The American Dream Movie
Take the journey with us as we travel across the country to discover what the American Dream truly means.
Sean Greeley
Transcript
Unknown Speaker
The idea of the American Dream
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is
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different things to different people. But when, when I think about it, I think of freedom, of course, because that’s what this country is founded on the freedom and the independence to go out and actualize yourself and do whatever it is you want to do the pursuit of happiness, it’s the pursuit, there’s no guarantee that you’ll catch it. But to have the freedom and, and to have the ability to go out and chase after it. That’s, that’s at the core of the American dream. To me. It’s all tied together, success, prosperity, freedom, the American dream, it’s all the same thing. It’s, it’s, you’re born here, you die here and in between, you just kick maximum ass.
Sean Greeley
Today, I’m in a special position where I get to spend my time helping entrepreneurs, helping folks fulfill their dreams, accomplish their goals through their business. And one of the things that weaves through the thread, the thread that weaves through all the stories of success of people that I get to work with today, is really the history of the American dream. So to explore the American dream, we rented a bus, we went on the road for five weeks. And to me, you know, history is not something that you just read in a book or see on TV, if you’re really going to get to know history, you’ve got to experience it, you’ve got to be there. Go to the places go to the sites that have historic significance. my great grandparents came overseas, through Ellis Island came from Ireland, here to America. And really, America has always been a special place in the world that folks came to find freedom. So we’re in Ellis Island now. And this is actually the main processing room, I guess, from 1890, to about 1950. This was the main processing center for the United States, they travel, you know, on a steamship over here, exhausted, tired, hungry, come through this processing station, hopefully get approved to come through. And then from there, you know, they’d be in America, welcome to America, and starting to pursue their dreams and build a better life for themselves and for their families. So pretty profound when you think about it. And for for most of you know, over a third Americans, this is where it all began. One of my favorite stories of that being expressed in today is a story of Dragon door. Pawel coming from Soviet Union, john mccain coming from the UK. And really, it’s a wonderful story of an entrepreneurial journey through the American dream.
John Du Cane
Welcome Raz. America is the best country in the world. And everybody hears about it. Everybody loves it or hates it. And if they hate it, the reason somebody hates America is because they’re jealous of America. So there’s no third opinion. They’re like growing up in the Soviet Union. You read some books, you watch some movies, that some American movies that were shown, and some of them left an impression. One I remember is the Magnificent Seven. And that was a terrific movie, such a powerful movie, and the American scenery and just the mood of freedom and opportunity, anything is possible. And later on, I understand the term that I learned here this term of American exceptionalism. I really like that. What I don’t like about what’s happening right now is this country’s trying to some people in this country try to turn away from what has made this country great. They just tried to downplay American exceptionalism and try to be just like everybody else. And they’re forgetting that the rest of the world is looking up to America, and they want us to be exceptional. So I came here and tried to start a new port expert business with some friends, which was unsuccessful this way never heard about this business. Finally, I decided probably I should better stick to things that I know about. August I did a bunch of odd jobs. I sold hot dogs I Boston nightclub I delivered newspapers, you know, the usual immigrant story. And finally, I started training people because well, what dunno, but important, what do I know about export? Then? What am I going to earn selling hot dogs. As I started training people, eventually, I changed several facilities, training facilities by less training facility that was in Minnesota, was in the basement of a bank vault. And that was beautiful, because it was in the basement, so nobody could hear the screams. And nobody really had any good use for the space. They had tried to rent it out to an armored car company, but they had their own. And so there’s no retail front. And so I got a great deal. About that time, that’s when I got my first lesson in marketing. I learned about positioning versus prospecting. And I understood that positioning prospecting means just chasing people down, okay? You come to me trained with me, because I’m the best or whatever. And positioning is just placing yourself where people will find you, people who are the right people will find you. So a friend of mine had suggested that I teach workshops at a local seminar company. And I offered a couple of different workshops to them stretching and ABS, things like that. As a result, as I learned early on, that were great, because instead of paying for marketing, I was paid for marketing. I wasn’t paid much, maybe a couple hundred dollars. But nevertheless, every time I would teach the course, and people come to me so well, do you offer private training? Yes, I do. And here’s a great example of positioning again. And this wirey, a skeptic looking Englishman took my class and he walks over to me afterwards, and he introduces himself as down Duquesne and is asking if I’d like to write a book. And that was the beginning of a wonderful friendship, and a terrific business relationship with Dan Duggan and dragon door
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when I first founded dragon door back in 91. And there was one impulse, which was an excitement about sharing my passion for Tai Chi and Chico with the world. And that was about it. You know, I didn’t have anything at all well figured out about how that was going to play out in my universe, or anyone else’s universe. For that matter. It was just a kind of vague sense of the desire to get the word out. And I didn’t really know what I was doing on many, many levels. We published our first book called avena. Ci, but bought it was through traditional publishing, you know, we was selling the boat from like 1695 to Barnes and Noble, and it didn’t matter how many copies you sold. If it was in the 10s of thousands, no one was going to get rich. I then also organized a couple of certifications. So certification systems for people who wanted to instruct in medical Chico and other aspects of Chico so that developed, however, I was in a desperate financial situation, no question. The most scary moment came when I remember opening the door to an African American gentleman who was there to turn off my water because we hadn’t paid the water bill. And we somehow managed to come up with the payment for the water bill. And I had lots of situations like that where we had a terrible time staying alive. I was had a little office over carwash and it got so bad that eventually I approached the guy next door to me in who is about the carwash also john Kramer who had a limo business. And I decided to start driving limo to bring in least some regular cash while I was trying to make it as a publisher. And I then had the very good fortune to rise to meet mostly most of the single most charismatic author I’ve ever been fortunate enough to meet and that’s Pavel setsubun. And he was But again to show us Westerners what we didn’t know about stretching and how everything we thought we knew was wrong, and he was going to fix it. So I was intrigued. And I went to this flexibility workshop with the open new. And there was this young Russian, very charismatic, very articulate, and he had a shirt on that said, body by Stalin. And he had a definite stick going, he was the EVIL RUSSIAN, and he came from the evil empire. And, you know, he made a lot about being an ex communist and having kind of escaped from Russia. And he’d been Special Forces. And it was very intriguing, and that was great. But what was so much better was combination things was that his ideas, and his techniques for stretching and flexibility were amazing. And they were genuinely different. And they were getting people extraordinary results. So I got very excited. And I just felt this special connection with Pavel. Right off the bat, I liked him immediately. And I went up to him and asked him three questions. I said, Do you have a publisher? And he said, No. And then I said, Would you like to be published? And he said, Yes. Third question is where you’d like me to publish you? He said, Yes. Let’s look at that. And he just had a few stick drawings of figures and a few kind of little pages of handout. And we worked on that and came out with the first book beyond stretching.
John Du Cane
After that, a book and strength training. That was power to the people that at one point, I was two kettlebells. It never occurred to me that kettlebells could be popular is just too hard. So this is how it came about. I’m sitting in Marty Gallagher’s backyard. Marta Gallagher is a good friend of mine. He’s a former coach powerlifting Team USA. He lives in a undisclosed location in the East Coast. And so we’re sitting in the backyard and enjoying some steaks and shooting some breeze and peace telling me about Kurt Kowalski at cone, all this lifters coach then I’m telling you about things I’ve done and tell him about kettlebells. So he tells me, why didn’t you write an article for Milo about this? I thought to myself, my little kid. Milo is this niche publication for just crazy guys who like lifting rocks and bend horseshoes and nails? And so I thought, yeah, this group seems to be crazy enough. So why don’t give it a try. So I wrote an article, but it was called the vodka, pickle juice kettlebells and other Russian pastimes
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and doing things.
John Du Cane
And then I started getting mail. People were really curious about it.
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People started getting kettlebells kettlebells had been around in fact, iron. They had been very big. Earlier in the century, with old time strongman they’d been used in Germany and in the states and of course in Russia. But that absolutely gone out of fashion. Iron mine had this weird adjustable kettlebell that didn’t work very well, in our opinion. There was no literature about it. There was certainly no DVDs or videos or anything. But pebbles pebble had become monster sports and kettlebell lifting in the military in the Special Forces in Russia. He had this in his background, the article stimulated interest. So Pamela and I started talking about it. And he asked me if he thought that this was something that could fly in the United States. And we had this historic meeting at a coffee shop in St. Paul in Roseville, actually called dumb brothers. And we had, you know, I think one of the most historic meetings in modern fitness fitness history, which is why he and I sat down for our espressos. And he had this huge hunk of on on the table with a handles like a cannibal with a handle. So this is a kettlebell is kind of rusting old object which he had actually got from a hockey player from Russia that had been visiting. And he said, What can we do with this? Do you think this will really work? And his idea was that Well, probably there’d be a few grizzled vets who’d been in the military who this would appeal to and then maybe some power lifters and some elite athletes and that would probably be it. So you know, I think it’s I think they have a bigger appeal.
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They kettlebell has been instrumental in weeding out weakness out of the Russian gene pool.
John Du Cane
And now you’re next, you are on the Soviet territory, and you are becoming a better man. If you don’t know how I’ll teach you, if you don’t want to, I’ll make you right now, it’s gotten to the point where you can find nobody knew what a kettlebell was in the West. At that point, right now you can find a kettlebell. And I don’t know, for crying out loud a bookstore, you know,
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and at Sears. I mean, it was just this amazing breakthrough. And, of course, what also happened is we went from being a publisher of books and DVDs to a company that was a manufacturer. And also, we suddenly had this organization of people are Casey’s, which has now grown to this, like 2000, okay, sees in 43 countries and are all over, all over the world.
John Du Cane
I mean, right now, we’re reached a point where we have, you know, an army of guys with tattoos of rkc eagle on their biceps, you know, or the calf or somewhere else, and it’s just feels awesome. It was truly, truly awesome. But we’re just doing what we love to do. I love spreading the pain and love, you know, down loves communicating about spreading the pain. And then we had this terrific community of people that grew around what we’re doing. So the growth has been totally organic. There hasn’t been any kind of a business plan. I mean, world domination, obviously, is the objective. But that’s about it, world domination, without any steps or stages.
Unknown Speaker
If you’re concerned as an entrepreneur, about two possible situations, one is you’re in a job, and you’re dissatisfied with your job, and you have a passion and you want to get into that new passion, but you’re scared as all hell about what’s going to happen if you quit your job, which is what I did, and jump into something which could fail. Or you’re an entrepreneur who’s been at it for a while, like I was for a long time, and it looked like it wasn’t gonna work. And you’re wondering, should I quit? Should I pull the plug is this worth it, just the more you tried to make things happen, the more you’re gonna have to realize that people are going to screw up and things are gonna go wrong. That’s just the nature of the game.
Sean Greeley
You know, working with a lot of folks on development of their business, development of businesses is really about development of the entrepreneur development of ourselves. Because people are what lead businesses businesses don’t, don’t grow themselves. And one of the most challenging obstacles everybody has to come across, come across and really come face to face with is fear. And that’s, that’s, that’s the, I think, you know, it’s the one of the most frightening parts and also one of most exciting parts of the journey. Because when you when you have the fear, but you do the thing anyway, that’s when you get to grow. And that’s, that’s where the magic happens. I think
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the biggest things you’ve helped me with more than anything, np has given me
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the belief,
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the belief, you know, I didn’t set out here and in seven years ago, eight years ago, and really think that I would have a business that supports me and then I’m not a slave hunt business. I thought I would be I didn’t know at the time. That’s what it was called. But yeah, you own your own business, to be leaf. That seed that was planted in my mind, to be able to walk up to presidents of companies. You would talk to me two years ago, when I’m telling it You gave me the belief that you can do that. You can walk into a room, sit down and tell them who you are proudly, confidently. It’s the real deal, man. The real deal, y’all changed my life completely.
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My name is Jeremy Guthrie. I’m the owner of Texas City boot camp,
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Texas Tech.
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I got started in the fitness industry. When I went through a time in my life where I really didn’t know. I really didn’t know who I was anymore. At the time, my life was interesting. My brother was in prison. You know, my mom and dad, they both had been married three times before I was 18. So I shake a lot of hands. And, you know, I really didn’t have that stable family in my life that I was yearning for at that time. And so one Sunday evening, sitting down, you know, as a rainy evening and sitting down, I can remember to this day I was at the coffee table, and I just sat there and asked myself, do I even deserve to live anymore? At the time, that Sunday night I was 280 pounds. got pictures that are just look at them. And you think what is this guy doing going into fitness, but 280 at the time, I was about 40% body fat, I was miserable. And that Sunday night, I made a decision, either take my life with the 45 on the table, or make something out of myself and really prove everybody wrong and fight the own problems. And inside me that things were telling me you can’t do it anymore. And all through life, everyone would tell me, Jeremy, you can’t do it anymore. And they would tell me that and I kept replaying that. And so instead of doing the unthinkable, I I still got the book, it’s a book I wrote, my three things I wanted to do in life number one was help someone, I just wanted to help someone because at that time, I needed a friend. So the second goal was be a friend of someone. And the third was be happy. I wrote those down as to get that book. And it reminds me of what you can do when you put your mind to something. And so I wrote those goals down. And then I went to work out. I said, this is this is how I feel, I feel great. Wow, this is how I forgot about how I felt when I worked out. And so it became clear to me what exactly my life was here on this earth for, to live life by giving back and showing others bring others make people happy, make them feel good about themselves, you know, show your heart be somebody and that was to me was like the turning point.
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Then it came into my life where, okay, making great money. Money’s good. But I had a daughter at that time, you know, 2008, I had my daughter, Lydia, and I saw her crawling on the ground. And it was it was really tough to see that it was tough for me to see her. Daddy, not there, in birthdays, and in. I don’t like saying this, but even a Christmas morning to have to help someone walk out on Christmas morning, instead of be with your family. And I did that. So I made a lot of sacrifices. And for two years from 2008 to 2010. That’s what I did, I had to make a change in my life. I knew something had to be done. And so I took a leap, you know, and and decided to go to mega training last year, October of last year. What I wanted more than anything was to have someone that could believe in me and kind of support me in ways that I didn’t think I would ever that I ever imagined I needed to be supported in. And I went there and you know, I saw people up on stage, Jeff t you know, all those guys that that I look up to. And I said you know, one day I want to I want to I want to be like those guys, you know, and I know I can do it.
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I joined VIP and had a matter of three months I had all this systems structure down and next thing you know, we sent out a campaign 48 out of 48 converted to prospects for 21 days out of those converted 74 over $38,000 Okay, now from small time ma’am like me comfortable. I mean, to me, that’s that’s a lot of dinero when I was grossing average, every single year, up to this point $75,000 in a year. My average clients hell was 12 clients a year average. I take him for granted four or five grand a month, you know, heading over to my house and thought Whoo hoo, but I was working 80 hours a week. So her am sitting there thinking okay, I’ve got 80 hours and now I’ve got Wow, so we’re only doing eight boot camps now. We sign up 17 more people. I’m doing eight boot camps a week, Monday through Thursday. 5:30am and 5:30pm got a good team got a good staff got clients that love us. What more could you ask for? And we’re doing cash flow of 10 grand a month and this was in February. Look down gross receivables $59,000 $59,000. Okay, fast forward now. You know, I don’t have to sell a thing for a year, if I if I didn’t want to if my passion wasn’t there, I could put this on autopilot because of the cash flow. Everyone, except for two people signed one year contracts. And if your systems are in place, and you create raving fans, you give good customer service, you show those people, you really do care and you you really love what you do. By Me, none can stop you. And that’s really what it’s all about. Nothing can stop you. And now I know that that the potential is there. What these guys have done is they’ve given me a program where I could sit down and I can do whatever I need to do. Be off on Fridays work boot camps, mornings and evenings, great if I want to do boot camp, I can if I don’t, I can contract that off to one of my staff. But I can do work eight hours a week. I was scared man, I was scared. took me two years to join VIP. I remember back in 2008 comedian calling me up and I just know I’m good. Yeah, 80 hours a week, two years later doing that every week. Yeah, that’s where that’ll get you, you’ll be like, Okay, I’m done. You can’t beat a dead dog. And as at that point, you just got to take the leap. And he would came to me in December and said, Jeremy, this is what you’re gonna do.
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five, eight months from now, I tell you, you’re crazy.
Dan John
You’ve got to trust the jury a little bit. You’ve got to trust the path, for whatever reason. And you’ve gotten to this place where this is something that you want. You have to trust the path. As you go through life, your options, narrow and narrow or narrow. One day you get this goal. Almost always, it makes sense. When you do this, look backwards over your shoulder. You don’t I mean, I’ve never had someone just kind of show up and comment and say, Dan, I want to be a world champion, the Olympic lifts. Why? Well, you know, I was on Wikipedia, and I saw that was one of the sports fields. No, there’s always a story that gets you there. So I guess, on that, trust your story, trust your journey. Number two, there are mentors out there, there are people willing to help you. But you’ve got to do a little bit too. You got to walk that walk. If you take the steps forward, mentors will show up the value.
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I grew up and
Dan John
youngest of six kids. So we’re always out playing sports. I always argue, you know, I’ve made more catches probably hit the ball more times than anybody who’s organized sports were always outside. And then when I was about, I must have been eight, my aunt Florence died, we bought a Sears Ted Williams barbell set. And we started lifted out terrible, of course, you know, it’s only seven, you know, I thought it was awful. And I just kind of got started interested in being bigger and stronger. And you know, all that. And I can remember in eighth grade, I’d come home every night and I had this little workout I found if I look back on it now, all three dumbbell presses, four sets of 10 alternating curls, four sets of 10 and I thought that was the ticket man, I have the perfect program. And so I but I did it every night, you know, and it’s just been a it’s just been something that’s been always in my life. You know, I can’t imagine separating Fitness, Health and life out very well. It just who I am. So I was in ninth grade discus thrower. You know how I was good. I was pretty good. You know, I taught myself how to turn you know, which is hard to do, especially at the time because there wasn’t a lot of role models and all track and field only have pictures and there was no energy interwebs and so I taught myself how to turn I turned myself into 103 foot discus thrower, you know the world. And here I was world. Here we go. And I bought a book called The track and field on the book. And in there basically it talks about a guy named Ralph Monae at Utah State. And basically I figured, hey, he’s got to be the best discus coach in America. I want to go to Utah State. We’re talking about 118 pound middle linebacker saying he wants to go to Utah State University on a disco scholarship, and six years, five, six years later, getting that dream. In hindsight, I look back on those my time at Utah State. It was a wonderful time. Wonderful time. In fact, my senior year I remember I was around April, April, my senior pictures in the paper, you know, a lot of press. And I remember thinking, you know, there won’t be too many times your life is gonna be this good. really enjoy this ride 9091 I think I was a pretty good force in both throwing and Olympic lifting. Throughout the 90s, I think that’s pretty successful. In the early 2000s, I blew my wrist apart, right after winning that national championship in weightlifting, my friend Dave Turner, my coach in Olympic lifting, at the time asked me if I lift in the state Weightlifting Championships, because I could earn enough points that we so we win again. So you know, Hercules barbeau Club, we got to win. So I show up. And, you know, instead of kind of doing the math where in fact, a coach myself, I wouldn’t allowed me to do this, I decide to break the state record on the last match, because well, that’s what one does in a. So I got the lift kind of askew, I had the right hand way back too far in the left hand too far forward. And so and of course, my motto was never let go. So I didn’t. And I was fine, the weight threw me to the ground, I was fine. until I hit the ground, my elbow hit, my hand was open like this, and the weight hit right there. my elbow hit the ground, and my wrist went that way. And on film, it looks like this. And I just shattered my wrist. Now, to win the state championship. The Hercules barbell club needs me to score. So I have to clean and jerk. I didn’t lift very heavy. But I have so far ahead in the in the snatch that I just took a minimal lift to win it and then go see a doctor. So we have I’ve had two surgeries after that. And then the surgeon, the risk specialist told me, I probably never lift weights again. And insisted that it demanded a paradigm shift in my life. And one of the lessons I learned, wow, the first thing is when when I was told I’d never lift again. My first thought was okay, let’s okay. This summer. I’m sorry for the segue. But it’s important. See, I think sometimes we get stuck in goal setting. And there’s not a big fan of goal setting, you know that. But the important thing that sits behind above on top is what’s the mission? What’s in what was nice about this injury was I realized that I wanted to be fit. I wanted to have my heart rate in good shape, one of my blood pressure in good shape. It wasn’t so much I’d never lift again.
How can I give back to those people helped me before? And so my first answer was, let’s start a new letter. And boy, I tell you, we had in its run, it became a mazing thing became a big deal on the internet when a new issue would come out. And so the two great lessons I’ve learned from that is you know, there’s going to be obstacles, there’s going to be obstacles, no matter what your goal is. But the idea is that on the both sides is that this moving over, no matter what you get hit with, if you if you really have a foundation for what you want to do. You can overcome a lot of stuff. But if you don’t have a foundation, you don’t get that of an obstacle is going to get in your way. So constantly constantly look. And I always tell people look, you know, look backwards a little bit. Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer says something interesting, he says, you know as you get older, I have my 54 I mean, that’s not older, older, but it’s older. He says all those random things that you thought were accident your life, when you look over your shoulder backwards. It’s what drives you to where you are today.
You know, it’s an odd thing. But this might not come across well to some people. But in the Gospel of Mark every time the word fear shows up, the word faith is ranked close to it. And I’m always amazed at people when they don’t go after their dreams, dreams, the goals, their mission, because they’re afraid of something. It’s like the Scarecrow Voss l Frank bomb didn’t just write the Wizard of Oz. He went on to write probably 12 of these books. In one the Scarecrow Voss has ordinary people are like leaves on trees. When they die, they just fall off. I like the extraordinary people. And it’s been something I’ve noticed my whole life is that you can have a wonderful life. But always be what it should have cutting yourself. You know, I think would have shoulda, coulda is so painful. When you had those chances. You keep watching those opportunities, those chances fly by that it’s more painful long term to not leap than it is to just stand against the rim and watch all your friends go. Okay, I’m gonna go back down. And we all know how dangerous it is to go back down that Rocky, Kravis leap, man get in there, let it happen. Every great thing I’ve ever done in my life. Not a lot of people thought I could do it. Everything. You know, I can even just something as simple as getting my book never let go out. I had people naysay it was talking to sell. Sounds pretty well. It’s just about as someone said, well, just about you. Yep. Well, okay, I’m sorry. You know, my autobiography should be about somebody else, I guess. You know, but it’s, you just have to get used to it, that not everybody wants to be extraordinary. But I can’t imagine not at least swinging away.
Sean Greeley
Freedom is such a big idea. There’s so many aspects to freedom, we talk about economic freedom, religious freedom, the freedom to just pursue our dreams. And it means so many different things to many people. But it’s by far without a doubt the biggest driver for entrepreneurs. For me,
Unknown Speaker
one of the biggest drivers. to own my own business is to have freedom. I want to have freedom so that I can travel and and have fun and not worry about what’s going on back at home and not worrying about where my rents coming from,
Unknown Speaker
you know, living life on your terms, being able to design your own schedule, be able to take, you know vacations with my family, where we do build those memories and that quality time because, you know, when I sit back and think of my childhood, and those are the things that you remember, you know, I’m able to do more of the things that I enjoy, which is triathlons and marathons. And and and when I’m doing that, I know that it makes me a better person, a better leader for the company, better husband, for my wife, better father for my kids. And that freedom would not be possible if it wasn’t for NP and everything that they’ve taught me.
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Freedom to me is definitely following following my passion.
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It’s about doing what you love. It’s about that passion.
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It’s finding you know what?
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What drives you from, you know, your heart. And I think I’ve found that success. Really.
Unknown Speaker
I’m Tom Jacobs, I own body three Fitness Center in Houston, Texas. I started working for Amoco chemicals in Chicago, and found a job here in Houston moved on down. I was only gonna be here for three years. I see what it’s like to live in a different city. And in that process, I’d gained about 4050 pounds just sitting around typing at a desk eating bad food. So I I had seen a doctor and he said that I have high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and I needed to make a change in my life for us. I wouldn’t be around for much longer. I went through a program. It was a life changer for me. The body for Life program. In 12 weeks I lost 40 pounds of fat, gained 10 pounds of muscle totally changed my life forever. And people would start to ask, you know, what are you eating? What are you doing? What’s your workout look like? And I started helping friends out and they started losing weight and I really enjoyed helping those folks. After a while. I just decided to leave corporate america and that very nice lifestyle, to change my life and change other people’s lives and open up a fitness business. I wanted to try something different that was kind of outside of my comfort zone that would involve fitness in some way and really be kind of a pivotal point. And so I decided to do a bodybuilding competition. And that that whole experience really solidified in my mind what setting the goal having laser focus, determination, passion, and just, you know, rock solid determination, what will what that will do for somebody, I talked to Shannon Ross, and I was like, you know, what, you know, which I do, and she was kind of a mentor for me. And not kind of, she was a mentor to me. And she, she agreed to be my trainer. So I said, July, there’s going to be a bodybuilding show. And in Houston, I’m going to do that. So I go the night before I get weighed in, I’m lightweight, I’m novice and looking good. Look at the other competition because kind of check everybody else out. I think I’m pretty good. My legs were a little weak. But I thought overall, I look pretty good. I came in the morning. And, okay, novice, we’re going to be you’re going to be last you’re going to be on the stage last. Okay, cool. So I can kind of chill out, do some final prep. So I’ve got to the car and and I do some final prep and just kind of get my mind where it needed to go. And I go back into the stadium, I go in there and I look up on stage. I’m like, this guy’s look really familiar. And this, my heart started to sink a little bit. They really look familiar. I go backstage, who’s on stage? He was on stage right now and novice Lightwave what, you know, you’re 57 you should be on stage. You know, you’re disqualified. You’re out. You’re done.
Unknown Speaker
I let you guys know you get
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, seven months, seven months of you know, dieting and working out down the drain. I just it you know, I’m going back there in my mind. I’m like, it ripped me to shreds. It was like the worst experience in my life. And I go out in my luckily my parents hadn’t arrived yet at the stadium. And when I came in, I just hugged my dad was like, I’m sorry. I failed you. And he’s like, No, you didn’t fail. So you know, pick up the pieces and and move on. And so I went to Starbucks, and I got a common macchiato. And that was kind of my Cheer up. And I kind of wallowed in my, my grief for a couple hours and families like, you know, put on the show here. And so as embarrassing as it is to put on, you know, show trunks and flex for your family. I did that. And then I called Shannon, I was like, when’s the next show? And she said, I think there was one in October. I was like, Alright, let’s do it. And start start back up. And I did. And so now 10 months later I go the show, I know I’m gonna stick around this time, go up on stage, I just nail it and won first place. Lila brada brought out the trophy to me. And that that was the best experience of my life, going from the very worst experience in, you know, that you can think of, you know, not even being able to, you know, compete, doing all that work and being disqualified to then winning first place. That was awesome. In my mind that just that I knew then, if I set my mind to something, and I had focus, that I’d be able to achieve it no matter what.
Unknown Speaker
So the first year I I didn’t own a facility. So I quit in January of
Unknown Speaker
three years ago. And
Unknown Speaker
I didn’t actually buy the facility for about three months after that. So the first you know, as an independent trainer, my plate was full. I was actually doing really well. I had a couple people going through a boot camp as well, for brides to be and it wasn’t too bad. But then I knew I needed to do more. And I had that itch. I have that entrepreneurial itch I’ve always had it. I had an opportunity from the the gentlemen that I was renting space from to actually buy the facility from him. So I bought it, dumped out my 401k and and bought it. I expanded it. I built it out in the caches gone. And I was like oh, now what do I do? And I saw what Shannon Ross was doing. And so that guy who she worked with, I knew she was working with Somebody. And so I called her up and they’re working with and she said, you know, Sean Greeley over at Npw they’re doing some really great stuff there. And so I got on the website, got the start getting the marketing materials, I joined gold, I think a month later, I bought every single piece of marketing materials that you guys had, I started with auto closer, which I never really liked sales, actually, one of my jobs was selling software. And I just was never really good at it. And auto closer took me through a step by step process. And it was a passion of mine anyway, so as a super easy sale, the second person that I sat down, we sold 100 sessions to right off the bat payment over three months, and she’s still training with us to this day, at that point, and that was four months into the to the owner of the facility. At that point, I knew that this was going to be it was gonna be big, and that I didn’t have to worry too much. That first year, I think it was 400 400% increase year over year in that first year. And now, this year versus last year, I’m up 30%. My growth and that’s, that’s incredible. All through my career, I thought I was the only one that could do things I was you know, I couldn’t ask for help. I had to do it. I had to rely on myself. I’m a pretty smart guy. But there’s people that are smarter than me out there. Or they’re better at doing things than I am. And using those resources to help propel you was absolutely pivotal. Hiring NP to be there to provide systems speed. You know, all the processes, so that I’m able to create speed and implement faster and be better at what I do naturally. Absolutely. It’s It’s essential. You’re not alone.
Sean Greeley
A lot of folks look at someone’s success story and they just see the end, they see the end product of success. And a great story of someone who’s achieved tremendous success but conquered obstacle after obstacle along the way, is my friend Paul jack.
Paul Chek
I grew up in a lot of different places. But I was born in Los Angeles, my parents moved to Idaho and started a pig farm. And we went from there to Oregon and had a sheep farm. And my parents bought up sheep that were known to produce black wool through crossbreeding. And we took a whole cattle truck load of sheep, and we immigrated to Vancouver Island, British Columbia. So I got there when I was 12. I live there from 12 to 22. Then I moved to Florida and join the army in Florida. And while I was there, I fought my way onto the army boxing team. And after a little while on the boxing team, I was asked to become the trainer of the boxing team. There I got to do two years of on the job training with an osteopathic physician and I got to work with 30 of the best boxers in the world. And my job was to take care of nutrition, writing their training programs. I was also the team massage therapist, and I manage the gym itself. And when my career in the army came to an end, I knew I didn’t want to be in the army anymore. My dream was to take my massage therapy skills and my conditioning skills and my diet skills. And I’d always studied holistic nutrition. So I had a very good grounding in what whole ism was and what that concept meant. And because my mother raised me that way, it wasn’t foreign to me. And then I wanted to move to San Diego because one I love San Diego. And every time I’d come here, I really enjoyed it here and I used to be a surfer when I was young. And this was the training Mecca in the world for triathletes. So my original idea was to start a business to train and take care of elite level triathletes. Well, one thing led to another and I ended up working in the largest physical therapy clinic in San Diego and it was the first massage therapist ever to be hired by physical therapy clinic. After four years of working there. One of my friends who was a very skilled physical therapist and I decided to leave and start our own physical therapy clinic. So we started Golden Triangle rehabilitation. I took the profits from the physical therapy clinic we’d started I started the Czech Institute in 1995. And then I just built the Czech Institute up from there.
It wasn’t an easy go at all in the beginning of the Institute for the first two years, I was teaching seminars, I lost $131,000. So I got some bad business advice and was told I needed to file bankruptcy, which scared the hell out of me. But I hired the best lawyer and the best accountant, I could. And they both made that suggestion to me, which resulted in a very, very challenging journey. So by the time I met my wife, Penny, I was flat broke, I was going through a bankruptcy. And Penny has a master’s degree in biological anthropology, a master’s degree in exercise and sports science and a master’s degree in business administration, an MBA. So she was my dream girl, she allowed me to focus on what it is that I really do, because I don’t enjoy business, it was sort of like torture for me. I like to teach. And I like to share, I don’t like to get involved in issues of money and all that stuff. It’s like two different kinds of mind. And it’s like living two lives at once. And I’ve watched a lot of therapists collapse trying to do that. So my career unfolded like that, and my wife was really the one that rescued the institute and put life back into it. But that said, we’ve both had to put up with a lot of challenging, scary times where it was hard to meet our overhead and pay our staff and our instructors. And so we’ve had to give up a lot of sacrifices. We’ve Penny I’ve gone without paychecks for months, and months at a time, just barely surviving to keep the institute going. But, you know, I’ve always trusted the universe and known that if it was meant to be it would be and here we all are. And we’ve created a pretty big movement, we’ve got over 10,000 check practitioners floating around the world now. So I get motivated by all the letters I get from all over the world from people, it was almost as though the universe wanted me to know that it’s not about money, it’s about the mission. Osho said, Never judge a teacher by how many students he has, but I’m by how many masters he creates. And I had my own level of judgment and standard can say, if I was to die today, I’ve left enough real masters behind to transform a large body. You know, if you think one, apple tree seed can grow potentially untold numbers of apples, right? Well, to me, each one of them is a seed with enough seed knowledge of the authentic things we need to know to live a full life, that they will continue the work that I started for a long time after I’m gone. That is what makes it worth it. For me. That’s where the medicine is for my soul. That’s what keeps me going.
Probably five years ago, one of the things that kept coming up over and over again, with people that would look at my system, or were studying is God, seven years of training, man, it’s so deep and so complex. And, you know, my, to be a Czech practitioner isn’t just to do what I say to do and go repeat it. My whole philosophy is you cannot give you do not have. You can’t do emotional counseling, until you’ve healed yourself, to the degree that you’re more healthy than most of your clients. I say, if you’re not at least one armed, like more developed than your client, you’re not a teacher, you’re just getting lost with somebody and you shouldn’t charge them for that. So because of the sort of the stigma out there that studying with Paul check is not easy. You know, it’s not like just going to school, you got to do your own work. And it can be like getting rototill, you know, I had to figure out a way to synthesize My Teachings into a formula that was easy for anybody to understand. And so as usual, I went and had a nice chat with my soul that day, I was told not to sit but to go for a walk in the hills. So I picked up a notebook and and my soul said, write down 1234. So I did 1234. And my soul, said, Paul, the most important thing for you to do to help anybody is to find out what it is that they love more than they love their pain. More than they love their drama. More than they love their little story that isn’t working for them. Well, in psychology, that’s called motivational interviewing. So I learned that before I start teaching people, a bunch of stuff, even patients, I’ve got to identify what it is that they’re really trying to accomplish or achieve. And most people aren’t actually coming to achieve something that they want. are coming to achieve something that they think they need because society has programmed them to believe that millions of people have told me Oh, you’ll never make anything out of yourself with a college degree. If I had a nickel for every time I heard that between the ages of six and 20, I’d be a multimillionaire, right? Well, I know damn, well, that’s not true.
So my first objective for helping somebody is to help them understand what love is and how love works. And I’ve been able to go through what I’ve gone through, even though it’s been painful, because it has been a labor of love. I am doing what I authentically love to do. And what I authentically see is the most valuable with the knowledge and the wisdom that I have, then my most important thing to teach them is Okay, now let’s look at what love is. And what I teach people is that when you’re, when you’ve actually found the flow of your own love, you’re not afraid of challenges, any more than an athlete’s afraid to lift weights or climb a mountain or bleed because they got a blister, there’s always going to be challenges going into any of these things. The difference is if the challenge that you’re facing is detracting from your sense of connection to what life is in the quality of life, and your sense of inner wholeness, then you’re probably moving in the wrong direction. If the challenges are something that you can take in and grow from, and learn from, and have a greater sense of awareness about what is really going on in your life, that’s when you’re in flow. I found out several years ago that the fastest way I could find help someone find what their love is, is to simply write down what you don’t like in your life right now, with the highest priority being the one you don’t like. So if you’re angry as hell at your spouse, write that down. If I hate being married, okay, good. Write that down. I hate having a low paying job. Good. Write that down. If you don’t know what you love, tell me what you do not love that you’re willing to change. So then sometimes I get a laundry list, you know, like, whoo. So I say, Okay, let’s just start at the first one. If you know what you don’t want, all you got to do is flip it over. I don’t want to be fat, okay, good. flip that over. I want to be healthy and thin, fine. So no matter what it is, if you don’t know what your dream is, all you got to do is know what you don’t want. And by getting your life, right, so that you’re taking responsibility for creating a life that feels good. You find out that as you feel good, it’s easier for you to love. And as it’s easier for your love for you to love. It’s easier for you to be still inside. And except that there is love everywhere in the universe. And that process ultimately is like climbing an invisible ladder. And all of a sudden you wake up one day bang, I know what I want to do. I want to be a park ranger, I want to be a school teacher or whatever it turns out to be. But that process is absolutely essential. Otherwise, you can think you’ve got a love, like a lot of men think they’ve got the love of their life just because their new girlfriend is a nice backside, and pretty boobs, and they have wild passionate sex. But as I say, there’s sex. And then there’s 23 more hours every day. So if you’re just flirting with your loves, they will be like girlfriends, but if you’re honestly interested and making a life that’s fun and enjoyable to live, and you don’t know what you want to do, all you got to do is go through the process to take the reins of your own life and create a life that’s enjoyable no matter what you do. Being a mechanic being a school teacher, being a scientist, being a farmer, I don’t care. Most people can learn how to find their legacy just by taking responsibility for their own life and going through those steps. And once a person does that, it’s as though their inner self is sensitive to their life path. And they don’t need to be pulled around or pushed around like a puzzle piece or a checker on a checkerboard. They just feel the draw. And then off they go. And I get to watch that.
Sean Greeley
One of the big struggles is as you’re building a business as you’re building a better life for yourself for your family, is you have to you have to work harder, right? That’s one of the first things you’ve got to do is you’ve got to focus more put more energy into getting ahead, doing things that other people won’t do. Everybody has to work through that sacrifice, challenge. And then you know, you kind of in that process, you find that you don’t want to lose sight of what really matters, what’s important to you. Right and balancing that The different roles and responsibilities we all have in our lives with our family, we take care of ourselves with being there for for those that count on us for leadership, and mentorship. And I think one person who really illustrates that well in his life, and certainly to help me with my own challenges with with working through that process is my good friend James Fitzgerald.
Unknown Speaker
It’s kind of cliche that people should have balance in their life. But I think the perception around what they think balance is, is just run at a really high intensity. Personally, the kind of things that I use for balance or trying to maintain balance is this constant search for personal mastery. And I have to thank you know, universe works in different ways. But I have to thank specific other people that have come into my lives who have questioned that we’re I’ve said, you know, I’m going to search for this, I’m going to search for what is the meaning of what’s the purpose of, you know, us being here on this very second? And I think when you start asking those questions, you start seeing that time is ticking. And if time is ticking, what are you spending your time on, in terms of judgments, greed, and all those, the things that can be downgrading exactly your thoughts and your processes, that slows people up. And then they get these enlightenment’s of, you know, vitality and good perception and things roll and they believe that is balanced, but that’s not balanced. So balance is trying to detach yourself from the lows and the highs, and understand that this, this search for personal mastery, understanding that you may not be here tomorrow, allows you to prioritize everything that should be important for balance.
Unknown Speaker
My name is James Fitzgerald, my business is often formed with training from Scottsdale Arizona.
Unknown Speaker
Through my youngest
Unknown Speaker
ages that I can remember, I was involved with hockey, I can remember my parents putting, give me a hockey stick and putting the blades on and lace up the skates and, and push a little piece of wood around in the in the ice rink back in Wall bush on a freezing day, you know, and just that day forward thinking that what that was called, it’s called sport, being a huge part of my life. And then, you know, I can remember that, you know, singular moment. And then a million moments after that, that are all the same kind of idea. These, you know, undulating, continuous feelings of euphoria and emotion around scoring goals and bumping with your buddies and, you know, winning games and losing games and turmoil and things like that to high school where I hated school, and I couldn’t wait for the day to be over to train for the sports hours participating in being in a small community and enabling having the ability for me to participate in numerous different sports made me a jack of all trades where I was able to do a bunch of different sports and be good at them into even adulthood. And I guess, coming into CrossFit, and understanding this idea around trying to be good at a whole bunch of things, and well roundedness, there’s some you know, moments through, you know, winning the CrossFit Games and also specific workouts, that, you know, I can go back and I tell people about that. It felt like after I was done those certain events, I could walk away, walk away from everything, or you’ve had that it’s such a high peak, that you believe there’s nothing else. And there’s, you know, besides, I’ve had a million of them, you know, and they all felt the same just like putting on the skates when I was a kid, which has led into my development of coaching and my philosophy on coaching and life in general, in terms of experiences, and that roundedness roundedness and balances ingrained in my system. It’s allowed me to create that, what I’m trying to teach everyone else in terms of roundedness and fitness and the importance of that.
Unknown Speaker
I think that some people may struggle with trying to create life’s balance because they are attaching judgment to their day to day performance or their search for what is what is the purpose of all things? And I think the when you start asking those questions, you go down a really scary road, because you start asking things like, Who am I? And what is my purpose here? And what’s the real reason for me to be here and in doing my job and doing the things that I do do or is it a father is it a strength coach Whatever. And when you start asking those questions, if your perceptions have changed throughout your life that make you realize that when you ask those questions, there’s not much there. That’s a very scary proposition to have. So when they find out who they are, it creates balance. And I think that for whatever reason, it is there, there is a lot more trouble today in trying to find that balance. And that’s what my job is to try and teach people about that teach coaches to teach other people as to what that means, both in athletics and in life.
Sean Greeley
The term success means a lot of things to a lot of people. And it’s it’s certainly a big, broad concept and theme that that plays throughout our lives. I think everybody wants to feel like they’ve done something like they’ve achieved something worthy of recognition of accomplishment for themselves and to be recognized by their community. And a lot of people get frustrated that they’re not where they want to be at, and they’re working towards, you know, something they want to achieve. And it’s just not, you know, they haven’t reached that point, right. But you gotta remember, there’s no timeline on your success. Success is a journey our entire lives. And we get to live that enjoy that throughout our lives. And I think what it ultimately comes down to is waking up each morning, making a decision about what you want to do, and a commitment to go do it. And if you wake up, and you do that every day, you are successful.
Unknown Speaker
Success, to me,
Unknown Speaker
is a pretty, pretty broad subject. I think that at its core, it means you decide what you want to do, then you go do it. And, and that’s really kind of the the core definition of success. In order to do that, you first have to believe that something’s possible. And I talked about this, when I do strongman shows, if you don’t believe it’s possible to do a feat of strength, then it’s not gonna happen, then you have to believe that it’s possible for you to do it. Because if you look at me and see me bend a piece of steel, or you look at my business and see that I’m, I’m growing my business, and I’m helping people you think, okay, that’s great. But that’s him. That’s not me, and I can’t do it. Because insert lame ass excuse right here, then it’s never gonna happen for you. Because you don’t, you have to believe that it’s possible for you, not just that it’s possible. And then once you believe it’s possible for you, then then you have to start taking some sort of action towards it. Whether that means educating yourself some way or just the very act of writing down, I will and fill in the blank with whatever thing that you want to do is that is, is the first action step that you take toward accomplishing things. Once you determine that you will do it, you’ll find a way to get it done. And the next thing you know, instead of writing out I will do this you write down I have done this.
Unknown Speaker
My name is Dave Whitley. I’m in Nashville, Tennessee. I own a facility called Nashville kettlebell. I was born and raised in Tennessee, lived here pretty much all my life. In a very small town, about an hour and hour and a half South Nashville, grew up playing football and all that sort of stuff. I got fascinated with strength and all things having to do with strength when I was a kid because I was a fat kid with a stutter. And kind of withdrew into comic books and that sort of stuff. And when the The Incredible Hulk TV show came on when I was a kid, saw Lou Ferrigno on there and realized in my brain that that even though it was pretend that that was actually a real guy, painted green. And so it became possible in my little child brain to, to be big and strong and to and so that was kind of my initial involvement in anything to do with any sort of physical training. So I got a set of weights for Christmas, that same year, I started plugging away in my bedroom, in my teens, I started playing music, playing guitar, and wound up doing that for a little while professionally during my 20s. That got to be a bit of a chore and a bit of a job and came in off the road one day and said, I don’t want to do this anymore, and just kind of a regular job, sort of started reevaluating things. And what was supposed to be a few months long wound up being a few years long. And so I find myself in my early 30s not knowing what I want to be when I grow up anymore and went to massage therapy school, started going back to the gym and I’d always been kind of in and out of the gym. From the time I was a little kid wound up reading an article that Pablo wrote for a magazine about kettlebells and next thing I knew I was at the arcade See, and had a very life changing kind of weekend that by the end of the first day, I knew that I was going to do something that had to do with the rkc and kettlebells, and all that sort of stuff. And I just wasn’t really sure what. So by the time a couple years have elapsed, I was teaching kettlebells full time, I was doing it out in the park, I didn’t have a facility, I just had equipment that to haul around in my car, and we ran in the park for four years before I want to move into this facility.
Unknown Speaker
Over the course of time, things kept getting better, things kept getting better. And eventually, I got to the point that I started reading business books got turned on Napoleon Hill, and some other good old school stuff, which was interesting to me, because the old school strength training in the old school business coaching stuff is all just kind of repackaged now. And that’s sort of the roots of all of it all goes back to Napoleon Hill. And when he starts talking about the persistence, and deciding where you want to go and what you want to do, and everyday taking a step in that direction, that’s still stuff that I practice to this day. Somewhere along the way, john mccain did a promotion for MP and I wound up meeting Shawn, just getting to talk to the guy and hang out with the guy had an immediate respect for him, I could tell that he had integrity and that he cared about doing the right thing versus just doing it for the money. And unfortunately, in business, that’s not always the case with people that you run into. But it’s definitely the case with everybody that I’ve met from Sean to camillia, to Eric didik, everybody in NP organization, I’ve yet to meet anybody, even the clients, everybody seems like they’re there to help each other to get help and to just promote a message of positivity and prosperity. One of the really cool things that locked me in and that I really appreciated with Sean is on our first coaching call, we were talking about pricing, I was talking about some of the obstacles that I was running up against with the idea of raising my prices, which is something he strongly encouraged me to do. And he immediately called me out on it. And I didn’t even realize that I had set this, this limitation or this, this idea of of lack programming up in my own brain regarding the prices. And I had some people that had been around for a very long time that we’re still paying the same thing we’re paying three years ago. And Sean encouraged me to raise the rates on those people. And my initial thought, like a lot of people have is if I raise the rates on him, then they’re going to go away. All of them understood that it was a business decision. And being able to separate the business personality from my personality, in dealing with people was a huge takeaway from that call, show me that Shawn knows what he’s talking about it show me that Shawn has a lot of integrity, and someone that I am excited to work with not just willing to work with because I know it’s going to be good for me. But someone that I’m excited to work with because it opens up new possibilities that I may not have thought of yet. It’s perfectly natural to experience fear, particularly the unknown. And fear is not the enemy. Lack of action is the enemy. If you take a bunch of gazelles that are standing around the watering hole and somebody they sniff and they smell the line, and everybody’s afraid. And they all run off except one. And the one that was too scared to run gets eaten. The action of running away from the lion that’s fueled by fear and it’s a healthy response for the gazelle. If you just paralyze yourself with fear, though, then you don’t accomplish anything you want to get eaten by the lion. I’m not saying run away from things that scare you, I’m saying deal with things that scare you in the appropriate way that Gazelle is going to run from the line because that’s his skill set to deal with lions. It’s not as black and white. And, and, and as obvious is that with us as business people or as entrepreneurs, we run up against stuff all the time, that can be quite terrifying. And that’s okay. Stuff scares me a lot. I, you know, you you look at a situation and it’s a scary situation on an emotional level. But when you learn to take that fear and direct it toward whatever the desired outcome is, that’s when you you learned to harness an emotion. It’s just an emotion, it’s just a reaction to something. It’s there are facts in front of you. You’re not comfortable with those facts, and you just have to deal with them. If you don’t do anything at all, you fail. It’s that simple. Everything every result that you want I’m getting is it comes about because of you. If you succeed, it’s because of what you did. And because the people you aligned yourself with, if you fail it’s because of what you did. And because the people you’ve aligned yourself with, so just take responsibility for it, having that accountability and that that personal responsibility is the key to overcoming fear. You take fear, you act on it. And if it turns out great, then great. And if it doesn’t turn out great, then you move on to the next thing you deal with it. But just be paralyzed by fear is a surefire way to get eaten by the line.
Sean Greeley
We went on this trip, to really seek out the American dream. And if you if you kind of dig underneath that what’s what lies beneath? It’s really the story of the entrepreneur. It’s the entrepreneurial journey. And really Man’s Search for. For more for more in his life for himself for his family, for his field, his feelings of success, accomplishment, wanting to freely express what’s inside him. And you know, somebody who represents that well, is Daniel Iverson, whenever you have the entrepreneurial
Unknown Speaker
spirit, you’re, you’re automatically going to be searching for solutions. It’s the way you think, well, I have this goal, how do I get there, I can do some of my own, but I definitely need more knowledge to get there. It’s just what you do. Whereas people who don’t have the entrepreneurial spirit and are the other part of the capital situation and working nine to five, they’re kind of the sounds harsh, but I don’t mean it harsh. They’re kind of a common capital that makes the entrepreneurial system work. They’re going to be stuck there. And they they’re never going to go past that vision. So they may end up it’s kind of hardcore, but they may end up in their last days going. You know, I could have been a contender I could have done something could have been somebody you know, I feel like I’m already there. So am I super fabulously rich? Do I have, you know, multi millions? No, I don’t. But do I feel like I’m wealthy? Absolutely.
Unknown Speaker
My name is Daniel Irish. I’m from
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Portland, Oregon, and I run boot camp.
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I grew up in Lexington, Kentucky, and first caught the fitness bug at about eight years old. Looking in the back of probably a spider man comic. I saw Charles Atlas and I was the proverbial 98 pound weakling. I just got my hands on everything I could get on for bodybuilding and fitness, which at the time was dominated by like Arnold Schwarzenegger. And, you know, Frank Zane, and all those guys, I was like, someday I’m gonna be one of those guys. And the years went by and I actually went to college for music. I was a scholarship for classical guitar, bizarrely enough. And then when I finished that, I went to Las Vegas, we just randomly picked up and went to Vegas, and I had this huge dream of being a professional musician there. I had been a professional musician for a while in studios, I was a studio guitar player. And you know, did reasonably well, so I thought, why not go for the big time and go to Vegas. So we got to Vegas, and I couldn’t get a job as a musician in any legitimate way. So I was searching one ads and was taking anything I could get, you know, from delivery driver to, you know, you name it. And then one day I saw an ad for personal trainer one and it said, no experience necessary. And I remembered, I’ve been interested in this stuff my whole life. You know, I’ve totally been into this. I’ve worked out all the time. Why not do what I love to do. And I finally for the first time saw, maybe you can make money doing what you really enjoy and I can’t the other love was music. I’m not making money without wanting to try this. So I went to 24 hour family fitness, which is now 24 Hour Fitness. And I got paid a whopping five bucks an hour for 30 hours a week and was a glorified, you know, leg extension teacher. And from there, it grew a little bit and so my wife got transferred to California with a company she was working at the time. She was my girlfriend at the time. And I was with a coffee company called Gloria Jean’s. We got to Santa Cruz and I dropped out of fitness for a little while, which I was kind of sad about, but I wanted to support her and her dreams. So we went there and that lasted for about a year or so. And then we moved to Los Angeles. We live there for a few years and it’s not fun. To be honest with you. We moved to Portland, Oregon because I wanted to start a family We got to Portland, Oregon and I jumped back to 24 Hour Fitness because I know this, I’ve been a trainer, I know I could get a job. I did that. I worked there for a few years and just blew up and did so well. I had so many clients, I thought, why don’t I do this on my own. So there was definitely fear involved when I broke away from the big gym, because here I am, I’m going to go on my own. But I was so ready, psychologically, to just do my own thing. So it was this slow building of skills, and understanding and studying and studying and then enter NP and it was just critical mass, it’s just like, it’s like rocket fuel. It’s like, I was building rocket, I’m not sure how it all fit together. And then MPa comes along goes, here’s the secret blueprints.
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I went to mega training after having attended over the last few years prior to that, lots of seminars on direct marketing on product development on continuity models, you name it, and they’re all legitimate if you apply yourself they are. But for some reason, none of those really spoke to me personally. And I couldn’t put my finger on what it was it just never felt quite right. So I went to mega training again, because I’m constantly moving forward, no matter what I always feel like there’s a solution. And you know, NPA seemed like they had another solution that I was willing to investigate. And I went to mega training. And immediately I could tell that there’s a difference in the quality of the people in the room. That was immediately obvious. These were real entrepreneurs, real entrepreneurs with real vision for real businesses, they actually create value in the community. And you know, cycle value exchange. And I could sense that. And then, at the end of the mega training con conference, there was a dinner that was held. And that’s when everybody stood up and told where they were. And I’m normally don’t have any problem speaking. But for some reason, when it came around the mic, I was thinking, wow, I really have to kind of open myself up and say, I don’t know what I’m doing at this point. And so I said that and I realized that the people in the room that were essentially a year or two a year ahead of me, were just cranking it, we’re just balling it in the fitness industry, I was like, I want to be part of that you had to apply to be in VIP. So immediately, I did on the spot, and then got the call from chameleon was accepted. And that was great. Awesome.
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Before I started with NP, I was averaging, I was doing okay, I think better than most people in my area, I think just because of my drive and sheer. I’m going to do it despite red eyes and pain. You know, working through it I was doing, I was getting close to six figures already. But then after I implemented much of what you have to offer, which is really just the beginning for me next year is going to be crazy. But just in this first year alone, I’ve more than doubled what I’ve done. This year, it’ll be well past quarter million. And I have my biggest month in June and about $31,000 gross with pretty healthy margin. Past 60%. I can say that. Sometimes. I didn’t really understand what that meant, until I was sitting down with chameleon talking to her. And I was like she said, that’s really an incredible. Really, what do you mean what that’s really incredible, because the average margin is much, much lower. There’s so many costs involved. One of the things I did though, and I recommend this for anybody is I built at the pace that I could afford. So I started in a park rather than having a space and just trying to blow up immediately. As far as lifestyle, that’s where it gets really for me the money is great. And I have no doubt that I’ll make a lot more. That’s fantastic. And that’s why we’re in business partly. But for me, it’s has been the peace of mind of knowing that I have legitimate systems in place so that I can grow without limits. So where I am right now is
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I think I’m 10 years younger.
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Even though I’m a year older, calendar wise, I’m 10 years younger. I’m fitter again, because I can focus time on my own fitness. I’ve got a better relationship with my family, because I’m not pushing them off. No, I’m not stressed out saying I don’t have time right now. And just that little thing is enormous. It’s an enormous, and for other business owners that are out there that that are feeling stressed out. I know that they understand what I’m talking about just the little things that you you know, the last, your last breath, you know how to how to things go and you look back and say, Well, I had all these moments, or did you miss all those moments, and I’m gonna get all those moments.
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If you’re gonna start a business, and you’re gonna try to pursue the American dream, things aren’t always going to be easy, you’re gonna have to just, you’re just gonna have to get up and make yourself do it.
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Nothing comes easily when you’re a business owner.
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You just have to stick with it. And you have to you know what I remember clearly my first mega event one, Carlos, he said, and I always remember this, he said, delayed gratification, and it just stuck with me because you have to be patient and know that it’s gonna get better. I got to work hard for it. And never be scared. Don’t be scared.
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That’s anyone sitting in that cubicle still wanting to do this fitness business, you can’t be scared, you’ve got to just listen, get good, coached advice from from Camelia and, and keep running with it. Because at the end of the day, it will work. If you get out there and you do it. Because there’s never going to be the right time. There’s never going to be the perfect opportunity. You just have to do it, find
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what it is
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that you want to do in this business.
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Understand what your role is,
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and, and follow through with that.
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Follow your dream, follow a plan and get a coach. Because without a business coach, you just be like me with, you know, her head, like a chicken with their head cut off.
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We found solid coaches, and NPA to work with us to give us the organization. So if you’re on the fence about running your own business, I think that’s what you need to do. You need to learn from the best. And you need to be willing to get help and coaching from those that know more than you do.
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What’s the cliche standing on the shoulders of giants, go find people who are good at coaching people to build businesses like MPAA and do what they say. Just follow the instructions. That’s all you have to do. Find somebody who’s smarter than you. Ask them what to do. And then the most important thing, do it