What to Do When Your Work Isn't Fun Anymore with Rick Mulready

Hey there, real quick before we jump into the episode, listen, if your earnings treadmill hasn't set you free yet, running faster won't either. Listen, hustle without principles just going to burn you out. So here's what I want for you. I want you to join me for my money machine experience live. It is three free trainings. Deep dive into how to escape the treadmill and build a money machine that actually works for you. All right, grab your spot here by going to moneymachinelive.com and I'll see you in the free training. Hey there. Welcome to this episode of the Affluent Entrepreneur Show. You probably can tell that I'm not in my studio. This one was a special one that I had to get in and so I had to do it outside the studio with a dear friend of mine, Rick Mulready. And this one is different. You know, one of the things that we talk about with respect to affluence is how are you experiencing your life? The richer lifestyle, not the money in the bank account, not the commas, not the wealth. But how do you experience life? What does it feel like for you? And in this episode, we're going to talk with Rick about something he was going through as an entrepreneur, a successful entrepreneur, as someone on the path to financial freedom but maybe hasn't achieved it yet. And he realized that he was in a situation where he was struggling and it was manifesting himself physically in him, physiologically, emotionally and all of that. And it's burnout. How do you deal with it? What happens when you start to struggle with this? Well, we're going to talk about what Rick's doing, how he set himself up financially and did it so he can take a 90 day sabbatical to clear his head. Now you might go, I can't take 90 days off. I get it. But the question is, are you living a richer lifestyle? What does it take? We talk about all these things in this episode. Welcome to this episode of the Affluent Entrepreneur Show. I think this one could change your life. Enjoy the episode. This is the Affluent Entrepreneur show for entrepreneurs that want to operate at a high level and achieve financial liberation. I'm your host, Mel Abraham, and I'll be sharing with you what it takes to create success beyond wealth so you can have a richer, more fulfilling lifestyle. In this show, you'll learn how business and money intersect so you can scale your business, scale your money and scale your life while creating a deeper impact and living with complete freedom. Because that's what it really means to be an affluent Entrepreneur.

Hey there, Rick. So good to have you on the show, man. This is way too long in coming. I don't know why we haven't done this sooner, man.

How long have you had the podcast now?

It's going on two years next month.

Isn't this my first time on?

It is your first time on, and I know that I've been on your podcast, I think, at least twice.

Thanks for having me on, man. I'm truly honored to be here right now. I am, I am. I'm even. I even have my standing desk all the way lifted up. I'm standing up. I'm energized. I'm ready to go, man.

Oh, my God. So, so good to have you here, brother.

Yeah. I don't know what we're going to be. I don't know where this conversation is going to go, but regardless, it's going to be fun. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, for those of you that don't know, I said something in the, in the introduction about, about Rick. Rick and I are our dear, dear friends. We met originally in a mastermind years ago and, and became good friends. And he's down south. And, you know, and I don't know if, if any of you do this. If you don't, you should. And, and you should right away is find a peer group or someone that you can reach out to, someone that you can connect with, someone that you can go have coffee with, you know, once a quarter or something like that. And that's kind of what Rick and I have done. And we've. We've become not only friends, but peers and in the sense of guiding each other when things are not necessarily going the way we want. And so this conversation is going to be an interesting one because we're going to talk about affluence, but we're going to talk about life and how we're experiencing life and what some things are that, that Rick has gone through that maybe you'll relate to. I, I think that we all go through these things, and how Rick is, is dealing with it may give you some insights and some things to do. So before we get to any of that, let's just talk about Rick Mulready, how he got here. I mean, you, you harken back to the days of you've got mail in AOL.

Literally, I literally worked at AOL. I started there in 2000. And I remember working in. There was. And I worked in. It was.

Vienna, Virginia, because I went to school in Northern Virginia. And I remember being in the original Office of where AOL was basically started. And this was literally back when I remember walking in the. The office on my first day and there were stacks and stacks and stacks of those CDs that they sent out so that you could connect to the Internet and hear that you've got mail sort of thing. And so yeah, that was my first sort of foray, if you will. And.

Getting into this whole world of online advertising because I was at that time I was doing, I was in a group what they call advertising operations, which means there was a sales team selling online ads. And I'm dating myself, this is way back when they were. I mean there was banner ads. That's it, you know, static banner ads. And they called it quote unquote rich media when there is animation in the banners. But anyway, the sales team sold the advertising to, you know, the comp. To. To brands. And then the team that I was working on was actually implementing it in AOL's advertising proprietary advertising systems. So I did. I was there for a little over four years and I moved my way up. I was actually running the operations team in just a couple years and I loved that time. But you know, as so many things were happening back then, you know, in the dot com burst and all that bubble burst and all that stuff like that, spent four years there. Then I came out here to the West Coast. I worked for Yahoo. I worked for Funny or Die. I worked for another contextual advertising platform which I think was ahead of its time because it's so funny because it's now coming back around and the importance of all that. And then I just got tired of working for other companies and tired of.

My.

Both financial well being and my emotional well being. I was relying on other people too much in order for that to happen because I was selling advertising. I was in online ad sales for years and I just didn't like it anymore. I love the selling part. I just didn't like working for a company and working with the people and these other agencies that I had to work with. And so I was like, yeah, I'm going to go start my. I'm going to go be an online entrepreneur. Which no idea what that really meant. And I'll never forget I hired a coach way back then and the question that he asked me was if you could. Because I said I don't know what to do to start an online business. He said, well, if you could, if you had to help me with something in two days from now, what would it be? And I said, well, Facebook ads Because Facebook was. Advertising was blowing up on Facebook. And I understood the online ad world. And he's like, okay, great, that's what you're going to do. And so that was. Well, that conversation was in 2012, so 11 years ago. But I left the corporate world in the fall of 20.

Fall of 2012, and then really, truly started the online business in January 2014, so nine and a half years ago.

Wow, that's like.

That's like what started the business based.

On someone telling you, this is what you need to do.

Yeah, basically because he had a website where, uh, his. His name is Adam Baker, and he had a website called man vs Debt. And so he, he was making money with like, ebooks and, you know, and other, you know, very simplistic ways of generating money from his website. And I was fascinated by it. And I don't remember how I got connected with him in terms of why I was looking at his website or whatever, but I ended up reaching out to him and I was like, hey, would you ever consider coaching somebody? And he was like, I don't know. Never done it before. And he charged me $500 a month.

Oh, my God.

Yeah, and. Yeah, but that's really what it was. That was. The question is, if you had to help me with something in the next 48 hours, what would it like? How would you help me? And I said online advertising, Facebook ads. And he's like, okay, there it is.

Really, it strips down the whole idea of, let's get to your expertise. Let's get to something that's commercial grade, that we can. We can market. That falls in line with your core strengths.

Yep, totally. Because I understood the online ad space like, you know, and I get it. Facebook ads and Instagram ads and online advertising and all that stuff is very challenging for a lot of people, not only to like to. To do it, but also just to kind of understand the landscape. And I mean, it's been 23 years now. I started Facebook ads in 2010, and maybe that's when I had that. That was the conversation. It was 2010.

And so.

Like, it just. That's 13 years ago. By doing it a long time. And then add to that all the years I've been in the corporate space starting in. In 2000, it just comes very easy to me, just understanding, like, how things work and where everything fits together and stuff like that. So. And it also interests me. I'm just fascinated by the online space in general.

So cool to hear. Now it's. And. And hopefully the, the listeners and the viewers will kind of look at this and say, well, wait a second. If I'm looking to create multiple streams of income, because it's something that I tell people, multiple streams of income is, it's no longer a luxury, it's a responsibility, it's a requirement if we want to find financial freedom and some security. And then one of the best ways is to answer that question that was asked of you. What are the things that if in two days you had to teach someone, what, what would that be? Because if we can get an online business rolling, it is the highest margin business out there. One of the highest margin businesses out there. And so it's a good place for us to play now. Doesn't mean that you're corralled. You've done so much more than just ads. In fact, I watched you transition from teaching people how to do ads, doing ads and doing that into other areas of.

The online space. The coaching, the mentoring, the business space. Tell us how that works.

I just got, I mean, to be honest with you, I got tired of talking about ads all the time because it was, I mean, here we are in 2023. So this is probably.

Four years ago, 2019ish. Yeah. That, you know, so many people were coming to me. I remember exactly when this happened. I was in a conference room here in San Die and I was holding a, a two part, a two day retreat with some of my accelerator members. I've had a version of accelerator coaching program for many years now. It's very different. Back then it was different from what it is now. But we were sitting in a conference room and people would get up and ask their questions and at least half the group was up there asking. And this is back when it was ads focused only they were asking. They were saying like, well, my ads aren't working and I don't know, I can't get a good cost per lead. And when we broke it down, it had nothing. They all, everybody thought like, oh, I'm doing something wrong inside of ads manager. I'm not setting it up correctly, I'm not pressing the right buttons or I don't have the right targeting or what have you. And it wasn't that at all. Because honestly, that's very easy to learn, Very easy to learn.

But what they were missing was the fundamental marketing, fundamental marketing knowledge of what they were doing in their business. And what I mean by that is, well, the reason that their lead costs were so high is because the lead magnet, their freebie that they were giving away had what wasn't a good offer for their target audience. And so that's just basically understanding your target audience and what problems are you solving and what challenges are they having and how do you help them specifically? And then once you have that, then it's like, all right, well, how do you speak to them? How do you message with them, how do you write copy, et cetera? How do you speak to them? And so on the flip side of that. So that was one thing that it was like, all right, it's ads. But now we're backing up a little bit. We're. We're kind of.

We're.

We're stretching out a little bit and saying, okay, now we're in more marketing fundamental knowledge here. Then on the flip side of that, people were having. Were coming to me where they were having great success with their ads and their business is blowing up, and now they're like, oh, I don't know what to do with my. Like, I need help. I'm working all the time. How do I start to hire people and how do I start to be a leader, and how do I start to not work 18 hours a day? And so that's. And that whenever people ask me those types of questions, I was jazzed, you know, because it was different than. Because, number one, I was good at it, and number two, it was different from ads. And so I was like, all right, cool. And so at that time, I had the. The podcast, the Art of Paid Traffic, where, just as it sounds, I was talking about ads and all forms of paid traffic. And so I really wanted to start to make that shift into expanding beyond just ads. And I was like, well, I don't really know what to do here. I have, you know, I've built this great audience, and they know me for ads and all this other stuff. And so what I started to do was I started sprinkling in these other conversations on the podcast. Things about team, things about mindset, things about systems and processes, things, you know, all these types of things. I was like, all right, well, I'm going to kind of sit back and see how it's received. And people loved it. And so eventually I changed the name to what it is now, the Art of Online Business. And on the show, I talked all things scaling your online business. I focus on course creators, membership creators, online coaches, and it's everything from sales and marketing to systems and processes to mindset to team, all that stuff. And primarily my audience is they're doing six figures and up. And. Yeah, and I still teach ads right it's still, you know, it still comes very easy to me, but it's. It's just one piece of the puzzle.

Yeah. And I think that if there's anything to be taken away from that is the fact that no matter what the technology is, no matter what we have at our disposal to execute, it doesn't replace.

Fundamental marketing, messaging, and business acumen, business strategies. That is underneath it all, no matter what we're doing and how we're doing it.

And that's where so many people struggle because they think it's something else. And I posted in the Facebook group of our accelerator coaching program a couple of weeks ago when we're recording this, and I said, this was the post. I said, at its core, business is very simple.

Yeah.

And it was six steps, I think it was. And it's like, all right, how can you. How can you help somebody? What is your special skill? And then who do you want to help? Like, what are their struggles? What are their challenges? And then, you know, I just listed out, like, then it's, you know, being able to message that what is the promise of what you want to deliver? And then how are you attracting those people? And then how are you selling to them? And then how are you fulfilling on it? That's it. Now, it's very. That's a very. In its simplistic terms, but when we think about it, that's really what it comes down to. And most people lose sight of that, and myself included, for a long time.

I think it's easy to get caught up in the strategy, caught up in the. In the technology, and lose sight of that. And in that process.

We lose connection with the market, we lose connection with our clients. We lose connection with the real purpose we're serving.

I think.

It'S so true, Mel, because I remember having a conversation with one of our members a few months ago, and she's in the teaching space, so she serves teachers, and they were. I mean, she was really frustrated because the messaging that they were doing and. And they had an evergreen funnel, and it wasn't converting as much as they wanted it to and couldn't quite figure out why. And I said, well, why don't you talk to. Why don't you more regularly talk to your audience, find out what they're struggling with? Because we all know in the past few years, teachers have been through it. You know, it's always something, you know, for that profession. And they've just had such a hard time and just such a rough go. And so because of that, what they're going through. Seems like it changes on almost like a, you know, like a 90 day cycle, if you will. And so it's like we have to understand our audience to be able to speak to them based on what they're going through at that time. Whereas most people will just have one message and not, you know, just lose sight of what, what, what their audience is going through. And then just to be like, well, why isn't, like, why isn't my stuff converting better? Well, it's because your message is the same message it's always been and it's not speaking to your audience anymore. And this comes back to the basics of business. Understanding what problem you solve and what they're, what they're challenged with.

So, interesting enough, I think that I heard someone say once, he said, we need to speak to where our audience is.

And in some cases your audience is searching for the yacht. In other cases they're searching for the life raft. If we're selling the life raft, when they're looking for the yacht, they're not buying. If we're selling the yacht, when they're looking for the life raft, they're not buying. We need to understand where they are. And a lot of people are looking for a life raft right now.

Yeah. And we, we, we. It's easy to lose sight of when we're not willing to listen.

Yeah.

And have conversations. I mean, one of the best things I did in my business, I'll never forget, it was a year and a half into my business. So this would have been the middle of 2015. I was sitting at a Starbucks in Carlsbad here in San Diego, and I was having, I had lined up four or five times.

Floor.

Yeah. I don't know why I was in Starbucks at that time. Man.

That is like last, last, last resort. That's like a step up from hotel coffee.

There you go.

But I was, I had, you know, and this is back when Skype was the way that we, you know, had calls. And I had like four Skype calls with my quote, ideal people from the program I had at the time, which was called FB Advantage. And I remember getting off those calls thinking, what? Why did I wait so long to have these conversations? Because that is just gold. Everybody always wants to know, like, oh, I terrible at copywriting, or I can't write ad copy or I don't know what to say or whatever. Just say what your customers are saying or what your audience is saying. Just use their words. You know, you're not saying, like Sally said This is just like you're looking at what they said. You're like, putting that in their copy. It's one of the quickest ways and easiest ways to be like, oh, my God, they get me. You know, like, they must be in my head because you're using the same language.

But anyway, so good. So good now. So you kind of transition, but at the same time, you're and extremely successful accelerator. All the things that you're doing, you have speaking at big conferences and social media world and that kind of thing. But there was something. There's something going on. And why I want to bring this up is I think that a lot of us go through what you were going through, but don't have the courage to do something about it. You know, as you start to come into this last. Let's just call it the last 12 months. I don't know if that's the case, but. But yeah, tell us about how, how this journey of entrepreneurship started to transition for you. Started to what, what you were feeling and, and everything. Because this really speaks to the truth of what we should be thinking about as entrepreneurs, which is how we feel and experience our life and not how much we put in our bank account.

So many different directions I can go with this and talk about. Yeah, but, yeah, I mean, about a year ago, well, first of all, my. My life completely changed for the most amazing, in the most amazing way, you know, possible when my daughter was born. She was born in December of 2018. So she's. @ the time of recording this, she's almost four and a half. And, you know, she's just everything. About a year ago, I. There was just something. I started noticing something in myself where I wasn't feeling. I wasn't having as much fun anymore in the business. And I would just be exhausted from the things that I was doing in the business. And it was really.

I was ever. I was never able to really shut off. Like, I would, you know, yes, I would close a laptop in the evening. But that was. That was more of a literal sense because figuratively, my brain was still going. And I'm just, I'm the type of. I've. I have struggle with, you know, anxiety and stuff like that for. Since I was a little kid. And so that's already there. But I. This was different. I sort of started feeling just differently about the business.

But I didn't really think much of it other than, yeah, I'm noticing this, but I'm going to keep pushing forward because that's what I have to do right and fast forward. Up until about say three months ago.

In early 2023, I. It started affecting me on not only an emotional level, but also on physical level, emotional level from the perspective of like I was finding myself really short with Maya, my daughter. You know, I wasn't really present when, you know, we were at the playground up the street or you know, we were playing in the living room here or what have you, or when I was talking to my wife Amy. You know, we'd be talking and then my brain would be out somewhere else and I'd have brain fog and all this other stuff. I just really notice it. Like this is not how I want to be showing up. I also.

I'm very in tune with my body and I could tell that something wasn't right. I could tell that, you know, like just something was off. And then I started getting headaches, which is not normal for me. I started getting headaches every day in the mornings. And this wasn't coffee related. I started getting headaches and it just like, wait, what's going on with, with this? And then I would find myself, I would be on coaching calls with our members.

And my eyes, my, my left eyebrow would start twitching and I, again, I was just. Because I've had that before. I'm like, ah, no, you know, no big deal. But it started happening like every day. And again I was like, I don't really, I don't really know what this is. And just, I wasn't happy and all these things were going on and I was still at that point was just like, you know, I'm just powering through and you know.

You know, I had some conversations with, with you about it and, and you know, a couple other people and then a quote, well known person in the online space up and closed her business. Like just snap, you know, like, yeah. And I don't, I don't know her personally. I knew of her. I didn't know how long this was in the works or anything, but it seemed sudden. And I just remember reading what, what they wrote about it and I was like, man, respect, like, good for you. And then that's what sort of started me thinking about, wait, what if I did something like this now what that person did was like, indefinite, like they're shutting, they're shutting the business down. And I wasn't ready to do that. But I also knew that, wow, what would a break look. What would an extended break look.

Like that you could, you couldn't continue the way you.

Were. I could not continue because it Was it was getting to. Especially with the physical symptoms of headaches and just my body not feeling right and like this weird muscle spasm in my, you know, it, I, I couldn't continue, you know, and, and also I just, the thought of like marketing the business was just. And that's like, it's what I've been doing for years and years is like, oh, you know, and you know, I have the podcast and we, we just published seven episode number. 750. You know, we've been doing that a long time and it just, it wasn't, it felt more like a. I just have to do it because I release two episodes every week. Is what I do what people.

Expect about what we.

Do. Totally. Yeah. And so I knew that something had to change or I was going to break in some way. And I have a four year old, you know, like, I, I don't want anything to happen, you know, to me. And so that's where I was like, I know something needs to change. And so I started thinking about it and I was like, is this even possible?

And so that obviously the first, first thing that comes to my mind is money. And like, is this possible financially? And I immediately was like, no, like I could never do it. Like this doesn't, you know. And so before I'd even, you know, I'd mentioned a little bit to Amy, my wife, but not seriously. But the first serious conversation I had about it was with Emily, my, you know, bookkeeper, and reached out and told her was going on and she'd kind of known this, but I said, is this, you know, this a conversation that we could have meaning? Like, is it even possible? Is it, is it, should we even be talking about it? And she's like, yeah, it should be on the table. And it was like she said to me, she said, I never forget that she said, how does it feel to hear that, like that it should be on the table? And it literally was like, oh, it was like my shoulders went back, went down and it was just such a relief to just know that this was something I could even just, I could.

Consider.

Well, here's the interesting thing. You know, we're talking about the financial side of.

It.

Yeah. Here.

But let the reality is that there's no time that it actually shouldn't be on the table because the cost on the other side.

Could have been your.

Health.

Yeah. Could have been your relationship with your.

Wife.

Yep. The relationship with your daughter and everything else in between. And so I think that the real question has to be when we get to these points. Now, look, there's things that we do on a daily basis that you go, I just don't like doing that. But yeah, when it starts to be a pervasive.

Problem and tugging, we need to pay attention to.

It.

Yeah. And I think that that question really has to be not if, but how do I make this happen? Because the cost on the other end of that, if I don't figure it out, is far greater than the financial cost. I think that's just my.

Perspective. Yeah. And I don't think that I really. I mean, yeah, I understood that, but I honestly really. That hasn't really come to the. The head of importance, if you will, for me, until the last couple weeks.

You and I talk a lot about, like, you know, Jeremy. I don't know how old Jeremy is, I forget, but he's 33. 33. And everybody who tells me, you know, I hear this from everybody, like, don't blink, they're going to be a teenager before you know it, etc. And, you know, Maya's four and a half, and I love this time with her. She and I are super close and I don't, I don't want anything to affect that. And, and I'm also, you know, I, I totally under. I totally understand that I'm in a very fortunate position to be able to, like, stop in the middle of the day and hang out with her, go pick her up from school or what have you. But, yeah, it wasn't until the last few weeks where.

You know, like, I. This was such a good decision to make, by the way. The decision I made was to take a sabbatical for, for 90.

Days.

Yeah. And, and step away.

And.

Being able to.

And I'm going. And we're actually recording this, like, two days before I officially go on. And people have been asking me.

Like a day or two after you sent the email out to.

Everyone. Yes. Yeah. And, you know, people have been asking me, like, well, what are you going to do? And stuff like that. And I'm like, I don't really have any expectations of what do I want to get out of it or what have you, but I know that I'm going to take better care of myself. I need to just.

Step back from everything and let my brain unwind, basically, and spend a whole lot of time with Maya and Amy. And I didn't think that I would be able to do it from a financial perspective. And I don't know if you want to go down this route, but you are a big piece of why I'm able to do it, because we set things up in the business financially, where we had a plan where money was going essentially. And you work really lockstep with Emily, my bookkeeper. And so I always feel supported on the financial side. And when we went in there to look at like, oh, is this possible? And she already knew. She's like, yeah, absolutely. And I was like, okay, wait a minute. Why, like, break it? I'm like, explain to me why, like, how are we getting to that answer? And it was kind of like, oh, okay, awesome. Cool. Let's do this. Okay, now the decision's made. What does this look like now? How do I communicate this to my accelerator members who are paying me money every month? And here I am, I'm going to take a three month pause, you know, and so that was one thing that Emily and I went through was like, you know, from a financial perspective, is there like, what are the worst case scenarios? What are the best case scenarios? But to your point earlier, Mel, like, with. Something had to change. I didn't care at that point what the worst case scenario was.

And I still don't, honestly, because I'm at a point where this has to.

Happen. It has to. And I think it takes a lot of courage to.

To look at it and face it and say, I gotta change something. You know, and as blessed as we are and you are and everything, it's not about the lack of gratitude. It's about making sure that you're living true to the path that you should be on. And the realization. I think this drove me a lot. Even when, when the Ponzi scheme, especially with Jeremy. Maya's watching.

You.

Yeah. And she's going to take more away from how you show up and what you do than what you say. And. And now she gets a chance to see her dad fully present, fully engaged and, and reinventing, if you.

Will.

Yeah. And knowing that her dad's there. These years are.

Irreplaceable.

Yeah. And they will go by.

Fast.

I. And so I, I think this is, you know, you're doing it financially smart. But I think more importantly, you're. This is really important. And so many of us just don't. We're unwilling to look. To make those hard decisions. We're unwilling to look at it and say, I'm. I'm miserable every single day. And I don't know.

Why. Yeah. And that's exactly what I.

Yeah.

Yeah. That's what I.

Was. I think we end up taking that home. We take that, we take it, and it, it, it manifests itself physiologically, emotionally. But then the people that bear the burden and the brunt of it, the people we love the.

Most.

Yeah. And now there's this parade or ripple effect that was never.

Intended.

Yeah. But it's because we're trying to place some, something somewhere and you're willing to sit back, go, no, it's me. I'll figure this.

Out. Yeah, well, I mean, thank you for saying that, but.

Actually you don't know this, but I'm telling you right now in front of all your audience here, and I know that you've told this story many times here on the show of when Jeremy drew that picture of you and you had a phone in each, in each hand, in each ear. And I think about that a lot because here I have a four year old and you're absolutely right, she's picking up on everything. And just yesterday she, she comes into the office here and you know, I have, you know, my mic, you know, my big podcasting mic here and I have a Rodecaster pro for my podcast that's, you know, that's all lit up and you can press fun buttons on there and big monitor. And she comes in, she likes to come down, come here, sit down, put, put the headphones on and start playing with the buttons and start banging on the keyboard. And I have a, for those of you watching on, on video, I have this, this is a remote for my air conditioner here in the office. And she likes to use it as her phone. And you know, and she's not saying like, but she's modeling that at that point. And it's, she's having fun with it in the office and she's not referring to it in other ways, but it is, I'm a very, I'm very aware of.

It.

Yeah. You know, and when I tell her, you know, when I first told her that I think my wife told her that I was going to take a vacation, a long vacation, she was so excited. And she said to me this morning, she said, you're on vacation as of this weekend. Right. I said, yep, it's gonna be a long vacation. She's so excited. And so that right there says a lot. And I think the interesting part of that is I really don't work that many hours compared to a lot of people. I work about 25 hours a week. And some people are listening right now like, oh, he's like, you know, only 25 hours a week. Which, true, it's completely true. But I felt even with that I felt like I was still going, going, going all the time. And I know that that's work that I need to do, but as it relates to my daughter, I'm sure she's been seeing that, you know, and how that was affecting me. And she just wants to play, you know, she just wants, you know, when I'm with her, when she's playing with me, she just wants my.

Attention.

Yeah. And when I'm not able to give that, I'm certainly not living the, you know, affluent, light life that you talk about here on the.

Show. I mean, in the reality is that no child wants our prophets. They want our.

Presence.

Yeah. And. And that's, that's the truth on it. It's the whole idea. Idea of a richer lifestyle. Richer lifestyle is how we experience it. It's how we feel it. It's. It's the people in it. It's all of those things. I, I, you know, manage a professor at the University of San Diego Law School. I'm not. It's been a few years, but they bring me back to talk about entrepreneurship, money and valuation. And the last day of class, these, these folks are getting an advanced degree. They've spent a lot of money for their education. Last day of class, I bring in the pizza, they bring in the beverages. I'll let your minds go where.

They go on the beverage.

College. And I usually have a conversation with them and I say, hey, y' all are going into this profession, legal profession, you're going to be doing this. I said, if it comes that you have this pervasive misery that's just, you know, don't feel that you absolutely have to stay where you're at just because you went and got this expensive.

Education.

Yeah. If that's driving you, if that's really not. Not having the momentary. God, that was a horrible day, but it's affecting you. Yeah, you gotta listen that voice because we have one time.

Here. Yeah. It's something that I, you know, and I mentioned him when I did the podcast episode about the sabbatical. And in my email, I wrote to the, to my list, like, I've. I have been so touched on the number of emails I've gotten from people responding to that and sharing their own experience, sharing their feedback, sharing their thoughts. So many people are going through this. So many people are going through it. And, you know, people are saying, like, yeah, I hit my. I hit my rock bottom in 2021. I, you know, I. Whatever. And, And I know as well as you do, there's a hell of a lot of people in the online space that are experiencing this right now. But won't. I don't know, I'll call it. Own up to.

It.

Yeah. Because I think that more people need to talk about this. And.

I was on two calls yesterday with a couple of my members in accelerator. Two different calls. One person.

Was. I won't go into too many details but basically what they were describing, I was like, yep, that is burnout. Because I'm like, that is exactly what I feel. And they're describing this and they have.

You know, a new newer baby. They have five year old and then other kids and stuff. Like, like just a lot going on. They have a very successful business, very successful other projects in the business and they didn't bake.

Extended breaks into their. Bit into their, into their, you know, basically their. In their year essentially. And they're burned out. And there's this guilt around.

Wanting to take a sabbatical of any period of time and, and they were just talking about taking like a month off.

But I think that's so common for so many people. Like, oh, there's guilt. Especially because they have a big team and they feel guilty around it, you know, and another person.

Is in the. Just leave it. Well, is in the money field and just wrapped up a very busy time of year, shall we.

Say.

Yeah. In now that it's the end of April and.

Complete burnout also. But to your point earlier, saying that why we should have the opportunity or the ability to be able to take a break when we need it because of how we set the business up. This person said to me, I told her, I said, you need to take a break. The signs are all there. And they said, I can't think of a seven day period where I could be away from my keyboard.

And so like my, my sort of before we get off that call, I said, you've got to figure out how to take a break. Because I. The signs are.

There. This speaks to something that I would. This whole. Because this. When that whole thing happened with Jeremy, I had a whole lot of people in my years talking about you got to get work life balance. You got to get work life balance. And I go, no, it's not about balance. Balance is like you've got two things that are counterweights to create balance in the middle. But that's not the way to live because you have the pressure of two weights. I said, it's really about harmony. And harmony is built on intent and sitting back and saying, am I like, like this person you had the conversation with. It would. My interpretation would be. And it may be hard to accept and it might be confronting, but my interpretation would be who's calling the shots. That's not an intentional life.

Harmony is driven by. It doesn't mean that everything's equal. It means that everything, everything is as you want it in the sense of I'm going to spend this amount of time with my family and it's going to be focused and I'm going to shut things down and I'm going to do that. And, and this is a season that I'm going into launch or, or a product promotion. And so I'm going to spend more time. And so it's. The key is that it's intentional and by choice versus unintentional and by, you know, demand, because we can't, we can sustain ourselves and we can have that richer lifestyle. Now. I get it. You know, people might say that, oh, well, aren't you so lucky to be able to do that? And I go, maybe. And I still believe everyone has the ability to have choice and we just got to find the pathway to make it.

Happen. Yeah. A lot of people are asking me, like, how am I going to spend this sabbatical? And you know, we're talking about before I hit record, like, I, I don't, I don't have any expectations about like, you know, I was talking to somebody last week and, and I said, I really want to respect the process of a sabbatical. It sounds good, but I have no idea really what that means, you know. And they said, well, what's your goal of the sabbatical? And I said, well, you know, like, I'm going to rest and, and step back and, you know, know, clear my head and all this other stuff. And I really want to see what lights me up. And I've been working on this AI. I just am fascinated by this, the AI world. And I've been working on this, this chatbot. It's a AI powered chat coaching chatbot that pull. It's a conversational chatbot, as if somebody's having a conversation with me. And the knowledge that it's pulling from is we've compiled thousands of lines in a Google sheet of questions and answers. And I've gone through all these, you know, answers like this is. These are people questions that have, people have asked me and then how I would answer them from, from years of being an online business. So anyway, I am really jazzed about this. Like, I am, this is something I'm really energized about. And so I was telling this person that and I said, yeah, I plan to, you know, I feel a little bit guilty, but I plan on taking some of the sabbatical to, to work on this. And they're like, well, why do you feel guilty about it? And I was like, because I feel like a sabbatical is, you know.

Stepping back and doing no work or what have you. And they said, well, if your goal is to.

Sort of recalibrate and this brings you energy, then why can't that be part of it? And.

Yeah, it's just really interesting. So I am going to be working on this project during the sabbatical because it doesn't feel like work to me and it's very energizing. And I don't know, I don't know really, I don't know why I bring that up, but I just think that, just, I think that it speaks to being aware of how you're feeling about different things and making those choices accordingly.

Yeah. And then, and being, you know, just like I said earlier that if you sit back and say, I don't want to do this that much longer, then now the question to ask isn't, look, you have a family with four kids and you're the old sole income earner and you, and, and, and you're working from check to check.

Commitment isn't saying I'm taking sabbatical or I'm quitting or I'm, I'm doing. That's, that's reckless. Okay, so the question is, if I need this, how do I, you know, how do we put things in place, which you happen to do already, to make it a reality, a possibility. So if you're feeling that tug, if you're feeling that, that, that feeling that I gotta, I gotta figure some things out, I may need to step back and you, you wanna do it then before you go off half cocked and reckless, then you sit back and say, let me put a plan in place. Let me, let me put some things in place that give me the latitude. Because the worst thing you can do is try and take a sabbatical that you can't financially sustain yourself. Now you're stressed out as all get out during the sabbatical and you get no plan clarity, you know, and now you're even worse.

Shape. That's, that's what Emily, my bookkeeper said. She said you, you know, I mean, obviously it's not a case of like, we'll take it for as long as you want, but just be mindful that you are an anxious person anyway, and that we, we don't want to spend the time doing exactly what you just said, Mel, of, like, being anxious around.

The money and all that stuff. And that was one of the questions I asked her. I was like, okay, after these three months, because revenue takes a dip, obviously, because I'm pausing the revenue for 90 days. And I said, well, after that 90 days, what kind of Runway do we have at that point?

And.

You know, she told me, I was like, ah, okay, I feel much. I feel much better. And that Runway, by the way, is not. Does not include the emergency fund that we've created based on your guidance in terms of amount and all that stuff. And so, again, worst case scenario, I'll deal with it because something has to.

Change.

So good. So good. I hope that people are. Are really starting to think about it, you know, and, and not, not that everyone needs to take a sabbatical, but to think about having the courage to really examine your life and how you're living your life, how you're showing up. What is the business doing? What is your life doing? Is this what you were meant to do? Are you living your calling? Are you living someone else's life? Are you just in. In the pathway? Because that's what you chose a decade or two decades ago. And you just say, well, I'm just going to fulfill this, even though it doesn't fulfill me. And being smart about those transitions, entrepreneurs and individuals, we will transition and we will have these things, and I think that it's okay. And, and we shouldn't feel the need to make decisions based on expectations of others that maybe aren't that meaningful to us in our.

Life. I think that's a big piece of what led me to this place over the years, is I was for so long, especially early in the business, like, for the first four or five years, I was building somebody else's business. It was my business, but I was building what other people were saying is a successful, quote, unquote business. And my perception and my perspective, I should say, completely changed a few years ago when we had a conversation and, you know, because everyone's like, oh, you, you know, seven figures and you've made it and you're an expert at that point. Like, it's like you can't be an expert for a whole lot, you know, when you get a whole lot less revenue. But that's what the sort of the. The standard was, if you will, to be taken seriously, if you will or, you know, it be in that the right Quote, unquote, conversation. Well, you said, like, well, how much do you need to. And I know you talk about it here on the show a lot. How much do you need to live, you and your family? If you have a family, what is that? What's that number? And then sort of like the next layer is like, all right, now, in terms of if you want to be saving and investing and whatever, what does that look like? And then you have your terms. I can't remember what the terms are, but I thought about that, and I was like, well.

That number is not seven figures.

And it just takes the pressure. I had this exact. I shared that your strategy with one of my.

Partners that I work with, and they were experiencing the same thing. They had some life things happening, some health stuff and reexamining their business. And that was the conversation. And I could tell with them, like, they just relaxed as well, because they wanted to hit that seven figures as well. And it's like, all right, well, what's real? What do we really need to be if we want to be doing this as our. To generate revenue? Like, what do we need to be living? And then the different levels from there, it just takes down that stress a whole lot. At least for.

Me. It does. It does. And I think that's the whole idea of being intentional and being. Taking the time to do that. And we lose sight of that sometimes. And that's the thing. Listen, now let me ask you this. Is your show going to continue? Is there or you just your hands.

Off. I am. So I do. I publish twice a week, Wednesdays and Fridays, and I decided to keep the show going, but just publish on Wednesdays. So I'm just doing one episode a week, and I've batched them.

Out. We'll hear. We'll hear from you.

Still. Yes, yes. So I'm batched out right now, the longest. And I've been doing a podcast since 2013 now, so for 10.

Years. 700 episodes is.

Crazy. Yeah, I had. I had a podcast first. I did 53 episodes of that show. Then I started the one. I have so been doing this a long time, and I've never been further batched out than I am right now. I am recorded through the end of August into September right now. And it's funny because.

I was. I was just saying this to somebody the other day. I said, doing one episode a week is easy. I'm like. I was. I'm able to be out, like five months now. And they were like, well, yeah, you cut your work in half. Because you're not putting out two episodes.

A week. So, yeah, the show is going to continue. I just did an interview, my last interview before the sabbatical for my show, before this one, and they said after we stopped recording, and she's actually one of my students, she said, I think that's really cool that you can. That you're continuing the show during this time, because I feel like it's. It's respecting your listeners, you know, like they're still going to hear from you each. Each week because they come to expect it. But also, even if I didn't have a new episode, even if I'm putting up, you know, best of, quote, unquote episodes with like a little, you know, spiel or whatever in the. In the beginning of it, you know. So anyway, yeah, that was something that was important to me. I wanted to continue. I didn't want that to. I didn't want that to lapse, but I also didn't want to do. I counted it out and it was. I forget how many episodes it was. I was like, I don't want to do that many episodes, but I will do one episode per week. So.

Good. So good. So as we close out, I want to make sure we'll. We'll hook them up with your. With your show, make sure that they're. They're listening to you.

As you sit here on the precipice of this sabbatical, looking back at what you've been through and speaking to a group of, you know, entrepreneurs and people trying to do things in their life, What. What are like one to maybe three things that you would leave them with that are go, you're going through, you've gone through, or you hope to be on the other side of.

This?

I think on the other side of this, I don't. I mean, I'll be honest with you. I don't know what the business will look like after, when I come back. I have no idea. Maybe it'll be the same and maybe it'll be completely different. Like, I. Again, I don't have any expectations. I don't know the answer to that. But that's one thing that I do want to try to figure out. And it's like you alluded to before, Mel. It's like, even if you can't take whatever, three months off, one month off, maybe it's just a weekend, maybe it's just a couple days taking a step back from your business and really thinking about, is this business set up the way that I want it to Is it supporting a lifestyle that I want to be living? I think the bigger question to that also is that a lot of people don't talk about that. I didn't really realize until going through this process is like, are you. Is the way that the business set up. Are you set up emotionally to be able to.

I guess, like, handle it? And I think that that's where I really struggled, to be honest with you, for. Because I love. I love coaching. I love helping somebody and diving deep. And I think that on a lot of different levels, though, it got to a point where.

The emotional part for me, because I put so much into it, was getting the better of me, if that makes sense. So I would say that's number one, is if you can take a step back in any fashion.

Do it again, even if it's a couple days. I'd say the next thing is really try to pay attention to what's going on with you. How are you feeling about. Do you wake up Jazz to do whatever you're going to be doing that day? Are you having fun with it?

If you're not having fun with it, are there things that you can do to make it more fun or re. Energize.

And also.

I'll say four things. Follow what you are saying. And I'm not just blowing smoke here and saying this because I'm on your show, but, like, listening to you and the financial perspective and advice that you give.

Has, you know, completely helped me. I mean, we didn't, like, even go down that path, but, like, you help Amy and me set up financially to buy our house. It's our first home. It's amazing.

On so many different. Different levels. And so, yes, we were set up financially to be able to take this break. I don't take that lightly. So that's. So I would say that. And then. And then finally, the most important thing is don't. Don't wait to be spending time with and doing the things that you want to be doing and with the people that you want to be, you know, that are most important to you. Because as you said, like, you know, it's. Doesn't slow down, and it doesn't last forever. So those would be my. Yeah, this.

Was. This was such a good conversation that I think more people need to.

Have.

Yeah. More people need to be willing to have it. And I appreciate you being open enough to. I mean, we didn't. When we set this up, we, you know, we got on, said, I don't know, we can talk about.

It.

Yeah. And So I appreciate that. I mean, first, it takes courage to sit back and say, I want to do it. Second, it takes vulnerability to be able to go, hey, I'm going to talk about it. And, and it also takes empathy to understand that other people are feeling it and not talking about it. I think it shows a lot. And so I, I appreciate you for, for being willing to have this conversation on the show. This is all about that richer lifestyle. When it comes down to it, it isn't about 100. It's about how you're living your life. It is how you're experiencing your life and, and how you feel about your life. And if we're all about the money and we have all kinds of money in the bank account, but we're not experiencing life fully. Yeah, it ain't worth.

It. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And that's not the case for me, by the way, where, like, I have all the money in the bank. That is just like, all right, something's either changed and I want to experience life more fully. So let's, let's do this.

And. Well, and we will keep you on the financial side. We'll keep you on the right.

Path. Yes. I'm not worried about.

That. This is a step. I think about it as, as we're climbing Mount Everest. There's those landings you kind of take a break on and you stay there for a little bit and then you strategize for the next, the next peak. And I think this is, and we all should be doing it. We all. I think that. Not to go down another path, but I actually think when you do your planning for, for the year, when you're sitting back and saying, what are my goals for. For the next year, for the next 12 months in there, you should be blocking out, immovably blocking out time for you and things that are important to you and, and blocking it out. I learned this long ago. I, we tried, Stephanie. I try to do it every 90 days we have. And it's not something extravagant all the time. It is just. It might be something simple. We put the phones away and we're there with each other reconnecting, reflect and, and rejuvenating and, and all that. I learned it as a single dad, you know, because Jeremy, I was traveling, I was speaking. He didn't, was trying to wonder as, as a six year old going, when am I going to see dad? When am I going to see dad? Well, I created a calendar marked everything in red where I. It was just me and him. And he knew the Red zones on the calendar. That's all.

Him.

Yeah. And that any other zone on the calendar, if he needed me, I would.

Change.

Yeah. And I think we need that in our lives. And you're demonstrating it. You're living proof you're embarking on a journey, and I would love to have you on the other end of this.

Journey.

Yeah. On the show to talk about what it was like, what you learned and what perspectives came out of it. Would you do.

That? 100%. Yeah. You know, it's funny, I didn't even think about that when. When I've been, you know, thinking about the podcast afterwards or what have you. But somebody said, yeah, I hope that you share what the experience was like. And I was like, oh, yeah, it's a good idea. So I. I scheduled in a podcast episode, you know, for the first week of August that. So when I come back, I will, you know, be. Yeah. Happy to come on here and talk about.

It. For sure.

Beautiful.

Yeah. Thank you, my friend, for being on. It is a sabbatical you're going on, but I know you and I'll be talking through.

It. Oh, yeah, 100%. Thanks for the opportunity to come on here and talk about it. I appreciate you.

Man. All right, man. Be well. Thank you for listening to the affluent entrepreneurs show with me, your host, Mel Abraham. If you want to achieve financial liberation to create an affluent lifestyle, join me in the affluent entrepreneur Facebook group now by going to melabraham.com group and I'll see you there.

And that's it for this episode of building your money Machine, where we help you learn how to master your money a bit little, eliminate financial stress and live a life of choice. If you found this valuable or helpful to you, here's what I'd love for you to do. If you do me a favor, go to Apple, Apple Podcast, or wherever you're listening to this podcast and rate and review the show. It helps us tremendously to keep us at the top of the list so we can continue to get this information and this message out to people, because I truly believe that financial freedom.

Is your birthright, and I want to.

Help each and every one of you claim it. Thanks so much.