Passive Income: The Right Way to Secure Your Future | James Malinchak DSH #755
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I do hard money loans for people that go do real estate and they just pay me a great interest rate. I want peace of mind, man. Wow. I don't want to be tied down. That's why I teach my students, you know, what's the price for peace of mind? Pay everything off. They say, you know, there's good debt and bad debt. I don't want to get spiritual, but there is no good debt or bad debt. In the Bible, it says that the borrower is the slave to the lender. Wow.

All right, guys. Vegas local, James Malinchak here today. Thanks for coming on, man. Oh, good to be here, man. I'm a big fan. Likewise. I didn't even know you lived here. Yeah, until you hit me up. I didn't know you were down here. And I was honored, man. I watch all your clips on Instagram. Hell yeah. We were talking about real estate pricing out here 20 years ago. Oh, crazy. Bought a house for $250,000. Shoot. Wish you would have had land back then. Yeah. Like some of the

Some of the folks bought land. They just held on to it. Now they're selling it for crazy millions of dollars. Just the land, the dirt. That's crazy. I saw some land sell on the strip for like 20 mil a couple months ago. Unbelievable. Nuts. Unbelievable. They're as rich as in dirt. Yeah. Is real estate a big investment vehicle for you? No. No.

Well, physical real estate is not because I have a philosophy. I want everything peaceful. I want peace of mind. I don't want to be handcuffed by fluctuations and unknowns. So I'm in real estate, but I just lend. I do hard money loans for people that go do real estate, and they just pay me a great interest rate. I want peace of mind, man. Wow. I don't want to be tied down. That's why I teach my students, you know, what's the price for peace of mind? Pay everything off. They say, you know, there's good debt and bad debt.

I don't want to get spiritual, but there is no good debt or bad debt. In the Bible, it says that the borrower is the slave to the lender. Wow. So I never wanted to be at the mercy of fluctuations, goofy government changing things. And so I don't want to be fixing toilets. And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. I've got tons of friends who are amazing real estate folks, some that you've had on your broadcasts.

But I just, I like freedom. I'm all in it for freedom. That's what I try to teach my students to. What's the price for freedom? To not worry about a bill when you wake up. To not worry about things that are out of your control. And did that thought process come at a young age or did it come when you reached some level of success? Came at a young age. I was very fortunate. I had a mentor who's still my mentor and he's my cousin. He's worth...

a lot of money. He was one of the great commodity traders on the floor of the commodity exchange. Before the trade centers went down, he was trading gold, silver, and mercantile. He came from the same small town that I came from in Pittsburgh, really tiny 6,000 person steel mill town. And he would always tell me these financial rules. He'd fly me out to New York for his amazing penthouse place. And I'd go to the exchange and I'd work for him. I was a gopher, go for this,

go for that, wash his car, whatever I needed to do. But he would start mentoring and teach me. And rule number one, he would always say, James, don't owe people money. At the end, he said, I know more about real estate. I know more about the markets. And I know more about floating money. At the end of the day, you go to bed owing people money. You wake up owing people money. And I understand leveraging debt and all that. But what happens when the crash comes again like in 08? Yeah.

And things are out of your control and people are upside down who are leveraged to the hill. Right. I literally just got a call this morning from a friend of mine who's in that situation. Damn. Leveraged to the hill to where, and he's a really good man, and he is liquidating personal assets to pay all his investors back because he said, I'm not going to screw them out of money. They understand real estate and deals, he said, but I'm not going to go bankrupt.

I got these folks in at my word, and I'm going to give them their money back, whatever I have to do. And I thought, man, what an honorable thing to do. Yeah, most people would not think that way. No, no. But that's the challenge, right?

You know, you're at the mercy of others. Yeah, that's good until it's not. Man, you hit the nail on the head. Yeah, you hit the nail on the head. So I just don't ever want to worry about that. So he started, my cousin started teaching me those things. Don't swing for the fence. Just get on base. Right? Nice, steady, slow returns over time. You know, don't try to hit the grand slam. Right? He used to always say Babe Ruth hit a lot of home runs, but he struck out more than he hit home runs. Yeah.

And he said, when you would think about great hitters, you know, Ted Williams, Pete Rose, they just got on base. Yeah, Jeter. Jeter, man, just got on base and just consistent. So that's what I've done. I've always tried to get on base. I remember saying about, I don't know, 15 years ago, how do I pay everything off fast? Now, here's the deal. Here's what I teach my students. When you pay something off, you don't stop making the payments. Right.

That's crazy, right? If you pay your car off, whatever it is, 300 bucks a month, you don't stop making the payments. You keep making that monthly payment. You just pay it to yourself and invest that money so that money grows for you and works for you. You pay your house off, which I know a lot of real estate friends say don't do, right? Because you're tying up all that equity. What's the price of peace of mind? I know that if everything goes to hell in a handbasket, I got a place to sleep and nobody can take that from me. Because when you have real estate under contract, you don't own it.

You don't own it. The bank owns it. When you put 20% down, you don't own it? Heck yeah. People don't think of, oh, I own it. No, you don't. Now, when you got debt on it, you don't own that.

And so what I always teach, like if you pay your house off, you don't stop paying the monthly mortgage. You just pay it to yourself and invest that money and let it grow for you. Right. Whether that's go buy, you know, passive real estate investing, stock market, whatever that might be, life insurance, you know. So I just don't believe in debt. Yeah. Because I love what you said. Debt's good until it happens and it's not good. Because odds are in a lifetime, you're going to deal with two or three major crashes, right? Oh, my gosh.

Yeah, and again, I keep coming back to the uncontrollables, things that are out of your control. That's the scary part. COVID was unpredictable. Who saw that coming? What's going to happen in the election?

I mean, you just never know. So I like to be in control and I like to put my head down on the pillow knowing that I'm good. Yeah, I love that. No matter what happens, that's what I try to teach my students. Powerful. Do you believe in passive income? That's a controversial thing, you know? Thousand percent. You do? Yeah. So like the real estate that I do, I don't do buildings, I don't flip, I don't take contracts.

But I lend my money to people who love doing that and are better than me. And they just pay me a great interest rate, just gets deposited into my bank account every month. So I love passive income. So it does exist. It does. Some people say it doesn't.

If you structure the right way. Right. You know, and I have passive income. I have 150 private consulting clients. Wow. Who every month pay a fee or every year they renew. They pay up front and they renew. Well, that's all passive income. It just keeps coming in. Yeah. So I'm a big believer in passive income. Yeah. Yeah. Some people say real estate is passive, but it depends on how you structure it. It depends. Yeah. Everything's relative. It depends on how you structure everything.

You can't just do an umbrella and blanket it and say everything in real estate is passive income. So I just teach students, be careful, do due diligence, and see the big picture. And everything looks great on the front end, but you've got to really understand all the pros, cons, ins, outs, every nook and cranny. You can't just...

you know, take some people online's word of, hey, you just invest in real estate and you become rich. I wish it was that easy. Yeah. A lot of fix and flippers got wrecked. That market's tough now. I know. All markets are tough. Yeah. Even short-term rentals. Right. Airbnb's getting tough. I was just talking to the guy this morning and he got creamed on him. Damn. His leverage really, you know, to the heel. Yeah.

doing these short-term rentals. And there's one state where they changed certain, I guess the government changed certain laws and they start putting fees and fines on top of it. So he's really, all of a sudden he went from positive to upside down. Wow. Literally positive to upside down overnight. It's pretty crazy how you could have a million dollar business and then overnight one change. And it's sad. It is sad what others can do

and how that affects your livelihood. You think you're set up, you're free, you're taking care of your family, and then all of a sudden you got to go dig in and work because an uncontrollable flipped. Right. With that being said, do you have multiple businesses at the same time to kind of mitigate that risk? I do, but within my lane. So I've done a lot of talks, as you know, 3,000-some talks in my career. Very, very blessed.

And so I have multiple streams of income within what I'm really good at. Like I don't do, like I'm not really good at real estate, nor do I want to get involved and be handcuffed to the uncontrollables. So I can lend the money and that's pretty simple, right? And then I just get paid every month. I don't go and then do like stock market and I don't do Bitcoin and I don't do, because I'm not good at those. But when it comes to

getting paid to speak as a speaker and teaching others, I'm really great at that because I honed in on that for 20 years. And so I can teach you how to get paid to speak for colleges and universities. I can teach you how to run your own seminars and have high net

I could teach you how to speak and sell, offer from the stage on webinars. So I have various coaching members that come to me, and I have various income streams coming in because of in my lane, I have multiple streams set up. Outside, I don't because how can I be good at any of those? If I'm dabbling and spending a little time on each, how can you be good at anything? How could you have mastery? I was just watching something on the Lakers.

last night. And Shaquille O'Neal, when he came to the Lakers, in the beginning, it was kind of a letdown. And when they brought Phil Jackson in, old coach of the Bulls, Phil looked at Shaq's schedule over the summer, and he had 50 things booked, rap videos and commercials and all these different deals. And Phil asked him, he said, hey, Shaq, do you want to be the most valuable player of this league? And he said, yes. He said,

then I need you to do something. I need you to cancel all that stuff and focus on basketball this summer. If you will do that and listen to me, I guarantee you will be the most valuable player. Wow. And he said, look, if you're not, go back and do whatever you want. Give me three months. Shaq canceled it.

and started leading them to back-to-back championships, back-to-back MVPs in the NBA Finals. Dang. Why? He was focused, brother. He was focused. Became really good. Then he started creating multiple income streams through basketball, in basketball. Mm-hmm.

Right? Before that, he was doing that Kazam movie and rap videos and all that. He was out of his superpower. He was out of his talent. He wasn't in his lane. So I'm a big believer in multiple income streams and what you're good at because you can have mastery over that and you can focus on that.

But I'm not real big on trying to create multiple income streams by dabbling in a whole bunch of stuff. Unless you've got people that are running it for you and you truly trust them. Agreed. Wow, that's a legendary story. Phil's one of the greatest coaches. Oh, if not the greatest, maybe. I think him and Steve Kerr are probably one and two. Yeah. Or maybe Pop. Yeah. Oh, yeah. It's hard to beat Pop. But I love how Phil incorporated...

the mental side of the game. Yeah. He would make the players meditate. Oh, yeah. I'm big on that. Yeah, I'm huge on the mental. And I used to play college basketball. Oh, yeah? Yeah. So you were nice. I signed to the University of Cincinnati out of high school. Oh, D1. Yeah, D1. I was all right. I was a pretty good shooter. Did you want to go pro? I did, but I blew my knee out. Oh, man.

And fortunately, I had a plan B, which was to get into investments. And I thought I wanted to be a financial advisor and a stockbroker, which I did coming out of college. But then a funny thing happened where I had success at a young age and built a pretty fast business. And I got called to speak. Mm-hmm.

And I'm like, I don't speak. I'm a financial advisor. Well, just come and talk to my sales reps. I think there were like 30 of them. I'm like, I don't speak. I'm a financial advisor. They said, we only want you to talk for like 35, 40 minutes. Fire them up and teach them business stuff. I said, I don't speak. They said, I'll pay you 5,000 bucks. I said, I speak. I speak. I was like, what? And that's how I kind of got into the whole speaking thing. $50 million later, here we are. Man, I'm just sometimes, you know,

you know god had blesses you and takes you in a path when you don't expect it yeah you know and if your antennas aren't up and if your blinders aren't off you know that's why they put blinders on horses and races so the horse can't see anywhere but right there i noticed that and we go through life like that and we miss a lot of opportunities i say you got to go through life with no blinders on so you can see it not do you have to take all opportunities but so you can see them coming and and evaluate them and see if it's a good situation man

I often think that if I didn't say yes to that, where would I be today? Crazy. We wouldn't be sitting here. Probably not. I would have no books. Yeah, you got, what, 27 books? 27. So you're writing about one a year. Man, which is crazy because I never even read a book in college. I was a C student in school. Wow. Yeah. You know what a C student is, right? See your way through school. That was me. That was me, too. Maybe even some Ds in there.

And I just, man, it's just greatest gift in the world is knowing that you've made a difference in the lives of other people. Yeah, you're probably starting to get some testimonials now years later of people saying you changed their lives. Sean, it's crazy. You know, man, I read your book 18 years ago and I still follow this on page 67. I'm like, huh, really, me?

I'm a small steel mill town kid from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. You know, never thought I'd do speaking at events and read books and write books and do online courses. And it's just such a blessing, man. Right now, I'm at a stage in my life where I want to help as many people as possible, leave a positive footprint in the heart, mind and soul of people and

hopefully make this world a little bit better after I'm gone. Hopefully, which is a long time from now. Yeah. Well, you got Gary Brekker as your health coach, so. I do, man. I probably added 10 plus years to your life. Man, he's freaking amazing. I had had a blood pressure problem for about two and a half years and nobody could fix it. I actually drove myself to the ER about four and a half, five months ago. Wow.

10.30 at night, my blood pressure was 232 over 124. That's double mine. Holy crap. Like crazy. Now here's the crazy thing. I've never done a drug in my life. I've never even smoked a cigarette. Wow. I don't drink. Maybe a glass of wine every couple of months out to have steak with friends. I walk or run 10,000 steps five times a week. Wow. Okay.

I had every heart test, every blood test, every kidney test, every liver test done that you can imagine. Everything comes back perfect. Once a cardiologist did a stress test, he's like, your heart's like an athlete. Like everything's fine. And yet this blood pressure thing's up. And I have no stress. Blessed to have no financial stress because I paid everything off back in, I think, 2012. I have no financial stress, nothing. No relationship stress whatsoever.

So why is this like this? And doctors couldn't tell me. You know what they do? They say, well, here's another medication script. So now I was on like six. And I'm like, this is crazy. Like, what the heck is going on? And so I drive myself to the ER.

They get freaked out, and they put me in the hospital and start running all the tests again, chest x-ray, blood, work, kidneys, liver. Nobody could figure it out. So then they start about 3 a.m., so about six hours later, they start to bring it down to like 150 over 98. All tests are negative. Everything's fine. So what do they tell me? We're going to send you home. And I flipped out. I said, how can you send me home? Look at that monitor.

120 over 80 is normal. That's not normal. I came in here with all tests are negative. It's your job to figure this out. And they didn't. And I got really upset. I said, you do this to all the people in this hospital? You just send them home? That's crazy. Your job is to figure this out. And so they sent me home, wrote me another prescription, and I said, screw it. I had it.

I saw the videos from Dana White of the UFC here, who was in a very similar situation, was on blood pressure meds for like 15 years and all these problems. And I had no problems. I just had high blood pressure. I said, who's the best guy in the world that seems to be helping people? And well, I don't...

think Dana would lie. I mean, Dana's got no reason to, and he's not getting paid for it. And then I saw Steve Harvey talking about Gary and then Stephen A. Smith. I'm like, okay, I know enough about working with celebrities because I've helped a lot of people with speaking through coaching program.

They don't say this stuff. These folks get paid big bucks and none of them are getting paid to say this. I said, I don't care what I have to do. Now, I didn't tell Gary this after I started working with him, but I went to the bank and I got a cashier's check for $100,000 because he wasn't taking clients, personal clients. And I said, if I have to stand outside of his office and wait until he walks out and hand him a hundred grand cashier's check, I'll bet you he works with me.

That's legendary. And I got to tell you this. This is crazy, man. God works in wonderful ways sometimes. So that was on a Monday that I had to check. I was going to go to his office the following Monday and just stand there. So you were going to fly to Miami? Well, I have a place down in Florida, so I was going to drive about an hour down to where he's at. I literally was going to walk in.

And just sit there. I mean, at some point I've got to see him. Or I'll show up where he does a talk. I mean, if I handed you a cashier's check for $100,000, would you work with me? I probably would. All I wanted was somebody who knew what they were talking about to figure this out because now I'm going nuts. Like, somebody's got to figure this out. Nobody has. So anyway, I'm at dinner. So that was a Monday. I'm going to go the next Monday to his office. I already had it planned out.

And I was going to tell the receptionist, hey, could you have Gary come out? I have a check for him for $100,000. That literally was what I was going to do. That Friday, a friend and I go to dinner in Miami at a restaurant, which I never go to Miami. It's just not my jive. So I wanted to go to this one. We were going to this restaurant, and I asked if we could switch and go to this other one that just hadn't been opened. It was getting great reviews. So we go there. We catch up for like two hours.

And they have these bridges inside where you walk across to go to other tables and stuff. Interesting. Amazing. So before we walk out the door to leave, I said, can we just walk up there and go across this bridge? I've never done that. I might not be back. So we go up the steps. We're getting ready to walk across this bridge, and I hear somebody say, James.

And I look, and it's a former coaching client of mine in the real estate world. And so we just start chit-chatting. And about 15 minutes in, he said, so what's going on with your business now? What are you doing? And Sean, I don't know why I said this. I said, you know, what's really going on is I'm trying to get to this guy, Gary Brekka, because I have this health challenge. And he goes, hang on a second. He said, I'm good friends with his wife, Sage. Here, let me just put you guys on a text thread. Wow.

And that's how I started working with them. Nuts. Now, here's what's nuts. I wasn't supposed to be at that restaurant. I wasn't supposed to walk up those steps. They weren't supposed to be at that restaurant either. They lived about an hour and a half north. They were there for business. Wow. They were going to another restaurant. They switched also. Ha!

That's crazy. What's the odds of all those tables? When I get to the top of the steps, he's sitting right there. I don't even see him. He calls my name out. What are the odds of me saying, I'm trying to get to this guy, Gary Brekka, because I need help with this blood pressure? Yeah. And what's the odds of him being friends with his wife? Nuts. Started work with him. It's been amazing. The guy is a genius. A genius. The universe works in wonderful ways. Man, 13, 14 days later, my blood pressure was normal.

That quick? Yeah. Well, it's amazing when somebody knows what they're doing. Yeah. You know, so anyway, I know it's a long story, but maybe that helps somebody out here that I just think Gary's amazing. No, that's big time. So what was the actual issue, though?

Really, I had some gene situations. I had a methylation problem. Oh, did you have the MTHFR gene? Yeah, I got that one. You have the two? Yeah. Did you do the test? Yeah. So I had to cut out gluten and pretty much bread and stuff. Yeah, and I'm on all the supplements, and I cold plunge. When I'm in Florida, I sauna every morning for 30 minutes, and I cold plunge three to six minutes. Nice. Changed my life. Yeah.

So crazy. I just do all of it. And man, I've never felt better in my entire life. It's so mind- More importantly, my blood pressure has leveled off now. Great. 13 days. I was so blown away. I shot him a video. I was in the gym at 5.30 in the morning working out because then I was wide awake. I had more energy. Yeah.

And I didn't know what to do. I was like, I've got to shoot him a video. And so I shot him this video telling him how amazing it was. And plus, I was 40 pounds stronger on the bench, which I had never done. I was stronger than I was when I was a college athlete. Two weeks. Crazy. Well, blows your mind, one. But think about it. I teach this in business. It's not about working harder. It's not about working smarter. It's about working right. Mm-hmm.

He knows the right way of what should be working and what shouldn't be working. So I'm doing the right things now. So efficient. I'm forever grateful to Gary Brecka, Sage, his wife.

And my friend DJ Thielen, who I happened to bump into at that restaurant. They changed my life too, to be honest. I didn't know I had that gene break. I used to eat pasta and bread daily. I love Italian food. Yeah, I used to. Yeah, I used to. Well, we could actually go to Italy and eat it, but something they do here is just weird. Yeah.

I had some friends that just came back from Italy, and they're like, oh, it's completely different. It doesn't even taste like processed food like ours here does. You know what's cool? I did a cooking class where we made chicken parmesan. Mm-hmm.

I'm so glad I did that because I was like, I never want this stuff ever again. Once I saw what went in it, I was like, oh, my gosh, I might as well just open up a bag of flour and grease and butter and just dump it down my throat. Yeah. And so, yeah, no, I'm glad you're doing good. I can't even eat out anymore. I get sick every time.

Because I'm so healthy now. Good for you. How long have you been doing it? They took my blood and genes a year and a half ago. So Sage was my second guest on the show ever. Oh, Sage? Yeah. That's awesome. And just changed my life. I used to get sick every month. Wow. Yeah. I'm forever grateful to Sage and Gary and also, of course, DJ Thielen, who, man, if I were to be one sitting there and...

Yeah, I'm so thankful and grateful because I feel great now. But more than that, like the mental part, like what the heck is going on? Like how can everything come out negative? Like everything's positive in my life, right? No kidney problems, which I'm glad that happened because I would have never had all those tests run because they don't allow you to pay through insurance through preventative, which is crazy. But how could all that be okay and yet the blood pressure would be up?

I was literally going nuts. I was lost. I said, I'm going to figure it out. And I don't care what I got to do. I'm getting to Gary. And fortunately, God works in wonderful ways and DJ's sitting there. I love it. And it's also a testament to your network, though, too.

Because you were one connection away from him. That's true. Yeah. It's the six degrees of separation. I was one. I bumped into DJ. Yeah. And I always teach. That's important in relationships, right? I always tell people, stop networking.

Networking equals pest working. You've had people come up to you and want to network you, and they tell you how great they are, or they slam you with a business card, or they try to get your number, your personal stuff. They don't care a lick about you. That's what networking is. When you network, you become an unwelcome pest. When you relationship work, you become an invited guest because we should be about building relationships, and that's something I've been...

follow my entire life. I'm here to build quality relationships where everyone's better from it. If I could serve and help anybody in any way, I'm willing to do it. So I always say stop networking, start relationship working. I love that. I think similarly. So when I meet a new person, I ask myself, am I feeling like they're draining my energy or do I feel more energy? That's so good.

And some people, man, they could drain you quick. Yeah, I mean, there are people who brighten up a room when they walk in it, and there are those who brighten up a room when they walk out of it. Yeah, all from a one-minute convo. Yeah. It's nuts. You can just tell, man. You get the vibe, the energy of like, man, I don't want to be around this cat. Yeah. Like, you know, watch how they are. They're kind of a leech. Your intuition is really good. Yeah. You know, especially when you do a lot of business over the years. Every time I've gone away from trusting my gut, it's gotten me in problems. Same.

Every time. Yeah. You know, I teach that for businesses as well. We run a really nice seven-figure business, and I have one staff person. Wow. People are like, how do you do that? I said, well, I run everything by question. I had a guy one time ask, hey, man, I heard you run your entire business by question. I said, damn straight. And I think you should too, and everybody should.

So I believe that we as entrepreneurs are in business for freedom to do what you want, when you want, where you want, how much you want, how little you want, with whom you want, with whom you don't want. And I never violate that. And so I'm in business for freedom to live my life the way I want. We all should be that. I truly believe that. So if you buy into that and you believe that, then you should run your whole business and life by question. Hmm.

So the answer is a C or C answer. And here's the question. Is what I'm thinking of doing or who I'm thinking of working with in this JV deal or this sponsorship deal or this hiring this person, whatever it is, will they be contributing to my freedom or will they be contaminating my freedom? And the minute, Sean, man, I get the indication that someone's going to contaminate my freedom is the minute I say no. Wow. It doesn't go any further. Even if the money's good?

Care less about the money. Can't put a price on personal freedom. I mean, there are a lot of people who got into deals because the money's good and then they have no freedom and they're working for somebody else. They're at the mercy of someone else. So I got to be careful when you take investors on. Right. I mean, essentially, you're a partner, but you have obligations to...

you know, other folks. And sometimes you got to listen to everything they say and they dictate what happened. I'm not saying you shouldn't do investing with others, but we're having others invest in you, but you gotta be, you just gotta be cognizant. I just never violate that. You know, are they contaminating my freedom or contributing to my freedom? And the minute they, I feel they're going to contaminate with their spirit, with the way they do business, with the way they are to other people.

I watch people. I love to go to dinner with folks. You know why? I want to see how they interact with the servers. That tells me a lot of whether I want to get in business with them. I want to see how they interact with people who can't do anything for them, the valet person. I want to watch them when they walk to the bathroom. Are they saying hi to people? Are they smiling? I want to see their energy. A lot of people can put a front on.

Right? But when they're not thinking you're watching, that's when you can tell a lot about somebody's energy. I love that. I'm the same way with the podcast. I see how they greet my assistant, the producer. Justin Waller, he shook everyone's hand as soon as he walked in before even greeting me. I love that. Not many people do that. Yeah. It's just not that hard. I'm blessed. I wrote some books. There are a lot of people that wrote books, right? But put the Bible aside...

There's only one book we need. It's a book I read years ago. I read it every December. Wow. It's called Everything I Ever Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. I never heard of that one. By Robert Fulgen. Check it out. Yeah.

Yeah, it's just basic stuff. Please, thank God, be courteous. Treat people as you'd like to be treated, right? Basic things that we all should be doing, and this world would be better if we did it that way. But yeah, it's very simple. It doesn't have to be difficult. Did you find yourself struggling with ego when you started getting success? Oh, yeah. Yeah, well, I think we all do in a way because it's—

you know, we start drinking the juice and the Kool-Aid. Yeah. Like you, number one in iTunes, right? Oh, man, I'm cool, right? I remember when I started speaking on like big stages and I was like, oh, man, I'm a somebody, right? You know, I'm a rock star. I'm flying to go speak and, you know, be on this stage and,

But at the end of the day, it's about leaving positive footprints in people's lives, right? Making sure that you're doing a great contribution. You're leaving a legacy. You're living a life of significance. I say this everywhere. The greatest gift you could ever receive is knowing you've made a positive difference in the lives of others. Yeah.

Very simple. So just wake up every day and figure, how could I serve people, help people, make people's lives better? And you'll have people magnetically attract you like a magnet. They'll want to be around you. They'll talk great about you when you're not around. They'll want to do deals with you. And we should be about that. It should be all about relationships and friendships. It should be win-win for everybody. It shouldn't be screwing people over. Yeah, I agree. I love that way of thinking. Most people just want to be able to see results, so they don't think like that.

When we come into this world, you and I are big on mindset, right? If you study anything about our minds, we have two parts of our mind. We have a conscious mind. That's what we're thinking with right now. When we go to sleep, it goes to sleep. Your subconscious never sleeps. It accepts, without a doubt, anything that gets programmed into it. It doesn't reject. It doesn't analyze. It's like a hard drive. It just stores. Well, you put enough junk on the hard drive, it gets a virus and it crashes.

Our subconscious is no different. If you think about an iceberg, you see the iceberg above the water, but that's only 10% of the iceberg. 90% of the iceberg is below the water. So think of your mind the same way. 10% is the conscious mind where logical decisions happen. The 90% below the water, the subconscious, is the emotions, the values, the feelings. So

When we are born and we come into this world, we all get a bib placed under our chin, right? Because we're being taken care of as infants. But you understand that gets programmed. And what we don't know is we go through life with that embedded on our computer. We go through life with being that way unknowingly because that's the program running that people should be giving to us. In essence, we're taking from people.

And what I always teach, I've been teaching this for 20 years, you've got to take that bib consciously off from around your chin and neck, drape it over your forearm like you're a server in the finest dining establishment, and just approach everybody with, what could I do for you? How could I help you? How could I serve you? How can I make this person's life just a little bit better from us meeting?

And if we just approach people like that, how can we have a great win-win-win in the business deal? If you approach that, then you'll have a great life. Absolutely. I'm writing a book right now called The Power of the Napkin. It's all about don't wear the bib, and it's all about why serving others is the, not one of, the greatest secret to all success and significance in life and business. Yeah, that's powerful. You've got to reprogram your subconscious, though, to get there. Yeah.

Because I feel like we're innately selfish because of survival, you know, just to survive. But times have changed. We don't need that survival instinct as much as we used to. And the first part of all transformation is awareness. See, a lot of times we go through life, we don't know why we're doing this. You know, why are we thinking for ourselves? Why are we taking?

taking from others? Why are we only looking for our side of the deal? Well, it's because it got embedded from that simple infant stage. And we got programmed that that's how we go. But first part of all transformation is awareness. Once you're aware, you can change that fast. If you're not aware, you just keep doing the same old, same old. Absolutely. That's why I'm aware of my ego and I go through phases of, oh, I need to tone it back a little bit. But that's the first stage. Yeah, me too. I mean, when I was blessed to be invited on ABC's Secret Millionaire TV show, I was like, holy cow, this is 8 o'clock.

Sunday night primetime. Wow, I arrived. Yeah, because that was one of the hottest shows back in the day, right? Oh my gosh, yeah, it was fantastic. It was truly one of the greatest blessings of my life. I met some amazing servers, unsung heroes that were just out there making a difference for no other reason than to make their communities better. And you sign a contract with ABC, I mean, it's not cable. And I'm nothing against that. I'm just saying this is...

this is ABC that's owned by Disney. This is kind of major. This is Monday Night Football, ABC. At the time, this was Desperate Housewives, ABC. Yeah, no, they were a big deal. I watched ABC growing up. Yeah. Yeah. And then you're going to all these ABC parties, and you're hanging out with Shaquille O'Neal, and you're hanging out with the people on all the ABC shows. You're like, wow. Right? And you start to like...

The ego, it's easy to creep in. And I heard somebody say that ego, E-G-O, is just edging God out. You're focusing on the fame and all that. And I had a friend tell me this. He said, you know, all that stuff is going to be gone. You know, you heard the 15 minutes of fame thing? Yep. And I was like, wow. And it took that to heart.

And that's when I was like, you know what? This isn't about, oh, look how great I am. This is about, you know, staying true and humble to who you are and always, you know, focusing on serving and giving and trying to help people. So, you know, for a little while there, a few months, you know, I started to float up in the air. Wow, this is great. And you know what, man? Stay humble. Stay true. You know, be kind to people, treat people in the right way, build relationships, you

So I started to wear the bib a little bit instead of the napkin over the floor trying to help others. It's easy to get wrapped up in that space when you're in the acting space. Yeah. So I admire you, man. You're number one in iTunes for podcasts. I see your Instagram little clips I watch all the time. You've got hundreds of thousands of people that view those. Yeah.

And you're just a cool dude and you're a good guy, man. You're just out there interviewing people, trying to help people make their lives better. Yeah, I think I get it from Rogan because I used to watch him every day. And he's just doing what he loves, man. He's number one. Yeah, he is. Well, you'll be there, man. You're young. You got some time. Yeah, he had 10 years on me. You've only been doing this 18 months. That's amazing, man. Yeah, man, I appreciate it. Absolutely. You're an inspiration. Just keep doing what you're doing, man. You're awesome.

I loved your stuff. That's why when you hit me up with the DM, I was like, oh my gosh, man, I love this dude. I've been watching his clips like, I don't know, for six, seven months before...

It was crazy. Like just, Oh, I'm sorry. No, you're good. Out of the blue, man. You just hit me up for that. No, I saw you comment on one of them. So I hit you up. I was watching this guy like, and now he wants me on his amazing pod. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. That's the power. You never know what a comment will lead to, man. I've gotten some guests just from commenting on photos too. That's awesome. Yeah. James, it's been fun. Anything you want to close off with? And I just want to say thank you for having me. I don't take this time lightly. Hopefully we shared something that might be helping somebody out there. Uh,

I lost my sister Vicki to a brain tumor several years ago, and it taught me a very valuable lesson in my young life at that time, that you can make more money. You can lose all your money, come back and be better. You can build another business. You can lose everything, come back, be better. You can lose all your customers, your clients, come back, have more. But the one thing we can't get back is time. Think about this. Every minute, every second,

You waste. You don't get back the rest of your life. It's not like you get a do-over. So I understand the value of time because I understand my sister Vicki has no more on this earth.

And so I just want to say thank you. I understand how valuable this time on your podcast is and for those who are watching. And I want to say thanks for giving me some time. And hopefully we made somebody's life a little bit better today. Likewise. Thanks for your time, man. Thanks for coming on. Anytime. Thanks for watching, guys, as always. Hopefully you enjoyed it. See you tomorrow.