A Sit Down with Florida Top Leaders

Count money, man.

Mother, man.

Stag gritts is fine.

I told her, trying to tell them I'm a beast, bud.

What's up, gang?

Welcome back to another episode of The Grindcast.

Get ready.

It's a new day.

And what we're going to do for this one is we're going to be sharing.

I was just down in Florida at one of the hottest offices and hottest organizations in the

country right now are Tampa, Florida, location, led by Mark Bernsdorf, Spencer Cozay, and

a bunch of absolute superstars.

Hopefully you enjoyed this podcast.

They had me on their podcast, and it was a real honor.

All right, what's up, everybody?

Listen in here.

This is Spencer Cozay with Aries organization.

We're based out of Tampa.

And today I'm occupied with Brian Calle-Russo, one of the managers on our team, Jake Taylor,

another leader slash manager on our team.

And then we are blessed enough to have the CEO of the entire organization Simon Areas

in the house with us as well.

So thank you for coming out here, Simon.

And thank you for having me at the hottest office in the country for what we do.

So it's an honor to be here and I'm so proud of you guys.

Yes, sir.

So I figured we'll just take this opportunity.

I know I've spent a bunch of time with you, Brian and Jake.

Haven't had a ton of time with you, but to just pick your brain and ask you a bunch

of questions that can be beneficial for us in our journey in the business.

And then for also people listening, whether they're in the business, thinking about joining

the business, have no idea what we do and kind of just want to learn.

Hearing for them to be able to hear from you and your wisdom since you've been in the

business for over 17 years is just going to be beneficial for everybody.

So we have a bunch of questions for you and we're just going to go around and ask them

and then learn in the process.

I like it.

So my first question is how did you initially get recruited into the life insurance business?

By the grace of God.

I had a business class.

I was playing Division II football at a school in Pennsylvania, Erie, Pennsylvania, Mercy

Hershey University.

I got registered in my first year, started strong safety for the next four years.

And we had a business class and I crammed, I waited to the last second.

We had to do an interview.

We had to make a resume, prove that you didn't interview.

And last second, I did all this in a week with like the help of some friends and put my

resume online.

This company calls my resume.

I have no other option.

I drive to Cleveland, Ohio in a mill of nowhere two hours away on a Friday.

I just, I got to get this interview done.

Now at this time, I already had my real estate license in the great state of the sunshine state

of Florida.

My heart was always in Florida and I had no, I didn't think I was going to possibly take

a job from this thing, you know, from this place at all.

But I had to do the interview.

I did the interview and I hit it off with the gentleman that did my interview who would

end up being my coach and one of my best friends, you know, to this day, Marcus Smith.

And man, my spirit told me that guy was real, you know, by the time I got done and it wasn't

like I just got sold because, you know, I grew up in an environment where I grew up fast

and it's hard.

It was harder even at 22 to hustle.

Me, I grew up around hustlers, you know, so I could read people.

In my read on this guy was he was legit.

Whenever he was telling me was legit and what he was telling me was about the residual income

and opportunity unlimited, you know, to control your own destiny and the amount of income

that I would be able to make, you know, and stuff like that.

Coming from an environment where I was, you know, getting off, right off the football field,

I loved that I would be in control of my own destiny.

And so everything that he was saying from the connection we had, you know, where he understood

sports to unlimited opportunity to the energy that he gave off, my spirit told me that

the guy was legit.

And so I went from just kind of cramming an interview just to show it for a class to,

by the time I left there, I was seriously considering making this an opportunity that I was going

to take advantage of.

You know, when I spun it around and I started to consider it, I still had a couple months

left of school.

And most people in my family were against it.

You know, they didn't think it was real, didn't make sense.

Getting into the insurance industry, I was one of the first people to get through, you know,

with a four year degree and a normal period of time out of my family.

Only person that supported me was my mother.

And my mom said, you know what, Simon, if you feel that strongly, you know,

about it, I believe in you and your young.

And if you're going to take a risk and do something different, that's would be the time

to do it.

Now, wait till you're 30, 40 years old to start betting and taking gambles and risks.

If you're 22 years old, you'll get one year experience at the very worst.

If that's what your heart's telling you to do, give it a year.

And worst case scenario, you leave with experience and you go do something else.

But I think if you feel, feel like you should do it, I support you.

Go give it a shot.

So she was the only one that said to do it.

And then I had to finish out the rest of my school year there.

And I started in December of 2005.

Wow.

I have a question on that going back to Marcus recruited you, Marcus Smith, right?

And so you guys have a wonderful relationship.

You always say that he's the Godfather of your children.

So how was it?

You say that you knew he was legit.

You really meshed with them and got along with him.

It's a little bit different for us because Brian and Spencer best friends growing up.

Yeah.

I knew Spencer and he knew me before even knew that we knew each other.

Our grandparents were best friends, complete different dynamic for you there.

Do you think that he felt the same way about you?

Or did you did it take you a while for you to really earn that respect back from Marcus?

Because how was that dynamic when it first started?

Yeah, I had to earn, earn his respect, you know, for sure coming out of the gates

and just with results.

Like any other coach, you know, he wasn't there to make friends.

We made friends because of the results, you know, and I just came in where I believed in him as a coach.

And to the point where I was so all in committed on what I was going to do that I signed a 12 month lease

before I ever made a dollar from the company.

Before I ever wrote a piece of business, you know, with the company and I moved directly like right next door to the office.

I wanted to be as close as I could possibly be to the office.

And so our relationship started out really just player coach.

And I just tried to be the hardest working person that he ever coached.

I tried to be the most coachable person that he ever coached.

And to this day, I think if you ask Marcus, you know, in his 20 plus years, you know, who's worked the hardest and was the most coachable.

I'm usually, you know, number one, you know, still to this day.

And so I think the relationship came from the results and the respect that I showed to the position.

And even as our relationship would grow to where we develop the friendship, I always had a professional respect for the position I never overstepped that boundary.

You know, I think a lot of people, once they start to develop a relationship, you know, with with their coach or with somebody in business, they don't know how to separate the two.

You know, they want to be friends and do the business at the same time to where they crossed the line and want to be two friends, you know, too much friendly where they disrespect the position.

They don't want to listen as much anymore.

It'll make certain comments in public, you know, like their friends around people.

I've never, ever done that with Marcus until, you know, maybe over a decade in the game, you know, where it was clear that we had crossed that line over to like brothers, you know,

to mean and friends in the business more than more than anything.

But in the beginning for, you know, even a decade, you know, I would say I just always had respect even though he had a friend relationship with me, always just kept the respect of the position.

And, you know, to what you're talking about with you and Spencer, first of all, I would tell both of your grandfathers, they've done a great job with their grandchildren.

And I hope my grandchildren, you know, turn out like you guys and I mean that's sincerely having three children on my own right now.

And, but I would say, you know, I've had the pleasure to have friends of mine that would join this business and a few of them that have had major success.

And I could think, I could think of some that couldn't handle that we were once friends.

And now we're in business and we had to have a player coach role.

And I have some friends that were able to evolve in that respect to where, all right, you were my friend, we did go to college together.

I do know you when you were young, bongan beers, you know, and I'm able to put that to the side and respect that position and follow you now as a coach.

And the friends that didn't that couldn't make that they couldn't adapt to that are no longer with our organization.

Some of them are with the company and the ones that were able to make that transition have made millions of dollars, you know, in the industry.

And I've always showed them, you know, respect and love and care on the way up.

But I think that's a challenge for a lot of people that get into into business as friends when you start to have that relationship is how do I have managed that relationship as we're coming up in business.

I got some to say on top of that just a thought I had, but I think one of the coolest things about the business is being able to recruit your friends and you can teach your friends to make a lot of money and everything like that.

The downside to that that's not a downside is people that aren't your friend might think, oh, I'm not Spencer's friend or I'm not Simon's friend.

I'm scared to hit him up about this opportunity because he might, you know, it might be different for his friend than it would be for me and something cool I've realized I've ever been doing it for three years is some of the best people that hit me up and are now currently on the team like no of on Gundon Zach Marshall Tyler law like some of our top income earners restars.

Don't know I didn't know them before the business. They didn't know anybody that knew me. They just saw me on Instagram. We got on the phone. We connected like you said you connected with Marcus.

And I felt their energy they felt mine so they took a risk on themselves and now there's some of the best people on the team versus other people that were like my high school friends.

Come they come into it and we were friends in high school because we did you know dumb stuff in high school, but they may have never adapted to being able to work hard and be disciplined and stuff like that so they end up not making it, but the person that never met me ends up making a ton of money, which is something cool and it's cool to know that you're the CEO of the whole organization.

And you didn't know anybody coming into the business. It was just a random interview that you were doing.

You ended up feeling the dudes energy. You saw the opportunity and you ran with it without knowing anybody in the business.

You know, I always say I was a walk on exactly. Yep.

So I'm a scholarship athlete. I had no friends, no family, nobody in the business. I was a straight walk on.

Yep. Move hour and a half away from my house with no friends, nobody there.

Yep. And that could be a blessing in the skies, feeling like, okay, this dude came into it with his cousin in the business.

I'm coming in with nobody. I got to chip on my shoulder because I want to prove that I don't need someone in this business to be successful. All I need is the opportunity.

Amen. Do you have a question, bro?

Yeah. So I got a question for Simon. It's how much money did you make your first year and how old were you when you started?

I started at 22 and I made 187,000 dollars in the dinosaur ages.

18 years ago.

So I think with inflation, you know, that's probably double, you know, now, but back then that was even more money than it is.

Then it is today year two, two 80 year, three, six, 24.

I think was the number in year four, made my first million. I put seven figures out.

And that's when it wasn't virtual too.

All it all in people's homes driving, putting miles, 50, 60,000 miles a year on the car, snowstorms, you know,

heller, high water, you know, we were we were coming.

And when it would snow, I would tell my team, this is the best time, you know, that hurricane, it came through out.

We had been out there, you know, like they're going to feel bad for you out there.

And you're going to nobody else is out there and they don't have nothing else to do. This is the best time, you know, to come out there.

And man, I could tell you I'm watching you folks in your way beyond that, you know, you're, you're, you're, you know, I'm looking, I'm sitting across from Spencer and you're 22 years old.

And you're going to, you're going to make more than what I made in my third year at 25, you know, turn to 26 years old.

You're going to make more than that, you know, this year.

So that's what I'm proud of and I'm excited about is it continues to evolve.

And, you know, I think there comes a point where, you know, people say it, but they really don't mean it.

I hope our people, I try to help people make more money than I did in the beginning and move up quicker and do things faster.

And I hope everybody breaks all the records, you know, that I've had and I'm here to help them do it.

So if you got somebody that blazed the trail and I'm the one coaching you to do it, there's no reason why you can't do it.

You know, you know, kind of on top of that.

Something that was encouraging to me and other thought just off the top of my head was, you know, coming into it.

I was telling my parents, like, yeah, the people that bring me in, they're going to make money off my sales.

And people that weren't in sales or don't make a lot of money might be like, well, that doesn't make any sense.

It might be a pyramid scheme until I understood the fact that the only way they would make money was if I made money.

And if I made zero dollars for the week, the person that brought me in made zero dollars for the week.

So there'd be no point to bring me in.

So it was encouraging knowing the people that did bring me in Greg Mark wanted me to make as much money as I possibly could.

Because obviously the little bit of selfishness in them knows the more money I make because they brought me in is going to make them more money.

And that's the whole reason for well, that's one of the main reasons for being in business in the first place.

So I was just always confident knowing like they're not hiding anything from me.

He's giving me all of his knowledge, all of his wisdom because he wants me to make as much money possible.

So in return, he makes more money too.

Yeah, that's something I used to get to.

And when people say, oh, it's just pyramid scheme or scam or whatever.

First of all, you look at the letters and it's really it's a good explanation of it, even though it's a corny and clichated to say,

it's the initials scam still confused about money.

They just don't understand the way the money works and that money flows.

Typically.

the people, anybody at a pharmaceutical company

or any sales organization in the world,

the manager is gonna get some form of a bonus

or some form of compensation,

based off of how well their sales reps are doing

and the people that they're responsible

for providing leadership are doing.

And so if you look at any corporate structure,

it looks like a pyramid scheme anywhere,

from a Fortune 500 company,

which we're owned by Globe Life,

which has been around for a hundred years,

it's very difficult to have more policy holders

than any other insurance company

in the United States of America

and be around for over a hundred years.

I don't have any family members

or anybody that I personally know.

I'd like to meet some,

but I don't know anybody that I personally know

that's alive, a hundred years right now.

So our company's alive more than a hundred years

and you really won't last that long

if you're doing the wrong things.

So it's the company's legit, the company's legal,

the company's ethical and you can pass people up.

I'm standing here, I'm sitting here with you

and within my first year, I passed almost everybody up

that I was quote, underneath, you know what I mean?

So and then you have like situations like this week

where you made X amount of dollars

and then Mark, who's your leader that brought you in,

made a lot of dollars, you know too.

And it's a lot.

And but you made more than him this week.

Well, if you're under him and it's a pyramid,

why are you making more than the person that's on top of you?

You know what I mean?

And that happens all the time of the person at the bottom

often can make more than the person at the top.

The person in the middle could often make more

than the person at the top.

So I think people just need to get educated on that

and that's for all different industries.

You know, the more educated that I got,

the more understanding that I got of other people's businesses

and other industries so where I don't look at things

because I'm not confused, you know about money.

I understand how it flows and how it works.

And I think that's a big testimony to the systems

and procedures and the product that we do provide

and you know, services, families because the biggest take,

what blew me away was really this year.

We started seeing it especially here in Tampa.

And our office Spencer was that specifically

with Big Bra with Brian here is when he came in,

he was just an agent and consistently weak after weak.

He was out earning people that were leading teams of six,

people that were leading teams of 10 people

because he was simply just outperforming on his own

in selling that much and having that much success selling.

And then we know how great the company bonus structure is.

You're hitting above quote and you're selling,

they're gonna bonus you significant amount too.

So he just kept it going and he kept getting free leads,

more leads, more sales he was providing.

And so that was a huge thing that really, really inspired me

this year seeing how many of the new agents you were bringing

on were actually having a media success

and out earning people with teams.

It was awesome.

You know, that's, you know, that's a testimony to the system.

You know, if you look at what a lot of these companies

that are MLM or whatever it is,

in order to make a lot of money,

you have to recruit tons of people.

You have to keep recruiting in order to make the money here.

You don't have to recruit a person.

You don't have to recruit one person

and you're gonna still be able to make a lot of money

just by selling directly with the products

and oh, by the way, the clients,

you don't even have to find Joan clients.

We're giving you the clients.

We're giving you people to call for free.

You're not call calling.

You're not prospecting, you know, and stuff like that.

So I haven't seen many other businesses that have a model

that's easier to launch.

You know, it's not easy to start a business.

It's not easy to be an entrepreneur.

I haven't seen many that I've been around.

I don't know of any, really,

to where you could start from the bottom with nothing

and launch because of all the things that you're given

in order to build that business

that doesn't cost you a nickel.

You know what I mean?

You gotta get a license.

Yep.

So, Sam, and something that I just wanna say thank you for

and kind of explain.

So when I was coming into the business,

I looked, I still look up to you

but I looked up to you not only because of the fact

that what you were able to do through the business,

that's the same business I have an opportunity

to get into like same systems,

promotion structure, leads, all that.

But when I was looking at you,

I was like, he makes a lot of money.

He's in shape, great family, kids love them.

Wife loves them just all around amazing lifestyle,

a ton of free time.

So basically time and money and happiness

and everything like that, great relationship with the Lord.

I was having a conversation with someone

a couple weeks back and they were telling me

about all their big visions and big dreams

with some corporate company they were working with

and my question to them was,

is there anybody in that company that's 10 years older

than you, 20 years older than you?

They've got the experience that you would trade positions with

and they're like, no, all the 60 year olds here

like, hate their life, never get to see their kids,

they're working all day, stuff like that.

So first off, you being able to provide that for me,

was a huge blessing and I'm super grateful for that knowing

that this company can provide me that lifestyle

if I just put in the time in the years.

That's something I try to do for people now,

like young people, something they can relate to

like if I go hard for three years,

I could have what Spencer has making

XYZ amount of money while traveling with his girlfriend,

driving this car blah blah blah.

So my question for you is just what's a couple things,

what are your biggest accomplishments

you've been able to achieve because of this company?

Maybe like a short term one,

maybe after five years, 10 years, just what is this company

been able to provide for you now that you're 39 or 40 years old?

So it started out real basic,

for me, of my first accomplishment that the company

gave me was my mentor, Jim Sirace,

taught me how to develop a relationship with the Lord.

And I think that would serve as the foundation

for all the levels of success that I've been able to obtain

professionally and personally that has been built upon a rock.

The foundation, they say that there's a story and listen,

before I get started, I'm not a pastor,

I'm not a perfect individual.

Once in a while I have a glass of wine.

I'll swear once in a while, I got tattoos, all that.

So I'm not saying I'm walking around

holier than thou or I'm your local pastor.

I'm not.

But I was developing this business to develop yourself

internally first and the external will follow.

And now as I get older, I understand there

was a story in the Bible about there

was two people that built their house.

One built the house on a rock, one built their house on sand.

And the one that built their house on a rock

was the one that built their house on their faith

and their relationship with their creator.

And the other one built their house,

just bought himself on sand with them

thinking that they had everything

themselves under the control when they didn't need the Lord.

And the story says the storms came and the storms went

and the wind blew and the water came.

And the one that built their house upon a rock,

the house was still standing and the other one wasn't standing.

And so over 18 years of being in business,

the storms have come and water has risen

and hurricanes have come and our house has been standing.

And I believe it'll continue to stand

because our foundation has built upon a rock

and it's built on the foundation

of trying to help people spiritually, mentally, physically,

and to financially aspect.

And we talk about it.

We get hated on for it.

You got a nice, was that truck you got there?

Gee wagon.

You got a nice G-Wat and it's like your fourth car

that you've had.

You'll make almost a million dollars.

And people, they get mad at the flash

or the things that people have and all that stuff.

But they don't realize that you're given 10% of everything

that you make to the church and the people's lives

that are being impacted that I hope my kid one day

has a mentor to look up to that does things

that you all are doing for people's children.

Out there giving them somebody to look up to in the right way.

You guys are out there, you're not at the clubs every single

weekend, home at three or four o'clock in the morning

getting tore up and all these other things.

I think that's because you're building your foundation

on a rock.

So for me, the first thing that I got

was I learned to build my foundation

with my developing relationship with the Lord.

That has allowed me to handle both the failures

and the obstacles that have come but also handle the successes.

You know, I think there I don't know who it was.

Was it Abraham Lincoln?

I may mess up where it came from, but there was a quote that

said, nearly all men can handle some form of adversity.

But if you really want to test a man, give him success.

Because it's difficult when people have success

that they can't handle it.

Because sometimes your talent can get you to a place

where your character can't keep you.

And that's the first thing that this company gave me.

Was they taught me as a young man how

to handle the success that would eventually follow

by having the right foundation.

From there, it was having the ability

to hire people that I cared about from my mother

to my college teammates to my high school teammates

and give them an opportunity in the business.

People say, you know, you're recruiting the people

or whatever.

Yeah, we're recruiting the people.

But there's not a lot of places where you can go

and say, yeah, I choose to have control.

I'm going to hire these five people

and you don't got to say so in it.

You ain't got to ask the CEO of the company

or the director of the company.

I'm going to bring in these five people

and I'm going to change these people's lives.

And I have five of my teammates right now

that have been with me for over a decade and a half

that I changed these people's lives.

They've done it, but I introduced them

to the opportunity that I had.

That was something that this company provided me.

Was the opportunity to change other people's lives

with this opportunity and me be the one in control

of making the decision of who's going to get hired,

you know, in this opportunity.

And then of course, it goes to the financial things,

you know, that have been able to happen.

I opened up two youth programs with others.

You know, I have a board.

None of it happened by myself.

I didn't do it all.

I had a team of people that helped me.

A lot of people blood sweat tears, you know,

put money into it, but opened up a youth program

in my hometown, Youngstown, Ohio.

Opened up a youth program in Pittsburgh for inner city youth.

Those were things that were near and dear to my heart,

you know, because of where I come from

and I could relate to some of those kids.

Retiring my mother at 50, some years old,

to where she works in a very limited capacity,

you know, in our company and does some consulting for me

and stuff like that.

When we open up offices, but other than that,

she chooses her own schedule and does whatever she's wanted.

And it's been like that for almost a decade, you know, now.

And this is the same woman that raised me standing.

We stood in welfare lines together.

Only because it is a great company and the grace of God,

you know, in America, can you go from a welfare line

with a woman to she's retiring, you know,

two decades before most people retire

and don't have a worry in the world,

rides horses, you know, every day because of this company,

you know, and my wife, you know,

has is able to stay at home, you know, with our children.

We're able to, we've lived in Florida,

we've had multiple, you know, homes,

we've traveled to country, I was able to go to Spain,

go to Italy, take my kids to meet my dad's side of the family

from Venezuela who moved to Spain.

I mean, that ain't cheap.

You try putting seven people on a plane,

you know, and taking them to all these different places

to have these experiences, just opportunities that I would never,

ever in a million years think that I would have

from the money that I'm able to give to people

to drive in a Rolls Royce, you know, from as deep

in your heart as you could get to a shallow and stupid

as you get, I can care less about this car, you know what I mean?

People, you could take this car today for me

and I will sleep nine hours tonight

and can give a shit less.

I don't care about the car.

I like it though.

You know what I mean?

I like the black badge with the blue guts inside.

I enjoy it, but you could take the keys tomorrow

and I won't miss a beat.

You know what I mean?

I don't love it to where it makes me.

You know what I mean?

I just enjoy it.

So this company has been able to give me everything from character,

how to be a good husband, how to be a good father

to financially provide me to resources

to impact other people, include my own family.

Amazing.

Amazing.

Yeah.

Honestly, we talk about all this money too

and I just want to say thanks to you Simon and thanks to you Spencer.

Like you guys are the two hardest working people I know, bar none.

And so it could be laboring on Labor Day together.

Labor Day together.

Yes, sir.

This isn't even labor.

I love my work.

I love my job.

Hey man.

And serving the Lord really.

But so the secret is there's no secret.

Mike Tomman, right?

You just educated us on Monday, last Monday, some time on is I'm there.

Let's get a stilers.

Standard is the standard.

Standard is the standard.

You guys are up every single day, 5 a.m.

You're sacrificing time with your family here in Florida to spend it with us,

pour into us, make us better people.

And then the money comes in afterwards.

So I just want to say thank you guys there.

And the fact that Spencer can do it.

I mean, it's different when we see because you know, you're 40 years old.

You're grown.

You have a ton of experience, but I just want to say thanks to Spencer here.

The engine on you is just.

I can't even put it in the words.

And so if you're watching this right now, you genuinely will be, you know,

showing a whole different side of a human beings.

And it's like it's the elite level division one athlete caliber discipline

that you bring to the team that you lead us with.

And I know where you're going.

And I know where you're going because you guys make it clear.

But you make it clear with your actions consistently day in and day out.

I just wanted to say thank you here on this public platform for that.

So thank you.

Thanks coach.

Salman, I got something that could benefit people listening.

So when I was coming into this and I told my parents, so I came into this

when I was still in community college.

It was my second year of community college.

And my cousin Mark was bringing me in obviously, but for people that don't know

that my cousin Mark was here for two years bringing me in.

And he said, for two years straight,

if you spent as much time as you spent in the gym

in this business, you would easily make six figures

your first year and just up and up from there

because he knew I was a hard worker.

And if I got obsessed with something,

that's just what it was.

I was obsessed with it.

And I finally was like, you know what?

I'm dropping out of school and I'm doing this.

And I told my mom and she thought it was a joke.

Like she was like, she literally just laughed.

So to avoid arguing, I was like, okay,

I guess I'm just gonna let her think it's a joke,

but I'm leaving.

I'm leaving from Pittsburgh going to Florida in two weeks.

You'll have to figure it out the day of.

And then like the day before,

I had a sit down conversation with my parents

because I was telling them, like, yo, I'm out here tomorrow.

Like I'm doing this.

I'm dropping out of school and they didn't support it.

My dad was like, look, he, I remember the quote, still,

if it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck,

then it's probably a duck.

And to me, this looks like an Italian dude with tattoos,

probably running an illegal organization.

Blah blah blah.

So that's probably what it is.

And I'm still sitting there thinking he just doesn't know

what he's talking about.

God bless him.

He'll figure it out in a couple years

when I'm paying for everything.

But basically I didn't listen to him

because I was stubborn enough to be like whatever,

they'll just have to find out the hard way.

But what would your advice be?

Cause I know that happens to a ton of people

when they're trying to get into this.

Most.

Yeah, most people.

Most people never get support.

And their parents don't understand.

They don't support their town.

No, no, no, no, stay in school.

Get a better job.

What's your advice to people like that?

First off, my advice is as a parent myself,

I can understand people's reservation,

getting into a business that's non-traditional.

And I never get mad at those people.

I'm never like talking bad about the parents.

And this isn't to be politically correct

behind the microphone.

This is what I feel.

I never have ill will towards the parents

that feel that way.

Because how I've learned to work with people

is I always try to put myself in their shoes,

not in their shoes from what I know.

Cause if I'm in your shoes from what I know,

I tell everybody, now I know I would coach my kids

to be entrepreneurs.

I'm not coaching my kids to whatever.

So everybody else in America,

most people are taught to get a job.

Everybody in America is taught to be workers.

Very rarely are you taught to be an entrepreneur.

Very rarely are you taught to matter of fact,

you look down upon to say that you want to do entrepreneurial

things, entrepreneurial things have no guarantees.

That if you're going to be an entrepreneur,

you're not tell people if they give you a floor,

they're going to give you a ceiling.

So the floor is the salary

and the ceiling is the limit of the amount of money

that you can earn.

And that's no knock to people that I'm just,

you got to understand the game in order to choose

the right game that you want to play.

And I didn't want to play that game.

I wanted to play a game that was unlimited.

I played sports, nobody came to me and said,

you're on a salary, you know,

you're going to get two snaps for every series,

regardless of how you work.

That's the most amount of downs that you could play.

I wouldn't want to play.

I want to have an opportunity to start.

And if I blow it, I want the opportunity

to sit my ass on the bench.

You know what I mean?

But it's up to me.

You know what I mean?

My grades, nobody gave me a salary from my grades.

You earn your aides, you earn your b's,

you earn your c's, I didn't go in and say,

you know what?

Just give me a 3.0, treat me fairly.

I'll show up twice a week.

We'll just settle on a 3.0, I'll give me a salary.

No, you earn it.

It's only when you get into business

that the whole school system is geared towards

making you be a person that works for somebody else

and has a job.

And so most people's mindset, even my whole family,

you know, it's like you're supposed to go to school,

get a job, get an education,

get out, have a 401k benefits of work to your 65

and retire and anything outside of that

would be categorized as nontraditional.

And so when you get into the nontraditional things

as a parent, your job is to protect your kids.

You want to protect your family

and protect your kids from pain and from making mistakes.

And so most parents are just trying to,

you know, they want their kids to take a pain free,

you know, approach and not make mistakes

and you know, take a nontraditional or a more traditional route.

So I never get upset, you know, with that.

I just learned that most of the time it's the rebels

that lead the world, you know, it's the,

what do you think Elon Musk was talking about?

You know, can you imagine Elon Musk as a 22 year old,

23 year old?

Can you imagine the people that started Facebook,

you know, as a 21 year old, 22 year old?

The people that changed the world, you know,

look at the presidents, look at, you know,

it's like a lot of these folks that start businesses

and change the game, change the world,

electric cars, you know, or this and that.

I think half of the millionaires in the country

are never have a college education, you know what I mean?

I'm a college graduate.

I'm not hate, no, people that graduate from college.

I'm just saying that you don't have to do that.

And especially now in 2023, soon to be 24,

people are rocking up all kinds of debt, you know,

for four or five years of school, you're coming out,

you know, if you go 40,000 a year for five years

or four years, you got $200,000 in debt, $150,000 in debt

and you still have no experience.

Now when you come out, you still got to get experience.

Everybody wanted two years experience for me

for the jobs that I really thought that I wanted.

They wanted two years experience.

So now I gotta rack up the debt, I gotta do the four years,

and I gotta get to two years experience.

That's, by the time you're, that's 25, 26 years old,

and by the time you're 26 years old,

imagine what you're gonna do.

I'm not even gonna say it over to my,

just imagine what you would accumulate

from the time you started to the time that you're 26 years old,

not to mention the experience, you know what I mean,

that you're gonna gain.

And so what I would tell those people

is it's not for everybody.

If you are not, and also,

if you're gonna take a risk,

the best time to take a risk on yourself

is as young as possible.

Because you can recover.

If you're 40 years old taking risks,

you're taking a bigger risk.

If you got a wife and three kids,

you're taking a risk,

you're betting on four or five people's lives, not one.

It's okay if I'm 22 taking a risk

and I gotta live with three, I got three roommates

and I can keep expenses low

and I'm betting on myself for a couple of years.

So what's the real risk here?

What am I risking?

Not my children.

You know what I mean?

Not my wife.

I'm risking, I got a couple of roommates,

we're gonna have fun for a couple of years.

Like we did in college,

you know, I would have in college

except we're gonna make some money in the process

and I'm gonna get some experience.

But what's the real risk?

You know what I'm saying?

It's the older that you get,

the people that kick themselves

is they get too far down the line

and now they're like,

man, this ain't really what I wanna do.

I wanna do more, I wanna do bigger,

I wanna do better, but now I'm making 100 grand

and I don't know if I wanna walk away

from making 100 grand to go take a risk and bet on myself

because I got a mortgage,

because I got cars, I got credit cards

and now it's a little bit tougher to take that risk

and so I would tell you,

take the damn risk while you're young,

whether it's this business or another business,

the time to take a risk is young

and the older that you get,

the more expensive that it gets.

Okay, that's the one thing I would say.

And then the other thing that I would say is make sure

that you got it in you.

Some people working is better for them.

Some people getting a job is better for them.

You gotta know your personality.

If you're somebody that would rather take orders

more consistently and you don't need an unlimited income,

you'd rather have summers off, weekends off,

off at four o'clock every day, no stress,

all that stuff, probably better to just take the role

of a job.

But really, when people don't wanna take

the commission stuff, they do so because of security.

When really the only security is when you take matters

into your own hands, you'll find people

that actually the security that they thought was there

because they're following somebody else's dreams

and they're getting a paycheck, those people get laid off,

those people lose their jobs,

those people somebody else is in control

and then they really don't have the security

that they sought for.

The more security that you seek,

the less the opportunity and the less security down the road,

sometimes you end up having.

The more you seek opportunity, the more security

that you end up providing for yourself,

because it's like, yeah, I'm in control.

You know what I mean?

I'm in control.

Nobody's gonna do this, nobody's gonna do that.

And so that would be the advice or something

that I would say is like, yeah, it might not be for you.

But if you're ambitious and you're like,

I want to be on my own merit, I wanna be in control,

I wanna be able to control my own schedule.

I think the American dream with everybody most people want

is they wanna have their cake and eat it too.

And then you've had people, you hear people say,

well, why have the cake if I can't eat it, right?

You should want to have your cake and eat it too.

And I think to have your cake and eat it too

is to have money and time both.

But when you try to chase both at the same time,

you don't get it.

It's like when I always say, you know,

the man that chases two rabbits at the same time catches none.

The old Chinese proverb,

I'm trying to chase having this balance

and all this time in my life,

but I also wanna have all this money.

You can't usually get both.

But you can have time down the road

if you chase the opportunity right now to build

when you fast forward life in five years,

10 years, you can have the best of both worlds

that comes with balance and you don't have to trade one

for the other to where it's, all right,

I got a bunch of time, but I'm broke.

Or I got a bunch of money, but I don't have any time.

You can obtain both of those

if you're willing to put in the work up front.

Yep.

Makes sense?

Makes sense.

Could you also touch on,

was huge for me?

And like this was just me learning from someone wise,

like yourself, teaching me how to think

because I've never heard this,

I've never been taught this.

So on top of that same question for new people

that their parents are telling them,

stay in school, get a secure job, blah, blah, blah.

I remember learning from whether it was you or Mark,

be careful who you take advice from.

And thinking of it like, okay, I'm coming into business

because I wanna make money.

And my mom doesn't make much money.

It's certainly not what I wanna make

and neither does my dad, but this guy does.

And he's telling me to do this,

but the people that don't make the money

are telling me to do this.

And I learned like when it comes to money advice,

maybe I should listen to the person that makes the money,

not saying I completely disregard my parents on everything,

because they're amazing people,

been married for 20 years.

They got a bunch of good wisdom to give me,

but maybe not just career advice.

So like could you further explain your opinions on that?

I think you'll hear me say try not to take it too much advice

from people that you wouldn't want to trade places with.

And then you always got devil's advocate.

Well, you can learn from a bum and you can learn,

that's true, that's true.

I can learn, I found old men on the side of the road

that looked like they're down on their luck.

And I spent five minutes with them in the rain

and they've given me some wisdom.

But outside of a couple small percentage, small moments,

I think you should look at life and say,

I'm gonna try to take advice from people

that I would want to trade places with

or be in that area of my life.

And not everybody is qualified in every single area of life.

So I'm not gonna take marriage advice

from my fitness trainer, necessarily.

I'm not gonna take business advice

from my marriage counselor necessarily.

I'm not gonna take jujitsu lessons from my boss in business,

right?

Those things people laugh at,

but then when it comes to life, they do the dumb shit.

You know what I mean?

They're listening to this one size fits all approach.

And Uncle Joe is the one that's given everybody advice out here

and he ain't done nothing in all those areas.

You know what I mean?

But be married.

You know what I'm saying?

So give me some marriage advice.

You've been married for 45 years.

Talk to me about that.

I can learn from that.

You know what I mean?

But if I'm trying to be a millionaire and you're not,

I gotta learn from a millionaire.

If I'm trying to be married

and you've been divorced five times,

you may be a great person,

but I'm not gonna get marriage advice over there.

And so I think people start just,

they just wanna listen to whoever

and make those people proud and listen in that moment.

So I'm not saying don't listen to your parents.

I'm a parent of three.

You know what I mean?

That's not what I'm gonna be on the mic saying,

because it's not what I believe.

You know what I mean?

I'm just saying whoever you take your advice from,

you need to make sure they're qualified

to give you advice in that area of your life

and don't be afraid to go against the grain a little while.

The people that end up changing the world,

oftentimes are the ones that are misunderstood

and they go against the grain.

It's if it's in your soul, and it's in your spirit,

to do a certain thing.

Sometimes you gotta just do whatever that thing is.

I'm not gonna force my kids to go to college.

I'm not, and I'm a college graduate.

I'm gonna look at every kid,

and I'm gonna see where they're at,

and I'm gonna give them advice based on

what their personality is, what their situation is,

what they think that they're gonna do down the road.

My grandmother almost had a heart attack

when she heard me say that,

but I'm not gonna force them to do anything.

A lot of my friends, and to each their own.

I don't think I'm right all the time.

I don't think somebody else is necessarily wrong.

It's up to you.

I think that, I can't give only advice in that area

to somebody because I'm not gonna tell them,

everybody don't listen to your parents

because you may need to listen to your parents

because you might not have the heart for it.

You're gonna mean it might not be right for you.

I think if it's right for you,

you'll find that spirit in yourself to do

what you are meant to do and call to do.

And if that's what you're called to do,

then you're gonna do it.

And if not, that's fine too.

I've had people that they came in

after they graduated, or they've done it for three years

and then they came in.

There you go.

Come on.

So I think it's not a one-size-fits-all approach.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Here's something that everybody can take advice

from on your part as well,

and then double back to the question before

about security and salary.

Can you speak a little bit on residual income

and how that works in the insurance industry

specifically here with global life American income

life and various organizations?

Yeah.

because a lot of people don't even,

I didn't know what that was coming in here

when I found out about it.

I know we're running out of time,

so I gotta try to be, you know,

I'm passionate, so I get long-winded

about each one of these subjects.

So I'm gonna tell you, it's getting equity,

a percentage of ownership over all the policies,

all the people that get enrolled into the benefits

or into the life insurance.

Everybody on your team, so if I have a hundred people

on my team, every time they make a sale,

we're gonna get a percentage,

you're gonna get a percentage of whatever,

when they renew, they pay a monthly fee,

they pay a monthly amount to have their policy,

and every time they make a monthly amount,

you own a percentage of it.

And you get a percentage of, you know,

let's call it more than half of anyone on your team

when you're in a high leadership role,

you get more than half of the residuals,

not out of their renewals, but in addition to,

everybody on your team, so if I have a hundred people

on my team, whatever they get into former residuals earned,

I'm gonna get more than half of that coded to my name

for the rest of the lifetime of that policy,

not my lifetime, it gets passed on to my children

and my children's children for the lifetime

of that policy, and it doesn't cost me anything.

That's why I originally liked the real estate industry,

is because I understood the concept of, oh man,

I like that I can own the rent, own the place,

and then people have to pay me rent

where really it's passive income coming in

that doesn't take me anything to do.

That's why I like the real estate industry.

I didn't realize, that's why I say to grace a God,

I didn't realize the insurance industry had it,

and the insurance industry had it even better,

that it didn't cost me a nickel.

You know, if I had to, if I wanted to get 10,000 a month

in the real estate industry passively,

you know, typically I would probably need

$1.5 million in paid off real estate

to get me a cash on cash return of $120,000

a year annually anywhere from 1.2 to 1.5 million,

and so that means I gotta make that much money,

I gotta pay taxes already on that money,

I gotta live on whatever money,

and I would have had to save and invest that amount of money

in order to get that amount of money in return.

And now we have people that are earning six figures

a month in renewals, not per year,

and per month in residuals.

We got new people getting $9,000,000 a month like Bennett,

you know, right now, it's been here for 24 months,

he's getting $9,000,000 a year in renewals.

That would have costed that,

he would have had to save up $1.2 million,

a million dollars and put it in the real estate

to get that type of passive income,

and that's what he's getting without ever going to work.

And so I would couple it to, you know,

if I'm a bartender and I'm giving this bottle of water,

or I'm giving this soda, and you know,

whatever, everything that left my bar

imagine if they gave me a percentage of it

for the rest of my life,

or you know, I'm selling cars every car that left the dealership,

they gave me a percentage of that person's monthly payment

for the rest of their life,

but a car you pay on for five years

and you're done or six years and you're done

on this life insurance,

they're paying it for the rest of their life,

so they're paying on it five years, 10 years, 15 years, 20 years.

And you get to the point where you're an old man like me,

and you start to roll in people that are the same age

or younger than you, 25 years old, 30 years old,

you're 40 years old, chances are possibly

the people may outlive you.

So I may be, you know, I'm 80 years old,

these people are 60 years old, 70 years old,

they're still paying on their policy,

they're gonna pay for the next 40 years,

they're gonna pay for the next 30 years,

and we're gonna earn residuals all while helping people.

We're not hurting anybody.

We pay a certain amount of death claims like I opened up,

the meetings all the time and say,

here's, it looks like a telephone book,

here's all the people that died this month,

unfortunately, the good thing is,

here's all the money that we paid out to these people.

Oh, life insurance, this life insurance, that,

every month, I got 27-year-old people

that their mother are grateful

that we're giving them $400,000, and they got two kids.

What were those two kids gonna do

if they didn't have life insurance?

We're giving them a tax-free $400,000,

or tax-free $200,000 to a family that's middle income

and don't have $200,000 set aside.

So not only are we making a lot of money in the industry,

where people have that opportunity,

but you can feel good about it.

When you go to bed, because you're actually helping

somebody with something that they need.

Right.

Oh, bless.

We got time for one more?

Yeah, go ahead, big bro.

Hop on the mic.

This will be for both you and Simon,

but when you guys are recruiting people,

what are some characteristics you're looking for,

where you know if they have those characteristics,

they'll be probably pretty successful in this business.

Who's that for?

Mia and you.

You can go for it.

They gotta be sick of hearing from me, go, Spence.

All right, I'm still interested

what you would say too,

but for the ideal person when I'm building a team

and who I think would do the best

and what results have shown these type of people do the best,

a couple of them former military people

because they're super disciplined, they understand

how to work hard,

and a lot of times they might not make a lot of money

in the military.

So if you can show them,

here's where you can make a ton of money with your discipline

and help a lot of people

and provide to a lot of people that you care about

because they obviously care about people.

They can kill it in this industry and a ton of them do.

There's a ton of millionaires in the company,

Simon, correct, that are for our military.

So military people,

I would say athletes, former college athletes

and especially D3 or D2 athletes,

because they've worked hard their whole life,

they got somewhere,

but they don't have a huge ego,

not that D1 people aren't gonna kill it.

My cousin Mark was D1 football for Pitt, he kills it.

But I like it like D2 athletes,

just because they feel like they got something to prove

there is people doing better than them in the D1,

but this is gonna give them an opportunity

past college sports where they can use their competitiveness

and everything like that to still perform past people up

in the world and just become better

and feel good about themselves.

And then the last thing,

me personally being one, I like hiring them

because I know they're all in

is just people that have dropped out of college

or willing to drop out of college

and go all in on something because you have no plan B,

like you don't have a degree

so I can't go get some job at the bank,

they would laugh me off the floor,

which is a great thing because when this business got hard

when I was new,

I didn't even have the option to quit

because where am I going?

And I couldn't go anywhere except like McDonald's.

I'm like I'm just gonna figure this out.

So I love having people on my team like that

because no plan B,

if you put enough time into this,

it's gonna work if you're doing it the right way.

Just like Simon says,

one of the successful people in the company

when you were new told you just last.

So like if you don't have a degree, you got no plan B,

you're gonna just last and it's gonna end up working out

if you keep on the time.

So those are my three.

I mean athletes, you know, Rugby wrestling,

you know, people that have had discipline

to where things got difficult

and they had to persevere in them, you know,

military sports but not always.

You know, there's, I got, we got people,

you know, I'm gonna name some names, you know,

that we're not athletes, you know, at all.

So I think if I look at just traits, you know,

of the people, it's coachability,

positive attitude, strong work ethic

and desire to be above average.

You know, if you're coming here,

I tell people it's not about the money.

It's, it's, if you're coming here and you can care less

and you just wanna make 60,000 a year,

this is too hard of a job.

You can go find something else to make 50, 60 easier.

This is where people need to,

they have to wanna come in here and say,

I'm coming here to make 250.

I'm coming in here to make six figures your number one.

I'm coming in here, I wanna make a million dollars.

And it's not about the money, it's just,

you have to want to be beyond average

and to be special in order to like what we do here.

Because this is a rewarding business

when you get through the obstacles and adversity,

which is really just the work, you know.

If you wanna work nine to five,

I could show you an easy 40-hour work week

where we can get you paid, you know, 50 grand a year.

I tell people, this is the hardest $50,000 a year job.

You can never have in the easiest $250,000

your job that you could ever have in your life.

And so you gotta wanna come here for the easy 250,

the easy 500.

You know, the people that you see making 20 grand in a week,

you know, you're looking at like, I want that life.

You know what I mean?

Traveling to Europe, traveling to Italy,

driving a nice car, working out, getting a tan,

pretty girlfriend going to dinner, you know,

all that, I want that life.

Yeah, you do, but that person started on the grind

in the cubicle making some calls, you know what I mean?

Making a thousand calls, all that stuff.

And so if you're coming for the 50,000

and that's what you want, this ain't gonna be it,

you're gonna hate it.

It's gonna be, it's not worth the grind.

But if you want the 250, if you want the 500,

you want the 800, you want the million,

you're gonna wake up one day and say, oh my God,

pinch me.

Am I alive?

How have I got to work and live in the American dream

at American income with no college degree?

And we ain't hating on the degrees.

I'm a graduate, he's a graduate,

and we got the fraternity president in the house

in J.E.T., the president of the fraternity in here, okay?

So you're the odd man out with no degree brother,

but you're in a position where you get to live that life

and have an unbelievable schedule and an unbelievable life

because you want it to be above average

and you wanted to go all in.

And those are the folks that I think do the best here

as the people that are like, man, I want all that life has.

I know there gotta be more.

I know there has to be more for me than $70,000 a year.

I know there has to be more for me than me being capped off

and them telling me I gotta sit behind this boss

that I know I'm better than for the next five years

to get a 5% raise.

I know there gotta be more.

I wanna take this into my own hands.

Those people are the ones that end up making it here.

Right, cool.

I think we got time for one more and this is kind of just broad.

But could you explain the,

because some people are like, what's areas organization?

What's glow, blife?

Like how's that all work?

I thought it was areas, but you're telling me it's glow, blife,

you know what I mean?

Yep.

Could you explain how that works?

Because it was confusing to me when I was coming in too.

Absolutely.

So, you know, I look at your San Diego and my dad said,

well, if it quacks like a duck, you look like a towelian,

you got these tattoos and all that.

Man, I knew these tattoos was gonna get me a truck.

I wanted these tattoos so bad.

So bad, I wanted tattoos.

And I never, if you look at my trajectory

and all of my old pictures, you know,

I never took my tattoos past my elbows

until I got to like my mid-30s.

I went crazy.

You know, my mid-30s, I got sleeved up,

but I wanted them since I was young.

But I knew people would judge you.

I know that people are gonna look at you

from the outside in and say you look like a duck.

You know what I'm saying?

With those tattoos, that's a duck.

You know what I mean?

And I'm not a duck.

You know what I mean?

I just got tattoos.

And I think people judge and I get it.

You know, it's human nature to judge.

I have to fight myself to not judge

because some of the greatest people

that I've ever met on this planet

and not all, but some of the greatest people

that I've ever met on this planet

got big long beards or they got long hair

or they got tattoos or they got a gold chain

and the world will look at them and say, they're bad.

He's bad or she's bad.

When really they're just doing what you wish you would do

and just be yourself.

You know what I mean?

And do what you want to do.

And so I waited, I waited, spent, I waited until

I was like 12 years in the business to say,

all right, I think people all know you're a nice guy.

People all know you're not a gangster.

They all know, they know you're from Youngstown

so they suspect that you might have some gangster roots to you.

But they all know that you do the right thing.

They know your character and so it's safe finally

for you to go ahead and get yourself these tattoos.

And I got these tattoos and they was coming after me, bro.

Oh, it was pictures of me, just the tattoos on and everything else, man.

But I get it, I get it.

But I would globe life shout out to globe life.

I love globe life and the stability that they provide for

our organization, more life insurance policy holders than any other

insurance company in the nation.

Texas Ranger Stadium, globe life, park, globe life, stadium,

official life insurance company of the Dallas Cowboys, globe life,

100 years.

That's like grandpa, grandpa, globe life.

You know, that's our family.

And then dad is American income and mom, mom and dad.

And then we are area's organization, the grandkids, you know what I mean?

Of globe life.

So our, we are owned.

American income is a wholly owned subsidiary of globe life organization.

American income makes up 40, 50% of all of the globe is a holdings company

and they own multiple insurance company from family heritage to Liberty National,

to globe American income.

They have a bunch of different insurance companies.

And out of those, we are LeBron James.

We are the Alabama, you know, we are the MVPs of that.

And within American income, we are currently the largest independently,

individually owned organization under that umbrella.

And second largest in the entire American income.

And I believe all of globe life, you know, umbrella and only second to somebody that started,

that has been around their organization over 40 years.

And we have about 15 since inception, since we started.

So start from the bottom now we hear.

Yes sir.

We started from the bottom now we hear with Big Bra, Spencer, Jose and all his quads

and the fraternity president, J.E.T., in the house and I'm great.

for that job would have me.

Yes sir.