Latest / Forge Fire Protocol Podcast / You Don't Know What You Don't Know

Transcript

You Don't Know What You Don't Know · Forge Fire Protocol Podcast

0:02
Imagine breaking free from the grind and building a business that lights you up, ignites with purpose, and delivers the ultimate reward.
0:12
Forge Fire Protocol gives ambitious entrepreneurs the proven five-step system to choose the right business, launch it successfully, scale it strategically, and exit on your terms.
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Turning vision into lasting wealth, forged in fire, built for legacy.
0:35
All right, welcome back to the Forge Fire Protocol Podcast.
0:39
We've got a great session here today.
0:41
We're going to be talking about, we teased this in the last episode, we're going to be talking about how you get to where you want to be and one core element that pretty much every business owner, every entrepreneur, quite frankly, pretty much everybody in life, we all need something to fill the holes that we don't know how to fill yet.
1:03
All right?
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We need to identify those holes and we need to fill those.
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And part of that and doing that, one key way is something we don't always think about, but it's coaching.
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So we're going to get into coaching much more in depth here.
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We, from the Forge Power Protocol, it's all about systems.
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We build systems that help people take an idea, validate it, launch it, scale it, and exit with it.
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That's what we do.
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All right.
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So this is not the mindset piece.
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This is that, that we're the, we're the tools behind the scenes.
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Does that make sense guys?
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And by the way, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm here with Michael Sullivan, Stephen Moynihan, my two partners in business here.
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And I'm Donald Plume and just always excited to be here.
1:50
So let's, let's, let's get into this, Michael, you know, I know you've done a lot with coaching.
1:58
Why has it been so important to you?
2:01
Well,
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Let me ask you this.
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Can you think of anyone?
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Just tell me who the top three athletes or the top two athletes you can think of in your lifetime.
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You don't have to tell me the names.
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Just think of them inside your head.
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Do they have a coach?
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Yep.
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Do they have a coach that you associate a coach with them, most likely, if you just spend a split second thinking about it?
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Yep.
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It's not by accident.
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So it doesn't matter who you are.
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The highest performers on this planet,
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The difference is in the business space, I have never in my life met a successful entrepreneur who didn't have coaches, plural.
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You don't know what you don't know.
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There's no reason to take the scenic route can be beautiful.
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And it also can be disastrous.
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It can be awful and ugly.
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It's nice for Sunday drives.
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Right.
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And sometimes you're lucky.
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Sometimes you're lucky.
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And along the way, you get some beautiful visuals to go along with it.
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More often than not, you're heading into the dark forest where the road ends.
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And now you're climbing through weeds.
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And you're trying to figure your way out to the main road.
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A perfect analogy I have, and this is insane, but years ago I was debating if I should make this decision.
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Should I go to college out of Stan South?
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And I was really going back and forth.
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I knew I should.
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I knew I should.
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It was undoubted, but I wasn't making the decision.
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I was letting everything else kind of even still be considered, which was obnoxious.
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So I'm thinking about, and this just shows how crazy I am partially, but I'm at a party at my friend's house and I'm not heavily intoxicated, but I'm definitely not without any alcohol in my system.
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And I looked and I was like, what, what did you just say?
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And my buddy's like, yeah, some people are afraid to walk in the woods because they said that there's some bear traps people have put in the woods, which didn't make sense to me why they would be in these woods, maybe others.
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He's like, so people don't go walking in the woods.
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Yeah.
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And I got up and I was like, okay, so here's the deal.
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I'm going for a walk in the woods.
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I'm going to do a straight path.
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If I make it out to the main road, theoretically, that's where it should take me, right?
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And he's like, yeah, theoretically, but you have to like, just, I don't even know what's, I've never.
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I'm like, yeah, I didn't ask.
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I'm going to take a straight path to the woods.
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If I walk, if I make it out to the main road, you guys just pick me up.
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Like look for me on like an hour, hour and a half.
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If I do, by the way, I'm going to Myrtle Beach.
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And he's like, what?
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Just in like an hour.
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Will someone just drive right around that section and just see if I'm out there?
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Like an hour, hour and 15.
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If it's more than an hour and a half, then I'll maybe call the police because that's not a good sign.
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Something probably bad happened.
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I'm like, but bottom line is, as insane as that is, I made it out to the main road.
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Yes, I did it.
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It's another one of them extreme moments in my life where I just made a decision.
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The path was obnoxious and stupid and ignorant and unrighteous.
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obvious for a teenage male because we're morons.
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We're just three to five years behind the females on that same side in terms of how we process at that age.
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But needless to say, it was a firm decision.
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As insane as it was.
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And it ended up having a major impact on my life because I never would have been the same person had I not gone there.
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That's wild what you just said.
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It's insane.
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But again too, I had coaches that pushed me to make the uncomfortable decision.
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who pointed out to me that doing nothing or doing the same old, same old wasn't going to get me where I wanted to do.
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If I wanted to be great, it didn't matter how much talent I had.
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It didn't matter how great my parents or my coach on last year's team thought I had.
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That coach is not my coach this year.
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He's like, what are you going to do if you look at the best players?
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What are you going to do to make sure that you're still working harder than everyone out there?
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Because every single player who's the best players in the world works harder than anyone else.
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Some people chalk it up just to talent.
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That might have been the foundation.
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But I knew some of the best athletes I've ever met in my life never got drafted.
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But kids who were mediocre when they were younger who worked their tail off and fell in love with the process,
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and had great coaching and great mentors and just fell in love with the process, those are the ones that ended up having professional careers.
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And the big difference was coaching.
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And that's insane.
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So what was the difference that coaching made in that situation?
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And we've all had our own coaching experiences.
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The courage to make an uncomfortable decision and push myself.
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That simple.
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The courage to say, I'm going to do it.
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This may sound insane.
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I don't care.
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I'm going to do it.
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and just doing it and then taking action.
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How does a coach get you to that point?
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It depends on the person.
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That can be a journey.
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Sometimes people just adopt it.
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And the best thing is, same thing if you read The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles.
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One of the first things he says at the beginning that is really off-putting for some people, others embrace it.
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It's like, at this point in time, I need you to put aside all other thought, all other books, all other information and just assume that I'm right.
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You need to go in and Bob Proctor, for example, used to say that his mentor said to him, can we agree that my life is better than yours?
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Can you agree that I'm someone you consider never sick, that I'm someone that you consider always having money?
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Well, my way works.
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Your way clearly isn't.
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So why don't you just adopt my beliefs and assume that I'm right until you figure out that I'm not?
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But you need to trust in the process and trust that that person can get you there.
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And if you realize they can't, okay, then now they're not the right coach for you anymore.
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But more times than not, overwhelmingly more times than not, they're going to make you a better person.
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They're going to help get you and do things you never would have done.
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And it doesn't have to be holistically.
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I had someone I hung around with a lot who wasn't the most phenomenal person and all around the edges, but he was one of the funniest pastors I've ever met in my entire life.
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And I'm like, I can pick up just timing and humor by being around him.
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I don't have to approve of anything else that goes on, nor am I gonna encourage it or allow it, but I am gonna, and it really helped socially.
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Because he was hilarious.
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He was one of the funniest people I ever met in my life.
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That's awesome.
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But I realized at a younger age that you can pick up on things from people.
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And that group of five doesn't have to be five perfect people.
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They can each have their benefits.
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but you need to make sure that you don't get brought into the bat.
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So like if that starts overwhelming, then you just got to push them aside and say, thank you for the lessons.
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I'm going to hang out with you a little bit less now.
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Yeah.
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And that's important because you do become who you associate with.
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Yep.
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So that's important.
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But you know, I'm thinking from a coaching perspective, right.
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Uh, just in my experiences, I've had coaches that will, they, they, they see things from a different view, right.
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Just like, um, uh,
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Edison would go to sleep.
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Yeah.
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I've,
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I've done the same thing.
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I can tell you that.
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Usually I'll bash my head against the window a few times going back to the last podcast.
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Right.
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But then from there, once, once I bashed it enough, all right, I'm starting to get a little sore.
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I'm like, all right, I need to rethink this.
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I need to come at this from a different view.
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So I'll sleep on it.
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I'll think about it.
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I'll sleep on it next, next morning.
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I don't normally take nap during the day.
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I don't, I haven't created that luxury for myself yet.
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But I, I will sleep on it overnight and the next morning it's amazing what happens.
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It's a whole different view, right?
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And that's helpful.
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So where does that come in or where do coaches come in with that?
9:39
Well, I'll tell you.
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Coaches look at what your situation is.
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They look at where you are.
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They look at your business and they're looking at it from a completely different set of lenses than what you have, right?
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So they're looking at it differently.
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And what do they do?
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They ask you questions from their perspective a lot of times.
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And it makes you think.
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It's like, because you were thinking about your own perspective, your own way of looking at something.
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And now you get somebody else questioning you about this in a positive way.
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You know, they're not trying to tear you down, but they're trying to, okay, so why is that?
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Or how does that really work?
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Or is that really the best way?
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You know, whatever the question is.
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Can I give a very real world example for a split second to what you just said?
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I'm going to use you as the example based on your words.
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Oh, okay.
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Okay, so I'm curious just to see it and I wanted to be interactive with it.
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So that comment we just made about Edison, I found your words very interesting.
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After it, you said, I haven't afforded myself the luxury to do that yet.
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Because you associate, based on your results and what you've had and where you've had success, is just pushing through as being the trusted way to continue that progress and movement to get things done.
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Because you perceive sleeping as not progressing at the time.
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I'm not saying it's right or wrong, but I'm saying we're talking about how coaches make you look at things from a different angle.
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So as you were talking about that, I was thinking if Edison was coaching you, would he not be like, you know what, let's just try this.
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The next time you don't have something and you can't get through it, stop.
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Give yourself, even if it's just a relaxation, five, 10 minute window, just to decompress and try to think it, just see what happens.
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If it doesn't work, then go back, but try it a couple of times.
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I'm not saying that's right, but I'm saying that's right.
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You were talking about coming at it from a different angle.
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There is a situation where if you were being coached enough by, let's say, someone such as Edison, I expect that would be the advice you would get that is completely, it's a polarizing approach to the way that you handle things and that you've had success.
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And so, like, coaching doesn't have to mean changing it because you're unsuccessful and you're going to have success.
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It can mean you've had success, and I'm just going to bring something to the table because this could be exponential hockey stick curve rather than linear growth.
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I love that you said that and you brought that up.
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That was, I mean, first of all, yes.
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Cause I was looking at it one way and, and, and by the way, part of it isn't so much the sleeping as it is, you know, not being productive during that time, but it's, it's, it's quitting.
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I can't in my head stop.
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I have to keep trying to find a way, right.
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That's, that's where my mind frame is, but I love how you brought that up.
12:19
It does.
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You know, I've launched some pretty big businesses.
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I've launched some small, I've done all kinds of different things.
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And, um,
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And yet, and I've been, I'm a little seasoned.
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I've been around for a little bit.
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So I've done a lot of different things.
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And you just caught something that was a simple tweak.
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And that was just live, right?
12:38
Yeah.
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And I love, I'm so glad you said it.
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And so now I'm going to be thinking more about that myself, right?
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But that was a great example of coaching, right?
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Because Mike wasn't knocking what I was saying.
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What Mike was doing was catching something that he saw in a different light.
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than how I described it and questioned it, right?
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Not in a negative way, but just in a, hey, I really wanna understand, right?
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And more so to make me think about it and look at it a little differently.
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And that's what you're gonna find coaches will do for you.
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And when you get that different view on whatever it is that you're doing, you're going to fill a lot of those holes.
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You're gonna come up with those ideas.
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I met with a guy and I want to jump to you, Stephen, because I need to get some comments on this.
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But I met with a guy named Doug Babcock.
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Now, Doug is a business coach.
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He owns Counterparts Coaching.
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Great, great guy.
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And I met with him about a week and a half ago.
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And we talked about Forgefire, by the way, and the coaching program we're building into Forgefire.
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All right.
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So calling all coaches, by the way, you're going to want to know about this.
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All right.
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And we're actually doing a 72 hour longer than, but a market test on this from a coaching platform perspective.
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So feel free to reach out if you have an interest in that.
14:05
But, um, he really made me look at a few different things and he's not technically my coach.
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He's a friend, uh, who is a business coach, but he, he looked at this and he started asking me all kinds of great questions.
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And then he allowed me to ask him a bunch of different questions from his perspective and from, from, from coaching.
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And it was just, it was a great exchange of ideas.
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I really enjoy the time I get to spend with them and what we learn from each other.
14:30
Right.
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But that's what you'll find with coaching.
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It's, and it doesn't matter what level you're at.
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Right.
14:35
Steven, you've been at all different levels in, in corporate America.
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Right.
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Your version of corporate America anyways, the Steven corporate.
14:42
Right.
14:43
But, but you, you see things differently than I do.
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Right.
14:52
Well, then Mike does.
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We all see things differently.
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How do we, how, how would we view things if we had everybody else's eyes?
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Am I, am I making sense in that question?
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I don't know that I am.
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Or another, or another set of eyes.
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Okay.
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We'll go there.
15:10
Yeah.
15:10
Yeah.
15:11
Um, a lot of.
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Well, for me, when you talk about coaching, I, you know, I always default to sports.
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Um, unlike Mike, you know, I played football, but my last high school game was Thanksgiving day, senior year.
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And in Connecticut, we always had a line, like whatever they, whatever they had in the water in Massachusetts, they just grew bigger and stronger.
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That was, you know, Yes, we did.
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Cause you would see players from up there and say, oh, this is going to be hard.
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Um,
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But when you had a coach that could really impart some skills to you and give you a greater skill set than you had, and when you've experienced that, it leaves that door open for coaching.
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But if you haven't experienced that, that door might be not open to you.
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You may not have the door open.
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But if you take a moment and you take a chance and you get that different perspective, you might just find that it's a key that truly ignites you.
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If I could add something, I just actually got emotional about something that I just want to share.
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I had a coach named Jerry Bilodeau, my freshman year of high school at BC High.
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I mentioned this briefly, and I'm going to just tell you why I'm even mentioning this.
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Day one, I was intimidated by the 125 kids going out for football.
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I've mentioned this before.
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Got on the bus and went home.
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I don't know why.
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I'm embarrassed by that, but it happened.
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I was 15.
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I had a brief conversation with me.
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I said, go back.
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talked to the coach, went up there, did my thing, validated.
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Coach had belief in me, even though I had to earn every step of the way.
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But what was insane about this team is the team would practice one person out of 100 before we even knocked it down, would make a mistake, stop, whistle, whole team runs.
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Then we'd do it.
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And even as it whittled down to like 50, 60 players, one person made a mistake, stop, whole team runs.
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And initially it starts off with
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One person say, come on, dude, you got to run.
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People yelling at each other.
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And he hears that and says, another.
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And then someone would give someone else a crap for causing us to do another.
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And someone would yell at the other kid for that.
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Another.
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What happened that year is the insanity of that to some people listening to it.
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How can one person do this?
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We were unstoppable.
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We went 10-1.
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We lost the very first game of the year by an extra point and then won every game for the rest of the year.
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Then we played that team again.
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The reason why I bring that up
17:47
is Don, when we were talking a minute ago about Edison, what all I could think of is, I want to now create a brief mastermind inside the portal where I want to bring Edison and Jobs, two people who have different approaches and have them to just battle and assess me on this.
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Forget anyone else right now, just bring them two in on that who have different approaches or an Edison and a Buffett and to have them just advise and just see that and see how that could take me somewhere.
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But what I started thinking is, there are people in our lives, like I've lost too many family members
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And Jerry Bilodeau, who's now, I believe, a Boston Latin, is where he still teaches to this day.
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Phenomenal person, major inspiration on my life, major.
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Just on definition of teamwork and leadership was defined as a 15-year-old through that one person.
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Why have I not reached out to him, had a conversation and added him to my mastermind based on his thoughts, even interviewed him to gather his information and make those thoughts and those things that made him who he is, share that and make that part of the mastermind.
18:46
He's still here.
18:48
You want to talk about coaching.
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How about being able to take someone who's had a major influence on your life?
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Because there are people out there who have, and a lot of them are probably gone.
18:57
Unfortunately, it's just the reality of it.
19:00
And Steve, you talk about your dad.
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And the minute you started going that, I started picturing you talking about your dad and your brother with regards to coaching.
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And just that stuff just started going right through my head.
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And embracing that and taking advantage.
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I would love to have my father's thoughts.
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And I can share what he did, but I would love to hear it from the horse's mouth.
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I would love to hear him take it and just dictate it and add that to my mastermind.
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And that's what you have the ability to do right now.
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Not only get that outside coaching, but when you get that coaching, record it, add it.
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Take that information to those people who are empowering you and add that to your mastermind.
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Take people from your past who are still with us.
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Interview them.
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Talk to them.
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Add them to your mastermind.
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You have the ability to do something now that is unprecedented that you never had before.
19:45
And that's not where we were going with this.
19:46
But really, I got emotional for a second thinking about the people that are gone that I can no longer ask.
19:53
And I cannot get their perspective in the little things that drove them.
19:57
Yeah, I had this happen to me the other night, I wanted something.
19:59
And I'm like, none of them are alive.
20:02
I can't even go to one of them.
20:04
Yeah, right.
20:05
Which, by the way, is another reason why you need to leave a huge volume of quality content on how you think.
20:17
Yep.
20:18
Because somebody
20:19
is going to need that later.
20:21
Yep.
20:21
You know, I look at what we've developed as a mastermind system inside of ForgeFire protocol, literally.
20:26
And I know that's we've had the discussions on masterminds, but inside of ForgeFire, we built a mastermind platform where you can pull in literally Einstein, you can pull in Steve Jobs, you can pull in Elon Musk right now.
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You might not know how to reach them, but here they all have a huge body of content and knowledge and videos and
20:49
books and, and all sorts of things.
20:51
We've been able to collect all of that information, put it into our system.
20:56
And by doing so, the, the AI that is utilizing that knows how they're thinking, how they would think, how they would respond, how they would answer.
21:05
And so you can literally go to them.
21:07
Okay.
21:07
Now that, that doesn't replace coaching from a, from a masterminding and coaching are two different things.
21:14
I do want to say that.
21:15
And that's probably really important to state.
21:17
Um,
21:18
The masterminding can really help you to solve a challenge.
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It can help you to think a little differently, but coaching really gives you an entirely new perspective.
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And it's from somebody that's working directly with you.
21:33
By the way, for those of you who, if you don't know how to find a good coach, we'll talk a little bit about that in a couple minutes, but if you don't know how to find a good coach, reach out to us.
21:41
All right, we're building a great, I don't wanna say collection,
21:48
What's the proper term?
21:50
But a great stable of coaches that really understand, and they're ideal for different situations, right?
21:56
Depending on where you are in business today, depending on where you are in life today, right?
22:03
You want to be connected with the right coach, and it will change your life.
22:09
And let me ask you this.
22:10
Do you guys find yourself...
22:13
if you have a coach, you're part of a program, do you find yourself recording your sessions so you can try to go back to them later or taking notes or trying to make sure that you can, you're not, you're trying to retain that information from the coach.
22:26
And that's what I think is so game changing.
22:28
Now is I want that coach's information.
22:31
I want to go back and listen to it.
22:33
I want to be able to pull exactly what they said in their exact words,
22:36
Because my translation of it is my words.
22:39
And my words might modify the power of their statement.
22:44
So that's where, when I have the ability to record that information, to gather that information and take that private data from those conversations I've had and import them into my mastermind or to my collection, I can now go to them on demand.
23:02
Because I get them and probably I'm paying for them for some period of time.
23:05
Oh, yeah.
23:06
Okay, like I'm paying for them because I want access.
23:08
It's the law of proximity.
23:09
Yeah.
23:10
And the value that they bring is immense.
23:12
Immense.
23:13
You're going to want to go back to that.
23:15
And depending on where you are, some people will have the same coach for 20 years.
23:19
A lot of people have a coach for 5, 10 years, and then they move on to someone else.
23:22
Or maybe they have five coaches and they're focused on this, that, and the other thing.
23:26
This person got them to 10 million, and now they're looking for someone that can get them to 50.
23:29
And that's probably not the guy who got them to 10.
23:30
Maybe it is, but it often isn't.
23:35
but I want to be able to go back to that.
23:37
And that's where I think the whole coaching and AI and mastermind and all that really has been married.
23:45
I never thought about it until we had this conversation, but as we're bringing in these coaches, we're having these conversations also make sure that that goes, conversations you have are available to you as part of your knowledge and your personal lexicon that that you can pull upon on demand to get that advice based on your conversations and your meetings.
24:02
Yeah.
24:04
And because of technology, you know, not just the stuff that we built in the Forge Fire, but some of the stuff that we build into our business platforms that we use for, you know, painters, for contractors, for all the different types of AI platforms that we built, because it's a different side of our business, right?
24:19
But you're able to take all of that content, right?
24:23
Not just from, let's say, a granola or a recording, the transcripts, all of that.
24:29
You're able to feed that in.
24:31
And now...
24:33
even when you're not there, which this is giving me another idea, by the way, guys, do you see the big light bulb?
24:39
Right, right above my head.
24:42
Right.
24:42
It's like literally just exactly what you're saying.
24:47
That coach can be with you.
24:50
I don't want to say 24 hours a day, but virtually.
24:51
Right.
24:53
And, and the more interaction you have with that coach or those coaches, the more beneficial.
25:01
because you're going to have even more content.
25:03
But also just how they're changing you.
25:06
And it's not like they're changing you.
25:08
They're giving you a different perspective.
25:10
One of my favorite, favorite series of books is a series by Andy Andrews.
25:18
I don't know if you guys have ever read Andy Andrews.
25:20
He wrote The Traveler's Gift.
25:21
He wrote a lot of books.
25:24
But if you read anything with Andy Andrews, read about Jones.
25:30
All right.
25:30
And Jones doesn't have a last name.
25:32
It's just Jones, not Mr. Jones.
25:33
It's just Jones.
25:34
But it's all about perspective.
25:38
And perspective changes so much of how we look at things because it's it's a massive key.
25:45
And that's where coaches come in.
25:47
So I know you got you got something brewing there, Steven.
25:49
Sorry.
25:53
You talk about having a coach or having a mentor.
25:58
So I was in my early 20s, and I had to go call on somebody for business.
26:04
I don't recall what it was.
26:06
And my father's best friend was insurance agent in town.
26:10
His son was my best friend.
26:12
And he always had sound advice.
26:13
So I stopped in and saw him because I knew he knew this business owner.
26:17
And I talked to him.
26:18
He gave me some ideas.
26:19
And it was great.
26:20
And he goes, but most of all, he's a tough guy.
26:23
And what you really want to do is you want to reach down and you want to hold on to yourself when you're walking into the building, walking through the parking lot.
26:31
Okay.
26:32
So, and I'm getting up to leave and he says, remember, hold on to yourself.
26:36
And I said, okay, I got it.
26:37
And I'm paraphrasing what he said because it was a little more.
26:42
And I'm in the car and I'm driving out of his parking lot.
26:45
He comes running out and he's waving his arms and this guy, he's 6'6".
26:49
He's tall.
26:50
And I stopped and he says, I forgot to tell you the most important thing.
26:54
Let go of yourself before you walk in his office.
26:56
You don't want to be embarrassed.
26:58
And what that did is it just took everything and went and diffused it.
27:05
And he knew what he was doing.
27:08
He knew that.
27:09
Now...
27:10
This is a guy that my father once said, if you ever want to know what to do in a situation, always think, and his name is Bob Smith, always think about what Bobby Smith would do.
27:20
And that's the right decision.
27:22
And it was really a testament to this man's character.
27:26
Now, fast forward a couple of years after that, the bank, that idea comes up.
27:32
I have three friends of mine in town.
27:36
They're all like one or two, three years older than me.
27:39
Um...
27:40
So, all four of us were married, two of us had kids already, and we're going to start a bank.
27:47
I knew the idea, I had it, sold it on them, we're going forward.
27:52
We finally have the application, which is another story in itself, and we get it in, and we get everything submitted.
28:02
There was a competing group in town, which
28:06
And then friends calls me up one Friday afternoon and says, you know, it's a competing group and you have a problem.
28:11
So what's that?
28:12
He said, it's, well, he called it the rotary club and that was all the people like our parents age.
28:16
Well, then it was men.
28:17
They didn't allow women in the club back then.
28:19
And he said, Bob's missing that group.
28:22
He says, okay.
28:23
You know, I thought about it and I'll have to deal with it.
28:26
What I knew is that at the time the banking commissioner had made,
28:29
four decisions on competing groups, that he would not make a decision with them, they'd have to come within their own town, they'd have to come together and work together, or there'd be no decision.
28:40
So I saw I'd made that four times.
28:42
And I looked at the members on that group, and they were all politically connected.
28:47
And, you know, I had that pull.
28:50
So it was two weeks later, again, Bob Smith calls me up one day, it was a little after five, I was home,
28:59
And he's talking, I see you got a competing group.
29:01
You know, one person was at insurance company used to work for him and he didn't like that.
29:07
He had a new entrepreneurial spirit at the American Way and started his own company.
29:11
Another person he didn't like, you know, cause his father didn't do a real estate deal with him that he wanted to do.
29:17
And he said, come in with us and we'll put you on a community board, which meant nothing.
29:22
You know, so I said, no.
29:24
Literally five minutes later, my mother calls me up.
29:28
says, I don't know what the problem is with Mr. Smith, but just do what he tells you to do.
29:34
Literally.
29:35
Ten minutes later, my father calls me up, and he says, I said, oh, Mr. Smith called you.
29:40
He said, yeah.
29:40
I said he called Mom, too.
29:41
He called your mother?
29:42
Yeah, that's what she said.
29:43
Just do what he tells you to do.
29:45
And he said, like, he was good.
29:48
I can understand for saying that.
29:50
And you're in a tough spot.
29:51
But here's what I'll tell you.
29:53
This is business, and do what's best for you.
29:56
And that wasn't like my father, but it was great advice.
30:00
And because I knew about that decision-making process, so he then calls me up, Mr. Smith, a week later, and he says, you gotta come with us, community board.
30:10
We're not gonna put you on the full board.
30:12
And I just said, no.
30:13
And he says, don't you understand?
30:14
And I said, what?
30:16
He said, the board that decides the decision on the banking license is the banking commissioner, the controller, the state of Connecticut,
30:26
the Secretary of State of Connecticut.
30:29
He said there's only three people.
30:31
And I said yes, I understand that.
30:32
He said, you know my connections to all three?
30:34
I said yes, I understand that.
30:36
And he goes, okay, you call me and let me know when you're coming in with us.
30:40
Didn't make that call.
30:42
Three weeks later I get a call from him, he says, well, we'll bring you on our board.
30:48
as founders and directors.
30:50
The banking commissioner won't make a decision.
30:52
We have to come together or there's no decision.
30:55
And I said, yes, that's what I banked on.
30:57
No pun intended.
30:58
He said, how'd you know that?
31:00
I said, well, I've been down to the banking commission and I reviewed prior applications from the last two years.
31:07
And I saw ones and I read articles in the newspaper because there was no internet at that time.
31:11
And that was what he said, he stated that.
31:14
And I figured it would be, and the reason he did it was to avoid things like this, where the political connections came into play.
31:21
So by not making a decision between two groups, he took himself out of that decision.
31:26
And he said, you knew that?
31:27
Yes, why didn't you tell me that?
31:29
And I said, that was my card to play.
31:32
And he stopped a minute and paused and he said, I forgot you're a smart guy.
31:37
And that was a validation.
31:39
Yeah.
31:40
Yeah.
31:42
Great validation and great advice from your dad.
31:44
Yeah.
31:45
And hard when a guy that was like my second father.
31:47
Yeah.
31:49
You know, it's like, you know, when your dad just tells you, just do this because I said so.
31:53
When you're 10 years old, that works.
31:56
When you're 26, 27, it doesn't work so much anymore.
32:04
it's funny when you say that I started thinking about, you know, when I give advice to my kids on a lot of things, I will often preface it as, listen, I'm not a 21 year old female.
32:15
I never have been, but here's how I see it.
32:23
Now understand that's coming from a 50 year old male who's lived a life and had a lot of experience.
32:27
And I think a lot of what I have to offer here is valid, but,
32:31
I just think it's important that I share with you where I'm coming from and what I think you should do, but I want you to do what's right for you.
32:38
And I would say probably 80% of the time we're in alignment and 20% we're not.
32:46
The 20% that we're not, she's been right more often than not because it was right for her.
32:53
And I believe she learned so much more by her having to,
32:57
decide that I'm going to not go with the conventional advice that I'm getting from multiple people and just do it my way.
33:03
So I love the way that you kind of had those competing thoughts and that's all I was thinking about.
33:06
I was like, Oh, I like the way I do that actually, where I kind of tell them the thought and here's what I'm thinking, but it's your call and same thing.
33:12
Like, I love what your dad's doing.
33:14
Like it's in business, do what's best for you.
33:17
You get great advice because obviously there's an agenda on the other side too, but you having and knowing what you knew because you were prepared,
33:25
was essential and gave you that confidence to make that decision and having the courage to make that decision, which is unconventional for a lot of people who would just end up just following the curve.
33:34
But if you had done that, think about the different trajectory it would have had.
33:37
So just reinforcing the courage to make the decision based on your own knowledge and preparation and sound advice.
33:46
Yeah.
33:48
And courage is key there because a lot of people that would have even gotten that research done and known what you knew at that time,
33:56
would not, still would not have stuck to their guns.
34:01
So you'd be encouraged to do what you needed to do.
34:03
And I think all three of us have probably been beaten down on certain things where people, I don't know if both your parents said this, David or your mom said this to you, but I've had moments without my mom, but my wife, especially, and some others, if something didn't work out, see, see, I told you, I told you, I knew it wasn't gonna work.
34:19
And I'm like, you never considered what if it did?
34:22
And you have no idea the lessons I learned through that process.
34:27
Well, you're not going to do that again, right?
34:29
That'll never, not specifically that, but I'm looking right now for what else is going to inspire me and take me to that next level.
34:36
I don't know if it's going to work out, but I do know that I'm going to give a go at it and I'm going to learn everything I got.
34:41
And if I believe in it, I'm going to go.
34:43
And if it's not this one, it'll be the next one.
34:47
I had a, that made me think of a different guy.
34:49
It's funny because, you know, all these things that we're talking about, it's important.
34:54
I mean, you need a coach.
34:56
We all need coaches.
34:58
and mentors.
34:59
I mean, when we think about our lives, right?
35:01
But you made me think of a guy and I hadn't thought of him in a bit.
35:06
He was more of an impromptu mentor.
35:10
A guy named Bob Dorn, still out there.
35:12
You guys probably you might have even heard of him.
35:14
Like I can remember him saying to me one time, because I was having a tough time after
35:19
a company I had launched.
35:21
I helped launch, and they shut down.
35:23
So it had nothing to do with me.
35:25
My side of it was very profitable.
35:27
It was doing what it was supposed to do.
35:28
I grew a huge, huge organization.
35:31
And he says to me, when I went to him and I said, I get people around me that didn't think this was going to work.
35:41
It was working.
35:42
They started to be believers, and then it went out of business.
35:45
It got shut down.
35:47
And...
35:49
And I said, should I really continue down the road I'm going?
35:54
And he's like, for all of those people who said that to you and for you, he says, wouldn't it be a shame?
36:01
Did you learn a lot from all of this?
36:03
Yes.
36:03
Wouldn't it be a shame if you wasted all of that knowledge you just gained?
36:10
And those words have stuck with me.
36:13
It's like we learn from our experience.
36:15
That's why people talk about failure.
36:18
There's never failure.
36:19
All right.
36:20
Did you find a way that didn't work?
36:21
Yes.
36:22
All right.
36:22
The only way to fail is to never go and try again, never get back on that horse.
36:26
But when you learn from something and then you continue with those lessons, you can move towards success.
36:35
But you have to go through that.
36:36
You have to.
36:37
Yeah.
36:39
And by the way, those coaches don't have to be living.
36:42
Because a lot of people wrote some phenomenal books.
36:45
And the internet, everything's out there.
36:47
Internet, Audible, the books, everything.
36:51
Some of my biggest mentors have been gone for a while.
36:54
And I fall onto them and I take their counsel frequently.
36:58
Okay.
37:00
If you touched on a point right now in the ForgeFire protocol, what about the system we have in to go back and past people that have, have a lot of information about them out there and we build a board of directors for a company that's based on that and that knowledge base.
37:18
That's what you just talked about.
37:20
We have that built into this ForgeFire protocol.
37:23
Yep.
37:23
And that's some of the inspiration for us doing it is, you know, we've all had people.
37:27
that were influential to us or we've studied certain people in certain, and it's good to have differing opinions.
37:34
I mean, if you put everyone in the yes-men on your team, I don't think you're going to grow.
37:38
Like I always want people around me who are going to push me and push back.
37:44
It's, that's how you get better.
37:46
And when you can pull in incredible names, like we were talking about earlier, for example, in the last podcast, we talked about, you know, Edison and Jobs, for example, who had different ways of approaching problems.
37:56
Just think about the value of that and what that kind of coaching and just even considering it through that lens can provide you.
38:03
We have that lens built into the forge protocol.
38:06
Yep.
38:07
We can use the knowledge of those people.
38:09
Yep.
38:10
It's, that's right.
38:11
It's remarkable.
38:12
And we've demonstrated that before.
38:14
Yep.
38:14
And it's just amazing what, what it's like, they're right there in the room with us.
38:21
Yeah.
38:22
And they analyze things in their way and their perspective.
38:24
And it's amazing that the technology that's there that does that today.
38:28
Don, you had touched on about someone who's a coach right now and adopting the Forge Fire protocol for their business to teach to other people and what that could do.
38:42
Yeah, coaches.
38:43
So, um,
38:45
The person I was talking about before, Doug Babcock, he was the first person that I interviewed, the first coach I interviewed for our coaching program for the market test.
38:57
And like I said, he's a phenomenal business coach.
39:00
Highly, highly recommend him on CounterPoints Coaching.
39:04
He's also a friend.
39:05
I consider him a great friend.
39:06
He's about to release a book, by the way.
39:08
In fact, I think it comes out this week.
39:09
I can't wait to get a copy.
39:12
But he's just a great guy.
39:14
I didn't say he's part of the protocol yet.
39:17
He's helped us form what we're doing for coaches.
39:20
All right.
39:22
And hopefully he will be.
39:23
All right.
39:24
But we're developing that and we're getting ready to release that.
39:27
But we're moving that forward.
39:28
So what you're going to see, folks, is, yeah, if you are anywhere, you've got an idea and you want to move it forward.
39:42
We know that all of us have a certain amount of knowledge.
39:45
We have a certain amount of our minds are in different places.
39:49
Right.
39:49
We look at things differently.
39:52
What we really need to do, the one thing we all know or should all know is that whatever idea is that we it is that we have, we have to bring that out.
40:00
We have to test it.
40:01
Right.
40:01
And if it's not us that's testing it, we need somebody else to do it.
40:04
All right, we need to move ideas forward.
40:06
We need to make them a reality if they're worthwhile.
40:09
And in order to find that out, we have to test them first.
40:11
All right, that's where the forge comes in.
40:13
But as you're doing that, as you're thinking about it, at whatever level you are at, a coach is going to be able to help you move to that next level.
40:25
Right?
40:25
They'll help you to be more successful at the level that you're in now and help you to move to that next level.
40:31
And in some cases, those coaches will be able to go a couple levels with you.
40:34
Others, you know, at some point you may have to change coaches.
40:37
They'll let you know too.
40:37
All right.
40:38
They're coaches.
40:40
Coaches are great.
40:41
And then for, I want to say this, cause I know we're about at the end of the podcast for those coaches out there that are saying, you know what?
40:48
I teach mindset.
40:49
I teach, I help people pull these challenges out and really look at things in a different way.
40:58
And I'm very successful at that.
40:59
I'm, I'm, I'm,
41:01
I'm able to help my clients to do a lot of things.
41:04
But when your clients ask you specific business questions, you don't necessarily have those answers, right?
41:11
And you're looking for a system or a platform.
41:15
I'd invite you to be part of our case study that we're doing right now with coaches.
41:21
Reach out to us and let's have a conversation, right?
41:25
Because you could help us to form a system
41:28
what is going to be a phenomenal tool for all coaches.
41:30
It'll add a revenue stream for the coaches.
41:33
All right.
41:33
But it's also going to add a service that is going to bring true value to your clients that doesn't compete with what you do.
41:40
All right.
41:40
It supplements it complements what you do.
41:45
And that's what we have in the Forge.
41:46
And that's what we're developing from a coach's perspective with some special tools directly for coaches.
41:52
So just wanted to share that.
41:53
So I think that's what you're asking about, Stephen.
41:55
If not, you can ask something different.
41:56
Right.
41:57
No, exactly.
41:57
And it's licensing an operating spine over inventing curriculum.
42:03
On the Forge Fire protocol, well, it gives coaches a license, really a five-phase delivery spine.
42:10
That's the SPARP.
42:11
forge, ignite, temper, and ascend.
42:15
So they stop preparing weekly agendas.
42:18
Instead, they deliver a repeatable system engineered for an eight-figure exit.
42:26
That's the base.
42:27
That's the beauty of a coach adopting Forgefire protocol and building a business on it.
42:35
That the blueprint's already there.
42:40
And also just touching on that is you're not going to be able to coach everything.
42:44
And they know that.
42:45
I mean, you would double down on what you're great at.
42:46
I talked to a strategy coach on Wednesday night.
42:49
He said, I'm great at strategy.
42:50
This is what I do.
42:52
I don't know.
42:54
I know they should be leveraging AI and optimizing and enhancing.
42:56
I'm not going to do it.
42:57
I can recommend someone else that I know that can do that well to do that.
43:00
I don't have all the systems.
43:02
I can recommend the strategy and what they can change.
43:05
And even like in other sport, a team has a pitching coach, they have a hitting coach, they have a defensive coach, they have often an infielder coach.
43:10
One guy focuses on these positions.
43:13
There's specialties.
43:16
Okay, so you're probably not going to have this.
43:18
You might start off with just one coach.
43:19
And that one coach is probably going to address your biggest gap.
43:23
And then it's going to progress.
43:24
But if you're even reading books, then you're already accepting information from multiple coaches.
43:28
Just you only paid for the book because you got their condensed knowledge.
43:31
And that's where, again, when you subscribe to a coaching program or a platform from an actual coach who's going to interact with you, you're paying for that law of proximity, for that live direct feedback.
43:43
And I'm yet to see someone who hasn't really experienced exponential success by finding the right coach to address their main issues and going through that.
43:53
Like for me right now, there's certain things that I really need to get a lot better at.
43:58
that coaching costs me bare minimum 500 to get part of a group session.
44:02
And it's going to cost me about minimum one to $10,000 a month to get in the proximity that I need to be in.
44:11
If I don't find a way to get the income to get me there, I will probably not get to seven, eight, 10 figures in the timeline that I've set without getting,
44:24
without me not being an obstacle.
44:25
Because me saying that money is an issue is me creating an excuse and a problem.
44:30
Yep.
44:30
Okay, now I don't have that money today.
44:33
I'm not going to lie and say I have that kind of money I can throw out there.
44:36
I don't even know where that would come from right now.
44:37
I do know where I could create it, but it's not tangible today.
44:40
It's not in my hand.
44:41
It's not in my account.
44:45
It's a disservice to me that I'm doing to myself and to everyone around me by not getting that information out there and by not having a bigger impact by not figuring out problem A.
44:53
The best way for me to figure out problem A is to work with other people who have got past that and solve problem A so then I can go and subscribe to fix problem B.
45:00
It's all progressive, but it all comes from relying on coaches who have been there, done that.
45:04
Success leaves clues.
45:06
Follow the people who have had success.
45:08
Model their behavior.
45:09
Learn from them.
45:10
Get close to them.
45:12
If I bridge that law of proximity, it's the fastest way to bridge that gap, in my opinion.
45:16
Okay, you can read it and see it online, but when you get that proximity, it really makes a massive difference.
45:25
It definitely does.
45:26
And I'll tell you, every single coach I've had throughout the years has exponentially paid for themselves.
45:33
That's how it works.
45:34
All right, you got to pick the right coach, a good coach for where you are.
45:38
But I'll tell you, they pay for themselves.
45:42
many times over.
45:44
So with that, I believe we are at our end for today's podcast.
45:48
Remember to share this, save it, go to app.forgefireprotocol, download the app, get the core tools, the 72-hour market test.
45:58
Let's get your idea launched.
46:00
Let's move life forward.
46:01
Let's move your future closer.
46:04
All right, time's going to do it no matter what, but will it be that future or the future that you don't want?
46:11
Right.
46:12
It's all up to you making the decision to take those steps, taking action.
46:15
Right.
46:16
Be a rhino.
46:16
Let's do it.
46:20
That's it for this episode of the Forge Fire Protocol podcast.
46:24
Take at least one step from today's episode while the fire is still hot.
46:28
Don't let the insight cool.
46:31
Our goal is delivering real value for you and your business.
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Subscribe now to never miss an episode and help other ambitious entrepreneurs like you find the show by leaving a review on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen.
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Want the complete five-step system, the tools, the scorecards, and the exact playbooks we use inside the protocol?
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Head to forgefireprotocol.com and sign up now to step in to the full forge.
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Because we are forged in fire, built for legacy.
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Is your home wish list just sitting in your cart?
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Well, get ready to hit checkout because Wayday at Wayfair starts October 24th with up to 80% off everything home.
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That new sofa, the rug you've been eyeing, the upgrades you've been putting off, they could all be way less during Wayday.
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It's Wayfair's biggest sale of the year.
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So make your list and mark your calendar.
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Shop Wayday starting October 24th for up to 80% off everything home at Wayfair.com.
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We'll be right back.