Ex-Pastor Turned 8-Figure Broker: The "Cheat Code" to Any Room

23:37Ryan Hanley:And the beauty of it is sometimes that's, you know, folding laundry, right? Sometimes that's hitting another workout at the gym. Sometimes it's digging into a project. sometimes it's making a phone call to somebody that I haven't reached out to the beauty I find in that spontaneous time is that even if you are still doing work the freedom of kind of what all that nonsense and I can use this time to clean up the nonsense stuff that I need to do you know what I mean like it it creates a little bit of serendipity in your day that um that I find is really nice as well. You know what most people do, Ryan?

24:20Most people medicate the food, margarita, movie, TV, Netflix. They medicate with those things instead of using that time to really take care of and build you as a leader. And you'll find that you don't need those times to medicate. Like that's what my therapy, I used to play poker. I'd go and I'd play poker for two days in a row. And that was, or food. I've lost 100 pounds in five years, almost six years. Congratulations. Thank you. And that used to be my medication. I would just eat if I needed, if I felt stressed. Now it's like, man, just let me get still. Just let me get still before God because that's what I need.

24:59And then I still like to do some of those things, and there's nothing wrong with those things as long as you're not using those things to soothe or make you feel better or give you peace. I tell our entrepreneurs, when I say it's your job to be obedient in God's job to build your business? I tell our entrepreneurs all the time, like if we will just simply be obedient and let God do what he wants to do, I said, how many of us, I did this last week, how many of us, because we're talking about value creation and finances this month, how many of us, we fall in love with our product versus falling in love with solving the problems of our clients?

25:37Because the reality of it is, we all love our product more than the person we're trying to sell it to does. We think it's the greatest thing in the world. Well, they just want to know, how's this solved my problem? What pain point does this alleviate pressure on? And we have to fall in love with those things and understanding in the process that, you know, God, you've called me to steward this. So if there's a number that I have in my bank account that makes me sleep well at night, again, that's God's job and God's role is to make me sleep well at night. How much money I got in the bank? Which it's easy to do that.

26:10It's easy to do that, but it's, okay, how am I taking care of me internally, externally? How am I stewarding my time? And am I making sure that I'm sharpening the ax first and putting the oxygen mask on me before I try to put it on my kids?

26:26Ryan Hanley:I tell a lot of my clients, there's no external utopia. There's no, we all search for this external utopia that just doesn't exist. No, it does not. Not out there. No, it does not. I do think you can find an internal utopia. Yes. think that's possible and i and i don't even know that reaching that may not be realistic but if you walk the path of trying to find internal utopia and i'm you substitute utopia for whatever word makes you feel right um you'll you'll find yourself in this place where all of a sudden the external starts to make sense and starts to look the way you want but you know and this is exactly what you're saying is that we almost punish or ourselves by like you said uh eating bad food, not being focused, not spending time or surrounding ourselves.

27:13Ryan Hanley:And I want to get into your book about surrounding ourselves with people who are going to fill us up and make us better and push us. Right. We instead it's, well, I have 37 emails I got to get to and I got to talk to the product team and, you know, sales is down. So I got to meet with, you know, and you're trying to do all these things. And my car is five years old and my neighbors is only two years old. So, you know, I don't like the way that looks. And, you know, we try to do all these external things. and really to make the internal better when really we can solve the internal tomorrow. You know what I mean?

27:44Ryan Hanley:We could, if we focus and slow down and really think and give ourselves space. Like one of the biggest hacks that I had last year on kind of getting my mind right. And this is such a stupid and silly thing, but it's been so powerful. I love to take ruck walks. I put a 40 pound vest on and I go for an hour long walk. And I used to always wear AirPods and I'd listen to a podcast or whatever. and I just started going with nothing. I just leave my phone at home, leave my AirPods at home, I put the vest on and this may sound crazy to some people but for 45 minutes to an hour, I am completely disconnected by space from any technology and man, when I get back sometimes, I'm almost like, I'm almost scared at how much is going on in my brain in a good way, right?

28:34Ryan Hanley:You start getting all these messages and ideas and oh, I need to get back to this guy. Man, I love this relationship I have. Why am I not cultivating it? And oh, here's the unlock to this block that I had on this business process we were working on. Because we just, if your mind is full, there's no space for those things. There's no space for God to talk to you if your mind is full. And if you just give yourself some space once in a while, it could be 15 minutes with a cup of coffee sitting in a chair by yourself. It could be, there's so many ways to do this. It could be driving in the car with no podcast, no radio, You know, just drive like these moments that you can find in your day of peace, 10, even 15 minutes can bring you so much.

29:14Ryan Hanley:I'm going to say peace to start, but then ultimately getting back to maybe what your goals are. That is how you unlock your goals. Grinding to the point that you're exhausted by the time you hit the afternoon in your day is not getting you, as you said, getting you closer to your goals. If anything, that's when I know for me, I make my worst decisions. the worst decisions I'm going to make are the decisions I make when I am full tilt out over my skis, a completely foggy brain going 10 ,000 miles an hour filled with a mess of different things. That is when I make the bad decisions, not when I've slowed down and actually thought about things.

29:50Ryan Hanley:And I know it sounds intuitive, but I think culturally we've lost this slow down. Like you say, you tell an entrepreneur or any type of ambitious person, Hey, slow, just be, just be still be quiet for a minute and they look at you like, you know, what are you trying to do, man? Like, you know what I mean? It's like you just cursed out their mother or something. You're like, no, no, I'm trying to help you, bro. Listen, there's a reason Steve Jobs would let his kids have Apple products. He understood about being busy and we are, think about the busyness that we have in America. Like it doesn't stop yet.

30:23We're, we're, we're at least, we're less productive now than we have been for the last 25 years with all the technology and everything. We're not as productive or, you know, ingenuitive or creative as we were before because we don't take time to simply, dude, I started driving in a car just in the last few months where no music. I'll just open the sunroof in my car and cruise on down the road and just be like, and it just refreshes or it refreshes your soul. So you have to, especially as an entrepreneur, you got to make sure you're taking time out. Like I have blocks for the gym for me. Like as soon as we finish this, I'm going to the gym and get my workout.

31:00It's back and by us today. I'm sitting here looking at my workout right now. And my team knows for those 90 minutes, you can't get me. Like I am completely off limits for those 90 minutes. So I think you have to take time to be able to be still and then probably a good part to segue into the relationships. Who do I have in my life? You know, I remember when I was 21 years old, probably 1990, 1991, way back before you were born. And I came home from the Air Force. I remember my buddy Mickey, we used to go to Blockbuster. If anybody remembers what Blockbuster, we used to rent this game for Super Nintendo called Contra.

31:37And we would stay up all night long trying to beat Contra. All night Friday, all night Saturday trying to beat this game. Couldn't beat it. We go to Blockbuster. One night at Blockbuster, we walk in, we're renting the game. This guy goes, hey, did you hear there's a cheat code for Contra? And I'm like, what? Cheat code? Like, there's no Google, there's no cell phones, there's none of that stuff. And he writes it on a piece of paper. Left, right, left, right, up, down, up, down, a B-A-B-A start gives you unlimited lives. And literally, probably if there's one thing that I could tell people, the biggest cheat code we have in our life is proximity.

32:11Like who are the people that you're around? I mentioned to you I've lost about 102 pounds of body fat in five and a half, six years. Well, Gary Brecca has been one of my closest friends for five. Well, I just picked the phone up and I just text Gary. The first time I ever stepped, we talked about referee and basketball together. Just earlier, in 1993, I'd refereed two years of Park and Rec, and somebody came up to me and goes, hey, man, you need to call Doc and Nan Sisk. They run the local high school group. You would be great doing high school basketball. And I'm like 22, 23-ish, and I'm like, great.

32:47So I sign up. I go to our first high school camp in the summer. I step on this high school floor, and they're like, Sally Bell, this is Ken Jocelyn. Sally's going to be your clinician for the next three days. Great. Well, little did I know Sally Bell is the most decorated women's official in the history of basketball. 14 Final Fours, the woman chosen for the WNBA, supervisor of officials for the WNBA. And when she retired and stepped off the floor about eight years ago, she took over the SEC, coordinator of officials, and six other Division I conferences. She's who taught me how to referee. How do you not become a good official when you got somebody like Sally, Doc, Nan, who worked the 2000 Olympics in Greece?

33:30Sally worked the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. I mean, the best of the best of the best taught me how to officiate. How do you not be good? I was doing things in officiating in my second, third, and fourth year. I was working college basketball in five years. Like, nobody was doing that. Well, look who I learned from. Like, who do you have? And people are like, Ken, I don't have those relationships. When the reason I was able to grow one of the largest youth ministries in America is God put me in proximity with the best people in the world and I made relationships with them. I'm like, man, I need to know what you know.

34:01I need to spend time with you because what the vision that God's put in my heart to build, and I don't care what it is. You can sell widgets, you can sell coaching, you can be an official, you can be a trash truck or a teacher, I don't care. Who's the best people in the world that do what you do? my whole team knows here. Listen, you find the two or three best people on the planet that do what you do and you build a relationship with them. You and I were talking about AI. I just picked the phone up. I text Dan Martell. One of my buddies was like, are you talking about buyback time? I just text Dan.

34:34Hey, Dan, what are your, I don't text him all the time, but I'll text him once a week or once every other week and go, hey, bro, because I did a mastermind in Salt Lake City two years ago. Randy Garn calls me, goes, hey, Dan Martell's in town. Do you want him to come speak at your mastermind? I'm like, of course I do. It's Dan Martell. You know, he goes, and he had just released Buy Back Your Time. So we had 50 people in our mastermind. Dan comes in and speaks first. And I had never met Dan. So Dan and I, he's speaking at my mastermind. And he's sitting there and he gets to the point in his talk about Buy Back Your Time.

35:03He's sharing a little bit of his faith journey. And he's talking about how you almost lost everything because he was alcoholic. I was working 16, 18 hours a day. My wife was about to leave me. And I found Christ. And I'm sitting there. And this is how God will bring people into your life, Ryan. I'm sitting there at the mastermind, and I'm 10 feet away from Dan. He's speaking. I'm in one of the front tables. And all of a sudden, Dan's got tears running out of his eyes, telling his faith journey. Dude, he literally looked like he saw a ghost. And he's looking at the back of the room, and I can tell he's tracking somebody walking in the room.

35:38And he goes, oh, my gosh. the person who led me to Jesus just walked into the back of the room and I've never met him in person. And it was Erwin McManus. And Erwin had led him to Christ through one of his videos or YouTube or teaching or something. He'd never met him in person. And so you want to talk about instantly connecting Dan and I, like that moment Dan had at my spot, Dan and I became, when I wanted to work with Taki more and what Taki and those guys are doing. I text Dan, I said, dude, tell me about Taki. He goes, he's my best friend. We're flying out there. We spent like three weeks with them in Australia for it.

36:14I'm telling you the relationships and the connections. So now if I have a question about something, how level not dude, what are you doing this afternoon? How are you? No, no, no. If it's a high level question, I have people in my life that I can text and just go, hey, bro, what are your thoughts on this? Here's what I'm thinking. What do you think? Like you were talking about cloud code and all the different AI things earlier. Man, I just I'll just text Dan and go, bro, what about notebook LM? Is this the best thing for me to use to do my SOPs? Boom, and he'll give me an answer. And people are like, well, how do I build those relationships?

36:46Number one is you have to have a vision and a dream and desire that God's put in your heart. Again, business, I don't care what the vocation is. Business, nonprofit, ministry work, I don't care. Whatever it is, being an official, being an umpire. I umpired college baseball, Division I college baseball up until about five years ago. my first time I ever walk on a baseball field, my clinician is Marvin Hudson. He's been in the big leagues now for 26 years, crew chief for about four years. Marvin was one of the first people that taught me how to umpire. How do you not get good at what you do? So I don't care what vertical you're in, who are the best people on the planet that do what you do?

37:29Well, Ken, they would never have conversations with me. You'd be shocked at the people who love it. They just want to help people. All they want to do is help people. You have to be very conscious of their time and how much of what you're asking for. Because I try to, and then I'll share this. My goal is to give. I want to give so much to them. My motto for my life right now, Ryan, is great leaders want something for people, not from people. Because when you get around people who want something for you and not from you, it's a game changer. and when people who are successful in whatever, I mean, we talked about refereeing, we talked about umpiring, college baseball, we talked about business, we talked about health, whatever area in your life you're trying to grow, there's somebody out there that has the knowledge that you need.

38:21You're only two things away from the next level, right relationship, right information because all the information isn't the right information. I would never be where I'm at today if it weren't for Grant Cardone, If it weren't for me walking, seeing an ad on Instagram in September of 2019, I had no idea who Grant was. Never heard of him. Didn't know who he was. Saw this ad. And I'm like, dude, this dude's passionate. Who is this cat? Followed him. Got an invite to do a free webinar on a Saturday afternoon in second week of October of 2019. And I'm sitting there. It's a 90-minute webinar on mentorship.

38:59And I'm like, I don't have any. I didn't even know who he was. I don't know what he's selling. I'm like this. I'm sitting there and I'm like, I'm pulling my credit card out and my credit card's sitting on it. I'm like, whatever this guy's selling, I'm buying. I had no idea what it was. It was his 12-week, first ever 12-week mentorship program for$1 ,000. Bought it immediately. And I started getting around Grant. Became a licensee. Became his number one licensee. I made$125 ,000 the first 10 months of 2019. I made$130 ,000 the last six weeks of 2019. One deal,$78 ,720 commission,$3 million commercial deal.

39:36I would not have closed had I not been in the room with Grant and said, Grant, I've got a$3 million deal. Here's the details. And our appraisal's in at$2.625 million. I'm$375 ,000 short. How do we get the deal closed? And Grant looks at me and he goes, Ken, you're going to have to be creative. I'm like, dude, I've closed$250 million in real estate. I know how to be creative, but I have no concept of how I'm going to do. And this is exactly what Grant told me on that Saturday morning. He goes, Ken, think through the deal. How can I get creative? And I'm telling you, there's a way for you to close it.

40:09I said, okay, all day long, I'm thinking. That night, I'm like, light bulb moment. I called, it was a church. I was helping buy a$3 million building for it. I called Pastor Steve. I said, hey, Pastor Steve, I'm down here in Miami. This thing called 10X Bootcamp, this crazy guy named Grant Cardone. And I said, I've got an idea. He goes, what is it? I'm going to fly home. This is an unlisted property. 72-year-old Chinese guy selling it. doesn't have no representation. He doesn't speak English. I have to go through his 22-year-old daughter. She's my interpreter. We're trying to get this$3 million deal closed.

40:37And I said, I'm gonna fly home Monday. I'm gonna negotiate the seller held second for the$375 ,000 we're short, five-year balloon, same note rate as the bank. He goes, okay, let's do it. I flew home on Monday, negotiated that thing through his daughter. We closed it on Wednesday. I made$78 ,720. I sent a screenshot to Jared and Grant that night on the call. There's 1 ,200 people on the call. We hop on that call that first, this was a second mentorship call out of 12. We hop on the call, Grant's like four or five minutes fast to me late. And as soon as he gets on, he's like, where's that preacher at?

41:08Y 'all pull that preacher in here. I want to hear that preacher story. And he made me go through the whole story in front of 1200 people. And then Grant's invited me to come down and speak to his team. Then he's invited me to speak to all the leaders, all the licensees around the world. Like it's just, and then in that process is when God said, I want you to do this for faith-based entrepreneurs. okay nobody else is doing what we're doing i don't have i don't have a roadmap to look at on how to do it john maxwell's been a dear friend for 25 years i can see some of what john's doing but what done what god's called us to do is different but put yourself in the rooms with the people that have the information and the ability to literally circumvent years of growth off your process of building a business dude that was like a 30 minute preach session right there

41:54Ryan Hanley:my bad bro this is like the best easiest interview I've ever done it's amazing um no I love it dude and I love that story and I think it's so important because

42:08Ryan Hanley:there's a level of cynicism that I come across and I've never I don't know if my it's just the way that I was wired however where I was raised but I I like don't relate to cynicism I think it's funny i think cynicism is funny i think i think i think you can be funny when you're cynical i don't i see zero value in it um as a as a mental practice and you know i hear this all the time wow that guy's just selling something oh he's just trying to make money the man and i'm like i can make no mistake make no mistake grant's trying to sell you something yeah no mistake whatsoever he is trying to sell you something but it's like they don't have to be They don't have to be mutually exclusive.

42:54Someone can want to help you and make money at the same time.

42:59Ryan Hanley:That's both of those things. And frankly, they need to make money so they can help you. Because if they're not making money, then they got to do something else, which takes them away from being able to spend time with you. And, you know, when I hear these comments, I'm like, how else are you going to get in that person's world? Like you just told me that guy, that gal, having a relationship with them could change the course of your career, your life, your relationships. Okay. You just, you, you're the one that told me that. And now what you're saying is you don't want to what? Pay to be in their world.

43:31Ryan Hanley:Like that's how they use a filtering mechanism to see who's serious. That's right. I had a friend of mine who called me one day. This was in June. This was the end of May of 2020. I'd already spent, I don't know, probably licensee 25K, 30, 40, 50 bootcamp, probably 60 grand, 70 grand with Grant already. My buddy calls me, he goes, hey, Grant's doing a mastermind two days. It's$10 ,000, 30 people. And I was like, okay. And he goes, imagine how many years of business growth, trouble, heartache, pain we can circumvent by being in a room with Grant for two days. And I'm like, I'm in, spend another 10 grand.

44:12Now I was down with Grant for two days, sitting in the second row. I'll never forget, I had, before I created, I actually created my planner after using Grant's planner. I tell him I took his planner and I put it on steroids. But I never forget at this time, this was June of 2020. I'm already seven, eight months in with Grant. I've spoken for him several times, big events, team, senior leadership team, everything. And I'm sitting there and I wrote speed in these big letters, like big letters, like on the bottom of my planner. And I said, Grant, I've done more than any other licensee that you had.

44:43And I said, and I've had more, the growth has been insane for the last six months. And I never forget, I flipped it over and Grant was in his director's chair. I'm in the second row, sitting next to Mike Sirocco. And I said, speed. I said, I'm not moving fast enough. I'm not risking enough, bro. He jumped up. Oh my God. Did you guys hear that? He's banging on the table. He comes around, bear hugged me and picks me. And I just started my journey. I mean, I was still probably 280 pounds. That was like 60 pounds ago. Picks me up off the ground. And he's like, oh my God, this guy's easy. You know, because he just, that action thing, he understands it.

45:19If I'll take action, I'm not always going to get it right. All the decisions aren't going to be correct, but the ones that aren't correct, I'm going to learn from. But he understood. And I literally sat back down and I text a girl from LA. I said, okay, I'm going to pull the trigger. She was helping me do my courses. I did three online courses on mindset, strategy, leadership development. I said, I'm buying your ticket right now. I flew her out in two days. My best friend who worked for John Maxwell for about five or six years, best ideator I've ever seen in my life. I said, okay, we're going to book this boardroom next week in Atlanta for five days.

45:51We sat for five days. Cost me with filming and everything about$75 ,000 to get my courses done. And I did it. And I said, Grant, I haven't risked enough and I'm just not moving fast enough. And I'm telling you guys, I know it seems old listening to Grant. to say, take action, commit first and figure the rest out later. I'm telling you, dude, the guys, if you will be disciplined with your time and you will look at the beginning of the week, if there's one thing I could tell you to do Saturday or Sunday evening around four or five o 'clock, I sit with my wife and we plan out the entire week. And then we have another time.

46:26We just did this this week. We were like, Hey, what about, and we're like, Oh man, we need 30 minutes a week just to talk about what we've got coming up next quarter. So we can get the right things on the calendar and the yearly calendar and those kinds of things. But if you'll do that and you'll just take action on what you know to take action on, I'm telling you, Jim Rohn, speed increases focus. Things will become clear. You'll get moving down the road and be like, ah, okay, this is what this looks like. And then you just tweak and make it better. But it's the relationship components, number one.

46:56And I would say this, probably the biggest question I get, Ryan, is how did you build the relationships? I have a text thread with five men on it. After my first Create conference in 2022, to. Got in the shower the next morning. We had Jesse Itzler, John Maxwell was there. We had 158 people in my very first one we ever did. And I'm sitting there in the shower and God just gave me the word. He goes, intentionality. Like that was my word for 2022 is to be intentional. And God said, I want you to build a relationship with these men. And so Brian Covey, senior vice president for cross-country mortgages on my list.

47:29Dick Keller owns his own private equity firm, sold 11 companies to Warren Buffett in 2017 for several billion dollars. And then was the CEO for Berkshire Hathaway Automotives for three years, taking from 8 billion a year to 11 billion a year. Gary Brecka is on that list. And then Randy Garn, who is on Tony Robbins' board, private equity firm, New York Times, all the stuff. I text each of them individually. And I say, guys, I want to build and take our relationship to the next level this year. I'm willing to invest three things. My time, my talent, my treasure. My time, like I'm coming to you. Dude, I've been to Salt Lake City with Randy, Nashville with Brian.

48:09I've been to Puerto Rico with Brent and Kathy Goh. Brent's the number one real estate agent in America. He has 45 ,000 agents in his organization to the tune of over seven figures a month in rev share. Killing it. I've been down there several times. I've hung out with Gary and Sage more times than I can tell you. Fountain Blue grand opening last year in Miami in December. Spending a couple days with Gary and Sage. like all these people time I'm going to come to you I'm not going to ask you for your time I'm going to come to you talent what is my talent my talent is I'm a connector who do you need to know who do I know that you need to know who do you who do I have in my life that can help you achieve what God's called you to do and then I did I probably already connected four or five people already today I'm a connector and when I connect somebody they know now all my guys and all my relationships and Martel.

49:02I mean, I could just go through the list, bro. It's ridiculous, the friends I have. And I can go through the list. And they know if I connect them, there's a reason that I've connected. And dude, they are quick to jump right back on. Time, talent, who do I know that you need to know, treasure. If one of my guys has an event, I pay full price. I'll buy whatever the most expensive seat is, I'm buying it. And I had Gary on a Zoom call with two other doctors. This was 2022, 2022, 2023, towards the beginning of 2023. And actually it was 2020. It was 2022 because we had just done my first creative conference.

49:40We were doing another event. I introduced him to two other doctors that he needed to know around the country that were killing it. And I'm on the call. I was like, Gary, I said, are you speaking at GrowthCon this year? This was the first year they were back. They were at the diplomat in Miami. The one that had President Trump. It was massive, like four or 5 ,000 people. Dude, Gary goes off. Oh my God, dude, Grant gave me 90 minutes. I can't wait. Blah, blah, blah. He goes, are you going to be there? I said, dude, I wouldn't miss it for the world. I said, what's the date? I think it was April the 16th.

50:10And he said it and I went, dude, I wouldn't miss it for the world. I get off the Zoom call and I look on my calendar and I'm like, ugh. I had just bought front row seats to go see Eric Church. They cost me a thousand bucks a piece. I mean, literally like the first two seats right in front of Eric Church. Thousand bucks a piece. Guess what day it was? April the 16th. I had to sell my front row seats, which I lost probably 700 bucks on. I picked the phone up. I texted Jim Morales, who was Grant's CFO at the time. I said, hey, Jimmy, I think I have$10 ,000 in my store credit. I need a diamond seat for GrowthCon this year.

50:45And so when Gary came out of the shoot that year to go speak for the very first time ever on the Growth Con stage, I'm in the second row and on the video, he eyeballs me and runs straight to me and bear hugs me before he goes up and gets on stage. And great leaders want something for people, not from people. And if you will invest, I didn't ask those guys for anything. I'm not asking you. Gary's been at Create five of the six Creates that we've done. And he's done them every year for me, except for this year or this last two times. He's done them for me for free. And dude, he's one of the most sought after speakers in the world.

51:19We stood behind my stage this year after he got off stage at Create. And I walked back in the green room with him and Sage. He has tears in his eyes. And Gary's like, oh my God, dude, I can't believe you've grown this to be this size. And you know what I said? I looked at him and I said, Gary and Sage, I couldn't have done this without you guys. There's no way in the world I could have built this without you. And Brent Gove, who's in the room, and Vic Keller, who's in the room. It's just in when you get the right people in your life and they know you want more for them than you want from them.

51:52I'm telling you, man, people, you will start to gather the right people and God will send you the right people to help you fulfill what he's got.

52:00Ryan Hanley:Yeah, in my first book, I wrote, give without expectation of reciprocation. And if you can hold that idea in your head and just give, just give and give and give. You know, I mean, Gary V put jab, jab, jab, right hook to it. I think the question, you know, people ask a lot of times is, well, you know, what is a right hook? Take all that out of it. If you're giving and honestly giving, like not giving as some sort of gimmick or hack or strategy, but like, honestly, you just want people to get better. The right hook takes care of itself. It just does. And every moment that I've forgotten that I've struggled, every moment that I've embraced it has been the most high growth times of my entire life and the most fulfilling and rewarding.

52:43Ryan Hanley:I mean, so I do a lot of speaking. It's the thing I love doing more than anything else. And it's the closest thing as an adult that I can get to being on a sports field is being on stage. I love it. And it's, you know, this is contextual, but I, you know, I actually, I get a lot of comments about stage presence and people ask, you know, how do you so comfortable, et cetera. And I actually attribute reffing basketball in large part to my ability to be on stage, because if you can manage a crowd, the players on the court, the players off the court, the coaches, the scoring table, and then all the other bedlam that is happening in the moment and do a job in which there is no replay for and every single time you inject yourself into the game you are one having an impact and two half the people are going to hate you and you can manage that both emotionally and produce an outcome in which you didn't play a part in um you can go up on stage and and and the the moment doesn't feel bigger because of what i i honestly believe that reffing basketball is one of the few, we'll call them reffing or umpire official type sport.

54:03Ryan Hanley:It is so, guys, I know you love the NCAA tournaments happening today when we record. It's the first day of the NCAA tournament if you don't count the playing games. And there's going to be a lot of you staring at the screen that are going to say a lot of negative things at refs. And I get it. When my kid has a foul called on him that I don't like, my natural reaction is your... when Tony Green, who's from Atlanta, called that goaltend on Trey from Michigan when they lost to Louisville. And I'm at half court, like 19 rows up, and I'm looking at it going, number one, you're the lead official. You don't call goaltending from the lead.

54:38Like, that ain't your call. Even on a fast break, that's your center or your trail guy. Like, I'm going, but I'm trying not to go bananas on it because I know him number one. And I'm like, dude, you just cost my team a natty.

54:48Ryan Hanley:So anyway, I had to throw that in there. My bad, Tony Green, if you ever listen to this. So I had, I don't know if you remember John Calhoun, Johnny Cal, or Jimmy Burden. So those guys are from Albany. Those are the guys that taught me how to ref. So they were here. They were in the second half of their career when I first started, because I started when I was 20 as well. And, you know, it's funny. You put yourself in that space. And, like, a lot of people would ask them about their interpretation of plays and calls. And I would just sit near them. And oftentimes, I didn't even really ask them any questions.

55:21Ryan Hanley:I wanted to hear, one, how they responded to those questions. And two, what I was always the most interested in, and really in life, this is a big part of where I try to sit, is to me, the most impressive people are those who can find clarity and calm in moments of chaos. And it shows your ability to be present, to be focused, your preparation. there to be calm and clear in a moment of chaos isn't like you're just able to do it it shows that you have executed a certain number of skills and put a certain amount of thought in before that moment to be there because if you decide i'm just gonna flip the switch on right now you're screwed it doesn't work that way right it's it's preparation it's thought it's the pre-game right so so you know a lot of uh people who've never reffed a basketball game probably don't realize this but similar to having a pregame call for a sales call or prepping for a talk, etc.

56:23Ryan Hanley:Referees will have an hour to sometimes three hour long meeting, depending on the game and how much time you have, where you're literally visualizing every move through the court, every play. How is this court set up? Where's the scoreboard? Are there odd looking lines that we could get confused on? You know, there's all these things that you talk about so that when you get out there, the moment doesn't feel bigger than you. And I think one of the gifts that we can take by surrounding ourselves with those who have done the thing already that we want to do is you get to learn their preparation.

56:57Ryan Hanley:You get to learn their process. And it doesn't mean that has to be exactly yours, but that knowledge can sometimes help you see around corners. And if you don't put, as you said, if you don't put yourself in those rooms, if you think, one, that you don't have something to add, that you're unworthy, that you pull up that cynicism or scarcity mindset in which you think that that person doesn't actually care about you. So much of that is garbage between your ears. It's not reality. And I love that we've spent so much time on the relationship side. And obviously, that's your book, 14 Frequencies of Proximity.

57:32Ryan Hanley:This idea of building relationships, I believe, today in this age of AI is becoming even more important. It's more important because we can't trust what we're seeing online, right? So it is about sharing air. It is about spending time. It is about those moments that create more, we'll call it friction in your life, right? Because they're real. You know, they're real. You know, they're tangible. You know, that it's coming from someone who this is their actual life experience, et cetera, where if we just sit back and you, you, you keep that arm's length. You never actually share that same air. You, you just can't, you can't take in, you can't internalize it in the same way.

58:15Ryan Hanley:Not that it's impossible, but I certainly believe that we're going to see a Renaissance of, uh, you know, I want to get back to the days where it's socially acceptable for four guys to go play nine holes of golf on a Friday morning. And people don't look at them like, Oh, you know what? Oh, you don't care about your business. You know what I mean? Like I'm not talking about going out and getting hammered. I'm talking about, you know, that time where you're walking with guys out in nature and the conversation inevitably leads to life and family and finance and faith and, and all these different things.

58:44Ryan Hanley:And what you take away from it is never what you expected when you showed up, but just to hit a little white ball down the fairway, you know, or whatever insert, whatever your, your thing is. So man, I, uh, I couldn't, I couldn't be more dialed with your viewpoint. I absolutely love it. Um, the 14 frequencies of proximity, um, when is it out? Where can we get Is there a place to sign up so we know about the launch? I want as many people as possible to be injected into your world because I'm just such a believer in your mentality and mindset. I'll have the team. They're working on everything now.

59:15Gary Breckett did the forward for my book. I quote from David Pollack, John Maxwell. Peerless Price gave me a forward, a quote in here as well. So, yeah, we'll have all of that stuff up in the next little bit. Like literally like the launch starts when we get back from our mastermind, the beginning of May. So it'll be May, June, and the end of July is when we're going to do the whole three-day deal. But yeah, you can just track. We'll give you guys a link in the show notes for you guys to be able to put in. I just think, guys, that whole book I wrote was out of, you know, what are the different frequencies?

59:46Like we talk about authenticity as the connection frequency. And I went back. I share a story from 2021. I did a live event. This was Gary's first ever, like, live speaking engagement, like in this atmosphere. We did it in Vegas at Bradley's Space. We had 50 guys and Gary did a whole talk on, you know, what Gary Brekka does. But Gary talked about a study that was done on the electromagnetic frequencies that we emit as human beings. And he asked the room, I'll never forget, he goes, what do you think the highest frequency emotion, the highest frequency we emit is? And everybody said love. And he goes, no, the frequency of authenticity, which is a deep understanding about a subject coupled with a deep passion for a subject.

1:00:31When those two things come together, it creates authenticity. Authenticity frequency is seven times higher than the frequency of love. And it's the most sought after frequency. That's where we talk about the connection. That's what causes people to connect. And do we both get around people that you can tell are authentic immediately? Immediately, I would say this, the biggest thing, like we host Create every year in January. We had a large church in Atlanta hosted this this year, and I called the pastor and I said, I said, dude, tell me what was your biggest takeaway? I mean, I had Horst Schulze, the co-founder and CEO of Rich Carlton, John Maxwell, Gary Brecka, Eddie Wilson from Aspire.

1:01:08Eddie's a dear friend. Eddie came in and did a couple sessions for me. I said, what was your biggest takeaway? Aha moment, favorite speaker. And he was like, be honest with you. He goes, it wasn't any of that. He goes, I had a conversation with a guy on Thursday in the hallway. And we're just having a conversation. He's just wearing this raggedy old blue t-shirt on. And he's just like, man, thank you for, you know, opening the facility to us. I know Ken's super excited, man. We're great to be here. If there's anything I can do for you, you let me know. And he goes, I didn't even get the guy's name.

1:01:39And the next day you intro him and you roll his little bumper video. And he exited his last company for$119 million. And I went, oh, that was Troy. And he goes, yeah. And he goes, dude, he was the most humble, kind guy I'd ever been around. And he goes, that's your secret sauce is the authenticity of the people that you have at this event and around you. Because there are people that ask me about Gary all the time, but what about Gary? Does he use the H2 tabs? Everything he talks about, he uses because we talk and hang out all the time. I was with him in Cabo two weeks ago. Like everything he talks about.

1:02:14He physically does. I've been to his home. Like these guys operate at such a high level of authenticity. And when you do that and you're authentic, it literally will attract the right people into our lives in order to help us do what God's called us to do.

1:02:31Ryan Hanley:Yeah. Gary's the one that got me on grounding sheets, which have changed the way that I sleep. Yep. Yep. A hundred percent. I have a mat. I have a grounding mat. Gary at his bed in Miami, they've got this thing that goes around the bed, like you can't use the phone because it cuts all the frequencies out. It's like, it looks like a mosquito net, if you will. I don't even know what it's called, but I'm like, bro, that's the craziest thing I've ever seen. He goes, yeah, you can't use your phone inside of it. It's like a little Faraday cage or something. Yep. Something like that. It just takes all the frequencies out of the room and they can't touch you while you're sleeping.

1:03:02So, yeah. But all the hacks he does. TCU's up on Ohio State 6-5 just so you know.

1:03:08Ryan Hanley:On that note, Ken Jossam, my friend, It's been a pleasure. Absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for taking the time. Can I tell you one more story that's hilarious, that's funny? Yes. I love stories. This goes back to officiating. It's 1993. It's the State Farm Hall of Fame tip-off classic in Knoxville. So I grew up, all my guys were on the women's side. So Doc and Nan are going. Nan's referee in with Sally Bell and Patty Broderick. Patty was the coordinator for the Big Ten for years. And their referee in the first game, Violet Palmer, Dee Kantner, And I don't remember, maybe Morningside was the other third for the second game.

1:03:45But it was Tennessee. It was LaTex and UConn was the first game. And then it was Tennessee and Virginia the second game. So Dawn Staley was a point guard at Virginia. Your boy from UConn was still there. And, oh, Gino. And so they're refereeing the game. I'm already sitting on the court watching the game. And I'm like right at the end of UConn's bench. And Gino's – now I'm sitting – you want to talk about it? I'm sitting through pregame for these things. Like for both games, I'm sitting through pregame with these guys. You want to talk about learning? Bro, my basketball IQ and officiating IQ, in two years, I got more than most people get in 15 years of being around.

1:04:23And so I'm sitting there, and somebody made a call. I don't remember who it was. Somebody blows a whistle. Nan's at the trail, standing right in front of Gino. Gino throws his towel up in the air. Sally looks at him and goes, Gino, when that towel hits the ground, I'm going to tee your ass up. I about died. I literally text my supervisor. I have a referee in like five or six years. I literally text Doc this weekend. I was sitting with my wife and we were talking and I said, because we're talking about officiating just everything that goes in it. And Doc used to always tell me, he goes, Ken, silence can never be misquoted.

1:05:00And I said, yeah, but I just don't have the ability. And my favorite line is a coach would say something. I'd I said, the film, don't lie. And I never had somebody send a clip where I missed it, at least in high school.

1:05:14Ryan Hanley:I'll be honest with you. I love these stories. To this day, my dad and I, you know, my dad rep for 40 years. I stopped only because of my older kid and traveling and did a few different things. But I, you know, I'm actually, now that they're a little older, I've been thinking about picking it up. Maybe just as a wreck, I don't know that I want to push really hard, mostly just from a time perspective. But I miss the what happens in those games and how you handle those situations just says so much about yourself. And like I had I was blessed, you know, I was blessed to do three years in Washington, D.C.

1:05:50Ryan Hanley:Washington, D.C. is a very unique place in the country for one, the basketball is absolutely off the charts. I mean, there's four or five schools just in Washington, D.C. that are essentially feeder programs for all the ACC schools that surround it down in North Carolina, Virginia, et cetera. And we're talking about top tier basketball. And down there, you're doing five, six hundred games a season, a season. So I had done more games in my third year than my dad had done in his career when I was 24 years old. and what you get when you're surrounded by these guys so so the guys that are down there that are reffing they are used to this level of basketball and what you get when you put yourself in those situations and you experience because you're gonna fail right you're gonna tee a guy up for saying something that he didn't say and now you got to deal with that mess you're gonna call a timeout and all these things happen and it's like uh it's what I love you know uh Naval Ravikant has this um quote, it's kind of a play on Malcolm Grabwell's 10 ,000 hours.

1:06:50Ryan Hanley:He says, 10 ,000 hours is not the answer. It's 10 ,000 iterations. And the beauty of our conversation and what we've talked about today is that if I'm going to spend time with someone like yourself and you're going to spend time with someone like Grant, when we spend time with these people who we can learn from, who have walked the path ahead of us, we are extracting some of their iterations by spending time with them. So now instead of needing 10 ,000 personal iterations, I might only need 5 ,000 personal or 2 ,000 because I'm hearing from you and I'm hearing from, and it's a big part of why I do this podcast is, is I want to try to bring in people and just for 45 minutes to 90 minutes, give the audience and myself the ability to just pull down a couple iterations on something that's important to them.

1:07:37Ryan Hanley:And this is how we get there, my friend. I appreciate that. I appreciate Appreciate you, man. Appreciate our time. Thank you so much. Wish you nothing but the best. And we'll talk again soon, my friend. Be good. Thanks, buddy.