"The Side of Success No One talks about" Episode 8 Featuring Carlos Gutierrez

In this episode of Unplugged with Pam (brought to you by Chosen Global), Pam sits down with Carlos Gutierrez of Financially Fluent for a real conversation about what it takes to grow—mentally, emotionally, and financially.

Carlos opens up about immigrating from Cuba, breaking free from a “survival mode” mindset, and the pivotal moments that shaped his leadership—including leaving a 14-year banking career, navigating divorce, and choosing therapy as a turning point. Together, Pam and Carlos unpack mental health, identity, entrepreneurship, and what it means to keep moving forward when life is heavy.

In this episode, we talk about:

• Unplugging from survival mode and scarcity thinking
• The “Hulk mindset” vs. strategy, finesse, and growth
• Why therapy changed Carlos’s leadership and relationships
• Building systems, discipline, and health as non-negotiables
• How to keep going when life feels like it’s falling apart

Follow Carlos: @begreat_carlos @FinFluent_Fam

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Transcript

Welcome back to another episode of Unplugged with Pam, brought to you by Chosen Global, where we not only are amplifying voices, but we're showcasing powerful stories, one story at a time. And I'm so excited today I get to chat with you guys with one of my great friends, Mr. Carlos Gautierz from Financially Fluent. Carlos is not only a community leader and builder, someone that is a speaker, someone that is an amazing father, a newly amazing husband, but an incredible human being besides being an outstanding businessman and financial strategist. So, welcome Carlo. Thank you. I'm going to have to hire you to do all my introductions. Right.

What is up? I'm so excited to be here with you. Thank you for doing this. Thank you for not only, you know, agreeing to do this, but just being who you are. You have turned into one of my closest friends and I do not take you for granted. Um, I got recently the pleasure of marrying you and your beautiful wife, Valerie. Shout out to Valerie. Absolutely amazing. and your beautiful children, Bella and Carlos Jr. and now Ella. I'm so just grateful for your friendship and just grateful for who you are and thank you. Welcome. Thank you. Thank you for allowing me to be here. Obviously, you have a million friends. You have a million people who you can contact. So, it's an honor to be able to sit here with you and chat, you know. Absolutely. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. So, the basis of this is unplugged. You know, everybody is pam the plug. Allows you to plug into everything and everyone that's happened and everything that you should know, but this podcast is more so than anything of unplugging of those things that we have to unplug from. You like I am know that I am a huge advocate for mental health just as you are. And I'm excited to kind of just dig deeper into it. So, let's get into it. Tell the people a little bit about yourself. Tell them who you are, you know, tell tell them a little bit about behind what they don't get to see on social media. A little bit about me. Wow. So, I've been in the financial world for about 16 years now. So, a very long time. I used to be a banker. Did that career worked corporate for 14 years. And through those amazing 14 years, learned a lot. But I knew I always wanted to be an entrepreneur hard. Didn't know how, didn't know who, didn't know what, the craziness. And I knew I had to jump out some kind of way. finally found calling something that aligned with what I did for 14 years and here we are today. I do have three amazing kids, two of my own and then a bonus child that I have. And then I actually was born in Cuba. I've been in Florida since I was 9 years old. Been in Tampa ever since and just making my way through the community and giving back as much as it's given me. I love that. I love that. Yes. And that's exactly where we met. You giving back to the community. We met at a networking event. Shout out to the Tampa Bay Latin Chamber of Commerce where we actually met at a networking event. And yes, I can speak on so many things about you. Like I said earlier, you are an amazing dad, an amazing husband, amazing friend, amazing leader. You know, you are always the person doing everything. And honestly speaking, that was one of the reasons that when I saw you from afar at a networking event, I was like, I need to get to know him. Yep. Because he was running around doing the most and you know, attracts your tribe. So I was it reminds me of me a little bit and when we as we became friends I got to know that we have so many different so many similar parallels as far as you know we both come from the banking world and all of these things and so you came from Cuba to the United States talk to me about what are some things that you've had to unplug from you know when it comes to not only culture but when it comes to tradition when it comes to the societal norms of and even expectation of to get you to where you're at today. So, I definitely say unplug from it's got to be the mentality of survival. Far too often, third world country, everybody's on survival mode. Everybody is worrying about where your next meal is going to come from. How are you going to make it to the next month? No matter how good or how bad you're doing, by the way. And when you come to a country like the US, it's not like that. And many people do live that, but it's don't want to say by choice, but at the end of the day, when you're an adult, that's kind of a choice at the end of the if you choose to live in survival mode. Um, so I had to really recheck myself and say, I got to unplug from that mentality. I'm no longer in survival mode. My family's not in survival mode. How do I escalate us to the next level? How do I help my parents get to that? Because they fought their butts off to be able to get us to the next level. And changing the mindset. And it wasn't until adulthood that I realized that and stuff because you grow up with these tendencies that you've known that you've seen your whole life. And I just couldn't realize why did I function particular ways. I had to dig deep on why is it that you act this way? Why do you see things this way? And when I realized the difference of cultures of how I grew up to what I've seen, that's when I had to see a different mentality of you're no longer in survival mode. Stop acting like you're in survival mode. Yeah. And now you got to think of what's next and what's bigger for you and your family. Yeah. So survival mode that was it's interesting that that was the first thing that you said because there's so many things that we could unpack but just that alone. Absolutely. Because survival mode a lot of times is not something like you said you know when you're an adult and sometimes in adulthood it's by choice but when you are growing up and you kind of see that as part of not only what is instilled in you because coming migrating here from another country our parents are hustlers and go-getters and I got the honor of meeting your parents and they're so incredible. Shout out to them. But it was also like you said, it was just that that mindset. It was more than an action and an activity that you saw because let's be real that survival is not a bad thing. We live in a world that is survival of the fittest. But if I'm understanding correctly what you're saying, it's more so than the action or activity of being in survival mode of getting it and hustling and getting to it. But it's how can I get out of that mindset that often comes with survival mode that is scarcity. So or that it is I got to keep going. I got to keep going. I got to keep going. No, it's yes, you have to keep going, but let's be strategic as to how we go about that because now we're going to a whole entirely different level. Like you said, you were trying to see of of ways to kind of get to that. So talk to me a little bit about that. What caused that shift into you? because you were, you know, you're very big in school and I got the honor of meeting Chris, your brother, as well. Super sharp as well. And you both are very just much so very sharp young men, you know, gogetters, both of you, very ambitious, very successful in your own. But what actually caused that mindset shift for you? I think the reality set in when remember exactly actually I was a leader already within bank that I used to work at. Mhm. And they asked, "What superhero do you most align yourself with?" And to me, all I did was, "How do I fix things? How do I when I'm when I'm I'm very resourceful. I I get things done. If you put a problem in front of me, I get it figured out however." Yeah. But it's true. Strategy doesn't come into play in that. I just figured out the quickest way with whatever I have. That's the survival mode piece. Got it. And I had a leader of mine say because what my answer was the Hulk because he just comes in, takes care of business, tears everything up around him. Yeah. Doesn't matter how he leaves it, but he but he gets all done. And that's kind of been my entire life. I just get crap done. And I realized that you have to put a little more finesse as you escalate to the next level. You get things done but make it look good at the same time. It matters. So it kind of shifted to me when she said, "That's great, but honestly, as you grow into your corporate career, you don't want to be in that kind of way." So it caused me to really think on things. I caused me to question a lot. Okay, I I could see that. So I dug deeper instead of saying, "No, I'm not. You know, you're correct." Yeah. Yeah. You know, I started questioning everything. No, I said, "Okay, well, how do I relate to what is going on?" And I just dug deeper. I'm a very strategist thinking on why why do I function that way? If I figure out why I function that way and the deep side of it, how can I change it at that point? And that's when that hit me. That's okay, you're really in survival mode because that's what you used to see it. My parents were engineers. They were selling stuff outside. My dad would travel to buy and sell things while still being a full-time engineer. Seeing this my entire life, it's you resolve what you have in front of you. Yeah. And that's really what how I was built my first nine years of my life. That's all I saw. And that's how it came to be where I had to dug deeper and now now not only resolving what you have in front of you but at the same time you got to make it look good. You have to have strategy behind it. And that's really what made me realize that I had to change the mindset. Shout out to just good people around you, you know, because and also shout out to good choices that you made and shout out to great parents because they were great examples just not only in your upbringing but also just showing you what it looks like to win at a high level and showing you what it looks like to go after it, right? Because being engineers is something that's not easy, especially being a family that's migrated to this country, no matter where you're from. And I love that you said something that you were like, "Okay, well, you know, it was a person at work. It was a boss or manager, whatever the case may be." But when she asked me this question and I feel like if she would have never asked you that, it probably would have never even got you thinking about that in that space because you could correct me if I'm wrong, but and we've talked a little bit about this before, just the banking world, the finance world in itself, business in itself, entrepreneurship in itself, you got to get after. And I remember working at the bank 24/7. You're on go on go. We're talking about this the other day. You know, I started out as a personal financial banker, got all my licenses, then was from series 6, 63, 215, all these things. Then I transitioned into business banking because I loved helping businesses and that's kind of where I fell in love with the business world more than anything. But it was if I wouldn't have just placed myself in those correct environments, there would have never been the room or anybody to be able to pour into me in that way. And I feel the same for you because you're in this hustle and bustle and you're doing great and here you are you're like your mentor just well what's a superhero and you're like the Hulk which it's fitting I can see that cuz you do get done all the time but it was it took it a step further cuz yeah that's good but good is the enemy of great let me show you why you need some strategy and well like next to it thinking bigger. So it was just it it shifted your mindset to now also thinking bigger, thinking, okay, well now I not only need to get things done, but I need to get things done strategically. Cuz it's one thing to be resourceful. There's never a lack of resources, it's always a lack of resourcefulness. So it's one thing to be resourceful, but then there's another thing to how you go about that and is in the method and the process that you go about that. And why was that something that it shifted not only your mindset but then it shifted your actions to go forward? I'd say as I was always searching on how I could do better and I was the word coachability. I really doesn't matter what position I'm in. It doesn't matter is my leader who is reporting to me who's working with me by side. I'm always listening to all 360 all sides. So that really stood out to me in the point of she challenged my mindset. Could have said two different things. I could have said screw you, I'm doing, you know, but in my mind I'm like, no, she's right. If she says something, she's in a position that I want to be in. I always want to strive for more. So how do I continue to get better? And that's really what set that button of I got to listen to. And when I when I sat down and was put the strategy behind it, right behind the thought, which I didn't do often, I did things. Yeah. It really that just shifted off for me at that point. Yeah. So, let's back up a little bit because I love that you had this mindset shift when you were already in the corporate world, but we're talking about what your mid20s, late 20s. Yeah, it was about 26, 27 point. So, let's back it up because you didn't just wake up one day and was like, I want to be a banker. No. So, I want to know how we got there. You know me, I'm a questions. cuz we going to talk about it. That's your money story. Yeah. I was Oh, that's you know what I'm saying? Unplug. You got to tell the people now. So, how how did you get there? Because you got come from a background, a family that's engineers. Yep. And we've kind of got into the story a little bit, but I want to go deeper into it because I do think it's interesting and I think that people need to know cuz a lot of times, and this is why I tell people like, listen, man, take the gloves off. like this is the reason why we're here is because I trust you and I know you trust me that we can have a conversation in a safe space because a lot of times people just see the glory. They see the glory. They see the the three-piece suit, they see the Tesla pulling up on them, you know, and they see the smiles and you just came back from Thailand and Bali and Dubai and they see the world traveler. They see this phenomenal story and glory, but they don't know the depths of the story. And I think that that's one of the most powerful things about you and about anybody is that the depths of their story. Absolutely. Absolutely. Like anything else, everybody sees that where you are somewhere, but they didn't see everything in the background that happened. Exactly. Yep. And I was just talking to my team today. I was doing the training on goal setting and everything be goes behind it and exactly that they don't they don't see the side of like the why on what makes you move every single day. So every single day if we don't have an emotional attachment on why we do things we're all going to struggle. That's right. We talk about it often. But if you the emotional attachment is not there you're not going to move your legs. You're not going to get out of bed. You're not going to walk through the hard times. Easy times are very easy. Exactly. So, how I got into banking, I actually I was in college and being in college, I could not keep a job. I would show up late. I had my first full-time job. While in college, I lasted three weeks there at Verizon. I got fired because I couldn't show up on time. I was getting paid weekly as a college student. Never seen so much money of my own. Yeah. Being paid weekly. So, I was having parties. It was ridiculous. My friend, she was a friend of mine came home and she was like, "Hey, the bank that I bank at, small little credit union is hired and I needed a part-time job." I said, "Sure, whatever. Never thought of banking, never knew what it was that point." I went and applied. The reason why they decided to hire me until this day, it's one of my long-standing mentors. She said, "You called me so many times following up that you were not qualified. I didn't want to hire you." Wow. But I gave you the job just cuz you were so persistent. Come on. So, I ended up there. My work history was so bad that I couldn't keep a job that my friends at the time, my roommates actually placed bets on how fast I would get fired. I didn't know this. I didn't know this till after. They literally put bets in. Yeah. So, that turned into a whole career. Literally turned into a 14-year career going from teller to banker banker to management. management of business banking, running sales teams and being inside of banking. It was amazing. It was amazing because my career was great. Had so many great mentors. It was a school within itself. Yeah, absolutely. But something inside of me could itching of wanting more from my life. Wanting my dream as a banker was to be a manager of a whole entire area. I wanted to manage managers managers what I wanted to. And then the closer I got to that position and I always kept being the youngest one usually within my group every time I got promoted. But closer I got to that position, I would fall more out of love. Not because of the work, but because of what I saw they had to go through. And I would think of like, okay, these people are going to get to 65 years old. They're going to be at retirement. They're not going to have anything other than a 401k. Yeah. Luckily, if you can to put some money away, because if you want to travel, have nice things, and put extra money away, you can't on a $150,000 salary. Yeah. So, I knew I wanted more. And luckily, in the position I was in, I would meet a lot of business owner. I would go into their businesses. I would understand what cash flow was, understand the whole entire gamut of running a business other than actually doing the work. And that's when I realized I was like, no disrespect, but some of these guys have less education, less knowledge of business things. They have different backgrounds where I saw my background was even more resourceful. I could survive under pressure. I could work well. I've let teams and that's when I saw it and I realized I can do to something like this. All they did was stuck with something, found something early enough and ran with it. But you said find a passion. Yeah. If you don't have the passion, it's not going to work. Absolutely. And I just kept bumping my head on like what am I going to do? I tried a million side hustles, had Airbnbs. I love property so I have real estate. But I just kept putting my eggs in a bunch of different basket to see what it was going to be, but never something enough that was going to replace that. Almost bought 12 different businesses. Wow. 12 different businesses. Well, system businesses, franchises, hair salon, being the ball guy with a hair salon. You imagine that? Yes. I didn't. Yo, imagine a bull guy with a hair salon. Y you you know business when you see it. That's it. But that actually that opportunity saying yes to that opportunity. I was so desperate that I told myself you're going to say yes to everything that comes in front of you until you find your whatever it's going to be. And that opportunity was the first opportunity that introduced me to the hair salon and to insurance. Wow. And little did I was going to know that I was going to own an insurance business later on. Wow. So, I met the owner of the hair salon, which was not the owner of the property. I met with him. Things sounded great until I met with the owner of the property. And when the owner of the property told me the terms of the lease, I was like, "No, this is not." Yeah. But I said, "What do you do?" Cuz obviously you don't you do something other than leasing property. And he said, "Well, I do insurance." Okay. Well, look, how long have you done it? I kept asking questions. He's like, "Come by, find out." So, it was PNC insurance. I got to understand that business, started studying for it and that was the right route I was gonna go. Wow. But it opened my whole entire world to understanding the residual income, why it was good to sell insurance, the many avenues of insurance. So it opened my life to a whole different avenue that little pass forward. Here we are. Wow. So there was a lot of things that you had to unplug from in that whole entire thing. So you had to unplug from some type of limiting beliefs. Absolutely. You had to unplug from people's opinion because little did you know everything that was being spoken of you, spoken to you, spoken like towards you, all of these things. Then you had to plug in to what it was that you wanted. and also not only plugging into a path and a plan, but also to mentorship, also to leadership, also to systems that were working. And I love that you were plugging into also community, but you also at the same time were like, you know what, I got to unplug from the stuff that was not serving me. Because not only were you unplugging from the limiting beliefs, but then you were like, "All right, well, these habits of me partying, there's nothing wrong with that, but if I want this life and if I want this, if I want to fulfill this yearning that I have inside me that is like I'm destined for more, I'm destined for greatness, I'm destined for something more with my life, then there's there has to be something that has to change for that cuz for things to change, we got to change something." And then even when you were doing great in banking and you're, you know, you're you're going through the ranks of banking and from this to that and now you're in business banking and you worked your way up because you went from being a teller and tellers are the heartbeat of the branch. You in retail to now you're in the commercial space. Now you are in, you know, all of these different avenues. But then you're like, but at the same time, you're you unplugged from the le from your comfort level. Absolutely. Unplugged from conformity because come on, you anybody would have been comfortable with that job. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Anybody would have been comfortable with that job. And here's another thing that you don't necessarily that you kind of just skated over, but I'm going to bring up. anybody would have plugged into the fact that my parents are set. So I can just do whatever and mommy and daddy are going to take care of it. Even though Sa and Carlos do not strike me as those people, but you know she love her baby. So she's like this is my baby one, baby two. She love her children like any mother does. But you also had a safety net there that you could have just easily been like ah I can just chill. I'mma just relax. But you're like, "No, I want to do more." And obviously, I know me knowing your parents, I know they've always encouraged your growth and encouraged you and your brother and been very, very supportive of those things. But anybody else would have just been like, I'm good. You and I both know good is the enemy of great. The status that it came with that, as you know, status that comes with that banking career, people thinking, yeah, but that meant nothing. It meant nothing at all. So talk to me about you're in banking now because when we when we met you were still in banking. You were still in banking. You were on your way out of banking. Little did you know but you were still in banking and you there was still something tugging at you. God was just tugging at your soul like nah there's still something. You were you had that entrepreneurial itch and the fact that you was about to own a hair salon. Oh man that would have been funny. It's it's like if somebody gives you the keys to a Victoria Secret, it don't matter. You going to be like, "Let me let me see. Let me see them P&L's real quick. Let me see what it look like. Let me see what the finances look like. Let me see what the projections look like. Let me see what the ROI looks like." All of these things. You don't necessarily have to be absolutely, you know, a part of that business per se, utilizing it for you to be able to benefit from it or profit more than anything or being being able to scale it. Then you're like, I love that you said, you know what, I'mma also go further and dig deeper and do my homework and okay, I don't only want to meet with the manager of the place that's going to tell me everything is amazing. I want to meet with the owner that has to actually deal with the building, that actually has to deal with the maintenance, that actually has to deal when things get slow. What exactly does that look like? Because anybody else, you know, in Spanish culture were like that means that would have been like they would have like just put a blindfold on and you would have just walked in there blind like, "Oh, well, it's cool. It's good." But no, good is the enemy of great. And you say, "You know what? I'm going to unplug from whatever this is and I'm going to plug into what I know and I'm going to be resourceful, but yet I'm going to be intelligent and I'm going to do my homework. I'm going to cross all my tees. I'm gonna dot all my eyes. I'm going to make sure that this is everything I need and some because you were not only thinking what the comeup was going to be in the moment or what the profit was going to be in the moment. You're like, "No, I want to build the legacy. I need something that's going to outlive me." So, talk to me about what was a pivotal moment for you because how and I know the story obviously so that's why I'm asking, but how did you transition out of banking? And how did you not only transition out of banking, but what was taking place? What had to take place in here? What had to take place in here? Because there's a certain heart posture that you have to be on when you decide to go all in on entrepreneurship. When you decide to go all in on your dreams, when you decide to go all in because a lot, again, we were talking about that like people see the success, people see the story, people see the glitz, the glamour, the travels, the smiles, but they don't know the sacrifices. They don't know the blood, sweat, and tears that goes into this. So, there's a lot there to talk about. There's a there's a a different layer of your story that I think is so interesting because it is so profound because a lot of people stay in that dreaming space. Yep. A lot of people stay in that dreaming space. A lot of people just stay in that little gray area cuz they're just like, "Oh, I have a dream and I don't, you know, and whether it's limiting beliefs or whether they don't feel like they have the encouragement or the support system. I mean, nobody really holds you back but yourself of really being real. It's really is up. That's it. So talk to us about that. So I even before I left out, I kind of always believe in what's coming for the future. You got to prepare what's coming up next. Whether you're in entrepreneurship, whether you're in a career with a W2 employment, corporate, whatever it is, you have to always be figuring out, not thinking of the now, but thinking of the year from now, the three years from now. Yeah. And prior to my last role within banking, I was actually a teles sales role. It was a business banker role. Thankfully due to co they transitioned business banking. It was the first time that this particular bank was trying it out and they wanted to do sales to business owners up to $10 million via teles sales which is unheard of. You do like the small businesses but yeah yeah I was wow the only one from the outside meaning that everybody who they hired for that team was internal from that particular bank. I was the first one. It took like four months of interviews, six different interviews, but it was almost a lateral move for me. And I took that because I saw the future. I saw what co did to us. I saw the changes in technology. So I said if I want to be able to work in the future was to come, teles sales is going to be it. People aren't working walking into the banks. They're not going buying services as much as they used to. Look at the Amazons. People just don't walk in the stores as much. Yeah. So I said, "Okay, take this role. It's going to allow you to work from home." I knew entrepreneurship was coming. Just now, not not if, but when. And I said, "If I could work from home, it's going to allow me to do side things." That's why I'm not a big fan of working from home. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. People end up doing side things and other things that they're not supposed to. But I knew that I could focus on other things while being successful at my job and at the same time prepare myself for the f whatever this future's going to come. Yeah. So I questioned for about three months of my life because that was the first time I did any kind of teles sales online sales. I sucked sucked sucked where I was like man I lost it. I don't have it anymore. 6 months in then everything turned up. I caught the hang of it to the point where now clients were needing about two weeks to see me. So everything was allowed a pilot at that point because I built systems that allowed me to start exploring more and more more outside learning new businesses interviewing different franchises and as I prepared myself and got to the point where I met what who used to be my ex- business partner at the point at a networking event and it was a networking event that I was speaking on stage. I did not want to be there. I wasn't going to go cuz I was going through actually it was 15 days after I broke up what used to be my ex marriage and allow but I told myself this is not about you. You're going to go speak for others. Yeah. Something spoken to me and just said you need to go ahead and go for other people. It's not about you. Forget what you're feeling. Just go show up. Thankfully I did cuz that was going to be pitiful moment of where I am today now. Wow. Hold on because we not just going to skate all the you know very lightly. So you were in a whole marriage that ended and we don't need to necessarily get into the depths of why that ended cuz that's not really what's important here. But here is what is important that I don't want anybody to miss. You said forget how I'm feeling right now. And it's not that I'm not going to process my feelings, but this is bigger than me. Absolutely. Cuz at this time, you already had two kids. Yep. So, Ken, being the great man and father that you are, you're like, this ain't about me and my feelings right now. This is about, like you said, I'm always thinking about the next step. I'm always thinking about the future. What is it going to look like a year from now, 3 years from now, 5 years from now? But more than anything is like what I don't want anybody to miss is is not is not doing things when you feel like it. Plans change, decisions do not. It's consistently showing up even when it's tough, even when you don't want to. Absolutely. And that is a mindset in his own that you had to unplug to but also unplug from but also plug into your vision for your life. Your vision for beyond yours your legacy for your children. And you're like even though this was a few weeks, you know, it's still it's still salt. you can still throw salt on the wound type of deal because not that's not something easy to just navigate through you know in any way, shape or form. But it was also well now I'm going to go get out there in the community and let's be real when you are networking your social battery has to be at a certain level especially with us because we're very high energy people. So if we show up to a place and we're not our natural selves, people automatically are going to be like you could see it cuz we wear our heart on our sleeve. So what was going through your mind? Because that's tough to say even I'm going to go show up and I'm going to go to this networking event. And I believe that networking event was on a Sunday because it was like a brunch and I didn't get to go but I remember being invited to it and I didn't get to go to it because I was like, "Oh, I got church. I can't go blah blah blah whatever. But on a Sunday and typically people were like it's football Sunday, it's family Sunday, it's God's time and my family time. We can't just skip on over that cuz yo that's that's major and that speaks volumes of not only what you were what you had to unplug from and the decision but the decision that you had already made and what you were looking towards. For me, it's how I do everything. If you don't have a why, and at the end of the day, I figured that for whatever reason, I was put here on this earth to impact others, to serve others. I really believe that. So wherever I go, anybody who I meet, my goal as I deal with friends, family, employees, business partners, I hope may not always be true, but I hope that I can impact you in a positive way that the day that we are no longer working together, you've become a better person or I've helped you become better in some kind of aspect. Amen. I love that. I live by that. So a lot of the things that I do is to serve others. I actually usually do more for others than I will for myself. Yes, you do. And I speak a lot that with a lot of my teammates because I have teammates who are so self-driven. They wake up every day, go chase their dollar, go help their clients for themselves. Then I have teammates who are not as motivated. And because I've learned that about myself, I've had to tap in to see their personality differences. And I've been able to now motivate others to be able to make them realize you're just built to serve others and you're serving others. So you need the responsibility to make yourself go. Yeah. I found out something myself and now I've been able to help some of my other teammates get to a different level. Plug in from whatever they have been taught to what how is it that they function. So for me that's really what drove me. I said Carlos not about you. It doesn't matter how you feel. Go serve others. Hopefully, you get it back one day. Maybe you won't. It doesn't matter. The people need the knowledge that you're going to give. You were asked to be there for a reason. So, you have to show up for them. Yeah. And I will say this, like I've seen you, you know, in the community back to school, book bag drives, turkey drives, I mean, haircut. I mean the phil the philanthropy that you have embodied in the Tampa Bay community and beyond is part. So thank you. We appreciate you. And also it's leading from the front because it's like it's one thing you're like oh do as I say not as I do and you're like I'm not only going to be that parent but I'm going to be that leader. I'm going to be that businessman. I'm going to be that human being. And you are definitely a servant leader in everything you do. And I love the the fact that it's like yes, we've heard it a lot of times in entrepreneurship. If your why doesn't make you cry, what has you getting up in the morning? What has you getting up in the middle of the night? But it's real. It's real because that why is what's going to drive you. So based on the course that I taught today and I'm all about stats or if you put numbers if you put a why which is very cliche but if you put a why and an emotional attachment to whatever you want to do whatever your goal is if it's shooting basketballs if it's tying your shoe if it's going if you put a why behind whatever you're doing you have two and a half more time chances to accomplishing it than if you don't which is crazy more than double more than double. I believe that. So, it's it was very impactful to see that because that's what now every action that I take, you have to have the why. If there's no why, I'm I'm not doing it. Yeah. I'm not doing it. And that makes sense because what's the what's the point if it's not if you're not doing something that's meaningful? What's the point if it's you're not being intentional behind what you're doing? I've done that for many times. Done that many years. Shows ends up showing sooner or later. You can fake it, but only for so long. Absolutely. But it ends up showing and we going to talk about that right now. Yes. So, you know, we talk about mental health all the time. Absolutely. We talk about therapy. Absolutely. And glory to God that, you know, allowed us to cross paths because I believe that it was so it's been such a not only not only instrumental to my growth in business, but just my growth as a person. There was I remember when I first came to Tampa and I was like it was COVID and then I went to take care of my mom and then I came back and I was like I'm here to build community and let's be real not everybody that you run into is is they post what they supposed to be. Let's be real. So when I remember specifically and this is probably the first time you're going to hear me say this out loud. I remember specifically when I had met you, I was like, "God, if I need one more person that I can read through their BS, I don't think I need to live here anymore. And I don't think you really want me to be here." And then I met you. And I was so like, "My people, thank you." Because, you know, you you just your heart just you feel it. You feel the heart. You feel you feel the servant leadership, but more than anything, you just feel the humanity behind the person. You feel the authenticity and you've always just been that person. So when you were dealing with this divorce, you were also in a transitionary period. You were about to leave banking going into entrepreneurship. Absolutely. So, what is something that had to happen? Because like you said, we can't put on, we have to always put on these masks to show up as the father, to show up as the son, to show up as the leader, as the coach, as the community pillar, right? To show up as the woman, to show up as all of these roles that we have to occupy. Abs. What are some things that you had to tap into when it came to that? because you can only mask it for so long. So during that period, I realized I started being more selfish than I've ever been in my life. And selfish in a way of obviously you see that I'm more into giving to others. Yeah. But I was always one. I've had many acquaintances, many friends by the loads. And I had to start narrowing down and closing myself up on people. Everybody had a different opinion about my divorce, good, bad or indifferent. Yeah. Everybody had a different opinion about the steps I was taking in my career. Everybody had an opinion about what was happening with my kids. And I really had to narrow down and deep down and say, "Who are you? What do you believe in? And what do you stand for?" It was probably the hardest self-t talk I had to have because I'm always one that I want to be liked. Yeah. I want to be liked. We we most of us do. We care to say, "Oh, no." Yeah. Sometimes I don't. It's our basic human need. It's part of our basic what we want to do. Yeah. And I had to say it doesn't matter who has an opinion about what you know what your intentions are when you do things. Deep down you know why you want to accomplish things. So shut everything down. Focus on what this passion is going to be. Focus on this dream that you have. Because I was dipping in so many different things in the past and nothing truly took off. So I said you have to go all in. shut it all out, have the tunnel vision that I've never had in my life. As the first time I've actually told myself, you have to have tunnel vision. I stepped away from I was in in the middle of adding additional Airbnbs and I stepped away from those partnerships. One of the most successful Airbnbs I had, I shut that down. Other business partnerships, I just went as a silent partner. That's what I did. That's a ton of vision. Focus on this. Focus on your kids. And eventually in six months, in a year, doesn't matter how bad it's going to get. If you really do it the right way, if you really do good behind it, the good side will show no matter what the results are. But something good is going to come out of it. And that's where we are today. I doubt. Talk to me about what else you had to plug into as far as tools to give you the not only the tools and the resources, but also to give you the safe space to just be and know that you were on the path because you have this great mindset, this positive attitude, this you you knew all of the steps to take, but there was a lot of pain that you were dealing with on the Absolutely. And I know that men typically it's it's hard to talk about these things. It's hard. It's hard to have these conversations, but it's like men hurt too. Yep. Yeah. Yep. I I had already explored therapy in small bits, but I actually doubled down into therapy at that point. My therapist, and I'm a very intense person. Whenever I grab a hold of something, I'm going to make it happen in whatever kind of way. Yeah. To the point where I was booking therapy. I was trying to book three or four times a month. She's like, "Dude, you got to slow down." So, I said, "No, this is going to work. I'm going to make this work. Whether you want to or not, I'm going to make this work." And my therapist actually said, she goes, "Honestly, I didn't think this was going to work in the beginning, but then I got to see another side of you. I got to open up doors." And that's at the end of the day, that's why you do it. But I ended up doing it twice a month in the beginning. I would go in with notes instead of a notepad. I would actually just keep out, hey, I'm just going to take notes on my phone. And I would take notes on the things that I would discover about myself through those conversations. I would take actionable items that I would then put in play because a lot of times what do we do? We listen. We may write something down but never our intent about what the hell we do. Yeah. So she literally said, "You are the most intentful person that I've had in therapy. Whether it ends up working out or not, I don't know. But at least right now, you're showing that every time you come back, what we talked about, you put it in play. You truly want to make a difference. I love that. And I can say that truly helped me through the hardest time of my life, which was that moment. So, I was going through leaving a 14-year career. Wow. a 12-year marriage almost passion in my entire retirement to start a brand new business. So, first time really truly being an entrepreneur. You can play do side businesses, but nothing like being 100% into it. And figuring out how to be a dad as a single dad. So, figuring all those four things out at the same time. Wow. I mean, Jesus, I don't even like I don't I don't know. So therapy, I can say that truly is probably the primary reason why I was able to get through it the way I did because I was able to uncover a lot of different things about myself that I was having a lot of trouble with that caused me a lot of the reasons why I ended up where I Yeah. Yeah. So thank you for sharing that. I think that it is important for everybody to know that mental health matters. Absolutely. mental health matters. No matter our gender, no matter our socioeconomic background, no matter what it is, if you need help, make sure that you are getting help because everybody needs a safe space without judgment, that you can be free and that you can get the help that you need. And we all need it. Mental health matters because you matter. Thank you for sharing it. Absolutely. Here's why. Also, you know, I'm a huge advocate for mental health. You spoke recently at our mental health matters conference symposium earlier this year. And it's a lot of things that people just kind of think, oh, well, this happened and you know, I've been able to be successful in this and I can overcome this and oh, I'll be able to do that. But I love the fact that you were smart enough to know that, hey, I just ended a 14-year career, a 12-year marriage, and I am transitioning into entrepreneurship. I'm making some very tough decisions. This is not only about me, but this is about my family. This is about my legacy. And like you said, this is about you leading forward the next generation and what you're leaving behind and what you're building. And if you're not building something on a solid foundation, you might as well build it on sand because it is going to crumble. It will crumble one way, shape, or form sooner or later. And I think that that's one of the greatest things because it's like I don't think people are talking about that enough. I don't think people are talking about that enough of no, I had to get help. No. And yes, I feel you your intensity. I I feel also not only your intensity, but your intentionality behind it because you said, "Hey, you know what? Yes. How you do anything is how you do everything. I'mma go here. I'm go four times a month and I'll just kill it." That was like me when I started going to therapy. I wanted to go twice a week. Yep. And when my therapist told me no, I was like, "Fine, I'll just go get another one and I'll see you and I'll see somebody else." Because I could not deal with the pain. I could not deal with the loss. me losing my mom, it was like, yes, and I know the word tells us it's a game for heaven. And you know, we we know all of those things, but when you're living it in the thick of it, and you're lashing out on everybody around you, and if you do not heal from what has cut you, you will bleed on those who didn't. Absolutely. And it is so important for us to get that help because it's not only going to allow us to feel better, but it's going to allow us to be better. It's going to allow us to do better. It's going to allow us to whatever it is that we're putting our mind to now is like we're called to do excellent work. We're called to do things well to when we're going to do things, we're going to do it in a sense of excellence, world class. And you were like, you know what? can't I can't help if I'm not showing up as the best version of me. But for me to show up as the best version of me, I got to go deal with these things that I didn't know. I'm not sure how I can navigate through it. And I love that you said that because I believe that that was pivotal as well to not only you transitioning into your entrepreneurship journey, entrepreneurial journey, but also into you now in a loving family, in a loving relationship, in a new healthy beautiful marriage. I remember even reading helping you guys both with when I'm reading the your vows and I'm putting together these this you know the documents that we have to go through. So each of you were like I never thought I was going to be married again. So that's why even when I'm saying what I was saying I was like and if you never believed that true love is possible look at Carlos and Val. Absolutely. But you guys both were doing the work. And I love that you also encouraged her because she even said that. She was like, "No, this is a friendship. We got hooked up on a playd date." My best friend was like, "Yeah, you got to go." And then he was like, "Oh, you should go to therapy." And I was like, "Sweet. I did. What? What do you mean go to therapy?" Imagine if you never had gone to therapy. Yep. Would you have ever been able to even tell her? No. Or encourag? Not at all. Because a mush is very easy to say something with your mouth, but you're not walking it. How you going to encourage somebody or lead somebody to a place you've never been yourself? Absolutely. You know what I mean? So, it was a ripple effect because you made that decision of plugging into therapy, of plugging into the best version of you and unplugging the beliefs. Exactly. Cuz God, talk about it. Unplugging those beliefs as minorities, as men. It's the thought of like, why are you doing that? You don't need that. I actually had a friend say and I'm I'm a very self-reflective person. I reflect a lot on and the reason why I ended up at therapy was because of self-reflective. I had to I was yes I had to figure out my pain but I was more seeking on what can I do so I don't put myself in this situation again. Yeah. Obviously I did something wrong. Yeah. It didn't work out for a reason. Whether everybody has fault we could easily play it's your fault. But I knew I had fault. So I synced on what can I change so I don't put myself and my kids in a situation again. Yeah. And I remember a friend years before or a year before and it was like why why the like why do you need that? That's for people and it the ignorant thought behind that the stigma is crazy which 10 years before it's exactly the mindset I had. Of course exactly the mindset that I have. Why therapy people only crazy people need that only people who are real issues need that? No, we all got issues. Listen, we all have issues. I found big ass issues. Yeah, let's talk about it. Yeah, I found issues. I didn't know what vulnerability was. Wow. I had no idea what it was. So, I was leading people. I was father. I was leading a family without knowing what that was. And I think it truly did make me today the leader who I am because the person that my teammates, my business partners know now to the person who the people who I used to lead at the bank is two different leaders. Two different leaders. And even with the course that I taught today, this morning I was able to open up in the middle of it and say, "Guys, I go through this. You're going through this. I may be the owner. I may be in the position that I'm in. I also go through this daily. But before it was game face 247. It was a shield you you never saw. That's right. So you got to put it on. And like you said, this that's what we we're also brought up to be we're raised to be very strong. Absolutely. We're raised to be very very strong. Like you said, yo, you got to be crazy to go to therapy. That's for people that got real issues. And you said you found big issues when you were in therapy. Yeah, me too. I was just talking to one of my friends about this last night. I I was like, "Yo, let me tell you, I am a huge advocate for therapy because if I would have never ever gone to therapy, I would have never uncovered the layers of the depth of the not [ __ ] show that was taking place that you don't realize." And you know now, and obviously people are going to be watching the recording to this, but Pastor Todd, Pastor Mike Todd off in Transformation Church, he's doing a series called Triggers. And one of my friends sent it to me, and it's funny because he's talking about what triggers are. And what triggers are when you get triggered is because you have unhealed trauma. Absolutely. But you know why he knows that? Because he went to therapy. And if he would have never gone to therapy, he wouldn't even have known what the traumas are. that because they're unhealed, they're causing you to be triggered. And it's like every time you have a trigger about something, it's because there's trauma there that has just been absolutely And you wonder why so many people we're seeing the the violence that we're seeing. We're seeing the outburst. We're seeing the division. We're seeing the craziness that we're seeing in this world that we're not even going to get into that battle. Let's be real. It's because a lot of people are walking around with unhealed traumas. So they're easily triggered by even what day it is when even they walk into a restaurant in the sense just triggers them. I mean honest truth is that usually when you argue with someone it's not all the time but usually the argument that takes place is not really the pro. Oh yeah, it's a background thing. So yeah, in the back and through my dating time, the time that I actually dated, I would meet women and thankfully the therapy I was able to see these things. Wow. And I would date and I would see things and probably some of them thought that I was crazy because I wouldn't argue about certain things. And I'm thinking my head, it's not my fault. She's mad about this, but it's not me. someone along the line in her past years caused her to think this way, see this thing because I didn't I didn't do anything wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It just came into the picture. So that for me was so profound because it now allows me to realize as I come to different situations to say whatever I have in hand, I used to be emotional to react to whatever it is. And now a lot of times the strategy comes in where I'm like hold on whatever problem we have here, let me see if I'm the problem. if this is the problem, if they have a problem somewhere else that they're lashing it out here, and it's allowed me to react to things a lot more calmly, allowed me to deal with people a lot better than I used to because I would be a reactional at the moment emotional type of person. Yeah, it's good. And there's a difference between reacting and responding because that's really what it comes down to. But it was the awareness that allowed you to say, "Hey, no, this was this was not what was conducive to not only what I want to do and where I want to go, but who I want to be." And also the example that I'm setting not only for my employees and the people that are watching me, the example that I'm setting for my kids, the example that I'm setting for the future leaders of the next generation, which really So talk to me about what is something, you know, when you're where you're at right now, like what what does it look like on a day-to-day basis? like what does your morning routine look like or what are some things that you have to plug into to be this powerhouse that you are today to be this amazing dad, amazing husband? Definitely being selfish with your health. Working out is a must. I saw me a thing on Instagram the other day and if you're getting divorced, go work out. If you're angry, go work out. You're happy, go work out. If you're sad, go work out. Whatever it is, go work out. We often go, whatever we're dealing with, we try to find patches. I used to drink a lot more than I would today. I would go and say, "I'm stressed out. I'm mad. I'm going to go drink." No, I don't do that anymore. Yeah. I now drink because I choose to if I'm in a moment socially, but not to get drunk, not to fall away from those things. I love that. Far too often people will smoke. Let me smoke to get away from whatever I have going at work and my relationship. No. Go work your ass out. Deal with the problem at hand. And you'll see that. And if you want to go smoke later, that's fine. Do whatever you Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But don't use those band-aids to get away from it. So, working out, it makes a big difference on how I carry on and show up on my team. So, that's one of my things that I have to do in the morning. Then from there, if I have the kids, take the kids to school. It's a very conversational, especially with my son now that he's 15. And just spend time talking about what he wants to do on school today, how things are going. That's our catch-up time a lot of times. Yeah. where I was running 2,000 200 mph. And from there, it's plugging into my team. Plugging into my team right away, sending messages, motivating, going different chats, individual messages, group messages, showing up everywhere to everybody because there's other people depending on me. I am one that I have to have responsibility to drive. I'm not one that I'm going to do it for myself. But if I have others depending on me, I realize that. So, I add more, more, more. Yeah. Because it makes me drive a lot further. So I definitely every single morning plugging in to my team and those who are out there that I haven't heard from in a while. Hey, how are you doing? Touch base with those. So that's what my morning consists of now. So plugging into, you know, making sure that you're taking care of self-care. Also plugging into personal development, plugging into teamwork, community, all of these things matter. Absolutely love that all of that. So talk to us about what's next. What what is next for Carlos Gutierrez? I haven't, this is one of the few times that I haven't thought about that yet. What's next further down the road? Yeah. is once I get this business to a place where I don't have to be plugged in 24/7 whether is we sell it whether it is running itself my dream would be to be in a space that I can purchase partner up businesses do consulting to get them from A to Z and whether sell them keeping them in portfolio so that's my dream I love that I now understand that business is business cyclical plants microphones, sales, whatever it is, you have to have a product. It's got to be moved. Yeah. So along the way, you have to understand numbers, P&L, balance sheets, marketing. But if you put systems, those systems in place, every business will move. Yeah. And most businesses, the biggest issue is probably marketing. Yeah. You could have the best product in the world, but it's really the best marketer who's out there winning. Absolutely. So for me, if I figure that out with the systems that we have in place, with the AI technology that we've been able to plug into the different parts of our business, I think that I'll be able to take any business, get it to the next level and either choose to sell it or spin the portfolio. I love that. So, anything you want to leave the people with, leave them with something. You know, we could look into the camera for this one, but leave them with something. Some parting words, marching orders, whatever is on your heart. Absolutely. one. Thank you, Pam. Thank you. I will be the first to call it now. I'm going to reverse this and I will be the one to reverse to do the unplug on Pam. Yes. So, challenge given and she's accepted it. She doesn't have to say yes. So, there you heard it first. I'll be the one interviewing Pam. So, thank you. I appreciate you. My pleasure. But I will say is is that out of everything that I've learned in life, my experiences, the reason why I am here today is because it does not matter how I felt during times. What I've done is during the good times, during the bad times, I've just kept moving forward. I know that everything is temporary. Everything is temporary. Good or bad, everything is temporary. So, if you're in a moment of your life where things suck, it's only going to last for 3 months, 6 months, a year, maybe two years. The worst part of my life was those 6 months trying to figure all those new things out. And I knew it was going to be temporary. So, if I kept going eventually, whenever it was, it could have been 5 years, I don't know. I was willing to endure whatever I need to, but I knew if I kept going, I was going to be okay. Yeah. The truth will come out on the other side. So that's really what I say. Just keep going, keep going, keep going, no matter how you feel. And you're going to see that eventually you're going to get to look back and say, "Those six months were nothing. Those two years were nothing." Yeah. When you look forward, they seem like a lot, but when you look back, you're like, "That was a breeze." Tell them that. Yeah. Oh man. Make sure you guys follow, like, subscribe, drop your comments below, and make sure you guys follow Carlos Gutierrez, Financially Fluent Fam. Let them know where to find you. Yes. Be great Carlos. I will challenge you all to be great. Yes. And FinnfluentFam. Uh you can find us on Instagram. Stay tuned for the next one. Appreciate you guys. Blessings. Let's get it. That was good.