Measuring Success Beyond Money

In today’s episode, Rebecca Zung interviews me about rebuilding my life after losing over $100 million and recognizing how deeply I had tied my identity to money. I share how mentorship, faith, and listening to the people who loved me helped me change my thoughts, habits, and priorities. We also discuss my book, Don’t Do Business with Dicks, and the difference between people who intend harm and those who challenge us with honesty and compassion. From trusting my own judgment to learning how to ask for help, this conversation explores building success around service, meaningful relationships, and a stronger sense of self. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  David Meltzer is my guest. Welcome, welcome.

• 0:03Speaker 01

  Thank you, Rebecca. I love your show and it's an honor to be here and really appreciate the content that you're putting out as well. And these incredible books that you've written. So, thank you.

• 0:11Speaker 00

  Thank you. Thank you. Well, you've written a brand new book. It came out this year, Don't Do Business With Dicks. You have an amazing story. It goes back to when you first went to law school. And you came out and you got a job offer, right? In oil and gas or something like that. And your mom said, you better take that. And you said, no. Tell us about that.

• 0:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was probably a really important part of my life because I'm a mama's boy. And my mom's word was God to me. And so from a very young age, I'm sure your parents were very similar. Since your background, doctor, lawyer, failure, fetus wasn't fully developed till graduate school. There's only junior colleges in Harvard, Penn and Columbia, a variety of different pressures in my life. So when I went to law school to be an oil and gas litigator, I, my life was set. And the reason I went to law school was to make my mom happy, but more importantly, to make enough money to buy my mom a house. She raised six kids on her own. All the kids, except for me, went to the Ivy Leagues.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  And it was really important to me. So I was offered a job for a hundred and fifty thousand dollar salary in nineteen ninety-two. Plus bonus to be a lawyer.

• 1:28Speaker 00

  So much money.

• 1:29Speaker 01

  For a lawyer, right?

• 1:29Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:30Speaker 01

  And then this company, West Publishing, which had a monopoly. I know they don't like me saying that. But in nineteen ninety-two, West Publishing was the official reporter of all states, federal law, secondary, Black's Law Dictionary. And so they offered me a sales job.

• 1:46Speaker 00

  Shepherding cases.

• 1:47Speaker 01

  Right, exactly. And I, they had the digest system that made it easy. But they offered me a job with a comp plan to sell online books. And in nineteen ninety-two, online was not what it is today. In fact, when I told my mom, they offered me two hundred and fifty thousand at comp plan, which was more than the hundred and fifty thousand. That's why I was taking the job. She told me it wasn't going to last because the internet won't last. She actually said, the internet's a fad and nobody will ever use the internet. Later on in my career, talk about people close minded, because you're a technology person like me. Justice Scalia, I got to present West Law in DOS, ninety-six hundred bound modems on an XT computer on a luggage cart that I wheeled in.

• 2:30Speaker 01

  And I have a monochrome screen and I put, because there was only Boolean language searching, there was a natural, so it was slip S slash S. Fall.

• 2:39Speaker 00

  Oh, my God. I haven't heard the word Boolean in so long. Oh, my gosh.

• 2:42Speaker 01

  Grocery store.

• 2:43Speaker 00

  That's so crazy.

• 2:43Speaker 01

  And I used the California database for slip and fall cases in a grocery store. And it took like twelve minutes to bring up all the case law for grocery stores in California in reverse chronological order. Then I used WordPerfect five point one.

• 2:57Speaker 00

  WordPerfect.

• 2:58Speaker 01

  To cut and paste it into a memo or a document.

• 3:02Speaker 00

  I remember.

• 3:02Speaker 01

  And it took a total of fifteen minutes. Now, Justice Scalia looks at me, who's probably known as the, next to Ruth, the most preeminent legal scholar of our time. And he looks me right in the eye and he says, son, I just have to tell you. He goes, that was fast. He goes, but nobody, and I repeat, nobody will ever do research on a computer. You need books. That, that's a really important part because number one, when I took the job, I didn't listen to my mom. I started to realize that just because my mom loved me, doesn't mean she always gives me good advice. I only asked her questions about what she knew about. Obviously, she didn't know about business or technology.

• 3:47Speaker 01

  But I also learned from Justice Scalia, that just because you're the best at something, you may not know, excuse my language, dick about other things like legal research online. So for me, that was the change in my life, that no longer would I go off of faux pas or fear of other people's opinion, including my mom. Or Justice Scalia, the most preeminent legal scholar in the world. I was going to make my own decisions from what I believe to be true today. What's well, what does well, what's stable and what I think is going to do well in the future. And it's served me, it has served me to have that type of opinion of my own.

• 4:27Speaker 00

  That is so good. And I've never heard of faux pas before, but I'm totally using that now.

• 4:32Speaker 01

  Turn it to Joe Poe, joy of other people's opinion.

• 4:34Speaker 00

  Yes, I love that. Joy of only certain people's opinion.

• 4:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, not the dick.

• 4:40Speaker 00

  That's right. I have a great Justice Scalia story. I'll tell you sometime, but. Okay, so you turn that down. You go into working for West Law.

• 4:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:51Speaker 00

  Right? And you end up, somehow you end up in the, the sports world.

• 4:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think that's an important thing because a lot of people tell me I want to be in the position that you're in. I want to run the most notable sports agency in the world. I want to hang out with all the biggest billionaires, millionaires, entrepreneurs, celebrities, athletes and entertainers. Which is what I got to do. But I didn't get there because I was a great lawyer or a great sports agent. What I did was develop skills and my knowledge aligned with these three things. I kept looking at what's doing well today, what's stable today, and what do I think is doing well in the future? And I would develop these skills. And the two skills that I developed were number one, technology. So I was a student of technology. I wasn't an engineer, but I was a student, kind of like an applied mathematician.

• 5:39Speaker 01

  I call myself an applied technologist. I would apply technology to business. Like Einstein was probably the greatest applied mathematician, not the best mathematician. And so for me, I learned technology, but I also learned venture capital. So when Lee Steinberg, the most notable sports agent in the world, they made the movie Jerry Maguire about him. When he met me, Jeff Moorad had just bought into the Diamondbacks, left him without a COO. He saw the future of sports in two thousand and one in technology and venture capital. Like, just like Lee, absolutely right. Go read sports news. It's only about technology and venture. It's not about any individual athlete in, in some sport side.

• 6:23Speaker 01

  It's all that, just read Sports Business Journal, look on LinkedIn, it's all there. So I was blessed. I developed those two skills and I ended up, most people thinking that I'm this great sports agent. But really, I'm really good at technology and venture capital and I apply it to sports.

• 6:40Speaker 00

  Well, you're speaking my language right now.

• 6:42Speaker 01

  I know.

• 6:45Speaker 00

  I want to talk about mindset because you are so a master at mindset, but it's really something that you've had to work on. There was a time in your life when you actually lost everything.

• 6:58Speaker 01

  Over a hundred million dollars.

• 6:59Speaker 00

  A hundred million dollars. And I think your marriage was, you know.

• 7:03Speaker 01

  Very much were shaky.

• 7:04Speaker 00

  Shaky. Yeah. And I've met your beautiful wife and you guys are really good and solid now. But there was a time.

• 7:11Speaker 01

  Forgiving.

• 7:14Speaker 00

  She's awesome. So tell us where your mindset was then and what you had to do to come out of that.

• 7:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, so my mindset was a scarce mindset, a competitive comparative mindset. Everything was a competition to me for the sake of making money. It started.

• 7:33Speaker 00

  Scarcity mindset.

• 7:34Speaker 01

  So, yeah, sorry.

• 7:35Speaker 00

  Fear, right?

• 7:35Speaker 01

  Fear, needing to prove myself, needing to defend myself, needing to control everything. And all these needs of the ego, for the sake originally, was to buy my mom a house and a car. But that came so fast, it, it lost its meaning to me. So money then became my identity. Originally, I had the right idea with making money. It was for the sake of helping my mom and my family. But I made so much money so early, I lost that meaning of money and it just became my identity. My identity was so tied to money that with millions and millions of dollars in my bank account, if it went up a hundred dollars, my personality would change. And if it went down a hundred dollars, my wife would ask me, what's the matter?

• 8:20Speaker 01

  And I'd be like, oh, our bank account's down. And she'd panic going, what do you mean? I'm like, yeah, it's down like two hundred and fifty dollars. And she's like, you have a sickness.

• 8:30Speaker 00

  So your self-worth was tied to that?

• 8:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 8:32Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 8:33Speaker 01

  I could not feel good about myself if I didn't have money. Everything was tied to my.

• 8:38Speaker 00

  Your self-worth was directly tied to the external factors.

• 8:41Speaker 01

  In my marriage, as a dad, in my family, in my community. And it wasn't that I wasn't generous. Right? I was, I gave away a lot of money, but I gave it away for the wrong reasons. And I shopped for things for the wrong reason. My whole premise today is about making a lot of money.

• 8:58Speaker 00

  What were those wrong reasons?

• 9:00Speaker 01

  For people to think that I was separate from, inferior, superior, you know, the need to be right, the need to.

• 9:08Speaker 00

  Maybe image.

• 9:10Speaker 01

  Total self-worth. So anything, or to be liked. But I used my money to be liked. I took people on trips. I paid for every meal, all kinds of gifts to people and to charity. I, I, you know, and I'm not proud of it, but I'm glad I did this. I would, you ever seen Larry David, the one where he's like, oh, my God, I wish you could have given it anonymously. And people still knew it was you that gave it. That was me, right?

• 9:39Speaker 01

  That was me like I would only give money like so that people would know. Thank God, that's a good place to spend it, but I have to be honest when I was young. I would give a lot of money so that people would know I gave a lot of money. It's not that I didn't care about the cause, but I wouldn't have given my money if it was truly anonymous. And then nobody thanked me for it, which is I do a lot of things today that nobody knows. And it's I'll get choked up on one of the things. All the gifts I've given during the holidays, I buy two. And then I go down to the Women's Center during and and I give all the gifts. And I'd sit and watch. That's it. That's all. I, I, I, nobody knows my name.

• 10:23Speaker 01

  Like I come every year and I just sit. All I ask is I can sit and watch, but not be known. Nobody thanks me. I don't want, and I would have never done that. And you know, I would want to be Santa Claus and have everybody hug me and thank me and tell me I'm the best.

• 10:41Speaker 00

  And that's so beautiful that it's the Women's Center. Is it like battered abuse women?

• 10:45Speaker 01

  With children, so.

• 10:46Speaker 00

  Yeah. And as a recovering family law attorney, I've, you know, been on that side of things. Yeah.

• 10:54Speaker 00

  So what did you have to do to get out of that? Like what shifted for you?

• 11:00Speaker 01

  Well, first I needed to pay attention to people that really love me.

• 11:03Speaker 00

  Well, I think there's a step before that.

• 11:06Speaker 01

  As far as.

• 11:07Speaker 00

  Before, like you had to shift something in here.

• 11:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 11:10Speaker 00

  To say, okay, I'm gonna start paying attention, but what's.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  Oh, no, not pay attention, meaning I had red flags.

• 11:16Speaker 00

  Yeah. So what shifted for you internally?

• 11:19Speaker 01

  For me, it was I wasn't surrounding myself with the right people and the right ideas. So I started to.

• 11:26Speaker 00

  But why, why?

• 11:27Speaker 01

  Because of my insecurity, my ego, I had the need to be right, offended, separate, inferior, superior, anxious, frustrated, guilty. I, I literally misunderstood the power and I always sought wisdom, but I never had faith.

• 11:41Speaker 00

  And how did you start to feel better about yourself? Because there, I think there has to be this shift. You know, I know I've had it in my life as well, where you kind of make a decision that you're gonna have a different identity.

• 11:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, it came from understanding how identity is formed. So for me, I had to change first my thoughts, then my perception, then the meaning that was created by that. And then the intentions that were driven by the meaning and then the behaviors. And so I started with the thoughts that I had and then perceptions, then meaning, then intention. I started changing what I thought, believe, felt and did and say. And I, I started creating frameworks and methodologies and had mentorship from Bob Proctor, Dr. Wayne Dyer. So I, I started surrounding myself with the people that were in the situation mindset wise that I wanted to be with.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  I started to create faith. So one of the people or things was just God. Like for, for me, it was there's no evidence. You know, or the evidence was contrary that it'd ever be where I wanted to be. And once I gave my faith that I don't understand and that I was protected, promoted, loved and perfected. And my mom and my wife played a major role in my mindset shift.

• 13:07Speaker 01

  And you know, I started, like I said, listening.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  I, I hated my mom, my dad, my best friend and my wife. And that was the day I realized I could, you know, all these other people love me and I couldn't understand why.

• 13:22Speaker 00

  You couldn't receive it.

• 13:23Speaker 01

  Well, because they're telling me the truth. And then I realized I hated myself. And so that initial thing, when I realized I, I'm the liar, the cheater, the manipulator, overseller, back end seller. And I don't hate them. I hated myself. That's where the work started. Then I had to go find the people. You know, the smartest thing that I learned was the fastest way to get to where I wanted to be was find someone that was already there. And then help someone else get to where they wanted to be. And I stuck to that. I still stick that 18 years later. You know, I'm not afraid of calling, you know, Wolfgang Puck, asking him how to make something, right? I like, it sounds silly, but I make sure I get people's numbers so that they can tell me what they know about.

• 14:07Speaker 01

  I was out there talking to the COO of Bugatti because Mike and I have a vintage Bronco. And I wanted to get your questions about creating something that makes people feel, right? They're not three million dollar cars, but I want to capture that same like, and I've been able to do it the first one, but I want to be able to replicate it. So it's really important mentorship now.

• 14:28Speaker 00

  So let's talk about thoughts for a second because I know I, I kind of always jokingly say, but not really jokingly, which is that I can never leave my thoughts unsupervised because.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  Very Michael Singer-esque.

• 14:42Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, I've read his books.

• 14:45Speaker 00

  Because you know, of those old neuronal patterns that will take over. So what did you have to do to really form new neuronal patterns?

• 14:55Speaker 01

  Great question. That, that was the key to the whole thing is understanding the conscious continuum. So I started being very disciplined in canceling things in the conscious level. So I'd cancel people that made me feel bad or did bad things, bad thoughts, bad words, bad feelings. I'd literally say out loud, and my whole family does now, cancel. You know, even Nick, uh, who's the Nick Awam, right? I'll say something like, man, I hope the plane's not late. And he'll say to me, cancel, right? So in the conscious level, then on the subconscious level, when things are repetitive, I know it's in my subconscious. So I started to do clearing exercises to clear the negative intermediate stored memories that I had, traumas, et cetera, that were causing. So I, I'd clear those and then the real work became.

• 15:39Speaker 00

  I think even before that, you had to go, I'm seeing myself have this thought.

• 15:43Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Yeah. Who, I would actually go a step even further in front of that. Who's seeing, right? A lot of people don't answer that. Who's seeing that thought, right?

• 15:53Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 15:54Speaker 01

  Because that was the identity problem I had. So I wanted to get in touch with, who is it that's seeing this? Saying this, feeling this, believing this. And then moving towards that repetitive pattern, clearing it. But then I got involved in the energy side of it, started studying quantum healing, theta meditation, transfer, transmission type of information. And, and I learned to shift my energy, which is directly communicating with the epigenetic layer, activating different things in my code, my hard code, the conscious competency that I have, the unconscious competency.

• 16:31Speaker 00

  Oh my gosh, you're saying so many things that I just want you to clarify for people who are listening.

• 16:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 16:35Speaker 00

  So good. And you're like breezing through them because you like just know this stuff like the back of your hand.

• 16:43Speaker 02

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• 17:12Speaker 00

  First, let's go back to epigenetics. Like, because you can actually change the coding in your, in your genetic, in your cells. Talk about that.

• 17:20Speaker 01

  Yeah. So there's a communication layer between you and your code. And it probably terrifies people, you're an AI person like me, how we could actually perceive ourselves as being AI of some God or, or something. Because there's actually a hard code and there's act, there's an activation layer to your code. And, and, and people get confused. This is where it got clear for me. If they say you could build a habit in 21 days or remove a habit in 21 days, then why is there alcoholism? Because i- if you could do that, you would just stop drinking for 21 days and you would never want another drink. But why is it you still want to drink? Because your subconscious still, it has activation of drinking.

• 18:04Speaker 01

  But even more importantly, your genetics, your genetic and energetic inheritance is stored into a computer cell called DNA is telling you this is a behavior. And regardless of whether you stopped or not, it's always going to be there. That's why you have to have daily practices to compensate for our coding. So the epigenetic layer, the more that we communicate with it, it starts to activate that. And that's why you can break the chain of genetic and energetic inheritance. Because you're constantly telling yourself, I don't drink. You know, Michael Singer, one of my favorite things as an example is way back then, remember how people had so much trouble quitting smoking? It was a big deal, right?

• 18:45Speaker 01

  And it was the silliest thing because people would say, well, I just don't know how to stop smoking. Well, really, don't put a fucking cigarette in your mouth. That's how you stop smoking. If you do not put a cigarette in your mouth, you will not smoke. But why is it that we smoke? Well, because free will is different. And will itself is different. And this is where faith comes in. You know, whose will is it? Your will is actually interfering with God's will. You're part of God. So you're interfering with God's will. You're not willing God. You're interfering with God's will. And so we have to use our free will to put ourselves at ease.

• 19:28Speaker 01

  And one of the ways to do that is understand the conscious, the subconscious and the unconscious and the genetic and energetic inheritance that we have. You can look for clues, patterns and make better choices. That's the way, you know, as I describe it to people, I'm constantly looking for clues and patterns of my behavior. So that I make better choices that are aligned with results. I was with Nick Saban. And I gave this understanding in a speech. And afterwards, he said, Dave, I just have to tell you, this really resonates with me about the thoughts become perceptions, perceptions meaning, meaning intention, intention, behaviors. He said, when I first started coaching, I was like you, except for it was with championships.

• 20:09Speaker 01

  All I cared about is I would do anything to win a national championship, anything. He's embarrassed to tell you the same way I'm embarrassed to tell you, I would do anything for money. Right, that's who I was and that's who Nick Saban was. He said, the day changed when I decided that I was going to build champions. I had 85 kids every year that I was going to build into champions. Because champions win championships. And I stopped worrying about winning.

• 20:38Speaker 00

  I always say that your net worth is directly tied to impact. You will only make money when you are actually making an impact. And that's why the Taylor Swift's of the world make so much money because she has such an impact. But you can just tie that to absolutely anyone and.

• 20:56Speaker 01

  Including Mother Teresa, Google how much money she, her net worth when she passed.

• 21:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's always tied to impact. So when you shift the focus away from yourself, that's when you really start to see a difference. And that's what happened with me with YouTube, quite frankly.

• 21:11Speaker 01

  A million subscribers.

• 21:12Speaker 00

  Yeah, 1.1 million, it's like.

• 21:15Speaker 01

  Don't discount me, 1.1.

• 21:17Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 21:19Speaker 00

  You know, that first 100,000 was, I worked hard for that.

• 21:22Speaker 01

  That's like I had a friend too, he had six, he had 6.7 billion dollars. And he would say like, you know, 6 billion, I'm like, dude, if the 7.7 billion isn't worth it, then just give it to me.

• 21:33Speaker 00

  Yeah, exactly.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  It's not even worth saying. Just send it over, I'll give it to charity.

• 21:40Speaker 00

  It's not an easy game. But you know, it's really because I started giving away information and making an impact.

• 21:46Speaker 01

  Really good.

• 21:47Speaker 00

  Yeah, and that's what makes the difference. I watch a shift because I think it seems like a kind of a hard left, but it actually is not because you're talking about your mindset and impact and all of these things. You have a book out on not doing business with dicks.

• 22:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:04Speaker 00

  And I want you to talk about that because a lot of people are always over there going, well, how do I not do that? I mean, how am I going to know if somebody is a dick?

• 22:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's such a good question. So first of all, I gotta explain the title. So I've written books, Connected to Goodness, Compassionate Capitalism, Unstoppable, Creating the Life You Love, Game Time Decision Making. I will tell you, nobody walked by the airport and saw compassionate capitalism. I don't think anybody walked into a college and saw compassionate capitalism and said, damn, I want to read that book.

• 22:34Speaker 00

  I need that.

• 22:35Speaker 01

  So Simon and Schuster said, Dave, your books are really impactful, but you can't sell a secret. Go home and think, because it was going to be how to ditch toxicity from your life. That was going to be the genius title this time. And they said, Dave, you need to, you're a marketing guy, you're embarrassing yourself. Think of something that people would grab out of your hands and say, that's the book I need to read. So I took a line from Lee Steinberg and it worked. And I added the rocket to it, that didn't hurt either. So people literally, I don't think I had to write the book, I could just title the book and it was sold more than all my other books combined. So number one, the title of the book is for sales because you can't sell a secret. And if nobody reads your book, what good is it?

• 23:18Speaker 01

  But inside of it, it's really about, based off of my favorite book, Outwitting the Devil by Napoleon Hill, about what I call the opposition, about negative energy. And one of the greatest materialized forms of negative energy are negative people. You know, and I can love negative people from afar. And we all have those people, they're called family and friends.

• 23:42Speaker 00

  No, I always say send them lifeblood over there.

• 23:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, pray for their happiness. So I go through, but here's one of the interesting things too about my misperceptions in writing the book. And then it evolves in it is this idea of feeding yourself this positive energy. There's a nuance in energy that some people, they may not be what you perceive as nice. We talked about earlier, but they're, they're kind, but you may misperceive it as bleeding. Right, some people bleed you and you bleed. Some people bleed you and it feeds you. And that's what we were talking with Wolfgang Puck and his first mentor. And understanding this idea of don't do business with dicks, it doesn't mean you don't do business

• 24:26Speaker 01

  with people that push you, that may not be nice to you, that expect more from you than you even think is possible. And I think people, especially today, misinterpret that as a dick. Someone that intends you harm, whether they're saying nice things or positive things to you, I think is a dick. But I know a lot of people in my life still call me out, you know, I have this amazing concierge, optimal health partner, Doug Grant. And he's not always nice to me because he's honest, right? The truth is kind. But if he, I wouldn't be where I am today health wise if he said, doing great, Dave.

• 25:06Speaker 00

  But what is the intent?

• 25:07Speaker 01

  Don't worry about the Happy Meal.

• 25:09Speaker 00

  But what's the intent behind it?

• 25:11Speaker 01

  Right, exactly.

• 25:12Speaker 00

  And is there compassionate intent?

• 25:13Speaker 01

  And when my mom passed, you know, much later, she shed dimension. Anybody that has to experience that with a parent is so bleeding. But then I said to myself, wow, how much have I learned? How much have I grown? How much has it elevated? How much I love her? And how much did it illustrate that I bled her? Especially when I was a teenager. And I wonder if she felt the same way, that me being a pain in her ass was a great feeding of her, that she was able and capable of, you know, helping me become who I was.

• 25:48Speaker 00

  I wanted to push on this, don't do business with dicks thing. Because I think that part of it is also, the world is a mirror for who you are in some ways. Do you think, do you believe that?

• 26:01Speaker 01

  100, if you ever want to see Sanskrit, they have the rules of being human. One of the rules of being human, besides life's about lessons, the lessons keep on coming until you learn them. You're a mirror, right? That's one of the lessons. Don't forget, you'll forget every lesson ever learned, but you have the power to remember, remind and recollect that lesson at any time. So anybody look up 10 rules of being human in Sanskrit, probably the simplest, next to the Tao, the simplest way to change your life. But absolutely believe that.

• 26:32Speaker 00

  So if you flip that and you go, okay, I'm not a victim, I actually take responsibility for my life, how does that change?

• 26:41Speaker 01

  The way we take control is by asking ourselves, what did I do to be responsible? What did I do to attract this to myself? And what am I doing to participate in this perception? And most importantly, all three are for one purpose, what am I supposed to learn from it? Once again, going back to life's about lessons and they'll keep on coming until you learn them. So for me, I'm constantly asking, and some really bad things have happened in my life. And I was even in therapy, I was, you know, unfortunately molested when I was nine. And I, I didn't go to therapy until I was 50 because I was just one of those people that said, never impacted me.

• 27:16Speaker 00

  Who needs that?

• 27:17Speaker 01

  Just like divorce.

• 27:18Speaker 00

  Nobody can tell me anything.

• 27:19Speaker 01

  My dad leaving my mom at five, oh, that never impacted me at all. So I'm working through this stuff. And I said to him, at the time, I said, well, I'm accountable for me being, this horrible thing happened to me. I attracted this into my life. And he was so adamant about like, and he actually got me to bring in a picture when I was nine, he goes, in what world with this little boy? Be responsible or attract this into your life. Like, explain, explain this to me. And I said, hmm. And that's why I understood that it was more than saying to yourself, I'm responsible for stupid shit.

• 28:01Speaker 01

  Or that I, that I'm not. I wasn't responsible for it. I thought I was responsible for it because I didn't tell my mom. Because in my mind at nine, it would disrupt everything so much that I didn't want to tell my mom. Because it would ruin her. And it would ruin her reputation and like, as like all these things in my mind at nine. But what it really was, this idea of what am I doing to participate in the perception? That's where the lesson lied in those tragic things. I'm not responsible for someone doing that to me. I didn't attract it to myself, but I was responsible or accountable for participating in this perception. And I had lessons to learn because I was still participating in a perception

• 28:46Speaker 01

  of it that was not aligned with my divine direction, with helping other people or learning and becoming stronger. Or one of the biggest things I've learned in faith, and it changed my life, is how difficult it is to be a parent. See, parents and God have the same purpose. We are here to protect, promote, love and perfect our children. That is it. Just like God is here to protect, promote, love and perfect his children or her children, whatever you believe in. So here, here's the problem. In true infinite beings, they're capable of allowing you to strengthen yourself. In, in what world would you allow your child to be molested?

• 29:32Speaker 01

  Any parent on here, are you brave enough to say, I'm gonna allow my child to be molested because I'm protecting, promoting, loving and perfecting that child? I can understand how God can allow it to happen because of his infinite being, that it actually creates a better being. And we have these human constructs, so it seems so awful. And that's why you say, well, why would God allow this to happen? Because he's actually protecting, promoting, loving, perfecting you, which has been the theme of my life. It's like, why would God punish me? And take all my money in my mom's house? She had to move. Why would God do? Yes, I know now, 18 years later in the infinite time. And I thank God for it.

• 30:17Speaker 01

  But I didn't know at the moment, and I certainly wouldn't, or have the power or the confidence to do that to any of my children. And I think that's where faith lies, when you realize how you feel about your own children. And that we just aren't infinite or powerful enough to do shit like that to our own kids. Because we just don't know. But if you knew that allowing your child to be molested, which create this unbelievable person, strengthen them and lead millions of people and raise billions of dollars or change the world because of that, if you knew that, you may change your mind that you, as, as an infinite being, I couldn't do it. But that just shows you how powerful God and faith are.

• 31:01Speaker 01

  Because you can ask tons of people like me that shitty things have happened to, that thank God, that he gave me the power to get through it. Not even thanking him for doing it to me, but giving me the power to get through that, and to learn from it.

• 31:18Speaker 00

  So one final question. If somebody just ran into you in an elevator and said, hey, give me one piece of advice, something impactful for me today, what would you tell them?

• 31:30Speaker 01

  Ask for help. No doubt. I had too many people limit themselves with the most powerful thing that we have. It's called humanity. And it, it all shifted, and you'll hear this tonight at dinner if you're coming. When you're able and capable of helping someone else, you're closest to God. When you're able and capable of helping someone else, you're at your higher self. So when you don't ask for help or receive help from others, you're cheating. You're cheating people of being closest to God. You're cheating people of being at your highest self. And it's the fastest way to get to where you want to be, to empower yourself so you can help empower other people. It's completely aligned with my mission of empowering over a billion people

• 32:11Speaker 01

  to make a lot of money for the sake of helping more people and having fun. Because I've never met anyone who makes a lot of money for the sake of helping others and having fun that isn't happy. Not one person have I ever met that do those three things. And I know for me, I've never been happier because I make more money than I ever have, and I help more people than I ever imagined. And I have more fun, enjoy every part, even what I don't like or love about what I do, I enjoy it. So that's what I wish for everybody here.

• 32:41Speaker 00

  Well, thank you, David. It's a pleasure.