Welcome to the “Making of a DM.” What got you to where you're at won't get you to where you want to be. You need to evolve or dissolve. With that said, let's get started.
Mark: Thinking about you guys, a lot of moving pieces, a lot of things are changing in a good way. Just Changing. Change is good. On today's show, I want to be very thoughtful on this because it's a very big key to success and I see a lot of people that want to be successful they say, but they're not willing to cut it loose and let go of the past, and I'll share with you kind of the journey I've taken, the journey I'm on the truth is even still today. [01:03.6]
But as I'm sitting here, I want to help you guys get more successful. It frustrates me seeing you guys not succeed at the level where you're capable of. That’s because it doesn't exist. Success exists everywhere. It's just where do we see it? How do we fit into it? How do we grow into it? Etc. What’s up? What got you to where you're at won't get you to where you want to be. You need to evolve.
So, you guys may or may not know this. I think I told you, I started…I grew up in a construction family. Everyone in my family built cabinets, built houses, did foundations, dug ditches, built, created the foundations, built the houses on it all the way from ground up, and that was my whole life. I mean, literally, that's how I grew up.
I remember five years old, hanging out in a project with my dad while they're working and cranking along, and it's amazing. I would never take those deep moments back. Actually, I learned so much about life. None of that. I got to hang out with my dad and do the things, and he got to teach me a lot of cool stuff, so I cherish those memories greatly. I actually call it “white van moments.” One day, I'll have to share those stories with you because I learned so much in the old 1970-whatever Ford E Econoline van with my dad at the job sites and coming home from them. [02:12.8]
So, I was doing seamless gutters. I was busting my tail, working literally 16, 18 hours a day, no exaggeration, on job sites, going to bed late, getting up early, four o'clock, get the trucks ready to roll to get out on the job sites by 6:00, 6:30, and back to bed at 11, 12 o'clock at night. Just loved it
I didn't hate it, by the way. I'm not complaining. I really loved those moments. I actually kind of missed these days, honestly. One, I was 18 years old, so I felt a little bit different, but, number two, it's just I loved [it]. I'm not afraid of hard work and so many people take the Magician vs. Mule thing like I don't do anything all day. I just realized I've had to evolve to do the work I do today. It's just different work. I work really hard. It's just a different type of hard work. I'm trying to connect the dots, not necessarily build the dots, if that makes sense. [03:01.6]
So, at the end of the day, what happened was I was doing construction. I remember I met a real estate guy smoking cigars on the porch. He’s like, Dude, I do real estate. I was like, That's what I want to do because he's paying me and all this, and I'm like, Dude, how does this guy have all this money? I was never exposed to it. I was just doing the work and I just started getting curious. I talk about that in the book as well. Curiosity did not kill the cat. Curiosity, every rich person I know, wealthy person, is very curious about stuff, opportunity and all that.
Anyways, I remember there was a very clear point in my business, in my construction business, because I was on windows, gutters, doors, siding, garage door, all this stuff at one time. I had them all bundled up. I kept buying little companies up to add to my portfolio, if you will. Again, I wasn't a big time business guy back then, but knowing what I know now, that's what I was doing.
What really happened is I was sitting in my office. I had a little 10-by-10 office that I thought I was paying too much for. I thought it was being wasteful. I don't really need an office and this and that. And it was maybe 250 bucks a month. I thought I was being reckless. [04:04.0]
What happened is I remember sitting in that office and I used to have three people in that small office, me and two other people, but they were all gone already for the night, and I literally was in the office crying. And I said, “Mark, you have to evolve or just accept what you have in front of you today. It is what it is,” and I was like, But I want change. I kept telling myself, “I want change. I want to grow. I want to evolve,” and what I was doing was I was struggling.
What I was really doing was struggling with the identity that has been handed to me by my parents, and my brother, my uncles and my brother-in-law. Not my brother-in-law, yeah, my brother-in-law now. So, all these people in my life did construction. It's my life. It's literally our family tree. Everyone does construction or handyman work of some way, shape or form, so I'm like, But this is what I do. This is who I am. This is what I stand for.
That's one category, and then then the other category is like, I want to be bigger. I want to be more profitable. I want to be wealthier. I want to work less. I want to make more. I want to do it the right way. [05:05.8]
The biggest thing is I had to come to the conclusion that what got me where I'm at today isn't going to get me to where I want to go in the future. So, I had to stop. Really, what I'm saying is, I just stopped talking to my present self and started focusing on my future self. Who am I? What do I look like? What am I talking about? And I had to bridge this conversation in my brain to execute the plan, I had to. I was scared.
See, the thing is, what got you to where you're at, you already know the struggle. You already know the pain points. You know the obstacles, the opportunities inside of where you're at. Everyone says they want change, but very few people are willing to take the step to change. Because I had to change, I just started talking differently. I just started thinking about my business differently. I had to start raising more money, right?
When I had my construction company, I didn't have to raise money because the clients would pay me 50 percent up front to buy the materials and all that. I never had to have a float or revenue to float it because I always made the money up front to get on that. [06:09.2]
So, in real estate, though, if I'm buying a million dollars in assets this week, I have to source a million dollars in capital somewhere somehow to make the transaction happen. The way I used to do deals, I used to just buy and hold for rentals. Either owner financing or creative financing, or something of the sort.
I went down that path and it was scary. The journey was absolutely scary, but the truth is I wouldn't be here today if I didn't have that conversation and make that bridge, and create that opportunity, and now moving forward. A lot of you may know me as a real estate investor, but as I've talked about for many years, I'm not a real estate investor. I haven't been a real estate investor for probably about seven, eight years. I've been a real estate business owner, a business owner that does real estate, just like this guy isn't the water guy. No, he owns a manufacturing bottled water plant and they ship water out, which just happens to be this brand. [07:04.1]
So, when people cast, I'm very conscious of being cast a label. I'm a real estate investor. Dude, you're way more than that. I'm a dad. I'm a husband. I'm a brother. I'm an uncle. I'm a friend and I'm a business owner. And I had to have that conversation, a real heart-to-heart reality conversation with myself, because I was making real money, millions of dollars in real estate, people knew me as the real estate go-to guy, and I'm like, But, dude, it's capped out. I can only make so many millions of dollars a year before I make the next transition. I don't want to just make a couple, three, four million a year. I want to make real money, meaning real money, again, is all relative depending where you're at in the journey. I want to make real money. I want to go after the nine figures a year. How do we do that in revenue? How do we get here?
I'm talking real revenue. In real estate, you could do $100 million a year if you buy two properties of $50 million. That doesn't mean that's what you keep and the profit margin is not necessarily 20, 30 percent either. But there's a lot of things I had to evolve to get to where I'm at today. [08:06.7]
So, I had the conversation with myself when I was 18 to never work for anybody, so that was one conversation. I was more afraid of what I knew, honestly, and that's what I'm talking about today. I was more afraid of what I knew than what I didn't know. I already knew my caps. I already knew my limits. I already knew the obstacles. I needed to go find new problems. I needed to go get with new people. I needed to get new friends. I needed to expand my horizon and my vision to the next level, because I was driving a nice car, but I wasn't driving the cars I'm driving today. I had to become someone different. What got me to where I'm at. I'm very conscious of what's not going to get me to where I want to go.
And this is in chunks, by the way. You're not going to wake up and go from zero to hero. You have to really understand that there's so many opportunities, and depending on what you're trying to do or what you want the business to do for you, there's different paths to do this. [09:03.0]
So, I did 18, never going to work for anybody to create your own thing. Gutter guy, construction guy to now real estate investor. Another phase is real estate investor. Now I'm a business owner and I used to love telling people I'm creating businesses from ground up. Now I don't care to ever create a business from ground up. I'd prefer to actually buy them that are performing and existing for multiple reasons because I'm buying time, because we take for granted that change is going to take time, because you have to evolve. You have to consume. You have to create massive consumption and execution momentum on your side. You’ve got to start consuming the bullshit. You’ve got to start executing what you're consuming to get reality, to get real-life results to come back to you to get feedback and say, Oh, that worked. Oh, that didn't work. Oh, that worked. Oh, that didn't work.
My buddy, Tim, did this really well. He was a single family investor and converted, and he made the decision to become a big dog in the commercial apartment complex space, and now he has, what, 3,000, 4,000 units in a very quick timeframe, relatively speaking, two and a half years I think. [10:06.1]
So, you don't know what you're capable of until you start conversating and making these decisions, because this is a big decision. You're going to have to grow. You're going to have to evolve. You're going to have to have that real vulnerable conversation to get to the next level. My buddy, Jeremy, has given me an example kind of like that person if you're in the gym every day, and you look good and look decent, and you're benching 225. It’s kind of easy. It's your norm.
It's your norm. You go in. You slap on 225 and boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, 30 reps. Everyone is watching like, Damn, dude. Even though you've been doing that for 10 years, but in your brain, you're like, Dude, I want to evolve. I want to look big. I want to get bigger packs. I want to get bigger muscles or I want to slim down or whatever. You have to change and recreate a new normal.
See, your normal today is not what your normal was 10 years ago. Hopefully, a year ago, let alone 10 years ago, right? Especially if you're just getting kids involved now. My normal today is nothing it used to be five years ago, pre-kids. I don't know what I did with all my time all day. I had so much more time, but with the kids it's so fulfilling. It's so hard, but there's a lot there. [11:14.5]
But you have to evolve. We have to push. We have to go to new heights. We need new problems. We need to work with new people. If your circle is always the same, if the conversations are always stale and the same, there’s just that thing in your body that’s like, I need you to do better. I need to go harder. I need to do more. I need to do more. It’s because it's like you're being constrained, and until you get out of that model, and until you're like the elephant with the chain on the leg and then, all of a sudden, we take the chain off and you just stay around because mentally I have a mental chain on your leg, and that's what you do with this stuff.
You've had an identity. I'm a construction guy. I'm a real estate investor guy. I'm a business builder guy. Dude, you're going to keep following me and I'm going to keep changing. I'm going to keep evolving. I don't want to be CEO anymore. I want to be on the board. That's a different level, by the way. I don't want to own 100 percent of one company. I want to own 20 percent of millions of companies. Why can't you? Why can't I? [12:16.5]
These are different conversations. This is with different people. These are different KPIs. These are all different. But I already know what I'm capable of today because I'm already doing it. I'm living it. But where am I going to be six months from now? What does my bank account look like? What do my lead flows look like? What does my life look like? What are my conversations like and with who? I need a different norm. I want a new normal, and then I want to get out of that new norm and go find it another new normal.
By the way, this is about love. This is about relationships. It's about business. It's about life. Everything I'm talking about is that evolution of life in general. But for some reason, we stop educating ourselves. This is why I recommend investing in yourself. [13:03.6]
I think the truth is I just posted in the DM family, my 35k-a-year group that everyone, everyone in that group should be investing a 100k or more a year in their self-education, 35. I would say in the DM family, go into two or three other ones. Get in around other successful people. I've never met anybody that has invested 100 grand a year that is broke, ever. And, again, you might be thinking that's a lot of money right now. Just get started. Start with 10,000. Get in a group for 15,000, 30,000, whatever the number is. Get involved and invest in yourself. You're worth it, right?
Everyone says, I’m worth that at least. Prove it by going and investing in yourself. The only person you need to prove it to is yourself. I hear it every day people say they're ready to pull the trigger, and then they puss out and don't pull any triggers, and then they're complaining three years later that, Man, I wish I should have done that. Cool, let's get started now. Well, you don't understand, I'm in a different spot now. Yeah, no fuck, of course, you're in a different spot. Why wouldn't you be? [14:00.4]
If you don't believe in yourself, why would anybody else believe in you? You have to evolve. And if you have no money, I started out with reading books. Read the right books. Put down Fifty Shades of Grey. Put down the stupid ass books written by all these people that are false stories or whatever, made up stories. Get out of fantasy land and get your ass in a real book, Think and Grow Rich, The Magic of Thinking Big, As a Man Thinketh. I mean, there's millions and millions of books that you could be reading and expand your brain for free or $20.
The truth is, and I know this to be true, most of you watching this won't even buy a book. You won't even spend $20 because you're waiting for it to go on sale. You won't spend $20 because you want to figure out how to go online and spend three hours you should get for free. You won't invest in yourself. See, you're not getting a deal on the book. You're shortchanging yourself. The investor, me as a book, I write books all the time. I might make $3 a book and all that money goes to charity. You think I'm getting rich off of $3 a book? I'm not even keeping it. I'm giving it away. Yet you won't invest $20 in yourself. [15:10.9]
See, I have thousands, tens of thousands of people who follow me on social and email and all that, and very few percentage-wise will ever buy my books because they're not worth it to themselves. If you're not worth $20, why do you expect you should get more out of life? Seriously, that's a real question. Why? Because you want to. Because you feel it's the right thing.
Until you start getting aligned with the universe and investing in yourself mentally, emotionally, physically, nothing is going to change. It's actually only going to get worse. You're going to get more anxiety. You’re going to get more frustrated. You're going to get more overweight. All these things start compounding. When is enough, enough? What people don't understand, I don't need to understand, you need to invest in yourself. You need to surround yourself with people in business. Grow, learn from them. Stop knowing everything. Stop being the king of the dipshits. You're better than that. [16:13.7]
But, again, I get it. Leaving your identity, it's scary. But you know what’s scary? Me waking up 10 years from now with that same identity. That's what scared me. I was more afraid of what I knew as opposed to what I didn't know. I know a lot of you don't want to rock the boat. If you're happy where you're at, why are you watching this show?
I'm never happy where I'm with a man. I'm not content. I'm not happy. I want to be bigger. I want to be stronger. I want to be better and physically in shape. I want to be a better dad. I want to better. I'm constantly trying to figure out how to be better on all fronts. I'm not saying we get better. I'm just trying to be 1 percent better tomorrow, 1 percent. And at the end of the day, let's be honest, when I'm sitting down in the morning, ready to take over the world, I'm telling you right now, I'm telling myself I didn't come this far just to come this far. [17:05.9]
Let me say it again. I didn't come this far just to come this far. Whatever you're doing today, you can do a hundred times bigger. Whatever you're doing. That goes for me. That goes for all of us. The question is, how do we do it a hundred times bigger? See the difference is I'm thinking a hundred times when most people are thinking, How do I double? How do I add 10 percent? How do I grow my profit margins by 2 percent this year?
Dude, you're in the wrong business if you're trying to do 2 percent increments. The only thing I'm trying to grow at a 1 percent increment is my life, my businesses, though, if I grow 1 percent, my compound effect will help my businesses grow thousands of percentages because I'm becoming a better individual, investing my time. I'm investing my energy. I'm investing my money. I'm putting my money where my mouth is. I invest hundreds of thousands a year.
I didn't start off like that, by the way. I started at 18 years old. I went to a seminar. It was $2,500. It literally was. I didn't have 2,500. I borrowed against job sites that I was doing. I took the money. I was like, I gotta get to work. I couldn't let a couple of my guys work. I had to work double shifts on these jobs because I had to pay the money back. So, we have to figure out what do we want in this business? What do we want in this life? [18:21.8]
See, the difference is I build businesses now with this knowledge, and again, this could serve you well. I don't look and say, How can I be a slave to my company? I'm asking myself, How can the company serve me? No one here typically has a problem being a slave to the company. We all want to work hard. We all want to push stronger. We all want to do more, right? But we've got to invest in ourselves. We’ve got to quit talking about it.
But I went hard in the beginning. I still go hard. Actually, knowing what I know now, I should have gone harder, you know what I mean? I've never met anybody that's rising to the top that says, Man, I should've played smaller. Man, I should've gone lighter. Man, I should've gone easier. Man, I should've done less. No, we're evolving. We did what we had to do in the moment, but now we know that. What can we do in the future? [19:08.1]
See, I'm looking at businesses as a board member, not CEO or COO. I know how to do the work almost on some of these, not all. I definitely know how to be a CEO. I've done it for years. I'm not saying I'm good at it, but I know how to do it. I try to get better every day. I try to be a better leader. I don't want employees. I want team members, right? I don't want to be a boss. I want to be a leader. These are different things I had to learn over the 24 years of being in business, being the contractor, being the investor, being the real estate guy, being the business owner, being the CEO, being the COO, being the accountant. I've worn all hats. I'm not good at 99 percent of them. I'm good at making decisions, right? Fast decisions. Not always good ones, though. Again, I try to take knowledge as quickly as possible and make a decision based off the data I have at that moment. Data not drama. Boom, move. [20:04.4]
Of course, I'm going to have losses. Of course, I'm going to get beat up sometimes. Why? I'm just taking more bats. That's all it is. You're sitting at home trying to make one decision a year. I'm making 10 a minute, 20 a day, minimum, real decisions. Pivotal. See, the problem I just had to become a decision maker, not a procrastinator, not a perfectionist, i.e. Beacon, not someone that's sitting around to sit around to think about to think about.
Dude, it's funny because, Beacon, I'm not picking on you, but guys like Beacon in that world, Dude, the best time to post on social media is from 6:00 AM to 8:00 AM or whatever time they tell you. It's like, So what'd you do today? Well, you know, I missed the window. So, that means you did dick. That's what that means. That means you dropped the ball. That means you're using a timeframe window to make your incapacity bullshit excuse a reality for you to make you feel good about not working today. That's what that means, by the way. [21:03.2]
You know the best time to put out content? Now. When? Now. When? Now. Most of you go, Dude, I listen to this guy, John, on YouTube and he said the best time to do it this time of day. Dude, he's advanced. You're not. Just get it started. Right? My boy, Mike, always says you don't have to get it right. Just get us started. I still don't have it right. Beacon still doesn't have it right. We're just getting started and we've got thousands of views. We've got tens of thousands of people following. We're just learning.
Again, I posted this today on Instagram. If you're not following me on Instagram, please do so, because I'm posting real stuff. But it went something like this. There's so many people out there talking about a lot of shit, but very few people say much of anything. They're out there just talking about talking. Let's get to where the rubber meets the road. Let's get to work. Let's get results. Let's make this happen. [22:01.5]
Again, what got you to where you're at is definitely not going to get you to where you want to go, and if you don't evolve, you will dissolve, your dreams, your goals, your passion. You'll have a very bleak outlook on life. It's not going to be fun. It's going to be just grueling and you're just waiting to die.
I just want to wake up to live, and when you do that, it's going to be scary. It's going to be fun. It's going to be exhilarating. It's going to be nauseous sometimes. But that's what you're here for. You're stronger than what you think you are. You're probably playing at five to 10 percent capacity of where you can be. That goes for me, too. Once you know what you're capable of, it's just unlocking new doors.
See, the difference is a lot of people make this all about money, right? Money is just a scorecard of if you're evolving and growing and developing financially in business, by the way. That doesn't say you're a good dad or a good husband and all that, but in business that says something, so you've got to kind of decipher that data. If you have a billion dollars, but your kids don't know you, your dog doesn't know you, your wife doesn't know you, blah, blah, blah, I'm not trying to be a billionaire like you. I'm going to be a billionaire like this guy because I like his lifestyle better than yours. I can learn how he made his billions and I could build my life into that billions, right? [23:12.0]
Again, a lot of people get it twisted. They have one mentor for everything. Don't come to me for financial advice. I can show you how to make money in business, but financial advice on buying a single family house or, hey, how to be a better husband, a better dad, I want to try to be a good leader on that, but I'm not an expert in it, by all means, so I'm not selling that service and not offering it up. But if you say, Hey, Mark, I want to build it. I know how to do that. That's easy for me. I've done it. I've failed many times. I have a lot of scars and I also have a couple of wins here and there, and I'm still winning. I'm still trying to win, but I'm going to keep losing, too. But I'm learning. I'm zigging. I’m zagging. I'm getting punched in the face.
And, again, I talked about this in the DM family like, Dude, how did you get it? What's your path to a $100-million business? I have multiple paths. See, a lot of you are just one trick ponies. You have one path, come hell or high water. The problem is the path you're on, it's a short plane cuff of a long bridge, long ledge, something like that. It's inevitable. You're going to drop like a ton of bricks. [24:13.0]
See, I know sometimes we just have blinders on. We don't see that far in advance. That's why it's good to have fiduciaries around you. That’s why it's good to have mastermind people around you and mentors and all that. They can help ideally see around the corners for you, give you a little guidance.
I had someone recently tell me what they're up to. I'm like, Dude, you told me you want to make $2 million a month. It's not happening in that industry. It's impossible. Maybe if you have a technology play inside of it, but not with what you're doing. You're going to burn out and expire, maybe make 800,000 a month, maybe. That's if you're amazing and you'd be the top dog in the game. Why are you trying to turn something to $2 million that doesn't even exist? And not only that, even if it might exist, why work so hard? There's so many other easier paths. Have you got to prove something? What are you trying to prove? [25:02.4]
Evolving daily, pushing me and my team to uncomfortable for our legacy. I love it, man. That's what this stuff's about, man. It's about pushing. I picture my kids watching. I did a podcast show. You guys should check it out. But “They're Watching” is what it's called, and your kids, your friends, your neighbors, your spouse, your partners, everybody's watching. Everyone's watching leaders, guys, I promise you. They're paying attention.
Listen, they might laugh and point their fingers and say, Ha ha, you got punched in the face. You're bleeding. Ha ha. But I promise you, stay focused. Evolve. You will step up, and then, all of a sudden, they're like, Dude, can I work for you? Hey, can you teach me? Hey, I remember when you blah, blah, blah, blah. Dude, just stay in your path. Stay in your lane. Evolve. Get around the right people. Remember, what got you to where you're at isn't going to get you to where you want to go.
They don't build these big houses, these cool cars, these great planes and big boats and all this stuff—that's what I like—for nobody. They build them for somebody. Why can't that somebody be you, if you're into that? If you're not into that, that's cool, too. They’ve got great charities out there. They've got great… If you have a lot more money, you can do a lot more with charity and do a lot more for your church, and do a lot more for your community. [26:14.0]
See, I'm past the days of trying to feed myself. I'm past the days of trying to feed my family. I'm trying to feed the world. Some people, there's four stages. Feed yourself, feed your fam, feed your village, feed the world. Why can't we feed the world together? Why can't we step up? Why can't we evolve? Why can we elevate?
Why can't we have a billion-dollar foundation supporting people, helping them out, guiding them, giving them a hand up, not a handout, everyone? Why can't we do it? If you create a billion-dollar charity, why can’t I? It doesn't mean I can't. That's the beauty of it. There's enough for all of us. Just because you get millions doesn't mean I can't get millions and vice versa. So, again, what's your thinking process? We talk about funneling the thought in the book. You guys have got to get your copy of Magician vs. Mule. [27:01.1]
If you don't get a copy of my book, please just stop following me. If I'm not worth $18 or 50, I don't even know what the book costs, 15, 20 bucks, let's say, if I'm not worth $20, I'm not your guy. And not only that, none of the profits go to me. It goes to charity, the Caring House Project Foundation, which we will build. We'll be building a village out there, here this year, hopefully, if we get this stuff settled up with the Corona and all that.
But I want you to know you're worth more than $20, and this is tough love because I want you not to be here if you're not willing to invest $20 in yourself. Yes, you did. You’ve got 100. You’ve got 30. I want us to all succeed. I want us all to drive. I want us all to evolve. It's so fun. Once we understand this, the levels on levels, it truly is endless.
Cool story. Yesterday, one of my buddies came into town. He has actually just moved here—his name is Matt—him and his wife and two boys. And I have a golf cart. I was actually selling it. Why? If you guys follow me, you know I just bought a new golf cart, kind of don't need two, it is what it is. [28:04.5]
So, he just moved here all the way across the country, and when he got here, not only did I give him a golf cart, but I had it personalized with his company name on the front and his last name on the sides to make it pop a little bit. Of course, we had to throw in the DM tramp stamp on it because that's what we do, but that's what we do. But I didn't sell it to him. I actually gave it to him as a gift, not just me, my wife, because it's ours.
When you can do that kind of stuff, not only does it feel amazing, it feels actually fucking amazing. If anybody tells you giving isn't fun or money doesn't buy happiness, money bought that car. Money bought the logos and all that stuff I did to it. It's what I did with the money that made me feel amazing. I was able to be able to give a cool gift like that. We've talked about gift-giving in these shows before, but I'm sharing a story with you because Mark, the contractor, would never even think about giving anything away. [29:04.6]
Actually, I was the opposite. I was trying to figure out how to get people to give me stuff. I was trying to figure out a pinch pennies to make millions. I was trying to figure out how to cut corners on jobs just to get a couple of extra dollars out of the deal. Terrible model, terrible. That's what I knew then. I can’t go backwards. I can only acknowledge, learn from it and go forward and evolve, develop, push, prod, pick the holes in my own system.
See, the truth is when we fail, no one can come to me and talk about it and shit up to me. I'm already talking shit to myself. I know when I’ve failed. I know when I'm succeeding. I know when I'm not accomplishing what I want. I know when I'm hitting goals and targets. I don't need anybody to acknowledge me. I don't need me to pat me on the back. I don't need anybody to point.
Actually, I don't mind haters. Haters fuel me. Haters of the reason I'm here. The truth is I owe it all to the haters. When people told me I couldn't be here, listen, they were right. I couldn't be where I was at because I was evolving. I would not be there. I kept growing, kept pushing, kept prodding, kept at it. I'm still doing it today. [30:10.6]
Today I read two books. I've listened to an audiobook a little bit today for about 30 minutes. I read 20 pages of another book, checking out some other stuff with my buddy, Jeremy, on some training stuff we're doing. I'm involved, dude. This is why I'm up at 4:30 in the morning, getting stuff done. I'm evolving. I'm expanding. I'm designing the future. While most people talk about it and talk about it a lot, very few do. Very few people say much.
And so, Beacon, anything else on this, my man? Because I could talk about this stuff all day because this, the identity crisis you're having with yourself, is a real thing. I'm not acting like it's not, but acknowledge it. Get scared of where you're at, because let's be honest, in 10 years from now, do you want to be in the same spot? Shit, in a year from now, do you want to be in the same spot mentally, emotionally, financially, physically? If the answer is yes, then there's no need to follow me. I'm not in any of them where I want to be a year from now. [31:10.6]
How could you settle? You're going to become complacent. You can get gobbled up. That's why I love working with younger people. I'm 42 now. When I get this, I love seeing the 20-, 20-year-old, 25-year-old guys and gals like, Dude, you change my life. I was able to just…
I just got a cool text from a 22-year-old guy. He's generating 400,000 a month off some stuff I showed him. He said, “Dude, I gotta give credit where credit is due. You changed my life. Not only did you show me a path to generate more money than I've ever thought was possible, but you told me how to think bigger.”
That's what gets me more excited, because the truth is the money doesn't show up until the thinking starts taking place. If you're not thinking, executing, plotting and pushing, guess what? The guy paid tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars for his education in the last two years. I wonder why he's expanding. I wonder why he's growing. I wonder why he's making more money than he's ever made. It’s because he's investing in himself. He's investing where he knows it's the best investment in the world. He's evolving. [32:08.7]
And, for me, like I said, I didn't come this far just to come this far. I'm just getting started. My Mark Evans six months from now, six weeks from now, six days from now will be a different Mark. We'll be bigger. We'll be more excited. We'll be more focused. We'll be bigger invested. Why don't you want more? That's what we all want I hope, more of something. More importantly, what am I going to do to get it?
Good morning, Mark. Do you have top five recommendations you could post later? I'll tell you. Again, Magician vs. Mule. I wrote the book because now nothing really that existed. The E-Myth Revisited by Michael Gerber, The Magic of Thinking Big, Power of Concentration, As A Man Thinketh, Think and Grow Rich, Rich Dad, Poor Dad. I mean, there's hundreds. By the way, guys, I've read 5,000 or 6,000 books. I don't even know how many because I lost track a long, long time ago. [33:00.9]
If you guys have ever seen my mansion video I had in Georgia, if you pay attention to the scene when I'm in my office, you'll see a stack of books behind me, probably about 50, 60 books on my desk sideways. And then, in the corner, if you pay real attention, you'll see about six feet of books stacked up. The books on my back shelf are what I’m getting ready to read. The ones stacked up are the books I've read. That's how I’d visualize it. I didn’t want to get fancy bookshelves because I forget what I read just like my clothes. If you went into my room, I’d leave stuff on the ground that I already wore because I forgot I wore it. I just don't think about that kind of stuff.
So, my books I stack. That’s like my trophy. My trophy is growing. I read a book. I had another book. I had another book. I had another book and it just kept going up and it actually became a game. I'm like, Dude, if I read 10 more books, it's going to be taller than me. I'm going to consume knowledge. I'm going to learn Blue Ocean Strategy. I mean, it's endless. There's so many.
I buy books every single day, though, still today. My wife can vouch for that. The real books. I do buy some audio books. I bought a couple of audio books yesterday because I'm traveling here in a couple of days, but other than that, I’ve got to read. I’ve got to open it. I’ve got to use this highlighter in it. I’ve got to take notes with this pen and this piece of paper. I'm old school, but I'm evolving. I'm learning. I'm knowledging up. [34:12.1]
The truth is I suck at reading. I'm a slow reader and I'm terrible at consumption. I have to read the page three times to even hear what I said because I’ve got to calm my mind down. I don't know about you guys, but my mind is like buzz and I'm reading, and I’m like, Shit, what did I just read? Read it again. Damn it, I got half of it. What's the rest, though? Reread it. That's my problem with reading for real, but it doesn't stop me. I keep reading and reading. When I'm sick of reading, I read more. It's not fun all the time, but it becomes a game, 10 pages a day, 20 pages a day. Could you do a whole book in a day?
That's kind of how Magician vs. Mule was written. I wanted someone to be able to sit down and read the book in an hour-and-a-half setting, and that book can be read in an hour-and-a-half setting, period. That's how real books are being written now. If you guys know this or not, your attention spans, our attention spans are reducing. Therefore, we're writing smaller books, more consumptional books, less talk, more action. Less fluff, right? Just get to the meat and bones of the book. Let's talk shop. [35:09.3]
And then none of that social media expedites that conversation, right? Because you kind of see how I am. Then you read the book, you're like, Damn, that's him. Damn, that makes sense. Whoa, I feel like I'm sitting side by side with Mark now. Not only that, I also did the audio book on the audio version. We were having some challenges with some of the uploads, but that will be out here soon as well, the audible version. I read it myself. It sucked to read tens of them. I didn't know how many hours, over 10, 12, 13, I don't even know how many hours, a lot, and I kept reading, sending, reading, sending, reading, sending. It doesn't stop.
Guys, I’ve got to bounce, but I also have this. Make sure you get over to MagicianVsMule.com. This will be coming out soon. This will be the manual to the book. Totally amazing. This will help you navigate, go through the journey, evolve, understand the path. Hence, why we have this, right? This is us as a child, oops, right here, us as a child. We're evolving to the mule, and then we hear about this Magician vs. Mule thing, and then we'd start becoming that magician. That's what we want. That's evolution, and this is phase one. [36:07.0]
Then there's more phases. It keeps growing. It never stops. I want to be very clear. Education and knowledge-building never stops. If you truly want to be massively successful, just know it is what it is. By the way, I'm ingraining this in my children. I talked to Mark yesterday about it. I'm like, Dude, Mark, you gotta keep working. You gotta keep pushing. You gotta learn constantly. Invest in yourself, Mark. It's so crucial.
And I'm not saying investing by going to college. I'm saying what happens after college if you decided to go to college, what happens every day after that. Where are you investing your knowledge to learn about financial awareness? Where are you investing your knowledge and learning about how to be a great husband, a great boyfriend, a great dad, great whatever? How are you learning and knowledging up about being better, more present, more business-building, more development, more leadership? Whatever you want to do, constantly… Dude, if you want to do tap dancing, how are you investing in your tap dancing abilities to be the best tap dancer in the world? That's how my brain is wired. That's what I'm thinking about all day, all day. [37:02.9]
Guys, appreciate you guys being here. Get over to MagicianVsMule.com. Thank you very much for your support. Appreciate you guys being here. If you got the book, please relieve a review over at Magician vs. Mule on Amazon, as well as make sure to check me out on Instagram and YouTube, @MarkEvansDM. Hope you guys share the show if it has made an impact in your day and your morning.
Have a great day, guys. Talk to you soon. And remember, you didn't come this far just to come this far. Go kick ass.
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