0398 | Ryan Blair

Hi, this is ryan Blair with Altercall.com and you're listening to EA Interviews.

EA Interviews, episode 398, inspiration, transformation, success stories and the Imperfect Action Round. Seven days a week, join Mario Ficcini for today's expert authority effect interview. I am excited to have a killer guest for you, Ryan Blair. It seems, you know, there's been hundreds and hundreds of great guests already, but it seems like more and more just phenomenal people keep coming my way. And I'm totally fine with that. If you're a phenomenal person, welcome. But I don't, I really don't even know where to start with this. Because he has so many impressive traits. We can talk about his background, where he started and where he went. That alone would be a story. His first book. That alone would be a story. How he overcame this other thing would be a story. What he did with the first company and transitioned it into this other one would be a story. I'm going to rattle off some stuff so you connect here.

Dr. Phil, CNBC, MSNBC, Bloomberg, CNN, Fox, Forbes, business, Trader, Inc. Magazine, Fortune, Megan, Fortune magazine, BusinessWeek, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, I believe New York Times, bestseller with the book can't go wrong with books right there. And I'm gonna start him off with the beginning because I need to know more about this. But I'm excited to take him all the way through and learn more about what he's doing now. Because between you and me, expert authority world, that's what got my attention. I'm like, I gotta bring him on and see what he's doing to help people now. And I just read a stat beforehand what he's done in the last two years and it's, it's mind blowing. So without further ado, I'm gonna bring up Ryan Blair right after we thank our sponsor. Every business needs a book, including yours. And that's why I'm launching my new book to help you regardless of where you think your current writing abilities are. Visit eapublishingmethodbook.com today to learn the seven steps to publish and promote your nonfiction, lead and profit generating business book in eight weeks. Once again, that's eapublishingmethodbook.com Here he is, ladies and gentlemen, Ryan Blair. Ryan, how are you feeling today?

I'm fantastic, Mario. Thank you for having me.

Oh, it's my pleasure. I literally just. It's so impressive, everything you've done. So like I promised everyone, I want to start off with where you started because we could go back five or 10 years. And it's just been. It seems like every year you just keep improving. But take me back to the very beginning. In the one line I read about, you were in a gang.

Yeah, yeah. Well, that was 30 years ago. But.

I was in a family that had a lot of violence and drugs and just very low energy, negative energy family. And as a result of that, I got caught up with the wrong crowd at about 13 years old. And I was forced into a gang and I was in a gang environment and, you know, in and out of juvenile hall and in and out of trouble up until I was about 17 years old. And my life changed when a mentor came into it. But, you know, the short story is I learned a lot from suffering. Not only did I suffer a tremendous amount, but I witnessed a lot of suffering as well.

What did you learn from suffering, both seeing it and experiencing it firsthand?

Well, as a spiritual person, suffering is designed to get you closer to God. And the more you suffer, the more you have an opportunity to get closer to your faith, which ultimately all of the suffering that I have been through has just gotten me closer to my faith. So suffering is a great teacher. Most people don't give it credit where credit's due. And when you see a person suffering, the way I look at it is I'm just seeing a person that signed up for a great teacher and they're going to learn, you know, a lot of lessons from whatever it is that they're doing, and no doubt it's going to change them and affect them. And the process is, though, or the, the, you know, the method of extracting the lesson, extracting the gold from the suffering is really what I've learned to do in the process. I've turned a lot of negative into positive.

What would you say is one of the biggest? Not even the biggest. What was like, one of the first things, because I'm trying to put myself back to when I was 17, 18, and it's like our brains are completely different. What was like when you were in that space? What were you just thinking, like, can I get out of this? Or was there any part you even liked? Or was it just, you know, God, get me to, you know, were you trying to foreshadow to 21, 22, 25? Were. What was your thought process during that time before you got out?

Well, I thought that I would be dead by the time I was 21. I would. I would actually work out. I haven't told anyone this, but, like, I would work out for my prison sentence. So that way, when I got sentenced, I would show up tough and ready to fight. And so I was training to go to prison or worse, you know, death. And, you know, that was my mindset that I had until a mentor intervened.

Can you tell me more about this mentor? And thank you for sharing that. I.

Want to give everyone context. And, I mean, you and I both know we could do a show based on the last three to five years, and it would be phenomenal. But I think there's so many people that. Whether they were in a gang, jail, whatever, maybe I would say this. I think there's a lot of people who. And I'm going to take my experience that grew up in a. Not super. You know, it wasn't overly wealthy, but it wasn't poor. You know, I'd say that's vast majority. And no matter what you were doing, if it was good, bad, indifferent, I think we all have mental blocks on our mind, whether it was one extreme or the other. And I just. I appreciate what you're sharing, but if you can unpack that a little bit more, what did the mentor do? And. And clearly, I'm glad you're alive and been able to help so many people, but, you know, just keep taking us through this.

Well, you know, when I was 17 years old, I was heading to a, you know, a future that looked like prison. And the first mentor that showed up into my life was a judge. I'd written him a letter begging him for leniency. And he read the letter and said, son, you should be writing in college, not in prison. And that was the first time an authority figure had ever seen me as a person that could potentially go to college. Prior to that, I dropped out of high school. I was relegated to remedial classes, and I was deemed unworthy of traditional education, certainly not college. So when you read that letter, he was so impressed by it, and that was the first time anybody had ever given me any confidence that I could probably do something at a collegiate level. I decided I'd become a writer at that point. So I just kept writing because I knew if I could write my way out of a prison sentence, I could probably write my way into anything. And then shortly after that, and a deal with God, there's been many of them throughout my journey. A mentor came into my life by way of my mother. This man had taken an interest in her. She said that I come with a little bit of baggage. You got to meet my son. And he begrudgingly said, all right, I'll meet your Son. And he took me underneath his wing. He taught me goal setting, he taught me personal growth. And he gave me a foundation of beliefs and principles that, you know, I was hungry for them. I didn't have a father figure in my life. And the teachers that I'd had, you know, they had really just seen me as a lost cause, and so did society as a whole. So when he took an interest in me and he was a very wealthy real estate entrepreneur, you know, it gave me a level of confidence unlike anything I'd had before. And all of a sudden, the teachers that said I'd never amount to anything didn't really matter because in comparison to what he had achieved in his life, they didn't have anything. So I could just basically wipe my slate clean and start to believe what he believed of me, which he believed I could be a great salesperson, as he would tell me. He believed I could be a great marketer. And I had some skills at that time that he could use, which was. I was very skilled in computer sciences, well, computer programming and computer repair. And it was because that in a gang, that's what I did, is I stole computers. That was my racket for income purposes. And so I had become quite proficient in computers at just the right time when computers were taking over. This is the mid to late 90s. And, you know, and I had a skill that I had developed on the streets that was, you know, very valuable to corporate America. And so I bypassed the traditional route and went straight into, you know, a highly skilled route inside, you know, corporations and, you know, doing computer work.

What did that do for you, and what did it change in your mindset from this gap?

Well, you know, when you. When you witness a person not. Have. Not played by the same rules like I'd been. My father was in the middle class, and when I lost him, I went to poverty. And then all of a sudden, I'm. I'm experiencing the wealthy class. And the wealthy class operates by a whole different set of rules than everybody else. Like, you know, they have millions of dollars in multiple houses and multiple boats. And, you know, in the school that I went to, I was taught that the American dream was to one day be able to own a house. And here's a mentor of mine that owns 60 of them, you know, and I'm like, what? Like, they never told you? They told me that I couldn't be a doctor and I couldn't be a lawyer, but they never told me that I could be the person that wrote the check to the doctor. And the lawyer. So, you know, I was like, this whole system is a scam. Right. You know, I certainly wasn't going to go to law school and I wasn't going to go to medical school. But without going to school at all, I could somehow become the CEO of a company that employs doctors and lawyers. I'll take that path.

This is surreal for me. I thought about being a doctor, lawyer, FBI, CIA. I always wanted to help people. I never finished college. I went a little bit, but it's just like, you know, we have two different upbringings, but I know we're just resonating with. You're resonating with me. It's at least one other person. I know there's many more, but I can agree 100% because it's like you can make your own path and go, what do I want to do? So you were talking about the computer science and I know we're going to get to the part I saw that you had a company with the early stages of wireless Internet. That sounds fascinating to me. Right at another turning point, which I'm familiar with because that company looks like has some ties to the Detroit area.

Yeah.

So what was going through your mind when you're going, okay, I'm going to draw a line in the sand. I have this new path now. Did it seem like unlimited, unlimited possibility, or did you say, I want to stay with the computer? Maybe a little bit of both.

I mean, well, you know, I. When, when you go to the Lowe's that I've been to, there is nothing that can come at you that is like being shot at, being threatened, having friends murdered. There's nothing like it. So when you've experienced the depths of the rock bottoms that I have, you know, the idea of losing your business or losing some money or having to start over isn't as scary as it is for most people. So I didn't have a lot of fear. I had a lot of courage. I was willing to take a lot of risk. And you know, when I made my first hundred thousand dollars, I plotted all back in. I didn't, you know, I was like, if I can make $100,000 and I did it at a very young age, imagine how many millions I could make if I continue to learn and compound my wealth.

As I was able to do at a very early age. So to me, I had the perfect upbringing for risk taking and entrepreneurial success. And where most people, when they're raised in a very middle class environment that is worried about status, worried about, you know, Getting great grades, you get into a good college, you can one day get a good job so you can compete, you know, with Sally down the street. You know, I didn't, I didn't have any of those things. It was just me and unlimited possibility.

Wow. Yeah, it's definitely a different ballgame that you're playing there. So did you use any of that real estate from your mentor is, did you originally use some of that as a vehicle to compound your wealth early on?

Yeah, I invested a lot in real estate in my experience as an entrepreneur and I've had it as a diversity plan. But I didn't love. So he was in the foreclosure business and he would send me in to do his dirty work. Like I'd have to serve eviction notices, clean up houses that were filthy because we did a lot of low income stuff. So oftentimes they would leave the houses and just shambles. We found dead bodies in houses. I mean, it was like, it was ugly work. And so the more that I worked for him, the more that I realized I wanted to do computer work and knowledge work because real estate was a lot of hard work. And you know, he had earned his wealth the hard way and he was a master at, you know, buying and selling foreclosures and, you know, he built his wealth, you know, you know, tearing up houses and rebuilding them and, you know, building nice houses and things like that. So I wanted to take a more easy route as I thought it was, and that was the route of knowledge working.

I'm in a complete agreement. You know, when I did my first book, I was like, I always knew the royalty, that passive income structure, you know, even what we're doing here, it's like, how fun is this? We get to have a conversation, everything that's going to be leverageable for the next 10, 20 years.

Yeah, yeah, there's, there's, you know, I'm, I, so I, because of my early background in computers, I've gone on to do a lot of technological, technological work. I've been an investor in a number of tech companies as well as I founded a few. And you know, an alter call right now is actually behind the scenes. I haven't shared this with anyone. We're actually working on, you know, some AI and some biosensor kind of devices to make an impact in the, you know, the wellness space. So I always see the world through the eyes of a technologist. And that's been my secret to success as a business owner is I've invested heavy in technology and invested heavy in scalability and things that scale enterprises. So that's why I've been able to achieve some of the higher levels of success that I've been able to achieve.

I appreciate everything you're sharing. I want to give some context for this, for people listening, because there's people that go, I made a million bucks this year, a million bucks this month. And it's like high levels of success.

Walk me through the real estate. When you met the people from Detroit, what was that company called? Share a little bit on it. And what did you end up exiting for?

Yeah, well, I bought a company that was out of Troy, Michigan, and I'd never spent time in Troy, Michigan. And next thing you know, I'm on a plane. And there was two team members there, and they were doing 20,000amonth in sales selling multivitamins and minerals based on a Detroit scientist by name of Dr. Michael Simon, who's brilliant scientist. So I met the scientist. I went to Detroit, met the two people that were working there, and we acquired the company. I think we paid about $70,000 for it, was doing about $20,000 a month, and we ended up exiting for $700 million, $792 million. So a little over a thousand times return.

How in the world did you take a company that was, if I'm not mistaken, 6 million in debt?

Yeah, well, at the time that I bought it, it wasn't at 6 million in debt. I got it into 6 million in.

Debt, but then within 18 months, you turned it around.

For how much? And just. You have to expand on that, because I'm curious just how you go from even zero to turning it around so quickly, let alone from a negative standpoint.

Well, the first thing I'll tell you is I've been blessed to always recruit brilliant people. So all of the success that I share with you, it was not me alone at all. Now, my role in my gift zone is strategy operations. I do have the ability to influence myself and others, and so I do have some skills that I brought to the table. But there was plenty of other people with skills. So I don't want to appear as though I'm taking credit for this. Anytime a company is successful, it's a combination of factors, and there's a number of people that play a role in that success. And so I want to give credit where credit's due. But we as a team were able to take the company. During the recession of 2008, the company went through a major correction, and we had just sold it prior to the recession to a publicly traded company. And we had taken some cash off the table, got a cash injection. And when the recession hit of 2008, we burned through that. The company was written off to zero and we basically had to go all in to try to salvage the company and see if we could salvage the earn out that we had been a part of through the acquisition. And in the process we re engineered the product offering.

The message to meet the new consumer. We re engineered everything about the company and reinvented it basically. And that was in 2009 is when we came out with what was called the body by vi 90 day challenge. And we were the first to bring challenges onto social media. No one had ever attempted to commercialize social media prior to that, not nearly to the effect that we were. And we had a large distributed team of people that promoted our products that all of a sudden were promoting not products, but promoting a lifestyle and a challenge. And it went viral and we ended up signing up 3 million customers and doing billions in sales. And then that public company that bought us now owed us a lot of money and we went through an entire exit process on that as well.

So I appreciate that you're giving credit to everyone. So you're saying obviously you have strengths, but you're saying you had the right team in place and everyone was working cohesively and synergistically.

Yeah, yeah. And you know, at that time I wasn't a fully developed entrepreneur and leader. You know, I was young, I was like 20 something years old, so.

Well, you did pretty decent figuring it out.

Yeah. You know, and I do want to say some 20 something year olds are better. I have a lot of unhealed trauma, a lot of things that I needed to figure out along the way. So I leaned heavily on my supporting cast in order to be able to augment my weaknesses. Now I still, I'm a much more developed business leader entrepreneur today and I still lean heavily on my supporting cast, you know, and you know, I was trained by some early mentors in the venture capital space that I should always try to find people that are smarter than me. And in fact I know I'm doing a good job if I'm paying them more than me. So if I'm recruiting people as the CEO of a company and actually paying them more, that means that I am building my equity value while I'm paying them, you know, cash value and that kind of trade off. When you do that, you get highly talented people. I paid them with equity and I paid them with Cash as well. And as a result of being generous in compensation, I was able to attract some very talented people that hung their hat with us and, you know, and provided, you know, the skills that we didn't have great people in finance and technology, sales and marketing. You know, I've had the privilege of working with people that are phenomenal, that have gone on since working together to do amazing things. Like, I smile every time I see someone launch a company. One of my interns exited a company for a billion dollars. So, you know, I'm blessed to know that I have inspired and provided some value to some people along the way. And, you know, that's what capitalism is all about. I haven't retained all the value that I've created by any means, but I have created a lot more value than, you know, than I've received.

Leave the world better than you left.

It, entered it well, you know, and I'm a capitalist. I'm a conscious capitalist, but I believe capitalism is a system that is not getting a fair rap right now. I think that there's an affront on capitalism and this movement towards socialism is a big problem right now. Capitalism pulled me out of poverty, and as a result of that, I have not only created one job for myself, but I've created thousands of jobs in my journey. And I paid over 100 million in taxes myself. So, like, when you think about that, I have contributed far more than I've taken from society because of this thing called capitalism. So I'm a huge fan of it. I do believe it's going through an evolution and it needs some change right now. But I'll tell you that there's. There's no better system on the planet than democracy and capitalism, you know, working as checks and balances against each other.

Would you like to expand on that?

Oh, yeah. I mean, I. I could go all day long. What do you want me to expand on? I wait. This is my presidential stump speech real quick here.

So we got time.

Free reign. I mean, some people shy back from this. I'm smiling. You're on the right show to, you know, I'm in full support. Same here. What change do you think you're saying? It's going through an evolution.

Obviously you don't agree with some things. Tell us more.

Well, there's a challenge right now with capitalism in that they have retained a bunch of economists to, you know, to spread what I would say is pseudoscience or, you know, there's some false narratives going on right now that do benefit some large corporations that have manipulated the system. There's crony capitalism, there's monopolies, and there's some corporations that are manipulating the system and politics have been bought off by capitalists. So I do want to say that there are some things that need to be changed systemically in order for us to be able to evolve. Otherwise, you're going to see a growing rise of socialism and even communism. Because capitalism unchecked is, you know, is dangerous, because the individual's pursuit for status and power and money and greed needs to be checked by something else. And so those checks and balances have to be in place. In addition to that, what I would say is capitalism is evolving toward more of a conscious form of capitalism where companies are including all of their stakeholders in their mission and their vision. They're seeking to leave the world better than they found it, not extracting resources from the environment and from one population to feed a small group of executives and shareholders. They're extracting those resources and redistributing them in a way that through problem solving, that is solving some of the greatest problems that we're up against right now. And I want to tell the audience, if you see a problem, there is a future capitalist or a current capitalist that could very well solve it. And so we don't want to go do away with a system that does solve so many problems. We just want to refine it and make it more efficient.

Yeah. You're reminding me of people who, you know, I'm a believer, Christian faith, and I remember hearing years ago, 10% of a million is way better than 10% of zero. And now it seems like a million is a good start.

You know, so you can have people that are just donating straight up because they have it. And then another thing comes to mind is like, Tom Shoes, you know, he's going, for everyone you buy. We're going to give one. I think, you know, that's also what a lot of companies are doing for. Hey, you're supporting us. Thanks. But we're also going to be supporting this. And I have no doubt people appreciate that more. The ones who have heart, I'll add in.

Yeah. But, you know, I'll tell you, there's a massive awakening occurring, and I believe our Heavenly Father's part, you know, his hand is at play here, where corporations are now becoming much more benevolent. They're realizing it's important to their constituents, in particular the millennials on their teams, that their company stands for a higher purpose and actually does some good. The world has become educated, so the Old way of capitalism is dying on the vine. And you know, there's some holdout certainly, but conscious capitalism is emerging as a new evolved form of capitalism where the companies are purpose driven and they're making the world a better place. Tom choose is one that you mentioned. Patagonia is another. Whole Foods and a variety of others are actually saying, you know, we stand for more than just profits. And I think that it's going to evolve from conscious capitalism to super conscious capitalism where people are saying we believe that our business vehicle is divinely organized and that it's here to fulfill a divine purpose and we're here to follow God's word, to glorify and praise God and to bring God into, you know, our customer base and bring, you know, God into the marketplace. Right. Because for so long capitalism was so built on greed that it wanted to eliminate God from the equation. And I think that it's changing now where God is in the equation. And the more of us that build conscious entities that are profitable, the more that our competitors will see that and they will have no choice but to copy us in order to survive in the free marketplace. And so not only do I benefit my constituents and my stakeholders the way that I do capitalism, but I also change the marketplace because there's plenty of people watching and those people will adjust if they see that I'm able to generate results through this new method of governance.

Yeah, I think it's great and I appreciate you speaking on it because like I said, you have such an impressive profile. I mean, we could spend an hour talking about your books, a single company, any of them, but can tell you're passionate about certain things. So feel free to say whatever you want. And you know, this is being live streamed and stuff. I don't know if I'm going to get hit down for it, but I also have a backup recorder, actually two of them. So say, literally say whatever you want. My show is going to continue. Regard.

I love it. Let's go. I hold nothing back. I, you know, when you've gone through the adversities I've gone through and many of which I have to tell you, I've done them on myself. There's plenty of things that I did that, you know, I brought suffering onto myself. But when you've gone through suffering to the degree that I have, you don't care if somebody's going to criticize you or somebody's going to challenge your beliefs. You know, you're, that's, that's not something that I lose any sleep over whatsoever.

That's awesome. I'm so glad we got connected. And, you know, I'm looking for more people like you who share our beliefs and just, you know, hey, I want to make the world a better place and have some fun in the process type of deal, versus, like, you know, how can we screw over this group so we benefit? Like, I don't have room for that. Talk to me about your books real quick. Or a little bit. We still got plenty of time. So tell me about the books. I mean, you didn't do just one. You kind of seeded us earlier with, you know, if I can write myself out of jail, you know, were you. Did you grow up a prolific writer? Did you always have a knack for it? I mean.

How'D you do one book, let alone looks like four or five?

Yeah, well, I've written a few books that haven't been published yet either. And I'm a writer. I had it in my soul's journey to be a writer, but I was never trained in any formal English. Terrible speller. But I could write some words and it would resonate with people. And when I would see that feedback, I was like, there's something in there. For me, the first major time that I ever really resonated with an authoritative figure was the judge. But after I wrote to that judge, I started writing some more. And next thing you know, I'd write love letters to some girls and, you know, and I'd see it resonate with them, and I'd be like, wow, there's something in this gift. So, you know, I really found a lot of power in the pen. And now I'm, you know, I write all the time. I've written two books. Nothing to Lose, Everything to Gain, Rock Bottom to Rock Star. I tend to write about overcoming adversity. My next book that I'm working on right now, I go into some of the formulas that I've been able to utilize through the mentoring of entrepreneurs and business leaders that I mentor and teach them how to overcome their own personal adversities and create their own hero's journey story as a result of them. So, you know, what I have done is I have always just seen my story as a gift from God. And I decided to craft my narrative in such a way that it inspires people. And so that's what I do when I mentor entrepreneurs, is I help them tell their own hero's journey because I believe that the world needs more stories of success and inspiration and that every single person out there has one to tell they just haven't learned how to craft it and how to tell it appropriately to make the impact that they're capable of. And so that's a lot of the work that I do is I help entrepreneurs and leaders tell their story.

Yeah, communication is so important because you know, you can have the right heart and go, here's how we want to help. But if you can't communicate it, whether it's a ngo, you can't get funds, if it's a business, a capitalistic for profit company.

You know, you're not going to have sales. It's just like the communication comes down to everything.

Yeah, well, I tell people because they ask me what I do and I, if I just meet a person, I just am a writer. And then they find out that I've, you know, created a few successful businesses. And I go, well, I wrote a business plan, I wrote ads for recruiting people, I wrote marketing copy, you know, I wrote sales copy, I've written memos and memorandum to investors, to board members. You know, I basically wrote my way into a business and that's the view that I have toward everything that I do. I'm constantly writing. In fact, with Alter Call, my most current startup, I spent two years crafting, messaging and refining it. It's a labor of love. I'll tell you to come to the point where, you know, we now know exactly what we do, we have a purpose and we know the purpose even beyond our purpose. And then, you know, we know that we're here to make a change in the way capitalism is done and to empower entrepreneurs to share their heroic journey. And so that that came by pages upon pages and meetings upon meetings of copy upon copy to get to the point where now I can articulate a message and a short formats such as this. So you're absolutely right. Communication is one of the key skills that every entrepreneur needs to learn. And you know, it is how businesses are built.

Would you say to anyone that writing a book is very beneficial for business?

It is if you know how to write a good book. I have a lot of books on my shelf that I pick up and put down pretty quickly. You know, you really have to become. So the best thing I can tell you is, and this is, you know, for me, I would meet a person that had success and I established there was a gap between me and them and I would realize the gap wasn't that they were smarter than me, not by, you know, by a wide degree, they might have been a little smarter. The gap might be they were more well, read on a subject, they were more experienced, they were, they had more skill. You know, those were generally the areas I discovered the gaps. And when it came to a skill gap, I would close it very quickly. I would obsess about, I would. At this time we didn't have YouTube so I'd be listening to audio tapes to close a skill gap. When I sat into business meetings or was at a business networking event, I didn't understand the language. I would be in my car that night, listen, listening to audio tapes, flipping them back on business vocabulary so that way I could, you know, understand the language that was being shared around me. I would seek mentors out, I would contact them. I still do to this day. I contact new mentors all the time. I'll come across a person's book and I'll reach out to the person because I'm always looking to bridge the skill gap and I'm always looking to apply and add new skills. And as entrepreneurs, you know, that's what we do for a living, is we sharpen the skills that we have and we add skills that we don't have and we surround ourselves with people that are skilled in areas that we're just not competent in or that we can't be or don't care to be competent in.

Wow, that's powerful. And I couldn't agree more because.

I just relate so much because you start off you go, here's what I want to do. I've never lost. If there's one thing that hasn't changed, it's. I've always wanted to help people and add value. You know, even their show is only a couple years old at this point. Hundreds and hundreds of episodes, but same goal is like what do I want to do? Add value. What do I want to do? Add value. The, the vehicle changes. But that closing that skill gap, oh it's so easy. Just take some freakin effort. Book training CD, you know, cassette tapes, remember those things? DVDs. There's so many different ways.

Every day I spend at least an hour adding skill. Every morning I'm reading something, reading some. I buy three, four books a week and every morning I'm reading for an hour and I'm adding skills. Some of the books I'll pick up, you know, scan it, grab something out of it, set it down. Other books I'll methodically read, highlight, underline, practice, implement, get my team reading them, practice, implement, reach out to the author, bring the author in. And I've done this with a variety of different great authors. This is how I've met, you know, the Tony Robbins and the John Maxwell's and coach Dale Browns and coach John Woodens and all of these people that I've just named. I've got to mentor me as a result of my obsession to extract from them the knowledge and wisdom that they have. And when you have that approach, mentors will they love working with you because there's nothing more gratifying than having a student that actually applies what they learn and gives you that feedback as a mentor, you know, because all of us want to make the world a better place. It's my belief that it is an innate part of being a human being. Now some people have disconnected from that and they've built walls around that. So not everybody is taking action on that innate purpose on this earth. But I believe each human being has an innate purpose to make the world better than they found it. And if you can connect to a person's purpose and give them the ability to fulfill theirs, as a result, they're going to want to have a relationship with you because you're going to help them fulfill their purpose. And that's very meaningful to be the recipient of that. So, you know, most people don't reach out because they're afraid to or because they're not willing to do the work. They're not willing to read the mentor's books, watch the mentor's videos, listen to the mentor's podcast, and then come and ask informed questions. They want it easier. They hope that the mentor is just going to give them gold and grant them with wealth and prosperity. And that's not how it works. You have to. You only get out of life what you put into it. So I put a lot into this life and I get a lot out of it.

I'm so glad you're saying that because 10, 20 years ago I was like, man, this is going to take some work. I wish it was easier, but now I'm like, good. You know, even 10 years ago, I realized this is a good thing because it's like, I don't want it to be so easy. The wrong people, you know what I mean? I have one rule. When someone comes to us for publishing their business book and it's like, you have to be at that level and transparent and if anything read flags me, I'm not going to amplify you. You know, I think there's too, too many people that they all this notoriety for the wrong things. And I'm trying to highlight the people that are doing the right things. So.

I'm glad that it's, it's a little different. It's very difficult. Not, it's not super easy, let's say that.

So, yeah, you know, anytime you're, we're dealing with people and you know, the sad part is, is that there's just no playbook for how to live a values driven life. You know, what principles that you should operate by, and there certainly isn't one in the field of entrepreneurship. And so a lot of people just go about life with the wrong thinking, the wrong principles, the wrong practices. And as a result of that, they limit their own success.

They operate out of scarcity, or they operate out of fear, or they operate out of ego. And, and I have operated in those states plenty of times in my life, so I'm not a person to judge. But when I do greet a person that is having difficulty in life, I always remind them that their outside is a representation of their inside. And the more work that we do on the inside, the better our outside is. And so this is my mission, is to help entrepreneurs do that work on the inside so that when they're outside, their businesses are a reflection of that work, their team is a reflection of that work. And they can attract great customers, great shareholders, great team members, and make the impact that they're capable of. Because it's my belief that each human being is like a supercomputer that is just untapped because it's programmed incorrectly. And if you can imagine, you know, we've been around for a little while, we've all had computers that had the wrong applications, the wrong programming that ran slow, they crashed, and they weren't very productive at all. And many humans are basically running with bad code. They're crashing and they're not very productive. And it's because they put in the wrong code, because there was no master programmer that taught them how to do this correctly. Because our school system is a mockery.

It's terrible at teaching these things. We can't teach spirituality, we can't teach religion, we can't teach this, we can't teach that. All it can teach you is how to become a worker in a factory, basically. And that's what it's made for. You know, the parenting system that we're a part of right now, there's no playbook for that. There's no, you know, there's more work that's been done on conscious parenting that's available now. But many people haven't, you know, taken that, that path to become conscious parents. The government's a mess, right? So where are we to learn these virtues, these values, these principles and these practices to be able to maximize our impact on this earth, to, you know, to be able to be productive and generous at the same time. And if you didn't have a good father and a good mother in your household or you didn't get lucky with a great mentor, you're not going to learn these things. And trial and error is a long road that often leads down a lot of dead end paths if you don't have the right faith and the right beliefs on this journey. And so I'm here just to be a beacon of light and a source of inspiration and a teacher to people that want to take that corrective action, to get themselves on the right path so they can maximize their productivity and their generosity.

I love everything you're saying. And this is, you know, this is what I expected and I'm so glad this, you know, I don't know, because sometimes people look good on paper and everything and then it's like, oh, wow, you paid someone a lot to Photoshop you. And I just, there was something in me and I was like, I need to have you on the show. And I'm so glad you're saying this. So this sounds like this is your new mission with Alter Call and that's your focus. You know, tell me.

Tell me more. I mean, it's, it's like the same thing. But I get, now that we've established the whole story, I get where you're coming from. You want to pull as many people up out of what you were in and never have them go in it and just have that ripple effect, like, same as me.

I knew we could go forever. I got a. This is awesome though. Tell me specifically what you did the last couple of years for everyone listening.

Yeah, I took a couple of years off after I went through a very difficult time and I lost my mother.

Sorry to hear that.

Yeah, it shifted me into. The best thing I could say is there was an awakening in me that I was not happy with where my life was at. Although I'd accomplished a lot of great things, I was not happy with the relationships that I had. I had some toxic behaviors and things going on in my life and I made a commitment to my mother as she was passing away that I was going to become the leader that I was destined to be. My mother passed over a long period of time and it was a very difficult undertaking to go through, especially for her. So in this process, I was making commitments to My faith and to God. And when she elevated, it felt like I had an angel by my side helping me start to change at a rapid pace. And so as I went through that, I got clarity that I wanted to be of service to the world. And I created a new organization called Alter Call, and we help people alter their lives so that they can answer their calling. Specifically, we work with leaders and entrepreneurs that want to make a big impact. We teach them the principles, the practices, the tools, and give them the community to surround themselves with so that way they can, you know, answer their calling. And, you know, I mentor them. And I have a number of coaches that I've trained that are part of our community that also coach, and, you know, I meet with them once a week, and we build businesses together. Right now, I have my hand in a number of different businesses that are making an impact and, you know, online technology, medical, real estate, and a variety of other places. And so I'm literally living in heaven on earth, having gone through a lot of hell on earth. And I teach entrepreneurs how to, you know, how to overcome suffering. The suffering of burnout, the suffering of scarcity, the suffering of a business that is stuck or a lifestyle that's stuck. You know, I dive in deep, and I help them overcome that suffering, and I give them the tools and practices that I've learned and mastered along the way so that they can expedite the process and they can accelerate their transformational journey.

I love that you're helping people do that. I think we need more people like you doing that, because, like you said, the outside is a reflection of the inside. I mean, you know, I think so many people are trying to band aid and gum and tape and all this crap on the outside. Look at me. I'm a shiny object. And it's like they're troubled inside. I mean, one of the things I've had the privilege ever since middle and high school is, like, people would share stuff with me, and it's like, you know, some of them were the ones I was like, man, I wish I was like that. And come to find out, I'm like, no, no, thank you.

Yeah, it's absolutely right. The people that appear to have it all figured out often don't. Most often don't. And so you have to be careful about who you surround yourself with. And you should seek mentorship, and you should make sure that you're finding people that are spiritually aligned with you, that are on the path, spiritually aligned, and have gone through the fire and literally through the fire they have been baptized and now they have some wisdom to share with you.

You.

And so if you can do that, you know, you're, you're going to be successful.

Well, I appreciate everything you're sharing. I hate to do this. I know we only got a few more minutes. I'm already truncating some of the questions. I got to throw this one in though.

Okay.

It's the Wheel of whatever. It's fun. It spins.

Yellow or black?

Yellow.

Cool. So my question you would be if there is anything you could change about everything you've overcome or anything in your life, if there's anything you could go back and change, are you feeling good about everything or do you wish you could have just done even one thing different?

Well, knowing what I know now, I certainly wouldn't have chosen the same path because it came with a lot of suffering. But I would not be the man that I am today. So I have absolutely zero regrets. And I'll tell you, I just had an experience with my 12 year old son where I was able to help him get through some things that I had struggled with at his age. And it all made it worthwhile. You know, when I, as a result of being a conscious parent, raising a conscious child, I realized that the stuff that I had gone through was fertile ground for me to be a better parent to my son. And the way my parents were, I would have been, you know, whooped and, you know, grounded for weeks. Like, I, I would have gone through torture as a result of it. And so as a result of what I've been through and even the stuff that I've done to myself, I'm a more conscious individual. And because of that, I wouldn't change a single thing.

Yeah, I had a feeling you'd say something along those lines. It's like we always want it to be perfect. And you know, that line of success, it's never straight. But at the same time, everything that we have gone through does make us who we are. So where would you like people to learn more?

You can go to altercall.com that's a L, T E R or a L T E R C A L, L C O M. Or you could catch me on Instagram. I'm E. Ryan Blair. If you DM me, I'm always in my DMs. We can have a conversation.

Excellent. I'll make sure that's on the show notes page. Ryan, it's been an absolute pleasure. Thanks for your time. Thanks for sharing and can't wait to continue the conversation.

Awesome. Mario. I'd love to come back. I know we could dive in for another couple hours. So next time I come back we can go even deeper.

All right. Well, thanks for sharing everything you have. Really appreciate it. And yeah, like I said, we could have done an hour on any one segment, but this was great. Expert Authority World we have another great episode here today. I will see you on the next one and have a great day and God bless.

You're already the expert, but have you transformed your expertise into a tangible asset that will generate qualified leads while increasing profit for you 24 7? And if so, how well are you promoting it? With my new book, the Expert Authority Effect Publishing Method, I take you through my process step by step. Visit eapublishingmethodbook.com today to learn the seven steps to publish and promote your nonfiction, lead and profit generating business book in eight weeks. Visit eapublishingmethodbook.com to get started now. Once again, that's eapublishingmethodbook.Com thanks for listening to today's episode. I would love to know what you enjoyed most from it. If you haven't done so already. I invite you to connect with me on my new LinkedIn. You can go to it directly at eainterviews.com LinkedIn Once again, that's eainterviews.com LinkedIn lastly, check out the full eainterviews.com site for complete show notes, the full interview video experience, links to the resources we mentioned, and more. Have a blessed day and I'll see you on the next one.