Many of us have an unhealthy relationship with money and may even experience feelings of guilt in the pursuit of making a healthy living. In this episode, join host, Erin E Hooley and special guest Chris Harder as he shares his ultimate money mindset. Take control of your finances by taking control of your relationship with them.
Many of us have an unhealthy relationship with money and may even experience feelings of guilt in the pursuit of making a healthy living. In this episode, join host, Erin E Hooley and special guest Chris Harder as he shares his ultimate money mindset. Take control of your finances by taking control of your relationship with them.
Welcome to the conquering chaos podcast. I'm your host, Aaron[inaudible], president and founder of multimillion dollar e-commerce children's clothing line. Bailey's blossoms. So it turns out I'm pretty good at business, but what really lights my soul on fire is providing other entrepreneurs and mompreneurs with the tools they need to truly succeed. So if you have a business or have one on your heart, you're in good company, pull up a chair or dropping some earbuds and let's conquer some chaos today. Many of us have an unhealthy relationship with money and may even experience feelings of guilt in the pursuit of making a healthy living. Well, today's guest is none other than Chris harder, and it's one of my favorite interviews to date. A few months ago, I had the honor of being on Chris's podcast for the love of money and loved every second of speaking with him. So I knew I had to get him to pour into our community as well. Chris is one of those people that exudes fire and passion and just a contagious excitement for entrepreneurship and all. He has accomplished both solo as well as in partnership with his wife Laurie. He believes that when good people make good money, they do great things and I couldn't agree more. So I am so honored to introduce you to today's guest, mr Chris. Harder.
Speaker 2:Aaron. Totally my pleasure. And I feel like we just chatted, gosh, last month or something. It goes so quick.
Speaker 1:Time is going by so quickly it's blowing my mind. And on top of that, you've been doing quite a bit of traveling I see as well, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I feel like I'm always traveling lately. Um, matter of fact, I'm leaving again for New York this weekend coming up. I'll be home for a day next week and then I head to Scottsdale to speak and to, um, San Diego to speak. So it's, I'm just in one of those seasons, right where we're in a season of productivity.
Speaker 1:Awesome. I love it. I love it. I'm going to be in Arizona here shortly in the next two weeks for an inc 5,000 conference, so we may overlap there a little bit.
Speaker 2:Oh, amazing.
Speaker 1:So I actually love the whole concept of money mindset. It's just super fascinating to me. And so many of us I believe are just, we're led to believe or we, we believed in our growing up that money is bad and it leads to self-serving and arrogance. But you teach that that's not the case. So I'd love to know more about the Genesis of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure. So what are they always say? They say that you kind of teach what you needed the most? So I think podcasts and, and me teaching this is of course me just working it out out loud for everybody else to listen in on. And I'd say the Genesis of this was growing up. Um, I had a Midwest upbringing. Now the great thing about a Midwest upbringing is this, you get really good roots. Um, like great family values, great work ethic, um, you know, just good foundational things to build your platform on. But one of the, you know, traits of the Midwest is they're a little bit more conservative when it comes to talking about money and talking about success and, and wanting your showing nice things. And that's neither good or bad. It's literally just a fact of area. And so growing up I knew two things about myself. One, I was from the youngest of ages, I'm talking like four and five years old playing with matchbox cars. I was drawn to the nicest of things and to beautiful things and to wealth and, and to success. I mean it was in me as a kid long before I could like form stories and all that stuff. And then I also knew this as a fact about me. I was generous as a child. Um, I remember even in middle school, sharing money or buying things for friends, high school, same thing, picking up the tab, even though money is scarce in high school, college, same thing. And, and as an adult, that trade is carried on. And here's where the, well the, let's call it, the polarity started to happen. Um, you're taught growing up to be generous and to be kind with your, your money. But then you're also taught to not pursue wealth and pursue nice things and certainly don't talk about it out loud or, or don't be showy with it. And these two things like opposites to me as a child, you know, I thought, wait a minute, you want me to be successful enough to be generous and create impact, but you don't want me to be motivated by the things that motivate me. And so that was probably the beginning of trying to work this out, uh, inside myself for everybody else to listen in on.
Speaker 1:No, I love that. And it's so interesting too that you bring that up because I'm thinking back on my own childhood and I always knew that my parents were well to do. We didn't have, I mean I was the third of seven kids, so we didn't have an obscene amount of money to where we could do whatever we wanted, but I knew that we were just fine. And, and uh, I remember asking, you know what dad, what do you make? And it was just this total taboo question where I got severely reprimanded and then when I became an adult and I'm thinking about, okay, well how much money does my husband even need to make in order for us to afford any degree of comfortable lifestyle? When does the penny pinching end? What does that level look like? But nobody wants to talk about it. And so I never really knew until we experience it ourselves and among, okay, well what, what is that magical number for people? So it's so interesting that you bring that up.
Speaker 2:I had the exact same experience in my household growing up. Uh, upper middle class family in the Midwest. Dad was a professional. And I remember distinctly asking him on a couple of different occasions what does dad make? And being told it was none of my business and I'm not supposed to ask those things. And as a caveat, I came from a really supportive, open family. Like we could talk about anything else and it was not taboo. So isn't that crazy that in our society people would rather talk about their most intimate things before they're willing to talk about money.
Speaker 1:So interesting. So you and Lori don't have children yet, correct?
Speaker 2:Not yet to a we are. We've been married 14 years, so we, we joke that making sure we love each other enough before we enter into it. No, all joking aside, we are right at the beginning of saying, Hey, clock's ticking and we don't actually want to grow old with their families, so we better get started.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. But how is your mindset for when that day comes, when that question comes from your kid? Would you be honest with them? Would you tell them the number?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Without a doubt. As a matter of fact, Lori and I, we do these money dates where it's kind of a state of the union. Um, where we go to a really beautiful place that we really enjoy is that we're in a good abundant mindset and we just kind of list out, Hey, what are our assets this month? What did we make last month? Um, you know, any big interruptions or expenses or w, you know, what do you want to invest in? And we just kind of have this state of the union about our finances as a family. I envision us doing the same thing. Now it won't be as quite granular and high level, but I really will have a household where we have a mini economy and our kids know that they'll receive money in exchange for other things they can do and they'll learn the power of money and the power of generosity. And I actually look forward to raising my kids in that type of household.
Speaker 1:I'm so fascinated by this because at this point in my life, I've got, my oldest is 13, my baby is five, and I've got multiple in between. And there are times, multiple times where this has come up. And to be honest, I have responded similarly to the way that I grew up because it's just how habitual and you just go, Oh, you're not supposed to talk about that. And they'll go, well, why? Well, I don't actually know why, but I just, I believe that we are not, we're not supposed to have this conversation and then you move on and so now we've got my wheels spinning. I'm going, okay, what does this look like to have this kind of open communication? Because on the flip side, my son who is in middle school recently had a project where he had to investigate his dream career, write down how much money he was going to make, what kind of car he was going to drive, whether he was going to be a homeowner renter and all of these different things. He had a budget his life, and he came to me so confused. What does this even look like to be an adult when no adult is willing to talk about this? In a perfect world, what is the problem that you see being solved by this whole concept of open and healthy money mindset and communication?
Speaker 2:You know, on a a very high level, I picture this. If every single person felt comfortable with money and exchanging money, and if every single person played all out to their highest of ability, then I truly believe that there would not be a single problem, single ailment or single solution that you know, uh, wouldn't be left solved. The problem is most people aren't holding up their end of the bargain. You know, that we've got so many mixed emotions and stories built on stories built on stories about money and whether we're worthy of it and whether we can make it to, whether we should talk about it, um, that most people are just barely getting by. So instead of being a part of the, by having excess abundance to contribute, most people are just consumed with wondering how they're going to make ends meet next month. And that's not a judgment. It's like a state of where we're at right now and what we need to fix.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And there's this very limiting belief that we're all stuck in the circumstances that our birth awarded us and in many countries that holds a certain degree of truth. So what advice would you give to those who struggle with this or at conflict with this whole idea?
Speaker 2:Well, you know, number one, be open to the fact that it might be okay to talk about money and be open to the fact that there are so many things that you don't know, that you don't know and become curious. And once you become open and curious, your whole world opens right up, right? You learn all these things that you say, why didn't I know this years ago and just start doing your own research. Um, look for both sides of the argument. I always say, so I've got this buddy, he will choose a topic that he wants to learn about and he'll read books both for the topic and against the topic because he wants to understand, um, both sides of the coin and form his own opinions. And so if right now, if you're struggling with money, go find the books. There's a great book out there. Um, a few of them that recommend, one of them is called secrets of the millionaire mind by T har Becker. That book changed, uh, everything for Lori and I. There's another book called you are a badass at making money by Jen Sincero. That's a really good book. Um, and there's another book, it's a little bit dry, but it's very informational, called broke millennial. And I forget the author, but it's a good book to follow as well.
Speaker 1:You know, there's this story that I love. There's this, this daughter who's growing up and every Sunday she watches her mother prepare at this pot roast and she cuts off the edges and she throws them into the garbage and she finally asks her and she goes, mom, why do you, why do you cut off the edges and you throw them in the garbage? And she goes, Oh, well my mother always did that. And so then she went to her grandma and grandma, why do you always cut off the edges and throw him in the garbage? Well, my mother always did that and then goes through a great grandma, grandma, why do you always cut off the edges and throw them in the garbage? And she said, well, because it wouldn't fit in my pan. And so I love that because it sometimes we just don't think to ask the questions. We do all the things that we've seen our predecessors do and our family members do in these people that we love and trust do, but we never inquire as to why we do them.
Speaker 2:Aaron, here's one of the biggest battles that we're facing is people who loved us and people who meant so well. Parents, teachers, coaches, you name it, they're the ones that shaped our financial beliefs and the problem is they weren't qualified to do so. And sometimes that's hard to accept and sometimes that's even hard for me to say outside because we're talking about people that sacrifice so much to raise us and love us and take care of us. But in, unless you came from a family, that number one was wildly successful and number two was willing to be very open about it, to teach you the traits of what it takes to earn and become secure with your finances in, unless you came from that family, which is pretty rare, then you are being taught how to think, how to act, how to behave, what your patterns will be around money from people that were not qualified to teach you despite loving you.
Speaker 1:Love that. Absolutely love that. And you know, it's interesting because when I first got married to my husband, Brandon, one of the biggest frustrations that I had with him was his mindset was different when in terms of cars and money than my father's was. And because I was raised and I loved my father and I respected my father, my father had a great job, but he always talked about how cars were a depreciating asset and so he always bought the cheapest junkiest car he could possibly find. He'd find a college student who was selling it for two grand and talk them down to a grant. I mean that kind of a car and then piece it together with duct tape. And every Saturday he's in the garage fixing this stupid car and we are broke. I mean, fresh out of school and my husband wants to buy a car that we, that I'm like, Oh my gosh, like why would we ever spend that much money on a car? And he said, and I said, you know, you're just supposed to be in the, in the garage every Saturday and fix it up. It's fine. Do the oil changes yourself like you're shit. That's what you're supposed to do. And he finally sat me down and said, Aaron, I don't want to spend all my time in a garage. I just, I want a car that works that safe and I love your father and that's his way, but this is mine. This is my mindset. I need you to respect that. And I had to take a step back and go, Oh wow. I see in their own right that they both have truth to what they're saying, base up of their own opinions, their own viewpoints or perspectives. And I was trying to pitch and hole him into what I thought he was supposed to be based off of what I grew up with.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is such a great story. It's such a great example. There's, there's two things going on there. Um, from your father's perspective. Many of us were raised where you cut back, cut back, cut back, cut back. But the problem with the cutback mentality is pretty soon there's nothing left to cut back. And the problems or the challenges or the bills, they'll keep showing up. And when you've cut back to the very last thing you could possibly cut back and a new challenge shows up. Now what? Now you don't have the muscles and the habits and the abilities to get larger than the challenge. And so instead of having a cutback mentality, we should be teaching everybody a get bigger than the challenge mentality and an abundant mentality and teach people how to become earners instead of teaching them to always play defense. And so it's such a great story to illustrate that in a second thing I love about that story is when your husband knew what would make him feel good and when he knew what was important to him to make him feel abundant. And most importantly when he said, I don't want to trade my time for anything that's not joy producing or income producing. That's kind of what I teach people is you should never be trading your time for anything that's not joy producing or income producing. Then he was spot on because sure you might build, do your own oil change in your garage, but how much did you save versus if you took that two hours and went out and created income with it. And so we're always trading pennies for dollars where penny wise and dollar dumb because we were brought up that way and never questioned why.
Speaker 1:Okay, so then what are the key components of a millionaire mindset?
Speaker 2:Number one, it's knowing that financial ability, things such as knowing how to earn, knowing how to create, knowing how money works is way more important than financial security or stability. As matter of fact, the great irony is that financial stability comes from financial ability. And let me give you example. So many of us are taught growing up that you need to get good grades, get into the best school, that you can get a good job, start contributing your 401k right away, rush out and you know, see how quickly you can own a home. And all these things are taught from a place of defense. They're taught from their very much middle-class advice. And now here's where I might trigger people. But I want to add a caveat. There's nothing wrong with being middle-class, nothing at all, except we live in a world where the middle class is disappearing and we are living in a world where it's turning into the haves and the have nots. And whether you like that or not, it's happening. And so if you follow middle-class advice and there is no middle-class guests, which side you're going to end up on out of the haves and have nots, you're going to end up on the have nots. And so we need to be teaching our children and we need to be teaching ourselves to have financial ability what it's like to take risks, calculated risks, risks of course, what it's like to create income, uh, that you need to have multiple income sources. Matter of fact, Lori and I teach a rule of thumb that we live by and it's this, you should always have enough income sources, whether that's two, three, four, so that if any one of them went away tomorrow, you would not have to change your lifestyle. And we talked that out of experience when I was the only breadwinner early in our marriage and the recession happened and I was in banking, we lost everything and had to start over cause we had all our eggs in one basket. And so now we live as though, and teach everyone as though that you need to live so that if even your biggest income source went away tomorrow, you would not have to change your lifestyle. So it's things like that that are financial ability instead of aiming for financial stability and always playing defense.
Speaker 1:I'd love to hear kind of this evolution because I'm sure it didn't just happen overnight. This whole money mindset concept for the love of money. What were the trigger points? What were those key situations that led you to that?
Speaker 2:Um, are you referring to when we lost everything had to start over. Okay. I love this example. So we were, let's see, upper twenties and I had a really big career in banking really fast. And what came with that was ego and arrogance and thinking it was going to last forever. And quite honestly, you know, I saw a lot of examples growing up where you are a good provider and I laugh at this now, but you were a good provider if you made sure your wife didn't have to work and could live in a beautiful home. And we wanted to do. And the great irony there is, you know, what really makes my wife Laurie happy is being in her her gifts and creating and you know, building businesses. And so I was actually robbing her of that experience by being what I thought at the time was a good provider. So here's what I thought was important. These, these really shallow, empty identities. I thought, uh, how many people I had underneath me on my team was important. I thought my title at the bank was important. Um, I thought being a good provider in that very shallow definition was important. I thought, um, the number of nice things that other people could see us have was important. And all of that was completely uprooted when we were living beyond our means at the same time as a recession happening at the same time as only having one income source and was slapped in the face with having to start over. And now the beautiful thing about having to start over as this, it's a clean slate. You get to reinvent how you want to show up in the world. You get to reinvent how you want to add value. You get to reinvent what you want, your moral code to be. You, you get to reinvent like how you want people to talk about you when you're not around. And that's, that was our chance. You know, I got to take this 29 year old ignorant and arrogant kid that thought it was gonna last forever me. And because I was coming from a place of being stripped of all those shallow BS identities, I was able to choose again. So I'll never tell you that it felt good in the moment. But looking back on it, it was like the greatest gift ever because now when we have a family, I know that there'll be, you know, wildly secure and that we're doing all the right things and creating wealth from the right place.
Speaker 1:I love that. And how easy would it have been to kind of allow that weight of all of that burden and that stress at the time to, to crush you and to never choose. Cause it is a choice to climb on top of it, to claw your way out. And to start that reinvention process. I think so many people are afraid of what that looks like, that they never even try.
Speaker 2:You know the one thing that I did believe that served me out of all the things that did not serve me, the one thing I believed at the time that served me was that I was 100% responsible for our outcome and that's still such a principle that we live on today. Now, again, this will trigger some people, but stay with me. Wherever you're at today, whatever your situation is, you are 100% responsible for, it's all on you and I know you're going to say, ah, this divorce happened to me. I didn't see this tax bill coming. I didn't see these medical conditions, you know, with bills happening. I'm not saying you won't have bad circumstances. What I'm saying is the longterm outcome, your reaction to the circumstances, the plan you create when you're faced with a challenge, the effort you put in, the resources you gather, by being resourceful, all of those affect the outcome regardless of your bad circumstances. And so I knew at that time when we lost everything, Hey, this is my fault. The recession did not happen to me. If you go far enough back in every line of decision making, you can find the moment that you became responsible for where you're at. So let's use me for example. Yeah, the recession happened and it was devastating for a lot of people and I was in banking, but the recession didn't happen to me. I could have been saving a lot more money and been able to invest when everything was quote on sale during the recession. It became, you know, wildly wealthy. Matter of fact, I have friends that became wealthier during the recession, then before the recession because they were prepared. Um, I could have seen it coming, you know, I saw signs long before the recession and chose to ignore them. Um, I could have had multiple income sources. I mean the list goes on and on and on where I am responsible for the situation that we are in, not the recession and so I always invite people like if you're just open to the concept that yes you are responsible for your outcome right now it can be as frustrating and angering as it is empowering because you quickly realize once you adopt this you quickly realize, wait a minute, if I put myself here then I can put myself anywhere. If I really am 100% responsible for the outcome that I can put myself anywhere and that begins this whole new shift in your paradigm where you start doing the right things, thinking of the right things and putting yourself exactly where you want to be.
Speaker 1:So much so much gold in there. I love the whole concept of that. Just being able to empower yourself and having that empowering mindset versus a lot of those limiting beliefs that often creep in and we allow them in and then we Harbor them and we fester them and we grow them unintentionally. But once we are self aware enough to recognize those tendencies, that's when we can change the whole trajectory of our future. So what advice would you give to entrepreneurs who are looking to level up in their life or in their business?
Speaker 2:For sure. It's about your tribe. It is 100% about who you hang around, who you seek advice from, who has an influence on you on a regular basis. And sometimes it's the people that we love the most or that love us the most that are holding you back. Sometimes they're accidentally sabotaging you and they don't even realize it and you don't realize it until you get outside and take a people looking in that the very people that think they're supporting you. For example, um Oh I know you had a bad day, let's go to happy hour and you can tell me about it. They think there's being supportive when they're really robbing you of the chance to go and you know, maybe get a workout in, get a, a meditation in or say your prayers and then get back to work and solve whatever created that bad day. Um, many times you'll live in a neighborhood or uh, have a circle of friends or go to a church where everybody says very small, seemingly innocent comments like, Oh, the people that live on the other side of town, they've got an easy, we struggle or things like that aren't for us. Or you know, the old misery loves company type of mentality. Like you're all together and getting each other's back. And again, they mean to be supportive, but they're actually holding you back with statements like that and beliefs like that. The number one thing you can do is purposely seek out up leveled individuals and start adding them to your tribe. And here's the part where it becomes uncomfortable. You always feel like you're leaving people behind when you start to do that. And sometimes they try and make it look like you're leaving them behind when you do that. But the truth of the matter is this, you have an obligation to follow your calling. You have an obligation to rise. You have an obligation to go out and do better because if you don't do it, then who's gonna spark that possibility and the person next to you, if nobody in your circle goes out and starts to think differently and behave differently than you're all just going to continue to keep each other down. So you actually have almost a moral obligation to go out there and be the one that rises in order to be the inspiration for whoever's ready to come along with you.
Speaker 1:You know, I recently, this past year when we had this big$2 million loss with a company that we had launched, and I've talked about that a lot on this podcast, but I remember talking to somebody who I viewed as one of my mentors who there was a shift from, they went from a challenger to a cheerleader because for a brief moment when I was starting to question my own value, my own worth, I needed a cheerleader. But if it was for a brief moment, and then when that moment was over, I recognized it and I had to, I had to sit him down and say, I appreciate that you've been my cheerleader, but I don't need you to be my cheerleader anymore. I need you to be my challenger. I need you to push me to the next level. I need you to make sure that I'm not complacent to stay still. So what's next? Let's figure that out. Push me. And I think we need to have that self awareness to say, and to give people the opportunity to, to say, Hey, this is what you are for me right now and I love you for it, but this is what I need. And if you can't be what I need right now, that's fine. I'm not going to love you any less, but I'm going to go find someone else who can play that role for me.
Speaker 2:What a great example. You know, we think we're doing someone a favor when we say, Oh, you know what? That's okay. You tried your best and maybe this just isn't for you. No, that's garbage. Tell them to get back in the game. You believe in them and that there's a gear they haven't found yet and they got to go find it.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I have a child who did, who signed up for cross country and he hates it. Granted, we live in Texas, it's fricking a hundred degrees outside right now and they run in the middle of the heat of the afternoon. It's miserable just to stand there. So my heart goes out to them to have to run two miles. I get it. It sucks. But he signed up, he made a commitment and I'm a believer that if you make commitment you follow through. After the first race, he said, mom, I hate this. I want to quit. And I said, but I hear ya. I hear ya. And he, and I said, why do you want to quit? And he goes, well, it's hot. I said, yes it is. It's hard. Yes it is. What else? Well, everybody else faster than me. I said, well, not everybody's faster than you. I said, but what is your goal here? What is, what is your best time as we talked about as best time. Okay. So what should your goal be next? Race? Well, to beat my best time. Yes, exactly. So the next race comes and he's on and I'm watching his split time and I'm like, Oh sweet, he's gonna make it, he's going to make it. And then as he finishes up the second mile and I'm watching it, I'm like, something's happening. He's not going to make it. What's going on? So after the race, I pull him aside and I said, you are on track to beat your last performance. And I said, what happened? And he said, well, I decided to walk. I said, why did you decide to walk? And he said, well, it was just too hard. And I said, okay. It said so. And he was just down on himself and I had to really have this tough love conversation with him where I said, wait a second, you were on track to be better today than you were yesterday, which was the goal because your goal should never be, I need to beat the person next to me. You should be in your own lane, focused on your dreams, on your goals, which is to be better today than you, than you were yesterday. And you gave in because of your mindset, because you started self sabotaging yourself and somewhere along the line you convinced yourself that you were in on track. But guess what? You were, you were on track, you were going to beat it. But that negative mindset sabotaged you and you let it creep into the degree that you allowed yourself to quit. But if you had kept it up, you would have surprised yourself.
Speaker 2:Wow. Is that a good story and amazing advice? I'm, and you nailed it. Your competition should be with yourself. You should aim to get better every day, every week, every month. You should track what is important to you, cause what? What you measure moods and what you don't measure won't. And you're not trying to keep up with the Joneses. You're not trying to beat the neighbor next door. You're not trying to, you know, be wealthier or show you're than somebody else who was inspired you. Your just trying to beat your own personal best every single day and it's that small incremental change and that challenging of yourself where all of a sudden you wake up one day and you can't believe how good you're doing. Absolutely.
Speaker 1:A small consistent actions lead to big things. And I think it was Jay Shetty who said, we tend to make big things a small priority. We should be making small things a big priority.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah. I love J
Speaker 1:Oh gall. He's fantastic. Okay, so biggest mistake you've ever made as an entrepreneur?
Speaker 2:Ooh, this is a really good question. Let me think about this. Um, I think the biggest mistake that anyone can make as an entrepreneur is to not ask for help. That would be mine. I spent so many years not asking for help. I thought I could figure it out on my own and I didn't want to bother other people. As a matter of fact, I had nothing to do with ego at this point when I wasn't asking for help at everything to do with. I felt like I was bothering other people and didn't want to be their burden. And, and that's silly actually. People get fulfillment and joy and, and, and a dopamine hit out of and value out of being of value to you. Right? So I was robbing them of that by not asking for help. Uh, so I would say for me it was a very long string where I just tried to muscle things out instead of, uh, you know, just saying, help me out here. What should I be doing better?
Speaker 1:It's all just experience. We can, we can only have so many opportunities in any given day in any given week or month or year. And so then to compound that with the people around us, with that tribe, as you were saying, to Uplevel your tribe, to Uplevel your experience and your understanding of the way the world works and perspectives and that really just does propel you to that next level. I love that.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:So what does your typical day or week look like?
Speaker 2:Ah, great question. Laurie and I have a very strict container for our days. Uh, we're big believers that we need to fill up our own cups first B. And that way we give the rest of the day from the part of the cup that's does pouring over. And this can be very difficult to get used to doing. Sometimes a lot of people out there feel like they're being selfish, but quite honestly you are not of service to anybody when you are burnt out and tired and not present and disgruntled and doing things out of resentment or from a place of no energy. And we learned that very early on. So here's what our typical day looks like. We have this non-negotiable protected time in the morning. We call protected time. And as I tell everybody to schedule, I want you to not get lost in saying, Oh, it must be nice. I can't do this or that. I want you to find yourself in the story. Okay? So our protected time looks like this. We wake up anywhere from, I don't know, six 30 to seven 30 and the very first thing I do, the moment I realized unconscious is I say out loud a mantra and it's, I'm happier, healthier, wealthier, and more fit than I was yesterday. And I roll over and I literally wake Laurie up to this mantra and it's like this love hate relationship that because she's dead asleep and I'm, I'm shaking her a little bit by shoulder and I'm saying it and I make her say it back to me until she says it in a way that I feel like she meant it. Right? You can imagine waking up and I roll right back over and I closed my eyes and I'll say a quick prayer of gratitude, uh, for 60 to 90 seconds, just taking inventory of I'm grateful for in that moment. Now this'll sound very juvenile, but it seems like I'm so grateful I woke up in this beautiful home. I'm grateful that my dog waffles as a Crow laying across my legs. I'm grateful that woke up next to Laurie and grateful and then it turns into more meaningful things like for my health and for my family's health and its different lists every single day. It's literally in that moment, whatever I feel grateful for. Now, look what I've done in the first like 90 to 120 seconds of my day. I can't possibly get up on the wrong side of bed because I've chosen my thoughts that I've chosen what colored lenses I want to view my morning through. And that sets me up for an increased chance that the rest of the day is going to unfold much better. So we go downstairs, have our coffee, and we've got this rule pages before swipes. I used to go right to my Instagram on the way down the stairs. And so now we have to read 10 pages of any book before we're allowed to open our phones for anything. Oh, I like that. Pages turns into 20 or 30 once you get into it. And then we do our prayers and meditation, and then we'd go to the gym and you know, whatever the workout of the day is, whether it's soul cycle or with our personal trainers or whatever, we do all that and then come 11 o'clock, everybody is allowed to start getting a hold of us, our team, uh, anyone that needs us and nobody can get ahold of us unless it's immediate friends and co and family during that time of, from when we wake up to 10:59 AM now again, don't get lost in the numbers. Find yourself in the routine, find yourself and in the story. But that's what works for us. And then we'll work our tails off all day long until, you know, six or seven o'clock at night. And here's another very key, important factor of our, of our day and of our success, both as entrepreneurs and as a married couple in the morning, I'll say to her, I'll say, when are you done today babe? And she'll say, ah, five 30, when are you done, Chris? Six. Great. Then our walk is at six 15 and we have this mandatory non-negotiable. I don't care if it's raining out, I don't care if we fought all day. I don't care if they hate each other in the moment. This mandatory non-negotiable walk where we take the dog for three and a half miles, it takes about an hour. And in that built in container is always kind of when the magic happens. Now on a bad day, we'll spend the first 45 minutes quiet and Loreal be like, so you're not gonna say anything. And that's my cue to start talking for real. This is how it goes. Some days it's, you know, jovial and amazing from, from minute one. But here's the importance of having this built in container at the end is we never end up coming home from the walk without having talked through whatever bothered us or celebrate some wins that day and coming together as a couple again, a romantic couple again, holding hands on the walk, laughing, um, you know, shifting from business partners to a romantic couple. And that has been absolutely key for us.
Speaker 1:I love so much about that because working with my spouse as well as, you know, it's a little bit of a hard adjustment sometimes or we would realize, man, we'd be hanging out in the hot tub at night talking about people from our team and I'm going, why are we doing this? We need to stop. We need to turn it off at some point. So building in those containers, containers kind of like that no fly zone, so to speak, where you're saying this is protected time, this is a sacred time where nothing else is allowed in is so vital. I love that.
Speaker 2:Thank you. It's, it's sure worked wonders for us. And listen, if, if you're saying, must be nice, you don't have kids, it must be nice. I have to be at work by eight, simply do this. There's no easier time to control and the first 30 minutes of your day, there really isn't. So start with that. And there's absolutely, there's no excuse for not having some kind of container, even if it involves your children, even if it's playing in the park, even there's no excuse for not having some kind of mandatory container built in. That's not negotiable at the end of the day. For you guys to come together again as a family or as a couple, you could build it ever it as you enjoy doing.
Speaker 1:I love it. Okay. So I'd love to know what are some of the things that you and Laurie have made it a priority in your generosity? Cause I know that such a huge part of what you believe in.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, for sure. Um, so pencils of promise is a really big organization that we work with quite a bit. In fact, I just met with the CEO yesterday or day before yesterday and um, they provide education in third world countries and like so many of the great charities out there, it's not just building schools, building schools is the fun part. It's the sustainability of those schools as simple as teaching children how and why to wash their hands. So that disease doesn't spread so that they can keep going to school. Things like that are as important as building the physical structure itself. So we've been over to Guatemala with them, looking at schools that we built and it's just a really great organization run by great people. Charity water is another one. Um, I absolutely love what Scott Harrison doing is doing with that. And then there's a local charity here in Los Angeles. Homelessness is a really huge problem for us in Los Angeles. Massive. And there's an incredible woman named Lauria Gastone who started a charity called lunch on me. And matter of fact, she lived voluntarily down on skid row, which is the largest homeless population in the United States. And it's like a different world down there. She lived voluntary for 42 days to really understand what the problem is and what's going on so that she could create more impact around it. So those are the, the three passions that I mean the most to us right now. And, um, Laurie is working on a new company that is a complete departure from anything we've ever done before, but it's going to have a give back component to women entrepreneurs with good ideas but no funding for them.
Speaker 1:That's incredible. That's great. What is one lesson that you've learned lately?
Speaker 2:Hmm. Um, I've learned that your perspective of I get to do this versus I have to do this is as simple and juvenile as it is massively powerful because that tiny shift causes you to find joy and happiness in what you're doing versus feeling coming from a place of obligation and resentment. And so really just nailing down, I get to instead of, I have to is been, you know, great for us lately.
Speaker 1:I love that. Okay. One last one. What advice would you give to yourself? Just starting out?
Speaker 2:Lose the ego and any risks as you want, especially when you say just, you know, starting out, I kind of pictured like my 16, 17, 18 year old kid. But let's think about it. If you spent the next 10 years failing, I don't care if you're in your 20s you're still young enough to Mount a massive comeback and have a very successful career. If you're in your thirties and you spent 10 years failing, no problem. You're only in your forties. That's more than enough time to have a incredible successful career. If you're in your forties and you spend a decade failing, then you're in your 50s when you make it. And most fortune 500 companies, most billionaires, most multimillionaires, they actually don't really truly hit until their fifties and even if you're in your fifties and you spend that entire decade screwing it up, then you're gonna hit in your sixties and have the best golden years of, of your life. So it's never too late. Just take the risks and just keep failing forward.
Speaker 1:I love it. You've given me so much to think about. I can't thank you enough for pouring into my community. This has been a true honor and a pleasure to, to catch up with you again. Uh, where can everybody find more of you and what you are up to?
Speaker 2:Um, so Instagram is the only platform I'm hanging out on these days at Chris w harder on Instagram, and you can find my podcast@fortheloveofmoney.com.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Chris, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it,
Speaker 2:Aaron. Totally. My pleasure.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 1:Thank you for taking the time to connect with me here on the conquering chaos podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, will you please take a moment to leave a review? It's the fuel to my fire and lets me know that my efforts to enact change and broaden your perspective of what's possible matter. Thank you so much for your support. If you want more content like this, don't forget to subscribe and connect with me on social media at Aaron equally or at Aaron EBU,[inaudible] dot com have a fantastic day. Get out there and Congressman chaos.
Speaker 3:Okay.