Sculpting Your Life: From Rock & Roll to Personal Discovery Architect with Paul Hoffman

Change is painful and most people won't do it until it's so fucking painful that they gotta change. And so some people will go right to the edge of that and then go, God, I gotta change my life. When. When asked if you just realize that you know what, life's gonna throw you.

Curveballs no matter what.

So sometimes you're gonna whiff, sometimes you better hit them. Life's going to throw you fastballs. Sometimes you're going to whip and sometimes you're going to hit them. But as long as life's thrown you things that you know will be.

Opportunities, because every challenge is an opportunity, opportunities for your growth and transformation, then you might as well seize that moment and go for it.

Hey, I'm Joe Fear and welcome to the Hustle and Flowchart podcast. This is where we talk all about building businesses so they give you the freedom and fuel for your life. I'm not here to help you build a billion dollar business, but I am here to help you create a business with systems that work for you so you can make more money than you need just by working part time. You know, I was a chronic Hustle mode kind of guy and I want to share my experiences and mentors I've met along the way to help you reframe things to be the most effective as an entrepreneur. I wish I had this guidance and insight when I was younger, so that's what I'm doing here for you. Please share and enjoy.

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Joe, it's my honor to be on the show with you, bro. You know, you, you, you're just an incredible human being and anybody that listens to this podcast and, and knows Joe Fear. Joe Fear is a stand up human being and I'm honored to know you, brother.

Hey, it goes both ways tremendously. I was just raving about the, the beautiful music tracks you shared with me and I mean, we'll get into music because you got a long history of music, but the fact that you're cranking these puppies out still and you're, you're doing it in such a fabulous, creative, collaborative way with movements and, you know, there's a purpose behind it all. So I was jamming to those prior, prior to this while getting my ducks in a row. Yeah, man. And it just, I got to give you love because, like, everyone seems to know you and that's a good thing, you know, and they're, they're always, like you said, if they're talking about you, it's a good thing. And it's, it's true.

And thanks.

Never. Yeah, it's good vibes all around. That's what you spread. That's why you're here. I know. That's why we keep chatting all the time. You know, a little 15 minutes here, hour there, whatever it is.

Absolutely.

Yeah. So I'm excited to get you on this thing, but also your own podcast. I know you have a couple in the works that you're. You're about to Release. Shoot Plug Plug 1 or all of them now if you want, man.

Well, first of all, I'm excited because, you know, see, you're smarter than I am and, and since. And I've been talking to you about the right way to do a podcast because you're an expert at it, Joe, and your podcast is just awesome, actually. Obviously, I met you through one of the people that you've taught how to do a podcast, Kimmy Seltzer. Right.

That's right.

And then I did her. So I've got a Couple of podcasts. My own personal one, which I'm hopefully going to launch, I would say, maybe within three weeks, is called Transformational Havoc with Paul Hoffman. And people go, what? What's Transformational Havoc? Well, I said, well, you listen, man, if you want to take your life to the next level, you got to create some disruption and havoc and. And let the old stuff go so the new stuff can come in. And so I do a little play on the whole thing about. There's a movie called the Unusual Suspect, the Usual Suspects. Right. And I think you've seen that movie. It's years ago. And so my. My theme line for the podcast is I interview the unusual suspects. And you'd be one of them, Joe. The Unusual Suspects, who make every moment a defining one. And the other podcast that I'm working on is with our good friend Lee Richter, who you know quite well, and Lee and I are doing one around music, consciousness, and technology.

Man, it all fits in your wheelhouse. Hers as well, Lee's. And I'm excited for Transformational Havoc to hit the airwaves everywhere.

I appreciate that. Me too, man. I'm going to lean on you, bro. I'm here.

I'm ready. It's fun, man. I love working with you and people with high vibes like you. I mean, that's what my mission is, to help others express themselves and create that positive ripple. And podcasting is my jam. You've done it through music for so long, and just connecting and the sculpting your life, I mean, that's where the core of this. This. This chat we're gonna have is. I would love to unpack the layers of your life that you've sculpted and chipped away, you know, like Michelangelo.

Yeah, but you're right about Michelangelo, because, you know, the metaphor for sculpting your life is when. When Michelangelo saw the block of granite, which was discolored, cracked, defected, nobody wanted it. None of those other artists back at those. Those time, back in those times wanted it, but he did, because he saw David, and all he did was take everything in the way, out of the way. And there's David. So if anybody that's listening has ever seen the statue of David, and I have, it's an unbelievable piece of artwork. Okay. I mean, just a beautiful, beautiful expression of creativity. And so, you know, through. Through all the trials and tribulations that I've been through in my life, and we could talk about them all, I realized that, you know what, one of the things that I'm really passionate about for myself, is to discover and uncover all the layers of crap that I've been carrying all my life, which get in the way of who I am. And so being able to create this concept called sculpting your life and using Michelangelo as the metaphor gave me the opportunity to understand that the biggest obstacle to success in anybody's life, including me, is me. So, I mean, I'm really good at getting. In my own way, I'm actually getting better every day and really becoming more and more of who I truly am. But the truth of the matter is, as I tell all the people that I have the opportunity to do what I call personal discovery journeys with, because I brand myself as the personal discovery architect. I love it, right? Because, you know, there's a lot of coaches, there's a lot of trainers, there's a lot of teachers, and, you know, and I'm one of those kind of people that likes to invent my own language, as you well know. And sometimes it gets me in trouble, sometimes it doesn't. I don't really care. But that's just who I am. And so since there's so much noise out there, okay, and we all know what some of that noise is, there's good noise, bad noise, left noise, right noise, up noise, down noise, whatever. It doesn't really matter. But there's so much noise out there, there, I might as well just create my own.

What's stopping you, man?

You know what I mean? Yeah. What's happening is me. Exactly. So being able to understand that since the biggest obstacle to my life or to my success or to have what I want is me, then it just stands to reason that once I learn how to get out of my own way, then I get to sculpt the masterpiece known as me.

All right, So I love the metaphor. I love your story. I want to dive into your story. Selfishly, I know glimmers of it, and it's wide reaching, it seems, and it continues to this day. I love that you're tapped into what you've been doing for so long, but through that and music being one and maybe the core. And you tell me if I'm wrong, but it seems like that's been the anchor throughout your life, at least the expression you put out into the world along with the good vibes and the energy. Probably wasn't always like that, huh? I'm imagining no.

You know, and it's so funny because, you know, I. And just to be totally transparent, you know, I resist. You know, and I love that word, resist, because you know, most of us do resist. I was actually just writing something about hesitation and resistance and, and the truth is. So music has always been a part of my life, okay. I'm a self taught musician, bro. Yeah, I can play enough to be dangerous. Okay. I've got the keyboard. I got a recording studio back there and, and you know, I, my favorite, my five, probably favorite band of all times is the Beatles, okay? And from the Beatles there's the Eagles and then the Rolling Stones and, and you know, I remember the first kiss I ever had was to Led Zeppelin's Whole Lot of Love. And, but, but so, so music has always been a part of my life, but, but I resist the whole idea and I. Maybe I shouldn't. Joe, thank you for kind of giving me this opportunity. I resist the fact that, you know, music is just a part of my life and sometimes I get caught up in this whole thing of. Well, that's. Music is, is, is who I identify with. And I think music is just one of the, one of the stepping stones to what I do in life. Right? And so when I was, you know, I went to college on a basketball scholarship, bro. You know, my brother and I were very, very young, you know, in our probably, you know, early teens, you know, we had like a little.

Karaoke, I'll call it a karaoke groove with our friend Tony, Tony Giratano. We used to sing, sing Beatles songs. We used to sing to the, to the records. Right?

Yeah.

And then, and then, you know, I played sports in high school and I went to college on a basketball scholarship. Excuse me, to the University of Vermont. And you know, basketball was my thing, man. I really, really love basketball. You know, I'm a suffering New York Knick fan. If anybody on this is likes New York Knicks, I'm a suffering New York Knick. They lost last night. But ever it's all good. And so I ended up going to school on a basketball scholarship. And then, as fate would have it again, I'm still not playing anything, Joe. I'm still not doing any of that stuff. I might be singing in the shower or whatever. And I realized that everything in life, this is a metaphor for me, everything in life. If you want to go to the next level in your life, this is where transformational havoc comes in. If you want to go to the next level in your life, then you got to do something different. Because if you're doing the same old, same old, I think it's the definition of insanity, whatever it was, and trust me, I practiced insanity. But to go to the next level of your life. You got to do something different. So I remember, man, I was really, really good in high school, bro. I mean, there were times when we were in like timeouts at the basketball, you know, playing the game. And I would be telling the coach, hey, coach, they know what we're doing, man, we got to do something different. And he would say to me, you know, Hoffman, you read too many, you read your articles too much, bro. Okay? And it was whatever. But I remember, I remember what he meant by that, right? And so I ended up going to the University of vermont and Division 1 school. And I remember going out on the court the first day, right? Kid, here's a kid from Brewster, New York, playing in a Division 1 school in Vermont. It wasn't North Carolina, it wasn't Duke. It didn't matter. It was still, it was still a Division 1 school. And I remember getting out on the court the first day and looking around and going, holy shit, these guys are good.

Oh, where'd I get into?

So I gotta up level my game. And so you know what I did? But I had this really little thing in the back of my mind which I think most people sometimes have, which was I wasn't good enough. I wasn't good enough. Self worth issues, and we can get into that in a little bit. And. And so I played basketball. I played for a year. However, my claim to fame in, in the University of Vermont was okay. You know, I was a freshman, I played varsity, but I played against Julius irving.

Wow.

Because Dr. J went to University of Massachusetts, right? So he was in the same conference, the Yankee conference. Now, I didn't guard him. I was on the court at the same time as he was. So it was like one of those kind of things. And then years later, when I got into the jingle business, which we can talk about as well, I got hired by an agency in Boston called Humphrey, Browning McDougal. I don't know if they're in. I don't even know if they're in there anymore doing it anymore. And they said, hey, Paul, listen, we got. Our client is Converse sneakers. We'd love you to write the theme song for it. I said, well, tell me a little bit more about it. They said, well, the spokesperson is Julius Irving, Dr. J. So I said, so what's the concept? They said, the concept is, hey, hey, Dr. J, where'd you get those shoes? So I wrote a jingle, but I'll try to find it and send it to you.

Oh yeah, it's probably YouTube or something. I know a lot of your stuff is.

It could be. So I remember that, you know, okay. So I gave up on myself, okay? And so then I decided. And at the same time, my. My high school girlfriend came to college with me, right? And it was a freaking mess, bro. Okay? And so I quit school and I said, okay, what am I gonna do? So I think I'm gonna go back and maybe go back to Brewster, and who knows what I'm gonna do? And a buddy of mine was quitting school at the same time. So this is now the second phase of my, I guess, my life, whatever, third phase, fourth phase, whatever it is. So his name was Neil Ratner. So he said, so, Paul, what are you going to do? I said, you know, Neil, I don't know. He said, well, why don't you come work with me? I said, well, what are you doing, man? He said, well, I'm going to go work as the road manager for a band called Edgar Winter's White Trash. Okay? Now. I said, oh, great. Well, what would I do? He said, well, you'll be a roadie. And I said, well, what's a roadie? He said, you know, you'll drive a truck around, set up equipment. I said, neil, I've never set up an amplifier in my life. Never plugged anything in my life except maybe a light socket. He said, don't worry, we'll have a lot of fun. Okay, cool. So he moved to Rhinebeck, New York, lived in a farmhouse with 26 people. The band, the wives, the kids, the girlfriends.

Yeah.

And I got into the rock and roll world, bro. And I, I, you know, bought the Beetle boots. I had long hair, you know.

Yeah.

I. I drove around the country in a U Haul truck setting up stages for Edgar Winter's White Trash. Now, we had a record deal on Columbia Records, and so we opened up for bands like Humble Pie ten years after. Yes, Chicago, Allman Brothers. And so. And so it's like, I'm Rod Stewart. I'm in this, like, rock world, bro.

Yeah.

And so I did that for a year, and then that band, then Neil got fired because he was very, very irresponsible, the road manager. So they made me the road manager of the band. And then the band broke up, and these guys were, like, all friends from childhood, bro. The band broke up.

So I worked with Edgar for a minute when he did Frankenstein.

That thing. So I worked with Edgar for a minute, and then Jerry Lacroix, who's the lead singer of Edgar Winner's White Trash, the other band called Me up and said, hey man, I'm starting, I'm starting the next incarnation of White Trash. It'll be Jerry Lacrosse, White Trash. And most of the band members came with Jerry. He said, would you manage me?

Oh man.

I said, jerry, I have no idea how to manage a rock and roll band. I have no idea how to do this. He said, don't worry man, I think you can do it. So I said, okay, great. So, so I, I, I'm one of those kind of guys, Joe, you know, I mean, I'm Italian, man. I throw stuff on the wall. I see with sticks.

Yep.

I'm fearless. Okay. So we moved to California. I knew I needed to have a, a co manager. I looked up a guy, a friend of mine, his name was Ron Strassner, who was managing a band called Rare Earth.

Okay.

And their whole song was I just want to celebrate. I just want to celebrate. Right. So Ron didn't want to co manage because he was too busy, but he said, go see my friends. And they, they managed Three Dog Night and Steppenwolf.

Wow. Okay.

So I went to see them, made a deal with them. They co managed Jerry with me, got him a record deal on Mercury Records, recorded the record at Ikentina Turner Studio in Inglewood, which is another story altogether. And then we ended up going on the road as the opening act for a 45 city tour for Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath.

Damn.

Wow.

And I'm, I'm all of 21 at this point. I see go on the road and we're in Chicago finishing a show. And.

All both bands went to this club called the Rush Up Club on Rush street in Chicago. And, and the drummer in our band, Bobby, Bobby Ramirez is name was May. Rest in Peace. Bobby got beat up in a bar fight that night.

Oh man.

Yeah. And so, so that band obviously broke up. So now it's like I've been on the road, you know, what, two years? Something like that, man. Maybe. And so I'm saying, okay, well I think I'm gonna go back to school. Okay. And my friend Neil, who gave me the gig as the roadie, who came from a very rich family, his father set him up in a tour management company. And so he called me up and said, hey man, sorry about Bobby, because he knew Bobby, but so what are you gonna do? I said, you know Neil, probably gonna go back to school. He said, no, no, listen man, I need you to fly to Germany. I said, and do what? He said, well, Emerson Lake and Palmer is my first client. I need you to tour, manage them. So I flew to Germany and I became Emerson Lake and Palmer's tour manager for two years, traveling around the world with elp, living at a hotel in London and just. Whatever, man. Just going for it, right? And then. And then finally that band broke up. I'm sorry that I finally decided, you know what? I had enough of that. I just want to get out of this thing. But I met Pink Floyd's tour manager on the road with elp.

Yeah.

And he called me up and said, hey, I heard you were leaving Elp. We're looking for a tour manager for the Dark side of the Moon Tours. Would you like to work with Pink Floyd? And I'm not a big Pink Floyd fan, bro. I mean, you know, it's a taste.

It's a taste.

I like the Beatles, bro. Right. So I. So I ended up taking the gig and I was. I worked for. For Pink Floyd for two years, traveling the country.

Right? This is wild, these connections, man.

As the tour. As their tour manager, right. Running their tours, you know, private jets, the whole nine yards.

Yeah.

And then finally, I'm about ready. After two years, I've been on the road now probably five, six years, I'm thinking, I mean, I got to get. I got it, like, you know, I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. Being rock and roll was never going to be my. My calling if you wasn't really a.

Chosen thing so much.

It was like, exactly. It was a gig.

Yeah.

Although I learned amazing. I learned organization, I learned systems, I learned how to deal with people. I learned business. I learned, you know, you're an entrepreneur. I ran it, all right? And so finally I decided to live, leave them. Came back to the States, and good old Jerry Lacroix, my. My beautiful friend Jerry la, who died recently, said, hey, man, listen, I need your help. Blood, Sweat and Tears. Remember the band Blood, Sweat and Tears?

I've heard of them.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, they were looking for a second singer, right? They had the lead singer. They wanted another lead singer. They liked Jerry. So Jerry asked me if I would negotiate his deal so he could sing with blood, Sweat and tears. So I did that. And then they conned me into going on the road again for another eight months. European, Australia, Far east tour with Jerry. Finally after that, man, I moved back, got back to New York, got myself a little small apartment on 79th street between West End. Sorry, between York and First Avenue. And I went back to school, I went back to nyu. I had plenty of money because I made A lot of money on the road. And I went back to school at nyu, and my brother. It's a long story, bro. I apologize.

This is great. No, I love the color, man.

And so my brother, who was the recording engineer, right. At a jingle company in New York.

Curious. Okay.

All right. And. And so I. I'd always see him every time I came off the road. And finally, when I was going back to school, he said, hey, man, listen. Mzh, which is the name of the company, is looking for a second sales rep. You're going to school two days a week. Maybe you want to, you know, take the gig. I said, harvey, what am I going to do with these guys? What are you talking about? He said, well, you know, you take their CD around, you go to all the advertising agencies, all the big ones, J. Walter Thompson, Leo Burnett, bbd, And all the big advertising agencies, and you try to get business for them, right? So I said, geez, man. Okay. You know, I mean, 30 seconds, 60 seconds. I'm used to dealing with songs, bro.

Yeah, yeah.

Anyway, so I took the gig, and I ended up getting them a lot of. Lot of business. So this is kind of where my musical thing started to happen.

Yeah. Because I go into. Into these meetings with, you know, either the creative director, art director, copywriter, producer, whatever, and they'd hand me a script and say. So here I say, first of all, I say, did you like our stuff? Yeah, Like I said, do you got any business? And so they hand me a script in that. And they'd say, what do you think? And, bro, I'd sing them something on the spot.

Wow. So you're just taking a script. Are they giving you the full thing, or is it just kind of a concept you're. You're riffing on?

Yeah, it's a script concept, right. And, you know, it had a theme line, had. Might. Had a few lyric. And I started to sing them, suit. Right? And I mean, I had no inhibitions, bro. And. And they go, oh, that sounds pretty good. Can we do that? I go, absolutely. Then I'd run back to the studio, get with somebody who could play, right? I'd sing them.

What?

I sang them, they'd pick it out on the keyboard, and then we'd present, and, you know, we'd win some things, we'd lose some things, whatever. So I got more into that, and then the. They made me their executive producer. Then I didn't have to do the sales thing, but I had a. I had a strategy. Joe, man.

Oh, yeah.

So I'd make a Hundred phone calls a day. When I was doing the sales rep thing, yeah, I make a hundred phone calls a day. And I would call certain people on Tuesday, Thursday, certain people on Monday, Wednesday, certain people on Friday and Monday. Just crazy stuff because you can never get to anybody because of voicemail. And finally I started to give them a lot of business. And then my brother and I left that company, started our own company, conveniently called the Hoffman Sound.

Most of the clients came with us. And then my brother and I had a falling out. And I started Paul hoffman Music in 1980. And I wrote have you driven a Ford lately? And it put me on the map.

Yeah.

And now I was like one of the guys, one of the top guys. And so for the next 10 years, I was one of the top guys in the jingle business.

And you have a lot of them, too. I mean, what, like Chevy, Pepsi? I mean, I don't have the list in front of me. You could probably name them.

I've done most of the big accounts. Right. And not. I mean, my most successful original one was Heavy driven, afford lately. But, you know, I. And so I ended up being very successful in the jingle business. And then I acquired, as I like to tell people, I acquired a very robust, which is one of my favorite words, cocaine addiction.

I was at that point, interesting. Not before when you're on the road or.

No drugs before, bro.

Wow.

Okay, maybe a little here and there, but not really because, I mean, I was. I mean, I had to get up every morning and be responsible for 50 to 60 people every day.

So now you're on your own. You're doing your own thing, making a lot of money. You're the star, you're the creator. Now, the robustness of the drugs addiction come in. All right, tell me about it.

And so I. So I end up getting a. For about almost 10 years, I had a. $2,500 a week cocaine addiction.

2,500 bucks a week.

Right. And now all the guys that you know, you know, all the guys that used to play on, on my jingles and sing were people that, you know. I mean. So all the guys in the Letterman band used to play jingles every day. Yeah, because all those guys were session players. Right.

They're like the best musicians anyway.

Right, right. And so during the day they would do jingles, and then in the evening or at 4 o' clock in the afternoon, which is when the Letterman show was taped, they'd go there. Paul Schaefer, Will Lee, anton Figs, Sid McGinnis. All those guys Right. All played on my jingles when they were available, right? And then, you know, and I used to have Michael Bolton sing on my jingles and Luther Vandross and as Ashford and Simpson, all these people, right? And then, so doing all this cocaine, blah, blah, blah, blah. And very successful. Making a shitload of money and really like, you know, kind of losing it, if you will. But, you know, I didn't think I was losing it. I thought, shit, man, everything's fine with me. And the people that work for me who loved me, right? And I love them, really said, you know, you got to get some help. I said, I don't need any help, man. I'm paying your salary, aren't I? So this is my attitude back then, bro. Right, right. And so. So finally what happened was, in order for them to get off my back, if you will, that was my thinking, okay? As opposed to looking like they really cared for me, which they did, and they really wanted me not to kill myself, okay? I wasn't going to shoot myself, but I could have, you know, snorted enough cocaine to kill myself anyway. So I ended up saying, okay, I'll go get some help. So. So I went, this is another crazy story. I'm telling you.

It's all right. Take us there, man.

This is all about sculpting your life, okay? And so. And so I said, okay, I'll get some help. So I found a. An outpatient program for drug addiction.

Okay.

Yeah. Meaning you didn't have to check in for 30 days. You just go once a week to see a, quote, specialist, doctor, PhD, a psychologist, whatever. So I found this guy, his name was Dr. Zahn, at Regent Hospital on 60th street and First Avenue. And I had unbelievable insurance. Screen Actors Guild insurance, right?

Oh, yeah.

And so I go see the guy, and, man, Joe, I got blow in my pocket. I got a fifth of vodka in my shoulder bag. And I go see this guy. And so before I go in to see him, I snort, I take some. I take a nice big hit of vodka, and now I'm ready to, like, talk. I'm like, prime, man. I'm glitching.

Great. You're high. Yeah.

And I go in and talk to the guy. And so. So we're talking, and the guy looks at me and says, blah, blah, blah, blah. And now this guy's got more plaques on his wall than they have in Harvard, Okay? He's a. He's an expert in this, in his field.

Sure.

And of course, I'm a drug addict, okay? And I'm Going to get over on him.

Yeah, you've done this for so long.

Yeah, exactly. I'm gonna slide in, bro, and manipulate anyway. At least I think I am, right? And so, but by the way, everybody, I don't do that anymore. But, but I have good expertise in it. Anyway, so, so I go in and talk to the guy and I'm talking to him, and finally after about an hour, he says to me, you know, you're a perfect candidate for this. I think I can help you. I said, thanks, doc. I mean, I really need help, man. You know, I don't want to lose it all. And you know, I know I got an issue. And, and you know, I mean, I would appreciate anything you do for me and so forth. He says, okay, great. So listen, we'll start next week. But I just got to let you know, it's a 12 week program. I just got to let you know that we'll meet once a week. But we're going to do a drug test. You're going to have to do a urine sample every week. I said, no problem, no problem, doc. So I leave the office, I get in the elevator, and the first thing I say to myself, excuse my language. Now what the am I gonna do?

Uhhuh. The aha moment.

Because now I gotta like go, oh, so I'm not gonna stop doing drugs. I ain't gonna stop drinking vodka. I'm gonna still do what I gotta do. So I gotta figure out a way now to beat the urine test.

That's the problem now.

Now I gotta solve that one. Okay, so I go downstairs, I go to a pharmacy, I go around the vitamin section, I find this, these capsules that are yellow. Buy them, go home, empty it out into a little jar, shake it up. Looks just like urine.

You got it?

I got it, Joe. So now for 11 weeks, I'm handing in that every time they gave me my little bottle, I'd go into the bathroom, empty a capsule, shake it up, hand it in.

Got it.

11 weeks, man. I'm shit, man, I got one more week, man. This is cake.

Yeah, yeah.

He doesn't know anything. Nobody else knows everything. I'm still buying blow. I'm still doing everything I'm doing. So week 12 comes up, right? And he says, you know, Paul, you're really doing well. I think today we'll have a supervised urine test.

So they call a male nurse, they take me into the bathroom, I got a pee in front of him. Excuse my language, right? And. And I'm busted, bro. But I didn't think. But I still didn't think. I'm busted. I'm going, hey, maybe, maybe they won't know. Anyway, I leave, I get a call two days later, it's Dr. Zahn. Hey, Paul, how you doing? I need you to come in. I need to talk to you. I said, oh, okay, doc, whatever. So I get in there and he goes, he looks at me and he goes. And he used some very colorful language, I bet. And he said, who the f do you think you are?

You've been handing in dirt for 11 weeks. We now know that you've not done anything. You've not cleaned, you haven't done them, you don't do the work. So here's what we're going to do, Paul. I'm going to call all your clients because he got in contact with my guys that work for me and they didn't tell me. We're going to call all your clients, we're going to call your family, going to call your friends. Unless you go home, pack a bag and you go to a 30 day rehab. Impatient. And I said, what do you mean? I said, paul, we don't need to talk about it. Either you're going to do that or I'm going to do this. So I said, okay. So I went home, packed my bags and I went up to a 30 day rehab up in the Catskills. Excuse me, in Austin, New York, conveniently called Stoney Lodge. And. And I spent 30 days up there. Right. And. And now I got to scheme that system.

Of course, yeah, you haven't changed the change.

I'm not, I'm not ready to change anything, bro.

Why would you?

Why exactly. I'm having too much fun. Anyway, so I get into Stony Lodge and, and.

I bring my Walkman. Back then it was a Walkman, my little keyboard, maybe I got to write a jingle while I'm here, blah, blah. Anyway, I set up this room like it's a recording studio. And the doctor walks in and goes, excuse me, what's all this stuff? I said, well, you know, he's getting rid of that crap. My friend Kurt was there who brought me. Get rid of that crap. And by the way, give me your razors and your shoelaces because I'm afraid you're gonna hang yourself. And I said, okay, this is serious now. Yeah, right. Okay, cool. Then I want. Then I go to go outside. It's a beautiful sunny day, right? We go play basketball outside. I'm gonna get healthy Joe for 30 days.

Okay, yeah, of course.

I go to go Outside, and the door's locked. And I look around, I go to the nurse and say, hey, can you open the door? And they said, where do you think you're going? I said, what do you mean? I said, I'm outside. No, no, no, no. You don't go outside unless you. Unless you earn your privilege to go outside. So now I'm going, okay, so now I got to deal with this. So now I got 30 days in there. And of course I'm doing everything. I.

Be the model patient, give everybody the impression I'm really serious about getting this over. And I do that. And then finally what happens is I end up getting out. And 30 days later, I left there. And on the way home, I went to the dealer in Cops and blow and had four more years of running until.

November 14, 1988. And this is the end of this episode, if you will, where I, I was, I was still making a lot of money, being very successful. My phone kind of stopped ringing because I was impossible to be around. I would be, I would be like a terror in the studio. Tell clients who are paying me 50 grand a day to go fuck himself and all that stuff. In November 14, 1988, I had a psychotic reaction and.

Was put in a straitjacket. You've been a straight jacket.

Never.

I've seen him uncomfortable, Joe. I bet it's uncomfortable.

Wow.

And I was taken to the 14th floor psych ward of St. Vincent's Hospital in New York City, detox for two weeks. Went to my last rehab, which was my third rehab, and then just reinvented myself. And then I got out of there, moved to California, got back in the jingle world, did really, really well, reinvented myself, but I just didn't want to do that anymore.

Yeah, yeah.

And then I met a guy named T. Harbecker.

Oh, yeah. Okay.

So I went to, I got involved with a spiritual center in LA called Agape. So I'm sculpting my life this way. I'm really kind of like understanding where and why I do what I did, you know, and it was really more about self worth issues, you know, I mean, I was a self taught musician, but I, but I'm, I'm. I got, you know, consummate musicians and people who are, you know, Paul Schaefer of the world and people like that playing my shit. I'm singing them what they're supposed to play and I'm thinking they're looking at me like, who the hell is this guy? He don't know anything. Right. And Meanwhile, you know, it's like, so I don't think I'm worthy enough for anything. Right, right.

That's a mind juggler. I don't know what the hell you call it.

It's a mind trap.

Yeah.

And so I ended up.

Deciding after I went to Agape, you know, and getting deep into the spiritual practice that I now have. Which is, which is really solid, you know, not religious, but spiritual. And I met T. Harve Eker at Agape and he says, hey, man, you want to come to my Millionaire Mind intensive? I had never been to a personal development thing in my life. I didn't even know what the hell it was. And I said, sure. So I went to it. It's a free three day thing in Laguna Beach. I went down there, I sat there for three days. I thought he was an awesome teacher.

Right?

It was like, fascinating New world here. My God. Right? And so after the thing, he comes up to me and says, so what'd you think? I said, well, Harv, I think you're a great teacher, man. I don't understand everything you're doing, but I gotta tell you something, man, your music sucks.

That's what you're focused on usually.

He said, what do you mean? I said, well, you seem to be playing over three days every cliched money song out there. Money, Money, money by the OJs, Pink Floyd's money, the Beatles Money Can't Buy. You love all these money songs to fit into your principles. Why don't you have your own song? Because then I'm coming. Marketing music. Marketing music. Have you driven a Ford lately, Mark?

Right.

He said, well, how would I do that? He had a big attitude. I said, I'll write you one. How about that? So I wrote him a song which I sent to you as one of the songs called I've Got a Millionaire Mind. The course was called the Millionaire Mind Intensive. During the course, he'd have everybody look at him, hey, look at you. Look next to your neighbor, give him a high five and say, I've got a millionaire mind. So that's what I called the song, sang it live. He comes up to me after it and says, hey man, can you write songs for all my courses? And I said, the only negotiating tactic I ever use, Joe, which is if the deal's right, I could do anything.

That's clever. I like how you frame that. Yeah.

It's not about like, you know, it's $5 here. If the deal's right, I can do anything.

That's right.

You Tell me what you want to do. Put the ball in your court. So I ended up making a deal. We wrote. I wrote a bunch of songs for him. And all of a sudden, Jack Canfield called me, right? Chicken Soup said, hey, Paul, this Jack Canfield I knew who, who Mark Victor Hansen was his partner in Chicken Soup. And I said, hey, Jack, how you doing? He said, listen, let me get to right to the point. I heard Harv Eker got a song. How do I get one?

You're like, okay, you're talking to the right guy.

Now I'm thinking, okay. So I wrote Jack's breakthrough to success. And then Jack said, can you do another one? Then I said to myself, geez, I think I'm onto something, so I'm gonna create a little business here. So I created my company called Success Songs, which you still have. If you go to successsongs.com you can put your name and email in. Of course I'm gonna email you, blah, blah. And I give you two songs. So I've written Harv Ecker, Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Brendan Burchard, Lisa Nichols, Alex Mendozian, and the list goes on. And so that's kind of how I got into what I do. But I write the songs from a standpoint of. Of understanding that if you can change your mind state, which is my word for mindset. Now getting into my sculpting your life, if you would.

Yeah.

I haven't let you talk at all, Joe, and I apologize.

You're okay, man. This is riveting. Like, it's got. You got a whole journey.

So, so, so mind. Because your mind state creates your mindset, it doesn't work the other way because you all know what you know state of mind is. And state of mind is really how you think.

Hey, I just want to pause this episode really fast and shout out a podcast that's also on the HubSpot Podcast network, the audio destination for business professionals. This one's a podcast that's hosted by someone I've followed for years. The name is Donald Miller. He has the whole story, brand, book, and all the different stuff online. He hosts the podcast called Business made Simple. The premise is to basically take the mystery out of the growing your business. And he recently had on. One of the other guys I follow is Alex Hermosi. And right at the beginning of the year, they're talking about facing uncertainty in your business. And Alex and Donald, they talk about different ways, four different ways to basically shore up your business, to. To ride the Uncertain times that inherently are the ones that we're living in in 2024. So make sure to go check that out. Go listen to Business Made Stuff. Simple, that episode with Alex Hormozi, but also the other ones, wherever you get your podcast. Hey, I want to tell you about an all in one marketing platform that's been a game changer for a bunch of businesses. It's called Kartra, and it's the all in one tool that you need to grow. So the point is, you don't need to pay for a whole bunch of different subscriptions because Kartra does it all. So what makes Kartra different is that you can automate everything. Everything from delivering your online courses, sending targeted emails, selling products, and even handling your customer support. So all in all, it's saving you time and a bunch of money. And right now, you can try it out for 30 days. Just head over to hustleandflowchart.com Kartra and go get that free trial again. That is hustleandflowchart.com K A R T R A.

So success storms will change your mind state behaviors and beliefs.

And how is it doing that? Is it because. I know, it's almost like affirmation E mixed in.

Exactly. It's just the lyrical approach of being able to inspire and empower and instill a different thought process or a different message, if you will, than you're normally used to hearing. You know, I mean, rap music's cool, but I'm not interested in talking about hoes and blah, blah, blah. I'm into saying, you know, today's the day I get to say I'm living life in my own way, you know, and things like that. So. So I ended up, as I say, creating this company called Success Songs, writing all these songs. And then one day I said to Harv, I said, hey, listen, man, I want to start speaking. He said, so what are you going to speak about? I said, I'm going to speak about how I went from what I just told you to where I am now, which is. Which is actually getting people to understand that within you is everything necessary. You already have it. To live your epic ideal life, all you got to do is get out of the way, access it, activate it, and integrate it in everything you do.

Get out of the way, access it, activate it, integrate, Integrate.

And then he said. And he said, okay. And I said, and I do that through. Through getting people to discover, because I'm a personal discovery architect. Getting people to discover how a morning ritual Because I'm very, very strategic on how I begin my day. A little about that in a minute.

Yeah, I'm gonna have to hear.

So a very strategic. Because how you start your day will determine the kind of day you have right now. Will you day always be like, hey, my day's great? Absolutely not. But unless you give yourself the opportunity to create a great day, then you're going to just be flowing in the cesspool that you're always in.

It's kind of like priming the pump right before priming the day.

Absolutely. And again, because if you keep doing the same thing that you've been doing over and over and getting the same results, that's insanity, man.

So I do it through rituals, habits. I'm a big habit guy. And there's good habits and there's bad habits. Okay. And, and, and, and mind state. And mind state. Because how you think is how you're going to be. So the internal conversation that you have with yourself, which you have the ability to change and dictate by the way, the internal conversation you have with yourself determines what you're going to do.

It makes so much sense. It's your wiring.

Yeah. And, you know, it's not rocket science. So, you know, I go back to what Harv, you know, Harv taught people how to change their money blueprint. Because the truth of the matter, Joe, is if you think you're poor, oh, man, I just don't have this. I just don't have that. Then guess what? You're not going to have this, and you're not going to have that. Because if you focus on what you don't want and what you don't have, you're going to get more of that. But if you focus on who you want to be and what you'd like in your life, then you're going to look at that and put your energy and your vision, your energy and your frequency into that, and eventually it's going to show up. And then I realized that, okay, if I can. If I can create this whole platform about understanding that within me and within everybody is a masterpiece. There's nobody on the planet like you, bro. And there's nobody on the planet like me. And that's just the way it is.

Yep. Yep.

Source. God. Okay, I believe in God, but. But Source is my guide. So Source directs me, all right? And. And, you know, I don't control anything.

How could you? There's too much to control or try to.

The only thing I can control is how I think and, and so when I get up in the morning, I talk about a morning ritual. So I get up in the morning, bro, and I spend the first hour of my day on me. I never look at this phone.

Nope.

Because if you look at this first thing in the morning, it's game over. Okay? Because now you're giving your power over to something outside of you. And see, there's nothing outside of you that can make you happy. Now you might think, oh, man, I got the beautiful car, great. Oh, I got this big ass house, great. Oh, I got this fine, beautiful woman, great. Whatever it is. But if you want to love something or love a person or whomever, you got to love yourself first.

Yeah.

Because life is a mirror image. And you know, I remember years ago and I was just starting out in the whole PD world, if you will. And the reason I don't call personal development or personal growth because everybody else does.

I love it. I love your, your tweaks in language everywhere.

And, and so, so when I say I'm a personal discovery architect, what that means basically is, you know, if, if, if I want to develop something, I have to discover what I want to develop and then I got to architect it. So when I work with somebody, and I don't even call it work anymore, excuse me, I call it play. So when I play with somebody, my, my, my intention, it's all about intention, is to manifest their ability to discover what they want to develop in their life. And then I'm going to get them to architect it because now they've been.

Rewired, or at least you've guided them to that point where whatever, aha moment probably just bursts in a good way. And now, now it's just, hey, it's, it's take the move, integrate, go, go, take some actions on it.

And that's, that's, that's the case in anything you're doing in life. And you know, so, so again, so if you want to love somebody, you got to love yourself. So I remember years ago, you know, that whole, that whole expression, you know, from Zig Ziglar to Jim Rome to Bob Proctor, all those guys, they all said, used to say, you know, your inner reality creates your outer circumstance.

That's right.

So I reframe it. I go, your environment in. Environment creates your environment en.

Okay, I haven't heard that one from you. That's good. Okay.

Yeah.

And then what happens is you're able to understand that everything emanates from within you. So where's the first place you should work on or. Where's the first place you need to shift? It's your internal dialogue. It's your internal presence. It's your internal frequency. That's what you got to shift first if you want something different out here.

Yeah. And we control. We can control that through a lot of means. And I'm curious on the morning how you're priming.

I get up every morning. Yeah. I got again, my. You know, not everybody needs to do what I do, but you got to do something. So I get up every morning. The first thing I do, bro, is pray.

I look at the ceiling. I don't get out of bed yet. I just pray. And I just say, say, thank you, Mother, Father, God, for this ability to have another new day in my life, you know, and for the ability for me to show up, stand in who I truly am, and face adversity and challenges and whatever, and thank you for giving me the strength, blah, blah, whatever I say to do that. Then the next thing I do is I do a gratitude exercise, because gratitude gets me into my heart, and so I'm grateful for three people every morning. I don't know sometimes who they are, and sometimes I do whatever, but I just. They just come into my consciousness.

Okay?

So I do a gratitude exercise. And then. And then I drink a great glass of water. So I hydrate. Then I get out of bed. And I'll find the animals. He left somewhere. I don't worry.

Yeah, I saw. Walking around a little bit.

So I find. That's Peekaboo and Bliss, my two cats. I find them, and I spend probably five to ten minutes with them. Because what they do is they teach me unconditional love.

That's the truth.

So they get me into a love vibe, okay? Out of my head, into my heart, and then I listen to my 15 minute, good morning, great day. Sculptation. That's my. That's my. My binaural beat stuff, right? Which I do differently than most people do. And. And I don't call it meditation, because everybody else calls it meditation.

Sculptation. Yeah.

Yeah. And what. What's the process? It's called tuning in. So what's meditation? Tuning in. It's funny because a lot of people say to me, you know, man, I'm gonna go meditate and quiet my mind. You know what I tell them, Joe, good effing luck, because you got a.

You got a monkey mind up top.

Most of us, your mind's not designed to be quiet, but your mind is designed to go where you want it to Go.

And it's receptive to that. Right.

Internal. It's an internal thing. So you can direct your mind to where you want it to go. Yeah, you're going to be coming, be bombarded with all this stuff. So what will have to happen is when you tune in, you're bombarded. Let all that other stuff flow through. And the stuff that you go, aha. Grab it and use it. Right. And that's kind of how I do that. So I listen to my 15 minute good morning, great day sculptation where I'm talking to myself. I do all the visualization, which I don't call visualization, I call it mind sculpting. Of course I don't call it visualization because everybody else does. I call it mind sculpting. And, and I'm talking myself into having a great day.

And this is your voice that you're listening. Yeah, I've done these like my own kind of recordings and mantras before. I'm like, damn, that is powerful when it's you.

Because who knows you better than you?

Yeah, exactly.

Right. And then after I do that, what I do is I read three books every day religiously. I read 365 Days of. It's over here.

Think and Grow Rich.

Okay. Yep. Napoleon Hill.

Yeah. So Today I read October 26th. Now I've read this book.

13 years in a row. So I just read. So I mean, I've read this same day 100 times at, at this point of a year.

Yeah.

365 days of this. 365 days of seven habits of highly Effective People.

And a book called the Art of Living by a guy named Epictetus.

Okay.

Who's around the Plato, Aristotle time. And I just flip it. I go, okay, good, that's a good page to read because it's not a. There's no date in it.

Right.

So now I just read that. So I read those three things. Okay. Then I get up because, you know, I'm trying to stay in movement, if you will. And I walk around and I have a deck over here. And I walk out, I got my deck and I talk to my plants and touch my plants because they're living beings. Then I come back in and I got this big ass plant over here. His name is Happy or her name is Happy. Whatever you want, it doesn't matter. Right?

Yeah. Yeah.

And I've had Happy. Happy was this big when I got it. Happy now is overtaking this part of the house over there.

Happy is pretty damn Happy, but happy.

Happy. Yeah. And every time I talk to happy, I know he's happy because he makes me happy. Okay. And then, and then I sit down and I write, good morning, great day.

So, Physical journal.

Physical. So I've written, I've written good morning, great day for, I would say.

The last 10 years.

Wow. So what is that? Is that your prompt to then start going from that point on, Good morning. Great.

So I got a book deal, Joe. And Good morning, Great day. Okay. With a publishing company called Morgan James Publishing.

Yeah.

And I don't know if I'm going to do it, but. So it's a 365 day book. Okay. And.

I didn't write it today because I got up late. I don't. I mean, I write it. I probably write it. You know, 97% of the time there's a few days I don't write it, but that's okay. So today's Good morning. I mean, Wednesday. I wrote it Wednesday. The last one I wrote was Wednesday. Right. Which was yesterday. Right. And I'll read it to you. This is what they are. Would it be okay if I read it?

Beautiful. Yeah, please.

Okay. So it's always called good morning, great day, and there's always a title. And yesterday's was called believe in you unconditionally. Okay. And it goes like this every day. It always starts with today. I'm a big ellipsis kind of guy today. Make every thought and every belief you have empower and inspire you so that any mind trap, which is my word for limiting belief, any mind trap loses its power over you. Anchor your decisions in so the actions you take are aligned in a mind state where possibility is the only outcome possible. Wake up to who you are. Yes. It might make you feel uncomfortable at times. However, own your power and step up your game. A renewed sense of purpose has taken over and you feel a frequency of fearlessness aligned in all you do. You have a mind state of certainty. A new you is seeking to be fully expressed, calling you. So tune into your brilliance and blaze a path paved with limitless pearls of excellence. Get out of your own way. Let the universe do its thing and stop making excuses for what you want in life. Believe in you unconditionally.

Man. Yep. That needs to be a book.

So it's always six little five. Five line kind of paragraphs, if you will. So I've. So I've written hundreds of these things, bro. And they're different every morning.

Those are online. Right. I believe I've seen some of.

I Put them on Facebook every day.

Facebook there.

Yeah. So I do. I do that every day. And then I do a word for the day on Facebook. And then I do this thing, this little boom boom thing. Then I do this thing called Paul's Mind Says. So basically I repurpose. I write it once and then I just pick parts of it and repurpose.

You're made for content marketing and all. Yeah. I mean, you've been doing it forever, obviously. Right.

And now I'm creating card decks around these things as well.

Okay.

So I do this and I write it for me, man. You know, because. Because it just gets me out, man. It gets me out of. Out of this.

Yeah.

And there. And so. So that. And then after I do that, Right. So now I'm about, you know, maybe an hour into my morning, if you will, then I will juice, make my juice, because I juice every day. I've been a vegetarian for 40 years. I juice every day, make my little vegan smoothie, okay. And then I go out either on the deck. I used to go to Gold's Gym every day. Either I go out on the deck, I got a spin bike out there. Either go out on the deck and I got some free weights and bands and stuff. Either go out on a deck and do it out there. I'll go downstairs in the car park and I'll do an hour and a half of workout.

Okay. Hour and a half. Wow. Beast.

Yeah. So now I'm ready to start my day.

Yeah.

So I get up around 5:36 the latest. So by 10, I'm ready to go.

Man, you're juiced. I mean, you've done all the priming you need to.

Absolutely. And so the thing about. About me and the thing that really kind of excites me the most about when I. When I. When I do personal discovery things with people is really to get them to understand that you can have anything you want in your life.

Right.

Any damn thing that you want. Okay. The. I wish I could, or I think I can, or someday I will, or any of that crap.

Yeah.

It's just crap.

Well, most of us, like. So my thinking here is the biggest struggle is most people have no clue who they are. And unless some. Something smacks him across the face, some life event, I mean, this has happened to me. Talked about it before, and here. Losing my dad to suicide was a big holy shit moment. Then having a baby, my first child, two weeks after that point. So it was like lowest of lows to the highest kind of highs, but still Confused as hell. But my awakening was that period of time and realizing, holy shit, there's a lot of patterns that my dad gave to me with love. But a lot of it was without awareness or consciousness because, you know, conditioning. And we all have that as humans. I mean, everyone, parents or whoever raised you could have been life on the streets, whatever. But either way, most of us have no clue what these patterns are. So we're just perpetuating the cycle to everyone around us and our kids. You know, that's the one thing I realized. Like, I do not want to perpetuate these whatever, negative patterns or whatever we want to label them, but, you know, in that moment, that's when I finally realized, and through a bunch of work, actually uncovering those and getting real with those patterns. That's exactly what you're saying here, man. And then you do the work to progress to where you want to go.

Yeah. And see, and the thing is that, you know, man.

I can't remember who said this, but, you know, change is painful. Mm. Okay. And most people won't go through change because it's painful. Right. And. And. And so they'd rather. But here's what happens. So it's. It's. It's a fascinating thing about human nature. So change is painful, and most people won't do it until it's so fucking painful.

Yes.

That they gotta change.

And so some people will go right to the edge of that and then go, God, I got to change my life. When. When. As if you just realize that, you know what, life's going to throw you.

Curveballs no matter what.

So sometimes you're gonna whiff, sometimes you better hit them. Life's gonna throw you fastballs. Sometimes you're gonna whiff, and sometimes you're gonna hit them. But. But as long as life's throwing you things that you.

Opportunities, because every challenge is an opportunity. Opportunities for your growth and transformation, then you might as well seize that moment and go for it. Okay. But a lot of people end up retreating. A lot of people just, you know, have all these. I call them mind traps. Okay. That's my word for limiting beliefs. Okay? So. But, you know, most people just are not. Are not willing to do something different that challenge them to get out of your. Out of their comfort zone. Because a lot of people are in their comfort zone, which I actually call your no zone. I've had many discussions with Khandura, my girlfriend, about it, because, you know, I mean, I always say that, listen, when you're in your comfort zone, you're going nowhere. Yeah, it's like when you were a kid or adult, whatever it is, and you're on a seesaw, you know, if you're going up and down, there's movement, movement. But most people just want to go and balance on those kind of things. So when you're in balance, and I don't like to use that word, balance, I mean, I'm more about a harmony kind of guy.

Yeah, I always use harmony instead of balance anyway. Harmony.

But when you're doing that, you're going nowhere. So in order you to get from point A to point B in anything in your life, you've got to move. Move, bro. And in business, you know, you know, being able to create a successful business.

Takes the know how and the. And the sensibility for you to a. Like you talked about earlier. Know what you want to do, know what you want to do, but know why you want to do it. Now, the how will take care of itself, okay? But the what and the and the why are very important pieces of the puzzle. Because a lot of people go through the motions and then they go, geez, I don't know why I'm doing that. And it's okay. I mean, a lot of people sometimes. Every time I speak, a lot of people say to me, and I never regret anything, bro.

Good.

And I. And I mean that from a really, really solid point of view because I learned that if I regret, then I'm just like beating myself up.

Well, and it's all past shit, right, that you're cycling through and revisiting.

Exactly. And so I always, you know, every time, you know, sometimes when I come off stage from speaking, I go through this whole story, man. I go through the. I tell everybody I'm an open book, you know. I didn't tell you about the man with no legs. That could be another story. Okay, Next time. Yeah. So people say, you know, don't you regret all that money you spent on cocaine and all those things that you did and blah, blah, blah, blah. And I kind of like, I don't have a watch, but I make it like. And I go, I don't have a watch. What time is it? Oh, it's 2 o'. Clock. Oh, okay, so it's 2 o' clock. On whatever date it is, I go, no, here's the thing. It's 2 o' clock on October 26, 2023. All I have is right now, okay? And everything that I've ever done in my life up until right now has gotten me to right now. So I don't regret anything.

Hell no. Why would you, man? I mean, that's. This is the colorful life that chose you. But you're choosing how you witness, how you navigate through it the best you best you can.

Which is beautiful because the truth is, you know, when you say witness, I love that because, you know, the whole idea, you probably read the Power of Now. The thing about that book, I mean, I think.

It'S an awesome book, but the whole idea of the witness, so when you're able to step up and step out and witness your life, then you can change it. So then the thing about tuning in, it's really a seven step process. So tuning in is the first step is observe. So it's my word for witness. I could say witness, but you know, Eckhart says witness. I don't want to steal all this shit.

Right.

Or borrow, I should say.

Sure.

So observe. So observe where you are in your life. And step two is then once you observe where you are, you can identify.

What'S holding you back or propelling you forward. Okay? So if it's propelling you forward, obviously you want to do more of it. If it's holding you back, you want to get rid of it. Okay, Identify, observe. So once you do that, then you can reframe.

What'S holding you back. So if there's something that's holding you back, a mind traps holding you back, you maybe, you know, you fear a failure, you know, you don't feel worthy, I'm unlovable, whatever it might be, then you can reframe that.

And then pivot into a new way of being, anchor it.

Activate it and integrate it. That's it.

It's the process that you can apply to anything.

Absolutely. And so in anything you do in life.

That's why entrepreneurs a lot of time, and of course I've been guilty of this, entrepreneurs lot of time forget that there's other aspects of life than making money, if you will. No, money's just energy, Joe. Okay, now I've had this conversation with a lot of people, man. All you want to do is make money. No, that's not all I want to do, but I do want to make money because money will give me freedom to do what I want to do. And it's not how much money you make, it's what you do with the money. Okay, so how much do you need to do all the things that you want to do, to live the way you want to do, to take care of your family, to do all those kind of things? But do you give back? Because if you don't give back, then one day the money's going to dry up. Because it's karma.

Okay? It's the yin and the yang, if you will. And that's just a universal principle. You know, I read this great book called the Kybalion, okay? It's a seven step. It's a. It's all about hermodic hermetic principles, Right. The old Egyptian principles, if you will. All that old stuff is what's still today. You know, it's like there's no new ideas. There's just our interpretation of the old ideas.

It's how you apply them. Yeah. New labels. Our interpretation.

Yeah, yeah. And so when you, when you, when you're able to like, understand that, again, the first thing in that in moving your life forward in whatever you want to do is you can't expect anybody else. Expectations, great disappointment, by the way. You can't expect anybody else to do it for you. You got to do it. So if you're clear on what your vision is, because vision is a very important part of life. Vision and purpose. If you're clear on what that is, then you should be able to do it. And I like to always tell people when you come up with a new idea, there's always three forms in idea, bro. There's the idea I'm going to create X and then there's the outcome, which is C. X will give me this, okay? A and C. What happens in B is the most important thing in life.

Because it's bridging the gap.

Yeah. Most people, when they get to B, they go, oh, geez, I don't know how to do that. And they'll never do it because they talk themselves out of it because they're in fear of some kind of thing. They don't think they can do it. I can't do it. I don't know, blah, blah, I don't the right people, blah, blah, whatever. Excuse, okay? And you know, there's always two forms to an excuse, Joe.

Give them two.

There's the excuse you make for something and then there's the excuse you make for the excuse.

Which becomes your reality.

And that's the deeper insight work.

Absolutely.

Drop.

And so when you come up with an idea man, it's like, okay, so I'll use me. I want to create a podcast. So you know what I say to myself? What do I need to do to make it happen? And you know what? One of the things was to talk to Joe.

Fear, my man.

What what do I need to do to make it happen, man? Because it's not like, you know, I'm a vessel here, man. I'm a vessel that, that wants to share whatever I know, whatever's been given to me, I want to just give back.

Yes. Express it.

Yeah. And so that's what people, you know, people miss that because, you know, people are afraid to ask for things or, you know, and, you know, worried about saying no. Well, you know, if somebody says no, you know what happens? That means you're saying yes to something else.

Yeah, definitely. And it's either you choose it or it's going to choose you.

And when you. And one. When one door closes, another one's getting ready to open. Yeah, yeah. So it's never about, it's never black and white. It's. We live in a rainbow of opportunity here, you know, and if you just join in, in the, in the party and the party called your life, then, man, you can make any goddamn thing happen that you want.

You can. And, man, the thing that I keep going back to, and I've been hearing it a lot more, I had UFC champ Frank Shamrock on the podcast chat with him last week. And everything's play everything. Like, you know, if you want to learn how to break a leg, you play. You first figure out how to not break your own leg, and then you figure out, okay, that's how you break a leg, you know, and then you just play until you figure that shit out. And then everybody around you kind of works together. If you fail, it's okay. You get to figure something out and have more fun. Yeah.

You know, making mistakes is exciting, you know, I mean, you know, I always tell the story about how they discovered Velcro, right? One guy, this guy was. He worked, it actually happened to work at 3M, right. I thought I had a piece of Velcro here. And he was walking his dog, all right? And he, he was walking in like, you know, forest, whatever it was. He got home and he had a long haired dog, I think was an Irish setter. And he saw all these burrs on him and he tried to pick the burrs off and he realized when he picked the burrs off, the burrs were kind of stuck to the dog. And the guy said, huh.

What if we, what if you could get something where you could attach something to something? And that's how Velcro came up.

That's wild, right?

And so the thing about, you know, it's very easy to play the victim, okay? Very easy to play the victim. And a lot of people like to do that, and they just get joy out of it, whatever that's up. I mean, I'm not here to judge anybody, but, you know, blame. Blame is very poisonous.

Well, and blame. It's not fair to other people if you're perpetuating that, especially if it's willingly and, you know, you're not doing the work, you're not going to that dark place. It's really. It's not as bad as you think. When you start opening it up. Yeah, it's going to be uncomfortable as hell and dark. It could be also enlightening and freeing, actually. It always is freeing. Right. When you bring it up, because now you got something to do. Like, you got. You got something to work with. You can mold something new and yeah. Sculpt your life through it.

And there's always, you know, in order to have light, you got to have dark. And always in order to have dark, you got to have light. I think, though, I just say that. But anyway, you know what I mean? But. Because it's. It's a mirror image. Everything's a mirror image. Yeah, right. And. And it's never. It's. And there's a lot of times, and we were just talking about this the other day is a lot of times, you know, how many times, you know, have you. And people tend to always go to the negative sometimes. So, so, you know, you text somebody and, and, and they don't get back to you right away. That's because you have an expectation. You want to be very like, oh, man, they don't like me. Well, you know, maybe their phone dropped in the fucking ocean. I don't know. You know. Yeah, but. So there's always, always, always something that is in play, if you will. And as long as you are open and willing to experience life to its fullest and not get caught up in the mishigos, if you will, of negativity and give yourself, like, you know, the ability to own who you are, your unique individual man. Ain't nobody like you. Just own who you are. Take responsibility for yourself. Because a lot of people don't hold theirselves. And one of the things I like to begin whenever I'm playing around with somebody in a personal discovery thing is I, you know, ask, you know, two questions. Hey, do you hold yourself accountable for all your decisions? And when you do, do you take responsibility for them.

Or do you blame them on somebody else or do you.

Think you're a victim that's right in the middle of the eyes Right there. At least it should be.

We all have the ability. Now, listen, okay, Circumstances are circumstances. Some people are born, you know, whatever. I mean, we both know people that were born in the lap of luxury, who. I've known people who are born in.

The lap of luxury who killed themselves.

And we also know people who have been born into poverty and circumstances that we wouldn't wish on anybody, who've created amazing things in their life. And it's all about his, man. It's really about what's in here. What's in here. What's in here is unadulterated and it's only poisoned by what you take from here to put in here.

Man.

Paul, this is. Yeah, that is. It's. Oh, man. Love yourself. I had a Kamal Ravikant on the podcast a couple years ago and he has this whole book, love yourself like your life depends on it. And ain't that the truth.

And that is the truth.

And man, like what you're doing. I love your work. I love your stories. I hope everyone can relate to some fast. I mean, it's all about applying it. And this is where. How colorful your story is. And thank you for sharing so freely to all the details.

And thank you for having me, Joe. I mean, of course it's a joy to be able to. To play around with the. And do the dance with you, bro, because you're just an awesome human being.

Thank you.

The truth that matters, you know? You know, again, who's ever listened to this? We all got stuff. We all got crap. We all got whatever. But we all. So all of us also have the ability to create gems in who we are and to really fly to any height you want to get to and to soar and to free this imagination of yours and to be creative and do all that stuff. And the only barriers and roadblocks that happen in your life are made up limitations you think you have because you have no freaking limit limitations.

Feels good, man. Feels good to know that, to hear that that's everything. It's like every time I talk to you, there's that message and it's so true. It's in all the music. So definitely go. I'm gonna link up a whole bunch of stuff in the show notes here for anyone, you know, who wants to dive in. And I got like, so where. Where are some. A few places people should follow along because I know you have a lot going on. We already mentioned the podcast. SculptingYourLife.com is the hub, right?

That's the hub. And I'm actually redoing that site now, but sculpting your life.com, you can go to Sculptations, which is the brain stuff, you know, where you could download a couple of tracks to experience it. Success Songs is another one. And very soon, we'll be giving everybody an opportunity to. To taste the good morning, great day every morning.

That's gonna be cool, man. Yeah, I want that sitting on my. My desk here. And I got my stoicism book over here. You know, the Ryan Holiday one. That's a nice one. It's a good one. But yeah, man. Paul, with what you're doing, I love that you're sharing the light. I could see why everyone loves you. And there's a reason why you come up in conversation a lot. Cause it's needed more than ever right now. And especially entrepreneurs, you know, we're the ones to do the change in the world. It's up to us. And truly, it's life or death.

Absolutely. Well, I love you, man.

Love you, too.

All right, all right.

That's what I got for you today. And remember, it's not all about living to work. It's all about working to live if you need to do the work. But, you know, work can be fun, and it should be fueling for your life. So if you enjoyed what you just heard, if you got some nuggets of wisdom that you want to share or you're just noodling on right now, please go tell others. The way that people find this show and how you can help others get their aha moments is through word of mouth. So if it is telling your friend, telling your family, send an email to your list, writing a review or whatever it might be, everything helps. So thank you so much for listening to the Hustle and Flowchart podcast, and I will see you next time.