Let go of that which no longer serves you and know that what
once served you might not serve you right now and might not
serve your highest self. I carry things and I use.
I used to carry things so much. I was that junior monk man.
I wasn't the senior monk, bro. I didn't set the woman down at
the river. And one of my bad habits in the
past was holding on to things too long.
And it's something that I'm working on.
And with everything that I'm able to let go of, I'm more
free, I'm more happy, got more peaceful.
So what I would say to myself is if it's past, if it's in the
past, just let it go. If you can make it right, make
it right. If you can't or if there's no
need to, let it go. Where attention goes, energy
flows and reality grows. So focus your energy on what you
want to grow, not on what you don't.
That's that's what I'd say. Before we dive back into today's
conversation, I want to share something important.
This episode includes a paid partnership with Better Help, a
platform designed to make starting therapy easier.
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it, sometimes the best investment you can make these in
yourself. Welcome to the King Dems
podcast, where we share the stories of extraordinary people
and dissect hot, relevant topics that shape our world.
From visionary leaders to trailblazing creatives, we
uncover the mindset, strategy, and grit behind greatness.
Whether it's business, culture, or personal growth, we ask the
real questions. This isn't just conversation,
it's transformation. The Kingdom's podcast, Your Next
Breakthrough, starts here. Music.
Licensing Reimagined. We are live, ladies and
gentlemen, once again welcome to the Kingdom's podcast and Diary
of the CFO and today I've. Got.
With me a VVVIP fighting out. Of Beijing, China, by way of
California, United States of America.
Beck Walker, you are, you fag. Let's go, brother.
Adam Ola, thank you bro. I I love the the very
passionate. Welcome bro.
It's a pleasure to be here bro. Bro, I guess you you'd be like
oh man, man man, I'm a fighter now let's.
Do this. Let's do this.
Whoa, you know, I, I love the
UFC a lot. And what a lot of people don't
know about me is, you know, a lot of people think, oh, he's a
finance guy, He's a finance bro, Marty.
Martial artists as well. So growing up, growing up in
Lagos, Nigeria, I was a skinny kid.
A lot of people used to think, oh, we can believe this one and
that. That forced me to get into
martial arts. So I got into Taekwondo.
From Taekwondo I moved to karate and karate, did a bit of judo
and ended up with mixed martial arts, mixed martial artists,
just everything. That's the best thing in a
street fight, you know, you have your striking, your wrestling
and the grappling, so. That is why I'm very, very.
Very big on the UFC and the UFC has produced a lot of champion
and you are also a champion brother and that's why I have
you here. So sit back and let me give you
your flowers. So our champions today we are
joined by a man who embodies global legacy leadership at a
level uranium, a communicator, A poet, a teacher, a community
builder, a linguist, A storyteller, and a connector of
millionaire and billionaire mentors to the next generation
of change makers. Yuan Yufeng is the founder of
Billions of Hooters and the head of community at the School of
Mentors, the world's number one entrepreneurship community.
He has lived and worked across China, Indonesia, the United
States, and beyond. He has taught to, LED, written,
performed, coached, and created systems to elevate thousands of
entrepreneurs. This episode is a journey
through self mastery, identity, communications, leadership, and
global citizenship. Joran is the man who sits at the
intersection of wisdom and execution.
Today pull the curtain back on the mindset, skill set and the
tool set that shaped him. Joran, we honor your presence on
the Kingdom's parkas and Diary of the CFO.
You are welcome, Rasha. Wow, sure, thank you.
Introduction is is a mouthful because you know your your
journey is a globe fool. Yeah, I appreciate you
dedicating the the oxygen to the intro bro.
Thank you. Whoa, brother, where?
Where do we start from? You know, like you love to see
you were made in China but raised in America.
You're just like Apple Brother. You're designed in in America,
but but made in China. Talk, talk, Talk to us about it,
brother. Yeah, so as as Adam Ola said,
and as I often say, I was indeed made in China, but the quality
is good. I was born 1995 I think I'm
dating myself a bit, but I was born 1995 in Wuhan in the Hubei
province of China and. Wuhan.
In Wuhan, dude. Wuhan.
Hey bro. The notorious Wuhan.
Before 2020 nobody knew Wuhan. After 2020 everybody knows Wuhan
dude. So it is what it is.
It is what it is. I'm not going to say anything.
I don't want, I don't want to get cancelled.
I love China. I love China.
That's. Funny, dude.
So yeah, I was. I was made in China, in Wuhan,
and I grew up in Wuhan a little bit in Changsha, another town in
China, and then in a small provincial city called Songzhu
in the Hubei province. And then I moved to the States
at age 6. Yeah.
And at the time, it was a huge change, man.
I changed my language. I changed my name, my identity.
I wasn't able to stay in touch with some of my loved ones who
had raised me from birth till age 6.
So it was just a time of enormous, enormous change, and
it had a massive impact on me moving forward in my life.
So yeah, that's that's the origin.
Wow. So you live in China, Indonesia,
the US and of course you operate across several languages.
So when you look back at your early life and global
upbringing, what woman planted that seed for self mastery and,
you know, positive global change?
It's interesting, I think growing up switching languages
at age 6 is very difficult. You, you pick it.
I, I picked it up pretty quickly, but I always felt like
I wasn't able to express myself. You know, I had all these
feelings and all these emotions. And when the, the language level
is not sufficient to express myself, like there's
frustration, there's anger. And also I looked around and I
saw like, hey, throughout history, all the greatest
leaders have all been amazing communicators.
So I really just focused in on that, honed in on that.
And I'm not sure I, I think everybody's born into the world
with their own unique karma. I'm very grateful to have been
born with a more altruistic direction.
I like helping people. I like positivity.
I want to see a better world for everybody.
And that's, that's always been a part of who I am, but I've
definitely leaned into that more and more throughout the years.
So I wouldn't say that it was, it was one exact moment, but
it's definitely been a very intentional honing and elevation
of what I'm naturally born with. Natural born leader and it's
interesting switching languages at the age of 6.
So I, I can't remember where I read this, but I read that kids
are, would I say children find it easy to learn multiple
different languages, especially before the age of five, but six,
OK, Yeah, you're still, you're still pretty much there, right?
And I look at myself, for example, I grew up in Nigeria
and in Nigeria, we have multiple different ethnic groups,
multiple languages. Nigeria is a country of over 220
million people and people don't realize that there are over 250
ethnic languages in Nigeria. And my father is from one ethnic
group, my mom is from another ethnic group.
And that's why I have AI, you know, have a good, have a good
hybrid. So people who understand the
demography of Nigeria and the geography of Nigeria would
understand that my first name is Adimala.
Adimala is a Yoruba name and my middle name is Isima, which is
and Edo name is an Nishan name, right?
So growing up, I had to learn Yoruba.
I had to learn my mom's language, Nishan.
I think that was the first local language I learned.
And in Nigeria we also have a Creole called Pigeon English,
right? So it's it's like English
scattered. Yeah.
I don't know how to explain it, but like you, you would feel
like this person speak English but it's not English.
If you don't understand the semantics, the syntax, the
language structure, you'd be you can't literally get sold by
people speaking something that sounds like English and also you
not even learn the proper English.
So I had to get master of like 4 languages.
So I understand like understanding four different
languages, code switching. You know, sometimes you're
speaking to somebody who is speaking one language and you
need to switch to another part of your brain.
Like, OK, we're not, we're not doing the English right now.
We're doing maybe Yoruba, we're doing another language.
And you need to flow and express yourself, right?
So, but then there's always that primary language.
And I tell people, your primary language is that language that
you think in. So what language do you think
here? Do you think in Chinese?
Do you think in English? It's, it's interesting because
I've till six I thought in Chinese and then from from 6 to
like 29 1/2 I thought in English and now I'm very intentionally
thinking in Chinese. So what?
What language do you pray in? What language do what?
Do you pray in? What language do I pray in both?
But recently it's been more and more Chinese and let let me just
dive into why, because I mean, that's that's the big question,
right? Like why, Adam?
I'll, I'll share an incredible experience I had.
Dude, I I was working for a start up.
It was called Atlas back. It was a posture correction
device and I was looking for investors for the company.
I walked into a water shop, an alkaline water shop in Thousand
Oaks, CA and I met this local physical therapist.
His name is Dan Kinney, you can look him up.
Dan Kinney physical therapy. And Dan used to work with
Olympian athletes, bro, and he focus on posture and posture
correction. And me and Dan, we hit it off in
this water shop and was collaborating with the owner and
doing giving like free posture correction sessions as lead Gen.
I think. And he gave me a free posture
correction session, bro. And when I stood up from his
table, I felt this whoosh, this like primal rush of energy just
shoot up my spine. And accompanied with that, there
was a voice in my head that started saying my Chinese name,
Yuan Yu, your phone, which I hadn't used since I moved from
China to the US. So bro, I'm hearing in my head,
your new phone, your new phone, your new phone, my Chinese name
chanting itself over and over again.
And I'm feeling strong, bro. I'm feeling like the strongest
I've ever felt in my body. And I'm like, what is this all
about? You know, like, why does fixing
my posture, why did it activate this energy?
Why am I hearing my Chinese name?
And I decided to go on a journey to relearn Chinese.
After that point, I'm like, there's something here.
I need to relearn Chinese, and what I realized is that there
was a lot of my power that I am now able to access because I've
relearned Chinese, because Chinese was my mother tongue.
A lot of people have the mother tongue and they learn extra
languages on top of that mother tongue, but they still have the
foundation of the mother tongue. For me, my foundation, I had no
way to access it when I moved to the States, so a lot of energy
and a lot of different patterns were still running.
Bro, there was a point in my life where I'd rewired my mind
completely in English, but I still wasn't getting the results
that I wanted. And I was like, why?
And when I started rewiring my mind in Chinese, rewiring some
of those thinking patterns, dude, my life changed for the
better very quickly. And like it is only getting
better the more I think in Chinese and work through some of
those old patterns that I wasn't even able to access until I
relearned Chinese. You know, you might be of the
conversation I was having with a doctor friend of mine, I said a
lot of people suffer from identity crisis.
How can you understand the environment around you if you
don't even understand yourself? How can you know what to do if
you don't know who you are? How can you know who you are if
you don't even know where you're coming from?
History. Is a template for people to
operate in the present and the future.
And that's why it's really, really important for people to
know their history and for people to have a deep and rich
understanding of their culture. And a very big part of culture
is language. You know, language, food, you
know, various practices, religion, politics.
But language, I think language, food, music are very, very
fundamental in the framework, in the fabric of culture and
identity. And I love the fact that you're
very proud of your boots, you're very proud of your identity.
So that journey is a very sacred journey, but a lot of people do
not take it very seriously. And during the introduction, I
touched on the pack that you were actually for it, right?
So your journey crosses poetry, communication studies, acting,
community leadership, and entrepreneurship.
So when did you start to realize that you were actually meant to
build people and not just projects?
And of course, beating people starts with beating yourself.
I think the, the more I went into my Buddhist practice, the
more the shift went from projects and accomplishments to
people because what, what are the achievements for?
What are the accomplishments for?
They're to get the love and respect and attention of other
people. A lot of us operate in that way.
And I will say that I operated in that way.
And when I loved myself and I realized, hey, I can be the
source of everything that I need.
And when I felt better and better and better and was able
to heal myself and find peace within, I realized one that I'm
suffering. I was suffering and a lot of
other people are suffering. So by going through my own
suffering and transforming it and realizing that a lot of
other people are also suffering, it's like, hey, no, it's, it's
all about people. And at the end of the day, man,
like the things that bring us the most joy, at least I can
speak for myself, are my relationships with other people.
It's how have I impacted this person's life?
It's not, it's not like, hey, like what did I accomplish in
this business? It's like, no, like how many
lives did I touch and to what level did I touch it?
How, how much was I able to help this person grow?
I think that's really what brings true fulfillment for me
personally. And it's a huge aspect of
fulfillment for, for humanity, just being able to help other
people and add value to other people's lives.
I think that's where the joy, the true joy of life lives.
Yeah. You know, for people who really
follow this podcast, they would have heard me say this most of
the times. I'd rather impact a billion
lives than make a billion dollars.
That's powerful. That's powerful.
And you know what? If you impact a billion lives,
you will definitely make a billion dollars.
I think absolutely. As long as you get your
monetization for for now correctly.
Yeah. Hey, you know, there, there for
me, the framework is balancing being a Buddha and a businessman
and we need to have both, you know, that's the balance right
there. And it's, it's OK to be a Buddha
and a business person at the same time.
You know, it's OK to be rewarded and paid for the good work that
we do. That's 100% OK and should be
embraced actually. You know, one thing that really
drew me to you from the School of Mentors was what I say the
impact of your Buddha stories. For me, I'm a Christian, but I
respect other religions and I strongly believe that all roads
lead to the top of the same mountain.
And people have created too many divisions, you know, especially
in religion and politics. They're very, very sensitive,
you know, areas. But I have learned to respect,
you know, every other religion. And yeah, coming from Nigeria,
you know, people practice different religions.
I think by default if you are a learner, educated and light in
Nigeria, you would one of the very first, you know, lessons
you are taught in your early life is religious tolerance.
So for me, I went above the tolerance to appreciation,
right, Go study what other people are about because if you
don't understand something, you cannot appreciate it.
If you don't understand something then you stand under
it. So you have like this really
really. Life.
Changing life, impacting stories, you know, from the
Buddha, right? And I'd like for you to share
some of these, you know, stories, especially from a
mindset skill set, tool set perspective.
But that is what we stand for here, the stand for growth
mindset and the belief that in order for you to collaborate
with anybody, the very first thing you need to evaluate is
their mindset, right? But if you are very big on self
mastery, and there are a lot of these, did I say anecdotes,
these stories that connect with the concept of self mastery and
self identity. So I'll leave the floor to you
to, to to educate us because, you know, the two goals of this
broadcast are to educate and to motivate.
But you know, let's deal with the education aspect right now.
Sounds good bro. I, I appreciate the, the
invitation and the respect and know that it is offered Likewise
for me, I respect all religions. I respect all faiths and belief
systems, and I know that like, these are the foundations upon
which people build their lives, you know, So I have massive
respect for it. And for me, anything that helps
humanity, that helps humans live healthier, happier, more
empowered lives, I'm for that. That's what I'm for.
I'm against anything that divides us, that weakens us and
do. That's a very easy way to tell
what to consume and what not to consume.
Is this piece of information creating more division?
Is it creating more conflict? Is it sowing more discord?
Is it saying negative things that are not empowering?
Then I just don't listen to it. I don't give it even a cent of
my time, bro. Zero of my time, zero of my
attention. The best way to kill something
is to just not pay it any attention.
And with negativity, that's what we got.
That's what we got to do. Now for the other side, Anything
that unifies anything that empowers, anything that makes
humans happier, healthier, stronger, gives us hope.
That's what I'm for. So yeah, that's just a quick
thing on the consumption of information.
Good paradigm to work through that.
But back to the Buddhist stories, man, one of my
favourites. And the more I study Buddhism
out of MOLA, the more I'm feeling that the Buddhist path
is the path of learning to let go.
And the Buddhist believe that attachment is the root cause of
all suffering. And it's usually an attachment
to an idea of who we think we are or who we think we have to
be in order to survive. There's there's so many subtle
attachments in my experience that I had attached to that once
I let go, dude, so much of my suffering, I'm able to let it go
as well. So let me, let me tell you this,
this story about letting go. So this is the story of the two
monks with the woman at the river.
Now, Buddhist monks, they're not supposed to, to have physical
contact with, with ladies. And there was one day there's a
a senior monk and a junior monk. They're walking through the
forest and they come to this river.
It's a very fast flowing river, kind of scary.
And there's a, there's a beautiful lady there and she
doesn't know how to cross. And she asks the two monks, hey,
can you guys help me across this river, please?
And without thinking about it, the senior monk just goes over.
It's like, yeah, sure, hop on, I'll carry you over.
And he picks her up, carries her over the river, sets her down
and moves on. Now, at this time, the junior
monk is like, dude, what are you doing?
You're the senior monk. Like, you're not supposed to
have physical contact with women.
Like, what are you doing, bro? And he crosses the river after
them, but he doesn't say anything at that moment.
They keep walking. The senior monk and junior monk
continue on their journey. They're walking.
And the junior monk, he can't stop thinking about it.
He's like, dude, like, why did this guy touch this lady?
Like we're really not supposed to do that.
And after like a couple a couple miles, he just couldn't help
himself. So he asked the senior mom.
He's like, dude, like you're the senior monk.
Like, why did you why did you have physical contact with that
Lady? And the senior monk says, hey,
brother, like, look, I picked her up.
I brought her across the river and I set her down.
Why are you still carrying her? Why are you?
Still carrying her. And the lesson there, bro, is
like, there's so many things that we attached to that we're
carrying inside of our hearts, carrying inside of our minds.
And for the senior monk, he wasn't attached to the rules per
SE. He was more concerned with the
human, with helping the human in the moment.
And a lot of Buddhists like that, that's the true way to
practice. Put the human first, you know,
like if it breaks the rules, but it benefits the human, do that
action. And then this junior monk, he
was holding on to convention. He was holding on to the rules
and he was carrying the lady inside of his head and inside of
his heart. And there's so many things that
humans carry for so long that drag us down, hold us down in
lower energetic states that if we could just learn to let go
like the senior monk, that we would feel so much lighter
immediately, bro. So that's the story of the two
monks with the woman at the river.
Wow, you know, you've actually shared the story on this kind of
mentors and really he did touch me.
And right now it's sinking in Defran again.
Like it's a story that when you hear it or you tell it, it does
heat with a new energy every time, letting go.
Very, very important. You know, I've said this before,
that people are too attached to constructs, to concepts, to
ideas, to philosophies. You're not your idea, you're not
your philosophy. And you know, for a very long
time people believe in things that are wrong, right?
And would kill or fight to defend that wrong position,
right? And a lot of people don't
realize that rules are made for man, not man made for rules.
Wow, that's a great perspective. I like that a lot of people are.
Attached to convention, but you need to think about the greater
good. I love that story very much.
The woman was in need and you know, he did what he had to do
and let her go. And you know, just from that
moment where he drops her off, he's off his mind and he's
continued on his journey for he's impacted her own journey
positively. Yep, and.
This speaks to even every other really journey in Christianity
and Islam. There are people who judge other
people. You know, we sometimes we call
them holier than thou. You know, individuals like, OK,
you want to be holy, no problem. You be holy.
Leave me, Just leave me alone. Let let me do my own thing.
Right? But why do people want to feel
like they're better than the next person?
Why do they want to feel like they're better than the next
person? They want to feel that way
because they're insecure about who they are.
And like, it's, it's just a, a lack of self love at the end of
the day. I think.
I mean, at any time, any there's any reaching that is external,
it's, it's a lack of self love, I think.
And you know, because if, if you truly love yourself, then you'll
be confident within yourself. And it also comes with
experience because it's only after going through certain
stages in life do we understand the experiences of others.
If we don't have those experiences and those
challenges, we truly cannot understand them.
There's no way to imagine your way.
You can't imagine, you can't envision.
But there's certain things that you have to experience to truly
understand it. And the correct way to practice
on the path, I believe, is to transform it with compassion.
And I think compassion is always the answer.
Dude, Zen Master tick not on. He said compassion is
invincible. It is the only thing that is
worthy of us. And hatred will not let you face
the beast in man. But compassion can.
And compassion can help you transform that.
So that's my perspective on it. Wow.
Compassion, they're very important.
If you've ever seen my, my core values or heard about my core
values, my core values to just three of them, kindness,
respect, hospitality. You know, compassion is a very,
very big part of kindness. I like to tell people I'm a kind
guy, but not a nice guy. You know, I, I generally care
about people's welfare, but I feel like niceness is about
seeking people's validation or trying to act like you're kind
so that people would say, oh, that's, you know, that person is
good. So from that Buddha story, we
can see the senior monk is actually a kind guy.
He genuinely cares about the human.
Yes, and. That is what kind people do.
They don't care about the frameworks, they don't care
about the rules, they care about the welfare of the people,
Right. And you talk a lot about self
mastery. And, you know, self mastery is,
you know, a theme of the mind. It's intrinsic.
It's about your internal engineering.
And in this age and time, people seek validation too much.
And, you know, I tell people I don't really care about what
people say about me or what people try to lead on me.
If you said I'm stupid, I'm crazy, whatever, that's that's,
that's on you. Thank you very much.
Because I use this analogy when you take $100 note, right?
Take the $100 note, you squeeze it, you, you know, grumble it,
you put it in the mud, you step on it and say, oh, you're not
$100, you're $50. OK, no problem.
Straighten it out and take that mint one, the fresh one and take
it to a shop. The, the, the rugged rackety 1,
you know, and that mint fresh one are going to buy the same
exact things. So I tell people my value is not
determined by whatever you call it, is determined by what God
has, you know, quoted. So it's more like the central
bank actually printed this thing and you know, you credit our
hundred, right? So whatever it is you want to
try to call it, it doesn't change it.
So our value is intrinsic, is determined by God.
Until people get to realize the fact that your value is actually
predetermined, right, and cannot be changed by people's
validation or people's expressions, they might not take
themselves very seriously. Yeah, no.
That's a beautiful perspective and I think it's true.
I mean, we, I think all humans have inherent value.
And I will say too that that humans are also capable of
elevating their own value, that that's, that's a beautiful
thing. We're all born with inherent
value, but we can also learn to increase our value by learning
to increase the level at which we can help other people and,
and service other people and provide solutions to their
problems. It's interesting, 'cause
there's, there's like, there's worth and there's value, right?
Like inherently, like we all have worth just as human beings,
but value is, I'm starting to think of value in terms of like
what I can do for other people, the, the pain that I can
alleviate, the problems that I can solve.
I'm curious about your, your perspective on that, Adam Ola,
because we all have value as human beings, just base basic
human respect, you know, and, but what, what's your take on
that? The, the dichotomy of worth and
value or, or is there a separation for you?
So. I'd say in terms of value, I'll
link it back to that analogy that I give, right?
What's the value of $100? Note, you can buy certain
things, right? And that value is intrinsic.
It's not determined by, you know, the aesthetic.
So it's it's, you know, you know what?
It is, bro. It's determined by our belief in
it. That's what it's determined by.
Because if nobody believes, you believe.
In the you believe in that $100 note, right?
That is why you're going to collect it and give some of the
value. Yes, I, I want to bring it back
to, to the, to belief. Now, bro, let's, let's talk
about belief for a bit. Because what is it that
literally gives that $100 bill the power that it has?
It's the investment of our belief in it.
It's our acceptance of it, but without, without our belief in
it. Like if an alien just came to
Earth and they didn't know anything about the $100 bill and
they didn't believe in it and like it's just me and the alien,
just us 2 left in the world. And it's like they don't know
what it is, they don't believe in it, then it has no value
because they haven't invested their belief in it.
And it's the same with people, bro.
I think we're valuable to the level that we believe we are
valuable. So I think it's belief at the
end of the day. I've got a quote.
Belief is the catalyst that transforms thoughts into
reality. Belief is the catalyst that
transforms thoughts into reality.
And you know, think about it from this perspective, talk
about belief. The reason why somebody's going
to accept $100 note is because they believe in that note.
I come from Nigeria. We don't spend dollars, we spend
naira. If you go to some rural areas
and you give a local businesswoman give $100 notes,
she's never seen $100 in her life, she will not accept it
from you. She wants a local currency.
Man, this, this is so interesting because now it
brings up like, hey, if you have something beautiful to share but
people aren't familiar with it, then you have to introduce it to
them in a way that feels familiar in order for them to
accept it. So like, let's say you have some
beautiful Christian messages to share with people, but these are
people that have never heard about Christianity or anything
like that. I guess a good way to
communicate those values would be through adopting them in a
format or through subjects that these people are familiar with.
So yeah, it's my, my mind is kind of racing with ideas now.
So I appreciate you, man. You're, you're inspiring, dude.
Let's know. Modern.
Day business philosopher. For reason, brother, Let's go,
let's go. The Joe.
Letters my. Mom.
Oh. The Joe.
Rogan of Africa right here with you brother.
We're calling it Global Top 100. Barrister embarrassing in your
faces, from your mouth to God's ears.
It's going to happen. You know, I feel like I was, I
was put on this earth. I was born just to be a
podcaster, like everything that I've done in my life.
Is. Just pointing towards that
purpose. OK, I have been viewing this guy
to become, you know, a global podcaster, you know, a global
elite level, the best in the world.
In order to be the best, you have to be to the best.
And the best is blessed. You know, we are blessed,
brother. We're blessed.
It's quite interesting, you know, like, I love the fact that
I'm able to connect with the brightest minds of my time.
I grew up reading a lot of books in my father's library.
Books and philosophy, psychology, sociology, history,
geography, political science. And, you know, reading the
ancient, you know, Greek philosophers and you know, some
Oriental ones as well, lacks of Confucius.
I used to think, how wish I could have a conversation with
these guys and know what's happening in their head and
trade perspectives. And no matter how brilliant you
are or how much of A genius you are as a person, connecting with
another genius helps you to expand the horizon.
There's something I learned in physics, you know the angle of
elevation and angle of depression.
So it's about your perspective. So your perspective is limited
to what you can see, right? And it's piece of the angle.
So if you, if you have a building, for example, you have
this and you're standing here, you're only limited to see what
is here. You don't know what's at the
back. But if you're standing here, you
can see what is down, right? If you're standing here, you can
see what is here and you know what is here.
So having conversations with people, right?
So I'm here and you're here, for example, so I can tell you about
what is here. You can tell me about what's
here and we both become better individuals.
I love it. Bro And like, do you think that
that's what happens like let's say when we, when we pass away,
right? Like the Buddhist believe that
we're just a drop of water returning to the ocean.
So what if like when I pass, I'm able to go back with that
information and say, hey, here's what I've learned about life.
Here's all of these different angles, take it and run.
You know, I'm, it's just so cool.
I'm thinking about the matrix now.
I'm thinking about some very interesting ideas like universal
consciousness. But no, I I love it, dude.
And I think when great minds get together, I'm not saying that
I'm a great mind, but you are a great you are.
You are a great mind, brother. You are a great mind.
There's no. There's no argument.
About. It, you know, you know, one
thing, one thing I've learned is, you know, yeah, it's
beautiful, humble, right. But it's also good to accept our
privileges. Yeah, we have certain privileges
based off our journeys in life, right.
So it's, it's not your fault that you're a great mind.
You just have to accept it. You don't have to be humble
about it, Right. Yeah.
You can be humble about it. Yeah.
But I, I think probably a way to be humble about it is, you know,
maybe framing it as I'm grateful, you know, to be one of
the great minds, you know, of my generation.
I think. Yeah.
What here here's something that I take pride in is
communication. And I think it's even better to
have a friend give you the compliment for you.
So that's why I deflected it because I knew how to help you
out with that bro. So I, I appreciate your assist
in that dude. Jeff Bezos said something really
interesting. He said we can't be proud of our
gifts, but we can be proud of our decisions and.
I'm. Proud of all the decisions that
I've made with the cards that I've been dealt, you know, with
the cards that I've been dealt. I'm very proud of how I'm
showing up. I'm very proud of how I'm
allocating my time, energy and attention in the world.
And I'm proud that I'm I've chosen to be a good person or do
my best to be a good person and make a positive impact in the
world. So another thing that you on
right there. You know.
You talk about Keith's right, the Bible.
Actually in the book of Proverbs chapter 18 verse 16, it says a
man's gift make up room for him and bring up him before great
man. A man's gift make up room for
him and bring up him before great man.
Think about it. It reminds me of what our
director of our higher ticket communities, Rob Fajardo says.
Rob has a great networking thing because a lot of people say it's
not what you know, it's who you know, right?
A lot of people say that, but Rob's spin on that is actually
it's what you know that allows you to connect with The Who you
knows and allows you to provide the value to them.
So it's the what you know that allows you to get in the room
and stay in the room. So actually it's our gifts, as
the Bible says, and it's the what that allows us access to
The Who before we become The Who.
So yeah, you know, that's something.
That the Bible says that I really appreciate.
It says study to show thyself approved or workmen that need
not be ashamed. Study to show thyself, approved
a Workman that need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the
word of truth. What does that mean to you?
That is, we have that responsibility to study.
We have that responsibility to study for our self growth and
self development. And that is what's going to make
you not to be ashamed. I love it bro, because it's
rightly. Dividing the word of truth.
That's beautiful. Humans, we're blessed.
And humans also a lot of people forget.
Maybe, maybe it's just me that forgot, but we're also organic
beings. We're not just observers of
nature. We are manifestations of nature
as well. We're a part of nature and
anything in nature that is not growing is dying.
A tree is either growing or it's dying.
There's no there's no two ways about it.
If the tree is not growing, it is dying.
And it's the same with humans, bro.
So like every single day, it's good to study, it's good to
learn something new. It's good to get new things in
variety. It's good to grow every single
day because if we're not growing, we're dying.
And the Buddhists believe that the the reincarnation as a human
is a super, super blessed chance and opportunity to actually dive
into the waters of truth, you know, to learn about the nature
of reality, to transcend suffering.
And just the Buddhist really Revere this opportunity to be
human, to have human intelligence and to study every
single day, man. So I love that quote from the
Bible. Let's go.
A lot of respect, brother. You know.
Speaking to the. Full concept of self mushroom,
right? And that internal engineering
that you very, very much appreciate.
So you talk about holistic success.
So what does self mastery mean to you in a world full of noise
and pressure? And how does somebody begin that
journey to self mastery? Damn bro.
That's a great question. I think self mastery, there's,
there's a lot of different elements to it. 1st, it's, it's
a willingness to take a look at where you are currently and
accept that honest with honesty. I think my, the biggest turning
point in my own self mastery journey was when I decided to be
100% honest. OK, honesty will get you super
far. It'll get you like 80% of the
way there. And here's how it happened for
me in the past, I had a really bad habit of telling little lies
to people to get them to like me more.
I don't know why, bro. I'll just confess that it was
something that I did. And I went to UCLA and I joined
a fraternity called Lambda Chi Alpha there.
And it was like my rush, my rush term.
And we were picking our Big Brothers inside the fraternity
to be our mentors, right? And I put these five guys as
54321. But I told number one and #2
that they were both my number one.
I still know their names, Bro Austin, Austin Kopp and Adam
Hakim. Those are my two guys.
They were my top two guys. And bro, throughout the process
of figuring out who is going to be my big bro, this lie came out
and it was exposed in front of the whole fraternity dude.
And I had to get. Bro it was.
Terrible. I felt so ashamed.
I felt embarrassed and it really 'cause we do these, I, I did
this instinctively just try trying to survive.
I think like everything that somebody does, it's a survival
mechanism that we feel we have to do but we don't have to do.
But Long story short, man, I had to give an apology in front of
the entire fraternity and I had to take a good look at myself,
man. And this is life gives us
opportunities to take a good look at ourselves and change.
And after that I decided, man, I need to be 100% honest and not
just to other people, but also with myself.
Like how am I feeling? What are my genuine thoughts
right now? And then creating space for
that. So I think honesty is an
incredible first step in self development and self mastery.
Honesty. Honesty and the search for truth
about ourselves, about the universe.
I think those are two very, very good things.
Honesty is the first step. Truth is the direction.
You know, in, in Nigeria we have we have a saying that's quite
popular. They say honesty is the best
policy. I agree with that.
I agree with that bro, because telling lies is like weaving a
spider web that you have to navigate yourself and it'll
eventually catch me inside of it if I, if I tell it, you know,
it's just, it's not, it's not worth it bro.
It's not worth it bro. My, my good friend Akon, he,
he's from Ghana, he says anything that cost me my Peace
of Mind is too expensive. Anything that's going to cost me
my Peace of Mind is too expensive.
And I agree 110%, man. So those are my thoughts on that
bro. It's interesting you're actually
aligning with a proverb from from Nigeria.
So I'll say it in Yoruba and Abu translate it so they say T
Yoruba lofo Guangdong putito yoshiburia meaning are if a lie
is told and it exists for 1000 years, the truth will still
eventually conquer it or be revealed.
I agree with that 110%. The truth will always come up
bro. Because the the experience of
life is truth. We're experiencing truth
everyday man. Like life itself is truth.
And if if I have a misperception or a misconception about how
life is, life experiences will show me that I am wrong.
Like, like there's certain universal principles that are
just so true that even if I believe they're not true, my
life experiences will prove them true to me over time.
So I agree with that. Speaking of.
Universal truths, right? Yeah, I think about how in the
past people used to think the world was flat for overtime.
Scientific discoveries, proof that the world is spherical.
So there are some people who see believe in the Flat Earth
concept where you stand and you know, like how did that concept
of changing from the universal Flat Earth concept to the
universal spherical concept, like how does that evolution
play for you? It's interesting.
Adam Ola I, I only speak about things that I feel I have some
level of expertise or skin in the game with.
I've never dove in very deep into that conversation.
Just off the bat, I'm I'm feeling that the earth is
spherical, that that's, that's my take on it.
But like for me, I'm, I'm only concerned with the things that
will improve human life. That's that's where I put all my
energy and attention. I love that.
That's just true. It's just true.
It's just who I am. But with with things like that,
it's like I will support whatever gives you the most
Peace of Mind because I care about the human.
Like at the end of the day, we're all going to die.
And does it matter? Does it matter if it's spherical
or if it's flat? Or does it matter?
I'm telling you, does it really matter because some people will
fight you? To define the.
Concept of the Flat Earth and I'm like, OK, do you think it's
flat? It is very flat.
No problem, let's move on. Just.
There's some telefix that are just like suckers of energy that
don't need to be there. Like if you have time to talk
about Flat Earth or spherical earth, like do something about
the water problem like purify water on earth.
OK go. Here's the order bro.
First, purify the air. Spend your time purifying air,
finding solutions to purify air because without good air we're
all dead instantly, like 3 minutes.
Second, find a good way to purify water.
If you have still have time after solving the air problem,
solve the water problem 'cause if we don't have water, we die
in like 5 to 7 days. Then solve the food problem
'cause if we don't have food, good clean, healthy food, we die
after like, I don't know, 3-4 weeks, you know?
So that's the order that flat versus spherical earthers should
take and allocate their energy. That's what I believe.
I love that. I love that, you know, water
food, In the words of Bruce Lee, be like water, my friend.
Be like water my friend. Dude.
Dude it's the basics man. People have to think like, what
is keeping us alive at this moment?
It's air. That's the most important thing.
We need clean air. What's secondary water?
What do we die without the fastest, without water?
OK, after water, food. We need to make these three
things healthy and good for all of humanity.
And then education, because it's food of the mind.
With education, bro, we can change the entire world with a
single generation. We just need to get one single
generation right and humanity is good bro.
Very. Very important and that actually
reminds me of of philosophy that I have.
I said the the capacity of the human being is determined by 4
ease number one, education, number 2 enlightenment #3
experience and #4 exposure. I'll take that again. 4ES, the
capacity of a person of an individual is determined by 4
ES. Number one is education #3 is
enlightenment #3 it's exposure #4 is experience.
So in no particular order, right, those are four ES.
I'd like to take this question. Bro this is beautiful and I I
agree. I'll give you some.
Sauce there? Bro I'm I'm I'm going to go in.
Bro, I'm I'm going in dude. So all right, let me let me
organize this and let me go in on this.
So First off, exposure, one of our mentors that we had on his
name is Will Rivera. He is a became a millionaire at
23. He's a great quote.
Ma'am, you can only grow to what you've been exposed to.
You can only grow to what you've been exposed to.
And dude, I I think that's super true.
So I think exposure and choosing to expose yourself to the things
that you want. Go and see the dream, go and
touch the dream, go and taste the dream.
Whatever your dream is, that environment is so important.
Put yourself in that. You might want to add
environment to those ease bro environment.
Yeah, that's good. Let's make it 5.
I like the concept of five. Let's go, let's go.
Bro So yeah, you can only grow to what you've been exposed to.
And that education is not just school, bro.
Like, I think I, I want people to not think of education as
just school and that's. Why we've been enlightenment.
Enlightenment is education on steroids.
I love it. I love it for me for me
enlightenment. I do go by more of the Buddhist
perspective, which is like. Let me think about how to
structure this. It's about seeing the nature of
reality as it is and experiencing that for ourselves,
because it's the experience of the nature of reality that
really frees us. OK, so there's a great example
of like a researcher and the Buddha.
OK, there's the researcher and the Buddha.
They're both researching and experiencing impermanence,
right? So the researcher will use his
micros or telescope, microglass, whatever it's called,
microscope, and he'll look at an atom and he'll see how it
fluctuates so much in every single second.
It's not the same. It's, it's impermanent.
The, the state that it's in, it's always changing.
But the researcher will not become enlightened just by
looking at impermanence. You know, the Buddha, the
purpose of the meditation part of it was actually to experience
the reality of impermanence using his own body as the tool.
Because when we meditate, we're able to experience, oh, here's
this sensation right here, 0 and now it's gone.
Here's the sensation right here, 0 and now it's gone.
Here's the thought that I'm experiencing 0 And now it's
gone. Thoughts are gone as soon as
they come, and every single phenomenon in the entire
universe is impermanent to varying degrees of impermanence.
Speeds that the speed that at which it changes.
So I think it's important to have the experience of
enlightenment, not just an intellectual understanding of
it. Because if we don't experience
it first hand, we won't truly know, I think.
And you know, in terms of education, a lot of people make
the mistake of what I say equating education to lead to
racy. But education is more than just
being literate. I'd like for you to speak to
that. And don't forget our five, our
five ES, enlightenment, education, exposure, experience
and environment. So.
You've spoken to, Let me see now, enlightenment.
So we're talking about education now?
Yeah. Yeah, I, I love that, bro.
Literacy gives you access to the flow of information.
That's what literacy does. Literacy is, is is a it's a very
beneficial thing to have, but it's not everything.
I think there's education in terms of learning, like what to
actually consume. That's a key part of education,
and that's an intuitive thing. It's like as we live our lives,
we know the things that are beneficial to us and harmful to
us by experiencing those things, right?
Like I had to drink this Coca-Cola and this beer to
understand that the next day I feel like crap and boom, the
output of drinking too much alcohol is feeling like crap.
So that's that's experience. And experience is a key part of
education. It's all interwoven, but
literacy gives us access to other people's experiences.
But it's that first hand experience that will convince
you one way or the other of whether or not to, to take this
thing or to not take this thing. The fastest way to succeed at
whatever your chosen pursuit is, is to put yourself in the
environment where that thing is the norm, where achieving that
is the norm. So for me right now, my goal is
to relearn Mandarin Chinese for the reasons that I've told you
and, and more. And what did I do?
I decided to come to Beijing. I'm here in the capital of
China. Immersion, bro, There's
immersion is the best way to learn in my opinion because it's
the you're getting the most possible reps in and quality.
Quantity breeds quality, quantity breeds quality.
Got to get the reps in and it's all about reps, bro.
I'm convinced that as long as anybody puts the requisite
amount of reps in, they're going to succeed at whatever their
chosen pursuit is. Absolutely. 10,000 Hour rule
Malcolm Gladwell. Yes, I.
I really appreciate what that guy said about 10,000 hour rules
and I think that's in his book. Outlier outliers, Yeah, they're
outliers, I think. That guy is reading a couple of
books that I really appreciate. Outliers, David and Goliath.
What? What about the book?
You know him, right? Malcolm?
Yeah. I know I've heard of him.
I think T pinpoint as well, like very, very great storyteller.
I think he is one of the greatest storytellers of our
generation. Like yeah, to to put some
respect on his name. He he's one of the greatest and
the way he analysis, you know, concepts and brings them to when
I say association with reality, I think, yeah, I, I rated very,
very highly. He should be.
On the podcast. One of these days, let's get him
on board. No, still, bro, I'm I'm speaking
it for you, man. Malcolm Gladwell's coming on.
He's coming on. Malcolm.
Gladwell. This is an open invitation to
you. We appreciate your body of work.
And of course, we'd love to have you on the Kingdom's podcast.
Yeah, we said he here first. Let's go and.
Adam Ola, I wanted to compliment you too, man.
I think if you've read The Tipping Point, which I haven't
even read, I think you're an amazing maven and an amazing
connector. So you're an amazing curator of
knowledge and you're an amazing communicator of and, and
connector too, bro. So giving you your flowers, Ben.
Thank you very much, Larry, take the flowers.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
Thank you very much.
You know, like in this age and time, people are very, very,
would I say stingy with compliments, you know, and
appreciation. And I always say something,
gratitude is good attitude. When a person shares their time
with you, they share their life with you because the Sr. unit
for measuring life is time. So when you appreciate it for
something, it gives you more motivation.
You know, I don't see validation, but the truth is we
are all human beings. When you appreciate it, it gives
you more energy, more motivation.
And I always say, do not go to where you're tolerated, go to
where you're appreciated. I love it, bro.
I I love it, dude.
Yeah. Don't go.
Don't go where you're tolerated. Go where you're appreciated and
celebrated. Absolutely.
And of course, you know what a great way to segue into the next
segment. I want to talk about
communication superpower, you know, the linguistic freedom.
So you wrote the Diamond Quarter Sutra.
That is freedom through linguistic mastery.
So how does language shape destiny, and how can the average
person use communication to elevate their lives?
What do you think is the most important conversation that we
have every day? The most important conversation
we have every day. That has to be a conversation
with yourself. Absolutely, bro, absolutely.
Lao Tzu. He has a great quote.
Watch your thoughts, They become your speech.
Watch your speech, they become your actions.
Watch your actions, they become your habits.
Watch your habits, they become your character.
And watch your character because it becomes your destiny.
And it's so true, man. It all begins with thoughts and
the way that we think and we perceive and the thoughts that
we're choosing every single day, brother.
So there's 3 levels of karma in Buddhism and the three levels
karma is defined as intentional action, anything done with an
intent behind it. And thinking is also an action.
And there's 3 levels of of intentional action and the
fruits of said action. The 1st is thought, the second
is speech, and the third is physical action.
Of the three, which one do you think is the most important to
control right off the bat, or to guide or to pick that has?
To be your thoughts. Like yeah, because that's
intrinsic. You're right bro.
Thoughts are the seeds of speech and physical action.
Thoughts are the seeds of both speech and physical action.
Let me break down manifestation real quick for people.
This is how manifestation happens in the world, bro.
We have a thought. It's a seed, right?
It's the seed of both speech and physical action.
And when a thought comes into our minds, we have two choices.
We can either allow it to go, or we can choose to act upon the
thought. If I choose to act upon the
thought abstractly, metaphorically, I'll plant the
seed in the ground, put it there, water it, and the plant
will grow and the fruit will grow.
In real life terms, what that means is let's say the thought
is, hey, I want some pizza. Pizza sounds good right now.
OK, I plant the seed, I put there, I water it.
What that means is I'm calling up 7 or I'm calling up Pizza
Hut. Bro, I've taken it to the speech
level. Hey, I want a double cheese
stuffed double sausage pizza. Boom, communicate.
We went from the thought level to the speech level.
And then I drive over there, I grab the physical pizza and I
come back. I'm sitting here with this
physical reality, bro, this physical pizza that began as a
thought. And look around you, bro.
Every single thing in your room that you're using, your glasses,
the sweatshirt that you're choosing to wear right now, All
of those physical realities began with a thought.
It began with a decision to whether or not to act upon this
thought or to let it go. Also, another quick thing I have
on thoughts. I have a saying, thoughts are
just like advertisements. They come up all the time, but
that doesn't mean you have to buy what they're selling.
And I say that to give people freedom because thoughts come
and go. As soon as soon as they come up,
they go. So like, if you don't attach the
thought, it has no power over you.
It's our active participation and decision to plant that seed
that manifests it into reality. So in terms of communication and
using it to master our lives, the most important conversation
that we need to master every single day is the communication
with ourselves. And it's the way that we
communicate with ourselves that leads to how we communicate with
other people as well. So mastering the internal
dialogue is what will help you master the the external dialogue
as well. Wow.
The Bible. Says in the book of Proverbs
chapter 23, I think verse 7. As a man thinketh in his heart,
so is he. Absolutely, brother.
Now here's the beautiful thing. The Bible could not be more
correct, dude. It's not about what we can think
in our minds, it's about what we believe in our hearts.
That's what it is. I could think a certain thing
with just my mind, but if it's not fueled by the engine of my
heart, if I don't believe it, then it's it's not going to
manifest dude. So I, I love that bro.
The, and I love how you can just quote the Bible instantly and
know exactly what it is, bro. That, that shows a level of
mastery that I, I respect a lot. Dude.
Not a lot of people can actually quote the exact proverb and tell
me where it's from, dude. So kudos to you man.
Thank you very much. You know, it's as though you
knew that I was. Loading.
Up another one for you. Hebrew chapter.
Hebrew Chapter 11, verse one. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
Faith is a softness of things hoped for, the evidence of
things not seen. And that actually links to that
belief of, you know, what you're hoping for.
Faith is a softness of things hoped for, the evidence of
things not seen. And of course, down in that
Chapter 11, it went on to say Abraham had faith and it was
counted unto him unto righteousness.
But without faith it's impossible to please God.
It's powerful. Bro.
Faith. Is so I I come from a, a family
of scientists. My, my dad is a PhD physicist,
my mom's APHD chemist and my Chinese dad, my parents split
up. He, he's got a PhD in, in
history and all of them are very sceptical, right?
It's a, we are very skeptical family.
So growing up I had a lot of Christian friends and the faith
element of Christianity was always difficult for me,
brother, very difficult because it asked me to believe without
any evidence. It's like you just have to have
faith in it. And it's something I still
struggle with. Like faith without evidence is
very difficult for me. But for me, what I've, what I've
come to learn is faith, or that I can have faith in is the
principles that I've tested over and over again with my own life
experience that hold true no matter what situation I'm in.
So for now, I have faith in the universal principles that I've
experienced and I have faith in the teachings that hold true no
matter what amount of pressure is I'm under.
But I'd love to hear your perspective on faith dude.
You know. For anybody who's been following
the podcast, you know overtime and by the way, we're recording
this on November 18 and the forecast actually started
November 19, 2023. So it means tomorrow we're going
to be clocking 2 years in the game and that's.
Gone. That is gone, you know.
Thank you very much, brother. Thank you very much, brother.
You know, I'm grateful two years in other two years we were able
to climb two people top 2.5%. Like I'm grateful, I'm grateful.
You know, when put that into perspective, a lot of people who
are at that global top 2.5% ranking actually started three
years, four years, five years before me.
And yeah, we're grateful, you know, for speaking about faith.
Even this podcast has been a brainchild of faith.
You know, when I was going to start, a lot of people were
like, oh, why should a finance guy start a broadcast, right?
You are a finance guy. You're not a communicator.
You're not, you know, a broadcaster.
So seats with your finance. Do your finance people like to
put people in boxes? But I always believed that, you
know, I would do excellent things.
I would do great things with this thing.
So it was just an idea, right? I had the faith that I can, you
know, tell the stories of ordinary people between
extraordinary things and go global with this thing.
But I think a lot of people did not believe it until, you know,
they started seeing a lot of great interviews and seeing the
rankings, the chats, you know, in multiple countries.
Today we're in 92 countries and you know, started with being
global top 10%. I think we earlier this year
around May, and I think that's when some people started
believing in it and at some point became global top 5%,
global top 3%, it was up 2.5%. You know, people start believing
more that OK, this is no longer a joke, right?
But when it was just an idea, people could not wrap their
heads around it, right? So and that comes back to faith
is a substance of beings hoped for, the evidence of beings not
seen conceive, believe, achieve. You have to conceive it, you
have to believe it, then you need to strive to thrive before
you can achieve it. So like you said, everything
that we see around us was at first of thought.
So there's a difference between thoughts and thinking.
So thoughts are like the advertisement and thinking.
It's processing those thoughts and you can decide to act on it
or not act on it. So that's why our intentions
sometimes are different from our actions because it all depends
on what you act on. So for me, faith is, you know,
science. I'm also a science person, of
course. You know, in high school, before
the secondary school, I was a science student in physics,
chemistry, biology. So I understand the empirical
concept. So if you cannot observe A
phenomena, right, you cannot believe in that phenomenon.
That's the empirical concept, right?
You. Create laws, you create theories
around what you've been able to observe, right?
And it's it's sometimes a conflict managing being a
science person and being a person of faith.
Science is, you know, very rigid about the observation and faith
is, you know, very deep on believe in what I say blindly,
right, that actualization. But you know, as you go on to
study faith more, study science board, you discovered that there
are actually synchronies, right? There are synchronizations
between faith and science. You have neuroscience, for
example, that's the study of the brain.
I've had a couple of neuroscientists on the broadcast
this year. We've had Doctor Ben Rain, the
Stanford University neuroscientist on the broadcast.
We've had Doctor and Johnny Chakala, he's the neuroscientist
advisor to Think he incorporated.
And these guys explain the complex concept of the brain and
how the brain works with the prefrontal cortex, for example.
That is like the CEO of the brain and the way the neurons
are wired. You know, the way the brain
controls the body, it couldn't have been created by God, right?
But you know, when you come back to that empirical construct, you
observe phenomena before you can trust and believe in that
phenomena, right? And that's why I always say that
you cannot force faith on people.
The reason why? I'm a Christian is not because
my parents are Christians. The reason why I believe in God
is not because my parents believe in God is because I've
been able to observe God come through for me personally.
I've been able to experience God personally.
You know when you pray and God comes through for you, you've
been in difficult situations and you express yourself with God
and finds a way where there's no way.
You know the Bible says he created streams in deserts,
right? So if you're able to get on your
faith journey and experience God for yourself, that would help
you to achieve a good balance between science and faith
because you've been able to observe on your own God doing
things for you, God, you know, making things real for you.
So that way you don't need any more proof.
To prove that God. Really exists.
And I think that's what makes faith stronger.
So that balance of faith and science is actually very, very
much, you know, needed. But a person cannot achieve or
unlock a higher level of faith if they've not been able to
observe, you know, in their own personal journey, but coming
through for them. So it comes back to our own
lived experience, right? I love that.
And I'm definitely open. I'm definitely open.
You know, I think I'm open with everything.
And one thought that I had about science real quick was science
should not be used to define the boundaries.
Science should be used to explore.
I don't think science should be definitory.
I think science should be exploratory and science that is
used to set the boundaries is is not creative enough, I think.
But yeah, just some thoughts on that.
And it's interesting 'cause let's go back to linguistics,
right? There's, there's a higher level
cause the, the way that I see the human journey of self
mastery is you go from potentially having, having some
negative right? And then you transcend all of
that. You rewire the mind.
All your minds has become positive and now you're on the
positive. But there's something even
beyond that. And that's transcending positive
and negative that, that duality. It's going beyond the yin and
the Yang. And at the end of the day, it's
going beyond all of language all together, because let me ask you
this first. What?
What came first, humans or human language?
What came first It? Has to be humans.
It has to be humans, exactly. So every single word is just a
sound, right? It's a sound that we've been
taught to connect this sound with this image.
Like when I say cup cup, you hear that sound.
We both have this right? But Adam all brother, if me and
you are the last two humans on Earth and we decided to call
this a watermelon, could we? Let's call it a mug.
Well. People call it a mug, but let
what? What if we called it a beanie?
Can we? Could we call it a beanie?
Could we? It is.
Whatever it is you call it. Exactly.
So the truth of The thing is not in the name, right?
So the truth of God is not in the name itself.
Or else. It would only be God, that
activation phrase, that combination of phonetics that
would give it power. But Chinese people call it Shen.
It's that's God as well. It's the same concept.
So back to the language thing, man.
It's like all words are just empty, Empty sounds that we've
empowered with our belief and we've been conditioned.
It's like a it's a spell essentially in Harry Potter that
creates an output of an image, an energy, and all of our
emotional attachments to that word.
But. All of these can be rewired.
So what is left after we've destroyed all of that
conditioning, after we've let go of all words, because all words
are human creations. They're relative truths.
They, we use them to communicate, but they don't
actually contain the truth. Let me give another example.
Let's take the example of a flower, right?
We call it a flower, but is is it truly a flower?
First off, let's look at the physical phenomenon of the
flower, the material aspect of it.
Bro, if you look deeply in the heart of a flower, you can see
that the flower is only made of non flower components.
It's made of the soil, it's made of the seed, it's made of the
rain, it's made of the sunshine that that nurtured it right?
And if I took away the rain, could this flower be no flower?
Is there rain or sorry, no rain? If there's no rain, is there a
flower? Yes or no?
If there's no rain, definitely there's no flower because you
know, whichever way you want to process it, water is, you know,
is important for that equation. So let's, let's take rain as
water. So it's impossible.
Exactly. And then for the rain to be, we
need the clouds, right? For the clouds to be, we need
the whole atmosphere of Earth. For the atmosphere of Earth, we
need the perfect alignment of everything in the entire
universe to be exactly where it is, to have the right
temperature, to have our atmosphere.
If the sun was a bit closer, it'd be too hot, no atmosphere.
If the sun was a bit further away, it'd be too cold, no
atmosphere. That's why there's a phrase like
you can see the entire universe inside of a single flower.
You can see the Buddha inside of a single leaf.
And that's the physical dimension, right?
So all phenomena are only made of things that are not that
phenomena. And that goes for flour, that
goes for organic things, that goes for inorganic things.
But let's take it to the linguistic level.
Even flour FLOWER, it's composed of these letters, right?
But if we took away the R at the end, take away the R at the end
of flower, what is it? Flow, flow, flow, flowy.
What is it that that doesn't, that doesn't evoke the same
concept? It doesn't evoke the same image
and the same feelings as flower, right?
So we can see that all of all of our conditioned responses are
just that. They're just conditioned
responses to certain sounds that we've codified into different
languages. Bro.
So language is the magic of humanity.
It's what we use to communicate, but it's it's not what we should
anchor our identities in. That's why in my book, I say
that we need to transform our relationship with language from
an anchor of identity to a tool with utility.
And it's been very important for me on my journey because I was
born this name, Yuen Yu Fong. And then growing up, my friends
and family called me Kai Kai. That was my nickname.
Then when I went to the States, they chopped off one of the
Kai's and left out the tone. They just called me Kai.
That's my English name. Cobra Kai.
Cobra Kai, man. And at that time, bro, I
remember feeling like an actor. I was like, who's Kai?
Like I don't know who Kai is. So I became like a chameleon,
like an actor almost bro like method acting.
This identity of Kai and these names that we have, they're one
of our strongest attachments. And now I'm realizing that my
whole entire life, I'm able to see it from a different
perspective. I'm not seeing it as a victim.
I'm seeing it as, hey, this helps me understand these
Buddhist truths and these universal truths and an even
deeper level so that I can help people at a higher level.
So that's how I'm choosing to transform it.
There's a great Buddhist concept, no mud, no Lotus, no
mud, no Lotus. This beautiful Lotus flower can
only grow out of mud. And it's the same with humans.
If we're able to transform all of our challenges, transform all
of our sufferings, then we're able to create beauty and truth
from what we're we're able to create beauty and no truth from
that. And when we know the truth, the
truth will set us free. Know the truth and the truth
just that Use me. Wow, you talk about language for
utility and it made me remember the fact that you are a poet.
I feel like you. The language for poetry is a
form of utility. And I, I, I love to, when I say,
get a deep dive into any one of your poems, especially one that
relates to the concept of mindset.
Let me let me do you one better bro.
First, go. I'll, I'll, I'll sing you 2
songs. I'll sing you 2 songs because.
Wow, I love music. By the way, did you know?
I did not know, but no. You know.
Let's go. There was.
You don't know. Now you know.
Now I know, dude. So I think music is some poetry.
That's what I believe it is. Music is poetry that is some and
the first song, it is first song I wanted to sing for you is to
commemorate your podcast, bro. I want to I want to sing you my
way by Frank Sinatra. So let's do it, bro.
Let me get some water first. Let me, let me top off my my my
mug. Sounds good man.
Jesus Christ, cheers bro. I'm topping up mine too.
Don't copy me, don't copy me. I'm not your robe model.
You know. It's a Nigerian joke by the way.
You see, you not copy me. I am not your robe model.
I am not your what I am not. Your role model.
Role model. Got it.
I'm not your role model. Yeah, yeah.
How about? Don't copy me, make your own Jol
of rice. Whoa, you know about?
Jol of rice, right? Wow, that that that's great.
Jolo price is Jolo Price is our national meal.
That's. That's that's the most famous
theme from Nigeria basically, you know.
Yeah, I had AI had a a friend who's Ghanaian and a Co worker
who's Nigerian and they always argued about who had the better
job of rice man. Oh, not yeah.
That's that's, that's the rivalry between Nigeria and
Ghana. But we call it the Jolof War,
yeah. Dude, it's so funny, dude.
Yeah, that's. Funny, right?
We call it the Jolof War, like always, arguing about who has
the better Jolof Rice. I love it.
It's it's a nice playful banter. It's it's crazy, right, who's
got the better to low price, but he he.
Do you know who even? Has the best to low price.
It's it's not Nigerite, it's not Ghana.
That's a funny thing. It's actually Senegal, Senegal.
OK. Yeah, of course that is where
that is where to low price basically originated from or
because Nigeria is a very big country, 220 million plus
people. So they just snatched the the
meal and made it their own. Got it, Got it.
I'm refilling. My pop.
You mean your watermelon? Yeah, my.
Watermelon. Whoa, There you go.
Let's go. Oh, I think we have about 30
minutes left. Cheers, bro.
Yeah. Whoa.
Cheers, man. Cheers.
Wow.
Hey, so. Now I'm in a good place to
listen to a song. All right, let's.
Do it No2 song. Alright, I haven't done this for
a while. Give my best shot.
And now the end is near. And so I'll face the final
curtain, my friend. I'll say it clear.
I stayed my case, of which I'm certain.
I've lived the life that's full. I've travelled each and every
highway and more. Much.
More than this, you did it your way, my guy.
Whoa, love and. Respect.
Very, very, very much appreciated, brother.
Wow, you did it your way. OK, OK, OK.
Bro good respect. To you man, a top 2.5% podcast
and going going even higher, 1% top 0.1%, that ain't easy man.
So that is the goal. That is the goal, brother.
Whoa now. Now I'm curious.
What is the what is the next one?
What is the next one? The next one, you asked about
one of my poems, so I will actually share with you one of
my songs that I wrote. You know what, I have my guitar.
I'll play it for you. Let's.
Go let us. Go.
Actually, this is my upstairs neighbor's guitar, so shout out
to Sue Hung upstairs. Shout out to Sue Warren.
God bless. Yes.
Can you hear that? Whoa, I love the.
Guitar. I love the guitar that is
acoustic hold. On between this thing.
Can you hear that? All right, Cool.
This song is great. The.
Song is it was actually inspired by the the flower example that I
shared with you, and I call it the flower of you, the flower of
you. Yeah, sounds amazing.
Let's go. just a flower.
Yeah, but I see the sun, I see the moon.
It is their light within her bloom.
A flower may seem like just a flower.
Yeah. But I see the sun.
I see the bees. It is the kiss that makes them
breathe. What?
but I see. I haven't played this for a
while bro. I can't remember what it is.
Let me think. Ah, sorry man.
I see. The flower but.
The, the message is, you know, we're, we're all like that
flower with there's so much more to us than just our name than to
anything that is contained within the name.
So the, the lyrics, let me try to remember it.
Let me put this guitar down 1st. Whoa.
OK, I had actually kind of paused my musical journey for a
while because the Buddha said why?
The Buddha. Advised practitioners that
because if there's still desire within someone, music will fan
the flames of that desire. So he advised practitioners to
avoid a certain sensual stimuli, to focus more on the path.
But I also think that music can be a vehicle of truth.
And that's, that's my intention for it.
So the lyrics of this go, a flower may seem like just a
flower, but I see this. Hold on, let me think.
But I see the sun, I see the moon.
It is their light within her bloom.
So you can see the light of the sun and the moon in the blooming
of the flower, in the flower itself, just like the rain.
Without the sun, there is no flower, man.
It's just without that nourishment from the sun, there
is no flower. And it's the same with us, man.
Everybody's just like this flower without this water, this
tea, like without the liquids that we consume every day.
It just goes to show that we are not islands and that we have to
be really careful about what we consume, what we allow in,
because all of it is actually going in and it will create a
corresponding output. And it's also the song.
My hope is to show people that we are so much more than
anything that we can be called, and to know that you are beyond
what language can express. And it's beautiful.
Beautiful, absolutely beautiful. And of course, Speaking of
languages, you are a global citizen.
You speak English, Chinese, I guess that's Mandarin,
Indonesian, Japanese, Korean. Just a tiny bit.
You.
Know very levels keyword. Very levels.
So how deep operating across cultures and languages change
the way you see humanity and leadership?
Wow, man. Every language carries with it
its own unique energy and its own unique concepts.
And I think part of part of the longevity of China, part of the
reason why it's lasted for so long, is because within the
language itself and in the culture itself.
Like if I if I were to see an older gentleman on the street I
could call him uncle. Like we do that.
Like we literally just say uncle to any people.
Dude on the street is. That shifu.
It's not. Shifu.
Is that shifu? Yeah.
Shushu, Shushu and there's AI and there's Gugu Mei Mei, these
concepts of like you, you can call anybody a Big Brother,
anybody a little sister, anybody an auntie, anybody an uncle.
And it's through that lens, I think that the language
determines the energy and the longevity of the culture.
I kind of feel. And like with Japanese, there's
some incredibly beautiful concepts that guide how they
live. There's a concept called Kaizen.
Have you heard of it? Yeah, I've heard of Kaizen.
I've heard of our that's, that's one Ikika Haiku.
Yeah, Hiki Guy, Hikika Origami. That's the art with the papers.
But then haiku. Haiku, the poem, the the 17
syllables. Yep.
I think so. Faraguchi.
What's Faraguchi again? I'm not sure about that.
Yeah. Yeah, just like different
concepts. But like the samurai culture is
something that like really, really would I say is amazing to
me. The samurai culture death before
the sauna. It's.
Like. That these people view life from
a different land. They do and it's it's very
powerful to learn from every single culture, from every
single country with from every single language.
I think there's merit and there's beauty and there's truth
and all of it. The concept of Kai Zen is the
art of continuous improvement. That's what it means.
It's essentially the 1% better 1%.
Better every day. I love it.
I think that's what I do, you know, just 1% every day.
Hey. I'm more interested.
I think you're doing at least 2.5% every day.
Thank you very much, brother. That's why we're.
Global top 2.5% right now. Let's go 2.5.
Percent. Every day.
Whoa. Brother.
You know, let's talk about community leadership and you are
at the heart of building the world's number one
entrepreneurship community in the world that is number one.
I've I've been. Privileged to have.
People that are #1 in the world awarded you on this broadcast.
For example, I've had Brett King, right?
Brett King is the founder of the world's first diesel bank,
right? Moving so before we had the
likes of Beverly Monzo, you know, we had Morgan and Breaking
is the host of the world's number one ranked fintech
podcast, which is Breaking banks.
We've had guys from Money 2020, for example, Zach Pettit, Money
20 is the world's largest fintech conference.
So number one in the world is not a joke.
In order to be the best, you have to beat the best, and the
best is blessed. So you need that number one
school of entrepreneurship in the world, right?
What does it take to build trust, belonging, momentum at
scale for over 5000 entrepreneurs?
Yeah. We're we're I think we're at
like 6700 now, brother and and growing.
Yeah, that's. What I said over over 5K, you
know, that's the bilestone. I decided to to to eat the
bilestone. No, I.
I appreciate it, man. I appreciate it.
I, I say it because I want to. I want to really celebrate my
team. I want to celebrate this school
of Hard Knocks guys, Jack, James and Josh.
They've put incredible work to build this.
Amazing. Amazing.
Amazing individuals. Amazing.
Shout out to them. Shout out to.
Them and for those who don't know that the School of Mentors
is the entrepreneurial community that they founded based off of
the School of Hard Knocks and I think one yeah.
And they have their own. Podcast as well they have their
own podcast as well like their podcast is so great that I have
recommended it on my own platform like I appreciate their
work you know shout out to Jack James yeah we should have James
doc on the podcast as well yeah I think I'm.
Going to reach out to James. Like.
I really appreciate. You know, his philosophies and
what he's building, you know. Big shout out to him.
Up next, James. This is the second.
Person we have manifested, right, James, See you soon on
the podcast. Let's go, let's go, bro.
Yeah bro. I would definitely include Jack
and Josh too. The Co founders are incredibly
sharp guys. Yeah, bro.
Bro bro yeah. Include Open invitation JJJ,
Jack, JJ. James.
We won the three JS on this podcast.
See you guys. Soon, see you.
Guys. Soon.
The interesting thing is, you know, anytime you hear me quote
the Bible, I'm always quoting in King James Version because that
was what I grew up reading. That's cool.
Man, yeah, I so yeah, I won. Huge shout out to the guys, the
energy of the school of Hard Knocks and the people that they
tend to attract. I want to just say like are some
of the kindest, most positive, most empowered, most, most
growth oriented people in the world.
And it's really my pleasure to to head that kind of community
with those kinds of people. Now in terms of leadership, I
think what's beautiful is it's, it's about creating space for
people. I think of course we have the,
the weekly calls with millionaire and billionaire
mentors. We got billionaire day coming up
like in an hour and 15 minutes, we got 3 billionaires coming on.
And the level of mentorship that people get access to inside the
school of mentors for the price point that we offered at is
absolutely unparalleled, bro. It's unparalleled.
And, and dude, we're building, we're building 1 of the greatest
curriculums for entrepreneurs at every phase of the
entrepreneurial journey. I'm heading that project.
I'm incredibly proud of it. And basically the mentorship
calls with the millionaires and billionaires, those live calls
are what you want. But the self development
contained within the curriculum is what you need to succeed and
to continue putting in the hard work to actually make it, to
make it work and to be successful.
But all of that aside, aside from those incredible resources,
I think the key to our success has been the culture that we've
created inside of the community. We've created a go giving
culture. This is taken from the book The
Go Giver by the great John David Mann, and it switches up that
classic go getter paradigm with the go giver paradigm.
So let's take the example of a pie, right?
Everybody looks at this pie and the go getter is like, hey, how
can I go and get my slice of that pie?
It's good to be a go getter. You know, in life, sometimes you
got to be a go getter. But the go giver thinks, hey,
how can I make this pie even bigger for everybody else?
How can I contribute more value to this pie?
And the go giver is someone that always leads with value 1st.
And we've created a beautiful culture of go giving inside the
community where we lead. And we give as much as we can so
that everybody can level up as much as they can as quickly as
possible. And we've built that culture.
And thankfully, we have amazing members who like yourself, are
giving opportunities, are giving platforms, are sharing insights,
takeaways, knowledge. And the momentum is just
building and building and building and building.
And I think another amazing book to draw upon for creating
community is called The Culture Code.
The Culture Code, I think his name is Daniel Coyle.
Yeah, amazing guy. And what Daniel says that it's
really important to create what is called a vulnerability loop.
OK, what is a vulnerability loop?
It's a loop created by the first two people.
There's a leader that starts the loop that opens up the realm of
vulnerability by sharing maybe their own doubts, their own
securities, their own challenges.
And then the the second person is also key in continuing that
loop. First they accept and then they
start sharing their own vulnerabilities as well.
And with those first two leaders, you've created what is
called a vulnerability loop. A loop and a space where people
feel safe enough to drop their guard, where they can be
themselves, where they can breathe inside the space where
they feel safe enough to contribute from their own unique
experiences. And that is the online community
that we built. And it's something that I'm
super proud of. And for me, one of my key core
values is include inclusivity, inclusion and compassion and
creating space and also listening.
That's a key component of it. Learning to listen with the
intention is 1. Mouth.
Exactly brother and Zen master tik not Han.
I go to him a lot. He's one of my spiritual
fathers. He's the founder of Plum Plum
Village, a monastery in France, and he's basically the godfather
of mindfulness. He brought mindfulness in
Buddhism to the West. And one of his quotes that is
like the foundation of my life is understanding is the
foundation of love. In fact, it is Love's other
name, understanding. And that's a core principle that
I operate with and that I teach my team to operate with, which
is come with the intention to understand, come and understand
the client, Come and understand our members.
What are their pain points? What do they actually need?
And then listen and communicate in such a way that makes them
feel heard, that makes them feel understood.
And then also deliver the tactical thing that can actually
help them. If you can do that bro, you've
covered the mindset, the skill set, and the tool set and you're
good. Wow.
You know. You talk about love, right?
And about what love is about. It's interesting that the Bible
actually aligns with that philosophy.
First Corinthians chapter 14 verse 4 says love suffers long
and is kind. Love does not envy.
Love does not parade itself. It's not puffed up, does not
behave really, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no
evil, does not rejoice in iniquity or rejoices in the
truth. There's all things, believes all
things, hopes all things, and gives all things.
That's beautiful, but love? Is.
That's beautiful and the by bro, as as a Buddhist practitioner, I
literally could not agree with the Bible more right now.
Like that is that is such a beautiful essence that it's that
it's communicating and it's it's very, very true.
It's very, very true. Wow.
You know, I love the fact that you you aligned with my
philosophy of mindset skill sets.
Also, you know and your career has actually spanned teaching,
acting teacher being songwriting, marketing research,
leadership for. What skill?
Would you say has given you the greatest return on investment
and why? It's communication, man.
That's I was. Expecting that I was that as
well. You don't.
Disappoint me. Bro, it it is, it is what it is
and it's why I'm here and it's why you're here.
And let's, let's go back to Malcolm Gladwell, the tipping
point, right? There's people who are mavens
and people who are connectors and they're salesman, the maven
and the connector archetypes. The maven is someone who is an
amazing curator of knowledge and can communicate that and can
teach that, and the connector connects people together.
Now, I think if you have a very high level of skill and
communication, all of these things that you pick up, you're
able to share with other people at a very high level in order
that they can understand it as easily as possible.
For me, I optimize my communication for
understandability. I want to make it as easy as
possible to understand. I think that's the sign of true
mastery. It's not.
Hey, how many SAT words can I pull out of my, my, you know, to
impress somebody? No, because my, my intention is
not to impress you. My intention is to communicate
things that are truly valuable, that can actually help you move
forward in your own life's journey.
And in order to reach the maximum amount, amount of
people, communicating with simplicity is the best way to do
that. So the number one ROI thing for
me is definitely communication. And it goes beyond, of course,
communicating with others. Like we go back to the
importance, what is the most important conversation we're all
having every single day? It's the one with ourselves.
And if we can learn to communicate with ourselves, with
love, with patience, with peace, with compassion, then we can
learn to do that for the others, for, for the world and for for
others in the world. And Adam Olem, everybody, a lot
of people are focusing on collective change, right?
Let's get collective change. But dude, collective change is
just the aggregate of individual change on a big scale.
So dude, I really believe these kinds of conversations that
we're having right here, this kind of education, this kind of
sharing, this is the most important thing that we can be
doing to help move humanity in a better direction.
It's sharing valuable consciousness, bro.
So I think communication is absolutely key.
And it's also important for personal relationships as well.
Like there can be so much love. Like, but if I'm unable to
express my love, then the other person won't feel my love, you
know? And I think mastering
communication allows your love to be felt at the maximum
impact, which I think is a worthy motivation for pursuing
and mastering the art of communication.
Wow, so. Scaling people, not just
platforms, actually involves communication.
So you are responsible for hiring, for training, for
onboarding, you know, for the curriculum, for customer success
and communication. So what systems or frameworks do
you use to keep the community engaged, aligned and to continue
to grow? Yeah, there's, there's two ways
to help people grow that I focused on.
I I used to be a teacher in China.
I taught English in a city called Yuyang in the Hunan
province. It's a Tier 3 city, relatively
smaller, still like a million people.
So that's a that's a small city in China.
And I learned from from teaching kids aged 4 to 15 that the power
of praise and the power of challenge cannot be understated.
And there's a saying that goes, the feminine grows through
praise and the masculine grows through challenge.
The feminine grows through praise and the masculine grows
through challenge. So for me, praise is a huge key
aspect of me helping people grow, as is challenge.
So anytime anyone does something that I know to be good for
themselves, for their own personal development, like
showing up to a call, doing an exercise, bro, I, I heap
abundant praise on that person because it takes a lot of
courage to reach that point. You know, it takes a lot of
momentum and I never, I didn't get as much praise as I would
have benefited from potentially. So I know that like, hey, that's
something that I wish I would have had.
So I try to give as much praise as I can and I do it
specifically. Like I, I do my best to connect.
It's not a general praise. It's like, hey, like I really
want to celebrate your amazing communication skills.
I'll praise something specific and praise them in public.
You know, if there's a conflict, address it privately.
If there's something you're dissatisfied with, train that
privately, privately, sorry. Anytime like you see potential
for improvement in somebody like never have that conversation
publicly. Have it privately as as often as
you can and praise publicly. And then issuing challenges,
brother, is a great way to help people grow as well.
It's not a challenge in that I want conflict.
No, it's a challenge in that I believe in your potential and
let's set a time frame for you to achieve this.
So like a challenge might be. Brother.
Like I challenge you to breakthrough the top 1% in the
next three months. You know, that's a goal and and.
Boom, it becomes a goal, right? So the power of praise and the
power of challenge, those, those are essential and making people
feel appreciated for the work that they do, man, for
everything that they contribute. It's, it's, it's key.
It's people want to be people want to feel seen, they want to
feel heard and they want to feel appreciated.
So anytime someone contributes to the community, I always do my
best. I train my team to, you know,
appreciate to accept and to connect on that thing and to
encourage. And to praise and to challenge.
And those are kind of the tools that I use to help people in
their personal development, to help the community continue
growing. Because the community is just a
bunch of people coming together. So if I focus on the people
inside the community, then I'm going to help the community
itself. Wow.
So. Speaking of.
Mindset. The Buddha within.
We founded millions of Buddhas. What does it really mean?
Thank you for asking, brother. So the dream of billions of
Buddhas. Buddhism believes that everybody
has their own inner Buddha. Every human being, every, all
life has an inner Buddha. Now, it's not trying to convert
people to Buddhism. It's helping them tap into their
own inner Buddha, that center of peace within them, that peaceful
stillness, that joyfulness. And I just see so much in the
world. There's so much chaos, and the
chaos is growing and the world is accelerating, and people are
stressed out and depressed and anxious.
And I know that I was like that too.
And now that I found a system for peace, I want to help share
that system of inner peace with everybody so that they can enjoy
that peace, so that they can live life at their own pace.
And even if life is moving fast, they have an eye of the storm
that they can abide from and operate from.
Because that's the truth. Like once, once you see the
truth of how reality is and how our universe is designed, peace
just washes over you. That's been my own personal
experience. So for me, it's my wish for
peace for the world. Put into 3 words billions of
Buddhas and I also think, hey man, 1 Buddha did so much good
one Jesus did so much good. What if we had billions of
Buddhas? What if what if we had billions
of Jesus's man And the what why I say that is I, I don't think
it's possible to become Jesus in, in Christianity.
I think that's sacrilege. There's Christ consciousness
that we can embody. I've done my own research into
Christianity and I definitely believe in that.
But in Buddhism, the belief is that the, the, it is a
possibility within human potential to actually become a
Buddha like that is within human potential.
I, I can't become Jesus because that'd be sacrilegious, but I
can bring my level of self development and self mastery to
the level of a Buddha. And I am fascinated by that
potential man. And I think that's what we need.
And I just think that's what is good for the world.
So that's the direction that I'm I've dedicated my life to do.
You want to know an interesting parallel to what you're saying
about Buddhism and Christianity? So it's pretty much the same
thing. In Christianity, the word
Christian actually means Christ to like.
That is. You should be Christ to like
like Christ. So that's also the intention.
If you can have multiple billions of Christ unlike
individuals on earth, it would be a better place.
It'd be heaven on earth. And in in many ways it already
is, depending on your perspective.
Like right now, brother, sharing this beautiful conversation with
you. I think we're already in heaven
on earth. I think we're already in
Nirvana. We're already in enlightenment.
In that experience. It's because I'm grateful.
You know, as you said, time is life.
Our life is just composed of time and I appreciate you
sharing your time and your life with me man, so thank you.
Absolutely, you're welcome and you know when I think about it,
I said something if you don't understand something, you stand
under it and study to show myself a Workman that need not
be ashamed quietly divided by the word of truth.
So the problem with a lot of Christians is they're not even
studied to do even more Christianities.
Many Christians don't even know that the meaning of the word
Christian means Christ. Like when the purpose of
something is unknown, abuse is inevitable.
So you need to understand what you're practicing 100%.
Bro, I think there's immense beauty in, in the Christian
path, There's immense beauty in the Buddhist path.
And anyone that really dives into the truth of their
tradition will find truth. They'll find peace, They'll find
love within and without and above and below.
And I, I love what you said about understanding, bro, that
if you don't understand, you're, you're standing beneath, you're
standing under it. It makes me think because
there's there's two paths for Buddhist practitioners, right?
You can go the monastic path and become a monk or a nun, or you
can go the lay lay path become just a secular practitioner.
And the Buddha said for the secular practitioner, there's
only one thing to focus on and that is all-encompassing
understanding. If you live with the intention
to understand all, you will attain enlightenment as a
secular practitioner. And brother, like if, if, if we
come into the conversation with our own ideas set, then there's
no point in having the conversation.
And if if we both come in with open minds and a willingness to
change and a willingness to understand, which is the
willingness to love, then we're already there then because there
is no like path to love. Love itself is the path.
There is no way to peace. Peace itself is the path, and
it's in every decision that we're choosing right now.
So choose. Choose it, don't chase it.
Absolutely. And you know, and that's what a
broke mindset is about, right? Deciding to learn, you know, so,
so for me, I love to learn. I love the pathway of being a
student for life. The day you know, there's a
proverb where I come from. It says the day we die is the
day we stopped learning. Oh, that's good, man.
The day we die the. Day we stopped learning.
I agree, and of course you. Know Speaking of learning, you
went from the school of Hard Knocks to the school of mentors,
right? Literally.
So what was the hardest season of your life and how did it
shape the person that you are today?
Oh. Man.
Man, we're getting deep, OK. The hardest season of my life
was was during COVID for sure. And.
Wuhan, Wuhan. So a lot of people don't know
this. I've only shared this with a few
people, but I'll, I'll share it here publicly for like kind of
the first time on your podcast, man.
I actually went to, I actually went to jail for five days and.
It was. It was an accident.
I had done something with a good intent, but I did it under the
influence of marijuana and the the outcome turned out bad.
So what what happened was it was like the middle of COVID.
I just had a fight with my mom and I went out with my buddy
Chris to go and and smoke some marijuana to try to relax a bit
and chill. And this was the time where I
had just seen a lot of like that Jeffrey Epstein stuff and like
child abuse and like, like, I had just dug into the child
trafficking issue globally. And it's, it's really
terrifying. It's really terrible.
And I was chilling with my friend at the park and we were
just meditating there, bro. Like, he drove his car.
He took us with his car. And then I saw this, this mother
and her child walking into the park, man.
And the child was shirtless and I saw her take the child and
pose the child against the tree and start taking pictures of the
kid. And it just didn't look right to
me. Dude.
I don't know. Just this woman taking pictures
of a of a shirtless kid at the park.
I was like, what is going on? And my mind was kind of primed
with all that Epstein stuff, dude.
So I told my buddy, I'm like, dude, that doesn't look right.
I'm going to go check that out, make sure that kids.
OK. So I go over and I ask, hey,
excuse me, is this your child? And the mother says yes, it is.
But she shook her head no at me when she said it.
So she said yes, it is. And I was kind of confused.
So I looked at the kid. I'm like, excuse me?
Like, do you need any help? And I thought I saw him give me
a little bit of a nod. So I'm like, OK.
Like, I don't know what's going on here.
Let me call the police. I called the police, bro 911.
I called it like, hey, I don't know what the situation is.
Like. There's a mom here with a kid, I
think, but like it looks could potentially be some child abuse.
Can you guys come and check it out?
And it might, it might have been like, you know, I was under the
influence of marijuana. Maybe I didn't sound completely
sober. But nobody came.
They didn't send anybody. I don't think they believed me.
And I was kind of, I talked to the police for like 6 to 9
minutes, bro. It's on their record.
And by this point, the mother and the child were leaving the
park and I was really worried for the kid and I was kind of
starting to panic. I'm like, what is going on?
Like, is this child abuse? Like what is happening?
Am I going to just let this happen in front of my eyes?
And I, I decided to spur the moment.
Instinct just kind of took over. And I ran over there and I tried
to get the kid away from her just to figure out the
situation. But in the States, if you move
anyone's kid from point A to point B without their express
permission, that's technically. Yes.
Exactly, bro. So just this whole situation
played out and I was arrested for kidnapping.
I, I, I moved the kid like, I don't know, like 10 feet.
And yeah. And it just like it was the,
the, IT was terrible because in that moment, I'd spent my entire
life trying to be a good person, you know?
And in that moment I was still trying to be a good person.
But I could see this, the movie of my life flipped from hero to
villain in that instant. And it broke my heart, bro.
And then went to jail, had crazy experiences in jail, like still
on marijuana. And I think from the shock of
the event that had just happened, my mind kind of just
lost it, dude. Like I was hallucinating.
I saw things on the walls and like it was, it was a terrifying
5 days in jail. But I did have a beautiful
moment of peace. My friend Cyrus, he had
introduced this concept of the God spot to me.
He was making a joke. He's like, yo, what's the G
spot? I was like, dude, what are you
talking about? And he said, dude, it's, it's,
it's actually not the, it's the God spot.
And in my hallucinations, bro, I saw this, this G on the ground
of my, of my jail cell and I decided to put my head on this
G. I'm like, oh, this is the God
spot. Let me just put my head on this
God spot. And when I did, dude, and I laid
down on it, bro, I felt just, I think I had an ego death
experience where I just completely let go of my idea of
who I was. And I was in amazing bliss just
feeling connected because I had set down the concept of myself
and I had fully believed in the complete immersion and unity
with God. And I found great peace in jail.
But then the aftermath of that were very difficult.
You know, I had to go through, I think it was a A2 year, like
probationary period because they saw my case.
They were like this guy tried to do something good.
The law is like the letter that it's iron.
We can't change it. But if you go through this
mental health recovery program, we can get this completely off
your record. And it's completely off my
record now. But hey, it's my story.
So I decided to share it here with you.
I'm not ashamed of it, but I I do believe now that one don't,
don't act under the influence, right?
And even. Even if there's good intention,
we have to execute at a very high level of skill or else it
can turn out bad. Even the most beautiful
intention can turn out poorly if there's no skill behind it.
And in that moment, yeah, it was.
It was a difficult call, man. It was a difficult call.
And I'm being very vulnerable right now, but I thought I'd
share it. And that was the most difficult
time of my life. But one beautiful thing that I
learned too was that we are protected by our good intent.
Even at the hardest times. I, I knew in my heart that I did
it with good intention and that that is what saved me.
You know, like just knowing that I acted with good intent.
And then that process also taught me patience.
You know, two years is a long time and patience.
Is a virtue. Patience is at a great virtue.
So I learned patience through that.
I learned compassion, I learned radical acceptance 'cause there
was a part of me that was still clinging to like, hey, like, I
know I'm right. I know what I saw, but hey, I
was under the influence, man, I'm, I'm not certain now.
Maybe I saw it incorrectly and, and it's, there's a high
probability that I saw it incorrectly.
So it's a hard lesson, but yeah, that was the hardest time of my
life. That was my rock bottom.
I had broken my shoulder in jail as well.
And I guess I'll just say I'm very glad I'm past it and I'm,
I'm grateful for the lessons. I wish it hadn't been as hard of
a knock as it was. But hey, man, we're we're past
it and that we made it through. So that's that.
It's a hard knock. Life, you know, you talked about
mental health recovery and this podcast stands firmly and
strongly on the side of mental health.
You know, our major sponsor is Better Health and Better Health
is the world's leading online therapy tool.
You know, they take mental health very seriously.
I'd love for you to speak on the importance of mental health and
the resources of tools like Better Health and help them with
mental health. Dude, mental health determines
everything. I mean, I think what happens in
our society is that if kids are too sheltered, that leads to
mental weakness. So there's mental weakness and
there's mental strength. And when those kids that are
mentally weak go out into society, they can't cope.
And then we diagnose it as mental health, mental illness
where it's actually mental weakness, I believe.
And if we see it as mental weakness, that's something that
we can actually work on. Of course, that it, it does go
into mental illness at a certain point.
But I, I, I do think that mental health is absolutely vital to
success, is vital to living a good life.
And when I was at my lowest, man, I just did one small action
every day to start building momentum.
I hit the treadmill every day. I, I just had to dude.
And that small win every single day started rebuilding my
confidence. It started rebuilding my
confidence. And because I had acted with
good intent, I could lean into that aspect of it as well and
just know that like, hey, like you're dealt a hard hand, but
you acted with good intent. So at least I know that you're
this kind of person that will do the right thing, that you
believe is the right thing under pressure.
But make sure I do it correctly next time and make sure that I'm
not under the influence. Make sure that I'm perceiving it
correctly. But at least I knew that I had
the courage to act. But brother, mental health is so
important. And I think mental health can be
diagnosed by the contents of our thoughts, by the way that we're
talking to ourselves, by our internal communication.
That's easily diagnosable. And what I learned is that I
don't think that we should label people.
I don't think that people should accept labels as identities
because once we accept something as our identity, the identity is
the most powerful manifestation concept that we have.
Who we think we are is what we attract.
Who we think we are is the lifestyle that we build.
And if we accept an identity of I am depressed, I am a depressed
person like I'm an anxious person like that, It's it's
going to be very hard to climb out of that loop because once
you attach to an identity, this is my personal opinion, by the
way. But once I bought into an
identity that perpetuates that loop, that cycle.
Instead of doing that, I advocate for people going to the
gym. Get moving.
You have to change something. I believe that the feeling of
depression is evidence that you're not living the life that
you want to live. I don't think there's anything
wrong with people. I think all the emotions come up
for a reason, and I think depression is there to tell you
that, or it was there to tell me that, hey, I'm not living the
life that I want to live. Let me change something because
insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting
different results. Now I, I've created a, a
philosophy out of all of this, which is curation is the cure.
Curation is the cure. So a curator is the person in
the museum that gets to decide the art that gets to go into the
museum. So you curated your entire
background right there. You're the curator of your home
and we're all the curators of our, of our lives.
And if something is going wrong in our lives, it's because we've
curated something, we've allowed something in that is creating
that non optimal output, or we're missing something that we
need to have in order to be healthy.
So I believe humans need movement.
Movement is medicine and movement is what helped me climb
out of rock bottom. We need extreme ownership.
Shout out Jocko Wheeling. We need to take responsibility
for our own lives. Growing up, I was kind of
entitled, and there was a lot in my life that I wasn't used to
having responsibility for. So coming out of college and
having to be responsible for my own life, it was a tough
transition. So I always advocate for parents
giving more and more responsibility to their kids as
times as time goes, Even financial responsibility, give
that to your kids earlier so that they can feel the weight of
it and they can get accustomed to the weight of it.
But yeah, movements and we we need to remove every negative
thing that we're consuming. If you think about it, what is
the point of consuming negative news?
What's the point of consuming news?
I mean, like, there's a point in educating ourselves on how
global events are playing out, consuming.
Good. News, yes, but the negative news
that is portrayed and there's a lot of it, there's no point in
consuming it because one, it's already in the past.
You can't influence it. You have no influence over it.
So why are you giving it your time, attention and energy?
What we consume, it grows within us and it's what we will
produce. You know, as the seed is, so too
is the fruit. So remove the negative, add the
positive, keep the momentum going.
That's kind of the three steps. Remove all negative things,
curate out all negative things, negative self talk.
Stop doing that brain rot stuff. Stop consuming that negative
news. Stop consuming that crappy food.
Stop eating it crappy beverages. Stop it, you know, and then move
in the direction of health. Add all the positive add in
movement, add in exercise, add in millionaire and billionaire
consciousness. Add in the Kingdom's podcast.
Add in, you know, add in the diary of a CFO, dude, add
consume positivity and you will become positive.
We are what we eat, bro. And then there's certain ways to
keep the momentum going because momentum is created by reminding
ourselves that we're making progress.
I think so. I have all these mantras, which
is like every little bit counts, you know, every step is one step
closer. Gratitude is its own reward.
And the the attitude of gratitude will take you so far,
dude, because gratitude for the good attracts more of the good
back to us. Gratitude magnifies the good.
And I can prove it because if I'm grateful for this cup,
right, I cultivate gratitude for it.
I will take better care of the cup or the watermelon as we had
established, and I will attract, you know, I'll, I'll make sure
that it's in in good condition because I'm grateful for it.
That shows that will invest care into the upkeep of it.
If we're grateful for the money that we have, we'll care for
that money. We'll take care of that money.
We'll invest it wisely. So gratitude for the good
attracts more of the good to you.
And gratitude for the challenges immediately shifts you out of
victim mentality and into that growth mentality that we were
talking about. Hey, I just got out of jail.
What can I learn from this? You know, hey, I tried to do
something good. I tried to help this kid.
I misjudged it. What can I learn from it?
Well, bro, don't smoke marijuana if it's not, if it's going to
have those effects on you, you know, like, like just don't do
it. So gratitude, man.
It's, it's an invincible frame of mind.
And what I've seen out of Mullah with all of the millionaires and
billionaires that come to the school of mentors, they all have
invincible frames of mind that allows them to perceive life in
a way that is always beneficial to them no matter what the
situation is. And gratitude is one of those
invincible mindsets. You know, that's something I
always see on the podcast every time.
Gratitude is good attitude. And when a person shares the
time with you, they share their life with you.
Because inside, you know, for measuring life is time.
You know, I'm really, really grateful having you on the show
today. There's a lot we, you know, have
spoken about, and there's a lot we should speak about in part,
too. I know you have very limited
time today because it's Billionaires Day today, right on
School Adventures and you need to run pretty soon.
So I'll take you through the big fire ground.
And guys, expect the Part 2 and of course expect the three JS on
the podcast pretty soon that is Jack, Josh and King James.
So Are you ready to rumble? Yes.
Yes and yes. Let's go.
Okay okay, So what is 1 habit that has changed your life
forever? The.
Pasana meditation bro, that is the top habit.
The Pasana meditation translates to insight meditation.
They offer free retreats internationally.
Go to a Vipassa meditation. It will change your life.
It's one of the top skills that any human can acquire.
It will sharpen your mind. It will de stress you.
It will elevate your stress tolerance.
It will give you great self-awareness.
It'll help you understand yourself and understand the
nature of reality. It'll make you happy and
peaceful. Vipassana meditation.
Interesting. So what language do you want to
master next and why? Still, Mandarin Chinese, man,
because I realized manifest in your mother tongue, that's the
most powerful way to manifest. And my programming language for
the first six years of my life was Mandarin Chinese.
And when I use Mandarin Chinese, I feel more powerful.
I feel more rooted. I feel because it allows me to
connect with that sense of safety that that language gave
me because my caretakers from zero to 6 used it with me at
that pivotal age. So Mandarin Chinese.
Fantastic. What is one book everyone should
read before the 10:30? I'll give you 3 how to love by
Zen master tik not Han. It will teach you love in the
truest sense of the word. It'll help you love yourself and
love others. How to win friends and influence
people. It's the Bible on communication.
Dale Kanegy. Dale Kanegy.
That was the first book I ever bought in my life.
Let's go. Brother, hey, we're, we're
connected on that. So how to win friends and
influence people. It will take you so far because
people will take you places that money cannot.
People will take you places that money cannot.
Third book Mastery by Robert Greene.
Think with the goal of mastery and you will become the top 1%.
You will be able to achieve your potential and you'll be able to
move mountains Because Robert Greene says once you've attained
mastery in one specific discipline, the entire world
opens up to you. And we've seen it happen again
and again and again. So Mastery by Robert Greene is
my third recommendation. So what do you think is the most
underrated life skill? Most underrated?
Life skill. Most.
Underrated life skill, the ability to rest.
So a lot of people, they don't know how to rest.
They literally don't know how to stop.
Like people think that watching the TV is resting, but no, it
takes processing power still in your brain to actually watch and
process the TV show. That's still stress that you're
taking on. The most underrated skill is
resting. Go to a park, lay on your bed,
don't go on your phone, just lay down there and be with yourself,
be in your body. The body's always, the body is
it always wants to heal you. It always wants to heal.
And with every breath that we take, it's always rejuvenating.
And if we can learn to rest and stop and relax without consuming
24/7, man, like everybody's going to be so much happier, so
much more peaceful. So resting is the number one
most underrated skill. Rest and recovery very, very,
very important. I think athletes actually do
understand that, that every first they have to perform with
the body. So if you could give your
younger self one sentence of advice about, what would it be?
Let go of that which no longer serves you and know that what
once served you might not serve you right now and might not
serve your highest self. I carry things and I used, I
used to carry things so much. I was that junior monk man.
I wasn't the senior monk, bro. I didn't set the woman down at
the river. And one of my bad habits in the
past was holding on to things too long.
And it's something that I'm working on.
And with everything that I'm able to let go of, I'm more
free, I'm more happy, I'm more peaceful.
So what I would say to myself is, man, if it's past, if it's
in the past, just let it go. If you can make it right, make
it right. If you can't, or if there's no
need to, let it go. And where attention goes, energy
flows and reality grows. So focus your energy on what you
want to grow, not on what you don't.
That's that's what I'd say. I think that's powerful.
Reminds me of a private conversation that's happened
with my Co host and Co founder a couple of days ago.
And he said I don't want to grow older and not grow wiser.
That will be a very, very big shame.
And you know, one thing I've learned this year as I grow
older and grow wiser is the importance of letting go and
letting God let go and let God add a deal.
That's powerful. Man, that's that faith, right?
That's that trust. And I think when I'm able to let
go of because for me, the, the Buddhist practice, what I'm
working on right now is letting go of my attachment to all
language and all the concepts that we cling to because we had
already established that language there.
It's, it's all just the sounds, right, that we've conditioned
the response. So for me, I'm, I'm learning to
let go. And I think trusting what comes
intuitively without strategizing, trusting and
leaning into that faith is the letting God aspect of what I'm
working on right now, dude. So I appreciate that.
And I know James loves that too. Let go and let God.
Oh wow, really interested in great minds thinking like wow.
So thank you very much once again.
And of course, the audience always go for something in your
lives, conceive, believe, start to thrive and of course, achieve
say it will come your way next. It's love and respect.
And of course, a very, very big thank you to you and your fan.
Wow. See you in Part 2.
Let. Go of that which no longer
serves you and know that what once served you might not serve
you right now and might not serve your highest self.
I carry things and I use. I used to carry things so much.
I was that junior monk man. I wasn't the senior monk, bro.
I didn't set the woman down at the river.
And one of my bad habits in the past was holding on to things
too long. And it's something that I'm
working on. And with everything that I'm
able to let go of, I'm more free, I'm more happy, got more
peaceful. So what I would say to myself is
if it's past, if it's in the past, just let it go.
If you can make it right, make it right.
If you can't or if there's no need to, let it go.
Where attention goes, energy flows and reality grows.
So focus your energy on what you want to grow, not on what you
don't. That's that's what I'd say
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