From Broke Teacher to Multi-Millionaire Founder! These 7 Steps WORK!

The dream you'll be most proud is the one you're afraid to say out loud.

Oh man. Gosh, that speaks to me right now in my life.

From high school math teacher and basketball coach to founder of a billion dollar global company. The visionary behind it works.

A leader, innovator and game changer in the business world.

Mark Pentecost. Life with punching a gut. I just do extra jobs and get my bills paid. and the car starts rattling, the washing machine's not working, something. Now you got punched again. I went from the mindset of just letting life come and trying to react to going on the offense. When you're living on the offense, you're dictating. You're making decisions for you.

Can you walk through a seven-step process for creating and accomplishing your dreams?

The very first step is.

Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness. Very excited about our guests. We have an extremely inspiring human being. His name is Mark Pentecost. And we're going to be talking about the seven steps to achieve your wildest dreams. Because like you said before we jumped in here, a lot of people feel stuck, they feel trapped, they feel overwhelmed on the stresses of life. And they don't know if their dreams are even possible. They don't know how to dream, how to take action on their dreams. And you have this fascinating story you went from being a high school teacher and a coach for over a decade and a half to becoming a millionaire, then a billionaire entrepreneur, a nationally recognized philanthropist, a world renowned thought leader. And throughout your life, you've learned from past experiences and being the founder of it works, which is a wellness company across more than 20 countries. You generated over $750 million in one year with this business, and you're doing so much good on the world. And for many years, you were a teacher and a coach, probably making a teacher's salary and a coach's salary, which isn't that much. Back in the, I'm assuming '80s, '70s, '80s, '90s, things like that. Then you have a dream. A dream to do something different with your life. And this is at a time when technology wasn't the easiest like it is today. It was hard to get the message out back then. And you started building something in the Midwest. Unfortunately, this was Michigan. I'm from Ohio. But you're even if you could do it from Michigan, you know, all right, I'll take that. You did something incredible and you overcame so many odds. And I want to ask you, you know, if you could go back to that time when you were a teacher and a coach and you started dreaming differently, what was the biggest fear you had then that you had to overcome? Because I think a lot of people have this fear insecurity or self-doubt. and I'm assuming you had some as well. What was the biggest fear and how did you overcome it?

Great, great question, Liz, 'cause I think people get stuck. I was stuck. And in the book, I actually call it Stuck Between a Rock and a Hard Place. Because the rock is you got people depending on you. So I couldn't just go try something. You're married, you got kids, and you're like, I got people depending on me. But yet you were dependent on this job thing to get a paycheck every month. Yes. And for me, insurance. So I was stuck and I think a lot of people are stuck and they're like, what do I do? And then also I was hungry. I had this inner thing that I was made for more, but I didn't have the vehicle. So I was searching, I'm a teacher and a coach. Now what I know today, I'm still a teacher and a coach. I just got a whole different classroom that I'm coaching now. And that's why I was excited to do the book, because I really want to inspire people. To me, dreaming's a muscle. The more you use it, the bigger it gets.

Yes.

And we think, well, my dream's small, no dream's small. It's just your first dreams. And they're gonna keep getting larger.

So then, so the big fear, how are you able to overcome the fear? Because again, you knew something for so long. You knew how to be a teacher and a coach. You knew how to overcome the fear of, motivating young kids probably to overcome their challenges, but launching a business, you didn't know how to do that, let alone getting it to a billion dollars. What was the biggest anxiety and fear and how did you overcome it? Or were you just so naive that you're like, I'm just gonna figure it.

Out and I'm not afraid of anything? Well, my wife and I, I'm teaching coaching, like you said, it didn't pay a lot. I think I was making 40,000 a year teaching and coaching altogether. I was lining fields for softball, I was umpiring games, I was throwing basketball camps, just make extra money. and, and so, yeah, I was hungry and we were trying to figure it out and we lit up, we got into a network business back then. A bunch of coaches was doing something and, and we had a small goal. $500 a month is what we needed. I told people I wanted more cash and bills at the end of the year. Yeah. You know, and it was hard, but my wife and I said, okay, if we want something different, we got to do something different. So We thought we were too busy. I'm teaching, coaching, you know, we're really our faith, so going to church, taking care of the three kids. But we freed up one night to work a business. Now, looking back, seeing how it worked, I would free up more nights. But back then, one night was a lot. And then the other thing that really helped me was I saw some people that had done what I wanted to do. I saw a guy that was a teacher and it started a business.

She had a model.

And so all of a sudden, and I think that's one of the things I talk in there is, you know, I think when you're dreaming, you've got to sometimes say it out loud. Sometimes you got to visualize. So me seeing someone, I knew it was possible. You got a model.

It's kind of like a mentor, essentially. Yeah. Were you asking him questions? You could see the mistakes he made. He was saying, hey, don't do this. Right. Double down here. Save your money here. He was giving you some of that.

Where's the potholes?

Interesting.

Yeah. Yeah. No, definitely.

Okay. So having the model and the mentor really supported you early on.

Yeah. And I tell people, this guy didn't know me. I saw him and I went, that's what I want to do. And I tell people today, you know, whatever your dream is, find someone that's been there, done it, so that you can see one, it helps you in your mind know what's possible.

That's so interesting because I was just telling you as we were before we got started that I just got married a week ago. Thank you. And I was, we did a, like a first dance, but it was kind of like something different and it was salsa dancing. And I'm, and I started salsa dancing, I believe it or not, 20 years ago. It's been 20 years since I've been salsa dancing. So I'm actually a pretty decent salsa dancer. But it's funny you say this because back then I was horrible and terrified to learn salsa because it was something that was so foreign to me. The music, how people moved. I was just like this tall white jock guy. I was like, how am I going to do this? But I saw a guy, a Latin guy, dancing on the dance floor, and I was like, I want to dance like him. So I had a model, and then I hired him to do group lessons and private lessons. So then I had a mentor as well. And every time I'd see him out dancing, I was like, Show me this move. What do I do here? And so you had a model and.

A mentor to give you the process. I think that's important. One of the steps I talk about is who you surround yourself with. And I think that's is having a mentor. And I think sometimes I come up with these sayings, but I think sometimes if you don't surround yourself with the right people, dreams will die. You surround yourself with the right people, they can thrive. And I think a lot of times maybe somebody wasn't successful at something they really wanted, not because of anything they did, but maybe they didn't have the right team around. Oh, it's so true. And I'm, you know, I'm a basketball coach. And so I'm always thinking, who's your starting five? Who you surround yourself with? Who's on the court with you? Sometimes you gotta put someone on the bench because they're and and I think we don't give ourselves permission sometimes to separate ourselves from people that maybe are dream killers.

But that's, you know, a lot of people might be stuck in a job that they don't they can't see themselves growing in. Maybe they enjoy the job. It sounds like you enjoy being a teacher and a coach, but making $40,000 a year, you're not creating financial freedom. And you're probably working 60-80 hours a week doing both. And you got kids, you got a family, you got your church, you want to show up in your community. So there's not a lot of extra time and not a lot of extra money. So how did you get out of the mindset of that kind of like, this is what I know. This is what I'm good at. This is what I'm comfortable with. How did you get out of the mindset to say, but I've got to give one extra night a week to this side hustle that maybe it works out?

Right.

And really allow yourself to dream bigger and be more risk-taking and creative because a lot of people don't have that ability. So how did you create that mindset shift to act different than what you knew for 16 plus years?

Well, mindset is so important. I'm glad you said mindset. I changed the way I was living. I was living on the defense. Life would punching a gut. I just do extra jobs and get my bills paid and the car starts rattling, the washing machine's not working, something. Now you got punched again. When I went from the mindset of just letting life come and trying to react to going on the offense, I'll tell my grandkids, I tell them, look, live on the offense. You know, because what happens, say football, you go to prevent defense and the other team always scores and you never win. When you're living on the offense, you're dictating, you're making decisions for you, you're deciding what I'm going to do. and then I remind them when you score, you get to do the end zone dance. And I think life's supposed to be fun.

It is fun.

And celebrate those things. So for me, it was a mindset shift and it was, I'm going to live on the offense. You know, a lot of times you're afraid to take risk, but I tell people there's good risk and bad risk. You know, you want to be calculated. You don't want to go to Vegas and just push everything in the table. You're taking calculated But at the same time, the biggest risk of all is doing nothing at all. What did Gretzky say?

You miss 100% of the shots you don't take. Don't take, yeah. And so if you're always playing on defense, like you said, you're never going to have any shots at goal. You never get any shots at the basket. You can't go for the end zone, nothing. So nothing great is going to happen if you're always playing defense. 100% of your life, yeah. That's a beautiful perspective. So you were playing defense for 16 years.

Yeah.

To try to make sure that you had enough to get by, but you weren't thriving.

You thought you're doing what was right. I went and got a college education. I'm taking care, I'm putting money away for my kids' college education. You know, you thought you're doing everything right, but I think the rules were wrong. And when I decided to go out on my own, my wife was with me, supported me. I think you work harder. when it's your own thing.

100%.

And so that was going on the offense, changing my mindset, and really being selective who I surrounded myself with.

So what were the three things you eliminated from your life when you started going on offense to create the new life of your dreams with the business? What did you see? Was one of them surrounding yourself with new people? What were those three things you eliminated?

You know, I looked for what I needed. Like myself. I'm pretty positive thinking all the time. optimistic. So I'd come in and go, you know what would work? And then I would, you know, where I, I got a great friend now, you know, 40 years back then, we were just getting to know each other. But I called him Dr. No. He, he would say no. You know, I'd say, hey, I got an idea. And he'd go, no. And I'd be like, oh, what? He goes, well, yesterday you had that idea. And, and I realized I needed that in my life. I needed someone to say, you you know, now it was a two-way street. One time he called me in, we're probably about five years into it works, and he said, you know, we're not making payroll. You're having to put extra money in. You've borrowed some money to put in. You're gonna bury yourself. I think we need to shut this down.

Five years into your business. Yeah.

And I'm like, I never thought that that was an option. And I remember thinking, No, we can't. And honestly, I didn't have a plan B. I don't want to go back to teaching. And on that salary, I'm getting used to. And so we had to look at a new strategy. And so sometimes I'll say to people, putting the right people around me, Doug made me face, you know, insanity's doing the same thing, expecting that same result. I had to change. But Doug caused me to do that. Now I had other people, I like surround myself with positive people. They give me energy. We'll come up with an idea, you know, what do you think of this? And you're like, well, I do, but what? And all of a sudden you're binging it off and all of a sudden it's, I call it a whole nother level. You know, you got, okay idea, good idea, great idea, whole nother level. So when I build our office building, my house, I always add a whole nother level. So people realize that's just part of our life. How do you take it to a whole nother level?

Interesting. So when you're coming up with ideas for getting yourself out of a stuck situation, or breakthrough idea, you'll have, well, you'll just kind of ping ideas off your friends or people in your life, but you're looking for not a good idea, but a whole another level idea. When do you know it's just a good idea versus a whole another level idea?

Now I'm intentional to find them. Back then, one of the steps is say it and see it. I didn't realize this about myself. So I started the business in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And at some point I realized I had a big sales force and they didn't like coming to Michigan in the winter.

It's cold.

I never lived anywhere else. So I decided I'm gonna move the company to Florida. Picked up the whole company. I think I had 25 employees in and we all picked an area in Florida that we could see the Gulf and do it. But I would go around the office saying, I think I'm moving the company to Florida.

Yeah.

And they'd be like, yeah, right. And I kept doing that. Well, what I know now, I didn't know then. I wasn't saying it to them.

You're saying it to yourself.

I'm saying it to myself.

Can I do this? Is it possible? How would I do this?

And I realized the more I said things, I was convincing. So, you know, one of my favorite quotes is the dream you'll be most proud is the one you're afraid to say out loud. Oh, man.

Gosh, that speaks to me right now in my life.

Well, and I challenge people. Go on the, when you shaved this morning, when you put your makeup on, what are you afraid to say out loud? Cause you're afraid of it. And for me at that time, so I went even farther. I said, you know what? I'm gonna move the company to Florida. Cause then I can entertain and we can go out on boats on the water. I love to play golf. So then I said, you know what? Instead of an office building, I'm gonna buy a golf course.

Wow.

This was my biggest sales job.

Come on.

Besides Cindy saying yes to me marrying me, I convinced her. I needed a golf course 'cause we could use the banquet facility to do meetings. You bought a golf course? I bought a golf course. Come on. So funny because you gotta reset your mind like we just said. My dad says to me, my dad worked, you know, 40 years for General Motors factory line. I said, Dad, I'm thinking of moving to Florida and buying a golf course.

And he said, Son, you could just join one.

Yeah, you save a lot of money. And I said, yeah, but we can give jobs, we can own it, I can have meetings. I, you know, it works. Our colors were green and black. I'm a Michigan State guy, so green- that's good.

At least you're a Michigan.

Yeah. In Omaha, I vote, I root for you guys once a year. That's good. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I had black for Johnny Cash. I love Johnny Cash. So black and green. So instead of roll out the red carpet, we'd roll out the green carpet. That's cool.

Yeah, yeah.

So we'd run these green carpet events, explain the business, show people how they could make extra money. And it, you know, we went from, we did 40 million that year and our goal was to get to 100 million. So I like making up things. So we said one team, you know, one dream, we're all together, 100 million.

Wow.

And we were at 40, went for 100, looked at what do we need in our team, what do we need to do better? We did 240 that year.

Holy cow. Now how much does it cost to buy a golf course?

You know, back then it was. It was like, I don't. I think it was like five, six million. Right.

So not as bad. No, a lot more expensive now. Yeah.

Wow. Now I'm building them. I got nine holes on the island. I got 18 at the ranch.

This is fascinating. So what do you think again? You said, what would it look like to buy a golf course? And what was the year around this when this happened?

We moved down. Would have been like. 2010, 2012.

Okay, so 15 years ago, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Something like that. So you have this idea. I'm going to move out of the state. I'm going to go to Florida. And I'm also going to buy a golf course.

Yeah.

And I'm going to move the whole company. I'm going to do this. I have this crazy dream, this vision. Yeah. And you're really trying to enroll yourself. You're asking other people, but you're enrolling you in the vision.

Yeah.

And something you've known your whole life. I'm in Michigan, and this is what I know.

And.

But what would it look like? if we bought a golf course, if we moved to Florida, if it's warm 24/7, if it's, and also you're like, how do I take my business to the next level financially? How much did taking that risk of moving the whole company to Florida, buying a golf course, spending money on all these different things, how much did that unlock new levels of financial success for you and your business?

I think it was the secret sauce.

Really?

Definitely moving out of Michigan. Now, at the time, taxes weren't very favorable for business in Michigan. Florida was very welcoming, no state tax, quite a savings. So just making the move was a good idea. But a great idea was saying, what if we ran the office out of. Because we don't want to be normal. I hate the word normal. We want to have fun, people come, you know, I'd have a lot of our sales force were women and quite a few of them were like, I don't play golf. And I'd be like, oh, that's all right. We're going to tee off of tennis rackets or we're going to have, we had a dunk, water dunk thing. We put a guy in it and let them throw things at it and dunk. We made it fun. Yeah. And so all of a sudden, people like to hang around and are attracted when there's a good energy and it's fun. You know what we do, which was, I think back, just amazing. But the golf course I bought didn't have a patio outside, so we built a patio with some fire pits. We would run meetings to explain our products and how you could be a salesperson. And then afterwards, this was better than my seminars. We'd go out there and sit around the fire pit. Wow. I owned the course so we could open the bar and have drinks and cocktails and food. And we did things like we wrote our dreams on a paper and, put them on lanterns and float them in the air. I mean, we just did things that, you know, what was holding you back? We'd write on a paper and burn it in the fire pit. I mean, we just did things that I think were different at the time. And again, it was a good idea, but then this was a great. And then we outgrew the golf course. I actually built our kind of a, like a campus on a marina looking over the water again, trying to make it an experience, not a. you know, when I was trying to find the right office, you know, the realtors couldn't understand what I was trying to do. And I'd be like, no, you're not, you're not. I don't want to be in an office complex.

I want to be an experience. And no one had that, so you had to build it.

Yeah.

You had to create it yourself, essentially. Yeah. We're talking about your book, which is really inspiring, Life of youf Dreams, How to Take youe Family, Fun, and Financial Freedom to a Whole 'Nother Level. I know the word. By Mark Pentecost. And this is, your story is fascinating. Just how you have transformed the American dream into a reality and created so many dreams for others is really inspiring. And you have a seven step process for creating and accomplishing your dreams. Can you walk through what those seven steps are? Women's health affects more than women. In fact, research from the World Economic Forum and McKinsey suggest that closing the women's health gap could boost the global economy by $1 trillion annually by 2040. Join Dr. Jen Ashton and her guests as they examine the women's health gap through specific topics like maternal health, menopause, heart disease and more. Listen to the new season of the Visibility Gap, a podcast presented by Cigna Healthcare.

Number one, I think is really an important one because for a lot of people, they got to start dreaming. you know, they've been stuck, they haven't. So the very first step is to get in the game. You've been sitting up in the stands watching someone else's, maybe you're working a job that you're building someone else's dream. And for myself, it was get permission to get in the game. Start dreaming. And you know, someone will say, I just have a little dream. No, no dream is little. It's a starting dream. You know, mine was just more cash, $500. that's what I was excited about.

How do I make an extra $500 a month? Yeah.

Yeah. And I was so excited about that. It gave us freedom. Yeah. And so number one is, is to get in the game. Give yourself permission, you know, to start, start dreaming.

Okay. Because most people aren't dreaming, or maybe their dreams are just, like, so far out there that they're not even willing to start taking steps towards them. It seems so far away. And I like the idea you're like, How can I just make an extra $500 a month? That would be life changing right now. And maybe your dream is to be a millionaire one day. And so you can have that dream and that thought, but really like, how do I get to $500 extra dollars a month now?

Well, it really lines up what you just said, because 500 was mine. I was working with this company and they were having a convention and I thought, I want to go down and find out. We were selling long distance usage on a wall phone. I mean, Google that later, you'll know what a wall phone is.

But I remember.

All right.

Yeah. So I grew up in the 80s, you know, I'm really.

Thank you. So I went down to see what this company was about. And while I was down there, a guy was a former math teacher walked across the stage with a $10,000 check for that month.

And now I'm a math teacher. I'm a teacher. I can see myself like him. If he could do it.

Exactly.

Maybe I could do it.

And I went from 500 a month to, I think 10,000 is doable.

Interesting.

So it wasn't to a million all of a sudden, it was 500 and that was a big dream for me. But then I saw that guy, so our step number two is see it and say it. You know, some people are visual, they need to see it. Some people are, they need to hear it. So, you know, the second step of our seven, first one, give yourself permission, get in the game. Number two is say it or see it. So what is your goal? You can't, you know, if we're gonna go on a trip today, we don't get in the car and just start driving. We go, where do you wanna go? Same with dreaming. So what's your dream? And then, you know, and I've had so many people I've worked with, I had a good friend, he wanted his car. He never thought he could afford the car. And he went down to the dealership, got in the car, smelled the leather, took a picture with him there and he took the picture and he put it on his mirror in the morning when he shaved. So every day he'd get up and see it and he'd see it. The funny part was his wife was seeing this and she said, you,'re never gonna get the car, you're not gonna get, well that was his goal. You know, he put, here's the path to get the car. He drove that car home. Next morning he got up, there was a picture of a diamond ring on his mirror.

Yeah, exactly. She's like, this is what I want, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So it works. Wow.

Yeah. Okay, so we got say it and see it. Can you ever say something too much about a dream and to where you might have the feeling of it and then not want to take the actions? Or can you not say it enough about your dream to people?

I think you can't say it enough because if it's something, you know, it's like a seed you're planting and if it's planted here, I think you start saying it. I wouldn't say too much, but you say it a lot because either you're nervous it's not going to happen or you're afraid of it. And so I think the more you say it, the more you're convincing yourself, I can do this. Yeah. If you said to me, Mark Pentecost, the teacher coach, when I left teaching, you know, I was now looking at that guy at 10,000 a month. If you said, you know, Mark, someday you're going to have a big ranch and you're going to have a private island, I would have laughed at you. I couldn't skip the steps.

You couldn't see that far ahead.

No, exactly.

So you needed to go from 500 to then a thousand to ten thousand and see like, oh, how do I just get to that level?

Yeah.

Before I go to having a ranch and an island and a golf course and a billion dollar business.

I hit the 10,000 a month. And I told a friend that I get to that. I'm going to get out of teaching, do this full time. And I remember I hit it and hit it a couple of months and the guy said, Hey, I thought you said. And I said, well, you know, I went to college for this and I have insurance. parents. And, well, finally I said, I got to do it. If I don't, it's, you know, I just, I'm putting handcuffs on me. So I stepped away from teaching middle of the year. I had a team that year. I was 18 and two basketball team, every kid back. I mean, it's a team you dream for. Basketball team. Basketball. So I'm 18 and two varsity basketball coach of this, this small town. And, and I said, man, I got a chance in life here. I got to go for it. So I resigned coaching, I resigned teaching. The next month my money went down.

Scary. You're thinking to yourself, I should have kept it. Why did I go back?

Yes. All the things we think in life. I'm thinking people are gonna laugh at me. I left the college education to go out and, you know, are my family gonna be destitute? And then about two months later it took a big jump, a big jump, and it just never stopped.

Really?

And so I think that happens in life. we're worried what people say. They don't pay your bills. Who cares what they say? And yet we think that way. And so for me, I don't think you can say it enough. I think that saying is what gives you the power.

That's beautiful. What's the third step then?

Third is living on the offense. Go from a defensive mindset, understanding no matter what you do, you're going to take risk. I call it the resiliency quotient. Every time, every how many times you get knocked down, you got to get back up. So I was a math teacher. So if you get knocked down three times, you got to get up three times. If you divide how many times you get knocked down by how many times you get up, as long as it's greater than one, you're good.

Yes.

If it's zero, you're out of the game. So for me, it's, there's good risk and bad risk calculated. But I told you a few minutes ago, you know, the worst risk in the world is taking no risk at all.

100%. Wow. What was the biggest risk that you took that you feel was actually you knew was the wrong action to take, but you said, well, I'm just winning anyways. I'm going to do it. It's going to work out. But you're like, ah, I didn't trust my gut or I didn't trust my team or I tried to go against what I knew I should have done. Was there a risk that was too big that you were like, ah, my ego got in the way?

Yeah, I don't know. There's a lot of things I would I call it turn the dials. You know, I turn the dials to get the business going more. So there's things I would go back and wish I did. Maybe hire a person sooner. Maybe, you know, we talk about one of them is the people you surround yourself with. You know, I realize now I do a quadrant and I have the two parts is encouraging, not encouraging. has done it before, not done it. And so now when we hire, I do this for the people you put around yourself, but if you got a business, I do this in the business. So, you know, the A+ person you want is someone that's done it and is encouraging. You know, I call them, you know, dream clingers. You want to cling to them because they know. You know, you could have some that's done it before, but they're not real encouraging. You can have a few of them around because they have experience, but you can't have too much negativity around you.

No, you can't.

The third one was someone that's very encouraging but never done it. Now you could take some of them with you on the ride and coach them up and they'll learn skills, but the dream killers are the one that I realized I kept some of them around me too long and I hired some at the office. Those are people that are discouraging and they haven't done it.

Yeah.

And so, and I find you almost got to give people permission. You know, when we started being really successful, some people would say, oh, you're outgrowing some friends. And no, you weren't outgrowing friends. There was just, you had new interest and new excitement and you needed a different skill set around you.

New people around you. Yeah.

And so, you know, for me, I always relate to coaching. The right starting fives gotta be in the game.

And you might like someone in that starting five that's not performing. and they're not being encouraging and they've got a negative attitude and they're gonna have to sit on the bench.

Yeah, exactly. And it's painful. But that's, it's your life. Coach it to win. That's true. You know, I look back and I think how many people are afraid to let someone go. Like, it's amazing how, 'cause we like people and you're like, I can't let 'em go. And you build a relationship with people. But you let 'em go and two weeks later you're like, boom, best thing I've ever done.

Why'd I wait so long? I know that feeling too many lessons I've had that I still need to learn that lesson, but that's interesting. Okay, so living on the offense, playing to win, not playing on defense all the time. And maybe there's seasons where you need to play defense, but you've got to get back to playing on offense. What would be number four then?

Four was get back up your resilience, get back up. If you get knocked down, you know, I call it my Rocky, you know, Rocky story there. I've spent some time with Sly and I love him telling his story and you're gonna get knocked down. Just know it, you're gonna hit potholes, everything's not gonna be, and when you do, you just know, okay, I'm built for this, I'm getting back up. And we were knocked down, you know, there was, I got caught in a lawsuit one time, I had never had a big business, I hadn't been in lawsuits, and that, there's no fun in lawsuits. That is not fun. Unfortunately, in life now, today, It happens, but at time I remember going, oh Lord, please get me out of this. Only people winning are the lawyers and how do I... But if you're coached through it, you know, okay look, surround myself with good people, let them handle this. The best for me was not trying to do everything, realizing what am I good at? Hire others that do what I'm not good at. I could have done the books, I could have done accounting, I was a math teacher. but that would kill me. I want to be thinking marketing ideas. I want to be leading from the front, charging the hill. And so it's surrounding me with people that could give me a good foundation and take care of those things.

Wow. When did you feel the most stress in your life?

There was a few times.

Was it the lawyer time? Was it pre business? Was it during the business?

It was, you know, there definitely were times It was a different stress. There were times when, you know, my wife Cindy, when we got married, she said, I really would like to be at home when the kids are at that early age and raise them. And I'm like, hey, honey, I want to support you in that. And it's awesome. You know, you don't want other people raising your kids. And, and yet when I looked at our bills into the month, I'm like, this isn't easy. And, we both were committed to it. And she was doing some daycare so she could earn money at the same time. I was doing extra jobs. And so that was hard. But, you know, there was no quit. You were just trying to survive. Later, there were things that would happen. You know, the lawsuit was not a fun one. When I first moved to Florida, 25 families, so they're finding doctors, churches, schools. And I'm like, what did I do? All these people are counting on me. But it's, that's a different and looking back it was almost fun. We all did things together. You know, we were buying boats to go fishing, we were buying quads to be at the ranch. We were, the golf course. We would work hard. If we were doing great, we'd close the company down like at noon and play golf.

Go play nine holes.

Yeah, that's awesome.

That's amazing. What were you thinking about when you were experiencing extreme levels of stress, whether it be family, personal stress, or business stress, how did you learn to mentally or emotionally navigate stress so that you weren't playing on defense, but you could still stay in a leadership, visionary mind and play on offense? Because a lot of people, when they feel stressed, they feel stuck, they contract, they freeze, and you're unable to be like this joyful energy that's like creative and thinking. So how did you get to that mindset during times of stress?

That's such a good question. I think one is realizing you're not in it alone. Again, if you build the right team around you, you know, I look at it as planting seeds. You know, you plant your seeds in the right ground, fertile, good ground, it's going to grow. You plant those same seeds in some barren ground over here, they're going to die.

Yeah.

So I learned I had to have the right teams around so I didn't feel I was alone. So in that stress hit, I had people to say, hey, I got this covered. I got this covered. Go do what you do well so that we can grow this together.

Yes.

That's when I became the best. When stress was so heavy, Cindy and I walk, you know, we definitely, in our faith, know that no matter what, he's got it anyway. But me being able to trust I think giving people hope. I've, you know, when you say about the dreams, I know going through the cancer thing, all of a sudden you realize life does end. We think it goes forever, but it doesn't. It does end at some point. And I'll never forget I had this girl, her name was Crystal, single mom, three kids, and she had joined at Workz. And, you know, we talk about how to be debt free. We talk about dreaming. And she had earned, it was gathering at my house, she'd earned to come over. And afterwards, Crystal would come up, she'd come up to me and she had like tears coming down and she gave me a hug and she said, Mark, I want to tell you, you know, I'm a single mom, three kids. She goes, I'm working two or three jobs. I'm just trying to make end meet. I join your company and she goes, for one, you give us hope. You show us how to make extra money. and how to be debt free and be smart. But she said, what I've really learned, you challenged me to dream. You challenged me to write my dreams down. And she goes, what I didn't realize, I quit dreaming. My life was so tough, I don't have time to dream. But because of that, my kids weren't dreaming. And she said, I want you to know today, my kids are dreaming because I'm dreaming. That's what motivated me to want to do a book. That's what motivated me to go, what's life about? It's. It's not you getting all the toys yourself. How many you can take with you and. And show them. And that dreaming is something we're all supposed to do.

Yeah.

Gosh, that's so beautiful.

It reminds me of the. The story of the starfish. Have you heard of the story?

Oh, I have. That's a great one.

It's a beautiful story about just making a difference on one person, you know, the best way you can. You may not be able to impact.

Everyone, but hopefully you made a difference to that one.

That's right.

That's a. that's Crystal.

I love that.

It mattered to her.

Yeah, it mattered to that person. Yeah, that's beautiful. And you mentioned cancer because you were diagnosed originally with cancer around 2015, 2016, or around that time. What was that process like? Getting that information? How did life shift when that information came to you?

That's a hard one. I I like energy. I like. I'm active. I just played in a in a fundraiser. And actually, Tim Tebow was a quarterback of a seven on seven fundraiser we were doing. And I was just going to coach, you know, because most of them were all young guys, but people started getting hurt.

So coach- you- had to put you in. Yeah, yeah.

And I scored a couple of touchdowns. And I was on my social team about, hey, did you get that? You get that? The Monday after that, I got the call from Doc. I said, Hey, we got an issue and it's just a routine physical. And I'm like, I didn't even understand he was trying to tell me something. I thought there was, you know, I was pretty close to my doc. I thought something was wrong with him. And all of a sudden I'm like, wait a minute, you're telling me I got the C word and it's scary. I actually was traveling to Dallas to speak at a convention and I was meeting some people, some kids, some pediatric cancer. We were supporting our book, any, any profit, any money from that is going to pediatric cancer. We work with the V Foundation and Dick Vitale's amazing person. That guy's 85, I think now, and has beat cancer four times, and he's still out there doing games and giving it for the kids.

And.

And I was like, it was an out of body experience and went through the journey. I had to do stem cell replacement and. you lose all your hair, you lose your muscle, and it's, you know, looking out, you're the same person, but when you look in the mirror, you don't know who that person is. And that was a dark time, but we got our numbers down, we went into remission, and, you know, the last six years have been amazing. And then literally a week before Christmas this year, the doc said, we got a chat, your numbers are back up.

So really?

So timely. I'm excited. wow.

So, I mean, what a journey. It's been like a 10-year journey of probably a lot of sadness originally and then hope and inspiration. I'm gonna beat this thing. I'm gonna be on the offense.

I'm not gonna just sit back and wait.

Gotta live your words. Living your, your, your words of living on offense. And number four step, get back up. Yeah. Because life knocked you down hard.

Yeah.

Because you were winning in life. You had money and tons of success and all the dreams and families happy and then. Boom, big health scare, big wake up call. And probably at that point, most people stop dreaming. Most people stop. And they have all the right to feel sad and depressed and angry and resentful. All these different questioning, doubting, lack of faith, all these things. You went back into having faith. You went back into it sounds like seeing it and saying it what you wanted.

Yeah.

Like, I'm going to beat this thing. I'm going to I'm going to start living back on offense and I'm going to get back up and you beat it. But then just a couple of months ago, you got the news that it's back.

Yeah. You know, I hadn't thought of it like you just said it. That was well said. Also, surround yourself with the right people. I got a great, you know, my wife, some friends, some friends stepped up so big. We you know, I wasn't expecting no one in my family had had my dad's 90. My grandparents all lived to their mid 90s. So I'm thinking that's that's what I'm on. I'll get serious about life when I'm 85 or something, you know?

And how old were you then when the when you got the diagnosis originally?

It's just turning 60.

Yeah, you were like, oh, I got 30 years to.

I just played with Tim Tebow. I'm still a guy. Hey, I got it.

Yeah.

But. so, yeah, all those things he said. But, you know, I had some people step up, friends, even some friends that we were, we were friends, but weren't brothers. And, you know, they took me around to some, we went to Boston, we went to New York, we went to Houston to find the treatments and what to do. And I, I know we'll find, it's a journey. And I think back there, I don't like going where it was dark because it was, there were some nights that are, there's some food that I smelled when I was that I, if I smell it today, it's like, makes me sick. And it was, it's not the food, but it was the memories that I was in and the memory and that. So we'll, we'll do it again. But it was timely because with the book coming out, I want my grandkids someday to go, oh, Papa was a stud. Look what he went from teaching, coaching to changing the world. Yeah. That's what we all want to do.

Yeah.

And so that's kind of a legacy thing. But it's also, I think, gonna really push people, people that are stuck and you're not happy. We did a Western movie at my ranch last year. And the whole story is, if you're not stuck, get up and do something about it. Move. We moved to Florida. People used to go west on a wagon train, you know, they risked their.

Lives to get a wagon on a horse from France to go a couple states, you know, with no roads, no nothing for a better life.

In my mind, that would have been me.

Yeah. I mean, this is a, is a very raw season of life for you because this just happened, this this kind of information. So I'm sorry you're going through this, Mark. And I know it's probably weighing on you emotionally, and I'm so glad that you have this book coming out at this moment in your life, and there's no accidents that life of your dreams is coming out in a season of your life where you probably need to redream and see how to go through the process again. And even though you've already been through it all and you're like, man, that was a hard time, you probably don't want to go through all that again. how is your mindset now on knowing you got to take practical steps and you got to probably do some types of treatments and all these different things and yeah, but also emotionally and mentally, where's your mindset at now this season?

You know, I think in coaching sometimes hard part of coaching is when you have to do what you coach and what you say. Because I think of a saying, I'll say there's no such thing as hard work. only work that's worth it. And when I look back, when I was going through it the first time, there was a couple times I went, I'm done, you know, no hair, no muscle, and I'm done. But then I look coming out of that, the last seven years have been really good years. Really? Two new grandkids.

Wow.

I got a grandson 19, 116. We have such great conversations and I wouldn't trade any of that. So when I think of that, even though I know it's gonna get dark and scary, I know, okay, it's not hard work, it's work that's worth it. And so, you know, just gotta battle. And then it's in his hands, what's happened. But I want to leave a legacy that I told my grandkids the other day, I said, you know, someone really close to me said, Mark, when's enough enough? You know, you got this huge ranch, you got a private island, you're, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, I started thinking about that, like, I never thought of that. And then I got to thinking, I got a chapter called the Secret Sauce, because I think we don't do all this just to have more stuff. We do it to affect people's lives. And I look at, you know, fighting cancer right now. I mean, I never thought that I would be having labs named after us or labs that we're finding breakthroughs or people send me a note saying, hey, you funded a new clinical that I'm in is changing my life.

Wow.

So that stuff, if I would have kept teaching and coaching, it would have been a good life. And we would have, every year I still talk to a lot of the kids I coached and you would have changed lives. But when you go after your God-given gifts and you go for the, then the ripple in that pond is huge. and I don't know, you know, we had a Millionaires Club, but it works. How many people had made a million in commissions and a lot of people in that we had, you know, you think of churches and schools and the cancer that we've, we've helped fund and people that are getting education or people are just so much that we've able to do. So I, I think the most selfish person is the one who doesn't do anything. You know, I could have I'd probably be retired and I run into people now, Louis, and they'll say, all right, what's your dream? I know you're up to something. You can't sit without doing something.

They're asking that to you.

Yes, they're saying that to me. And I'll be like, that is kind of true. And, you know, my grandkids, I said to them, your goal is not, you know, say, oh, look what old Papa did. Your goal is to get on my shoulders and take it to the next level. Wow. and I, I truly believe that.

Yeah. And I think they will.

You know, I didn't have a choice of Education. I didn't have a choice. We didn't have, you know, really, it was limited. A little bit of what I went by my own mind today. I believe there's nothing our family can't do. If they dream it, they say it. They say it out loud. They can do it. They can do it.

Wow. Yeah. What's your biggest fear then at this season of life?

I don't have. I don't have any. It's been a, it's been a great life. And if God said, Then I've really enjoyed it. I just don't want to leave anything. When I was coaching, I'd say, guys, when you come off that court, I want you exhausted. I want you that you put it all out there. And so it's not a fear. I just want to make sure I use all my talents. And I want to inspire as many people as I can. I'm hoping people read this and go, you,'re right. I was stuck. I wasn't dreaming or you're right. I was afraid. I'm not afraid no more. Or, hey, I wasn't dreaming. My kids aren't dreaming, but now they're dreaming.

I wanna lay it all out there and be bold. Do you feel like you're leaving everything.

On the court for yourself right now? Mm-.

You do? I do.

This is, would I rather be at my ranch riding a horse right now, or I'm building my own little golf course and I set it up so that my bad shots are good shots on my course.

Don't tell all my friends I said that. Yeah, yeah, all the holes are designed for you. That's right.

All your slices perfect for your- It's nice. It happens to be a dog leg right there. And so, yeah, I'd rather, but I'm also really fulfilled when you're helping others and when people say thanks. Thanks for that.

Yeah, I mean, it's so cool because I heard one of your speeches at your, one of your It Works conferences and you were talking about if you want more, if you want to be more, you've got to give more to live more.

Yeah.

And, It's great to have fun and do all these fun activities for yourself. And it's also great to use some of your time, your talent, your treasure to make an impact in other people's lives. And as unfortunate as it sounds like it is or it has been at different times for you, it sounds like your darkest moments and scariest moments and you overcoming them, and giving, and it's almost like your cancer diagnosis and the challenge of that, you've had to go all in on finding like how to recover and how to overcome it, that you've invested in different therapies that other people, you're saving people's literal lives because of some of the biggest challenges that you've been through. So not only are you able to impact people's life financially with freedom, with the ability to dream more, to get out of debt and all these things you do through your business and give people healthy products to improve their life, all that stuff. But also, as sucky as it sounds and as horrible as it is, you going through this situation is also making an impact on people's lives based on how you respond to it.

Yeah.

And so, again, I'm, I'm really sad you're going through this, and it's extremely unfortunate, but I'm also glad to know your mindset is I'm gonna overcome this, I'm gonna find solutions, and I'm gonna help other people that are going through something like this. I think that's the only mindset we can have.

I agree. You know, I'm a little more private. Great friend of mine, I think the world of him, is Dick Vitale. Dick's 85 and just did the Duke game on ESPN. He just beat four cancers.

Crazy.

Yeah, and Dick puts it all on his social. I mean, he's showing at the doctor, he's hooked up, and I'm like, you know, that's not me, I can't do that. Yeah. But I realized my calling then is to help find, you know, cures for it, help support him with the pediatric. And so I think we all have our own, you know, I really don't say much about it or say it and I'm just going to live hard and play hard and have fun and do it until I can't. But that is and we all face that. I mean, there's no one listening to us right now that you know, again, play on the offense. I can sit at home and say, yeah, I got it, it's bad, I can't help it, or go, no, we're gonna, you know, they're mate, we're gonna have a cure, we're gonna get past this. If we do great, then I'm living high on the mountain.

Exactly.

If I don't, I want out being positive and helping people go live bigger in life.

100%. We're talking about life of your dreams, your book. Again, it's really powerful lessons and steps that we're talking about here. and really there's seven kind of key steps to achieving your dreams. What would you say? We talked about get back up, which is number four. What would be number five on this process?

I think we talked about about find your people.

Oh, yeah. Your team.

That was fine.

Find your people.

Yep.

And really making sure you're finding people. The ultimate level of finding someone is someone who's encouraging, who's also done something before that you need that support with.

Yeah.

At least find someone encouraging who hasn't done it.

Yeah.

If they've done it and they're encouraging, you want them on your team.

Well, and this is a key part for your own life, but also if you're running a business, because what will kill your dreams fastest is what I call the dream killers. That's someone that's not encouraging and never done it.

Yes.

Think about that, Louis. How many people are all excited about something today? They go home and tell their favorite uncle who's never done something like this in his life, and they go, oh, that won't work. And a person goes, oh, okay. And quits.

That's a dream killer.

Dream killer. So make sure you're not listening to the dream killers and make sure you're not hiring them in your business because they will kill your business, kill your dreams.

Okay, number six, what would be that?

You know, this one I put in because I had to learn it. Celebrate your wins.

Oh, man.

Yeah. This is huge because so important. Yeah. What I found I was doing. is I was so focused on the finish line. I'm sprinting hard, get to the finish line, say, yay, I did it, and then immediately go to something else. And I realized, and I had a good friend with that, like, Mark, listen up a little, you know, celebrate the milestones, not just, you know, trying to get to the finish line. And there's a balance. I think everything in life's a balance. And for me, it was like, okay, we just we threw a party at my ranch and we get ready to do another one. But we were celebrating 20 years of it works. You know, I had a little big town came down and saying we had fireworks. We had the greatest night. And I thought, why do I wait 20 years to do that? You know, let's let's show our family, our people around us. And you know, early on, it could be a date night. Hey, honey, I'm going to really be working this month, there won't be many free. But at the end, we're taking a weekend and we're gonna do a lock-in at some favorite place of yours, or hey, it's movie night. We still with our kids, we'd pull the kids in and said, hey, dad might miss a few games. You know, they used to be coach, teacher, I'm at everything.

But now I'm like, hey, I gotta work. I gotta work.

I might have to travel, might have to do some stuff. But we wrote, we called it a dream board. We started, you know, Louis, what would you like if we have a great and you know, one of my kids was like, I want a hot tub. All right, let's put the hot tub on the list. You know, we'll put it on the deck. And one was like, Hey, I want to go on a safari. I mean, we wrote these things down. So we had everybody, even though I was the one out there doing it, we were all invested in it.

And so celebrate your wins, I think, is a big one. That's huge. I can relate to that a lot because playing sports, every time I would win a game, it'd be onto the next. It was never like, not even a moment. Maybe in the locker room, we're like, okay, good game. Like, Let's get ready for the next one. Are you thinking, thinking it, right? And the same thing in business. I translated it to business as like, just wanted to create more. Okay, now we're on the momentum. Let's just keep going. But it was never like, you know, it's a Friday night, man, we had a great week. Let's go to dinner. Let's go watch a game. Let's go bowling. Let's do something. It doesn't have to be like, it's so extravagant. It can be free, but also just celebrating the moment and really acknowledging and reflecting, man, what was that? Like, again, I just got married last weekend and all week we have been celebrating and like reliving it. Yeah. I've really tried to soak it in and be like asking people, what was your favorite moment? And just looking at videos and yeah, as opposed to, okay, on to the next thing. You know, it's like, let's enjoy this celebration.

I'm grating big because congratulations. That's so exciting. But I remember when we first started the business, we have three kids and we had, you know, taken vacation. So we're like, all right, no vacation. We're going to do this vacation and and then Cindy and I had the big dream was we had never been to Hawaii. We decided, oh man, we want to go Hawaii without the kids. Oh, wow. So our big dream, our big focus was if I could accomplish this, we're going to Hawaii. We're going to Hawaii with no kids. And that was our big dream. Okay, vacation and then vacation without the kids. So you're down the road with that one.

But someday you'll be thinking of it. One day you'll be like, yeah, it's amazing. Okay, so celebrate your wins. I think a lot of people, again, when you don't have When you can't even have the ability to dream, you're living in survival or stuck mode, you're probably not celebrating survival mode. You're probably not celebrating, I'm stressed out at work, I've got no money to pay my bills, there's nothing to celebrate in life. If someone's watching or listening right now that feels stuck in debt, they're not getting the momentum, they're not feeling like they're alive, how can they celebrate their life when they're in that state of being?

Well, that's because we call it the dream cycle. So you got to have the dream, and then we got our plan. And then I actually, I do this, and it works. When someone first started selling product for me, they're part of our. Our field team, you know, I'd have them do a dream board. What I found. was people's, it's like sticking your water, your toe in the water to see if it's cold. You know, they just, so they do a dream board, but it would be not really putting themselves out there. What I found was after they went through the cycle a couple of times, all of a sudden they'd say, hey, I want to do over on that dream board. So we called it the Redream. So in this, we actually call it the Redream where, you know, you've done a dream, you've taken it through the cycle, Now you want to redream and go, go bigger, go bigger, go bigger. And so we literally called it a dream board, then the redream, just because people wanted to do over to go. And I think you'll always be in that cycle, you know, like myself, you know, it was to buy a house in Florida, then it was to be on the water, and then the island thing was crazy, you know, someone brought me that and I was, I kind of, laughed at it in front of Cindy because I thought for sure she'd say no. And she's like, well, to look at it. And I'm like, oh, really? Lion Island? You know, I couldn't dream like that in the beginning, but you get that dream muscle going, it starts to be anything's possible. That's cool. And so really, I'd say to the person, we gotta get started. We gotta get you in the cycle. Who are you surrounded with? You know, what's, how are you giving yourself permission?

And, and so the redreams of biggie. so is the dream cycle the part of the seven steps or is that something separate?

Yeah, no, the dream cycle is just you've gone through it. You've dreamed, you've accomplished. Now let's. You celebrate. So dream, celebrate, redream, do it again. And it's the seven pillars that steps there that get you there.

And.

Okay. And then I add at the very.

End, the secret sauce, because I think.

The secret sauce, this is the extra.

Okay.

Did we miss step seven that I missed? No, seven was. Was dare to redream. Dare to redream. Gotcha. That's him. Okay. Yep. You've done it once. You now, and again, my favorite saying is this one now, the dream you're most proud is a dream you're afraid to say out loud.

Wow.

Now in the beginning, you don't trust me yet, so you're doing the dream cycle, but now you've done it. Now I'm saying to you, come on, tell me the real dream.

Wow. What do you really want?

What do you want? You're holding back. Yeah.

Interesting. Okay, so you said there's an extra step, an extra credit. Steph, what's the secret sauce?

The secret sauce is, you know, when I first, we all want freedom and abundance. And I, Sunday night, you know, we believed we'd be blessed if we gave. So, you know, we grew up that you make so much money and you give back, you give back. And we were always taught, when you give, your hands are out like this, and now God can bless you back. And I do believe that. but I think it's bigger than that. I think just like dreaming, your dreams get bigger when you're giving it, it fills something in you. If you're helping with a cancer cycle, if you're helping with organizations that are, are really changing the world, you want to give more. So now I say we give so that we can give more and we give more. And that person that said to me, when's enough enough? I realize it's never enough because the more we do, the more we can give. So the secret sauce is start giving.

Yes.

Because it'll fill you up. And the more lives you can change, the more you're excited to go after your own dreams and be bold because you get to give more.

This is interesting. I ask a lot of billionaires and people have exited, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars of companies and things like that. I ask a lot of wealthy people, this question, and I'm curious your response. I think I know the answer based on how you're already speaking about it, but how impactful is the growth of your business year after year based on how much you give to either charities, churches, people, causes? Do you see a direct impact on how much you give or the energy in which you give and the growth of your business?

I think there's a direct correlation because the person that doesn't give is trying to hold tight to stuff. And if you're holding tight like this, this is mine. I'm not giving it up. It's mine. You're not in a mindset of abundance to give more. So when my hands are like this, 'cause I'm giving to you, I'm out here to go, let's go. We'll build this bigger. We'll give more, we'll do more. And I look at Cindy and I, if you would have said, I'm not going to tell you because crowns are going to come in heaven, not here. But if I think of what we've given, you know, here to give a hundred dollars when I was teaching was a lot, was tight. You know, today when it's millions and millions and you're like, how did that happen? It's because the more you gave, the more blessings in your business exploded. So I think it's a direct correlation myself.

How does someone get into that giving or generosity mindset when they have no money when they're struggling, they're living paycheck to paycheck. They're in student loans. They're working 2 to 3 jobs. Their kids are, you know, constantly crying and they can't seem to get people to like relax and they got no time for themselves.

How do they give in that state? That's that's that's such you worded that very well. I think it's the same way as we're talking about if you're stuck in life and you're saying, how can I dream when I can't pay my bills and the boss is terrible and he tell me what to do and I come home and the baby, I think it's the same thing. It's a discipline. And if you'll start in the little things, as it gets bigger, you lose what that amount is. You know, if you said, I'm gonna give millions, millions, you're laughing and go, I can't even pay my phone bill, you know, what do you mean? And yet, I think it's a discipline and the more you do it, it works.

Wow.

And that's how it grows.

It works.

It works. It works. All right, plug in.

What is the, you know, you are a coach for many years to students, but also to athletes. You're still a coach. You still coach basketball, I think today, is that right? Yeah. And you coach your, you know, your executive team, your sales team, like you coach the people in your business. You've always been a coach, essentially. You coach your kids, all this stuff. Yeah. Who is the greatest coach you had? And what was the biggest lesson they taught you growing up?

You know, good question. I think in each season, I've had different coaches. I think in high school, there were two coaches that were amazing. Both, both, you know, I played tennis and basketball and I coached math. They were both math teachers. One was my tennis coach, one was my best. Huge influence, very competitive. I, you know, were taking charges on a half court concrete thing there. And I thought that was normal. I think, no wonder I'm so crazy competitive. And then I remember going to college and talking to a lot of people there. And I realized a big Mentor I didn't realize it was my dad. You know, my dad went from farm in Tennessee to work in the factory in Michigan. You know, you'll pick up a lot when you listen to this. I probably speak the worst English in the world. My parents were from Tennessee. I was raised in the north. Recently, someone said, Mark, do you realize closeness isn't a word? And I was like, what? And you know, and Warsh doesn't have an R in it. I didn't. So, you know, we laugh about that. But my dad came up at 18, got a job on a factory, was going to night school. He would come home, have one brother, there's two, and he'd say, all right, let's compare report cards. And so I got to college and realized my dad was a big mentor. I didn't even realize the example he set, you know, back then at GM, you work seven days a week. We'd see dad on weekends and. he'd be working nights or afternoons and you wouldn't see him. So, you know, Dad was. And then I started teaching and coaching. The football coach there gave me the book, Rich Dad Poor Dad. And it talked about the difference of an employee or owning the business. And it opened, so I think at each level there was a coach that opened my mind to something that was that made me go, wow, I want that.

Wow. So different seasons of life, different mentors, the right teachers, you know, when the student is ready to the teacher appears. Right. That's what I was saying.

Yes.

Who's your greatest teacher today?

Oh, I think, you know, I have a couple, I would say later in life, it's harder to get new friends because you kind of, you know, now you have quite a bit and people may want something or, you know, I don't mean that bad, but that happens. But I'd say I've got two right now. One's helping in I had never, our family had business and a great guy, lives in Jersey and he kind of took me under his wing and said, let me help you. And his name's Keith and he just did a great job of kind of protecting me too, but making sure we were making good decisions. And then there's a pastor out there, I'd say Jensen that just, you know, just has really made sure that we could balance.

Who's the pastor?

Jensen.

Jensen.

Yeah.

What's, what's the biggest lesson he's been teaching you?

You know, Jensen has a way, tremendous preacher, but he speaks so softly that when he talks, you have to lean in and lean in. And he's the same way off stage as he is when he's on. And I, you know, I really, like how he's same thing. He wants to make sure someday God says, well done. and so I'm like, yeah, that's what I want.

So, yeah, that's beautiful. We're talking about the life of your dreams, your book. I want everyone to get this book, but there's something I'm learning in the last few years, and I'm going to get, I'm already getting kind of emotional just thinking about it, that I feel like you've experienced, and I'm just assuming here, because this is the first time we're meeting and I don't know your full life story, But I'm assuming the person you chose to be your life partner, your wife, has been a massive impact in your life and has supported you in pursuing your dreams. And it's the number one person you need on your team is your spouse. That could be your dream supporter or your biggest cheerleader or your dream killer.

Yeah.

A lot of people have dream killers at their spouse, but they still love fully and they've got to overcome that. Yeah. What is the thing about your your wife that you love the most and the greatest lesson she's given you.

You know, she's just been all in supporting. It's funny. I shouldn't answer this way. I'll get in trouble. But I will. You won't show this part, right? No. You know, I would say sometimes we were younger. We were high school sweethearts. So we've been married 47 years. 47 years. Yeah. She's prayed for her. She needs it. She's been with me that long. But, you know, I would say sometimes, you know, the devil has a way of getting in your head. Like you're thinking one way, like I'm like, she's holding me back. Where later I realized, no, she was protecting you. She protected me and kept me from imploding.

Wow.

And what we came, you know, her strength was scheduling behind the scenes, really keeping a good foundation so that I could come out here and, you know, we first started the business and we started making money. I would go every night of the week. and we made a deal, you know, all right, Sundays we're not going to work, family, here's what we're going to do.

You can never turn it off as an entrepreneur, really. You've got to like learn to turn it off.

Put that phone over there, but that might be the call I need. And so I realize now, and I'll tell people just because you, you know, there's a lot of, for Cindy, it was my foundation, realizing we're a team, realizing when I felt like maybe it wasn't support, it was really great support because she was keeping me from, but I would tell people that feel like they don't have a supportive spouse, find out their love language. Because I, you know, when I used to go out working at night and it'd be like, are you going again? If she gave me a lead and I made a sale that night, send her flowers.

Oh, because then she's gonna say, go out every night.

Then she started giving you a list, go every night, you know, or and keep doing that.

Yes. Like keep doing the love language. Don't do it a few times and say, right. oh, now I'm good.

Right. And maybe I said flowers, maybe it's a night out dinner. Maybe it's leave my phone at the house tonight, whatever that love or maybe she goes out, you know, or it's the bubbly bath and you're with the kids. So to me, it's it's being intentional. You gotta you gotta us guys can be a little done sometime. Like, really? I miss that. And wow. So, yeah.

So what's the secret after 47 years of marriage and going from a high school teacher and a coach to building a billion dollar empire? having healthy kids that still want to be around you as an adult. As adults, what's this? The three keys to having a healthy marriage for 47 plus years?

I think communication. Never take yourself too serious. I I tell people all the time, don't use the word I. If you say I, you're in trouble. It's we. We're going to do this. It's what we are doing. And I think really trying to think about what does that other person need right now? You know, what's something that fills them up? And I still get it wrong. We were talking the other day how I was talking to a friend and he goes, my wife's like, why can't you help with the laundry? And I was, I was, I was shooting the socks into the clothes basket thinking I was Larry Bird. And, you know, I think it's both realizing he's always going to act like he's 12 years old and she's going to need me to help and support. So I think it's just finding that, Common support for each other and what time out you need in life.

That's beautiful. I love that. You've got so much wisdom and don't know about that. You got so much wisdom, so much life experience, and you share so much of it in your book, Life of youf Dreams, how to take your family, fun and financial freedom to a whole another level by Mark Pentecost. I want everyone to get this right now because again, I'm always a fan of the reason I love doing this show, the School of Greatest and interviewing people like yourself. is that I can always learn from someone on how to model something that I want. And this for me is like I get free mentorship. It's like I get the mentorship, but then I get to give that to the world where most people don't have access to you. There's not many interviews of you online. This is a book that has all your life's knowledge in one place that people can have access to. And people don't understand how powerful that is. to have the wisdom, the knowledge, the lessons of someone who has gone through extreme adversity, someone who has built incredible life, massive business, and someone who lived like most of the country, as a teacher, as a coach, making 40 grand a year, and was able to get out of that and create a whole another life for themselves. So I want people to get this book. I want people to share this book with a friend. If you know someone in your life, that could resonate with this message, send them this link and say, Hey, what was the biggest takeaway you got from what Mark was sharing here? And have a conversation and dialogue about your own dream. And say, what is a dream that has been lost for you? What is the dream that you're afraid to talk about? What is the saying again? The dream the most proud is the one you're afraid to say out loud. I would love for you to text that message to one friend right now in your life that you know, maybe they've just been struggling or they got a good life, but it's not an extraordinary one. They're not leaving it all on the field right now. They're not taking those moves that are a little scary.

Yeah.

And you can be that accountability partner for your friend, your family member, someone on your team. And text them this quote right now. What's the dream you're most proud that you're afraid to say out loud. Literally just text them that with a link to this episode and say, I want you to listen or watch this and tell me what that dream is afterwards. I think it's a great conversation starter with the people in your life. And also follow up by getting a copy of this book, Life of youf Dreams, so that you can go through these seven steps and detail, because you have exercises and lessons and stories in the book where people can Follow the steps and start going through their own dream cycle. And I think that's the key. Step one is just allowing yourself to dream and then redream. Now what's the real dream? Not like, ah, but what's the thing that, ooh, that feels different when I say it. And I think this would be an amazing exercise for everyone watching or listening to text one friend and leave a comment below on YouTube here if you're watching on the video as well. on what your biggest takeaway is from this episode. What resonated the most, what stood out the most? Leave a comment, your biggest takeaway with Mark here. I've got a couple of final questions for you before we wrap up, Mark. This has been powerful. I've got tons of other questions here that I'm unable to get to, but I think this has been a beautiful place to talk about right now. You have a virtual summit coming up where you're going to be inspiring people to reawaken their dreams even more. Can you share more a little about this summit? and also you do a lot of charity and giving back. Can you share a little bit about that as well? Yeah.

You know, I'm really excited about it. First time I've ever done it. We have a mutual friend, Rory. Yeah.

Rory Vaden. Yeah.

He's like, hey, that's what we're gonna do. And I'm really excited. You know, we did a Western movie at the, at the ranch last year. I've got, we really were blessed. A lot of the actors and actresses were on the upswing, and they're really hitting some big things. They're gonna be there with us. Nice. Some of the people have been very impactful when I said Jensen the other day, he's going to be with us. I believe yourself is going to pop up.

I'll be there too.

Good, I love it. I'm doing it. And you know, when I first heard we're going to write a book on dreaming, I was thinking sometimes people will say, oh, you're just a dreamer. And I was like, wait a minute, I'm not sure I like that as a superpower. And then I got to realizing there's two types of dreamers. There's a dreamer of the night, they dream, then they wake up and go on about their same life. Or dreamer of the day, I call, gets up and takes action. So we're talking about your dreams. We're talking about going to take action. Dreamers of the day. And I've decided I want to be a professional dreamer. I'm so excited about it. So when we do this, it's April 3rd and we bring it in, you know, mind thinkers like yourself that does dream big. I mean, in a short period, I can I can tell I'm excited to learn more of what you've done yourself, especially what sport you played. You could have played for me. You got some good size.

Yeah, I was a basketball player.

Yeah, yeah. I love it. Yeah. But, you know, to me, we're gonna inspire people dreaming that day. And if they're stuck, we're gonna get them unstuck that day. And I don't know how someone's gonna sit. So I think it's online. You'll be able to see it. And people that are watching it, you be ready because you won't be able to sit and watch this. You're going to have pacing and walking in your mind's gonna be being blown. So I'm really excited about that.

That's exciting. We'll have, if you're watching this, we'll have the link up on the screen and we'll put it in the description below where you guys can go watch this. And I believe it's a free summit, isn't that right? It's free. So you can click, you can sign up. Um, it'll be in the description and the audio or the video wherever you're listening to this.

And what about the charity work that you're a part of right now? I know you give back a lot to research to things like that for cancer, but how can people learn more about that as well? you know, there's quite a bit we're doing right now, but with the book, I really want to focus on just what really gets my heart is pediatric cancer. And it's one thing my age to go through cancer. It's my way to say, well, I know sometime it ends, Louis, but I'm, I'm ready. If it ends, I'm ready. But when I watch these young kids, it breaks your heart. Yeah. And we really focus with pediatric cancer, working with the V Foundation, we're with Moffitt. and we're just going to make it. We're going to find cures for cancer. And like you said a little while ago, there's just one or two or three. I think there's going to be thousands and thousands that were able to help through their cancer Journey, live longer, and that's our goal. We're going to give quite a bit to it.

I think I heard that all the proceeds from the, the book sales are going towards cancer research.

Yep.

So again, guys, if you buy a book right now, just knowing that your your impact of buying a book to support your life and dreaming bigger. Or if you buy a book for yourself and a friend, the proceeds are going to go towards cancer research, which is extremely powerful. So it's a big, big thing that you're doing. So again, get a copy of Life of your Dreams, how to take your family fun and financial freedom to a whole nother level. You're going to be inspiring your life and the people in your life. You're going to be a model for someone in your, in your life as well about how to live your dreams. bigger. And you're going to be helping kids who are struggling with cancer with the proceeds from this book. So go get it right now on Amazon or Barnes & Noble or wherever you get your books. I want to acknowledge you, Mark, for an incredible journey that you've lived, but one that you're going to continue to be living for a long time. And I acknowledge you for having so much joy in your life and giving back as much as you do, because a lot of people who Could be a millionaire, a billionaire, could just make it about them. They could just buy all the fun toys and the gadgets and have more and more and more and have more status and not be as generous as you are. So I want to acknowledge you for your generosity and your playful childlike heart. Because I really think people lose the ability to dream as adults and they forget how to be like childlike energy when they are adults. and I acknowledge you for that. And I think that's one of the reasons why you are so successful externally is because internally you have childlike spirit and energy. And it's a beautiful thing to witness. And I acknowledge you for the consistency of showing up for you, your family, your friends, and your community your entire life. It's a beautiful thing to watch. And hopefully I'll get to come down to the ranch or the island or the moon, whatever you buy next, whatever your dream is to buy next. and and come down and ride some horses or do some fun stuff with you sometime. This is a question I ask everyone at the end. It's called the three truths. So imagine a hypothetical scenario. You get to live as long as you want to live on this earth.

Okay.

Many years in the future. But it's the last day for you. And you get to accomplish all of your wildest dreams. They all come true. Anything you dream and then redream and redream. It's all comes true.

Okay.

But for whatever reason on this hypothetical scenario on your last day, you have to take all of your message, your content, this book, this interview, it all has to go somewhere else. So no one, when you leave this earth, no one has access to your content.

Ooh.

So just hypothetically, let's just imagine they don't have this book, they don't have any video online of you, you know, we just don't have your content. But on the final day, you get to leave a message to the world that we do get to keep. and it's the three lessons that you have. And this is all we would get to keep from you.

Okay.

What would be those three truths for you?

I'd say, hey, there really is a heaven. So have faith. Because I think some people think they don't have to worry about that. I would say have faith. God's real. Make sure that you have a belief there. Two is Laugh more. The world was serious enough. Let's laugh. And you were born to dream. So dream, baby dream. You know, to me, that's, I want to scare myself some of the dreams. If it's to get cancer free for all pediatric kids, let's do it. Let's find the cures, whatever it is. So I would say just dream big.

That's big. Yeah, that's beautiful. And Mark, final question for you. What's your definition greatness.

I think greatness is when you, whatever your talent is, you've gotten the most out of it you can get. I think greatness comes in all shapes and forms and your greatness is probably different than my greatness, but I think greatness is whatever skills, whatever you were made for, you've gotten the most. I think that you go, I watch, you know, what games do I enjoy watching? When, man, those guys are exhausted at the end and they're high five and one team won, but they're exhausted because they left it all out there. I think greatness is someone's on the court and has laid it all out there and they got nothing left because they put it all out there. That's greatness.

There you go. Mark, appreciate you being here, man.

Thank you.

Powerful. Thank you so much for watching this video. I hope you enjoyed it and let me know in the comments below your biggest takeaway. If you haven't subscribed to this channel, make sure to click the subscribe button right now, like this video. And also, if you're looking to create more financial freedom and live an abundant life, then make sure to get the new book, Make Money Easy Right Now. The link is below. Go right to Amazon, get your copy, and I can't wait to see you in the next interview. What I didn't realize at the time.

Was I was looking for external things.

To make me better. It took me a long time to.

Realize.

I can't take external things to.

Make me better until I become better.