Building Valhalla Farms with Marc Angelo Coppola

So welcome to Sacred Business Stories. This is our weekly Substack Live where we really just have honest conversations with entrepreneurs about what it's like to build a business that's aligned with your deepest truth. And today we are really honored to have my friend, actually my first coach. So it's a very special, for me at least, a very special relationship here. Mark Angelo Coppola. He is a Canadian entrepreneur, philanthropist, and I guess most recently notably founder of Valhalla Farms, which I still haven't had a visit to yet, by the way. On my list, which is an 88-acre permaculture community outside of Montreal. So yeah, we're really happy to have you here, Mark. And yeah, really looking forward to this conversation.

Yeah. Well, thank you. And, you know, first of all, I'm always happy to connect with you, Phil. And I'm just, you know, it's, we've known each other for a long time. You've seen each other evolve for a long time. And I'm, I'm just happy to, I'm even happy to be trying on, you know, Substack here and being part of a Substack Live. So I'm, mind blown to begin with and appreciate you having me on.

Yeah, cool.

Yeah, thanks for being here, Mark. And I just like to remind our audience like why we do Sacred Business Stories and we invite people that inspire us in many ways. And this is a space for inspiration. Like we think that the more we share our stories, the behind the scenes, like people start tapping into the possibility, right? Like if you can create this thing that it's really awesome, like they can have that too in their own version. So this is a space really for inspiration and to tap into the possibility. So thanks for being here with us.

No, thank you.

And, um, yeah, so I think like we usually start these things pretty open-ended, and like Catalina said, it's, it's for us, it's about, you know, so often I feel that, um, when someone finds someone and starts following them online, for example, they kind of see this picture of what they perceive as success, but they— what they often don't really see is kind of this long and, and windy path to that people have taken to get to where they're at. And, you know, I certainly know I've had my path, you've had your path. And so what we love to kind of hear is, is, yeah, just a little bit of that kind of behind the scenes of, of, you know, your story and where you came from and really where you found yourself today. So I know that's like terribly open-ended, but, you know, whatever, whatever, whatever you feel. Okay.

Yeah, I'll give you— I'll give you the long winding road, but in the faster path. I mean, look, I've been an entrepreneur since the age of 18. I honestly, I think I was born an entrepreneur. I think I've always had a tendency towards entrepreneurship. And part of that, that tendency was because I never wanted to be in a job where I had to go through traffic. For whatever reason, I hated sitting in the car. I hated the idea of like everyone has to leave at 9 and they have to, they have to, you know, come back home at 5. I never understood this. I never understood why I would go and just do like everyone else would do and why I wouldn't be empowered to be, you know, and create something for myself. And so I was lucky enough at 18, I, I, uh, started my first, uh, business. I actually bought into an indoor skate park that was about to fail. It was, uh, you know, a 17,000, 18,000 square foot skate park with a 7,000 foot mezzanine. It was minutes away from where I grew up. And basically I always wanted to build a space where me and my friends and, and people who I like jived with would come together. And really that space was started with the idea of like, if I had an apartment building And all my friends lived in it. What would be the amenities? Like what would the condo building have that would like be super awesome for all of us? And so somehow that ends up being me buying into an indoor skate park 'cause they had this big open space. And then I found out that they were closing down. I wanted to host an event there. They were closing down. All of a sudden, I'm 30 days later, I own the place. And for 3 years I went on this journey of paying super high rent, super high insurance costs, uh, you know, electricity costs, all these different things. I'm an 18-year-old, I'm full-time in school. Uh, in entrepreneur— I started marketing, or sorry, I started in finance and accounting. I end up graduating in, um, entrepreneurship and marketing because what happened is I started to see the dichotomy of these two worlds. See, up until that moment, I was in school my whole life, right? I went to school, that's where I learned, that's where I learned, you know, math and languages and whatever, history and all these different things. But then all of a sudden I was working in the real world in business and I had a rent that was, you know, almost $15,000 a month at 18 years old. Unheard of. I honestly would never recommend that if I ever go back and do something like that again. It's insane that I was naive enough to kind of go into that path and just start. But it totally worked over 3 years. It totally worked out. I kind of learned a lot and I was learning the economy between what was being— Oh, I just have somebody calling me there. I was muting that. Yeah. So I was learning between the dichotomy of, of, of what it was like to be in school and then what it was like to be, you know, actually out on the ground, actually being an entrepreneur. What, what does that really kind of come out to feeling like? And the truth was that being in the real world, actually going out there and realizing it and doing it felt so much more empowering. It felt so much more real. And, and, and it just excited me in ways that always kind of shifted my mindset into being solution-oriented. And so from there, you know, long story short, I, I, we, we do a good thing. My, my partners and I decide that I own 50% of the business. They didn't want to go in a different direction. They couldn't go, I couldn't continue with them, so they buy me out. And I kind of get, you know, at 21 years old, the first ever payout, the first ever business success that I've ever had in that way where we paid off all our debts and I got spout out. I travel the world and I start watching a documentary a week because I didn't want to let kind of schooling get in the way of my education. So I graduate, I'm free. I'm like, okay, what can I create? What can I do? So I travel the world and I get my first dose of culture shock. I get my first doses of realizing like the world is a little bit different, right? Not everything is governed by the way that we grew up and were taught. And then all of a sudden I start to kind of have a, I'll call it a spiritual journey, right? Where I start to like question the why, like what is my motivation? What is my purpose? What am I really trying to create? What do I really want to do? What do I want to see in the world? And a lot of the seed of this idea of like what would it look like to be with my friends was really around freedom. It's always around like how could we be as empowered and free and abundant of a state as possible. But over time, as I kind of watched all these documentaries and I learned so much about the world and a lot of the problems of the world, because that's what documentaries countries do, I realized that we had a big story problem, that these documentaries spend 90%, 95% of the time talking about a problem and 5% of the time just being like, oh, maybe we should do something about it, and like sounding the alarm and essentially, but never really hitting upon the solutions. So I believe that we needed to have a new narrative, and that's why I started to learn about storytelling. That's why I started to get interested more and more and more in marketing, um, more and more and more in like shifting that story, and more and more and more in like what it would take to do what I built or call what I build freedom, or what I would call freedom culture, which is to empower and encourage all individuals to share their unique gifts with the world. And that's what entrepreneurship is at its core, right? Entrepreneurship is like, I have a gift, I get to learn something, right? When I met Phil Powis, I could see his gift, right? I could see what he was good at. I could see what he thought he was good at. And I could also see what I thought he was good at. And then how can I like just enable that to happen? How can I like inspire that? How can I connect dots and build like an ecosystem of different talents and different people's gifts? And that led me to starting a marketing agency because that's what being a marketing agency is, right? It's like understanding who's good at design, who's good at code, who's good at video production, who's good at, you know, telling stories, who's good at copywriting and all these different things. And all those people became many of my friends, right? They became the systems architects. They became the copywriters. They were the designers, the developers, all these different artists, so to speak. And so my career really shifted and grew and kind of navigated naturally into marketing. And that led me to being in behind the scenes, behind the curtain, almost almost like the wizard behind the curtain on so many different businesses. And then, so that's one kind of path that I took, marketing, storytelling, and a bunch of amazing things, masterminds, all kinds of creations of online schools, all kinds of things that I've done over the years. That's how I meet Phil. You know, sorry, getting another call. Just having a, this is what it's like to be an entrepreneur. But getting all of these different, you know, all of these different, you know, things that are happening on the, on the, this side of the, of the equation. But then there was this deep, long calling for something was connected to what I would call my roots. Something was connected to my ancestry. Something was connected to the ground, Mother Nature, you know, Gaia, you know, God, whatever version of that you want to, you want to call it, but something that was just grounded in reality. And so at the same time as I was launching a marketing agency and kind of learning how to tell stories online, I was also kind of learning how to build in the real physical world. And so that's where the farm comes in. 13 years ago, this is the end of my 13th season now on the farm. Now we're literally building a house and here's the plans and some of the, you know, the designs and things behind me. But we're now physically rooted in building a physical ecosystem. With plants and trees and bees and, you know, everything from fruit trees to berry bushes to garlic to honey to, you know, meat chickens or egg chickens to pigs. I mean, you name it, we grow it here. And that's developed over time from a GMO cornfield into now an organic paradise into an entire physical community. And so I feel like I'm living the yin and the yang. I've had a digital community and learned what it takes to build a digital presence, a digital brand, a digital, arm, you know, something now that I would, you know, relate all the way up to like AI and what is happening on social media and AI is, is kind of one side of me. And then the other side of me is just grounded and rooted in everything I've learned from permaculture, learned from building physical space. Now every day I pick up a physical tool like a drill, a hammer, a saw of some type or kind. And so I feel like I live in the dichotomy of both of those worlds and deeply informs the other. I would say what I've learned from nature, what I've learned from permaculture, what I've learned from farming has humbled me in a way that has brought me on a very long journey. And now I'm 19 years an entrepreneur, 19-something, 20 years maybe, or somewhere approaching there, you know, since 18, April, you know, it's been on a long journey. So gave the quick-ish story to who I am and what I'm all about.

It's very interesting. Um, would you talk a little more about your community right now? Like, I feel that, and, and talking about AI and not thinking that AI is the problem, but I think one of the things that we need more and more, and it's kind of like growing in the online world, but as well as the physical world, like people are trying to connect more, right? There's like a huge gap in like, how do we connect? How do we support each other? And this is very clear online, but I, I would say that online is just a reflection of what's happening, uh, here and like in the live world. And then there is this need of like, like, uh, Phil Powis was living in Costa Rica. I was living in Costa Rica and there's this bunch of people trying to build community and trying to like, okay, how can we, um, how can we be together again? Because this was actually natural for us, right? Before we create the cities and all of that. So how is it for you right now? And like, the relationships and the supporting each other, like, um, that you see, that's kind of like, and the direction that you're taking with that as well.

Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, um, look, I, I, I think that in a world that is getting increasingly more digital and more and more people are spending more and more hours in front of screens, um, it is not a surprise that I think we are having a bit of a crisis of physical community. Um, we do not have enough people who want to work in the trades. We do not have enough people who want to be young farmers. I mean, these are crises that are happening across all physical businesses, and obviously mom-and-pop shops and businesses in on Main Street are being replaced by those funded by Wall Street. That is not new. That trend has happened well before AI. That trend has, you know, been happening for some time because so many of us were taught that we have to go to school and get a good job. And that made a lot of sense. It does create a career that, you know, in many levels could skyrocket you to a whole other level. But now what we're seeing is a crisis or the lack of young people who know how to do anything physical with their hands. And I was one of them, right? I grew up in suburbia, you know, 20 minutes away from downtown Montreal. This farm is also 20 minutes away from downtown Montreal, but I had never driven a tractor. I had never used power tools. I never built anything with my hands before. I never really planted anything. I knew nothing about farming when I first started farming. And so to start with a GMO cornfield with like absolutely no infrastructure to get to the point where we have, you know, power, water wells, you know, houses, infrastructure of all types and kinds, tools, and learning how to use all of those tools has been an enormous gift. And that gift really comes from my community. And what I mean by that is in the digital world, I deal with a lot of, you know, what I'll call digital talented people, entrepreneurs who know and have digital talents, right? They know how to send emails or automate things. Phil Powis is one of the world's masterminds. He understands how to connect tools and make things happen online that I would only dream of can happen. And maybe now with vibe coding or whatever, I can, I can catch up. But the, the truth is there's so many amazing digital talented people. And now physically here on the farm, people come by every day. There's like, it's almost like a, the episode of Friends or Cheers if you, if you know what I'm referencing. It's kinda like we're like a local bar without being a bar, right? We're a local coffee shop, a local farm where every day, you know, people who do bricklaying or people who work in and doing driveways, people who work in and, uh, and carpentry, people who work as electricians, plumbers, they stop by, they drive by cuz they see what we're doing. They see that our infrastructure's getting better and they're curious about what's going on. But you also have a lot of moms, kids, people who wanna, uh, you know, look for alternative schooling, looking for alternative food sources. Uh, you know, giant health food trend obviously growing as we understand more and more of like what's in our food and what we don't want in our food. Um, And all of this comes from like my own research on these things, right? Like as I watched documentaries and realized the, the situation that was happening in food, in medicine, in education, in money, in all of these different things, I think that, that we are kind of a window into an alternative that is deeply, deeply, deeply gaining importance, has always been important, has always kind of existed in the village mentality. And I would call our community a village at this point. We have physical infrastructure with actual physical people who show up on a consistent basis who either live here or are participating here on a daily basis. And we're so close to a city center. We're so close to the, whatever, the Home Depot, the hardware store, the grocery store, the this, that, and the other that we're kind of rooted again in both, right? We're not separated from reality. It's not like I don't go to the grocery store just like everyone else does, but I go less. I have significantly more of my calories that are coming from the farm or from people who are now co-creating with us on the farm. And so this farm is kind of structured like a co-op. It's structured like a bunch of small entrepreneurs who take care of different parts of the farm. They have their own production. So for example, you know, I used to take care of the chickens and I no longer have for a few years now. The person who's taking care of the chickens, that's his business. And so he takes care of that. And we, I trade with garlic. I trade with other products that I have. And so all of this kind of surrounds this community center and a lesson that I learned in building a business, which was consistency in storytelling. Is the most important component, right? Online marketing, physical community building. The best thing, the best advice I can always give to people is like churches on Sunday, on every Sunday. And so for me, it doesn't, you know, what our community has nothing to do with the dogma of any religion of any kind, type or kind. But we started, I just started showing up on the farm every Saturday. And then all of a sudden every Saturday becomes like, well, people start to show up and they're like, oh yeah, but what about Saturday where it's raining? It's like every Saturday. And every, and then what about that one? But when it's 4 weeks, like, are you gonna be there in 4 weeks Saturday? I'm like, yeah, every Saturday. And then eventually every Saturday turned to Fridays and Saturdays and Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. And now I'm here every day. And the community that can build out of that with a mentality that shifted in me that I learned from the farm, which is long-term thinking. How do you make long-term plans? How do you build long-term infrastructure? In a, in a big powerful way. But that wasn't that different than building long-term brand, building infrastructure for your brand, building infrastructure for your newsletter, building infrastructure for your video podcast, your Substack, or whatever it is on a long-term basis and understanding the difference between marketing and branding. And so I think all of the lessons that I learned in marketing and all of the lessons I learned in community or physical world, they, they overlap. They're the same. They're both ecosystems that are just function with different characters or different types of things. And in the ecosystem on our farm, the fruit trees provide shade for the, the berry bushes. The berry bushes then need ground cover and the ground cover of putting a bunch of strawberries on the ground that crawl over the ground, then makes that the humidity doesn't leave. And that whole ecosystem functions right from the fruit trees at the top, the berry bushes at the middle height, and kind of the ground cover, the, the, the strawberries at the bottom. As an example. And then online, same thing. You have a web stack, right? We think about the things that we are doing, the stack of different tools that we can use to enable us to stay connected. And so to me, I just, I'm zigging against the zag in all ways. That's why I have plans physically printed. That's why I have pictures physically, you know, spaced. That's why over there on my wall, I have a physical story. Of who's part of the community and what does that look like so that people can physically come and see the animals, the fruit trees, the people, use it and physically see the tools and the spaces that we've created for that community to come together. And then replicating that same thing digitally is super powerful. And so, yeah, that's been, that's been the journey. That's what I've learned from, from doing both.

Yeah, I feel that, you know, this is your genius and something you're masterful at. And I honestly, I feel like I've learned so much from you through like observation and like quite honestly, you know, I think a lot of what I learned from you early on has been an inspiration for the community we've been building with Sacred Business Flow. And like, I give credit. I've probably mentioned this on multiple episodes of this, of this series, just like the power of community and like just, you know, I think back to Superhero Academy, which we haven't talked about much, but that was one of Mark's kind of community businesses or, you know, ecosystems, if you want to call it that, and an event that he hosted in Costa Rica. And I can literally connect, like, when I think back to, like, when I think about where I am now and back to, I think that was like 2017, maybe 2016. Like, I can literally see this chain of like of relationships and how they've like led to this exact point. And quite honestly, yeah, I don't feel I would be anywhere close to the same place that I am now if not for that. And so, um, yeah, I, yeah, I give— I have a lot of gratitude for you, and, and I just think there's so much that we can all learn from kind of your story. And just like, yeah, I'm just curious, you know, kind of thinking back to that time, like one of the things I was always very amazed by was your ability to inspire people around this, like, common vision. And like so many of our, our clients and people that we're, you know, we're in contact here with Substack, they're all trying to create their version of community, right? Whether it is online or offline. And yeah, I just would love to hear from you kind of like what are some of the, you know, especially early on, like when you were kind of first like getting, you know, your roots in that, in that way of, of building, like what were some of the big lessons and maybe even pitfalls, like things that that you feel like led to your learnings?

Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I go back to the story arc of storytelling, you know what I mean? And what I mean by that is through storytelling, I believe you can rally an insane amount of people around any cause that people actually genuinely care about. And most of that story, and I think a lot of what branding is, is that a lot of people are trying to paint themselves and call themselves the hero of any situation, right? Like, what is a business other than you have a problem and we're the, the solution, right? That's a business. That's all we, every business opportunity basically boils down to that. And, and so, okay, great. But what's the real story behind that problem? What's the story that people have or they're telling themselves? What are the blocks that they have? And then I get back to, and you, you mentioned Superhero Academy. I get back to a superhero story. I get back to the story is not driven only by the hero, but is actually driven more by the negative reputation environment. That surrounds a problem, right? Like the environment of our time, right? A lot of people have AI anxiety right now. We have, you know, high inflation. We had all kinds of, you know, challenges with the world shutting down due to the pandemic or all these other things, right? So there's a lot of like negative challenging things that are impacting our daily lives. And then there's this villain and different people kind of like tweak or feel different types of villains, right? Different people feel it in different ways for different reasons. But if you can build and understand who, what the negative reputation environment and clearly identify the villain, then eventually you are the kind of the character of the story is the leader that is dedicated to fighting that villain. And so when you think about the story of Batman, the, the story isn't about Batman. It's actually the story of Bruce Wayne against the villains and who Bruce Wayne needs to be What does he need to create? What does he need to build to then take on the challenges that these villains kind of, you know, force him to take on? And so building community is about understanding first, it's seeing people where they are, how they're experiencing life, how they're experiencing the negative reputation environment, what are the villains that they are facing, and then what could you do that would actually add value to making them, you know, progress and move forward. And so one of the things that I've always seen to have that, that, that's an easy way to add value is just throw the party. Be the guy who sets up that every Saturday you're gonna be on the farm, or be the guy who gets a bunch of amazing, similarly minded people, similarly minded leaders all into the same space at the same time with, into a shared reality and make that reality really fun and make that reality be grounded in nature. So I always hosted my masterminds and events, um, you know, at ecovillages, at places or in communities that kind of embodied many of the things that my farm, uh, you know, I had it as an ideal and now is literally living that ideal, right? How is it restorative? How is it in nature? How is it surrounded by either water or forests or, or something that's beautiful in, in that way? And bring amazing leaders into that space, allow them to get away from their screens and the presentations around, away from the big stages and flashy lights and allow them to connect as humans. And then find ways for us to connect and rally over not only our own stories, our own leadership, but maybe sometimes a, a bigger, more collective common cause and what I like to call the co— a collective flag. And so to me, a brand is that collective flag. It's like we are here fighting and solving this problem for this thing in whatever market you are in. So no matter what you're doing, whoever's listening to this, no matter what you're doing in the world, you have to understand what is it that, what are, who are you as the leader? What flagpole are you holding? What does that represent? What does that flag represent? Can you get that representation down to one word or two? Right? I, I use freedom culture in my case, but if I think Batman, many people, when you think word association to what does Batman stand for, most people send, say, justice, right? Very clear brand, very clear understanding of what flag or what the bat symbol means and what it kind of evokes, right? So the more clear that, that flag is and the more clear who the, the, the fight is against, the more a community can join. right? A more community can form. And then the next secret sauce to that community is that every time the villain is present, the community has to rally. The hero has, or, you know, the hero that's not self-labeling themselves as the hero, but the leader has to show up. Then inherently you build community every time the villain shows themselves. Here we are, here we are, here we are. So it's consistency, the value and the powerful nature of consistency or the powerful nature even of tradition, right? Like, so for example, when I hosted the Mastermind, I did 3 years in a row in Costa Rica right before this big event called Envision. So our Mastermind was right, you know, like at the peak moment of being there, the right time of the year, the dry season, the perfect time to be in Costa Rica. And then we host this event, we really come together, we mastermind, and then we go and have fun together. And the combination of both those things. Right? We're gonna work together really hard, but then at the end of the day on a Saturday, we're gonna have pizza and we make pizza every Saturday. Well, now all of a sudden we work hard together, we create hard together, we fight against the villain together, we learn together, we grow together, we, we sometimes clash together and we break bread together and we share together and we kind of have common experience where we all bring a little something to the table together too. And so those two things, if you can replicate that in the physical world, one I just explained about what we do on our farm, how we grew Saturdays into an everyday, you know, community here really is the same thing I would have done or what I would recommend to do digitally. There's nothing new under the sun. The tools have changed, right? AI has changed the, you know, the trends of, you know, when I first started on social media and I built a big social media empire with millions of followers, it was on Facebook. Then it transitioned to Instagram. Now it transitioned to TikTok or maybe people are on Substack. I mean, every one of these tools It's just slightly different with a slightly different community. And you have to understand what that community is. But I think a lot of people are also just trying to build community in every direction. So they're like trying to build community on Instagram and on the newsletter and this and that and Substack and podcasts and da da da da da da. And they're so distracted that they're actually not accumulating that community anywhere. So if I were to equate that to being a farmer, it's like, imagine trying to sell, um, you have, you have a bunch of fruit trees and, but you only have 2 of every fruit tree because you need 2 to pollinate. Those who don't understand farming, you need more than 1 fruit tree to make sure that they produce fruit. But let's only say you only have a couple of every fruit tree and now you're every week you're trying to sell a different fruit. Well, it's really hard to do that. It's really hard to grow kale and lettuce and this and tomatoes and cucumbers and garlic and fruit trees and everything and try and do everything and bring that to a market. Much more difficult than if you're a master of one thing, solving that one thing at scale, right? So same thing applies in farming. As it does in community online. Be part of the community, build community where you are, first of all, right? Like I like, I like to recommend that if you wanna build, like I, I'm a YouTube guy, I watch everything on YouTube. I'm a big, big video podcast guy. I don't even necessarily watch the video podcast, but I generally consume video podcasts consistently. So guess what I've done since 2013? For the most part, on and off, right? And recently haven't been doing it, but it's coming back. Doing video podcasting. I build where I am. I understand, or I build community in a space where I participate. Because to be a leader of community is to be a consumer of it too, to be a participant of it, right? How do I show up and give to that community? Not only as a leader, but also as a follower and also as a, you know, as a proponent of that community too. And so If people just focused a little bit, grow a little something in one place, make that community grow strong, find ways to provide value, find ways to continuously add to the same pot or to the same collective pool and, and build and build and build and then build tradition on top of that, right? Build something that happens on a consistent basis. Like every year we go to Costa Rica and host a mastermind, for example, at the same time, right before this event. Or every Saturday we build community by working hard on the farm and in the gardens and then breaking bread and having pizza together in a wood-fired oven, whatever that is. That combination of work hard, play hard, that's a secret sauce. That's what always has been, you know, share a lot, but celebrate, right? Like build, create, struggle, share, you know, try, push your limits and then Relax, inhale, exhale, right? Some version of that.

Yeah, it's very cool because you touched and you said this word many times and, um, I, I think we should keep saying it because consistency is so underrated, right? Sometimes you think you need to do like many different things and then at the end of the day, you just need to do the same thing. Not exactly the same thing, but like just keep showing up, keep showing up. And the way you describe, I almost feel that like I love when you said that, like, yeah, like, I'll be there every Saturday. What about, like, 10 Saturdays from now? I'll be there too. And what about, like, 20 Saturdays? Like, this is, like, you've already defined that this is happening, right? That's the energy that you're putting in because you're not planning on maybe in 20 Saturdays not be there. And it doesn't matter to you the way you're sharing that, like, if there's nobody there, you're gonna be there. Exactly. And then eventually, like, the people will, and that's the, The evolution for me of like the understanding of like the discipline and then the need of having the external thing and then the devotion for what it is, your vision, right? And then you keep showing up for yourself, keep showing up for yourself. And eventually like the neighbor, you know, hey, you're there. Like, can I participate? You know, because you're there every Saturday and it seems that you're doing something cool.

Like, and that stands out. That stands out in a world where a lot of people are constantly uncommitted or, or loosely, you know, going in every direction. And that's okay. Like, look, I, you know, on a Friday or on a Thursday, I can go out and explore and do different things. But as long as I'm generally committed to the Saturday, well then everything's gonna work. Same with your podcast, same with this Substack, you know, this series that you guys are doing. If you do this every week, the magic is in it being happening every week. The magic is not just what I can learn from you in 5 minutes as quickly as possible, and we exchange value as, as quickly as possible. Sometimes that value exchange happens over time. It takes time to unfold. It takes me to understand who you are and learn your story, how you guys are connected, maybe what really motivates you, what scares you. All of those things can now help me help you and also help you help me. And when that reality comes together, as we get to know one another, as we get to know our audience, as we get to either in the physical or digital, as we get to build that power and bank that power more and more and more and more. Well, look, you know, 13 years ago this was a GMO cornfield with absolutely nothing on it. There was not a single road. There was not a single lick of power. We had no tools. We had no experience. We had no water. We had no shade. I mean, you had no bathrooms. Like, it, it, it's difficult, right? Now we have all of those things and now we're building a big, beautiful home. Now we have a team that works together. Now we grow food together. Now our, you know, the kids come and play together on the, on this property. Like, There's so much that's grown out of it. And the beauty of it is at some point, it's not just about who I am. Nobody's necessarily showing up for Saturdays just because I'm there. Eventually, it escapes me. It's bigger than me. Yes, absolutely.

Right?

In the same way that it's bigger than Bruce Wayne. And so, it's not about Bruce Wayne. It's about what we, as a collective, as a community, can do. And every superhero story you've ever seen has a supporting cast of characters and a bunch of other people who make that Saturday happen. Right? So the, the church is every Sunday kind of lesson, the sun sign, the sun comes out and shines every day, even if the clouds are there. All of those ecosystem components that show up every single day in a patterned-like way make for massive amounts of beauty, massive amounts of collective capacity, and just way, way more possible. And it's also a question of time, right? Like if you want to achieve building a strong, solid community, I think a lot of people think about like, how do I reach millions and how do I go viral and what is the hack to do this and that and the other thing? And like, you know, look, you wanna go viral as, as quickly as possible and, and test out an idea. Facebook ads, easiest way to do it, but you need a lot of money. But if you wanna do it the sustainable way, you actually wanna build a real community. You wanna build something where you have a, what I would consider to be 1,000 true fans, right? Those 1,000 true fans worth way more as an actual business, as an actual entrepreneur. Than millions of people who know nothing about you, nothing about what you stand for. So you can get millions of views and I've done it, right? You could get millions and millions and millions of views, but have very shallow depth of value that are in real exchange and like they very seldomly know you and you know nothing about them versus a real community who you truly understand is showing up, who are the people who are truly participating and then making that build and build and build and build. And so getting consistent, you know, I, I, one of the metrics I, I like to talk about is, you know, any, any business success or any story that you're ever gonna have as an entrepreneur, you have to have metrics. And so even here on the farm, one of my metrics is boots on the ground, right? So it's like, okay, how many times can I get boots on the ground? But then a downstream metric of that is returning boots on the ground. How many people will like come back and then consistently returning boots on the ground, like constantly avail, like boots on the ground. Now all of a sudden you start to, to, to build, you start to climb that the, the mountain that is Everest of building a community, one base camp at a time, one metric, one step at a time. And so, you know, Phil will talk to you about how, uh, an online workflow, how somebody comes in through one rabbit hole but then goes deeper and deeper and deeper into your ecosystem online. He knows all about that, the, the, the waterfall of metrics and the waterfall of, of of community that comes with that. But then you have to understand, it's like, what are the real things that make that happen? And the biggest businesses in the world, even the digital businesses in the world, they knew what those metrics were. For Facebook, I heard it was like, at the beginning, it was in the first 14 days, if you can add 10 friends, you were very likely to use Facebook as an, as a social media app. So we're like, okay, how can we connect you in the first 14 days to 10 friends? That was it. It was like how they were hyper obsessed and focused on a couple of core things, and then you expand And then you gain, then you grow, then you, you know, then eventually you have enough money and enough users, enough community to then build, build, build, build, or buy, um, you know, WhatsApp and Instagram and all these other things, right? That eventually happens in Facebook's history. But the, but it all starts with the same seeds, right? Even giant trees start from a small seed. The biggest community started with only a few people watching. Or listening or paying attention or participating. And so do not underestimate the power of consistency over time. Consistency over time is way— I would much rather have somebody put in an hour a day towards something, but every day, than put in 10 hours on one day, but then be completely distracted for, you know, undetermined amounts of time between effort, right? Like it's, it's, it's not worth it's, it's much more worth doing something consistently because you are going to gain way more perspective. You're going to learn so much more from it and you will just be like deeply connected to it in a very different way. It's almost like a heartbeat. It's the power that comes with like being connected to these like very natural systems.

I mean, I love, I love all that. Um, yeah. And the consistent thing, this is something that we, We spend a lot of time on consistency and focus and one channel, like in the, yeah, to your point, like this is something where, like for us last October, uh, we planted our, our flag in the ground here on Substack and that was it. We were like, you know, we're not playing around with any of these other places and, and, you know, and, and now we understand the culture of it and, and it's, and it's worked wonderfully, but so many people get pulled in so many directions. So, Yeah, I love really quite honestly everything that you just shared there. I wanted to, with the time we had left though, I wanted to kind of shift in a different direction, which is like around identity and identity shift. And, you know, this is something that I feel our audience, you know, is challenged often by. Like we have a lot of people who have experienced domain expertise or authority in one area of life and they have received the work, the gift, or the rewards of the world kind of mirroring that back. And you know what comes with that. And then oftentimes when they come to us and they've, you know, kind of had this awareness that they want to create something different that's connected from their heart, there can be this— this— it's almost like being a toddler again. It's like, I built this identity and now it's like, who am I that can do this new thing? And can I allow myself to be messy? Can I allow myself to make mistakes? And it brings me back to And I'd love to hear your perspective. It brings me back to like when we first met and when you became my coach, you know, I don't know what was going through your head at the time, but I remember when you first, you first proposed to me that I should, you know, offer, you know, I didn't have a client yet and I was like, I had this idea of what I could do. And, you know, we were brainstorming and you're like, basically like, yo, you're going to go out there and you're going to ask for $2,500 and it is what it is. And you're going to let it be messy and, you know, you're going to learn through the doing. And that brought up— I mean, I don't know, I had it. I found the strength in myself to actually listen to that advice. And I, and I did do it. And I think that it was a linchpin moment for me because I think that, and, you know, when I think about how much I invested in working with you and then the ripple of income that came out of that, I think you probably saved me like what could have been like 10 years of toil of just being like, oh yeah, I need to, just freaking like work for pennies over here. But it was so challenging for my mind. And, and, and I feel that you were very gifted at kind of helping me through that process. And so, yeah, I'm just curious, like, what— and I feel like this is something that a lot of our people face, right? Like, they're like, okay, I want to, I want to move into this direction, but who am I? Who do I need to be to kind of step into this and create value? And yeah, I would just love to hear like what advice you would have for someone who is kind of toeing that line and maybe, maybe ready to take the leap, you know, but, but still kind of facing some resistance there.

Totally. Yeah. I mean, you know, I boil all my story, all my, like, superpowers back to storytelling. And, and so what I think when you're talking about an identity shift, right, that somebody has to go through and, and they're experiencing resistance, imposter syndrome, like, what, why me? Why would everyone and why would anybody want this from me? Don't they know that this is my first time doing it or that I'm still a novice at this, or I'm still a rookie or whatever it is. And I break it down to 3 core things. One, okay, find somebody who's been on that path before you and learn from that person. Find somebody who's at least 2 steps ahead of you and make that person your mentor. And so you mentioned that you made, you know, me your coach, your mentor in this kind of leap. And I had already been sharing what I, you know, my story, my gifts to the world. I was already working with different people. I was already building these online brands. and learning about, you know, online presence and social media and all these different things. But I knew what it was like to be, uh, uh, working in that digital space. I knew what it was like to kind of, you know, pitch. I knew what it was like to tell the story. I knew what it was like to say, hey, here's where you're at and this is the pain point you have and here's maybe where we can bring you and I feel I can get you there and it seems like it's worth this much, right? And so all of that sales even is just storytelling. It all boils down to what identity and what story are you telling yourself? Right? And then how, with a good mentor, can they help you shift that story? So then the second phase, right? So first is find a good mentor and find somebody who's a little bit ahead of you 'cause they're gonna save you an enormous amount of time and energy and money. It's always gonna be worth whatever dollar you spend on a mentor pays off 10 times. It's like having the right tool when I, I'm, look, I'm building a house right now. It's like having the right tool for the job. It's vital. Vital. It's absolutely vital to have the right tool for the job. 'Cause yeah, sure, everything could kind of be, you know, you know, everything could kind of be built with a hammer and nails, but maybe hammer and nails is not what you need for everything. Right. That being said, the second piece I love to look at is your time. We spoke about consistency. We spoke about the power of like, for example, in my community of physically here at the farm every Saturday, but the idea of How much time, how can you take one small step every single day that brings you a little bit closer? So I, I, lesson number one in Superior Academy, lesson number one when I was a coach or mentor to people was always show me your calendar and I'll dictate your priorities. If you, if this isn't on your calendar every day, or at least in meaningful ways throughout your week, it's, it's not gonna matter to you. You're never gonna progress. You're never gonna feel confident enough to make that leap. Okay? So it has to become something you do every day. It, like, even if it's a side hustle, even if right now it's a side hustle, you need your job. I understand. You have a mortgage, you have kids, you have things, bills to pay. I fully understand that making that leap is difficult, both in hiring the mentor and in putting in your calendar every day. But if you do both those things, what ends up happening is there's an accountability that starts to build up behind you in your corner. And it's almost like you planted a flag in the universe, and the universe, you're staking it, saying, I'm investing in me. I'm investing with my time. I'm investing with my money, and I'm investing with my mind, my body, my heart. In this direction. And the courage when you take that leap, when you make that happen, then leads to what I would just consider to be the third key step, which is the offer. And the offer isn't the sale, it's not the tactic, it's not the tech stack, it's not any of those things. It's like, What is the problem and how am I helping you fix it? And what is that worth to you? If you can, if you can connect mentorship, somebody who's going to help you and guide you and just accelerate your path and point out different things as well as keep you on the path when you want to quit, right? You can combine consistency of time, small amounts of effort, but done consistently over time that builds up confidence, builds courage, and gets you more and more approaching the point of that that, let's kind of call it leap of faith. And then taking that leap of faith by just being courageous enough to offer it to somebody else, not sell it, not like force it down somebody's throat, not like, you know, not contrive it. Just like, hey, I truly believe that I can help you do this thing and it's worth this much. And even if you don't know what it's worth, ask them what it's worth to them, right? Hey, if I can build you this AI agent that would take all of these complex processes and then make it happen for you. How much of that time and money and energy would that save you? And what would that mean? What does the opportunity cost? Like, if you had more time, what would you do with it? Would you make more money? Would you spend more time with your family? Would you go out and garden, farm, whatever, right? Like, if you had that extra time, what would it be worth? And so now all of a sudden it's not just connected to business or money. It's connected to life. It's connected to like the fundamental thing that we are all equal on, which is every day the sun rises for me, but it also rises for you. And every day I only have 24 hours. And so I think that's the ultimate, you know, offer is something that helps people, whatever they're struggling with, and just getting really, really, really, really clear on what that offer is and what the story behind that offer is. What's the negative reputation environment? Who's the villain and what are you the leader of? I'm not asking you to be the hero. I'm not asking you to pretend what it's like to be in the hero position, 'cause that's where you're gonna feel like, like the imposter. Right? You're pretending to be the hero. You're pretending that you're already Batman, but start at Bruce Wayne. How are you Bruce Wayne dedicated to helping somebody do this? And maybe sometimes the offer says, if I can help you do it, maybe I don't even know if I can, but if I can help you do this, if I achieve this, is it worth this? Yeah. Great. Let me try. So if you're fully unsure if you can make it happen, like I'm unsure if I can make an AI agent that might be able to solve your problems. Then I'd offer it with, with a contingency, right? I'd be like, hey, look, here's what it's worth for me to try, and here's what it's worth for us to learn, and here's what it's worth if I succeed. Are you interested in either or? Right? And you go from there. And the worst that can happen, the worst thing that can happen is they say no. No, not right now. Maybe this is not for me. It's the worst that can happen. But the best that can happen is that you learn, you grow, you, they say yes. Maybe they say yes with a couple of conditions and all of those things, all their conditions, all the yeses and all the, the feeling, the, the excitement that you'll have. I can't believe I'm getting paid to do this. I've, this is finally, I'm following my calling. I'm following the thing that is my freedom culture, right? The thing that I want to bring to the world, the unique gift that I have. That natural force will make you find a solution and an answer. It will bring you to the right points. And even when you fail, that will lead to more success. Failure's the part of the journey. It's part of the story. In fact, every time Batman faces the villain for the first time in every movie, he actually loses, right? He ends up at the bottom of the pit. He fights Bane and ends up at the bottom of the pit and he has a broken back and he has to find a way to literally make a leap of faith. And that doesn't change. As an entrepreneur, I'm constantly managing risk. I'm constantly taking leaps of faith. I'm constantly doing something new, right? It's not like I understand all the world of AI and all the tech. Right? I have the same FOMO or, you know, maybe I'm falling behind. What about my job? What about me? Maybe everything's gonna be replaced, period. Maybe I'm replaceable too, right? We all feel it. We all have some level of that anxiety or thing, but then we get back down to the basics. Who's smarter than me and who can, who can help guide me? How much time am I spending on the things that I truly say matter to me? And am I doing consistently? And do I have an offer? That I can try to put out and I can learn from. I think that builds an enormous, powerful online presence and makes you a powerful entrepreneur, both digitally but also physically, right? What is the offer of our farm? Well, to understand what our farm really sells, it's not garlic. I'll tell you that. It's not fruits and vegetables. It's community. That's what we sell. We sell a place for people to come and spend. It's a, it's a, it's a lifestyle. It's a, it's a, it's a dream for many people. Right? We sell all of those things. And so we're packaged and we're the representative. We're the Bruce Wayne that they come and meet. That we're Bruce Wayne in our mind, but to them we're Batman because we're living the dream that they have. And that's why they come for our products, both physically on the farm, but also digitally online. So understand the story and help have somebody else who can help you rewrite it. Those are the 3 pieces of advice I'd give you.

That's beautiful and powerful. Thank you.

Um, cool. Well, my friend, we're, we're pretty much at time, and this has been an amazing conversation. I, I feel like there's like so many gems I'm gonna make sure we extract out of here and share with our, our community. But, um, yeah, I mean, right now, uh, you know, I know you're, you're here on Substack, but I don't think this is truly your home yet at the, at this point. But if anyone is you know, felt something kind of sparked inside them and is curious more about your story, where they can learn about you, like what would you suggest? Is there anything that you would want to point people towards?

Yeah, I mean, look, I'm on all your favorite social media apps or whatever it is. If you're an Instagram person, you can follow me there. If you're a YouTuber, you can follow me there. Right now, honestly, I'm not promoting anything. I'm— the story that I'm living is that I'm learning how to be a handyman. I'm learning how to build a house. I'm learning how to build a farm. I'm learning how to build community and what that takes to scale. You know, the things I'm scaling is patience now, you know what I mean? That's, those are the things I'm scaling. So I'm not really building so much community digitally at the moment, but I am planning on coming back. You know, for me, the thing that I've always felt was the most authentic expression for me has been video podcasting. And so I will be relaunching at some point the Vajala Movement podcast. It, for a long period of time, became the Superhero Academy podcast, but now it's called the Vajala Movement podcast. So Vajala is the name of our farm. Here outside of Montreal. You can always come and visit. You can always come and pick up a shovel. You can always come and buy Meggs or, you know, honey or garlic or whatever it is. But no, I mean, there's, you know, you can find me anywhere. Just type in my name on Google or on ChatGPT or whatever people use today and you'll find me.

I'm sure.

Do you host, I'm just curious, do you host any events or, I mean, as the, as I knew you as the event guy back in the day, do you host other entrepreneurial events or like people from other communities or is that in your—

I've been building the infrastructure over the last 5 years. To make that happen. So physically on the farm, we literally started with like, we had this little greenhouse, was called the nurse ship, and then we built like a little coffee shop, then we built like a washing station, you know, a dish pit and all the things that go with that. Then we built a deck and an outdoor kitchen, more and more and more and more and more like infrastructure over time, right? And the, the reality is now we're able to host quite a few more people. This house is now going to enable me to actually host people from out of town, come in and, you know, maybe do a podcast with me, come and do a mastermind, do a little deep dive with somebody for a week in person with with that person and then, or maybe a couple of small little collections of people that I bring to my house, bring to Montreal, and we dive in deep in person. And I will bring back the mastermind. I will bring back hosting larger entrepreneurial retreats, events, community. I've just been so like working on the infrastructure that I'm kind of hidden and, you know, Phil, you know this, right? Like sometimes you're building the funnel, you're building the systems, you're making it all happen. So it's not quite released to the public. Public. It's kind of where I'm at. I did a bit of a release during COVID during the pandemic where we became so unbelievably popular for obvious reasons. We were the only place that people could go. We were an essential service, you know, all of the things. So our community ballooned and then I realized literally that we literally did not have enough infrastructure to deal with that many people showing up. So I had to stop basically promoting Saturdays. I had to stop telling people to show up because I could not deal with the number of people that were showing up with so much enthusiasm, so many questions. And I kind of see our farm as a bit of a bridge. We are like a stepping stone in your jump to the alternative, right? Outside of the matrix, outside of suburban city life into what is still to some degree semi-suburban rural life. So we're a little bit of a leap in the physical in that way. But I also think we're a little bit of a leap emotionally. We're at a great place for artists, entrepreneurs, people who are going to like follow their passion, follow their gut, follow their heart. I've always been a stand for that. I've always been a community pillar for those types of things. And so I will be hosting more events and I would love even personally to have you guys both come out and join Montreal at some point too. It would be great.

Yeah, it feels a little overdue to be back in presence again. So Definitely going to keep that on my radar. And yeah, we'll definitely link to your farm's website and stuff like that. And yeah, man, I just want to say thank you, you know, and it's refreshing too. Like, you know, there's a way in which we play this game and it is about the promotion and that's totally fine. It's part of the picture. But I just love your generosity to show up and just share your experience and really with no expectation other than just sharing. And that's meaningful to me. So yeah, I just want to say thank you for being here with us.

Doing my job, just telling the stories that matter to me. Cool, my friend.

Thank you, Mark.

Thank you.

It was very nice to connect with you. Thank you.

Bye. Talk soon. Bye.

Bye.