Welcome to the “Making of a DM.” Are your holidays stale? I want to share with you how to put some spice into your holidays and create the most epic memories you thought were possible. So, with that said, let's get started.
Mark: Hey there, it’s your boy, Mark Evans DM. Hope you had an amazing Thanksgiving. I'm sitting up here in the treehouse today, sharing some information with you about creating some amazing memories. Holidays versus memories. I’ve got a lot of cool things to share with you guys here real quick. [01:02.5]
If you follow me on social, you guys probably saw some of the videos that my video guy did and pictures of us with the fam and all that stuff prior to the event and after the Turkey Bowl, which is awesome. I'll tell you who won and all that good stuff.
Real quick, before we get started, as you guys know, I'd always ask that you leave a five-star review over on iTunes, Stitcher, wherever you listen to the show. It would mean a lot to me as it helps us get pushed up in the algorithm, so we can be seen by other people.
As you guys know, there are people sitting here right now in their life wondering. They're looking for a solution to their life. They're searching. They're seeking help. Maybe they don't have family or friends or people that lift them up and that are around all day, so they're seeking out from outside. That's what I did. I went and found tapes and CDs back in the old days. Even VHS videos I'd buy online or even at meetups where people would have VHS tapes, and you’d just buy them and put them in and learn how to do real estate or learn how to change your mindset and all that stuff. [02:05.4]
The reason I always ask you to do a five-star review in these environments is, as we get more and more of those, what it does is it just pushes it up. Maybe someone right now is having that day where they're typing in something like “I want to learn how to be a deal-maker” or “I want to learn about life,” whatever they're saying, and maybe your context of your five-star review would pop up and they'd be like, Shit, let me just check this out. They’d click on it, subscribe, and, boom, now they're in our world and you could change someone's life. I know this doesn't cost any money to you. This is simply something I ask of you. I've done 90-plus shows and beyond, and will continue to do so, but if you could just take a couple minutes and do that, it would mean the world to me.
I'll get on with the show today about holidays versus memories. I was thinking back about one of my dreams always as a kid in life that was always about how to do things over the top. I'm kind of an over-the-top person. I've never been that guy that wants to do things half-ass a hundred times. I want to do something amazing one time. [03:04.7]
That's kind of how I’ve built my life over the years. When we got the property here in Ohio, I was like, How do I go over the top? I've been doing this, by the way, for a long, long time, not just here in Ohio. I like to create experiences. I like to create memories that people will never forget on many levels.
As you know, we do this thing called the Turkey Bowl, the Evans vs. Long Turkey Bowl. What's cool about that is they all come to our house, which I like, and we get to control the environment. I get to control what they smell. I get to control what they see. I get to control what we're going to eat. I get to control the experiences that are about to take place. Now, this may sound crazy to you, maybe not, but it's not crazy at all, because I saw someone recently posts like, Don't go to your family events, blah, blah, blah, and here's why if you're focused. [03:58.5]
I get it. I understand what they're saying on the surface level, but I don't think that's necessarily a good thing because the last thing I'd want to do is to tell someone not to go visit their family members on a Thanksgiving holiday, for example, and then, all of a sudden, their mother passes away, their father passed away, their cousin or brother or someone passes away. Sometimes you hear people say stuff and you just take it for exactly the way they said it, not understanding the big picture. I don't think this guy meant to say it the way he did. Maybe he did, I don't know.
But let me explain something. I've talked about this, because we had a show called about the black sheep, right? I am a black sheep of my family. Literally. I don't know what to talk about to them. They talk to me about stuff that I don't really care about. It's always the same stuff and it's just gibberish, right?
Why I like doing experiences and holidays at my house or turning things into memories is because that allows me to get and change their world. See, when I go back to them, I have to downshift. I have to change me. Not really change me, but I get changed. I feel it. I change because I'm like, Here we go, okay. I’ve got my I’ve got my whole fence up, my guards, but I go there. [05:09.6]
Again, my parents, I care about them greatly. I don't really have tons of stuff to talk to them about, about life and business on my side. I want to show them. I don't want to talk about it. I want to show them. When I bring them to the house, let's kind of get to the house part where everyone started showing up at 11:00 AM. 11:00 AM to 12:00 is when people show up and, like I said, we've got great music playing. I've got drinks flowing. We've got food, hors d'oeuvres everywhere that Deena has got set out. Her and her mom did an amazing job with that.
Deena loves doing that, by the way. Typically, I would have a chef at birthday parties and stuff like that. I hire this great lady that works with us. But Deena wants to do the Thanksgivings and the Christmases. She likes that side of it and it's awesome. She does an awesome job and it's fun for them. [05:53.5]
They start showing up between 11:00 and 12:00 and people are coming in and all this stuff, and then by noonish, everyone is already here. I say, Hey, guys, here we go. I go to the closet and I have everyone's jerseys. I’ve got everyone jerseys this year because we're playing football, right? Turkey Bowl. Not all the females play, but it's just fun. It's just a family thing and we're not out there tackling and breaking necks and all that. That's the goal anyway, it's not to break any bones.
But I’ve got everyone jerseys made up with the brand on there, “Deal-Maker.” Maybe I’ll send you a picture of this, so that you guys can see this. But they’ve got jerseys made up. They’ve got their name on the back. It's a memory, right? This is something they can take and have forever.
It’s funny, a lot of people said, “Oh my gosh, can I take this with me?” What's funny is obviously the answer is yes, because it's yours, and I just love to give. I don't know if you're that person or not, but to me, I like to be thinking about amazing gifts, memories, moments, thoughtfulness. I know a lot of people have got it, because I’ve got a cell phone, too, obviously, and I got 20 people sending me a mass group text, “Hey, Happy Thanksgiving. I'm thankful for you.” It's such a shitty way to do things. It's terrible. I'd actually rather not hear from you if that's the way you communicate because it's very reactive. [07:12.4]
Obviously 60 days prior to this big old Turkey Bowl, I started getting gifts set up. I started creating lists. “Hey, here's the jerseys we're going to make, pink for the girls, Bengals collars for the Evans team, Cleveland collars for the Browns team for the Longs team, and I started putting all this together. Then I got my assistant to help execute the vision and the plan, and if it was me, I'd have to do it, that's fine, too, just someone has got to execute. That's not my forte at the highest level because I kind of wait until the last minute with a lot of that stuff, on little things like this.
But we did that. We’ve got cool jerseys made for everybody and I promise there's a point to all this. I’ve got jerseys made for everybody. As you know, if you follow me on IG, we’ve got the field all painted up. We’ve got the Evans vs. Long, Turkey Bowl No. 2 in the center. I mean, it's just over the top. Some people think it's crazy. It might cost about $5,000 to do all this, maybe $6,000, but to me it's like $6,000 worth well spent to create. [08:09.3]
There are about 30 people here at the house, and to create a very, very fun, cool, exciting [event]. They're still talking about it to their friends and family and they're talking about it on social there. They're thinking about next year and all that, and it's neat to me. We had the jerseys. We have the field. I got a Turkey Bowl trophy, so whoever won got the trophy I got a coin because it's Evans vs. Long. My dad, I put his face on one side of the coin and my father-in-law, Preston, on the other side of the coin, and that was the coin flip where we did the flip to get the ball, right, who was getting the ball.
Again, these are memory pieces. My father and Preston, we each get that coin because that will mean that year they were there. You guys do realize, right, and I think about this because I’ve talked about this on the show as well about death, my parents, my dad is not going to be here forever. Preston is not going to be here forever. The longer we do this, the less likely they are going to be here actually. I'm very conscious of that. [09:04.6]
That doesn't deter me actually. It motivates me. I use it as a motivator because I see so many great people wait until the last fucking minute to do anything. “I'm going to do it when this happens.” Why not do it now?
“Well …” Yeah, exactly, get the fuck to work. Let's do it now. Create that experience.
Maybe you've got that trip planned for your mom and dad, or your brother or sister, or your friend or someone, and you're like, Dude, I want to do that in three years from now. Why wait three years? Why not do it now? Why not do it in 60 days or less?
I've seen this happen so, so many times in my life and, fortunately, Deena and I got to travel the world for seven years, and I’ll never forget. I think I’ve talked about this in the past, but I’ll never forget it. We'd be in Santorini, Greece, or Paris or Barcelona or wherever, Italy, somewhere, and I'd always see the old lady or the old guy pushing their spouse, and I would talk to them. I want to talk. I want to see what's going on. They’re like, Oh, yeah, this is a trip. Once we retired, we were always going to come here. I thought about it. Man, why wouldn't they do it sooner? Why wait until retirement? You're assuming that when you retire, you're going to be healthy. You can walk. Clearly, they can't. They can't enjoy the full experience. [10:14.4]
I like to create these cool environments. Let's recap real quickly. I have the jerseys. I have the coin. I have the trophy. I have the field, and not counting some other cool stuff I did. But, again, I want to reiterate, the main reason I love doing this is because I can control the environment. When they pull up, I want them saying, Holy shit. I’ve got the Christmas lights on. I’ve got the flagpoles lit up. I’ve got the treehouse they're anticipating to see. We've got the field. They're ready. Who's going to win? Anticipation, excitement. It's an experience.
This is not hard to create. You can do this for free, by the way, if you just get out there and do some thinking about how to create a cool experience for yourself, your friends, your family, whoever. When they get here, they're in awe, right? They’ve got out of their world to come into my world as opposed to me going to their world. [11:09.8]
I'm not judging either one. I just do like the conversations we have when they're at my house because they're like, Oh, dude, you’ve got a new car. Oh, man, hey, can I have a cigar? Hey, man. They're doing stuff and talking about things they probably very ultra-rarely, if ever, unless they're hanging out with me, talk about, so it's a neat way to create a framing opportunity for conversation.
Got a new watch. Hey, Mark, check it out. Mark, your Patek is amazing, dude. I love it. How? Oh my god, what does something like that even cost? I love that question because they don't talk about money unless around me. Again, I'm very conscious of these conversations, right? And then we're talking about NFTs. We're talking about crypto. We're talking about what my ideas are. I'm asking them what theirs are. Now, listen, I might have more or less than the market. I don't know. I think I know. Again, we're conversating. I want to see them expand their vision. [12:07.2]
Another thing I do this for is I want my kids to see us create some bad-ass experiences for the family. I want them to see what it takes to make this a reality. It's not like I just wake up and just hang out, because I think about this. When I was a kid, I'd go to Thanksgiving, and, literally, we would just walk in. “Hey, Grandma. Hey, Dad. Hey, Grandpa.” Hey, blah-blah. Boom. Sit at the kitchen table or on the couch. Football is on. TV is on whatever. Watch the Macy’s Day parade. Boom. Watch some football, and all you do is eat, drink, sleep, wake up, eat, pass out again, drink.
There's really no high-level shit going on. There's no fun, cool experiences. Once in a while, maybe they'll pull out some cards and start playing cards with cousins or whoever, but it's nothing like “Can’t wait to go out and see Grandma.” It's more like, I can't wait to go, eat some cold Turkey, good Turkey and noodles or something like that, right? [13:03.4]
My environments are different. They got here between 11:00 and 12:00, like I said, and we had a blast. Everyone is getting excited. They’ve got the jerseys on. They're getting pumped up. They're talking about who is going to win. We're talking about money. We're talking about fun things. My uncle has never seen the new Ferrari, so he's checking it out. He's taking pictures, probably putting it on his social apps or whatever he's doing, which is fine, and it's neat. I like that shit. That's fun to me, you know what I mean? I'm just kind of sharing my thought process into this and kind of why I do the stuff I do sometimes, actually all the time. There's a reason behind it, always.
So, 12 o'clock hits. “Guys, we've got to get out on the field.” It's kind of drizzling. It's about 38-degrees. Perfect football weather. I’ve got cleats for everyone. I had DM hats, toboggans for everyone. I had DM sweatshirts for everyone to put under their jerseys. Really, the Deal-Maker, my company, sponsored this in essence, right? [14:05.5]
I create this cool experience, and also they're buying into the brand. They're buying into the vision. The DM means something. It's not just deal-maker. It means dream-maker, right? It really does. My mom is there. My dad is there. My in-laws are here. My nieces, my cousins, my brother-in-law. They're seeing this. They might not even know what's happening on a certain level, but they definitely know that they're coming in and I'm heightening their senses. I'm showing them what's possible because they know I come from exactly where they came from. It's not like they don't know me and it's like, Oh, yeah, I'm sure this guy had everything given to them. They know exactly who I am and where I came from, so there's no excuse in their brain. They can avoid it, right? That's what a lot of people do. But we're creating environments to create conversations that create better futures. That's what the goal is. [15:00.0]
At 12:15, we get on the field. We flip the coin. Preston gets the ball. We kick it and the game is on. Who do you think won? Who do you think won? We play for about an hour-ish, have fun. We're playing. The kids are running. The kids are crying, whatever. Sure enough, the Evans’ come out ahead, 33-18. I actually had two picks for touchdowns, which is awesome.
By the way, I'm there to win. Everything I do, I'm in to win, period. I don't want to lose. I hate losing, even at a backyard football game with kids and stuff involved. It's not like I'm out there trying to hurt people, but, genuinely, it’s just me. It's who I am. I'm a winner. I'm built to win. Not say we don't lose all the time, but I hate losing so much, I want to win.
But as I built this, so we get done with that. Everyone is going to come in. We’ve got to shower. Everyone is showering off in the different bathrooms, getting cleaned up, ready for dinner. About 2:00-ish, 2:15, they start eating and they're talking about the game, “Oh my gosh, did you see?” and I just sit back and I love it, because we might have the game on in the background, but everyone is connecting and talking about stuff that I’ve never heard them talk about unless they're in my environment, my creation, if you will, the memory-creation that I'm doing. [16:19.2]
They're talking about how they're running here, they're running there, and then during dinner, I hand everyone their cards. They each got 10 cards of them as a football card, right? Each person. Now the guys, each has got a card, and then they start trading. Preston is giving one to my dad. “Hey …” whatever. They trade cards back and forth, and 2021, Turkey Bowl No. 2. Last year, they had cards as well, so it's an evolution process. It's funny, my mother-in-law, she came the night before. She kind of knew what was going on behind the scenes now at that point and she's like, Oh, my god, Mark, you've thought of everything. [16:55.2]
Now, keep in mind, that's very interesting because I haven't. Literally, why I'm doing these every year, and this goes for everything I do, by the way, every year, I do an event. Every year, I do something experience-wise. I have a list of stuff I want to do next year. I can't execute it this year because it's too late for whatever reason, typically because it might be a process. But the day of, I'm like, Oh, man, should I have fireworks? Oh, man, should have done this. Oh man, I’ve just got to definitely do this next year. Then I start sharing that vision with the team and we start executing for next year, because I didn't think of everything. I've only thought of where I was at in my head at the time and every year is getting better. Every single year is getting better.
Then, 2:45, ding-dong, guess who's there? That's right, Santa Claus. My nieces, my kids, my brother-in-law's kids, all are going crazy. Santa Claus is there, and I could have just done that as simple as that, but I actually went out, my team, my assistant, actually, Kim, we got gifts for all the kids, wrapped them up from Santa and gave them to Santa Claus because he was coming in. He's sitting down and he knows what their hot lists are. “Christian, I hear you want a scooter. Here's a cool tool,” whatever, just kind of like because they're writing letters to Santa, so he's got to know what's going on, right? [18:11.5]
He's sitting in the living room by the tree, by the fireplace. Each family is getting pictures with them and everyone gets a family photo. I have my photographer guy here taking high-quality, amazing pictures. I might see these on everyone's Christmas cards this year, literally, I'm not joking.
Again, I'm thinking in advance. I'm thinking of experiences. Could you imagine being a 5-, 6-, 7-year-old kid and Santa Claus actually comes to the house, and he gets you a gift and he knows what you want because you wrote him a letter? And Mom and Dad and Grandma, everyone is around and it's so fun. Then Santa Claus sings a couple of songs to the kids. This is the shit that gets me excited. This is the stuff that gets me up in the morning. This is the stuff that keeps me from going to bed at night as I’m doing sometimes. But I'm literally thinking about creating experiences for me, for my family, my clients, my customers, my team. I'm thinking about that kind of stuff. [19:12.7]
I do know on all of our teams and all of our companies that we send out gifts. We send out turkeys for all the families, pre-made turkey. A lot of people are just busy and my team is amazing. I'm very thankful for them at all companies, so I want to send them something. I invest a lot of money on gift-giving every year, not just on holidays, but every year.
Then, not only that, we went a step further as a company and sent an email to the teams, asking them if they know anybody that needed help. We've fed a lot of families this year. I wanted to feed more, honestly, but we fed a lot of families this year for Thanksgiving where we’d buy them everything. I mean, there are people reaching out to us, family of five, has no money, no food, no jobs, and they're scared. [19:55.0]
My thing is I'm creating memories over here in my house. I want them to have a nice, amazing meal where they can sit down with their family, feel safe, feel full, just be grateful at the highest level. I won't meet 99.9 percent of these people probably ever in my life that we're doing this for, but it's an absolutely amazing feeling—and I share these stories with my kids. I share these stories with my family because I want them to know it's not about just getting. It's about giving.
Giving us such an amazing gift, such an amazing muscle, and we can do it all. We can have it all and we can give it all. I believe in true abundance. It's not like, I can't do this or that. It's about, how do we do both? Right? I'm still going to do my experiences and I'm still going to give.
This year, for Christmas, I'm excited to do that as well. We're going to do some cool stuff for Christmas, so if you have any ideas, I'd love to hear them. Hit me up at IG, @MarkEvansDM, and let me know what you’ve got going on.
But that's what we did. We changed the environments. The real thing that I'm doing is leading by example. I'm not talking about it. A lot of people are like, Dude, one day, I'm going to build a football field and I'm going to have a blast. You've been saying that for the last 20 years. When the hell are you going to do it? All too late. I’ve already done it, you know what I mean? Execution, talking and doing vision-building is simply that. You’ve got to execute this shit. [21:14.6]
There are a lot of people who have great ideas, great goals, great visions. Terrible, terrible results because of the lack of execution. I execute. I actually do it. Me and my wife, my wife gets crazy with me. She's like, You're wasting money, this is so silly. It's not silly and it's not wasting, let me explain, and then I share. Again, to me, $6,000, if I can't invest $6,000 on an amazing experience for my family, I'm doing something wrong anyway. I need to step my game up. I need to look at this differently. I don't know what I don't know, and I would start seeking answers.
I think everyone that listens to the DM podcast show here should be thinking of how to create environments, how to create experiences that people will have memories that they will forever, forever talk about. I believe my father-in-law, my parents, my in-laws, they're hanging out, talking to each other. It’s cool because my dad is like, Man, I haven't talked to Preston in a long, long time. We're putting them in environments where they're connecting, hanging out with each other. [22:16.7]
We're in an environment where it's positive. It's exciting. “What's Mark going to do next?” That's kind of what everyone's thinking, right? What the hell is this guy going to do next? Right? We have every drink that everyone loves. We have all the food that everyone loves. We've got Santa. We've got the football. We had a blast. What's next?
What's cool about it is no one fell asleep. No one talked shit. Everyone is hanging out, relaxing, enjoying, having fun. The kids are having a blast because the environment is conducive to that kind of conversation. It's not, like I said, how I grew up where it was literally a U-shaped couch, TV. That's all you just do. You're just lying there, passed out. I want to start doing more. I want to start thinking bigger. I want to start thinking about how to do more of that. That's what I'm here for. [23:01.1]
That's why I'm trying to share this stuff with you guys, because I shared this with the DM Family, the 50k-group guys, and they loved it. It gave them a lot of insight, great ideas, and, hopefully, which I know they will because they're doers, but they're going to create cool experiences for themselves and their families.
I love doing that kind of shit. What's neat, too, is I share it with the world. I'm sharing the pictures of the football field pre and after. I'm sharing the video of before the game, because that's kind of what we do. Right before the game, I share a couple of videos with the family that my guy has put together. It's about two or three minutes, nothing crazy, but it's funny stuff. Choo-choo train, Mark, blah, blah, blah. Just silly, fun, talkative stuff where people don't talk about it. We're going to get done playing football and they're going to say, Dude, that was awesome. The video you were in, you did the choo-choo, or whatever.
I'm thinking about this kind of shit all the time when I'm doing customer journeys. I don't know, this is where I'm going with this whole story as well. First and foremost, family. You’ve got to take care of fam. You’ve got to do cool shit with them. [24:06.1]
If you don't like going home, like I’ve seen that one guy talking about it like, Don't go home, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, Dude, that is bad. That's bad data. That's bad info. Go home and/or go somewhere to create an environment that's conducive to what you want them to see, feel and learn. Maybe the old you didn't want to go there, but there's a new you inside of you that you’ve got to start thinking ahead. You’ve got to start casting a different vision. You’ve got to start planning and putting them in different environments.
See, if you keep planting seeds in shitty soil, you're going to get shitty plants. If you put it in really high-quality soil, i.e. the kind of experiences we'd create, you're going to get better conversations, a better plant. You're going to get better stuff just in general. That’s the way it works.
That's why when I do the yacht trips, that works powerfully. That's why when I do the jet trips it works powerfully. Why? Because it changes your state. It changes your environment. You literally are like a duck out of water. You're like, Holy shit, I'm on a $20-million yacht. People actually buy this shit? This is one of seven of their toys, by the way, right? Or if you're on the jet, Oh my god, someone paid $12 million for this thing? This is amazing. Right? They don't even know how to act to get on. They don't even know how to act to take pictures. [25:16.1]
The environment is so different when they get on. Then they start realizing like, I can be here. I'm no different than you. They are no different than me. I create me. What do I want? Not what does Johnny, Grandma, cousin, brother, Mom, Dad think I want, but what the fuck do I genuinely want?
See, from outside looking in, you can think this looks overly over the top, because it is. That's why I do it. It's fun. It's exciting. But there are so many other things I'm going to do that are going to make this look small, right? So, what do you want? [26:00.0]
I remember when I used to do gift-giving. I still do. Our teams do gift-giving to clients and stuff. I'll never forget when I was semi, not as wealthy. I was kind of pinching pennies to try to pick up dollars back in the day and I remember I was like, Dude, we're not giving a $12-gift. We're giving a dollar card or just something stupid like that.
The thing is the $12-gift actually makes you more money or the $50-gift back then, whatever it was, because it changed. It's different. It's accepted differently. It's a very thoughtful gift. It takes three minutes to put together instead of pushing a button to automate it, right, and make them feel like just whatever.
I really think everyone, including me, I can always get better by having a better customer experience, having a better customer journey. I was talking with my buddy, Jeremy, today and he was telling me about how he just ordered some new dog food, and he's like, Dude, the packaging was impeccable. The story was amazing. They actually put an editorial, a newspaper editorial, inside of there and it's all testimonials and why this food works and how it works. That shit, that's very thoughtful. [27:11.6]
That's a gift, by the way. A gift. There's a lot of package. You get Amazon packages. It's just your fucking package, that's it. That's cool. That's what you wanted. But what if you got the same exact package with a handwritten letter in it? The same exact pack package with a handwritten letter that says, “Oh, P.S. I tossed in an extra gift in here for you just to say thank you. I appreciate your business.” That's what you as a small-business owner can do. That's what we do. I'm a small business owner just like you. That's what you and I could do to compete against, but it's not even competing. It's just about playing a different game, being better.
Let me ask you a question. Would you rather buy a product for $100 off Amazon, a faceless company at this point, and just get the product—which is cool if that's what you want—or if it came in the same amount of time, if you’ve got it in two days on Amazon or two days from me and you paid 105 or 107 for me, does it really matter? [28:01.1]
I personally am spending more because I want to shop local. I want to give the money to local small businesses. I want to see them, and not only that, I get to know them. They leave messages, personalized messages, not mass messaging, personalized messaging. Again, this is something you could always be learning from other companies. When you get a box, you open it. What kind of experience are they creating for you? When you get an email, are they creating cool experiences? Video, an experience? This is stuff you can do. This is tactical shit you can implement in your business immediately.
I got a message over the weekend as well where this guy messaged me like, Dude, your gift-giving shit is for real, it works. He’s like, Literally, I think I'm making an extra six figures this year because I implemented giving a gift of $43 to my team, my clients. Six figures, and he might spend three grand to do it, four grand. Even if he spent 100 to make 100, it's worth it. Why? Because the client is in forever. That client is in. Those customers, they're anchored into your environment. They get it. They understand the game you're playing. They want to be a part of it. [29:10.0]
This is the shit I'm doing daily. This is the kind of thought process I'm thinking about. I'm just trying to get more tactical with you guys. I want you to start implementing stuff in your business that can help you grow. I want to see you. I'd love to hear your stories, by the way. If you're listening to the DM podcast show right now and you’ve got a business and it's growing because you're learning here, I would love to hear it. Shit, I might even feature you on the show and get you more visibility, more conversations, more business, create more money.
I’ll leave you with one more thing. It's kind of cool. I’ve got a question for you and I’ll probably do a longer show on this one day, but who are you sharing your dreams with? Who are you sharing your dreams and goals and visions with? It's a very important thought, because, Mark, my son, he wants the Nintendo switch. I'm not about to buy it for him. I don't think he needs it. But I said, “Hey, listen, if you can save up $300, you absolutely can get it, but you have to do it. You have to earn it.” [30:11.8]
It’s cool because me, Deena and Mark, I'm not the artistic one, but they created a cool little thermometer style. They put all these 30 rings on, $10 each section, right? The way Mark makes money is he gets paid a quarter for a page of a book he reads, and he lost a couple teeth, so he made a couple bucks there and different things like that, but he's on track. He's at $212, give or take.
But one thing happened and I always talk to him. I share visions and goals and dreams here all the time, and my wife and kids, everyone does here, right, so I kind of think it's normal, but it's not so normal. But it's definitely in the day to day, because I remember being a kid, you're sharing your goals and they're like, Oh, yeah, man, sure, that'd be nice. Yeah, that shit doesn't happen for guys like us, man. Keep dreaming, Evans. Evans, you're so unrealistic, dude. Keep dreaming. [31:06.0]
They'd say shit like this my whole life, by the way. Still people say crazy shit like that to me, which is funny, but I don't hear them because it's my goal, my vision, my dream. It's so big, I'm actually confused by it as well, so I get why they're confused, but I'm not giving up. They've given up.
Anyway, Mark. We had Deena’s dad over here. We call him Papa P. Mark is like, Papa P, I want to show you something, and he had about $80 or whatever on the chart, and he's like, Papa P, I'm saving. I'm going to save $300. I'm going to earn $300 and I'm going to get a Nintendo switch. He just started explaining like, I want the red and blue one. I want this and blah, blah, blah. Just kind of sharing with him, Papa P, what's going on.
Papa P said, “Mark, that's awesome. I want to give you $100 towards your Nintendo switch,” and I thought about that for a second. I was like, Dude, that's actually pretty fucking powerful and real in my life, and I had never even thought about it. [32:05.3]
My buddies and the people I'm rolling with, dude, we're sharing dreams, goals and visions all the time together and we're not downplaying it like, Yeah, right, whatever. We're actually saying, Dude, I think I can help you, or, hey, do this person? I think you can get there quicker.
That's kind of what Mark did. He just shared his ideas and dreams with Papa P, and then, boom, got $100. Think about that. Who are you sharing with? This is why masterminds work. This is why groups of highly-qualified people that are kind of on the same trajectory and beyond are very powerful to be a part of, because you can actually share your goals, share your real dream.
I'm talking shit that you've been hiding or holding from everybody, probably even yourself because you're like, Dude, if I say this shit out loud, it actually might come true, or maybe you've said it out loud so many times to the wrong people that you're starting to believe their shitty ideas about dreams and goals. [33:00.4]
Listen, I’ve never met anybody that has talked down to my goals that have more than me, ever, ever, ever. Ever. The only people that ever said negativity about goals and dreams and stuff are people I would not want to be around, not want to be. I was sharing with the wrong people. I didn't know better.
Thank God I'm hard-headed and stubborn and I didn't listen to them. There are a lot of people that listen to a lot of bad people, a lot of bad advice, but I promise you, great advice is this. Get in a room where you can truly share your goals, dreams, and visions, and people will help you execute them, just like at my house, the football field.
My buddy, Mike—and if you guys are in Ohio and need an amazing landscaper, that's what he does. He's a high-level landscaper. I met him through doing my other house here in Ohio and he's just a great dude, a great friend, and an all-round just an amazing guy—I was sharing my dreams about putting that in and he was like, Dude, my team could do that for you. I was like, Done, get them over here.
Now, notice that I didn't say, Well, how much is that? Can you do it for less? Come on, man, hook your buddy up. No, dude, support your friends. Invest in them. It's the best investment you can make other than yourself. Invest in people you care about. It's what it's about, man. Life is so short. [34:15.6]
Again, that's why these memories are so important to create for yourself, for your friends, your families, and you'll figure out what you're capable of. Go rent a skate park. Go rent a football field. Go rent a soccer field. Go rent an ice hockey [rink]. Go do something that you've never thought you would do and turn it into an experience for your people you care about the most in your life, and just pay attention when they walk in how they act.
I know recently my buddy, Mike, rented out a skating rink for me, Deena, Mark, Dria, and his two kids and his wife, eight people. Literally, the people that own the place, they were like, Oh, wow, this is a small party. We were like, This isn't a party. This is our life. We're just here to hang out and connect and enjoy. Not as dicky as that, but something like that, right? I wasn't so rude to those levels. [35:07.0]
But when we walked in, Mike's wife got cookies, roller-skate cookies with our names on each one of them. I'm talking about it because it's memorable. See, it's still memorable, just going to the skate park, to hang out with our buddies, but it’s even more memorable that everything was handled. They took care of the food. They took her to the park. They took care of everything. More importantly, that one extra little bit by spending $30 on cookies or $20 whatever they spent, it's an amazing gesture. It's very thoughtful. It's very powerful and it’s the shit I remember.
I know you do, too. We all do. You just have to start becoming conscious of it, more importantly, start living it. When you can create these experiences and these cool funds, I mean, life is very fun. It's very interesting. A lot of challenging times, but it's very fun if you're leaning into what I'm talking about here today. [35:54.2]
I want you to know I'm thinking about you. I want you to have amazing experiences in your life. I want you to go above and beyond and overboard. Yes, overboard. Do crazy shit, memorable. I want them talking about it. Literally, they're about to take their last breath and they're like, Mark, that was the best Thanksgiving party ever. Boom, done. Maybe it's me. Who knows? But I can tell you, memories will always be way better than just the basic holiday. Holidays are cool, but creating an amazing event with memories inside of it absolutely changes the game.
I'm thinking about you guys. I'm rooting for you. Keep me posted. Again, I appreciate all the shout-outs. If this show hit you in any way, shape or form, I'd love to hear about, one, your success, two, what you're going through and need help with—that would help make my life easier because I’ll create a show to help you—and, three, if the show [helped], share it with your friends or people you care about that you feel that could make a big impact.
So, Evans 33, Long 18. You know how we do it. Appreciate you guys here. In the meantime, we'll make today count. Talk to you soon. Peace. [37:03.3]
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