Why Are Men Lonely?

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In this episode of SmartPro Radio, we sit down with Bill Spencer, co-founder of Narrow Gate. He shares the idea that sparked the business and how it's come to be as impactful as it is today.

In this conversation, Bill shares how he guides young men through life’s toughest questions: Who am I? Why am I here? He also explains how Narrow Gate creates a powerful environment for building community, discovering purpose, and growing in discipleship. They share how they are unpacking the loneliness epidemic in young men and how their sense of community can help.

If you know someone searching for direction or meaning, this episode could make a lasting impact. Feel free to share it with anyone in your life who might benefit.

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Discussions in this show are for entertainment and educational purposes only and should not be construed as specific recommendations or investment advice. Always consult with your investment professional before making important investment decisions. Securities offered through Registered Representatives of Cambridge Investment Research, Inc., a broker/dealer, member FINRA/SIPC.

Advisory services through Cambridge Investment Research Advisors, Inc., a Registered Investment Advisor. Cambridge and SmartPro Financial are not affiliated.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:01

Discussions in this show are for entertainment and educational purposes only and should not be construed as specific recommendations or investment advice. Always consult with your investment professional before making important investment decisions. Securities offered through registered representatives of Cambridge Investment Research Incorporated, a broker dealer, member FINRA SIPC. Advisory services through Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Incorporated, a registered investment advisor. Cambridge and SmartPro Financial are not affiliated.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

Hey, welcome back to SmartPro Radio, where we love people and like finance. We have an amazing guest today in studio with Bill Spencer, who's one of the founders of Narrowgate. Bill, thank you to coming here and being on the show.

SPEAKER_00 0:48

Yeah, our pleasure, man. Glad to be here.

SPEAKER_01 0:50

Can you tell a little bit about Narrowgate to our audience?

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Yeah, it's a it's kind of a history lesson because we've been around for 22 years. So to really get the picture, we have to back the clock up a little bit. Um Stacy and I were in business. We were in financial services software structures. Okay. Um got tricked into going to church by a client, and that was sort of a devastating thing. We won't go into all that, but that was sort of a devastating moment in life where we had the privilege of stepping back and saying, this life that we've built, this this chase of the American dream, is this actually the life that God wanted us to build? The life that God wanted us to have. So, you know, those are those are difficult conversations to have inside yourself. And we made some decisions that we wanted to live a life that actually esteemed others more highly than self, right? That we we looked out for the interest of other people. Okay. So we started making shifts in what we were doing. We found a couple of 19-year-old guys who were really, really talented, really smart guys, but they hadn't figured out how to engage their potential with the realities of adulthood. Okay. So we gave them jobs in our company, we started training them up and asking them, what do you want to do with your life? And they said, we want to start something for guys like us, 19 years old, who don't really know who they are, they haven't settled on that, or why they're here. That was the genesis of Narrigate. Those two questions. Who am I and why am I here? So we started putting a construct together where we could invite young men, high potential young men who haven't figured out how to engage that yet. We can invite them into an environment where they could step away from society long enough to get real answers to those two questions and then re-engage in a way that they become people who are servants and a benefit to society in the marketplace, in ministry, and whatever. Okay. Because we're we're not career planners. That's not what we do. We literally help people become disciples of Jesus in the market space in a way that the market space, the ministry space, the community where they live gets better.

unknown 2:54

Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

And that's that's a big project. That's a huge life change.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

It's it was life. I mean, I don't know that it was a life change as much as it was discovering what life truly is. I mean, if we live in a society that, you know, post-World War II, if you want to turn the clock back that far, came back and said, we have an opportunity to build something to give to our children that we never had. Because you got to think, coming out of turn of the century, 1900s, 1920s, things were rough. Sure. It was a huge gap between wealth and poverty. And things were rough. And the American dream wasn't a reality yet. But when you start coming into the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, that era, all of a sudden it was possible to have a home, to have a car, to have a career where you could provide a legacy and an inheritance for children. And when you've struggled through poverty that long, that's what you want. You want to give that flexibility and comfort to children. The problem is if you follow that track too far, you actually steal something because you've taken that character development away and you've replaced it with comfort. Yeah. So now we find ourselves in a society where comfort is the expectation, comfort is the goal. What we're trying to do is turn that clock backward and say, what if comfort isn't the goal? What if instead of comfort, character is the important missing issue? Okay. So we decided to create something where character could be formed, because character, properly implemented into society, will build the comfort that you're looking for.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Wow. No, that's that's a very unique perspective on that. Because I I do feel like, you know, with what we do, we're helping people with their finances, it generally is to go for it's for comfort. It's so you don't worry. And all of those things have some purpose behind it for sure, when it comes to money. But when it comes to your life, when it comes to what you're trying to do and achieve, or just the impact you're trying to make, generally comfort's not compatible with that, with impact.

SPEAKER_00 4:57

Yeah, but here's what I love about what you guys do. Money is actually the fruit of the minutes of your day, right? How you spend your life, how you exhaust the minutes that pass by are represented in the income that you make, at least in some fashion. So what you guys do is teach that the disciplined stewardship of that representation of life is a metaphor for all of life. Because there's a big difference between building wealth and getting rich. One, you build something through discipline, the other you just get it. It's given, and that usually goes about as fast as it comes. That's right. Y'all take the time to say if you'll live in discipline with character with regard to money, that will spill over into every aspect of life. So there's really not a grave difference between what y'all do and what we do. We just take a different tack. We just we come at it from different angles with the same end goal. It's about stewarding all of life, whether that be financial, whether that be talent, whether that be relationship, doesn't matter. It's about stewarding life in an adult fashion in a way that you not only benefit, but everyone around you benefits.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

So one of the things you said that really stood out, and I want to go back to is you mentioned these young men said, Hey, here's what, here's what we need. And you guys had a heart to fill that need. You say you pull them out of society, you give them a break to answer some, get the answer to some big life questions, questions that a lot of people struggle with. How do you pull them out and give them that space to actually think about those things and be discipled in that way? When it seems like, man, just turning off your phone can be such a burden, much less getting away and being somewhere different. I mean, do you you pull them and say, hey, we're you're gonna actually and move in place to where we're located? Or is this done virtually? How does this how does this happen? How can you do that?

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Yeah. So um Stacy and I, like most people, we had a home. We had a business, we had transportation, we had income, we had some savings, we had, we had some means. And what we figured out was the things that we have, we have to give all those back. The company we were growing, we were only growing it to sell it. Like most people. And that's the goal, right? You grow a business and sell it, have a liquidity event and walk away and enjoy, you know, golf or fishing or whatever you do. So that was our goal. That's what we were doing. The house we lived in, we intended on selling that house and moving to a new location. You have a car, you sell it. And one day after this event that I told you about, we were kneeling down in front of our couch praying, and we went, God, we get it. Even the breath we draw in to say this prayer, we have to give back. So, since in the end everything belongs to you, why don't you just do with what is yours whatever you want to do? Well, now all of a sudden I've got a house with extra bedrooms, I've got some extra cash in my account, I've got a company where I can employ people. And we take this position to say, what we have is not just for our benefit. If we invest it in other people, the return on that long term as their life grows exponentially becomes better. So how do we pull them out of society? Well, we started there, but eventually we thought if we can get a home, a place, a property, like we've got 122 acres south of Franklin, Tennessee now, if we can get a property where we can invite guys to lay down their phone, lay down their laptop, do a and tell them for eight months, you have no expenses, you have no expectations, everything's provided, your meals are provided, your housing is provided, everything's here. Because there's a a family, a huge family of support for Narrogate that makes that possible financially. It's investing finance for the betterment of others. Yeah. That's the true ROI in life. Okay. So, yeah, our guys say, okay, for eight months, I don't know who I am or where I'm going right now. I'm searching for something greater, and I'll invest this eight months in the hope that at the end of that eight months, I will have acquired something that I can't have any other way. So we remove the distractions. Okay. They come and live with us for eight months. It's tuition free. They set down their phone, they set down their laptop, and we go all the way back to the beginning. Who are you really? Because the truth is, identity dictates behavior. Like you woke up this morning and you didn't think you were your wife. You thought you were you. Sure. Because if you thought you were your your wife, you would have dressed like your wife, driven your wife's car, followed your wife's calendar, eaten your guy's like everything would change. But you dress like Rick, you talk like Rick, you do Rick's job. The question is, who told you?

SPEAKER_01 9:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:38

Who told you who you are?

SPEAKER_01 9:40

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

That's what we address. We go back to is there a source for identity that can drive a behavior that produces a life that's beneficial?

SPEAKER_01 9:48

I want to go into those two questions that you mentioned in a moment, but I want to go back to something you said at the beginning. And I love people's stories. I love the idea of where people came from and those people that create things that are new. And you said something interesting of like, I we had this moment where we went, you know, what are we doing this all for? And I feel like a lot of business owners, a lot of people that are entrepreneurs and creators, they have to have this thought at some point of why am I doing this? And you guys made the bold step to together and say, say, why are we doing this? And is there something more? What what push what could possibly push you to then have to pray that that prayer and then actually do it, right? Because I feel like a lot of times people are like, what is it? and then they try to find it in something that or they try to make it fit what they assume it should be, what why they're doing something and find purpose behind it. But what made you say, hey, I'm just I'm gonna I'm gonna turn this over and guide me to where we're supposed to go, because I mean that's a that's a I don't know if the right word is to say a dangerous prayer, but it's one that's gonna come with it's definitely gonna come with some implications, right?

SPEAKER_00 11:08

Dangerous is the right word, I promise. Yeah. But it's only dangerous from one perspective. Um you guys handle investment, it's what you do. The greatest investment ever made in the history of all histories, in the history of the universe, is really found in Philippians chapter 2 in the Bible. It says, talking of Jesus, it says, Have in you this mind which also was in Christ, who being in very form God. So let's start with that. Okay. This is God, this is the word of God. This is this is the creator of absolutely everything. Made himself of no reputation. He he gave up that position to become a man, a servant, and became obedient even to death. If we follow that pattern, he wasn't actually um spending. He wasn't that that it wasn't a cost, it was an investment. Because what he bought back in that decision was us, the thing that he wanted at the end of the day. The question we have to ask is do we want to get to the end of life and have chiseled into our tombstone our net worth? Or do we want to get to the end of life and have chiseled into our tombstone a statement about character?

SPEAKER_02 12:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

Because true character is always found in selflessness. If you finish that passage out, it says, esteem others more highly than yourself. Let everyone look out not only for his own interest, but also for the interest of others. And here's the thing: look out not only for your own interest. If you give away everything you have, absolutely everything you have, you become a ward of society. Somebody's got to take care of you now. But if you'll keep enough back, and that contentment, that's a big deal. Yeah. If you'll keep enough back to live simply, to live contently, then you can take all the rest. Once you've asked that asked and answered that question, what is enough? That's right. You can use the rest to benefit the people around you, and what will build in that process, that's true character. That's true investment. So people say, Oh my gosh, what a sacrifice or what a cost that you and Stacy made. No, we didn't. We made a calculated investment. We looked to the future and said, what do we want our return on investment to be? And it wasn't money.

SPEAKER_02 13:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:32

It was character, it was people, it was society, it was everything that we're supposed to love. Because loving relationship is the greatest gift we'll ever have.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

Yeah. Man, I do you ever think about what life would have been if you didn't do that? Yes. Like if you stayed on that track. Yes. I mean, because it's it's got to just be something that I mean, just illuminates you in such a way of going, oh my goodness, the the life change that we've seen over these years and what it how it could have looked different and the impact. It's it's it really kind of can change your your whole motivation for anything. If you're listening to this right now and going, oh my goodness, I could what can I do differently?

SPEAKER_00 14:12

You and I talked about it, right? How many people build a company because we've been told that's what we do? That's right. We're we're capitalists, right? We live in a in a Western capitalistic society. So we have the freedom to build something that has value that benefits people along the way, benefits society. Like we can do all of that. But then we get to this moment, this liquidity event out here.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

And you and I have both known a lot of people that crossed the arc of that liquidity event and then said, now what? Yes. I just grabbed the brass ring. Yes. Well, guess what? It's not hanging there anymore. And a lot of times, for for driven people in society, and I'll just we work with young men, so I'll just phrase it that way. For young men trying to have a life of purpose and meaning, they want to do something that conquers, accomplishes. They want to be on a quest of some sort.

SPEAKER_01 15:07

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 15:07

Well, business is a pretty good quest. It's a pretty brutal environment. And if you can survive in the business world, not just survive but thrive and get all the way to a liquidity event, you've sort of risen to the top of the heap.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:20

Our society tells us that means something. I'm not sure they're telling the truth. Getting to the top of the heap doesn't necessarily mean something. It's what you do with getting to the top of the heap, what you do with it, that's what means something. Yeah. So now we're back to the contentment thing. There is nothing wrong with building a thriving, wealthy business. There is something desperately wrong with thinking you did it for yourself and yourself only, because you're going to wind up alone.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Rich, alone. Accomplished, but now purposelessness. It just sets in. It's like a void in your life. That's right. And you stand there and say, I did it, now what?

SPEAKER_01 16:03

Yeah. You know, it's it's funny you we we talked about this too. A lot of people, not maybe they're going, well, I'm not a business owner, or maybe I've I've you know worked at a company for a long period of time. I got a 401k, but I'm thinking about retirement. I'm thinking about, hey, I'm I'm I'm I'm ready to be done. In a sense, that is a liquidity event of, hey, I'm I'm moving on to something new. I'm gonna live off my investments, which is my my labor, my work over the years that I've saved for this time period. And I've been looking for it. It's been my target, it's been my mission to get there. And they get there and they're going, oh my goodness. I look back and go, 30, 40 years of work was for this, and I don't even know what this is. And you go, there's people lack purpose. I had a conversation with um, an uncomfortable conversation for me, but it was one I felt like I needed to have. And, you know, we're interesting in the sense that we help people get to retirement. We help people save to get there and and start their money well and invest it well, and we're principled about that. But if you asked our advisors, say, Do you believe in retirement? I think all of them would say, probably not.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

Then I love your advisors.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

It's but it's uh it's because what you've seen. It's because what you've seen is people go, Man, I I I had a conversation with a with a gentleman who's you know quite a bit older than me, senior than me. He's retiring. And I said, Well, what are you gonna do? What are you gonna do now? Because it was one of those, I just I'm I'm ready to be done. I can't wait to be done. And it was very much driven to the end point. Like the goal is just I have to be done. So what are you gonna do? I don't, I don't know. There's no thought into what am I gonna do next? I don't, I don't know. What do I care? What am I gonna do? I'm gonna do whatever I want, right? And I'm I've never thought about what I'm gonna do. I said, Well, what are you gonna do that's got purpose behind it? Like, what's gonna excite you? I don't know. I've never thought about that. I told him, I said, until you think about that, until you come to that conclusion, you can't retire. He's like, Well, I can retire. Look at the I have the saved. I was like, You can't retire. He I said, he goes, why not? And this was the uncomfortable part. I said, Because a man without purpose is a dangerous man, and we don't need more of them. And he was like, Oh, okay, let me think. Because I've seen the pattern the first year, maybe like this is interesting, two or three years down the road, all of a sudden it's not, and you go, Man, everyone else is living their life, and I'm just waiting for someone to call me. I'm waiting for something, I don't know what I'm doing, I don't know my impact, and people just wither away. And it's a it's a thing that we've seen consistently, and that's why we say our advisors really don't believe in retirement in the sense that people just are done, and now you just go play golf every day or go fish every day. Those things are fun to do, but how are you gonna impact the people around you? Like, how are you gonna share your wisdom with people? How are you gonna uh mentor people? How is that gonna look? And most people never think of that because that's not the goal. The goal is I want to be done. It's very inward-focused, very individualistic. Yes. And it's well, how are you gonna impact people around you?

SPEAKER_00 19:00

So let's go back to something you said. I want to retire and do whatever I want to do. That is that is a sentiment that I would expect the vast majority of people in America to hold on to. Sure. I want to retire and do whatever I want to do. The problem with that is that if every let's say everyone achieves that. If everyone in society does whatever they want to do, that is the definition of anarchy.

SPEAKER_02 19:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:28

Most people define freedom as the ability to do whatever I want to do. Yep. But that's not freedom. Because when an entire society gets a hold of that, that becomes anarchy. So one of the things we walk through with our guys is let's redefine freedom. Let's say freedom is the ability to operate without constraint within a defined set of disciplines. Okay. Now that's freedom. Yeah. If you build a wall around an ancient city, you didn't build it to hold the people captive. You did it to keep the enemies at bay. And as soon as you lose those disciplines, those walls, as soon as the definition of why is taken away, you're not free anymore. You're subject to all sorts of attack. Retirement to do whatever you want to do is dropping the walls and letting the enemy come in for an attack. But if you can walk through, like with you guys, if you can walk, if your advisor actually cares about you and not just your money, it's not just, hey, we're going to manage your wealth and take some points off of it so we can be wealthy too, which unfortunately is out there. If you've got an advisor that genuinely cares about you as an individual, they're not going to let you drop those walls. It's what you're you can't retire until you can tell me what these disciplines are that are going to guide you into what could be the greatest season of purpose in your whole life.

SPEAKER_01 20:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:54

So we were asked recently by a national organization that we'll just leave it off the table, but a big men's ministry organization. They said, Will you come and speak at our national event? Sure. They said, What we want to know is how do we get young men, the guys we deal with, to join our men's ministry, to join us in what we're doing. So we put together a construct and we told them. They didn't like what we told them, but we told them nationally. We said, if you'll follow this pattern, number one, identify the right candidate that you want to invest in. And there's ways we can do that that we could discuss, or people can just contact us directly and we'll give you the formula for that because we've had really smart people help us figure that out. Identify the right candidate and then adopt the right posture. We're back to what we just said esteem others more highly. I'm going to take what's been entrusted to me and invest it in someone else. Okay. And then employ an effective method to lift them up. Your life will become richer in that moment than anything else. That's not retirement. You may stop. Doing what you've always done as a profession, as a vocation, which are really cool words, vocation, vocado, voice, right? What's your voice to society? All you do is switch voice.

SPEAKER_01 22:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 22:11

What if your vocation now becomes the betterment of other people?

SPEAKER_01 22:15

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

Well, let's go back 22 years. What did Stacy and I want to accomplish? What if our vocation, instead of writing financial services software that made wealthy people more wealthy, what if our vocation became taking people with high potential and building them into the capacity that God had put inside of them?

SPEAKER_01 22:36

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

All we did was switch voice.

SPEAKER_01 22:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

We're still working hard. We still have purpose.

SPEAKER_01 22:41

Our purpose just changed. Oh, that's that's so good. No, that's really interesting. I love when you when you break down words like that of what they mean and it changes.

SPEAKER_00 22:49

Words drive me nuts, man. Yeah. I can't just use words. I like I'm obsessed to think about what that word really means. Yeah. You know, what am I professing to the society? What what am I vocado, my voice, my vocation? What is my voice and my role in this world? Yes. Because if you ask those questions honestly, it rarely comes down to I want to get everything I want so I can do whatever I want. Fantastic. Then you'll die purposeless and alone.

SPEAKER_01 23:18

Yeah. Hey, if you've been listening for a while, you know that we care about doing things the right way and helping people make choices that truly matter. But here's the thing: you don't have to do it alone. At Smart Pro Financial, we build a custom step-by-step plan that has the potential to help you today, but also guides you into the future you're hoping for. We use Ramsey-inspired investment models. So your money's invested the same way the Ramsey team talks about. And get this there's no account minimums because we believe that everyone deserves trustworthy financial advice no matter where they're starting. If you're ready to get started, then click the link below to meet with a smart pro financial professional today. Man, so we we've tackled some big things, freedom being a big one, two more that you've you've talked about. But I wanted I think there's some people right now that struggle with these two questions. And the questions that you guys help young men answer is who am I and why am I here? And those are those are life questions that everyone has to struggle with at some point. Yeah. Who am I? Why am I here? How do you how do you help men find that?

SPEAKER_00 24:21

Well, like most things, you have to have a source, right? So if we're gonna say who am I, you have to say, Who am I according to? Right? Now in America, hey, you know, I'm Bill, you know, what's your name? And the first question we ask is, okay, so what do you do? That's right. Right? Yeah. Who are you? Tell me who you are. And the first thing we say is our profession, our vocation, our what do we do in society? What's our voice? What's our role? If you define yourself that way by what you do, then you have immediately discluded a ton of character statements, a ton of identity statements. That's right. We choose not to do that. We choose to take young men and say, the Bible is going to be our resource, scripture is going to be our resource. So there are 17 verses in the New Testament about Christ in me, and they're fantastic, man. They're just, they're amazing. There are 10 times, exactly 10 times as many, 170 passages about me in Christ, and every one of them is a defining verse. Okay. So anyone who's in Christ is a new creation. Old things have passed away, behold, everything's new. Well, if I wake up, we're back to our analogy earlier with you and your wife. If I wake up and I think I'm actually the redeemed, forgiven, servant, saint, sanctified son of God, like if I think that, I'm the child of God, I'll act in accordance with that. So we take biblical character, biblical character, and we say, you are, if we're going to have existential statements, you are a disciple of Jesus. You are a child of God. That's who you are. Now, what you do in society, I don't know, let's figure out how you're wired. That's your why you're here. Okay. Let's figure out what really makes you come alive. And let's take who you are from a character perspective and plug you into that capacity that God's given you and watch your life explode. And it works every single time.

SPEAKER_01 26:18

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 26:18

That's what we try to get people, even in adulthood.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:22

The problem with trying to get somebody in adulthood to do it is that the perceived cost, what I'm going to sacrifice, what I'm going to give up, is seen as sacrifice or giving up or cost instead of what am I going to invest to get back what I cannot have otherwise?

SPEAKER_01 26:41

So my question to that is is if somebody says, This is who you are, and the the baseline is Christ, right? When people come in there or people you've interacted with, what's their baseline? Is who I am a bad student? Is who I am somebody that just keeps screwing up? Is who I am someone from a broken home and it's always going to be in disarray? Like what where do people is I know it's probably different, but what do you see when it comes to that?

SPEAKER_00 27:10

No, it is different. You're right. Every single student that we deal with shows up from a different background. Everything from there was a guy in this area in Tampa St. Pete, no family, no background, was living in the the back seat of a car that didn't run. Wow. But some people knew about him, recommended him. He's actually a good guy. So we put him through our screening methodology and he scored and he came to Narrogate Lodge as a student. We spent eight months with this guy establishing identity and character. Then we spent another six months putting him through an internship program. This guy wanted to be a long haul driver.

SPEAKER_01 27:49

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 27:49

That's what he wanted to do. He had no way to get there, nobody to support him. So we spent that time developing character in him because I don't care about him being a long haul driver. I care about him being a disciple, somebody who cares about people. And then we got through all of his legal stuff. We his driving record got cleaned up. We showed him how to save money in a paid internship that we did. We put a repository together. We got all of his academics in place, and he passed the written exam. And literally, last Saturday, a week ago, we kissed this guy on the cheek and gathered around and prayed for him and put him in a car that he had acquired with a savings account that he had acquired, with a vision and a purpose that he had acquired, and we sent him off to truck driving school. Wow. Success. Yeah. The thing that every one of our guys has shares in common, whether they come from an incredibly successful and intact family or no family whatsoever in their disheveled history, they're all searching. That's the person I want. The person who's asking the honest questions. What's this really all about? You give me that person and we face them in the right direction, we sacrifice what we have for the good of them. That combined effort will produce a true character-ridden adult who benefits society in every way.

SPEAKER_01 29:06

So going into purpose, I think a lot of people struggle with purpose because they think you know, I've seen this a lot, and this is this kind of goes along with purpose, and I'd like to get your perspective, but a lot of people can pull away, let's say somebody's um somebody's a Christian, and they go, Well, I can I can pull that away from my purpose as a business owner because business, I can, I can compartmentalize it. You see this with politicians a lot where they'll say, Well, my faith will have no role in my decision making. You're like, I'm always like, How is that possible? Yeah, you know, how is that possible? Like, like, can you can you actually profess this on one side and then treat people poorly in your business because you decide to put that in some business box that works differently?

SPEAKER_00 29:52

Yeah, you can. Yes, you can. You definitely can. Good podcast answer because it's a lot of conversation. Can you do it? Yes, is the answer. Yes, you can. Is it right? I mean, come on. We that's right. That's not even a discussion we need to have. Yes. If you treat look, Jesus lived his life 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in the middle of society. He cared about people that were afflicted, and he tried to educate people who were super successful. There was nobody there is never a time he was invited to a meal that he didn't show up. Go find it in scripture. Every time he's invited, he showed up. He went to weddings, he did, he showed up in the marketplace where they were buying and selling again. Like he was everywhere. He was impregnated into society. He was interleaved in everything and he cared about everybody. If we can learn from that model, then we don't say, I have my marriage life, I have my business life, I have my faith life. You cannot do that kind of a siloed approach and live a life that has, here's a funny word, integrity, integrated. You you can't you can't live a siloed life and live with integrity. I want to be a man of integrity. I don't want a net worth on a tombstone. I want a character statement.

SPEAKER_01 31:10

Yeah. I think when I go, one of the things that stood out to me is when I go to your website and I go search narrowgate, I look at it, one of the things that you're gonna see immediately is that you not only are making disciples, but you've in you've integrated work into that experience. And I think a lot of people might go, oh, someone's gonna go for eight months, six months, whatever the timeline is. That's not gonna be part of it. And you're saying, no, it's a huge part of what we do. What made what made you guys decide that we want to make work part of this?

SPEAKER_00 31:48

Uh I don't think it was ever even a question in our mind whether it was gonna be a part of it. I I mean I grew up a Midwest kid, a really scrappy blue-collar family. When I was a little kid, my dad died when I was really young. So when I say my dad, I'm talking about my stepdad.

SPEAKER_02 32:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 32:03

Um there's something noble about a man who will marry a w a woman who has kids. He doesn't have to raise them. And my my dad found us in bad shape. We didn't have food. Like we were we were poor, poor, bad. Yeah, and my dad wasn't much better off. But he married my mom and he raised us with a work ethic. That work ethic builds character. It's the capacity, the adult capacity to do what you don't want to do because it's just what's best. So there are three components to what we do at Narrowgate Lodge. We have classroom, that's the information. We have creative, because a lot of our guys, they don't learn best in an academic setting. We need to give them the information, but then we need to do something kinesthetically, creatively. So we have a wood shop, we have a leather shop where we can take raw goods and transform them into something useful and beautiful. That's a metaphor for what's happening inside of them. So they can learn about their own transformation, the lessons we're teaching in the classroom by creating something useful and beautiful. And they're some of these guys are amazing, they're incredibly gifted, and the light bulb goes off when that happens. And then the third component of what we do is character. So classroom creative and character. Because if what we learn and what we do isn't structured in a way that's selfless and decidedly adult, we're not really making men of God.

SPEAKER_02 33:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:34

So work has to be a component because these guys don't want to go out and dig a ditch or split firewood or take care of that. They don't want to do that. That's not, man, I hope today we get to that's not how they wake up. But what they learn is when we care for the things that have been entrusted to us, that's those walls of discipline we're talking about. We can live in this incredible 122-acre environment that's absolutely beautiful. Yeah. Because we do the discipline of caring for it. We're allowed to operate without constraint within it. And that's a metaphor for what's going to be the rest of their life. I don't see a way to develop character without work. Yeah. I don't think it's possible.

SPEAKER_01 34:12

Yeah. No, that's that's as you see so many people run away from that, run away from work, doing hard things. What creating something new, creating something out of out of nothing, right? Raw material and making it something beautiful. Like most people are running away from that. And we see that and and with men, especially, you know, one of the big things that came out of the last few uh few years was the amount of men that are able-bodied that just decided I'm not gonna do, I'm not gonna work, I'm gonna do anything.

SPEAKER_00 34:39

Okay, so let's let's do this clock rollback thing again. If the goal in the 50s was to build a level of wealth that allowed a level of comfort for my children that I never got to experience, that's noble. You're trying to do something for someone else that you think benefits them. And that's the society that that we had. The problem is if you do that generation after generation after generation after generation, and you transfer the comfort without the character, you wind up where we are today, where the goal of life is not to build something for someone else in character. The goal of life is to have the comfort that you see everybody else having.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:20

So you run away from work because you think life is about you. But it's just not. Life is about us. Yeah. It's not self-neglect, it's just including the well-being of other people in the scope of everything that you do. So work has to be a part of it, which is why we actually started our three businesses using our graduates. Yeah. We took, we took a tiny amount of money and we said, we're gonna capitalize this business, and we've got some rules. We're not gonna leverage, we're not going in debt, we're not gonna do it. We're gonna take this amount of money, capitalize it, and we're gonna go to work. And I I thank God for my stepdad regularly because he used to tell us, if you can make it work on paper, you can make it work, just never forget it's gonna be work.

SPEAKER_01 36:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:08

So we went to work and we built a wood products division and a leather products division, and then we inherited and grew a coffee roasting division. And our graduates work in those constructs, and the profit of those businesses folds back into the foundation to keep Narrogate Lodge tuition free. 22 years we've never charged students to come. That's amazing. So it's becoming internally sustainable as we grow into maturity.

SPEAKER_01 36:33

Yeah. What do you see? I mean, obviously, a big part of this is these men are coming to live on this property, but it's the community that is happening, right? They're around each other. How what that's obviously a huge part of it, but what have you seen from that? What have you seen from the importance of community? As so many people withdraw, or some people, especially I think of um older men, you know, maybe they're not 19, 20, 21, but you have guys that are going, okay, I'm established and I'm married, I'll go through, I do what I I do what I have to do, right? I I I come home, I go to the work, I go to work, I do what's expected of me, but loneliness is a huge problem. And you guys are solving for that with how you've developed narrowgate, but what why is that so important to be around other specifically? I think I'm gonna say this from my perspective as a man, to be around other men.

SPEAKER_00 37:30

Yeah. Okay, so it's it's really not that complicated. There's a con Imago Day, image of God. If we are built in the image of God, then the core of who we are. This is weird when you're talking with guys, but you just got to get past all that. You have to do it around a campfire. That makes it not weird. Dude, we do it around a campfire. That's what the guys live outside for five weeks when they first show up. Yeah. Like we're gonna ask the question, what do you need? Because what what you need is not comfort. It's like, what do you really need? Well, I got a sleeping bag and a thermostat and a campfire, and I I got food and shelter-ish. So we break it down that far. And around a campfire, you can have discussions about what are you really here for? And this is what it comes down to. When we take five, six, seven guys and put them in a cohort, in a class, they are one of four classes migrating through this eight-month period. Every 60 days we start a new class. That means there are three classes ahead. And the bonding they've done around that campfire, realizing if I only look out for me, we're not going to make it. We look out for each other. That selfless position is love. That is the hallmark definition of God. Anyone who doesn't love doesn't know God because God is love. Love is not an emotion. Emotions are attached to it. Love is a choice. It's decided selflessness. At its core, that's what it is. As men, we can decide I'm going to do what's best for us instead of what's best for me. Now that class moves forward and there is a fraternity built there. There's a brotherhood, a bond, because we've done some tough stuff. Again, we got to work, you got to do some things you don't want to do, right? We have to work at this. But what it builds is this commonality of struggle and success. That class rises above and another one comes in behind them. Well, this class is looking at that one, which is looking at that one, which is looking at that one. And that peer association of continual improvement is what grows the character and sets the standard. If you brought a new advisor into SmartPro and you had no advisors that were succeeding in actual money management, your new advisor wouldn't succeed. That's right. Because the standard is, well, we fail around here. Yeah. No, absolutely not. You've got advisors who are constantly trying to do what's best for their client. What's best? That means they're going to produce fruit success. And your new advisors are going to come in and learn from the seasoned guys. That builds a community of success instead of an individual who is successful. And that's the turning point.

SPEAKER_01 40:08

So I see how to ask this question in a way that is correct or makes the most sense. But I think a lot of people now young or old, I don't know if it matters. I think there's there's been such a lack of development around what what being a man means. Or at least what's being said about it has changed. I think it it's got to become a struggle with people going, what what am I? What's my purpose? You know, and if you look going back historically of what men did, like protect, right? Provide like those things, you go, okay, is that needed as much anymore in a safer society, in a in a place where it's all about comfort. It's not about you know, what am I gonna go create and accomplish? Like those things are pushed back, saying that's not important. It's about individual and comfort and making sure that you don't have to go without those things sometimes doesn't jive. And I I just I I wonder if you've seen that, you've had to have seen the struggle of what am I supposed to do? What is what is a good man look like every day?

SPEAKER_00 41:37

It's not a complicated answer. We already have the elements of the answer on the table from this discussion. So if we've created a society that seeks comfort, and if we've said the goal is comfort, and we know that everybody is seeking what I individually want, then I get to determine who I am based on how I feel and what I want. That is the disintegration of manhood. We choose not to do that. We choose to say there has to be something that's going to inform how I make a decision about who I'm supposed to be.

SPEAKER_02 42:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:11

We have to have a base set of information and discipline. It's not everybody gets to do what they want. That's the disintegration of manhood because now I get to define what a man is according to what I want in my society, in my circle. That's not helpful. That is the beginning of anarchy when everybody does what everybody wants to do. So what we look at is roles in society. Uh, when a child is born, everything is about providing for that child what that child needs. That's adulthood. Adults provide for children. There's nobody that would disagree with that.

SPEAKER_01 42:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:50

But that's a discipline. Adults provide for children. That means we have to give something up. Well, if you follow that track forward, you get to say, what does that child need? That child needs a nurturer. They do. Yeah. Guess what? Welcome in, mom. Yeah. Welcome in some attached, caring, nurturing, child rearing person. Yeah. There's a role that needs to be played. I'm not dictating who that role is. I'm just saying that role needs to be played. There's also a role of go out, work, acquire, and bring back into this family unit something that cares for that child. This isn't about the role of the individual. It's about how that role benefits somebody else. And when you change that perspective, you change everything. Does society need biblical manhood today? My answer is yes, absolutely. Because a man in the scope of things is the most sacrificial, the most disciplined, the most selfless, and should be the most. The most invisible in the entire equation. Everything comes after the man.

SPEAKER_01 44:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:07

But the man is the one who continues to go down. I will give, I will serve, I will work, I will care for others. And the more adult we become, the more we need to have that posture of my life is not about benefiting me. My life is about benefiting in a way that the fruit of what I do and the fruit of who I am can benefit everyone around me. That's biblical manhood.

SPEAKER_01 44:32

That's so good. Can you explain that last line that you said about being visible in a society where everyone wants to be seen? Everything's how much attention can I get?

unknown 44:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:42

What do you mean by that? We've already got it on the table. God chose to become the most humiliated human on earth.

SPEAKER_02 44:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:53

He died the death of a criminal that he didn't deserve. Follow that pattern. Choose to take a lesser position that will garner more that you could give. If you will invest what you have in a way, if you'll exhaust what you have in a way that other people benefit, you'll be on the right track.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:13

And it's I I get the idea that esteem, the esteem of society, feels good, but we're back to where we started. If that's really the goal, is is esteem. Esteem, the people that we esteem most are the people who are most noble in society. Yeah. The people who give the a nobleman in a feudalistic society was the Lord that everybody looked up to, who literally exhausted his goods for the good of the entire village. Right?

SPEAKER_01 45:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:46

So be noble. Matter of fact, when our guys graduate, we have three words on the sword that they're given at graduation when they're when they're presented into adulthood. It says courage, honor, and nobility. Because courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is the willingness to step into whatever the calling is despite the fear. Yeah. Honor? We give honor to the people who give most. That's who we honor most. And nobility is the position of caring more about the society with the goods entrusted to you than what you have. The noblemen cared for the society.

SPEAKER_01 46:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:26

That's who we're creating. Noblemen.

SPEAKER_01 46:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:29

Filled with courage that society will honor. That's their calling. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 46:34

So I something you just said. I I we I didn't think we'd go here, but you mentioned when they they graduate into adulthood. Yeah. And we talk about, you know, you've given us a lot of history and and going back, and a lot of times in society, there is this moment, right? That you're into adulthood. You think about that in American culture. I don't know what that is for someone to say, you know, it's is it 16 when you get a driver's license? Is it 18 because you can, you know, join the military? Is it 21? Like what what is it? And it doesn't seem like there's this, it's just okay, you you've got through high school, now you're an adult. I I don't know. And there's not this moment defining moment. It sounds like you one of the things that you guys do you go through this process, you create this defining moment. How important that's got to be a huge importance of what you do.

SPEAKER_00 47:27

It's it's more than important. It's it's seminal, it's pivotal. When our guys spend eight months, and it's a difficult eight months, you need to you need to know it's yeah, look, it may it may be tuition free. It isn't cost-free. Okay. It's there's a lot of cost on the individual. It is hard to be accepted in Narrogate and go through Narrogate. It's difficult to graduate. But when you get to the end of it, we have a father, if you have a father, or a father figure, come to your graduation and they will pronounce a blessing on you. It's the moment where a man in society looks at you and says, Today, you are a man. In Jewish society at Bar Mitzvah, the last thing that would happen is a father would lift his son into the air on the women's side of the synagogue and carry him from the women's side to the men's side, declaring, My son is a man, my son is a man, my son is a man. And when they put that kid on the floor, when his feet hit the ground, he was responsible for his own decisions. No longer was he covered by the family, he became a man. He had all the expectations of a man. He fit into the role of a man, but he was so junior in the society of men that he began to learn, just like we talked about. You come in and you learn from those who are more senior how to play that role in society. We do that intentionally with our guys. They receive a blessing and the declaration is made. The last eight months have proven you're willing to do the thing that we declare makes a man be the selfless, I'll go first, I'll give the most, I'll work the hardest, provider, protector, and caretaker of the society around us. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 49:10

No, that's that's awesome. I think of how many, how many men listening right now goes, I wish, I wish I had that experience in my life. Yeah. You know, and they might be 40, 50 going, I wish I I wish somebody had done that with me.

SPEAKER_00 49:24

Cool thing is, everybody can have it.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:28

Everybody can have it. There is nobody that can't have it. You don't need a physical father to make that pronouncement and blessing. That blessing already exists in scripture from our father who art in heaven. It's already there. If you adopt identity in Christ, that blessing is actually pronounced on you by God. The question is, would you step into it?

SPEAKER_01 49:52

Yeah. No, that's oh, I've never thought of it like that.

SPEAKER_00 49:56

Yeah. That's really that's awesome. We've got a lot of years to think about a lot of people.

SPEAKER_01 49:59

It sounds like it's just don't think about it. Sounds like it. Wow, that's amazing. So, you know, I I think as we kind of come to conclusion of this conversation, there's been so much here. There's been so much to think about. This is one of the ones I I definitely will listen to multiple times because the amount of of wisdom that you've you've brought to the conversation and what you've shared, I think they're deep questions, they're big questions that a lot of people, between their hectic life or the distractions, or the the retreat to comfort, don't think about. They don't stop and pause and think about some of these things. Maybe subconsciously they come up of like, why am I doing this? But they don't think about these big questions. And to have that moment to do that, um, man, I think that's so important for people to do.

SPEAKER_00 50:52

Most people don't think about them because they think, what will it cost me if I take time to do it?

SPEAKER_01 50:57

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:58

So let me ask a question. What will it cost you if you don't? That's right.

unknown 51:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:04

Like we're this is get rich or build wealth, right? In the long haul, what will it cost me? We have employees that sometimes join Narragate Artisans. And for whatever reason, when they join, they don't sign up for their IRA.

SPEAKER_01 51:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:21

So we have a quarterly all staff. I will stand on stage at our quarterly all staff and tell if you haven't signed up for your IRA, I will give you$500 to put in your IRA right now if you pledge to stay disciplined to it. Because I know that if they'll take what it's gonna cost them, that little deduction from their paycheck, right? Over time, I know what it'll cost them if they don't.

SPEAKER_01 51:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:45

And I would rather see that person benefit long term. So you can't ask, what's it gonna cost me to do it? Well, I'm gonna give up, you know, 100 bucks or 150 bucks or whatever. Don't don't worry about that.

SPEAKER_01 51:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:56

Don't ask what is it gonna cost me if I if I do this. Ask me, what is it gonna cost me if I don't?

SPEAKER_01 52:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:03

Because the end of life to wind up there, hollow with questions, asking what could have been.

SPEAKER_01 52:10

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:11

That's devastating.

SPEAKER_01 52:12

Devastating. I I want to end with um this final question. I think I'm gonna know, and you've probably answered this already. I think I don't know your answer, but one of the things that we see so much, and one of the things that drives us at SmartPro is we see a society right now that lacks hope in a lot of ways. We see people that lack hope in a lot of ways. And in our world, it's it's finances and it's it's you know, it's those statements of like, I'll always live paycheck to paycheck, I'll I'll never be able to pay off my student loans, I'll never be able to own a home, I'll never be able to get married because I'll never have kids, right? It's it's the I'll never and it's those dramatic words of I'll never or I'll always. And we go, man, we have the answers to so many of those things. And you know, but ours are are these tactical things that you can do, right? When it comes to your finances. But what's the hope that that people can have broad? Like what it what what gives you hope? What what do you instill in your in your students, the people that are around you? Like, what's the hope that people can take? Because I just I see it as an epidemic right now of of people and even and we're talking about finance, but just in general.

SPEAKER_00 53:21

Yeah, hopelessness. Yes. Okay, so back to words, right? Because the words just they kill me.

SPEAKER_01 53:28

Yeah. I want to know all the other words you know about that we haven't gotten to because this is like no, that's not a podcast.

SPEAKER_00 53:33

That's a lifetime. Okay, that's like 60 podcasts. Oh man. But let's just take the word hope.

SPEAKER_01 53:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 53:38

Hope for us in society right now. Oh man, I hope my team wins. It's wishful desires.

SPEAKER_01 53:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 53:44

We it's something we have no control over. And because we have no control over it, when it dissipates and the outcome isn't what we anticipated, then we become hope-less. Yeah. Right. We don't even wish for it anymore because we're convinced it's never going to happen. That is not the biblical definition of L peace, this word hope that's in the Bible. Hope means confident assurance. If we hope for a thing, we are confidently sure it's going to happen. So let's just take finance for a second. Can you sit down with somebody and say, if you'll just start with 20 bucks a paycheck, just something simple and over time we build, it's it's Ramsey baby steps kind of stuff, right? If we just start here and build, I can confidently assure you that this will be the long-term outcome. I can also confidently assure you that it's gonna take character to get there. That's right. You're gonna have to stick to some disciplines. Yes. But I can also confidently assure you that when you live a life within disciplines, you'll be able to move without constraint inside of those disciplines. And as those disciplines produce fruit, we can move those walls into a bigger and bigger and bigger environment. That's building wealth. But I can tell you the same is true with building character, building relationship, building outcome, building influence, building every aspect of life. That's why I wish everybody would come and talk with financial advisors, because the principles for financial management are the principles for building life, because finance is just a representation of the minutes of your day. They go hand in glove. So hope is confident assurance. Yeah. And I can tell you that when you're grounded on what's taught in scripture, identity in Christ, purpose in the body of Christ, fulfilling a role, and you live in those selfless disciplines of love, hope is a guaranteed outcome.

SPEAKER_01 55:45

That's awesome. Yeah. I love that. I think some people think about the first way you talked about about hope of just I wishful thinking. And that's why it never seems like something that can be accomplished or it's too far off. Or that's why those dramatic I'll never or always statements are accompanied with some some sort of outcome that's almost predetermined that you'll never be successful, you'll never be able to retire, you'll never be able to, you know, and I we reject that. And I I I love what you just said. I think it goes right along with that.

SPEAKER_00 56:15

I'll never be superlatives are just the worst. I'll never have a million bucks. You just don't have a plan for it. Yeah. Because the way you get a million bucks is put 20 bucks in the bank. That's right. That's right. Let's take a step. And over time, I can show you with confidence how we can get there. Yeah. Well, same thing's true. I'll never have truly admirable character in life. No, no, no, no. You've you've got this far off utopian horizon-based fit. Let's just take a step. Yeah. Let's just take, give me your phone. Yeah. That's right. Just just, oh my gosh, how would I live? Trust me, you will. And it'll be better. Let's just put that. That's a step. Yeah. That's you taking a step toward a a better outcome in life. And if you take that step, you can take another and another and another. Yeah. And the beauty of it is you don't have to do it alone. You can't do it alone. Yeah. And because you can't do it alone, you won't wind up alone. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 57:18

Yeah. So I know a lot of people are listening, they're going, okay, how do I interact? Whether that's narrowgate artisans, whether that's helping continue to keep um Narrogate tuition free, whether that's just how do I, how do I apply to I have somebody I know that they would benefit from going and being a student here. How do how does somebody interact with you guys?

SPEAKER_00 57:38

Just go to narrogate.org and then the link to everything is is from there. You can go to Narrogate Lodge, Narrogate Artisans, you can you can get there, but just go to narrogate.org and the rest will take care of it. So I think you probably put a link in the show notes or something.

SPEAKER_01 57:51

Yeah, absolutely. Well, but thank you so much for your time being here and sharing your wisdom and experience with us.

SPEAKER_00 57:55

My privilege. All right. My privilege. Thank you. Yeah. All right.

SPEAKER_03 57:59

Discussions in this show are for entertainment and educational purposes only and should not be construed as specific recommendations or investment advice. Always consult with your investment professional before making important investment decisions. Securities offered through registered representatives of Cambridge Investment Research Incorporated, a broker dealer, member FINRA, SIPC. Advisory services through Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Incorporated, a registered investment advisor. Cambridge and Smart Pro Financial are not affiliated.