Next Level University

Why Rock Bottom Isn’t ALWAYS A Good Foundation (1955)

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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Building from rock bottom isn’t as glamorous as it sounds. In today’s episode, Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros challenge the popular narrative, sharing why rock bottom isn’t always the best place to start. With raw honesty and personal anecdotes, they explore what truly helps people overcome adversity: self-belief, a supportive community, resourcefulness, and grit. From learning to turn adversity into an advantage to the power of tenacity, this episode delivers practical wisdom for anyone seeking to overcome obstacles and achieve success.

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NLU is not just a podcast; it’s a gateway to a wealth of resources designed to help you achieve your goals and dreams. From our Next Level Dreamliner to our Group Coaching, we offer a variety of tools and communities to support your personal development journey.

For more information, please check out our website at the link below. 👇

Website 💻  http://www.nextleveluniverse.com

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Show notes:
(2:17) Does rock bottom help everyone?
(5:38) The big three: Belief, circle, resources
(7:37) How reflecting shows progress
(10:04) Resourcefulness over resources
(16:33) Living below your means
(22:36) Meet like-minded people and jumpstart your journey to achieving your dreams while optimizing your life. Join Next Level Group Coaching.
(23:04) Coaching insights and tough lessons
(34:43) Turning survival into success
(43:34) The power of the right people
(44:24) Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

🎙️ Hosted by Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

Next Level University is a top-ranked daily podcast for dream chasers and self-improvement lovers. With over 2,100 episodes, we help you level up in life, love, health, and wealth one day at a time. Subscribe for real, honest, no-fluff growth every single day.

Kevin Palmieri

Here's the weird thing I used to think the reason you wanted to get wealthy is so you could not focus on saving money anymore. That's not how you get wealthy and stay wealthy. You get wealthy by essentially just living like you're broke forever and focusing on making more money, being resourceful and all of that stuff.

Alan Lazaros

Some of that was just out of self-preservation and survival. And now what helped you survive now can help you thrive, and I feel like UNI's work ethic was built on out of necessity and we didn't choose that. I think we just had no choice Either that or we were going to end up, you know, having very minimal lives.

Kevin Palmieri

Welcome to Next Level University. I'm your host, Kevin Palmieri.

Alan Lazaros

And I'm your co-host, Alan Lazarus.

Kevin Palmieri

At NLU, we believe in a heart-driven but no BS approach to holistic self-improvement for dream chasers.

Alan Lazaros

Our goal with every episode is to help you level up your life, love, health and wealth.

Kevin Palmieri

We bring you a new episode every single day on topics like confidence, self-belief, self-worth, self-awareness, relationships, boundaries, consistency, habits and defining your own unique version of success.

Alan Lazaros

Self-improvement in your pocket, every day, from anywhere, completely free.

Kevin Palmieri

Welcome to next level university, next level nation. Welcome back to another episode of next level university, where we help you level up your life, your love, your health and your wealth. The reason I'm laughing is because I'm tired and I'm sleeping today for episode number 1955. Why rock bottom isn't always a good foundation can we just have a moment ready?

Does rock bottom help everyone?

Alan Lazaros

what? What kind of moment. So for the long-term nlu indians for those of you who are new, welcome. Welcome for the longer term nlu indians. We often talk about doing an episode a day, and we started with one, and then two, and then three, and then four, and then we bumped to seven. I think we went from five to seven, and the production team is amazing. We could never do this without them. Thank you, production team. Now it's become fairly standard. We've been doing this for years. That's become kind of our new normal. Every now and then I just got to be real. Oh yeah, it blows Tonight's one of those nights.

Kevin Palmieri

That was one of those.

Alan Lazaros

Earlier before we recorded. I've had it's been a day, it's been all day Back to back to back to back Group coaching went awesome, good, good, good. Lots of coaching clients love you. I don't want to do this right now, but but I think that's a. There's a lesson in that which we weren't planning on this episode, which is sometimes you just gotta show up anyway because it'll be worth it. We're not gonna break a almost 2 000 episode streak because we're a little tired and I was thinking of it wigging out from our lights.

Kevin Palmieri

You mind carrying the weight. I'll take off. I could try. That's not very confident, all right, why are we talking about what we are talking about today? Alan and I were having a conversation. What kind of episode do we want to do? What are your thoughts and I?

Kevin Palmieri

We've been doing it a lot, especially recently, like the last year and a half, two years, where we talk about how there's a bumper sticker quote and there's just so much underneath it that I think certain, certain quotes only apply to certain people in certain ways, at certain times. If you really think about it, what are the odds that you're going to be able to fit something in 15 words? Oh, let's say this In 11 words. That's going to apply to the vast majority of humans. That thought that I have today is rock bottom is a good place to start, or rock bottom is a good place to build a new foundation. In construction terms, hell yeah, if you're building a house, you want a solid foundation, and rock bottom is probably the best one In life. That shit sucks and I think there are a lot of things that have to line up correctly or that you have to line up in order to make rock bottom the place to build from.

Kevin Palmieri

Oftentimes, when I'm on podcasts, I tell my story and my little one-liner is not only did I find out, not only did I hit rock bottom, I also found out rock bottom has a basement. And people get a little chuckle out of that because there's a little humor in the misery. And oftentimes I'll tell my story and then people will say ask questions on that. And oftentimes people say what's the number one lesson you've learned from the podcast? Adversity can be your advantage if you know how to, how to turn it that way. I can't tell you how to do it, though I don't know. Now I think I have a deeper understanding. I think it's belief. I think that's the biggest one is belief. I think the second one is circle People around you, because I wouldn't have gotten here without you. If I had somebody super negative in my life, it would have been way harder to get here. For sure, resources slash resourcefulness and we'll go into that.

Alan Lazaros

Love it.

Kevin Palmieri

I think those are probably the big three.

Alan Lazaros

I would say yeah, those are strong.

Kevin Palmieri

What do you think those are strong? What am I missing? What am I missing and let me explain While you think, let me explain those are the three Resources Not resources.

Kevin Palmieri

Well, let's say resources. I'd like to put resources and resourcefulness. Resources meaning if you hit rock bottom and you have a family that can help you out financially, it's probably way easier to get back on your feet. Resourcefulness is you hit rock bottom and it seems like you have nowhere to go and nobody's there to help you. You figure out a way by messaging people you used to hang out with messaging old boss, whatever You're, somebody, who you, just there's tenacity and you never stop trying and you're always getting creative and reaching out to people and that type of stuff.

Alan Lazaros

The first one was belief, self-belief, yes, Belief, it's possible. Belief it's possible for you. Belief it'll be worth it. The second one is your circle, your reference group, the five people who you spend the most time with you are the sum average of the five people you spend the most time with your community circle, family, friends, influences known as your reference group.

Alan Lazaros

And the last one is resources slash resourcefulness. I think those are. I agree. What are we missing? Those are the big three. I would say those are huge.

Alan Lazaros

I was on with a client earlier how I want him to put on his tracker. He never feels like he's making progress. He always feels like he's up against it. I said well, here's the thing. It's just like fitness no matter how much progress you make, you always kind of feel like you're losing in a way. If you're, if you're squatting heavyweight. I'll explain. I said when you're lifting 240 and bench press, do you think that's going to feel harder or easier than what you're doing now at 185? He said probably harder. I said exactly Same in life.

Alan Lazaros

So we went to my calendar share screen boom, full calendar this week. Very grateful for the demand, also very challenging. I am more productive than I've ever been, but I don't feel super productive. I feel like I'm losing. If anything, I said here's what we're going to do. We're going to go back. What's today, the 21st? We're going to go back to January 21st, 2018. No, 2019. I forget which it was five or six years ago. I said what you're missing from this equation is how much progress you've made. That's why I want you to look back. Some people need to focus on the today and the small wins and stacking them. This person is wired in a way where he needs to constantly look back, otherwise he'll always feel like he's behind. I said let me show you me. Five years ago we did it.

Alan Lazaros

I was a fitness coach. I think it was six years ago. Six years ago and one of my clients began with an M and I had this flashback. I used to go to Panera bottomless coffee, big salad, fitness model, fitness competitor, fitness coach and I remember I would drive my 2009 subaru putt putt that thing from the panera to the back of a walmart up in milbury and I used to do back-to-back fitness coaching sessions with my notebook with it was hot summer day and I would blare the ac and that ac unit in the 2009 subaru wasn't great and I just coached in the hot sun back to backs in my freaking car on my phone using facetime, audio or whatever. Whatever I was using back then and now I'm a coach.

Alan Lazaros

22 business owners. I coach 30 people If you include the team, blah, blah, blah it's. You got to look at me and I said dude, I was 28. You're still only 25. Like, just keep going.

Alan Lazaros

So my point of this is resources, resourcefulness. I was very resourceful. I didn't have a place, I didn't have an office. I had to use my car as my office. I had to use my phone instead of a computer to get to work because it had internet and I didn't have hotspot at the time.

Alan Lazaros

Resourcefulness, I think, is the most important thing. However, you're not going to be resourceful unless you have self-belief, and so I never doubted and I know this sounds arrogant, so I'm going to say both sides of it I never doubted whether or not I could be a successful coach. I only ever was trying to figure out how to do it with very, very, very limited resources. And in the beginning you don't. No one knows you, you don't have a brand, you're not super successful yet, so you don't have perception. It's very hard. The beginning is atrociously difficult, especially if you're not. If you're very truthful and say like hey, you're my third client, I'm just giving this a shot, you want to rock and roll? In the beginning, it's just bad. However, if you do have self-belief and you're resourceful as hell and you surround yourself with supportive people who believe in you but also push you when you need it. Yeah, you're going to succeed.

Alan Lazaros

But if you don't have those. You are jeffed.

Kevin Palmieri

Especially if you're building from rock bottom. Have those you are jeffed. Well, especially if you're building from rock bottom, because I think about that. That's the number one lesson out of all the interviews we've done, out of all the people I've talked to. The number one lesson is you can use adversity as your advantage, because I would. We would do an interview with someone and we would get to the end of the interview and I would think to myself I'll probably never hear a story like that again somebody overcoming such adversity and then next week the same shit would happen, just in a different way yeah and then eventually you connect the dots.

Kevin Palmieri

It's like, okay, why do all of these people have such a such a story of overcoming adversity? How did they do that?

Alan Lazaros

of all the peak performers. We interviewed literally olympic athletes. One of them was an o gold medalist. We we Olympic athlete skier. One was four by four. I mean we interviewed millionaires. One billionaire. I mean it was wild. We interviewed a lot of amazing people, a lot of very successful people. My question for you and I want you to actually go into this rather than just yes or no answer I would say three of the common things would be self-belief they had a good they surrounded themselves with other people of self-belief and a growth mindset and they were resourceful as hell. Some of them were broke, I mean, came from absolutely nothing, foster care, that kind of thing. So I would say it's very clear that I would say is there anyone successful that we interviewed that didn't have those three things?

Kevin Palmieri

I don't think so. Maybe the community one. I feel like not everybody had a positive community, but they definitely had. I think most people we interviewed had way more self-belief than they thought. Yeah agreed, or maybe they had way more self-belief than they understood.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, unconsciously yeah.

Kevin Palmieri

Unconsciously, and I think they were all. Most of them were really, really, really resourceful. What's the definition of resourcefulness from your perspective? Remember I gave you a book called stretch by scott more sun and sun and sun and steam, sun and sheen, I do not know it's called stretch hold on, let me, let me, let me look it up, because this is what happens.

Kevin Palmieri

I say I'll look it up, I look it up, then you go into a long thing and then I never say it. I'm on it, I'm on it, scott Sonnenstein, I am something, what?

Alan Lazaros

did? I say, mortensen, I don't know what you said. I need to get better at remembering these authors. I really do. I feel like I have a few books that I know the author's names and the book title. I should just go with the book title and again, but I feel like I should give credit to the author. Stretch the book is called Stretch.

Kevin Palmieri

When you don't know, you can't give credit. That's what I mean.

Alan Lazaros

So the book is called Stretch, yes, and the idea is that most people think that going out and getting more resources is the solution to their success problems and while that would help, the real solution is becoming more resourceful. I got I've been getting a lot of text messages lately. We had a big Q4 and I don't know how people know, but like I, and I don't even know if it's correlated I get a lot of text messages hey, do you want this loan? Like? I got one really good offer earlier. Actually, I blocked them, but the truth is is I don't want a low interest loan. I want to succeed with our limited resources and I tried to explain this to kev early on and I'm not trying to come off like pretentious, but you've said I've been your mentor and all that. At the end of the day, I tried to explain why at one point in the past. Wouldn't mind me sharing this. He's like we have mentors that would give us a loan for sure what's a quick multi-millionaires?

Alan Lazaros

that's what I'm saying, and I said I'll let you share the story. I fucking hated you.

Kevin Palmieri

I mean, we were, we were in the, we were in the podcast studio and we were riding the struggle bus and we were talking to a mentor at the time what a net worth of 150 million dollars. And I was like dude just at we. All we got to do is ask him for a hundred thou, like that's nothing for him, and obviously you knew that better than I, but I but it's not going to fix the problem.

Alan Lazaros

I think it's going to. There's another one with 50 mil. There's another one that we definitely could have. The end of the P, pt was the initials.

Kevin Palmieri

Yeah, yeah, no, he was 150. 150.

Alan Lazaros

He had 150 mil in that one. Yeah, he had 150 mil.

Kevin Palmieri

Oh, okay, at least I think it might have actually been more.

Alan Lazaros

That's why I was like yeah, why not?

Kevin Palmieri

What's a quick hundred thou? What's a quick hundred thou amongst friends? You believe in the mission. You know you believe in the mission.

Alan Lazaros

All right, what's your new take on this?

Kevin Palmieri

You were a young, we should have taken it for sure.

Living below your means

Kevin Palmieri

Yeah, 100%. You were a young entrepreneur once trying to figure it out. It goes back to what we were talking about with principles. Here's the. Here's the weird thing. I used to think the reason you wanted to get wealthy is so you could not focus on saving money anymore. That's not how you get wealthy and stay wealthy. You get wealthy by essentially just living like you're broke forever and focusing on making more money, being resourceful and all of that stuff, and then you just kind of live like you With some slight lifestyle upgrades.

Kevin Palmieri

Slight, but the goal is to always live broker than you actually are.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.

Kevin Palmieri

I thought the goal of making money is so you can fucking ball out Like that's the only reason.

Alan Lazaros

Now I can connect it. I wish you were joking.

Kevin Palmieri

I'm not joking, I'm very serious. Now, maybe that okay, maybe that's one of those things where if you have a relationship with money that isn't positive, you're like Kev, that's dumb. I would love that I understand. Let's put it from a relationship standpoint. I would love that I understand. Let's put it from a relationship standpoint. If you think the second you get your dream relationship, you can stop doing all the things that got you your dream relationship in the first place. You're going to end up lonely and single. Probably If you think and again, I'm talking to myself as much as anybody else, so if it sounds like I'm talking down to you, trust me, I'm not If you think that the only reason you do the things to get in shape is so once you get into the shape that you desire, you can stop doing all the things that got you in shape.

Kevin Palmieri

That is a perpetual cycle of just chasing something that isn't real, unfortunately, yeah that is now my understanding that at almost not almost most things are principle based. I used to. I used to drive by a nice car and think to myself I wonder what they're listening to in terms of music. What are they bumping? Now, when I drive by a nice car, I think what are they listening to? Audiobook or podcast? Nice, I think about that all the time now and it sounds probably kind of douchey. I can imagine somebody hearing that and being like that's kind of douchey I know, I know I know.

Alan Lazaros

But so that's my speaking of. I use pretentious a lot because I think a lot of these things sound that way and I that's not my goal, but I do think it's important to teach these principles, right? So you've heard the thing of why don't lamborghinis advertise on tv. Yeah, people who have lamborghinis aren't watching TV. Does that come off pretentious?

Kevin Palmieri

I think it's dumb because I don't agree with it. Most 70-year-old business owners aren't buying Lamborghinis A bunch of them do.

Alan Lazaros

Dude, a bunch of them do. No Dude if you were to look at the demographic of Lamborghini owners, I would bet money on this. If you were to look at the demographic of Lamborghini owners, I would bet money on this. You can research this. I'd put money on it that 80% of them are above the age of 45.

Kevin Palmieri

80%, I would wager Money.

Alan Lazaros

I would do a wager with you.

Kevin Palmieri

Think of all the professional athletes.

Alan Lazaros

Nope Bet money.

Kevin Palmieri

You're looking at YouTube. How much A dollar Dude 10 GBOs. No, you're looking how much a dollar dude, it's 10 gibos. No, ten dollars. Ten dollars, ten thousand million, ten dollars. Let's do it. I would bet no. Well, first of all, your money is my money, so it's like it's gonna go from my bank account to the business let's see if we can pull this up.

Alan Lazaros

What percentage? Over 45 of course yeah, lamborghini owners I'm gonna say owners are over the age of 45.

Kevin Palmieri

Wait, wait, what's your percentage? You're guessing.

Alan Lazaros

I would say 80% are over the age of 45.

Kevin Palmieri

Less than 80 is my guess. Nice, strong work. Well, that's how it works. You set the line. I say over or under.

Alan Lazaros

Ready 50% are 45 to 64. 30% are older than 65. I am accurate 50% are older than 45. So ready With approximately 50% aged 45 to 64. And 30% 65 or older.

Kevin Palmieri

I don't believe it.

Alan Lazaros

Where's this coming from? Chat GPT? The reason why brother is is just the compound effect. You see on youtube all these quote-unquote kids, these young people with lamborghinis dude, most of the lamborghini owners aren't on youtube they are business owners from the past, but think about, like all the sports people but there's not that many people in sports. I mean, the nfl only has how many people. You're missing the mark on this and it's okay. I'm not trying to be a dick, no, no, you are a penis.

Kevin Palmieri

But it's okay no, I'm kidding, I literally can screenshot this.

Alan Lazaros

I can send this to you yeah, send it to me.

Kevin Palmieri

Let me take a look at the numbers, let me see if all the numbers kind of add up yeah, with my math, yeah maybe that's wishful thinking well, you, it's, it's um, just because you see you're not.

Alan Lazaros

You're not seeing the older people with lamborghinis because they're not on social media. Yeah I think that's like my mentors, they have limber what they porsche they have whatever, but lamborghini money they're not on tiktok man. They don't even have tiktok right, so it's. That's why I knew that. It's just because the majority of wealth is in the hands of older people, that's and those people don't 80% of their market.

Alan Lazaros

their target demographic don't watch TV. Well, they're missing out. There's not a lot of young kids that can afford a $15,000 car payment man no I know, I know they might as well.

Kevin Palmieri

They need to go to college and buy a house. I think it's a really good example of I've used this example before when I go to the gym and I squat. I'm really good at squatting in my gym. And then I put it up on social media and it's like sorry, sorry, I know this isn't that impressive at all.

Alan Lazaros

one percent of one percent of one percent of people that are squatting.

Kevin Palmieri

They got me in the algorithm. Yeah, exactly they got me I I would have.

Alan Lazaros

This is what's happening, unfortunately and I know this is off topic, but this is what's happening to our consciousness. Kevin is under the impression that young people have lamborghinis often no only young people on youtube that the algorithm elevates. You see what I'm saying which is all they elevate.

Kevin Palmieri

It's just all they elevate yeah, so it.

Alan Lazaros

It creates, and that's why the mental health issues are everyone has low self-esteem because it seems like everyone's a model and everyone has a lamborghini, when in reality that's the smallest percentage.

Alan Lazaros

But they happen to be elevated on social media and nlu, unfortunately, is not leveraging those things, because we don't want to hoodwink anyone and we want to build a real business without those kinds of things. And again, it doesn't mean you're not going to have a nice car, you're just not going to have a nice car at the expense of the team. We would rather grow and scale the team than have you have a. Lamborghini.

Coaching insights and tough lessons

Kevin Palmieri

Next level nation. What is happening? If you've thought to yourself, I want to try coaching, but you don't really know where to start, group coaching would be a wonderful place for you. That's really why we created it in the first place. We start a new round every 90 days. So if you're hearing this, go to the website nextleveluniversecom and we have the landing page where you can actually hold your spot right now. Even if there's a group going on right now, you can still lock your spot for the next one.

Kevin Palmieri

The biggest thing that we've seen is, as we get closer and closer to the date, unfortunately, some people end up missing. The group fills up and they can't do it, and then they end up regretting that. So please head over to the website. The link will be in the show notes and we would love to see you there. I said this to a client today. No, was it a client, a potential client? I said I think it's very important for me just to put it out on the table that we're results, not typical. Our level of quote unquote success. We're results, not typical.

Alan Lazaros

I also think we're work not typical and effort not typical, and resourcefulness more you than I not typical, and belief not typical. More you than I not typical and belief not typical more you than.

Kevin Palmieri

I. There's so many things that go into it. What is it? I'll take some credit. I was here for some shit too. No, I just enjoy this. I think that's the important piece is for every podcast guest we had on that went from rock bottom to living their dreams. There are a thousand people who didn't. Yeah, I don't want that Again, bottom to living their dreams. There are a thousand people who didn't?

Kevin Palmieri

yeah, I don't want that again. I don't ever want this to be the dark hour. I don't ever want this to be. You can't do it. I don't want it to be that. I just think it's important to see both sides of things all the time, because if you're only seeing the brights, like just like I did, why don't I have a lamborghini? I'm 35, like this 21 yearyear-old. No, no, I know I'm not saying that's how I actually think.

Alan Lazaros

Can I have you go through why you actually don't Go through the why?

Kevin Palmieri

don't I negative thing Mostly. Because, again one, that person that you're seeing is one in a million.

Alan Lazaros

And generational wealth.

Kevin Palmieri

Let's say it's a YouTuber.

Alan Lazaros

Their parents probably have a business that let's say it's a YouTuber.

Kevin Palmieri

Let's say it's a YouTuber. Oh, okay, yeah, fair, because I know a lot of people out there want to. I mean, if you go ask a six-year-old what they want to be when they grow up a lot of kids are saying influencers, media, person, like that's a thing.

Alan Lazaros

I just want to share something real quick. You share it, I coach. I coached someone in their early 20s and they have a car far superior to your bmw.

Kevin Palmieri

How dare they? What kind of car is it? I don't know, nor do I care straight. You can't say they have a car superior and then not say what it's probably an eighty thousand dollar car, whatever that means to you okay, reach out to me.

Alan Lazaros

Reach out to me, let me know what you don't know is her father owns a dealership, but she doesn't say that. Do you know how many people are doing that like dude I? I need to. This is for the listeners, because if you don't know this, you're going to compare it to the wrong thing. I know several human beings I'm talking like a lot of people that live lifestyles that are extremely wealthy, extremely wealthy that never made any of the wealth themselves. Like imagine, okay, imagine, kevin and I spend our entire life building wealth and then we have children you're going to adopt, maybe I'm going to have children and then those children have the benefits of that wealth without doing it themselves and they don't tell anyone how they did it and they have. Let's imagine they have some shame around that and so, of course, they're not gonna Say it.

Alan Lazaros

That's what social media has become in a very large amount. Like I mean, I have a lot of wealthy mentors. Right again, that sounds so. I have several wealthy mentors that used to be mentors that are not mentors anymore. Their children are doing very, very, very well seemingly, but they didn't build any of that wealth themselves. And I I really wonder, like the I wish people understood how much wealth was built in the 90s. Like if people knew how much wealth was built in just the 90s alone.

Alan Lazaros

It is insanity, dude. I have a client we went through his numbers from 2001 to now. He's shooting for 2 million this year. Dude, the growth rate's not that big, it's just 23 years. Like this is a doable thing, but you can't do it in two years. You literally can't. Like Google is 28 years old, apple's 48 years old. Can't like google is 28 years old, apple's 48 years old. You can't build companies in three years with lamborghinis unless you have generational wealth and or get a big loan from a mentor. Like what? If we had done that, you and I easily could have gotten loans from mentors and then bought lamborghinis and then started a youtube channel about cars and then not tell anyone and then pay back the loan and then not tell anyone. That that's how we did it. We would have told people, though.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, I'm just saying I'm going to tell people, but other people are doing that without saying it that's my dream.

Kevin Palmieri

It's one of my dreams to have it.

Alan Lazaros

I don't want to do it the easy way. I know you like the hard way, you like the worst way the worst way.

Kevin Palmieri

you like the. I was talking to somebody the other day, I was talking to somebody today and they're like have you ever thought of doing it this way? And I was like, honestly, like I appreciate it, it's not going to happen. We're going to do it the worst way. I thank you so much, I do appreciate it. I have thought about it. We just not on the table. We can't, I'm not allowed to, I'm not allowed to do it. Thank you so much, but we can't. Okay, the point, the point with the, that whole uh detour was it's a principle. I think it's a. It's a principle of all of those things together. And there's, there's just something about I have never quit, tattooed on my arm, never quit, kid. And I've quit a lot of stuff, every job Almost, I've ever had. There is something to be said Again. There's another quote you can never beat the person who never quits. It's like fairly accurate, fairly accurate. It's something.

Alan Lazaros

I want to share something that I've never shared. I'm not fucking done yet.

Kevin Palmieri

Tenacity. Tenacity is another one that might be worth adding, because belief is one thing, but belief without action is not necessarily constructive. If we had to, add a fourth.

Alan Lazaros

It would be grit, grit, yes, grit, or tenacity, or persistence, or hunger. I drive grit like, yeah, grit, grit's good drive. You have a lot more grit, you and I have never shared this on the podcast. I actually think it's really important. You and I came from no generational wealth uh, quite the opposite.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, generational debt maybe yeah well, I, I, I know it's playful, but like you don't have general, like your family doesn't have wealth, like they didn't build wealth no same with mine. So we? When I say we came from nothing, I don't mean, like you know, rags to riches. What I mean is we actually just didn't have money, like there was no generational wealth. Does that land differently now in this episode? No, I've always known that, but do you think other people know that?

Kevin Palmieri

I don't know. Yeah, I mean you and I have told our stories enough where I think I would say so, but I don't know, does somebody when I go through the drive-thru, does somebody?

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, I mean in your BMW, I'm sure they don't think just to somebody when I go through the drive-through to somebody. Yeah, I mean in your bmw, I'm sure they don't think oh, he, you know, didn't have any. You know, I don't know. I never really think about that because I never. There are some people seriously that like, are born into wealth. Oh for sure, there's like a lot of. Actually quite a bit, statistically it's the smaller amount, but like there's like a lot of people, and those are the ones on social for sure, yeah. So I wonder if that's talked enough about enough. It's certainly not talked about by the people who are understand.

Kevin Palmieri

I mean, it's understandable, right you? If you feel like it gives you a leg up, the last thing you're going to want to do is just put yourself back down. Yeah, and that takes. Think about it, that person.

Alan Lazaros

I was talking about with the dealership. I she's awesome, I like I love coaching her, like I don't think she's a bad person or anything like that. I just think it's a little bit frustrating sometimes when I know people are comparing to her and it's like you're in your early 20s and it looks like you're rich and the truth is you're not. You just just your family is. You know, and I think that I wish more people knew that.

Kevin Palmieri

I think that would help people's self-esteem, you know Well it's hard because in order for I won't talk about I don't know who this person is, so I don't want to talk about them specifically. But imagine how much self-belief you have to have to have a head start and then admit you have a head start. I feel like that's a different level of self-belief yeah and self-worth and resourcefulness and community. If you're surrounded by people who get jealous of that, it's like I can understand why you wouldn't.

Kevin Palmieri

For sure I can understand. Yeah, I didn't have a choice, neither did you that's interesting. That's hard to contemplate because it's like I can understand why you wouldn't. For sure I can understand why you wouldn't.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, I didn't have a choice, and neither did you. That's interesting. That's hard to contemplate because it's like I didn't. I remember when my stepdad left.

Alan Lazaros

we did well before that we had a yacht, and I never told this on this podcast or I haven't in a long time but when my stepdad left at 14, he literally took I or I haven't in a long time, but when my stepdad left at 14, he literally took, I say, 90%. He took all the income pretty much with him. My mom was a stay-at-home mom and she worked as a lunch lady as part-time and she was home during the summers. My stepdad made 95% of the income and he worked for a company called agfa. Agfa, they did hospital computers during the 90s, the dot-com bubble. I mean I remember it was wild hospital. Imagine computer era, hospitals, integration, digital. I mean it's a big deal, right, it's. You can't lose in a in a riding, a big wave like that, so to speak. And and you can research this, research the 90scom bubble, and it will show you everyone just made a bunch of money, right and and he left when I was 14. He got the yacht and the apartment building, we got the house and the dog and my sister moved out and it was us without. How are we going to keep the house and the family? And I'm 14? So I went to work.

Alan Lazaros

I was a bus boy and a car kid and my mom did what she had to do. She got her class b license and she drove for the newspaper and the newspaper went out of business and so at the end of the day we used to playfully call her a mother trucker, playfully, playfully. She said it not me. She said she was a truck driver, right, and I just had to bootstrap my way to get to college, like I wasn't going to be able to go to college if I didn't get really good grades and I just my college was $50,000 a year and I you don't just like go to that school. I mean, when I went to college, dude, I remember it was like go to that school. I mean, when I went to college, dude, I remember it was like a lot of rich kids and it was like oh, you guys don't have grit like me.

Alan Lazaros

Like this is different, I'm, you guys are fine, I'm screwed if I lose the scholarship. It was so different for me and you know I partied a lot, so that wasn't smart, but like I guess, yeah, I don't think about it that often, but what seems like detrimental short term can be long-term advantage if it develops work ethic and grit and humility and tenacity and you surround yourself with the right people. Like you always used to say. I had to say goodbye to the people who didn't believe in me. I didn't believe in my fucking self Facts, yeah. And so some of that was just out of self-preservation and survival.

Kevin Palmieri

And now.

Alan Lazaros

What helped you survive now can help you thrive, and I feel like you and I's work ethic was built on out of necessity and we didn't choose that. I think we just had no choice Either that or we were going to end up having very minimal lives.

Kevin Palmieri

Yeah, I've told the story before of when I got that job in weatherization, the job that I made a lot of money doing. The call I got from my boss when it was like, hey, it's time You're on, we got a job. I literally was walking out of the movie theater I don't even know how I afforded the tickets. I had zero dollars. I was broke as shit waiting for this job and then I got into a car with him. I met him for the second time this is the second time I ever met him and we drove I don't remember I think it was like maybe 12 hours from Boston to Wilmington, delaware, and then I moved into a house with five other strangers that I had never met and then I proceeded to do a job that I had never done before and it was the weirdest shit ever. It was the like, but there, for lack of better phrasing, is there really wasn't any other option, like it didn't matter that.

Alan Lazaros

I I know People say like.

Kevin Palmieri

What does your family think? It didn't matter.

Alan Lazaros

What am I going to say?

Kevin Palmieri

No, I'm going to turn down 50 bucks an hour to go do this thing. I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what I'm doing and I remember the first week when I went to get groceries. All I could afford literally all I could afford was deli meat, bread, chips, and I think I might have balled for diet soda, but that was. I couldn't afford that's all I ate.

Alan Lazaros

I love it man.

Kevin Palmieri

Every day, I think breakfast, lunch and dinner. I just ate sandwiches and chips. It was terrible.

Alan Lazaros

I'll be vulnerable here. I and chips it was terrible.

Kevin Palmieri

I'll be vulnerable here. I want to share this and I know we gotta jump.

Alan Lazaros

I'm just past my bedtime. I'm saying right, I'm speaking at my alma mater. So wpi, worcester polytechnic institute for the global listeners it's like a mini mit in massachusetts. It's one of the best engineering schools in the world and it's also one of the most expensive and worth every penny, straight up. I mean, one of the best decisions I ever made was going to wpi. I want to talk about surrounding yourself with the right people. I just surrounded myself with freaking geniuses. I mean it was awesome. That said, it was also atrociously difficult, particularly coming from a high school that wasn't so uh tech savvy. And you know, everyone else had computer, you know ap computer science and I didn't. We had a little computer lab, but it wasn't anything great, and so I had to really learn that. Okay, I'm in trouble, like I'm in trouble here. This is not. I have a disadvantage. I came from a town that didn't have computers well Like, we didn't have a well-equipped school, high school and middle school and all that stuff, but I didn't.

Alan Lazaros

We didn't have a well-equipped school, high school and middle school and all that stuff.

Alan Lazaros

But I didn't know, you don't know when you're a kid and then you go to wpi and it's like, oh, I am fucked straight up and and let me be vulnerable here and share this I'm speaking there on thursday night this is in two or three days or whatever and I'm excited. I'm so excited, I'm so pumped to talk to these kids and I met some of of them and it's awesome. It's an entrepreneurship group, it's a club on campus and I'm so pumped. Emilia and I are going to go for a walk after we're going to get our exercise and I'm going to show her my old stomping grounds. It's a beautiful campus.

Alan Lazaros

Wpi is gorgeous Old buildings but high tech inside. It's awesome. And the gym is heaven on earth. Heaven on earth. That said, I'm really scared because the truth is, these kids in business, they want me to teach them how to succeed, and the truth is, I can give you every one of these formulas. I can show you the flywheel concept. I can teach you, but but if you don't have the drive, if you don't have like, they have advantages you don't give.

Kevin Palmieri

They are more educated than you it is true, dude, it is true.

Alan Lazaros

No, that's why they don't have your grit and and they can't beat you without it. And and the world is competitive and not everyone makes it to the top, despite what people want to believe. The nfl only has what? What? 800 people, 800 players or whatever. Maybe it's 900 now out of the 150,000, whatever the point is, there's only one Olympic gold medalist and these kids. I'm scared to share with them the truth, Like, if you don't have drive, you are fucked and you can't rest on your smarts. I know smart people that Kev will run circles around because he surrounded himself with smarter people and he has grit that they just don't have because he came up rough. And for the people who came up rough, I'm going to share with them. They have an advantage For the people that didn't, which is you, wpi is a very expensive school. A lot of them came up very soft for lack of better phrasing and with very uh many leather mountain books I they're in trouble if they don't work on the grit part well, I'm sure you will crush it.

Kevin Palmieri

Thank you, brother, and those are your people. If you want I can come in. You know, tell my story, kind of rally the troops you know, I've never been in a college like this before. So I've only been in like one college actually before this my second college. It's kind of a big deal for me I'll walk you through my story how I built a business with my bare hands, kind of what it's taken for free too, I don't even charge. I won't even charge you.

Alan Lazaros

No, I'm sure you'll, you'll crush it. Can I sleep in one of the dorm rooms? Yeah, let me see what this?

Kevin Palmieri

Let me see what this life's all about. Let me try the calf. You know all that stuff.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah it's.

Kevin Palmieri

It's very, it's very interesting Because, again, the other quote is what doesn't kill you Makes you stronger. It's like that's just dumb for some people if you have self-belief. There's got to be a little, a little asterisk for the people that make it.

Alan Lazaros

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger and honestly, I think that's the exception, not the rule this you and i's story very, very easily could be very sad, of course, and I think that of course a lot had to very sad you wouldn't be hearing our story.

Kevin Palmieri

Yeah, yeah, no, because you wouldn't want to.

Alan Lazaros

Yeah, you wouldn't want to.

Kevin Palmieri

So that's the paradox of life. Yeah, there's a lot of those stories. There's a lot of those stories, unfortunately, unfortunately. But that's what makes you out there, achieving whatever it is you want to achieve, worth it, valuable and challenging, because you're going against the grain and that's kind of. I had a moment today and we'll get off. This is just I don't know. I'm in a weird phase. I I found somebody on social media who talks like a ton about manifesting, but they bought their followers. Like that's interesting to me, like isn't like you, that's kind of weird. Well, they manifested it, they did manifest right on into their account. Stay, I'm telling you, I'm all for it, I'm all for it, but you got my last takeaway.

Alan Lazaros

I'm not done yet again okay you know like. I'm so sorry. You're good. What's your takeaway?

Kevin Palmieri

I don't ever want anybody to compare their rock bottom and where they made it to somebody else's Because, honestly, you don't really know what somebody else's rock bottom really was and even more, you don't really know where they are today. I think, if we're talking about judgment, I had a friend one time who said to me I feel guilty for being successful because I didn't go through what you went through. It's like, dude, you shouldn't feel guilty. Good for you, good for you. But I also understand that sometimes the lack of trauma seems like trauma. It's like I would rather have it your way, but then again, would I? I don't know, it depends, right. What attributes would I have built?

Alan Lazaros

So, yeah, don't compare, what's what you do with it, and my main takeaway is if nothing else came from this episode other than a couple stories that were either hilarious and or sad, uh, surround yourself with the right people. I mean you and I. That's in your control. You have a choice with who you surround yourself with, and if you get that wrong, you are Jeffed. You have a choice with who you surround yourself with, and if you get that wrong, you are jeffed. You're jeffed, and I'm telling you, I was Mr. I can do it. I would never have been able to do it if I didn't get away from the wrong people. So, Kev, you needed to focus on getting around the right people mentors, coaches me, whatever, Blah, blah, blah. I don't mean to yeah me.

The power of the right people

Alan Lazaros

I need to own that you say it with your chest, they say it with my chest, but I needed to get away from the wrong people. And if you're out there and you, maybe you don't have self-belief, maybe you're not resourceful yet, maybe you don't have the resources. You do have a choice with who you spend time with, and that has got to be where you started, because that can make or break fucking everything started, because that can make or break fucking everything.

Kevin Palmieri

A good episode for the future might be. Is it hard? What's harder? Getting around? The right people are getting away from the wrong ones. Actually, I kind of have that written down and we were going to kind of do an episode on that. But it's a little. It's deep. After a long day sometimes it's hard to go into those types of deep, emotional kind of episodes.

Alan Lazaros

But we'll do that. Let's do it. I'm the reason we didn't do it and I'm I think we're both biased. I I think it's harder to get away from the wrong ones, but of course I would I think it's easy as shit.

Kevin Palmieri

You just stop answering the text messages, they go away, that's it simple, simple.

Alan Lazaros

We're both biased one was easier for me and one was easier for kev. Yeah, so that'll be well. We'll do an episode, well.

Outro

Kevin Palmieri

I guess that's the episode. That's it. So that's like a preview of the episode. That won't happen, because now you know exactly what the episode would be like, and I'm teasing, it's not. Neither one is easy. There are so many things that are wrapped in each of those. All right, we're going to let you go so we don't take up your entire day. As always, we love you, we appreciate family. We will talk to you all tomorrow.

Alan Lazaros

Stay Next Level, next Level Nation.

Kevin Palmieri

Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level University. We love connecting with the Next Level family.

Alan Lazaros

We mean it when we say family. If you ever need anything, please reach out to us directly. Everything you need to get a hold of us is in the show notes.

Kevin Palmieri

Thank you again and we will talk to you tomorrow.

Head Shot

Alan Lazaros

Host
Head Shot

Kevin Palmieri

Host