"Creating Your Own Reality: The Power of Choice and Intention with Brandon Burns"

In this transformative episode of The Happy Wealthy Show, Neo Phalora engages with the dynamic Brandon Burns to explore the profound concept of creating your own reality. They discuss how our beliefs, choices, and intentions shape the lives we lead and the experiences we have. Brandon shares his incredible journey from adversity to achievement, illustrating how embracing personal responsibility and intuition can unlock a world of possibilities. Together, they delve into actionable strategies for shifting your mindset, overcoming limiting beliefs, and aligning with your true purpose. If you're ready to take charge of your life and manifest your dreams, this episode is filled with inspiration and practical wisdom to help you design the reality you desire. Tune in and discover how to step into your power and create the life you envision!

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:31:15
Speaker 1
Welcome to the happy Wealthy show. My name is neo. Neo Phalora. Just call me neo. How do you create a wealthy lifestyle? Well, it's much more than money. So let's redefine wealth as a matrix of impact, fulfillment, worthiness, success, relationships, and revenue. We'll explore the definable and digestible steps to get you there, and how we can live the highest quality of life along the way.

00:00:31:17 - 00:00:39:21
Speaker 1
I know that we can be happy and wealthy. And I'm here to show you how I.

00:00:39:21 - 00:00:40:18
Speaker 1
Welcome to the

00:00:40:18 - 00:00:41:04
Speaker 1
Happy

00:00:41:04 - 00:01:01:03
Speaker 1
Wealthy Show. Today I have in the studio remotely, of course, Brandon Burns. He is an amazing dude. I met Brad Pitt at a speaking event. His signature is a big bicep. What? He shows you his selfie or send you his signature, which is quite massive. But more importantly, this guy's got a couple of things he's into.

00:01:01:05 - 00:01:22:00
Speaker 1
He plays the guitar, a great singer, a great gymnast. He's an avid health nut. He's also a speaker. But let's not forget, he's also the right hand man of one of the most prolific speakers out there, Eric Thomas, as well. So how does somebody get to that place where they're doing so many great things and even announcing sports announcing in his spare time?

00:01:22:02 - 00:01:25:12
Speaker 1
Let's talk about a little bit, Brandon. Tell us a little bit about you.

00:01:25:13 - 00:01:38:18
Speaker 2
Well, first and foremost, I just want to say thank you so much for having me on the pod. It's an honor and a privilege to connect with people like yourself. As always, I'm sure if your audience is any reflection of who you are, it's going to be a really, really good time. I know we're talking to some really good people right now.

00:01:38:19 - 00:01:54:21
Speaker 2
A little bit about me, as you mentioned, I do have a bit of what I self-proclaimed as entrepreneurial, add a little bit all over the place, but that is how I think life is meant to be lived is with a variety of experiences. I was born and raised in Huntsville, Alabama, came up with a 900 square foot house to a single mother.

00:01:54:23 - 00:02:09:19
Speaker 2
Didn't have a whole lot growing up. We were safe. We always had food and a roof over our head, but didn't really grow up with a ton. Ended up going on to the University of Michigan when I was 18 years old. Moved across the country from Alabama to Michigan. I was a walk on the gymnastics team out there.

00:02:10:00 - 00:02:28:09
Speaker 2
Men's gymnastics was my first love. Started when I was ten years old, did it all the way through college. I was a walk on and then I was cut from the team four times in five years. Stuck with it. Ended up being a two time Big Ten Championship coach of the same team that I was cut from that experience gave me a whole lot of content to start talking about.

00:02:28:09 - 00:02:47:00
Speaker 2
When I got into the speaking industry, started with an unpaid internship with a guy named Eric Thomas, E.T., the hip hop preacher, started with administrative work and spreadsheets and all that kind of stuff. Ended up climbing the ranks with him doing some business development projects. He was the guy that put a microphone in my hand for the first time, became his agent.

00:02:47:00 - 00:03:02:23
Speaker 2
He started my speaking career and then my digital marketing agency. Spurred from him is, of course, client number one. I just use everything I've learned from working with him to proliferate that into other projects. So that's super condensed. Usually that's a 45 minute, but that's the super condensed version of how we got here.

00:03:03:00 - 00:03:25:10
Speaker 1
I appreciate the conciseness, my friend, but these are some juicy things I want to put a pin in the fact you were cut four times. We'll come back to that in a second, but I want our listeners to remember that because that's an important point. When we talk about our life story and how we become both happy and wealthy, let's talk about being from a single parent home, especially a single mother.

00:03:25:10 - 00:03:32:11
Speaker 1
Right. But start out a little bit. What was that like and what lessons were there? Let's just be honest. What burdens do you carry because of that as well?

00:03:32:11 - 00:03:50:22
Speaker 2
That's a fantastic question. So my situation was a little bit unique because if you look at it on paper, technically I was born to a single mother. My biological father left before I was ever born. However, my stepdad, who now I call him dad because to me he is my father. But he was in the picture already before I was born.

00:03:50:22 - 00:04:08:03
Speaker 2
Now he didn't move in with us until I was probably 5 or 6 years old, but he had pledged that commitment very early on that I'm going to help you raise this child right. So for me, it was very, very interesting because my mom never held anything back. I don't remember her explaining it. I don't remember how she explained it, but she was very transparent with me.

00:04:08:07 - 00:04:27:09
Speaker 2
I remember from as early as I can having this dichotomy in my mind of there's this one individual, my biological father, who had the responsibility, who had the obligation to love me, raise me. And I felt like he didn't even give me a chance. He didn't even meet me before he decided, I'm not going to be here for this.

00:04:27:11 - 00:04:48:23
Speaker 2
Then there's this other guy who had no responsibility, no obligation, no reason to raise me and love me and treat me as his own. And he also made that commitment before he ever met me. So is this really interesting dichotomy of all the responsibility and none of the commitment and all the commitment, with none of the obligation, I got to see both sides of that.

00:04:49:03 - 00:05:10:06
Speaker 2
So I grew up in a relatively healthy household. And what's funny is I didn't realize any of those burdens that I was carrying so way later on in life, like almost embarrassingly, way later on in life, because I always grew up with the mentality of it doesn't bother me. I have a great father figure that's here in the house ever since I was five six years old.

00:05:10:08 - 00:05:29:15
Speaker 2
It doesn't bother me. And that was my mentality the entire time because it was that whole tough guy, macho attitude. Yeah, emotions, feelings, whatever. It doesn't bother me at all. I'm good. And I was probably 24 or 25 years old now when I finally realized, oh, some of this attention seeking behavior. Maybe that's because I'm trying to get attention or love from the person I should have been.

00:05:29:15 - 00:05:43:21
Speaker 2
And I started to put the pieces together, and it was about a week before my 25th birthday, when I went to my biological father and we had talked, you know, Christmases, birthdays, whatever. But it was a week before my 25th birthday when I really went and sat down with them and said, hey, we need to have this conversation.

00:05:43:21 - 00:06:00:13
Speaker 2
There are definitely some burdens there. I'm happy to say that we did have the conversation and it was very freeing. But if anybody's listening right now and you might have one of those things in your life where you act like you're fine, but deep down you know you're not, I'm telling you, run at it head on, confront it, have a conversation, talk to whoever need to talk to.

00:06:00:13 - 00:06:03:07
Speaker 2
Do what you need to do because it's worth it in the long run.

00:06:03:09 - 00:06:24:18
Speaker 1
Wow. And I really appreciate the vulnerability to share that. It's the thing that I think is not self-evident to us as kids, but I see this all the time and it's well studied now, although it's not talked about a lot, is that we just we don't have recall for what's happened to us as kids. We don't take and all that and associate it with why we are the way we are.

00:06:24:20 - 00:06:45:21
Speaker 1
It becomes self-inflicted. We absorb the responsibility, we assume it's an issue with us and we just move on. We don't have that emotional mental recall right until much later, until it manifests much later. That's a really important point. I see that as a reoccurring theme in a lot of people. I understand you have this desire to be a gymnast and you were on the team.

00:06:45:21 - 00:07:04:19
Speaker 1
You got cut four times, right? I think that was one of the things that people don't talk about is that dirty middle. We celebrate that and it's like, oh, great, it's going to be this world class sleep. And then when it actually wins an award, guess what? Everybody shows up, goes, man, that was awesome. But nobody really talks about that dirty metal.

00:07:04:19 - 00:07:08:15
Speaker 1
And you have that experience being cut four times. What was that like?

00:07:08:15 - 00:07:28:19
Speaker 2
I mean, the whole gymnastics thing was crazy because I started when I was ten years old, and I have no idea why I wanted to do it. I don't remember seeing it on television. Nobody in my family ever did gymnastics. I literally went to my mom one day and said, this is what I want to do. I remember going into the gym one time and I had a free trial lesson that they let us do, and like I said, I didn't really grow up with a whole lot.

00:07:28:21 - 00:07:45:11
Speaker 2
And they said, hey, do you want to do gymnastics or do you want to do tumbling? Gymnastics is all six events and men's gymnastics tumbling is just for exercise. I knew we didn't really have the money to afford one, much less more. I looked at my mom, dad and then I said both. And it was the beginning of this and not either or mentality.

00:07:45:11 - 00:08:02:16
Speaker 2
I stuck with that for the rest of my life. That's one of the frames of which I see everything now. But that was just the way that I did things as a ten year old. I don't even know why I got into gymnastics. It was one of those things that was just a calling, a whisper of the soul, a nudge from God or the universe, however you want to conceptualize it.

00:08:02:18 - 00:08:22:05
Speaker 2
Those are the things I think we don't pay attention to as adults. We really should. When you're a kid, that intuition, you follow it. We we sometimes talk ourselves out of that later on. That's how that whole journey started was just this passion that came from nowhere. I chased that thing as far as I could. It ended up being the walk on at U of M my freshman year, I was redshirted.

00:08:22:11 - 00:08:42:01
Speaker 2
So usually, Neal, when I say I was cut from the team four times in five years, people assume that I was cut the first four and I made this miraculous comeback, and it was like the movie route. And it was this epic journey, right? It was the exact opposite. It was the literal opposite. I was on the team my freshman year as a redshirt, and then I was cut every subsequent year after that.

00:08:42:03 - 00:09:00:07
Speaker 2
The full circle moment was becoming the two time Big Ten champion. As a coach of the team that I was cut from for the previous four years. Now we have this quote at Michigan from the old football coach back there that says those who stay will be champions. And that was my experience. I just thought growing up.

00:09:00:09 - 00:09:18:17
Speaker 1
Let's run a couple of things back. Those who stay will be champions. That is something that if the top five pieces of advice I hope everybody is listening to here, is that what he just said is that is something we don't understand in the short term in our societies. Got to a place where everything is immediate gratification. I talk about a principle often.

00:09:18:17 - 00:09:36:21
Speaker 1
I talk about money. I talk about extended gratification. That's what we're really looking for. There are two things that really landed. One is you talked about intuition. This is a really near and dear subject to me. I'll just tell you, closet it like I'm really working on my health, like I've never worked on it before, had my own journey, a chronic illness.

00:09:36:21 - 00:10:07:08
Speaker 1
But I am fascinated by people who just park for a wall and then with two fingers, climb up a column, right? Because so much as possible. But what I don't think human beings really understand and where information has become the new religion is how much mindset lives in the body. I mean, dude, how can a guy who's running 75 yards down a field and just know at the one instead of a turnaround and catch the ball, people like, well, he practiced that.

00:10:07:08 - 00:10:24:09
Speaker 1
No, that's not it. You and I both know when you have a level of mastery in the body, it is actually our first brain. It lets us know before the mind does. I know this is a rabbit hole and we didn't prepare anything for this, but I want to talk about this because you know me a little bit.

00:10:24:11 - 00:10:38:13
Speaker 1
I am a mindset guy that says if you're just focusing on the mindset above the neck, you're missing out on 80% of your potential and your past reactions. So talk to me a little bit freeform about because I know you have something to say about, first.

00:10:38:13 - 00:10:56:20
Speaker 2
Of all, what you just said about information being the new religion just blew my mind. That is 100% the case and the whole nother rabbit hole, but I'll let that one go. But that deserves to be on a t shirt anyway. The mind body thing. I think you hit the nail on the head. If you are only focusing on the neck up, you're missing 80%.

00:10:56:22 - 00:11:20:17
Speaker 2
Anybody who has ever pursued anything in the physical realm knows there crosses a certain threshold where it's no longer just a physical training exercise. When you first get started, you gotta build muscle memory. You have to build the physical adaptation to be able to do the skill, lift the weight, do the backflip, whatever it is. After a certain point, mind and body start to become one.

00:11:20:19 - 00:11:44:13
Speaker 2
And it's this very, almost spiritual experience of your full body, mind, soul being interconnected and being fully you completely present for me. That's why I love gymnastics, because it was the one thing where because here's what happens. You know, most of the time our mind, body, spirit, soul, they're all separate. They're all separated, broken apart entities. That's not how we're meant to live.

00:11:44:18 - 00:12:05:01
Speaker 2
We were meant to live as a cohesive unit. But what happens is our feet are in one place, our mind is in a completely different place, and then our soul is in a different place. Right? And let's just get real. Your feet are at some events that you don't want to be at. Your mind is thinking about your bank account and your stress, and your soul is caught up with some soul.

00:12:05:01 - 00:12:30:13
Speaker 2
Tie with somebody you should never been with in the first place. That's what happens. So now our whole ecosystem is ripped apart. For me, what gymnastics did. There's this moment of ecstasy when you're in the air and it lasts for a half a second, maybe less, and everything comes together and you are purely present and in peak form that you're supposed to live in.

00:12:30:15 - 00:12:46:21
Speaker 2
It's very elusive, and it's very difficult because you got to remember when I was in gymnastics, like as a 12 year old, you know, my I almost lost my mom when I was probably 12, 13 years old. She was in and out of the hospital. A lot of health problems. I got this emotional stuff going on with my biological father and some of the trauma that was there.

00:12:46:23 - 00:13:08:20
Speaker 2
I got all the things you already go through as a 13 year old, stressed out, social anxiety, whatever. I had depression and anxiety battles, like all these different things are going on in that period of 10 to 16 or so. But I'm telling you, dude, when I'm in the air, 0.2 seconds, mind, body, soul, spirit, it all comes together and I'm perfectly present and it's the most beautiful feeling.

00:13:09:00 - 00:13:24:23
Speaker 2
A drug can't replicate it, alcohol can't replicate it. There's nothing that can get you to that point other than that true unity. If you can figure out how to. For me, it was gymnastics. If you can figure out how to create that, you found one of life's greatest blessings.

00:13:25:00 - 00:13:50:21
Speaker 1
Oh my God. We've not discussed this before, but this is one of my pursuits in life. I am at this point for doing this podcast selflessly for this topic right here is that it is a tremendous sense of presence. And that's really what we all seek. You said it so perfectly. I don't want to say anything more about that, but that's really what we're all seeking is how can I be here?

00:13:50:23 - 00:14:20:07
Speaker 1
And as a child, I had multiple moments, what I would call ayahuasca, a lot of experiences, just feeling connected to everything. I've had moments in my life and I've not been. I'm more athletics I've ever been. I wasn't an athlete growing up. There are reasons for that. That's a separate podcast, but I had so many moments where I would effortlessly be in the kitchen with music on and spin around, toss a spatula in a two basket, kick my feet around, kick a drawer closed.

00:14:20:07 - 00:14:42:09
Speaker 1
I could just feel that there wasn't anything I couldn't be in touch with. When people watch Star Wars, they're like, oh, this is cool. You know what I thought? What? I watched Star Wars as a kid, that relationship to other things is real. It is real. Everything is vibration. It turned me on so much, and my whole life has been this pursuit through science, which I'm really an artist that is a scientist, not a scientist.

00:14:42:09 - 00:15:03:21
Speaker 1
As the artist to find that vibration, that connection. Right. We installed a basketball hoop out here for my kids. And it's been the best thing because when I go out there and kind of find that place where I know it's going in before it hits my hands, it is the biggest hit of dopamine because I am present and connected.

00:15:04:01 - 00:15:14:09
Speaker 1
My nervous system is aligned to spirit, God the source, and I'm not afraid to say that. So thank you for the opportunity to be vulnerable and sharing that. That's beautiful brother, I appreciate it.

00:15:14:11 - 00:15:35:05
Speaker 2
I love it, it's such an important part of life. I think so many people miss it. We get so wrapped up in the worldly things, and I think this is where that science meets spirituality, right? If you get so focused on the bank account or all the different worldly things, the social status, the things we get caught up in, those are not real in the way that the thing we're talking about is real.

00:15:35:09 - 00:15:50:20
Speaker 2
Like you mentioned, the ayahuasca type experience. I've never done it, but everybody I know who's done it always says it was more real than this reality that we're in. That's because the reality we're in is not real. It's made up things that are not important, that are just these constructs that we decide have a hold on our emotions.

00:15:50:20 - 00:15:58:07
Speaker 2
It's like, well, yeah, it's more real than real because it is real. And everything that you spend your day to day life thinking about and doing is not real.

00:15:58:07 - 00:16:17:15
Speaker 1
And fulfillment comes out of this act. You understand you are worthy born and you'll be worthy when you die. And your final score in life says nothing ever worth. But guess what? Play the game like your hair's on fire. See how many things the spiritual being in a meat suit can experience. You are the poster child for that.

00:16:17:16 - 00:16:42:12
Speaker 1
I think that's why we energetically came together, because I'm just attracted to people who understand we're here for the experience. So you're like this gymnast and you crush these goals. You have this sort of full circle moment, right? So what comes after that? I think the thing ready, you can help the audience. So many people get lost in how do you come from here to being not just an intern for ET, but his right hand person?

00:16:42:15 - 00:16:48:02
Speaker 1
That doesn't seem to add up. I get those questions as well. My life journey so drops some knowledge.

00:16:48:02 - 00:17:09:01
Speaker 2
Please say yes to everything. Figure the rest out later. That's how it happened for me. Say yes to everything. Figure out the details later, and also bet on yourself because you're never going to experience all that life has to offer, and you're never going to get some of those opportunities. If you're waiting on somebody else to hand it to you on a silver platter, at some point you're going to have to take a risk on you.

00:17:09:01 - 00:17:27:15
Speaker 2
People always hesitate with that and say, oh, well, I don't know if I'm ready for that. It's like taking a leap of faith on you is only really a leap of faith if you don't believe in you, if you believe in you, it's not a leap of faith because you have full conviction there's going to work out so the way that all went down was, first of all, I loved coaching and I absolutely fell in love with it.

00:17:27:18 - 00:17:41:01
Speaker 2
What's funny is I always knew I was a better coach than I was an athlete. I just had this image in my mind of, I was supposed to be this type a athlete type of dude that was going to go out there and win the championship. I had way more fun coaching, and I was ten times as successful at it.

00:17:41:01 - 00:17:58:18
Speaker 2
With half the effort. I knew that I was supposed to be a coach, but I was not being authentic to myself when life forced me and slapped me into my authenticity, which thankfully happened, it was a much more fulfilling experience. I loved being able to help the guys. I love being a part of those championship teams. One of the highlights of my life thus far, for sure.

00:17:58:20 - 00:18:16:03
Speaker 2
So after those two seasons where we went back to back as Big Ten champions, I looked up and I was about to graduate and this is right before Covid happens. Of course, none of us anticipated that. None of us knew that was going to happen, but I didn't really have a crystallized plan after graduation for what I was going to do.

00:18:16:05 - 00:18:32:03
Speaker 2
The one opportunity I had on the table was to go coach gymnastics at this gym out in Houston, Texas. The guy who owned the gym wanted me to be his new head coach and basically run the gym. It was a brand new gym that he was opening, and he was the head coach of the United States Olympic team for men's gymnastics for the past 12 years.

00:18:32:07 - 00:18:56:20
Speaker 2
He was going to put me on a fast track to do what he did and become the next USA head coach for USA gymnastics. He was a very, very good gig. He was going to start me out at $60,000 a year, which is more than my parents ever made in a year combined. Great gig right? I flew out to Texas a couple of times toward the gym, but then I had this thing going with it where I had actually paid for a coaching session with him during my college years.

00:18:56:20 - 00:19:13:13
Speaker 2
Dad was diagnosed with cancer, mom was diagnosed an autoimmune disease. All sorts of stuff was going on. It's a difficult time in my life. On top of being cut from the team being told I'm not good enough over and over again. So I ended up developing a relationship with RTE from using, the $100 a week that I was making, working for the same team that I had been cut from.

00:19:13:17 - 00:19:28:21
Speaker 2
I had invested that into a coaching session with him. After that, he invited me to have breakfast with him on a whim. He only lived about an hour and a half away because he was a Michigan guy as well, and I started volunteering at all of his events, paying my own way and again, making a hundred bucks a week, putting myself through college.

00:19:28:21 - 00:19:43:12
Speaker 2
I had student loans, but nobody else was helping me, and I'm paying my way to go to all of this guy's events so that I could just get in the room and develop that relationship. And what ended up happening, Neal, was I had that job offer for the gymnastics thing in Texas. Then I had an unpaid internship opportunity with Eddie.

00:19:43:12 - 00:20:00:19
Speaker 2
At the same time, I could only do one because guy in Texas needed me to drop everything and move to Texas with Eddie. You know, I couldn't really do that because I was put in 70, 80 hours a week at this point. It was a ridiculously intense internship. He was just put me to the test to see what I could handle and what I could do.

00:20:00:19 - 00:20:17:19
Speaker 2
I ended up calling the guy in Texas and saying, I'm so sorry. Thank you for the opportunity, but I can't do it right now. I went all in on that internship opportunity with AG, and then the piece of advice that really put me over the edge was my dad, my stepdad, technically, but my dad, I was talking to him about it and he said, if you start with nothing and lose it all, do the math.

00:20:17:19 - 00:20:29:15
Speaker 2
That's the kind of thing your guidance counselor won't tell you, right? He was like, dude, you're not going to be able to take a risk like this ever again. If you're going to do it, you need to do it now. If you believe in your ability to make something happen here, then you should go all in on it.

00:20:29:17 - 00:20:47:07
Speaker 1
I love that fork in the road. It's very symbolic of where a lot of people go through in life. Big fan of Gary Vee. He talks about this a lot. He's like, you can't live your life for the other fork in the road. We don't know what would happen. You could have been driving and got T-boned and been a quadriplegic the rest of your life.

00:20:47:08 - 00:21:18:05
Speaker 1
We don't know. There is no position of mitigation in life that will prevent risk. In fact, we'll go harder and say that actually any position where you're trying to mitigate risk, you're setting yourself up for something even more catastrophic to happen. That's the way that life works. Is going to nudge you out of safety. But the thing I'd like to highlight for the listeners here is the thing that creates the activation potential people, when you choose you in the face of extreme opportunity costs, you really know your value.

00:21:18:07 - 00:21:27:09
Speaker 1
I would like to ask you this question, and maybe it's a little bit of a loaded question, but when you made that decision, did you think about it or did you choose the one that felt right?

00:21:27:10 - 00:21:54:09
Speaker 2
Here's what's funny. If you ask people who have been steady in my life for a very long time, they'll tell you, I'm an overthinker, I'm an analyzer, I'm very detail oriented. I really, really analyze situations. Every major decision that has shifted my life in a positive direction. Every major fork in the road I've looked back on and said that changed my life has been made from intuition.

00:21:54:11 - 00:22:12:02
Speaker 2
Every single one. When I decided I was going to go to Michigan, I had a bunch of different offers on the table. Not scholarships, but different acceptance letters and everything. I was looking at Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, all the Big Ten schools because that's where women's gymnastics is big. I had a chart. Neal and I ranked the categories that were important to me academic gymnastics.

00:22:12:02 - 00:22:30:18
Speaker 2
How far is this from home reputation? I scored them 1 to 10 and I added them all up. At the end of the day, the decision was purely made on Michigan. Feels right. I don't know why I can't describe it. It just does. When I was doing the egg thing and I was deciding to go, do I take the safe option and do this gymnastics thing and have a great career in the sport, which I would have been happy with, by the way?

00:22:30:18 - 00:22:45:21
Speaker 2
Like I love to coach, I would have been fine making 6065 grand a year and coaching and going to the Olympics and coaching the guy. I think it would have been super fun. I would have had a very fulfilling life like that. It's so funny because I spent a couple of weeks really breaking down all the options. My girlfriend at the time was like, you know what you're going to do?

00:22:45:21 - 00:22:54:24
Speaker 2
I don't know why you keep doing this. I don't know why you're dragging this out. Called the guy in Texas and tell him you're not going. I was like, you're so right. You know, every single time it's been made off of intuition.

00:22:55:00 - 00:23:13:24
Speaker 1
If people knew. Right. And I have it out in and out of each other's lives. We talked about doing something together, a podcast. I saw something pop up. And again, I function very heavily on. Intuition is a primary tool that I use for people. I say people start at theater and scarcity and they get to struggle that they got the hustle.

00:23:13:24 - 00:23:44:19
Speaker 1
They call that successful, but it's alignment that informs action. And you do that multiple times. That pulls you into intuition, which accelerates you to authenticity, which is the highest vibration of the human being. And that creates what I call wealth, which is not just revenue, but all things that make us truly wealthy. Gary Vee recently I saw him at the Aspire To Greatness tour, and he said on stage, we will show by science that the gut is actually the first brain and the brain is the second brain, and we know this.

00:23:44:19 - 00:24:07:20
Speaker 1
I mean, it's only taking us like eight by 10,000 years to to basically rediscover what ancient societies have told us. And someday we'll get a clue. But I just can't even tell you guys if you take nothing away from what Brandon is talking about. This podcast, it is so true. And we vilify these feelings that we have to help the guy that helped coach him through buying a 60 million luxury homebuilder.

00:24:07:22 - 00:24:31:02
Speaker 1
Why did you decide to sell it? Right? That's the basis to buy a $60 million company feels right. So this if you're listening in the brain right now, this is not an ordinary dude. If you could see how jacked is, how disciplined he is, how much he's yeah, he's got that big old biceps. He's done a hard thing or two in his life and he continues to do so.

00:24:31:04 - 00:24:49:04
Speaker 1
But he just told you guys that intuition is it. I had a panel of ladies. They were at a Dave Meltzer dinner that were five of them. They probably had a billion and a half to the worth. I ask them, what can men learn from your success? They said, we use our emotions intuition. So kudos to you, Brother Kudo.

00:24:49:05 - 00:25:13:18
Speaker 1
So what I think a lot of people would like to know if anybody knows you and I know you. I've learned a lot from it, but you're very different from it as well. You're definitely not in his shadows, ever. But what do you feel like is the lesson you learned, working with Ed and what I say that what I'm asking Broden is that when we see things and other people we know, as I reflect, too often people say, oh, I see this, and I want that.

00:25:13:18 - 00:25:27:09
Speaker 1
And what I say is, if you can see it, that is a reflection of both direction. You see something that is not what you want or as a trait. You also say, just like me, right? So what do you see in Ed that ended up being true for you?

00:25:27:09 - 00:25:47:12
Speaker 2
Oh my gosh, we're going to okay. This is going to this is going to take us a second because we got a bunch of things we need to work through from that question. First and foremost, what you just said about when you see something and others, it's really a reflection of you that is so critical. I forget which one of Emerson's earlier essays, where he talks about any idea that a philosopher has thought.

00:25:47:12 - 00:26:13:06
Speaker 2
You may think any vision an artist has had, you may see as well, we're all part of the same energy, the same essence. Everything is interconnected. So when you see something in other people, it's okay to admire it as long as you admire it with the understanding that you are of the same essence and energy. And should you choose to actualize that within yourself, it is more than capable of being revealed within you as well.

00:26:13:08 - 00:26:34:24
Speaker 2
That is critical, because what most people do is they look at people they admire with the level of separation, and they say, you're way over here and I'm way over here. I've worked with you for a long time now, almost five years, and I see these people show up to events time and time again. It's like you're on your seventh event and you've been in the room with these people over and over again, and you still see yourself as less than.

00:26:35:01 - 00:26:51:22
Speaker 2
I remember a staff meeting we had when I just started getting paid. They're paying me like 50 grand a year. I took a pay cut to do this after three, months of this unpaid internship, maybe six months of an unpaid internship, no plan, no way to frickin pay rent. I wake up from a text at 3:00 in the morning because that's when he gets up.

00:26:52:02 - 00:27:13:05
Speaker 2
How much do you want to make in your first year? Full time? I go full time for my first year in 2020 and I'm doing admin work. I'm doing assistant work, whatever, and we're in a staff meeting. The oh, at the time was talking about how our job is to support the faces of the company. Eric Thomas, Jamaal King, you know, some of the big names, personal brands we work with.

00:27:13:11 - 00:27:31:20
Speaker 2
I had to turn my camera off because my face had an attitude. I was like, you see me different than them. You think I'm not. And I got it right because they're saying we weren't to support the big vision of the company. I get it, I'm not saying I'm somebody that I'm not. I hadn't earned it yet. But the fact you see me as a support cast and them as the main character, like, oh, that pissed me completely off.

00:27:31:22 - 00:27:51:21
Speaker 2
So I've always had this identity in me of I'm not different from anybody. Like you talk about Gary Vee. Gary Vee ain't better than me. He's further ahead than me. But he doesn't have some spiritual power that I don't have. He's not a different being than we are. He's just realized it differently. So people have to understand that that's first and foremost.

00:27:51:23 - 00:27:53:04
Speaker 2
The second thing I want to say.

00:27:53:10 - 00:28:06:08
Speaker 1
I'm going to pass a quick double click on that. I want you to keep going. But I want to note for the listeners, I think that's the first time a gymnast on a podcast has quoted Emerson. So we made history here today. But continue please. This is wonderful.

00:28:06:13 - 00:28:26:20
Speaker 2
There's another thing to talk about. You're going to get me on a whole rant and a tangent here. There's another thing to talk about. Everybody's wanting to listen to the Gary vs and the Andy, Elliot's and Ed my lads in the 80s, and those are great sources to listen to, but it's very much worth your time to go back and read or listen to some first principles thinking.

00:28:26:22 - 00:28:44:20
Speaker 2
It's great to listen to everybody who's rehashing it, but there's nothing new under the sun. Bible tells us that it's all the same concepts and ideas. So if you haven't read Emerson or Nietzsche or the Gita or whatever spiritual book you want, the Bible, the Quran, I've read all of them. It gives you a perspective on what these people are saying that adds depth.

00:28:44:20 - 00:29:05:03
Speaker 2
If you haven't gone to some of the first principles or the original sources, you're just spitting out rehash information. And it's like playing the telephone game where you're losing resolution and the granular level of understanding the more that gets repeated. So you got to go back to some of this stuff if you actually want to discuss and have a real understanding of the fundamental basics and building blocks of life and what it's made up of.

00:29:05:09 - 00:29:07:00
Speaker 1
It's beautiful to understand.

00:29:07:00 - 00:29:08:04
Speaker 2
Thousands of years.

00:29:08:06 - 00:29:26:23
Speaker 1
Beautifully said, actually researched it. They call it the 12 Rules of Being Human. It's actually nine were written that were written before the written word in Sanskrit. And when we read these things, it sounds like a Tony Robbins lecture. I want to ask the listeners before the internet, before the information, the religion of information, where did all this come from?

00:29:27:00 - 00:29:47:19
Speaker 1
Where do we have access to these things? I couldn't agree with you more. I, like a lot of people, started meeting these people and getting into the VIP dinners, getting into rooms. It's important I was doing it because I thought there is some success. Brock proximity. I'll tell you there is none. There is zero other than a moment of a selfie where you can get a few what is available.

00:29:47:19 - 00:29:59:03
Speaker 1
And I want you guys to hear what Brandon is saying, because this is probably the second big mic drop moment in this unbelievable podcast is what you're working on is to reduce the artificiality of separate.

00:29:59:03 - 00:30:18:00
Speaker 2
Yes. And let me say this as well. I think if you go back and read some of those more canonical books, like the really core books about these concepts, that's step one. Go a step further and just go sit in a room and breathe is where do you think these people thought about it? How do you think they got the idea?

00:30:18:02 - 00:30:36:05
Speaker 2
Like these books were written thousands of years ago, where do you think they got it from? So it's like, just go sit there and experience life and experience the connection with the world, the spirit, God, the universe, whatever you want to conceptualize it as, go experience that, then you'll get it from the true source rather than taking it from even those books.

00:30:36:05 - 00:30:55:22
Speaker 2
It's worth the time. I could talk about that for hours. Here's the other thing I wanted to quickly go back on. Before I answer your question about what I've learned from Etsy, we talked about betting on yourself. We talked about following your intuition. I think two things are very critical to putting yourself in a space where you allow yourself to do that.

00:30:55:22 - 00:31:16:10
Speaker 2
Number one, extreme gratitude. Number two, it's very closely related, extreme fulfillment. In order to free yourself, to make the decisions you really need to make in your life, to go to the next level, you need to get to a place where you are infinitely grateful, where if you lose it all, you know what you have had more than your fair share.

00:31:16:15 - 00:31:37:00
Speaker 2
And number two, or you are extremely fulfilled. Where if you die today, you have done something worth living for and you can be at peace. Those two things will give you the freedom, mentally and emotionally to take those risks and make those decisions. I'll tell you why. When I was 14 years old, I wrote a suicide note. Not that I wanted to kill myself or that I wanted my life to end.

00:31:37:06 - 00:31:55:13
Speaker 2
But every day that I went to sleep at night, I saw me hurting myself in my brain. And I wrote it down and I put it in a notebook. Fold it up. I put the notebook under a bunch of other books on my desk. Somehow, by the grace of God, my mother found it the very next day for me, and therapy got me some help, but that's what I was struggling with when I was 14 years old.

00:31:55:13 - 00:32:15:16
Speaker 2
Since then, my mentality has been, I'm on borrowed time. This is the bonus round. This is a gift and deserved. I didn't earn, I didn't do anything. I just got this for free. So I'm so unbelievably grateful. I'm in overtime. And then the second thing with that is two years later, 16 years old. I'm in charge of a group.

00:32:15:16 - 00:32:34:22
Speaker 2
I'm working at a summer camp and not too far from here in Nashville, Tennessee. It was in Crossville, Tennessee. I'm working at a summer camp, a gymnastics camp. I am in charge of a group of six teenagers that are cleaning the camp in exchange for decreased tuition. So what I did when I first started at that camp, and now I'm in charge of these kids, we're cleaning toilets and sweeping floors all day.

00:32:34:23 - 00:32:51:02
Speaker 2
I do a little speech at the end of one of our nights of cleaning the camp, because I'm just trying to pour into these kids. I'm still an introvert. I still have social anxiety. I don't know what the hell I'm doing, but I took a Eric Thomas YouTube video, remixed it, the worst little remix of a motivational speech you've ever heard, and I gave it to these kids.

00:32:51:06 - 00:33:07:09
Speaker 2
The next day, another 16 year old walks up to me, hands me a note, doesn't say anything, walks away. The note said, I've been contemplating suicide for the last nine months. What you said last night really helped me and taught me to keep pushing, keep struggling, keep going and just never give up. So here I am at 16 years old.

00:33:07:11 - 00:33:28:02
Speaker 2
I'm already in bonus time. I'm already eternally grateful for everything. I already can't get mad at anything that happens. And now I feel like if I get hit by a bus tomorrow, my what? My life was worth living, I did something and help somebody who contributed enough to where I feel like if I lose everything, including my life, it was worth being here and I'm at peace.

00:33:28:06 - 00:33:48:20
Speaker 2
Now you're talking about, oh, how are you going to pay rent if this doesn't work out? I don't care. I'll figure it out. I'm not concerned about anything because I'm eternally grateful and I'm eternally fulfilled. What risk is so great that it's going to bother me? So you need to figure out a way to get those two things in your life.

00:33:48:20 - 00:33:52:12
Speaker 2
If you really want to free yourself up emotionally to make the decisions that you deserve. Man.

00:33:52:14 - 00:34:12:02
Speaker 1
Wow, that was prolific. I'll say I want to come back to fulfillment a second. You touched on something that was very near and dear to my heart. My son was out playing basketball recently, and there's a little girl in the neighborhood that plays. We had about eight kids outside last night and I just sat there because I've never had that kind of experience and just felt like, wow, mom is a house for kids.

00:34:12:04 - 00:34:30:06
Speaker 1
Yeah, I, I started tear it up like like I tried, just tried not to let the tears fall down my face, which is not something I do. I usually let it flow. But my son, I finally passed the ball. Let a little girl, the little girl got hurt. I saw that her face hit the ball and she was crying and he didn't do anything about it.

00:34:30:08 - 00:34:47:03
Speaker 1
I just took him aside and I said, this is unacceptable. I said, but you don't understand why. So you think I'm making you try to make you feel bad right now, or I'm saying you're bad? It's like, not it. I said, there's only one measure of our life. How would we there for somebody in their pain, their isolation and their celebration?

00:34:47:05 - 00:35:09:23
Speaker 1
Everything else is bullshit. Yeah. That's it. That's all there is to do here. Can't make it any more complex than that. But I want to go back to this idea of fulfillment. This has been such a unbelievable topic in my life. In fact, I was at one of those places where I was trying to decree separation and I got a chance to set kneecap to kneecap.

00:35:09:24 - 00:35:27:10
Speaker 1
Stop. Believe we're not friends. I don't drive this whatever car I'm saying. I got a moment to talk to me, and I said, Tom and I got along very. I said, you say this thing, the most important thing is how you feel about yourself when you're by yourself. Like, what does that mean to you? I know what it means to me.

00:35:27:11 - 00:35:46:18
Speaker 1
And he went on to say how he got his 400 million, how it didn't make any difference. All his problems were still there. He said, life is a game of fulfillment. It's a game of neuroses. Unless you live for fulfillment, you will implode. Here's the piece that I want to draw on everybody that I'm passionate about. The reason we don't live since the settlement is not that we're broken, Brandon.

00:35:46:18 - 00:36:12:23
Speaker 1
The reason we don't live for fulfillment is we confuse what's familiar as Sicily. Our nervous aligns to a familiar hell, but we reject an unfamiliar heaven. Our suit is programed to keep going and snapping back to some center, even if it doesn't serve you. This is why people keep recreating money, situations and abusive situations and sexual addiction situations.

00:36:13:04 - 00:36:19:08
Speaker 1
It's because we keep realigning to a familiar hell. We confuse what is familiar for what's fulfilling.

00:36:19:10 - 00:36:41:10
Speaker 2
So true, so so true. And now we're back to let's go back to first principles, right? Every spiritual book talks about, to use the biblical example, what is it to gain the world and lose your soul? We've all heard stuff like that. Most religion is like, what does it mean? The first commandment, the very first command. There's power in the first commandment.

00:36:41:10 - 00:36:55:17
Speaker 2
You would think the first commandment, the very first thing that an all powerful entity would tell us is something obvious, like, hey, don't kill anybody I hate. Don't do anything malicious, you know what I mean? Like, don't go run around beating people upside the head. You would think that might be the first commandment. The first commandment is I'm the Lord your God.

00:36:55:18 - 00:37:21:05
Speaker 2
Thou shalt worship no other gods before me. Okay, great. What does it mean to worship? A practical, operationalized definition of worship would be what do you make sacrifices to, right? If you're sacrificing towards something, you're worshiping that thing. So if you are sacrificing your time, effort, energy, sacrificing your family, sacrificing your health, sacrificing your spirituality toward the pursuit of money, are you not worshiping money and then has money not become your God?

00:37:21:06 - 00:37:36:03
Speaker 2
Has that not become the primary North Star in all of your life? That's a violation of the first commandment. For some people, it's money, for some to control. For some, it's sex. There's a million different things it can be. Either way, you're making an idol out of it, whether you want to conceptualize that religiously or spiritually or not is really irrelevant.

00:37:36:09 - 00:37:59:09
Speaker 2
The concept remains. What is the North Star in your life? The idea of making God your North Star or worshiping that above all else? Well, what is God? If you go back to Saint Augustine or Aquinas, then they're going to talk about the sun and Bono, right. The greatest possible good. So if you make the greatest possible good, your North Star, you cannot go wrong.

00:37:59:10 - 00:38:19:14
Speaker 2
That's whatever. I'm using biblical examples because that's what I'm most familiar with. Every religion says this whether you go to the Koran, every religion says yes. If you make the highest possible good, your North Star in life, you will have a fulfilling life. So in Jordan Peterson talks about this, what's the highest good you can conceptualize? What's the highest sacrifice you can make to get to that highest possible good.

00:38:19:16 - 00:38:35:23
Speaker 2
Let's start going down that path and you will find as you start taking steps towards that, you're not going to be perfect. You're going to make mistakes. You're going to stumble along the way. But you will have a life that is meaningful to you because that is what meaning is derived from. I was in to loom a week ago on a yacht.

00:38:36:00 - 00:38:55:18
Speaker 2
It's fun. I'm from a 900 square foot house in Alabama. The whole ball out thing is fun, but it's not fulfilling. It's two different things. I'm not saying don't do it. I'm not saying don't enjoy your life. I'm not saying don't have fun physical experiences, like with the physical world. But I am saying don't make that your primary focus or it goes nowhere.

00:38:55:22 - 00:39:14:09
Speaker 2
Once you start trying to look for depth and substance and fulfillment in those other things, you will constantly come up empty. Matter of fact, when you recognize that it is what it is, it's a fun experience. It allows you to detach enough from it to actually enjoy it. But when you're looking for more, it's going to be empty.

00:39:14:09 - 00:39:17:03
Speaker 2
I don't know if I answered your question at all or if I just went on a tangent.

00:39:17:05 - 00:39:33:04
Speaker 1
You know, there's a couple things we can wrap this point up with is that it's never going to be enough until you are enough. You have to understand that. And while we went deep down the rabbit hole, for those of you that are vibing off of this and what we're talking about, at the end of the day, life is basically meaningless.

00:39:33:06 - 00:39:54:09
Speaker 1
I don't mean to say that there's no, no reason for us to be here. It is without meaning. What I'm saying to you add the meaning and everything that you do when you're talking about that radical gratitude. It's radical acceptance, right? It's radical responsibility for what's happening in your life. There's no other version that's empowering. I said this to somebody the other day.

00:39:54:15 - 00:40:13:07
Speaker 1
I said, what if you could look from the lens that nothing is an accident? I want that lens because they want to displace the things that happen in their life. We want to place it at the feet of a blame. And fundamentally, it is the discharge of accountability. In my world. There's no other version that that works well like that.

00:40:13:09 - 00:40:32:13
Speaker 2
So let me let me hit you with this real quick. Two just on the subject of meaning, because these are ideas I've been thinking about since I was literally a teenager. One thing I wrote down when I was probably 13 or 14 years old was when nothing means anything, anything can mean everything. So that one more time, when nothing means anything, anything can mean everything.

00:40:32:18 - 00:40:55:17
Speaker 2
The whole experience here, intrinsically, it doesn't really matter. The money you make doesn't matter. Whatever it does matter, you get to decide. This is going back to Nietzsche because you talked about deciding your own North Star value, hierarchy, etc.. What is meaningful to you? How do you derive meaning? Personally, I think most of us end up finding it from the connection between spiritual beings.

00:40:55:17 - 00:41:13:14
Speaker 2
Here's another thing I'll hit you with. Let's think about the story of the passion. This is not a Christian point. This is just if you want to look at metaphor, think about it this way. The story of the passion is Christ dies. Why does he die? To save us from our sins? Why does he care if he is the living embodiment of God?

00:41:13:16 - 00:41:31:23
Speaker 2
At the very least, he's got a direct line to God because that's his father. Can't we just make more humans? Screw these humans. That messed everything up. Just get rid of them. Just make new ones. Screw the world. Make a new world. Why not? It is completely and utterly meaningless for Christ to have died for our sins. It's completely and utterly meaningless.

00:41:31:23 - 00:41:51:00
Speaker 2
It's nonsensical. It's not logical. He cared enough to do it anyway. Where is meaning derived when it doesn't really make sense? When it's not sensical? When it's not logical, but you care enough because of some sort of human reason to make a sacrifice anyway. That is where meaning is derived. That is what all the great mythological stories have told us.

00:41:51:04 - 00:42:08:08
Speaker 2
That is what every person has experienced in some point in their life. It's like every rom com movie has showed this to it. Let's go away from the religious example rom movie guy finds girl. Guy falls in love with girl, girl rejects guy. Girl tells guy it's never going to happen. There's no point in this and you stay away.

00:42:08:08 - 00:42:28:12
Speaker 2
It's not happening. Guy is crushed and defeated. Guy says, you know what? There's literally no point. She's told me it's not going to happen. But I'm going to go out of my way to make a sacrifice and show her how much I love her and care for her anyway. That's where meaning comes from. When it doesn't matter when it shouldn't matter when there's nothing there, when it doesn't make sense and you sacrifice because you care even though you shouldn't.

00:42:28:14 - 00:42:38:18
Speaker 2
That's where meaning is derived from. So there's a whole lot of places you can find it, but you get to decide where it comes from. You get to decide what sacrifices you make and how you're going to actualize that in the world. So there's a lot of depth that we can go.

00:42:38:19 - 00:42:57:03
Speaker 1
I love this stuff, and it's not esoteric. It is the literal basis for how you decide the worth of your life. When you're breathing, your last breaths, how do you feel about your life? Let's talk as we wrap things up here. Let's talk about and Burns impact. What's the next level of impact? Because you mentioned that word universally.

00:42:57:03 - 00:43:17:13
Speaker 1
You said what most people want is a connection to some spiritual being, to know that they're making a difference. And that's what it is. It's not the money. It's not the things of all the people. I've coached sports figures and entrepreneurs and everybody in between. They just want to understand their impact. So help us out. How are you making an impact in the world, and what is that next version of whatever you're doing?

00:43:17:15 - 00:43:38:19
Speaker 2
For me, it's the speaking. Speaking is where I find my fulfillment in my impact, because I know the information I receive, that energetic transfer of somebody caring enough about me to pour into me that changed my entire life, right? You asked earlier what I learned from it. It's the energy and the love he moves and communicates with. There's a genuine ness.

00:43:38:19 - 00:43:55:19
Speaker 2
Here's what I'm I go on another tangent. I don't like the speaking industry. I don't like the influencer industry. I don't like the personal branding industry, which is funny because I own a business that does digital marketing for personal brands, and I am a personal brand, and I do a lot of speaking from stage and I do a lot of coaching.

00:43:55:21 - 00:44:14:24
Speaker 2
I'm very selective about who I work with because I don't need your money, and I don't care about it enough to work with these people who are just a walking, talking TedTalk. I can't do it when I can tell every single answer that you have is planned. It's the scripted thing and you're really just trying to get famous to boost your own ego, and you want to make money in the industry or whatever.

00:44:15:03 - 00:44:29:05
Speaker 2
I can't be around those people. I literally cannot do it. The thing that I learn the most from it is how genuine and authentic you really is. He is exactly who he says he is. You take all of his money away and him and I are living under a bridge together. I promise you, we'll be doing the exact same work.

00:44:29:08 - 00:44:46:09
Speaker 2
We'd still be going to the prisons for free. We'd still be going to the schools for free and he'd still get up on stage in front of 10,000 people in a stadium and kill it, as if he was making millions of dollars that he is now. That level of I'm genuinely trying to help you cannot be faked and you can sniff it out in a second.

00:44:46:11 - 00:45:03:09
Speaker 2
So for me, is just being as authentic and genuine as I can and trying to take the stuff that we're talking about here and give that and proliferate that to as many people as humanly possible so that they can live the life that I believe they deserve to live, and the life that I believe they're called to live.

00:45:03:09 - 00:45:16:17
Speaker 2
I've always said my mission statement is to become the version of me that God had in mind when he created me, and used what I learned in that process to give that to other people. Because I think it is disrespectful to you. And wherever you believe that you came from, to not live up to your highest possible potential.

00:45:16:17 - 00:45:21:10
Speaker 2
And that's what we should all be chasing every single day. So helping people get there is how I get my fulfillment.

00:45:21:12 - 00:45:45:06
Speaker 1
Wow, wow. I'll just say my goal when I do these podcast is to for people to leave with something, the next goal, or I should say the next sort of measure for me is feel like I fundamentally am walking away with something that I previously didn't have, and that is this kind of conversation for me today. You know, it's been very connective and reflective, and that's what I strive to be.

00:45:45:06 - 00:46:05:06
Speaker 1
And if anybody else is completely present and connected and reflective in any way, and you, my friend, have done it and a massive she make way today. I know you work with people. I know you do speaking. Somebody hears this podcast and they should think, flex intended. Hey, I want to know more about Brandon Burns and what he does and how I can work with him.

00:46:05:06 - 00:46:10:15
Speaker 1
How can I come to my events and speak with me? Let us know how we can accomplish that.

00:46:10:17 - 00:46:29:09
Speaker 2
100% man. Everything is connected to I am B burns.com all my social media on every platform as I am B burns and then pretty much everything can be found at I am the burns.com and turned to speaking inquiries. Coaching inquiries, the digital marketing agency that I own has a link on there as well. Anything and everything I am B burns.com.

00:46:29:10 - 00:46:30:22
Speaker 2
Try and keep it easy.

00:46:30:24 - 00:46:49:09
Speaker 1
Very cool, I love that. Let's just wrap it up with a couple questions. Always ask or I am trying to think of a question for you that I like to come out of from a really different angle. If somebody is listening today was in a situation where they have a moment where they need to choose that big risky thing in life, right?

00:46:49:14 - 00:46:55:17
Speaker 1
What is the 32nd thing that you're going to tell them to do? Piece of knowledge you're going to draw out for them?

00:46:55:17 - 00:47:14:09
Speaker 2
32nd thing for somebody who needs to take that big risk in their life. Russell Brand said the surely there must be a death. Hopefully it is just the death of the idea, not the host. Something is going to die. Either you're going to get to the end of your life, and you physically will lose the opportunity that you had.

00:47:14:11 - 00:47:36:21
Speaker 2
Like, that's what bothers me. That's if I was to lay awake at night and think and be kept up by something. It's that idea, the version of me I could have been, that I should have been the version of me that impacted a whole bunch of people, that had all the experiences that really got the absolute most out of life and can leave happy, fulfilled, and truly feeling like nothing was left on the table.

00:47:36:23 - 00:47:59:14
Speaker 2
I don't want to kill off that version of me before God does. And that's what most people do, is you got 60 more years left to live. You got 40 more years left to live, 20 more years left to live. But really, you're already done. Like what life is that? That's not worth living to me. So don't kill off the version of you that could have been by choice.

00:47:59:16 - 00:48:23:22
Speaker 2
I really feel like if you can be happy going for it and failing, but you really can. And I know, and I'm not saying that because I read it in a self-help book. Like I really moved across the country with two sick parents on my own, with no financial assistance, from all the way to the south, as far south as you can go, to as far north as you can go on my own to chase a dream that I was not qualified for, not prepared for and failed at it for four years.

00:48:23:22 - 00:48:42:03
Speaker 2
It is cute to say I was cut from the team four times in five years, and it goes by really quickly to say it verbally, but that's four years of my life. Surgeries, injuries, depression, anxiety. Am I good enough? Am I going to make the team is you're constantly being told I'm not good enough. For years straight, and I'm telling you I'm better for it.

00:48:42:05 - 00:49:04:17
Speaker 2
The hard work didn't disappear. It didn't turn into a trophy, but it did turn into substance and depth and character. And it prepared me for everything that I'm doing now. And I'm so happy I would not be able to live with myself sitting up at night thinking, man, I wonder what would have happened if there is an alternate life path where I went to a community college in Huntsville, Alabama and never even tried to go for my dreams, bro, I never would have met.

00:49:04:19 - 00:49:17:13
Speaker 2
I never would have had the network that I have. I never would have started my company. None of these things would have happened. And the type of regret failure you can deal with, I promise you. I don't care how weak you think you are, you're wrong. Failure you can deal with, you will get over it, I promise you.

00:49:17:13 - 00:49:21:23
Speaker 2
You will regret. You might not ever get over you. I wouldn't take that risk.

00:49:22:00 - 00:49:47:17
Speaker 1
You're right. And I've never heard that distinction. And I love that. And the thing that you reminded me of when you said, don't kill off that version, is, this is what I see with people. There was somebody in our extended family saying it's not dealing with their present circumstances very well. I don't want to reveal who it is, but, and somebody else said that I wish I would have said this because this is the thing Neil Flora usually says I'm credited for saying all these prolific things, but it's not mine.

00:49:48:09 - 00:50:03:00
Speaker 1
They said, I know he doesn't want to die, but I'm not sure if he wants to live in it. So I stop me in my tracks. I thought I said, wait, wait wait wait wait wait, what did you just say again? Rewind that. Because I know he doesn't want to die, but I'm not sure if he wants to live.

00:50:03:00 - 00:50:19:06
Speaker 1
I said, you just described most of the human race. If you read conversations with the Devil by Napoleon Hill, he talks about people in the drift. Right? We are in the drift. We're not asking the fundamental questions what am I doing? Why am I doing it? And why am I still here?

00:50:19:08 - 00:50:40:05
Speaker 2
Most people commit spiritual suicide and they kill off that version of themselves. That could have been because of fear, because of limiting beliefs, because of hesitations, because of other people's opinions are so worried about and they commit spiritual suicide far before their physical life comes to an end. Like if you want to take the spiritual approach to that, that you imagine how disrespectful that would be.

00:50:40:05 - 00:50:55:20
Speaker 2
Like, one thing I think about a lot is if God cries, it's not from the mistakes we made because he expects those and he's already forgiven us for them. He would cry from the gifts that he gave us and the potential that he gave us that we never even bothered to open or explore. If you, because you're a father now, you get it.

00:50:55:20 - 00:51:20:23
Speaker 2
You're a father. If you work your entire life to give your child a certain type of life experience and they say, you know what, screw you. I don't want it. Like, how hurtful would that be to you? So just watch your child make a decision. You gave them the free will and the opportunity to make this decision, and they just choose to practically kill themselves and not even explore the opportunities that you gave them.

00:51:21:00 - 00:51:40:19
Speaker 1
That's why most parents are unhappy. And I tell this story a lot. I left a multi six figure corporate career and multi six figure bonus for one reason because I call bullshit. We start our lives and make believe and we should make the leap to belief maker. But instead we download Human Operating system 1.0 that says shit happens and you die.

00:51:40:23 - 00:52:05:18
Speaker 1
I said it is total hypocrisy to tell my children, hey baby, be anything you want to be and then not fulfill my old dream. So I left it all because I am a dreamer and that is our first and foremost power. If you want a spiritual map for your life, just regress back to the emotional, mental, and spiritual power you had as a child and this is all the direction you get.

00:52:05:18 - 00:52:35:20
Speaker 1
But we can't. Kids will own what they're shown, not what you tell energetically, philosophically, mentally, emotionally. They will own that right? We all girl, when we say we won't be like my parents. And then what ends up happening? Because that is imprinted. Show me that. Show me kid in the first seven years, and I'll show you the man that you become because you're literally in a fatal brain way state, absorbing like a sponge, most importantly, non-verbal energetic cues about how do I deal with life?

00:52:35:24 - 00:52:47:05
Speaker 1
How do my parents react? How are they fulfilled? I tell parents all the time, is your most important lesson at any point, your life is to lead a fulfilled life and show your child that you are fulfilled.

00:52:47:06 - 00:52:58:16
Speaker 2
Reason that those young kids especially are so genuine and pure is because they are closer to the version of humanity that we were all meant to be and modeled after.

00:52:58:16 - 00:52:59:10
Speaker 1
Yes, before.

00:52:59:10 - 00:53:20:17
Speaker 2
We encountered the worldly trauma and negative pattern imprinting that we all go through at some point or another because they are truly creative beings. That's what makes kids kids is they're imaginative and they're creative. I tell people all the time, if you want to change your life like you said it, shit happens and then you die. It's like, no, you get to create the standards you want to live your life by.

00:53:20:19 - 00:53:32:04
Speaker 2
Every day means every day. That's my catchphrase. That's my mantra. Every day means every day. I made a decision that I was going to work out every single day. Rain, sleet, snow. Shine. Sad. Happy. Traveling. Not I.

00:53:32:04 - 00:53:33:01
Speaker 1
Don't care.

00:53:33:03 - 00:53:55:09
Speaker 2
I work out every day and I applied the same thing. And then funny enough, because I created that standard and that principle, the results followed because we are creative beings, modeled after a creative creator. If we create the world we want, the identity we want, then the physical world has no choice but to catch up to it. And so I did the same thing financially, right?

00:53:55:15 - 00:54:12:13
Speaker 2
Happy, wealthy show. Financially. I made a decision. There's certain hotels I won't stay at if I can't make it make sense to go to the types of hotels that I like to stay in, I will not go. I will cancel the trip. Why? Because I live in abundance and more opportunities will come my way. Once I compromise my standards in my identity.

00:54:12:13 - 00:54:36:06
Speaker 2
I can't get that back because I just prove to myself what I think about myself. So I just won't go. I create the standard. I uphold the standard. I uphold the identity. The physical world will catch up, I promise you. But most people don't have enough faith in their own creative powers, and you put your faith in other people's definitions of you, other people's opinions of you, other people's limited beliefs.

00:54:36:06 - 00:54:49:20
Speaker 2
You have more faith in that than you do in your own creative ability to decide what your life is going to be. And now we're back to the first commandment, because you're worshiping other people's opinions and other people's limited beliefs above your own essence and spirit. You piss me off today, Neal. I'm mad. I'm mad at people now.

00:54:49:22 - 00:54:52:00
Speaker 2
Got me up here preaching angrily.

00:54:52:02 - 00:55:14:07
Speaker 1
Well, you and I is very passionate. The only reason I didn't start leading in because I don't know if we need that much passion. Screaming through the podcast headphones. Well, people listen to this, but rather I thoroughly enjoyed this. Please connect with my brother Brandon. I always knew we had a lot in common. I didn't realize that we're just a slightly different shade of skin tone, but we're obviously brothers from the same guy, a mother and father.

00:55:14:07 - 00:55:20:11
Speaker 1
So thank you for being on the wealthy Happy show. Just always remember that the best part of being wealthy is being.

00:55:20:11 - 00:55:20:18
Speaker 1
Happy

00:55:20:18 - 00:55:25:20
Speaker 1
I.

00:55:25:22 - 00:55:46:20
Speaker 1
Thank you for listening to The Happy Wealthy Show. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and leave us a review. It helps us reach more people, and through a little bit of your generosity, we can help those impact driven, heart centric changemakers out there like yourself. I.