Ep 146: The Easy Way To Earn More With Less Stress with David Ralph

How would you like to earn more money with less stress and less work? I know it's a massive pipe dream for most people, but hear me out. I'm Jaryd Krause, host of the Buying Online Businesses podcast, and in this episode, I'm speaking with David Ralph from JoinUp Dots, which is in the top 0.5% of the best podcasts online. It's a seriously awesome podcast, and David lives and breathes business coaching and has helped countless people’s businesses. And in this podcast episode, David and I talk about how to identify the dots in your life and how to join them up.

And these are the pivotal moments that allow you to project scale and growth without working more or having more stress, allowing you to actually earn more money. And this all comes from reflection and learning how to see the wisdom within your own life and within your own business. And there are certain things that you can do to be able to unlock these things. So this is really a podcast about business mindsets and how to evolve in a way that shapes the lifestyle that you actually want. You are not shaping a business because you have to, your business is your life.

This is about creating a business and turning it into a great one that you love and get a lot of fulfillment out of. We also talk about how he bought his business just recently and what you should learn from him and take his advice on when you're buying your business. We also talk about how to harness your hunger for growth in business and in life and how this hunger can be a two-edged sword, how it can distract you, how it can disrupt things and cause destruction in your life, but how it can also fuel growth in business and life as well, and how to harness that energy into the right channel at the right time in the right place to actually evolve in your business and life and actually have a better lifestyle.

Like I said, while earning more money with less stress, we also talk about how to overcome obstacles and all the cool things that David has talked about on his podcast with many world-class guests and speakers. This is seriously a delightful episode. It is the funniest episode that I have done on the podcast in a long, long time.

Probably ever, and I really enjoyed it. I know that you're absolutely going to love it. So let's get stuck in. Today's episode is brought to us by Niche Website Builders, which is a company that a few of my clients are using and have used for content creation and link building services that are everything from start to finish. So from keyword research all the way to uploading your completed article, We've also had Bob members join ready-made affiliate sites built by Niche website builders. So if you're looking to outrank your competitors' content links, niche website builders, I have a special deal for you.

Head to nichewebsite.builders/bob. I'll put a link in the show notes for you. But again, that's www.nichewebsite.builders/bob. Do you want to start investing in websites, but don't want to drop $20,000 on your first investment? Check out Odys, where you can buy premium age domains to build a website on and add Odys done for you affiliate site package to help you grow your website and get seen. Instead of buying a crummy website that's been built to sell with no authority, buy a premium domain with built-in authority, great SEO, and fresh, quality content for your website. Head to odys.global to check out their great deals. That's O-D-Y-S.G-L-O-B-A-L. The link will be in the description too.

David Ralph, thank you for coming on. It is an absolute delight to be here, sir, connecting across the globe, even though I've been doing this for years and this is the way it is. It still blows my mind that we can watch Star Trek and click and see each other and FaceTime and stuff. It's never going to be boring to me. Well, imagine what it's going to be like when the metaverse becomes a bigger thing. It's going to be crazy. We'll be able to holograph into each other's lives. What a way to open up the metaverse the other day. What a way to open up the conversation. Oh, it's madness. It's madness. I don't know what the men from Facebook and Zuckerberg are talking about. Life is about having connections. I think the metaverse is taking us away from that connection. And yeah, I'm upset with it as well because you're right, if you look at the hierarchy of needs of individuals and humans, one is Real human connection, and I mean, we're connecting now, which is cool, but it's not the same as human connection Being being in each other's energy fields or sitting, you know, being close to one another in the flesh. That is where people start to live in their own bubble in their own room and spend all that time there, and then I want to touch you. That's what I'm trying to say. I want to touch you in the flesh.

Let's have a hug. We won't take it any further than that. But yeah, I got blown away by the metaverse. I just thought this was insane. Well, what a way to open up the podcast! Let's dive into some other mindset stuff that's going to warp our minds as business owners. So I wanted to chat with you because I came on your podcast, and it was honestly just a delight to chat. We just had a really good connection, and I wanted to bring you on to talk about mindsets, our favorite subject here. And yeah, first, before we dive into mindsets, I wanted to ask you, have you bought a business before?

I have. I bought a business recently, actually. I've got an offline business, which is a car spares and accessories business that was failing. It was a family business, and it was doing extremely well 50 years ago and really well 40 years ago, but as the market changed and fewer people could own cars and men had their own cars, the business was going downhill.

I would turn it around using my online skills. It's been a bit of a drag in certain regards, but it's been good for me as well, because I don't know if you feel the same, Jaryd. And like the metaverse, there really is a similar sort of connection. When you are an online business coach and a podcaster, you can become quite isolated and lose track of your real business skills. And that's about building relationships, providing value, and satisfying customers.

And so it's been very good in that regard, getting me back into a real life arena where proper customers are coming in, some of them delighted with you, some of them not, and you've got the ability to turn one around and get somebody in again. So it's been very good. But it's not as easy as doing the online work, you know, getting somebody to come into a property is a lot harder. But it's still basically the same principle.

So a lot of people would agree. I mean, you've bought a business that has been around for quite a while. I remember us chatting briefly about this on your podcast about the family business. You know, a lot of people here want to either buy a business or grow the business they've just bought. What would you say to them as a piece of advice that you'd learned through the purchasing phase that they should be tuned into?

Exit strategy. Know what you're getting into and how you're going to get out of it. And I think that's the piece that people screw up on, especially when they're building a business themselves. I work with a lot of people, and I say to them, You know, this is dying, you need outside help; you need new eyes to look at this. But because they're so precious about the growth, they actually cut their losses and found an escape.

And I see every business as a learning experience, and it's a learning experience where you've got to paint yourself closest to the door. You've got to make the decisions that may not be pleasant to make, but they toughen you up. But ultimately, you know, when it's the right time to say goodbye. That's enough. That business isn't mine anymore, and I'm leaving it. And we can see that.

Online, and we can see it, you know, we've got quite, you know, huge companies where they outstay their welcome. And you know, Blockbusters is the classic example of how he should have gotten out of it years ago. But because it was his business and he was precious about it, he stayed in, thinking that the market was going to turn. If the market is turning away from you, you've got to be canny enough to say, I'm going to turn the other way and just cut my losses and get out. And I think that's one of the things that people don't like to see.

It's so tough when you've been ingrained in a business for so long and you've built all these processes and systems and how the business works and you've put everything into it, and some people are just at the stage where they're like, How can I even have the energy to change as the market changes, which I think would be a tough thing. You work with a lot of people as a business coach, including a lot of people just starting out.

Out, sort of starting their business. Why do you think so many people fail in business? What do you think that is? I know this 100%. Without a doubt, it's their personal belief. Especially with newbies, I say to them all the time that it is easier, or at least as easy, to make a ton of money online than it is to earn a pittance.

When new guys come along, they're all looking at creating tiny little products and tiny little entrance points into the market. When I say to them, Let's go big, let's find somebody that will pay you a million pounds, and then work backwards from that point, there's a real mindset piece where they're going, Who's going to pay a million pounds? You know what value I can provide that's worth, and I always say to them, it's not your value. You've just got to collect the value from other people, and you could put a package together where you get Jaryd teaching this and David teaching that, and then you step away from it. You're the conduit for value. And I think that's the biggest point that I see. People don't believe that they can actually make a ton of money.

So they kind of limp into a world where we've seen it thousands of times before, Joe, where it's about let's create a Facebook community and try to bring people from there over. No, let's go big. Let's think big, and let's try to hit it out of the park. And then you will be past all these people spending their time trying to build Instagram accounts and Pinterest boards.

Belief and go for it. Bit ranty there, sir. Sorry.

I was a bit random there, but that's what I think. This is what this podcast is going to be about. I'm so in the mindset. Because a belief is a mindset. And I agree with the person who is working, and I got this from Naval Ravi Khan, who has a beautiful philosophy on business and life. And talking about somebody that works at the corner store that makes $80,000 in their business a year as a wage and may work 80 to 90 hours a week, right? And they're managing, owning, or running this corner store.

May make the same amount of money, or sorry, will do the same amount of work as somebody who's running a $10 million business but pockets, you know, maybe three to $5 million, but does the same amount of work. It's crazy to think that, but I agree with you. Like you can, you can start off at the bottom selling these drink bottles with a profit margin of $2, or you could sell something bigger that makes a profit margin of $2,000 or $20,000.

Less work means less work, right? Is that what you're getting at? Yeah, it absolutely is. It's down to that. I can provide something that the market is waiting for. You know, I always give them a classic example of, you know, Porsche engines. You know, if you can get a Porsche engine second hand or used, somebody's going to come along.

Now, how many customers do you need in a year? You don't, but you found something that people are wanting. And I use the example of Porsche engines, because I know there's a marketplace for them. Okay. And classic Ford cars using that, you know, of the 80s, that the profit margin on those is phenomenal at the moment. I put a Ford Escort back in and put a sheet over it and left it for 30 years, it'd be worth a fortune.

You know, people are looking for those kind of things. And it is. It's trying to find that smallest niche market with the biggest profit on it, you know, and it's just that. But you find that the majority of people that come through to me. And what I do now, Joey, is that when I started teaching people, I made the mistake of trying to help people find a business idea.

So they'd come through to me, and they'd say, You know, I'd read that to start my own business,s and we'd work on ideas. Now I say to them, No, it and not up to you to find the business idea. It's up to you to allow the business idea to come to you. So we now teach people to, you know, find a hundred business ideas and then do the research, the data analysis to filter it down, filter it down, filter it down until five drop out of the bottom, all winners, And think to yourself, Where do my passions and skills sit within those? Okay. And so it's real mining for gold, totally different from how I used to do it. Now I say to them, Look, we're business owners, we're not in it for passion. We're not in it for, you know, if you find your thing, you never work again, and all that kind of stuff, we're in it to make a really good living and pay bills. And sometimes that's going to be a business that you don't potentially love. But as a business owner, you should love making money because that's the only reason we're in business. So that's how I do it now. I just want to pause this episode for an immediate update. Online business owners and website investors.

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That's buyingonlinemusinesses.co, Ford slash online summit. There'll be a link in the description too. Yeah, I think about this mindset a lot when people are trying to make money online. That's my niche, I guess, or industry. I don't really like it because every single platform that I advertise on hates me because I'm in the make money online niche.

For the mindset of somebody who's like, I want to get out of my job and I want to make money online, The hardest thing is, I think, part of that belief that they may not have the strongest belief that they can do it, or they don't have the long-term grit to do it. And I think I said there's two things that are important for people who want to just make money online, and this is pretty biased. So for yourself, David, and everybody else listening, my opinion is pretty biased. I think if people just want to make money, why don't they go and buy a business that's already set up and established and already making money?

Because they don't need to care about the niche as much. They need to care about the business, make sure it does well, and become passionate, which is my passion, right? I'm not so passionate about all the niches that I'm in, but I love the business and the business models, the strategy, and the growth, and I become passionate about the growth of the business. So if your only goal is to make money, why not buy something? But then some people come to me and say, Joe, you know, I want to start a business.

And I believe that if you start a business, the best thing that you should have in your corner is a business. Take that business and run with it for more than 10 years because the startup phase is so hard, right? Like, you know, you can just go buy something that's already making money or you can buy an investment that's already making money, but that startup phase, you know, if you're not bought into it with passion, even the smallest thing can come up. That smallest problem can come up and be like, Oh, that's too big to tackle, and you're out, and then you're wasting your time, effort, energy, and money. What do you think about that, David?

I think you're absolutely right. I do. I think that, you know, why not find something? Because there are so many businesses out there where the owners have just run out of steam. End of story. And they've been in it for so long, which are great local businesses. I'm a great advocate for local businesses, because the competition is lower. And if the competition is there, they're not very good at driving traffic, marketing, or SEO. They're basically operating through word of mouth. I'll give you an example.

We've just launched, me and my brother. We've just started a business, and it's for electric charging points for cars. And so on the side of houses, we are now going around and installing that. Now he's a trained electrician. We've had to jump through many different hoops to get him signed off. But I'm doing the online business and he's doing the offline business, and we're working together now on a startup right from scratch. We've hardly put any money into it, but we know that that is a market that is exploding.

And even this week, the government has said, all new houses from now on will have to have a charging point because they want all cars to be electric, you know? And so we looked at that. And that was one of those times that he came to me and said, I'd like to start my own business. I'm fed up with working for somebody. He came up with about five or six really stupid ideas.

Instantly, you could see that was it. And when you look at the marketplace, there's no competition. And so that was great as well. So it is, it's one of those things where you can either go with an existing business that has just run out of steam or breathe new life into it with your passion. I'm a great believer in that, because I've done that myself with the car business. Or you can look in your local market and think about things, and sustainability is brilliant because that's the buzz word. So another thing I'll give to people, electric bike kits.

People converting their push bikes into electric bikes is a brilliant market to get into. Solar panels—anything to do with being green and saving the planet Evergreen Business is not going out of business. And fortunately, you can get in before most people. Yeah, awesome. A lot of people just had ticks going off in their heads because I'm all about evergreen.

Business is hard, like even when we've worked out what we're going to buy or what business we're going to patronize, there are things that are going to come up that we just can't anticipate, right? And it could be a change in market, your marketing, you may have lost a bunch of traffic from a particular platform or a bunch of customers because you've got a single source of dependency on customers, and it can really hurt your business.

What do you teach people in terms of strategies, how to handle things that happen in business, and how to overcome those sorts of obstacles? Because, you know, it can crush people, and it really can be in business, it can be a make or break for some people. So how do you help and guide people through that sort of stuff?

Well, I think there's always an angle. You know, I'll give you an example with the car business. It was failing. It was failing big time. And the reason it was failing was because a lot of the historic customers had either gotten old and retired or passed away. It was a very sort of old scale business. And to compete in the automobile business, you've either got to go on price, which will kill you. Or you've got to go on something that I like to call gap marketing, where you see the gaps that no one else is interested in out there and target those.

So we went and targeted the classic cars, the Volvo estates, and the non sexy vehicles that people have in their garages that they suddenly are struggling for parts for. And I think that's one of the things that people will struggle with when their business needs to pivot. They've got to go back to basics and look at the customer.

You've got to look at the customer and think, Okay, is our customer still viable to us? And if they're not, what is the new stage of customer that we've got to go for? And through that process, you will see that marketing actually becomes easy. The data makes sense, because you're working on a fresh version of the old one. And so that's what I did with the business. I looked at it and thought we needed a new customer. We need a new customer base, and we need to do things in a different way. I looked at the whole marketplace and thought, "Who's not being sought for?" And I basically did thousands and thousands of Google searches on Google Maps and Google My Business.

And every time something appeared, I jotted it down. Every time something didn't, I would put myself in that position and then, three weeks later, do a search. Oh yes, I am there. Tick, tick, I'm in there. And I just looked at how we were moving ourselves into the gaps left behind. And the beauty of it is, once you get one customer coming in and they like their service, then it's quite easy to say, You know, tell your neighbors about us. Online, it's a little bit more difficult, but it all comes down to reviews, and it doesn't matter what your business is; it still comes down to the fact that somebody either likes you or they don't like you.

Get reviews and get testimonials, and use those as your social media, not some clever kind of graphic that you think is just going to hit the spot. Business is all about trust and loyalty, and the stories and people you know are really safe. End of story. And it doesn't matter with my coaching. You know, I do a lot of coaching. I spend more time talking to the people, trying to push them away to say, You know, make sure you're alright. Come back next week if you still like it. Talk to your spouse. Have a conversation with your spouse, because your spouse has got to be on your side. This is a big investment, you know. Come back to me. The ones that come out at the top end are your perfect customers.

They're willing to invest in you. They're willing to do the work because, you know, you haven't jumped all over them. You've made them believe in you, trust you. And once you get that, everything becomes easier again. You'll find that yourself, Jaryd, I'm sure that the ones that really put the money into you are the ones that do the work, listen to you, and take your advice. Pushing people away. It's just a different energy. So I used to do a lot of sales. I used to have a sales team, and I used to build my own sales team, head up the sales team, and, you know, teach them. I used to teach sales, and there's a very different energy between them that I just don't think can be faked. A lot of people tried to fake it in sales, like the wantingness and neediness of needing the money to put food on the table, and I came from that.

But when you get to the point where the money isn't a big thing, then the energy between yourself and the customer changes. You can be very grounded, and you don't need them as a client. Instead, what's more important than money is your reputation, doing the right thing, and your ethics and values.

And that's why I think, you know, I pushed someone away just this week. I sent them an email, and they told me they wanted to work with me as a client for coaching, and They told me how much they were making. I was like, Maybe they're not at the level to pay for my coaching. So I told them, You know, look, this is how much this costs. You know, are you at this level? This is something you're willing to invest in if you want.

But you know you need to understand that this is going to be an investment, and you may not get the ROI now. It may take you a little bit longer to get it, and it will cost you this amount. So they thought about it, and they came back and said, Yeah, you're right, let's wait till I get to that level. So that's about buying trust. You know, this person will probably go and tell somebody that, like, Look, I want to get to this level so I can work with Jaryd, and I'm a strong believer in showing people that, you know, results are the only reason people want to; they don't care about me.

They don't care about, Oh, I just want to talk to Jaryd. They don't care about that. Nobody cares about just talking to Jaryd. They want it for themselves as a result. Right. So how can you, like, I think, you know, turn people down. If I say to them, Send me an email on Monday, and they don't send me an email on Monday. They send it on Wednesday, whatever. You're setting traps. They're gone.

But if they don't do that, then I think, hang on, it's not worth it. You know, if they do send it on Monday, I think, okay, I told them to do that, and they did that. You know, there's clues to that relationship moving forward. Yeah, it gives you insight. I guess it gives you that insight of, is this person really wanting it? And if they don't do it like what I tell them, you know, you're giving them, you're telling them to do something for free.

Do this on this day. They don't do it. They're definitely not going to do it when they pay you. Yeah, so Yeah, it's strange how people operate. Yeah, some of it comes back to that belief that some people aren't just Hungry enough, and hunger may not be the correct word, but they just May not want it bad enough. So what do you say to people like that? I think you're right.

I do think it is hunger. I think it's the Eye of the Tiger. You know, we used to watch that in the Rocky films. And I saw it the other day, actually. There's that girl—that British girl, Emma Radhikhanu. And she was playing a tennis match, and she won the US Open. And there was a shot that she missed, and she looked up at the camera and her coach, and I could see it in her eyes. And it was like, No matter what happens, I'm going to win this match. You know?

Could just see every ball that she'd hit over the net since she was five years old, four years old, it had come down to this moment, and she wasn't going to lose it. And you don't get that very often with people. It's not that they want the fast track, they want the results. And more often than not, they're not willing to do the work. You know, the fact that I've been running my business for nearly 10 years now, only my business.

For nearly 10 years now, and every morning I'm at my desk more or less at the same time doing the same thing. You know, I go to bed with the results, but they're not willing to actually hit those balls across that net every single morning for hour upon hour upon hour. It's strange. You've either got it or you haven't. I don't think it's nature and nurture, and I don't think you can, you know, get it if you haven't got it. Because that was going to be my next question.

I think I've manufactured it a little bit, or I've sort of added fuel to the fire. Like the competitiveness between my siblings and myself had maybe added fuel to the fire, and then some things in the personal development world of, you know, manifesting, and, you know, there's a lot of fluff in that type of stuff. There's some good stuff in it as well.

I think there are parts of it that have been managed. I have manufactured it for myself, which has worked. So you don't think that there are some things that we can do to really build that belief in ourselves, build that willingness and desire for this or build that hunger up.

No, I think you said it. You had the fire, and you threw extra on the fire. You know, I think you need to have something, and more often than not, it is the, you know, are you running away from something or running towards something? And a lot of people want to be happy, but they're not willing to do the things that make you happy. A lot of people want a beautiful girlfriend or a beautiful husband, whatever, but they're not actually going out on 100 dates with people to find the right one. You know, it's the non-important stuff that brings about the importance, you know? And I think with you, if you've got that fire in your belly to actually, you know, as I'm talking now, I can actually feel it kind of come up to me. It's like a blaze inside me. And I can't get rid of it.

And there was a time when that took me over. And I know you had burnout, and I had burnout where it was, it was crazy times. The fire was blazing. Now I've got it under control, but it doesn't take a lot for it to come out. But yeah, if you say to somebody, You know, send an email on Monday, and they don't do it, how much study do you want? Yeah, it's awesome energy. But it can be like I can feel it now as well in myself; it is very much a lack.

You get hungry, which is a good word for it. And like you said with the burnout thing, I am still always running towards things. Like if you see me in the water, if you see me when I'm training, or if you see me when I'm surfing, I'm always the one that's going to fall off because I'm going higher on the ramp or doing something just stupid.

Ability is not ready for an injury myself, and you know it can get me; it can be helpful, but it can also be ignorance, and I feel the older that I get, The more I understand that that is a good energy, And if I just learn how to channel it at the right time, yesterday I could have worked 12 hours Because I've got the hunger for it, and you know you and I could work 100 or 120 hour work weeks. It's just not the right thing to do, though, is it?

So for those people that are listening, that are like, You know, they're hungry, They're like, I want to buy an online business, I want to make money online; I want to be in business; or they are in business. What are some of the ways that people can learn to channel that energy to the right, so they're not just, you know, causing destruction as entrepreneurs in their lives?

Yeah, I think the three hours, I really think the three hours—you know, know what you're going to do in those three hours, work hard for three hours. And then that's about enough. It really is. You know, I was working 16, 20 hour days, hardly sleeping. And I look back on it. Most of that was crap. You know, I was doing the hours. But none of that's really around my business now. It was not valuable.

And so I think three hours on the business and three hours on your own, you know, might be enough to go for a walk in the country. Meditate. People are told they can't meditate. Now I spend so much time meditating because I know it's bringing the gold back into my business, you know, and I still feel slightly embarrassed talking about meditation because it's just not something that I do, and so I think that's the one thing.

Know what you're going to hit that three hour with, really work on that three hour and then switch off and then go off and do something else, you know? And you will get so much done instead of just turning your laptop on, checking your emails, going onto Facebook, having a coffee, coming back, and then it's lunchtime, three hours in, three hours out. I really like it because I had a conversation with the mastermind just two days ago. Somebody that's come in that's a little bit younger than me and has so much good energy is going to do well, but only if that energy is channeled. So I said to him, Look, You're going to do really well if you do it the right way, if you follow a strategy, and if you don't go outside.

Lines too many times. Otherwise, you're just going to go around and chase the shiny ball too much. So I kind of like to prescribe people homework. And what I said to him was, Look, what I want you to do is do this task and do this work and say it's three hours, right? As an example, do three hours of homework. And when you're not doing the homework, Turn off your computer and shut your laptop down. And actually, I think I said to turn off the internet. And he's like, What do you mean?

I said, Well, what we have a tendency to do, and this is my tendency a lot younger, is, alright, I've done that task; what else can I do to make money? What else can I do to get out of the survival phase of my job? So I'll go away and learn crypto, share trading, and all these other sorts of distracting things. And what I find when people go away and do that, David, is that they put energy into that three hour work that's going to get them a result. And what they do is spend that other energy that they have on things that are distractions. And then when they come back to do their work, they're tired.

And they don't get it as well. And so I prescribed to him, Go on your way in that time off after those three hours, don't do any work, force yourself to do something that fulfills you. And what I mean by fulfilling is a hobby, you know, meditating is hugely fulfilling. I get a lot of fulfillment out of it as well, David. It could be spending time with your partner, your kids, anything that's not work that actually fulfills you, and then you'll find that once you've really filled your cup up with fulfillment, when you come back to those three hours of work, your hunger is overflowing; it's peaking at the top, and the work that you produce is going to provide a way better result, and I think that's a huge downfall of people that have so much hunger and they spend it on the wrong things. What do you think?

Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. There's a big piece.

Yeah, no, I think so. Today, my wife and I went on our adventure day. And what I do, I secretly plan a trip quite locally, but it's got to be a little bit more difficult. So today we had to get over to the River Thames, which is near me. And then we paid for a little ferry to take us across. And we've never been on this ferry before.

And then we got off at the other end. We went to some shops. We had a bite to eat at the, you know, and then we came back and it's like a little mini holiday and we don't know where we're going; she was playing the next one, so it's a surprise, you know, and you come back and you feel recharged, you feel refreshed, and you're ready to go again, and we called him our little adventure days, and it's a holiday in a day, a vacation in a day really, and it doesn't have to cost a lot of money, but it gets you away from your kids, the business, the internet, you know, and we find that's great. And then tomorrow when I start again, I'm ready for it. I'm already ready for now. I could do it now, but I won't. I will wait till tomorrow. Yeah, because imagine if you did just go, Um, I'll work the whole day, and then the next day I've got my three hours, you know, and I didn't do it. Producing great work in that three hours is a lot less than, hey, I've filled my cup up. I wanted to ask you about the dots. You know, you've got, I'm a huge believer in feedback, not just feedback in business, but in life and what things are actually telling us. And I have my conclusions and ideologies around what the join up dots means. So guys, if you haven't listened to join up dots podcast, it is the podcast to listen to.

Just the way you've said it, David, was beautiful when I first heard it. So check that out, guys, there'll be links in the show notes. That part usually comes at the end of the podcast. But yeah, tell us what joining dots means to you and the philosophy around it, if there is one.

Yeah, there is a philosophy, and Steve Jobs basically did a commencement speech back in 2005 when he stood up and said three short stories, and the premise of it was that you can't see how your life's going to pan out until you look back and connect the dots. And he says you've got to have trust; you've gotta have faith that your path will lead to something. And so what he's basically saying is that by living your life every single day, you gain experience.

You get good things, you get bad things, but it's up to you to pay enough attention to what's happening in your life and not just be one of the walking dead going from situation to situation and really sort of take control of your own life. And so I've got a show called Join Up Dots, and every time we talk to people like Jaryd, we say, You know, what was your big dot when you looked back on it? What was the one that you said, God, without that.

Where I am, and more often than not, they're the worst things in your life. You know, in my case, I had a boss at work who was an absolute cow and made my life terrible, and I had no reason other than to say, I can't do this anymore; I've got to leave. Now if I ever met her again, I would go, Thank you so much for being a complete cow. You made my life a misery, but without you, I wouldn't be where I am today, and then the acute once again was a terrible time, but now that I'm so far away from it, I think, Thank God for that.

I mean, in such a better state, my business is better, and so it's really the ability to look back and constantly be taking the experiences that are good with you but learning from the bad ones, and it's the bad ones that, when you're far enough away, become like white dots and not black dots; they become the ones that you go through again. That was terrible, but God without that, you know. And we've all got those in our lives.

We've all got, we go into a bar, we meet somebody, and we think it's going to be brilliant. What a great experience. And then they turn out to be completely mental, and they ruin our lives. And then, through that experience, we meet somebody else that we would never have met, and we go, That's the love of our life. It's a really cathartic way of operating when there's no good luck. There's no bad luck. It's just life and experience. Wow, there's so much wisdom in that. I would almost go as far as to say that you are working with so many people, David, and know those stages in life. All those dots—I should say, as an entrepreneur, it seems like we've all got similar dots.

Similar big dots are yours with your boss, similar to my work, your burnout, my burnout, how you would have changed your life and business once you had your burnout, how I was, you know, probably forced to, like I was, that's really cool, so are you, and most people can't really see these dots themselves until they've looked back in hindsight.

But yeah, it's very much the case. But once you get an understanding of the dots, you can almost pivot them to become stepping stones. You can actually see it and you can think, Right, I'm good at this. I know that I'm good at this skill that I've developed. So how do I take this skill and make it into something? Okay. And it's not.

Like we were talking about, Oh, find our passion. It's about being very pragmatic. You know, I'm very open. And I say my three big skills are one, I can motivate people, and I can communicate very well. And three, I can break down very complex subjects into understandable content. And those are my three talents. And it doesn't seem like a lot. And you kind of think to yourself, Well, how do I use that? How do I use this stuff to start a business?

And that's one of the things that, once again, people struggle with. They struggle to see the things that they naturally do amazingly well, and they dismiss them because, Oh, I can just do that. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Ronaldo can just hit a ball from 30 yards into the top corner. You know, you know, who needs that? A lot of people need that. A lot of people need that, and they will pay a lot of money.

Wow. That's awesome. David, I'm just sitting here listening and going. You're definitely talking to me because there are things that, you know, I was speaking to a guy who's raising a $100 million fund a couple of weeks ago. He's like, I'm trying to work out what you're about, Jaryd. I'm trying to figure out what you're good at and what your skills are. And I'm thinking, Look, I know a lot about online business, and I know a lot about these things.

And he's talking about the similar things that you mentioned, you know, the soft skills that I know I have but don't feel that I get across to people and say, This is, you know, these are my skills. I think I feel that we're very similar in terms of communication, breaking down complex problems. That's really, really interesting to think about turning the dots into stepping stones, where you can almost anticipate that something could become a dot and decide that. As a force of energy in a different direction or a better direction. Is that what you mean? Yeah, absolutely. And you only get that by walking away from your business, becoming quiet, and allowing the feelings to come to you, And I'm a great believer; as I said to you at the very beginning, you said, You know, how's your life at the moment? And I said to you, I'm not doing much at all. You know, it's a very quiet end of the year because you need to have that break to allow, ah, yeah, I understand.

And I think a lot of us experienced that in lockdown when we were suddenly forced to be in our homes and not come out, and everything became quiet and the roads were quiet. I think a lot of us suddenly gained clarity where previously we were just running, running, running, running all the time. And then suddenly, it stopped. And you see that with musicians like Paul McCartney and Alton John, and you know all these people, they all made lockdown albums because suddenly they had all this free time and albums because suddenly they had all this free time and because suddenly they had all this free time and best work, so the creativity came to the fore, and they probably did back in my life, and because they weren't a lot of people, I used to quit my job, Brian.

The machine would just travel for, like, six months to a year and a half. And you're just explaining a dot that's happened, like the big dots that have happened to me. I was at work, and the dot ran away from me. I had to go look at my life, be forced to look at my life, and then make that change. I think those are forcing moments—I guess it's hard for a lot of people to get out of the conveyor belt when they feel like they're stuck in it. To force themselves to, I think that, you know, one of my mentors, a real estate mentor, said about what wisdom is, wisdom is knowledge plus reflection.

Can equal wisdom, where you've learned so much, but when you stop and reflect back, that feedback, I guess, is vital. I don't think enough people do that in business, where they actually track things, spend a bit of time each week to look at their business, and go, What is it doing? Not what am I doing in the business, what is the business doing? Do you see that as well with business owners? It's not really getting feedback from the business. Yeah, I do want to see an increase. They're not interested in the plateau, you know?

And I think the plateau is brilliant. You know, when my business is plateauing and it's done it numerous times, I don't have to strive for anything because it's kind of bringing money in. I'm having a nice life. So why am I sort of climbing again? And I see that as the part of the piece where I'm getting ready for the climb up, and as soon as you get there, I go, Oh look, there's another one. We're going to go straight up there. You'd go, you're mental. But in business, a lot of it is like that. It's all about just climbing, climbing, climbing. And so I do think that people don't look at what the business is doing, but I don't think they appreciate that there's got to be times that the business has to go into hibernation. And you have to go into hibernation.

It's time for you to regroup, take a breather, and get ready for the next stage. And more often than not, when you come out of that, you know what the next stage is, you know, you know, hang on, I've got an idea, this is it; the excitement comes up, you're ready for it, you've got the connections, you start building it. But when you're just climbing, climbing, climbing, all you do is get to the top and you think, oh my God, there's another, there's another step to go.

That's a really good way to look at it. Once you get to the top, let's go climb another one. I guess most people will also just finish climbing. They see the next bit. Don't take a break. Yeah. Which is madness. It's total madness, but we've all done it. We've all done it. You know, I started JoinUpDots. JoinUpDots is now, and I hate quoting these, but it demonstrates the story. It's in the top 0.5 percent of podcasts.

I had this company come through to me, and they said they'd monitored it all and stuff. So out of about 3 million podcasts, it's in the 0.5% range. There was a time I was striving, striving, striving to get bigger and bigger and bigger constantly, and it almost killed me. And so I stopped and thought, What am I actually striving for here? You know, how many of these people that listen to my podcast are filling my bank account? Very few. So what am I actually aiming for?

And I realized then that I had to think about the enjoyment of actually listening to the podcast. And when I enjoyed it more, the audience took care of itself because they enjoyed it more, you know, but there was certainly a time when it was like the global dominance I was aiming for. And that takes time. That takes time. That takes investment. That takes a team. But do you actually need it? Do you need global dominance? And yeah, don't. It's just a hassle.

I often look at people that are doing, you know, eight figures in business with big teams, you know, moving into even bigger than that, you know, striving for the, you know, nine figure mark, and you can go all the way to a billion dollar business. But if I look at their lifestyles, I'm like, Like you, there's a lot that they miss. There is a lot that they miss. They don't get, they tell you what, David, they're not going out and having adventure days with their partners; they're not going away and surfing, and If you're living to just work, and I think you know some people get a lot of fulfillment from work, but you're getting all your fulfillment from one source, it probably isn't you. It's not a balanced diet. Is it? There's going to be a trillion clouds soon.

There's got to be a trillion air, you know a millionaire wants to be a billionaire and every millionaire wants to be a billionaire and there's going to be a billionaire that becomes a trillionaire and you you go when there enough you know my dad once said this to me and when I was striving striving striving he said to me how many dinners can you eat each day and I said what does that mean that you know what he says if you've got hungry, you've got a roof over your head and you've got a lovely life and you can leave it all behind and come back to it. Surely that's success.

I totally agree with him now. I totally agree with him, but there was a time I couldn't. I couldn't agree with him. It was more, more, more. And once again, it's that understanding, I suppose. Is it wisdom, or is it just the life of hard knocks?

When you're on your deathbed, you're going to be remembering the experiences you've had. You're going to be remembering the love you've had. You're not going to remember how much money is sitting in a bank account that you've forgotten about. I think somebody said, I don't want to be the richest man in a cemetery. And I think that's true. And that's where the dots join up again. The dots join up. Because life is a journey.

Life is showing us, you know, that we should never have a completed business. We should never have a completed relationship. We should always be moving towards it while enjoying the dots as they happen, being in the present. And I don't think I've been the best person at doing that in the past. Well, I certainly haven't either. Either David or I didn't even know how to get feedback in my life.

Reflection or any of that sort of stuff. But as we evolve and hopefully people listen to this episode, I'm sure they've learned a bunch. I mean, there's so much wisdom in this episode, and I just want to say thank you for that, David. That's all, and you and I really appreciate it. And yeah, join up the dots. Is that where we're going to send people? You can send them there. You go over to Google and type in join up dots, and you'll find me, and everything spins off from there.

Right. Awesome.

David really appreciate it Guys, check out join up Dots; it's an awesome podcast and we'll see you on the next one.

Thanks, Jaryd.