The Secret to Thinking Bigger with Kent Clothier (Q&A from CFE Live)

Wanted to bring up a good friend of mine, business partner, and I've learned so much from him. I have convinced him to say ever so often that he's learned something from me too, which makes me feel better. But brilliant guy. He's started when he was in his twenties, a billion dollar business. A business that grew to a billion dollars and then moved from that into real estate and a whole bunch of other cool things. I am not going to talk and steal his thunder, but I want to introduce my good friend, Kent Clothier.

How much more successful would you be if you had lunch once a week with insanely successful entrepreneurs who share their.

Biggest secrets on how they think and achieve success?

Grab your seat at the table because.

This is business lunch with Roland Frazier and Ryan Dice. Hey, business owners. At Scalable, we know there are three key steps to getting your team clear on where they are in relation to your company's goals. The first step is to identify three to five metrics that tell the clearest story on how this team is helping the company hit its growth goals. The second step is to create clear targets so your team can declare in advance what winning looks like. And the third step is to measure these targets on a weekly basis. When your team is forced to interact with the numbers themselves, they begin to truly know their numbers. If you want to see how we track our numbers here at Scalable, you can get a free template@businesslunchpodcast.com dashboard. That's businesslunchpodcast.com dashboard.

Okay, so who's got questions for Kent now? Kent's done tons of consulting for equity deals, acquisitions deals, fundraising, all those things. So any of those topics, masterminds, obviously, that you have, anything you guys have questions on, feel free to ask, is a great opportunity.

All right, I'm going to start it off working on thinking bigger, right? You know, I've got two companies, companies now. One we bought using the EPIC system. We 4x their revenue. We're going to do way past that this year looking to buy another company that is essentially going to take a turn, a cost center that we currently have into a profit center. So I'm trying to break it even sooner.

Okay.

I'm trying really hard. Like trying to frame up in my head is 3 to 5 million because the big companies, right, are doing 8 million. So that's a reasonable like thing. But then I watched Richard Branson's masterclass, right? And he talks about the Boeing deal where he couldn't borrow 10 million. He tried. So then he bought a billion dollars worth of planes and rolled the 10 million into it. And that's how he got his capital. And I was like, this is a Roland moment. This is what Roland does all the time. How do I get past that third, fourth wall? Can you help me? Give me some examples where you've been looking at a problem like that and you're like, can I go big? Can I go bigger? How do I get there? How do I stretch my brain? Slash the math in my head.

I tell you what, I appreciate the question. The best way that I know how to expand your thinking is expand the people and up level the people that you're getting around, right? If your circle. This happens to people all the time, Whether it's pride, whether it's what it. There are people in this room right now that when they go back home, they're a big deal. Like, they're the most successful person in their friend group. They're the most. Whatever the case may be. And those people, it's not that they're trying to do it, inevitably they're holding you back.

Right?

If you want to think bigger, go hang out with billionaires. Go get around people. You know, I spend a lot of time with a lot of really successful people. Roland's at the top of the list. But I've got friends. I'm very. Ed Milette is one of my closest friends.

Right.

Jesse Itzler is one of my closest friends. A lot of guys like that, Dan Fleischman, Joel Marion, Bobby Castro, there's some. These guys are worth hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars in many cases. And you'll quickly figure out that there is no nobility in thinking small. It's a zero. It is literally a zero. That's all it is. It is a matter of. I say this self to my. I say this to myself all the time, is that risk is always better than regret. Risk is always better than regret. I do not want to be on my deathbed regretting in any way, shape or form what I could have done or should have done. Let me risk. Let me go for it. What's the worst thing that can happen? I'm going to go. I'm going to go as big as I can go. And if I get told no, if I get slapped down, it's not going to kill me. I survived 100% of all my bad days and all my biggest mistakes. I'm still here. There's no nobility in going low, right? This is. You got one shot. And I got a tattoo right here where it says the time is Now. And one that says mediocrity is the enemy. I. The time is now. This is whether you like it or not, this is the moment. I would tell everybody. One of the best exercises that I do to myself to this day, and I encourage other people to do it, that makes me go big, really big, is if you're a man, write down the number 78. If you're a female, write down 82 and subtract your current age. So this is a formula. Everybody do this real quick, right? If you're a man, write down the number 78. If you're a woman, write down 82 and subtract your current age. Okay? Now take that number and Multiply it times 365. What you will have just calculated is statistically speaking, how many days you have left on this planet.

Okay?

And I don't care who you are, that number is way too small. Now, if you want to be a gangster, you want to get out of your own head and stop playing small, get a dry erase marker and go write that number on your mirror in your master bathroom where you brush your teeth and comb your hair. And every morning when you wake up, you get to count that bitch down, right? You do that, you will quickly evaluate, what's the point? This is all I got left. Why would I ever play small?

Why would I.

What would be the point of that? Why would I ever say, I'm going to get to it next year, next month, or we'll reach Those goals in five years, 10 years, dude, get it now. The only way to get it now is to go big. And when you get real serious about every one of those days being the best of your days, all that kind of inner dialogue, to me personally, just goes away. I don't. I just don't give a right. I'm going to go as big as I got to go and as hard as I got to go, and I'm going to wring everything out of life that I possibly can. That's just the way I play. You got it, bro. Hey, Ken. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, too. Thank you. I took a lot of notes. Top three books. Oh, that's a great question. Top three books. The very top of that is the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. Okay, Not a business book, but a life changing book for sure. Next one, it's. I tell you, a book that has had a profound impact on me in the last couple of years is Principles by Ray Dalio. And then I always love when I go, I refer to A lot is Secrets of the Millionaire Mind by T. Harve Eker really helped me to understand that successful people think differently. Most people are trapped by what's going on in their head. And also Michael Gerber, the E Myth. These are. If you've never read Traction or Rocket Fuel, those are great books. Finish it yesterday.

Yeah.

Though I think that what you have to appreciate, and again I appreciate the question, is just that you are a product of the environment that you put yourself in, the books you read, the people you hang out with, the conversations you have. And it's real easy to get lazy about that. And you got to realize that every dialogue, whether you're sitting around vegging out and watching Netflix or if you are just having a casual conversation with a high school buddy, that's a deadbeat, that's impacting you. And if you want to change your outcome, get around better people, get in bigger rooms, get in better rooms, have elevated conversations. It's hard to have small minded conversations about high level people. I was talking to Ed yesterday and he just came out with a new book. Have you read it? Oh yeah. It's great. And it's so funny because yesterday morning with my trainer, I pushed a weighted sled 45 pounds on top of the 45 pounds, so 90 pounds. And I pushed this a mile. A mile, right. 1600 meters, four times around the track. I'm 52 years old, I'm way too old to be doing that. But what was repeating in my head over and over, because I've heard him say it at dinner, I've heard him say it on the stage. I've heard it, I've read it in the book is one more step, one more meter, one more lap, one more minute. And when you just. That's the point of hanging around. Rolling has told me so many things over the year that just play on repeat in my head, hey, how do you turn your expenses into income? How do you little things that just you pick up around very high caliber people and the books you read, that you never know what kind of impact it's going to play, but it's for sure making an impact. The version of that that Ed told.

You too, Arnold Schwarzenegger told me is it's one more rep gets me closer. Like every rep that I do, everything that I do, I figure I'm one rep closer, one step more, one step closer, one rep closer. That's how you achieve anything. Right.

So it's translates to business. Translates so well to business.

Right.

You're talking about the Imposter syndrome. Now you get over it. One more. Make one more phone call, have one more conversation. Make one more big decision. Make. If it scares the shit out of you, then you need to do it. That's how you grow. And if you're not pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone and doing things that scare you, then you are. By virtue of that, you are coasting. You're comfortable, you're going in the wrong direction. There's only one way to coast. That's downhill. You have to pedal to go uphill, period. And so if you find yourself in those situations where I'm just going to do what's comfortable going in the wrong direction, baby.

Do you find yourself annoyed frequently at not thinking big enough, even though a lot of people might think that you think very big?

I find myself. That's a really good question. I find myself very annoyed after I meet with you. That's just my personality after I meet with Ed and that whole little group up there. Time and time again, it happens to me where in my world, I'm the big thinker. And then I go put myself in another room and you're like, I've literally had Bobby Castro and Ed Milette at dinner with me sit there and say, kent, we don't understand why you're not a billionaire yet. And I'm like, God, and that's that. But I love it.

Right?

But I'm getting challenged. Yeah, we don't understand why this hasn't happened. What are you doing that? Why are you not pushing harder? And where. If all I did was hang around all the people that do nothing but blow sunshine up my ass and tell me how great I am, I would never have that conversation. But these are guys looking at me like, you can do so much more. Why are you not doing more? And that's what you have to do.

I think that's a good barometer, is you don't find that you're annoyed at yourself for not thinking bigger. Really often you're around the wrong people and you got to. Not that it's bad, because it is good to. It's not that you only should spend time with people smarter than you because then you're just selfish. Right? You have to be giving back, too, but you should be, I think, regularly saying, I'm not playing big enough and how can I play bigger? And even Bezos just got passed up, right? So it's even. He should be doing that as well. If you want to keep growing, maybe you're happy with a couple hundred billion Loser. Right. And you're like, I don't need to make more money. But. But seriously, I think in your personal life, in every aspect of life, financial relationships, et cetera, et cetera, if that's not what. If you're not learning and having breakthroughs constantly, then you're playing too small. If you're not annoyed because you see people or the people that you're surrounded, that you've surrounded yourself with, are telling you things that you're like, why the.

Can I see that? I can't believe it. Somebody said it earlier. I can't remember who said it, but get comfortable being uncomfortable. And I think that's. You have to be. I have an intimate relationship with discomfort.

Yeah.

You should seek it out.

Yeah.

I have a very good relationship with pain and discomfort where I understand what it looks like to feel that, to embrace it, and to use it as the wind at my back. And. But if you're not. If you don't feel it, it's really hard to know that it really is.

Okay, one more question, if anybody has one right there.

Thank you.

I know you mentioned it's only you who is limiting yourself to outgrow, but some of us are in family situations. You have your other half. You're ready to take that leap, but your other half is not. Have you ever been in situations like that?

You know what's funny is I get asked this a lot because my wife works inside of my company, right. And I had at my event last week. I did not ask Grant Cardone. I did not ask Grant to come speak on my stage. I asked Elena to come speak on my stage because I know how powerful of a force she really is behind the scenes. And I know she's the one that drove him to become the best version of himself. That as a team, I can tell you, in my humble opinion, it is very challenging. I don't envy you at all. It's very challenging to have somebody that is. Even in a loving way that is potentially pulling you backwards.

Right.

But as the saying goes, the selling starts when somebody says no. And from your standpoint, as the husband and as an equal partner in this relationship, the selling starts when she or anybody else is digging in their heels. You have to become better at selling your ideas. You have to become more influential. Another great book is the Psychology of Influence. Robert Cialdini.

Right.

You should go read that book. There's a way to present your ideas, and there's a way to have conversations with people where they buy in to what you're trying to do. They believe deeply in what you're trying to accomplish. And that's not only in a marriage, but that's in a partnership and that's in bringing on equity partners and that's in bringing on lenders. One of the best skill sets you can have as a CEO and as a business leader is understanding how to influence and persuade people and win their confidence in your ideas. That's a skill that when you refine that, it will just make you wildly rich. And I would tell you that I'm giving you the best answer I know because I don't know your exact situation, but I would tell you that I would start there. I would challenge myself if I were your shoes. That I have to learn how to become better at selling my ideas to my spouse and to my family and really help them understand what my, what I believe our future is together. What I'm trying to accomplish in my life, what fills up my cup, what gives me, what gives me so much satisfaction and why I'm going down this journey. A lot of times those concerns, they come, they're born in financial risk. Hey, we work so hard to get here. We don't want to lose it. It's more of a fear based thing. The reality of it is, brother, you didn't come this far to come this far, right? You got a lot of life ahead of you. You got a big journey ahead of you. You're at the beginning of the book, not the end of the book. And for anybody to stifle your growth and to deny you the opportunity to keep filling up your cup, you have to take that as a personal opportunity for you to improve on how to sell your ideas. It's the best answer I can give you. It's a pretty great answer. Awesome.

Let's give Kent a big hand. Thank you so much.

Really appreciate it.

Hey, business hunch listeners. We're going to get right back to the show, but Roland wanted me to invite you to a brand new training that he's doing on acquiring businesses with no money out of pocket. It's something that he's talked quite a bit about on the show, but he's doing a free training where he's going to walk through the entire process. So if you want to get access to that, go to businesslunchpodcast.com EPIC. That's businesslunchpodcast.com epic. And you can get signed up.

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