The Happiness Formula With David Meltzer

Hello my friends, and welcome to another exciting episode of Negotiate Anything. This show is produced by the American Negotiation Institute and with over 5 million downloads and listeners in over 180 countries, listeners just like you have made this the number one negotiation podcast in the world. Hi, my name is Kwame Christian and I am the founder and CEO of the American Negotiation Institute. Here at AI we believe that the best things in life are on the other side of difficult conversations. And we are passionate about providing you with the best content that will help you to make your difficult conversations easier, both at work and at home. Lastly, I want to remind you that we offer consulting and conduct trainings both virtually and in person all around the world. Our focus is in three main areas. First, negotiation and conflict resolution. Second, leadership. And lastly, diversity, equity and inclusion. Check the link in the description below to learn more about how we could work with you and your team. And now, without further ado, let's jump into the interview. David, thanks for joining us today.

There's no better place I'd rather be. And another Buckeye fan. I gotta be here with you. Go. O h I o my man. Well, I appreciate the opportunity to share with your community and share with my community to like minded, open hearted, open handed people.

Absolutely. Well, let's get started man with just tell the listeners a little bit about yourself and what you do.

Sure. I'm a speaker, author and entrepreneur. I do a variety of things. I have one of the most eclectic backgrounds of anyone that you'll meet. I was born in Akron, Ohio and into the world of scarcity, I call it. And I wanted to be rich to buy my mom a house and a car. So I went to law school to be an oil and gas litigator. And out of law school, ironically, I got offered a second job that paid more than an oil and gas litigator and that was to work in the Internet. And despite my mom, who I love so much, telling me that the Internet would never work, it's a fad. You're going to lose all the opportunity of being a lawyer. I went into the Internet in 1992. By 1993 I was a millionaire. Now 95, we exited for a small bit, 3.4 billion in 95, which led me to the Silicon Valley where I doubled down on the technology understanding that I have. And I always say I am good because I had a technology understanding. I'm still good because I have an understanding of technology. I can't code right. I'm not a technologist. In fact, I hire people to tell Me the business issues that are involved in technology. But I was really good at that. So I raised hundreds of millions of dollars in the middleware space. I landed a job 99 at 31 years old as CEO of Samsung's first smartphone division. It was not even called a smartphone. It was called a convergence device because it converged a laptop and a phone. It was a Windows device, it was a Windows C device. And with all of that background, the law degree, playing college football, all the things that I did, it aggregated and evolved into giving me an opportunity where I met a gentleman named Lee Steinberg. He ran Lee Steinberg Sports and Entertainment. Most people know Lee. They actually based the movie Jerry Maguire about Lee and our firm. And so I somehow, with a law degree, being an average Division 3 football player who dreamed of playing at Ohio State, ended up not only being CEO of Samsung's phone division, but but actually ended up being the CEO of the most notable sports agency in the entire world that they made the movie Jerry Maguire about. And then even luckier, my office was right next to a man named Warren Moon, the Hall of Fame quarterback, who he and I spun off a sports marketing company and called Sports1Marketing, a global sports marketing company which we build to an incredible business that was based off of making a lot of money to help a lot of people and having a lot of fun around the biggest sporting events. Super Bowl, Pro Bowl, Masters, Kentucky Derby, Breeders Cup, SB Zemys, Oscars, Grammys, national championships for Iowa State, beating Oregon, all kinds of great events that we would do. And then, lucky me, the COVID hits and I have to hire all of my employees to work for Dave Meltzer Enterprises because there's no Super Bowl, Pro Bowl, Masters, Kentucky Derby. And so I leaned into my brand, which I already had, written books, I spoke, I had podcasts, but I really leaned in the last three years to build a brand with one mission in mind. Not just to make a lot of money, help a lot of people, and have a lot of fun. But my mission got much bigger. I realized I was limiting myself. So because I know how to make a lot of money, help a lot of people, and have a lot of fun, my mission became to teach other people to do that, to empower over a billion people to be happy. What do I mean by be happy? I've never met anyone in my life that doesn't make a. That does make a lot of money, that helps a lot of people, that money and has a lot of fun with that money that isn't happy. And so I've been on a mission to help empower the world to change the world. You can't stop me. I know people laughed at me, scoffed at me, and made fun of me when I started. I know people still laugh at me, scoff at me, and make fun of me today, but I don't care, because I'm going to change the world. I'm going to create a collective consciousness of plain old happiness.

Oh, my goodness. This is. It's one of those things, man.

You.

Sometimes I forget that I'm the host. I was just like, man, I love this podcast. I'm all hyped up. This is great, man. And listeners, think about David's background here. There are so many different ways we can go. And so I asked David the question I ask everybody when we come on the show. Where is your energy taking you? What's most excited around human interaction? And you had a really simple answer. And it was the size, scope, and scale of the audience. You were talking about community. And so with all of that in mind, what made you focus on community today?

And it was really understanding it. I try to simplify everything. I have all these simple statements. One that's blowing my mind right now. How about this one? I can't understand why people won't say thank you. Everybody agrees with me that gratitude changes your life. So I teach people to say thank you before they go to bed and when they wake up, but everybody can't do it, Including. It took me nine months. I teach this stuff, but it took me nine months before I could do it. Every day without missing for 30 straight days. Why is that? Talk about simplicity. Here it goes. Things that are simple to do, unfortunately, are simple not to do. That's deep, man. I know. But this is changing my life. That little statement. Because now I know how to get people to do shit. Because I know if it's simple, that means that, unfortunately, it's simple not to do as well. So when I looked at this idea of where we were going and the biggest opportunities, the options, and the touches of favor, when I knew that my frequency was my neighborhood, because I come from Akron, Ohio, like your wife, and I tell people all the time, I have great today, great options, opportunities, and touches of favor because my frequency is my neighborhood, and the neighborhood's so big. See, when I was living in Akron, Ohio, I could be sitting in a lawn chair in the projects where I grew up. Single mom, six kids. You and I could be sitting right next to us in those projects on lawn chairs, drinking Colt 45s and I could turn to you and I say, man, Kwame, I got the best idea in the world. It's called Uber, right? I'm going to change transportation around the world. And you look at me and you say, oh, man, Dave, that is amazing idea. And guess what? Because our neighborhood is the projects, you and I would just have a great idea. But today we're not locked into the projects. You can be in the projects and with an Internet connection or a mobile phone. We now have a neighborhood that exists with 7.6 billion people, where your frequency, your essence, your skills, your knowledge and your desire will resonate with someone. Not just someone, but with millions of people. We don't understand the size, scope and skill of this audience. This potential community of frequency. A shared environment of people that are willing to what? Number one, I want people around me that are willing to help each other. And even more importantly, because of the sky scope and scale, I want a group of people around each other that know people that can help us. That's even more. You know how many kids I meet, the 19 year old kid who's like, Mr. Meltzer, you changed my life. You gave me five minute phone call, you talked me into staying in college, you talked me into leaving college. Whatever I talk them into that I think is best for them. Then they're like, oh, by the way, my dad wants to thank you. And then their dad gets on the phone going, oh, I'm CEO of so and so, and I'd like to hire you to keynote my annual meeting for, you know, 100 grand. All because I helped a 19 year old. I didn't help the 19 year old for the money. It's the frequency in the neighborhood of the people who want to help you and know people who want to help you. And that's the idea. I don't want people to limit themselves to the projects of Akron, Ohio. You have 7.6 billion people in your neighborhood. 10% are going to love you no matter what. 10% are going to hate you no matter what. That's frequency, no matter what. I could sit on your podcast and I could say the for 30 minutes and 10% of your audience, I'm not lying. 10% of your audience would be like, dude, that was the most incredible thing. I saw what Mr. Meltzer did with discipline and patience. He taught me more than anything I've ever heard on a podcast.

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That's 10% of people. They'll find a meaning to what I do because they're at my frequency. 10% of the people I could be Einstein on here and prove to you equals MC squared and people would call into you and go, that's the biggest idiot I've ever met. I hate that guy. He's like Tabasco in a room. But when we realize that we have such a size, scope and scale of 7.6 billion people, then we got to pursue meeting people react, finding out what they're doing, asking how and what they like about what they're doing, what and how they don't like, and then say, will it help you if this simple template will allow us to build that community of millions of people? Eventually, if you stay consistent.

Oh, this is so good. And now let's go to a word that you've mentioned a number of times because I don't want to assume that people really understand what this means. So you've said the word frequency, see a lot. And this gets into the quantum physics and different energies and things like that in the corporate space. People look at this and say, oh, this is woo woo type of stuff and silly. And so I want you to talk to those people who are saying that in their head silently.

Oh, majority of people should be saying that because I said it right. I was that corporate guy. There's two things that are funny about me being 55 last week. One, I'm one of the only 55 year old men that came back into the closet. This is, I'm in a closet for my studio. But I also, I also came out of the woo woo closet, right? I came out of the woo woo closet. I am not afraid of telling people about my faith or my quantum physics, metaphysics and physics background. And the understanding goes like this. If you don't understand frequency, it's really just vibration. And here's how I explain it to people. It's math. Everything vibrates the earth vibrates the slowest. Then plants, animals, human sound, then light, and then thought. Now you know what vibrates the fastest is the thought of truth or your potential. Now remember nothing. You can be aware of only things that exist at your vibration or less. You cannot be aware of things. That's why some people don't get it. Some people can't see it, some people won't even see it. You can see something, they won't even see it because their frequency is so low. And so when we understand everything vibrates, everything creates a frequency, then we can understand why we have a stronger signal, a wider spectrum in a clearer message. And so I focus on frequency. My own including through meditation. I have a frequency based meditation called theta, which is a frequency Theta meditation. I utilize how I feel. See, there's five levels of understanding. When I talk about being aware. We can understand what people do, the actions, the materialization. We can understand words saying, we can understand thoughts, what we're thinking, we can even understand beliefs. But the highest level of frequency is the way you feel. But it cannot be analyzed, interpreted with logic. And this is where people get into trouble when they deal with like mediums or intuitiveness or even gut feelings. They try to interpret a gut feeling. See, what a gut feeling or intuition is, is an indicator. It's not a solution, right? So many times this is the biggest BS that I know about intuition or gut feelings. Watch someone gamble because what they'll tell you is, oh, I knew it was going to be a hard eight. I should have bet on the hard eight. But they have discounted all the other gut feelings when they thought it was a hard six and it wasn't. Right. There's a lot of gut feelings going on. And especially in business, this frequency is the highest level of intention. One thing to not as well, the mathematical equation of luck. I'm one of the luckiest people you ever met. If you meet my family, you will absolutely say, how the heck did this guy do that? That wife, those kids. Oh my God, this guy's the luckiest person ever. Forget that I was a multimillionaire. Lost 100 million, gained it back. That's not luck either. You know what it is? It's math. And here's how the math goes. What I pay attention to. I know what I want every day in a trajectory of what I think I want, making sure I give the meaning of the inflection points and defining moments of my past. My historical references are also aligned with what I think I want in the future. But I know what I want. I pay attention to that. Then I give intention to it by doing everything I can in that trajectory today of what I think I want in the future, of saying everything, words mean something, of thinking everything, of believing it and feeling it. And I use my gut as an indicator to raise my awareness that, hey, stop. See, when I get a gut feeling, I don't think that's the answer, right? I say stop. There's more to learn here. It's time to be more interested than interesting. And for me, it's turned into an understanding of how the five levels of intention work. Why? Because the mathematical equation of luck gets your pencils out. This is it. If you want to be lucky, this is all you got to do. Attention plus intention equals coincidence. The coinciding of the universe with what you want. Or better. I have never met one person that put their attention on what they wanted, put their intention into the attention that didn't end up with what they wanted or better.

Oh, my God. Okay, so. So let me. Let me tell you something, David. All right? We've. We've rescheduled this interview a number of times, right? And so I. I have been very skeptical. Skeptical of, like, quantum physics and vibrations and things like that. Now, last week, I went to California. Great start to a story, right? And I was part of this. This presentation out in. In San Diego. And there was mindfulness and meditation. And then we did this whole. This sound bath with crystal bowls doing vibration. And, you know, I was kind of making light of it. I was like, oh, we can do a sound bath. I thought all this year, all these years, I was just bathing in water. I didn't know that we could bathe in sound. You know, I think it's nonsense. And then I do this, and it changed everything. It changed my life. What are the odds that in 700 episodes of the podcast never talked about this? We've rescheduled a number of times, and now, like, when I start to say this might have some legitimacy, you come on and talk about this. So attention and intention equals coincidence? Is that what we're seeing here? That's insane.

This is the core of my transformation. Because instead of looking at things in resistance, like, as simple as people are trying to get more happy, more healthy, more wealthy, more worthy, this thought process that you're going for changes your whole life to understand. Wait a second. I am happy, healthy, wealthy, and worthy. What am I doing to interfere with it? What am I doing to interfere with it? It changes and shifts the entire paradigm of abundance. And there's no question in my mind when things get rescheduled all the time. Nobody does more interviews or gives more interviews than me on Earth. I think I can mathematically prove that I have more shows. I'm constantly on every platform. I do more shows, and I utilize that to that measure. When things get rescheduled, I know I'm being protected and promoted. See, faith, believe it or not, my own lack of spirituality. I remember telling my mom at one time when I was super rich and young, I said, mom, my mom's religious. She was the principal of the San Diego Jewish Academy. My brother's a rabbi from Harvard. They're very Jewish. And my mom said, you know, I'm disappointed. You're not gonna, you know, have your kids be bar mitzvahed and bat mitzvah. I said, that's because I don't believe in God. She said, oh, son, makes me choke up. She said, son, you believe in God, you just believe in the wrong God. And I hope that you learn what God you should be believing in. The omniscient, all powerful, all knowing source that literally, son, knows everything and it loves you more than I love you. This is the God that you need to believe in. Not the one of money, not the one that bought you everything that you think is making you happy, but the God that's omniscient, all powerful, all knowing, that loves you more than I do. More than I do, son. Except for it knows everything. It's not going to give you bad advice. It's not going to tell you the Internet's a bad. It's omniscient and all knowing you, you have to have faith that you're being protected and promoted by that. Because I would do anything to protect and promote you. But I don't know what I don't know. But there is an omniscient source that could make you a resource, right? And I sat there and I still took a long time. I sat next to a lady one time, changed my life. I'm on an airplane to India and she looks at me, she said, are you okay? And at the time, I was running Lee Steinberg, right? So multimillionaire access to what billionaires couldn't even afford to do, which is why they wanted to be around me, because I could give them things nobody else could give them, experientially wise. Anyway, this lady says, are you okay? I said, why do you ask? She said, because you have so much light and you're blocking it. I was like rolling my eyes I'm like, what? She goes, you have so much light. Do you meditate? And I literally said this to him. And I said, meditate. Only people that I know that meditate are broke, high, sick, on their mom's couch, dreaming about what I have. I made everything that I have myself. I have no time to meditate or no reason to meditate. And she said, that's too bad, because I could teach you to vibrate faster. And I literally was like, what? Right, the vibration, the frequency. And then she went through and taught me everything vibrates or blah, blah, blah. Everything I said today I learned from Dr. Sangeeta Sai. And then she convinced me to go to a meditation workshop. My first experience, just like you had yours. And then right afterwards, I met this guy, Lee Brower, that was in the movie the Secret, the Gratitude Stone guy. And then he introduced me. The next thing I know, I'm writing books. I'm on the transformational leadership in the movie beyond the Secret, Think and Grow Rich. I all. It just went on and on. No coincidences. It's that people like my mom and people like Dr. Sangeeta Sahi and hopefully me, to all your community in mind, help to raise the attention and change your intention so that you have better coincidences combined with faith that you're being protected and promoted. So when they told me that we rescheduled again, most guys in my position, this is what they would say. Excuse my language. F him, right? I got a need to be offended. Dave Meltzer is not important enough. You can't find 15, 30 minutes for Dave Meltzer. Blah, blah. This is how I used to think years ago. Not anymore. I tell my team, hey, please thank him, right? It'll come at the right place at the perfect time. I'm being protected and promoted. You're being protected and promoted. And if anyone. You got to see it here. If you're not experiencing what I am with you, then you don't get being protected and promoted because it could not have happened at a better time, in a better place. This interview, and so many people are going to love this.

It's perfect. And my mind is blown. I'm going to need to spend some time in meditation and let this sink in. David.

Well, we'll do this again, man.

We'll do this again for sure, man. And one last quick thing, because I know you have to run. I was. When I was listening to your last podcast, one of the things that was interesting to me was that you talk about faith, but it doesn't seem like you Tie it to like, what we would traditionally identify as a religion. Can you speak to that very briefly?

Yeah, I think it's important to speak to that because first I was afraid to talk about faith, and then I had to practice figuring out how can I resonate with everyone? Because I believe everything's one. And I believe inclusive in that one is many religions, inclusive in that one is many philosophies, inclusive in that one is many spiritualities, even including within philosophy, spirituality and religion, there's many different beliefs within the same religions, philosophies and spirituality. Same, same ones, different meanings and different things. So I have practice articulating what this is, this frequency or faith, how faith works, so that hopefully instead of separating us as conservative, reform or orthodox, Christian, Judas, Buddhist, Muslim, whatever, instead of separating us, hopefully, the way that I articulate the meaning of faith resonates with everyone. And then you can make it your own. You can define it how you want, you can make it what you want. But at its core, it's really simple to me. I believe that you have to believe there's something bigger than you that loves you more than your mom. Name it what you want, practices how you'd like. But please, if you want to live in protection and promotion like I do, if you want to live in abundance, if you want the coincidences to exceed your expectations, just start with, I believe there's something bigger than me that loves me more than my mom. Therefore, when I go bankrupt and lose over a hundred million dollars, I'm not being punished. It saved my life, it saved my marriage, it promoted me and protected me to a level of awareness to empower over a billion people in my lifet to be happy. I was blessed by what other people see as punishment, by what others see as a mistake of failure or a setback. If you're not making mistakes, then God's made a mistake because you're not supposed to be here. This is the place for mistakes. Be protected and promoted by them and I promise you'll make a lot of money, you'll help a lot of people, and you'll have a lot of fun.

David, this was incredible. And let me put a little negotiation bow on this. Yes, everybody. And if you tie into this, you will become better negotiators, of course.

So let me tie in negotiation real quick. I will, because this does apply so negotiation to me. I was at, you know, Lee Steinberg wrote a book that's very famous on negotiation. I've been trained in negotiation. I'm one of the world's Greatest business negotiators and I used to negotiate by trade by negotiation by in a what I call zero sum game, winners and losers. And I know Chris Voss won't like this. I believe the greatest negotiation is those who live in a world of value add. Those who challenge themselves to create a situation where everybody can win by asking simple questions. 1 what are you doing today about solar? What are you doing today about X? What do you like about it and what don't you like about it? And if we can add what people like and take away some of what people don't like and create and articulate value to exceed that expectation of what we're asking for, it's the best form of negotiation. And I'm happy to dive into your community. I have an open ended question template that simplifies negotiation in a value add world where everyone wins. Where when somebody helps you, they win. When you receive, you win. When you give, you win. When you witness giving and receiving, you win. Don't live in a zero sum game of negotiation. Live in a value add world of abundance. There's more than enough for everyone. There's more than enough of everything for everyone. You just have to co create it with that individual. Thank you so much. I'm coming back on. You're coming on my shows. We'll see you soon.

I appreciate you, brother. Thank you.

Thank you. Take care.

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