0 (2s):
Light that sparked Fire Nation. JLD here and welcome to Entrepreneurs On Fire brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network with great shows like being boss today, we'll be focusing on how to create an unbroken business to drop these value bombs. I have brought Michael Unbroken into EOFire studios. Michael is an entrepreneur, a bestselling author, speaker, podcaster, coach, and advocate for adult survivors of childhood trauma. And today foundation, we'll be talking about owning our story. We'll talk about standing out with our personal brand and values. We'll talk about vulnerability, doubt, fear, the imposter syndrome and the power of powerful mentors and so much more Fire Nation.

0 (44s):
When we get back from thanking our sponsors, ready to dig deeper on the creative side of business, then the podcast being boss has you covered discover new tools to unravel the complexities of starting your own creative business with episodes on topics like building systems for freelancers and brand strategies. Listen, learn, and grow with being boss on the HubSpot Podcast Network at hubspot.com/podcastnetwork. According to a survey over two thirds of Americans are planning to travel this summer. This means that airlines restaurants and more have been ramping up their hiring, who do they turn to ZipRecruiter? ZipRecruiter's technology finds qualified candidates for your job, and you can easily invite your top choices to apply.

0 (1m 25s):
And right now you can try ZipRecruiter for free at ziprecruiter.com/fire. Michael say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful. That most people disagree Fire Nation.

1 (1m 41s):
What is up? I am super excited to be here with you guys today. I, I think that one of the biggest misnomers in success is that you have to do it alone. And I will tell you this right now asking for help is not weak. If you want to grow, if you want to build an empire, a business, a community, a family, and impact, you're going to have to understand that no one great has ever done it by themselves and asking for help will catapult you into the next level.

0 (2m 9s):
Fire Nation I think you can tell this is already going to be a special episode. I mean, we have a person with passion. We have a person with meaning. We have a person with purpose on the microphone here today, a quick backstory. I was actually the coach of Peter Vargas's advance your reach presentation slash conference, not too long ago. And Michael was one of the people who was selected as one of the top 10 speakers, and we all had to vote on them. And I actually had to raise my hand as the judge to give some feedback to Michael on his talk. Cause I thought it was amazing, but of course, you know, I wanted to give some feedback as well. And it was really cool to see how he took that and how he's gone forward with that.

0 (2m 50s):
And that's why I invited him on entrepreneurs on fire today because we have a lot of awesome things to talk about, but my whole kind of backstory there, Michael was because it was really your story. That's inspired me that you were able to share at a very short period of time that I loved what you went through. So you owned your story on stage, and I was impressed by that. How can we, the listeners Fire Nation own our own story instead of it owning us first

1 (3m 16s):
Off and thank you for the opportunity to be here, John, it means the world to me, I, I will say this. We are the sum total of all of our experiences leading up to this moment and to create quick context. I want people to understand this. When I was a child, I was homeless. My mother was a drug addict and alcoholic. My stepfather was the kind of guy you praise, never your stepfather. By the time that I was 12 years old, I got drunk for the first time high at 13 expelled from school at 15. And I found myself in this situation where I was just blaming the world. And in my late teens, I was like, okay, there's gotta be a way to solve the solution for poverty. And so I chased money and I ended up getting a job with a fortune 10 company at 20 years old with no high school diploma and no college degree.

1 (4m 6s):
The hard part was that money only made my life worse. I was still letting the past the trauma of the abuse, the fact that I was homeless, that my mother had cut my finger off, that it had all these really dark things happen to me impact the choices and the decisions that I made. And then John, I did one of the hardest things that we have to do as a human being. And I had to look at myself in the mirror and I had to ask myself, what am I willing to do to have the life that I want to have? Well, and when you get vulnerable with yourself, when you make that choice to look at yourself in the eyes and go into the depths of your soul and get serious about your future, you make a declaration yourself that the past, no matter what it was, will not be the catalyst for why your life will not be what you want it to be.

1 (4m 59s):
And I'm not saying you have to get on stage and share your story and do the things that I do. That's not what I'm saying, but what I am saying is that you must come to this place of understanding that the only way you're going to create massive change in your life is not only to be incredibly vulnerable with yourself, but to offer yourself compassion and grace, knowing that you are not culpable for the things that happen, whether you were two or 10 or 18 or 22, but from this moment forward, you have to make a decision about what's next, because nobody lives for you. Nobody breeze for you, nobody loves for you. Your life is literally in your hands and you have to ask yourself the question, what am I willing to do?

0 (5m 43s):
100% of responsibility Fire Nation. When you look in the mirror and you say, you know what? I'm not super stoked about. What's looking back at me, take a hundred percent ownership. And I don't even think I've ever mentioned this actually on the show before Michael, but this is kind of a little note on top of the mirror, my full length mirror, my gym, I have the sign that I had custom made that says the results of your last six months of decisions. Satisfied question mark. And so I'm looking in the mirror in my gym and I'm realizing what's looking back at me is literally the results of the decisions of the last six months that I made. And I have no one to blame, but myself where I have no one to praise, but myself, because I'm actually currently, as we speak in the best shape of my life, since I was 17 years old and I'm 41 now.

0 (6m 28s):
So I mean, it took a lot of work to get to that place because that mirror, every single day, it talks to me, it says a hundred percent responsibility responsibility on you. JLD. And the thing is when we're growing up and with kids, a lot of times, Fire Nation, you know, we think that everybody spends all of their days and all their time thinking, how can John's life be better? How can I make John's life better? How can I do this and that? And then you realize at some point, hopefully sooner than later that no, no, no people may like you. They may love you, but they're worried about their own lives. They've got their own things to worry about. You are a hundred percent responsible for you Fire Nation. So that all being said, Michael, in today's world, we have to stand out.

0 (7m 9s):
We must stand out. So how can we align both our brands and our personal values that will allow us to stand out in the marketplace today? I love that question,

1 (7m 20s):
John. And you know, I've spent realistically the majority of my life being an entrepreneur at eight years old, I was knocking on doors, selling boy scout stuff. So I could fun trips by 10. I was taking candy from the candy store and selling it on the streets, like literally to survive at 13, even though it's not great, I did sell drugs because I had to survive. And I've always been thinking about branding and marketing. And how do you stand out in the marketplace? Ever since I was little, because it literally meant survival. And today I've been very, very fortunate to work with companies like Coca-Cola red bull for roses, Lynn's baby and tons other. And of course my own brand think on broken. When you understand this about branding and marketing and standing out in the marketplace, that your values can be the cornerstone for what people create alignment with.

1 (8m 8s):
Then you can stand above those who do not have them values are everything. My values personally, also correspond with the brand values of my business, honesty, kindness, leadership. Self-actualization because I'm always thinking about who I am every single day, that allows me to parlay it with the brand. That way, when I'm approaching the forward facing marketing, I know exactly the message that I'm delivering. If you do not know your values, my challenge for you is to figure that out. As soon as humanly possible, I wouldn't even go to bed tonight, unless you can decide who am I?

1 (8m 48s):
And what do I stand for? Why? Because it's the old adage. If you don't stand for something you'll fall anything and having values as an individual and whether or not they correspond with your brand, give you the ability to put your feet down and cement the beginning of a legacy. Because what I'm always thinking about is when you look back and you think about the choices and decisions you've made over the course of the last six months, John, were they in alignment with your values? Were they in alignment with the brand? Were they in alignment with your mission? Because if you filter everything through your values, first, whatever that value may be for you and for your brand, then you know that you will always be making the right choices, the right decisions and choosing the right

0 (9m 34s):
Action. If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for everything. Fire Nation needed to be understanding these words because it's time to stand for something. It's time to stand out and stand for something. Now, vulnerability, talk about how vulnerability and leadership are intertwined.

1 (9m 52s):
I think about this every single day, we have the ability to let the guard down, to let people in and to understand that as leaders like them, we are simply human beings. And we come from an odd society where it is almost dismissed to be a vulnerable person in a leadership role. And I'll tell you this. I've learned every mistake that a human can have in leadership. I was running a Wendy's at 18 years old with 52 people under me. And I learned so much about leadership at that age.

1 (10m 32s):
And the one thing that I learned that I carry with me today is that if you're not willing to be vulnerable and speak the truth, then your team will not follow you. If you're not willing to say guys, you know what? I made a mistake, I was wrong, or even I'm scared. And I don't know what to do, or I don't have the answer, but I will find it. People will relate to you more. They will connect to you more because chances are the same fears that as the leader, you're willing to express and say, we will figure it out. Anyway, those are the same fears that your team has. Those are the same worries that they have.

1 (11m 12s):
And so when you can create this connection, John it's human connection that happens through vulnerability. Because think about this natively, we are able to read each other. Part of it is a defensive mechanism instilled in us for survival and the other part of it. So we can build community. And when we're in connection with people, when we feel something is off, our gut intuition tells us something is off. And then we're in this position of asking questions of, do we want to be here? Do we want to work for this person? Do we want to show up to this place every day? Because I'm in fear that I can't be able to be seen, heard, or felt. And as leaders like stepping into vulnerability becomes a point power for you.

1 (11m 55s):
People will look at it and feel like it's a point of contention. Well, I have to be strong. I have to lead with the iron fist, but you know, I really truly believe this, your team, your people will work harder and stronger and longer for you when you're willing to stand in front of them and say, I don't know everything, but I will figure it out. I made mistakes, but I won't do it again. I will do everything in my power to make sure that I set you up for success. Because when you are vulnerable as a leader, you create human connections

0 (12m 26s):
And Fire Nation. Anybody who's listening, who's ever been in a leadership position, especially at a young age, understanding the power of this. I mean, I was 23 years old, leading 16 men in Iraq in war. And let me tell you, I learned about my shortcomings as a leader very quickly, and definitely understood that the power of being vulnerable of going to people who had more experience than me, maybe weren't ranked as high as I was because I was an officer, but say, Hey, listen, I just need to be honest and vulnerable here. Like, I don't know what the heck's going on. Can you help me? And like that is so key. And we have so much more value to drop Fire Nation. When we get back from thanking our sponsors, according to Forbes, gyms, nail salons, hotels, mom, and pop stores, and more are set to go on an epic hiring spree in the coming months to meet the pent up demand for these services.

0 (13m 14s):
And all of these businesses reopening means that millions of jobs will need to be filled. So where do these businesses turn to, to fill these roles, fast ZipRecruiter. And right now you can try it for free at ziprecruiter.com/fire. When you post a job on ZipRecruiter, they send your job to over 100 top job sites, giving you access to their network of millions of job seekers. Then ZipRecruiter's matching technology scans, resumes to find qualified candidates for your open roles and proactively presents them to you. ZipRecruiter's technology is so effective that four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. And right now you can try ZipRecruiter for free at this exclusive address. ZipRecruiter.com/fire that's ziprecruiter.com/fire.

0 (13m 59s):
One more time, ziprecruiter.com/fire. ZipRecruiter. The smartest way to hire. If you're looking for a virtual event that will help you grow your network and learn from global industry leaders across business marketing sales and customer success, then you're in luck. Inbound 2021 hosted with love by HubSpot takes place online October 12th to 14th. And the lineup is amazing. Oprah Winfrey David Chang, spike Lee and other grades will be dropping value and inspiration on a custom digital platform, giving you an online event experience like you've never seen before. This is the one event you don't want to miss. This year. Sessions will include topics like breaking into unchartered territory, social responsibility at scale, and more, grab a free starter pass to access all spotlight conversations or upgrade to a powerhouse pass for full access to breakout sessions, curated meetups, and on-demand inbound 2021 hosted with love by HubSpot takes place.

0 (14m 55s):
Online October 12th to 14th, find inspiration, explore the custom digital platform, grow your network and learn from global industry leaders across business marketing sales and customer success. Learn more about the inbound 2021 lineup and register now for free@inbound.com. So Michael we're back and at some point we need to scale. So share why we need a community in our life, in our business, in our world to scale. Absolutely. You

1 (15m 25s):
Know, I have a funny story about this. Someone in your phone is the difference between you going to the next level in your business and not I was in Miami a couple months ago for one of grant Cardone's events. And I didn't know much about him, but whenever I go to these events, I'm trying to connect with people, right? And so what happened is we're here and there's a guy on stage talking about last year. I was where you are, but today you can be up here on this stage. And they showed this clip of someone doing a speak off the man who won, happened to be sitting behind me. I didn't know this at the time, but I said, hello to him, Hey, what's up, man? How's it going? How do we connect? How do we get to know each other?

1 (16m 5s):
Well, it turns out I make it into the top 10 of the speaking event that grant is holding and the winner gets $10,000. So I was thinking to myself, okay, who do I know in my phone, that one, this speaking event before, and it was the person, his name, Russ Yeager standing behind me at this conference. So I picked up my phone and I called Russ and I said, Hey Russ, can you help me? Because I was willing to ask for help. I ended up winning that stage, winning $10,000 investment from undercover billionaire grant Cardone, which led me to this position where John, I got to meet you on stage at Pete Vargas, his event, which led to this moment, your community, the people around you, the people in your phone that you connect with on the street that you say hello to in the elevator that you pass by in the grocery store.

1 (16m 55s):
Even the guy who drops off your groceries, if you're doing it online, a simple, hello can build your community to a place that can help you scale. That is not even measurable yet. You may not even understand it. Cause I didn't understand that. Just saying hello to this guy in Miami would lead to this moment, John, right at six degrees of separation. And I think about this every day, how do I bring value to people's lives so that every single day I'm building my community up, I'm building around the people because everyone always thinks about scaling as simply as making money. Well, I think about scaling as creating impact about building legacy, about putting people around each other who have the capability and the ability to do great things when in connection.

1 (17m 41s):
And when you think about it from that aspect and you're not, and there's of course chasing the idea of scaling a business to make revenue because ultimately as, and business owners, that's why we do this. It's for it's for impact and income and lifestyle. But when you think about the fact that just simply saying hello to someone, not only build your community, but maybe you have the ability to put them in the right position to be successful, right? There's so much that happens through just the property of serendipity that leads you to these amazingly beautiful moments that you can't pinpoint six months a year down the road until you're sitting in it. And you're looking back at it and you're going, oh, that one choice to connect with a human being has changed my life in such an impactful way that it's in measurable.

1 (18m 29s):
Stop thinking about the measurement of ROI of people being anything other than connection. And it will change the way that you scale your life, your community, your business, your investments, everything, because I'll tell you this out of everything I understand and know about running businesses, about being an entrepreneur, about being a speaker and author, everything. It all comes down to people. John. And I want you to understand this at depth, because if you don't take care of people, then you're going to be on a ship by yourself. And I don't know about you, but that sounds kind of low

0 (19m 3s):
One. Hello, Fire Nation one, hello can unlock so much. And you can't even connect those dots until sometimes weeks, months, years later, doubts, fear the imposter syndrome. I mean, how can we commit when we have these emotions? It's everything

1 (19m 23s):
I live by this adage of commit first and figure out the rest later. Fear, doubt, shame, guilt. We all feel those emotions. John. I feel fear every time I wake up in the morning and I'm like, okay, I have to go and create impact in the world. I fear fear when I get on a stage. When I write a book, when I coach, when I do anything, there's always going to be fear. There's always going to be that little inkling of imposter syndrome. There's always going to be that little bit of guilt that you have or shame that you feel as you step closer and deeper into yourself. And the thing that I'm always thinking about as well, how do I allow my voice right now to be louder than the voice of the past that was embedded in me.

1 (20m 3s):
And one of the things that we have to understand, and especially if you grew up in Western society, we actually learn how to become robotic to a sense to turn ourselves off from the time that we're in elementary school. If we paint the sun purple, we're told that's not how you do it. And then you try to step into creating the life that you want to have. But you've had people your entire life, negative little reinforce, the things that you want to do, they say, that's not good enough. You're not strong enough. You are not capable enough. And because of that, you start repeating that story to yourself. And I believe we are the stories that we tell ourselves, because what you think becomes what you speak and what you speak, become your action and your action become your reality.

1 (20m 45s):
And so if you tell yourself, I'm, I'm fearful, I'm shameful. I'm not good enough. I'm not strong enough. I'm not capable enough. Then that is going to hold true. And the truth about it. As you have to understand in order to get to where you want to go, you have to understand how you got to where you are. And if you can pinpoint these moments, and I'm not saying you have to deep dive into them, but if you go, oh yeah, Mr. Smith, when I was on the football team, when I was 14 told me I was not good enough. So now I don't ever put myself in a position to be in the spotlight. Then you leverage that and you go, okay, cool. I understand that about myself. So I'm going to do the thing that I want to do. Anyway. The truth is you have a moral obligation to impact the world.

1 (21m 31s):
If you have a story, if you have a mission, if you have a voice, if you see something that needs to be changed, because if you don't do it, who will. And when you think about that and you understand that and you embrace the idea, that fear is a part of growth. And you say to yourself, I am going to do this anyway, because it's more important to me that I do then have the idea of fear being the catalyst for why I don't create massive change. John, my biggest fear in my entire life is that I will be on my death bed and I will have regret about not doing the thing that I knew I was capable of doing, because I was worried about judgment of others.

1 (22m 16s):
The most important thing is how you feel about yourself and the choices and decisions that you make. So challenge yourself because I promise you on the backside of fear and your commitment to creating the life that you want to have, you will find peace.

0 (22m 32s):
Well, Michael, I can assure you that fear is not going to come true for you brother, because you are doing the right things. You are surrounding yourself with the right people and you are making this impact in the world. And Fire Nation doubt, fear the imposter syndrome. I mean, you are literally feeling those things because of one reason, you're a human being and human beings have these emotions is how you deal with them. That changes everything. Because as Michael shared, if you see something that needs to be changed in the world, you have a moral obligation to be that change. Now, mentors are so important. We've touched upon it a couple times throughout this episode, but I really want to end on this powerful note, which is the power of having powerful mentors.

0 (23m 19s):
I think

1 (23m 19s):
It's everything, man. I think it's everything. Especially if like me, when I, when I was growing up, my, my mentors were people who weren't going to create change in the world. They weren't going to impact anything, unfortunately, because we were products of our environment. And when I started thinking about the life that I wanted to have to get removed from, from poverty and homelessness, to show up for myself, to be the hero of my own story, to look in the mirror and be okay, the reflection, I started asking myself this question, who's one step in front of me who is just simply one step in front of me that I can learn from. And I came up with this acronym team, T E M time effort, energy money in order to be in connection with the mentor, you're going to have to invest at least one of those, if not all four, to see reciprocation.

1 (24m 16s):
Why? Because we understand this. The people that are one step ahead of us are ahead of us for a reason. And they're likely very busy and just buying them a coffee isn't enough. And you hear this all the time. You have to create massive value, but guess what? You still may not have access to them. John Lee Dumas is one of my mentors. I've been listening to entrepreneur on fire for eight years. I've been lucky enough to be on ask Gary V Tom, bill, you as a person. I actually get a spin real time with who helps me every day. I've been able to work with people like grant Cardone. And the, the thing about this is when I started this, my mentors were the library. I would go to the library and get a book, watch a YouTube video, read anything I could get my hands on.

1 (25m 2s):
And then I started making the decision to go to conferences, to get deeper into it, to learn, to connect with people. And in that, in that I saw the massive shift in my life because I wasn't measuring them. Here's what's funny, John. I used to look at people who were one step up in front of me and I'd be like, who do they think they are? Right. Just such a fixed mindset around it. And then it turned into this very simple understanding. If I can leverage what they understand about the world, then I can change my own life. Wow. And I had to stop feeling, shame about asking for help and that form of help. Again, it will come in time, effort, energy or money.

1 (25m 42s):
And I believe it scales as you grow, as you change, as you heal, as you impact the world today, you're like, I want to go and learn from Tony Robbins. Well, guess what? You're not there yet, but what do you have the ability to do? Where can you be today? Who can you connect to? Because you know what? The truth is, the neighbor that you've never met, whose door you've never knocked on, whose hands you have never shaken. That could be the person that could change your life. And it starts with asking for help. And it starts with reaching out and getting clear. You have to also understand why do you want a mentor? Why do you want someone to be in connection with you? What is the purpose? Because if it's just the simply say, oh, I work with this guy.

1 (26m 23s):
That's not going to end well for you. But if it's so you can say I had a conversation for him for 15 minutes and it forever changed my life because I got clear about something I was stuck on. Then you will never lose

0 (26m 36s):
My friend who is one step ahead of you Fire Nation, ask yourself that question. That could be the first hint and clue as to who could be a great mentor for you. In fact, I dedicated an entire chapter in the common path on comma success, chapter five, to finding your perfect mentor. And I said, your perfect mentor is somebody who is where you want to be in one year time. Meaning that it's not 10 years from now 20 years now, it is literally in a reasonable timeframe that you can see yourself there in one year so that they can look back when they're mentoring you and have some relevant, meaningful understanding things to share with you. And I love that acronym team, time, effort, energy, money, at least one Fire Nation.

0 (27m 19s):
Sometimes all four is what it takes. So think about that. And Michael, you have dropped countless value bombs. Give us the one big takeaway from this entire episode, you want to make sure Fire Nation really gets, give us the best way we can connect and stay connected with you and anything you want to share there. And then we'll say goodbye. The biggest takeaway that

1 (27m 38s):
I want you to understand is that you are not alone. There are 8 billion people on planet earth, and the difference between success and failure in your life, your career, your business, your endeavors, your community, and the impact that you want could very be just starting to ask for help. And you can connect with me I'm everywhere. And please reach out to me at Michael unbroken on all the social media and John, I created a special master class just for Fire Nation, the mindset of marketing and branding. So if you go to think unbroken business.com/fire is an in-depth course where I'm going to talk about the mindset of marketing and branding and how to move through fear, to have the conversation about your message in the marketplace and everyone who goes to thinkunbrokenbusiness.com/fire.

1 (28m 29s):
We'll get a free digital copy of my book. Think Unbroken.

0 (28m 34s):
Fire Nation. You're the average of the five people you spend the most time with. You've been hanging out with MU and JLD today. So keep up that heat head over to EOFire.com type in Michael in the search bar. The show's page will pop up with links to everything that we've talked about here today, but again, your direct call to action Fire Nation. thinkunbrokenbusiness.com/fire. Get that masterclass, get Michael's book for free thinkunbrokenbusiness.com/fire. Michael, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation today, for that we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side.

0 (29m 14s):
Hey, Fire Nation today's value bound content was brought to you by Michael and Fire Nation. Over the last decade, I've interviewed more than 3000 of the world's most successful entrepreneurs, and I've created a revolutionary 17 step roadmap to your financial freedom and your fulfillment. And I put it all into my first traditionally published book. The Common Path to Uncommon Success personally endorsed by Seth Godin and Gary Vaynerchuk. The Common Path to Uncommon Success is the guidance that you need via nation to achieve the lifestyle of your dreams. Visit UncommonSuccessBook.com order your copy today. I'll catch you there or on the flip side, ready to dig deeper on the creative side of business than the podcast being boss has you covered discover new tools to unravel the complexities of starting your own creative business with episodes on topics like building systems for freelancers and brand strategies.

0 (30m 10s):
Listen, learn, and grow with being boss on the HubSpot Podcast Network at hubspot.com/podcastnetwork. According to a survey over two thirds of Americans are planning to travel this summer. This means that airlines restaurants and more have been ramping up their hiring, who do they turn to ZipRecruiter. ZipRecruiter's technology finds qualified candidates for your job, and you can easily invite your top choices to apply. And right now you can try ZipRecruiter for free at ziprecruiter.com/fire