MI Rewind: How to Succeed through Mentorship and Adversity w/ Lewis Howes

25:12They'll be like, oh, I see something, there's a passion in this person I used to have when I was younger or whatever, right? And I think if you go about it in a I don't care type of mentality, then you're going to get that type of response. But when you're passionate about something, you're excited in your emails, you're excited on a phone call when you meet someone, and you start with that intention of this passion for this idea, you'll start to attract more people than you think who want to support you, who want to help you. And if you show that you have already been working hard towards something, showing credibility that you have been putting in the work daily, weekly, monthly, yearly towards this dream or goal, that's going to tell a mentor, this person's not going to drop off their dream.

25:52If I'm helping them or coaching them, they're not just going to stop in a month when it gets hard. They're already doing hard work. So I can trust that my time is not going to be wasted because the biggest thing a mentor has is their time. And if you waste their time by just asking them questions and not taking action, then why would they want to work with you? They only want to work with people that they see get results that will validate their wisdom, that will validate their time, that'll make them feel fulfilled. So you got to make sure you have those things before you go after mentors. That's absolutely one of the things that I've noticed with mentors is that they just, a lot of people are willing to help, but they want to see you take the action.

26:32If you go out there and you're not taking action on what they're telling you, then they feel like their time is wasted and that's wasting their most valuable resource. They don't expect you to not make mistakes or anything like that. Mistakes are good. They want you to come to them and teach you that, but you got to take action. That's it. And I think a lot of people go wrong with mentors is at the beginning, at least, they're not looking to build a genuine relationship. They're more just firing off email saying, hey, will you mentor me? Hey, will you mentor me? That's not really how it's done.

26:57It's building a genuine relationship. Yeah. I think also doing your research about the mentor, not just because, oh, I just saw this person on Instagram or Twitter that they had a big following and they did this big company, like I'm going to reach out to them. I think you want to admire your mentor for a while, your potential mentor. You want to follow them. You want to read their stuff. You want to learn about what they did 10 years ago. You want to know as much as you can about them. So when you approach them, they feel like, okay, there's a true, genuine respect that you have for them, that you've been following them for a while, you respect the brand or the business they've built, you know a lot about them, I think that will go a long way.

27:33If someone knows a lot about you, if someone came to me and they're like, man, I've listened to 100 of your episodes, I've got 900 episodes. If they're like, I've been listening for the last two years and I feel like I know everything about you. I've been studying the School of Greatness. I went to the Summit of Greatness. I bought your books. I read it. And I've been working for these last two years on this project, and I've gotten to this point, and I feel like I just need some answers on how to get it to another level. Is there any way I could jump on five, 10 minutes and just get it? I've got these two questions.

28:04I really love your feedback, and I just think you would have the answer. I don't know if I'd say yes or not, but something like that would be more enticing for me than just, hey, will you mentor me? It all depends on how much time the person has. It may not be the right timing, but if someone approached me like that, and they were that devouring of my content, and they were specific about what they got from it and how they applied it. And they were like, can I at least email you a question? I would answer them free email. Maybe I'd get on a call the next time and go back and forth and build a relationship.

28:35But it's got to start somewhere. Yeah. I mean, you have to prove it. You have to prove that you're willing to do this thing. Start with an email, and then maybe it goes back and forth two, three times on an email, and then maybe you show them that you're willing to actually do what they've taught you, and then you can dive into a call. I know you've talked about mentoring people through your podcast since you can't possibly mentor everyone that you'd like to. So your podcast is a great way to do that. That's why I do it. Yeah. If you want to be mentored by me, go listen. I'll teach everything I know there.

29:01Exactly. And I personally love this idea of having someone as a mentor indirectly because for me, there are people I personally look up to as a mentor that would probably never mentor me one-on-one. They just don't have the time. Yet I can still learn so much from them. And one of those people is Andy Frisella. I've looked up to him and tried to learn as much as I can from him for so, so long through his podcast, his website, blogs, everything he puts out on social. And I feel like I'm able to have him as a mentor. And the same goes for other people as well. Why do you think more people don't take advantage of that indirect relationship or indirect mentorship that's now available because of technology?

29:38So lazy, man. I mean, listening to something for an hour a day, watching videos, reading books, going to events, people are lazy. They have excuses. They'd rather watch TV. They'd rather watch just flip through Instagram or TikTok or whatever it is. They want it, but they're lazy. They don't have this desire. That's what I think I talked about in the beginning. You might have a dream. Yeah, I want to make a million dollars. Yeah, I want this car. I want this house, whatever. I want to be the CEO of a big company that gets bought by Facebook. Okay, but do you have the desire? And the desire comes from hunger.

30:08It comes from a lack of something. I had a lack in my life. I was like, I'm sick of feeling hungry. I want to freaking be full. I want to eat. I want to go after this thing. And people have a lack of desire, and that's what holds them back. It really kind of blows my mind because if we were able to show people back in the 90s or 80s what we have available now to us to learn from these people, they would be amazed at the opportunity we have and that people aren't just taking as much advantage of it as they can. It's is insane to me. For me, I mean, Andy, using Andy as an example, he just ended his podcast, the MFCEO Project.

30:46And I've gone back, I'm listening from episode one all the way back through a couple of 300 again. I know having a great mentor is a big component of a winning team, but there are obviously other pieces that are needed too. Who else is needed? And how can the audience find the right people outside of just a mentor to build a winning team? In business or in life? Let's talk about both. I think you just need someone to keep you accountable that you respect. I've got my COO, a friend of mine I've known for 15 years, who just keeps me accountable to my word. It's easier for us to lose willpower over time because doing hard things is hard consistently.

31:24So having someone to hold you accountable that you respect, that's not going to buy into your BS, that's not going to allow you to just make excuses. I just think that person's important. And that needs to be a person very close to you that you spend a lot of time with. Otherwise, you're going to fall. Your willpower is not strong enough over year after year, constantly by yourself to stick to the hard goals you have yourself, hard habits. I think your partner in your intimate relationship is someone that needs to really, it's got to be both ways. They've got to be willing to lift you up in a big way.

31:56The same with you, but they've got to be a person who you respect so much that their words to you mean a lot. And when they give you feedback, you listen. You don't just dismiss it. If you're around that person, sleeping with them every night, waking up next to them, spending so much time with them, you need to respect them so much. So you need to make sure you choose the right person you're going to be with because they're going to be saying a lot of words around you and those words are powerful. So you need to make sure you really respect that person. I think you need to be around really fit people, people that understand nutrition, people that make good habits in their food life and their fitness life because you become, obviously, like your circle.

32:37So if you're around people that are eating sugar all the time, you're probably going to cheat and eat more sugar and smoke and drink and all those things. It goes to those people. Just choose to be around people who live a lifestyle you want to be like. And then choose to be around financially abundant people. I spend a lot of time with really rich people. And even though my motivation is not like, how do I make as much money as I can? For me, it's how do I impact the most people possible? That's the motivation I have. The money comes from that, but I'm also surrounding myself with really smart money people where I can just ask a question and they'll be like, okay, let me make this decision now moving forward with my money or let me invest in this, let me try this, as opposed to just going blind and doing what I think I'm supposed to do.

33:18I'm mentored by really smart, financially wealthy people who I learned from. Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors. Hey, it's Sean O'Malley, just popping in with a quick message. If you like this podcast, well, I've got great news for you. We've got a handful of other shows for you to explore, from learning about Bitcoin to embracing a richer, wiser, happier lifestyle. Just go into your podcast app and type in We Study Billionaires to find our collection of shows. We Study Billionaires is our flagship podcast, and we've made a name for ourselves over the years by interviewing the best investors in the world, including Ray Dalio, Howard Marks, Joel Greenblatt, and many, many more.

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36:42That's theinvestorspodcast.com slash tip-finance. All right, back to the show. And it goes back to that saying, you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with. And just to drive that point home further about being around people that eat well and healthy, I think a step further is that those people aren't out partying and drinking on Fridays and Saturday nights, which doesn't drag you out into that scene, which means you have more time to put into your business. You wake up Saturday, Sunday mornings, ready to rock and roll and really get to work, and you're not being dragged down by those types of activities.

37:17You mentioned that you're not doing the things you're doing just for money or the material items. So how else does one live a truly successful life? It's based on what everyone wants. For me, what fulfills me is seeing people grow, seeing people transform, seeing people overcome their challenges and achieve their dreams when they achieve the thing that lights them up the most. And I know that I was a part of it in some way. It just brings me a lot of joy to help people overcome their adversities and achieve their dreams because it's like, I don't know what other, it's like winning a million dollars every time that happens for me.

37:53I can change a human life or be a part of their change. It's just really fulfilling and rewarding for me. So I do that for selfish reasons. It feels good. and I know I'm helping other people. That's just what it is for me. Robert Leonard How can somebody find out what that specific thing is for them if they don't already know? Robert Leonard I just think whenever you're living life, what brings you the most joy when you do it? Is it an activity? For me, this was sports for a long time, like playing sports in front of a large audience and winning the game or being the best player, making great plays, and being able to express myself on the court, on the field, in front of a live audience, pressure is on.

38:33That was the most fulfilling thing for me because it was my expression that inspired people. People would come up to me after the game and they're like, man, I was so inspired how you broke through those players and dove for the end zone. It just inspired me in my life. So I was doing that in sports without really realizing it until people would tell me like, man, that was so inspiring how you made that one play or how the whole game or how you guys came back. To give people hope, to give people a lesson, to show someone what's possible in their life. I was doing that in sports and now I'm trying to do that in business.

39:06And if you get around the right mentors, they can likely help you find out what really inspires you and what makes you successful. Seeing their success can help you find what makes you successful. Yeah, I think so. I mean, I think so. But at the end of the day, no one can give it to you. You got to figure that out yourself kind of thing. You got to try different things and see what lights you up. For example, there's a lot of people right now that say they want to write books, they want to launch podcasts, and then they do it. And three months later, they're like, eh, it seems exciting, but it's not what I want, actually.

39:35Too much. It's not as fun as I thought it was. I'm losing money. I don't even enjoy interviewing people. And then they stop. So I think you got to try different things until you realize, oh, this brings me a lot of joy. And a lot of people make decisions based on pain, like a pain they had growing up, where they said, this is going to be my mission. I don't want anyone else to feel this pain anymore. So I'm going to go build a company that helps end cancer or eliminate this or help people get out of toxic relationships. They do things because they were in pain, a family member or a friend was in pain.

40:06They said, I don't want other people to suffer. I'm going to go find a solution. I'm going to go do it. That brings me joy. That's kind of the way I live my life. There's a book by Gary Keller called The One Thing, where he talks about really just focusing in and really honing in on one thing specifically and becoming great at that one thing. But then on the flip side, you have people like Gary Vaynerchuk who talk about how you should be working on all kinds of different things at once and how he always has eight different balls in the air at once. So where do you fall on this? Should people be focusing on one thing or should they be doing a multitude of different things?

40:43I think you got to know yourself. Like Gary would say, I think you got to know yourself. For me, I'm a decathlete in sports. I did an event in track and field called the decathlon. It's 10 events in one event. And so it was two days, five events each day. And decathletes are known as people who are really, really, really good at all 10 events, but not an expert at any one. And they actually didn't have the skillset to be the best at any one in the world, but they're really, really good at all 10. And you're judged on your ability to be really, really good at all 10. You're scored at each event.

41:21And by being really good at all 10, whoever wins the Olympic gold medal is anointed the greatest athlete in the world. So even though you're not the fastest person, the highest jumper, the longest jumper in the world, you're not a specialist at being the best at the 100 meters, you're the greatest athlete in the world because you were great at 10 different things. I think you got to know who you are. So any one of those athletes would have never gotten a medal, maybe one or two, but most of those athletes would have never gotten a medal if they specialized in just the 100 meters or the 400 or the mile, whatever it is, pole vault.

42:00Almost none of them would have gotten a medal at the Olympics, but they medaled because they were great at multiple things. And that's what their skillset was. But then you got to know who you are, what's available for you. For me, I like to do lots of different things, probably too many things. And this year, I decided I'm going to cut back and focus more on one thing and see how that works for a year. And I'm going to focus more on optimizing my show, my podcast going all in. And any projects that I do on the side have to support that. So that's my way of saying like, okay, I'm going to have fun.

42:34I'm going to do this thing, this thing. But it's all got to go back to pushing the podcast, promoting the podcast, building the podcast, making it better, doing whatever it takes to grow it because that's my mission. So I spent the last seven years building a show and trying lots of different things as well. And I realized that my greatest gift is doing the show. So I'm going to eliminate a few things, go all in on the show, see what happens there for a year or two, and then reevaluate. It's all depends on where you're at in your life. Yeah. I remember listening to your episode where you talked about that.

43:05I think it was with Rory Vaden, if I remember correctly, a couple of weeks back. Great episode. Yeah. Thank you. That's so right. I mean, it goes back to doubling down on what brings you happiness and success, right? You mentioned that helping people is what brings you and makes you feel successful. And like we talked about, you can mentor so many millions of people through your podcast. are you still looking for or just working with mentors today, even though all the success you've had? Absolutely. I mean, I probably don't call them, I don't have official mentors. I just feel like I get to interview the most brilliant people in the world and I just stay in touch with them.

43:41And I was texting with Grant Cardone this morning because he's in town and I'll FaceTime when I want, I have a question about money. I'll text some Olympic athlete if I have a question about training. I'll text a top doctor about nutrition. I have mentors on any topic of life because I've interviewed the best. And so they're not an official mentor, but they're just friends that I help and support and they help me. And I'm always leaning. Last night, I did a three-hour coaching session with a friend who's a mentor and specialist. He helped me with some emotional things. It's like I'm always reaching out to my network.

44:17Robert Leonard If you were able to go back in time and give your millennial self just one piece of advice, what would you tell yourself? Robert Leonard Knowing what I know now, I mean, I've probably said invest in certain things differently. If I knew how the future was going to be, put it all on Red 7. I think I would read things popped in my mind that I wish I would have had 10, 15 years ago. I wish I would have studied Spanish and become fluent in Spanish back in, And even right after college, just started studying it and saying, that's when I had the most time to just learn and most downtime.

44:51I wish I would have just been all in on learning Spanish. Because I believe that the Spanish-speaking countries and communities around the world, there's a big opportunity to impact them through the content that we're creating. And I think translating subtitles and someone else dubbing audio is great, and you can impact people still there. but I think if you actually had the language, you could do some incredible things for these communities and impact people. So it would just be another skill, like another tool in the tool belt that would make you more unique and stand out. I'm actually looking for someone to come tutor me every day here in LA.

45:28So I'm actually trying to find that person right now, Spanish, and invest in it now. Because I don't want to regret in 20 years still not having the language, still not being at least fluent enough to have a conversation. The second thing I would say I would have invested in, I feel like I did a pretty good job with my health, but I think I would have invested in learning how to cut out sugar 100%. Because I think sugar is like rat poison and it tastes incredible, but it's killing us slowly. We don't understand how much sugar is killing us. And I'm the first one to follow. Sugar is my addiction.

45:59It's my vice. I eat cookies, brownies, cakes, whatever you name it, candy. I'm all in. It hurts me. like in the long run, I feel the negative effects in my mid-30s. I start to feel it. And I wish I would have cut that addiction earlier because now I have to work a lot harder to manage it and make sure I'm not eating it at certain times and all that stuff. And I think the third one, I would have learned about creating amazing storytelling videos at a much younger age, like viral videos, because that's what reaches the masses right now, viral videos, and video in general, video on Facebook, video on Instagram, video on YouTube, video on TikTok.

46:37Video has the ability to transform the world or reach a broad audience. Even if it's a negative thing, it has the ability to reach more people. So I would have learned how to be a great video storyteller at an earlier age. It's funny that you mentioned Spanish because that's actually something that I wish I had learned myself. I'm going to probably go ahead and try and learn that. Yeah. I think you should make it a goal of yours for the next three years to be fluent and do whatever it takes. It should be a non-negotiable. In my opinion, if I could go back and change anything, it'd be that for sure.

47:11Just because imagine what you can do knowing the language for the rest of your life. And the sooner you learn it, the more powerful your life will be. The longer you wait, it's just going to be harder and harder. It's going to be more busy in your late 20s than it is now. So sacrifice an hour of TV a day for an hour of learning. How about in business? Is there anything that you'd go back if you were starting your business over again that you would do differently? I learned through all my mistakes. And so I don't know what I would change specifically. I think I might've hired better people earlier on because I just hired based on a need quickly.

47:47I didn't really go through a hiring process and find the right people early on. I was just like, all right, you're available. Let's bring you in and then train you up. And then six months later, they weren't the right fit and they would leave. So it was just a lot of wasted energy on getting subpar people who were invested and who had the skills and the attitude to really do something, which took a lot more time and energy for me to make up for it. So making sure to have the right people on the team and being very specific about the energy you bring around you, the people, skills, attitude, everything.

48:20Whether it be about business, entrepreneurship, or just life in general, what is a common piece of advice you hear given on the internet by quote unquote gurus or experts that you think is misleading or just wrong? And how would you make that good advice? First thing that came to my mind is don't sleep and hustle more. But I think it's impossible to have balance, like total balance in your life. And you're going to need to have seasons of hustle and lack of sleep, potentially a little less sleep. I think it'll hurt you if you're really cutting, pulling all nighters all the time or four hours a night all the time, I think it'll hurt you in the long run.

48:58So be strategic about creating structure and parameters and boundaries around these seasons of your life and don't allow hustle and no sleep to be a lifestyle. Allow it to be a lifestyle for a certain amount of time, season, and then you're able to recover and get back on track with better boundaries and balance in your life. Lewis, thanks so much for your time. I know it's super valuable, so I really do appreciate it. This seriously has been a great episode that I think the audience is going to gain a lot of value from. I know I have. So where can the listeners go to learn more about you and connect with you further?

49:36School of Greatness podcast on Apple or Spotify, lewishouse.com, at lewishouse. And I've got a new documentary coming out. If you go to greatness.com, you can watch the documentary for free just by opting in. So check out greatness.com, Check out the movie, spent a lot of time on it, a lot of money, Hollywood directors, the whole thing. That's coming out. So check that out at greatness.com. I'll be sure to put a link to that in the show notes, as well as links to all of Lewis's other resources. And as always, I'll put links to different books that relate to the topics that we talked about today.

50:11So you can dive deeper into them if you're interested in learning more. So be sure to check out the show notes below in your favorite podcast player, or going to theinvestorspodcast.com and looking for the Millennial Investing Show. Lewis, thanks so much. I really appreciate it. Lewis Thanks, my man. Appreciate you. Lewis All right, guys. That's all I had for this week's episode of Millennial Investing. I'll see you again next week. Thank you for listening to TIP. To access our show notes, courses, or forums, go to theinvestorspodcast.com. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any decisions, consult a professional.

50:47This show is copyrighted by the Investors Podcast Network. Written permissions must be granted before syndication or rebroadcasting.