This One Pattern Was Controlling My LIFE (Blake Eastman, Money Stories Ep3)

We're walking contradictions. There's a pattern-based aspect of humans. We are pattern-based creatures. Our whole worldview or our perception is shaped by past experiences and past events. What you've done in the past is the easiest thing to do. I was looking at some of my money stories and there was a moment with my dad that I never, I never put one and two together. My dad had lost his job, was like, oh, we're totally fine. Like, I can, I'll work 3 jobs if I have to. Like, you have nothing to worry. And I remember I put myself in a situation where I'm financially screwed and I find my way out of it to sort of mimic the pattern of my father and saying, I'm going to work harder than I've ever worked in my entire life. I have this moment where in Austin, like, the sun's rising and I'm sitting there and I'm drinking a cup of coffee and I'm like, no, no, no, no, that's— working harder is not the answer to this. If you, if you're too myopic and you focus just on one area, you're not able to see sort of the bigger picture. And that's what happens when a lot of people unfortunately become narrow focused. They can't see outside of that.

Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional. I think suffering starts to come in when we're learning the same lessons over and over How can I shortcut the suffering? How do I make sure that when that comes, I can sit there, I can be with whatever's coming up for me in a moment, like it's not going to be a disaster? All right. Welcome to another episode of Money Stories. Today, I have my dear friend and nonverbal communication expert, behavioral scientist, Blake Eastman. Welcome to the show. I'm so excited to get your insights because A, I just think you're one of the most brilliant people I know and really appreciate how you view the world. I can't wait to share that with our listeners.

Yeah, thanks for having me. It's always strange when you're on podcasts and you're like a friend, but it's a cool vibe. I like it better.

I know. I want to only have my friends on the show. That's kind of the way I want to go. But being a behavioral scientist, being a professor of psychology, I want to both use your story and your own experience, but also through the lens of behavioral science. And I think poker's as good a place to start as any. What do most people get wrong about the psychology of money? Why do most people When there's so much good advice out there about what to do with our money, why do people fail to follow that?

I mean, all of the research on economics and cognitive bias, I think there's this notion that we're logical, rational creatures, and we're not. We're walking contradictions in so many various ways. And I think if you sort of understand the culmination of research that's been done and just look at sort of history and look how people directly act in alignment with something that's— they're not incentivized to do, but continue to do it. It sort of shows that there's these— there's a pattern-based aspect of humans. And I think that's what comes up with money more than anything else. We are pattern-based creatures. There's this whole sort of concept or theory known as predictive processing, which sort of suggests that our whole worldview or our perception is shaped by past experiences and past events. And our brain is this like this energy conservation machine. That's obsessed with doing what conserves energy. And sometimes what you've done in the past is the easiest thing to do. So, you know, I'm really big on childhood shaping your worldview, perspective, and actions around money. I've seen it play out in clients. I've seen it play out in my own life. And I think a lot of your money answers or psychology of money are embedded in those earlier years.

I think it's a great point. And, you know, when I think about our brains as pattern matching machines, right? The way I like to explain it is if you rewind a few thousand years, you know, our brains evolved with one function is to keep us safe. So, back in caveman hunter-gatherer days, I eat the red berries, the red berries made me sick, I don't eat red berries anymore. Well, that decision cuts off a whole slew of healthy nutritious red berries. But the brain's on default mode saying, hey, I don't eat red berries because they make me sick. I think if we think about it through that lens, that's essentially what we're doing. We see these things in childhood, we get these patterns that keep us safe. So they, they came from somewhere good and yet they become limitations because we're actually just cutting off a massive amount of information and data that's available to us.

Yeah. And we have blind spots and rationalizations and all these things that we keep going, it'll be fine. Or if this is— and that's why you need people around you to show, oh, it's not really in alignment with what you want.

Totally. Well, that's— and that's, you know, when I think about my work, the first question we, you know, the first question people ask when it comes to money is like, where are the best returns? Like, that's question 7.

Yeah.

Like, let's back up. Number 1 is what do we want? What are we actually solving for? Like, why are we making money in the first place? Then we can start to back into some of these other decisions. But I think there's a real lack of first principles thinking in the finance world.

I totally agree. I think, yeah, some— I mean, working with a lot of corporate clients, I'd say, you know, giving everything in their life to become like a managing director or senior SVP or something of an organization, or even an entrepreneur. And it's so fascinating when you ask people like, you know, like, okay, I get it. Like you want to exit at $100 million or $200 million and you ask them why and they just don't really, really have an answer. It's like, ah, it's pretty fascinating. It's almost great when people answer and like, it's completely dumb. I don't care, but I've always thought I'm going to exit a $100 million company and I just want to go out and I want to tell people that I exited for $100 million. I'm like, okay, fair.

Totally fair.

Yeah, totally fair. It's your prerogative. Like, it's your choice. Like, I wouldn't want to do that, but good. At least you have an answer. But people just like look at you like, oh, I don't know. You know, and I've had— I did the same stuff. Totally.

I've been there. Well, let's, let's, let's pull on that thread a little bit. How did you get interested in cognitive behavior and, and what does that journey look like?

I mean, I've always been interested in people. I think at the first, people would scare me, a lot of anxiety when I was a kid. So it makes sense that I got pulled to like forensic psychology and sort of like trying to more deeply understand people. I think people are pulled towards the things that are probably they fear or they want to learn more about. And then it's just a fascinating subject, but the truth is a lot of my worldview or perspective right now, you know, a lot of psychology is kind of crazy to say, but like bullshit. Yeah.

Yeah.

It's just a lot of research is not really good when you're studying humans. We're so complex. We're not these basic— anytime you hear like, oh, 86% of people are not— it's not, that's not real. It's just like some sort of study. And if you actually read the study and understand the study, you'd be like, oh, okay, this is not. But we live in culture right now everybody's like oh so if you want to change your ex— A study found that da-da-da-so you should do this even though I was kind of sitting there going "This sounds bullshit." Like it doesn't really make much sense how they're taking these big aspects human behavior on board but not interested studying them more than just being cross-disciplinary approach which everything gets answered through looking at things from sociology or neuroscience psychology history cultural anthropology start getting all those different perspectives together get answers. And I believe that if you, if you're too myopic and you focus just on one area, you're not able to see sort of the bigger picture. And that's what happens when a lot of people unfortunately become narrow focused. They're, they can't see outside of that. And that's, I'm grateful that I didn't go down that path because entrepreneurial pursuit allows you to sort of go this way and not this way.

Well, and you know, backing out even further. What you're doing now is essentially the intersection of practical application, right, of behavioral science, because there's a poker connection. Yeah, I mean, and poker's fascinating when it comes to cognitive biases and decision-making, right? So tell us a bit about that link. How did you get into poker, and, and how has that shaped your connection with behavioral science?

I mean, so the real reason I got into poker is I saw Rounders when I was 17. And at the time I was, I only had one job in my entire life. I don't think I ever tell you this. I made tie-dye t-shirts from the age of 12 to 17. I was like a, almost like a sweatshop worker in my neighborhood. And I watched this movie Rounders and I was like, I want to do that. Like, that's so cool. And I became obsessed with it and I studied and I learned and it was a lot of volatility. I didn't really make it into something that was making money until I was 21 or 22. I probably got more insights about poker coaching it than playing it. Just because it's, you don't see the stuff that you do. You see the patterns and stuff that other people do. And just the, I mean, there, I could talk about this for like thousands of hours. Like it's such a phenomenal game for understanding human behavior, money, psychology. The economics. I mean, you could just draw correlates everywhere, but at the end of the day, I think the coolest one is poker is a process-based game. So you're always focused on the process, not the outcome. Hmm. And in poker, when you're first learning this game, you become very outcome-oriented. So you play a certain way some night, it does well, and you're like, oh, I'm really getting it. And then you play the next night. And you lose a lot of money and you're like, it's not working out for me. But what you're really looking at is the underlying thought process on sort of how you approach your decision-making. And poker is the biggest smack-in-the-face game because there's very few things in life that don't have direct feedback loops, right? So like a lot of people listening to this, you might have a business where, all right, if you're in sales and you go out, you do 2,000 calls this week or next week or whatever, it's going to have some ROI, right? Like just being out there. Poker is not like that. So poker is a game where you can make the right decision given the information that you have and not be rewarded for that decision. You can also make the worst decision and be rewarded for it. So the foundation of variance or sort of luck in poker, it shows you how people handle it, how it comes up, and there's just a lot there.

I actually think it's a perfect microcosm for business. Yeah, because, you know, as someone who's coached a lot of founders and business owners, I think one of the most confounding things for us as entrepreneurs is when we put in the correct inputs, and then don't get the expected output. You know, I'm on my third company now, and there tends to be this sense that comes up for me of like, I should know better, or I should know how to do this, and it should be easy. And it turns out, despite all my experience, despite, you know, building and selling two companies before, despite coaching hundreds of founders, like, I still bump up against personal limitations. I'm like, how, how do I not know this by now? And I did the right things. I know exactly what I should be inputting here to be successful. And yet it doesn't work out the way I think it's going to.

Yeah. I mean, it's, it's part of the reason. It's also why any of anybody's in their own business. It's kind of a cool exercise, but if you had somebody's same exact business as you and you stepped out of your own business and you were able to coach somebody who had the exact like clone of your business, you'd be world class. You'd be like, do this, do this, do this. But when it comes to your own stuff, all those limitations, all those aspects of it, they act as barriers. And that's why, like, I've worked with a lot of executives over the years, like founder CEOs and a CEO, two different beasts, man. Founder CEO, so you're always dealing with some personal stuff and with a CEO, it's very different. They're cold. They're more, let's look at it, bottom line. It's just, they don't have attachment to product. They don't have attachment to how they're being seen. They're just dealing with it. But founder CEOs also have that love and that care and that, so you see the beauty of both sides. It's, you know.

Totally wild. Well, let's dive into a few concepts that shape people's relationship with money. For example, loss aversion. This drives a lot of our behavior in poker, in investing, when it comes to business. How do you view some of these things and how can we understand these concepts and apply them to make better decisions?

I mean, I think that everybody has— the reason why I'm laughing is because like loss aversion was a principle that didn't connect with me. I never had it. I was never— I was just— I was a psycho. I would, you know, make $150,000 one week, lose it all and be okay with it. It wasn't— after a while I was— I had a site. I loved the volatility. And I'll tell you, so my dad passed of ALS, you know, like a year ago. And I was looking at some of my money stories and there was a moment with my dad that I never, I never put one and two together. People, somebody says something to me is like, cause I had great family. My family was loving and supportive, but my dad had lost his job. And I remember there being like anxiety in the family for the first time. Like my mom was making jokes like, oh, we're just gonna eat pasta every night. Like, and I remember sitting down on this, this table with my dad. It's like one of those visceral moments. And I'm like, are, like, what are you going to do? And my dad with such, like, authority was like, oh, we're totally fine. Like, I can, I'll work 3 jobs if I have to. Like, you have nothing to worry about. And I remember feeling, like, good after that. And then I realized that I literally, throughout my entire 20s and early 30s, lived that. I put myself in a situation where I'm financially screwed, and I find my way out of it to sort of mimic the patterns of my father. And I was like, that can't be it. And it was totally it. 'Cause like once I got that, I was seeing that like I was trying to sort of replicate that dynamic. And you know, I had a very, I had a very volatile financial life from 20. Like anybody who has stories, I always beat them. Like when everybody was like, oh, I have a worse story. I was like, let me tell you where I was. I just did not fear the bottom. And it's, it's good. And it's, I mean, I remember this one moment being at home with my mom and I had every single bank account was overdrawn. I owed, I was probably like $1.4 million in debt. The IRS, Southern District Court of New York was coming after me for around $750,000. And I had literally no money. Like my accounts were overdrafted. I was at the, and I walk outside and there's this like tree right near my mom's house. And I'm like, I'm fine. Like, that's all just my narrative around money. Like, I am safe. I am fine. I have a house. I have a family who loves me. I have food, and I can find my way out of this. And that has almost been not good for me because I don't— so I've had to raise my standards for what I'm willing to— because I used to have no problem, like, oh, $0 in my bank, I don't care. And then it goes, okay, $50K, and then it's $100K, and then you start sort of raising what I'm willing to do. And at this time of life, not willing to have that. I'm not willing to be like, oh my God. But in my 20s, I fed off having my back up off the wall, and I'm the entrepreneur I am today because of all those moments.

I mean, our stories have— yeah, so many parallels, right? Like, I mean, I, I was addicted to risk, like my fighter pilot, you know, mentality of hair on fire, back against the wall. And it's almost like I was playing games with myself of like, how far can I go and still pull myself out of this thing and pull a rabbit out of the hat at the 9th hour?

Yeah, baby.

And I got really good at it. Yeah, right. And, you know, the, the, the universe will give you an opportunity to learn a lesson. And if you don't learn it, it'll make it a little bit harder and a little bit harder and a little bit harder until the lesson is so intense and in your face that you can hang up the phone and go, okay, I got it. And the reality is I had the opportunity to learn the lesson of not putting my back against the wall many, many times, but I would always come out, meh, in the 9th hour. And so it wasn't until I got universally smited that I was able to integrate and go, oh, I actually don't have to operate this way anymore.

Yeah. I always just— the IRS sent me a letter 2 days before Christmas. And I remember like shaking when I'm reading it and it's like, oh, you didn't file your taxes for the last 6 years. See you in court. We filed for you. Here's the amount of money you owe. And Southern District of New York, been through 2 audits, been through all that stuff. And like, you know, going through it, it's just like irrational fear as an entrepreneur of the IRS. They're a very reasonable organization. It's like, here's my money. Here's my this. Here's this. I didn't do anything wrong. I just didn't file taxes. I got fined out the ass, but I got My biggest money lesson from that was this: there's a big difference between accountants and tax lawyers.

Mm.

Accountants sort of tell you what to do as a byproduct of laws, and this is what you do. Tax lawyers, those people are savages, dude. Like, just the way that they think. So here, like, there's just so many stories about, like, tax law and how that— and, like, for example, I I didn't file 1099s. I ended up filing them. But it was so interesting. I was like, I want to sleep at night. I want this to be done. And my tax attorney is like, okay, okay, slow down. Like, let's not, let's not go too fast. Like, no, I just want— let me explain to you as a CPA. Let me tell you, you have to file your 1099. So you got to do by this date, blah, blah, blah. As your tax attorney, let me tell you what happens when you don't file your 1099. And I was like, or is it 1090 or whatever it is? And I was like, well, what happens? And he was like, well, if the IRS ever audits you and they look at that specific thing, they will say, why was that not filed? So I was like, oh, so you don't actually have to file? No, you can file it in the middle of the audit and have a small pen. I'm like, these players, these people are playing chess, not checkers. And like just in the audit, the lawyers did things that my tax, my accountant was like, you can't do that. And the lawyer's like, you can totally do that. He never filed. So you can retroactively file a C corp or S corp or whatever it was. Do this, this, this, this, this totally on books. There's nothing wrong with it. He saved me like $90K. So it's just like the— so now to this day, all tax things are filtered through a lawyer and an accountant. And I want to unders— and I'm very big on, you know, I have sort of like a civic duty. Like, I believe, like, I have no problem paying taxes. I never had an issue with that. But there are certain things that are just like, yes, strategic. And you have to be smart as you make more and more money and how you sort of want to allocate those things. And I'm just a big fan of tax attorneys. It's, it's so worth it.

So, so for the IRS AI gods that are listening, Blake is totally above—

No, I'm good. Like, I really feel like at the end of the day, like, ever since that audit, it's kind of like, come at me, bro. Like, I know I have everything. I don't break laws. I have friends. Yeah. And mutual friends. Like they tell some things that are write-offs. I'm like, go read the 27-page. That's not a write-off, bro. You cannot write that off.

Totally. But, you know, this is the way I think about taxes is like I always tell my team, hey, I'm fine with paying penalties and having things say, hey, you actually can't do that. I'm not fine with going to jail.

Exactly. There's a line.

There's a line, right? So unethical?

Nah.

But let's also, you know, do our best to, hey, take things off and they come back and say, hey, you're actually not allowed to write that off. Okay.

Yeah.

You might just have to pay some money back. All right.

It's there. It's reasonable. And it's just, yeah, don't go to jail. That's just kind of the, like, and some people operate in a way where it's like, you're not good.

Well, and, and what strikes me about this conversation beyond just the taxes, but the, but the behavior piece is we can know, like you're, you're, you're simultaneously like studying cognitive behavior science and putting yourself, putting your back against these crazy situations, these money situations, where, how do you think about that relationship?

I mean, it kind of like totally makes sense, man, right? Because you look at some of these like just like classic studies where they're like, oh, we'll give you like $10,000 of this, like, and you look at it and you're like, yeah, I'm acting in alignment with that. Like, I'm kind of Everybody wants to think of themselves as special, but there's just like these patterns and trends in human behavior that sort of just recur. And I think I just got good at over time. I mean, it's so funny because I got good at over time, protected myself at that time for saying, I was very good at being like, this is the right decision for me at this time in life.

Yeah.

You know, like, and being able to conceptualize that. So, but was it? Probably not. but I thought it was when I thought it through and really looked at it. And I mean, there's a couple of, there was a couple times earlier in my career doing well with poker, could have easily invested in a couple of startups that are now very big companies. And it's like, oh, I would've made a lot of money. Same thing happened with BTC. I don't even wanna tell you those stories, but like, I don't, I don't, I guess there is a confidence and an assurance that I'm gonna get to where I'm gonna get to. So I don't really care that much about, I don't have, I think that's what poker teaches you. It doesn't teach you this, like, I missed out on this opportunity and I don't even think about it because like there's, yeah, there's, and then I get that and I get to a car accident and I die. Like there's, you just don't know. So what's the point of, of shaping the past and, but looking at future, you don't want to make the same mistakes over and over and over again. And yeah, I was, I was a different person in those poker days, man. Like when we talk about the thrill. Like, yeah, there was a rush. There was a rush in getting yourself out of a situation. I would like run up my Amex card to like $100K and be like, all right, I got 20 days. Or like literally $100K, I'd look like— I know all the Amex, I love them so much because I call them up, be like, hey, I can't pay you, like, what can you do? Like, can you pay a dollar? I was like, what? It's like, yeah, I could pay a dollar. Yeah, probably, you know, like, and then yeah, just pay it with the next two because they're so reasonable. But just, just feeding off of like, I fucking did it. Like I did it, I, you know, I did it, I did it, I did it. But then I would, you know, make the $100, be in the hole at $100, make $120, and then the next month spend $180. And it was just a cycle of that.

How do you break that pattern?

I think, I think the only way is to go broke. Like for me, yep, I really believe in this thesis that you can listen to as many podcasts if you are one of those people out there that can listen to something internalize it and do it, you're just like a world-class, like, learner. But I believe that pattern changes in behavior only come from failure, not really successes most of the time. So I needed to fail in the way that I failed in order to become a different person. I think if, if we go back and things were different, no matter what was happening, I had an epic failure on that trajectory. It was going to happen. And I'm grateful that it happened in the amount of money, like, I could have easily seen a world where instead of owing the IRS $750,000, I owed like $4 million and I wouldn't have been able to get out of it. Right. Like, and it would have been much harder. So I'm grateful for that failure because I'm just a different person because of it.

And I love the way you're talking about this because I feel totally the same way. You know, for me, it was a, it was, you know, my failed e-commerce investment. I lost $1.5 million in 18 months.

I was talking to you and you were excited about that investment.

Yeah, absolutely.

I'm like, oh, it seems like a cool idea. I remember using them and, you know, yeah, totally.

But, but You know, here's, here's a couple of things that I think are in line with what you're saying. Number one is I am, I am so grateful for that lesson. First of all, I wish upon everybody a failure that is good enough to smack you down, but you don't have to start completely over. It is the ideal way to fail.

Like scaffolding for failure.

Yeah. But, you know, prior to that, I had a, I carried a certain arrogance that only someone who's never lost could have, right? And, you know, the reality is, is I was just— my coaching career was just taking off, and I got scared. I got scared about who I would have to become to become a great coach. So I went out and I distracted myself, and I said, well, if I just— if I turn this company around, that'll give me the credentials. That'll be, that'll be the story that I can tell to be a great coach. Because I really wanted to be one of the best coaches on the planet. Well, be careful what you wish for. It gave me exactly what I needed. Yeah, a dose of humility, right? Ability to be more empathetic when, you know, because I think, I think 37, 30, you know, 35-year-old me might have looked at a business owner who was struggling and be like, just figure it out, right? There's a, there was a distinct lack of empathy because I always just figured it out. Then the universe put me in a situation where I couldn't figure it out.

Yeah.

Now I get the lessons, I get the rewards on the backside of that. So failing through pain is, you know, and integrating the lessons is certainly probably the most effective way to learn. But I always say now, you know, I love learning the hard way, but I'm trying to quit. So if I want to, if I want to do my best to not learn the hard way in the future, Where do I start?

Well, I think the interesting thing is me and you are in an echo chamber because we're very similar, so our pain was the same, but pain is relative. So I think people right now hear this and they're probably not seeing themselves in our story, and they're masking from the fact that their relationship with their wife is terrible, that they don't see their kids that they, they work 16, 18 hours a day. Like, you have to see the pain. Like, if you're not seeing the pain and everything's working, great, but that's where we hide out. So like, the first thing I really think is sort of like the life audit of like what's in alignment, what's not in alignment, what's working, what's not working, and having someone else sort of facilitate that for you to just be real honest with yourself of like, okay, Is what I am doing actually learning? So the answer is awareness. Like, you're not— people just are not aware. And I wasn't either. We weren't— we thought that was a healthy thing. We thought— and I had friends around me that we would all commiserate about, oh, how much you stuck. Like, it becomes a little bit of an echo chamber. So I would start with first being like aware. One is aware, and then two is find out like where the pattern originated.

Yeah, I call that insight. Yeah. So my AI loop is awareness, insight, action, integration.

Yeah, that's perfect. I like that framework a lot. Yeah.

Insight is, okay, where did this actually come from? Yeah.

Why am I like this? Like, where, why do I keep doing— and it's also when you can see that you keep doing the same thing over and over again. It's like, and sometimes the same thing, that's what's so weird about humans, right? Like I have friends and I've seen people that are insanely wealthy, and I wouldn't trade in a heartbeat my life for theirs because they've, they've got one area of wealth, but they don't have, you know, the other aspects of it. And they're just so hyper-focused on— they think they're winning because they have a lack of awareness of the areas in their life where they're not winning. And you just— and usually you're going to be really like, most people are going to be defensive around those things, and you're not gonna, you're not gonna own up to it. I'm a good father. I see my kid You know, once a week or every day I help them with, you know, or I'm a good mother or I'm a good this or I'm a good that. But good is relative to what your standard is.

Well, I mean, one of the most dangerous phrases in entrepreneurship is I'm doing this for my family.

Oh yeah. It's such bullshit. I know.

Totally. It's because first of all, let's just, let's go to immediately, you know, inheritors.

Yeah, they lose it all.

Well, it's also, it's also a burden that they didn't ask for.

That's so true, right?

There's, there's zero empathy for people who inherit money. It's, it, it can be quite isolating to, to have this thing that you didn't ask for placed upon you, right? So that you'd never have to work again. Like you draw immediate ire from society when you walk in anywhere.

Yeah.

And then if you ask most kids, would you, would you prefer, you know, your dad to be there with you at dinner every night, or would you prefer him to hand you this empire on the backside? What are they going to choose?

Yeah, no, it's, it's my biggest fear, man. It's like, I, I remember being young and my mom— I told you this when I saw her over Christmas— I was like, do you remember this? She's like, no. I wanted a pair of sneakers, and my mom like gets down on her, on her like knees. She's like, Blake, I would love to get you everything and anything. We just don't have the money. We have enough money to buy like one pair of sneakers per like 6 months or whatever. And we weren't poor, but like, it was like, you know, and I was like, okay. And that was like a driving force. It was like, I don't ever want— I want anything when I want it, where I want it. Do not tell me no. And the whole joke was like, where did you come from? Because I was so different than the rest of my, my family. But then it's like, I, you know, there's an accomplishment to the— and I was telling my wife, like, we're moving to a new home in 20 days. Like, it's so insane. Like, my— the home that I grew up with my family in versus this home. Like, I am now that, like, rich family, you know? You're like, what did they do? Like, there's all this food in their refrigerator and their house is so big. And it's like, I don't want to rob my kid of that pursuit, but at the end of the day, they're gonna grow up in a different circumstance than I did. And yeah, that's probably one of the biggest things I think about with kids is like, how do you raise kids that inherently do it? And I've got a lot of like entrepreneurial friends that have like all their hacks and stuff. Like, it's a different fucking thing, man. It's a different thing when you're like going to certain vacations. And I'm not changing my lifestyle for my kids. Like, I want nice things too, right?

Like, absolutely.

But that's what they know. And then what do they desire? What do they want to reach for? Because I wanted to stay in the nice hotel. I wanted to go to eat dinner everywhere, right? Like, it's tricky.

Totally. Well, I mean, you know, a client of mine often says, like, you can't expect a kid to have Honda taste when they were raised with Mercedes.

Such a good line, right?

Like, you know, you're setting the baseline for them. But you touched on something a little earlier that I'd love to unpack a little bit. Which is real wealth.

Yeah.

Beyond the money in the bank account. What does wealth mean to you now?

Yeah. So I told this story, I'll tell it again. So long story short, during the 2008 financial crisis, I was playing with the people in finance in New York and everything was burning like AIG's gone and Lehman's under and all that stuff. And at the time, somebody had owed me $50,000, right? and I was trying to, I was like, uh, I don't like, their world is like burning, right? I don't want to be like, hey, like, do you have the, I just didn't, it wasn't good for relationship management. I lose money, I need the money. I send them a text. I said, listen, I know a lot's going on for you and there's a lot of fires going on, but is there any way we can settle up? And he goes, he answers me in like 10 seconds. He goes, of course, of course we can stop by Sunday. And What did he say? I don't see any smoke. Winky face. And I was like, that's weird. Like, you're— I would assume. So I go to, I go to New York City, I go to Manhattan, I go to a brownstone, beautiful brownstone. I'm greeted. I walk upstairs and he's sitting there and this is like Sunday morning with his legs folded, reading the New York Times like nothing is going on.

Not a care in the world.

Not a care in the world. And I, and I'm like, And he passes over the check, slides over the check. He's, here you go, Blake. Like, you always could ask for me to settle up. Like, why did you wait? I was like, no, I'm like, because all of this fire. He's like, what fire are you talking about? What burning?

And he's like, this company is like, I know you're directly involved in all of this.

Like, your name was in Too Big to Fail. Like, it's, what's going on? And he was like, I've set my life up in a way where I'm fine. You know, I, I, I, I, there's no risk for me. So yeah, it sucks and yeah, it's this, but like, I'm good. And to me in that moment, it was such a thing of wealth. But later in life, I realized it wasn't. So he passed away like 3, 5 years ago and he didn't live a wealthy life. He had his, he didn't have a good relationship with his kids. He didn't have a good relationship with his wife. He was maniacal about making money and very good at it. But later I realized like, oh no, like I want the comfort of what he said and the assurance, but I also want connection and family and my own time and my own this and my own that. And I idolized him for a while and he was kind of like a mentor to me, um, financially at least.

Yeah.

But I wouldn't have learned those other lessons from him. And, you know, to this day, like, you know, when my dad died, like, I'm glad my parents were— went on vacations and did all those things because, like, my dad thought he was going to retire and travel and do all these things. And he died at 65, you know, and we always plan for that. So it really did change my foundation of certain things. And to me, wealth is really— a lot of it's a byproduct of time. A lot of it's a byproduct of, like, the people you spend your— like, I believe that I'm immensely wealthy right now. And I may not have, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars or anything like that, but like, I, if somebody asked me, are you wealthy? I'd be like, yeah, because my definition is probably different than what most people do. And then you like, this is the whole joke, you know, I, you know, when people tell you stuff and you're like, yeah, whatever, the tie-dye t-shirt is coming back to it. The owner of it, this guy, Steve's in, I wonder if he's still alive. I should reach out to him. He says something to me that I never understood. He said, Blake, it's not being rich that's fun. It's getting rich. And I was like, I was like, what do you mean by that? Like, you're bloody nuts. Like, no, it's a, it's like, it's the path. And it totally is now. It's like, when you look back at it, like, you remember what got you there and what you had to go through and what you had to attain. So I feel like you have to have fun in the journey. If you're not having fun in the journey, you're just chasing a destination. You get there and then it's like, then what?

I mean, one of my favorite quotes from Jim Rohn, right? It's the true gift of wealth is the person you become along the way.

Yeah.

And that's the reality. And if you don't become the person who's capable of being wealthy, you might have money, but you're not— your habits and your mindset are not going to allow you to be wealthy.

Yeah, exactly.

You know, right?

I mean, I know some people, some of my clients are just like, they're insanely wealthy and they'll say things like, but if the markets crash, I'm like, if the markets crash, you're still fine. What are you talking about? But you see how that scarcity mindset is what has made them so wealthy, but then they can't enjoy it. They can't truly enjoy the money.

I mean, wealth can absolutely be a prison of our own making.

Oh yeah.

Right. And so, you know, one of the four freedoms that I talk about is freedom of mind because you can have all the money in the world, but if you're staring at the ceiling at 2:00 AM, you know, worried about the market crashing, Do you have— do you truly have wealth? Yeah, I would argue no.

No. And I think the only time you really have these realizations is when you go through the shit and you lose someone close to you, or you have your health taken from you from a heart attack or something, and it has you see the— but I've seen people that have had like 2 bypass surgeries that are still out there grinding. So some people, everybody learns at their own timeline, you know.

Totally. I mean, did you know Except I'm trying to get better at learning the first time or the second time the universe presents me with a lesson. My friend Dan, our friend Dan, gave me a word for that the other day, divine assignments, you know, and if you don't learn the lesson from the assignment, the assignment might just get harder until you do. And it really is, you know, I think these things are placed in our path so that we can get the answer and then and then go learn, you know, something new, or we'll just be stuck repeating the same loop over and over.

I have this joke, like, you know, some people are like, religious, whatever. I call it the simulation.

Yeah.

Like, I'm convinced we're in a simulation. So that's the thing. So I'm like always like—

Probability says.

Yeah, we are. So I'll always be like, all right, like the simulation is doing this for me. And I kind of feel like it's almost like there's this joke of like, there's like these rankings that you have to pass. And it's like, so, okay, first get out of this loop and then get out of the net. But you're always in some sort of challenge or loop that you do. You've never arrived. And especially if you're like sort of entrepreneurial mindset and, you know, improvement and all that, there's just always something to sort of break through. And that's life, right? Like that's what life is, is playing that game. And yeah, it's like, I really wish I could give myself like advice at 21. I wouldn't have listened to myself though.

Like, if I had time, what advice?

My first piece of advice would be like, you need a coach, number one.

Why?

Because I couldn't see my own blind spots, and I really didn't get that at that point entirely. I had so many people, man, like, I had offering to like mentor me. I was disgusted by the concept of a mentor. It's gonna fucking mentor me. I had such a chip on my shoulder. I was like, choose myself. I don't want— I had this whole thing that like, if someone mentored me, they would rob me of own success because I didn't attain it myself. So I wouldn't want to even like, hey Blake, I could put you in touch. I don't need to be in touch with that person.

Where did that come from?

I think a fear of like almost like trusting other, like, uh, you know, not trusting others and also just an addiction with the validation that I did it. Like I was very big on that. Like I did it, I did it. I, it was me. I was a source of this. I was a source of this. And that's changed over time a lot where it's like, no, I just don't see— someone said something to me recently. He was like, you got to stop being Kobe Bryant and start being Phil Jackson. And I thought that was a genius reframe. And it's like, yeah, it's not about— and Steve Jobs is something I love. Somebody asked him a question. They were like, what's the best thing you've ever made? Your best product you ever made? He sat there for a couple seconds and he's like thinking, he's like, the team that built the iPod or iPhone. And I was like, ooh. And it's like, yeah, and that's what I want to be more about. It's no more about Blake. It's about like inspiring others and building this apparatus that can accomplish sort of amazing things. And that's been sort of like my new game, but I'm still a little bit of a lone wolf. It still comes up where I'm like, you know, I got it. I'll do it. I'll, that's like my own thing. And then I do, so like I did an exercise, very helpful. I was having trouble with outsourcing things because I'm just so used to doing it. So I recorded my screen for 8 hours the entire day, and I made one of both EAs go into it and say, you pick things that you're going to take off my plate because I'm not good at telling you. So now, like, every month they'll pick, like, one of my screen shares and be like, oh, why are you fixing this? Like, I could do it because I'm still just like, I want to do it. I want to do it.

Yeah, you know, the thing that strikes me though is that I think there is a, a bad idea out there that if we heal or break these patterns that we'll never deal with them again.

Oh no, they'll come up over and over.

They're gonna come up over and over again. And B, so, so it's not to get rid of it, it's to be at choice with it. Because at some, at some point, being a lone wolf still may be a massive benefit.

It is.

So, okay, when do I choose it? It's not my subconscious driving it anymore. It's not— I'm at choice with when and how to apply this, but I still have access to that part of me that made me so successful.

I mean, it's still a very deep part of my identity.

Yeah.

So like before I was waiting for you, I was having a 15-minute conversation about production setups with the owner of this place, and I like the fact that I'm able to talk about marketing at a high level, talk about, you know, development and design. I love that. I love that I get to do whatever I want every day. So some entrepreneurs will say to me, like, for some friends, like, oh, I don't even know what solution we're using. That's someone else. And I'm like, okay, I get that's for you, but I— this is where my enjoyment comes from. So like, don't make me wrong for the fact that I have this. However, there's a fine line between understanding these concepts and me working an entire day on something that I should not be doing, you know, and that's sort of the line.

Well, I mean, you know, A, I agree with you. Best advice, hire a coach, pay for other people's playbooks, right? There's the fast way and the slow way. The slow way is the expensive way. First of all, you can either pay that money up front, shortcut the pain, get somebody else's playbook, or you can build it yourself. Through blood, sweat, and tears, you're going to end up spending more in market tuition on, on, on two. But in that same breath, it's gonna sound like I'm talking about both sides of my mouth, like other people's frameworks can only go so far. We got to take those frameworks and then we got to mold them into what we actually want with our outcome, like, because everyone has different outcomes.

Yeah, so let's talk, let's, let's triple click on frameworks for a second, right? So There's a lot of frameworks, framework-based thinking, structured thinking, great, nothing wrong with it. But the truth is there is a propensity to sort of carbon copy a framework in business and entrepreneur in this, that the context is very decisive. And it's like, that will not work here. And it may not, not work because of the market. It may not work because of the product. It may not work because you're not willing to give up The ability to utilize that framework. So that's why coaching is so valuable. Like where, where if you're just taking information externally and you're like, oh, let me use that framework. Your coach can be like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like I have this with all the time with my clients. I, one of my company's early startup doing really deep tech AI stuff. I was like, dude, why are you, why are you not talking your entire meeting? Like the team doesn't think that you're like actually involved. They don't know what you're doing. You don't talk. You don't say anything. An hour-long meeting. And he's like, well, I saw Jeff Bezos say that, like, he doesn't like to speak in the beginning of the meeting because it impacts—

I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Okay, so Jeff Bezos has an insane level of status and hierarchy and sort of icon mysticism behind him, and that's why he doesn't talk. But in the early stage of your business, these people see you as equals. You don't have that. You can't carbon copy that.

It doesn't work, right?

It's not going to work. And that's like the whole thing of like you take stuff outside and you don't understand the context. A coach should be able to see the nuance and context and find out what— use this framework, use this thing, use this.

Well, and also discern correlation versus causation. Yeah, right. Because I mean, obviously, you know, ice cold plunges get a lot of shit nowadays because people took that and went, well, if I have the same morning routine as Alex Hormozy, I'm going to be successful. It's like, no, no, that's not actually the thing. Yes, there are some benefits of creating discipline and working out and doing all of those things, but that's actually not gonna, gonna be thing that gets you to the next level. Yeah.

And the whole, like, notion of high performers and watching their— it's all nonsense, most of it. Like, you're seeing, like, cuts of them. You're not seeing them pick their fingernails or, like, scroll through it. I love— Dan did a post recently about— he's like, I spent 2 hours a day on TikTok. And he's like, you know, it's my downtime and it's research and that's where I forwarded out and do this. And it's like, there's just this idolization. Like, there are some days of the week where you will look at me and be like, that guy is a savage. Like, I wake up, I write 6,000 words, I work out, I go to a meeting, I do a workshop, and you're like, wow. And then you see the next day and I'm literally on the couch playing video games. But nobody puts those in those reels. Like, here's what my day really looks like. So then you carbon copy and you overindex on the fact that if I do all these things, I'm going to be that. Come on. Like, no, you know, it doesn't work like that. Like, I know some very high performers that I would consider very— like, I've built something for myself where I can— my output— I try to always think of high performance as this mixture of, you know, you got time and you got output, and you're trying to condense time and increase output. To me, that's what high performing is. It's not working from 7 AM to 10 PM at night. There's times in life where you'll have to do that, but for the most part, I, I think it's really cool if I could wake up at— I don't wake up with an alarm clock. It's one of my favorite things. This is— I love it. Don't have any meetings scheduled at the time that— so if I wake up an hour later, it happens. And my sleep's pretty locked in because of Molly, but like, my wife's a sleep expert, so I, I have that. But it's my own freedom, and I love that, and that's beautiful. And I have to sometimes— for me, being around high performers, I have to schedule downtime for myself. So I put in my calendar sometimes, like on a Saturday, let's say, or a Sunday, which I, you know, I just literally only up until like 3 years ago, I stopped working weekends and that was revolutionary. It was like, oh my God, me and Molly were so proud of ourselves. Like, okay, let's start with, I still work, but it's my enjoyment work. It's not like working on the business, not in the business usually. But I put in my calendar, you know, 12 PM, to 3 PM, sit on the couch and do absolutely nothing and play video games. You deserve it. And by scheduling it, it gives me permission to do that because sometimes I'm thinking, what am I doing with my life? I should be doing more. I should be doing that. Like, no, you need your off time. Like, you need to have that.

If you were listening or watching right now, like, this is profound because when we talk about wealth, Right. This, this, I mean, hustle, hustle culture is a disease. This, hey, stop going to dinner with your friends, you know, put your head down and grind, you know, look up in 10 years and you'll be a billionaire. Like, who cares? You've given up the best parts of your life. Like, everybody go right now and put a block in your calendar to play video games or do something stupid, take a walk with no point. With no need to get better. It is one of the best gifts you can possibly give yourself.

You know who taught me this, right? Your wife. It was Claire at a mastermind. Claire said, you need to do things not for a reason. Because every time I would do something, I'd try to be the best or just do things for the sake of doing things. And I was like, huh, I really like that. I need to do more of that in my life. And it's been a staple ever since.

It's the best.

Yeah.

Right. And, and, you know, again, the, the, the tweets, the Instagram Reels, like the, the way we're shaping our mindset is, yes, look, we, we want to take some of these habits on, and, you know, you don't want to be so unstructured that, yeah, uh, you lose purpose. And you, like, we get it. I don't think most people listening are in danger, no, of, of going that far. Most people, if they gave themselves a gift of an unstructured hour a day, would dramatically increase their life enjoyment.

Yeah. And it's also about— there's also something really interesting is what kind of worker are you, right? So for me, if you were like, hey Blake, I'll see you at 6 AM, what we're gonna do is we have a bunch of interviews that we have to do. Okay, I'm gonna do interviews from 6 AM to 7 PM. I, from a social perspective, I have no problem with that. I can talk for an entire 12, 15 hours and be excited and passionate and all that type of stuff. When it comes to writing and intellectual output and good ideas and good thoughts, the 12 hours, no way. It's going to be out of those 12 hours, going to be 3 hours of actual decent material. And then the drop-off is so substantial that I'm like, I should just be doing something else right now. So it really depends on the kind of work you're actually doing. And I think our whole Ecosystem is not really geared towards knowledge workers. It's geared towards like, you know, other stuff. And yeah, it's— I mean, I listen, I, I was a— I hustled hard from, I mean, I'd say the age of 17. I graduated high school and the person to my right was going to Harvard and the person to my left was going to West Point. And I remember sitting there and going, I'm fucking smarter than both of these people. Like, what did I do with the last 4 years of my life? I didn't do shit in high school. I was playing cards, I was playing video games, and I was always smart enough just to always pass. So the teachers hated me. They're like, he, oh, I can't fail him, but he's not a good student. I became, I made a commitment to myself that is never going to happen again. I'm never going to feel like this again. So I went to school and I was a nut job. I got shingles twice. I was stressed. If I got a, you know, if I got an A-, I would lose it. I became an absolute nut job for 4 years. I didn't, all my friends, partying, clubs. I did none of it. I worked, I studied. I went out once in a blue. Then immediately when I left that, I became an entrepreneur. Same thing. So from the age of like, I didn't really start living until I think I was maybe 33. I just worked every single day. That's all I did. It's all I knew. And it was me hiding out and me doing all those types of things. And some of the skills that I have are because of those 10 years of being in that flame. So I don't want to make myself wrong about it. That's— there's this woman, man, I, I got to find it because I've said this like 10 times. She wrote a thread on Twitter that I thought was so genius. It was— she said she was going— she ran a tech company with like 60 engineers, and I think it was in New York City. And she says, I was going on a date and I left my leather jacket. So I went back to my office to get my leather jacket. And I see this young engineer working in the office at like 9 o'clock at night. And I sat there and I sat next to her and I taught her about life-work balance and all, and how you have to have all these things. And then I walked out and I immediately felt guilty because I got to where I was by not having that balance and then gaining it. And I didn't want to rob her of that. And I was like, that's so profound in a certain way, right? Like, so it's like, I don't think I'm half the person I am today without those 10 years. But if I had a coach, I don't think it would have been 10, it would have been 5.

That's—

and I still would have learned the lesson. That's what I— you know what I mean, right?

Because look, pain is inevitable. Yeah, suffering is optional. And I think suffering starts to come in when we're learning the same lessons over and over. So how can I shortcut the suffering? Because, because pain's inevitable, right? Like, I am going through a really amazing period of my life right now. And I know that at some point it won't be this good.

Yeah.

Something will happen, right? Maybe I'll lose a family member, a pet, whatever it is that's coming. So there's no way to avoid the pain. But what I'm doing now is thinking about how, when I can see a valley on the horizon, how do I engineer out risk? How do I make sure that it's not catastrophic? How do I make sure that when that comes, I can sit there, I can be with whatever's coming up for me in a moment. but it's not catastrophic. Like, it's not going to be a disaster.

I mean, it— so to bring it all together, when my dad first got ALS, I remember looking up to the simulation and saying, I'm going to work harder than I've ever worked in my entire life. I don't know why I said that. Like, I had money to pay for his alternate treatments. The family was good, but that's all I know. In times of stress, work hard. That's all I knew, right? Then 2 weeks later, as my dad starts to lose the ability to move his hands, to drink, to eat on his own, I have this moment where in Austin, like, the sun's rising and I'm sitting there and I'm drinking a cup of coffee and I'm like, no, no, no, no, that's— working harder is not the answer to this. It's being able to savor these moments. It's being able to have the mindset of— I really— it sounds cliché, but it's like, No matter what you're going through, there's somebody going through it a lot worse. And I do this tool where I use a historical context. So I say like, okay, everything I'm going through right now, what would it have been like for people 300 years ago? Like 300 years ago, we might be doing this conversation and all of a sudden our village might get sacked and our wives get raped and both our heads are cut off, right? Or we're going to war every other, like, so if you just see that your problems in the grand scheme of reality are really not that big, it allows you to de-risk. It allows you to do all those things.

Well, there's just such an inherent narcissism. Yeah. Like, like when I hear— I'm going to, I'm going to get on a soapbox. Like when I hear people that compare wearing masks and COVID with Nazi Germany, I'm like, no, Anne Frank was under these floorboards with machine guns. Like, how dare you compare having to wear a mask to the fucking grocery store?

Yeah. Different dynamic.

Like, this is, this is not the same. These things are not the same. And the fact fact that you would compare them, it says more about you than, than maybe we want to get into right now, right? But, but so I agree, like, this is inoculation from— it's not the trauma Olympics, right? Like, all we have is our own lived experience. And me losing my dog could feel the same as somebody losing their entire, their entire family, right? Like, like, we don't have— we only have our own lose— lived experience. Right. So you, you, it's, it's not trying to plot it and dismiss the pain that you're in, but there's a healthy, yeah, there's a healthiness to saying, hey, you know what? This is the best time in the history of the world to be alive. Like, it's like people are really worried about politics right now. They're really worried about all this stuff. This is the best time in the history of the world to be alive. Things are only getting better. And maybe, just maybe, I can stop feeling sorry for myself for just long enough to actually start to create somebody. Yeah.

And you need to feel them. You need to know the method that works for you. So some people, sitting in it works. They sit in it for 30 minutes and they really feel their emotions, and they really go through it, and they cry, or they throw something, or they do whatever. I know, enough of that now. And now let me try to— like, you gotta find out what— and I think it works for It works for different people. I mean, I'm so callous that sometimes I just like block everything out and it hits me later, right? It'll hit me in random moments.

Well, when you're addicted to stress, when you're addicted to risk, you got to be really good at compartmentalizing.

Oh, I mean, and that's so like— I, most of my stress was always in my stomach. Yeah, right. So like for years I just had like stomach problems and I'd have this palpable anxiety and it, I don't have any of it now, but occasionally if I like went out with you right now, we had like cheeseburgers and some alcohol and a milkshake tomorrow, I'd get that feeling and I immediately go back into the old, like I start going like, oh my God, I have no money. I'm like, whoa, like this is not 20 years ago. It's not 15 years ago. Like you're fine. You're healthy. You're safe. This is a physical sensation in your body. That's a byproduct of something else. And has nothing to do with the state that you're in. And I just go through a process of like, I'm good. Like, I have nothing to worry about. And I constantly do that. But the thing, it's not fair. Like, the thing that everybody's got experience in life, just seeing my dad go through ALS, that just changed my— I don't— it changed me. I'm like, I'm— it's hard to get to me because I'm just like, at any— seeing him go through that, like, I was just like, it's a particularly just like hard disease. And I'm just like, okay, it's terrible. So if I get a cancer diagnosis— I was telling my wife the other day, like, I was like, a cancer diagnosis? I'm like, it's not ALS. Because it's, it's relative to what you experience. But my wife doesn't have that same because it's not her dad, and the people listening to this don't have that because it's not there. So you have your own things that you ground in reference to, and you collect those, and those are a source for you getting out of whatever you're in.

Yeah, I love that. There's a, there's a gap, right? There's a relativity gap. And if we could identify that gap, that is actually where we can maybe elicit some of this Yeah. And that's what you're talking about.

That's what people make the mistakes. Like, they hear your story and they try to relate to your story. So they're like, oh, you know what you should do? Just go work out more. Like, that'll fix it. And it's like, well, it worked out for me. So what you could say is like, listen, I have no idea what you're going through. I have no idea your relationship to your family or whatever, what you lost. But let me just— I can share with you what helped me when I was going through something similar. It's so much more responsible. It's like, oh, you need to fucking just go out and just go in the cold plunge every day, or you need to do this, you need to do that. Like, depends.

Totally, man. Well, and then, you know, like on that note of coaching.

Yeah.

There is a lot of prescriptive stuff out there. And the reality is we don't have the context. We don't know. Everyone's situation is different. And so, you know, for me, a core principle is always to lead with that vulnerability and go, hey, look, I don't have it all figured out. Here's what's working for me right now, or here's what I'm struggling with right now. And here's how I'm attacking that. And then, you know, in turn, you're giving the gift of, of that vulnerability to somebody else to go, oh yeah, actually I'm struggling too, and maybe that'll work for me.

Context is everything.

Totally.

You know, it's just more context you can create, the easier it is to answer questions.

Nailed it. Well, back to— because I love advice for 21-year-old self.

Yeah.

Or yourself 10 years ago. So one is hire a coach.

One was hire a coach. Two, it's stupid saying it, but like balance sheet. Yeah, I didn't know my numbers. Yeah, I lived with my head in the sand. I was like, all right, I can pay the rent. I did not know my numbers and that was very bad. So two, if there's all these things in life, but at the end of the day, the sort of lifeblood of a business is money.

Yeah.

So in order to sort of measure the performance of the business, you need to measure your money. And I did not do that. And then 3, maybe this would be 1, never stop working out. Because for me, that was such a part of my mental health. And I was like, I was in really good shape from like 21 to like 24. It all left when things started getting hard with the business. Like I was a hardcore runner, a hardcore CrossFitter. I was like, I was in great shape and I still haven't been able to sort of get it sort of like back. And I would have never have stopped physical. I didn't realize how much of a psychological thing that was for me and how stabilizing working out was.

Well, I would offer you a corollary perspective though. Because I would submit, given our similarity, that part of that was driven from a different place, maybe driven from a dark place.

Yeah, 100%. Like I used to be—

Like for me it was.

Yeah, we were both like, yeah, like ultra events where my feet are bleeding and I'm like, yeah, push it harder. I wasn't good. Yes. So I would have liked to have carbon copy my mindset around fitness and health now to back then.

Yeah.

So it's easier now, right? But you're 100% correct. I was like I was dumb.

Yeah, well, I mean, doing the best with the information that you had, right? And the reality is that ultra and endurance sports are a really good place to go create physical pain. Yeah, to distract yourself from what else you're doing, from what else you're doing. And, and I want to go back to balance sheet as well, because this is one of the things that, that I give out for free, one of the most powerful tools in my entire coaching practice is the One Page Wealth Snapshot. We'll link to it in the show notes because it is a one simple look view at the numbers that matter. Money in, money out, net worth and debt, right? I mean, like this, this is like very simplistic. The reason we don't look at that stuff, because we don't want to know the answer. But not knowing the answer causes way more stress.

So much more empowering to know what reality is.

Totally.

Yeah.

Now you can actually start to make good decisions. And this is total— I mean, I'm with you, man. Right? Like if the account's up, we're doing great. If the account's down, we're doing terrible. Right? That is like, for me, for sure, getting a handle on numbers is just absolutely critical and not obsessing. I'm not saying have a 64-tab spreadsheet where you track every cent and go, ah, I spent $213 on my cell phone this month. Doesn't matter. What are the numbers that matter? And then take ownership of those numbers.

Yeah, no. And that's the— that's part of the reason is like by having optics over your numbers, like I do like kind of monthly reviews and I did a yearly review this year and I was like, huh, like looking at the potential of like one line of business, it's like if I grow this, it's got a ceiling. Like I can't do more than $2 million because I wouldn't be able to actually facilitate that. This has no ceiling. This can just has more scale to it, right? And I enjoy it more. So I was like, okay, not doing this anymore. Like, and slowly I would have, if I don't look at the numbers, I would have just thought that I make all this money. I was like, I don't know. Like, you don't really know. I use, I use Tiller. I like this application Tiller. I love it because I like to build spreadsheets and stuff. So it just shows me everything. Snapshot each business. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. What's working, what's not working, and put in the calendar like once a month, like review it. And then also like just when I was younger, I mean, do you know how much money I paid in interest? It's like I spent like $300,000 in interest from these like payday loans I used to take, you know, and I don't hate on them because, you know, nobody else would give me money, but they did. And then you start to be like, oh, so now I can get SBA money because my finances are in order. And I can do all this type of stuff. That option's available to me. It wasn't available to me when you didn't file 6 years of taxes, right? Like, it's just like— and also, I think at the end of the day, like, it's just a thing of integrity. Like, not knowing, it's kind of like you just hide out from it. And like, I guess I do agree with what you said, though. Like, I know people that kind of go into this like weird obsession thing with their money, like about like little things. And I'm like, dude, like, why are you focusing on a $22 bill? Have your EA go through and do something like that. Like, that's some weird control mechanism of like wanting to know where every dollar and cent is, or that just seems silly to me.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's just like, no. And yeah, it's just, it's awareness.

Yeah, well, it's, it's really, it's finding the 80/20, the Pareto principle. Like, okay, I want, I want a minimum effective dose of monitoring my finances. I want to be empowered to make good decisions, but I don't want to spend time tracking shit that doesn't matter. Yeah.

No. And it's still to this day is I don't, I don't think I've, you know, finances is still my, you know, it's different. I, I play things still risky, but within a risk that I'm willing to take. And that's going to change when I have a kid. I might not have a child and I'm responsible for other things. I might be like, okay, the number, but it's a conscious decision instead of like hiding out. Like it can be empowering if you say, no, this is my minimum. This is my— this is what I'm not with. And you stick to that versus just not knowing anything and just like operating in a vacuum.

Yeah, I mean, this is what I always tell post-exit founders or people getting ready to exit is take a small percentage and go blow it. Either blow it on a car, blow it on stupid investments, like buy some crypto, like whatever you want to do, but take some to blow because if you try to optimize every dollar and put it all perfectly, you will— it will result in self-sabotage.

So this is my friend Alyssa Akon. She's like a CEO, a founder CEO coach. And she was like, she's— we were talking about finances and she's like, so what is your financial accounts? I was like, ah, I don't really do any of that shit because I don't understand it, right? And she was like, what do you mean? Like, you don't have like a basic Vanguard account or something like that? I was like, what's a Vanguard account? I had no idea. But then just this year, like, my little Vanguard account was up 31%. And then you get addicted and you're like, oh my God, look at this. I made, I made money. And I use— what really helped me is like automating my finances. I use this routing software. Oh, I forgot the name of it. But basically it like auto-deducts from my accounts because if it's there, I'll spend it. So I need to just like— and then I forgot about this thing and I look in my account and I was like, I was like, shit, you know, this is so cool. And then you get like kind of addicted to the game of like building wealth and it becomes fun and you're sort of in that game. I think that's what is— if you could enjoy the game of it, it becomes like it's fun and not saying like, oh, I have to, or if I get to this, I'll get to buy this or buy that. And yeah, I have enough money now to do pretty much whatever I want to do. Like, it's not like And I don't know if it'll change. I think I'm at a— I think this year was— this year is like a breakthrough year for me financial-wise, is that like, yeah, like you realize that like more is not really going to do much. Like I'd like to build a new house. I'd like to do things like that. But like, yeah, if I want to do that, I can do that. If I want to do this, I can do this. Like it's just you realize you're not going to get much out of it. And there's a beauty in that. And, you know, like I'm in it.

I'm in a shedding shit phase.

Yeah. Yeah.

I'm, I'm I'm selling both my supercars.

Oh, cool.

Currently, because, you know, I always try to give people permission to spend on the things that really bring them joy, but you better get clarity about what brings you joy.

Yeah, yeah.

And supercars were a really important part of my life 10 years ago. It was really important to me to have the car that I, that I had the poster on my wall when I was a kid. And I looked last year, I put 1,100 miles on my two cars.

Yeah.

So, okay, clearly this is not a priority for me anymore.

Yeah.

Now, does my, does my expenditure match this output? No, it does not.

Yeah.

Like my calendar is saying, is showing me that I'm not enjoying this thing.

It's responsible. I love it.

Because, you know, having, having spent a lot of time around the ultra wealthy.

Yeah.

Around people with multi-nine figures, 10-figure bank accounts. More does it, more does it make better.

And it's also just everybody's got their own stuff. Like I have never, you know, we're all sitting around, everybody's talking about their McLarens and they're this, and I'm like, I love my Tesla Y. Like I don't, I'm not a car guy. I could understand, but then I saw, I think it was, I think it was Nick and he was talking about something about customizing Porsches, like that you can customize them a bunch of different ways. I was like, oh, I could see how that's appealing. I could. And then, because I never grew— I got my license like 3 years ago, so I didn't know what it was like to drive a car, right? So for you, but now I know, like, oh, driving is— it's got this fun sort of thing. But you want to say interesting, I don't like attention for things that I'm not in control of. So I don't like having a nice car. I don't want people looking at me. Yeah, I don't mind them reading my, you know, book or videos or all that, but I don't like the wealth optic attention. It just something about it. I don't like it. Right. So that's why. And then I was in a supercar with a friend and I was in a McLaren and all these cars and I'm just like, yeah, it's— and I'm always trying to inspire them. Like, I'm so happy for you. You got your dream car. But like, I don't fucking care. They're hard to get out of. I'm like, this sucks. How do you get out of this car?

Basically, that's the reason. Don't ever buy a McLaren. Fuck it.

It's insane, you know?

They're super hard to get out of.

But everybody's got their— everybody's got their thing. So I'll tell you one, like, purchase for me, right? Like, so years ago, I think I told you this story. Years ago, I had the same guy that I told the story about before, the whole Lehman thing. He— I wanted to buy a watch when I was playing poker because I felt insecure that everybody had these, like, expensive watches and I didn't. So I said, listen, can I take you out to dinner and can I pick your brain about, like, what my first watch is going to be? And he's like, sure, let's go. So we go to dinner. And we're having a conversation and I'm asking, you know, IWC and like, oh, like, what's, what's good? Should I get a Rolex? Like, tell me. So he just sits there and answers all my questions for like 30 minutes. And then he stops and he puts his, like, napkin down. He's like, wait, let me ask you a question. And I was like, what? He's like, do you deserve to buy a watch? And I was like, excuse me? And he's like, yeah, do you deserve to put a $50,000 optional piece of luxury on your watch? And it's like, what's your definition of deserving it? He said to me, and I was like, fuck. I was like, no, I don't deserve a watch right now. I was like, I don't know how wealthy you are. You're playing our big game, so you probably have some amount of money, but, you know, you're a young kid. I don't know if this is the right time for you. And I was like, fuck. I was like, yeah, I want a watch when I feel like I can deserve a watch, right? And over the years, I've sort of flirted with this concept and I always look at watches. And this year, I think on my 40th birthday, I now starting to feel I'm going to fly to Belgium and I'm going to get my first watch. And my first watch is not optics. A lot of people won't like this watch. It's called Ressence or Ressence. It's like it's a watch made by a product designer and it's just— they're like, you know, between $35K to $50K. But it's like one of those things that like people don't know it's valuable. You'd think it's like an Apple Watch or something like that, but it's not about anybody else. It's about me. And when I get to look down on the watch on my wrist It's like, oh, I've got to a place where I can deserve it. And that means more to me than the watch.

Yeah, right.

Like, then the apparatus of the watch. So I like games like that. Like, that's the stuff that Dan does where he like, you know, it's something ridiculous, like fucking Ferrari or something. So I deserve the Ferrari. I really like that concept though, of like, you know, I'm going to do what I'm going to do to earn this and I'm going to feel good about the purchase because I've made a lot of purchases in my life. That I don't feel good about.

Yeah.

And I'm like, do I really deserve this apartment? Do I really deserve this? Do I really deserve that?

You know, the deserving question is interesting. What I try to do when I'm, when I'm thinking about a purchase is, how do I want to feel as a result of this purchase? Or how do I want to not feel as a result of this purchase? If you, if you pull on those, on those levers, you'll usually find the real answer. How do I want to feel? I want to feel significant. Yeah, yeah, that's what, that's what I want from a watch. Yeah, right. Until you get to a place where, hey, this is actually just for me, this is a reminder for me, that's super cool. Most people can't quite get to that.

Oh yeah.

You know, from the, from the get-go. So what are you trying to feel when you're going out and you're about to swipe that credit card? Are you trying to feel part of the group? Are you trying to feel, you know, superior? Are you trying to, you know, justify missing dinners with your kids because you know you're giving up something really valuable to have all of this money? Like there's, there's a lot of things that drive purchasing behavior. Most of it is not healthy.

No, I mean, also like, yeah, any of you— it's so interesting because I just like nonverbal things. You can tell the people that like want to show other people that they have the watch just by like how, like at a dinner, it's like, you know, they'll like, you know, make sure it's very obvious. Like, yeah, like their gestures will be like this or like that or like this or like that. And it's like, all right, and I'll always say to make them feel good, I love your watch, that's so cool, da da da da. But I can't relate to it because I don't view it in that sort of way. I think my big wealth thing is houses. I like building and creating things. Like, I followed the whole build of your place. I was like, oh, it's so cool. Like, just to be able to design every detail. And to me, that's wealth. Like, we want— I want to have like 3 houses in America, maybe 1 abroad, and you balance between them, or like that's my idea. And yeah, sometimes like buying a house is, you know, I still think renting is better in a lot of cases, but it's different in terms of like what I want.

Rent until you can't buy the place you want to— or sorry, until you can't rent the place you want to live. And then that, that, you know, I like that a lot. Go build a place. I mean, yeah, it was hands down the best ROI from a— but, but from a return on happiness perspective, not from the return on investment. Like Yeah, sure, we made money. Great. Irrelevant. Designing every detail of your space is something that I think is really underrated as a lever to pull.

And that's such a— what you just said is so important. Like you have to have the, like almost like a multi-lens way of viewing decisions because we think financial decisions are just finance. That's what you just taught, right? Like financial decisions, they're not. They're like happiness decisions and status decisions and how am I going to feel and how am I— and I think if you're just a better decision maker unilaterally if you approach it from a multifaceted perspective.

So I love this thread and I think this is a great place to leave off. We're going to have to do a part 2. This is so fun talking about the behavioral piece.

Let's do it in your evil villains lair. That's it.

In the Bond lair.

Yeah.

But you know, If taking your own life experience and your experience as a psychologist, if you could leave the listeners, the audience with one piece of advice for how to make better decisions, what would that be?

That's a good question. So interesting. I guess where the conflict comes up is like I kind of feel like the life advice is better than any psychology advice out there. It's just like the truth.

It's totally. So what have you learned that you want to share?

You— I think it's like something along the lines of you as a person right now has a past and has a history, but you really do have your own path. I think we're in a society where we want to carbon copy, and there's no way anyone's path— and sometimes you're following people's path with one lens. So you're looking at somebody who's got a huge social media following and you maybe want to do that, but you're not seeing what they had to sacrifice in order to do that. So I would say, like, really choose the model. It's okay to carbon copy and sort of just appease, but until you know what you want and why you want it, you're going to be on some, someone else's version of the way to live life. And unfortunately, I feel like you're going to have to go through some failures in order to truly see that. But don't be resistant. I don't know, it might be just get a coach. Like, it really, it goes back to number one, right? It might just be like, you're curious about your blind spots. You, you can't, you gotta see You just don't know. So you need the accountability. You need someone who understands your con— like, that's the easier way to do what I'm saying. It's, it's kind of like, like, we're in this room right now. Most people would say, like, they're in this room, it's got four walls, a ceiling, and floor. You can't see outside the room. The room is your reality. And a coach might take a cup, throw it at the wall, and it might break it open a little bit. And you're like, oh shit, there's another room. Like, let me walk through to that room. And there's like a whole world outside of you. But it's just so hard to see when you're in your— like, I couldn't coach myself. Like, it's not what works. I'm like, oh, Blake, I do. I will tell you though, like, the more I think writing is an important thing. I think using tools like ChatGPT or any sort of LLM, it can really give you some really incredible insights if you can't afford like higher level coaching.

Yes, and I use ChatGPT as myself all the time. It's wild, the insights it'll have.

I have a client that uses all his inputs summarizes it on a weekly basis and sends it to me, and we tackle the common themes.

Amazing. No, like, it's changing. So, like, the world is changing so fast, and we have these tools. Like, I, I had a massive realization on this recently. It's like, oh, you know, right, asking ChatGPT to write Instagram captions, like, LOL. There are some really high-level uses that we're not— we're just starting to to consider. Yeah, from a therapy perspective.

I mean, there's so many— like, I'll be honest, like, I'm— my background in psychology is more like in forensics and an assessment, so I was never a clinician really. But I would totally prefer my kid working with ChatGPT than a random psychologist. Not a a random psychologist, not a focused somebody that I've sort of vetted, right? But a random one. It's just—

they bring all their traumas, they bring in their projections, they bring all their cognitive biases. Like, it's tough for them to get them right. It's tough, right? And also, like, all of that—

no, there's something about any of your business people— therapeutic frameworks are not all of them. If there's like desensitization therapy or phobia therapy, it's different. But like been seeing a therapist for 10 years, that's like customer lifetime value, baby. Like, they're not incentivized financially to get— that's why all of my— most of my coaching is designed in sprints, because like, if I keep working with you, I'm not effective. Yeah, right. And I'll always be there as a person to chime in, and we can do that. But like, you know, certain therapeutic frameworks or certain therapeutic modalities are just like, you're listening to one person's perspective and one person's advice for 10 years, and you're still in the same place.

Ruh-roh.

Okay, like maybe it's time to start stepping out, right? And I'm not saying therapy is— I, I listen, I think that therapy is phenomenal and all those tools are great if you're struggling with certain specific things. It's very good.

Yes.

Like if you've got a fear of flying, there are effective frameworks for reducing that that are documented, that are well established. But like Other things, you kind of need people who, you need a multi-thing of perspective. It would be almost cool if you can go to therapy and you can sit there and you have 6 therapists and they all sort of chime in. That'd be a cool little—

ChatGPT kind of allows you to do that.

That's what it does. Well, you can go into ChatGPT and say, I want you to create a cognitive behavioral therapist, somebody who's got, I don't know, principles of like, m-m-mimetic desire, Girard, whatever his name is. You can like put all of the different things in it. And say, answer this question from all of these perspectives. The answers are phenomenal. You can even do Freudian. It's incredible. It's incredible at language. It's such a cool tool.

Yeah. What an amazing conversation. Thanks for— wide-ranging. We went all over the place. Learned a lot. Really appreciate you sharing. Thanks for coming on.

Thanks for having me, brother.

Thanks for making the time.

Yeah.

Cool. Cool.

That was great.