Lessons from a very rich human

First things first: in December, part of our crew will be in NYC running a training on speaking (and selling) from stage. In February, we are running an event in Deer Valley, Utah.

If you like to ski, come join us.

The topic for February is YouTube, Content Amplification & Social Media Distribution. It will be a lot of fun. Go here for more details on all of our events for next year.

How to Get Rich

“A man always has two reasons for the things he does — a good one and the real one.” — JP Morgan

If you’re going to fix your game, you first need to know why. This isn’t woo-woo, it’s pretty basic neurobiology. Your brain doesn’t waste energy… it’s calibrated to rig the odds for maximum chances of survival under any circumstances.

Trust me, it won’t waste resources just because you tell it to do something.

There are evolutionary codes that OUTRANK you and your “preferences.” You will need to give it a very good reason to go through the energy-burn of creating great ideas. But then comes execution, and that’s even harder…

As the late, great Sam Walton (founder of Walmart) said:

“Nothing in the world is cheaper than a good idea without any action behind it.”

I tend to go through cycles with my studies. And lately I’ve been back on a history kick. These old entrepreneurs were just tough as nails. If you were soft, you died.

(Death in this case means you were absorbed by John D. Rockefeller or pulled under by JP Morgan; I don’t mean they literally killed humans)

And yet, people competed (and won). It was very hard to beat Rockefeller. It was very hard to beat JP Morgan. And yet, Henry Ford held his own (Morgan tried to get into his business with financing and Ford said no). Rockefeller got so big he had multiple fights with the government and, like all companies facing big government, eventually lost. JP Morgan and Theodore Roosevelt hated each other for a time.

I’m telling you, it was brutal!

Interesting Lessons from Great Entrepreneurs

  • “There will always be room for the man with energy and imagination, the man who can successfully implement new ideas into new products and services.” J. Paul Getty

  • “I studied the lives of great men and famous women, and I found that the men and women who got to the top were those who did the jobs they had in hand, with everything they had of energy and enthusiasm and hard work.” Harry S. Truman
  • Sam Walton was optimistic all the time. He felt the world was something he could conquer. -Vance Trimble
  • Every day an estimated 2.4 million pounds of manure and sixty thousand gallons of urine flooded onto the streets— Traffic was often obstructed by horses that dropped dead in their tracks from heat and illness, and approximately fifteen thousand dead or crippled beasts had to be removed from the streets every year. -David Landes

Quick aside: this is how important innovation is. If Henry Ford was regulated the way Elon Musk is regulated, we’d be driving horses around in the street right now. Not all regulation is helpful or beneficial to society. The United States is getting lapped innovatively right now because of the pendulum swing from the early 1900s.

  • “True entrepreneurs never fail, sometimes it doesn't work out, but they never fail.” -Sam Zell
  • ”It is said that to be an overnight success takes years of effort. So it has proved with me. There were twenty years of debt, personal overdraft liabilities, at times, of millions of pounds.” -James Dyson

By the end of his life, Disney had made 700 films in 14 languages. He experienced 8 separate mental breakdowns. He was either accepting an Oscar or desperately trying to avoid bankruptcy.

About his life, he said this:

“All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all the troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me. You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.”

It doesn’t have to be easy.

It has to be worth it.


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