The Only Thing Worse Than Being Blind Is Having Sight but No Vision Ft. Jim Stovall

Audio Transcription

Welcome back to another exciting edition of the thrivetime show on your radio and best business coach podcast download. And for those of you who are discovering our podcast for the first time, two things. I want to make two housekeeping notes. I want to share with you one as of July, second, 2018. We are number one in the world of all podcasts. It doesn’t mean we’re going to stay there. It doesn’t mean that we couldn’t move down or up. I want to say thank you to you thrive nation, for listening to these conversations and for sharing these podcasts with your friends and we hope this show provides you the mentorship that you really can’t get anywhere else. And one of the things I pride myself on doing is trying to bring on guests onto the show that know the millionaire map. People that don’t just talk about success, but people who aren’t just charlatans, but people that have actually done it, who live it, people who’ve gone through the struggle and the adversity that you’ve gone through. One today’s show, we have a multimillionaire, a best selling author, and a man who’s written a book with Steve Forbes, shared the stage with Tony Robbins, General Colin Powell, Zig Ziglar, and more and this just in thrive nation. He’s done this all after having gone blind. Think about that after having gone blind. Jim, Jim Stovall, welcome to the show my friend. How are you doing?

I am good. Play. It’s great to be with you. Congratulations on being number one and keep it up.

Brother. I, uh, I, uh, again, I will try not to get emotional while interviewing you because just talking to you, I remember hearing you speak as a best business coach years ago watching you online, watching the videos of you speaking. It just, it’s the impact you’ve made on my life in terms of just not making excuses has been profound. And so I would like for you to share, if you can, what you were thinking when you first learned that you were going blind. I mean, how, how old were you and when did you first learn that you were going blind? What were you thinking when you discovered that? Soon? I’m not going to see again.

Well, it started, uh, as a young man, I grew up here in Tulsa, Oklahoma and I had no ambition other than to be an all American football player and go on to make my living in the NFL for the sake of your audience will say the New England patriots. And um, you know, every year before you go play football that you have to get a physical exam. They want to make sure that you’re healthy before they take you out and try to kill you. And the exam was taking a lot longer that year than I had ever remembered it. And then they poke you, they prod you, they weigh you, they measure you, they do all this stuff. And then, uh, Dr Shine a light in my eye and wrote something on a chart and called another doctor and he did the same and then a third doctor came in and ran several tests and eventually they took me down a long hall and sent me down at a table.

And these three doctors told me, Jim, we’re not sure why and we’re not sure when, but we do know someday you’re going to be totally blind and there’s nothing thing we can do about it. And your whole world just stops right there. And I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I knew I was not going to make my living in the NFL. And that was the beginning of a 12 year slide from a fully sighted person to a totally blind person. And uh, I lost the last remaining scrap of my eyesight at age 29. And that’s where I’ve been for 30 years now. And uh, that was the beginning of everything that best business coach people know about me, whether it’s the 40 books or the movies or the arena events or anything people know about me. All happened after it went dark.

I remember I was in the parking lot of our riverwalk offices and my dad called me. I remember like it was yesterday. My Dad called and said I’m going to be dead soon, and I thought what? He says I have als and the timeline, I don’t know the timeline but I’m going to be dead soon side. Like if we could plan out some things that I want to do before I pass and I know that for me, a gym. I took it. I listened to what he said. I went in the office, I did my day. I didn’t say this to anybody. Then I got in my car, I got onto creek turnpike headed out east to broken arrow. I drove right through the, the, the toll there with my bike pass and then it just like a flood of tears and emotion and I couldn’t get it together for a few hours. Did you have that moment? Did you have that moment where you just emotionally we’re overwhelmed. I mean, cause you’ve, you battled that for years before you ultimately lost your sight at the age of 29, I believe you said, but did you ever have that emotional outburst at initial? What was going on emotionally when you, when you. Did you ever have that emotional outburst?

I remember waking up several weeks after that diagnosis and I had just been through a total roller coaster and I told God if you’re real and if there is such a thing as you better show up today, I’m giving you one day, one day, one, if you can imagine the audacity of that statement. And I said, God, you’ve got until the end of the day to day. I need to know that there’s some plan for my life, that there’s something I can do out there that there’s something, a blind guy could do something. And then that was in the fall of that year. And uh, as you will know, every year the state fair comes to town. Well, I’d always been playing football during that time. So I hadn’t been to the state here since I was a little kid and I could see still see well enough to get around on my own. So I decided I’m just going to go out to the fair and, and see what transpires and I reminded God you got till sundown. And uh, first thing I did is I walked into the old IEP building there, that big giant building behind the golden drill or whatever they’re calling it this year and they had an exhibition from the previous Olympic Games and they had the runners in the gymnast’s and all those sorts of things. And to be real honest with you, I went over to look at the girl Jim Minister. I thought that was something.

And after they do their thing is they made an announcement and out came the weightlifters and I thought, wow, that’s something that a best business coach guy could do. Even if he was losing his sight and the. I became the national champion three years later and got to finish my athletic career as an Olympic weight lifter. And that was an interesting moment. And then I walked on down the midway to the pavilion, the big arena there on the fairgrounds, and they had a giant banner outside clay and it a free concert and I didn’t know who was playing or when it started, but free, totally fit my budget. And I went in and there was no one there. I sat on the front row and I cried a little and I dreamed a little and I reminded God, this is your one day, you better show me something. And I was so intent on my thoughts and reverie there that the arena filled up around me and I was really not aware of it. And the first thing that was in my conscious mind was the voice I’ll never forget. Said, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the Tulsa State Fair. The one, the only, the legend Ray Charles. And they brought ray out on stage. He was about 12 feet away from me. And Ray Charles was absolute magic. And I sat there and said, okay God, I get it. A blind guy can do something now. I, I kind of figured raised at this music thing covered so I better go do something else, maybe a best business coach. And that was kind of the beginning of everything for me, you know, and uh, and as I was slowly losing my sight, I was building my way toward the, the things that I do and know now. And you know, clay, I know people think about me as a blind person or you know, the limitations on my life. I, I, honest to God, I don’t know anybody I would trade places with today. I, I am happy. I’m fulfilled. I do everything I want to do. I just wish there was twice as many hours in a day to accomplish all the things I want to get out the door. But, uh, I don’t know anybody I would trade places with. It’s been a tremendous. And uh, and I’m just excited everyday and more excited now than I was 30 years ago.

Although you and I have a very similar world view, it’s not a religious discussion. I think both of us in our time of need some cried out to God, but I know people that are, that are Christians. I know people that are Buddhists. I know people that are from the, uh, the Jewish faith, people from all different religions who lose all hope. The first sign, something terrible. The first for the first time something terrible happens to them. They lose all sign of hope. But if you look at the lives of let’s say Abraham Lincoln or Martin Luther King Junior, or you look at the life of anybody you can think of Steve Jobs, someone who achieved massive success. We all, we all remember them because of the struggle they went through. I mean if Martin Luther King Junior didn’t lead the civil rights movement or Abraham Lincoln hadn’t died in slavery, or if these people hadn’t had these adversities, we wouldn’t know them. So it’s like your, your, your best business coach strengths actually comes through the struggle which Napoleon Hill wrote about in his books. The strength comes through the struggle. How did you keep from feeling sorry for yourself when you went totally blind? I mean, how’d you keep yourself not from just going into a cocoon of pity and sorrow. How did you get off the mat? Time and time again when most people, the average person, unfortunately I’m choosing to believe before they hear this podcast would quit

the first one to tell people if you have those feelings and you know, my boys are no greater than yours or anyone listening to us now we’re all only as big as the smallest thing it takes to divert us from where we ought to be. So whether it’s someone’s divorce or bankruptcy or they lost their job or a health crisis or whatever it may be, you know, we all have those things and for everyone defeated by one of those things, I’ll show you someone else had the same circumstance and used it as a springboard to great success and everything they ever wanted in this life. Well, like you, I went to all Roberts University and I was slowly losing my sight. I met my wife there. She was one of my readers who read textbooks to me and uh, um, you know, it was coming close to senior year, all the recruiters on campus, hiring everybody and nobody wanted to hire this, a blind Olympic weight lifters.

So I made the only decision that made any sense to me. I went home and told my mom and dad, I’m not going to get a job. I’m going to be an entrepreneur, which you can imagine how much that’s real them at that point. But Dad said, I don’t know anything about that, but I do know one guy I’ll introduce you to, and his name was Lee Braxton and Lee Braxton had a third grade education and became a Deca millionaire during the Great Depression. Gave nine of the 10 million away and lived off of the investment returns on that 1 million the rest of his life and worked for oral Roberts University for a dollar a year until his death. He was kind of a grumpy old man and he said this book at me, he said, either redis or find somebody to read it to you and come back when you read it, and it was a book called think and grow rich.

And I read the book and crystal helped me and I came back a couple of days later, he asked me a question. I didn’t know the institute. He said, you need to read that again. And I came back couple days later. I said, okay, I’ve read it twice, and he asked me another question and that he was not satisfied with my answer. So you’re gonna need to read that again Sunday. And I read it the third time and came back and that was the basis of all his mentorship. And he taught me everything I know about success and money and achievement in business. And a number of years later, um, he had long since passed away. I wrote a book called the millionaire map and a in there. I disclosed to my investment account. I started, uh, well I, I people, I didn’t start with nothing that poor people can’t get that far in debt.

We had to work a long way to get up to nothing and um, you know, because I don’t believe anybody should ever take advice from anybody that doesn’t have what you want. I felt I owed my readers and explanation. So I had bank of America and Merrill Lynch to an audited accounting of my investments, not my, not my books are royalties or movies or my television network or other businesses, just cash equivalent stocks, bonds, and they showed I had well in excess of $10,000,000 and I put that in a book and put it out and it became a best seller. And I got a call from Don Green who’s the head of the Napoleon Hill Foundation. He said, loved your book, Love Your word. He said, but did you know that you’re Mr Braxton, your mentor you mentioned here in this book was Napoleon Hill’s best friend. I said, I had no idea. He said, yeah. He said, he gave the eulogy at his funeral. I’ll send you the transcript. And he did.

Today we are interviewing the best selling author, best business coach, the multimillionaire, the coauthor of a book with Steve Forbes, the man who shared the stage with Tony Robbins, General Colin Powell, and Zig Ziglar. My folks, my friends. This is today’s interview. We’re, we’re, we’re, we’re interviewing today. Easy for me to say we’re interviewing today, Jim stovall. Jim Stovall is a successful entrepreneur that didn’t earn the vast majority of his success and accolades until after he went blind. After he went blind, that’s when he had his success. You know, Helen Keller, the, the, the claimed a writer who was both deaf and blind, she wants wrote the only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision. So if you’re out there today and you’ve made yourself a series of excuses for why you can’t get up early and why you can’t get your to do list done and why you can’t make your action items and why you can’t save money.

I hope. My hope and my prayer is that today’s is that today’s podcast we’ll provide for you the, uh, the medicine that you need, um, that will provide for you the, the anecdote to the wealth repelling cosmic habit force I called Jack Jackass Jack [inaudible] where you know what to do, but you simply choose not to do it. And Jim Stovall, I don’t know how he felt about it. I don’t know what was going through his mind as he was going through the things he went through. But he is a blind man who has decided to turn his life into a life of success. And so without any further ado, Mike exclusive interview with Jim stovall.

We had to work a long way to get up to nothing, you know, because I don’t believe anybody should ever take advice from anybody that doesn’t have what you want. I felt I owed my readers and explanation, so I had bank of America and Merrill Lynch to an audited accounting of my investments, not my, not my books are royalties or movies or my television network or other businesses, just cash equivalent stocks and bonds and they showed I had well in excess of $10,000,000 and I put that in a book and put it out and it became a best seller and I got a call from Don Green who’s the head of the Napoleon Hill Foundation East. Loved your book, Love Your work. He said, but did you know that you’re Mr Braxton, you’re a mentor. You mentioned here in this book was Napoleon Hill’s best friend. I said, I had no idea.

He said, yeah. He said, he gave the eulogy at his funeral. I’ll send you the transcript and he did, and then he sent me a two inch thick file of letters exchanged between Braxton, the hill in the forties and fifties and sixties. And that’s the basis of a book I’m working out that’ll be out the year after next. But, um, you know, all of these things came to me through, um, you know, one of the worst tragedies in my life, you know, and uh, you know, I, I, nothing is all good or all bad. I mean, you know, I’ve talked to people, they’ve had horrible divorces and abusive relationships, but I say, well, would you go through it again to get those kids? You go and you know, there’s always something in everyone. And as you mentioned, Napoleon Hill said, every adversity comes with the seed of a greater good.

And what this means is once you believe and understand that principle, when something bad happens, you start looking for the opportunity. And the thing I have found in my career that has made me wealthy and healthy and happy and everything I’ve ever wanted in this life. When something is seemingly bad, happens to me. I am looking for the opportunity because I know that opportunity comes disguised as a problem in the whole world is praying for a great, you know, ideas, you know, they just want to have that one big idea, the next uber or whatever it is and you know, the only thing you got to do to have a great idea, clay, is go through your daily life and wait for something bad to happen and ask yourself, how could I have avoided that? And the answer to that question is a great idea and the only thing you got to do to turn that great idea into a great business is ask one more question.

How could I help other people avoid debt? Because the world will give you fame and fortune and wealth and success and everything you ever wanted. If you’ll just solve their problems. But everybody goes out there and say, I want to make money. The only people that make money work at the mint, they print dollar bills. The rest of us have to earn money and the only way you earn money is by creating value in other people’s lives. There’s nothing else that matters, so when you go out there and you’re worried about yourself as a best business coachand you think it’s all about you, you’re going to be poor your whole life, but if you go out there and say, who needs me today and who needs me the most, where can I help the most people in the biggest way and if you’ll go out everyday with that thought in your mind, you’re going to get rich

knowledge bombs, they’re all in a row and I’d like to break them down one by one because there was so much knowledge you just provided there. So what’s what’s good into knowledge bomb number one that I took note of you said that behind every failure or setback there is an opportunity on Napoleon Hill writes about that extensively in his book think and grow rich. That single idea is the only reason that you and I are on this radio show together. I grew up as a kid that stuttered. Therefore, I had to learn how to become a good listener, which is why I do very well at the business ventures I do because I’ve learned to become a good listener and then I wanted to become good at speaking and I had to practice so much speaking over and over and over that it became sort of a super power, but I don’t think I would have spent that much time in my life focused on speaking if I was naturally good at it. You are a man with tremendous vision. As a result, I believe in part of being totally blind. You are a man of tremendous vision as a result of being totally blind. Do you agree? Do you agree with that idea that you have tremendous vision today in part, as a result of you having gone blind?

It’s a very wonderful thing. I had it for the first part of my life, a gift and I hope everyone listening to us now, we’ll go out and use their site and think about the blessing that it is. It’s a wonderful thing, but it pales in comparison division. That site tells you where you are and what’s around you at this moment. Vision tells you where you could be and what’s possible in the world and given the choice between the two, and I’ve had both. I’ll take vision every time.

Now this, this best business coach concept of looking for a problem that you can solve for others. That’s really all entrepreneurship is. It’s finding a problem that people have and they’re willing to pay for you to solve. You find a problem people have, whether it be a product or a service that solves it, solve the problem, and if people are willing to pay for you to solve the problem, then you have a viable business. If you people have lawns that are growing and they don’t want to mow the lawns themselves and they pay you to mow the lawn, than that is a business. How would you. What advice would you give to somebody out there, and I’m not ripping on every single multilevel marketing business. I’m not ripping on all of them, Jim. I’m just ripping on 99 point six, four, three, two, one. Carry the four percentage of them thrive nation. Are you looking to save both time and money on your office supplies? Are you looking to save both time and money with your office supplies? Well, if you are looking to save both time and money with your office and printer supplies, then go to onyx imaging.com. That’s [inaudible].

Oh, in why imaging.com today, the one you are now entering the Dojo of Mojo and the thrive time show, thrive time. Show on the microphone. What is this? Top of the charts in the category of business driven down on business topics like we need to shift, like if we go past that, you might get motion sick in like some three, two, one. Here come the business ninjas. Thrive nation. Welcome back into the conversation since five times show

on your radio for anybody. Just now tuning in. We’re interviewing today the multimillionaire, the bestselling author, the man who’s written books with Steve Forbes, and who’s who has shared the stage with Tony Robbins, General Colin Powell and Zig Ziglar. Ladies and gentlemen, family and friends. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to Mr Jim Stovall, the entrepreneur who became successful after becoming blind now. Then he further new back to our interview with Jim stovall and they’re willing to pay for you to solve. That’s all you find a problem people have, whether it be a product or a service that solves it, solve the problem. If people are willing to pay for you to solve the problem, then you have a viable business. If people have lawns that are growing and they don’t want to mow the lawns themselves and they pay you to mow the lawn, than that is a business. How would you.

What best business coach advice would you give to somebody out there, and I’m not ripping on every single multilevel marketing business. I’m not ripping on all of them, Jim. I’m just ripping on 99 point six, four, three, two, one. Carry the four percentage of them where they’re not actually selling a product that people need, but they’re trying to convince people to get rich quick. You, I’m sure you’ve seen that before, where somebody has a product that doesn’t actually solve a problem, it doesn’t offer value to the marketplace, but yet they want to become rich as a result of auto shipping. Something that you don’t need to your home. What advice would you give for somebody out there who’s trying to get rich with their newest get rich quick scheme or scam? What advice would you have to. If they said, Jim sent me straight, tell me how life works.

I’ve never seen anybody get rich longterm, quickly. I have never seen it happen. I’d like to see it happen. I remember I was working with Willie Nelson on a deal. He did the music and bb King for the first movie based on one of my books and you know, I had done some research about him and I said, there was this article in variety magazine in 1971, so you were an overnight success. He said, yeah, I guess if you look at it that way, I became an overnight success. It took me 21 years to get to that night, but then I was an overnight success and you know, everybody I’ve ever seen that makes it succeed has paid their dues and something my grandfather told me years ago that always stuck with me. He said, just figure on earn and everything you’d get out of life. You’ll be a lot happier and you’ll be a lot wealthier and it’s, it’s happened for me and there are great network marketing companies,

marketing companies, but if you’re just trying to run through and scam a bunch of people and, and do something, you know, deep down and you know, a lot of these companies, they won’t tell you what they’re in or what they’re doing or what the meeting’s about. And, and that’s just the thing, you know, I mean, I do five things in my life. It, it looks like a four sided pyramid with a point on the top. And those are the five things I do. I do books and movies and television and speeches and my syndicated columns. I do those five things and I am proud of those five things. I will tell anybody anywhere at anytime about what I do and how I do and how I’ve opened the world of television to 13 million people here in the United States and I’m very proud of that. I, I wish for everyone listening to us right now that you would be just that proud of who you are and what you do do and if you have to kind of hedge or hide behind something and when you tell people what you do, go do something you’re proud of.

Make a difference for somebody you know, you can drive down any street in America and look at the houses and you can pretty much guess what kind of contribution they make to society. You know, how big a contribution and how many people do they make a contribution to it.

You mentioned your connection now. What’s the Napoleon Hill Foundation and you mentioned Mr. Braxton, can you share with us why you decided to donate to build the Jim Stovall? Is it, is it called the officially the Jim stovall centered. There’s a building at oral Roberts University that has your name on it. People who aren’t familiar, oral Roberts University as a division one basketball team, a division one volleyball baseball, big Christian school. And your name’s on the side of it. Jim stovall, this dusty stovall center. Can you explain why you decided to donate back to oral Roberts University?

Well, so many good things happened to me there. My education, I met my wife crystal connected with libra. You know, clay, uh, many, many years ago. I quit measuring my wealth based on much how much money I have. I have more money than I’ve ever gone to spin and uh, you know, we give away a vastly more amounts of money that we spend or save or invest for ourselves. A 27 years ago I started a scholarship at Nyu is a crusader scholarship and we just passed the mark. We’ve sent 500 kids to that university that cost more than, than that building cost. But, uh, you know, several years ago, um, my father worked for 57 years for oral Roberts. He, my dad came to Tulsa in 1955 right out of the navy and started working in the mail room and worked his way up and became the chief financial officer and, and then took over university village and ran that until he retired in his early eighties and mom and dad still lived there and a house.

So University village. And uh, my dad was an administration so I thought I’m going to build the stove all administrative center and if anybody in Tulsa, if you’re ever out there and just walk into the building and it’s beautiful atrium and it’s got a big thing. Talks about my mom and dad and why crystal and I wanted to donate a building and dedicated to my mom and dad and because of that in. But the ironic thing is that next, uh, thanksgiving, I was over at my mom and dad’s house and I’m standing in the kitchen with mom and, and she said, how did you do that? And I said, mom, I don’t know what she’s talking about. She said, well, when I stand here at my sink and look out the window though, the sign lights up on the stove all building and it’s the only thing I can see right here from my window and to this day my mom thinks I placed that building so that is she could stand at her and see the name on it, but you know, clay and I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor. Richard’s a whole lot better, but the most fun you’ll ever have with money. He’s given it away and you think you’re having a bad day or you’re down or whatever. Go buy a truckload of bicycles and go to a poor area in your town and just get ready to have an amazing experience.

What is your role with the Napoleon Hill Foundation? Because I named my son after Napoleon Hill. My son’s name is aubrey, Napoleon Hill Clark, because the books think and grow rich changed my life. Now listen out there, listeners, if you’re listening right now, understand this. I only have one son and I’ve read thousands of books, audio books, and I named my son Aubrey, Napoleon Hill. Clark. I could have named anything, right? You can do that freedom of choice, but I named him Aubrey Napoleon Hill, not Aubrey, Russell Simmons, not Aubrey, Jay z Clark, not arbery a Dave Ramsey Clark. Then Robert Kiyosaki, a lot of great authors, but I named my son after Napoleon Hill. You. What is your role with the Napoleon Hill Foundation today and what? What? What? What are you doing on an ongoing basis with that group?

A number of years ago actually made the introduction for me, the National Booksellers Convention and I saw her there and we’re just having a moment.

All right. Thrive nation. When we returned Jim stovall shares with us how Oprah Winfrey, Oprah Winfrey, Oprah, the Oprah Winfrey, introduced him to the Napoleon Hill Foundation and incredible story from an incredible man and if you’re out there and saying to yourself, I want my spine to feel incredible. Well, if you want your spine to Philadelphia is incredible. As Jim stovall is, then go to Sibley chiropractic. That’s Dr John Sibley. Dr John Sibley Dot Com. Schedule your consultation today with the chiropractor of choice for Wayne Gretzky,

Nhl Hall of fame. Dr. Johnson Dot Com, the world’s best business workshop, led by America’s number one business coach for free by subscribing on itunes and leaving us an objective review. Claim your tickets by emailing is proof that you did it and your contact information to [email protected]. All right, thrive nation. Welcome.

Welcome back to the thrive time best business coach show on your radio and podcast download. Uh, recently we’ve actually hit the top of the itunes charts, what we’ve reached, the top of the itunes charts, this just in, in the category of business as well as an in all categories overall as a result of you subscribing to the podcast, sharing this with your friends and families. So I appreciate you very, very much for doing that. I mean, it means a lot to me. Uh, another thing that means a lot to me is if you get yourself a copy of the book, think and grow rich. Think and grow rich is the number one self help book of all time. The number one selling self help book of all time outside of the chicken soup for the soul series and the Napoleon Hill Foundation. And thinking grow rich has sold over 100 million copies of the book, think and grow rich. And the book was had made such a profound impact on me and my life that I actually decided to name my son after the author. So my son’s name is Aubrey Napoleon Hill Clark. Now on today’s show we are interviewing Jim Stovall, who has a very, very close connection to the Napoleon Hill Foundation. He’s also a New York Times best selling author and a man who became a multimillionaire after becoming blind. And during this next portion he’s gonna explain to you how Oprah Winfrey introduced him to the Napoleon Hill Foundation. And the rest, as they say, is history studying.

But I named my son after Napoleon Hill, you, what is your role with the Napoleon Hill Foundation today? And what, what, what, what are you doing on an ongoing basis with that group?

The national booksellers convention. And I saw her there and we’re just having a moment and I’d just gotten on the floor of the convention. I said, what’s the best thing here? And she said, you know, there’s all these amazing multimillion dollar booth with lights and fireworks and everything and you know, and, but she said, I was walking around and over in the corner, there’s one little man standing there at a card table and had about 40 people in line waiting to talk to him, no sign, no nothing. And so she said, I couldn’t wait. I had to go over and see who this guy was. And it was don green of the Napoleon Hill Foundation. And you know, she talked about what a difference that it made her. So I didn’t know this guy at all, clay. I wrote him a letter saying, hey, we have a mutual friend and fan.

And uh, you know, I appreciate what you do and, and what that book did for me and you know, written in 1937 a over 100 million copies now. And I wrote this letter to Don Green. And then years later he made the connection between me and Lee Braxton and they were best friends and sent me the file of ladders and everything. And, uh, so we were sitting there and he has an office of the University of Virginia very near where Napoleon hill was raised and lived and uh, and they have a scholarship there and I said, Don, what can I do for you? And he said, could you do some books for us that would benefit the foundation? Well, I write a weekly syndicated column. I’ve written over a thousand of them and they appear in newspapers and magazines and online publications around the world. And I have just finished the fifth book of those.

Uh, and uh, and it’s an official publication. They’re Balding Hill Foundation. Every penny from every book everywhere in the world goes to provide scholarships for Napoleon Hill kids at the University of Virginia. Then two or three years ago, Don came to me and he knew about my experience in television and movies. We have an Emmy Award and I’ve done eight major motion pictures based on my books. And he said, we have a group that wants to do a movie about the life of the pulley and hill, but I don’t know much about it. Will you oversee and help us with this project? I said, sure will end the movie. Now. You’re going to love this clay clay, a lot of creativity when it is, it’s called think and grow rich.

Nice.

But, uh, we got together about two dozen of the greatest 21st century thought leaders who have been impacted by that book. And we reenacted parts of Napoleon Hill’s life and this book and you know, Basically Hill was the first one to quantify what’s called the science of success. He was a newspaper reporter. Napoleon Hill was there the day the Wright brothers flew. He was a young man and his newspapers sending him out to interview Andrew Carnegie, the richest man in the world, the, the founder and president of a US steel. And when he’ll go out there, he said, what do you have to do to be rich? How do you get rich? And Carnegie told him, he said, young man, no one has ever really quantified that. But if you’ll dedicate it to the next 20 years of your life to that proposition, you’ll be the one to break that open for the whole world.

And Hill agreed and Carnegie introduced him to Henry Ford and uh, Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison and Helen Keller and over 500 of the most prominent people of that era and hill synthesized all of that, their secrets and put it out in the book, think and grow rich in 1937. It is credited with helping to end the great depression. It has changed the lives of more people. And I’m a member of a group to Steve Forbes told me about it originally. It’s called Tiger 21 and it’s a group, it’s called the investment group to enhance returns. And I’d heard a lot about that. And, and um, there are 238 of us now. DECA millionaires. You have to have over $10,000,000 to get into group. And um, you know, but I remember when I was talking to them and they do surveys of members and one of the questions they ask is, when did you first read, think and grow rich? They don’t even ask you if your bread.

I lose my mind for a second. It’s your out there and you want to become successful. Read that book three times. If you’re not a reader, get the audio book. Jim, you’re blind, so reading a book might be tough. You’ve listened to it. We have one of our show sponsors, Paul Hood, who wants to ask you a question here in just a moment, but I want to ask you this question. You do not listen to an audio book every day. I mean, what’s your process now that you’re blind? You could have the excuse of, I can’t see the words, but you instead listen to audio books. Everybody out there who’s a vision impaired or they just struggle with reading. Can you talk to me about how you digest audio books? Because I don’t care whether you read it or listened to it. You’ve got to. You’ve got to devour thinking, grow rich at least three times. How do you consume books? Now? My friend, when I first went blind, I woke up that morning at age 29 and I was totally blind and I thought about what can I do and what can I not do in the two things that came to my mind that I cannot do is number one drive and number two read. I can’t read anymore and I can’t drive and I decided I’m not going to be limited in those two areas. So I found out about audio books and at the time digital electronics, we’re just beginning to happen in a group that contacted me because I had been researching and they said, we’re doing this, would you like to be in the Beta test? And it was for compressed high speed best business coach audio. And I started listening to that a little faster, a little faster, a little faster every day. And now I can listen to, depending on the, the uh, whether it’s high statistics and numbers or whether it’s just narrative, I can listen to it. Five, six, even 700 words a minute. And because of that, I, over the last 30 years, I’ve read a book every day. There hasn’t been a day in 30 years. I haven’t read a whole.

You said you listened to a book every single day. You read a book every single day for the past. How many years?

30.

That right there. Thrive nation. Listen, listen to this. I am a man bear pig with no discernible best business coach talents or skills and I read a book a week. Okay. And I’m like, I’m the man. I read a book a week. I’m the man and I’ll tell you what I, I, my mind is like a, like a. it’s like a concrete app. It’s tough to get into my skull. I’ve got to drill down there, really auger down into my brain. I struggle with retaining things. I have to highlight it and tab it. Jim Stovall is listening to a book every single day for how many years

I listened to. I get up everyday at four in the morning and people always gas. The alarm hasn’t gone off in years. That’s just when I wake up and I go into my office and I start my, you know, I go through my morning routine in my quiet time and my gratitude and then, and then I read and, and then when I have moments at the office I was reading for you, call me fair. I’m going to mess with your sound guy right here. Here is a book at about 600 words a minute that I was reading the moment you called. So here you go. Read, that’s the autobiography of Red Hour Back, who coached the Boston Celtics for many years, 30 years. That’s a few seconds of him going at about six, 700 words a minute. Started listening that fast in the beginning it, you know, I just sped it up a little more the day and the next thing you know, there you aren’t. People come into my office, they said, what is that a fleet, what is that? And I is an audio book. And um, yeah, that has been a game changer for me. And, uh, one way to learn and to learn quickly and to avoid pain is to learn from mentors instead of learning from mistakes. And if you’re out there and you’re wanting to build a commercial building and get it done right the first time, you’d rather go with the pros as opposed to learning from mistakes. Visit will-con.com that’s will dash con dot com,the world’s best business workshop, led by America’s number one business coach for free by subscribing on itunes and leaving us an objective review. Claim your tickets by emailing us proof that you did it and your contact information to drive time soda.

All right, thrive nation. Welcome back to the thrive time show on your radio and today’s show. And every show is presented by Williams contracting. A, these guys are, if you’re left, they’re looking to build up an office building. We want to build a restaurant. You want to build onto your school or your church. You want to go with an experienced team of builders who’ve been doing this for a long time. And that’s why without reservation, I can recommend you check out our good [email protected]. Will Dash conduct comments, Williams contract. Give him a call today at nine. One, eight, six, eight, two five, five. One, one that’s nine, one eight, six, eight, two, five, five, one, one. And on today’s show, as a result of the generous sponsors at Williams contracting and our other thrive nation sponsors, we are interviewing today a living legend. His name is Jim stovall.

Jim, what Jim Stovall Jim what? Jim stovall s t o v a l l. he’s a multimillionaire, a bestselling author, and a man who’s written a book, a book with Steve Forbes. He shared the stage with Tony Robbins, General Colin Powell, Zig Ziglar. He is a multimillionaire and he did not have the majority of his access, a majority of his success. The things you would know him for today. I’m all happened after he went blind. So whatever excuse that you’re battling with, you’re dealing with, you’re giving yourself. If you’re, if you’re tired of making excuses for yourself and you want to move beyond just surviving and you want to hold yourself accountable to operating at a high level of success, I highly recommend that you listen to this exclusive interview with Jim stovall.

10 million books in print around the world, and how do I become a New York Times best seller or nominated for surprise? Everything I say, if you want to be a writer, be a reader, be a reader. I mean the most amazing thing to me is is people always want to know what’s the secret to success? The wealthiest and most successful people in the world wrote down everything you have to do. There’s a recipe there. Just open it up and read it.

Oh, okay. Now we have Paul Hood, one of our show sponsors, and a lot of people ask me, clay, is this really true? And I’ll say yes. There’s a little phrase that says, your network is your net worth. Richard Branson has said that phrase. Other best business coach clients or entrepreneurs like Tim Ferriss have said that you are the average of the five people you spend your time with the most, or Jim Roan, the legendary speaker and author. He said you basically become the average of the people you spend the most time with. And so I surround myself with the top optometrist in Oklahoma, Dr Robert Zellner and that the top CPA in Tulsa, and in terms of clients, I mean Paul, you have clients, you have thousands of clients, you have clients in Claremore clients in Bartlesville clients and Tulsa Cpas and and again, just quantifiably one of the most successful accountants in the, in the region. They’re out of Tulsa, Oklahoma. Paul. It’s not often we have Jim stovall on this show, so I’m going to. I’m keeping them like you can ask them any question you want, just a wealth of knowledge and I’m just going to try to take notes and see if I could mentally comprehend the answers he’s giving. So what question would you have for Mr Jim? Well, thank you clay.

Jim, just first, what an honor. What a big honor. And by the way, tomorrow, I’m telling everybody I’m friends with Jim stovall. I’m just telling you right now. I am bragging.

I’m going to tell everybody I just got to look under the hood.

Hey, love it, love it. Hey, so one I do. I’ve discovered that the average business owner in the country is a good technician. Um, they’re not really business owners. And so I think what, what, what I try to teach people is that success is determined by what you measure and how often you measure. Would you agree with that? And how would, do you have any advice for me to help guide my clients and the people that come to me for advice to, to help them because everybody wants to do this, the fund and the marketing and everything. That’s exciting, but they’ve got to measure. So what, what comments or wisdom could you, could you give me on that? Jim?

Probably the most adapted this, but in every business there is one and one specific thing that moves the needle. That’s it. And you can count out up and move the needle and, you know, you got accounts of things that matter, the things that matter. You got account and um, you know, I know what those things are in my businesses. Uh, and, and you know, I have five businesses and uh, as I was telling clay, I visualize it always like a foresighted pyramid with a point on the top. And the thing on the top is what I’m doing at any point in time. And I do books and movies and television and arena speeches and my syndicated columns. I do those five things. So whatever I’m doing at any given time, that’s the point. That’s the top of the pyramid. And it has to support and be supported by the others.

And you know, people confuse activity with productivity. Just because you’re doing something doesn’t mean you’re moving. You’re like the little hamster on the wheel. You’re going around like crazy and you’re not getting anywhere. In fact, some people and many entrepreneurs, they’re actually going the wrong way out here on 44 and they’re going east when they intend to get west. And you know, we’d be better off if they just had a flat tire and pulled over to the side at least they’re not losing ground. But people confuse activity with productivity. And in most businesses there are just a handful, if not one or two things that matter. I, years ago I, I consult with a lot of companies around the country and I had been hired by a group of a yellow page ad salesman than they sold the big display ads in the yellow page books.

And I, I sat with these guys and I asked them all, I said, we’re going to go around the room and tell me your name, what’s your goal and how many hours a week you work. And you know, Oh, you know, I, I want to make a, you know, 600,000 a year and I’m already working 70 hours a week. And I said, I don’t believe there’s a man, woman or child in this room that’s actually working 20 hours a week. And I bought a whole gross of those, a little plastic runners, stopwatches at Walmart. I said, you all get one of these free of charge, you put it in your jacket pocket or your purse. When you’re actually sitting in front of a prospect, a new prospect talking about buying one of your ads. You Click that on and when you leave their presence, you click it off and if you ever get to two hours a day, you’re going to get absolutely rich and if you don’t think so, you try it and come back and call me a liar.

I had a guy call me three, four months later, he’s a gym. I just my I just finished a month where I made four times what I’d ever made in a month and I haven’t even gotten up to the two hours a day yet and he said, what should I do? I said, don’t do it anything. Don’t work more than the two hours. You are a salesman. You get paid for presenting ideas and concepts to new people. Go fish and go play golf. I don’t care what you do, I don’t care what you do, but don’t confuse activity with productivity because too many people, they’ll come in and horse around with the team secretary and read the newspaper and drink coffee and do all these things that don’t make any difference. One of the huge advantages I have huge advantage

I would say, just to pile on with what Jim’s saying, to break it, break it down to make it very, very. For all the listeners, according to Forbes right now, 88 percent of people read reviews before doing what? Anything before going out to eat before watching a movie before buying a book, and so if you’re an author, if you own a restaurant, if you own a business of any kind, putting your focus on gathering objective reviews from real clients is a massive needle mover. This second, the second idea there, maybe one or two step one is do a great job step to get reviews. Step one, do a great job step to get reviews, and a lot of owners, they just, they, they focus on everything else, but that’s what’s going to create. That’s what’s going to work today and this transparent culture of social media and the Internet. That’s how you grow your company. Then you turn your ads on, you turn your billboard on, you running radio commercials. It all works when people know that you are the real deal, so I want to get into this, the the daily grind and into the mind of the daily grind of Jim stovall. You mentioned briefly your daily routine. You wake up every day at what time? My friend who’s a VC at 4:00 AM. Is that correct?

What do you do?

Between 4:00 and 6:00? I have my morning best business coach routine, my quiet time and meditation and gratitude and then I read and it’s 6:00. My wife gets up.

What is it? What is the. What is the gratitude?

Were it not for me? She’d probably get up about 10:00, but a number of years ago I came home from work and I started telling her about that deal I’ve been working on for months and months. Finally came through today and I was so excited and I realized she didn’t have a clue what I’m talking about because we hadn’t sat down and had a serious conversation and I don’t know how long and I said that is never happening again. So every morning from six to seven we sit out on the deck or by the fireplace or whatever. We drink coffee. No, no, no devices, no radio, no TV, no newspaper. We talk an hour every morning and then I get ready and then I come to the office. I’m in the office at eight and I go around and visit with all my people and I find out what they’re doing today.

And how can I help you? How can I help you? And when I was selected as the National Entrepreneur, the entrepreneur of the year, um, by the United States Chamber of Commerce and the blue chip people at mass mutual, they did the Wall Street Journal, sent a guy here to Tulsa, Oklahoma to shadow me for a whole week. And he stood around while I did my work. And at the end of the week he said, you know, the most amazing thing about you. And I said, what’s that? He said, if I didn’t know you were in charge, I wouldn’t have a clue. I would’ve thought you were everybody’s assistant. And I said, thank you very much. So I go around and I find out what everybody’s doing, how can I help and to make sure we’re all on task. And uh, then I go through with the things I want to do that day. And I always try to keep it to no more than five, six, seven, eight things.

If I’ve got more things than that, I, I am majoring in minors and I need to, uh, major in major things and I need, need to get it off my plate and onto somebody else’s. And uh, and uh, unless I’m traveling, I don’t work. You’d been used. I don’t work weekends. I honestly believe that if you will go to work and, and be diligent, and b, I mean crazy about what you do and maniacal about quality. Um, you don’t have to work a ton of hours. I, you know, because of my scholarship, I, I talked to hundreds and hundreds of college kids and they all know, don’t come in here and tell me, Oh, I pulled another all nighter and I just, I don’t want to hear about that crap. You just put a billboard out front so that I don’t manage my time well. And you know, there should never be a crisis.

There should never be anything urgent. Um, the, the late great friend and colleague Stephen Covey, he always said, you got to understand the difference between urgent and important. And uh, my biggest best business coach or mentor ever, I lost him for months before he turned 100, was coach John Wooden and he always told his player to be quick, but don’t hurry, be quick. Quick means you’re ready or prepared. You know where you’re going. Hurried means you’re out of control and, and you circumstances are leading you. And the other thing coach wouldn’t always told me, and it goes along with that, doing an excellent job that you were mentioning clay, before, every meeting, every phone call, every interview, everything you do, whatever it is throughout your day, every activity before you go in, you ask yourself one question, what would I do right now if I were amazing? Not Adequate, not good, not excellent.

What would I do right now if I was amazing right now? If I were amazing? And if you will treat everything you do like that, you will be amazing and amazing. People in America get very, very wealthy. And if you’re getting ready to do something that isn’t worthy of being amazing, don’t do it. Get it off your list. But if you’ll ever do everything, like, what would I do right now if I were amazing? Um, your advertising, your marketing, you will find the number one thing that happens to great businesses is everybody will be talking about you. Everybody will be.

You mentioned John Wooden. So I’m going to peel back the onion with John and John wouldn’t a little bit. He has his, his success pyramid, his team won the Ncaa Championship, the ridiculous amount of times, I believe 10 out of 12 years with players, all different sizes, top recruits, people that were awesome people that people never heard of before. They just won every year and one of the things he was focused on was breaking it down to the foundational aspects of the game, so to start every season, he started the first practice every year. All right. Thrive nation. On today’s show, we’re interviewing Jim Stovall, the New York Times selling author, the multimillionaire entrepreneur, and we come back from the break. He’s going to be breaking down for us to words of wisdom, the things he learned from being personally mentored by John Wooden, the ucla

coach. Stay to attend the world’s best business workshop, led by America’s number one business coach for free by subscribing on itunes and leaving us an objective review. Claim your tickets by emailing is proof that you did it and your contact information to [email protected]. All right, thrive nation. Welcome back to the thrive time show

on your radio and podcast. Download on today’s show, we’re interviewing the multimillionaire, the best selling author, and a man who’s written a book with Steve Forbes and who shared the stage with Tony Robbins, General Colin Powell and Zig Ziglar. It is none other than the famous blind entrepreneur, Jim stovall. If you don’t know his name, check them out online. Google him today, Jim Stovall, that’s Jim s, t o v a l l, and during this excerpt he’s breaking down his personal mentor, John Wooden, the the Ncaa Hall of fame basketball coach, and some of the lessons that John Wooden taught him while he was still with us on the plan.

You mentioned John Wooden, so I’m going to peel back the best business coach onion with John and John Wooden a little bit. He has his success pyramid. His team won the Ncaa Championship, the ridiculous amount of times, I believe 10 out of 12 years with players of all different sizes, top recruits, people that were awesome, people that people never heard of before. They just won every year and one of the things he was focused on was breaking it down to the foundational aspects of the game. So to start, every season he started the first practice every year by making the players put on their shoes, the John Wooden way, you don’t know how to put on your socks, you’ll get a blister bench or on the bench or not doing us any good here.

Then he went on to teach them layups and basic passing and they nailed the fundamental. So you said part of your daily routine, part of your daily fundamentals was this word gratitude. And I would just like for you to express and a little bit of detail what you mean by that gratitude portion of your day. And again, recapping when is that gratitude portion of your day and why do you do the gratitude? What is the gratitude all about? Explain to us about that meditation because a lot of people aren’t used to meditation daily or gratitude or walk us through that. That meditation gratitude portion of Your Day

go into my office. Uh, and I start with gratitude and it comes in if people are familiar with my work at all through my books and the movies and the things I’ve done more people are familiar with the concept I wrote about called the golden list than anything else. And I ripped that off from my grandmother many years ago. Uh, I’m my parents third child. The first two died, uh, I had a brother had cystic fibrosis and I had a sister that died of leukemia. And for those of you who’ve seen the ultimate gift and the little girl Abigail Breslin, and he gets sick and dies, leukemia, that was not a, that was not fiction for me. That was something I had lived through. But while my sister was going all around the country to various specialists and doctors, my parents would take me to Missouri and drop me off at my grandparents’ house when I was three, four years old, five years old.

And I guess I complained a lot because I didn’t have my friends and my toys and my dog and everything else. And I guess I was complaining a lot and my grandmother said, Jim, we have a rule here at our house now. You can complain all you want to once you fill out your golden list. And I said, what’s a golden list? She said, well, all you gotta do is write down 10 things you’re thankful for. And she had to write them for me. I wouldn’t know lifting it right? But I, I listed 10 things I was thankful for. And clay is that there has been well over 50 years ago. I’ve done it every day since. And I defy anyone listening to us now, when you’re having a bad day, a bad moment, a bad experience, stop enlisting things you’re thankful for, and was impossible to have.

Fear, anger, resentment, jealousy, bitterness. At the same time you’re having gratitude. The two cannot exist in the same best business coach space. So I start every day with that and that’s the beginning of my day because it sets the tone. And then I go into my meditation, my quiet time. And uh, you know, and I, I would ask people do not get all hung up about that. You know, you know, one of the great thought leaders of the last century was a Catholic priest named Thomas Merton, and I read his book on Saturday and he said, one of the most profound things I’ve ever read, he said, either everything is spiritual or nothing is spiritual at all. One of those two things has to be true. And, uh, and you can, you know, go to an agnostic and atheist or a, a Christian or Buddhist or whatever. And I, I can’t imagine anybody disagreeing with that statement either.

Everything is spiritual or nothing spiritual at all. There’s no middle ground. And so when I have meditation or what this means is I clear my mind and I focus on the things that mattered to me that day. And through my books, uh, I, I’ve gotten to meet a lot of people like coach wooden in. One of them was Jack Nicklaus and uh, he is read all of my more recent books and uh, he’s a great friend and he said the whole key to success. And here’s a guy that won 19 majors. No one’s ever come close. He’s kind of, the John wouldn’t have golf and uh, if tiger woods when 50 percent more majors than he’s won, he would approached Jack Nicholas and one of the things trying to said I never hit a golf shot that I hadn’t seen in my mind before I hit it

is so powerful. But you said something that I, I will make sure that the listeners are getting this and they understand your intention of the statement because you said don’t get all hung up on this. And I see a lot of people now I’m a Judeo Christian. I believe that the Bible is the literal inspired word of God. Some people don’t believe that, but I meditate everyday for an hour every single day for an hour. I think about where am I now versus where do I want to be in my areas of faith, family, finances, fitness, friendship and fun. And if there’s 24 hours in a row where I’m not happy with where I’m going, I change. I make a change. Make a little, little quick correction. But I think a lot of people do get hung up on the phrase meditation. Why Jim does so many people get hung up on the phrase meditation,

the meditations of our hearts and and the things it talks about in one of the great to. I read about a 16th century pope and he wrote about before he was pope. He was meditating and praying for hours a day, but when he became pope, his duties were so pressing and he had so many commitments. He had to move his meditation from four hours a day to six. Unlike most great truth in life. That seems counterintuitive. But the reality is if you want to get more done, prepare your spirit and your mind first and your body and your schedule and all those things will take care of themselves.

So for our Christian friends, of which I am one, like you, seek ye first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and then all these other things will be added unto you. And what this tells me is that I can worry about that one thing I meditate on and what God wants me to do with my life. Or I can worry about every other detail in the whole universe. And I don’t have the mentality to do that. So I seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and you, you know, and that’s not something you did want. It said, seek ye first. And so I do that every morning. Where am I supposed to be? What am I supposed to God? Make me an instrument and a light today.

Catch the rest of our exclusive interview with Jim stovall. Head on over to thrive time show.com, and click on the podcast button. And there you will find that the remainder of our interview with Jim stovall. But our interview today with Jim stovall and all of our great interviews we have with top level entrepreneurs would not be possible without the generous sponsorship of some great entrepreneurs in some great sponsors out. So if you have a Ford Automobile and you want to get that thing repaired, check out one of our show sponsors, chicken RC auto specialist Dotcom. If you ever forward it needs to be repaired. Ticket RC auto specialists DOT com today from the center of the universe.

Welcome back to the thrive timeshow on your radio, both Dr z and I started from the bottom and we’ve been able to get to the top of the world of business. We’ve been able to have both time freedom and financial freedom as a result of learning how to execute and implement the 13 proven steps that we teach countless best business coach entrepreneurs all over the world, but that’s not what this show’s about. This show is about helping you get to where you want to go and so when possible, we’d like to interview entrepreneurs who have had massive success and who are willing to take time out of their schedule to come onto the show to teach you how they did it. How did, how did they do it? And so we guys, we just interviewed Jim Stovall, The New York Times bestselling author, a guy who was born with sight but who lost his vision at the age of 29 and became a multimillionaire after having become blind. And so I want to get your take on this Darlin. I mean, you heard the interview with Jim stovall. You probably thought to yourself, Whoa, that was, I should write that down, or that was amazing. Or Wow, that was what were some of the W. and as we’re processing the, the, uh, it just try to understand, grasp all the nuggets of knowledge, all the knowledge bombs that Jim stovall just just gave us there. What did you get the most out of that interview with, with Jim Stovall?

Well, I was really taken back by his, just his grace, first of all, usually, um, usually when people are really, really, you just never know what to expect when people are wildly successful, but he’s just as a grace about them that I’m always stunned about when I see wildly successful people like yourself who just really are still so grateful in a way. But um, you know, he just, you know, he, his practical wisdom, practical knowledge. I’m one of the things he, he said that I really, that really kind of hit home for me was when he was talking about, um,

just the nuggets that you can put into place that make that, that kind of set a chain reaction for other things. And he was talking about being maniacal about quality, right? You know, just being absolutely obsessed with just, you know, putting out quality can. Wait. Can we talk about that for a second? Quality. Yeah. Quality. And I want to talk about the gift of grace for a second. The word charisma and the English language is spelled c h a r I s m, a charisma, right? But the original word that was given to the planet was charisma, which is a Greek word with, with a k. and somebody might be saying to themselves, well that’s great that you found out that we can spell it differently. No, but the word charisma and the English language means somebody who’s a excitable, entertaining. They have that gift of personality.

They just really are magnetic. Wow. What? What charisma that person has. But the word charisma means the gift of grace. Somebody who can leave a conversation with the other person feeling whole and not with the other person feeling like they’re full of holes. People should want people who can coach people up and not talk down to them. Right. And Jim stovall has that ability to do that in a way that I think very few people can do or choose to do. And in Jim was talking about this concept there, Paul, of not making excuses. And again, I mean he’s blind. He has a lot of excuses that he could make. I mean, he talked about the importance of his daily routine. If a guy who’s a multimillionaire and a New York Times bestselling author and a guy who’s had his books made into movies and the guy has had every kind of. He’s done books with, with Steve Forbes. If a guy like that, Paul has a daily routine. Why? Why do all of us need a routine? I mean, what? Why does everybody out there if you want to become successful? Why? Why do you need on a foundational level to have a routine?

Well, you know, what I find is it’s almost comical week, day in and day out. Um, I hear the same thing from your program. There’s a pattern for success. There is a path for success. There is a design for success. It’s not luck. It’s you do these things. And one of the the, and it just seems so simple and the, and the simplest thing is you have a routine. You decide what you’re going to do before you’re going to do it. And you know Jim, one of the things he said was, if you want to get more done, prepare your mind and spirit first. Your body and actions will take care of itself. That is prepared, that’s plan that starts your day off knowing where you’re going to go before you actually get out there. And most people, so few people do that and I’m telling you, Jim, had I wrote down, I was writing as fast as I could. Write down a little things that we could spend days if not weeks displacing just but little nuggets that are just but you, you think about and say, that can’t be right. That is too simple to be. That’s how you define. That’s how you become successful. What I want to do is I’m going to play an audio, a testimonial from one of our clients in Dallas, a company called full package media. I’m going to play it for you guys and I want you to hear the profound simplicity of what Thomas is sharing. This guy went from a startup to generating over $105,000 a month of gross revenue in less than two years, making over $20,000 a month of profit. And how did he do it? It’s with that daily diligence. So then he further ado and audio testimonial with Thomas and his company, full package real estate, photography and media based in Dallas, Texas,

Thrive nation. If you want to learn how to grow a successful company, you want to stay tuned, we’re going to break down the specific best business coach steps you need to take to become a diligent and disciplined successful entrepreneur. But even if you don’t want to become a disciplined and diligent entrepreneurial, you’re going to have to pay your. I mean, you’re going to have to pay. You’re going to have to. Wow, that’s amazing. What are you saying? This Justin? You’re going to have to pay your taxes. So if you’re looking for a financial planner or an accountant who’s as proactive about your business as you are good, a hood Cpas, Cpas, dot com today, three, two, one. Boom. You are now entering the Dojo of Mojo and the thrive time show, thrive time. Show on the microphone. What is this? Top of the charts in the category of business driven down on business topics like we are a dentist into shift. Lucky if we go past that, you might get motion sick pad to the that’s stumped. The best approved three, two, one here come the business. Thrive nation. Welcome back to the thrive time show on your radio. My name is Clay Clark and today I have a hot

take that I want to break down for you. A Darlin Tucker’s on today’s show, a Darlin Tucker. D A r l o n Tucker. He’s been a graphic designer with our team. Daryl. And how long have you and I worked together or how long have you and I known each other? Do you think? It’s probably been about seven years now. Yeah. And I would say it’s about Darlin. Darlin is um, in my, my cycle I have, I have a circle of probably a

20 people in my circle in the corner. No squat in my soccer dobbin is somehow in the top 20. He vacillates from number two.

Number 19. No, but Darwin is always a consistent guy. Honestly, one of my favorite 20 people, I mean I love this guy and he’s very consistent and let me explain to our relationship. I am a rainmaker. I bring in hundreds of clients every everyday. I have just the other day, Paul, you would enjoy the story. Uh, we had an accountant who’s been looking at what you’re doing and they’re like, how can I, can you guys of work with me, you know, Roy’s garage, one of his competitors reaches out, could you work with me because everyone kind of figures out what’s happening. And then they want me to. I had a pool company the other day that asked me if I could, you know, on the dl work with them while I’m working with the direct competitor. I don’t do that kind of stuff, you know?

And so, um, I can really only work with one person in every industry and less. That owner of that particular business says that they’re open. They’re okay with me working with two of the same niche. And so I was a business coaching program. We’re only going to work with 160 clients at one time. Never going to work with more than that, but here’s the relationship. Darlene and I have, I have to bring in clients, so today I have a person who reached out to us, you say today and then yesterday in everyday, every year it’s probably two to five people everyday, real business owners with multimillion dollar companies that reach out for coaching startups, middle middle, the road companies, and then Darlene has to do the graphic design. He and the team, they have to do photography, videography, web edit, print pieces, business cards. They have to do that and I have to trust that Darlene is going to edit the indesign files for Paul Hoods.

Newest book. I’ll look under the hood so I have to believe that Darlan and the team with Jordan and Johnny, you guys are gonna. Edit the file. So when I walk into the meeting with Paul Hood on a Thursday, I have to know that by Tuesday afternoon you guys are finishing the project and by Wednesday it’s being proved. It is a relationship where you have to trust me to provide the clients I have to press the trust you to produce on the back end. And Paul, that’s probably as deep as it is. I mean, if you’re a farmer, you have to trust that somebody tilling the soil, somebody sowing the seeds, somebody watering the, the, the, the, the seeds. And somebody reaping the harvest. You have to, if you’re the farmer’s wife, you have to trust your husband’s out there, tilling the soil. So in the seeds, watering the seeds, getting the harvest, you’re the. If you’re the farmer, you have to trust your wife is not out there having an affair. Uh, teaching the kids crazy things. You have to. There’s a trust that’s built with daily diligence. So I want to get your take on this, Darlene, and I want to get your take on this. Paul Darlin. Why do you come to work and do what you’re saying? We’ll do what you say you’re going to do every day. Why do you do that?

Um, I mean, I wish I had some revelation, but I was just tired. Was brought up that way that you, you know, you do what you say you’re going to do. You just were there other people that were raised the same way you are, or you were, that have chosen not to do what they say they’re going?

Absolutely. Absolutely. Um, but just because you raised, I guess, I guess I took it to heart. You know, you just, you let it in when you’re being taught and you let it in.

Proverbs 10, four states, lazy hands make for poverty. Here comes the teaching moment, but diligent hands bring wealth. Now this is from the Bible. So this is what I believe in Paul, you and I could argue if you want. This is what I believe. I believe proverbs was divinely inspired by God. It’s the literal words of God and it says, Lazy Hands Make for poverty. So I believe that if you’re out there and you’re being lazy, it is God himself who is punishing you. I also believe that this next verse is really going to be freaking out. Oh, proverbs 13, 24, which by the way happens to be my favorite verse. I just don’t talk about it a lot because I mentioned it. People are like, you’re a sick freak. You’re a sick, you’re sick. Proverbs again, proverbs 13, 24, oh, what’s this going to state? Is it going to be negative? It states here that he that spareth the Rod, Marina Hadith his son, love it. Therefore, I believe if you’re out there and you’re a business owner, if you are an employer and you do not let your employees feel the consequences of doing a poor job, you hate your employees.

If you’re out there and you have kids and you just let them get away with murder, you hate your kids, so I would say that it is God punishing you. Poverty is God punishing you. If you’re in a free economic system and you have the ability to decide to get up or not and you choose not to, then you are actually getting in the way of God’s judgment. If you try to minimize the consequences. Now, that’s my great epiphany. Now you get into the real world where Paul, I’ve hired family friends, people I know, and people I don’t want to run out. They’re bringing out my rod. Let’s go to work today. Let’s get out my rod and whack people with it. Nobody wants to hit their employees with the Rod. So walk me through that, that balance that you deal with Paul, managing a team. When someone doesn’t do their job, you’re not a bad guy. You don’t want to punish people for being lazy. How do you, how do you deal with that?

Well, the way I deal with it, clay is I tried to assess what my staff’s needs and desires are, what their skills, their talents are. And um, I tend to use more of the, uh, the reward side of things and the withholding of a rewards. I believe that, uh, now there’s a point when you come in and, you know, it’s either beat him across the head and shoulders with a stick or um, but, you know, I believe in compensating based on extra effort. I don’t believe in, in, you know, just everybody’s going to get a pay raise because it’s this time of the year and it’s mods. We create systems and, and merit based pay the where if you do extra, I’ll pay you clay. I’ve, I’ve paid for an employee to fly to Ireland because her son was playing in a band a because she’s such a great employee, right? I’ve paid for employees to do all kinds of things that, you know, I’ve just something extra, you know, maybe they, they bought a new car and you know, and, and I helped them tag it, you know, just something out of the ordinary because they’re a players, but also do believe, um, and uh, you know, public hangings, you know, you’ve got to, if somebody steals from you, whatever. And I count and counseling my. I just want a client. The other day you got to have a public hanging.

And this is the segue into being an best business coach client or owner because if you’re an employee, the boss, it’s their job to discipline you. But if you’re an owner and you don’t do your job, Paul, what happens typically, if you’re the owner and you don’t do here in job, you go broke. Typically the customers canceled, they leave, they get upset. Nobody’s out there. Nobody out there is perfect, myself included. But I’m just trying to explain this to you. If you don’t do a good job for the customer, they’re going to just move on to somebody else. Right? And so today is, we’re breaking down the notable quotables from Jim stovall and just sort of marinating on the post Jim stovall interview. I would, I would ask you this. Jim stovall went blind and didn’t, became a New York Times best selling author. Jim stovall started with nothing and ended up writing books with Steve Forbes and has gone on to have massive success, massive success as a multimillion dollar business owner.

But he’s blind. He’s blind. He can’t see this just in when you’re blind, that means you can’t see. Oh, oh, thank you for clarifying. So if you’re out there, what excuse do you have that’s valid? Unless your brain has been pureed into a salad, there is no excuse that I think out there that is valid. You gotta just decide today, are you going to believe in your own excuses or are you going to be a diligent doer? And if you are a diligent doer, I would encourage you to take the first step. Take the first action in that shows that you believe in yourself and book your ticket for our next in person. Thrive time show two day workshop and you to be saying to yourself, I can’t afford it and that might be a great current reality for you. That might be the real reality. That might be the profound thing you’re going through, but here’s the deal. If you subscribe to the thrive time, show on itunes and leave us an objective review an email us proof that you did it by emailing us to [email protected]. Email us your contact information to [email protected]. We will give you free tickets to the in person workshop I got to do is buy the workbook for like 27 bucks. So there’s no excuses my friend. We’d love to see what our workshop and as always three, two, one boom.