Life-Changing Books Podcast Episode 32. Chris Jarvis: Author of Giraffe Money

Well, Chris Jarvis, thank you so much for joining the Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books Podcast. How are you?

I'm doing fantastic. How are you?

I'm doing very well. I'm super excited. This is my first in-person podcast experience. You have a beautiful home, so thank you very much for the invitation.

Glad to have you here.

So for those in the Book Thinkers audience that don't know who you are, can you introduce yourself to everybody?

Sure. I'll read it as my mother wrote it. So my bio, Chris Jarvis, I have written 16 books. I was the advisor to millionaires and billionaires, helping them with their tax and business and financial problems for a long time. Sold my business and then decided I wanted to give back. So I have taken the lessons from thousands of very wealthy people and put together lessons to help people figure out how to elevate and how to evolve in their lives so they can make more money, be more successful, be more impactful, and enjoy their way.

Something I thought about your book, Giraffe Money, I thought it was very interesting that in the introduction you paint this picture of You know, kind of in yesteryear, the rich and the successful, they were idolized. People really enjoyed looking up to those people. But now some popular media demonizes those people. They victimize them. They, they make them the bad guys. And so why do you think that is? What, what kind of shifted there?

Interesting question. So in talking to people, I can tell you that when I was doing tax work for really wealthy people, some folks would be very excited about saving taxes. taking that money and reinvesting in some new business. But there are a lot of folks who said, hey, it's really a great country, I don't mind paying my tax.

Yeah.

But it was when they started being demonized and vilified that they said, well, hey, I'm employing people, I'm giving money to charity, I'm doing a lot of good, and somehow I'm the bad guy because I'm successful, that the mindset shifted to, the hell with these guys, if I'm gonna be the bad guy, then I'm gonna keep as much as I can. So somehow it definitely happened somewhere over the last 10 years that the 1% became Rather than being idolized as you're super successful, you've done cool stuff, you're a titan of industry, it's, oh, you're bad because you have money. So it definitely happened. Um, who did it? People who are jealous. Uh, you know, I'm not sure. Why do people want to take things from people who are successful? Why do Americans love to see somebody fall from grace? I don't know, but it's definitely happened.

Well, as somebody who aspires to be very wealthy, who's elevating every area of my life, Your book was a great tool for me because it helps me to become aware of a lot of different tools and mechanisms and strategies that the ultra-wealthy, the giraffes of this world, are taking advantage of that maybe some aspiring entrepreneurs and people like me aren't taking advantage of. So I appreciate you sort of opening the doors on your life and the lives of the people that you work with and make some of this stuff more common knowledge. So I really do appreciate that.

And that's why I did it. So you're welcome. And, uh, What I didn't realize when I was doing financial work for super wealthy people was that I was embarking in a 20-year masterclass of how to, how to run a business, how to build wealth, how to be impactful. So it was very cool to work with people who made millions and billions who were doing different things. And so when they brought me in to help them figure out their lives, protect them from lawsuits and other risks, reduce taxes, I had to dive really deeply into their businesses and understand what the hell they were doing.

Yeah.

And the interesting takeaway is that people who make a lot of money, people who wanna save taxes make a lot of money, people who make a lot of money do a lot of wacky shit. Like that is, like that's the best way to describe it. I don't have any other way than, and I couldn't title the book Wacky Shit.

Yeah.

Like that wasn't, you know, maybe the next one. But the idea is that people do different things and they are different. And when I started thinking about how do you encapsulate how people are different, the giraffe made a ton of sense. And it wasn't just that the giraffe is taller and stands above everybody else. It's that the giraffe— it's how the giraffe did it. And the giraffe is the only animal that evolved to be more vulnerable. So the neck became more vulnerable, but in being more vulnerable, they can see things others can't and reach things others won't. And that's what I found from all these super successful people was that they had reached these greater heights, but they had done it because they saw things before other people saw them, or they saw things people never saw.

Mm-hmm.

And so that was really an important thing in the book is let people know that every great idea was once idiotic and dangerous. Like, that, like, that was it. So, and everybody I know who had a great idea, their best idea— no one's ever forgotten their best idea— was told it was terrible. It's stupid. It's idiotic. It's too risky. It's dangerous. It's— you're going to ruin your career, ruin your reputation. But they did it anyway. And so that's the giraffe thing, is breaking away from the herd and doing things differently and being vulnerable. And that was the big theme I wanted to get across in the book, is that it's going to be different. And people are going to tell you it's stupid, but that's the only way you're going to become successful is by not taking all the risk management advice that is never going to stop coming.

Well, there are a few different things I'd like to unpack there, but before we unpack, a lot of the Book Thinkers family, we like hearing about the author's journey. What made you decide to turn your specialized knowledge into a book that everybody else can take advantage of? And so when was the decision that you said, hey, you know what, I'd like to become an author? And I'd like to open up the doors of the rich and the wacky and the successful and tell everybody about some of these secrets.

So, so touché. So I, I threw a bunch of stuff at you and then you gave me 5 questions in one. So I intend to do that. I'm gonna do the best I can to try and, uh, unpack as many of those as I can. So I wrote my first book at 26, and I did it because I was 26 and I didn't really know anything. So I was trying to— it was a credibility builder that how am I going to get 40-year-old and 50-year-old wealthy people to work with me From a distance without, without meeting me. So I needed credibility. So that's why I wrote the first book. And the first 12 books were all about knowledge. So that was, look how smart I am, look at all this interesting stuff you don't know, and I'm going to give you information. So that was a— the first 12 books were absolutely low self-esteem workshop. Like, that was my thing, was I needed something that at least I believed I needed something, which may or may not have been true. Certainly whether I wrote 2 books or 12 books, I'm not sure it mattered, but I kept They kept feeding that ego issue. But it's funny that the last couple of books have been about giving back and trying to help people excel, not about getting people to become clients. So my first 12, 13 books generated 18,000 leads of people making $300,000 to $3 million a year calling me asking for help. So it worked very well. But it was when I turned to say, I just want to give back and I want to teach people how to be better entrepreneurs, how to make more money, how to enjoy their money, how to be more impactful, that those were the books that became immediate bestsellers. So there was a lesson in there that those became— they weren't selfish books. They were, how do I give back and help other people and inspire and motivate? And no surprise, probably to a lot of people, those are the ones that were best received.

Well, we were having some conversation before we jumped on this, and I heard a little bit about some of that transition from ego and money and leads over to impact. And we'll definitely touch on that in a minute. But before we do that, let's paint the picture of this giraffe metaphor a little bit more for everybody. So it was 2002 and you went on safari through 4 different South African countries and you had an amazing experience. You even put a picture of all of you guys in the book, and I love when authors do that. But you were awestruck by these giraffes. I think you said remarkable and a few other words to describe them. And so how did this come to be the foundation for all of your different business units and for, frankly, the title of this book, Giraffe Money?

So like many people on a transformational journey, the time that you take action is not the first time you hear it. So with all the books that are out there, there's not a lot of new lessons, right? So the books that everybody's reading— I once had a mentor tell me there's only 2 self-help books: Think and Grow Rich, which is all about how you talk to yourself, and then Making Friends and Influencing People with Dale Carnegie, which is how you deal with other people. So there's only 2 things: what do you say to yourself and how do you talk to other people? And every other book is some version of that. And for me, the giraffe was 2002, but it didn't become part of my message and metaphor and brand until more than 10 years later. So it was planted, the seed was planted, and I was very slow to tend to that seedling that somehow just kept pushing and kept pushing. So for me, it was after I was voted out of a company I started, homeless, broke. It was a miserable time in my life, suicidal, suicidal thoughts. And I was trying to figure out what do I do? How do I— where am I gonna go? What am I gonna do now that I've lost my old career?

Mm-hmm.

And when I was trying to figure out what I did, I started talking to old clients and saying, why do you work with me? What makes— why do you work with me? Why wouldn't you work with me? What was good? What was bad? And what kept coming was people told me, you helped me think about things differently. You helped me elevate my perspective. And that was a seed. And then it was still probably another year until they said, you helped me see a different path. So when I'm done talking to you, I'm looking at things differently and I'm considering a different path. And I started going back to thinking about the giraffe and how the giraffe eats, how the giraffe is born, how the giraffe lives, how it, how it moves, how, what kind of groups it's in. It's not in a herd. And all of a sudden it started coming together with, you know, again, slow learner. All the seeds are in front of me. Like I would tell most people, most, most people you need to know, you probably already know. The lessons you probably need to work on or apply to your life, you've already heard. And so for me, it was— it all sat there for a while. And it was— it really was probably when my younger sister died. And she had a really tough life. I was the prodigal son who did all these wonderful things, never could get my parents who were divorced to talk to each other. But when Dee was in the hospital and then in hospice and then died, it was at my parents' worst moment that I have my fondest memories. And that they were so kind and loving to each other and gracious to each other. that it became, oh shit, like it's the vulnerability that brings people together, not the strength and the accomplishment. So then that was the, um, the lightning bolt for me of, oh my God, vulnerability is more important than intelligence. And then the metaphor really kicked in with the giraffe of, oh, the giraffe is that only animal that became more vulnerable, not stronger, not faster, but more vulnerable, but it allows it to see other things. and reach other things. And truly in my life, when I started to become more vulnerable, I saw better connections. I saw better ways to work with people. I found ways to be more impactful. I'm on a bunch of boards for nonprofits. I've started Draft University. It just all became clear to me. So again, right under my nose in 2002, very cool experience watching and learning lessons and then going back to my notes and saying, oh my God, that applies to business. Oh my God, that applies to life. Oh my God, that applies to relationships. And then I realized I didn't beat myself up too much for waiting 15 years to, you know, to see what was given to me. But that's how I found it.

Yeah. Well, it's a beautiful metaphor. And as you go through the book, for everybody listening and for everybody that's going to pick up a copy, that giraffe metaphor continues to grow and it continues to evolve and cement itself. And so, you know, we'll get into this giraffe versus zebra metaphor, which I really like. You kick off path number 1 with that. But, um, For people who are listening and they think, okay, Chris works with all these millionaires and billionaires, I'm not that person yet, maybe this book isn't a good fit for me. You lay out some statistics in the beginning of the book, and the one that I wanted to point out is that there were over 675,000 new millionaires in 2017. That number blew my mind and it gave me a lot of hope of like, okay, well maybe I do need to protect my wealth. I am going to become one of these people now. And so what do you say to everybody that thinks maybe this book isn't a good fit for me? I'm not a millionaire. I'm not a billionaire.

Well, the number one thing to becoming successful is mindset. And it's understanding that, again, every great idea was once idiotic and dangerous. And that the beaten path is really the place that you get beaten down.

Yeah.

And so don't do things other people do. That's the masses. That's the herd. That's the zebra, which is zebra are in herds. And when the zebra move to to greener pastures, they all move. When they stampede, they all stampede. And so for people who are thinking, I'm tired of doing what everybody else does, I'm tired of doing what my parents want me to do, my girlfriend, my boyfriend, my husband, my wife, my neighbors, my friends, I'm just tired of being in the herd, I wanna break free. Everybody who's been really successful has had to break away from norms and do things differently. I find that most people wanna be financial outliers. Everybody wants to make more money than their friends, but nobody's willing to act differently.

Mm-hmm.

I wanna be one of the guys, but I wanna have twice as much money as the other guys. And so to be successful, you have to do things differently. You have to be somewhat non-compliant. You're gonna take risks that people are gonna tell you are terrible ideas, which isn't even a bad thing. They're just looking out for you. So my mother, at this age, I'm 50 years old, I've traveled the world, and every time I'm going somewhere, she's like, be careful. Like, I travel more than you do, like, you know, but I take it as, it's not that she doesn't trust me, it's she just worries.

Yeah.

And so I take it as she cares, and that's all I take it as. So when, for anybody who wants to be more successful, they should just be open to I should do different things. I can't just keep doing the same thing I've always done and expect somehow miraculously next year I'll sell twice as much, my commission will be twice as big, my company will just give me a promotion they haven't given me. Just because you want it, you've got to be willing to do something differently. So this giraffe is how to be different in life. You want to have more fun, take some chances and do something you haven't done. Try a new restaurant. Ask somebody out that you've been afraid to ask out. Like, where's the risk? Where are you going to stick your neck out? If you don't stick your neck out, you're never going to be able to experience new things. So, I mean, that's 675,000 new millionaires in 2017. Like, that's happening every year. And there's billionaires now who used to be billionaires, used to own large companies. Now you have billionaires who take bikini pics on Instagram.

Yeah.

Like, it really is crazy that you can make money in ways that you never used to be able to make money. You had to start a big company. All the billionaires were over the age of 70, and now that isn't the case. So there's actually 12, I think, new billionaires under the age of 40 in the last 3 years. So it's, I mean, it's crazy how much this changes. So I really think it's not— the advice is about mindset and how you can elevate and get away from what everybody else is doing. So whether it's, I don't want to be a billionaire, I don't think I ever could. Well, do you want to be more interesting? Do you want to have more fun? Do you want to have better relationships? Do you want to be a better father, a better brother, a better son? Like, all this mindset can help in all of those areas of your life.

Wow. I'll have to go back and rewatch that because that was— that differentiation is what I built, you know, we're building this brand around. It's that you can take these personal development books, you can take a risk on the advice that's being given to you, you can implement it into your life, and the outcome will be better. And so for the rest of the interview, here's what I'd like to do. There are 7 paths in the book to elevate your wealth, to elevate yourself. And I'd like to give everybody a preview of each path, but not go too far into it because I want people to buy the book and experience this for themselves. So the So the first path is what do giraffes know about money? We already talked a little bit about the giraffe versus the zebra. But you were just talking about you have to take risks, you have to go above and beyond. Do you believe that we are the average of the 5 people that we spend the most time with?

100%. So if your 5 closest friends are really funny, I guarantee you're really funny. And if your 5 people are really thoughtful, you're really thoughtful. And if your 5 people, 5 best friends are jerks, The rest says itself. That's right.

Yeah. Yeah. So then what happens if the 5 people that you spend the most time with are zebras? What if they're part of the herd mentality? What if they don't go out there and take risks? How do you get giraffes into your life?

You ask. So, I mean, the irony of how do you get giraffes in your life is you have to actually be a giraffe. So you have to reach out and ask somebody. So there's part of that conversation of we're having this conversation today, but we hadn't met each other a week ago. So somewhere there's a conversation of, hey, what do you think about this? Or do you want to be on the show? Will you come to my house? Or, I mean, there's some conversation that happens that you don't, you don't know the answer to. So it's talking about the things that you want, sharing your dreams. And it's funny, when you share your dreams with people, they can say, oh, that's really awful or scary. Or they can say, wow, that's, that's really cool. I have that same dream. Or I know somebody you'd really like to get to know. And so putting yourself out there and being vulnerable is, again, it's a great lesson. And most people want— I find want to help you. They don't want to put you down. Maybe that's the case when you're in 4th grade or you're in 7th grade and you've got mean girls and you have that whole age where power is considered to be popularity. But that's not the case with adults. Most people, if you know somebody needs something and they tell you, my first thought is at least, how can I give— who do they need to know and how can I make an introduction? So the first thing with the dress is just ask people and And find out who has that dream. And the beauty now with social media is it's really easy to find people who have the same interests. What are the odds that you would have found 100,000 people who were interested in books hanging out in, you know, the suburbs of Boston? Good luck.

Yeah, not very high. I didn't know any.

Right. So, but you created a community and now you have people doing this. So it's a— that's part of putting it out there and letting people know what you want, and that'll attract That will attract people with similar interests.

Yeah, no, it's, it's brilliant advice. And for anybody that does feel like they're the only person in their family or in their group of friends that's into personal development and wants to take risks, like my story started that way. I mean, we got connected. Now I'm here sitting with you. You work with millionaires and billionaires. Who am I? I'm 26. I'm from Boston. I'm from Book Thinkers. But that's the risk. It's you have to start, you need to put the engine in motion and then the momentum will start to compound for you.

One, 2 of the big people that I have as mentors, one is Jack Canfield, one is Jay Abraham. I met Jay by executive producing his movie, his documentary. And I remember going to meet him. And one of the things you got from being a producer was some one-on-one time. So I had the one-on-one time with him and he had a 250-page intake form and said, if you fill it out, you know, I'll give you advice on your business. And so I filled it out and my team that I worked with in my company at the time said, how many people do you think Do you think everybody fills this out? And I said, I don't think anybody's ever filled it out. I can believe it. And sure enough, when I got to Jay's office, he said, I'm so sorry, I didn't look at your form. Nobody's ever filled it out. And it was everything I could do to not say, I know. But the point was, I did the form because nobody else had done it. And I went to see him. And when he asked me about the movie, what do you think about the movie? I was like, I don't give a shit about the movie. And he said, wow, that's so— how do you tell somebody who's a big ego guy that you don't give a shit about his movie and that's why you're meeting? And he said, you're a really interesting guy. He said, funny, why did you do it? I said, I did it because I thought if we spent an hour together, you'd want to spend more time with me. And he said, mission accomplished. Let's schedule a half day to talk about stuff. And then he told me the story that he did the exact same thing with Jack Welch, the CEO of GE, when he, he said he cut him off the plane before they had TSA and said, hey, Mr. Welch, I just want you to know I'm Jay Abraham. You don't know me, but I figure your time is worth about $10,000 an hour. Here's my bag full of $10,000. If I could share the cab with you, I'll pay for the cab ride and I'll give you the $10,000. I wanna ask you some questions. And so again, I came right out and told him I'm not interested, not, hey, I can't wait to do this movie with you. That created this kindred thought, which was great.

Yeah.

I did the same thing with Jack Canfield where we had talked about writing a book together for years, and then I went and took his class because I said, I'm gonna sit in his class and I'll stand out from everybody else in the training class. And he's trained thousands of coaches and I'm the only coach who has a business card that says, I'm a VP of strategic partnerships for his organization. And I basically said to him in the bathroom at one of the breaks, how's the course going? I said, much better than expected. What did you expect? I was like, nothing. Why are you here? Because you and I keep talking about writing a book together. And if we don't come in the room with you for a week, I have a bet that you're going to actually want to do a book with me or do a project with me. So interesting. He's like, yeah, let's have lunch. And then we decided, and then we worked on a book. And now I work— now we have— I'm his partner on a business. So That came from putting myself out and spending money and saying, hey, I'll just see if this works. So some of that is just— and those are people who were further along in their careers than I was. I'm 50, Jack is 76. This is a few years ago. You know, Jay's similar age to Jack, a little younger. And so I just took a chance and they were happy. They liked that I took the chance. So I think, you know, Lady Luck does favor the bold.

Yeah.

And I think you have to put yourself out there.

Yeah, no, it's a fantastic story. And I receive a lot of inbound questions and Instagram DMs and through other forms of social media about mentorship. How do you reach these people? How do you get access to them? And yeah, it's hard work. It's— you have to go out and ask. You have to put the risk out there and you just need to go do it. And so I really appreciate you detailing that story.

If I can add one thing too, for the people at home, if you want someone, if you want someone to mentor you, offer something, do something for free. You should never apply for a job that's been posted because the job's not worth having. And if you want a mentor, go offer to do something for free. So finding out what somebody needs, And I asked Jay, what's your biggest problem? And he said, I'm bored out of my mind. And I said, I get it. He said, so what are you looking for? He said, I'm looking for something interesting. So like, all right, I'm gonna work on an interesting project for you, or I'm gonna help you. I offered to move one of his books along and do a bunch of research because he wasn't interested in the research.

Yeah.

So finding out what somebody else wants and then delivering it to them, you become of value. Then most people, if you do something for them, unless they're psychotic or sociopaths, they're gonna want to do something back. So they want to return the favor. So Find people and do something for them. Do a research project for someone you admire and send it to them, or just do a project and promote somebody's stuff and promote it just because you want to promote it. So giving something away for free is, is a big way to find— is a great way to find a mentor, is go give something first. And what does it cost you? It's a way better— like when I wanted Canfield and I had a promotion for him, he didn't— we were talking, and before I did the course, um, I knew on his bucket list he wanted to go to Machu Picchu. So I climbed Machu Picchu, brought his book, took a picture from Huayna Picchu, which is the mountain above Machu Picchu, of me holding the book. And then, and I took it, I blew it up, I put it on the back of a FedEx box with a note that said, when are you going to go? And that box got opened because I did think that was— I was going there anyway. I didn't just go to Peru to climb Machu Picchu to get you a book.

Everybody, you have to go to Machu Picchu.

That's right. If you want somebody to open your mail, you should go to Machu Picchu. Climb it, take a picture, and send it. But no, that was the— but that it wasn't much for me to think ahead of. I'm just gonna bring the book, and when I climb, I'll take a picture, and then I'll send it, and that'll get him to open the box. And the box was the proposal for the business unit that we're working on now. So, so there's just some— how do you get somebody's attention? Offer something, do something. That was— he's like, you carried my book to Peru, which was— yeah. So that's just that idea that I was thinking about him before I even went on vacation.

Yeah.

You know, that was obviously got his attention.

Before we transition over to the second path, I've hiked Machu Picchu and Huayna Picchu. How did you do? Because it was a very difficult hike for me. My girlfriend ran up kind of like a billy goat or something, and I was sweating and had to take a bunch of breaks.

It is, it's that elevation. If we had done it the first or second day there in Cusco, I would have died. But the fact that we acclimated for 3 days made it manageable. But there was a lot of heavy sweating and it was very steep, and I have no idea how the hell they moved the stones up there because it was, it was a lot of work.

I love to bring books and take pictures with books in extreme places. So every once in a while you'll see one of those on the Instagram.

So that's probably a good takeaway for people is if you want to talk to an author, take that person's book, get a picture of you with that book in some really cool place, the Roman Colosseum. If you're going somewhere, just bring it. I mean, that would be— and just that thinking of you, I'd be shocked if an author didn't respond with, oh, here's some guy on the Great Wall of China, here's some guy at The White House, the Lincoln Monument, whatever it is, I would think I would be flattered.

Plus authors are always looking for content that they don't create. We were talking about this before. And so if you can hand-deliver content to an author that's high quality, unique, interesting, validates all of their hard work, they get to repost it, they get to tell their friends about it. Like what a cool opportunity.

It's very cool. If someone said, oh, look at me, look what I'm learning with DraftMoney, or someone's on the beach or someone's in a place, I will use that. Because it's way cooler than me holding my book.

Everybody buy your copies and send some crazy pictures.

That's right, I promise to repost all of them.

All right, the second path. We'll give a little preview of this one: Stick Your Neck Out to Reach Higher. The common theme in this chapter for me was the word leverage. It seems like you love the word leverage, and it means a lot kind of in this area of the book. So what are some of the ways that you can leverage, um, yourself to Paths to better wealth?

I call it sticking your neck out to reach higher. You reach higher by getting leverage. Leverage is when you use a stick or a crowbar to move a rock or to fix a tire and take a lug nut off a tire. But it's also leverage how you grow a company as you get other people to do work for you because you only have 24 hours in the day. So, but if you have 10 people working for you, you have more than 24 hours in a day. So the key is you have to let go of all the things that you've been choking the shit out of and trying to control. You have to let other people do the work. And so that's where you're sticking your neck out, because it's one thing if you do every conversation in the company, you know how they'll go, but you can only have so many calls. So you have to allow other people to do other things. You can't do everything because it just won't get done.

Mm-hmm.

So the only way to grow is to leverage other people's efforts, which means you have to take chances on other people. So you have to leverage other people's efforts and other people's expertise and realizing things won't go the way you want them to go. But you can't just work hard. Working hard is a fool's game. And I'm not saying to be a lazy piece of something. I'm saying you need to just realize that other people can do things and get away from doing all of it.

Yeah, I loved— in my little notes here next to leverage, I wrote work smarter, not harder. And I love the 80/20 principle to find the 20% of activities that are going to lead to 80% of the impact and then outsource everything else. That's the, the low-impact stuff can be done by everybody else. And that's how you can create more leverage. Uh, there's another analogy in this chapter I'd love to have you elaborate on a little bit because I never thought about planning my financial future this way. You use a construction analogy. The bigger a project, the more creative that team is going to need to be working with subcontractors and contractors and coordinating the timelines of all these different people. The more wealthy you plan to be, the more time you need to spend planning out your financial future.

And the more— and so think of it very simply. There's the 2 of us. So in our conversation, we only have one interaction. How do we interact with each other?

Mm-hmm.

If we add a 3rd person, now there's the 2 of us, there's you in the 3rd person, and there's me in the 3rd person. And then you add a 4th person and it goes up exponentially. So now you have more interaction. So the more things you have going on, the more things that can go wrong, the more complicated the dynamic is, right? So the, the, you know, 2 people can get along really well, 3, it gets tricky. Because like, while I'm talking to you, somebody's being ignored.

Yeah.

Right. So it's a very— so it's, it's, it's, it just becomes more complicated. And I mean, today we're at my house and I'm replacing a jacuzzi tub that never worked. And so I'm happy to let the world know that jacuzzi is not very good. But it was a brand new— was a $7,000 tub that never worked from the day we built the house. But we have to get the plumbers in here, have the tile guys, and we have an electrician. And there's just a lot of things that have to happen to pull this thing out and redo it. But that's a more difficult That thing had electric and water and tile and drywall. And there's just— so all these people have to be involved to get this thing, to get this project done. And of course, in a house now you have heating and you have flooring and you have appliances and, and you can't do all that stuff.

Yeah.

So you have to have a general contractor, you have to have the lead electrician, the master electrician with the subs underneath it. So yeah, the more complicated your money gets, you can understand retirement planning, business strategy, taxes, Insurance, property casualty insurance, investments. It's just a lot of stuff that if you try to learn everything, you'll end up doing a bunch of things half-assed and you'll never get to the— you'll never get to that holy grail.

Yeah, that's great advice. The 3rd path is titled Don't Stumble into the Lion's Den and Get Eaten. And you had a subtitle chapter in here that I thought was super creative. By the way, quick side note, Your subtitle chapters, or the chapters within each path, very creative titles. I loved all of them. I was kind of laughing to myself when I read this one. It's called Social Distance Your Assets. So this is a lesson you'll learn in a lot of other books— don't have all of your eggs in one basket. But what a creative way to put that. So why should we social distance our assets?

Well, the idea that you wouldn't— whether it's a business or it's personal assets— that if you had everything in one, let's say you had all your money in your company and somebody sued you or the company went out of business or you had an issue, let's say it's COVID and you personally guaranteed all the debts of the business. I wrote a lot of books on asset protection early in my career working with a lot of physicians that it's like cooking a stew or a gumbo. If the shrimp is bad, the whole thing is going to hell.

Mm-hmm.

So this idea of having different entities and every business should have an operating entity, a marketing entity, an intellectual property entity, and you cross promote things, that protects them. So if something goes wrong, you don't lose the assets. The famous example in the asset protection world is a restaurant. Somebody owns all the equipment, somebody manages the restaurant, somebody has the lease because the most important thing in a restaurant is location, location, location. So if the lease on the corner of Smith and Main is really valuable, somebody owns that and then subleases it to the operating company. The operating company leases the equipment. And so what happens then is if you're going to sue somebody because someone dies of food poisoning, you sue the operating company. You don't sue the leaseholder. And you don't sue the person who owns all the equipment. So, the benefit then is you own— the company that has no money, it has overnight receipts is what loses, but you still have all your equipment and you still own the lease. So, that's just a way to get past mistakes and make sure one silly mistake doesn't wipe out everything you have.

Yeah. I recently started to invest in multifamily real estate properties and the little group that we put together, right up front I learned, hey, every single property needs to be under its own LLC. Because if something bad happens over here and it all burns down, you don't want it to impact this property over here. And so, it's another kind of good example of social distancing your assets.

Correct.

Yeah. Under this chapter, you also said something. You said, our single greatest asset is our future earning potential. And I had never heard that before. And so, disability insurance is a small thing that a lot of us don't pay attention to.

Right.

So, I'd love to have you talk a little bit about that.

It is the least utilized. Insurance is boring as batshit. And that's a guy who owns an insurance agency and it's just not that exciting. And I was an actuary. who made rates for insurance companies, and that was my earliest career. But disability insurance, it's what— it's how you protect your income when you can't work. So it's not just Aflac. This is what happens if you dive into a pool and break your neck. What happens if you get leukemia? What happens if something happens? You get some neuropathy or somewhere that you're a surgeon and you get carpal tunnel.

Mm-hmm.

That it's your future earning potential that's so important. It is the number one thing that I see people not doing. not buying enough disability insurance. So people have $10,000 a month of disability, but their expenses are $30,000 a month. So we work with a firm out of North Carolina that does a lot of Lloyd's of London stuff. So we've been able to get people $50,000, $80,000 a month of disability insurance for the high earners. But people just miss this whole disability thing. They don't have the— they just don't pay attention to how they protect their income, which is their single greatest asset beyond—

Yeah.

Disability is actually worse than death. The person's still in your family, but they're an expense now. So you still eat tough. Yeah, it's horrible. So that— so I'm just saying it's, it's probably the most common— it's the least insured, most commonly under- and uninsured item of any family, wealthy or otherwise, in the United States.

Well, don't stumble into the lion's pit and get eaten. It's all about protecting your downside. And there's one more area in this chapter that I wanted to talk about, which is a little bit of a touchy subject for some people. It's divorce planning. Why should we divorce plan? Because sometimes I have debates with my friends about this. The subject comes up and they say prenups are the worst thing ever. You're planning to get divorced, yada, yada, yada. Why should we spend time divorce planning?

So most of the divorce planning we do is actually with the parents. So it is, it's a very touchy situation for, you know, imagine your daughter comes to you and says, hey, I'm getting married. You're like, great, get a prenup. She's like, I hate you. Like, that's how that all goes. So They want you to be happy. So what, what the solution that most wealthy families that I work with use is they set up a separate trust for the child. So when parents leave money in trust for their kids, the kid doesn't need to agree to it, nor do they have to get the spouse to approve it. So if I— if you're my son and I leave the trust to you, I can leave a trust where you then would have access to the money for certain things. But if the person divorces you, that money is still your trust, or we allow you and your spouse to borrow money from your trust. at 1% interest. So then when you get divorced, if that happens, the family— you and the spouse will each owe money back to your trust.

Mm-hmm.

So there's little things you can do that don't cause the emotional ripple. So this is the thing about— and we talked about this with Giraffe University earlier today and being the giraffe, and this idea that all these parts of your life are connected. So you want to be smart with your money, but not be really mindful of what is the cost of money. So this idea that you want to protect your family money, but you're going to make your kids hate you. And you're going to distance yourself from your future ex-children is not, is not valuable. So there's a way to do it without having the difficult conversation. Intergenerational divorce planning without, with, without the aggravation.

Without the aggravation. Oh, it's very important. So the 4th path is don't waste energy playing with the zebra. And so there was a lot of discussion in this chapter that said traditional retirement planning for an employee is a waste of time. It's never going to make you wealthy. And you kind of take a stance against that. And there are some alternative ways that a company can incentivize employees. This is something you spend a lot of time doing and consulting with other businesses. So, what's that all about?

Well, the— so, the issue with retirement plans is the people who tell you, you have to have a retirement plan, you have to save for retirement. People want you to have a retirement plan. A friend of mine, client of mine, good friend of mine, had 500 employees that worked for him over the years that quit or left his employ. He said every single one of the 500 cashed in their 401. within 30 days of leaving his employer. So what I took from that was people say they want the retirement plan, but they actually aren't using it. So the problem with these traditional retirement plans is if you— is you have to give money to the employees and, and they don't even want it. So it's really expensive and time-consuming. And the entrepreneur is saying, I'm spending all this money and they don't even care.

Mm-hmm.

So if I could give you $3,000 toward your retirement, or I could give you another $1,500 as a bonus at Christmas, what would you want? And most people want— they should want to save for their retirement, but it's not my job to be everybody's parent.

Yeah.

So if the staff would rather have $1,500 in cash or $2,000 in cash instead of $3,000 in their retirement plan, it would save you the money to just give them the cash. And this goes to all the marketing consulting I do, which is ask people what they want before you give them things. So I would like to give you a mic. I already have a mic. Yeah. What do we ask? What do people want? Don't, don't give them things they don't need. So with this retirement thing, what do people really want? What do they really need? And then if you don't do a traditional retirement plan as an executive, you get to do much more creative things for yourself that allow you to put more money away and grow more money. So it's really there to just get them thinking. It's really to get people to think about giving your employees what they want. Some want, like anybody, some want, want positive affirmation, some want cash, some want more time off. Your generation is much more into is much less into, I'm going to work 100 hours and make more money, to I need work-life balance. I want to have the ability to have impact, which I love. And but people say, well, they shouldn't want that. Well, just let them want that. If they don't want to work 100 hours, then let's find a way to make this work. So it really is about trying to align the— making the rewards and the incentives for your people aligned with what actually matters to them instead of giving them shit they don't want and then wondering why they don't jump through hoops.

Yeah. You just mentioned the word impact. It's something we talked a lot about a little bit at the beginning, and I said I would come back to it. So now's a good time. Let's trace our steps back to the beginning. Why do you care so much about impact now compared to you cared about money and leads and all of those other things before? Like, why is impact so important to you today?

Why is impact so important? There's a lot to that. Some of it is, some of it is once you've had an opportunity to impact somebody's life and you've seen it, It's really hard to undo that.

Mm-hmm.

So, you know, I have a problem of a thought comes to my head and then I'm going to spit it out even if it isn't right. So it's almost— it's like a drug. It is truly. I've had the drug and felt the high. So now I can't not— I can't, I can't unfeel that. So I'm not, I'm not suggesting anybody, you know, watch this on Molly or E, but the, you know, but the idea is like once you feel this euphoria of doing something, How do you not enjoy that? And so I've made a lot of money and done a lot of things and maybe didn't feel so great about it. But then when you impact somebody's life and think, oh my goodness, I helped this person launch a company, or I helped this person start a charity or do things to help other people. For me, the high of watching them light up so that they can help more people, you know, to do good things is one thing, but to help people do things for other people, to me, that's the combination of leverage and impact. So I'm on a lot of boards with nonprofits and I give a lot of time to help them. I think it's, part of it is age, you know, I'm 50, which is closer to death than 40.

Yeah.

You know, when I was 25, I thought 50 was 100. And now I'm like, now I know it feels like 100. So it's, I think for me, it's the joy of seeing that and then wondering what is your legacy and what are you gonna leave behind? And I also think part of it is having children and just knowing the impact To have people you would die for, you know, some of that just comes with age. That when I was 35 and single and living on the beach in Manhattan Beach, really wasn't thinking about legacy other than hoping I had a legendary evening when I went out. It wasn't, you know, it was, it was very different.

Yeah. Well, I've started to care a lot more about impact in my personal life. When I was in my late teens, early 20s, I operated from a place of ego and insecurity. And it was all me, me, me. A lot of my actions were very selfish. And because of that, I developed a non-empathetic persona around myself. And so now that Book Thinkers, I've tasted the poison. I love the impact. I've transformed in that direction and I'm never going back, just like you aren't ever going back. But it's tough sometimes for me to stand up and say, hey, I care a lot about impact because it's pretty new for me.

Well, you're— yeah, but you're 20 years ahead of most people. So I come across people who are in their 70s and their 60s and their 80s and they're asking the same question, is there more? So, as much as the millennials catch a lot of shit from the older generation saying, you guys don't, you know, you're not hard workers, you're not willing to grind it out, you don't know what tough is.

Yeah.

May all be true, but the point is most people I work with who are really successful, they get to a point where it's, now what do I do? It's either, what do I do with my life? I'm not used to doing anything other than making money. A friend of mine met the Dalai Lama who said, Man is the most intriguing character because he gives up his health for money and then spends all his money trying to regain his health. And, um, it's a true story that he heard him say that to him. And, and I find these older people who are trying to figure out purpose or they're trying to teach their kids purpose after they've given them this life of, I'll work so hard, so I'll just give the kids a lot and make up for the fact that I'm not there and then wonder why they're not purposeful. So people get to this point and want it. The fact that your generation and you in particular are really into impact and purpose, is really, it's really special. It's a wonderful— I mean, my interactions with younger people in the last 2 years have changed my— where I thought the same thing, that because I was also gauging it on teenagers who don't care what their dad does. But, but I realized young people take this advice and they go and do stuff with it. And that's so cool that it's changed my focus from I don't want to spend my whole life working with the 70-year-old rich guy and helping figure out how to save $100 million in taxes or sell a business. It's, it's how do I inspire the next group of a million people to do cool things. So, um, I love where you are, and it's— it's— you may think you're not there yet, but you're so far ahead of everybody else.

It's always going to be a work in progress, but I love the transformation that you went through as well. And I can see, you know, your last 2 books— one was about how to make money, now this one's about how to preserve that money, how to take care of that money. You're protecting people's downside, and so that is a really big impact.

Yeah, I'm trying. Yeah, yeah, one book at a time.

And, uh, one more thing that you just mentioned that I'd like to touch on is I read a book called The Top 5 Regrets of the Dying by Bronnie Ware, and she talks all about how at the end of people's lives, their number one regret in life is that they didn't live a life true to themselves. And so impact, a lot of times it does feel good and you want to prioritize it, but then you end up working for money instead because you care about everybody else's opinion. Your dad says, hey, you need to go get a good job, or your mom says you need to make more money, or your spouse says, hey, you really need to take care of the kids, or whatever the case is. And all these pressures boil down on you, and then you don't live a life that you want to live. And so what are your thoughts on that? I mean, you talked a little bit about prioritizing your time.

Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts on that, and that is the— that's what we're really trying to do with Draft University, is help people find a path that's true to them. And what is it that you want to do? And as I mentioned earlier, the beaten path is where you get beaten down. I mean, that is the living for other people's expectations is a really dangerous— it's a real dangerous place.

Yeah.

And it's playing with somebody else's currency. It's just not— it's not real. So figuring out what matters to you and being vulnerable with, hey, this is just what I want. I want to do this. That's our Pathfinder we're working on, is helping people see the interactions between the different parts of their life and understanding what the cost is. Of pursuing one thing. It doesn't make it bad. Just be aware that there are— there's always some give and take. And I don't think people do money, go after money because they're broken. I think the problem also is, as a mathematician, we all do the things that we measure, right? We pay attention to the things that we measure. So if your doctor says you need to get 8 hours of sleep, you will chart when did I go to bed and when did I get up early. If the doctor says you should drink more water, you're going to measure your water and you're going to get your 120, or I do 200 ounces a day. Because I monitor it. When I'm not monitoring it, I'm drinking 40 ounces of water a day. I mean, it's not even close, roughly, but I'm not monitoring, but I'm guessing. If they tell you to do steps with your Fitbit, then you walk your 10,000 or 12,000 or 20,000 steps. So whatever you measure is the thing that you— is the thing that you work on. So because we don't get measured responses from our kids, from our spouses, from our girlfriends, from our friends, we don't work on them all the time. So I think the thing with the money is you get the check, the commission check, The followers, the likes, the views. I mean, you start obsessing about things that really don't matter, but it's the thing you can measure. So what are you going to do? You want to see the, I did this, and you can measure and go, ah, my to-do list, I checked it off. So I think some of that is just we have to change people's mindsets to measure things that matter so that they'll actually put the time in.

Yeah, yeah. No, it's a lesson that reigns true through a lot of personal development type books. I mean, you can't measure what you're not, or you can't manage what you're not measuring. I really like that. So let's go back to the paths. The 5th path here, Teach It to Plant and Feed It for a Lifetime. In this chapter, money helps us make more money. That's something that you touched on. It's something a lot of other people debate back and forth about. So what was that whole section of the book about?

So in the 6 Secrets to Leveraging Success book, I talked about the thing that gets you here will not get you there. And essentially millionaires, doctors, lawyers, Salespeople make terrible millionaires because they, they make money by doing something, whatever that thing is. They work hard, they try hard, they study hard, they're diligent. But then you get to a, you get to a crystal ceiling and you just can't go any further. And then you have to change what you do from doing to building. And ultimately, you are going to run out of time. Last I checked, Mother— Father Time is the undefeated champion that no one has beaten.

That is true.

So everybody will eventually get beaten down by time. So you run out of hours. Everybody says, if you could have one thing, what would you have? It's more hours in the day. So you could do what? Do more shit. Well, how about if you just were more effective with the time you had and did less? So you get into Tim Ferriss, one of your idols, and you get into The 4-Hour Workweek of, hey, if I can do it in less, why don't I do it in less? Which reminds me of the old show Name That Tune, which maybe your audience doesn't know, but it was a game show where you would guess a song and you do it on the number. I can do it in 6 notes, 5 notes, 4 notes, 3 notes, and then the piano would be Ding, ding, ding, and someone has to guess this one. So the life is— this is a name that tune game of how do you do everything in less. So this, this whole chapter, this path is about how do you do things more efficiently so you can do all the other things you want in your life. Because if you're just doing one thing and you're busting tail on that, you're going to have to give up other areas of your life. And so you're never going to get to a high level. You're never going to be able to enjoy other parts of your life if you can't figure out this work thing and this money thing. Without you working for it at every turn.

Yeah, I've, I've been spending a lot of time trying to analyze that 20%. What are my high-impact activities? What are the things on a daily basis that I should prioritize that can have the biggest effect or outcome on the business or whatever I'm focusing on? It might be on communication or improving the podcast or whatever the case is. So it's a big chapter and the compound effect matters too. The more you can walk in that direction, The faster you'll gain momentum. The more you can focus on leveraging high-impact activity, the faster. So it's a, it's a really cool chapter. All right, the 6th path: stretch your advisors for your benefit. And use this great metaphor around doctors, and this is something that I've been realizing more and more. Okay, so you don't go to the same doctor for every health issue, right? You don't go to your optometrist when you have a broken bone, or You don't go to your cardiologist when you need stitches or something like that. So why do people think, okay, I might need a financial advisor, but then they think that person is all-encompassing?

Well, some of it is they're afraid. Sometimes they're afraid to question people's advice. I find that with accountants all the time. People don't want to question the accountant, and accountants don't give tax advice. They give tax reporting advice, which is very different. And this is, this is a big thing that we're doing with DraftU, and I do in a lot of the teaching, which is ask people to question, try and understand what is an industry and what's the purpose. What's the person you're working for and what are their motivations? And so, for example, the legal system is built— not built for the plaintiffs and the defendants, it's built for the lawyers. The political system is not built for— now it's not built for the people, it's built for the politicians. But, you know, so every business, every industry is built around the people who— it's built by the people in it who are working in it. And so this whole thing with accounting, when you understand that the accountant's job is to do your return, and they, and they're generally very risk-averse people. So for them, they ask your accountant, what's a great year? And if the accountant says you not getting audited, that means the accountant's not going to take a lot of chances.

Yeah.

But that's how they measure it. But you might measure it as I want to pay as little taxes as legally obligated, which is very different from I don't want you to get audited, because the easiest way to not get audited is just pay all the possible taxes necessary. So This, this with advisors, they just don't ask. They don't, they don't push them to say, I'm going to bring in somebody new to look at the work. I've been brought in numerous times to do a second opinion. I always find problems. And it's oftentimes because there's miscommunication or advisors don't talk to each other. People don't think of it. They're like, oh, just, I don't want to bother them. I don't want to get a bill. If you want to— if you're not going to call your advisor because you're afraid of getting billed for the hour, you have the wrong advisor.

Yeah.

You should be thinking, I'm going to spend $300 and I'm going to get $9,000 of value. Not, I'm just going to talk to somebody, get $300 a bill. So some of this is not understanding how it works and not setting the expectation with the advisors of, I need you to do this, how are we going to interact, and what do I expect from you? And, you know, it comes just from not knowing.

And I read a book recently called The Path by Peter Mallouk and Tony Robbins, and Peter had a really interesting line. He basically said that financial advisory as an industry now is one of the only industries where you can go to get help, but if you don't seek out the right advisor, you can come out worse than you went in. Because a lot of people now, they don't have financial advisory degrees, but they claim to know everything. They'll say, hey, I can sell you insurance, I can manage your estate, I can also do X, Y, and Z, let's do retirement planning. And it's way too much. You need to be specialized. So do you see that a lot? Do you have people who want everybody— that want you maybe to take care of all of the problems, whereas really it should be a team?

Well, yeah, I think one of the challenges we have in service is The— I'll call it the Amazon effect, and that is everybody's getting super subspecialized. So whether it's StrengthsFinder or it's Amazon— Amazon is great if you know that you need part 123652 or you need 8 AAA batteries. It's easy to go put it in there, find the price, who's going to deliver it by tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock. But when it comes to service, it's not so easy. You don't know what you want, and one of the big challenges you have is that because of a lot of the rules, Attorneys aren't going to touch financial topics because they can— they could have liability and they get no financial benefit. Financial people aren't going to talk about the insurance products. The insurance people aren't going to talk about the financial products, and the accountants aren't going to talk about any of this stuff. So they're all working in silos and nobody's paying somebody to oversee all of it because they're worried about the expense, not the value. And I have a certified financial planner designation, which I got years ago. And the difference between a certified financial planner and a financial advisor is a certified financial planner, like an attorney, has a fiduciary duty to the client. I have to put the client's interest ahead of my own. I have to disclose any potential conflicts. A product salesperson or an investment person doesn't. It's just— was the only test that they have is, was this suitable? So did I sell you something that might make sense for you given your circumstance? Could it be seen as possibly valuable? Not, I have to put your experience ahead of mine. I'm not doing a lot of fee-based financial planning for clients these days, so it's not— I'm not trying to pimp that out, but that is finding somebody who is a CFP who has a fiduciary duty, meaning your interests are ahead of mine. The CFP Board has done a horrible job at letting people know that there's a fiduciary duty. This is the person who has to take care of you, or you can successfully sue them by putting their interest ahead versus somebody who just sells you something with a really high commission.

Mm-hmm.

So I see it all the time. It's a really, um, it's a really big issue that advisors who are looking for the money, who are pushing for I'm doing a sales training tomorrow for 500 advisors for one of the big insurance companies and trying to help them better connect with their clients because they want their people to be awesome advisors, but they get paid for selling product.

Yeah.

So again, like, I know I want you to do everything you can for your client, but I'm only paying you when you sell things from this pile. Well, then what the hell is that person going to do? That's all you get paid for is when you sell these 3 products. But I want you to do all this wonderful stuff. If you went to a restaurant and told the waitress or the waiter you only get paid for the spaghetti and meatball dishes you have, but we really want you to give people whatever they want, you're only gonna— you're gonna hand out a lot of spaghetti and meatballs.

Yeah, I interviewed with a couple of those big companies right out of school because I went to university and I got a degree in marketing and I focused a little bit in sales and then I ramped up the public speaking and that's a good fit. You can go sell insurance or you could go sell financial advice and Yeah, it's tough when you have to recommend a product that might not be the best fit just because you know you're going to get paid for it.

Or get paid more. So there are incentives and there are trips and there are— I've been the top advisor at multiple places, but it's been I'm working with some client who just happened to need the insurance. So I sold a lot of insurance after I helped somebody sell a company or after I helped them do something else. And for me, that was, I'm going to add a lot of value and then I'll go ahead and do this commission thing, but I'm going to disclose what I make. Not everybody's in that position. But there is an enormous, enormous conflict of interest in this, in the commission sales world. And what's really bothersome, again, this is an industry I spent a lot of time in, they've pushed for commission disclosure where you have to tell people what you make and say, hey, there's 2 products. This one I might make $10,000, this one I'll make $5,000. If you're gonna make a different amount, I would think the client would wanna know which one might I make more money so you can gauge whether or not I might be skewing you one way or the other.

Sure.

And they fight it down and spend a ton of money saying we shouldn't do that. And my thought is, what's the— don't be afraid of making money, you know. So there's just these awful conflicts that people don't even know exist. And that was the other chapter earlier, was ask the questions and try and understand how these industries work. Not because you don't want to work in them, you just want to understand the potential biases so you can prepare yourself and not make terrible mistakes and not end up worse off than if you hadn't hired anybody.

Yeah, don't, don't fall in the lion's pit and get eaten.

That's right.

You know, and for the average person who's not spending any time planning their financial future, a book like this is a fantastic fit. It introduces a lot of subjects like disability insurance that the average person isn't thinking of. So thank you for writing it. Really appreciate it.

Thank you for reading. Yeah.

All right. The 7th and final path that we're going to talk about today on the podcast, achieving your desired giraffluence. And I'd like to have you talk about this equation, E plus R equals O. Ryan and I on the drive over here, we had a big conversation about this equation and we actually ran a couple different situations that we've had in the past through this filter to look at, okay, what could we have done better, or this is why that went really well. But anyway, before I ramble too much farther, let's have you describe the equation to everybody.

Yeah, so 2020, I've done a number of events, webinars, whatever you want to call them, shows, where I say 2020 is the best time to start a new company. It's the best time to launch a new product, launch a new podcast, do something else. And people say, you are crazy. We have political issues, we have social unrest, we have COVID, we have things closed. What are you talking about? This is a terrible time to do anything. 2020 is awful. And my response is, well, let's think about where we are. It's the E+R=O— event plus response equals outcome. So there are events in our lifetime, and then after the event is your response to the event. And then the sum of those 2 things is the outcome. Something happens. What do you do with that? How do you get there?

Yeah.

And ultimately, of those 2 things, the E and the R, which one can you control? You can't control the events. You can't— we don't know who the president's going to be as of this. You know, we don't, we don't know, but it's going to be one or the other. And then either way, I get to sit there and you can bitch and moan and complain that you liked or didn't like the answer. But ultimately, how are you going to respond to this, realizing that the world will be a little bit different? Maybe it'll be Taxes might go up, they might go down. You might have different incentives and different types of businesses and economies and industries. And okay, it is what it is. Now what do you— what next? I don't care what happened. What next? So if you want a different outcome, you should be focusing on the response, not on the event. The event happened. It's over. Now what can you do? And so the thing that comes after the E+R=O is the 100% responsibility, which is a really important— which is a corollary that You have to talk about, which is whenever there's a problem, taking 100% responsibility for the outcome changes the way you do stuff. Because if we're working on this podcast and I say, okay, you have 50% responsibility for this thing going well, and I have 50% responsibility for going well, and it doesn't go well, it's obviously because of your 50%. But if it's— but if it's what's 100%, it becomes I'm going to make this thing great no matter what happens. You act differently when you say I'll do everything I can. And for me, I mean, that was a huge lesson that always seeing something as it's my responsibility. You don't— there's no if, there's no decision tree. Well, if this person, you know, if I can get that person to do it. No, forget whether the person does anything. What can you do? They do it, great. I have a response. They don't do it, fine. I'm gonna move to the next thing.

Yeah.

So I can't get this one client, I can't get this podcast guest, I can't get this book promotion, I can't get this publisher, I can't get whatever it is, I can't make this really important connection to this influencer. Okay, fine. What can you do? It's not somebody else's fault that you didn't get there. Don't worry about it. Just what else can you do? I couldn't get Jack. So what did I do? I took the picture from Machu Picchu and sent it to him. Right. I still— we still couldn't iron something out. So I went and took his class and spent $20,000 so I could be in the room to make sure we got it done. Like, that's, that's the what could I do? So I wanted to— I removed all of the, well, he's just not returning my stuff. Well, okay, so rather than whine about it, get out there and do it. So that's that E+R=O with 100% responsibility, which to me changed my life. It changed my relationship with my kids. It changed my relationship with my wife. I mean, it really was groundbreaking for me in a personal way, not just in the financial way.

I've, I've sort of adopted this equation into my life over the last couple of years, but through the lens of Stoic philosophy. And so reading a lot of these older Stoics, they Have a love for fate. Like, you can't change what the outcome is going to be. Your reaction is the only thing you have control over. And therefore, if you want a better outcome, learn to control your reaction. And so something that I've done personally is adopt meditation into my life. And I feel that when I'm meditating a lot and I'm meditating consistently, and I do guided meditations through the app Headspace, I have a little bit more time between the event and my reaction. And so I can use and filter my decision-making through the lens of some of these amazing books that I've read, like yours. And that gives me a better chance at a successful outcome. And so I still have to take responsibility, but I can also gain a little bit of leverage through some of this meditation and stuff. Do you ever meditate? Have you ever spent any time?

I do. And it wasn't until 2 years ago that I started meditating, was when I was working with Jack. And I could never meditate because my head was so busy. And I would, I would start meditating and it would be Is the stove on? What kind of stove do I have? What can I put in the stove? How long would I want to put brownies in the stove? How about if the brownies were at elevation? What if I did this in Denver? Would it be longer or shorter? How much shorter? And I would just, and I would go down this rabbit hole and I could never get there. But when I started doing meditation is when I had all my big visualizations. And it's when I had, um, I could even conjure up the sound of a bird in the tree and the, um, uh, and I started to see things and I, and I had this, this calmness and this stillness that I had never had. And I always had a racing mind, but the meditation without a doubt did a ton for me. And then I even, I did the HeartMath, which is an app and it clips to your ear. And if I do the HeartMath breathing 3 times a day for 5 minutes, every second— now I don't usually sleep much. When I started doing the HeartMath, I would fall asleep in that 5 minutes every time.

Wow.

So it's something to just slow your— so the meditation is fantastic to get your life to ease things and to just help you ask these questions. And it just gives you a little bit of I would always call it room. It would give me some space to, to not feel like I have to respond right away because something's on top of me. It just made me feel like there was a little bit of— it just slowed things down, if it makes any sense.

No, it definitely does. Well, this has been an amazing conversation. My first in-person podcast interview with a guest. So thank you very much for coming on the show. For those that want to learn a little bit more about you or your books, where should they go? What should they do?

So best place to go is Instagram, Chris Ray Jarvis. So if you go to Chris Ray Jarvis on Instagram, that will have a link to everything from there. If you want to find out a little bit about me and you didn't quite get enough of me, then chrisjarvis.me online. So check chrisjarvis.me and Chris Ray Jarvis on Instagram.

Be the giraffe.