 I made 100,000 calls with my hand over a 15 year period, right? And you can literally do that with today's technology within like two to three years right now. Literally. You can do what took me 15 years and two to three years and literally be at that hundred deal deal a year mark in like two to three years. You got to find that balance between ambition and happiness because a lot of us are too ambitious for our own good. And, um, you know, how long and grueling the process is from nothing to something is, is, is, is a long process. And a lot of people, you know, are so ambitious that if they don't get there within a month or two, they become very depressed and then they're just in the state of depression, you know, you got to find that balance between your ambition and what actually makes you happy. You know, like I knock off a five o'clock every day. Now I haven't always done that. I mean, when I, for 15 years, I worked till midnight every night, but now that I'm where I'm at, and I can literally, like once you get to a place where a very little effort keeps so much momentum going in your businesses, you can really take a step back and say, okay, now what's, what's really important here? Like, and you know, knocking off a five and hanging out with the family and on the weekends and all that stuff and going on the vacations, we're going to go on and stuff like that. Meanwhile, business, my businesses are continuing to explode. You know, like I could work till midnight now and probably double what I'm doing. But listen, I mean, at some point, you got to enjoy what you're doing. And when I got my real estate license, I told dad, I was like, peace, dude, I'm like retired from roofing. I'm going to be a real estate agent now. So I go in the office for 30 days straight, full time, like, as soon as I got my license, I went full time real estate agent, like right then, knowing nothing. You know what I mean? So like 30 days, I'm in the office, like eight hours a day, like grinding it out, sold nothing. And then like 30 days later, I was like, dad, I'm back. So I went back and I'm roofing now I'm roofing and doing real estate on the side. So it eventually took me eight months to get to that first sale. So I mean, like I was living check to check, you know, like I'm making $300 a week roofing houses with my father. I mean, I can barely eat, you know what I'm saying? It's not like I saved a bunch of money or anything. I literally had to wait until I closed enough properties, you know, to be able to take that money and quit nine to five job and do real estate full time. So that eighth month, I still have the checkstubs. I found them the other day. Like I have all the checkstubs for my first sale. My first sale was my grandmother's condo. And I closed on this other condo the same day. And so I had those two sales. And then I had like two more pending deals or two listings or something. And I was like, I feel the momentum here. I can I feel like I'm gonna go forth this time. Of course, listen, I'm 20 years old, no bills, no rent, no expenses, no family, right? Totally different ballgame than a lot of these people who have a family that they're trying to take care of and they're trying to transition. I mean, I never thought about quitting, you know, at all, you know, I I did kind of have a have a few moments there when I was like a year and a half in that I look back during those eight months. See, this is something for new agents to listen to because, you know, closings are happening every single day. And and you're if you're out there talking to people, some of these people you're talking to doing deals, you're just not experienced enough to understand the lingo and be able to read people the right way to know when to try to close and what to say and how to make it happen. But about a year and a half in I look back at those eight months. And and I recognized a couple of different moments that I definitely could have closed a deal. Like I was I thought back and I was like, you know, that person that said that I could I could have done that deal because I remember they listed it and then it sold. And I remember I talked to him before it listed. This is a couple different people. And I remember the language they were using and they weren't coming right out and saying, you know, hey, we want to sell it or hey, one of this. But looking back on it, I realized they were that's what they were telling me. Hey, we want to sell this and we're interested in you doing it for us. But they didn't they weren't saying that they were saying it without saying it. And I look back and I was like, I could have closed several deals during the eight month period. But when you don't know, when you don't have the experience, then, you know, you can't capitalize, but you have to go through that that part of the process, you know, to learn, you know, you know, like if you get introduced into that mark, you just think, Oh my gosh, this is how it's going to be forever. We're just going to be rich. It's just gonna it was so crazy, you know, and I definitely didn't see coming what happened or I would have definitely prepared more. And that's why I wrote the books. And that's why I do what I do is try to prepare agents so they don't have to go through what I went through during those times. And but no, it was all about the deals back then. It took me having to lose everything, hit rock bottom, go back to my roots of why I got in the business in the first place to help people read 100 books, study, think about how everything went down to realize Wait a minute, if it would have been about people not deals, I would have been able to continue to close deals the whole time and not only close deals, but close a lot of deals, you know, even through those worst moments, you know what I mean. So no, it wasn't till 2008 ish when I came back in real estate, you know, in 2007 towards in 2007 when I really started to realize, wait a minute, you know, these people, you know, every every relationship you put in place is worth 10 to 20 deals to you. You know, when I got back in the business, I started to have different conversations with my prospects, I was asking them how they're doing and really wondering how they're doing and asking them why they're buying or selling talking to them about their kids and their life and what's going on. And it was totally different tones, right? And like, you had this feeling that that they were like an extended part of my family and vice versa, like we were on that level where it's like we trusted each other, you know, like they I felt I feel like my clients feel like they can get like hand me $1,000 and it's safe, you know, and vice versa, I feel like I could just say here, you know, and not worry about where that money is going or how everything's going to play out. But that was just the tip of the iceberg, though, right? Because as time went on, and listen, in the very beginning when I started doing this, and I tell agents this that are that are used to that high pressure strategy, you don't really go cold turkey on this, you don't just turn off the high pressure and just go completely low pressure, right? You do 50 50. It's like you still got that part of that bone in your body that wants to try to close because that's what you've been trained and used to. Don't fight that urge, right? Just try to slowly start integrating this low pressure with if you can mix it up in just the right way. That's why I always say 95% low pressure, 5% high pressure, whereas you just got to know where to put that 5% to make it work out, you know, right at the right time. But as time went on, I realized more and more and more how like I didn't even know how the depths of this thing. If I walk into a room of a thousand people who follow me and I say, Hey guys, you know, how many of you, if given the opportunity, you know, would do business with me? And I guarantee you probably all of them are going to raise their hand. And then I can say, Okay, cool. How many of you have ever charged a dime to and none of them are going to raise their hand. So like I have this room of people who every single one of them would love to do business with me, right? But I've never charged them a dime. You see what I did there? And then so that's what you have to try to emulate in any kind of business you do, I think I think that this is like the new business model of the future, whereas if you can build an audience on the back of bringing value, not asking for anything, you can you can at that point build any kind of business you want on the back of that behavior, right? So number one, we got to make them feel comfortable with us. And then number two, we got to collect their data so that we can keep that feeling going, right? And so for me, I just want to have the meaningful conversation and really care about what their answers are. And if they're not looking to do any business today, it's like, you know, I would love to work with you later, right? I would love to work with you when that day comes when you decide you wanted to do something. Would it be okay if I just stayed in touch with you, right? So that and then once they commit to that, because a lot of people, they're thinking, oh, okay, yeah, you can stay in touch, you can call me, you can do this, you know, all this, you know, public stuff. They're not thinking I'm going to ask for private information necessarily. They're just thinking, wow, nice conversation, good person, somebody I could probably do business with, sure you can stay in touch, right? And then it's like, boom, I dropped the hammer and say, cool, what's a good email? What's a good email for you? Is this your cell number? And like a lot of people get this messed up because they ask for the email, it's like, hey, okay, I want to stay in, I'd like to stay in touch with you, what's a good email? Or something like that. No, no, no, this is a two-part process when you're asking for the data. You want to let them commit to it being okay for you to stay in touch before asking for anything. Like, listen, I'd love the opportunity to stay in touch with you. Is that okay? Listen, you know, email should be the foundation of your personal brand because it's the highest organic reach out there, in my opinion, right below text messaging. And I think text messaging is still a little early, a debatable subject, as far as like, it's still a very intimate place with friends and family. And I'm using it for my business, for my coaching bit. Like, there's businesses using it more and more and more, and it'll get more and more crowded. But email is a very, you know, organic, high-organic reach platform. Do I think that you should be doing social media every day? Yep. Right? Yep. You need to be posting on social media every day. Does that take any time? Nope. The problem is, there's two types of content. There's a type of content that you can like, spend a lot of hours thinking about and editing and working on, and then you post it, and then there's a kind of content. You just take your phone out and you say, boom, right? You just take a picture and you write three words and you post, you know, that takes you five seconds. There's an entire, like, process, you know, from like, first day in the business, you know, through your first year, and then okay, here's our second year. Now we have our foundation in place. Now we can really ramp up, because the first year is just throw, just, just toss that to the game. I mean, the first year is, you know, okay, let's, maybe you close 20 deals. I mean, I have agents that close 20 deals. I have a couple agents that did 100 deals, but most people don't. Most people close, like, five to 15 deals, even if they sell anything. I mean, most agents don't sell anything. Most agents, 90% of agents don't make it, which means they didn't sell anything, or maybe they sold one or two, and they couldn't pay their bills off that. So, listen, it's a, it's, that first year is so twisted with people, because they're looking at the bottom line, what's on their tax returns, and I'm looking at, wait a minute, you learn how to write contracts, you learn how to talk to people, you learn MLS, you learn the process of a deal, you have a database in place that's growing, you have your weekly email going, you've posted on some social media, and you've, you know, you've made relationships with property owners and other agents, and I've talked to so many agents, man, that are like, uh, I'm fixing to close out my first deal, and you know, only sold 14 properties, and they're very, very, very, very down on their self, like genuinely disappointed, frustrated, depressed about it, and I'm like, what the hell are you talking about, bro? Like, you, like, I want you to understand something, I sold four properties my first year, you know what I'm saying? Um, people just get it so twisted, I'm like, you sold 10 more properties than I sold my first year, and for the last eight, seven years going on eight, I've closed 100 deals a year, you know, I don't understand your mentality behind being upset about 14, like it's so incredible to close 14 deals in your first year, and you're complaining about it, you know, it makes me want to jump right through the phone and smack that dude's mom so hard. Listen, they need to think of theirself as a politician, right? They need to canvas the market, let everybody in the, in their market know who they are, what they do, they're here to help, right? Think of yourself as a volunteer worker, okay, we're working for free, we're just trying to do community outreach to see, to see who needs what, like, this is what we do, I'm here to help you do it, okay, you want to sell your house on your own? Cool, let me see if I can help you do that, right? Don't you want to commission? No, I just want to help you do whatever you're trying to do. Why would you do that? Well, you're probably going to buy a house, right? Cool, you're working with somebody on that? No, cool, I'm your guy for that, let's get your house sold and then let's go sell you another house. I don't know, man, let's, let's put it like this, if I have to tell you what to do, then there's, we're in the wrong place right now, if I have to tell you, that you have to get out there and grind and talk to people, I don't know man, I'm gonna, I'm gonna double think this, and people wonder why so many agents don't make it, right? They wonder why so many agents don't make it, listen, I never had a headshot, right? When I started making calls and doing my weekly email, I didn't have a website, right? I didn't have a website, I didn't have business cards, I didn't have a website, I didn't have any of that stuff, I couldn't afford any of that stuff, I didn't have anything, right? I was still making calls, I was still using Yahoo to send 100 emails per email five times an hour, I was still, you know, sending letters, right? Scraping up whatever dollars I had to buy some stamps to send some handwritten letters, it's so crazy the technology we have on our fingertips to be able to do what used to take me 10 hours and literally one hour, you can do things, you could, I made 100,000 calls with my hand over a 15-year period, right? And you can literally do that with today's technology within like two to three years right now. Literally, you can do what took me 15 years and two to three years and literally be at that 100 deal a year mark in like two to three years.