From the Archive: Your Money Blueprint: Why You Keep Earning and Losing the Same Amount | T. Harv Eker

[00:00:01] This isn't your average business podcast and he's not your average host. This is the James Altucher Show. Presenting the Archive. Classic episodes that remain timeless. The raw, unfiltered conversations from the early days in which people shared their failures and showed us exactly how they rebuilt everything from the ground up.

[00:00:36] I am so happy to have T. Harv Eker on the podcast today. Harv, how are you doing? Amazing. Thank you. Harv, I haven't been to one of your seminars, but I've read and reread The Secrets of the Millionaire Mind a gazillion times. So thank you for that book. It's a great book and I've learned a lot from it. I think it's really helped me personally. So I just wanted to start off by thanking you for that.

[00:01:01] Well, it was interesting because we run seminars and we teach seminars all over the world. One of our niches is that we teach seminars using accelerated training technologies, which really gets the teachings and learning at a much deeper level. We actually do reconditioning for people, reprogramming their dendrites of their minds so that they actually take some new actions and make some new decisions.

[00:01:22] I never thought that any book could do that, but I was wrong because people have to get more credit than I used to because they actually read something and a lot of people take action and they actually become wealthy. And it's like, well, I go, what seminar did you take? They go, I didn't. I read the book. I went, oh my God, that's amazing. So, you know, I give credit to people. It's incredible.

[00:01:42] What affected me was this idea that you could have these pre-programmed beliefs about wealth from maybe traumatic things that happened with either your parents or childhood. And my listeners know this. I kept selling businesses, making millions of dollars and then losing it all. Wow. And when I thought about it, I realized the exact same pattern happened to my father. And I was sort of connecting the dots while reading your book.

[00:02:10] Like I had to kind of change that pattern and choose to change that pattern. And the book helped with that. Yeah, I think one of the most important things that all of your listeners need to realize is that, you know, we have something called a money blueprint. And that means that, you know, we, I mean, really, you know, when we take a look at our results in our life, where do they come from? They come from our actions, right? And then those actions, where do they come from? They come from our feelings and our thoughts before that.

[00:02:39] So the big question that nobody seems to want to ask is, okay, if your thoughts lead to your actions, your actions lead to your results, where do those thoughts come from? Why do you think the thoughts you think and somebody else thinks completely different thoughts? The answer is you were taught, you were programmed, you were conditioned to think the thoughts you think based on what you learned in the past.

[00:03:02] And unfortunately for most people, a lot of what they learned in the past came from people who either didn't have a lot of money or they had money, but they had bad habits and a lot of negative emotion and fear and struggle around it. And so their ways of thinking and being automatically passed down to us and became our natural ways of thinking and being. And we don't even recognize that we have a program running us. So we make our decisions based on these beliefs that may not be true. I agree. And hold that thought because I want to get back to that.

[00:03:31] I want to wind back a little bit because I sort of feel when I was a kid, I always read these comic books. And always my favorite comic book was the secret origins of the of the heroes, where they came from. And so you mentioned in your book that in your first bunch of businesses, this is before the chain of retail stores, you were stuck in short term thinking.

[00:03:53] Yeah, I went through 14 different jobs and 12 different businesses in just over a decade, which was surprising to me because I thought I'd be rich right after I came out of school. All of it didn't work out that way. And yeah, for me, it was always about looking for the right. Let me put it bluntly so everybody could get this. I had a belief and many, many, I mean, I have over a million students now, but many of them used to share that belief before I got to them.

[00:04:21] That if you get on the right thing at the right time, you're going to become successful. I mean, it makes a lot of sense. I actually had the first edition of Entrepreneur Magazine. So I was always looking for the right business opportunity, the right vehicle, the right car, the right race car. If I just got in it, then I would be successful because other people were successful. And I tried that methodology for 12 times and it didn't work when I kept trying it.

[00:04:48] And so that was one of the biggest things that I learned is that just because you have the right vehicle or a vehicle that other people are doing well with, it doesn't mean that you are going to do well with it. And so I started recognizing that I, as the driver of this race car, had the other half of the equation. And if I wasn't a good driver, it doesn't matter how fast the race car could go. I would either crash it, which I did a lot, or I wouldn't be able to get to its maximum, which I did the other half of it. What you were good at, though, it seems, was persistence.

[00:05:17] I mean, many people, maybe after 12 different tries, would just say, OK, I'm going to go work in a cubicle somewhere and be happy that way. You know, I got to be honest with you, James, I would have rather taken a gun to my head than work in any cubicle. That's not what I'm cut out to do. I just, everybody is different. And, you know, again, this comes from your past programming. My parents never had a job in their lives. My dad was a contractor and a builder and my mom was a seamstress.

[00:05:46] And, but she would work, they all worked for themselves in the house or, you know, outside the house, but whatever it was. And I am unemployable. I could not work for anybody. I say I had 14 jobs, but every one of my jobs was to go to school, quote unquote, on somebody else's dime in their business to try and figure out what businesses, how their business works so I could start that business. I never thought of having a job.

[00:06:14] Well, you know, that's a great positive way to look at it, though. Like a lot of people are, you know, feel that they're stuck in a cubicle, but they don't frame it in the way you just framed it, which is I was going to school learning about this business or industry while I prepared to make the next jump. Well, you know, this is what's really interesting that everybody who is, quote unquote, in a cubicle or should be in one right now.

[00:06:35] 67% of all, listen closely, successful entrepreneurs are successful because they actually were in the same business and found a niche within that business working for somebody else that wasn't being covered properly, went out on their own, took that niche and started doing it on their own. And became successful. Whereas 80% of, as we know, of entrepreneurs who just start their own thing fail at it.

[00:07:04] So you have a much, much, much, much higher percentage of succeeding. If you've already been in that industry, find a niche that isn't being served properly and go serve that niche. So then you started from there, first one store and then a chain of like retail sports stores. Had you been in that business or that industry? Well, here's the thing. As I said earlier, I was trying everything to, you know, become successful.

[00:07:31] And I was trying it with the methodology that, hey, something is working for somebody else, it'll work for me. But that didn't work. And so finally, I just really was almost, I wasn't on, not on the verge of tears. I was crying my eyes out. I was praying. I was, my fourth business in a row that year had gone down the drain and I didn't know what to do anymore. So I said, you know what? I don't give a, I'm going to, I don't give a shoot anymore. You can swear here. Yeah.

[00:08:01] It's podcast world. I don't try to get rich anymore. I don't, I don't care. I just want to do something I like doing. I hate this. I hate this up and down. I was in the coupon business, which I didn't care about. I was in the jewelry business, which I didn't care about. I was in this business. I didn't care about. I just was trying to make money. And I said, I don't care about that anymore. I'm going a whole different route. So I said, okay, what do I, what do I love? What am I really interested in?

[00:08:25] And one of the things is I used to run, I was really into fitness and I used to run five miles every morning and five miles every evening. I was on the beach and I was in really, really good shape. I loved fitness and I, I knew my stuff, right? I was kind of a little ahead of the time and nutrition and everything and not having sugar and certain protein shakes. It was just for me. All right. And so I said, you know what? I'm going to be in the fitness business.

[00:08:50] So believe it or not, I became the first distributor of what gravity guidance boots, those inversion boots you would lock onto your ankles and go upside down like Richard Gary in American Jigolo. I became the first distributor of that. And, you know, it didn't go all that well, but I really loved talking to the sports store and the fitness people and, and go to the trade shows and talk about that. It was just my thing. And I didn't know, I didn't care if I made any money. I just said, I like to talk about this stuff.

[00:09:16] So what I found was that I actually moved back to Toronto where I was born. I was living in the States. I moved back to Toronto and it was cold. And so now six months of the year, I couldn't really run outside. I wasn't going to kill myself on the slush and snow. So I was looking for exercise equipment I could buy for my home and I would use it and, you know, stay in shape that way. Well, when I went out to buy the stuff, it was absolute crap. It was total, anything you could get for the house was complete junk.

[00:09:45] And if you wanted anything good, it would only be sold to the health clubs and to the fitness studios. And so I put two and two together and I started looking around at this. I said, you know what? There's nowhere that you can actually buy good fitness equipment for your house. So I started looking for that kind of equipment. It was semi-reasonably priced.

[00:10:05] Thank God I was semi-intelligent enough from my failures before that the equipment that I found, since there was nobody else doing this, I said, I'm opening up. I didn't see a store. A chain of retail fitness stores for the home, high quality. If I take on your equipment, I want an exclusive for 10 years on this. And well, they didn't sell to anybody else. So they go, okay, sure, whatever. So you did a little bit of faking it till you make it.

[00:10:33] You had the chain of stores already kind of in front of them. I had, yeah. Well, sure, that was my intention. I already knew that one store wasn't going to make me rich. So I already understood the concept of duplication. It's just that I needed to find one thing that I could duplicate. So now I teach that. I teach first you create a, have a concept, a model that actually works in the real world. Then you systemize it so it can work without you. So you can duplicate it. And that's exactly what happened. I borrowed $2,000 on my Visa card.

[00:11:03] I opened the first retail fitness store in the world pretty well. And it only sold out high-end equipment for the home. And within two and a half years, I had 10 stores and sold out to H.A. Heinz Corporation. Oh, that's great. So then I was reading, and I don't really know the timeframe. It wasn't clear. But so you made some money from this and it was good money. How old were you at this point? Between 30 and 34. Okay. And then from what I understand, and correct me if I'm wrong, then you lost some or all

[00:11:30] this money through poor money management at this point. Well, correct. Yes. So what happened and how did you pick yourself up from that? Because I think that happens to a lot of people are good at what they do. But then initially when they first have money, they're not good at having money. You got that right. Absolutely. I just didn't know that making money and keeping money were so far different skills. They're completely different skills. That's also for all your listeners listening to this right now.

[00:11:58] That's a very important concept when you're in your own business. Not just when it comes to you personally. When it comes to you personally, obviously earning money and keeping it are two different things. But here's the different thing. When you're in your own business, earning it and keeping it in your business are two different things. So you can be good at bringing the money in, but you may not be very good at keeping it in and growing it in. And again, I wasn't that good at that either.

[00:12:23] So I had to relearn my skills and recognize that just because I could make a lot of money didn't mean that I could keep it and didn't mean I could grow it. Those are three different skills completely. So yeah, I ended up with $2,000 in my bank account. I kept on looking at that number. I kept going, wow, I keep on having the same amount no matter what I do. Wait, wait, wait. Were you depressed? I mean, you went from like about a million and a half to $2,000. Did you get like suicidally depressed? Well, I never thought suicide, but let me put it this way.

[00:12:53] Both when I had my time, I told you about where my fourth business in a row went down. And when I looked at my bank account and it was right down to $2,000 and the mortgage company called me up and said, if you don't pay your mortgage this month, we're taking your house away. And I went literally a year ago, I was on top of the world and everybody was asking me what a star I was. How did you get rich so fast and blah, blah. I mean, I didn't, I never thought of actual suicide, but I certainly, let me put it this way.

[00:13:20] I was embarrassed to go out. First, I put sheets on my mirrors so I wouldn't have to look at myself. I hid in my room for about three weeks. I turned off the lights. I didn't want to go out. I mean, if you want to call that depression, the worst thing I could think about is going out the door and having anybody talk to me and ask me, hey, heart, how's things? And having to explain all this. So I was more than embarrassed.

[00:13:49] I was humiliated because my self-worth was wrapped up in my net worth, which was another big mistake. And so it took me a while, but that's where I said, you know what? I'm not getting into anything again until I grow myself. Because obviously I am still not the right driver. On a business level, I can drive, but on a personal level, I don't have what it takes

[00:14:14] to withstand the ups and downs here and the persistence and the determination. There's something missing in me. And that was the best thing that ever happened to me because when I lost it, I started thinking about just like your story, how could I lose this money? And it was just then that my dad went through the same thing again. He was a builder and the mortgage situation affected that. And he almost went bankrupt after 40 years.

[00:14:42] And I said, wow, look, I'm the same as my dad. We have the same thing going on. And he just hit me. I went, oh my God, look at this. I'm doing exactly like my dad. Up and down, up and down. Were you scared that there was no way out of that track? Like here was the future 40 years later. Were you scared that maybe there was no way to sort of, you know, change time, you know, change the future? No, I wasn't afraid because I believe in serendipity. I believe in the universal powers.

[00:15:11] I believe in some spiritual power of some sort. And I wasn't afraid because just before that, I had had an episode with my son who was six months old at the time where my daughter was two years old. And when she came out from it, from the moment I laid eyes on her, and I don't know if anybody can relate to this, and I am a little bit embarrassed to say it. But from the moment I laid eyes on her, she couldn't do anything wrong. I would pick her up, but I would never put her down.

[00:15:41] My wife would say, put her down. I go, no, I'm not putting her down. I want her beside me. I would never put her down. She couldn't do anything. She was my princess. She was, I wish I could just unzip myself and put her into my heart. I mean, that bond between us was ridiculous. Now, when my son was born, the second one, my second born, it was a different feeling completely. Of course, I loved him, but he was the man. And I began to treat him like my father treated me, the tough guy, which was he couldn't do

[00:16:10] anything right. You know, and I'll show him how to live by pointing out his flaws. Of course, I didn't know I was doing it then, but that's what it was. So he was crying one day, so I was on the phone with a creditor, actually, who was trying to get money from me, you know, money I actually owed him. And I'm screaming at this guy, well, get off my back. And then my son started crying because I was screaming so loud. And my wife wasn't home and my daughter wasn't home. And just me and my son, and he started crying.

[00:16:37] And I screamed at him so loud without stopping to shut the F up. What are you doing? I can't handle you anymore. And the kid's six months old. And all of a sudden, it just hit me because my heart was coming out of my head. That's how much my blood pressure was going up and how crazy I was. And I said to the person, I said, listen, do whatever you need to do. I need to call you back and I'll call you back in an hour.

[00:17:05] And I hung up the phone and I picked up my son, Jesse, and I started crying. And I said, I am so, so sorry. I cannot believe what I've turned into. I will never, ever yell at you again. I promise you for the rest of your life. And he just was looking at me in shock. And that day changed my life because I knew I need to change who I was and how I was.

[00:17:33] Not just the business and success principles, but who I was as a person, my character. And so I began working on that very, very heavily. And it was the most important time of my life because I realized that I personally am the root of my success. And who I am, my beliefs, my attitude, and my character will determine my financial results. Not just what I knew business principles wise and not just the vehicle that I got into.

[00:18:02] And that day changed my life. I could definitely relate because I blew up many times before hitting my stride. And I realized it was definitely 100% an inner game that made the difference for me. Which is why I relate to one of the quotes in your book. A lack of money is never the problem. A lack of money is a symptom of what is going on underneath. Take a quick break. If you like this episode, I'd really, really appreciate it. It means so much to me.

[00:18:31] Please share it with your friends and subscribe to the podcast. Email me at altitra at gmail.com and tell me why you subscribed. Thanks. So that day after you had that experience with your son, what did you do the next day? What changed the next day? I started looking at courses. See, I'd always be interested.

[00:19:00] I was always interested in brain change stuff, believe it or not. And actually, how do you change your brain? Because I was really interested in success. So I started actually getting involved with some of these people who were at the highest levels of these brain change technology. Be it subliminal, be it belief change elements, be it biofeedback or all these different technologies, NLP, everything. And I started putting together a program for myself to change my own thinking,

[00:19:27] my own natural, habitual ways of thinking and being so that when something came in front of me, it wasn't the same kind of trigger. It was a much more positive trigger. And I started working on myself very heavily. I actually, for two years, didn't do anything but work on me in long, long walks and programs and things like that and courses that I took all on brain change technology. And all I can tell you is, man, did it ever work? But how did you have faith during those two years of doing nothing that it would work?

[00:19:56] Like, were you scared? Because you were already down. You had just been talking to creditors. Were you scared that you were going to go totally broke? It worked right away. I mean, it wasn't about a result in it anymore. It was about a process and a journey for me to grow myself. And I said, hey, if I ever make money again, great. And if I don't, I don't. I'm working on me now. And this was the interesting thing. I was working at a very spiritual levels too, I have to say. I don't know who your audience is.

[00:20:26] And I don't, you know, I can't say that everybody agrees with this. But believe it or not, I was working a lot in Zen and Buddhist principles, trying to make myself grow and be happier as a person. Because I wasn't happy. And so as I started working on those more and more, I became happier and better functioning. And I could take things better. And my money started growing again. I was in the mail order business. I was in the marketing business. And I wasn't killing it. But things were starting to turn around.

[00:20:55] And believe it or not, I was looking to become a Zen monk. I have to tell you again, the parallel. After I sold my first business and lost everything the first time, I got heavily into Zen as well. And it's just funny, the parallel. Yeah. Well, I was working with a Zen monk, a very heavy hitter in the arena. And she was brilliant. I loved her. And we were going to do things together and whatnot.

[00:21:23] And so I was going to live at the monastery. And we were going to write a book together. And I was going to become a monk. And before I did that, I was still working on the book with her and working on myself. And then people in the business world would talk to me. And I would start seeing all the things that they had. I was starting to question whether I should forsake money and success and everything. Because as I was doing that, I still wasn't happy, James.

[00:21:51] So now, as the business guy, I wasn't happy. And as the monk, I wasn't happy. And I kind of had one of those moments again where I just threw my hands up in the air and started feeling depressed again. Because, you know, you get a direction, you feel good about it. And then all of a sudden, you close the door in that direction. It goes, now what? And so I said, and this was, again, a life changer. And I've had many of these happen to me, but where never so much where it was such a direct

[00:22:20] channel, where the message was so strong and spoke to me so directly. And because I have a pretty loud mind. And so for a spirit or a channel to get in and talk to me is a little bit shaky. And I just looked at the heavens. I said, oh my God, not again. I'm directionless. Now what? I'm not happy going for millions and going for the money. And I'm not happy going the monk route. You know, what should I do here?

[00:22:47] And this voice, James, I mean, it was just crystal clear. It was so much deeper than my obvious mind thought. It came right from my heart. And it said, heart, get a post-it note and a pencil. Because I always wrote on a post-it note. So that was a natural thing to do. And it said, write this down. And I wrote down what it said. I mean, I know it sounds so weird. I get it for sure. I wouldn't. It doesn't sound weird to me at all. It was like, just, it was just an intuitive thing. Write this down. And I wrote it down.

[00:23:17] And then I read it. And it is exactly what it said. It said, heart, embrace both sides of yourself. And I read that. And it was the first time in my life I ever read anything like that from anyone. Or if it was there, I never saw it. And it was so obvious that I'm the kind of person that needs to have success and wants success.

[00:23:46] And I'm the kind of person that needs to have something much more deeper in terms of spirituality and enlightenment and the universe working with me and for me at the same time. And it was like using my right hand and my left hand. And I went, of course. And so the minute I recognized that, again, my life took a completely different turn. And I have never looked back from that.

[00:24:15] Because now what I teach and what I believe in is that you can be kind, generous, loving, balanced, and spiritual, and really freaking rich. And that has changed everything. And, you know, a lot of people, they get into this mindset. And you talk about how to change that mindset. Like you had this big change, this big realization. But it came to you suddenly after all this frustration.

[00:24:44] But you give kind of a formula for people who consciously want to make these changes. They realize they have, let's say, a poor mindset. And you talk about awareness, understanding, disassociation, and reconditioning. Maybe can you describe, like, if I want to change or if a listener wants to change, what do these four things mean? Okay, that's a really good idea. But here's the thing that everyone needs to realize. And this is a big one, everybody. I mean, a lot of you may or may not know me.

[00:25:14] But if you know me at all, you know that I'm extremely direct when I teach. So bottom line is this. You know, I'm not here. I don't think any good coach is going to tell you all the great things about you. Why would you need them? Then you just might as well have just, you know, a buddy that says, oh, you're wonderful, all that. But here's the thing. How do you know if you have a program or a blueprint or something that isn't really working for you? And here's the answer. Look at your results. Look at your bank account.

[00:25:44] Look at your income. Look at your net worth. If it isn't where you want it to be, you need to make some changes. And as James said, those changes must start on the inside because your inner world actually creates your outer will. It's as simple as that. And until you understand that and believe that, you will not have a full and complete life, especially financially. There's a lot of factors in play. And so how do you know if there's anything that you need to improve? Simple.

[00:26:12] On the inside, look at your results. I'm going to say this bluntly. I'm not saying it for everybody. There's no generic here. But I will say this. If you're over 30 years old today and financial success is really important for you and you're not a millionaire, then I've got to say, you've got to take a look. You've got to take a look because today there's 18 years old who are millionaires and 21-year-olds who are billionaires. So I'm not putting you down at all.

[00:26:41] I wasn't a millionaire at 30. I was a millionaire at 34, not at 30. But I didn't know what I knew today. And if I knew what I knew today, I'm telling you right now, if I started out today at 21, I'd be a millionaire. So a million dollars is not a lot of money. And if you believe it is, then you're going to rearrange your thinking again because it barely buys you a house. Okay? So bottom line is this. You need to be aware of your thinking pattern. You need to observe the way you think.

[00:27:09] Are your thoughts and beliefs supportive to financial success at the level that you want it to be? Most people are not. They've been ingrained and taught and conditioned to believe that, here's an example, that is really a bothersome to me. Most people believe in some way, shape, or form that rich people are bad. In some way, shape, or form. A little bad. Yes.

[00:27:37] I will say I give that question in email or on Twitter or whatever, maybe a couple dozen times a week. Of course. How would you not? It's propagated by the government. It's propagated by the highest levels of politicians in the world that rich people are bad. Now, let me ask you a simple question here. Why would they say that? What's in it for them? Simple. Power. Power.

[00:28:03] You see, if everybody has to be rich and you're not getting rich and they're in office and you're not doing as well as you want to be doing, then they say, well, you don't want to be rich because rich people are bad people. Let's not be rich. Let's just be a good person and have a good time and whatever else they say. And there's a lot of elements of goodness and poverty and work and struggling and whatever it is. And the church tells you that.

[00:28:26] It's interesting that everybody who tells you that has got their hand out and says, you know, money's bad, but it's okay to give it to us. We'll take care of it. Right. Really. Okay. So it's very interesting. So most people believe rich people are not. But you know, and Harv, sorry to end up. They do. It seems like there's anecdotally, they can always point to something like, let's say the 2008 crisis or Bernie Madoff or something like that.

[00:28:50] Not that any of these people ended up happy, but they can always point out that, you know, some aspect of the financial system became crooked for a while and bad things happened. That's kind of the excuse. Yeah. Okay. Let's just look at this. I mean, everybody here, as long as you have an open mind, just simply look at the numbers. That's all you have to do. So if I always ask in my seminars, I go, are there some, are there rich people who are bad, quote unquote bad? Put your hand up if you think there are.

[00:29:19] Everybody puts their hand up. I go, are there some middle class people who are, quote unquote bad? Put your hand up if you think some people, everyone puts their hand up. Are there some poor people who are, quote unquote bad? Everyone puts their hand up. Of course. Of course. It just has to do with money. Right. It has to do with people, not money. You know? And so bottom line is this. If you think that rich people are bad in any way, shape, or form, and you want to be a good person, guess what? You can never be rich.

[00:29:45] You will unconsciously disallow yourself from ever being rich because you think rich people are bad. So why would it want to be that? You know? You know? So it's kind of crazy because people always say to me, Harv, you know, money corrupts people. I go, really? Okay. Tell me, at what number will you be personally correct? I say, raise your hand if you think you're a decent person, a good person, a kind person. Everybody puts their hand up. Okay, good. So you're a good person. Great. We know that.

[00:30:13] Now, at what dollar figure will it be that you become a bad person? Corrected, a bad person. When you get $1,000 where you all of a sudden wake up in the morning and now have $1,000, oh my God, I'm a bad person. Of course. Okay. Obviously too low. How about a million dollars? You get a million dollars, now you're a bad person? No. The whole conversation is stupid. It's ridiculous. And people bought into this crap.

[00:30:40] Yeah, so let's say someone has that mindset, okay, which obviously many people have. They're listening to you. They recognize that's a bad mindset to have. How can they deep down start to change? Okay, so the number one thing is awareness. You recognize that this belief itself, this way of thinking is not supportive to success. It's not supportive to happiness. Regardless of whether it's true or not, it's only true if you make it true. There's no big red chart mark in the sky that goes, yes, this is true.

[00:31:11] You're going to make it up. It's true. It's not true. So the first thing is whether you have this type of a tendency to believe that in this case, there's dozens of them, that rich people are bad or shaky or greedy or whatever it is. Okay. Now, once you understand that, then you have to understand, where did you get this? Is this yours? Were you born with this belief? Is this true? No. Where do you get it? Well, actually, my father used to always say, you know, spiritualism is where you're pious.

[00:31:40] If you should be educated and intelligent and you should, you know, get a good job and have a good family. That's what's important in life. And money's not important. And rich people are bad. They take advantage of other people. Don't be one of those. Oh, that was my dad or my grandfather or my uncle. I got that in the media. That's not my thought. That's someone else's implanted in me. That's not mine. You know, you bring up that. You bring up a good point in the book because this is related to education.

[00:32:10] Like everyone's taught, oh, you have to do X, Y, and Z to get a good job. No one's ever taught, oh, you have to do A, B, and C to get passive sources of income. Exactly right. That's one of the things that we teach. It's like, see, that's another one. So we were ingrained, James, and everyone listening. This is a huge one for everyone. Listen, please listen very closely. I'm in the midst of teaching this right now in our program. This is a huge one because today, myself, and I'm sure you, James, and many people understand

[00:32:39] the value, the huge value of creating passive income. Because if you don't create passive income, you will work till the day you die and you will never be free. You'll be a slave forever, okay? No matter how much money you earn, you've got to eventually turn all active income into passive income so you can be free and live the lifestyle you desire without having to work, okay? That's the goal. That's winning the money game.

[00:33:04] But if you take a look at it, when you were 13, 14, 15, 16 years old and you needed money, what did your parents say to you? Did they say, go down and earn some passive income? No parent ever said that. No, I had to get a paper route. Yeah, yeah. Go get a job. Go to work. You know, go work for somebody. Go get a job. They never said work some, we had some passive income. Go make money. Never talked about that.

[00:33:31] So we learned, we equated income slash what we want. We want a car. We want this. We want that. We want that. We want that. With working, job, you know, that whole thing. We never equated it with how do I earn money without having to work? And that's a sin, by the way. Oh my God. For a lot of people, you know, a dollar's work for a dollar's pay. Anything else is a sin. You're not doing your part in the world.

[00:34:00] Well, let me tell you something now, everybody. You did your part and you continue to do your part. Why? Because for me, the number one key of passive income is delivering the value slash the problems that you solve for people, the value to others without you having to be there to do it. Which means you can deliver a much higher quantity of that value if you don't have to be there.

[00:34:30] If I have to be in every single store I'm in, I only have one store. So so many, only a few other people can buy that financial equipment. But if I don't have to be in the stores and I can have 10 stores, 20 stores, 30 stores, 100 stores, and I can serve thousands of people a day instead of 10 people a day and help them in their life. If I don't have to be at the seminars, which I don't have to be anymore, I am in 36 different countries right now. I don't teach live seminars. I teach one a year. I'm not kidding you. One a year.

[00:34:57] I have nine other trainers that go around to all these other different countries. I probably have every weekend somewhere between three and five seminars a weekend happening. And I'm in freaking Maui. Okay. I'm looking at the ocean right now. And I just came back from my work. I'm going to swim. I don't, I only go once a year to a country I want to go to. And yet every year there are somewhere between 200 and 300,000 new students who learn the

[00:35:26] lessons of how to become financially free, how to become wealthy and be a good, kind, loving, and wonderful person at the same time. And if I had to be there, you know, it would be a 10th of that. So you're doing the world a favor by not having to be there and earning passive income. That value is being delivered without you. You have set up a system. So again, let's go back to this, everyone. You've got to have a model that works in a little way, just a tiny way.

[00:35:54] If you can earn $1 from one person, that means you can earn $1 from 10 people. Now you have to systemize that you can earn $1 from a thousand people. So if they're without you, and then it's just a question of duplication.

[00:36:22] So fitting into the four things, awareness, understanding, disassociation, reconditioning, how do you still continue to get into that mindset? Mostly by negating the ridiculous ideas that were implanted in you. When you can see how ridiculous they really are and where they come from and who they come from and why they come from, it's easy with new information and new, everyone listen to this word, with new evidence, you will change your belief system. It's a human trait.

[00:36:52] When you get new evidence, you change your belief system. And what do you mean? What do you mean by evidence? Okay. You have a way of thinking that you're sure is true. You're sitting on a jury. Okay. Okay. The, every single thing that has been pointed out to you over the last three days about this person who's on trial says, this person is guilty. They show you the weapon. He did a garage where he showed you how he fought. It was his fingerprints on the screwdriver that forced their way into the house.

[00:37:22] That it's obvious that everything, okay. Everything is obvious. The person keeps on saying, I'm innocent. Somebody frame me. You're going, yeah, right. Okay, fine. The jury gets together. They're just about to say, it's obvious. This is a five minute discussion. This guy's guilty. And all of a sudden, you're called back into the courtroom. And then you come back in the courtroom and another man is sitting there crying and crying and crying and going, I'm so sorry.

[00:37:50] I can't live with myself anymore. I did this. I put the screwdriver in his bag. Da, da, da. I took his fingerprints from over here and laid him on over here. I couldn't handle it anymore. I'm wracked with guilt. I'm so sorry. Okay. What happened to your guilty verdict? All of a sudden, someone else is confessing to the crime and it's real. And you go, well, there's some new evidence. He's not guilty. Now you don't believe he's guilty anymore. Why? Because you've got new information, new evidence to prove that he's not guilty. It's the same way with this.

[00:38:19] When you get to realize that rich people are not bad, they're not worse than poor people, not worse than middle class people. If I said to you, okay, all of these rich people who are supposedly greedy and bad, go ahead. Name them. Name them. Write them down. Name them. Send them to me. You're going to get to 10. Ha! 10! You're basing your whole life on 10 people? Now, if I asked you, how many people are there do you think are hardworking, they worked hard

[00:38:44] and long, and they became wealthy by saving their money, became wealthy by helping people? How many of those are there? Oh, like 90%. Yes. So yeah, everyone who you're going to, listen, I'm going to say this right now, everybody listen closely. If you look at actual research and numbers, you can get rich by being a jerk, but you're not going to stay rich. Why? Because the number one way to get rich and successful is by giving people what they need to solve the problem. Okay?

[00:39:14] In other words, you solve problems for people at a profit or for pay. That's how you get rich. You solve a problem for somebody. Now, let me ask you, everybody, your own experience. If you're going to do business with somebody, would you do business, would you rather do business with somebody that you like or someone that you dislike? Somebody that you trust or somebody that you distrust? Everyone's going to say, I'd rather do business with a nice person. I'd rather do business with somebody that I trust. Of course you would. And so why would you do business with someone you don't trust, you don't like? Because you have to.

[00:39:43] That's the only reason. So the reason people do well is because they are nice and people can trust them and they are an integrity and they do deliver the value and they do do what they say. Not everybody, but most people. Because if you don't, you're not going to have customers for long. So the only way to get rich and stay rich is to be in integrity, do what you said you're going to do, really solve problems for people, really deliver value, make people happy, allow

[00:40:12] them to come back and buy more from you. That's how you get rich. It's so obvious. You know, it's kind of funny because there is a Zen component to this approach, which is that very first awareness. Oh, I'm thinking that thought again. So being able to, you know, take a step back and observe your thoughts and say, oh, I'm making that excuse again. Or I'm subscribing to that, you know, erroneous philosophy again about rich people or whatever.

[00:40:39] So stopping the thought and kind of replacing it with something more positive. Or simply, exactly, or just simply, I like just my, I have something that I say are my four magic words. I'm going to teach them to your audience right now. These are, these words will change your life. I gift this to you as I gift this to all my students because it changed my life. Write these words down. Whenever your mind- Harv, you're great. You're like the best salesman I've ever met.

[00:41:08] And it's all true. So it's not, it's not, I'm not using this in a pejorative way. Like it's all the way I live. Because my life changed and I'd love to help other people's life change. But listen closely. What you are not your mind, you're not your voice, just like you're not your arm and you're not your hand and you're not your leg. You're not your mind. You're not that voice in your head. You are the one listening to the voice in your head. You are much bigger than that. Okay. And so the voice in your head comes from a survival mechanism. It's only going to repeat what it needs to repeat to protect you.

[00:41:37] Bottom line, it's always going to tell you what's going to keep you basically in your comfort zone because that's familiar and it wants to keep you safe. That's a lot for a little short period of time. But bottom line is this. When you hear yourself say things, the first thing you ask yourself is this. Is this helpful? Does this thought, is this voice right now helpful? Is it making me happy? Is it making me successful? Is this a supportive thought to my happiness and success? 99% of the time it will be no.

[00:42:07] Okay. So here you are, you know, you just heard Obama saying that the richer are not paying their fair share. And you go, yeah, the rich aren't paying their fair share. Okay. Immediately. Is that a helpful thought to your success and your wealth? No. Whether it's true or not, it's up to you to decide. First of all, it's not true, but it's up to you. So that's not a helpful thought. Here's the four words you immediately use when you have what I call a non-supportive thought

[00:42:36] come through your head. It goes to you and here they are. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for sharing. You say that directly to your mind because your mind obviously wants to be acknowledged. So you acknowledge it and you don't say, what a jerk you are for thinking that because it's going to come back at you twice as strong. You go, oh, thank you for sharing. Thank you for sharing that thought. And I choose another thought. I choose to believe that I'm going to be a rich person and I'm a good person.

[00:43:05] And if I become rich, I'm going to make sure that I'm a good person and I help other people. So it's not true that rich people are bad because I'm a person and I'm not bad and I'm not going to be bad. So it's obvious. So immediately, any thought you think that is not supportive to your happiness or your success, you immediately come back with, thank you for sharing. And move to a more empowering thought. I love that. Just control your thinking, everybody. You have that right.

[00:43:34] You may not be good at it, but you control your thinking. That is the one thing you have complete control of that nobody has control of. Your own thoughts. Let me ask you this because it's related. So obviously, and you refer to this a little, people who are successful want to associate with other positive, nice, successful people. And not just in business, but in life in general.

[00:44:00] And you mentioned in the book, you get this question a lot, but I get this question also. What if people you have to be with, like let's say family members are overly negative or down or discouraging, or don't share this philosophy with you? What's kind of some solutions to deal with that? Number one, number one is don't make them wrong. Don't make them wrong. Because if you make them wrong, you make you wrong too. That's your habit. Okay. It's a not a supportive way of living.

[00:44:30] Don't make people wrong. There is no right and wrong. Again, there's no red check marks in any sky that I see. So you have to recognize that anybody who is the way they are, is the way they are because of past conditioning and past learning. They are habitual in the way they think. They're for their feelings. They're for their actions. They're for their results. So someone who is always negative learned to be always negative. I'm not saying it's not their fault because I'm not talking about fault.

[00:45:00] It's just the way they learned to be. Okay. And so when you hear them say something negative, you practice being the observer. You practice being the person who's outside whatever's going on and noticing what's going on for them and going to yourself, wow, are they ever negative? Then your next piece is not to condemn them.

[00:45:24] I know it's hard here, but to have a little compassion, a little compassion that goes, whoo, can you imagine what they learned and what they went through when they were young for them to be able to think this way, for them to feel this way, for them to have such a nothing's going to work attitude. I feel sorry for them. Okay. But that's not, their poison is not going to enter me. Whenever they say something, if they say it directly to me, just simply go, hey,

[00:45:54] thanks for sharing that. I appreciate it. And then just cut it right off in your brain and go, whoa, that's interesting that they would come from there. Thank God that's not me anymore. Thank God I can watch that person do that and not be affected. Is it easy? No. Why? Because we're habitual and our ego doesn't like when someone says to us, that's never going to work. You're crazy. Don't listen to that stupid James dying, that stupid hard guy. They're just trying to take your money. Okay.

[00:46:22] Of course, listen, I'm going to say this and I'll say it many, many times. I say to all my students, you don't have to listen to anybody. All you have to do is check your life. If your life is where you want it to be exactly, then you should be a teacher and teach other people how to have that light. But if your life isn't where you want it to be and you're not getting the results you want, what does Talia Woods do? He goes to a coach. What does Wayne Gretzky do? He goes to a coach. What does an Olympian? Everybody goes to somebody who's doing what they want to help them. There's nothing wrong with that. That's a smart thing to do.

[00:46:51] Then what happened was you came up with these philosophies and ideas and they worked for you and you basically became this mega coach. You started an entire business around these training seminars and creating other entrepreneurs and businessmen and so on. Ultimately, how big was your business that you created doing this? Well, I think it's really important to recognize why I became popular. I never thought I would be a speaker or a trainer.

[00:47:20] I was the last person in school to raise my hand. My God, I'd be nervous as hell if the teacher ever chose me. I'm like, please don't pick me. I hated it. Okay? I never thought I would be this. However, I do like helping people. And when you have something that actually works in the real world, it just starts to become kind of natural. What happened was when I started making all my money back and it just started flowing for me,

[00:47:44] all these people that were kind of following my friends or whatever, following me when I was broke all the time. And then when I made it and then I lost it and I started gaining it back again, very, again, quickly even and really solidly. I was a different person. They started asking me, started, hey, you were broke. When we were you, you were broke. How did you all of a sudden, where do you have this $2 million house? I mean, how did you get? And so I started saying, listen, this is what I did. I'm not saying for you to do it, but this is what happened for me.

[00:48:14] And I started working on this and I started changing my thoughts around this. And this is what worked for me. So I would start saying, this is what I did when I stayed broke. This is what I'm doing now that's working and I'm becoming very successful and wealthy because of it. Here's the two ways. Do whatever you want. But I used to do what you're doing and it didn't work for me. Here's what does work for me. Now, that's my own experiment. And so people started relating to that.

[00:48:40] And literally, I started having just in my own experience of teaching people, this is what I did before that didn't work. This is what I'm doing now that does work. Do whatever you want. People started telling their friends about it. And pretty soon I started having between 1,000, 2,000 people in a room for a weekend. And they started telling other people. And then the book came out. And before I knew it, I was having between 3,000 and 5,000 people for a three-day weekend course. I went to Singapore.

[00:49:10] I had 7,000 people waiting for me there after one talk. People resonate with truth. They resonate with the truth. They know the truth for themselves. And then they hear, they go, shit, this really makes... I mean, I believe that I have the golden grail. I have the holy grail. If you don't work on your thinking process, you will continue to take the actions you are taking and continue to get the results that you get. It's so simple. There is a root cause to this.

[00:49:39] And so now I've been able to work with people on their thought patterns, on their habitual patterns, on their action patterns, and on business principles that seem to work in the real world because they sure work for me. They work for over a million students. So, you know, I'm 39 different countries. Peak Potentials, before I sold it, was the largest personal development training company in the world. I had 272 full-time staff. So you sold it to a public company, right?

[00:50:08] I sold it to... Peak Potentials was the largest in the world. The second largest was Success Resources. The third largest in the world for seminars was EmpowerNet. Those two got together, Success Resources and EmpowerNet. They got together, and then they bought Peak Potentials. And so now I'm in Mali, and I'm running my computer right now talking to you, and I do one program a year. I open one country a year. Two years ago, I opened South Africa because I wanted to go on safari. Last year, November, I opened India because I wanted to go to India.

[00:50:39] This November, I'm opening up Brazil because I want to go to South America. And that's my life. And that's because I created it that way based on the principles that I teach. And it's not hard. It's not hard. Do you have to work? Of course you do. But you have to work even if you're broke. I'd rather work hard and be rich than work hard and be broke. Right. Well, Harv, this has been really enlightening. I'm really happy you agreed to come on the show. What can you leave the audience with?

[00:51:08] What special message would you like to say to the listeners? Well, you know, again, because I'm fortunate enough to have over a million students. And here's the thing. I get to hear from most of them what's working, what needs to be tweaked, what's not in their life. And, you know, for me, going around and hearing it online and everything, it's still a little strange and a little sad for me to actually recognize that most people don't,

[00:51:34] how they want their life to be and how their life is are pretty far apart. And like 90% of the people actually don't have their life together. You know, this part's working, that part's not. That part's working, this part's not. And they're not happy because of it. And I've recognized that this is the way I used to be for a lot of my life. Even when I was quote unquote successful, James, a lot of my life, I was highly successful in business, but then my relationship would suffer. My health would suffer.

[00:52:04] Then I would focus on my health and put time in my family. And then my business would suffer. It was like, what the hell do I do? How do I put together my whole life? And so I, again, for myself, I spent close to two years working on simply this problem. And I put together a system for myself that developed. It's a seven-step system. I worked on myself. I did it for two years. And my life came together. And it's stayed together.

[00:52:38] I got to be extremely happy. I've got my health. I've got the relationship. I got all the pieces in place. And I learned how to do this. And so I started mentoring, coaching some of my VIP students. In fact, at my home originally. I'm in my private circle of how to do this. And they did it. And so now I put together this really amazing result-based program called, well, it's basically a life makeover system.

[00:53:07] And it just really works. So I've got this experiential webinar where you not only learn the skills of life design, but actually walk everyone right through every part of the design program right there. And I just want to teach everybody three things right now, because whether you get on the program or not, it's completely up to you. But I need you to answer three of the seven questions right here. So everyone, listen closely. Write the questions down. James, I hope you're going to ask them if they get this later. I got my own pen and paper out.

[00:53:36] Okay, listen closely. Okay. So of the seven parts of the system, these are three questions you're going to have to answer. Number one is clarity. What do you really want? Remember the number one reason most people don't get what they want is because they don't know what they really want. And I'm not talking superficial. I'm not talking about the laundry list you put down on January 1st for your New Year's resolutions every year that don't come true. I'm not talking that. The reason they don't come true, by the way, is because they're not what you really want.

[00:54:06] So if someone says, I want to lose 60 pounds, you're saying that might not be what they really want. It is not what they want. They want to eat more than that. Okay. They want to sit around watching TV more than that. So what they want is eating and sitting on TV. That's what they want. It's okay. But don't fool anybody, especially yourself. Okay. So you have to know what you want and it has to come from your heart, from your soul. And here's the biggest thing. What's right for you at this point of time in your life?

[00:54:35] And that's what everybody forget. They keep putting the same stupid laundry list for their New Year's resolutions for the next 20 years. And then you know what? You change in your life. You become a different person. Other things become priorities for you. You need to really hone that in. The second, and that's one of the things we work in the Life Makeover Program. The second question is critical, James. This is one that nobody will ever ask you. But until I asked myself this question, now that it worked, then here's what it was.

[00:55:02] So basically, if you know what you want and you said you want this, how come you're not getting it? So the second question is, why don't you already have what you want? And that's really shocking for people. And it's deep for people. Why don't you already have it? I guarantee it's not the first time you said this. I want this. Good. Why don't you already have it? Then this, here's the scary part. Everyone listen closely.

[00:55:28] Is that the reason you don't have it right now will very likely be the exact same reason. I hate to say this, but you will never, ever, ever have it. And if you do, it'll be temporary and you'll end up losing it. So this is a hugely important area. What's stopping you now will stop you in the future until you remove that roadblock. It doesn't just dissipate by itself, okay? You've got to go in, understand it, recognize, go, holy crap, this is what's been said. This is why I don't have this.

[00:55:56] The third key you have to ask yourself is, now, what do you need to do to get what you want? So now that I know what I want, now that I know what's stopping me, I need to be able to remove that. Then what do I need to do? Both, here they are. You have to have a new strategy, new strategy, not an old one, that actually works in the real world and a plan of action to go with it. There's a saying that says, if you keep doing what you've always done, you'll keep getting what you've always got.

[00:56:26] That's obvious. And so to get something different, you're going to have to do something different. And most people don't want to do anything different. They like the idea, but they won't do it. And they won't do it on their own. It's like, if I want to be really successful, then I have to give up this and this. And my contention is, you only think that way because you don't grow the system. And I used to think that way too. And then when I tried to, well, let me try to balance it.

[00:56:52] Huge problems occurred because I didn't know how to balance it. But now I do. And so I teach that. So how do you have balanced success in your life? And that's a beautiful thing that most people are missing. Well, thanks again, Harv. This has been great. And look, if I'm ever in Maui, I hope we can have a coffee or something. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you, everybody, for listening. And I feel very blessed that I'm able to give anybody advice right now because, you know,

[00:57:22] I was broke for a long time and I swore up to the heavens that, God, if somehow I make it, I've gone through so much myself and I know what it feels like that I swear to God, I will help other people make it too if it works for me. And that's all I'm doing. I'm just keeping a promise. So I'm kind of scared to stop, to be honest with you. Well, the good thing is, and I also really recommend, you know, Secrets of the Millionaire Mind for people to read. It's a very, very good, quick read. And I found it to be very valuable. Okay.

[00:57:52] Well, thanks so much, Shane. And thank you, everybody. Bless you all and good luck to you. Excellent. Thanks, Harv. Sure. Bye-bye. At first, I didn't think it was real. I woke up to this blinding light and I was transported to another place. Pluto TV. Then I heard a voice.

[00:58:21] Come with me if you want to live. There were thousands of movies and shows and they were all free. The truth is ours. It's just so beautiful. On Pluto TV, free streaming of Terminator 2, Fringe, Arrow, The 100 and The X-Files may cause excitement, loss of sleep and sudden belief in extraterrestrials. No credit cards or alien encounters necessary. Pluto TV. Stream now. Pay never. To train wherever is your brother. And do you serve things like transport?