From the Chicago Bulls to Building Legacy Wealth with Chris Gandy | LINK LIVE EP. 18

Welcome back to the Link Live Podcast, presented by Link Creative. For Episode 18, host Lorenzo Costa, CEO of Link Creative, is joined by entrepreneur, former professional basketball player, and financial industry leader Chris Gandy, Founder and CEO of Legacy Wealth Group and President of NAIFA (National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors).

Chris’s journey is one of transformation, discipline, and long-term vision. From growing up in Starkville, Mississippi and later Kankakee, Illinois, to becoming a top national basketball recruit, playing for the University of Illinois, and eventually earning a roster spot with the Chicago Bulls, Chris experienced firsthand the preparation and mindset required to perform at the highest level. After witnessing how many athletes struggled with financial decisions despite earning significant income, he pivoted into financial services, turning a personal curiosity about managing money into a mission to help individuals and families build sustainable wealth and avoid the financial pitfalls he saw throughout professional sports.

Today, Chris leads Legacy Wealth Group, advises clients nationwide, and advocates for financial literacy and industry policy through his leadership role at NAIFA.

Inside the Episode
In this conversation, Lorenzo and Chris break down the transition from athlete to financial leader:

- From Small Town to the Big Stage: Chris reflects on growing up in Mississippi and Illinois, discovering basketball, and ultimately becoming a top national recruit before playing at the University of Illinois and later with the Chicago Bulls organization.

- Lessons from the Bulls Dynasty Era: Chris shares what it was like practicing alongside elite players and witnessing the discipline, preparation, and relentless work ethic that separated great players from everyone else.

- Athletes & Financial Mistakes: After seeing how many athletes mishandled sudden wealth, Chris became determined to build a career helping people make smarter financial decisions and avoid becoming statistics.

- The Identity Shift: Chris opens up about transitioning from being known as “Chris the basketball player” to becoming a financial advisor and entrepreneur, learning that what you do and who you are are two very different things.

- Building Legacy Wealth Group: After years in the financial industry and leadership roles within major firms, Chris stepped away to build his own company focused on leadership, impact, and generational wealth.

- Success vs. Significance: Chris shares how his definition of success evolved from chasing numbers and achievements to focusing on significance, impact, and helping people improve their lives through financial education.


CHRIS GANDY:
Website: https://tlwgllc.com
INSTAGRAM | @coach_cgandy
LINKEDIN | Chris Gandy

LINK CREATIVE:
Website: https://linkcreativeco.com
YT | https://www.youtube.com/@linkcreativeco
INSTAGRAM | https://www.instagram.com/linkcreativeco/ 
TIKTOK | https://www.tiktok.com/@linkcreativeco

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I said he who leads the most people will win. You mean I just gotta give it the most shots? Fine. Talk us through that identity tip. Why do you think so many athletes are reckless with their finances? What were the most effective strategies for developing leads? I was meeting somewhere between 20 and 25 people a day. What do you think are the most foundational things for financial success?

SPEAKER_02 0:21

One of the my mentors told me nothing in this world is new. It's all borrowed and repurposed. The best thing about this is you can borrow and repurpose everything I'm telling you and make it your own. Just add another word.

SPEAKER_00 0:33

What's going on, everybody? It's Lorenzo with Link Creative. We're welcomed by none other than Chris Gandhi, the CEO and founder of Legacy Wealth Group, the current president of NAFA, the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisory. Chris used to be a member of the University of Illinois men's basketball team. He then went on to be a Chicago bull where he had a career in the NBA for a few years. Chris takes us through transitioning out of the NBA into the professional world and what financial freedom truly looks like. So without further ado, Chris Gandhi, Link Live episode 18. Don't forget to like, comment, subscribe, share these videos. It goes a long way. We really appreciate you guys' support as always. Let's hop into the episode. So we're back with another episode of Link Live. We're welcomed today by a very special guest, close friend of mine here, Chris Gandy, founder, CEO of Legacy Wealth Group, uh, president of NAFA, which we'll get into. But you honestly have a million accolades, so um we're gonna we're gonna touch them all here. Um Chris and I have known each other now for a couple years. He is a pioneer in insurance, tax strategy, financial literacy, and all things um there. So I'm excited to get into this episode. He has a lot of wisdom um and a lot of stories. So Chris, thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_02 1:49

I appreciate you inviting me in. And um hopefully this is one of the accolades that I can add to the list of things that I've accomplished in my career as being a part of of a wonderful show like yours.

SPEAKER_00 2:02

Amazing. Awesome. Um, like all shows, and like I was kind of telling you off camera, I want to start with younger Chris and kind of your your upbringing, your story, and how we got to this point. A lot of people know you through your days of playing professional basketball and your days uh playing basketball for Illinois, which we'll get to, but I want to start kind of from you know, adolescents, even like high school, Chris, where you were from, how you kind of got into the space you're in today. Sure, sure.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

Um, if I just rewind the tape a little bit, um, you know, I'm from Starkville, Mississippi, so a southern boy, and uh my mother eventually moved up to uh about an hour south of Chicago, uh the Kankakee area. Um Kankakee is very blue-collar, and uh you know I learned a lot there. I learned a lot about just the the essence of being young and growing up, um making mistakes and and and learning how to fall in love with uh with with at least one of the games. You know, my the first game I played was baseball. I love baseball, you know, America's pastime. But uh as a pitcher and a first baseman, I was really good because I was I was really long and lanky, you know, and so uh had an opportunity in Kankakee to be part of a great couple teams and uh learned to fall in love with the idea of winning and losing and um and slowly but surely people kept saying maybe you should try basketball because my uncle uh my uncles, right, so I have five, they were all pretty good at basketball, and then my uh one of my uncles had gone on to play college basketball.

SPEAKER_03 3:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 3:49

And so they were all really tall and wildly athletic, and so they said, Well, you should try it. And I held on to dear life of not playing the game because other people told me to do it. Yeah, so um I learned to be stubborn in Kankakee too. So uh but shortly after that, just uh I played started to play basketball and um I wasn't very good at it at first and then uh I was determined to really work at it and uh figure out if I could be good at it. So between my seventh and eighth grade year, decided that I wanted to study the game, really start to play the game a little bit. And uh between seventh and eighth so between sixth and seventh grade got pretty good, but between seventh and eighth grade got really good. Was one of the better ones on the seventh, eighth grade team. Um, from going not playing in sixth grade at all, sitting the bench on the B team. Many people may remember the B team, they used to call them B team bombers. Because basically, uh you could score a total of maybe eight to ten points a game. Well the whole team. Oh my god. And uh but you you you learn a lot, you learn camaraderie, you know, you learn you learn that it's all not about winning and losing. Uh, you know, at times I I I wish I could go back to being as innocent as I was at that time where it wasn't about winning and losing, it was just about about being a part of a team and being part of a culture where you got a chance to learn and just have fun, right? Um that was the the essence of what I learned there. Um went on to high school and grew six inches in a summer. Wow. And uh got noticed by some high school other other pl people we were playing against and uh got noticed nationally after scoring a bunch of points here and there, and they said this kid has a chance. And um got invited to the ABC camp in Indianapolis, which was a regional camp, Nike. And uh from there met Sonny Viccaro, which is the the czar of Nike, yeah. One of the you ever go back and read anything about Sonny Viccaro and Nike? Uh Sonny Vicaro is one of the ones that was connected to uh to shortly after Jordan, like the Jordan brand, and I mean he was the go-to guy at the time. Uh when Nike was launched, wanted to get go into basketball. Matter of fact, I think that movie that came out, Sonny Viccaro was mentioned because he was the pipeline of future talent for Nike. Um and uh got his chance to to play in Sonny's ABC camp, uh, which was the premier camp at the time, and did pretty well. Nice. So rose up to one of the top hundred prospects in the country. Um got to number forty-three or forty-five or something. Lo and behold, doors, you know, people start knocking at the door saying, Hey, we think you should come play college basketball. But you know, college basketball for me was never an intent. College basketball for me was a ticket to get out of the economic situation and and get get away from home and get an opportunity to live independently as a young man. So that's what it really was for me a ticket to education.

SPEAKER_00 7:11

So yeah, that's what I took it as. So back in that time you were getting scouted, you ultimately decided on Illinois. Was there any kind of reasoning behind that? A little closer to Kinkakee? Were there any other schools you're interested in at the time?

SPEAKER_02 7:26

Uh yeah, I was interested in a couple, but I had to go where I knew I would I would actually maybe get an opportunity. At the time, Illinois was in um not in a great time in Illinois, Illinois was actually on a uh uh limited scholarship opportunity because they were on um probation at the time. Um so they only had two scholarships, but that offers from Ohio State, offers from Michigan, Michigan State, Northwestern. I mean, I'm thinking about the Big Ten teams, but most of the teams in the Big Ten, I think the only one I didn't get an offer from in the Big Ten was Penn State, and I think they were relatively new at the time.

SPEAKER_03 8:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 8:08

So I mean it was really my choice. Out of the top 50 schools, I probably had a chance to probably go to 40 other, probably 40. So really my pick to go to wherever I thought was going to suit my talents the best they possibly could. And again, I I had no idea what it was going to be, but I was open. I wanted to go. I wanted to leave home, not look back, go and create, be independent, go be a young man and go have some fun in college.

SPEAKER_00 8:37

Love it. At what point in college did sort of that that same spark or same feeling in heist where you're like, you know, this is probably gonna turn into something still a bit more serious. College, maybe an opportunity for me here. When did that experience happen in college when you thought maybe have an opportunity to go pro here?

SPEAKER_02 8:56

I didn't. Believe it or not, I didn't.

SPEAKER_03 8:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 8:59

Um it was always a surprise, which is still today I'm still shocked I even had a chance. But for my first three years at the University of Illinois, I got a chance to play, but I wasn't playing to my potential. Uh some may be circumstance, some may be because of timing, some may be because of of just my confidence and in my in myself because of the actual um structure and the and the actual coaching system, the system in which I was playing under. Um for one reason or another, I didn't I couldn't build that confidence that aligned with my skill set and um my senior year. I was pretty good, but my senior year, we had an opportunity to play under a new coach, new regime, so I got a chance to start fresh in everybody's mind. Got it. And so they didn't know any any of the history of of of me being somewhat timid when I was out playing, um, because I didn't want to make a mistake, right? The worst thing you want to do is go out and make a mistake, but because you're playing timid, you're not playing as aggressive as you should. Right. And so um the coaching structure we were under, if you made a mistake, it was one that could sit you on the bench for a couple couple games. Wow. And so, you know, as a freshman, sophomore, you're like, I don't want to make a mistake. And you're playing on your heels, you're playing passive versus playing aggressive. Um, and I remember our coach saying one time, he goes, You're the best practice player we've we've got on the team. And I'm like, well, put me in the game and don't pull me out, right? When when I make a mistake, because everybody's gonna make a mistake. It doesn't matter if it's in business, if it's in life, you're going to make mistakes and your ability to learn from your mistakes so that you can pivot or your opportunity to improve so then you can identify those mistakes uh openly and not feel ashamed for making them. Right. Um, not saying you feel good about them, but also not be ashamed because you made it and feel like your opportunity has slipped through your fingertips because of that. Right. And so getting a new coach was fresh ground. It's like a reset. It's a reset for me. And yeah, it gave me the opportunity to learn from a new coach that played differently. So we played in the Big Ten, which was you know, you you bang around, seven footers, 260, 270 pounds. As you see, I'm thin to win, still having gained a bunch of weight, but I was always a thinner framed guy. Sure. Um, I would like to call it a skinny athletic. That's what I was. I was um I was uh fairly slim, so I had an opportunity to get up and down the court faster than a lot of the big guys. I could jump a little bit higher in the big guys, and I can actually, you know, one thing my coach taught me in high school was that if you can always score the basketball, big guys that can shoot will always have a place in sport in basketball and white. Yeah. So my coach was religious about shooting and scoring, shooting and scoring. So I always had the ability to hit the 18 to 20 foot jump shot, even in high school. And big guys just would be stuck in the paint, they wouldn't come out and guard me, so I'd just light them up, and then when they came out, I'd just go around them and dunk on them, you know what I mean? Like it was stuff like that. So it you know, I I could use my athletic ability over that. So the opportunity of starting something new or getting a new coach just allowed for me, like you said, to reset and then prove that not only to everyone else, but prove to myself that I I'm supposed to be here. Sure. And um, you know, with the new NIL, I would have got another year. I might have been I might have been lottery by then, but under a new coach. But new coach came in, brought in a new regime, a new scheme. Okay. We played fast instead of wait till they come down and bang up everybody. We didn't play that way. And allow for us to use our capabil our athletic ability to speed the game up and play at the pace in which we were comfortable playing it. And that fit right in the the way I was built and the way in which I uh I went about playing the game going forward.

SPEAKER_00 12:59

Nice. Well then you go on to playing for the Bulls, right? Out of college? Yeah. At a time where uh They were pretty good. They were pretty good. Not to uh date you here, but what year would that have been when you entered the league?

SPEAKER_02 13:16

No, no, seriously, I was uh I graduated from the University of Illinois uh this fall of ninety-six, and in ninety-seven I finished at Illinois. So ninety si that that season ninety-seven, I was uh a free agent in Chicago. And so people were like, I I looked at the drafts, I didn't see you. Well, no, you gotta look so so in most people don't realize how the game actually works, is the Bulls that year only had two picks. Okay. Uh the last pick of the first round and a pick in the second round. Their pick that year was Rusty LaRue. You can Google it if you want, and uh and Keith Booth out of uh Keith was out of uh Maryland and Rusty was out of Kansas.

SPEAKER_03 14:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 14:07

And uh those were their two picks. Their intent wasn't to keep any of them, right? Their intent was to fill their roster, and then so you had five or six or seven of us playing for what they call a roster spot. And so you might remember Jordan Pippen, Robin Dennis, but there those are five guys. And then you might remember Ku Coach and Luke Longley and those guys, and that's another three or four guys. But typically an NBA roster will have 15, 14, 15, 16 guys. And the reason why they have those guys is because those are the guys that on every day we're the ones that they actually practice against. They don't practice against themselves, they're actually practicing against, and then we would rotate on and off who dresses and things like that. So an opportunity to hang out in Chicago and see some of the best basketball from the front row.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

Unbelievable. Pretty cool. Um, being around guys at that level, what were some of their daily habits, mentalities that maybe rubbed off on you, whether it was directly or not, something that you observed that you saw compounded into success?

SPEAKER_02 15:16

Well, the biggest thing I saw is that they practiced just like they played. Like practice was a full-time game. There was no practice was the hardest thing ever. Because if you practice that hard, then the games become easy. Right. And because they were practicing it at it at that level, you learn how to play at that level. Or you try your best to keep up the play at that level. But every every possessions competition, every time you step on the floor, expect to expect that the ball's coming your way. Every time there's a competition, you need to try to win, right? Don't you know? So it's just there were some things that were ingrained in the players there that just was top-notch. It was the eliteness of what they have accomplished in the past, and here's how our expectations of the people that are going to be affiliated with our team. Wow. So when they roll a ball out there, you under time you understand what time it is. It's not time to hire a shoe, you better be ready. Okay. Because they're coming at you full speed. So um it was it was great though. You know, there's so many things that prep. Um I saw guys work out more than they played basketball. I I'll I'll tell you, most people did not realize this, but which is just insane to me, some of the some of the mentalities, because it was so extreme. But we go, we'd see Dennis and a couple of guys work out before practice. Full-blown workout. I'm talking about lifting weights, pushing what pushing weight, I mean, heavy weight. And they're like, they're coming to practice for two, three hours. They're gonna be gas, right? Yeah. Come to practice, go get an ice bath, whatever, and then go lift weights again. I mean, I'm like, wow, okay. So that's a different type of, and that's the difference between a commitment and an interest. Right. Is that you know it the difference is inconvenience. And so it was understandably very inconvenient. I'm sure they didn't feel good about doing it. I'm sure they didn't want to do it. I'm sure, but they understand by doing that their body was prepared for when it came time to, when everybody else was tired, they they could count on their body because they had put it through so much. Right. Yeah, that was the commitment I saw at so many levels. Um, studying of the game, game film, like to the nth degree of being able to like study plays and people's tendencies when it comes down to catching the ball, you know, where they run to on the floor, like down to each person on the they would memorize those things. So they would know people's tendencies prior to them even thinking about what they were going to do. So if you can focus on that a little bit, and then the execution on the triangle. The execution on the triangle was a book probably this thick of options for off the triangle. If you didn't know what to do, they tell you to go sit on the bench, they tell you go sit over there and know the playbook. And so if you think about it in everyday life, no one tells you what to do or how to do it. Right. Right? No one tells you what plays to run. Um, but they always tell you you gotta do whatever you're gonna do when you decide to do. You gotta do put 110% into it. So you know, in business and life and love and kids, and you gotta put 110% into whatever you decide to do, and you gotta commit to whatever that is, and when you commit, you gotta commit 120%. Um now I think we all are a little, you know, like, well, I don't want to commit and lose. I don't wanna I don't wanna but think about that if I go back to sports. Imagine if I played with the idea that I'm playing not to lose versus playing to win. You know, that's a losing proposition. I'm gonna lose before I even before I really start. Right. And so um that mentality is something that uh I think has helped. I still struggle with it because those guys were built that way, right? And so because they were so good at that one thing and they were able to compartmentalize those things, the other things in their life also suffer. So you know that people love athletes, they love the idea of athlete this, athlete this. But what most people don't realize is we're human just like everybody else, and so the things that you learn to do there also hurt some of the other things, other areas, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Absolutely. Well, you go on to play three three or so seasons um in the league, play some some time in in France overseas, right? Um one thing that sticks out to me, or one question I wanted to ask is was financial services always in the back of your mind? Did you go in intentionally with that? Is that something that naturally progressed after you were exposed to some of the experiences in the league?

SPEAKER_02 20:07

No, I I saw that a lot of athletes made bad decisions with money.

SPEAKER_00 20:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:13

So I saw a lot of recklessness as it dealt with money, as it dealt with the way they they they they dealt with business. So I thought that I could be a conduit to help players because the one thing I did learn about athletes is they trust each other. You know, there were there'd be millions of dollars, and to the to date I've I've not heard of this yet, and I'm still waiting to hear, it's very rare. I don't think I've ever heard it actually. I've never heard of a stick-up in a locker room. Right? I've never heard of somebody getting all their jewelry stole in a locker room, right? You see there's millions of dollars in a locker room of jewelry, cars, stuff, and your locker's open. It's not like it's locked. It's whoever has access to the locker room can go into it. But the thing is, there's an unridden rule amongst athletes is that we don't take from each other because we all went through the fire together, right? We all went through the struggle together, and that's that's that that's part of it. So um it's been a lesson that I've learned, and we've been able, but that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a resource for other athletes, so they didn't end up statistics.

SPEAKER_00 21:22

Why do you think so many athletes are reckless with their finances? Obviously, I'm sure it's driven by ego and the fame and the perception and all that, but from being someone who who's seen both sides, do you think there's another reason driving kind of the reckless behavior with some of it?

SPEAKER_02 21:37

Well, I think it's a couple things, and um I'm sure there's more similar to what you've said. But I think a lot of it has to do with um the environment in which they grew up. Sure. I I believe we are a by product of what we see here and do, and so kids tend to mimic the behaviors of their parents. And so and that's you know, acad that's acad Academic. It's not a belief of Chris Gandhi's. If you study just forget athletes for a moment, people have a tendency to mimic the behaviors of their parents. And so if you're you saw your parents make smart financial decisions, you tend you have a tendency to actually make smarter financial decisions because of it. Right. Um, if you saw your parents just abuse credit cards and things like that, you have a tendency, whether you wanted to or not, subconsciously, yeah, that undercurrent of what you're actually doing will have a tendency to do the same types of things. And now we flip it back to athletes. So many athletes come from uh lower income environments or environments where they might be a single-parent household, or they may be from a household that might not have the financial means to be able to understand the economic, what I call fundamentals of building and sustaining wealth. And now all of a sudden, you have somebody who's never had it. The people you love and care about have never been aware of it or accustomed to it or dealt with it, and now they've got it, and now they're out on their own trying to figure it out. And so I think much of it has to I think even more of it has to do with where they came from and the environment in which they're in. And then there's no, you know, there's no boundaries or rules around the spending in sports, quite frankly. There's no there's no guide rails to say, okay, if you do this and this, you'll be successful. Right. Um, so I think a lot of it has to do with where they came from and then the fact that there's there's just no no boundaries around 100%.

SPEAKER_00 23:42

Yeah. Um so you segue into financial services, and I feel like a lot of athletes, former athletes, get into the financial services space. It seems like a natural progression. You kind of just alluded to the reasoning as to why you were passionate about it. Um, but talk us through that identity shift. It's one of the the developing topics I want to talk about today is identity shifts, um, understanding your identity, right? I'm sure up until that point, so many people identified with Chris as the basketball player, the basketball guy, this and that, right? And then you make a shift into financial services. Talk to us about what that looked like, how you overcame that, um, and also what it looked like to segue and kind of transfer into a new industry at that time, building up your book and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 24:30

Well, I think it's it's hard. And I'll speak on behalf of the athletes that are out there, is I've always said what I did and who I were what who I was as a person were two different things.

SPEAKER_03 24:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:42

So um, if you think about an athlete, it goes down. So if we rewind the tape, do you remember back in the day it was athletes are role models? Athletes are role models, and there was a big commercial on that, and then the media jumped onto it and said athletes are role models, and then Charles Barclay finally said, Athletes are not role models for your kids. You guys are the first role model or the or their parents. So it's the idea that athletes are held at a at a almost on a on a pedestal, right, of understanding that this is who they are. And so it doesn't matter if you're knowledgeable or not, it doesn't matter if you're smart or not, it doesn't matter at the end of the day, you're an athlete. Like Magic Johnson, it doesn't matter if he's won three championships, it doesn't matter if he's he's still Magic Johnson, right? And so what do you recognize Magic Johnson? The first thing you say is basketball.

SPEAKER_03 25:36

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 25:37

But most people don't realize Magic Johnson's made more money outside of basketball than he did play in basketball than he did play in basketball. Michael George made more money outside of basketball than he did playing basketball. So why is it that society recognizes him as basketball? It's because it was a first introduction of who he was as a person. Well, it's the same for me as who I was, who I was how I was brought on the scene, was not why I was was why I was there. But what I did with that was was up to me. So for me, getting into financial services was I was really good with numbers. It was the natural in high school, I was just really good with numbers. Um the reason why I exceled at sports because I was actually good at numbers. I understand percentages and I also understood ratios and I also understood actually uh angles on the court and just weird stuff like that. Yeah. Almost savant ish. Um, but I just really understood those those type of things. And so after an injury, uh most of my contracts looked like they were pretty much drying up, and then a lot of them got paid out to me within a small window of time.

SPEAKER_03 26:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 26:49

And I wanted to figure out what to do with the money, and I heard my mom in the back of my head saying, Don't spend all your money in one place. Um, like all mothers do, I think, right? They want to look out for us. Um and I didn't want to make all the mistakes that everybody else has made. So I jumped into financial services by default. I I like to say that this industry chose me. I I didn't choose that. Um same thing as the identity thing. Um, it chose me because I came into it with trying to understand what to do with this this opportunity that's ahead of me. What to do with this money that I've gotten paid, and not displace it with this is going to be I'm rich. To think of it as this is an opportunity for me to unlock the next door of my life. And that's what it did. So I came in and talked to a guy at the time, he was with a company. He said, Chris, I want to talk to you about what are you gonna do next, what are you gonna do with your money, those type of things. And I said, I don't know. And after an hour or two, he sat down and he said, Okay, well, here's where you should put it. You should put some here, put some here, put some here. He actually laid out a wonderful plan and actually said, This is why you're never gonna run out of money, this is why you're gonna be a multimillionaire over the course of your life. And I'm like, I don't have multi-millions, but it's gonna grow to that. Yeah. And so it was really fascinating to me, and I'm by nature I'm pretty curious. I'm always curious about people's story. How did you get here? Tell me about your story, what were the struggles? I'm really curious about people. So I was curious about him. Like, how did you get here? And he told me his story. He said, You know, I was recruited back from college, played sports in college. He goes, I was able to take what I learned in sports and use it here. I was like, Really? He said, Yeah, just like shooting jump shots. You gotta take how many shots a day. And I tell him, he said, imagine if you can make that many phone calls or reach out to that many people, right? Are you gonna make them all? I said, No, you're not, right? And then he'd come back and say, Okay, so how many do you think you're gonna make? Maybe 30, 40 percent, depending where I'm shooting from. He goes, okay, so 30, 40 percent, you're gonna talk to those, but all of those aren't gonna go in. Some of those are gonna hit the rim, some of those backboard, are they all gonna go in swish? No, probably not. How many are gonna go in and swish?

SPEAKER_01 28:56

Maybe like 10%.

SPEAKER_02 28:58

He goes, okay, perfect. He goes, that ratio 10-3-1 will live for with you forever. He goes, if you can do that, he goes, you'll be successful in this career. I said, wow. Maybe, right? And I understood numbers. Yeah. Right? So if you go back to what I said, numbers just made sense to me. So I know I didn't make every shot I made it, I didn't make every shot and I didn't shoot, so I shot it, shot every time. I shot as many as I could, get as many shots as I could. There was a standard that was there that they that the organization set out, this is how many people you need to contact a day. So I took that number and actually did twice as much. So I would have my progression, my growth would grow faster. And uh I became more skilled at at playing the game that other people were playing because I didn't have a network. My network was people that I knew growing up with that didn't have money. Right. So their network were people that maybe they grew up with money, and they had a great network, people that ran companies, things like that. So I I didn't have that. So I had to fight my way out of trying to figure it out, and the only way I did that is by doing it more than other people. Right. And so financial services kind of found me. But I go to your identity piece. Who I am now and what I do are two different things. Um, don't confuse the two. Uh what I do now is I help people try to show up as their best version of themselves financially through education and empowerment, so then they can actually live a better quality of life, not for me, for themselves and their families, for the people they love and care about. So so they can be better in their communities. Because if we have solid people that can stand on their own financially in their own communities, the communities will rise up and be better for it, right? Yep. Um, but where do they go get those resources from? Right? There has to be people that give more than they receive, and so the idea is that we could create that that place, that environment for people to do that. That's the reason why I feel called to this industry is to help as many people as we can.

SPEAKER_00 30:58

Amazing. At the time when you started, what were some of the like the most important and I guess effective strategies for developing relationships, for developing leads and continuing conversations, right? There wasn't as much tech, obviously, as there is today to do that. What were some of those early strategies?

SPEAKER_02 31:17

My thing was I used to, you won't believe this. Some people some people may listen to this and say, I can't believe he actually did that. But I did, right? So they said he who meets the most people will win. Regardless of what they say, regardless of how they do it, regardless, and I was like, you mean I just gotta get up the most shots? Fine. So they told us that you had to go out and you had to meet about 10 people a week, introduce yourselves, get their business card, tell them who you are. I think they called it an elevator pitch at the time, or whatever it was. I'm not sure. Um and I did that. And I found that I can only get to so many per per day because there's only so many places I can go where there's people. Sure. Because I would go where people are, right? Then I stopped and thought about it, and most people don't do this. Most people don't think about the strategy before they actually implement it. What they try to do is implement a strategy while they're going full speed. So I'll relate it to this. Most people will actually think about driving the car and then changing the tire as they're driving it. That's pretty disastrous, right? So you have to stop the car, change the tire, and then do that. So I kind of stopped for a moment and thought about where will most people go in the morning? Where will most people go at lunchtime? Where will most people go in the afternoon? If I go there and I actually have an intelligent way of introducing myself, I'm somewhat gregarious in nature. I can talk to people, I can actually overcome a couple objections and just be kind and nice to people. If I have the opportunity to do that, I'm gonna ask for the opportunity to earn their business. That's it. Some are gonna say yes, some are gonna say no, but at least I took my I took the shot. Right. So what I decided to do was I decided to go to Panera Brid. It was big where I was where I was at. I decided to go to Panera Brid, and I bought every morning I would buy ten coffee gift cards. They were five bucks. Then I go in line a couple times, I get my tea, sit down, go in line. When the line would get, so between seven and eight o'clock, it was really, really, really busy there. And people would have to wait. They'd wait five or seven minutes to actually order their coffee. So I just go up to people and say, hey, I want it I want to make your day better. I will I would like to give you something from my heart to yours that would make your day better. And I'd love to give you my business card, and maybe sometime we could sit down and maybe have a cup of coffee together, just like I'm gonna buy you. And I would just give out the I give out the gift cards, and on the back of it would have my business card. And then other people I say, Do you have a business card? And they say, Yeah, of course. And they give me their business card. So I was meeting, literally at breakfast time, I was meeting five to seven people. I was meeting another five to seven people in the afternoon at lunch places. I'd go sit at the bar and sit there and I'd walk, I'd introduce myself to this person. I just would I I found a way to meet people. Sure. I'd go to networking events, after hours, things like that. So I was meeting somewhere between 20 and 25 people a day. Every day. And most people were meeting somewhere between 20 to 25 people a week. And so my my growth was there's nothing gonna stop me from meeting I don't need it I don't need approval to introduce myself to people. And so I just introduced myself to way more people than other people did. Wow, invited them into conversation.

SPEAKER_00 34:34

Principle still stands true today, right? With volume and sales and all that. At that time you were with Northwestern Mutual, right? Yeah. Um so you were able to kind of run your own business and and leverage the structure that they were able to provide for you at the time. Um why do you think Northwestern Mutual gets such a bad rap, like modern day? I don't know if you've heard of about that, but at least when I was like getting out of school or like people were looking to get a job in the financial services field. Um if you went and pursued something at Northwestern Mutual, I think part of the reason is because like you were just able to get a position without like barely having to interview. Sure. But um current day they're kind of a bad bad rap for no reason.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

But well I think I think the Northwestern Mutual and I'll relate it to the military, it's not for everybody.

SPEAKER_00 35:27

Right.

SPEAKER_02 35:28

It's a unique training system. I will tell you, I wouldn't be sent here if I didn't go through the Northwestern Mutual training system. So kudos to them because they developed the what I would call the elite training system for the elite salespeople. Period. There's there's in in the insurance industry, there's no one close.

SPEAKER_00 35:48

I read something about the million-dollar club that you were part of, right? Million dollar round table, right?

SPEAKER_02 35:53

Round table, yes. So one of the things that they they they do is they teach people how to sell insurance at a very high level. That's that's one thing they they do do, and they hold people insanely accountable for the way in which they do it. Like there's a metrics, there's a system, there is a process. If you don't follow that process, it's like the military. You get you're not gonna be here. It doesn't mean you can't be in the military, you just can't be in this unit. Right? So I'm if I'm looking at that group of of professionals at this time, I'm thinking that it's more like they're like the SEALs or the Delta Force, right? They because it is specific to doesn't mean you can't be in the military, right? Right? But it just simply means that if you follow that model and you can make it there, you can make it anywhere. So I think it gets a little bit of a bad rap because it's not for everybody. But everybody goes, but the major so many people go there first, and a lot of people don't have that mental toughness or discipline to do the things that they ask you to do. That makes sense. So it's never their fault, right? It's always their fault, right? And so it's never, and sometimes it's just not the right fit, right? And that's okay too.

SPEAKER_00 37:09

Um so you pursued a career there for a while until then starting Legacy Wealth Group. Was there anything in between that I'm missing? Or it kind of transitioned right into that?

SPEAKER_02 37:20

Yeah, so I was at Northwestern Mutual and did a did a bang up job there, brought on a couple friends, convinced them. I said, listen, you're not doing anything else. Why don't you come join my team? And I taught them how to do the business too, and I I recruited some other people, did the college training thing, was teaching young people how to do the business, got excited, and I'm like, I can lead people. This is kind of cool, just like sports. Um, I was a captain on our team, so I was leading our team too. Um I was one of the leading scorers, so I was leading by actually doing and by actually, you know, empowering others and encouraging others along the way. So I got into this business thinking, and I had a whole I've always had a mindset that I wanted to be a leader, not a follower. I've always wanted to be progressive in thought. I've always wanted to be a visionary of actually the industry, not just a reactor, just not an actor in somebody else's movie. So even when I was playing playing basketball, I always wanted to be a head coach when I played, right? And so if you think about it, there's the uh player. If you think about the hierarchy of a sports team, there's the player, there's the GM, there's the assistant coach, there's the head coach, and then there's the owner of the team, right? And what's interesting is the owner can afford to pay all the other people. So that kind of made sense. Like, what do I need to do to become an owner? And in these systems, the way the systems are built at Northwestern, I raised my hand and said, I want to be a coach, right? Because coach was the avenue, coaching others, helping people achieve what they need to achieve, and by that, me achieving what I need to achieve. It allowed for me to tap into the idea of growing from within. So the one thing I didn't do is stop being a producer. So I always was a producer, always on the on the field of actually creating opportunities and building clients. And then um I raised my hand to be in in quote unquote management andor a field leader. So I took a field leader position at Northwestern, did well the first two, three years, and then left Northwestern Mutual and went to Mass Mutual because I thought that my progression was seated, was moving slowly because there was only so many seats at the top. There was one seat, which was GA, and that general agent role, that role didn't have my name on it at that company. Doesn't mean it didn't have, you know, just like being a part of a team. You know, it doesn't mean that I I can't play on in the league because I don't play for the Bulls. Okay. I just go play for another team. So I took that jersey off, put on another jersey, went to Mass Mutual here in the city of Chicago, joined a group and helped grow that group to a pretty prominent group in the country. Um we had probably six, seven offices around Chicago. Uh we were doing amazing work. We were recognized nationally as uh one of the most unique and diverse organizations within the company at Mass Mutual for a long time. And Mass Mutual was a great experience. Uh got a chance to learn, got a chance to build very large groups, uh, got a chance to lead a couple diversity groups in that space too. Um It was great. It was great. But that was my first my first introduction to real corporate America, Fortune 100 company at the time. I think they were 100 they were Fortune 500, they were 106 at the time. And uh there were just some cultural things involved in that as large as that was that just made it so then locally it was very difficult to work within the infrastructure here if you didn't have a good leader. Okay. So if you didn't have a good coach, you you couldn't go to the corporate side of it and be like, that guy's not a good coach, get rid of him. Right? It was well, that's not our issue. Like it's the brand is the brand is the brand is the brand. So it just wasn't it got to a place after about eleven years where him and I, um, the way in which we thought about doing business was different. Um my vision for building something significant, the legacy, that's where that comes from. Um his idea was me, me, me, me, me, like how do I build for me? And so um we eventually separated. Okay. And uh legacy wealth was born. I said I was never going back to the you know, to the ivory tower, you know, to the tower where they're not connected to the field that way. So we'll figure it out. And uh 24-7 a day it became like recreate yourself, recreate yourself. I thought about college, you know, then my story goes full circle.

SPEAKER_03 41:56

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 41:57

I recreated myself in this industry probably twelve times. Uh and it all goes back to I I did it in college. I played on that team for a long time, and then there was a new coach that came in. When that new coach came in, he didn't know anything that happened before, so I got a chance to recreate that identity that you mentioned, who I was, and in their eyes, I don't know who that person was, but this is the person that we know. Um, this is the person that we believe in. And the same thing in our industry. I got a chance to build something from scratch. So if it was messed up, it was messed up because I created it wrong. Um, and we got a chance to start creating that momentum where Legacy Wealth was born.

SPEAKER_00 42:38

Very full circle, very full circle. Um, so that now we're around 2017. Obviously, you were wildly successful as a producer in financial services. What were some of the early business issues or challenges where you're like, well, I know how to do my job and I'm a master of my craft and I understand my profession and industry, but I haven't tried this full-blown business thing before. What do you remember as some of those like early things that you maybe didn't struggle with, but that you saw as a challenge, as a roadblock that you had to overcome?

SPEAKER_02 43:12

Uh I would say just unbridled uh naivete. Sure. I mean, I was naive to the fact that there was tenure in this. I was like, no one's stopping me. I have the talent, I have the wisdom, I have the skill, I can do whatever I want. Um arrogance, ego, those are real words that uh people don't take seriously. Um ego wins every time it shows up, so you gotta figure out how to put it somewhere where it it actually works for you, not against you. Um But it's it's a real it's a it's a challenge. It was one of the largest challenges because I'm like, I'm an athlete, you know, I could do this, I'm better than you. You know, I wanted to compete right all the time with whatever it was. And uh there were times I just didn't need to compete. So that was that was that was some really difficult and then organization. To be honest, I I hire people now so they deal with the organization because it's just not you know, I think people have to understand just in life, there's things you're good at. Yeah, there's things you're not good at. Um and most people will try this, and I heard this from Zig Ziglar's, one of Zig Ziggler's books, and uh you know, um, was the things you're really good at, you're gifted at for a reason. The things you aren't so good at, you need to make enough money so you can hire somebody else who's better at that than you. And I'm like, huh. Okay, so organization was never really my strong suit. So I have a tendency to be around people that are really crazy organized.

SPEAKER_03 44:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 44:46

Because that's their strong suit. Right? If you look at my team, they're meticulous about organization, right? Because I'm not so so good at it. Right? They struggle with you know very large visions and and really creative and colorful visions of what the future can look like. That's not what they are, they are tactical people uh in nature. Same with a lot of the vendors and resources that that we use or work with. Um same type of thing is here's a product, here's a service, but this fits you now, where you're going, no, let's talk about what that looks like, because that's the exciting part, right? That's where the motivation comes from, that's where the fire and desire comes from, right? Is how how do how do how do we do that? What's the future look like?

unknown 45:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:33

Because I'm never focused on where we are today, because it's nothing more than a byproduct of what I believe and where I came from. That's it. So how do I how do I improve that? And so I'm constantly thinking about the change now that I'm trying to make is shifting from the idea of what success looked like to what his significance looked like in this lifetime.

SPEAKER_00 45:54

Um how I want to s ask that actually, how has that shifted for you? Right? Maybe it stayed the same, but uh when you started Legacy back in 2017 versus now, how is your definition of success for the agency for the organization shifted?

SPEAKER_02 46:09

Well, it shifted a little bit because I I always thought like other people wanted me to think.

SPEAKER_03 46:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 46:15

Does that make sense? Like I someone else's definition of success may not look like mine. Right. Right? And and we spend so much time trying to adopt and adapt ourselves to what their success looks like. Like someone may say Elon Musk is successful because he launched Tesla and because he's got twenty billion dollars. I may say, well, success to me looks like uh someone who helps people uh at the homeless shelter. You know, success looks different to every person. They may not make the most money, but in fulfillment in life, they may have a different fulfillment because of it. They may sleep better at night because of it, they may be able to help more people because of it, right? Maybe it's not a product, maybe it's a service. Um I have friends that have services that they really help people. They they they they help people, humanity and life and things like that. So as I've got a chance to see their level of success, and in their eyes, they may not be as successful as they might as they should, but in my eyes, I look at them and I'm like, wow, like if I have 10% of what you've got, like I I want to learn. So I'm always like I mentioned, I think if everybody starts out in a conversation with people with curiosity and care and concern in their heart, I think we get to the place. And so for me, over the last probably five, six years, that shift has come into me. It's been introduced by by people I've engaged with, people I've I've cared for, people that I've become friends with, people that are that are close and and dear to me. And what they've done is they poured into me to say, hey, listen, let me see let me let you see the world through these rose-colored glasses and see the world a little different. And so that's allowed for me to look at legacy wealth and say, We've we've made a mark, we've done okay. We we've built something from that look at this, right? Because I was constantly like, we haven't done enough, we haven't done enough. And uh that's the idea that um the greed monster will never be satisfied. It's always gonna be hungry. So if I don't feed it, it's like okay, what's next? Well, so if you ask somebody who has a hundred million dollars, what do they want? 101 million. Sure. So what is what is truly driving them and what is success for them? Um I think people have to define that for themselves. But I think it truly comes down to awakening yourself and trying to figure out what's important to you and why it's important, and then ultimately being comfortable with the things that are that that success will look like for you, and you don't have to prove it to other people.

SPEAKER_00 48:48

Right. S uh currently, what is the size of legacy in terms of we move every day?

SPEAKER_02 48:56

Yeah, every day, right? I wake up in the morning, it's this number, and the next day it's this number. But you know, we have this office that we we're partnering with and and trying to move along out in Newport, so we love that. Um the office in in uh Fort Lauderdale, which is great, and then the office here in Chicago is great, and then there's a small office here in in uh in the city that we're trying to move along, but we're trying to expand. Um this year we're gonna try to probably double in size of just feet on the streets of people. Um because that legacy can't be done by just one person or two people, even five people, right? At the we think that the impact, the true impact we can have is by affecting as many people as possible as possible to inspire as many people as possible, hence why I've taken some of the role of trying to help the industry with the NAFA opportunity.

SPEAKER_00 49:53

Yeah, let's get into that a little bit. So um you obviously have a very strong footing now in in public speaking. Is that something you were always interested in doing? Is that something that again kind of naturally called to you? How did you get into the whole public speaking thing before we get into to NAFA and all that? It was performing.

SPEAKER_02 50:14

It's playing on the biggest stage. Yeah playing in front of 20,000, 30,000 people. Um when uh you're shooting a free throw, there's only one person they're paying attention to, and that's you. Um and so the fear of of performing in front of people, as simplistic as that sounds, just goes away. Um you learn in sports how to compartmentalize uh the audience, the the uh the crowd. Um because if you go to a school like Michigan State or another what they call a hostile environment, uh the people are literally standing right behind you and they're yelling anything and everything about your family, you stink, you know, and they're the worst person on the planet, hey, you know, so they're they're yelling those things, and if you don't have the ability to block them out and listen to what's in your head, listen what's in your heart, listen to what your training is, listen to those things, you won't be able to hear it happening at the same at the time, and you will, you know, you won't be able to perform optimally at that time. So being able to speak with people and engage a group of audience of people just comes down to the ability to be able to lock in, yeah, quiet the noise, listen to the message the way it's supposed to be delivered, and really try your best to leave them better than you found it. Leave the audience with something they can take away where they feel like one, I'm inspired because of he was here. My life is a little different because I've I've learned I've I've heard him, right? Sure. And then last but not least is they feel like they want to go out and they want to move now, right? You know, so why why do people do those things? Why do people go to professional speaking things? Why do they do that? So it's it's always been a part of kind of my DNA, is that you give more than you take, and you show up and people ask you to do something, is your knowledge and your wisdom is not yours. Right. Right? If you think about wisdom is best when it's shared. That's why there were the three wise men who shared the wisdom amongst all the people, is because it wasn't theirs, and those who didn't share it actually lost it. So, you know, if you think about that, our our wisdom and we get it over time, and our ability to share it is it helps us become more and more successful because of it.

SPEAKER_00 52:40

So is there any framework or any preparation that you've adopted that really works for you? Just like a game. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:49

Go in just like a game, go in a couple hours before, go in an hour before, sit in the sit sit quietly, look at your review your notes, whatever. If you don't know it by now, you're not gonna know it. Sure. But if you're looking at the notes right before you go out and play, you're like, you don't really know it. Right? So um for me it's bullet pointing. People are like, send me your sketch or your outline, what you're gonna go through. And it's literally like one paragraph, two, three words, tell the story about this, two, three words, two, three words, two, three words. They're like, This is it? I go, I know where I want to take it, I know what message I want to deliver, and I know what people should get out of it. And um, so you know, I'm halfway decent in it, so people ask me to come back and do it again. And you know, if I do it well enough, they ask me to come back and do it again, and I'm I'm constantly tweaking it to become better as much as I can.

SPEAKER_00 53:42

Right. That's one thing that impressed uh impressed me about yourself early on is your seems effortless for you. Um not in a nonchalant way at all, but it definitely speaks volumes, uh your preparation, kind of what you go through because you're a very natural speaker and you've obviously done it before and repetition shows, but um that then is translated for you, right? So let's segue into kind of NAFA and those opportunities, those extracurriculars within what you do that I'm sure is supporting your growth within legacy as well. Um I think I have the acronym memorized, so I want to say it. NAFA, for those that don't know, is the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors.

SPEAKER_03 54:23

There you go.

SPEAKER_00 54:24

Yeah, Chris is the the president elect. How long is that term last? Is that a year? Is that more than a year?

SPEAKER_02 54:29

It's a I'm the president now. So as of January 2026. I was a president-elect in 2025. Okay. That's why I think in January 1st of this year, I I went through my uh uh inauguration, so to speak, was sworn in uh about a month ago um to my duties in DC. And uh, you know, we we started the process four years ago of really uncovering what we really want to do this year, um, which is dynamic in nature. They've never seen anything like this. Um and I've got good people to help me execute it the way in which we need it to we need it to go.

SPEAKER_00 55:10

Explain the progression because you've been on the board for quite some time. You held another position as secretary. Um what does NAFA do? What's the mission? And then how is Chris Gandhi uh how is your involvement going to create impact?

SPEAKER_02 55:25

Oh, great.

SPEAKER_00 55:26

I'm glad you asked that.

SPEAKER_02 55:27

That's a great that's a great question. So so NAFA is an organization, it's been around since 1850. Um it was the way in which if you wanted to buy insurance in the early 18, 18, 1900s, then you had to buy it through an association. You had to buy it through a kind of club, so to speak, right? And so if you bought it within this club, you had an opportunity to to buy it for your family, buy it for your tractor, buy it for whatever it may be. The association was put together so then there was some sort of regulation around the guidelines, the pricing, so people can just say this is insurance, and then you couldn't do that. So there was one organization, and it was the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors. They were the ones through the congressmen and the senators talked to in DC to help create actual insurance, right? So it was the first, right? It's the largest, it's the oldest. And so it's been an amazing organization over the years. It's spun off numerous organizations since then. It's spun off uh leadership organizations like Gamma, uh NELBA, which is the National Association of Uh Leadership and Brandon. It's like so they've spun off a lot of other organizations in the process. It spun off the company or the group Finseca, uh, which is another uh NAFA spun organization. Um just people visionary doing it a little different. Like we want to focus on the actual tax stuff, or we want to focus on the actual parts of it. But it all came from one place. And so um I served as a trustee, I was appointed. I ran for actually, it's interesting. I actually ran in Illinois to be the president of Illinois, okay, and then um during COVID, became the president of Illinois in or president of Chicagoland, which is Illinois, uh Chicagoland, which is Chicago based up north, uh, ran that during COVID. The year before COVID, I was supposed to go in, ran it the year before COVID, uh sent membership through the roof. I would like to say COVID assisted me because people weren't going anywhere, right? But I got the credibility for it. Um that's something positive that COVID did for us. Sure. Um we spun up the membership, people started engaging because what were people doing? They were behind their computers, they wanted to be connected to others, we were putting on great content, and people were like, ooh, I want to get involved. So we increased the membership here. We did so great that National was like no one stepped in to actually run the following year. So I said, I want to run it again because I got a bad deal because COVID, look what COVID did, right? And so I stepped in and actually uh was the president of Chicagoland two years in a row. Okay. Which was great. And then word on the streets were was that someone in DC actually took a liking to the way we did it, the aggressiveness we did it in, and the actual vision we had for doing it and how we did it. And I was able to attract some very young talent, some motivated people to really change the look of the board. NAFA's a traditional and very older 50, 60-year-old, uh kind of older experience type of um membership. Um I was able to attract some people that looked like me, people that were younger, people that were motivated, leading, they were the next phase of the industry, um, and inspire them and activate them to get involved, almost grassroots type of thing. And I was like, we can do this together, like I don't want to be on this island by myself, come help me, right? And uh somebody in DC said, Hey, we love your input um at the national level, and I became a trustee the following year in DC. And uh I was a trustee for four years. Uh I think it was seasons, four seasons. Yeah, I was a trustee or a president in training, so to speak. And I got a chance. The one thing that NAFA's done for me, which is kind of interesting, is it's allowed me to see leadership at different levels when you're not paid for it. Okay. See, because NAFA's a volunteer organization, and without the volunteers, it doesn't have representation, but it's the only representation that Main Street America has to their cons to the to the uh to the government. What I mean by that is um we talk directly to the Ways and Means Committee. We talk to actual senators. I've been in the senators' office, I've been in congressman's office, and we're actually talking about things that will affect you, like rising costs in healthcare. Like those are real things that we're having conversations about. We're having conversations about educating your kids, we're having conversations about them wanting to tax the insurance proceeds, right? Them wanting to add an actual tax to how much you pay, right? So those are things that you may not realize, but people are starting to see it. Like you mentioned prior to us talking here in California. Um, they pull back, so there's only so much insurance you can have in California on a house, right? Well, what if California now said, well, whatever you pay in insurance, there's a 20% tax on that insurance.

unknown 1:00:57

Right?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:58

That's a real thing, right? And states have looked to do that. Why? To cover the gap of of some of the budgets. We have to figure out, and not to get too political on this, but the government has to figure out a couple things. One, and we all do too, and here's a real topic: people have to figure out how to be sustainable financially on their own without the government. That's a real thing. Yep. Um, Social Security was meant to be a supplemental income. It's it's 80% of people's primary income. It wasn't, it was never meant, it was meant to be a social system to help. Not to it was meant to fall in line with the pensions and retirement savings, and then social security was meant to be the glue, the gap in between. Now it's the opposite way around. People have 80 to 90 percent of their money tied into Social Security, and that's going to be their livelihood. So if the government decides to change things, what happens to all those people? Right? Those social systems were meant to meant to be a supplement, not a not a not a primary. And so, one, people need to decide financially how to live on their own and not be dependent on the government. Number two, the government won't come rescue you. You gotta stop spending so much money and have to save some money. That's a real thing, right? We're in a we're in a world where people spend more than they make. It just is that's a natural statistics, has nothing to do with Chris Candy, has nothing to do with Yulorenzo, has nothing to do with Link Creative, has nothing to do with his podcast. People spend more than they make. That is a fact, right? That's a statistical data. And last but not least, is we have to start really starting to think about not working in the future. Um we were conditioned to work until you just can't work anymore. That's not the quality of life we were ever meant to be or ever designed to be. We were meant to work so that we could take care of the things and take care of our family. Yeah. Right? We weren't meant to work until we just couldn't work anymore. And that's where people are. Well, I'm just gonna work until I can't work anymore. And so quality of life is super important. Um, and people need to get to the place where they have a good quality of life and be comfortable and stop trying to chase someone else's dream. So if you look at my role in NAFA now, my role is to help what I call Main Street America. People you look at, your parents, uh, people that are out hustling trying to make an income, people that are trying to figure out after certain things happen in their families that may not go the way they want to, whether it's a marriage or divorce or something what I call financially significant happens, for them to stop and to think about what can I do? What is the most intelligent way for me to approach this financially? And as long as I can do it with sound financial decisions, our job is just to give them advice on how to do that. And NAFA serves a great role in that because we have a moral code that we swear by that we have to adhere to outside of just the actual one that the laws have. There's a whole nother one on top of that that we have to go by that actually holds us to a higher standard, even over and above the regulation of the SEC, FENRA, and and all the other ones. And so I'm leading that organization now. Um and we got a lot on our plate, man. We're excited. I'm going to the Treasury in a couple weeks to yes, the place where they print the money. I'm going there to talk to them about some of the new accounts that are going to be coming out in the um in the summer that people will get a chance to participate in. Um the ability to do testimony on on certain bills and issues. Yeah, you know, if you turn on CNBC and some of the other stuff, you might see my grill on there and I'll be smiling and testifying. I have uh I'm in the testimony on the Department of Labor. Okay. You know, this this idea of fiduciary responsibility. Uh I was one of the ones that put in uh expert testimony on that. So if you look up the bill in DC, I'm actually in there. So that was actually really cool to go into the Senate and listen to the hearing. Nice. Um, but it's been it's been a wonderful run. Uh a joke because I always in high school, here's full circle. Watch this.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:21

And I was gonna ask you because I feel like this is where you're going. Like, what is the motivation that out of outside of everything you do, right? These volunteer opportunities, what is pushing you to continue to strive for more?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:32

Well, it's not it's not that, but I've always wanted to do something different. So listen to this crazy. You never know what's gonna come into your life until it comes. You never know what blessings are gonna come into your life until it happens, right? And uh in high school, my high school trip used to be they used to go to DC, Washington, DC, every year. And I remember asking my mom, I want to go to that. And they were like my mom was like, We don't have the money to go to that, you can't go. Right, okay, got it. So my sophomore year, I was playing basketball, and I said, I want to go to DC. She's like, You can't go to DC, you gotta play basketball. I'm like, okay, I gotta go to DC. Right. And so I never got a chance to go to DC. Here's here's full circle. You know, uh sometimes you have to wait your turn. I never got a chance to go to DC until I until NAFO brought me to DC. And now I go to DC all the time, right? And I I wondered, so I asked one of the people that used to go to DC all the time. I said, Did you guys get to go in the Senate? They were like, no. Like we did a Capitol tour. I was like, you didn't? Like you didn't get a chance to go into Longworth or into any any of the buildings? They were like, no. I was like, did you get a chance to talk to like any of the centers or anything? And they were like, no. I said, wow, okay, so I've gotten to do things that even my high school wasn't able to do, but you asked the question about motivation. I just simply tell you that I stay motivated because I know that you know the world is round and there's a lot of opportunity out there, and I want to see it all while I have this time on the earth. I want to be able to participate in it all. And I think I know from my NAFA experience and with others is that people want to be inspired. They really, they really do. In life, they want to surround themselves with positive thinking people and uh people that have that can make an impact. I when playing in here in Chicago, I learned Michael Jordan couldn't win a game on his own. Right. He couldn't. So he has to surround himself with smart and talented people, people that makes him the you know a better version of himself. Right. And so I try to do that with our some of my NAFA constituents.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:38

What are some of those things that keep you focused, disciplined, consistent outside of more of the business stuff, right? I know you're you're a family man, you are very much so into boxing, health and wellness, things of that nature. What are some of those things personal to Chris that keep you grounded, keep you dialed into do these things that you've set out to do?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:02

Well, the discipline comes in in sports always. Yeah. Sports is always fun. So I always have to figure out how to stay athletic and how to keep what I call the athletic edge. Right? So um my body doesn't work the same way it used to. I can still play basketball, I just can't play at the pace I used to, and at the end of the day, as young, it's a young man's game, right? So um I have to brace up, I have double braces and things like that, you know. I look like a old look like a robo cop out there. But now, um about a year and a half, two years ago, someone was saying, you know what? Boxing is just as hard as basketball. Yeah, stop it. It's boxing, come on, man. It's like, you know. So I took up uh I started boxing a couple years ago. It's it's it's truly a hard it's one of the hardest sports I've ever played. But because it's taxing, it's just you. And how far can you go? Right. Um, how much can you give, right? Uh and it's it's really it's peaceful because you can just go in and forget. Sometimes I'll be in there an hour, hour and a half. I've we've been in there two hours and fifteen minutes. Um, you know, six thousand calories less later, you know, you're you're trying to figure out, you know, what what okay, where am I at? But yeah, you know, it's it's uh the thing that keeps me motivated the most is that uh you know I never want my son to think that his dad can't do something. So I it's important to me. You mentioned family, uh you know, it's important to me that he sees his dad as somebody who can who can do a lot, right? If he can do it, I can do it. Yeah, I learned that from other people. If he can do it, I can do it. I can do a little bit better, right? And so inspiring him to do those things, also other young professional professionals are coming up is you know, when I was coming up, I saw somebody and I was like, man, I want to be like him when I grow up, right? Right, man, I if if that guy would just mentor me or spend some time with me, man, maybe he'll check on me and that type of thing. So I I've built a long-standing career off of gravitating to successful people because I can learn from them, not only learn from them, but one of the my mentors told me a long time ago, nothing in this world is is is new. It's all borrowed and repurposed. So he goes, listen, the best thing about this is you can borrow and repurpose everything I'm telling you and make it your own. Just add another word. I said, Really? And so, you know, borrowing and repurposing things in life and coming up with my own little you know unique sayings and and things like that is always kind of cool. When I hear other people in my office start to say, hey, I got a Gandhiism, I was like, What? Excuse me, give it to me. So they've started to write down some of these, some of those things, and uh it's kind of an ongoing joke since I'm the oldest one in the office, which is shocking at this point. That's funny.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:02

Um before we wrap up, I want to do a little bit of a rapid fire round here. Through your eyes, right? There's so much information out there now through social media, through mass media and stuff like that, of like these outlets just pumping information and agenda down people's throats, candidly, right? Through your eyes, and from what you've seen over the past couple decades, what do you think are still the most foundational things a young professional, aspiring, you know, business individual could do to set themselves up for financial success?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:39

Well, I think the main thing is the main thing, and um just come up with a plan. I I think so many times people react to plans, yeah, they're reacting to what they see on social media, they're reacting to I need this this product, right? I need IBC, infinite banking, I need I need, you know, this this hedge fund or I need this ETF or I need gold or you know, it's it's constant. Right? And um you have to think for a moment that just because it looks good to me doesn't mean it's good for me. Right. Right? You know, one of the mentors told me that just because it looks good to you, he had a little twang in his voice too. He's saying just because it's good, just because it looked good to you doesn't mean it's good for you. I was like, what? What does that mean? I never knew what that meant. Yeah. Um there's a lot of good products out there, but no one has the market cornered on ideas. So how do I know this fits into my plan, my strategy? Let me stop and think what's important to me and why it's important and stop reacting to everything. So if I'm a young professional man, I start putting money away, I start buying into the SP early, so you can start to realize there's ups and downs, and yeah, there's that type of thing. Start saving your money. Um, you know, there's no shortcuts. I I don't believe, and you know, this may be the first time you might have heard this, the majority of young people under the age of thirty don't believe that social security will actually be there by the time they get there. So if that's the case, then you gotta do something to protect yourself and to say for yourself. And so that would be something, and then also finding I think finding a mentor is great.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:28

Because most people that are successful want to help other people. They they do. Um I see it now. There's people I was I was at a conference and I was feeling really good because we had a great year, a great year a couple years ago, and I'm walking around like, yeah, you know, tough, you know, whatever. And I met this guy, very unassuming, super unassuming. And uh we're sitting and I was like, yeah, this kind of year for, you know, feeling really good about things. And he looks up at me, he goes, Well, that's interesting. He goes, I did 30 million in a month. Excuse me. Yeah, I'm feeling good with my three, four million, you know, like that those type numbers. And it just humbles you. It humbles you because you start to realize that that the opportunity, you've only begun to scratch the surface of the opportunity that's ahead of you. So we've got so much work to do between NAFA. Um NAFA, what I'm trying to do right now, which is I'm glad you gave me this platform. I'm trying to change the narrative of how we've existed in the past. What got us here won't get us to where we gotta go. Right. Um, we need to integrate who we are into society and be part of the DNA of people having monetary and financial conversations. Is that uh how how is it that you can have a financial conversation with someone without talking about this bill that might change it? Right? Like, how do you have a conversation about a mutual fund without talking about the regulation behind it? Right? It doesn't make any sense, right? And so if that is the case, how do we integrate that in just it's part of like the way in which we make financial decisions, right? Um, how do we do that? How do we bring NAFA from 1850 or 1890 into the present fast through the use of AI, digital technology, through the use of uh progressive thought, uh creative thinking on membership, all all all those things, right? How how do how do we do that? You have activated each state to bring us ideas and now start to integrate those into the very fabric of this 120-year organization. Yeah. And they're looking at me like, whoa, what is going on? But you know, change is not always bad. Change is only bad if change is only bad if you don't embrace it. Right. And remember, I think I started out this conversation with I always start with curiosity because I really truly want to understand where you come from, where you're going, and how I can help you get there. And I think NAFA's a lot of the same. Legacy Wealth Group is scratching the surface of what it's capable of doing. Um you know, I'm just a chief, I just help put it together. I planted the seed, our people will water it and grow it, and uh hopefully that people hear your your your talk, our conversation. They pick up something right and they say, you know, I may not be an athlete, but I learned the fact that through this conversation, there's some things I should be doing, there's some I should I should be creative in my own thought. I need to come up with my own ideas of what success looks like and then pursue those with uh passion and desire for the rest of their lives. Right? You shouldn't have to apologize for passionately pursuing the things you want in life. That's not that's not the real deal. So hopefully that's the case, and you know, people follow us and follow you and keep keep doing the deal.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:19

Well, we're gonna get the word out there. That was very well said. That was a great way to wrap it up. Yeah. Tell the people into your camera there where they could find you. Personal handles, Legacy Wealth Group handles the whole thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:31

Yep. So uh Legacy Wealth Group is uh www. uh T L W G L L C the Legacy Wealth Group L L C T L W G L L C dot com. We're there. People can put their their name and say, hey, I want to talk to that guy. I want to have a consultation. There's a lot of advisors around the country that uh that can help. But um there's a lot. I mean, there's there's just a lot. We we we look to just add value. We're gonna be going around. We did, we're so we're blessed, really. Um I didn't come up with it, but I had an idea that we took to four of the congressmen, and this is how NAFA as a volunteer is helping our communities. I did have an idea of taking financial literacy into districts that are governed by constituents and ran by people. And uh a couple of the senators bought into it and said, we have to do that because of the changes, how fast the government is changing. Right. Um and I said, let's do it. I said, but I don't want to call it financial literacy because as soon as we call it financial literacy, everybody puts it in a bucket and nobody can define it.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:50

Sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:50

Right? What is financial literacy? I have ten people, they all tell me differently. Um, but when I go to McDonald's, everybody gets the same burger. So how do we have the same results? I say we need to talk about financial empowerment. How do we empower people to be a better version of themselves financially, regardless of what they have going on in their lives? I go, if we do that, your people will rise to the top. That's what they will do. And they were like, we love it. Okay, so so we're we're employing these. We got four that we got the okay on, so we're gonna roll these out this year. We're gonna roll them out with our NAFA partners that are in certain that are in districts around the country. We're the only organization that has representation in every single district. So every district that's out there. Um, what that means is for some people who don't follow government, is that your local congressman and your local senator have to do what's in the best interest of their representation, they're representing the people in in DC. We have representation in every single district. Wow. They're wear the same, they're saying we're the same things. And as we roll these out, we're gonna roll these out in partnership with their districts, the constituents, the people, just like you guys, everybody. We're gonna roll that out. And then um uh I'm gonna pilot it nationally. So we'll you'll see us on a bunch of different things, waving like, oh here, we're here, and you know, we're we're here to you know to uplift the people, to empower the people. Just to try our best to give back dign dignity to humanity. Yeah, because I think we've missed it. We we've lost it along the way, and uh we can get it back.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:28

Amazing. Well, you heard it here first. Powerful messaging. Chris, thank you so much for uh for coming today.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:34

Yeah, it's a joy.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:35

I love it. Amazing. Thanks for having me. Link live. That's a wrap.