What is up, guys? It's Andy Fursella, and this is the show for the real estate. Goodbye to the lies, the fakeness, and delusions of modern society. And welcome to motherfucking Reality. Guys, today we have Q&A. F. That's where you submit the questions and we give you the answers. Dj is going to tell you how you could submit your questions.
Guys, we want your questions. Please submit them at askandy@andyforseller. Com. Click the link in the description right now. Submit your questions for a chance to be answered, or if you want to just pop them in the comment section of this video right here. We'll check them out there as well.
All right. If this is your first time listening, we have multiple different formats on this channel, on this podcast. Today, you're going to hear Q&AF. Tonight at 7: 00 Central, you're going to see CTI Live. That's where we talk about what's going on in the world. It's called Cruise the Internet. We speculate, we talk about it, we try to figure it out, and then we talk about what we need to do as citizens to make the country better. Other times, we're going to have real talk. Real talk is just 5 to 20 minutes of me giving you some real talk. Then other times, we will have 75 Hard Verses. That's where people who have completed the 75 Hard program come on the show. They talk about how they were before, how they are now, and how they use the 75 Hard program to change their lives. If you're unfamiliar with 75 Hard, it's the initial phase of the Live Hard program, which is the world's most famous mental transformation program ever. It's free. You can get it at episode 208 on the audio feed. Again, that's 208 on the audio feed. There's also a book on andyfercela.
Com called The Book on Mental Toughness, which gives you the entire program, plus a whole bunch of other stuff on a discipline mindset, how to apply to your life. One thing about this show that is different from all the other shows out there is we are an outcome-based show, meaning we are giving you this information, both in personal development and society, for us to create a better outcome. I don't take ads for that. I do this because I feel obligated to do it. In exchange, I ask very simply that you help us grow the show and share the show. We got this little thing that we say around here. It goes like this, Don't be a hoe. Should have the show. All right. Maybe got threatened them a little bit. What was that? Yeah, that was a little aggressive. Should have a motherfucker show. I got a problem over here in my chair.
I didn't touch it.
What do you mean? One of you motherfuckers did?
No, I think the air cylinders, they go out after a minute, bro. You got a thousand episodes in that chair, bro.
Yeah, that's true.
You know what I'm saying?
This is my most comfortable place to sit. Really? In the building? That's why yesterday when you were in here, I said, I'm going to have my meeting in here. It's the only place I can focus. I don't know what that is, but from now on, meetings are in here. Yeah, I like it.
I'm down with it. I like it.
That goes for you guys, too. When you talk to me, we come here. We be in the studio.
That's right. It's so crazy to think, too, man. I know my first episode, but your first episode, MFCO probably was in a conference room, bro. It's so crazy. Now, it's like...
Well, people think they got to have all the stuff. You don't have to have all the stuff, dude. People, they think about this in business, too. They think like, Let me get the business card, and let me get the nice sign, and let me get the name on my door, and let me get the nice office. None of that shit matters, dude. When it comes to podcast creation, you just got to go. By the way, creating a podcast isn't for everyone. It's a lot of work. It's a skill that you have to develop over time. Like most skills, people quit before they actually develop it. When we started out there in 2015, dude, we didn't even know what we were doing. I barely knew what a podcast was. Yeah. In fact, we didn't even start it with the idea of being a podcast. The idea was, Vawn was going to write me a book, and he was interviewing me to do the ghost writing for the book. We started taking the interview clips and posting them on Instagram. This is back, people don't realize this, but Instagram used to only be 15-second clips. We'd post these 15-second clips, and it was the most popular thing I was posting.
Fucking heat. Yeah. Everybody was like, Man, where can I listen to this podcast? I said, I'm in this. You got to remember, dude, podcasts were popular in the early 2000s. Then they went away. They became uncool. If you had a podcast, you were a nerd. Yeah, fucking nerd. All right? Yeah. Then 2015, it really happened right when we came out with it, they became popular again. I had all these people posting in the comments. They're like, We're going to listen to this podcast. I'm like, Dude, this isn't a podcast. We're We're writing a book. We're doing real shit over here. After probably six months of that, a year of that, finally, I was like, Well, maybe we should just do a podcast. That's how it started. We just committed to it, and we just kept doing it and doing it and doing it, and now we're here. It's really parallel to anything that you're trying to build in your life. You got to be willing to suck. If you go back and listen to my original episodes, which are on the internet still, if you're unfamiliar where they are, they're back at the beginning feed of the Real AF audio feed on the audio platforms, and you go listen to them, and you're going to be like, Holy shit.
This dude was It's durable. It's a parallel. You got to be willing to look bad. You got to be willing to look stupid in front of people. Now you're number seven on Earth. No, I'm number five. Number five? Yeah, I just checked. Let's check again just for fun. Let's see where we're at right now. You see that? Number five. The only shows ahead of us are Crime Junkie, Dateland, NBC, a fucking multiple tens of of dollars operation. Of course, Joe Rogan, who is the fucking greatest podcaster in the world. Then The Daily, The New York Times. Then there's Sean Ryan and Megan Kelly, and we're all right there in the group. You just got to keep going, dude. That's really what it is. We've never had corporate support. I've always funded this out of my own pocket. I don't do this for a living. This isn't my main job. I don't take ads because I want people to trust that what they're hearing is my honest opinion. I think for a long time, that was like, Why does he not do that? That's cool that he doesn't, but why not? Well, now you're seeing why.
I had the foresight to understand that we have to be able to trust our people, and I don't want that eroded. You know what I mean?
Because once it's gone, dude, it's gone.
Yeah. Dude, I don't want to listen to someone telling me what I can and can't say or and shouldn't say. It's just not who I am, dude. Yeah. You know?
Yeah. Well, there's something to that, too.
Now, if one of you motherfuckers wants to come and give me $100 million and I can say whatever the fuck I want for real, then I'm going to take the money. We can talk But that just never works out that way. They always promise these things. Then all my buddies who get these deals end up dealing with a bunch of corporate dorks who are trying to censor them and shit. Like, dude, I'm not with that shit.
Can you not talk about that so hard.
That's what I'm saying. Even shit like that. Dude, when someone says that to me, I'm going harder now. You know what I mean? It's just it is what it is. But anyway, I'm very thankful I'm very grateful for all of you who have been here the entire time. You guys that share the show regularly and share my content, that means a lot to all of us here. We need to figure out a way make the show bigger and better on YouTube. Please tell your friends, please have people join. We're trying to do a good mission here. Yeah, that's it. One very important point I would like to say, that number 5 is not in the business category.
That's overall. Correct. That means on Earth, out of 4. 2 million podcasts. Yeah. That's how many podcasts there are on iTunes.
Well, I guess we're doing all right.
I like those eyes.
That's pretty good. The newer shows, the guys who've come around in the last four or five years, they started their show on a YouTube. We didn't start YouTube until two years ago. We're behind there, but Our audience on audio is always there. I appreciate you guys.
Ogs, man. Ogs.
It's cool, man. Then we have the Operator Standard show inside the Operator Standard app, which is the rebirth of the MF CEO, which is going very well. But that's not open to the public right now.
So, yeah, I'll let you know when. Suck or sucks. Yeah, Sucks or Suck. I love it, man. I love it, dude. Guys, it is Monday. Let's make some people better, shall we?
Let's do it.
Guys, Andy. Question number one. Andy. I'm sorry. I be feeling for these people without read these derribles questions, man. It's like, fuck, man. Andy, I say I want to grow, but I'm still attached to the version of me everyone knows. The funny one, the laid-back one, the one who doesn't take things too seriously. Part of me worries that if I level up, people won't like me the same. How do you grow without feeling like you're losing your sofa your people? Is that a real fear to be worried about?
Look, dude, there's plenty of people that are successful, that have good personalities, and they're fun to be around, and they're cool, and they can make jokes. I like to think I'm cool. You know what I'm saying? I actually think I'm pretty cool. But you have to know when to understand. You got to understand this, dude. To become something else, there's parts of your life that you're going to have to be okay letting go. Because the new parts are going to come in and take space where the old parts were. So unless you're willing to let go of who you are to become who you're supposed to be, it's going to be a very conflicting journey. All right? This is why when we talk about going down this path, you have to go all in and you have to accept what the price is going to be up front. Okay? And so many people, this is not just during this era. This is in human history. Okay? I actually believe that the reason that most people never get where they want to go is for the reason that this person is asking right here. They are afraid of what they have to give up, which actually makes no sense because if you loved what you had, you wouldn't be aspiring to have something else.
Why are you afraid to give this thing up that is creating this outcome in this reality that you don't enjoy or that you know isn't fulfilling to get what you actually want? That doesn't make sense if you actually think about it. It's like the people who Do '75 hard. On day '76, their idea of celebrating is going right back to the things that they did. I'm going to have a big cake, and I'm going to go out, and I'm going to stuff myself. Well, if that's where you are, bro, you didn't do the program right because you'd be terrified to go back to who you were. We have to understand that when you think about this, logically, you are not comfortable where you are. You understand that you need to do more. You understand that you want more and desire more. You are willing to go do it, but you're afraid of letting go what you have that's holding you from becoming this. That doesn't actually make sense when you're logically thinking about it. You really think about it. We have to separate our emotions from our logic. You are going to lose some friends.
You are going to fucking... People aren't going to like it. That's the reality of doing anything outside the social norm. Anytime you do anything outside the social norm, you have a weird haircut, you decide to wear different clothes, you talk a different way, you pursue a different life. Even if that life would be something that would just be different, not necessarily an entrepreneur or success. But let's say you wanted to be a vagabond and travel the Earth and do all these things. There's going to be people that are going to say, Bro, you're fucking up. But each person's life is person's life. You have to understand that those people that you're afraid of upsetting are not going to be there for you when it really counts. That's the truth. That is the hard truth that most people don't want to admit. You come You're not going to this world alone and you die alone. There's people that come and go along the way. They serve different parts at different places for different lessons and different reasons. You can't have that perspective when you're a young 20-year-old person. But as someone who's lived a little bit of life, I can promise you that most of the people that you're afraid of upsetting now are not going to be there in five years, and they're certainly not going to be there in 15.
Why would you short circuit what it is you want for yourself? Because maybe these people won't approve of it or they might not like you. Here's the final point to this question. It is to not be liked. You don't want to be liked by everybody. If you're liked by everybody, you're irrelevant. There's certain people that shouldn't like you. There's certain things that you should stand for that make people say, I don't I can like that. Your thing is to make sure that it's the right people that don't like you for good reason. You have to be comfortable and become comfortable not being liked. This is something that a season entrepreneur or even a seasoned person who's been on their own path and is comfortable with their own identity and who they are, they don't think about those things. You're thinking about those things because you're a young person and you don't know any better yet. That's okay, dude. But I'm going to tell you right now, that shit is irrelevant. There's going to be people that don't like you because of your fucking haircut, bro. Okay, what are you going to do? You're going to keep doing the dance to make sure everybody's happy?
You're going to get your haircut the way they want. You're going to wear the clothes they want. You're going to fucking do your life the they want. They're fucking probably going to lose, bro. When you do this dance for everybody, you got to realize the people you're dancing for, they aren't the people you should be dancing for. You should be doing your own fucking dance. You see what I'm saying? Absolutely, dude.
I think another big thing with especially the young crowd, man, it's like, I'm known as the funny one. Being funny means you have to go to the bar and fucking make a fool of your sofa people to be cool with you. Is that really what you want to be known about?
Is that actually a quality relationship?
Yeah, you could do a cool fucking shotgun with the beer can. Okay, cool. Is that really what you're trying to amount for? That's it? Yeah.
That shit goes away, man. Yeah, bro. It does. I promise you, and this goes out to all the young people out there, and the older people listening can vouch for this, Those people that you think are your friends in high school and college and shit, you might still know them and be cool with them and be friendly with them and consider them friends, but they're not going to have the same impact your life as they do when you're surrounded by them every single day. At the end of the day, bro, here's what it comes down to. You got to do what you think is best for you. If you don't, and you don't do it because of all these other people's maybe not approving, you're going to be fucking broke. Your life's going to suck. You're going to be frustrated, and you're going to get to 40, and you're going to say, Fuck, I wish I would have done what I wanted to do. You don't want to be that guy. Most people become that person. All those people that you're afraid are not going to like you anymore, they're going to be that motherfucker.
They're going to be that person at 40 years old and saying, Man, I wish I hadn't fucked off. I wish I had went a little harder. I wish I had chased my dreams. I wish I had become what I wanted to become. You don't want that. You want to be the guy at 40 years old that says, Hey, I got 20 years in this shit now. Now we got good momentum while everybody else is just trying to figure it out, and they finally realize their party life is over, and you got 20 years fucking stacked. That's how you get ahead, dude. If you're my friend, and I'm talking to you straight up, fuck those people. That's it. I don't give a fuck what they say. I don't care if they like you or not. I don't give a shit because this is what I'm doing. That's the attitude you have to have. If you don't have that attitude and you don't have the ability to cultivate it, you don't have what it takes to win.
I love it, man. I Love it. I don't know how old I do. I do know how this next person is. Guys, Andy, question number two. Hey, Andy, I'm 19 years old. Fuck, were you 19?
Yeah, like yesterday. Like yesterday, man. I still feel that way.
Yeah, fuck, man.
I still feel that way. I still feel the same as I felt then. Just no more shit.
Yeah. You handle shit quicker, too. Andy, I'm 19. I've had people tell me for years that I have a lot of potential. Teachers, bosses, friends. But I'm starting to wonder if that's just something people say before you disappoint them, how do you make sure you don't end up being that guy who almost did something? Fuck. I mean, yeah.
Well, that's a good question. I would tell you that just like we talk about where there's a paradox when it comes to success, okay? Most people believe that if you're successful, you had some advantage that they did not have. They believe that you were fed with a silver spoon and that things were always smooth and that you just got all the breaks and got all the luck and everything was great in there you are. That's what they believe. But the truth of the matter is that the most successful people on Earth come from the most chaotic things as a childhood. The reason that those people grow up to be successful or total nightmares is because they learn how to win or lose battles at a young age. They learn how to navigate life at a young age. They learn hardship at a young They came from shit. They didn't have anything. They had a parent that was abusive or mentally abusive. There's some battle, or probably a lot of them, that they had to fight through. Because they learned that skill to fight early, it applies later when it comes to them building shit. Then when bad shit happens, they're like, Well, fuck, I've been through shit.
This ain't nothing. There's a paradox there. There's another paradox. Which is the one you're talking about, which is the kids who are told that they have all the potential in the world and that they can be anything they want and that they're probably going to be President of the United States, and everybody Tell us them how great they are. They get straight A's, and they're the MVP of the football team, and they're all this shit in high school. Those people end up being fucking losers. That ends up being the peak of their life. They end up taking all of the praise and saying, I'm great, not realizing that they've got 80 motherfucking years left. They attach their identity to this thing of everybody else's belief and everybody else's praise and all the things they accomplished. Then they go out in the world and they think that the world is going to just spread its legs and give you the fucking prize, and it doesn't work that way.
But I got all this potential.
Right. Potential doesn't mean fucking shit. Action means shit. The people, like me, who were considered dumb, who were considered unfocused, who were told repeatedly by their teachers and their coaches. And by the way, I had good teachers and coaches, too. But the people who were told that they weren't going to be shit, that they weren't smart enough, that they weren't good enough, that they weren't what it takes, or in my case, cream of the crop, which was the exact quote used in my scenario, those are the people that a fucking chip on their shoulder because they've been told all this shit, and they're like, Fuck you. I'm going to fucking show you. Now, in each one of those paradoxes, you have the ability to choose. You have the ability, as a young person who went through a very difficult upbringing, to choose, do I turn out like that and just repeat the cycle, or do I break the cycle? I don't want that. There's a very famous story. I don't know the exact lingo, but it goes something like this. There was an alcoholic man who had two sons. One son became an alcoholic like his dad.
The other son never drank a drop of alcohol because he didn't want to be like his dad. Those are the choices that we have. You sound like you have some good things going for you. Maybe they are just telling you that you have this potential. But here's the bottom line. It doesn't fucking matter because potential doesn't mean anything. Action means things. If you don't want to become the guy who gets told that they're the most likely to succeed and win and become all these things, then don't put any weight into the praise that people give you. This goes into an even bigger topic, which we'll address the first question as well. You have to know who you are, and you have to decide who you're going to become. When people tell you along the way that you're doing bad or doing great, you have to let that shit roll off your shoulders. There's a lot of talk about people saying, Hey, fuck the haters. Don't listen to them. But there's no talk about, Hey, fuck the praise. Don't listen to that either because that'll get you just as fucked up. There's no talk about that.
That's probably a bigger killer than the negative because it makes people believe they've already done something. All right? We have to understand that along our journey, it is very important to stay centered. When people criticize you, don't be emotional about it at first. Ask yourself, is this a critique or is this emotional fucking haters shit? If it's a critique and it's true, then you can adjust. If it's emotional haters shit, then you put that into your fucking chip that you got on your shoulder and you draw upon that on one of the 10 million times that you're not going to feel like doing what it is you want to do, or one of the 10 million times that you're going to feel like quitting. Now, on the other side, if someone comes in and they say, Oh, you're doing so great. You're the greatest on Earth. You're the... Winners will let that shit roll off their back. They don't give a fuck. They don't celebrate. They don't put any stock into it. They look for the truth. Is this person telling me the truth? Is this person pumping me full of shit? Or are they identifying things that I'm doing well?
If they're identifying the things that I'm doing well, What am I not doing well that I can prove upon there? This is how champions think. Champions look for ways to get better in the negative and the positive, and they stay very balanced. There's a saying in professional athlete world where you don't read your newspaper clippings. You don't read them when they're good, you don't read them when they're bad. You focus on what it is that you have to do, the actions that you have to take. You keep your head down and you work like you've got something to prove your entire life. And eventually, You look around and everything that you ever dreamed of is your life. But that doesn't come from other people's input unless you have the ability to deduce the ways to get better from both the negative and positive. You got to keep yourself balanced. You got to learn everywhere you can. You've got to be able to recognize the difference, which is hard in the beginning because you don't have the experience. But you got to be able to recognize the difference between people just hating or people giving an honest critique.
How do you use it? Same with positive. They're telling me I'm great at this. Well, why didn't they say I was great at that? I'm working really hard at that. Maybe I need to work harder at this. Winners don't give a shit about the critiques or the praise unless it serves them in a certain way, and it shouldn't serve the ego. People's ego, they're hubris. Now, there's applications of ego. It's important to have a big ego at certain points of time. What people really say is a big ego is confidence. That's what most people think is a big ego because confidence is so rare that they never see it and they Oh, look, that guy's full of himself. Well, let me tell you something, dude. If you're going to walk out onto a football field in front of 100,000 people, you better think you're the shit or you're going to get fucking killed. I'm going to get ran the fuck over. If you're going to go speak in front of 20,000 people, you better think you're fucking good or they're going to know it. They're going to know that you're insecure. Ego serves us in certain aspects when we go to perform, but it doesn't serve us when we're preparing to perform.
It's two different things. Champions will be humble in preparation and confident or cocky in execution. We have to be able to determine where our ego is appropriate and where our ego is not appropriate. The easiest way to know that is what I just said. It's humble in preparation. Don't think you're better than you are, no matter how good they're telling you. Do the things you need to do. Do them to the best of your ability. Then when you go out and execute, know that you did all the things that you can which generates real confidence, and go out and perform. When you let your ego get involved and the emotions get involved in the preparation process, that's not a good thing. That's always going to get you off your game.
It sounds like a lot of this just comes down to some self-awareness, right? Absolutely. People are like, Oh, you're killing it. I'm not killing it yet. You know what I'm saying? Or you're doing terrible. I look at my bank, I can be broke.
I'm doing all right. But the thing you got to remember here, DJ, is that their praise or their criticism is coming from their perspective. They don't know what you have planned in your head. They don't know what you're working on. They don't know what level you're trying to reach. They don't know these things. For example, I have big dreams. Even what I've done so far in my life, I'm still very young and I have massive goals, massive goals, so big that if I were to even tell you what they are, a lot of you guys would be like, Dude, what the fuck? This guy's fucking insane. But it takes crazy to do crazy shit. We have to understand that when you get praise and you get criticism, for example, a lot of people come to me, and I know it's a compliment, and I appreciate it, but they say, Dude, you're killing it. But for me, I'm so far away from where I want to be that I'm like, No, dude. I'm not. But for them, I'm living their dream every single day. It's all relative to where they're at at the moment. You got to keep that in mind.
That's some real shit, dude. That's real. Guys, Andy, we got one more question for you, bro. Guys, Andy, we got question Number three. Andy. My business is finally growing. I own a plumbing supply company, but the more it grows, the more complicated it gets. More people, more issues, more moving parts. It's not fun the way it used to be. Is that just the next level, or is that a sign you scaled something you didn't actually want? Like, Bro, I want to win, but I had a way better time when we were small than if I'm being completely honest.
Yeah, that's the way it goes. Okay. Look, man. I can relate to that so much, dude, because as much as I love doing what I'm doing now, as As much as I love seeing all the people here and coming here every day, what I really loved was working the floor of one of our retail stores because I was face-to-face with the customer. I was able to help them with my own two hands and my brain, and I got to see the payback of that. That was very rewarding. I really enjoyed that. As the business has grown, my place of usefulness in the business is no longer that. You're going to go through phases. You started the business. It's going well. When it was small, it was probably much more intimate and you had better time. You went drinking with the boys and all that shit. You're on tailgates.
Right, yeah.
That shit's amazing. That's the best memories. Well, not the best, but some of the best memories of my entrepreneurial journey. Sitting on it, dude, I can't tell you how many times Chris and I sat on on that shitty ass couch in the store. Or one of us, we sit on the floor and we'd be drinking beers and we'd be talking. It'd be fucking midnight. We'd be talking about what we're going to do. You know what I mean? Or as we got a little bigger and there was a core of 20 20 guys, and we were going out to eat together and going to bars and having fun. That was just a different era. You're going to go through eras of growing a company, and certain points in time are not going to be fun, bro. When you're stretching from one level to to the next level and you don't know exactly what to do. It's very high stress. It's very high anxiety. It's very unfulfilling because you're frustrated most of the time. But what will happen is your company will evolve to that next level, and then there will be a There will be a new set of fun that you enjoy.
There will be new experiences that you enjoy. There will be different aspects that you enjoy. We have to be very careful to think like, Oh, well, these were the good old days. Well, the reason they're the good old days is because you kept progressing. All right? If you didn't progress, they'd just be the days. You'd just be an alcoholic. Yes. Here's the reality, bro. If you stay where you were, that will no longer be fun. You will no longer be having fun if you stayed exactly where you are, you're only saying it was fun now because you're in a different part of the business. But if you were there every day and you're looking around, how do you even appreciate that for what it is if it's what you do every day? Okay? You see what I'm saying? You're going to go through these levels where you're going to be building shit. Then you're going to go through a scaling period, and then the company will become a different version of the way it was in the beginning. You're going to go through that many different times. There's many different phases over the course of my business career that were a lot of fun.
They were just different. Now my fun is much different than it was in the beginning. But I appreciate all of those levels because those are some of the best memories that I've ever had. You need to let go of the idea that you're moving into something that is perpetually never going to be fun again. That's not reality. You're just in a place of scaling. Anybody who's scaling will tell you or scale anything that those are the hardest years. The way businesses typically scale, people think this because this is what they see on the internet. They see the glory stories. They see the guy who came up with a business, and in three years, it was a $200 million business. That's what they see. That's not most businesses. Most businesses scale in phases. They go from one. If you're watching, if you're not watching, I'm using my little finger drawing here, you start out at the bottom, and then you start to move up, and then you plateau. That move up usually lasts 2-3 years, and then you get to this new phase. That phase usually lasts 2-4 years, and then you start to go again.
That's the way. It's like a step up, if that makes sense. But instead of the up being vertical, it's like at a 45. It's like flat 45, flat 45. Then there's time along those periods. When you're in that '45 period, it's fun because you're making more money and things are going well, but it's also sucking all your money. Now you're like, Fuck, I'm making money, but I'm still broke. Where the fuck is it going? Then you get into this phase where things start to stabilize and the company operates, and you're probably making some money, and then you're going to go on another growth phase. During those growth phases, you're probably not going to make much money. All right? The dude making money is not fun. All right? Then to pile onto that, what's not fun about it is not only are you not making money, you don't know what the fuck you're doing at the same time. You're learning, right? When you are in this phase of not making any money because it's sucking all your money in because you're scaling, and then you don't know all the answers because you've never been on this before.
Now you're in a position where it feels like, Fuck, this sucks. Fuck this. I'm not making any money. I fucking hate my life. I'm frustrated all the time. But, dude, you just got to keep going because what happens is you end up leveling up again. That happens over and over and over. For me, somebody who's been doing this for 27 years, I understand understand that. The reason I was able to push through the first version of that was for no other reason that I didn't have any other options. This is why we talk about having a zero option mentality. In the beginning, your back is against the wall, bro. It's either do or die. Then when you start to have a little comfort and a little money, it's no longer do or die. But you have to create that mentality inside of you where it still is do or die. The way that you do is that you realize that if you don't keep going, you're going to lose everything you got. You're going to go back to that place of discomfort where you didn't have shit. That's worse than fucking anything for an entrepreneur.
We have to cultivate this idea, even when it's not true that we don't have any other options. When things get hard, it's funny because I'll say this to people, you've heard me say this, where I've said, I don't want to dig ditches. Because Because that's what I've convinced myself that I will be doing if this fails. Even at this point in time, even at this point in time in my life, I look back and I say, All right, I better go because I don't want to fucking dig ditches. All right? Now it's a little bit different. Now it's more so like, I know that's not the truth because I've cultivated a certain set of skills that I'll always be able to provide for myself. I'm a great speaker. I know a lot shit. You can't really take that from me. You know what I'm saying?
You might have to start a ditch digging company.
Well, I could be like everybody else on the internet and just sell what I know, which I probably should do because that's what everybody else is doing. But Regardless, the point is, I can always take care of myself now. Now it moves into you guys and these guys and everybody that works and associates with our companies, whether it be any of the companies that we work with. I feel a sense of responsibility to continue to go. But don't think that I'm still not thinking like, Fuck, if this really goes south, not only do they fucking lose, but I'm going to be digging fucking ditches. I think that shit every day. You got to cultivate that mentality to make sure that you continue to act urgently.
How many times of those stair climbs, I guess, would you say that it took you before you realized, Okay, cool, this is just how it works? You know what I'm saying? Because I'm sure that first big jump was probably-Honestly, it probably took like 15 years for me to figure it out.
Really? Yeah, maybe even 20. Wow. Because those are like three and four-year spans. You see what I'm saying? You can't really figure it out until you go through a few of those cycles. Yeah. All right? Yeah.
That was also probably, too, just historically, some of the hardest years, too. 2009, you had to deal with. Oh, yeah.
Yeah, fuck. No, listen, dude. The years where your company is actually growing or the hardest. Everybody thinks that's the most exciting time. No, it's like you're running around with your fucking ass on fire. It sucks, dude. The positive is, is you're like, Okay, well, things are growing. Let me just reel this in and let me get it operating right and let me make sure it's profitable. It's like pruning the fucking bush. You know what I mean? Yeah, dude, it takes time. That's why I share this lesson, because those of you who might be in that first cycle, especially when you're in your your 20s and you're just getting started, you have to understand that you're in the place where most people give up. Most people are in your position right now. Let's take this guy, for example. He started this little thing. It's not what he wants it to be. It was fun. Now it's hard. He's like, Fuck, maybe I picked the wrong thing. Those are his words. Yeah. Those are his words. Yeah. Okay. But you already got... Do you say how many years he has in it? No, he didn't. Okay. But you already got a significant amount of years built into this.
All right? Here's where people fuck up their lives. They get to this place where it's very frustrating, and they turn around and go back, and they say, Well, this isn't what I wanted.
It's too painful. This can't be it.
Right. But what happens is now you just wasted three years. Here's what happens. They go out and they do something else, and then they find themselves in the same pattern, and they're like, This isn't it either. Then they go back again. Now you're talking about nine years wasted. All right? So three years, go back. Three years, again, go back. Now you're talking about nine years. People do this all the time without realizing it. They don't understand that a lot of people waste their lives going from thing to thing to thing to thing to thing, hoping that it becomes the thing that they, quote unquote, enjoy. That's not how the fuck it works, bro. You got to force it into something that you enjoy. You got to keep going, and you got to understand that we are all working on a time scale. You will die. All of us will. Wasting 12 years going from thing to thing to thing to thing to thing is not really a good thing. All right? By the way, you're in plumbing. That's never going to wait. People I thought it was going to be shit. If I were you, I would be grateful for the business that you're in.
I would be real about the challenges that are faced by building anything meaningful. I would understand that I have all this time I'm invested. I have a certain skill set that a lot of people don't have, and I need to build upon that. When you build upon that, you will get to a place that is higher than the beginning guys. Remember this, too. Lots of people that are competing with you, that have other plumbing companies, and they're doing the same thing that you're doing. They're quitting in this fucking hard part. If you don't quit, your competition actually goes down. There's less people that you're competing with. This is practical stuff. If you do it again, there's even more people that quit. Then eventually, you find yourself on a level where you're looking around. There's probably two or three other guys that are at your level, and they didn't quit either. You know what happens? You become friends with them. Some respect. Yeah, because you all respect each other because of what you know you went through. That's what I was trying to say the other day when we were talking about getting into circles. I think we were talking about this on the hangout last week.
A lot of people who are day one, they want to be in that year 20 circle. But you don't get in that circle, bro, because you haven't paid your fucking dues. You don't have the respect of people who have been in in 20 years. Dude, when you complain about three years in, the guy who's been doing it for 25 looks at you and he says you're a bitch. You don't get into those rooms unless you earn that respect. All right? Then you could get it. Now, I'm not saying you can't physically get in the room and learn from the people and pick up what you can and provide value and potentially get a friendship going with some of these people, but they're still going to always look at you different. They're going to look at you as a little grasshopper, which, by the way, is a great thing because if you actually do have the ability to connect and get in a room with high-level people and you're humble about it, a lot of those people will go out of their way to help you as long as they see that you're pushing through this hard shit.
Nobody wants to waste their time on people that are bitching about how hard it is. It's fucking hard, bro. It's the hardest thing you could ever choose to do. You could not pick a harder profession in the history of humankind than to become a fucking entrepreneur. It's the hardest thing. That's also why there's the biggest reward. You have to think about what you really want. Entrepreneurship and the way the internet tries to make it, they try to make it like it's for everybody. But dude, quite honestly, it's not for everybody. It's not for everybody, not because they can't do it. It's not for everybody because it doesn't the life that they think entrepreneurship is about. You follow me? Absolutely. They get into it thinking, Oh, man, I'm going to become an entrepreneur. I'm going to start a brand. I'm going to become my own boss. Make my own schedule. Bro, you're not your own boss. You just think you are. Because when you own a company, your customers are the fucking boss. And by the way, if you're a good leader, your employees are the boss because you're answering to them, you're helping them, you're developing them, you're taking You're always going to answer to somebody.
It's just, who do you want to answer to? Do you want to answer to some dude? And maybe you like him. Maybe he's a good dude. Maybe you really like your boss. That's a good thing, by the way. But maybe you're thinking, Oh, man, I need to go on and do it on my own. Well, you need to really think about what that dude goes through because it isn't what you think you see. It's not the high life that the internet makes it out to be. Everybody has a different version of what success looks like. You need to be real clear about what you think that is. Here's what I will tell you from my experience. I'm glad I went when I was young. I'm glad I went hard as fuck when I was a young man. I'm glad I didn't waste that time. That's my perspective on it.
I love it.
It's been well worth the journey. It's been very hard. There's been a gazillion times I wanted to quit. There's still times I want to quit. Fuck. It literally, probably every week, I go through a serious debate in my head of like, what the fuck am I doing? But that's where you have to have this big vision, bro. You've got to have this vision for your life that is so big that it literally propels you forward into it. You have to understand that once you create that vision for yourself, if you don't fulfill it, it's going to be one of your biggest regrets of your life. When they've interviewed thousands of people, when they're on their deathbed, the regrets aren't the things that they did. The regrets are the things they didn't do. You got to think about that. Not everybody has this big vision. Not everybody wants to make millions of dollars a year. But those people are going to have different challenges. They're going to have to consider what things cost on the menu. They're going to have to consider where they go for vacation. They're going to have to consider what cars they drive.
They're going have to make different concessions in their life that you're not going to have to make when you have a lot of money. Having a lot of money is a great fucking thing. Nobody that has a lot of money will ever tell you any different. You always hear from people who don't have money how evil it is, how bad it is, and how you shouldn't pursue it. You ever wonder why that is? You ever wonder why you don't have people who have gone out and built things, say, Man, I really regret doing that. Have you ever heard that? No. I've never heard that either. I only hear that from do nothing losers on the fucking internet who are trying to morally have a high ground over people who are actually doing things. Keep that in mind, too. Everybody shits on it, and the reason they shit on it is because they didn't do it, and you're doing it.
That's real, bro. That's real, man. Guys, Andy, dude, that's three. That's a hell of a way to start a week, man.
All right, guys. Well, we will see you tonight, seventh Central on YouTube and X, and 7: 00 PM Live. Don't be a hoe. Share the show.
On today's episode, Andy answers your questions on how to become a better version of yourself by dropping old identities, how to unlock your potential without fear holding you back, and what are the best ways to handle the struggles of a growing business.