Unstuck Economics: How Ordinary People Turn Smart Hustles into Real Wealth with Bo Jacob

0:02John Lee Dumas:Who's ready to rock today, Fire Nation? JLD here, and welcome to Entrepreneurs on Fire, brought to you by High Level, the all-in-one sales and marketing platform. Today, we'll be breaking down unstuck economics, how ordinary people turn smart hustles into real wealth. To drop these value bombs, I brought Bo Jacob into EO Fire Studios. Bo is a CPA, investor, and entrepreneur with 20-plus years in real estate and business, teaching proven wealth strategies to help others achieve financial freedom and live with purpose. And today we talk about why so many feel stuck. Rent an income versus own income, making the first move, passive income.

0:36John Lee Dumas:Is that real? And oh, so much more. And the big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Bo and our sponsors. My best piece of advice when it comes to getting your business up and running, keep things simple. Start your business today with the industry's best business partner, Shopify, and start hearing. Sign up for your$1 per a month trial today at shopify.com slash on fire. Go to shopify.com slash on fire. If you are building a real business, you need real infrastructure. High level gives you website hosting, funnels, email marketing, automation, calendar booking, payments, and course hosting all on one platform.

1:12John Lee Dumas:Plus award-winning 24 seven supports get a 30 day free trial and my full bonus stack that includes a 15 minute private call with me and much more at high level fire.com high level fire.com. Bo say what's up to fire nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. Hey, John, uh, thank you so much for having me on the show. A huge fan of what, uh, what you're doing here and just, just the, just the help and the inspiration that, that you provide all to all the entrepreneurs out there. Um, so like, like you mentioned, I just published a book called Unstuck Economics, How Ordinary People Turn Smart Hustles into Real Wealth.

1:55You can get it on Amazon and print Kindle or the podcast listeners. You can even get it as an audio book. But back to your question, you know, I'm, and you probably just agree with me that I'm just not convinced that, you know, the traditional path that society teaches us, it's hard for it to lead to success and to true financial freedom. I think the traditional script, it just says, go to school, get a job, save a little eventually when you're 65 and old and you can finally retire and hopefully have enough to scrape by. But I think that was built for a different economy. I think today so many things have gotten so much more expensive.

2:35It's hard to get homes. And, you know, even, you know, this latest in AI, we fear of, you know, is my profession going to get replaced? You know, I think even of my kids, you know, in 30 years, what's still going to be around and how can I set them up for success? But, you know, I'm not trying to paint, you know, a doom and gloom picture, but I think where some doors closed, I think in today's age, the benefit we have is that if you are willing to work and if you have just a$300 laptop and an internet connection, you know, there's endless possibilities. for you. And so I think, Chance, the question that most of us might disagree with is that, you know, I think, and maybe even when you started off, John, is that you might have a lot of people doubting you.

3:17You know, your parents might be thinking, oh man, like why is our son, you know, quitting this job to pursue this? But I think that, again, there are these other paths that can really pay off in the long term. So I would say, you know, if you really want to get unstuck, there is another path out there. We see a ton of successful people who have taken the road less traveled, if you will. And this isn't because they're smarter than you are or luckier than you are. They simply decided to get unstuck and they didn't stop until they did.

3:49John Lee Dumas:And Fire Nation, that's why we're talking about unstuck economics, how ordinary people turn smart hustles into real wealth. And Beau, let's talk about why so many people feel stuck. I mean, it's just a reality of the world that we live in today because they're doing everything they were told to do. They were told to get the degree, to work hard, to save money, yet they still feel financially stuck. What the heck is happening? I think the real reason people feel stuck is because their effort isn't translating into progress the way it used to. It's not that people aren't working hard, that they're lazy.

4:23It's that they're putting all this effort into a system that I think has a ceiling built into it. if your entire financial life depends on just one income stream, your nine to five job where you'll only get paid when you show up, you're always going to feel that pressure because your income can only grow so fast, but your expenses, they don't have that same limit. So what happens is people do everything right. They get the degree, they work hard, they save, but they're still stuck in this cycle where they're trading time for money and they're not getting ahead. And in my book, Unstuck Economics, I talk about this idea that people aren't actually out of time or opportunity.

5:00They're just not making moves that change their position. And that's why it feels frustrating because you're doing more, but nothing is really changing.

5:09John Lee Dumas:I want to talk about rented income versus owned income, Beau, because to me, this is something that a lot of people need to understand because you make a powerful distinction between the two. Rented income, owned income. What is the difference? And why does that shift completely change how somebody thinks about wealth? This is a shift that changed everything for me. You know, I call it rented income versus owned income. I think others call it active versus passive income. But I just like thinking of income that works for you as owned income. You know, rented income is your paycheck. You only get paid when you work.

5:42The moment you stop working, it stops coming in. Owned income is when you build something that keeps paying you whether you're working or not. So in the book, you know, I use the analogy of just rowing versus sailing. Rented income is rowing. You only move when you're paddling, right? Owned income is sailing. You set it up once and then the momentum carries you. And John, I'll actually admit, I actually read your book, John, The Common Path to Uncommon Success. And I'm here to talk about my book, but I'll pitch yours as well. But you mentioned being able to take a three-month vacation. Yes. Right?

6:12And since you built up Fire Nation and all the appendages attached to it, you know, your business keeps working even when you're away. It keeps generating that income. And I covered this concept in my book. You know, I've covered a ton of examples from my own life, whether in real estate, picking the right products to sell, starting out on social media and how to monetize it. But it can be even simpler, right? You know, I had a friend who learned how to install wallpaper. I haven't installed, I haven't, you know, installed wallpaper myself, but I can't imagine being, you know, rocket science, right?

6:39But she learned how, she had a good eye for design. she started doing the jobs herself at first, right? But then what happened, right? Demand grows, she was able to hire a team and now she earns from every job without doing the work. And I think she's gonna net about half a million dollars in revenue this year. Same thing with my house cleaner. And again, I'm trying to just focus on these simple examples. That's what the book is about, just ordinary opportunities. My house cleaner was great at what she did. She got more demand that she could handle. Then what happened, right? Where's the switch?

7:09She hired a team, she added a margin and now the business pays her whether she's cleaning or not. And that's the shift, right? Where it started off as active income. You only get paid for each hour that you work to creating a system that could earn money without needing to put in that hour of, you know, putting up the wallpaper or cleaning. And I think that's the shift, right? Working for income to owning income. And I think the real question that people should ask themselves is, how many things in your life are actually paying you without your time? Because for most people, I think the answer is zero.

7:40and that's why they feel stuck. So once you start building even one owned income stream, I think it completely changes how you think about money and what's possible.

7:48John Lee Dumas:Well, Bo, I love how you're using examples that everybody can resonate with. It's like wallpaper, got it. Like laying down carpet, like we get it. Like maybe doing roofing, like being a housekeeper. I mean, these are real examples we can look around and say, what problems can we solve? And I think it's even better to be like, what problems can we solve that AI is probably not gonna be able to solve for the foreseeable future is obviously another good part of that question. So I want to move on to making the first move without blowing up our life, which of course we don't want to do because for someone with limited time and limited money, what is a realistic first step that they can take without quitting their job or taking massive financial risks?

8:29Thanks, John, for asking that. Again, going back to just my subtitle in my book, just this for ordinary people. I think most people think getting unstuck requires a huge leap, but it doesn't, right? It can start really small. You know, in my book, Unstuck Economics, I talk about this idea of seed money, just a small amount of capital that you intentionally set aside to build something with. And I don't know if I should be embarrassed to share, but it started out so small for me, right? Where I was commuting from New York City to Connecticut and it was an hour each way. And I think like, how can I monetize this.

9:05And I honestly, I signed up for Uber and I just, I just put in like, Hey, have me pick up people that are going my direction. And so I would just pick people up as I was driving, as I, as I was commuting. Um, I also signed up just to be a coach. Uh, I, I ran in college and I, I signed up to just coach people. I would meet them at the park, run with them for an hour, get my, get my exercise in and also get paid for it. Um, now again, that wasn't glamorous. And that, and that, That's exactly the point that I focus on things that ordinary people can do today to get unstuck. And the point of these small seed hustles was not to become a millionaire from those alone.

9:42I think it would take you a long, you'd have to drive a lot of Uber to become a millionaire, but to generate a little bit of seed money to just get in the game. And that seed capital is enough to throw up a website, create a prototype for a new product or make your first polished video as an influencer. And this is where I talk about, you know, I go on to just talk about the concept of, I'm sure you've all heard like the marshmallow experiment, right? Like, can you wait to eat that first marshmallow to get that second one? And so, and that's huge that most people, they'll eat that first marshmallow, you know, they get a little bit extra money and they need to upgrade their lifestyle.

10:19but the people who get unstuck, they use that money as fuel for their next move. I mean, I see this played out all the time and you probably see it too, John, where, you know, somebody has a good first year of business and then they upgrade their house based on how they think they'll do in year two, right? But then things don't work out as planned and they're stuck with all these, you know, very expensive commitments. And so as you focus on just small changes, building seed capital, you know, you train your mind to really spot opportunities everywhere, not just opportunities to make extra cash or make that seed capitals, but also opportunities to invest that seed capital.

10:55John Lee Dumas:Fire Nation, this is powerful when you realize that you can do this without blowing up your life. You can do this without taking massive financial risk, without quitting your job. This is stuff where you take that first step. We're going to be talking about passive income, choosing the right move, unstuck, what it actually looks like when we get back from thanking our sponsors. If you've ever tried to secure a traditional bank loan for your business, then you know the process is slow, complicated, and it rarely moves at the speed you need. In between increasingly strict lending requirements and a growing number of obstacles, you're often stuck waiting right when you need capital now.

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14:10John Lee Dumas:Visit highlevelfire.com and start building your something today. But we're back, and I want to talk about passive income. Is it real? Because the term passive income, it gets thrown around everywhere. Is it actually real? Or is that phrase misleaning, especially when we're talking about beginners? It's real, but I think it can be misunderstood, especially by beginners. Going back to what we've been talking about and what I try to really cover in the book, that I get into nine specific moves to really get you started on generating this kind of owned income. And obviously, any book that you write, you can't cover every single opportunity on the planet.

14:52But it's really just to get your mind thinking of, okay, maybe one of these nine moves works for me. Maybe it doesn't. And then my hope is that it'll help you think of something else that will work for you. But I think that people think that passive income, it means no work. And these offers that you see online about guaranteeing success with very little to no work, I would be very skeptical of those things. And John, I'm sure you're pretty well up on reading in kind of just entrepreneurship and kind of self-starting. And I think a lot of books, a big theme that I saw was just really about, hey, as long as you believe in yourself or you set that goal, the universe will come together and make it happen.

15:38And in my book, I don't try to sugarcoat that at all. I say that, hey, creating passive income, it's going to take a lot of work. Obviously, building up Fire Nation and everything you've done here, John, you're probably thinking like, man, this is a lot harder than law school, for example, right? Totally. And so every owned income stream, it starts active, whether it's real estate and a business or something online. And I talk about all these things in my book. But what you have to do is just first, protect your time like gold. And second, what I already talked about was protecting that second marshmallow and just investing in your hustle.

16:17I get into how do I, I walk through how to get started in e-commerce. I walk through how to think about stock market investments. I walk through how to start in real estate. I walk through how to start on social media or blogging and how to really grow your audience and how to effectively turn these, I call them moves in my book, how to effectively turn them all into moves, turn these moves into own income that generates income for you. So passive income is not something that is magically going to appear, right? It's the result of building something that outlives your time. And once you get even one of these things working for you, it changes everything.

16:50You stop thinking in terms of hours worked and you start thinking of terms of assets built or what am I actually building? So you ask the question, you know, not how do I make more money, but how do I actually build something, right? That keeps making money. And I think that is the shift that's going to put people on a complete different path.

17:09John Lee Dumas:You're completely right, Beau. I mean, ignorance is bliss when you're starting something. I mean, if I knew how hard it was going to be to take entrepreneurs on fire to the level that it is now, I may have never started, but guess what? Ignorance is bliss. I'm like, you know what? This sounds cool. Like talking to people online, like interviewing them, asking them about their successes and their failures. And then of course the work begins. So, I mean, to me now, I want to like let people know in the audience, this is a good thing. When it feels hard, lean into that. That's good because that means you'll have lower competition because the higher the barrier, the lower the competition.

17:43John Lee Dumas:And you really, really want lower competition. If you're doing something easy and you're having success, that just means everybody's going to copy you and then nobody's going to win. Okay. So I want to talk about what unstuck actually looks like. But before we get there, choosing the right move, Bo, there are a thousand side hustles and strategies online. I mean, there's thousands. How does someone decide what's right for them instead of blindly copying somebody else's blueprint? Because if you've listened to me before, Fire Nation, you do not want to be a pale, weak imitation of somebody else.

18:15John Lee Dumas:So Bo, how do they choose what's right for them? I think this is where a lot of people get overwhelmed. And like you said, there's just so many options out there that it's easy just to kind of freeze up. You know, in my book, I talk about something as simple as the Stanley water bottle. You know, it's a water bottle. Like no one needed to invent water or even the bottle, right? They just made it better or at least convinced, you know, the consumer that, you know, the Stanley water bottle is better. And that's just how a simple everyday product turned into a real opportunity, right? And so, I think that's the part that people miss that.

18:47And maybe the reason why they don't, you know, aren't even willing to really get started is that your big idea doesn't have to be the next iPhone. You know, it might just be in improving something that already exists or noticing a small frustration in your own life and just solving it in a better way. And so, you know, you touched on this in your book too, John, about, you know, your idea, it might already be part of your daily routine. You just haven't recognized it yet. So, you know, not everything is going to be a hit. I do believe of the framework that I lay out in my book, Unstuck Economics, that, you know, including how to think about a product, for example, how to choose the right one and how to market it.

19:21I think it gives you every opportunity for success, but even then, right, not everything will land. And I think it's just part of the process that if you look at most success stories, we might think that that person just, you know, stumbled upon a lucky idea and caught their big break. But yes, that might be true. But my guess is that those people who achieve success, that they were hustling for a long time before they got it right. And so the common thread is not the idea. It's starting with what you already have and turning into something valuable. So I tell people, don't look for the perfect move.

19:54Look for the next move that fits your life right now and either make something better or solves a problem. And just start. Start building that momentum, learn along the way, and that beats perfection every time.

20:05John Lee Dumas:I want to talk about what unstuck actually looks like, boat in the real world? Because it's not overnight success. I mean, you know this, you've experienced it myself as well, but a lot of people go into it being like, if I get unstuck, then boom, it's just like, I'm king of the world. I'm queen of the world. Walk us through what real progress looks like in year one, in year two, in year three. Getting unstuck is not an overnight transformation. And we've already talked about just, you know, the commitment and the work that you have to be ready to sign up for, but it is momentum that just builds over time.

20:39So yeah, year one, it's going to be messy, right? You're learning, you're experimenting, you're trying different moves. Maybe it's, you know, reclaiming your time, launching your website, starting something small on the side. You might make a, you know, you might make your first few hundred or thousand dollars. It's not perfect, but you're at least in motion. Year two, something starts to work. One of the moves begins to produce, you know, more consistent income for you. And, you know, you're not just experimenting anymore. you're actually building something. And, you know, this own income stream that you've created, it starts to take shape.

21:10You know, those online sales start trickling in much more consistently. You gain more followers. Your real estate investments is increasing equity. You know, you're gaining confidence. And then year three, I think that's when things can really start shifting where now you're stacking moves. You're not just relying on one source, but you've started to diversify. You might have, you know, income coming from a couple of different places, maybe online, maybe another investment that you made, hopefully something that you built that runs, maybe not completely without you, but starts running day to day without your full commitment.

21:43And that's one of the things I talk about in the book as well, it's just diversification. Hopefully by reading about the nine moves that I talk about in the book is that it just shows like, hey, there are all these things that I can build to achieve financial freedom. Now, if you find your$1 million idea, awesome, right? But it's not always about finding one thing and riding it forever. It's about building this diversified foundation, right? They can carry you through economic cycles and the changes and the uncertainty that we live through. So in Unpsycheeconomics, I talk about diversification, how to think about own income, whether it's income you own, money you invest or something you build and how they layer together over time.