- Not thinking about you at all.
So the first two strategies:
First of all, don't take advice from broke people.
Number two, developing thick skin.
Three minutes, discuss among your table
what have you learned, go!
(audience discusses amongst themselves)
(audience laughs)
What have you learned?
- [Audience Member] Listen to more Dan.
- Listen to more Dan, good advice.
(audience laughs)
- [Audience Member] Doesn't matter what other people think.
- Yeah, it doesn't matter what other people think, good.
- [Audience Member] Change your perspective.
- Change your perspective, very good, very good.
Give me one more. What have you learned, this side?
- [Audience Member] Do it anyway. If it's what you want,
follow your heart.
- Follow your heart, do it anyway.
It's like there's a book, I love the book.
I know you've already read that book.
It's called Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway.
Great, great, great book.
Just so you know, successful people, we have fears, too.
We have doubts, too.
We have worries, too.
The difference is we just don't let those things stop us.
That's the only difference, I have fears.
I still make a lot of mistakes. Last week
I made a big mistake!
Cost me a lot of money, but that's how business is.
That's how it is. It's not that we don't make mistakes,
and in fact, I challenge, I probably make
more mistakes than most people in this room.
I fail more than probably most of you here.
Probably a whole table combined.
(audience laughs)
You will not add up to my failures,
because I try more things.
I've done more things, that's all.
Not that I'm so smart or anything like that.
Well, you know, it's not about that.
It's just, I've just done more things.
If you've done more things, you've fucked up enough times,
(laughs) you learn some stuff. Right?
When one time you don't learn it,
the second, third time, you pick up clues, yes?
- [Audience Members] Yes. (laughing)
- That's what it is, that's what it is. (laughs)
Strategy number three, you wanna get a mentor.
You want to get a mentor.
Now, who is a mentor?
Let me ask you this question.
What is the difference between a mentor and a coach?
- [Audience Member] A mentor has been through
what you've been through.
- Yes! A mentor is someone who's been there and done that,
and is where you want to be in your wildest imaginations.
That person is what you want to be.
A coach is someone who'll hold you accountable,
who asks questions, like you know how it is.
Coaching it is, you ask the coach a question,
the coach is asking, "What do you think?"
They're trying to draw it out of you.
So you are the answer,
but a mentor is something a little bit different.
A mentor is someone that's been there and done that.
When you ask a mentor a piece of advice,
just like when I ask my mentor to give me some advice,
they're always brutally honest, very straightforward,
and they've been there.
They will know, "No, don't do this, do that."
Or: "No, don't do this with that person, do it this way."
Or: "No, you shouldn't waste anymore time with this project,
forget that, you should do this instead".
That's the difference. Make sense?
- [Audience Members] Yes.
- That it's all, a mentor.
Let me show you a story of how I found one of the most
important mentors in my life.
One day, I was browsing around on eBay,
just checking all different things, I love buying books,
I got over two thousand books in my library.
I love buying books.
And I was looking on Amazon and I stumble across
this particular book, called "Your first 100 million"
Now, that book called my attention. Yes? (audience laughs)
No, not your first million, your first hundred million!
That's interesting. So I clicked on the thing
and the book at the time was selling for $400, US.
On eBay! A used copy.
Then I looked at that and thought: What kind of idiot
would spend 400 bucks on a book. (audience laughs)
Come on! A book is like typically, how much, 20 bucks,
it's outrageous! So I was reading the description,
and funny thing is, on that listing, on that eBay listing,
there's a chapter, like a free chapter, first chapter.
So I read through the chapter, and then five minutes later,
guess what, I bought the book.
And quite frankly, my intention at the time was, you know,
I'm gonna buy it, I'm gonna read it and then
I'm gonna resell it, it's 400 bucks, right?
(audience laughs)
Poor person's mentality! Not good.
I read the book and I got the book, and that book
absolutely changed my life.
I never read a book like it, it's a lot like, if you
have read my book, you can see a lot of similarity.
And after I read that book.
And the book was written by a gentleman called Daniel Peña.
Dan Peña.
This gentleman is very, very successful, he grew a company
in the 80's from zero to 400 million dollars in eight years.
- [Audience Member] Wow.
- So, and that's his home, by the way.
He lives in a castle, in Scotland.
So, after I read the book I thought to myself: I don't know,
I just feel like that's the guy.
That's the guy I want to learn from. That's just like,
I don't know, I just, somehow in the book, something-
how many of you have read a book like, the message resonates
with you. It just resonates with me so deeply.
So, I called up the castle.
After I read the book, I called the castle,
of course when you call, what do you get?
- [Audience Member] A receptionist.
- A receptionist, a gatekeeper.
So I called the castle in Scotland and said "Hi, my name is
Dan Lok, I read Mr. Peña's book, may I speak to him?"
(audience laughs)
So the secretary was like: "Who are you, what do you want,
you read his book- no, he's so busy, doesn't have the time.
I'm sorry, just doesn't have the time." Click.
Called back the next day: "Hi, this is Dan Lok, I read
Mr. Peña's book, I love his book, may I just talk to him?
I just really wanna thank him,
has impacted my life, the book."
"No he's so busy, what do you want, he doesn't take calls
from strangers, he's so busy." Click.
Called back, next day: "Hi, this is Dan Lok."
"I know who you are!" (audience laughs)
"What do you want!?"
"I read his book, it affected me deeply, I just want to
speak to him". "No, I've said to you, it doesn't matter if
you call a hundred times, you're not gonna get through,
he's just busy. No way." Click.
I called thirteen days straight! Every single day,
same time, everyday. I got to know the assistant,
"Linda! Hi, Linda!" (audience laughs)
"Don't Linda me! This is Dan!" "I know"
"Well, I just want to speak to him"
"What, seriously, what do you want from him."
"Just give me five minutes, put me through and give me
five minutes, let me talk to him. I won't call you again,
I won't bother, just give me five minutes."
(Dan Lok sighs) (audience laughs)
And it felt like eternity. Finally she said:
"Fine, I'll put you through" Right? She put me through,
I got through the Den, and he said: "Hi, this is Dan Peña."
"Hi, this is Dan Lok-" I was nervous as hell, of course,
I didn't expect I would go through! (audience laughs)
I thought just like, I'll call back the next day, okay,
now I'm calling- "H-Hi, Mr. Peña, I've read your book."
I was startling and was like nervous, I don't know.
Peed my pants maybe, even. I was so nervous and he was
just laughing on the other end. He was like "Ah! You're
the kid my assistant's been telling me, calling us everyday,
bugging, bugging me, what the fuck do you want?"
Seriously, "What the fuck do you-"
I said "I just want to thank you, I want to learn from you,
you've been an inspiration, your book resonates with me"
And he said "Well, you know what, I'll be in Los Angeles
next week, next Wednesday, why don't we have breakfast?
I'll have breakfast, I'll be in Los Angeles on Wednesday,
I'll be in so-and-so hotel, schedule the time with my
assistant, good bye." That's it.
Now, he did not ask me-
- [Audience Member] Where do you live.
- Nothing, nothing. "Can you make it?" None.
Just that, the offer, click. Now I thought about that for
about two seconds. Two seconds. Because I thought:
"Well, go to Los Angeles, gotta fly there, you know,
it's so far away from my home"
(audience laughs)
"It's so far away, I don't know, going to have breakfast-"
But somehow, I just like- I had to go. I just had to go.
So I booked a flight, and I flew there and I had breakfast
with him for about an hour, an hour and a half.
When I saw him walking down, it was crazy, like-
him walking down and I was so nervous, I was all dressed up
and stuff like that. And then we had breakfast,
and we talked for like an hour or two hours. And he was
asking me all kinds of questions, you know: "What are you
doing now? What's going-" Now, keep in mind that at the time
I was already making pretty good money.
I was making pretty good money. And he was talking different
things, and I said, you know, at the end of that two hours,
he gave me a lot of advice, a lotta advices,
like "no excuses", all this things, showed me a lot of
different things. And we just chatted, and he said, well-
at the end of that breakfast- "Can you be my mentor?
like, I'd appreciate if you can be my mentor." He said:
"No fucking way." (audience laughs)
That's not very nice, That's not very nice! I said:
"Why not?", and he said "You're not ready yet."
"I'm not ready yet?" "You're not ready yet."
"When would I be ready?" (audience laughs)
"I'll let you know when you're ready." Okay, so then,
we kept in touch for a year, a year and a half. We've been
e-mailing back and forth, I kind of kept him up to date on
what I'm going through, what I'm working on and he's giving
me a little bit of advice. And finally he said-
I got to phone with him and he said: "You know what, kid?"
He always called me kid "Hey kid! You still wanna learn?"
I said "Yes". And he said "Come to my castle,
come to my castle. I'm doing a small kind of workshop,
seven day workshop, come, this is going to be some of
my mentees here, just come." I said "Cool! Great!"
And then said "Talk to my assistant, she will arrange
everything." Great, talked to the assistant, well.
First of all, that seminar costed ten thousand pounds.
- [Audience Member] Ouch!
- Not dollars, pounds!
Okay, that's like 20 to plan the flight plus, you know,
flying there to Scotland, it's a lot of money. Right?
But again, was I scared? I knew it was the right thing to do
So I paid the money, I flew there, you can see, I was there
in Scotland and hanged out with a whole bunch of kids.
That seven days! The book was good but that seven days
within total immersion, completely expanded my horizon,
let me tell you something, the first- that got to the castle
I was extremely uncomfortable. If you've never been to
a castle, you don't know what it's like.
Fifteen century castle, you've got butler,
you've got maid, everything, right? Crystal glass,
I'm like (mumbles) and then you eat, you ring a bell,
and then you have breakfast, people prepare, pamper you;
the first day I was like "This is- This is not like...
I am from Vancouver! This is not how I live!" Right?
After the second, third and four day, guess what?
I kinda get used to it. (audience laughs)
Nice to have a maid! Nice to have a butler! Nice to "Hey!"
And then you got food, orange juice, everything. Flowers,
the whole nine yards. You get used to- I thought to myself:
"I could get used to this." Seriously, I thought:
"I could get used to this, I like this.
This is pretty awesome!" People talk about rich people-
Until you've lived on a castle, you don't know
what it's like. It's just- the amount of wealth, the amount-
Like, just one of the paintings it's like a million dollars.
Right? It's just crazy, like, you're surrounded by wealth,
that seven days completely changed my life, completely
changed my life. And after the seven days, go back to my
business, work on my business very, very hard. Apply a lot
of strategies. That's why I say total immersion. Yes?
Total immersion. Went back to my- finally,
I approached Dan again. I said one more time:
"Dan, can you be my mentor" And he said: "Hmm..."
He said "Sure, I'll be your mentor."
It's gonna be a hundred thousand dollars.
A hundred thousand dollars. Okay?
Now I was making about half a million bucks a year then.
How many of you recognize a hundred grand is a lot of money?
Okay... And in my mind I was like "C'mon Dan!
You don't need the money, just help me out! Right?
Young guy, eager, I've been to the castle,
why'd you charge me a hundred grand, c'mon.
Just help me out here, right?"
He said "No, it's a hundred grand. You want it?
Or you don't want it?"
Believe me, he doesn't need the money. Okay?
He doesn't need the money. Probably his monthly overhead
of the castle is a hundred grand. He doesn't need the money.
It's not about the money. And I said:
"It's still a lot of money, I could write a check but
it's a lot of money." Finally, I made a decision,
I wrote a check. Hundred grand.
I don't know if you've ever written a check for
a hundred grand to somebody else.
It's a very nerve-wracking feeling. Like, I was so nervous
I wrote a check, and after I asked him:
"Why'd you charge me so much? Couldn't give me a break-
how about half? Fifty grand. How about like, payment plan,
you know, we can work it out, I make more money,
I pay you back, we can work something out here."
And he said: "No no no, it doesn't work that way.
Kid, here's what I know. The more you pay for something
the more you value it." It's very simple.
In fact, think about it. How many of you, if you were to pay
five hundred bucks to be here at this meeting,
you'd be taking better notes.
- [Audience Member] Nope, same notes.
- Same notes? Good! I like the attitude.
So I wrote a check for a hundred grand,
half a million dollars, next year, double my income,
millionare status. Now, let me ask you a question.
Is that worth the investment?
- [Audience Members] Yes
- Hundred grand, half a million bucks.
What changed? I can tell you, Dan actually
didn't teach me that much. Honest to God.
He didn't teach- He didn't give me a breakthrough strategy
or something that totally transformed my business,
none of that, just the fact that I wrote the check...
(audience laughs)
...changed everything. Because the minute I wrote a check,
what does it say about me? Have I burned a ship?
Now I'm determined to produce results. That's it!
Seriously, I joke about with Dan afterwards, I could have
written that check, and he doesn't even need to coach me.
Just write that check, here you go, I would have
doubled my income. It's very, very fast. Seriously.
Because I was saying to myself: "I am worth it,
I invest in myself." I'm not investing in Dan, I'm investing
through him. I'm investing in me through him.
We talked and still to this day, he's still my mentor.
He's still my mentor. He just came a few months ago,
here we hung out at the Falmouth Hotel, we talked,
I still talk to him on a regular basis, still coaching me.
Every single time I pick up the phone, every single time
I talk to him, always, always, always kicking my ass.
Every time I thought I was doing so good, I was so proud
and this and that, I called him and he said: "So what."
He's always pushing me. You can do better than that.
"But compared to other people at my age I'm doing good!"
"Don't compare to other losers at your age.
(audience laughs)
Compare to people 20 years older than you.
Compare to people like me," he said. Okay.
So every time, just pushing.