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June 8, 2023

No Bad Days: How To Cultivate Ultimate Gratitude In Life & Business w/ Jeffrey Holst (REPLAY)

No Bad Days: How To Cultivate Ultimate Gratitude In Life & Business w/ Jeffrey Holst (REPLAY)

Today we talk about cultivating gratitude no matter what life throws at you. The ROI on this episode will be even greater than most of our investing shows!

Jeffrey Holst is a recovering attorney who spends his time as a podcast host and real estate investor. Jeff graduated early and with honors from Michigan State College of Law where he was the graduating class speaker. He also holds a M.B.A.

At 30 years old, Jeff checked the last item off his personal bucket list by climbing Machu Picchu. He was on top of the world. As he stood looking down at the lost Incan city, he had been living the life of his dreams. He was well traveled, having previously visited the Pyramids in Egypt, climbed to the top of Mt Sinai, swam with sharks in Belize, and backpacked alone around Europe. He married the girl of his dreams. He had a beautiful house in the suburbs and a thriving law practice. Two weeks later, he was in the hospital dying. His business was in disarray, his wife was barely holding it together and he was on his way to bankruptcy.

Today, at 43 years old, just over a decade later, Jeff is back on top. He is a millionaire, with over 250 residential units in his personal portfolio. He also owns multiple commercial properties. He is still married and continues to travel extensively. In February of 2020 Jeff climbed Mt Kilimanjaro and stood at the highest point in Africa. He is the co-host and founder of the Last Life Ever Podcast. As the original “Last Lifer,” Jeff is passionate about helping people live the best possible version of their lives. He is also co-host of the Old Fashioned Real Estate Show where the hosts drink bourbon old fashioneds and talk about real estate investing.

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Transcript
Speaker 1:

I went to law school, i made money, i went and saw the things I wanted to see and Machu Picchu was the last one. And I remember sitting on the top of the mountain and Machu Picchu, looking down over the city and thinking to myself what do I do? Like I'm done, like I'm 30 years old and I've just finished my bucket list. And literally two weeks later I was in the hospital diagnosed with leukemia and told me you might not make it till the end of the year. And when this stuff happened I went okay, how do I make this positive?

Speaker 3:

Welcome to the Action Academy podcast. Stand back while I celebrate freedom, the show where we help you achieve financial independence with the mindsets, methods and actionable steps from guests who've already earned their freedom. The flags of freedom fly. Choose to do what you want. What you want With who you want, with who you want, when you want, when you want, with another episode today. Now, here's your host, brian Lubin.

Speaker 2:

All right, jeff Holst, how are you buddy?

Speaker 1:

I'm doing really well. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 2:

Thanks for coming out of podcast. retirement man, I'm excited to have you.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no, I'd spend a minute. Actually, I've recorded only a few podcasts. in the last year I used to do them like three, four a week. Now I'm only doing them once in a while.

Speaker 2:

Taking the cobwebs off. How's the year been without the podcast? Was there anything else that you gave up to just have more freedom? Or what was your kind of MO behind it?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, honestly, this year I've been traveling a lot, so that's part of the reason why I haven't been doing as much, so I went to five continents so far this year, it's August right now. So pretty solid, solid start to the year. Yeah, i've been to Africa, tanzania, europe. I went to Germany and Amsterdam. I went to Antarctica, i went to South America and Argentina. I'm in Puerto Rico right now. I've been here like six times this year now. I rented a place year round in Puerto Rico And I've just been spending like two, three weeks here And then going back and taking care of my real estate business. I come, stay here for as long as I can And then when I have to go sign something or have to look at a building or something, then I leave and go for a while.

Speaker 2:

God man, that sounds nice. Must be nice for you On this podcast. We hate traveling, we hate freedom.

Speaker 1:

Travel is terrible.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's a horrible problem You lose your bags in the airline. No, it's dude, that's awesome. And you and I just just met like five, ten minutes ago. I was instantly like, oh, this is the guy. This is either your freaking show man. I'm so excited to get into the 30. Like I just joked about the 30 different ways you've overcome adversity in your life to create this beautiful life of freedom and traveling fun that you have now I really want to just give you the pilot seat, Like I'll give you the hunting license and just walk us through your story And we'll go from there.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, i could take up the whole show talking about my life because I like doing that And I won't be labored that because it will be unfair to your listeners if we spend all the time on my life story. But the short version is I was a bankruptcy attorney by trade. I went into bankruptcy law mostly because I didn't like doing other laws. So like when you go to law school and you just I went there to make money I thought I don't know what I want to do with my life. I'm going to go become a lawyer because they make money And that just made sense to me And I did make pretty good money. So there was that It wasn't really fulfilling me. It was like I'd show up to do the work. First I was doing criminal law and I was like man, i don't want to deal with criminals anymore. And then I was fighting over kids And I'm like I don't want to deal with people fighting over their kids anymore. This is like really soul sucking, terrible work. And bankruptcy law wasn't that much better, but at least I felt like I was helping people.

Speaker 2:

I was about to say that was your positive end to all that You're like divorce. no, this, no, But a bankruptcy. that's my jam.

Speaker 1:

You see why I should have never been a lawyer. I think this habit of talking to people out of going to law school. But really in my dream world I would have went to law school and never tried to slog Because I met so many great people in law school. One of my main business partners was a friend of mine in law school And he was flipping houses to pay his law school tuition And I was like I didn't even know that guy. I need to hang out with more people like that. So we became really good friends And now we own a couple hundred units together, so it's really worked out well.

Speaker 2:

But what?

Speaker 1:

happened really was. I went to law school. I went through this period of time. in 2007, i started doing only bankruptcy law, which was like actually really good timing and retrospect right. It was 2008 hit and everyone was going bankrupt. I lived in Michigan, in Grand Rapids area, and the GM plant there went bankrupt and it just caused this cascading effect of bankruptcies. I mean, in 2008, the first half of the year I probably made more money than any year until the last couple of years, for me It just were just stacking up cash And I was only four years out of law school. I'm not even. I was 30 years old and I was like just like I had TV commercials and I was like these ridiculous TV commercials like bankruptcy stuff And I felt like I was like better call Saul of West Michigan or something on the side of the bus. Yeah, i wasn't on the bus, but I actually was on the back cover of the phone book too actually. So I had television commercials and like phone book ads and those phone book ads, man, they were not cheap, they were like I think it was like a hundred thousand dollars a year to be on the silly phone book, which seems ridiculous now. but with the internet, like no one even looks, i don't even know if I have a phone book. I don't think I've seen a phone book in a decade, but at the time it was like this really good marketing strategy And we were actually about to get billboards too. I was negotiating with a contract to put billboards up all around town and that was going to be really fun. We had this cool idea that we call that false happens and we had this wheel and things would spin around and then bad things would happen to you And then it would be divorce happens or whatever bankruptcy happens, And then it would be like false happenscom. It's like it was so ridiculous. It was like this giant wheel, like a price style wheel with bad things happening on it. It was going to be really fun, but then in 2008, i decided to take. I've always loved traveling, so I decided to go to Peru and go to Machu Picchu, which, honestly, was one of the last things on my bucket list, like back in 2000 and 99, somewhere around there, when I was trying to decide what I wanted to do with my life. I went to on a golfing trip around Europe And I went to see the specific sculpture and I had this idea that it was one of Michelangelo's works. It's called the Moses and Michelangelo had this thing where, when he unveiled it for the Pope right Because it was the centerpiece of the Pope innocent the second or Julius the poor I don't one of the popes right It was the centerpiece of the Pope's grave. He unveils it for the Pope and he just sits there staring at it and doesn't say anything and the whole crowd's like awkward And finally, like one of his students is, hey, man, you got to say something. And he just takes his chisel and he throws it at the Moses and he screams out move. Like he's put so much of his life into this marble sculpture that he thinks it should just get up and move And I was like There's nothing in my life I'm not passionate about, so I'm going to go see this thing and see if it solves my existential crisis. So I go back backing around Europe, i climb the stairs to this little church that sits on a hill above the Coliseum and I'm looking at this thing and I'm like it's really nice, but it didn't change anything. So I walked outside and I sat down in the front steps of the church. Back then I was young and dumb, so I lit up a cigarette and I'm smoking a cigarette and looking down at the Coliseum and I'm like I'm just going to go to law school and make some money so I can travel and see old stuff. Like, really, that's all, that was the whole plan. So I made a short list of old things off the top of my head the pyramids in Egypt, peshu, a couple others. I made the short list Petra and Jordan, and then, over the next 10 years, that's what I did. I went and saw those things and I went to law school, i made money, i went and saw the things I wanted to see, and Mach Peshu was the last one, and I remember sitting on the top of the mountain in Mach Peshu, looking down over the city and thinking to myself what do I do? I'm dumb, i'm 30 years old and I've just finished my bucket list. And literally two weeks later, i was in the hospital diagnosed with leukemia and told me you might not make it until the end of the year. What? Yeah, literally like that fast, like two weeks, i'm at the top of the world, just finished my bucket list, i'm on television commercials, phone book ads, everything and I literally climbed off the mountain, checked my voicemail, called on a pay phone It's still old, back in the old days, all the pay phone checked my voicemail. I had this other attorney that worked for me put in his two week notice, like a week earlier, but I hadn't been traveling so I hadn't heard it, So he had it a week and then I got back and got diagnosed with leukemia, like all in the same, like two week period. So I went from having two attorneys to zero overnight, like I couldn't work. He was quit, he quit, and then I went from literally feeling like I had just done everything I wanted to do in life to being like, oh, maybe that is all I'm gonna do in life. And it wasn't awesome, obviously, but when I was 17, i made this decision that I would never have a bad day again, and I was really stubborn about it for 13 years leading up till that day. And when this stuff happened I went okay, how do I make this positive? My brain is trained to find positive things. So one thing is like the first night my brother came to the hospital and he goes oh, i bet today's a bad day. He's almost trying to prove it's not possible to never have bad days. So he says that And actually I didn't find out till 10 o'clock at night. Most of the day was pretty good And that was literally how I thought about it. And the thing about that is it's good and bad. Stuff happens to everyone every day, and it's right now somewhere in the world someone's having the best day of their life, so somewhere else in the world someone's having the worst day of their life. So the day is not good or bad, it's just how you perceive it, how you receive the day. That's what matters. And so that day was fine for me, because I felt like most of the day was pretty good. And then the next day was a little bit harder. But I remember it was like one or two o'clock in the afternoon. there was a shift change and this nurse walks in and she looks at me and she goes oh my God, jeff, i'm so sorry to see you here. And I went oh my God, shelly, i'm so happy to be here. I think she thought I was nuts. But the thing is, this girl was like my childhood babysitter and hadn't seen her in a decade, and I was just really excited to see her And that made my day okay for me. I was like this is a good day, like I got to see Shelly And like, yeah, i still had to deal with leukemia. I still thought I was going to die. I remember telling my mom I said I just hope I make it till Christmas, and this is in September, september 2008. And I'm like I hope I make it till Christmas. That was the thing, fortunately, there were no symptoms before. Yeah, i was. So I had a CRONIC myeloid leukemia. It's very slow moving And what happened is like over time I became more and more fatigued And what really set it off was when I was in Peru. I went up into the mountains where the oxygen is lower And my white blood cells were so high it was suppressing my red blood cells, so I wasn't able to adjust very well And I thought I had really bad mountain sickness. But really I just didn't have enough oxygen in my blood And then I was getting myself even less oxygen And so my vision started getting blurry And I like passed out a couple of times and I developed this like persistent cough and I had these like bruises all appear in a really short period of time.

Speaker 3:

Oh, wow.

Speaker 1:

And yeah, it was pretty dramatic And they couldn't figure out what's wrong. Like they thought I'd maybe I'd been in the Amazon for a little bit right before that. They thought maybe I'd picked up like a parasite or something. And so we did all these tests. But then it was routine blood work came back and my white blood cell count was like 250,000, supposed to be like 4,000. And the only thing I knew about leukemia at the time was I had a cousin who died of leukemia and her white blood cell count had got so 120,000 when she died. So I was like double what she was at And I was like I'm toast. So even before the doctors were telling me and this doesn't look good, I was going. yeah, there was about three days there where we really thought it was done. And that is the way to change your perspective too. And the funny thing is, in retrospect, that was probably the best period of time in my life, because that's when I went. why am I practicing law? No, really crap. You know what I mean. Like I might die, having never done something I love. even though I'm happy, I'm not as happy as I can be, And what ended up happening was yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 2:

I said happy, but not fulfilled.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, exactly Right, happy but not fulfilled. And so I started thinking about that stuff. And then the phone book ads and the TV contracts and stuff, they pushed me into personal bankruptcy. So I'm a bankruptcy attorney and I go bankrupt And I remember sitting there at the bankruptcy hearing they do this thing where they you have to swear on your oath that you're telling the truth and everything. And I had drawn the one trustee I didn't want to get the one that I like. I never liked going in front of him as an attorney and I really didn't want to go in front of him as a debtor.

Speaker 2:

And.

Speaker 1:

I remember he started his recording and then he stopped the recording and he just said Jeff, i'm really sorry that you're hearing. And then he started the recording again And I went, man, this could have been the worst day of my life And I was like in that that moment, even though this was like really tough to like, it was worse than getting leukemia in a lot of ways, because it felt like failure Cause I knew like I'd been interested in real estate since the nineties. I read Rich Dad Porter when it came out in 97 or 96, whatever it was, and I never bought any real estate. I always went I'm going to do it later, i'm going to do it later. I made friends in law school with people that are doing real estate so I could get into it later. I never did it And I knew while I was seeing that at the bankruptcy table the head, i just started buying real estate. when I first started thinking about it I would have been fine And and so I walked out of that meeting with two things One, this guy who I was terrified of was a human and he cared about me, so I felt good, i had a good day because of that. And two I knew at that moment I needed to figure out how to buy real estate sooner rather than later, and I walked out of there and less than six months later I did my first real state.

Speaker 2:

So let's put a pin in that, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Zero credit, no money, and I still bought real estate, and it was 2010,. The hardest time to start real estate almost ever.

Speaker 2:

So let's, I want to get into the real estate here, but I want to circle back to a couple of key concepts here. So, first and foremost, what happened at 17 years old where you say I want, I'm not going to have a bad day ever again?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, okay, great question, something I've avoided answering for a year, but I wrote it in my book. That's what coming called no bad days how to make every day great. So I'll share it with you anyway. I don't know that I've ever told it on a podcast before. So welcome to the beginning of my story. So at 17, i had a girlfriend that I was serious with. I thought I was going to marry her because I was 17. You have these grand ideas. My parents split up. We were. We were having trouble between my girlfriend and I And I just I walked into a bathroom with a knife, planning to kill myself. I had a Guinsoo knife actually you know these old or miracle blade 2000 or some crazy thing like that, one of these like infomercial knives with a serrated blade. And I really believe the serrated blade probably saved my life, because I walked in there and I put this knife on my wrist and it kind of hurt And I was like I think I want to do this, it hurts. And then I just something clicked in my head. I don't know if I was really going to do it or not, it's hard to even imagine for me now, but something clicked in my head and I went this is really dumb. I'm young and healthy and I live in America. Like, my life is pretty good. Yes, there's stuff going on That's bad, but I get to choose how I respond to those things. And that's when I started the journey towards self development and personal development. This is like before the internet. Right, it wasn't literally before the internet, but Google didn't come around till 99. This is 1994. So there's no YouTube. There's no. Tony Robbins existed, but I didn't know who he was. So I didn't know any of this stuff. But I just went. I'm just going to tell myself today's a good day and I'm just going to say it out loud a whole bunch of times. So positive affirmations worked really well. So I looked in the mirror and I said today's a good day, today's a good day 10 times, and then for the next two months, every time I saw a mirror. So I'm getting my car If I'm by myself in the car, i said it out loud. If there are other people in the car, i thought it. Every time I saw a mirror it said today's a good day for 10 times Out loud, if I could, and hundreds of times a day. Right, today's a good day, today's a good day And I remember this really clearly. I walk into a 7-Eleven and the guy behind the counter he says to me how are you doing today? And I go, i never have bad days. And I went. Holy crap, i never have bad days.

Speaker 2:

I realized that I had a couple of holy shit. Yeah, holy shit, i don't know. I don't want you to have to beat me or something, holy shit.

Speaker 1:

No one of your former guests, Matt Faradklopp actually dropped an F bomb on my show.

Speaker 2:

Oh, yeah, he dropped one on mine. I left it in there for color.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I did too. I was like, yeah, why not Just let's just go?

Speaker 2:

Throw it in the air, so I go, so yeah, so anyway, i'm at the 7-Eleven I go holy shit, i never had bad days.

Speaker 1:

Like I realized it had been like a couple of months since I'd had a bad day And I just went. I like this strategy. I'm not going to have bad days anymore And I haven't had one since. So it's been like 26 years. Yeah, ups and downs. Obviously, cancer I actually ended up with melanoma a couple of years ago. That one actually, when it happened, the very first thought that happened to me was like shit. If you have more than one cancer, that's really bad, right, you always know people who had it.

Speaker 2:

Baby, a cancer Like when you get a second cancer.

Speaker 1:

it's like man, that's like game over.

Speaker 2:

So my first It's a diversified portfolio, yeah.

Speaker 1:

First I was like, oh crap, diversified cancer, that's not good. And then the second thought was this is going to make a great story on a podcast. Like I can't wait to tell this podcast to people about how I have another cancer. So that's the kind of crazy messed up like stuff going on in my brain is everything's positive. It doesn't nothing's negative anymore When there's science behind it. Tony Robbins calls it the reticular activating system, but the real science behind it is the Bader-Meinhoff effect. It's been known for a hundred years And the Bader-Meinhoff effect just says your subconscious mind defaults to what's familiar.

Speaker 2:

Wow.

Speaker 1:

And the science, the other science behind it. There's PhDs that are doing like neuroscience research on it. The more you use certain channels of your brain, the stronger those those neuron pathways become and the easier it is for them to fire. So you can do this thing. This guy wrote a book called Hardware and Happiness. I can't remember his name right now, but he was like if you want to be happy and you see a bluebird, just stop and smile And if something bad happens, try to, because you'll train your brain over time to focus on the positive stuff. Sun hits your face, you go, oh, it's so nice. Starts raining, you think, oh, i don't have to water the grass. Like it's just about framing everything to the positive. And then after a while it becomes subconscious and you can't do anything about it. Like if you started calling me names right now, i'd be like so awesome, so much to this guy. He cares enough to call me names, It doesn't matter. Like I just stay positive on everything. It's almost impossible to handle me as a result of that. But it took a while, right. If I had been diagnosed with leukemia, like the second day after I decided to give up bad days, i don't know if it would have worked, because it takes time You got to. But I had 13 years of muscle memory built up in my brain by the time I got diagnosed with leukemia. And now it's man, like when bad stuff happens. Now it's almost laughable, right, hope it happened And I'm thinking, man, this is crappy, the world's got all this bad stuff going on. But think of all the positive that can come from this. Because the thing is, i believe, when people go through hardship, some percentage of them come up much better. And as a world we've gone through this difficult time. We're thinking about how we think, about the effects of it or whatever, But what we know is it's suck It just, it wasn't great. There's all kinds of new regulations and people are dying and people are fighting over stuff. But when we come through all this stuff collectively, some percentage of the world is going to have learned and grown from that. They're going to start in new businesses, they're going to have started new charities, they're going to have come up with new ideas And those things are going to change the world for a better. yeah, the technology I mean. the fact of the matter is, it's easy to forget this, but five years ago it would have been difficult for us to do this interview, because you're in Italy and I'm in Puerto Rico. The technology was here, but Puerto Rico had very unstable internet before COVID, so so, even if nothing else changed, now I can use the internet regularly.

Speaker 2:

Well, lots of impact there, Holy shit. So, first and foremost, i want to say sincerely I appreciate you opening up and your story is beautiful because of the things that you've went through. The only person that I can even compare what you've been through with is Hal Elrod. Miracle Morning, if I may with that. Yeah, i know.

Speaker 1:

He keeps trying to one up me Yeah. I got to get in the key man.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, have you gotten in the car crash?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like he died, i didn't die, i only almost died. So, yeah, no, he exactly true. And actually I told Hal that when I met him, i was like dude, i was like man. I really feel like you're the only person I know that has gone through more crap than I have.

Speaker 2:

I know.

Speaker 1:

And he's super positive about it And it's the same kind of stuff, right, like he just leaned into his own mindset And actually I quote him often because one of my favorite quotes of all time came from him and of course I'm going to butcher it now that I brought it up, but it's basically the moment you accept complete responsibility for everything in your life, is the moment you can change anything.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

And not my fault that I got leukemia, but it's my responsibility to deal with it.

Speaker 2:

And to react to it. You can show you have complete control of how you go moving forward. And then, so his thing was. He was like no matter what, there is no other option. I'm going to do everything in my human power to be able to beat this every single day. No matter what, there's no other option. He didn't say. He didn't sit there visualizing himself and just being like, oh, i'm going to sit here in positive affirmation my way out of leukemia. Of course, not No, i'm going to do everything. That was his affirmation And that's why I relate to him.

Speaker 1:

Yeah yeah, he's out there doing it And the thing is like that resonates with me a lot because when I got leukemia like a lot of people get a diagnosis like that They go curl up in a corner and die Literally that's what they do. They're like I'm dead. I might as well just accept it. I was like, hey, if you were diagnosed with the exact leukemia I had, what doctor would you talk to? And I'm asking all my doctors this And I got consistently one name and they were all like you can't get into see her because she doesn't take new patients, but she's like the foremost expert on it. And I'm like I'm going to go see that doctor And I did. I had to harass them a lot and called them all the time Hey, i need to come see her, i need to come see her.

Speaker 2:

And it worked. Yeah, and it's crazy.

Speaker 1:

It wasn't necessary because she recommended the same course of treatment as my other doctors. But hey, you know what It was power of action. It was really reassuring for me and it could have made a difference. It's possible.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, there's the new thing that I've been implementing, called the UDA loop, and it was from the book the Buddha and the badass. I did a podcast episode about it and I forget what the hell UDA stands for. It's like observe, orient, decide and act. I think is what it is, and it's essentially, whenever you get punched in the face by life or a situation that really sucks in the. It's a naval combat tactic to where, as soon as you, as soon as enemies start firing, there's that four step process that they follow so that they don't just freak out and just be like fire bullets. It's okay, bullets are coming at me. Okay, i'm going to do it right now. Okay, let me get my body, let me get this nervous system back in control. Now I decide okay, what am I going to do? And then you act on it. And before I was super hairpin, like if something happened, something went wrong, like first it would ruin my week, let's just call it what it is Like it ruined my freaking week, then it would ruin my day, then it would ruin like an hour, and now I've gotten it down to about 10 minutes, 10, 15 minutes of just being like.

Speaker 1:

Perfectly reasonable. And when I say I don't have bad days, i don't say I don't have bad moments. Sure, yeah, i can be shocked, i can be pissed, i can, i can freak out. But no bad days does mean I don't have bad months or weeks or years.

Speaker 3:

So love that.

Speaker 1:

It doesn't go the other way, though It doesn't mean I don't have bad seconds. There are like my dog got hit by a car in front of me. It's not going to be my favorite minute during that day. That would really be a sad moment, but I would also look at it And I felt this way. Actually, when I love my dogs And we had to put one down last year, we had a great day and that lived to 13 and a half, which was probably a world record.

Speaker 2:

It's old.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it was definitely the oldest great day in America at the time she died. We know that for sure. But we had to put her down and we didn't have a choice And I was very sad about it And I was sad for a while. I was still sad about it Like I would trade it. I'd trade it to have her back right now, like I would do it if I could. But I also recognized at the time the reason I felt that pain was because of how much love I had gotten from her over the years. So I look at things like pain and sorrow as a positive thing. If you don't feel sorrow, then that means you didn't have a real connection. Whatever that was And that could be an animal or a person, for sure, those are the obvious things. But it could also be like when you leave a job that you love because you want to pursue real estate. You might feel sorrow about that. You regret that you're going to miss certain people, right? Or even something like when I sold my house, like we sold our house this year because the market is crazy. It went up so much and I was like I'm hardly ever there. What do I need a giant house, for I'm spending half my time in Puerto Rico and I'll just rent a place in Puerto Rico and in Tennessee where we live. But I was sad to sell my house. I knew it was the right decision. But the reason I was sad is because I had a lot of positive memories there, so I just started leaning into the reason I'm feeling. This is because of how great my life is and how great this experience was.

Speaker 2:

Contrast. Yeah, contrast creates clarity And when I'm looking back right now this sounds so stupid and superficial, but I'm going to say it anyways because it's just if you're in corporate America still listening to this, which a lot of you are, on your path to financial freedom. We have what's called a Presidents Club where you're the top sales rep, top 10% of the country, and whenever you hit that like that's the goal, that's what everyone's working towards The one day hit Presidents Club and I hit it. But then I hit past that and I hit Diamond level. I got to the very top. I was like in the top 10 people in the country in the company, and you're supposed to have this massive like week long vacation and an award ceremony and a red carpet, and they walk you down and everyone's clapping, and every single day, jeff, i visualized that for three years working that job outside of college, i visualized that moment of walking up and receiving that award whenever I would eventually hit. And I finally got to the moment where I hit. And then what happens? COVID, everything's canceled, everything's shut down. They took away a $70,000 bonus that I was supposed to get And this all happened And then they canceled the trip. I got a PowerPoint slide as my thank you for the contribution and the blood, sweat and tears. Oh, congratulations, brian Lubin. Sales rep of the year for the company. No-transcript, oh my God. And then I was so upset about it I went to a depression And then the worst part about all of this is that was back when everybody believed like COVID was like actually like COVID. It was like in the first couple of months, yeah, where things were actually like serious And we're all like Everyone was scared man. Yeah, And I was just by myself, like in my house, like essentially quarantined, sitting there watching a PowerPoint slide congratulating me on achieving that goal. that was my entire life's identity.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And I say that now, looking back, because that was one of the lowest points in my life was I was just like all this things, all the stuff that just worked my ass off for this company, and now this is the least fulfilling thing ever. And now I say that because yesterday they just had their ceremony for this year's winners and award recipients for the first time. So I get to see all these pictures of people like achieving and getting their awards and everything. And I thought back the reason I say this people, if that had not have happened, i would not have gotten on my path to being like, hey, corporate America is not for me, There's something else. And I wouldn't have gone harder in the real estate And I wouldn't have bought that next rental and bought that next rental and bought that next rental And I wouldn't have quit that job And I wouldn't have been here today.

Speaker 1:

That is so exactly right. That's the leukemia moment for me, right? If I didn't get forced into bankruptcy, I would be a happy but unfulfilled bankruptcy attorney today. I might have a few 15 years later I might have a few rental properties, but I would not be here. Instead, what happened is I started buying real estate And in seven years, i was able to quit my corporate job, walk away and not have to worry about anything. And then that freedom allowed me to go. Oh wait, i can like do all this other stuff, and the other stuff for me was helping people buy real estate, teaching people about real estate, doing some coaching all this stuff. That's super fulfilling. That I've never been able to do. Plus, it also got me to where I went. You know what I want to grow? I want to do bigger deals. We have 50 single family properties when I quit working And now I have like less than that in single families And we bought 10 units, 20 units, 30 units, 50 unit buildings And we just we've been ramping up the whole time And it's just been amazing. All that happened because of that moment that I call those pivot points or something happens in retrospect. You look at it and go. That thing was probably the greatest thing that happened to me, and the cool part about what we were talking about earlier about not having bad days is, if you match this no bad days mindset into that stuff. When you get to those pivot points, you're more likely to recognize the significance of it at the time. Because your mind's going to be more clear, Because you're not going to be sitting around going. oh man, this is so crappy, like all this bad stuff's happening.

Speaker 3:

You're going to be like what's the positive.

Speaker 1:

And so you have this pivot point and it changed the trajectory of your life. And we all have. If we want to grow, we have to have. But if you can have those and remain positive at the time that that challenge is arising, then it just freaking. It's like pouring gasoline on your future and lighting it on fire. It's so amazing They talk about the fire stuff all the time. This retire, early stuff, it's cool, there's nothing wrong with that. But like holy crap, man, like the real fire is when you're like super positive and energized about everything you're doing.

Speaker 2:

Dude, yes, you will be best friends.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we can be best friends.

Speaker 2:

Well, I don't know.

Speaker 1:

I have to call Matt and see if he's okay with it, Matt also best friends.

Speaker 2:

Okay, we'll just do it the old fashioned way fist fight to the death and then yeah, that sounds good.

Speaker 1:

I'll let you and Matt fight over who gets to be my best friend. I don't want to fight, so you guys do that.

Speaker 2:

Perfect, I'll take down.

Speaker 1:

I'll take down the rest of you as we get off and I'll be like dude.

Speaker 2:

I'll take down Dorosik group, but no, exactly what she said. another phrase that comes to mind is things are either a blessing or a lesson, and so I'm religious. So I always think I'm like. I always have a little laugh at myself, because whenever something goes wrong before let me put some context and color to this before I was the person that was looking for that thing I'm on hyper alert all the time, super stressed, super anxious, constantly thinking what could go wrong. because why? I was a B2B enterprise sales rep to where we were conditioned that the deal was not done until it's done And there would be everything to go wrong and you could poke holes in it to see what was going to go wrong. And that used to be me. But now, whenever things are cruising and something goes wrong, i'm like all right, that's God just testing to see how bad I want it. I'm like it's like a little test like just a little test.

Speaker 1:

That's the thing. If you believe everything happens for a reason, right, god has a plan for you, then like that makes it. That's the other part of that. I don't always explain it, but for me that's a big part of the no bad days thing. It's also about having faith that whatever you're going through is okay.

Speaker 2:

There's supposed to happen when it's supposed to happen.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah. Even when you're trying to make hard decisions or whatever All this stuff, you're not sure if you want to quit your job or whatever it might be, you're not sure if you want to get married. It doesn't really matter what the decision is Like. You just got to be okay with not being, not knowing. There's only three. Any time you're facing the decision, there's three possible solutions Yes, no, or I don't know. And if you can go, i'm okay with I don't know, because I'll know when I know and you Then you're, there's no problem. It takes away all the angst in that stuff and then you can just like whatever you. That's okay. That's when you know.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and you're supposed to know when you're supposed to know. Yeah, that's such a, that's such a huge thing, because there's people that are listening to this right now, that I've had people say, hey, i was listening to all these podcasts before and then I heard this one episode Say this one thing, that on your show, and it just completely clicked for me and we all have those click moments.

Speaker 1:

And they may. Yeah, exactly, that's just like those pivot points when something It's yeah and I believe in. I believe that most of our progress in life comes in to discrete moments like that. I can be in your real estate investing. You go to conferences all the time and you're meeting up with people and learning stuff, and you walk into one conference and one person on the stage or one person sitting next to you says that one thing That changes your whole strategy. Yeah, i had this happen to me at a conference once in 2016-17 somewhere around he was 17 they started talking about how Bonus depreciation works and I went I don't know what they're talking about And then all of a sudden, i was like I need to figure this out and within like months of that, i had never paid federal income tax again. It's ridiculous like literally that one concept and cost segregation and bonus depreciation Eliminated my federal tax for the last five years.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, i went to a go abundance event and I pay ten grand a year to be in go abundance. And I go to an event It last fall and one of the guys I'm golfing with goes. He's like how are, how am I good friends with you? right now? He's most people can't even get in touch with me, yet I view you as a good friend. He's you've got like a gift of connection. He's you need to start a podcast. Man, i was just like nah, i'm not gonna start a podcast, nobody wants to listen to me. Yeah, so now here we are, to where now I'm literally building an entire company around my podcast And it's literally my life's defining work and the Right those little tiny things.

Speaker 1:

They matter, and now we're leading to this too. You pay ten thousand dollars a year to hang out with a Quality people. Yeah, those things are important. That is something that most people choose not to do. See, it's easy for us to forget because because guys like us, like we do that kind of stuff, but most people don't. So if I were giving advice to your audience, i would say keep listening to the show, you know, keep absorbing quality content, but don't be afraid to pay for access. I don't know if you do a mastermind, but if you do, they should pay for your mastermind, right? Like whatever, you should be going to these things and hanging out with the people. Whether it's go abundance or whether it's some Multifamily mastermind, it doesn't really matter. Whatever it is that you want to work on, you want to hang out with people that are working on that project.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, speaking of multifamily on buddies with Gino, from Jake and Gino, sure, and he was on this podcast and he said That's great. Yeah, he said a quote where he was like he said it really well It was a pay-to-play or seek to serve. That's the two ways. So getting in contact with people that are worth their salt. And it here's another stress test people, if there's someone that you Reach out to and they're just like, extremely easily accessible, probably not worth their salt too much.

Speaker 1:

Hey, if someone doesn't value their time enough that anybody can reach out to them, Yeah, it's not a nice. Nice.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so you either have to pay the players seek to serve. So it's either you pay to be a part of whatever organization, or pay for the time, pay for the coaching, whatever have you, or You find a very specific and tangible way to provide value in which they're like wow.

Speaker 1:

Cuz you're sitting here listening and you're talking to coach and they're telling you It's gonna be 10 grand to talk to me or whatever. You don't have 10 grand, then take the other stretch. You figure out a way you can help somebody in some way, because that's the other thing. Like Most people I know that are successful I know this is sure of me, but most people I know that are successful actually want to help other people be successful. That's a big part of what makes you successful in the first place, so that service mentality By itself will make you more successful, even if you never even connect with anyone, because you're helping people and helping people. I really believe that God the universe, however you want to believe it rewards people who bring value, like the more Value you bring to the scale the more you get back right. Yes, i help you. I get a little value if I go on your podcast and I help a bunch of people. I get even more value, right, if I if. I can scale out a huge I'm gonna. It's even more and more value, like people like how I'll rock, for example, that I'm telling his story and over and over again, has helped millions of people and, as a consequence, he's received millions of dollars back right, i don't know how exactly what it is, but it's not millions Yeah he didn't do it. He didn't do it for the money, he did it to help, and when he do things from the right place, the money follows.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I used to think that I had such an edge. You know it's a recurring thing that I keep bringing up, but I used to think that I had an edge with all this information, all this network, all this community that I have. I thought that it gave me, like in the battle of business. I was like, okay, you go against me, you're gonna lose, plain and simple, because I have I'm better connected, i know, have more information and more resources. And that's how I used to think until I joined the freaking mastermind And I got around people that were years, decades and the polls past, where I was with my net worth and with my journey and maturity and growth in general, and they were like, hey, dude, everything that you think is completely wrong. And I'm like, okay, say more, because obviously you're, you've got it figured out. I don't know like you're thinking this is like a zero-sum game, he's, we can all win together. And then the faster you pivot to that and be that guy and like, just pour everything out into others, you know I that's gonna exponentially grow you faster doing it that way. Oh, it's just like.

Speaker 1:

Oh, my god, it's also more rewarding, and yeah, and all that stuff. and the truth is I don't work very hard, i really don't like actually I might be the exception. If people reach out to me, i'm actually pretty easy to get a hold. I like talking to people. I have enough time to do it. But the reason I have that flexibility is because when I you have, it's not even just that, it's when I Find things to do with my time That's productive, that brings value. I always share those things always and, as a result, i made a lot of money without having to put that much effort in, because I would find deals And I would talk to people and I put deals together. It's like syndicating in a way, right Like when you syndicate you're able to do bigger deals than you would have done by yourself. But I was just like naturally, like I I've never done a deal, a real estate deal ever without a partner. Even when I have the greatest deal and I know I can do it on my own, i find someone that's that I've wanted to do something with for a while and I offer it to them. I'm like just the other day I want to do plex. I hardly ever buy the boxes. It was such a smoking, there's such a good deal. I was like have to buy it. I was getting ready to buy it and I talked to the bank about it. And then I went my one friend He's always wanted to start investing in real estate. Let me call him up and tell him about this deal. And then afterwards I went oh crap, i have something wrong with my brain because I literally am incapable of doing deals on my own. But the reality is I believe that because I brought people into it, i've benefited way more than they have, without even intentionally doing that, like my buddy who I brought into the steel now, flash forward a year, he's on the board of a credit union.

Speaker 2:

I Never saw. All of a sudden he's on the board, like on the board.

Speaker 1:

And now he's a lawyer and stuff, so I knew him for a long time and now he's out of board of a credit union. He's telling me like how, like underwriting works from the inside and like I'm getting this insight That's a thousand times more valuable than half of a new place.

Speaker 2:

Oh my God And that's just a matter of perspective, because I had Rod Cleep on the show too And he gave me something that was a Tony Robbins quote actually, but I just remember these quotables And he said it's about the science of achievement and the art of fulfillment, And I love that. So you've got both. Yeah, you've got both of those figured out now, brother, But as I'm looking at this right now, computers about to die on my chargers in the other room, so this is at our time anyway. So, brother, you mentioned a book that you are about to launch.

Speaker 1:

What stage is this? Yeah, it's written. I have a publisher. The release date is in April, so it's still a ways off, but the pre-orders available on Amazon, barnes and Noble and all that It's called No Bad Day is how to make every day great.

Speaker 2:

Perfect, and where can people go to find you and get some more positivity in their life?

Speaker 1:

I'm not hiding, So if they Google Jeffrey Hulse, they'll find me. But I have a Facebook group called The Last Life Ever where we just share positive things about living the best version of our lives. So that's a cool place. Otherwise, Instagram's good. I post on there frequently at Jeffrey Hulse on Instagram.

Speaker 2:

I love it, brother. So, everyone, if you want a little bit more positivity in your day, go and join these groups and freaking pre-order the book.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, do you Spread it?

Speaker 2:

Order it for 50 more people too, for the heck of it, just to keep spreading.

Speaker 1:

And then be actually what? if you order the book, and if you pre-order the book and you email me or screenshot it to me on Instagram that's probably the easiest I will find something fun to give you. I don't know what it is yet, but I'm going to create a bonus gift for you and get it out to you.

Speaker 2:

There we go. You heard it here first people, And we didn't talk real estate at all.

Speaker 1:

We didn't. We'll come back again. We can do it again. sometime We'll do a real estate episode.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's all good, but this is like infinitely more helpful And this is stuff like this and shows like this, episodes like this. This is what this is where 10 real estate shows. I'd say it over and over again because I've been through both of them And I know that people are still listening at this moment because of how freaking powerful your story is. So thank you for sharing it so openly, so candidly, and thank you for allowing us to have a peek and open up the window to see your lessons so that we can take stuff away. That's greatly appreciated. Thank you for the authenticity and the transparency.

Speaker 1:

Oh, thanks for having me out, i enjoyed it.

Speaker 2:

It was awesome man. So this has been Brian Lubin and Jeff Hulse, the Globe Trotten. Happy guys signing off with the Action Academy podcast. See you guys.