0181: Success or Significance? [Part II] with Vincent Rush

Ea interviews episode 181. Inspiration, Transformation, Success Stories and the Imperfect Action Round. Seven days a week. Join Mario Ficcini for today's Expert Authority Effect interview. Alright, Expert Authority World, I hope you enjoyed part one as much as I did. And if you didn't know there's a part one, there is. I advise listening to that first. But let's jump right into it. Here's part two with Vincent Rush.

We never wanted kids. Now we've got two wonderful kids that are very empathetic individuals, very caring and compassionate kids. Never given us an ounce of trouble, never even have been so much as even had a speeding ticket. I mean, they're just incredibly good kids and they're gonna go out and make impacts on the world on their own. Because, you know, we were talking a little bit earlier about the state of our, you know, our, you know, race relations in our country as they exist today. You know, I think our, the foundation is really what we need to focus on. That foundation begins at home. You know, I've said this before, I don't believe we have a problem with racism in our country. I believe we have a spiritual problem. And when we take care of the foundation, because racism is hateful. Racism is a spirit of hate. It's a spirit of evil. It comes from an evil place, okay? And so we can make a difference in the mothers and fathers and we can bring families together and make a positive impact and we can get, when mom and dad stay together, that little child doesn't grow up dragging baggage through his life with him. But this was all my fault somehow. Because even even though we tried to tell the kids that they still drag that 50 pound weight with them all through life thinking, if I'd been a better kid, this wouldn't have happened. Because that's the spiritual bully that starts poking them with that fiery little dart into the subconscious. But when we can actually teach kids to love themselves and be proud of who they are and feel good about themselves, guess what they do in turn? They feel good about other people. They treat other people kindly. And that's the way we end up solving a lot of our world's problems one person at a time, you know, and the impact that we make. So Mario, what you were saying about what you do, hundreds and hundreds of shows now, the way I look at it is that you're being prepped and you're in training and you're going everything, every step you take, every video you do, every book that you write, every little speech that you give and talk To a group, it puts you one notch closer to what God's ultimately got called for your life, for what you're actually called, designed to do. And 10 years from now, when you're standing on stage in front of 15,000 people who all paid a couple hundred dollars to come hear you talk, you'll think again. That's why I had to go through all those struggles. That's why I had to go through those people laughing at me. That's why I had to go through the negativity. That's why. Because it made me stronger and made me tougher and it built character on the inside. So you're on the right track. You're very much on the right track. The books that you've written, the places that you've talked, I know you were probably kind of nervous about it when you began. Am I right?

Very much so. And every step of the way. But I always think back to the. Even in high school, the people that I just talked to that I helped, just one on one, maybe at the locker. And then that gave me the energy to, you know, talk to a bigger group. And then it was a small room, then it was a larger room, then it was this. And I was freaking out of my mind even before I started this show. And the truth is, I had done 3,000 plus videos, live streams, you know, Facebook, whatever. And.

People kept saying, I love I. Sorry I couldn't make your event. Sorry I couldn't make your thing. I love your show. And I'm like, I don't have a show, I don't have an event. I. I was always promoting everyone else's until I had my own. And I was like, oh my gosh, I've been doing this for eight years. I just never claimed it, if you will. And God gave me the vision for this. August of 2018, right after dad passed. And I was thinking, what am I going to do with the rest of my life? Because I plan on living over 100 also. And I was like, I got act one. We're going to count this as act one. Act two is starting, and you know, act three. And I go, what am I going to do? So it wasn't the second half of my life, but act two was starting. And I go, there was someone at church and on eainterviews.com about, I have the video of the church. You can actually see me in the first row. But he was talking about, are you honoring God in your work? And I was like, mostly kinda, no, not really. And you know, if you, if you get honest with yourself, it's amazing. And I was just thinking, what am I. I just felt so depressed, so sad. So whatever you want to call it, Lost Dad. And I'm like, what am I gonna do? And I thought about it and I go, I've always loved helping people, even in school, speaking, video design, everything. And I started thinking about all the pieces, you know, and I go, oh, my gosh, I need to start the show. And I called. I called my first guest back, and it was interesting because the first guest I ever had on the show, I made a list. And like, I said, you were in the original list. And I was like, if this ever happens, wow. You know, I'm just dream building. And I put a list together of 405 people, so that way.

I didn't need to think about booking people every week. I just made a list. I go, this will get me through the first year. And the Tony who was episode one, someone had me on their radio show. And I put. Sent out an email that was like, if you want to call in and ask questions again. He thought I was bringing guests on my show. I go, I apologize. I must have written it the wrong way. When I have a show, you'll be the first. And it was about nine months later, September 11th of 2018. I called him because I wanted to anchor the day in something positive for us here in the US And I called them, and he's like, hey, how's it going? I go, guess what? He goes, you're kidding me. And I'm like, I'd love to have you on. And we filmed like two days later. And as they say, the rest is history. But that's all, you know, I still.

I tell people all the time, let go and let God. Because, yeah, I had no clue what I was doing. I had never done a show before.

So what?

Well. Well, you know, you say a good. Good point. I just had this conversation with somebody the other day about following our spirits. You know, the spirits functions within our souls. And the guy asked me, well, how's that work? I said, well, I said, look, I said, you know, I heard the term, like, don't let God many years ago or turn it over. You know, I know. I know what that meant because I was a heathen. You know, when I started coming around these people, I had no clue what that meant. But what I've come to learn. And I'll tell you a simple little story to illustrate. My son is an it kid, and he loves video production and design. That's what he studied in college. And, and so. But he was always a steam job fan. And of course we all know what Steve Jobs has contributed to society. The other part that we seem to know now that all these videos and books and biographies have come out, is that he was really a pretty crappy human being. Okay. He's like, he never treated people nice, stabbed people in the back. He took advantage of everybody could take advantage of. And nobody really ever has a whole lot of good to say about Steve Jobs other than he was great at giving a speech.

But I wanted my son to read Steve Jobs book. And I said, when you read it, I want you to tell me what his greatest gift and talent was. I said, and come back to me when you've read the biography. So he comes back to me about a month or so later because, okay, I think I know it was a trick question. He was never going to get it. So he says, well, he was great with infrastructure. Nope. He had good vision. Nope. All leaders, great leaders have vision he was good at. So finally he gets. Okay, I give up. What was it I said? He had the ability to follow his unctions without getting caught in analysis? Paralysis. When he got an unction to do something, he immediately acted upon it. Now we don't know how many ones he failed at. Our world was changed because of the ones he succeeded.

And Mario, here's my way of thinking is that you and I both were both people of faith is that God is going to get accomplished what he wants to get accomplished in this world through men and women of faith. He doesn't say specifically anywhere in his word that it's only for born again Christians who are putting money in the tithe plate. It's men and women of faith. See, there's so many wonderful, wonderful people that God would have rather gave that unction to. In fact, he probably did, but it just. Oh, it's too big. That's too scary. I can never do that. Okay, Fear, right? Fear of the bully, the spiritual bully. Okay, now you're not capable anything like that. There's plenty of great IT people that are born again Christians that serve their church and God would have loved to channel all that through, but unfortunately many of them are like I used to be their pew potatoes or part of the frozen chosen. Okay.

They'Re great pew potatoes.

Pew potatoes are the frozen chosen. Okay. They just won't take action. Okay? So because, okay, I'm going to make this happen. Now we look because of this little thing called a smartphone. Okay. You realize the Gospel can hit all four corners of the earth in a moment's notice. That you can look up the scripture in any language in a moment's notice, you know how important that is. And the whole big picture of things, the way that the word goes, everybody, the word, the gospel, is heard by every person in the world. So. And it helps us connect with people, you know. Now granted, it's also a. Opens gateways to a lot of bad, depending on the person that uses it. Okay. It's where your heart is. Okay. You can look at a lot of stuff you shouldn't look at this. My big thing with my kids and I'm always kind of want to make sure they're looking at the wrong stuff. So dad has a watchful eye. Okay. But you know, because guys like, I remember they. One of the movies I saw with Steve Jobs and he's had. At the end of the movie, he's having an argument with his daughter and they're in a parking garage and Steve Jobs is supposed to be getting on stage to give a talk by him. His daughter getting into this fight, this argument, and he goes out and he talks with her. She's basically. She's telling what a crappy dad he is. And he said, but I gave you guys all the money. I gave you. I'm giving you so much. Because ain't it, dad. Because I wanted you to be present. I didn't want your presence. I wanted you to be present. That was basically just the conversation. And Maro, you've probably seen the movie where he says he just looks at her. He's not even paying attention to her. He's like looking at the thing called a Walkman that was on her belt. He goes, I'm gonna put a thousand songs in your pocket. She goes, what? He says, why are we carrying around old technology like that? And that was the inspiration for the smartphone. I don't know if that's exactly. There's a great part of the movie.

But still, at what cost? I mean, she's baring her soul and saying, I just want you present. And he's still zoning out at that point.

We know. We know. Absolutely. I'm on the same page with you. Lousy, lousy father. Lousy human being. Okay, but because he acted upon his unctions.

But thanks for saving us from cassettes.

Like, yeah, yeah, you're a young buck, man. You're a kid, man. I grew up through eight track tapes.

I'm familiar with those. I remember some of my first boat rides. They had eight tracks in Them. And I even got cassettes. You want to know something crazy?

Yeah. Why?

I used to ask for cassettes for gifts because I would watch shows and make commentary on them.

Really.

And I think I still have some around. I'm considering releasing them as some special episodes or something. But have you ever heard of In Living Color?

Oh, yeah.

I had a microphone thing and would comment on that and other shows and just be like.

Yeah. So lot of famous people came out that show. Jim Carrey, that was his first show. He was mainframe. Now he's fired. Marshall Bill.

Yeah. JLo was one of the dancers. And.

Jamie Foxx, he had his own show in the early. It's interesting. So when I look at successful people like yourself, it's like it doesn't matter where you start. So many of them. It just, you can start off here and you know, the overnight success of let's Take celebrities and movie stars, you know, oh my gosh, look at their breakout career. Yeah. Well, go to IMDb and look at the 18 other movies over 16 years they were in before you recognized them.

Yeah, most, most overnight Success stories are 10 years in the making.

That's that.

That's it. Well, miss that train.

Yeah. Malcolm Gladwell's, you know, the outliers, 10,000 hours. You know, if you ever read that book, most greatness is achieved with 10,000 dedicated, focused hours on that craft. So with what you're doing now, Mario, I promise you, you're so much on the right track that one day you're going to find yourself standing on a big stage where people paid incredible amounts to come hear you talk and share. And you know what's really interesting is going back to why I started telling that story about following the unctions is when our spirit moves us to sow into somebody or call into somebody or that gives us an opportunity to have an experience. The one that grows the most from it is us. Because I find that, you know, like a five gallon bucket of water, Mario, if you fill it up to the top and you take a big thirsty sponge and you stick it down in a bucket and you squeeze and you soak up as much water as you can, eventually it doesn't hold any more water. You've got to pull that sucker out, you've got to wring that sponge out dry so you can soak up more. And I believe that God gives us opportunities to serve people and give to people because when we wring out our personal sponge, it creates capacity so he can actually pour more of his goodness in there as he directs us along the path of the journey of what he wants us to ultimately become. And as long as we're living in pursuit, moving forward and trying to do our best to reach out and help other people, to make a difference to people, to create extraordinary experiences in the interactions that we have with each individual that God puts in our pathway, I believe. And here's the other thing too, that Kevin Brown says in the Hero Effect. Heroes help. Hero being an acronym. Heroes help people the age help people with no contractual obligations. They help people unconditionally. You know, he says the E is they create exceptional experiences for every individual that they serve and give to in the here and now. Because as I said, if we don't master the here and now, God never trusts us with the next. You know? You know, and the R.

Is, oh, holy moly. I just forgot what the R.

I just totally forgot what the R was. So I know O was for optimism.

So anyway, it'll come back to you got a good brain.

Yeah. Later on I'll come back to it. What was it? What was the R? That's totally for you, whatever. But they accept responsibility. Everything good and bad in our life that happens is our responsibility. You know, if we find ourselves in bad situations, we meet bad deals or we screwed up relationships, it's our responsibility. You know, heroes accept responsibility for their circumstances in life. They don't blame external circumstances, socioeconomic upbringings, because every excuse that you have for not being where you want to be in life, there's an example, somebody that's overcame exactly the same experience, if not only even worse, you know. So.

Let me ask you this. So always have a servant's heart. Heroes always are looking to help people without contractual obligation. How have you found as you've progressed on and you know, one of my favorite times was starting off a business or another business or a division or whatever. Like when I started the show, it's like that brand new phase where it's like, hey, nothing can go wrong because nothing's established. You know, that's startup. It's fun. But how have you found to move past that where you want to serve everyone, but you're also aware of your own time and you're not doing stuff you shouldn't be doing or wasting your time doing, but still might be in of service.

Does that make sense? I'm trying to articulate best I can, but basically, how do you still say in service as you grow, but you're not wasting your own time, but you're not just like, oh, I'M too big for this, basically.

Yeah, yeah, it's really good because there was a point in time where I was like that, where I was kind of getting high on my own supply, so to speak.

Scarface. Nice.

Yeah, Scarface. Right. But I was really, because, as you know, the nature of our business is a breeding ground for egos. And of course, as we know, from, from a spiritual standpoint, prime ego or the beginning of a downfall of any, you know, team, organization, individual. Everything that goes bad is because of pride. That's where that's the root cause of it and where it starts. But so, yeah, I went through a phase like that where everybody was giving me a lot of accolades and praise because of the nature of our business. And I was getting a little full on myself. And, you know, and that's where I really kind of lost focus, my true north, so to speak. You know, my compass started spinning around like crazy rather than having one. Laser focus. Now, the other thing, Mario, is that you may or may not know about me is I'm not clinically diagnosed, but I know I have a little bit of add. Okay, because in the personality books, you have the sanguines, the melancholies, the phlegmatics and the cholerics. Cholerics. If you look at animals, clerics are like German shepherds. They are focused on one job and one job only. That's protect the family. Okay? They don't make a lot of jokes. They just. They're very taskmastered. They're very matter of fact engineers, make great or great cholerics. Me, on the other hand, I'm kind of a sanguine personality, which means that I get easily distracted. So sanguines are kind of the cats of humans, you know, because we can be distracted by a shiny ball. You know, we're all sudden, we're over here, you know, we're looking at something totally different. You know, what I've become is I've developed self awareness over the years, and I've learned to forgive myself and not compare myself to other individuals who I admire the powerful clerics in them. You know, God's got me where he wants me. He's directing my path the way he wants to direct it. So I've learned to relax with it and let go. Okay, Maybe that comes with age, a little bit of emotional maturity. You know, I said the other day, I was talking somewhere and I. I said, you know, I'm in, you know, late 50s now. I say, you know, when I was in my twenties, our perspective changes when I was in my twenties.

Impressed with ladies. You know, about the car I drove, about how big my muscles were. I always bought my shirts a size too small. That was, you know, that. That was the way I was in my 20s. In my 30s, it's about impressing all the guys I went to school with how successful I was becoming. Okay, that's because you want to be a big shot. You know, that's so. It's. 20s is about personal ladies. 30s is about impressing your old high school friends and the people you grew up with. In your 40s, you get a little bit more settled. It's about impressing your family about what a great provider you are. You know, impressing your kids with the vacations you can take them on. You know, being a provider, that's what your focus becomes. Now in my 50s, it's about impressing my proctologist. You know, if he gives me a good, good examination, gives me a thumbs up, I'm good, man. That's all I care about now is just being in good health. So your perspective changes.

That's hilarious. But I appreciate the perspective on it, and I think you had a little segue into that joke a little bit. But.

See, add I totally forgot.

Okay.

I think there was. I got distracted by the shiny ball.

But it's great to know the focus.

Of trying to tell my.

It's great to know the perspective on that, because.

If you don't know what you're really going for or the reason.

What'S the point of doing it? Or if you're going for the wrong thing and you're unaware. I mean, that. I think it was Jeff that said, it's not what you don't know that'll hurt you, but what you. It's not what you don't know that will hurt you, but what you believe to be true and is false.

That's absolutely right. And once again, that's learning. You know, being smart enough to learn how to listen to or what to listen to or who to listen to. I was like your question earlier about that, you know, staying focused on one thing at a time. Yeah. I am not the type of individual that I can stay laser locked, you know, forever, but because I do have self awareness, I make up as much I can when I'm in that season, being really locked in versus when I'm distracted by something. And I realized, fortunately, hopefully I've created enough of a mess that needs my attention. So it kind of forces me to stay focused. You know, it's like my wife and I were having kids and our teams were starting to form up. You know, I knew I had nine months to put another team of people in that needed my wife's attention because when that baby came, she was gonna. That that was going to consume her world. I had to create an environment for her to be actively engaged in our business because there were ladies who needed her and she felt a sense of responsibility to that. So during those times that I'm not as focused, I'm still very focused on serving people because I realized that the moment I take my eyes off of giving to the individuals and spending time with the ones that need my time, you know, at that point in time, I start to. My self esteem starts to atrophy, okay? Because I'm creating capacity every day that I pour into somebody so God can pour a little bit more of himself in there. You know, here's my take is, you know what? Because we're in a people business when it comes to that, everybody deserves our love. Not everybody deserves our time. And so you can love people without giving them a lot of time. Mario, you know that, you know, there was a term that we came up with you years ago called, and I'm going to say very carefully, so I'm not misquoted, a term we came up with called ask A S K ask holes. Okay? These were the people that constantly kept coming to us every three to four months wanting our advice, wanting our WIC council, wanting our, you know, game plan. And you look back and they never take any of your advice in the previous game plans or previous counsel and stuff. They just wanted to actually spend time around you. So one of the things that I've done, you know, too, is, is I, when I do have that free time and I'm driving back from somewhere, maybe I'm coming back from Michigan, you know, and all sudden they get the unction to give Bobby a call. Well, I'll just pick up the phone. And most times it goes straight to voicemail. But it gives me a chance to say, hey, Bobby, this event's just thinking about you, buddy. Hope you're doing well, you know, because Oprah Winfrey in her career interviewed over 37,000 people. And when she was done, she retired from her show. Larry King interviewed her. And you know, Larry King is hunched over on the, you know, at the TV because Oprah, because 37,000 people, he goes, did they all share anything in common? Noper says, absolutely. She goes, at the end of every interview, when they took their microphones off, they all asked the same Question, how did I do? Because they sought validation.

People seek validation. They want to know you listen to them. They want to know that you care about them. They want to know that they matter and that they're important. If we go back to what we were talking about earlier, about the state of our world today and the way it is, we live in the greatest country on earth. I've been all over the world, I know this is the greatest country on earth. We have unlimited opportunity to be whatever we want to be in this world. We may have to work harder to overcome certain circumstances, but it's a free pathway, at least currently in the state of our affairs. Hopefully it stays that way.

We have the ability to compete. We have the ability to overcome ourselves, you know, to leave our past behind and shed our baggage. Okay? We don't have to drag the very worst of our lives into all the relationships that we encounter throughout the rest of our lives. We have unlimited opportunity. Okay? So it's a great country, it's great opportunity. You are what you want to make of it. Okay? So when we encounter people, when we see people, if we can get people to feel better about themselves and each of us can be ambassadors for what God's called us to do, he'll take care of all the rest, Mario. He'll move all the other chess pieces on the board for you.

You know a little bit more about my story. Every person, every leader in my organization that became great, I haven't had to do much work for but their rewards for my cheerful. Because God searches for a cheerful giver. That's what he looks for. And we don't just. He's not just talking about only tithing your money, be cheerful giver, tithe your time, tithe your love, tithe your service to other individuals. I know you do things for people because you're a giver. I know you do things for people with. Nobody ever knows, nobody ever sees it and stuff. And why has God blessed you and you know, as the way he has because you're one of his people. Like I said earlier, you're not a pew potato.

You're frontline warrior, okay? Out there making a difference. And so that's just my simple minded philosophy on life. And you know, that that's, that's why I'm happy at 57 and I'm not, you know, growing a ponytail, getting a Mazda Miata and looking for some girl that's 30 years old to replace my wife, you know, because I feel good about who I am already.

Well, that's Not a simple minded take on it. It might be a simple explanation, but that was very deep and very much needed. I know Expert Authority World is, it's resonating and it's a great way for me to go into and ask you the next question before we go to the second half. And I call this the Wheel of Whatever.

It always stops where I need it to and it's always landing on the right corner.

I wondered, I wondered what that was because I saw that on one of your other videos, but I couldn't get any sound like, what the heck is that?

If you want the truth, it's a hamster wheel that I painted. There's actually two episodes that I was painting it on, but I got.

No, go ahead, you figured.

I figured as much because I also saw one of your early videos where he explained where your microphone swag. It comes from.

Oh well, this one's a real one now, but yeah, that. Start where you are, you know, it's. Why name the second half? The imperfect action round. Too many. You know, I don't let my clients off the hook either. They're like, well, buh, buh, buh, buh. I'm like, you started off about a hundred times better than I did and you're asking me for the advice on this? Trust me, you're gonna be fine. Don't, don't worry about the details. But I created this as a fun little whatever. And sometimes I interject some lightheartedness if it needs it. And sometimes I, if someone's very light hearted the whole time, I might inject. You know, there's been many episodes I was like, so moon landing, true or false? And it's just like whatever, you know, most of them I make up on the fly. I do have about a dozen written out, but I came up with a custom one for you and, and like I said, it always ends up where it needs to. I need to stand for it. It's in work in progress. But with talking about the world, the state of affairs where everyone's at people's hearts and how God is getting taken out of everything. Unfortunately.

If we were to put God back in the schools and people were to go back to 50, 100 years ago when. No, even longer than that. Like when the country was founded. If.

If we went back to a society that trusted God, that stopped the hate, stopped all this other stuff, how many years do you think it would take to turn the US and essentially the world around?

Well, that's such a, that's such a deep question. Man, that is so good, man. You put some thought into that.

First of all, let me say, okay, yeah, you bet, man. Let's pretend that we go back to that hundred years. Well, let's go back to that hundred years. Look, with the disclaimer on there. Let's go back to that hundred years without all the bad that we had in the hundred years. Because we're also quantifying this by saying we're God focused, okay? And, you know, because now it's at the forefront of the movements that we're going through right now. We're going back and we're really, really talking about slavery and all those type of things, which was, which was bad. You know, I, you know, I didn't have a relative owned slaves. And, you know, I mean, I'm pretty much white trash background, you know, my whole life, you know, that's where I came up from. You know, where I grew up. When I did something dumb, my dad would look at his friends and he'd say that white trash never falls far from the dumpster. And they will all just shake their head, you know, so, So, I mean, so. But going back through our heritage, we were all poor and broke and, you know, nobody hanging, but. So let's go back 100 years and eliminate that part. Okay? You know, I think you're still looking at a shift that would take a few years. I mean, you know, in God's time, if you. First of all, we're acknowledging that, number one, you believe in God, okay? So if you believe in God, you automatically believe in God's word because one doesn't exist without the.

Okay, so I believe in God, but I also understand some people don't. Okay? So, but we're talking strictly believer to believer, okay? So heart to heart here. So in God's word, he says, in God's time, a day is as a year, a year is as a day, or a thousand years is as a day is as a thousand years. So in his time frame, it's hard to say, but it would definitely make things better, you know, because you look at the abortions that take place now, before, since God's been out of society, you look at the split families. You know, Mario, one of the things I face now, and I think one of the reasons I'm much softer than I used to be with people, is because I realized that most of the young men that come into my business or I'm introduced to, it's a 67% chance that they grew up in a split family home. Okay? I Was blessed. And you were blessed to grow up where mom and dad were home. And dad taught us values and taught us principles and, you know, basically taught us how to treat people and taught us what respect means. And, you know, so we need to get, like I said, we need to get a lot of what, just basic goodness in the people back. And like I said, I believe God is the foundation of that.

You know, to shift that whole thing where men stay with their wives and, you know, now granted, there are certain circumstances that are, you know, you know, if that husband is abusing the woman and being. Okay, totally different story. Okay. We're just talking. Okay? But, you know, because that happened too, back then, and women didn't talk about it. Okay. Got a fear. Okay. But, yeah, I think if we brought God, we. If I think we brought the. Into the current.

I think that would be a good start. But who knows? We may be so far gone now. But, you know, here's our thing. Nothing surprises God. He already knows how this whole thing's supposed to work. You know, he already knows the story. He already knows the ending of the book. And this is all part of, you know, and so that's why I said, you know, we're not, you know, we're not living with COVID PTSD right now. You know, we're not all hunkered down and, you know, you know, refusing to go to stores and wearing hats, hazmat suits. And now we're, you know, we're healthy. We've got good immune systems up here and good immune systems in here. So, you know, I'm just. God's in control. He already knows the date that I'm supposed to, you know, go be with him. So. So anyway, that's, That's. That's probably not totally the answer you were looking for, but that's just my take on it because like I said, you were. You were deeper than my thought process went with that question.

Well, I did appreciate the answer, and I do like it because it is God's timing. And I just thought it would be fun to think about turning everything around for the better and in everyone's best interest. Because I found. And maybe this is me projecting.

I always want everything now. I love my ambition, but sometimes it's like that whole patience side, it's like, just chill out a little bit, you know, and that's what I've been practicing more and more and more, but at the same time, it's. You have to realize things aren't going to happen in seven days or 14 or 20. I mean, maybe wrapping a gift, maybe getting the mail or something. But when you're talking about helping a person, you know, change their thought process, or let alone a city, country or society, you know, let alone the world.

Yeah, it might take a couple of months. So just.

You can't turn an aircraft carrier around on a dime. It takes miles to turn AN aircraft carrier 180 degrees. So imagine how long it takes to turn an entire nation and culture that's been programmed. You know, when I would travel overseas, people would ask, you know what? Why do certain nationalities or certain religions hate America so much? I said, it's not because they were born that way. It's because they've been programmed that way. And if you're a little child, the only thing you've ever had written on your hard drive is, that's evil, that's bad, then that becomes your reality, that becomes your truth.

You know, I just happened a conversation with one of my guys recently. We're about talking. Talking about the issue with racism. And I already told you how I feel about that. I believe it's a spiritual problem, But I think some of the worst racism that we can.

That we can project is those parents that teach their kids, hey, you know, welcome to the world. Let me just tell you, it's all stacked against you because of the color of your skin. So sorry, it just ain't. Just ain't gonna be able to make it because of the way we are. That kid grows up being better and thinking that, you know, well, the whole world stacked against me. So that guy, that kid grows up rebellious in some cases, and angry, you know, suspicious of everybody that tries to reach out a hand. On the other hand, other parents raise their kids. They can be whatever you want to be. It's the world's unlimited. Go get it. And, you know, I work with a lot of those. Those guys that are high achievers.

See, and that's the cool thing about the mind is everyone has the same brain, and you can program it to do whatever you want. You know, even if you did grow up that way, I love talking to people that have turned it around. And, you know, I didn't grow up that way, but like I said, I got picked on and bullied till ninth grade. I mean, I could have just not been like, hey, how can I improve myself? But just been like, oh, this is where I'm at. You know, I'm kind of not the best, but I'm not the worst. I'm just kind of here. I mean, that's that's, I think that's a personal hell is when you're stuck in mediocrity, you know, kind of in the middle.

Of different things.

Oh yeah. You know, I said earlier, apathy is mediocrity's weapon of choice, you know. So what's the definition of apathy? Just, this is the way things are. Yes, I'm fine. I'm comfortable.

You know, it reminds me of the, reminds me of this joke. It's like, what's the difference between apathy and ignorance? And it's like, I don't know and I don't care.

That's a good one. Yeah, absolutely.

Well, I'm thoroughly enjoying this. We're going to thank our sponsor and come back for the second half with the imperfect action round. Invest automatically, save for later and spend today. That's why I love Acorns. I used to think spare change didn't make a difference and saving and investing was an old fashioned manual process. It's not and it's a game changer. If you're not leveraging compounding interest in your business and life automatically, you're missing out. Acorns not only makes saving and investing easy and automatic, it makes it even more valuable. By investing with diversified portfolios, spare change, extra cash and rounding up everyday transactions. You can even set recurring monthly investments in the amount you desire to make good. Great. There is also a debit card option that will continue to help you save and invest even further when you spend plus no minimum balance and overdraft fees. Now for the cherry on top. They have partnered with 250 plus companies and brands and growing with their found money program to invest back a percentage into your account with the everyday purchases when you shop, two of which you're probably listening to this right now through an Amazon or Apple device. Get started profiting from your everyday life and business simply and easily today@eainterviews.com Acorns Once again, that's eainterviews.com Acorns and we are back with the imperfect action round. Vince, are you ready to take imperfect action?

All right, let's, let's do it. Hey, I got one question to ask you before you do though.

What's that?

Okay, well, you know, I apologize if I offended you by talking about not wearing a mask and all that because you know, I see that, you know, you've got your mask on and you know, so, so hey, it's.

Where's that even from? I know which one you're talking about, but holy Smokes.

That is hilarious.

And I wanted to touch on the whole, you know, we're on the second half, but the truth is it's closer to 90 to 95%. And here's one thing I love about business and life. You can do what you want, doesn't matter what age you are. Because I've done hundreds of these and none is actually 50% in. I just let it roll. And this is the imperfect action round. 60 second rapid fire answers. The first one is what is the fastest path to the cash.

Fastest path to the cache?

Pursue excellence. Let the cash follow you and chase you down.

Excellent. Number two, what is the biggest problem you see your prospects making and the fastest way for them to fix it?

Listening to influences like taking swimming lessons from drowning people. Listening to people. I have no concern if the people you're listening to are not going to pay your bills, if you lose your job and you're unable to perform, if you get injured at work and they won't come in to take care of your wife and pay for the car payments stuff, then appreciate their advice, but don't listen to them. Find somebody in life who's where you somebody who's in life where you want to be and learn to actually develop a mentor protege relationship. Good mentors will not make you do anything. They will not tell you what you have to do, but they'll give you perspective. And if you can walk through the minefield after somebody rather than being the first guy through it, you have a much better chance of surviving this game of life.

Excellent. Love that. Number three, what is the best way to maximize customer lifetime value?

This is one we've been focused on ever since this whole quarantine lockdown. So when I basically talked to my teams and we basically called a play, we said, look, there's going to be those of you that come out of this with the quarantine sheen or you come out with COVID ptsd. What you do with this opportunity, Reach out to your customers, see how they're doing. People don't want to be served or sold, but they want to be served. Check with people, check in on them out of sincerity. Nothing unites a country, a team, an organization, a family, like a common enemy. And this Covid was the common enemy. So it's not unusual to reach out to people, check on their well being, check on lost customers, customers that used to do business with you but don't do business with you now. Just, hey, I'm just thinking about you, man. Just want to know how you and the family are holding up on this. You guys need anything? Then the last one. Check on those customers that never became actual customers. In other words, the lost opportunities. Mike Tyson, he got out of prison 1995, resigned with promoter Don King. Jim Gray interviewed him. And Don King had stolen millions from him before he went to prison. And Jim Gray said, mike, why did you re sign with Don King?

Mike Tyson said, when I was in prison, I had nothing, nothing to offer anybody. The only person that came to see me was Don King. When you invest emotional equity into people, the dividend is in relational currency. And that's customers, that's family, that's individuals. People appreciate being appreciated.

And you're saying I was going deep.

I get a good one every now and then.

That's phenomenal. You mentioned a few already. But I want to ask you what books have made the biggest impact on your life?

Well, that's easy. You and I share a common theme in some of these books. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. One of the first books my mentor ever gave to me. Probably read it 10 times over the last 30 years. I get something different every time I read a book because I'm at a different place mentally than I was before. So that's one of the books. Hacking Leadership by Mike Myatt, who's a Forbes syndicated columnist. One of the best leadership books I've ever read. And Mario, you and I both read all John Maxwell books. In fact, the last John Maxwell book I read was 21 irrefutable ways that this book sounds like all my other books. So. But I love John Maxwell, so we've had him in to speak to our groups. Great guy, enjoyed his books. But Hacking Leadership was a fresh take on leadership, the modern day individuals. It was really phenomenal. I probably plagiarize it accidentally many times because I probably read it two or three times. I took notes on the whole book. I filled up a comp book on notes on that particular book, Hacking Leadership. The other book, another book was His Needs, Her Needs. How to Building a fair proof marriage. 10 years at 35. I had read every leadership book that you could possibly read. The books I never read were My Men Were Marriage books. And I was stuck at a plateau and I couldn't get over the plateau. And I was just like, ugh. You know. And finally I started reading marriage books. And that book totally opened my eyes to how I was. I was not giving my wife the exact type of fuel to make her tank run that made my bank run. And because opposites attract, because we're attracted to the strengths that we recognize subconsciously as weaknesses in us. Vice versa. But our love languages are different and we express our love languages different.

I was just thinking of that one. To the five love languages.

Five love languages. Yeah. That was incredible book. Last two books. Out of 35 years or 30 years, 20. Since I was 25, I read three books a month. Okay, let me grab real quick.

So this book right here by Travis Bradbury, Emotional Intelligence 2.0, was a game changer in my life. I was flying to San Francisco two years ago because I started a new client out there and I left my book home. I'd seen this guy advertise his book on LinkedIn a few times and some of his quotes were on there. And so I picked it up and I saw wasn't really a hard book to read. So I picked up the book, read the whole thing on the flight to San Francisco with a highlighter. Came back from San Francisco a few days later and I got through about half of it before I fell asleep. This book totally caused me to change the way I relate to people in the way I understand people. Once I understand how people are wired the way they are and why they act the way they do and stuff, I understood. And Mario, here's the thing you'll love about this book. My IQ is maybe, I don't know, I didn't never measure it, but I'm not average. Maybe a hundred. I know what average is. I'm average. But you know, a guy that started me in business, Alegar, his IQ is up around like 160, 180. I mean he was studying a neurosurgeon at the time that he started his own business. So he's way up there. He was magna cum laude at Ohio State. I was a 4.0 student at a junior college. Okay. I learned that IQ is not something you can adjust. You either have or you don't. But emotional intelligence, eq, you can develop it. And the people that have the greatest success, that seem to do the least, have brilliant EQs. EQ becomes more important to your long term success. Understanding relationships. And it's the ability to be able to navigate the changing currents of personalities in a company and an organization and be able to inject empathy in every relationship. That's the definition of eq.

It sounds like the social acuity and situational awareness.

Situational awareness too. And the last book I mentioned, these are my top five, right. Was Hero Effect by Kevin Brown. Okay. Unbelievable book you get on Amazon. You know, it's it's just I can't go. I can't say enough about how much this book totally changed my life and my business. Since last March, we injected this book into our organizations immediately. And that's why over the last four months, we've had the record growth that we've had in 18 years in the midst of a plandemic. We've had record growth in our business and stuff because people got this and we're in a business of relationships and all sales is relationships, so.

And I see you got the shirt there too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I got that. Kevin's shirt. Like I said, I've given away 30 of his books. So my reward was he sent me a free T shirt.

The world needs more heroes. No, the world needs your hero.

That's exactly right. In other words, and Kevin will say it, suicide. I don't mean to steal his thought and steal his thought, but at some point in time in our lives, when we were little kids, we believed we could fly. We believe we were Superman.

I still do.

Yeah. But as kids, remember, as kids, as kids, we dressed up like our favorite superheroes. Now, nobody dressed up like Aquaman because what the heck are you going to do as Aquaman? Walk around with your mom's spatula? You know, so it's really. Nobody wanted to be Aquaman, but everybody either wanted to be Batman and every kid wanted to be Superman. At some point in time, we fashioned a cape around our neck and we started jumping off stairs. For me, it was my mom and dad's red satin bed sheet that I pulled off of the bed. Okay, that told a story all of its own. But that was as I was wearing that around the neighborhood, my mom caught me running around their bedsheet, you know, and it told tales that shouldn't be told in the trailer park. But I was basically grounded instead. You can't fly anymore, okay? And I think they burned Superman's cape at that point. But nonetheless, if you could go back and have a conversation with that 8 year old version of yourself, the question I would ask him is, when did you forget you could fly? When did you forget you were created as a superhero?

Clark Kent's greatest kryptonite was. He chose to be Clark Kent more than he chose to be Superman.

Our kryptonite is our insecurities.

Fear of what other people think. Fear of, you know, people are gonna laugh at us. Mistakes of the past, shame of the past. And so that's. Our kryptonite is our insecurities. So tremendous book and by the way, I stole most of that right from this book because I read it so much, it just kind of comes out. So. But wow, that's.

That's hard hitting. It's something I've always said is, at what age do we go from being afraid of the dark to afraid of the light?

Oh, go. That's good. Right there.

It is. It's all. It's inside of us. And we. You know, Clark Kent's biggest kryptonite was. He spent more time being Clark Kent than Superman.

Yeah. Well done, grasshopper.

So that's pretty hard. That's. That hit me hard.

Wow. As always, you always deliver, and I'm very appreciative. And thank you for your time.

Vince, Mario, let me. Let me. Thank you. Okay. Number one, let me tell you, I'm proud of you because I watched it come up in the business. I was disappointed to see you kind of go down a different path. But I understand now that you found a calling. I imagine your dad would be so stinking proud of you and something. Proud of the man you become. From a man who spent his whole life writing to know his son has written three to four books. And the last book he written was a love letter to him.

You know, you're living. You are living the dream because you're living in pursuit of something much bigger than yourself. Keep it up and stuff. That day is going to come. And the only thing I ask is that when it does happen is you send me a picture somebody shoots for you from backstage where you're standing up with a microphone, and there's a complete audience out there that have came from all over to hear you talk, to basically so into them to give everything you've got to help leave them better off than they were just before you found them. From that moment you come on stage to the moment you leave, that's the definition of impact. And we can make it right where we are, no matter where we come from, socioeconomically, race, religion, you know, we can make an impact right where we are right now by striving to make every single person's life better than it was before they came in contact with us and create an extraordinary experience for every human being. So thank you very much, Mario.

Thank you. And I still have a dream of you getting one of the shots.

There you go. Maybe we'll do it together one day. Maybe we'll both be on stage one day. Somebody take it from both of us.

Work in progress. We're just getting started.

All right, buddy.

Take care.

Val.

Thank you Vince. All right, Expert Authority World. We have another great episode here today. I'll see you tomorrow. Have a great day and God Bless.

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