The Rise and Fall of Trust

Trusting Yourself at the Bottom: Promises, Small Clients, and Long-Term Loyalty

• Cashflow Podcasting • Episode 20

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0:00 | 38:53

What holds a relationship together when outcomes are uncertain, mistakes are inevitable, and incentives begin to shift?

In this episode, Anne speaks with Brett Danko, president of Danko Education and a financial advisor at Main Street Financial Solutions. Working in both financial education (where students place their future in his hands) and in advisory work (where clients do the same with their money), Brett has seen that trust grows through candor, responsibility, and relationship. 

Tune in as Brett shares what he has learned about trust through the years, including the value of saying “I don’t know,” owning mistakes quickly, and treating people as more than transactions. As you listen, consider where trust in your own work depends less on being flawless and more on being transparent, steady, and willing to stick around when things get difficult.


What You’ll Learn:

  • Why saying “I don’t know” can build more trust than pretending certainty.
  • How a spouse’s belief and a clear time boundary helped Brett bet on himself.
  • The cost of treating early, “small” clients as disposable once you’ve grown.
  • What broken business promises reveal about someone’s true reliability.
  • How transparent communication can preserve trust in failure.
  • Why many younger investors no longer trust traditional markets and what that signals.
  • How real conversation, not online conflict, restores trust across differences.


Ideas Worth Sharing:

  • “In the end, it comes down to relationships, and I found that when people actually talk to one another, even from different viewpoints, they tend to understand one another.” - Brett Danko
  • “When you’re working with clients, it’s all about trust. They have to know that you are a fiduciary. They have to know that you have their best interests at heart.” - Brett Danko
  • “You can have a business that doesn’t work out, but yet the trust still remains because it’s about the longer-term relationship. That’s what really matters.” - Brett Danko


About Brett Danko:

Brett R. Danko, CFP® is the Founder and Managing Partner of Main Street Financial Solutions, LLC, where he actively advises clients on complex financial planning and investment issues. He also leads Danko Education, teaching CFP® Certification Education and exam prep courses nationwide, bringing real-world planner experience into the classroom. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, Brett grew up in Pittsburgh, PA and now lives in Newtown, PA with his wife and two children.


Resources:


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If you enjoyed this episode, follow The Rise and Fall of Trust wherever you get your podcasts. And if you’re thinking about launching a podcast that builds trust and drives results, that’s our jam. Schedule a free call at Cashflow Podcasting to learn more.

SPEAKER_00

In the end, it comes down to relationships. And I found that when people actually talk to one another, even from different viewpoints, they tend to understand one another. But when they're off, away from one another, there can be no trust. If you're just in your treehouse and you're in your treehouse and you sort of bark at each other online, there's no trust.

SPEAKER_01

Welcome to the rise and fall of trust by Cashflow Podcasting. Here we explore how trust is built, broken, and everything in between.

SPEAKER_02

Brett, welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_00

Thank you. Thank you for having me on.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I'm super excited to talk to you about trust because I think you know you're doing two different things, right? It's education, but you also work with clients as a financial advisor yourself. So I think that's super, super interesting. How important is trust in your work? Or like what role does it play for you?

SPEAKER_00

I think it's the basis of everything that we do. I mean, at Denko Education, students trust us to help them get through the CFP exam. And that's something that we don't take lightly. And we are actually humbled and honored that they would do that. And I really mean that. And obviously, as a financial advisor, as a managing partner at Main Street Financial Solutions, you know, that I started, you know, almost 20 years ago. For that, when you're working with clients, it's all about trust. They have to know that you are a fiduciary. They have to know that you have their best interests at heart. And if that trust ever breaks down, you're you're in a you're in you won't have a relationship anymore. And so really you have to be able to do that. And I think you can do it in a lot of ways, but uh, you know, building up that trust is a a big thing and it can break down pretty darn quickly. So all that time that you've spent developing it, it can go away in a nanosecond.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, 100%. And it's what you said, right? I think for people to trust in you for upgrading your skills so that they can help their clients, you know, that's that's a huge deal for sure. They really need to trust that you were the the person and the company as then go education to do that. And then also managing people's money. I mean, that's obviously extremely important and a lot of trust required.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Yeah. And that's and that's a bit that's a huge responsibility, and it's it's a bit daunting because they're putting their short, mid, and long-term goals into your hands. And it's up to you to actually try and help them to achieve those. And if you can do that, then that's great. And and usually you can, but I think one of the most important things is where things, if you, if you don't know something, you go ahead and you would simply just say, I don't know. I think that helps to create trust as well. If you do something wrong, if something is not going right, is to own it and or just discuss it with the client and say, look, this is this is what's going on. It's a situation. We're not exactly sure how things are, you know, why why this is happening. It could be market events that are beyond your control. It could be something where uh an email slipped through and and you didn't respond to them in a in a timely manner. Those are all things that nobody's perfect. So we we you know would admit our mistakes and move on and and own them. And so uh and then and then do better in the future.

SPEAKER_02

I think you have a really good point. I think people don't expect perfection, right? Because you can mess up within reason, right? Not a thousand times, but like I do think that people don't expect perfection. But I think the transparency that you mentioned and maybe also being proactive as much as you can if something goes wrong, you know, reaching out instead of just sitting back and waiting until someone notices or doesn't notice. I think that also is a is a trust builder. And I mean, I've definitely seen situations and also, you know, talked about situations on this podcast where something went wrong, but in the end, it was more of a trust builder than a trust diminishing.

SPEAKER_00

Yes, yes, you can actually use it to enhance your relationship. In fact, when we talk about trust, I remember watching something, I think it was Modern Marvels, because I travel a lot. So I'm flipping through channels and it's modern, and it was the Hoover Dam. The Hoover Dam is in, I don't know if it's in Arizona or Nevada or wherever it is, but it's out on the Colorado River. And they went ahead and just kept pouring concrete during the Great Depression and they created this dam. It was a great works project, had lots of jobs. And what was interesting about it is they they poured so much concrete, so much concrete so quickly that when they were checking the dam in the 1980s or 90s or something, they drilled holes or they bore holes all the way through. And it's you know, hundred plus feet, hundreds of feet at its base. And when they did that, they found liquid concrete in the center of the Hoover Dam. So there was, I don't know, 10 to 20 feet of liquid concrete. And the reason why it was liquid, it had never gotten a chance to dry. Because they just poured concrete on top of it, on top of it, on top of it. And I thought that was a really interesting analogy for trust. Because what happens is you go ahead, you have that liquid concrete in the middle, and then all the good things you do, you build up concrete solid all the way out. But when you betray that trust, when you make mistakes, a little bit gets nicked off. And if you nick too much of it off, it gets down to the liquid concrete, which means there ain't no dam anymore and it falls apart. And so maybe I'm stretching it a little, but I remember thinking about that. It's like 20 years ago, because I was using it to talk about you know our trust with clients and how you know it's it's so important and how it can erode away over time if we're not careful with it. So if also if we have a house, if you aren't constantly doing maintenance on it and making sure that it's safe, et cetera, eventually it'll just fall down from neglect. And I think that's true with trust and relationships. You have to constantly keep building and keep fixing and keep tinkering to make sure that it's that it's good. And so if we can do that, I think that's great.

SPEAKER_02

No, I I mean I absolutely agree. You know, we called the podcast the rise and fall of trust for this reason, right? Like the rise of trust, as in it's something that's being built over time. It's not something that just all of a sudden exists, but right? It's the pouring of the concrete. You have to pour in a lot, but then also the fall of trust, like it can all crumble, it can all actually fall apart 100%. I'm really interested to hear kind of the stories that you brought for us today, Brad. If you can start off by sharing a positive story, the rising trust story, where you know, trust was really important, it was built kind of like the success story.

SPEAKER_00

I don't know that I'll have anything that's so profound. I mean, I have a couple things that I was thinking about in going into this, the in into this podcast. I mean, one of them is just the relationship that I had with my wife. I was involved in a situation that I'll I'll talk about later is that trust was was was not there and and it had broken down, and we were in a very difficult economic spot. And I decided that, you know, yes, I could possibly go and get a job in the financial services industry, but I actually wanted to try and form my own company. I wanted to do lecturing, I wanted to do teaching, I wanted to work with clients. These were all things that I wanted to do. So this was nearly, you know, 25 to 30 years ago, where you know, my wife said, Look, I trust you. I trust you to go ahead and go after this. But it also was one of those things where there was a little string attached where she said, you know, we don't, we want to have children. Right now we have a negative net worth. So at that time, so it was, wow, you know, this is a little scary. We're in our early 30s. So one of the things that I would like to just say to you is that, you know, how how long do you think this will take? And I said, Well, I think, you know, a year to two years. And she said, look, I give you two years. And and and in two years, you don't have to be making a lot of money. That is not the case. But if you but but in two years, if you haven't found something that you're really happy doing and at least can bring in some income, doesn't have to be a lot, but some income and also for you to be satisfied with what you're doing, then you have to go get a job and work for somebody else. Because I had decided after my previous experiences in work that I didn't want to work for anyone else. I actually wanted to trust myself, but I was afraid to. And one of the reasons why I was willing to trust myself is I kind of didn't have anything to lose. I was like, well, I might as well try it now, because if it doesn't work, then I can always go work for somebody else. And I think that's one of the points I would like to get across is I trusted myself. And I also had the backing of someone that I was in a marriage with, long-term relationship, best friend type type scenario. And I had that person behind me, and I had other people behind me saying, you can do this. So they they put their trust in me in terms of helping me to work with me for different or my my first few clients, etc. And I also had my wife saying, Hey, I trust you to do what's right for our family longer term. But I had to trust myself. And that's the one thing I would want anybody listening to this to realize. You have to be willing to trust yourself. And you have to be willing to trust other people for other people to trust you. I think that's really important. Was it the uh at the end of Abbey Road? Paul McCartney says, in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make. So I'm a big Beatles fan. So if anybody doesn't like the Beatles, sorry, but I'm a big Beatles fan. But but the point of that is, is I would relate that to trust. So the the trust you take has to be equal to the trust you you make or you give. So I think you have to be willing to trust other people, or they're not gonna be willing to trust you. You have to be willing to be vulnerable. I was willing to be vulnerable. My wife could have said, hey, you know what? Go get a job. We want to start having children. I don't want to have a negative net worth. Let's go. She could have said that, but she was willing to be vulnerable too. She was willing to trust me. And I got to tell you, that made all the difference in the world. Later on, I mean, I in in business. I have a partner who is who who joined with me for Main Street Financial Solutions. He was the first advisor to come work with with us. And I got to tell you, he just said, Hey, I trust you. And I was like, What do you mean you trust me? He's like, Well, I trust you. I want to work with you. And that person, his name is Mike Mentor. He went ahead and said, I want to work with you. I trust you. And let's go ahead and do that. There's another person named Ted Durkin. I have many others, but Ted, who who on the on the Main Street side as well as we had grown and grown, it was sort of saying, you know what, for the RIA, I didn't think I was necessarily capable of doing it, say on my own. I had the education, business, et cetera. So it was like, all right, what's best for our clients and our advisors and all of our wonderful, wonderful employees and management team? And it was working with somebody and going to Ted and saying, hey, I need help with this. And I trust you to be able to really make a difference on the management side and helping bring advisors in, et cetera. And he also then trusted me. And he could have had all kinds of other offers making a lot more money. But he said, you know, uh, including his current position where he was. And he said, you know, I trust you, and I'm gonna go ahead and do that. So it meant the world to me that somebody was willing to trust me. And then also, you know, I was out there, you know, saying, okay, I'm I'm gonna trust you. So it was, it was a wonderful, wonderful thing. They trusted me, I trusted them. Last sort of thing that I kind of wanted to bring up here for a story is I had a dear friend who I've known for since college days, and that person came into some money, and they called me and they said, Hey, I want you to manage this money or have somebody from your firm. And I said, you know, and this was a couple years ago, and I said to him, I said, you know, you're coming to me. That's great. You're an incredibly bright and successful person. Oh, and by the way, you know a lot of financial advisors out there. And I was like, you know, what why me? Like, I'm not being a jerk, but I'm just being honest. Like, why are you trusting me? And he said, you know, I've known you since college. You really haven't changed. You're the same person. You've always been somebody who was trustworthy, a good friend, always there for other people. And you've carried that out throughout your career as we've stayed friends and we've talked, et cetera. And so, yeah, you've built up that trust over all those years. So, yeah, I mean, I guess if I wanted to go with somebody who was a hedge fund out there and was trying to maximize things, that's one thing. But I have this nest egg and I want to make sure that it lasts for a long, long time. And you always talk about short, mid, and long-term goals. Well, I have some short, mid, and long-term goals that now I can go ahead and hopefully accomplish using this money. And so I want you to be that person because I trust you. And I was very humbled by that. I actually, you don't think of, you know, as a college student, because I was thinking back, I was like, because we've all done some some some sort of dodgy or sketchy things uh when we were in college. Maybe you haven't, and maybe you haven't, but but most of us have. So I was thinking, holy heck, like, wait a minute, did he forget certain things? But and I even joked with him on that. He goes, Brett, you never were mean, you never, you know, took advantage of other people. You were always that person who got stuff done and volunteered and helped out, and you were for the team and you were for, you know, the group, et cetera, and and for other people around you who are your friends. I gotta tell you, that was that was very humbling for me. And I was, I was, I said, I'm honored. I actually was a little cry, I said, I'm honored by that. And it was interesting because my my wife, my wife has passed away, but this is before she passed away. She said, she said, you know, why does that surprise you? She said, Why do you think I'm with you? Why do you think I've been best friends with you for over 35 years? And and I, you know, and she goes, now you're gonna cry again. She goes, so just stop it. She got and please take out the recycling. She said, so let's get back to real world. Go back and take out the go out and take the recycling and the trash out. And I said, okay. And that's what I did. And that ended our conversation. But I got to tell you, those were sort of good, good, good stories there, where people put their trust in me and it is humbling. And I gotta tell you, that's a responsibility. And you need to back that up. There are things you'll be like, you know what? I need to make sure. It doesn't mean you always are are correct in things, and and and when you're wrong, like we talked about earlier, you you simply you know go ahead and admit it, own it and and rectify it and move on. But I gotta tell you, it's it's pretty, it's it's pretty humbling and it's a huge responsibility.

SPEAKER_02

I think that's really interesting, especially like the last story. I think it really is someone who just sees you as a good person, right? Like this, like this person is just a good person. And so I trust that they will take good care of my of my money and of my wealth, and they'll, you know, are trustworthy in that, in that way. And especially that what you said, it's just built over so many years. You've always been like consistent in that way. But I just want to take it back a little bit to like more that starting point where you had to trust in yourself, and your wife also just said, like, listen, I'm trusting, like, I trust you. I think you're gonna do what's best for the family. What do you think it was that made you trust yourself and that made your wife also comfortable enough to say, like, okay, let's let's give this a go, let's try this out for two years. Was there anything specific that was like, you know what?

SPEAKER_00

I would like to say yes. And I was, you know, I had such great fortitude and I had such great courage. I was gonna go out there and do my own thing. I gotta be honest, I I think I said it earlier. I I had no, I was kind of at the bottom. I needed to find a job, and I just said, you know what? I I want to do this. What was interesting is I knew a couple years before that it the situation I was in wasn't necessarily the best, three or four years before, and I toyed with the idea, but I still had a paycheck coming in, and I didn't have the courage to do it. And I have to tell you, the the twin things of having to find a job or to find something that would occupy my time and bring in some money, and having a person that I loved and respected, my wife, sort of say, I believe in you, I trust you. Let's go ahead and do this. And you're not alone, and I'm gonna be behind you, and sometimes I'm gonna be pushing you when you're a little afraid. Those two things, more than any courage or great insights from me, actually got me to do it. And I'm I'm pretty, pretty honest about that. I really love the folks who leave a great job and say, This is my mission in life and this is what I'm gonna do. And I've talked to a number of entrepreneurs like that, uh, some have been successful, some who haven't. And I just say to them, man, I wish I had your guts. And they said, Well, you did this. I was like, Yeah, I kind of had somebody behind me who also, you know, who had a job but also was kind of pushing me in a big way and trusting in me and believing in me. And then I needed to do something. So there was something like, well, wait a minute, we're gonna have a child here. So I need to bring in some revenue. It doesn't have to be tons and tons, but I need to bring in some revenue. And I also need to be happy as a person because then I can be a better spouse, I can be a better friend, I can be a better parent in all those ways if you're happy doing what you're doing. It's not so much people think it's the money side. If you're happy with what you're doing, the money's important. It's it's helpful to have something coming in to pay your bills, but after a certain point, it's because you are really loving it and the money sort of fades away, and that actually makes you a lot happier. I also know people who are miserable and they make a lot of money, and then that affects their relationships. So I do think that that's something that that really does matter. I know that's not on the matter of trust, but just in general, as as we're talking about about my journey in going through and starting a couple businesses.

SPEAKER_02

Well, I can absolutely see that that support, that's having that support system of one person or probably like several person you also people you also mentioned, you know, you had friends around you as well. I can absolutely see that that encourages you to trust yourself and that that really is like a push in the right direction, 100%. So, Brad, what is the other side? Like, what is the your story of falling trust where it didn't it didn't work out so well?

SPEAKER_00

I'll bring up two two two different scenarios. One is sort of a generic scenario where you know you as an advisor, because we are talking to financial advisors here, and I'm a financial advisor as well. I do less of that now and more of sort of general planning and things like that. So more on the managing side and solving different problems that come about and the education side. At my core, I think of myself as a financial planner. So at my core of everything, before teaching, before lecturing, before you know doing investments or insurance or anything, it's as a financial planner. And and one of the things is when you start your practice and those I'm gonna say smaller clients who trust in you and sort of say, hey, I'm gonna give you my money. And I feel greatly indebted to those people. And I know that there's business people out there who say, Yeah, you got to get rid of those people. They're your small accounts, whatever, just get rid of them, you know, send them off, or you know, do whatever. And I gotta tell you, I I have a little bit of difficulty with that because those are the folks that trusted me that then allowed our firm to grow to get those other clients that wouldn't have even returned my phone call before we had a billion dollars under management or two billion dollars or three billion dollars under management. Now it's safe. Now it's safe. And I even have people that I'm friends with who are like, yeah, can we? You talk about it's like, yeah, you didn't want to talk to me when we were starting out. You didn't want to talk to me when we say had a billion dollars. But now that we're much bigger, now all of a sudden it's oh yeah, now I can trust you. It's that trust but verify. So they trusted, but they wanted to see how it worked. So I don't hold it against them and we'll work with them. But those opening clients that you have, now you do come to a point where you can't serve everyone. So that does happen. But maybe having a junior person under you where you still are working alongside you, that actually still keeps them with your firm and actually learns the business through those smaller clients, but yet you're still involved. I love to be able to see people, and maybe one of our other advisors is working with them, but there's a core group of people that I still know what's going on. And I make it a point every quarter or so to say, hey, what about this person, this person, this person, and this person to that advisor? And they say, Oh, here's what's going on. It's a quick recap. And that's when I see them at an event someplace and they mention anything to me. I may not know the exact specifics, but I know the generalities and know what's going on and can talk to them. I'm not totally divorced from it. So I do think it's worth spending some time with those older clients. That's just older clients that maybe are too small for your current practice because it's gotten so big. Because you can only have so many clients that you really focus on. But for me, that's that's a trust thing that I think some advisors they just get rid of them. And I get it, and I get it. And some firms actually have a mechanism where they set other people up with clients. It's at the same firm, but it's a different advisor, but it's out of their practice. And there's that that works great too. I just sort of would feel a little awkward doing that because I feel a debt of gratitude to them for giving me a chance for trusting me. So I want to basically still give that trust back. Maybe have somebody else really in-depth who's who's wonderful, manage their day-to-day assets and day-to-day needs, but actually still have something that I understand kind of in general or in a macro aspect, kind of what they're going through. So that's one thing. And I think some advisors just jettison people like, you're no good to me anymore. You're not good enough. I've moved beyond you. Yeah, well, without those people, you may have not have been able to move beyond. So that's I kind of, and I know people disagree with me on that because I've had this discussion. So that's one way I think some advisors just they don't, that's a bad thing that they just sort of jettison them. But I understand when they've explained to me why they needed to, I get it. Another came personally for me, I was involved in a small business, and I did put my trust into the people that were running it. I lent money to them, et cetera. And I was thinking that, hey, this was a wonderful thing. I didn't, I guess I was a junior partner, but I didn't have any say in it. And in the end, it it didn't work out. Circumstances changed, and I get that, but there were some promises that were made that even if things didn't work out, then if certain things occurred that I would get paid back certain monies, et cetera. And then that really didn't happen. And it was one of those things where my trust was betrayed. And and the people involved may have said, hey, it's it's you know, it's Wall Street, it's dog eat dog, it's it's you know, swim with the sharks. But I don't know. I trusted those people in business, and I learned a lot from that. That the people I want to do business with and the people that I've I work with, our management team, et cetera, I think even if things ended badly, I would keep my promises to them and they would keep their promises to me. Now, maybe that wouldn't occur, but I had kind of watched that behavior with some of the people involved where they necessarily hadn't kept certain promises. And I just thought, oh, well, they'll keep promises to me. And that didn't occur. And I really learned a lot through that. Because if somebody, if you notice that they're not keeping promises to others or they, you know, are a little squirrely about the way they handle things, guess what? They're possibly will be squirrely and and not as forthcoming and and righteous in honoring any commitments that they made to you. So I think that's something that's really important. So people who who you do trust, you know, you should look. Wait a minute, are they actually trustworthy? Because they might not be trustworthy back to you.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I think what both of these stories really show is that for you, relationships are really important with the people that you work with. So it's non-transactional. So small clients, you have a relationship with them, you care about them, even if they're technically too small for your firm, you want to make sure and like really make sure that they're well taken care of. And the best way you can do that is by still being involved in their accounts in some way, or at least, you know, making sure they're well taken care of. And then also on the other hand, this story is also like probably these people saw this investment and like this business partnership as a really transactional situation. Yes. And I think for you, it sounds like for you, it was way more, you know, a relationship and way more, I would say, probably also a long-term view of this. Like, because if they would have paid you back and kept their promises, maybe there was gonna be a next venture or you know, something like that. While if you handle things like this, all the trust is gone. I mean, like you said, you feel betrayed. So there will never ever be a next venture with these people.

SPEAKER_00

Yes, and and I also would say that I'm naive. And and your, you know, listeners could say, oh, he's just being naive. This the world is transactional out there. I get it. I get it. But as you said, I believe in relationships, I believe in doing things for the long term. It's it's sort of like in my investment philosophy, it's about getting rich slowly. It's about doing that. And and I just, if I could bring something up, the younger generation sort of looks at things and says, hey, we're falling a little bit, falling behind, or we feel like we're falling behind. We necessarily can't buy a house as early as we want to. We have more debt, college debt, other types of debt out there. So we feel like we're falling behind. So we don't necessarily trust in sort of the stocks and bond market, et cetera, out there. What we're looking for is more get rich quick. So or better returns from crypto, from online betting, or the predictability markets, or these other things out there that for people who are who are like me who have been in the markets for a long time, we're like, no, no, no, this is the greatest thing. You have 100 to 125 years of the SP 500 basically going up double digits. Like, and you're not buying one stock, you're buying the SP 500. And people say, well, that's just the the seven stocks or five stocks over the last say X amount of years. Well, that's true, but there were five or seven different stocks that led it 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 50 years ago. And so new new companies come along and then they lead it. And I was sitting there thinking, I was like, wow, just put your money away, your long-term money away in the SP 500 and just forget about it. Meaning, don't ever even look at it. But they're looking at it as, yeah, I don't trust in that. I don't trust in that view. I don't trust that that's gonna continue. So therefore, I have to look for other places. And I gotta tell you, that sort of shook me. So I'm like, wow, wow. And I can understand why they might think that. And I've talked to people who are who are younger and they've said, look, you know, you were able to do this when you were this age and able to do this when you were this age. And we can't do that. So I get it, but man, not trusting, you know, capitalism, not trusting, and I'm not some you know, extreme capitalist. I don't mean that, but I'm talking about the capitalist system in general, that also has a social safety net, of course. But understand that that system has worked pretty darn well for over a hundred years when we've had all kinds of ups and downs over the last hundred to 125 years. So I gotta tell you, for young people to not trust in that, that says something. And I hope that they'll get that trust back because they're probably, you know, there's fool's gold out there. And and trying to get something, you know, that that you think is gonna happen and it's gonna double my returns in, you know, in five years or something. I just tell folks, be very careful. It's too good to be true, it it likely is, or it is. So that's one of the things. So I didn't mean to, you know, throw that extra one in there, but that's something that just made me think about how a younger generation doesn't necessarily trust in the economic system that that has been incredible for this country for the last 100 to 125 years. And you can even argue 250 years since our founding.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, absolutely. And I think also, you know, it's important to keep in mind, like you said, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true. But then also, like high possible reward means also high risk. Like, yes, there are people who are who have made a lot of money off crypto, and then there's a lot of people who lost a lot of money in crypto, but you don't see that on social media.

SPEAKER_00

Yes, or or day trading. So I do day trading and I I'm I'm I make I make tons of money. I'm like, yet you still live with your mom and dad, and yet you still live with your mom and dad and drive a 20-year-old car. So clearly you haven't necessarily had a ton of winners. Like, well, I've had some winners, but I've had a bunch of losers too. Like, yes, because nobody talks about the losers. I'm a big believer in, you know, you have strengths, you have weaknesses, and I've had successes and I've had failures. So it goes hand in hand. And most of the time you don't hear about it in the press, that somebody made a joke. They said that they had a friend who posted on Facebook, is always posting about this amazing family that they have, their amazing relationship, et cetera, et cetera. And it turns out that, you know, six months later they were divorced. And and they, but because on social media, everything is perfect and it's this and it's that. Well, life isn't perfect, as we all know. So it's realizing that, you know what, it's okay out there. We're gonna have things that work out and things that don't. And hopefully we learn from the things that didn't work out. And one of those is could possibly be when we didn't trust someone, or excuse me, when we trusted somebody and that wasn't given back. So that's something they absolutely we can learn from.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, 100%. I think your story is a great example of you know what to kind of like look out for, maybe when you are putting trust in people. What is their mindset as as far as you can see, right? Because you can never know what people are thinking. Like, look out for people who for whom relationships are important, who don't see everything as strictly transactional. Maybe that's a takeaway if that if that resonates. And the other thing, like the transparency that we talked about, being proactive and trusting in yourself as well, right? Taking taking a calculated leap, trusting in yourself, especially when you're at a point where it actually like kind of makes sense because you have nothing to lose, you have a lot to gain. So then give yourself a limited time, especially when you have a support system in place, in it whether it's a spouse, family members, friends, but people who do trust that you can make it work and that you can do best what's that you can do what's best for your family.

SPEAKER_00

And can I add one more? I just thought of something else. I was involved in a private company that I I I helped initially put in the money to capitalize it, and that was with two people, but one gentleman really really started it, and he went ahead and it was a success. We we sold it and we made money on it, and that's wonderful. And all the investors made money, and then he did another venture, and that venture was not successful. So I lost all of the money that I had invested. Other people who had invested had lost money, but he handled it, he called everybody individually. He always let us know what was going on and how he was trying, and things weren't necessarily working out, and he was trying different things. In the end, it didn't work out, but I still trust him. So it's not a transactional thing, it is that long-term thing for me of he handled himself with dignity and respect. He owned it, and he said, I'm sorry. He said, Well, you know, things didn't work out, you invest money. And I viewed it as, yeah, I get it. It's business, it almost as a transactional thing. And he was saying, Yes, maybe that business venture was a transactional thing. However, our relationship and his relationships with people that had trusted him with their money was not transactional. And I learned, you know, you you learn from that. And he we talked a couple of weeks ago and he said, again, I'm really sorry. I go, you have handled yourself with dignity and like I said, respect and and and and just he handed himself in a way that trustworthy way. And that, yeah, it didn't work out, but when you have something new, come to me and we'll we'll talk about it. And uh, I don't know whether I'll invest, but if it's a good idea, I probably will. So that's something that's kind of it's it's interesting because it does show that that exists. You can have a business that doesn't work out, but yet the trust still remains because it's about the longer-term relationship. And that's what really matters.

SPEAKER_02

Exactly. I think this is an amazing example. It's like it also sounds like this person was really proactive, really transparent, like everything we talked about at the start of this episode as well. Red, thank you so much for sharing your stories and your experience with us on the podcast today. It was really interesting. I already shared some of the takeaways that I had from this episode. If people want to connect with you, follow you online, what's the best way to find you?

SPEAKER_00

The best way to find me is Brettdanko.com, MSFsolutions.com. So Main Street Financial Solutions.com, or just Brett at Brettdenko.com is my email. And obviously I'm on LinkedIn and things like that. But yeah, so I am thank you. I'm I'm honored that that that you had me on. I always I wanted to joke that I guess you've been through a lot of guests. So it's like, who do we get? We'll get this guy. So thank you though. So I am humbled by that because I think your message uh on trust, uh, especially in today's day and age, where there's so little trust in our political system, in our educational system, in our just our economic system, it matters because in the end, it comes down to relationships. And I found that when people actually talk to one another, even from different viewpoints, they tend to understand one another. But when they're off, away from one another, there can be no trust. If you're just in your treehouse and you're in your treehouse and you sort of bark at each other online, there's no trust built. If you actually had dinner with that person, you'd say, you know what, I totally disagree with you on this, this, and this. But we actually agree on a bunch of things as well. And there's a more humanization process as part of that. And so this is something that's actually bringing people, I would argue, together and having them think about those things, even though we are using modern technology, because modern technology breaks us apart, but it also can bring us together in a huge way. And so I thank you and applaud you for doing what you're doing. So thank you.

SPEAKER_02

Thank you so much, Brad. That absolutely means a lot. And also thank you for our listeners. Without the listeners, there would be no podcast. So thank you for listening to today's episode and see you in the next one.

SPEAKER_01

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