Transcript of Douglas James: The Navy Veteran Who Built Schools, Saved Lives & Revolutionized Sales

When I found digital marketing, after about six months, I was making my annual salary in the military, but monthly. It was like over 50 grand a month. We helped over 15,000 people, and it did nine figures in total revenue. I had two quarters, back to back, read. I just lost $10 million. I was so into my business. I was very distant from my wife, my kids, my faith. I felt like I was going to lose everything. I just remember, man, I was walking around. I'm like, Man, what is the answer? I've lost eight figures. I'm going to possibly get divorced. My kids don't know who I am. I looked over at my desk and I had Crucifix, and I just remember looking at the Crucifix. I'm like, Oh, my God, the whole time you've been there. I just fell to my knees and I just surrender my life to God. And ever since that moment, everything has literally turned around.

Hey, Guys, and welcome back to the Love of a Podcast. This is Paul Alex. Guys, here is the latest update from Google. We are currently number 19 on top podcast, number one in business in the US. Guys, come on. Help us out. We're trying to get to Rogan. Okay, with that being said, today's guest is living proof that you could go from military hustle to a multimillionaire muscle. Douglas James is a Navy veteran who turned his side hustle into over $100 million in high-ticket sales. He's helped over 15,000 entrepreneurs start and grow their own businesses, and now he's building a game-changing tool that is using AI to help people qualify leads and close more deals without wasting time. Dude, that's fire. But behind the money, and the millions is a man who had to figure out all the hard way. He started with no business background, face setbacks, rebuilt, and now he's here to give you the real game, guys. If you ever felt stuck, lost, or like your goals were too far away, this episode is for you. Let's welcome to the Love All podcast, Douglas James. Welcome, brother.

Hey, love to be here. We're in beautiful Miami, so I'm really enjoying my time here.

Dude, absolutely, man. When did you fly in?

Let's see. We got in on Tuesday around five o'clock. So we've had not even 48 hours, and it's been nonstop since then.

Isn't it crazy, guys? I know you guys are Cali boys just like me, but isn't it crazy? You come to the East Coast, dude, Miami. It feels like you're here in 48 hours, but it seems like it's only been a couple of hours, dude. Oh, yeah. It's insane. I know the time changes all. It jacks me up every time. But okay, cool. We have a lot to cover, dude. So let's go into it. You were in the Navy for 10 years. What made you want to start a business while still serving, dude?

Yeah, it's a great question, man. So I came from a background where it wasn't really an entrepreneurial upbringing at all. My mom was a respiratory therapist. She worked for 30 years, nights in the hospital. She provided for us. My dad was in and out of odd jobs, mechanic and all that. And I grew up in a household where it was like a chaotic environment, and I saw things no kids should ever see. Physical, verbal abuse, maybe on my dad's side, abuse of drugs and alcohol. And I actually left home around 16 years old, and I ended up getting into the Navy and finding entrepreneurship. So a lot of context there, but I build it up a little bit because I don't have any background in this stuff at all, in the online space, building businesses, anything. But to answer the question, specifically, I just remember I spent 10 years in the Navy. I was Hospital Corman. And in five years, I made E6, which is like a high level supervisory position. I'm going to be in charge of hundreds of battalions of people, right? And it takes the average person 12 years to make that rank.

And I went on a deployment to Papua New Guinea, Fiji, in the Philippines. And we were out there building schools for kids, rendering medical aid, some of the best work I've ever done as a human being, even to this day. And that really set the tone and shifted my way of thinking. It's like, man, I want to be able to do something for kids and provide more, not just with my time, but financially, because if I can figure out how to make more money, I can actually make a bigger impact. And that's where the misconception, a lot of people hate money or think of people with money or bad people. They just don't understand what you can actually be capable of or what people do. Like, entrepreneurs, we create jobs. We create opportunities for other people, right? So I wanted to do something along the lines with helping kids. So now, to date, we've built over a dozen schools with Pencils of Promise. I've given to a number of charities as well with military veterans, RIP Medical. We help military veterans eradicate medical dead as well. But I just remember being back from that deployment and building all these schools for these kids.

By the way, I want to tell this quick story because it's so memorable. And I love When I get asked the question because I get to go back to that moment. But I just remember we were in the Philippines in Rojas City. It's super, super rural. Super rural. There's no big city there. There's Manila, but then there's Rojas on the other side of the island. There was four structures that we had built. We built a soccer field, a basketball court, all those things. And on the last day, and mind you, I'm the corpsman, right? So if the Seabies are building everything, so if they nail through the therm or anything, I'm there, I'm their medical aid. The last day, we were walking off this steep hill to get to the top and had boxes of books and crayons. We were all carrying supplies. We get up there and you can't see what's up there. You can't see the site until you get up there, right? So we get up there and you just see hundreds of kids, man, a freaking sea of kids. And they see us and they just ran to us and just grabbed our leg and they were like, Thank you, thank you, USA, USA.

And I just remember in that moment, I'm like, Man, this is so beautiful. I want to do more stuff like this and give back. And I want to have kids. I want to have a family. And I want to be able to give my kids a life that I didn't have when I was growing up. So I get back from that deployment. I just got capped to E6. I didn't even take a test. They were like, Dude, you're being meritoriously advanced because you deserve it. And I'm like, Man, what an honor. And I got back from deployment. My now wife, then girlfriend, was waiting for me, and I just was home one day, and I was talking, and I was like, I think I want to transition out the military. I don't think I want to do 20 or 30 years. I want to start a family and figure out what life looks like. I just was up googling one night, and I was like, Man, how do you get out the military? How do you make money online? I was searching all these things, and it landed me digital marketing. And here we are.

I love that, dude. That is such a great story. And guys, that's the Love of a Lo podcast. Thank you. No, I'm just kidding. No, dude, that is a fire answer to that first That's a good question. So let's break it down real quick. Number one, you were growing in a household where you saw a lot of things, trauma between your family and your environment. What's your perspective on environment? Do you think that holds a lot of people back? Because you, at 16, you decided, hey, you know what? I'm going to go into the military. Not a lot of people can take an action like that, a decisive action, right? A lot of people are actually indecisive, right? So what made you be so decisive at the age of 16? You were so young.

Yeah, man. It's really unfortunate that most people are a product of their environment, of their upbringing. So if you live in a household where there's guns, drugs, alcohol, and all those things going on, you fall into that because that's what you're used to. And then when you're a child, I got two girls. I have a six-year-old, about to be six-year-old and a two-and-a-half-year-old. They're sponges. They look at me like that is Superman. Anything he says or does is gold. We take it to heart. It's the real deal. And they want to model that. And so I have to really watch our tone, my tone, when I'm speaking and doing things in front of her because she'll start doing them. And like the same thing, when I was a kid, I thought my dad was Superman. I would see him do things. I would want to model him and model his behavior. But it was just like when I was 16, 15, 16 years old, man, I really started to come into my own as a man I started to have trauma, PTSD, of the things that I experienced as a kid. So I actually seeked help at my school that I was going to, and I got a guidance counselor.

And Mr. Morris, I don't give him enough credit when I speak about my story, but I just started bringing him up. And I, dude, if Mr. Morris ever hears me speak, please reach out to me. Look me up because I want to talk to you because this guy, I think he saved my life.

Yeah. Shout out to Mr. Morris. If you're out there or if someone that knows Mr. Morris, hey, tell him that we have a great guy here that you actually changed his life.

Yeah, man. For sure, man. He's a guidance counselor, and I went to him every day From when I was 15 to 17 years old, literally every single day, I stopped in his office. Sometimes I would be there for a minute. Sometimes I'll be there for a couple of hours. But he just helped me realize a lot of the behaviors and emotions, the things that I was experienced was not okay. And the biggest thing was reinforcing it's okay to be not okay. You're sad. These are normal things. So he really validated a lot of my emotions and coddled me in a bit to help me get through it. But that's when I really started to realize, wow, my dad is effed up. And bless his heart. He's never been a dad before. He's never been a husband He's trying to figure it out. I'm a dad. I'm a husband. I haven't done this before either. I don't have a blueprint, but I'm still trying to make a conscious effort to be the best that I can every day. So Yeah. So I went to counseling, man. I remember I went back home one day to my dad, and he had just gotten home from drinking super late.

I saw him and I confronted him, And I was like, Hey, I don't believe in your behavior. I don't appreciate what you do to my mom. You're destroying your health. I think you need to man up. And I told him, I'm going to move out. I'm going to run from this home because I don't want to be under your household anymore. So he basically got into an argument, confrontation. He took a swing, and I was like, That's it. I'm out. And I left, 16 years old, and I moved in with my best My friend's parents at the time. And then I moved in my grandparents, which was my dad's parents. And I coasted and prepared. I got into the initial program before you go into the Navy, and I ended up joining the Navy. Actually, before that, man, I was pretty troubled. And I'll share this, too. It wasn't smooth, and it still hasn't been smooth. But life is always going to... You're going to have the plan, but it's never going to really pan So you have to adapt and overcome, which the military teaches you, which is great in entrepreneurship, too. That's right.

But I was troubled even when I moved out. I got a job working at Target, and I was the I was an electronic specialist, and I was helping people get TVs and all the things. And I ended up shoplifting some stuff. And it was like, there's still something inside of me that was like, I was still wanting to model this behavior. I'm sorry. That's actually Before I moved out, I got the job at Target. And I think also going through that experience because actually I went to jail for 18 hours. And I remember sitting next to a guy that was talking about wanting to murder his wife, and he wasn't successful in doing so. And it was like, man, this is not the place I ever want to be again in my whole life. So, yeah, I remember my mom and my grandma came out and they basically told me, you need to fix yourself up. You need You need to consider going to college, you need to go to the military, or you need to get the F out of our house. And that was the three options that I was given by the two people that loved and cared for me the most at the time, which still do today, obviously.

And I graduated high school with a 1. 4 GPA. That college was out of the question. I could not sit in a class and listen to a teacher. I was just not built for that. Not saying I'm not a student. I'm a student of life, faith, and business, and all the things. But back then, I was this kid, and I didn't want to have my family disown me and be homeless, so I joined the military.

Yeah. Dude, that is so powerful. The fact that at the age of 16, you were able to make a conscious decision to go ahead and say, Hey, I'm going to leave the only home that I know. I'm going to go ahead and leave my parents who love me, right? And even though I love my dad, my dad is doing wrong, and I see that, right? So this goes back to mentorship, because you think about it, dude, your guidance counselor, he was one of your first mentors in your life. And I reflect all the time. I'm like, Dude, did I have mentors throughout my life? And as I reflect, I'm on this entrepreneurship journey, just like you, I'm like, yeah, I actually did. There are certain reasons why we do what we do. But for a lot of people, I urge you guys, if you guys are looking for the help, if you guys need to talk to this money, it's super important, man. I Back in COVID, dude, I got into massive deep depression, bro. Massive. To the point where I got to get on Prozac, depression pills. I had to up it a few years later, and then I had to go do my chemistry and the gut and all that jazz.

That's why I started optimizing my health myself. But to get back to you, man, man, that's deep.

Can I just say one thing about what you said? Yeah, go ahead. You're absolutely right. I see people with the self-made mentality, and they claim that like a badge of honor. Dude, that is complete BS. It's bullshit. We've all had mentors along the way, and I think it's cool that you have that much pride and you believe in what you do, but you have to give credit where credit's due.

Yes.

A hundred % all the time.

I agree. Even till then, my parents, they didn't really believe in entrepreneurship. They believed in what I like to call the old American dream. It was the American trap for me, man. I was working 80 to 100 hours. I was Yeah, getting paid well. But in California, 100K doesn't go that far, my man. You're in poverty, my friend. That's just what it is, right? Not at all. And I get a lot of hate online for that, man. People are like, Oh, there's no way cops make that much. I was like, Dude, in California, yes, they pay you that much, but guess what? You're not living that way. You're in California. Yeah, you're in California. Let's remember that, guys, okay? So with that being said, let's go ahead and talk about, all right, digital marketing. Did Did you figure it out as you went, or did you already know? Did you have a basis? Did you get a mentor within digital marketing? Or how was the process for you when you started that out?

Before I really found what my niche was going to be, the whole mindset shift happened because I actually found people like Tony Robbins and Zig Zigler. Self help. Self helps, personal development Just to shift the paradigms of how I thought about money and my time, value, and all these things. So when I started to realize that and shift, that's when I was like, Man, how do I create value in the marketplace. And that's really what found me digital marketing. And I got to tell you what really stuck out to me was a quote by Zig Zigler in a book he wrote in the '60s, I believe. It's, Help people get what they want. You'll have all you want in life. Yes. And that immediately when I read it, I was like, oh, my God, that's how I was so successful in the military. So I told you I put on E6 in five years, and it takes the average person 12 years. And I did that because I was completely obsessed with helping junior sailors win. So any program I took on, anything that I did in the military, I had a group of people behind me that was taking care of everything.

And I had the vision and the mission, and I had all these people bought into where we were trying to go. And yes, I got the rank, I got the awards and all that stuff, but they did, too. Those were bullet points and things they were able to put on their evaluations, and they went on to become chiefs and officers and all the thing. I still keep up with it. I'm like, oh, my God. That's awesome. So that's really the start of it. But when I found digital marketing, I'll tell you, the first thing that I found was search engine optimization. I remember googling And I'm like, why are these businesses on Google? When I put in a dentist, San Diego, why is it this particular dentist is ranked number one? Correct. And why is this one number two? What's going on? Why in the map section, there's these businesses ranked? So I just started to play and just do Google searches and research this stuff. And I ended up finding a mentor in that space. His name was Dan way back in the day, and he was teaching and talking about how to rank websites.

So I started to learn from him on YouTube. And before you knew it, man, after about six months, I was making my annual salary in the military, but monthly. I love that. In six months. So it was like over 50 grand a month. And I had probably 20 something clients paying me small retainers of 1,500 to 2 grand a month, something like that. And I got really good at it. But here's what happened. The guy I was learning I'm hearing from, and this is 2015. It's the online is the Wild Wild West. It is. Today, it's way more regulated. You got a lot more rules to follow. He was basically teaching these, I'll call them Black Hat procedures on how to do it. There's a lot of context there, but basically it's frown or prwn. And I didn't know any better. I was just naive. I'm making all this money. This is working. Businesses are happy. People are googling, Hey, I'm looking for a carpet cleaner in Escondido, California.

You weren't even thinking about liability. You were just like, Dude, I'm making money.

No. Attorneys, liability? Dude, no. It's the Internet.

It'll be fine.

Exactly. And Google releases this algorithm update. It's called the Penguin.

The Penguin.

And today we call it the Penguin killer because it flagged those same strategies that people like me were using. So I woke up one day, man, and every single client that I had disappeared from page one for their perspectives Google search. Oh, no. Completely disappeared. So what does that mean? They stopped getting calls and emails to their website. Correct. So I'm getting calls. What's going on? What are you doing? Are you scamming me? People are freaking out. I'm like, I don't know So this algorithm update came out. I'm trying to figure it out. So I basically lost my $50,000 a month business overnight. I had four clients that was willing to work it out with me, literally a fifth of them. And And I was like, let me get into paid advertising. I've seen Facebook ads. I've seen the ads on top of Google. Let me see what that's about. So I started to run ads for them, and I sucked at it. I sucked at it really bad. So I lost three clients. But one, I started to have traction with. It was a limousine party bus company, and we worked out a deal where they were like, hey, look, we're going to give you 25 % of whatever you make us for the next 30 days.

And that was my deal with all the clients, actually, and it worked out for them. And I remember they just gave me a check for like, 7,500 bucks after 30 days. I was like, Okay, this works. So that's how I got into paid advertising on Facebook and Google.

I love that, man. So you went through a roadblock after you had success. Dude, I could only imagine the first time you got paid 50K in a month. How was that emotion? How did you feel? You were on top of the world. You're like, oh, yeah.

Dude, I took my wife, well, girlfriend at the time, to Eddie V's in La Joda.

Eddie V's is great. Yeah. Love their fried rice, dude. Yeah.

So we celebrated there. It was like our first... It was a good time.

It was a good time.

Yeah, it was a good time.

It's a good feeling, dude.

It was a really good feeling. Oh, yeah. Because I went through a lot at that point.

First milestone, dude. You're like, Dude, we made it. You're thinking about like, All right, cool. What we're going to build next. We're going to keep going. I love that feeling. It's about building the journey. Something that you had said that made you ultra-successful in the military, and I can relate, dude, coming from law enforcement and working with a lot of military folks like yourself, is that You cared about your people, dude. And some of the most successful people that I know, you have to build a team to build something big. And I know that if you can build a culture, you care about your folks and where they're going in life and their vision and their family and who they are, right? Dude, people will have your back all day, every day. So you transition that skillset that you built unknowingly in the military to where you are now in entrepreneurship, dude. And that's why you have that level of success. A lot of people don't get that because they don't have the experience. And that's just what it comes down to. Some of the most successful people that I've met in my life, military dude, law enforcement, a life experience, right?

So at this time, when you're going through all this, and then you're at that point where you're going to start running essentially an agency for paid ads, how old were you?

I was 26. Yeah, about to be 27. So I'm 37 now. So I've been doing this total for 11 years.

11 years. That's wonderful. More than a decade, full-time entrepreneur from the military. See, guys, this is the stories that I want to bring you. Stories from real people just like Douglas, come from the military, come from not a Silver Spoon family. And for a lot of people that know my story, it's the same thing. Single mother, immigrant, dude. I never had anything handed to me ever. So I respect you, dude. Thank you. Okay. Now, let's get down to your baby. What is the new company that is changing the waves with using AI? Because AI is huge right now, dude. Everybody's like, It's going to replace the world. But what are you doing specifically where you're dominating this space, dude?

Yeah. So I have a company called LeadFi. It's a SaaS product, Software as a Service. It's basically a lead qualification technology that we developed. So if you can imagine if somebody visits your website or your funnel, either from an ad or they DM you on Instagram, you get them to book a call or opt into your offer, whatever that is to watch your video or webinar, they give you their name, email, phone number, right? Correct. So what we've been able to do is create verification technology technology that is patent and proprietary. And we're able to basically conduct a soft credit poll in real-time with Experian TransUnion Equifax, and then provide credit information that you wouldn't be able to get otherwise without having their address, date of birth, and sensitive fields of information. I can basically tell you someone's exact credit score, how much money they can spend on their credit cards right now in their wallet, their annual income, their debt to income ratio. And I could also pull their real estate assets, investable assets, and retirement assets as well. But we do this with all the purpose of providing funding pre-approvals. So it's called pre-screening.

So it's actually the same things that banks do to send me a mailless credit cards in the mail,pre-approvals. Correct. So it's interesting. So you don't need actually a checkbox consent when people opt in for that because we We're providing a funding pre-approval through the API as well. So there is some language you have to put on your privacy policy to be compliant. But this company was established from another past trauma that I experienced.

Let's talk about it, man. What was the vision behind this company, dude? What led you up to this company? Because I know for a lot of entrepreneurs, when they hit a nine-figure company like where you're building, man, it's one of those things. It's like they learnto learn from experience and they learn from possibly building a company before, and they just went to complete shit. And you're like, Dude, that's the hard lesson I learned. Let me build it the right way this time. So what exactly happened?

I was running my agency for a good while. I got into paid ads. I was still active duty, by the way, when I was doing that. I was active duty for four years as an entrepreneur.

I love that.

I had veterans coming up to me. I remember the first person I ever coached and taught how to basically make money online by doing lead generation for businesses was a Master Chief, so E9. So highest rank you can go in the military, active duty, I should say. He comes up to me, we're in uniform, and he's like, HM1. I'm a hospital in first class, so my rank was HM1. Hm1, I heard about you. I've been in Navy for 25 years. I'm 45 years old, and I'm getting out next month, and I don't want to sit in a classroom full of 19-year-olds. Would you be willing to teach me how you're doing this business stuff online? I said, Sure, Master Chief, I got you. So I went home. It was a Friday. I went home. I recorded the worst course you've ever seen in your life, uploaded a Dropbox, gave it to him, and he took it, and by the next weekend, he landed a client making a thousand bucks a month, and he paid me. And then he gave me a thousand bucks for my material. I'm like, wow, this is incredible. So people are willing to pay you just for what you know.

Yeah.

Right? So from there, Where what I did was I started to create a... As time went on, the course got more and more advanced. And then the better it got, people wanted more and more of my attention. So we created not just do it yourself programs, but done with you, then done I'm coming down for you. Then they were like, I want to come see you in person. So I started holding events. I got this 7,000 square foot penthouse where I could hold these private exclusive events, and people are paying really good money to be in the room. And I did that for years. And And we helped over 15,000 people in that program, and it did nine figures in total revenue. That's huge. Yeah. So it all led up to about, I want to say, just over a year and a half ago, now getting close to two years, actually, if I remember correctly. But I was selling high ticket, right? Yes. 5k, 10K, 25, and then 55K. So really high tickets. So the sales cycle on those purchases might have been it would take 2-3 months sometimes for someone to close. Correct. I, as a business owner, really couldn't look at my PnL month to month because I knew out of the quarter, one or two months sometimes would be in the red.

And I'll be like, It's cool. It's cool. But month three, boom, massive green month. Boom, we're in the profit. We're like 3X, right? To the limit. Yeah. So all these sales just transpired. So I remember about a year and a half ago, I had two quarters back to back red. I'm like, something's wrong. And I saw the sign after the first quarter, and I'm like, it's okay. It's a season. It's summertime. People with their kids. The second quarter, boom, red. I'm like, oh, my gosh, I just lost $10 million.

And Douglas, this is in 2024 or 2023?

Late 2023, early 2024.

Okay.

All right. So I was like, something's wrong. And so from what we started to do there, and I had over 100 people in my organizations, from sales, marketing people, fulfillment people. Payroll? Yeah. Stressful. Dude, it's not just 100 people. It's like 100 families. So if I They can't pay them. They can't feed their kids. So obviously, you take that to heart, and it's a lot of stress and responsibility. Anyway, I tried to bring on the best of the best at the time to try to fix everything, and I just remember nothing was working. And at the time, man, I was so into my business. I was traveling a lot, networking, speaking, all the things. I was very distant from my wife. I was very distant from my kids. I was very, very distant in my faith, nothing was really lining up for me at the time. And I felt like I was going to lose everything. I really did. Actually, I almost did. And I just remember one day, I was just in my office, man. I was walking around. I'm like, Man, what is the answer? What is going on? I'm losing. I've lost eight figures.

I'm going to possibly get divorced. My kids don't know who I am. Dude, all this is going on at the same time. And I just remember, man, I looked over at my desk and I had my crucifix sitting there. And I just remember looking at the crucifix. I'm like, oh, my God, the whole time you've been there. So I just fell to my knees and I just surrender my life to God at that point. And ever since that moment, man, Everything has literally turned around. The very next morning, the very next morning from that, one of my friends put me in a three-way chat with my partner Eric, who is a partner with me in LeadFi now. Eric has been in the financial space, underwriting for banks, he's had this relationship with the credit bureaus for 15 years. I told him, I'm like, Dude, I want certainty of every single lead that opts in my phone. And I was saying it jokingly. I was like, I want to know their credit. I want to know their income. These people are opting in and lying to my sales team, and my marketing team is saying the quality is good, and the sales team is complaining that the quality is bad all the time.

Can we figure this out? What do you do? And he's like, Well, he was He was working on an underlying technology, and it wasn't fully developed yet. I was like, Let me partner with you. I already have a company that I've done big numbers, and I want to help figure out the use case of how to implement this into marketing and sales. So we have a team of PhDs. I'm in another AI company as well. We all got together and we basically developed what is now LeadFi today. And we were able to get my offer back profitable. And as soon as I told one person, I told We called one guy about what we did, and now it went viral. There's over 200 high six-figure to nine-figure brands on it. Love it. And we organically get at least 10 to 20 calls a day. Wow. So I haven't ran a single ad for this at all. So it's very successful, and I think it's going to keep growing because we initially started working with coaches, consultants, info product owners, people like that, because that's my world. That's my space, marketing agencies, sales agencies. But now we are going into the mortgage space as well, and we've integrated Freddie Mac and all these things.

So now we're actually able to underwrite a deal with just name, email, phone number, and save you 99 % of the cost to see if someone's pre-approved to buy a home with a co-buy. It's literally going to disrupt that whole industry. We're super excited about it as well. We're also looking at other niche as insurance and auto as well. But, yeah, man, it's been quite a journey.

Dude, that's phenomenal. A couple of things to touch on that, Douglas. I mean, number one, my mind just goes, boom. I know so many industries that can use that, man. I mean, you're talking about market this. I'm thinking real estate agents, right? Real estate agents, they're willing to go ahead and pay leads like they do with Zillow, and they could go ahead and you can qualify them based on how much the person makes, their credit score and all that stuff. So now, hey, you want the guy that's going to buy a $5 million house? You got to pay for that, So, dude, the possibilities are endless with that, man. Yeah. Congrats, brother. Thank you. To go back to that point, back in 2023, dude, when you thought you were about to lose it all, dude, and you lost yourself, right? Do you think it was because you were so hyper-focused, you were a hyper-focused, driven individual. Was it because you were deep into building your prior company? You were in there trying to grow it. You were I was driven to grow that organization that you were like, Hey, dude, I'm going to forget about personal.

I'm going to forget about my marriage. I'm going to forget about my kids. I'm going to forget about... You didn't do it intentionally. You're a great guy. But at the end of the day, I feel like as an entrepreneur, we're highly driven, dude. It's just like success love speed, right? Let's get it done. Sometimes we get lost in sauce. 2024, it happened to me, dude. Gained 40 pounds, married the love of my life. But yet I was in deep depression, double on my medication. Couldn't sleep. I looked like shit. Dude, it was all bad. And then I came to realize, I was like, What is wrong with me? Best financial year I ever had. But then everything else was crap. It wasn't until a good friend that we both know, Big Mike. Shout out Big Mike. He was just like, Dude, is your gut?

Yeah, he told me the same thing.

He's like, It's your gut, Paul. You got to optimize. You got a biohack, bro. The doctor is going to kill you. Guys, we've had heart surgeons on this show that were like, Yeah, you guys need to do your own research. Because as we know, big pharma, they're all about making money. It's a coin, right? To get back for your situation, man, 2023, dude, you built a nine-figure company, the pinnacle of success for any entrepreneur. But then yet you realized you're like, Dude, my life, it's spiraling out of control. So why do you think that was happening?

I'll tell you why I think it wasn't happening. And this is just my belief, but God calls us to lead his church. So if you can't lead your family, how are you going to lead his church? That's my belief. With my wife and my family, success without presence is failure. I was not present for my wife. I was not present for my kids, and I wasn't leading in that household. But I thought I was successful because my idea of success was to travel and meet all these cool people and have dinner and drink tons of alcohol and tear up my cut, too, and build this company. And it was successful from a monetary standpoint. And yes, I did help a lot of people. And yes, I'm very grateful for that I've literally saved people's lives. I've had people write me letters saying, Hey, I was contemplating suicide. Then I saw your ad on Instagram, and I showed up to your event. Now I want to live for my kids and my granddaughter. That happened, right? I've had people be Being able to afford chemo treatment to save their loved one. That's all great work. But I sacrificed a lot in order to achieve that.

So I do believe that There are seasons where you have to sacrifice and you have to buckle down. But what good is gaining the world if someone sells their soul? These are Bible references that I'm mentioning, by the way. I'm really big into my faith now, and now I really see where I went wrong. If I knew now, then, dude, I'll probably be so far ahead. But here's the thing. These downfalls and these rock bottoms are blessings, right? Because it gives me a level clarity to now that I'm preparing for what's coming for me and where I'm going. So I know that I'm going to do incredible things going forward, but there has to be some balance. When you have kids and you have little ones, you have to think, what are they going to think of you when When you're older? Are they even going to want to sit down and have a cup of coffee with you? Are they going to want to even be over for Christmas? I look back to my dad, I don't want to be with him for Christmas. I don't want to have a cup of coffee with him.

It's the hard truth, dude. A lot of people don't want a man up to it. At the end of the day, as an entrepreneur, as a man, you want to be successful. You want to be the provider, right? But at the end of the day, what is it good being a provider if you're not present, dude? It was the same thing with me. My mom, my dad, they separated when I was two. Mom, basically single mother. Dad, he was a construction worker that actually converted to be a restaurant entrepreneur. Multiple locations. Never saw him, dude. Twelve kids, twelve, nine wives. He was a player for life. But at the end of the day, the week that he died, dude, he tried reaching out to me. And my They had brothers and sisters. They were like, Oh, he tried reaching out to you. You wanted to see before he passed away? Bullshit, dude. I was a cop. I have a public record, dude. You could find me easily. So at the end of the day, dude, it sucks. You have to go through those trials and errors in life. And you're right. In life, in your seasons, dude.

But what you've gone through, dude, it's going to build you up for the next level. Well, if there's a new level, there's a new double.

That's right.

So now that you've realized that, dude, you're back bigger than ever, dude. You're a dad and a husband. How do you make sure you're winning at home while building the big next thing?

At my life, man, I got to tell you, God's at the center of everything. As cheesy that might sound, I know it's not popular with a lot of people. Actually, to be honest with you, I'm finding that it's actually more popular than we do. It is. No, it is.

Family, traditional values, guys.

God, right?

It is. The cliché that you always hear, guys, you versus you. It is so true. I talk to so many entrepreneurs. They're like, Dude, how do you do it? I'm like, Bro, I'm no one special. I'm not smart. I just execute because I get in my own head. It's like you. Everybody bleeds. Everybody has emotions. Everybody goes through trauma. But at the end of the day, we get in our own way. How are you making sure now that you're winning at home, dude, while building this next big thing?

My wife is a part of everything at this point. Every decision, every planning. We have regular meetings. We always have a plan for our kids. Like right now we're in Miami. She's here with me, but the kids aren't. So that took coordination. That took communication. Yes, 100 %. So being present at home, making sure the home is secure because the home is the foundation. When you build a house, foundation cracks, everything's going to crumble. So that is the number one thing that I focus on first. My dreams are always at the top of the list, what I want to do and accomplish. Those are visions, those are ideas. But through my execution starts with the foundation, which is the family. And then from there we go build, we go travel, we go to meetings. So that has been my focus and putting God at the center of everything and making sure we're strong in our faith. And then for me, dude, sometimes when I'm feeling like I'm alone or like I'm on an island, which I know a lot of people do. Absolutely. A lot of people are entrepreneurs. If you're a human being, we think we're on an island, we're freaking everything.

Dude, we're all humans. We all have the same psychology. We go through the same problems. You're not on an island. That's the first thing. But then you always have somebody over you. That's God. And when I When I realized that I wasn't alone, he was there that whole time. When I saw the crucifix in my office, that's when I fell to my knees. That's when everything turned around for me.

Yeah, because you realized it. You realized it, dude. You're like, Dude, I'm not alone. I just got to go back to what I know. Just like you went to your counselor when you were 16, dramatically changed your life, gave you belief to go into the military. If you never went to the military, you never would have got the skill sets to go ahead and build a nine-figure company out of that.

That's it.

It's awesome, dude. That's it. Guys, phenomenal interview here with Douglas James, military veteran to a multimillionaire, building multiple nine-figure companies. Now, there's one thing that I always tell every single guest here at the LevelUp podcast, we have about 100,000 downloads a day, which is pretty cool. It's all for you guys. From somebody who was in the military, someone who was at a household at the age of 16, dude, that had to run away to better your life and to LevelUp, What do you have to say to the people that need self-help right now, that need somebody to talk to, that want to become an entrepreneur? They want to live your life, dude. You're living the new American dream, dude. N-a-d. New American dream, bro. That's what it's about. So what do you have to tell them?

Man, there's so much that I could share with you right now, and I wish we had a lot more time. But I'll just tell you this. There's this quote that I think about every single day. And in my darkest moments, when I feel like I want to give up, when I feel stressed, when I feel like I'm in a corner, I think of this quote, and it's quotes from a famous author. Her name is Virginia Satire. And the quote is, Most people choose the certainty of misery to the The misery of uncertainty. So think of every decision. Think of everything that you have to do in your life. Goals, dreams, aspirations. Picture there's two doors in front of you. Behind door number one, it's the life as you know it. It's the same job, the same house, the same car, the same circumstances, the same finances. You're comfortable there. You're miserable, but you know what you're going to get. Because door number two, there's complete uncertainty of how that's going to play out for you. It's a miserable feeling. But I got to tell you, every decision that I've ever made in my life, every billionaire and successful person that I've ever interviewed or had dinner with, I ask them the same question, door number one or door number two.

And guess what? They always choose door number two. So if there's anything that you want in your life, you have to get comfortable with uncertainty for long periods of time. Time and business compounds, just like time in the markets and crypto and real estate compounds. Don't get emotional at the first sign of distress or fear. You have to continue to pursue and you have to stay in the game. At the end of the day, one of my mentors told me, no matter what you do, no matter how hard it gets, stay in business. That's it, because it will compound over time. The losses will compound in success. The success will compound even more success. So stay in the game.

And that is the level up, guys. And then Douglas, where can the audience find you?

Yeah, go to Instagram, type in Douglas James. Should be the first one with the blue check. I think it's @the_douglasjames. And if you're interested in LeadFi and my software company, just go to leadfi. Ai.

Phenomenal. Guys, there you have it. From military veteran to a multimillionaire. Guys, if Douglas can do it, you can do it, okay? Don't overthink. Make it happen. And it's you versus you, guys. All right, guys, we are top 19 in all categories, number one in business currently in Apple podcast, guys. Make sure to share this with a friend. Leave a five-star review on Spotify. With that being said, guys, I'll catch you on the next one.