Driving Uber Eats at 2AM to $450k+ a Year | Adetayo Ibijemilusi

There was like a sea of homeless people, and it kind of triggered something in me. I'm naturally empathetic, and so I told myself, I'm going to make a difference. I felt worthless. It was like I wanted to, you know, I want— I wanted my parents to, you know, be proud of me. And it was, it was really, really tough. I was depressed. And a week later, after I dropped out, you know, I attempted to commit suicide. You know, before I passed out, I don't know if I was about to pass out, but I heard a voice and it said, it's not your time. Wealthy people understand this one word very well and they implement it and they live by it. How can I make more money and work less? Myron Golden talked about this about a couple of weeks ago in one of his YouTube videos. But he says, how can I get a multiplier output with minimum, minimum input? After reading that, I said, let me go ahead and look for a skill a skill set that can make me more money and work less? I did some research, and that's when I came across— I think that if you're able to take God's wisdom, that is the highest form of wisdom. I think just— it's nothing specific but intentionally seeking wisdom from God, not only through his word, but even from speaking to him, actually having conversations with him, hearing him speak back to you in a very still place. And before I started my program, I asked God, this is what I want? I don't wanna live a life where I'm doing something and it's not my, it's not what I'm destined for.

Yeah, this is what I want, what do you want?

And I always pray, if this is for me, give me signs and make it so obvious that I'm not gonna miss the sign.

Yeah. Hey guys, welcome back to One Part Lion, One Part Lamb, helping you rise, lead, and last the integrated way. As you know, I've been saying this for weeks now, we are super stoked because we're bringing you real leaders who are really doing the work, who are really building the things, who are really also operating within themselves what it means to become one part lion, one part lamb. I thought for this week, rather than bringing someone who's already built a bazillion dollar company— don't get me wrong, this guy's super successful. We'll talk about that. I would bring you somebody who's actually already— who's still right now building, growing, looking at different ways to create better infrastructure, looking at ways to systematize, looking at ways to build great teams, looking at everything that's really needed to build a sustainable organization, right? This is the next level. So guys, please help me welcome the one and only Taiyo Lussey. What's going on, brother?

I'm pretty good. How's it going on your end, dude?

I'm super stoked, man. Um, it's, it's funny, we were just chatting off camera with a, with one of the other guests that had been on the show earlier, and I'm gonna go ahead and call it now, okay? Um, I believe you're the Alex Hormozy for your industry.

Wow.

I really do.

I've never heard that one.

I really do. I guarantee our mutual friend Sean is going to clip that in a heartbeat. But before we get into being the founder and the CEO of The 1% University, I want to understand more about you because we got a chance to start chit-chatting over here before we hopped on air. And I was like, no, don't waste it. Don't waste it. The reason I want to start with your origin story a little bit and what you've been— what you have walked through or what you've been carried through.

That's a good way to put it, and that's true, right? That's more accurate.

Um, I want, I want business leaders to understand more than anything else, uh, that their current present or their past past does not define or come remotely defining to their future or where they're heading, right? Um, and sometimes the best way to do that is to share the story, right, and not the success. So we get to celebrate achievement, accolades and stuff all I mean, you've been uber successful. You're continuing to grow. Your ROAS is ridiculous, right? You know, stuff we can jam about off air. But you know, I don't want to be, I don't want to have the show that focuses only on the highlight reel.

Yeah, yeah.

Right? I want to be a show that focuses on the real.

Yeah, yeah.

So would you like introduce us to your real?

Of course.

Before we get into the highlight reel.

So those of you who are listening, my name is Tyell. My full name is Adetayo Ibiyamalusi. I go by Tayo Lucy for short. And I'm really glad you brought that up in terms of, you know, the trials and tribulations because, you know, in my perspective, that's where the gold is. You know, that's where you learn the lessons. That's where you have to overcome challenges and become a new person that's needed to actually attract the things that you want in life. And so, you know, I want to take it back to 2014. I was born in Silver Spring, Maryland, and my My parents are Nigerian. I'm Nigerian too, as well. They came to America in the '70s. And they always told me about how Nigeria was. They used to have to walk miles to go get water and bring it back and use it to cook, bathe. And they would sing it to me every day. I'm just like, you guys are just talking like— you guys are annoying. And so, you know, 2014, they took us to Nigeria for the first time. And they took us to the nice spots, the nice places like, you know, Beverly Hills, like the nice spots of California. And it's very beautiful down there. Like, very, very beautiful.

Yeah, the weather's incredible.

Yeah, literally. And then they showed us, they took us to where they came from, which was the village. And in between, you know, the nice spot and the village, in between, I will never forget it. There was like a sea of homeless people, elderly, middle-aged, and little kids. The elderly people, it's like they were just on the side of the road, just waiting to die, lifeless.

Yeah.

You know, middle-aged, they were just walking. The kids, they were smiling, running up to the cars with, you know, bruises, and they didn't even know they were in poverty. And it kind of triggered something in me. I'm naturally empathetic. And so I told myself, I'm going to make a difference. You know, I was blessed enough to be born in America, you know, have a lot of opportunities that, you know, unfortunately some people don't have. So I told myself that day, I'm going to impact a lot of lives in Nigeria. Now it's other third world countries worldwide. But, you know, I'm saying this to say what, that was a very pivotal moment in my life because it just naturally called, called me to serve.

Yeah.

And so Fast forward in 2015. I was in nursing school. I wanted to be a nurse because I like to help people. I had dropped out of nursing school on the third day.

Okay.

Yeah, I wanted to drop out on the first day.

You were committed.

Yeah, yeah. It was, it was, it was 3 days in and I couldn't do it. At the time, I wasn't really that serious with school, partying. And, you know, I luckily got into nursing school. And it was, it was like, It was buckle down season. Yeah. And so the third day I dropped out, my parents came and got me. And dropping out of nursing school, and then I dropped out of college, in a Nigerian household is— it's like taboo. You know, you either have to be a doctor, a lawyer, engineer, and coming home knowing that I brought shame on my family, the expectations they had on me, you know, it's like I disappointed them. It was tough.

So it was almost like saying that you're not worth, like almost like a sense of worth.

My worth, I felt worthless, you know, and it was like I wanted to, you know, I wanted my parents to be proud of me. And it was really, really tough. I was depressed. And a week later after I dropped out, you know, I attempted to commit suicide. You know, I was in my garage. You know, I had a, you know, I turned on the car, I had a note that said, "Sorry, Mom," because my mom was like pushing me. And, you know, I turned the car on, you know, I attempted to commit suicide. And, you know, before I passed out, I don't know if I was about to pass out, but, you know, eventually I would have, but before that, I heard a voice and it said, "It's not your time." And that's when I turned off the car. Nobody was home at the time. I turned off the car, I went upstairs and I just started bawling, crying. And I just didn't know, I was confused. I didn't understand. Like I knew it was God, but I was just like, I was at my bottom. And that was another pivotal moment of my life. So there's two pivotal moments, Nigeria, dropping outta college. Fast forward about a couple weeks later, maybe 2 or 3 weeks, my parents said, "Hey, you know, you should go to your uncle's house. He's successful. He has his own business. He's in IT." And so I went to his house and that's when I met my first mentor. And he really just kind of, he didn't give me a fish, but he showed me how to fish for myself and showed me how to think.

How did you recognize your first mentor? 'Cause one of the questions that we get a lot is, is how do I select a mentor? How do I choose a mentor? All this kind of stuff. How did you recognize like this, this, this man can help me?

I think this mentor was different from all my other ones. And this was more so a mentor that saw where I was, gave me faith and hope that where you are now is temporary. It's necessary to become—

Ooh, temporary is necessary.

Fortune cookie.

That wasn't even intentional, to be honest.

But, you know, it was, you know, it was something. He just gave me hope that, you know, yeah, like this is really like nothing, right? And you're meant for more.

Yeah.

And he just gave me hope. And he said, you know, I got you, you know, we're going to step by step, take it one day at a time. And now we're going to knock this out the park. And so the next, so next semester, I went back to school. So I dropped out of school for one semester. I went back to school. I was searching, I was searching. I did a finance major. And then information systems, and then I switched to information technology all in one semester.

And so— So very much finding your way.

I was lost and finding my way. And my mentor was a key pivotal moment of guiding me through that process.

I don't know if I can pause you there, but just want to dig in a little bit deeper there because I feel like a lot of us get lost in the messy middle. Like we don't give ourself grace. We don't realize we're actually trying. Like it's okay not, one, it's okay to not be okay. 2, it's okay to not know.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, I would— one thing I would tell, because I think leaders a lot of times that we're, we're talking to and working with on a regular basis, there are a lot of times it's like, well, I don't— I just don't know. I'm like, it's okay not to know.

Yeah.

Like, the fact that you're voicing that, like, is important. So when you're going through this messy middle, like, walk me through how you were kind of feeling at the emotional level as you're kind doing a little bit of exploring and searching.

Yeah, I remember I came back to college and I was so depressed. I didn't leave my room, like, and I had class, like I didn't leave it for probably like 5 days, 6 days. I would leave out and come back in, didn't leave for like another 3 days. I was lost, depressed, you know, anxiety. And the feeling was, it was unbearable, you know, but it was something I needed to go through because it was building who I was, who I am today. Yeah. And so I think what you said is important, is necessary to— well, it's okay to not know. It's okay to be— it's going to be uncomfortable.

Yeah.

Not knowing, not being where you want to be.

Yeah. Well, the truth to me is always in the uncomfortable.

Yeah.

That's where the truth is.

Yeah. Yeah.

Right. And that's why so many of us are searching for truth because we don't want to get uncomfortable.

Mm-hmm. I think it's getting comfortable being uncomfortable, being in that arena, you know, because that's like you said, that's where the truth is. That's for me. That's where the leveling up was originated from. And so I needed to go through that to get to that next level. And I found myself in IT. And that was like, oh my gosh, this is like my playground. Yeah, I didn't even know this was a major. My dad used to teach IT, A+ specifically, it's a certification. And I used to help him with the labs, like when I was like 3, 4 years old, like he used to tell me, I used to help his students change the background. I don't remember this. But, you know, I was really involved in technology at a young age, you know, more than most kids. And when I figured out, oh, wait a minute, I used to do this back at home. Like, I was like, wow, it's been here the whole time. And I didn't know. And I had to go through that. Oh, well, I didn't— I don't know if I had to, but that is what I had to go through to find that. And it made me cherish it more. You know, it made me feel like this is me. And, you know, 2019 is when I graduated from Frostburg State University. And I was like, wow, they said you needed your IT degree. You know, recruiters are going to be coming to you. And, you know, you've made it, right? You need to go to school to get a job in this IT. So you're going to be making a lot of money. That wasn't the case.

No, no, no one was calling. No one's knocking on the door.

No one was calling me. I was applying to jobs. I could not get a recruiter on the phone. It sucked. It was like, another feeling again of like hopelessness. I heard, hey, Tyrell, you need to go get your certifications. And you hear that online. If you try to search up how to break into tech, you'll hear a lot of people saying, go for your Security Plus. And I got my Security Plus. I failed it 5 times. I wasn't that serious. Spent a lot of money, but failed it 5 times. But I passed it. I got my A+. I got my AWS CCP. And so at this moment, I have 3 certifications and I have a college degree and I'm still driving Uber Eats at 2 AM in the morning, trying to average $10 an hour. And so I tell people, you know, for me, a college degree and 3 certifications, unless you're the type of person, and I was, that was excited to do Uber Eats and steal french fries in the middle of the night, free food, you know, I mean, we're not advocating for that.

Now, if you're delivering something to my house, you can have a few fries. Just don't eat them all.

Leave some for the customers.

But that's why they tape the bags, because of you.

Really, really, really do. And so, you know, it's, for me, it didn't work. And it wasn't, it wasn't until then I realized I was playing the wrong game. And that's when I read for the first time Rich Dad Poor Dad. And that book changed everything. Yeah, I learned that I was playing the wrong game. And I needed to learn skills that can actually—

So let's talk a little bit about the wrong game versus the right game. What is the wrong game?

So in my experience, and I'm only speaking from my experience, and I've seen people who, you know, come to me for help, and they had the similar experience, go to school, get a job. Now, this for anybody that wants to go to school and get a job, I'm not saying this is a bad way. This is just what I've experienced. Everybody wants different things. But for me, the path that I don't think is good for me is like go to school, get a job, and retire in your 60s. And when I started working, because I got my IT technician job from a friend, I started working and I was like, wait a minute, this is what like people are doing? Like, I started working and I was like, wow, this is like the biggest scam on earth.

And the reason college exists is to put you into a system, not so you can actually break free from one.

That's crazy. I never heard that one.

I just made it up. We call those life truths and fortune cookie moments.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's true. And it's exactly what you said. I realized it when I was in it and I was like, I have to get out. I was stuck in traffic. I saw everybody else around me stuck in traffic. Yeah. And this was the norm. Yeah. And so I said, wow, like there's kids younger than me that's, you know, have 7 figures and they figured like e-commerce, they, you know, dropshipping, day trading, you know, real estate, like, you know, these are all vehicles that all work, right?

When applied properly.

Yeah, exactly. Like when you have the right information applied properly with time and experience and diligence. Yes. Yes.

A lot of folks want to get rich quick.

Yeah. It takes time. It takes time. And I said, you know what, this is one way, you know, going, you know, the 9 to 5 route, you know, and it was stressful. And in terms of, in terms of, sorry about that.

You're all good.

In terms of like, for what I wanted. And like I said, there's nothing wrong with what you want. If you want the 9 to 5, retire in your 60s, there's nothing wrong with that. But for me, I wanted to retire early so I can live the life that I truly deserve. And spend the time with my family and my future family too as well. And so that's one way. And I had to realize to get to this other way of retiring early, I needed to learn a different skill. I needed to learn how to actually solve problems at a higher level in a way that— because there's different problems based on the level of problem that you solve, that's how you're compensated in the marketplace. And so I told myself, okay, I need to learn.

Yeah.

For the next couple of years, I'm just learning. I'm just a student. I'm in school, but just not in the traditional way. I read another book by Robert Kiyosaki, "Retire Young, Retire Rich." Anybody watching this podcast right now, I highly recommend you read that book because that was the second book that I read that changed everything for me. In that book, Robert Kiyosaki talks about this one word That one word is called leverage. His definition is very simple. He said wealthy people understand this one word very well and they implement it and they live by it. How can I make more money and work less? Myron Golden talked about this about a couple of weeks ago in one of his YouTube videos. But he says, how can I get a a multiplier output with minimum, minimum input. And it's just to say, after reading that, I said, let me go ahead and look for a skill set that can make me more money and work less. I did some research, and that's when I came across AWS Cloud Engineering. AWS Cloud Engineering is an environment where you can make a lot of money and work less, especially in the age of AI.

Mm-hmm.

Now, I joined the program. It was actually from one of my cousins, and I was able to learn the foundation of AWS. I was able to build projects. So getting that hands-on experience to solve problems for that companies have the projects is just a solution that I can deliver to somebody.

Yeah. One thing I want to showcase there because we get this question a lot is like, what's the best way for me to start a business? What's the best way for me to grow a business? What's the best way to scale a business? The number one question is, are you solving the right problem? Are you solving the right problem? In other words, can you— is your business actually set up to solve a problem? One of the reasons that businesses go out of business is because what they call poor market fit. Poor market fit is all about solving the wrong problem or providing solutions for problems that either don't exist or are the wrong problem. Right.

That's really good.

Yeah.

And that's really good. Anybody listening to this right now, I highly, highly recommend you, you take what he just said. It's, it's going to save you a lot of stress, a lot of time, a lot of money, uh, opportunity cost, which is huge. Um, but what you said is important because you can think like, oh, because I like this, I'm passionate about this, the market may or may not care, literally.

Yeah. And so, and it may or may not be saturated.

Exactly right.

There's a bazillion thought leaders, if you want to call it that, right? Some of them do it very well. I mean, they're actually very good humans and they're actually solving problems. So other people— um, I say people, people is a strong word— others, uh, struggle to be authentic, struggle to actually be there to solve a problem. They're like, just pay me. Yeah, yeah, I'll pay you when you solve a problem.

And you actually get further by serving. You know, I've experienced this too, like, and we talked about this off camera, but I've, I've learned and I've always been open and giving, but I've, in business, I've learned that when you lead with serving first, you know, it talks about in the Bible too.

Yeah.

You know, I'm gonna paraphrase it 'cause I don't remember the verse, but you know, God blesses the servant. You know, my name Adetayo, like Ade means crown and Tayo.

Stephen does too.

Yeah. Wow. That's crazy.

Keep going, keep going.

Yeah. And ayo means joy. Like my name translation means the crown has brought us great joy. Funny enough, my family's from royalty in Nigeria, in the village that they're in. My grandma was the queen of her area. But you know, we do come from royalty in a sense, but I don't lead with my ego. I lead with my heart and serving naturally. And God has blessed me because of that, of putting people first. And because I put people first, I look at what they need.

How do you put people first without self-abandoning yourself? Because I struggle with that. I was very much the same way, but I would do it too far. I would go too far too often.

I was a people pleaser, and that stemmed from insecurities that I didn't deal with at the time because I was bullied and I wanted to feel accepted. And, you know, I went through a lot of stuff to heal, but I wanted to— I put people first, you know, all the time, and I was drained. And I was broken and it got to a point where my mom picked me up and she said, "Tyle, remember these 3 things: God first, then yourself, and then others." And so I won't go out my way to help you if it's going to be detrimental to me because I can't help you if I'm not good, logically. But But I've noticed that when I put myself in a situation where, you know, I put God first, I put myself second, and then others, like I can still pour a little into you and my cup is still full. God now blesses me in abundance. If I give $1, God literally brings back $100 and I'm not even expecting it. I'm not expecting it from this person, et cetera. And I'm talking about like a monetary, physical money aspect, but I do mean that in different forms.

Yeah.

And so, you know, but it stems from serving and how can, from that mindset of serving, I'm always thinking, how can I actually bring more value to somebody's life? How can I impact more lives on a global scale?

Yeah.

Which is the mission statement of my business.

Yeah. Impact lives at a global scale.

Impact millions of lives on a global scale.

I love it. I love it.

Yeah.

One of the things that I try to get business leaders to understand, which you're, it's funny how you're intuitively doing it. Like it's just, you're kind of living it, which is, I mean, most of us are scared to face the darkness.

Scary.

Okay, I've been very, very similar where you've been in a different capacity.

I'm still afraid of the dark to this day. Okay, well, I'm just kidding.

In that case, I'll get you a nightlight for Christmas. But no, I mean like, One of the things that people, that I feel like is, all right, so our belief is, our core mantra is you can't scale dysfunction. Okay, that's our core belief, right? And we see chaos as a spiritual principality at this stage in the game. Okay, so look at any marriage, any business, any human life, and where chaos and dysfunction are operating, dissension, self-worth, all that stuff's being like trampled on, right? Yeah, so our, our big belief is that you've got to have complete alignment before acceleration. But we find that culture wants us to accelerate before we're even ready, and building the house on sticks instead of a strong— and I've also realized God's kingdom builds businesses like crockpots. The devil's business builds people— builds businesses like microwaves. All right, so as soon as it's done and it goes ding, you had your— you get to eat your joy and then you're done. Well, where, you know, with, with Guy who's building your business with the crockpot scenario, you get to go in, take a little sip out every now and again, like, is it a little spice, like that kind of thing. And, and it slow cooks right now. In the grand scheme of things, one of the things that's brought me is like, you don't understand, Taiyo, dude, he's accelerating. Like, he is, he's really, really— his businesses is doing really well.

He's got it really quick. Just want to correct, um, A lot of people say, "Tayo, Tayo, it's not even me, it's all God." Yeah. Honestly speaking, like, I can't even take any credit.

Yeah.

Just honestly speaking.

Yeah, no, I think that's great. But you know, the— when, you know, because we get invited to have guests on the show all the time, right? And we intentionally only put people on the show that we know can serve the audience.

Wow. Right.

And One of the, you know, so even when I was first learning about you, I was excited to learn about you. It was like, he's doing this, this, and this. He's doing these big things. I'm like, okay, what's the story? What's the real, like, tell me about him.

Yeah, yeah.

And then it was like, oh, I love this guy already. And then it was like, oh my gosh, he's actually living and building out the principle that we teach all the time, which is alignment before acceleration.

Oh, wow.

Not only did you go inside out to get aligned there, not only do you have the connection up and down for alignment. Yeah, the, the way in which you're applying your skill set is very much in line with yourself, your— how you're wired, how you're— yeah, you see what I'm saying? And so I'm sitting here, I'm putting this together, I'm like, this is why he went from like $55K to like $500K, like fast, right? Is because he was aligned, right? Talk to me a little about what that alignment journey was like and like really understanding kind of the— this stage in the calling. I do agree with the other— the Dana, who the other guest that was, uh, mentioned. I do, I do feel like you'll be, um, presenting at a very high level.

Wow.

Um, I do— I can, I can easily see that. Well, um, especially as you continue to stretch your legs. But I'm curious, I'm curious about your alignment journey. Like, how do you know when you're in alignment and how do you know when you're out of alignment? Because I'm trying to give people a bit of a steering wheel, a GPS.

Yeah, I think it starts with First, discovering who you are. And that was a little bit tough for me because I didn't, you know, I was insecure, right? I wanted to feed, you know, I wanted to, I was a people pleaser. I was focused on others, feeling people to accept me as opposed to me accepting myself. Yeah, spend time with myself and know who I was. And so I think the first thing to align, get in alignment with yourself is to first spend some time with yourself, discover who you are. And You know, for me, I've discovered, like, when somebody asks me, hey, Tyler, what do you want? I was thinking about this on the drive here.

Yeah.

Hey, Tyler, what do you want? I want to help others. Hey, no, no, no, I know, I get that. But like, what do you want? Like, it's literally what I want that is like, I don't want like the big house. I mean, obviously it's nice, you know, cars, stuff like that. I'm still going to, you know, have these things, but it's not everything.

Yeah.

You know, but what I want is to retire my parents. What I want is to help somebody that truly needs this. And so like when I asked myself, and I asked this way months ago, I'm like, what do I want? That's literally what I want. And it's not coming from a hurt place. Like, oh, people are struggling. I feel guilty. It's not coming from a lower emotion. Yeah. It's coming from a higher emotion of love.

Yeah.

Like, you know, but that's just who I am. And so I feel like you have to spend some time to understand who you are first to be in alignment with you.

What were things that you learned about yourself that you didn't know were there?

Uh, that's a really good question. That's a really good question. I think— I don't want to rush the answer. I think I've— it's like not having glasses and something's kind of blurry, so you can kind of see it. But once I spend time with myself, it's like crystal clear. And I think just how empathetic I am now, like I can feel emotions and, you know, I, you know, I care for people, but I think like, I think based on what I've experienced internally and externally and what people say is, you know, it just comes back to, I don't know the word for it, but I'll say it in a way that it's probably not going to hit the way I want it to, but just serving people.

People.

Yeah, like, that's all I want to do. Yeah, like, that's what my business does. That's what my generation is going to be doing, you know, because I'm building a business that's going to last for generations and generations. And that's the mission statement. All my— I don't really call them employees, right? They're people who work in the business.

Yeah, we call them team members.

Yeah, yeah, thank you. And so we lead with serving first, then before money. Yeah. And, you know, I think it's just that one word, just serving. Yeah. Because it's a— there's so much treasure.

Yeah.

Even like what comes out of serving. If I give you what you want and fully focus on you selflessly, not only will I, let's say, I get what I want, but even God will bless you in abundance in other areas in different forms.

Yeah. Well, it's funny, I think a lot of times when we we go to donate or give or whatever, and it's financial, we inadvertently think, well, this is how we're going to be repaid.

Yeah.

First, so first of all, the fact that we feel like we have to get repaid is a problem.

Yeah.

Um, and the second of all, he rarely gives you the, the same gift you gave someone else.

Yes.

Right.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's been my experience. But like, for me, when I was going through my own search, um, first of all, I had to stop. I just had to stop and sit still.

Be still.

One of the things I discovered recently in the— and there's a verse in the Bible in Psalms that says, "Be still and know that I'm God." A lot of people have heard that. Very few of us have studied it in Hebrew. So much deeper, so much richer. It means to completely offload one's burden, completely surrender, and let, literally let God do the work. It means it's, it's to— it's, it's not self— and I'm paraphrasing it some because I have an entire like thing on it. Um, but it's, it's to actually sit completely still. So one of the things we teach is this— what I hear you say is journaling practice. So my journal's over the counter, you can see it over there, right? I'd normally go sit over here on this little lounge, lounge couch behind us, and I was God, what I hear you say is today's date. And I just listen. And today I only heard one phrase. Sometimes it's pages upon pages upon pages. Sometimes it's a paragraph. But I do it every morning and I do not move until I hear something.

Wow, that's powerful.

Right, so I'm forcing myself to build this presence muscle, right? Because if you look at Jesus, you look at David, you look at Noah, you look at any of the major biblical figures, Isaiah, Jeremiah, so on and so forth, it doesn't matter who it is. They all spent one-on-one time intentionally with God. And when Moses was at the bush, he wasn't doing the talking, right? So you can't be given your assignment until you stop doing the talking, right?

That's very powerful.

So I've been learning these lessons, right?

Um, I'm gonna take that page.

Oh yeah, just feel free to give it— give— continue to give him glory. It was his thing.

Yeah.

Um, but one of the things that really stood out to me is when I went and did my own research and some of these moments when I was healing the stuff that I didn't know was there. And I'm 50 years old, dude. I was like, this has been here for 48 years.

Are you serious?

Like, driving me 48 years, right? Is this the motivation? When I sat with myself and I was like, you say you're for service, you say you want to be helpful. But if I was to hold up a mirror to your actions, you like being seen. You like being validated. You like performing for applause. You like this, you like that, you like this, you like that. And when I was able to sit down with that and I turned the mirror back and I was like, is, is this the man that I want to be known for when all is gone, right? Doesn't matter if I build another business or don't build another business. The reality is, is like, I have nothing to prove. Why do I feel the need to prove? Because the need to prove is what was creating the, the motivation inverse which was actually repelling the people that I could actually serve.

Wow.

Rather than becoming the man. So I share this in the new book that'll come out next year. Not to give away the punchline of the book, but since the last chapter, in one of these experiences, God said these words to me, and this has become the entire battle cry of everything we're building now.

Mm.

He says, "I've called you to be a David, but you've been leading like a Saul." Mm. Okay. So I sat with that and I sat with that and I sat with that and I sat with that and I sat with that.

Wow.

I sat with that. I said, what does that mean? And that's actually where One Part Lion, One Part Lamb was really born.

Mm.

Right? David carried both lion and lamb in its maturity. Saul carried lion and lamb in its immaturity. Mm, mm. It was all about the heart posture, the motivation of the posture. You see what I'm saying? So I started like thinking, so I— when someone says, yeah, you gotta go do— you have to go, you have to go have an honest conversation with you, and you got to be honest with yourself.

It's hard to do that.

Oh bro, it's like— because your, your ego, your mind will go like, well no, I really am of service. I just gave up— I just gave $100,000 away. I just gave $1,000 away. I just— I'm buying— I bought a car for somebody didn't have a car. I just— I did like you You give and then you're like, okay, well, that's awesome. Fantastic. You were very generous to people.

Why?

Were you doing it really to be of service or were you hoping someone else would notice? Ah, bro.

And the ego comes from— I've done some masterminds and stuff spiritually. And the ego is there to protect. But in the deepest form, it's really insecurity. And it's, you know, asking those questions is hard. It's like you kind of want to be defensive. Like, egoness is a part of you. It's not you. And it's when you peel those layers, you know, you get to the root, which is like, you know, the essence of like who you are. And that's where the truth is.

Yeah, I really feel, and I believe that God created all of it. Like, he created our ego self, our spirit self, all the things. What I've discovered is that the ego serves us all the way through about adolescence, and then it becomes a pattern that we have to shift from. So I begin, like, what I would say that you— that in the story that you shared, even about your own— before we get into the business stuff, like, the business stuff's cool, right? Um, because I'm trying to give— I'm trying to give a voice for what entrepreneurs and business leaders should be focused on, because we're so focused on the winning and the revenue and the pro-ass. That's all important. Yeah, but like, what's driving it?

Yeah, that's—

the most important. What's driving it? And when it comes down to it, I'm thinking to myself, it's like, okay, all I gotta do is help people become one part lion and one part lamb in maturity. I've got biblical illustrations of what that is. The quote, well, there's several, but David was really close. Jesus was perfect.

Mm. Mm.

He was perfect in it. He could challenge a Pharisee and a Sadducee in seconds. And within a second later be humbly helping another person with no gain. 'Cause there was nothing that you could give Jesus. Like there was nothing you could give him.

That's true.

Right? And I don't know, it's had me going down these different rabbit holes, right? And what I needed to bring, what I'm just speaking for myself, what I needed to kind of move out of that direction was I needed to understand the system. Which had never been identified. And then I had to turn the system into stewardship.

Mm-hmm.

Right. Which is what I've seen you do, not just with your life, but also with your business.

Wow.

Right. Hey there. I hope you're enjoying the episode. Look, I love making great content for you, but more importantly, we like creating great resources. So before we get you back to the episode, I want to make you aware of the Aligned Leader Index, which you can find at stephenscoggins.com/leadership. This is a one-of-a-kind tool that I wish I had when I was actually building and scaling my own organizations. Why? Because a lot of times the bottlenecks that we think are actually in our way are not really the bottlenecks that are actually in our way. And what the cool thing about this specific thing is, it's going to let you know what the number one constraint is internally, the number one driver that's actually in your way or being disrupted, or chaos and dysfunction are showing up. And number three, probably most important, where your leadership blind spot likely is. So if you're tired of your business actually running you and you want to take operational control over your organization, make sure you take complete advantage of the Align Leader Index. It takes 5 to 7 minutes and it'll give you instant clarification on the thing that's holding you back right now. Let's get back to the show. So I want to pivot a little bit because I believe that's why you're— you yourself are climbing to the 1% of the 1% of the 1%.

God's grace.

So it's one thing to, to go and build this for self, meaning it's one thing to go and be very successful in, you know, the, the, the IT space and like become like master engineering and start really looking, okay, well, this is what AI should do and could do and how it could integrate. It's one thing to do all that. It's a whole other thing to start teaching it for people.

It's a lot harder teaching, I would say, um, running the, the coaching business if You know, because honestly, so what led you there?

Like, no side of you was like, hey, this is, this is so good, so other people need to know about it.

So I used to do photography.

Okay.

Naturally, I started business about, um, I was in college and I created an organization. It was really tough at the time, but created an organization to bring photographers and models together to, you know, kind of just make things a lot easier for them. Like, um, I started day trading, created the business to help IT. Anything that I do and I found some success in it, I always want to share it. And that's just, um, it goes back to discovering like who you are. Like, that's naturally who I am. Yeah. Um, if I know that there's gold here, um, hey guys, come, let's go right now.

Some gold.

Yeah, yeah. So I'll carve you out a pile. Yeah. And it's more for everyone. And so turns out it it doesn't run, it doesn't go anywhere.

We make it, it just shows back up again. It's crazy. It's like Nana.

Yeah, it's so— it's, um, it's, um, I think, I think just to go back to the question, can you restate the question? I want to make sure I'm on target.

Yeah, I mean, I just, I think it could, you know, it's one thing to again go and create something for self. Like I said, okay, I created a good business, we're making good money, we're doing good work. That's one thing.

Yeah.

That's another thing to say, I'm doing— like, I'm now taking the same model, the blueprint that I've been working on creating, that I found to be very successful.

Yeah.

And I'm now going to teach the people.

Yeah, yeah. I think, uh, the— so to answer your question, I was, I was getting— I was kind of saying it, but anything that I do, I always want to teach it. I think I always wanted to share people like, here's, here's some gold. But, um, I think that Honestly, it really does stem from 2014, just wanting to, you know, that's when my world just opened up. Like, people really do need some help out there. And it's not even their fault that they're in certain situations. And so I've always just wanted to help, wanted to help. At first, it came from guilt, right? Because I felt like I don't like— I'm born in—

Do you think guilt can be good for a season?

For a season, depending on the energy and how it's used.

Okay.

But I think go. It's just an emotion.

It's emotion that showcases or something more to dig into, right?

Yeah. And it's from a vibrational— it's more of a lower level, for sure. There's more ways to operate in higher, like, just like love.

Yeah, love and authenticity are the brightest.

Yeah. Yeah. And, um, you know your stuff.

I've been doing this a minute. Actually, I take that back. I've been rebuilding me for a while, let's just be honest. Yeah.

And so I think, um, At first it started with guilt, but then it came from like love in terms of wanting to help people. But to answer your question, I think that, you know, doing it myself, you know, I scaled my income from $45,000. It was $50,000, but after tax was really $44,000, but $45,000.

Yeah, thanks Uncle Sam.

Really.

Which has never showed up at a family reunion, by the way.

He's always got your hand in the pocket.

He's the only uncle I've never met.

He takes from you though. But yeah, from $45K to $489,000 with cloud engineering.. And so once I figured out how to do that, job stacking ethically and legally, you know, I had posted like my offer letter and people asked me like, hey, how did you do it? How did you do it? And I was like, okay, cool. I was already teaching day trading and I wasn't really that successful there teaching. I had like, I think 5 students in 2 years. And then I posted it, my offer letter, and I had 9 students who wanted to sign up. Within a week. And so I was like, okay, there's more demand here. And so I started teaching and, you know, it's insane. Like we have people, like I'll leave names out, but I mean, I can include names, but different students. I have one person named Stormy, no degree, no certifications. He just knew how to turn on a computer and search something up on Google. He's making $321,000 right now. Wow. He still has a high school diploma, reserves, Marines, and no certifications. And he's gotten 3 offer letters. He left one and he's doing 2 ethically and legally. And he's at that $300,000 range.

Why do you qualify that ethically and legally?

Because—

Are there other organizations that aren't doing it ethically and legally?

So in the IT space, you can get different jobs like W-2 jobs. Jobs, but you can't work a job— you can't work at Burger King and McDonald's, you can't work for competitors. You have to— you typically sign a non-compete agreement. Um, and then also there is like, when you do like C2C contracts, you're getting paid for a deliverable, not really for your time. We're paying you to deliver this solution to solve this problem from the solution that you can provide. Um, and typically from cloud engineering, the solution that you're providing to businesses one business is paying your business. Um, you know, that solution is a 6-figure solution.

Okay.

And so you can work for different contracts under a cloud consulting business to scale your income to way past $500K. I know somebody doing $1.1 million right now. And so the other— the reason why I say ethically and legally is because you can get work for W-2, 1099, or C2C. Most people in tech go through W-2 and they work multiple jobs under the radar. And so they don't really say anything.

And it's like they're actually infringing on their non-competes in many cases.

Not only that, but then also, um, like you're obligating, hey, I'm working 8 hours in this company, and then now you're saying you're working 8 hours the same time at this other company, and you're probably not working 16 hours. Exactly. Well, everybody in tech, especially cloud, they know you're not working like 8 hours, but it's, um, it's just there's, you know, um, I don't know if it's time fraud or, um, I forgot what it's called, but nonetheless, the non-compete is one. And there's other stuff where it's like you kind of have to be under the radar.

Yeah.

And there's a lot of people in tech to do that. Yeah, the whole culture. Yeah. But, you know, a cloud consulting business or any, you know, consulting business, you get contracts. Yeah. And you can work multiple contracts as long as there's like same thing, non-compete, um, and you're delivering a solution for a business. And they're paying you six figures to deliver that solution. It doesn't matter if it takes you, for just, just an example, you know, two weeks or two minutes. Literally because of AI, I was able to create a solution in two minutes instead of two weeks. And so that time that going back to leverage, Robert Kiyosaki, make more money and work less.

It's funny you mentioned that cuz I, uh, I tell people all the time, ROT is more important than ROI sometimes. Return on Time.

That's crazy. Yeah, I've never heard that one. That's crazy.

Return on Time. Yeah, it's, um, uh, a good friend of mine, Rory Vaden.

Um, Return on Time.

Yeah, he's— he has— he wrote a book called Take the Stairs.

Yeah, he's a—

he's a big, um— the book's all about multiplying, right? Just multiplying your effort, right? So if you have 5 pounds of effort, you're producing 20 pounds of result. You're— you got 1 hour to dispose of, you're getting 4 hours of return.

That's another way of looking at things.

Yeah. So I call it return on time because sometimes I went and made the money. I got return on income or return on investment in some cases, financially. And then I was miserable.

Right.

What I like doing more than everything else, I like being able to control my day. I like the income. I like being financially stable and safe. I mean, when I'm not, my little scarcity kid goes, hey, hey, hey. I'm like, slow down. Just breathe through it. We're going to be okay. Okay, you know, takes box breathing, let's go. Yeah, yeah. Um, but, um, like, I don't like being places that I don't want to be.

Yeah, yeah.

Like, freedom's like really important to me. Yeah, yeah, right. Um, and you know, the, the return on time concept became like a pivotal moment, and that's basically what you just described.

Yeah, well, well, yeah, I never looked at it that way, but it's true.

It's, um, you know, just bring me a teacher group now, we're gonna do some exchanges. Hey guys, Here's about— here's what I'm gonna break down. Return on time.

There's, um, there's different ways of making money, um, low money, middle money, high money. What—

it's all object, um, objective, uh, but I think you can't get back more of this time, and as far as we know.

And, and that's where— and I got this from Myron Golden and, and, you know, Robert Kiyosaki, just in terms of operating in, in arenas or environments where I can make a lot of money with least effort. And so, you know, it's, uh, and it's about learning the skill set.

I'll say this, um, do you think it's, um, less effort or more intentional effort?

I think it's—

because if I think about a, a leverage point, a fulcrum, and a pry bar. Yeah, that's what the— I want my intention, my thing that I'm working on, to be the thing I should be working on.

Yeah, yeah. I think, um, because in business, all All business owners watching this, everyone knows there's thousands of things you can do in the business, but it's having the wisdom to understand what thing in the business is going to pull the most lever.

Yeah. Give you the most—

give you the most juice with the least effort to squeeze.

Yeah.

And I think the only way to do that is experience or somebody coaching you because they're pouring you that wisdom to not do 1,000 things.

Yeah.

For example, my mentor, he said the only thing you should be doing in business until you're at $70,000 Cash is— it's a— was it a follower ad funnel?

Mm-hmm.

But you're running the ads already, but having conversations in the DMs, appointment setting, and having more conversations on sales calls. Mm-hmm. Until you're at $70,000 a month, there's nothing else you should be doing. Obviously, like, you know, you can— you have a product already that's— yeah, people results. That's how you can have a long-standing business. But anything else?

No, notice that two times through this conversation we talked about the importance of having a mentor and advisor.

Yeah.

And people, people a lot of times— so we get this all the time, it's like, I, you know, to work one-on-one with me is, um, it's not inexpensive but it's not super expensive. I could be, you know, it's as far as how we, we intentionally price ourselves below market so I could be more helpful to more people, right? And, um, one of the— every now and again you'll get someone who's, you know, building a business, like, well, I'm not sure if I can afford it, right?

It's crazy. Yeah.

And I'm thinking to myself, I'm watching and I'm listening, I'm like, I hope you shift 3 levers. You're gonna collapse your learning curve by a decade, right? And you're gonna get a 25x return on that investment, right? So I want to talk about that because being selective with mentors— I had, um, some other good friends that I'm sure you'll meet up with. This— we're both connected to Sean The Polites on, um, and they, they do, um, 50/50 Flip on A&E. They have multiple businesses, are big in real estate.

Interesting.

Um, they sat right where you guys were sitting.

Wow.

Um, and Crystal was sitting there, Deja was sitting— actually, Crystal was sitting there, Deja was sitting over here, and, um, she was talking about like— she was having a conversation. Everybody should go watch the episode if you haven't seen that episode. It's a killer episode. Um, but she was like, yeah, you know, this, this mastermind that they were going to invest in was be like $16,000, right?

Right?

And Dedrick's like, we don't got the money. Yeah. And she looked, she said— you see her doing all the things— she's like, I told him we got the money.

Yeah, we got them credit.

I'm like, careful with them credit cards. But, uh, but you know, but they, they went on to say that that $16,000 investment gave them a 1,000x return.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's— if I do the math correctly, that's $1.6 million on a $16,000 Yep, yep, yep. Right. So I'm curious, you know, not, not to give like numbers, uh, whether they're going to learn more about 1% University working with you or— but what are you, what are you investing yourself? Are you, are you investing a certain percentage of income into your ongoing training? So, um, you're, you're, you know, when you do invest in a mentor, you sh— you, you collapse the learning curve by a lot.

I think investing in a mentor is the cheat code of— honestly, I'm not the smartest guy. I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed.

I think he's being humble, myself personally.

Honestly, all I, all I do— so if you're in business watching this podcast right now, my business does anywhere from $200,000 to $300,000 cash, not revenue. I don't really count revenue. Cash with a 74% profit margin. Typically in my space is around 10 to 25, if you're lucky, 30% profit margins. It is crazy, I would say, to see the numbers that I do see, and I'm not special. How I got here is I, I look first, I look at what do I want? What do I want my life to look like? I envision it. I wake up in the morning, I smell eggs, my wife's cooking downstairs. I can, I envision the whole day. Then I asked myself, what is the mindset first, mindset that I need to acquire? That's good to get there. And what is the skill set that I need to acquire to get there? And then I write it down. You can even use AI to help you build this out. Then I go ahead and look at somebody that has the mindset and skill set that I need to acquire. Then I go ahead and see if they have a step-by-step blueprint that I can clearly follow to acquire the mindset and skill set. If you didn't know, mindset is 95% 100% of everything that you have externally. What you have externally is a direct reflection of who you are internally. It took me a long time to realize that.

Yeah. Yeah.

So I look for a blueprint that this person has, like he has the life that, you know, I want, or he has the skill set.

And maybe a proven track record of success for his clients.

I was getting there. Yeah. And then if he has that blueprint, then I ask myself, Has 3 or 3 people, at least 3 people gone through that blueprint and seen success? If so, I'm going to invest. And the reason why I say that is people— and I used to have a very, very poor mindset. I would look at the price of the program, but not scarcity, but not the cost. Let's just say there's a program right? For example, I just sold— and we were talking about this before— I just sold an offer for $100,000. And realistically, it wasn't for sale because, you know, I didn't have time and I didn't know this person was serious. It really wasn't available. Like, he really, really wanted to do it.

Yeah, he basically created a product.

Uh, it was— it's already created.

Well, it is now.

But so, um, you know, one of my students, he's doing the same thing right now, he's crushing it, doing $200,000 a month. Another of my students, he just joined recently, he's at, I think, I think $20,000, $30,000 a month. And so I told him, you know, you can do this on your own. I even gave him like the blueprint. He tried it for 10 months. He's still stuck. He has the information, but he doesn't have that experience to know what to apply, right? Which is coming from a mentor.

Well, that and mentors also help give you the motivation to apply it in real time. Exactly, keep you accountable.

And then also paying that money is going to help you out too.

That's true.

Because, you know, he got it for free at first. And so, but going back to the point is, you know, when choosing a mentor, first I look at the intention of this person, you know, does he have my intention? Does he have my best interest at heart? And it's kind of hard to gauge that at first because you don't know him. But you can kind of pick up on vibes. Like, is this guy just trying to sell me something and and, you know, take advantage of me? Or does he actually want to, like, impact lives? You can kind of tell.

I like, I like how you brought the proof, the proof of actual wins, not, not just testimonials, but like real, like, people. Like, yeah, because I was telling this with another guest that there is a, a trust recession, a trust economy, because people have paid a lot of— excuse me— paid a lot of money and not gotten very much for it. Yeah, I've, I've done that. I've paid in some pretty expensive masterminds, got nothing for it. Yeah. Meanwhile, I've paid in some other expensive mastermind, got a ton for it.

Yeah, yeah. I think one of the things I'm gonna get back to— so one of the things I want people to understand, there's a lot of people that when you get on a call and they drop the price, $10K, $20K, $5K, whatever it is, they're looking at— they're coming from a fear perspective. And a lot of people, they don't really see it this way, but they allow fear to overcome them. They, they have an obstacle, which is themselves, and they allow the obstacle to overcome them. Yeah. And a lot of people, anybody listening, do you think that most people will get to their goals if they have obstacles overcome them, or if they overcome the obstacle?

Yeah.

You know, even when you do join the program, there's still going to be obstacles. You have to have the mindset.

Yeah.

The identity to say, I am somebody that's going to overcome obstacles to get what I want.

Yeah.

Because everybody has— you had to do that.

Yeah. I mean, one of the things, and then you do it at every level, by the way.

Yeah.

One of the things that you said that I want to highlight real fast, because I I got asked this question 3 times in the last 3 weeks.

Yeah.

Most of them were in the same week, different people.

Wow.

Don't know each other, completely different industries. And their core question is, I'm here right now, but I want to be there. What do I do? And almost my exact verbatim response in written form and Zoom call was, what is that person doing when they wake up? What is that person doing at 9:00 AM, 10:00 AM? Like, what are they doing? How are they living their life? Well, they're getting up, they're doing their presence practice, they're going to the gym and getting their workout on, and they're spending the first hour of the day, they're studying their niche, like physically continuing learning.

Pull that now.

And then they're setting up their first team meeting. They make sure that their team meetings aren't longer than 15 or 30 minutes. There's an agenda, right?

And you know, it's—

so they're telling me this and I'm like, yeah, once I just say, how does this person live their life every day?

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, right.

This— what do they do? Yeah, right. And where, and where are their blind spots and what they do that you don't know what they do, right?

Yeah.

And it's funny, every time they come back with this, they're doing this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this.

They know.

And I'm like— and they were like, you know, like, okay, that's a great exercise. What do I do now?

Do that and then come back.

Do that.

Just do that. Yeah, yeah.

Like, get up, have your presence practice. Get up, go work out, get, get your physical on.

Yeah.

Spend an hour of your day learning and learning more about your niche or how to elevate your niche, you know, from a trusted source, whether it's a book, a podcast, or whatever, right? Coordinate really efficient meetings. Like, make sure your priorities are in alignment for your highest priority first, which coincidentally is the number one thing you're typically avoiding, right? And it was just so funny because you're like, yeah, I envision that. And you use your five— so I teach a process called Five Senses. Like, use your five senses. I like that. You know, I'm picturing my, my spouse downstairs and she's making— I can smell the eggs.

Yeah, right. It's powerful.

You know, um, I can, I can, I can feel the texture of a steering wheel or a doorknob or a cloth. Or, you know, I'm— we're here on, say, at Safe Haven on the lake. It's like I can, I can, I can go out and physically put my feet in the grass and hear the, like, hear the water rushing, right? These are the most underrated visionary skills that keep us stuck because we get so focused on living the life that we've always known, we forgot how to dream about the one we want.

It's powerful. You know, I'm taking notes.

I'm taking notes.

Like, it's, uh, it's like I've, I've heard it, but the way you're saying it, you know, 10 people could say the same thing and, you know, it can be interpreted differently. And I feel like the way you're communicating it is just very effective and more powerful. But it's very, it's very good stuff. It's very good. Thank you.

Well, I mean, just if you think about people that build very successful organizations and lives in general, the one quality they all share is they have a vision. The Bible says have a vision to make it plain. I say the— I said my, my Stephen Scoggins translation is, is create the vision and create a strategy. Right, the make it plain is the strategy. Yeah, it is the playbook. Yeah, it's operating the 5 drivers, avoiding the 5 constraints. Yeah, looking at it anyway. Yeah, um, I want to pivot because I know we only got— we haven't got much long, uh, much time left, but yeah, what are we getting wrong right now with AI?

Um, a lot of people say this too, um, Alex Hormozi, um, Myron Golden. Those are the 2 people I— Myron Golden more so, but I think that Yes, AI is replacing jobs, but more importantly, people that know how to utilize AI that can create more value in a short amount of time are replacing people. And so I think that spending— and I told, you know, my colleague, um, she's a business owner, I said, because I'm in tech and I'm— this is my field, I can understand the value of AI. It's It's like people telling you to buy Bitcoin when it was at a dollar and you're like, I'm ignoring you because I don't understand it. I don't understand the value. And now it's at, I think, $64,000 right now at the time of this recording. And so that value from the Bitcoin boom was huge, right? There was a lot of millionaires. From what I understand about AI and the power of it and what it can do, it is more explosive compared to Bitcoin. It's like buying Bitcoin at a penny, 0.001%. And to reap the rewards of it, I told my colleague, I said, please learn at least 15 minutes a day learning something new about AI. And you don't have to be technical because they make it easy now. But I think the biggest misconception that people have, just to answer your question once again, is, you they think AI is replacing jobs. The people who know how to utilize AI is replacing jobs from a, from a job perspective. But from a business perspective, you know, I learned this from my mentor. It's good to have mentors. Um, and this is how I went from $100K to $200K in 30 days, is from one thing he said. He said, you're not just a coaching company anymore. You're a number one media company, you're number two an AI company, and number three a coaching company. Right now, the amount of automations that I've built with AI, like, I can work 2 hours a month, and that's because I'm in the coaching calls because I still want to connect with my students. Um, but AI is pretty much running almost everything. Yeah. Um, except for sales calls, and that can still be automated in a unique way. Yeah. Uh, one-page offer document and, you know, the, the sellings and the marketing and they're ready to pay already. Um, but in terms of AI, I think that it really truly, truly, truly, truly, truly gives business owners, if you know how to use it, it's a tool If you know how to use the tool, it gives them an opportunity to have the biggest leverage.

Yeah.

Make more, work less. Yeah. And I think that if you, depending on whatever industry that you're in when it comes to business, if you learn AI and understand how to use that mix with your experience, your context, the solutions that you can create, the automations that you can create, the value. That's one thing I was trying to say. The value that you can create without AI within, you know, the marketplace is amazing. With AI, the value is a multiplier. And the time that I can— I can text on my phone right now and AI is connected to my Slack, build me a website that delivers this product or whatever the case may be, and it can build it literally in 3 minutes. And it's a product that's really good because it has context. I fed my AI context about everything about me, about my ICP, my minutes. I can build a low-ticket product right now and sell it. And the, and the time to, to, to tangible result in terms of having a product, that time, 3 minutes as opposed to days, that it took me 3 weeks to build a lead magnet or to a value, a high-value lead magnet.

Because I have to sit down, I gotta think about it. How would I structure this? Where does the structure go?

And the crazy part is AI is a thousand times smarter than us.

Yeah.

And you just have to give it context text about everything about you, your business, everything that you can think of. Yeah. And then you're— even my business model. And now the, the— it's just, I can go on for days about AI, but I think like if you're a business owner and you're, and you, and you're not utilizing AI, I would say about 70% in your business, the opportunity cost, not only money but time is so huge, it's not even funny. Like, it's, it's, it's— you can't even fathom the, like, the difference. It's, it's crazy.

Yeah, yeah, it's great. Well, I think one of the things I've been, uh, telling leaders to do for a while is like, you don't just have to fire anybody, right? Teach them how to use the tools, let the tools do the work. You'll get a force multiplier of value-add creation, and you'll have the same size team but you want to take on 3 times as much business with the same size team, which means everybody wins. They get a little more, you get a little more. Because then I think in the next 2 years, probably even 5, maybe 5 would be very different. But as of right now, either you will learn how to use AI and be a, be a value add to the company leveraging AI technology.

Yeah.

Or you'll be a tradesperson.

Yeah.

Okay, using your hands. Massage therapist. Agreed. Nails. Hammer, mow the lawn, which will become high-paid jobs, by the way. Yeah, HVAC that we used to say, well, these, you know, when I was in high school, there used to be a picture of a guy wearing a construction outfit. They're like, you don't want to be like this guy, go to college.

I'm like, it's crazy how times change.

Uh, yeah, well, my truth was I lived the opposite, which is kind of crazy. Um, you know, but, and then, and then you're, then you're gonna have the folks who just resisted change so much.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, right.

Because it's, it's not a matter of if, it's, it's when.

Yeah, yeah, right.

And you've got it, you've got a window of time.

My first mentor told me one thing, the first advice I got was when you have to know, you have to be, you have to know when to pivot and you have to be flexible and adopt. Pretty much the market right now is adopting. I mean, it's proven already. And I think if you're Humans, we don't like change naturally, but if you're reluctant to adopt AI, it's like, imagine you compared to your competitors using AI and then their team members using AI, like you said, and the return on, ROT, the return on time that each of those team members are getting now to have it a multiplied output with minimum input. And they can now focus, they just saved a bunch of time, then now they can go focus more things to bring in more value. Yeah, within the company. Yeah, not just you but your team members.

Well, and I think one of the quickest ways to fast-track people who are watching right now who are very interested in this particular subject matter is to look into the 1%, the 1% University. Talk to me a little about the 1% University. What are your students most like? What do they most enjoy? Like, who is your ideal— who is your ideal student?

So for the 1% University our perfect client, they're already in tech, they have experience in tech. Some of them, they got laid off and they were making six figures already, or making six figures and they're stuck because they're probably a software engineer working 8 hours a day, more because they're on call. Um, you know, it was tight deadlines, it's, it's very stressful. Um, or, you know, they're in tech making six figures and they're trying to get to that $300K mark, that $500,000 a year. But the job that they're in, the skills that they have, does not allow them to do that because they're typically working 6, 8 hours a day for one job. One person that I, I'm now teaching him business stuff, um, he was a cybersecurity analyst and he got two jobs working like 16-hour days, day shift and night shift. I said, what the I was like, that's insane.

Yeah.

And he's burnt out. Of course you think, and he has a family, right? And he has kids, you know, he has a family and it wasn't ideal. And that's what a lot of people tend to do. Yeah. And so it goes back to that one word, leverage. I teach people AWS cloud engineer. There's 3 skills. The first skill is the tech stack of cloud engineering, right? SQL, Python, Terraform, Ansible, Docker, Kubernetes. Um, like if you are not aware of these tools, it's going to sound like a different language, but those are the tools that you need to Um, a few other ones, right? Like Grafana, Prometheus, et cetera. But that is going to teach you this skillset of AWS cloud engineering and building projects around that, that solves problems for companies. Then the second skill, and this is where most people don't teach, how do you get recruiters to reach out to you? I hear it all the time. I can't get a recruiter on the call. It took me 6 months to get in, to get one interview. To you. That's insane. I used to do the same thing. That was my experience. How do you get recruiters to reach out to you? So I teach people how to brand themselves. I teach people how to position themselves as an authority in the marketplace. And so the third skill that I teach is communication. It's really just sales. How do you— and all sales is, is identifying the problem that a company has, and from the projects that you've built, the skill set, number one, from the projects that you've built, how are you able to clearly articulate the technical value that you've obtained from cloud engineering? And in a way that positions yourself as an authority and one of the top candidates on any job interview.

Yeah.

I will never tell anybody, hey, in this 3 months, 6 months, you'll get, you'll make $300,000. I have no idea. I don't know if you're gonna make any money.

You can't guarantee they're gonna apply themselves.

But what I will say is, you know, anybody, you know, that joins our program, what we do teach is, those 3 skills. And with time, it transforms into offers from my past students. I don't know what anybody else is going to do in the future, but for my past students, it takes an average of 2 to 5 months depending on their time commitment to actually get their first offer or multiple offers. And so I've seen some crazy stuff. All my testimonials, anybody listening, is on my Instagram highlights and also on my YouTube channel. It's a bunch of different testimonials that you can see. You'll see the offer letter. You'll see, you know, the incomes. And so just check it out to, you know, do your own due diligence if you are interested.

That's awesome, bro.

Yeah.

Where can my, before I gotta give you the last question, where can anybody find that information?

So on my Instagram, type in Tayo Lusi, T-A-Y-O L-U-S-I. You'll see, you know, a pretty face and so, but you'll find me on Tayo Lusi on Instagram. On YouTube is Tech with Tayo. LinkedIn, Tayo Lusi. X, Threads, Tayo Lusi. And so, um, yeah, you can find me on all platforms. Love it, dude.

All right, so this, these are— this is more of a fun one, and depending on the payment time, we might do two just for fun.

Let's do it.

All right, what is the best $100 you've ever spent?

Um, I gave it to my brother and it was my last $100, and this was before I had like money and stuff like that. It was my first job, was I was serving Bob Evans.

Uh, it's crazy.

But yeah, my brother, you know, he needed some help, was going through some personal stuff. His mom had just passed away. It was my half-brother. And he was—

That's what I'm saying, ain't that your mom too?

Yeah.

Thanks for qualifying that. I'm like, you're disassociating, bro.

So yeah, it was my last 100 and I didn't feel anything, but it just really, it just reconfirmed like who I was. And then it also, when we talk about investing into mentors, a lot of people hold themselves back. You know, you talked about the 1,000 ROI percent, but a lot of people hold their hands and they want, you know, God to give them, you know, blessings. But how can you receive blessings if your hands are closed? And so it taught me how to let go of money, which is a spiritual, like, like the principle that I'm saying.

Money's like water, it has to flow.

It has to flow. Most people, they put money in a bank account for security and it's stuck. The only way it can leave is if you spend money and give it to other businesses. But, you know, wealthy people, we truly believe it's like a stream. Money comes in and out, money comes in and out. $1 comes in, $10 go— you know, when a dollar comes in, I'm thinking, how can I turn this dollar to $10? So it always goes back out. Yeah. And so, but that taught me how to open my hand to now invest money. Yeah. But it came from a selfless act. Like, I just want to help you. Yeah, but it was a— that is a principle that I learned from that, that stemmed from that.

That's awesome. All right, one more. We're gonna wrap this thing up.

Yeah.

What is the best piece of wisdom you've ever been given? Ooh, he's gonna have to ponder this one, guys.

Um, the best piece of wisdom It's gonna be Proverbs. It's not gonna be a specific, you know, verse or anything like that. It's just the aspect of when I ask myself, I'm reading books, I'm learning from different people. I've mentioned Alex Hormozi, I've mentioned Myron Golden, very smart people. But I think that if you're able to take God's wisdom, that is the highest form of wisdom. I think just, it's nothing specific, but generally speaking, intentionally seeking wisdom from God, not only through his word, but even from speaking to him, actually having conversations with him, hearing him speak back to you. In a very still place. And before I started my program, I asked God, this is what I want. I don't wanna live a life where I'm doing something and it's not my will, it's not what I'm destined for.

Yeah, this is what I want, what do you want?

And I always pray, my mom taught me this, but God, allow my will to be lost in your will. And so I asked God, if this is for me, give me signs and make it so obvious that I'm not gonna miss the sign. God gave— I wanted to coach and do all this stuff. And I said, hey God, is this what I'm supposed to do? He gave me 3 different signs. And I was like, okay, God, I understand.

Got that fleece.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so that's probably the answer, but being able to lead with what God has in store for you and consulting with God in the different steps that you have, God's gonna show you. You, but making sure that your will isn't lost with God's will because his plan is always the best plan. And being in alignment with that plan in terms of what you're destined to do on this earth.

Yeah. That's really interesting. I had a mentor of mine told me once, he said, the more you, let's see here, the more your heart comes into alignment with God's heart, the more your will will match his will.

That's crazy.

He's like, so it's like, that's why when Jesus is like, what are the greatest commandments? The number one is love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your mind, with all your mind and all your soul. Just do that one thing. And so I also realized that out of that one thing, the second piece of that, you'll actually give, you'll be given what you need to love other people. Right? You can't love other people well without loving God first. You just, that's why they're actually in order. I like patterns, I recognize patterns. But Nehemiah, he says, when your heart, matches God's heart, then your will will become his will.

That's powerful, right?

So it's like a circle.

Like I said, the way you say it, you say it in a different way, it's powerful.

Yeah, dude. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show, man. We had a blast.

Thank you for inviting me.

That went by quick, doesn't it?

Yeah, it was amazing. It was amazing.

Beautiful settings.

Gotta look at the lake. Love it, love it. I've never seen a view like this, honestly. It's crazy. It's crazy. Yeah. Yeah.

All right, guys, that's going to do it for this episode. I hope you really enjoyed it. I know I did. If you haven't already done so, check out the show notes and all the things. We will put all the links that we talked about there. Uh, check out Taiho. He's, he's doing some really cool stuff, and he's, he's already walking in what you've heard me talk about so many times, which is becoming more like David, right? David in his best days, not David in some of his challenges. The good news is, is even David in his worst days still humbled himself when he was caught, when Stephen Scoggins, uh, caught in a misstep. But I really hope you enjoy that episode. I know you do. Um, if you know someone right now, for example, that, um, maybe IT is not your field, but you know someone who could really use that— I'm actually thinking about a couple people in my own head that I was like, I want that, I want to introduce them to them, right? Then share this episode with them. Share it with them. Help them see the benefit. Um, just send them a love note of sorts. Hey, I saw this episode, I thought of you immediately. Stephen Scoggins, there's a moment about, I don't know, pick some time in the show, the 10-minute mark, 30-minute mark, or whatever that I think specialty. But I love the whole show. I hope you enjoy it. And just send a love note. We've discovered that that is the easiest way to like and share because you're liking and sharing with sincerity, and that's how people like to be gravitated towards, in authenticity. So anyway, I hope you enjoy the episode. As always, if you haven't already done so, please like, share, subscribe, do all the things. I don't like asking. I don't like me asking. But if you're just— if you'll do it to help us hook us up, we can actually reach more people, more lives, do more good in the world, and you'd be a big part of that. So until then, I'll see you in the next one. God bless.

Peace. Take care.