Peter Principle back in the 60s, bestselling book, he was the featured speaker. So 8 o' clock the convention is going to start and I'm standing there in the wings and all of a sudden the president of the association comes over to me and says Tom, he's caught in. Our featured speaker, Thomas Peters is caught in traffic in LA and we got to get started. So do you want to go on? And you can only speak till he shows up, but we gotta get started. So anyway, the president walks out, says ladies and gentlemen, while we're waiting for our featured speaker, we have a young man here who's gonna be speaking later today in one of our breakout sessions. But last year he did something pretty special. He sold 365 homes that year, closing one a day average. And the audience, you can hear him go, because that was unheard of. She had four, five real estate sales, you Were hot.

That was an office.

Yeah. So I walked out on the stage and I told him that there's 10 words that you gotta quit saying in your company. And I got into him. Wouldn't you know it, I had 12 minutes before he showed up. I covered the 10 words, got a thunderous standing ovation, which I was flabbergasted.

Yeah.

But I went back to my real estate office in Simi Valley, which is where it was, and sure enough, my phone started ringing and these brokers would call up, what do you charge to come and teach our people? And of course, I didn't want to do that yet. You know, I figured I got to spend a couple more years investing in real estate, buying properties, which I did, and build my net worth to where I can, really. Then if I want to go and become a seminar speaker or wr a book, I'll have the money to do that. And that's kind of what happened. And so it was. It was. And I'll get into some of that in our decades stuff.

I love it. Well, I love the story from start to finish. So many lessons. So our listeners are called gappers and gappers. I think we all understand if you listen to that story, the amount of despair at different times in Tom's life, the amount of courage to take the opportunity and make something happen. These are the lessons of the legend Tom Hopkins. We are going to take a quick break. We're going to come back with knowledge through the decades with Tom. We're going to walk through his life, and we will be right back. And this is Glenn Bill. We are back at the Get Attitude podcast with the one and only the legend, Mr. Tom Hopkins. The world's number one how to sales trainer. Over 5 million people he has trained on five continents. Just imagine, Tom doesn't do interviews very much anymore, so we're so fortunate to have him. But now we're going to go through his extraordinary life and the lessons that he learned on knowledge through the decades. Tom, I'm sure you don't remember when you were born, but I'd love to know what you feel the attitude lesson is of a newborn baby of birth.

Boy, that's a tough question. And you know what? I don't think in all my years of interviews that I've ever been asked that far back. I think one of the main things I learned was because my dad was a pretty strong disciplinarian, even as a baby, I could see that, you know, everything was in order, lots of order in our family life. And, you know, we pick up so much as very young babies.

Sure.

And I think that. And of course I had a wonderful mother. My mom was a saint and I mean she is in heaven, I know today. But yeah, she was so great. She really helped me a lot with her overall attitude about life and people and communicating and you know, I've always had a little philosophy. Love people and use your financial blessings, don't ever use people. And of course that was my mom. Every one of her friends and all her relatives, they just worshiped her. And I could feel this love. And I think a lot of that came into my life at that point as a young, young baby.

Yeah, that's fantastic. What a great lesson. What was your parents name? I just want to get it on the record.

Kathy and Lester.

Les and Kathy. How about that? Let's go. I'm just curious, did you have a relationship with your grandparents?

Not really, no. Not really. They lived in another part of the town and no, I wouldn't say it was a lot.

Okay, okay.

We'd have holidays but I couldn't hardly remember much of that.

No influence. So let's go to third grade. Do you remember being in California in third or fourth grade? Do you remember a teacher? And do you remember maybe a day or something where you said, you know what, Glenn, when I was 10 years old, this is where I was. This was my attitude lesson. You remember learning anything back at 10 in grade school?

Yeah. I started playing football for Pee Wee football league at 8, 8 years of age.

Oh wow.

And I was smaller than most of the kids. I always have been a short person but because I was smaller, I so wanted to win in playing football. I had to really work hard. I had to I think do more workout, run more just so I could compete. Because there again as an example, my dad would go to the games and I was always trying to prove myself to him. And so I will say this, that probably one of the first things that affected me as a 8 year old getting into football was you're gonna have to work harder than most people because you're not as big or as strong. And so I've always been one of these people. I've always loved my work, whatever it was, selling real estate, even carrying steel. I would a lot of the older guys on the steel deck, they didn't want to carry steel with me. And they used to say I'm not kid is too. Wants to move too fast. Let's you know, because you know, they were their old old thir. And 40 year old old Guys.

Yes.

They didn't want to carry steel with me because I would really say, hey, let's get it done. Let's go.

And we all know that most of our attitudes, most of our inner thoughts, most of our emotional anchors occur at that young age. So certainly that story goes through your life. As we hear it now, we know at 20, you've kind of told us a little bit, I guess, the attitude lesson. At 20, you're carrying steel. I just want to know who taught you at 20. What was the attitude lesson when you were hauling that steel back and forth? What's the one thing that our gappers could take away? What did you learn?

Well, I basically learned that if you got to do a job, do a good job. If you have to do something, do it well.

Love it.

I've been, you know, I know when I went into management and had my real estate office And I managed 18 salespeople, you know, they. A lot of them had said, that guy wants us to work so hard. But he's their first thing. He's there, the last thing. And so, again, I think you have to be an example of your attitude and your lifestyle and so forth, and the way you conduct yourself, the way you handle people, the way you do business and so forth.

I love it. So let's, let's get to that. Let's get to that management phase then. I'm guessing by the time you were 30. We're on 30 now. You probably were the manager. Maybe you were backing off, selling, and maybe this speaking career, this book career was launching. Do you remember being 30, and what's the attitude lesson at 30?

Well, yeah, I would say I realized through the investing of buying properties, which, again, I felt that the real wealth in California wouldn't be selling properties and earning a commission. It would be owning properties as income rentals. And back then, believe it or not, there was about a 10% home repossession rate in Simi Valley, California, meaning one out of every 10 home, the guys are being foreclosed upon with their VA and FHA loans. And I, I would, you know, go out and I see a house looking pretty disrepaired and so forth. And I do some work and talk to the folks, and many of them say, yeah, we're letting the house go. And you'd be amazed. For a few hundred bucks, I could bail some of these houses out. Wow. And, yeah, and I was buying these darn houses, and I, they. They were vacant, so I'm trying to rent them. I drive over to Chatsworth and Woodland Hills, California, where the expensive properties were. And I'd find a hotel where they were renting and I'd go into the rentals and say, look, I've got some homes right over the hill, four miles, Simi Valley, and I'll give you a great rental opportunity to rent a home instead of rent this little apartment apartment and I'm moving them out of apartments into my home.

I'm. I'm sure the owner just loved you, Tom. I'm sure, believe me.

There is a no trespassing sign put up after I would go by.

No solicitations. I love it. Let's go to 40. So now you're 40 and I'm guessing you got some net worth, you've got your real estate. I would love to know what was in your mind. Where Were you at 40? What was happening at 40?

Almost every week I'm on a plane flying somewhere in the actual free enterprise capitalistic world. And I was flying to Canada, to Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, and taking my concepts of closing the sale and so forth to these countries. And back then very few Americans were flying across the world to teach. So it was pretty super for me. And of course, you know, we developed a company in Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, and we had trainers that then I would train so that I would leave and they would carry on the Tom Hopkins training using my book. And back then we didn't have our CDs and all that today as we do today, but I train them and I take them and write out scripts for them and have them memorize what to say so that they could do the job, showing home properly, presenting an offer on a property. And it was super. 40 to 50 was a great 10 year period for me.

That's so good. I interviewed the great Don Hobbs of Hobbs Herder. I mean certainly, you know, Don, and I'm sure Don will probably end up listening to this. Did you guys, you crossed paths? Did he ever publish your stuff or did you guys do business back in the day?

You know, I can't remember if we did, but of course I know of his reputation. But I had a lot. I've been so fortunate to surround myself with such great people. Judy Slack, she's the woman who's kind of worked on putting all this together for us. Yes. But she's been with me 40, over 40 years. Yeah.

Amazing.

And his hand, all these type of things, setting up promotions and so forth. I've been, knock on wood, very blessed to have great people around me.

That's great. How about 50? Do you remember the big 5o? Did you have a party or were you still. Were the 50s kind of the same as the 40s for you?

Yeah, at this point I was still, you know, getting on a plane every week doing seminars and you know, I just love the teaching. That's probably one of the biggest challenges I think I have today in my life is I'm not flying away like I used to. I use the term not retirement, but winding down my time. And now my lovely wife Michelle and I, we are doing much of the travel to visit with people like, like you or so forth. And you know, our folks in Australia or New Zealand, they have us out and we stay there. And so it's, it's, it's really become a wonderful life. And my wonderful wife, she does so much of the work to keep everything going on our lifestyle with our puppies and so forth. But yeah, it's been a blast. And 60. I was still doing the seminars. I think I. 42 years of doing seminars. Wow.

Wow, that goes fast. But I mean, you had such a full life and you've given so much to others. Others. When we talk about the 10 attitude boosters in my book, number five is have a mentor and copy them. You've covered that. Number 10 is be a part of something bigger than you. And look at your training was you, but the touches of 5 million people, certainly what you did was bigger than yourself. And then we hit on attitude booster number one with Tom be nice, which was your mantra from the get go. So, so really, really cool. Talk to me about your 70th birthday. That's, you know, you hit 70. That's kind of a. By the way, retirement, that's a nasty word. So now you have 11 nasty words, right?

Yes, I really well, actuary tables of insurance companies pretty well have proved that if a person does totally retire and doesn't have a lot of activity, that they will probably die much earlier than a person who stays creative active. And so for. And of course, you know, I fell in love with the game of golf and was playing almost every day. I wasn't doing a seminar, but the golf game is kind of deteriorating. Has a lot of things too. When you get in the 70s, it's been a dream life, man, it's so cool.

Let me, let me pay homage. Let's see if we can come up. Let's see the 10 nasty words. I know that we don't say bye, we say. We don't say monthly payment, we say monthly investment. We don't say down payment. We Say initial investment. That's three. Now I'm trying to think what else don't we say contract. We say agreement.

Form a contract. We call it the agreement. Yes. People love agreements. They're afraid of contracts.

And we don't sign. We endorse.

We don't ask them to sign. We ask them to. Okay. Approve or endorse our paperwork. Oh, that's so funny. And you know, that is so cool after all these years. And of course, coming to 30 seminars, you really got it down. That's super.

Yeah, we know.

And we are all in the word business. You of course would let the podcast Communication Words and of course speaking and doing a seminar. It's the words, the phraseology. And you know, it's just been pretty exciting. And one thing I'm learning in our country and most countries, big companies are craving real fundamentally sound how to training.

Yes.

It's almost like they say, hey, we got to bring someone in from another industry or outside who isn't part of our team and can impact them properly. So that has been a big advantage in my life. Life. And you know, of course, as I think the greatest compliment is when a person can honestly say that you've helped me change lives by you changing mine.

Right.

In growth and achievement and excitement.

Yes.

And so, yeah, it's been, you know, if I was to go to the Lord tonight, I would have had a wonderful life, which, knock on this is real wood. Knock on wood. I don't want that.

I'm sure you've been been asked this morbid question. What would you like to have on your headstone? Oh, gosh, your epitaph.

I would say a changer of lives for the betterment of all.

Oh, I love it. I love that we'll make.

And I think that would be. You can come out and put it on, you youngster, you.

I'll get my chisel out. I'll never forget old Matt, Matt de la Cruz, who was a guest on the Guy Gap, set up the arrangement for the very first time I met Tom and what I did, I think I picked you up at the airport and we went to the Adams Mark Hotel and had dinner together and I wrote down 100 questions to ask you. You spent three and a half hours with me before your seminar and you got every one of them answered. And it was so beautiful and so kind of you to do. And I never forget that night. I wish I had that notebook. I still may, but boy, did I learn a lot. But the one thing you said was, glad, Glenn, you Do not want to be a speaker. You literally said that. But I said, no, Tommy, I am going to be a speaker and I'm going to continue your legacy to the people that we've had. Tom, it's a different world than we used to live in. I just want to finish with this. If you were an entrepreneur and ladies and gentlemen, Gappers. Tom's training is timeless. You could go put in anything that he has done. And I'm telling you, it will work. Still to this day, I still have agents that I hire that listen to you. But hey, it's a new world. We get it. I still think your stuff works. Even though it's new, I know it works. What's your message to the entrepreneur of today? And if you were starting all over again, tell me what your attitude, your mindset, what advice can you give those that are listening now? Going to, going. I got the legend, the sales legend. What the hell do I do?

Well, here's a message. And I don't want to be selling, but because of my winding down, Amazon has taken all my products, books, CDs, DVDs. And they are marketing them and they're marketing them at a tremendous discount from what we used to when I was totally active. But anyone who is interested, they could go to Amazon and just look at the Tom Hopkins training products. And I think that, you know, they can get some really great. And my favorite is a CD package called how to Master the Art of Selling, where I really. And that's what I put you through so many times. All the concepts of qualification, closing the sale, handling objections. But I really feel that if they liked our little short, brief time here, that I'd love them to maybe let me become a mentor for them as well. And if I did and they do better, then I'm doing the right thing, as you are as well with a gap. So that's probably for the gabbers. Come slapper with Tom.

So let's close with two things. Number one, I never see failure as failure, but I only see failure as a way to improve my sense of humor. Humor to change my course of direction. What else are there? I think there were three other ones.

Learning experience.

Learning experience, improve my skills. Number four.

And I didn't see a fan of my learning experience. The negative feedback. I need to change course in my direction, which is a positive.

Yes.

And you know what's amazing is those darn attitudes, once those are memorized and internalized, you know, they pop out whenever you have a challenge, which we all will encounter. Times of a challenge. And I will say this to anyone in business today, you've got to be very careful not to take in the negativity that can be out there. I really feel if I were to jump right back into real estate or any business where I was active out in the street of sales, I would just outwork everyone, because I really believe your activity will determine productivity. So stay active. Stay always out there focused on serving. And I've always tried my best, as you know, Glenn, that be a servant to your fellow man with benefits. Not just a sales or sales manager, but a servant. And if you serve and serve well, people will beat a path to your door. Not one, but for their lifetime, which is really when life is fun.

And, Tom, you just dropped bombs. We're going to say this together. I'm going to start it, and maybe you can join in with me. And this is something that I memorized from the time I was 20 years old listening to Tom. And if you don't take anything, you can always go to the last minute of our podcast here. And I call it the Tom Hopkins mantra, and it begins with this. I. I am not judged.

Judged by the number of times I fail, but by the number of times I succeed and the number of times I succeeded, times I can fail and keep trying.

All right, all right. Well, Tommy, we ardently desire what you do. We love you to death. You've just been such a positive influence. I'm so grateful that you come to me and come to the Gap when you get to Indy. You're staying with me. When I come to Arizona, I'll say hi to you. You've just given us some beautiful stories, and God bless you for everything you've done for our planet.

God bless you again, Glenn, and thank you all. Bye. Bye.

Bye. Thank you. This podcast is a part of the C Suite Radio Network. For more top business podcasts, visit c suiteradio.com.