Why Most Realtors Lose The Listing In The First 4 Seconds (René Rodriguez)

0:00What if I trained for the hill? Well, I ran and I ran through that hill. So, to me, when it's slow, run faster and run harder. If it's a hill, run up it faster because you will you'll gain way more market share. If the market's great, everyone's running and you're trying to run one mile in front of them. You're not going to gain much market share. But the moment the market sucks and they stop running, I'm running faster. But this is one of those times. The hell are we waiting for? Welcome back to Be Wealthy with Brett Tanner, the show where we deep dive into the strategies, mindsets, and real world tactics that unlock financial freedom and abundance in your life. Today on Beealthy, I'm honored to have my good friend René Rodriguez. He has shared the stage with Ed Mylett, Tony Robbins, Gary Vee, and countless others as a wildly requested keynote speaker and author of the best-selling book Amplify Your Influence. The result he brings neuroscience and psychology into leadership and influence. The result of his work is greater influence, personal transformation, and immediate results in

1:02business and in life by encouraging people with courage and grace. I can't wait for you to listen to today's podcast as I jump into all things with René. We talk about the narrative gap and how you're maybe missing out as a leader by not filling in the gaps. We talk about the frame and how everything in his life how our in our lives how the frame affects your reality. Let's jump into my conversation with René Rodriguez. All right, we're live with Be Wealthy. I am with my good friend René Rodriguez and I could not be more excited to have him on the podcast. René, welcome to Be Wealthy.
All right. Thanks for having me, man. I'm just as excited. I always seem to make more money when I'm around you or at least I at least think differently about money. So, I'm going to learn more from you. So just let's say that's that's like the dirty secret about working with you.
That is absolutely not true. But what I'm excited about is uh René and I met 3 4 years ago. I actually went and attended uh not the full amplify kind of a one-day amplify that you were doing

2:05for a good friend of ours and I got to experience a day with you. We went to dinner uh afterwards and you were still it was still part of the training event and it was eyeopening to say the least. So, you wrote a bestselling book called Amplify. You have a training. You speak on stages across the country. And I'm excited because I think what's there's so many things that's interesting about you. But you're actually a neuroscientist.
Not scientist, but background in behavioral neuroscience.
Okay. Well, you know, those are my words for now. I got to like that's what I in my mind that's who you are. And so I got I want to get to how you've got there, but I want to kind of go back to Rene's origin story. And you know, our goal here, right, we help entrepreneurs scale their income. Uh we help them think different about their money and their wealth and realize that wealth is so much more than just money. But I want to go back and figure out, you know, it's easy to look at René who speaks on stages in front of audiences of just mass audiences and he's at the top of

3:08the mountain. Um, I always want to go back to where did it come from? And so, you know, you're you're 10 years old, you're at that family dinner table, and the topic of money comes up, you know, was it was it scarce or abundant in your family growing up?
Well, it did it didn't come up, that's for sure. I think what's funny is like I have no recollection of money conversations. I do remember at that age, this is so weird cuz I never thought about this, was my stepfather at night, you'd hear him counting coins, but he's closed his door completely in his office and you hear cha-ching clink clink clink and you could just count these coins and it was why was it done in secret? I had never understood and I knew that there was some coin box in his drawer and but it was it was like this secretive thing and uh yeah, money was never talked about. Don't even didn't even think about it.
Yeah, it's wild.
No, no, it's not. And well, the point we're making here is like most people didn't grow up with it. Right. Today,

4:10like in my household, uh my kids, we talk about it openly. They know my net worth. They know my income. Um and we talk about money. Not that it's something that should be coveted in the only thing in life, but uh openly money provides you opportunities and access. And I just think we're trying to break that barrier down on this podcast that it's okay to talk about. How cool would it have been if your stepfather brought you in there? Hey René, let's talk about let's count it together. Let's measure it. Let's
Yeah,
there's so many lessons that could be learned there. And I just think it it's it's it's interesting how we all start. So when did you
Well, I was going to say just to add on to that like I mean me personally I'm trying to do that with my kids to say here's what we did today. Here's the sales. Here's what's happening. This is what this looks like and here's the money that's going out and you it's a totally different piece and it's like and at first you know it was like oh I don't want to know if I want to know that. You know people want to know the good but then the bad is stressful but it's like it's just all part of it. the all you know one of my uh I went to this dinner and the dinner was actually not a great use of time there's a bunch

5:11of group uh folks there but the guy came out of the comment he said all progress starts with truth and it's kind of money right good or bad is is irrelevant it's just we got to start with the facts of where we are right then we got to have some plan we want to go but until we step into where we are
you know it doesn't matter so when did you René decide to go down this path of being the educator going to influence. Where do we go from, you know, where you grew up? Kind of give us that journey that led you to where you are today.
So, my my whole vision was basketball grow as a kid. That's the only thing that I liked. I didn't like didn't like school. I just wanted to play basketball every single day of my my life. I I I was proud of the fact that there wasn't a single day that I didn't at least play basketball. No matter the day, I somehow played. I played. I played. I played basketball on my hands. It was all the time. And for me, when I got cut my sophomore year in college, I didn't know where to go. And I'm sitting here, you know,

6:15if I go back before that, actually, 17 years old, I was trying to figure out what what school to go to. And I was looking at Baylor University and all sorts of things. And I wanted to travel, get out of getting out of Minnesota. And I I wanted to go to Baylor because uh I sat in their business school and I was I thought I was going to go to school for business and their seats were so comfortable. They were like almost like somewhat have the back part was like a little reclining, you know, you sit back just the back top was reclined. I'm like this is the most comfortable chair ever. I come from Catholic school, private like Catholic school wooden chairs that are ridiculously uncomfortable.
And I'm like I could study in an environment like this. I'm like I'm going to go to Baylor. And my mother takes me to this workshop that she was speaking at at min in Minnesota. It was at the University of St. Thomas. And I remember walking by the classes as I was going and I'm like, they have the same chairs. Well, I guess I'm going here. That was like my only decision. It was the chairs. And it's like legitimately that was my choice. And but I remember that day was the first time I saw my mother speak. And the guy that went before her, it's a guy by the name of

7:18Bill Shepard. And I watched him and I watched this guy just was so ridiculously charismatic. He was talking about creativity in the workplace. I was locked in on this guy at 17 years old. He was funny. He was charismatic. He owned the audience. And I looked at my mom. I go, "Mom, I want to do that someday." And she looks at me like, "What?" I'm like, "Yeah." And she goes, "Well, I'm next." I'm like, "Oh, man. No. I don't want my mom to follow this guy. Like, she's going to get destroyed and embarrass us." And I remember,
was she a speaker, though? Like did she have a did she have a back? Was she what? And she was so she was giving talks.
Yeah, she was in
and you've never seen her speak before or
never.
Okay.
Yeah, she was doing workshops like in fact amplified material was based on a workshop she created for change management and behavior change. And so the I remember we went on break. I went and got like a soda or something and I came back 30 seconds later after she had started. I'm hearing her play her guitar. I'm like, "Oh my god, is my mom playing her guitar in front of these 500 business people?" And they're all standing up swaying back and forth

8:21singing the song that she used to sing all the time. You are more You are more than what the people say. You are more than all that stuff. It's crazy. I haven't told that story ever. Is um I lost her two years ago. And so
I'm sorry.
She's playing this and I'm going, I can't believe these guys are falling for this this music. And she just owned them. And she started talking afterwards and it was like she was a magician. I could literally see like her hands the way she would talk and it was almost like you could see the magic going. I'm watching this and at 17 I start crying just like this tear thinking this is my mom and I'm going I never knew this. And I I thought to myself instantly I'm like well I guess I got the best mentor right here. It was in that moment I was like I'm going to follow her somehow. It was just crazy.
That is so beautiful and cool. I never knew your origin was going to see this other guy. Then your mom gets up there and that was so so you realize in that moment I got to see this other incredible speaker. Then I see my mom

9:24rock the stage and and change these people's lives.
They did a two-page spread on her in the Minneapolis business uh newspaper, Minneapolis Star Tribune Business News where she like two two-page spread on what she did. I was like, "Okay, they've never done two pages spread on me in the newspaper, you know, like I've been in some cool magazines, but that was that was just that was really cool."
That is So when do So you go to you go to Baylor, right? Or where do you end up going to school?
Oh, I went to University of St. Thomas cuz I Yeah, this is I didn't have to travel then. Like I say, it's in Minnesota.
Okay. So you you go there and what's the process to go from
I want to go you know I want to go down this road of being a speaker to yeah because I'm you're now just excited and you're a kid. What do how do you you know in college doesn't have a course called how to be a public speaker unless maybe the one I went to. They don't have that.
No. So what what so I went to school and I decided to study because you know she asked me this question. What does everybody here have in common? And I said I didn't know. Oh, and she said, "They all have a brain, and if you understand how the brain works, life

10:26becomes easier." So, I went to school for behavioral neuroscience cuz I remember in high school, um, I hated all the classes, but my psychology teacher brought in a magician, and I was and he was doing like sensation, perceptual tricks and stuff, and I'm like, "Okay, so I can be they can do magic in a in a classroom. I'm all for the psychology thing." And then, so she told me this, and so then I'm like, "Okay, I got to study the brain." So, I went through behavioral neuroscience, which was all the classes on the brain. And so, I was also playing basketball. That's what I thought was going to happen. Long story short, I get cut and I get to ask one of her clients who was a CEO or to be the CEO of International Paper at the time. And so he was executive vice president. Probably had 40,000 employees that worked under him at the time. And I said he he asked me how basketball was and and I told him I was cut. Now you have to remember this. We were broke prior to my mother doing this. So like we when I say broke like we didn't have money until probably my sophomore junior year in high school. um we grew up poor as could be and then she got into this consulting thing and it just like skyrocketed for her. And so she's got this client and he's like,

11:28"How's the basketball?" I said, "It's done." And I said, "But I don't want to talk about it." I go, "I have one question. What's the one thing I have to do to be in your shoes when I get older?" And he smiles. He looks around. He goes, he goes, "Okay." He goes, "You learn how to sell. If you learn how to sell, you'll always be employed." And I was like, "Okay, I guess that's what I got to do." And didn't know what selling was. And two weeks later, I get this letter in the mail that I've been selected because of my GPA, which I was a 2.7 at the time, or 2.3, sorry, to join this fast-paced sales and marketing company in the health and wellness industry. I'm like, okay, sales and marketing, I'm supposed to do that. Health and wellness, I love to work out. This is great. Let's do it. It was a cookware uh recruiting to sell cookware door to door. Now, to get into college, I had I was part of the probation program with all the other minorities that had to maintain a 2.0 you know, just to stay in school, but we also had to work as a janitor the first year. So, we're cleaning up cigarette butts, cleaning toilets. That was our first year, but I made a ton of money that first summer. I made $976 and kept it all in one. So, I would literally put in a drawer and smell it every once in a while of, you know, just

12:29this big stack of roll of of $900. And the guy comes out and they said his first summer he made $9,000. And I had never heard of that kind of money before. And I'm thinking to myself, that's another zero. But what am I going to do with another zero? Like holy what? And it was like all my passion for basketball went away and I just locked in on this guy. And I walked up to my interview. There's 80 kids in there. And I said, "I will do what you say when you say to do it with no questions asked." And he looks at me and he's like, "All right, okay." And then that was it. He ended up hiring everybody because it was mass recruiting. Uh 79 kids uh quit one stay. That was me. I was the last guy to make a sale because my mom was out of town and I ended up becoming number one in the or number five in the United States, Canada, Mexico at 18 years old. So then that whole process was presenting four three times a night, four, six, and eight. We would do a trade show and we'd go present and I'd read it read a

13:31perspectus and I'd learn how to sell and close. And then we moved from one-on- ones to one on five couples, so 10 people at a time. So I had to learn how to speak in front of 10. And this is where this is all and this is where the okay
over four year period.
Okay.
And so then I remember when um we were done I was like okay so I I horrible GPA except in in in all the neuroscience classes I had like a 3.8 but the rest of the class I hated. And I remember having all these job offers but my mother said well you can come work for us. And she she told me she told me before you're never going to come work for us first. she got to go somewhere else. So, I took I took the offer, which was like $33,000 a year. I was getting offers from Xerox and Eli Lilly and all these other jobs for for being a salesperson and 3M. And I was like, you know, do I want to say I told sold 10,000 copers or do I want to say I had great conversations on a daily basis? And I knew that the people that I would be surrounded by working with her

14:32would be much better conversation. I knew I'd get coached and I'd get mentored, which is all that mattered to me. So, I took the job at 33,000 and it started there. And long story, I I was couldn't learn how I was too young to sell these high-end consulting gigs, but I was trying to help on from a sales coordination standpoint. And um failing miserably, failing miserably. And then finally worked my way up through this the ranks. And
why were you failing? Because you had that early success. Why were you failing initially? Yeah, because I'm selling to CEOs as straight out of college, a consulting, and I didn't know what I was doing. Like I just I was there to just try to drive some kind of sale, but I didn't know how to do it. Like it was no experience in it. And there was no she didn't have any experience cuz she had one client that sort of bought into her and then started bringing her to all these other businesses like DuPont and International Paper. So he would make the sale for her and the company grew like we did like $28 million in eight years period of consulting.

15:34
Yeah. And so it was a big deal. And so I'm senior my job was to figure out how to sell this. And right in 2001 in uh August 2001 I become CEO 25 employees. We're doing 55 workshops a month. 37 consultants that are out there working and we're we're just rolling and I'm thinking, okay, I got eight months of cash in the bank. I got to figure out how to sell. And 9/11 hits a month later
and no clue as to what that would impact me. I'm like, okay, the I don't know what that means. A week later, we lose our million- dollar contract. That was all their cash for eight months and I got 25 employees and I owe the bank 573 $3686,000 and I get sued for $275,000. Like what do I do?
And you have no revenue because when people don't realize when 911 hits for like there was like a 30-day period the world kind of just stopped, right, Rene?

16:37Is that a fair? Like everyone just said we're not doing anything. We're not moving forward. We're not back. We're just hold. Right. Because we were all just terrified. It's It's weird to think about everyone stopping for 30 days. Was that what it felt like to you?
Well Well, yeah, because they were a manufacturing site, a paper mill, and oil prices went through the roof. And they said because of oil prices we're putting on hold or we're canceling indefinitely, everything. And so, thank God we had some provisions in terms of, you know, ones that were 30 days out, they still had to pay us on, but there was no revenue. And so, I was like, what do I do? And then my mother was so stressed that she had a she had four strokes.
And so she was a little bit off. Remember she had never had to sell this to a new client. She was just good at what she did and delivering it. And so we had four of us. It was me and my mom, a bookkeeper and our CFO and then one executive. And and the even the CFO was sort of on the sidelines. I'm like, "Okay, I'm just

17:40going to go sell." And I put her in front of a room and she would she would talk about these things that assuming these clients knew what she was talking about. All these assumptions and inside language and things that just made no sense. And I'm like, "Okay, they're not following along." All right. So, I'm going to do the intro next time. I'm going to go five minutes. I'm going to intro. You're going to hear my mother talk about things like the reptilian brain. And what that means is, and I do this and so goalie, come on. And then she'd go and add five or six other words. It made no sense. And I have to go from five to 10 minutes, the next intro, and then 10 to 15 minutes. And next thing I know I'm a half hour 45 minutes and I'm doing these intros to just kind of make sure that she lays the groundwork and then people are like just keep going. And it was very interesting where I had started learning. I we're getting more comfortable in front of the room and still at that time I remember calling a friend of mine in the mortgage industry saying I just lost all this business and I'm going to go need to sell something. Remember if you learn how to sell, you'll always be employed. So I called him up. His name was Greg. And I said, "Hey, how does this mortgage thing work?" And I went in there and started doing mortgages. And I only did

18:42that for about two weeks. And realizing that, you know, one, there's a ton of money in 2002 in mortgages. Like it was so much money. And but then I also realized there were no sales people. He had 65 loan officers that didn't know how to sell, realtors, but didn't know how to sell. And so I looked at him and I said, "Why don't should we do a sales training for him? I'll put it together because I wanted to learn how to do, you know, like speaking." He goes, "Yeah, let's do it." I spent two weeks to get together my first sales training, the fundamentals of selling and we had four people show up and I gave it everything that I had and at the end of four hours they're like this was incredible. I merged neuroscience with sales process and the five or six money making activities and they're just like what is going on? And can we do this again but I want to bring the rest of loan officers. I'm like cool. 10 people showed up. They're looking around. They're going, "This was insane." And they go, "We should do this for our realtors." Okay, let's do it. Anyways, that kind of kept going and within a couple weeks, he's like, "Let's do it every other week. One internally, one externally."

19:43And so, we did 27 workshops that that's that that um that year. 6 months in, I've got standing room only, 110 people showing up. They're blowing out walls. And that's sort of how it started.
All right. If you've been listening to the show for any period of time, you know I run a a high-end mastermind for entrepreneurs that are looking to create a different outcome and create more freedom and their life as it relates to their wealth and their money. And that's what I want to offer you a risk-free opportunity to come check it out. We have two seats available at our upcoming mastermind. You can book a call with my team over at bewealthy.com. Navigate to the mastermind section and book a call. We would love to have you at the event and check it out and see what it's all about. So, so René, you you do so many things so well and I love that you blend the science of it with the act of it. So, let's go there because I think a lot of our audience uh people think they know how to sell, right? People watching this are like, René, I mean, I sell, but then you tell them, "Cool, you're stripped away from all of your your

20:45accolade. You just got to go. It's we're only going to give you a device."
Yep.
And nothing and drop you off. Now go. And people realize pretty quickly, oh, I actually don't know how to sell. I don't have a sales process. So, let's pretend that someone's watching this. Let's just say we got a 21-year-old out there and they're like, hey, I I want to go start selling. Walk us through your that process at that workshop and you know, let I'll let you just talk like they're they're going to get into it. They're excited. They want to be you you pick the career and the what we're selling. Take us through a little bit of some of that training with the science around it. I think that'd be super helpful for the audience. I think a lot of your Let's go. A lot of your audience is in real estate. Why don't we just choose that?
Yeah, let's do that. I love it.
Yeah. So, so you have to think about there's there's two things. There's dependent events and statistical fluctuations in every in any business. And dependent events, like if you want to make paper, I got to cut a tree down. You can't negotiate that. I have to cut a tree down before I do this. And but so somebody says, "Well, I want paper." And okay, great. Cut the tree down. Well, I don't like cutting trees. Great. You're

21:46not going to have paper. And well, I want paper. Wonderful. Cut the tree down. Let's start. No, I don't like doing that. Okay, then fine. Well, but I want a paper. Well, let's cut the tree. Like, you see how like maddening that that idea is ridiculous. It makes no sense. Well, sales is the same thing. It's like I want a lead. Wonderful. Let's pick up the phone. Let's start there. Assuming we're not doing marketing. Uh, well, but I don't like picking up the phone. Okay. Well, then you're not going to have leads. But I want leads. Okay. Well, let's pick up the phone. Let's start making You see how ridiculous that conversation is? you but this is you're anchor in this point. This is the conversation people really have as you and I you know influence others. This is where it starts. So this is so good. I mean this is actually what people say.
It always starts there and I I was on a conversation with today with a guy and he is a top producer. He was worth about $10 million um probably about 6 months ago. That number is significantly reduced. has needed to sell properties just to pay cash. And he's like, I want to hire you to help me build my brand and all that sort of stuff. And I looked

22:48at him and I said, "I would love to take your money, but no." I go, "You need to make phone calls and book appointments and close some accounts with some realtors. That's it." I go, "How many calls can you make today?" And I go, "If you don't believe this is real advice, I'm telling you, don't pay me. Go do this instead." And he's like, "You're right." I go, there isn't any way around it. I could help you build a brand, build a social media following, and all that sort of stuff, but it'll never replace selling from an immediiacy perspective. And when you sell, you control the outcome. Like, I don't care who you are, you could go talk to 10 people today, someone will need to buy something. And how? But most people won't talk to 10 people in a week, two weeks, even in a month. And they say the market sucks. No, you aren't engaging in the market, period. And I said, "And you do this for me for two weeks, you promise you promise you you will be laughing at yourself for even saying those words, hearing those words coming out of your mouth." And so think about as I look at what I was taught when I was 18 was that there are

23:50six ways you make money in in sales. And it's an acronym is PAP-CAR. Okay.
Yep. PAP-CAR. Prospecting appointments, presentation, closing, aftercare, referrals. So in between each one of those those are activities and skills. Prospecting is a skill. Appointment setting is a skill. Presentation is a skill. After skill care is a skill. Closing is a skill. Referrals are skills. In between each one of those skills or activities, there is an outcome or we call a commitment objective. I prospect to generate a lead. So what do I do with that lead? I set an appointment with that lead. How do I know I set an appointment? The objective is a date, time, and a place. Pretty simple. And with a daytime, a place, I present value. I present value. they're credible, differentiate myself and gain trust. So then then I can close the deal and close the deal by getting a signature and the signature is then transcended into keeping a promise or aftercare to deliver the service and the goal aftercare is to wow them so that they can ask for the referral and start back over again. That is a perpetual sales cycle and I don't care who you are. That is how it works and it is no more complex than that. And I was

24:54telling my kid, I go, I go, you know, here I am. Everyone's coming to see me speak bestselling author. I still have the pap car. And I go, watch, this is a lead. Person came up to us after an event. I go, hold that lead. Help me book an appointment. Right. He's like, great. He's talking to him today. The appointment was set for today. I'm like, what? Watch what happens. I did the presentation. Oh, magically I closed them. Oh my god, magically he bought. And he looks at me, he goes, "So, Dad, every single sale you made was once just a lead." I go, "Yes." And every lead was just somebody out there that didn't even know I existed. And so, I have to be out there making sure that they know I exist and turning that and triggering that interest so that they express that interest. And then I can book an appointment with them. If I can book an appointment, I do. And then then now I can make money just based on really a lot of activity. Just up my activity. And we tell people is make up in numbers what you lack in skill. If you suck, just do it a lot. Period. And it was it's this is an if

25:57then flowchart. There's no more complexity. If you suck, do it a lot. And after a while, you won't suck as much. That's called the learning curve. And your law of averages will get better with the more times you do something. It's just we get better at it. A baseball pro baseball player swung the bat a few million times, right?
Yeah. And how many reps have you had with with P&L sheets and balance sheets and looking at credit reports?
Well, in sales, right? So, my It's funny. Everybody wants the shortcut, René. They want the I want to get there, you know? So, I started when I started selling, right? I came as a farmer to this business arena and I was getting on the phone. I couldn't sell anything, Rene. I would just I'd get on the phone. I'd be talking to you and I was making the calls. It just wasn't going anywhere, right? I just This is before scripts. I mean, maybe they were printed books, but I just, you know, I was just so and I tell the story. I had this lender I worked with who was to this day one of the most talented salespeople I've ever seen. He was just a wizard on the phone. You know, those people where it's their framing and you know, all the things you and I are going to get to. It's just, you know, I love

26:59those guys.
But the art and the and and the joke, you know, at the certain moment to soften it and then there's emotion,
timing is perfect. the timing, that awkward silence, they pause, you know, they've gone at all. And I literally tell a story. I You know what I did? Because I I was doing this all day and it just wasn't going anywhere. So, I literally hooked my headset into his I went to his office back physical headsets and I plugged my phone in and sat on the floor of his office and listened to him eight hours a day. Did it for day. I mean, not that not in my proudest moment, you know, being you think that you're going to, you know, 25 years old sitting on the floor in someone's office beating your brains out. And I got to tell you though, I just started repeating what he said and I realized like you said there was he said, "Brett, there's eight objections really in in life for most products you sell, there's eight. I'm not going to tell you what they are, but when you get one, I want you to write it down."
Yes.
Come back to me and I'll give you this beautiful objection handler, you know, to to handle it.
Bullet in the chamber. a bullet. He goes, "You just need to know those

28:00eight." And he goes, "Once you learn them, you're almost waiting for the objection." You're like, "Yeah, I know what this like. Come on, let's go.
I can't wait till they tell me it's too expensive. I can't wait till they tell me my friend, you know, also does this. I can't wait." And so, you get to the point where, to your point, you start out really crappy and then you get less crappy and then you slowly get world class and you get to play at the level you are. Um, and you train others to do it. It's so But people want to cut out today. For some reason, our society, René, we want to skip the work and get to the result. And there's nothing in life that works that way. We've got to do the work.
You know what's funny? When you get sales professionals talking about sales, you see how like giddy we get. You have you met a sales professional across the room, you're like, "What'd you sell?" They're like, "Cookware. Knives." I'm like, "Dude." And all of a sudden, we start talking about selling and we just get all like happy. There is there is a sales professional understanding that comes from I control my income. You don't. The market doesn't. I do. And I

29:04remember I hated microeconomics. I hated macroeconomics. They're like, well, if you want to sell something, you could just lower its price here. I'm like, I'm going to have a better present. I'm in college going, they're going to buy because I closed them. And I I couldn't get out of the macro thinking because it was about the masses. micro I understood, but macro I'm like, "No, they're gonna buy. I sell they won't buy at this price." I'm like, "Bullshit. I sold cookware last night till $10,000 worth of cookware last night." And I couldn't I just couldn't I was just it was a young arrogant, you know, 18, 19 years old and I couldn't understand it. But it was so ingrained in me that I determined the outcome and it wasn't about the market because the market never wants to buy $2,500 sets of cookware. I go, "Of course they don't."
In any market. In any market.
Yeah. Of course they don't because and I'd say because they haven't met me yet. That was like it was just like there. It was like you just haven't met me yet. I'm like oh you poor child. Just like you just haven't met me yet. Cuz once you meet me I'm going to show you things you never even knew were possible. Of course you're not in the market. You know real estate agents and loan

30:06officers they say well the mark the the the the market sucks. Therefore I'm not going to sell much. Versus saying the market's slow right now. I got to up my game and start telling better stories asking better questions. Like that's that's the mentality shift. That is the V the the the fork in the road of who you are. Are you a uh externally focused victim or are you an internally focused proactive? Those are the two distinctions that I have. Am I externally focused on what the world is doing and becoming a victim of that or am I internally focused being proactive about that? No matter what the the world is, I'm going to go sell. I'm going to go uncover value. I just may have to do it twice as hard for a while. And then the cyclical nature of the market comes back. Always does. But what I also know is when it's hard, I smile because I know how many people are about to quit. I go, "Oh, it's a little bit tough, let's see how many quit and how my my conversion ratio is going to go higher because less people can endure." Period. Navy Se Navy Seals are interesting. Um, I talked to a lot of these guys and when

31:09they get scared, what immediately follows their fear in a gunfight is calm. And I'm like, why? He goes, "Because I know if I'm scared and I'm the best train in the world, I can only imagine how scared they are going against me." And they and he goes, "So I just wait and get a little comfortable." I'm like, "That level of confidence, how exciting." But that's what selling is your
That's from the reps, right? That's from doing the work and getting the training. So I want to go there. So I think a lot of people out there watching this, right, are their business is off. The world's weird. We're as we're filming this, you know, uh you and I are actually filming this on uh on Halloween. Uh and the world in a weird pl almost like it's almost this conversation we're about to have. It it's a weird place kind of like Halloween gets a little weird. And you know, I coach people for a living, right? I coach top entrepreneurs uh at helping them unlock their business. And and today, Rene, there's feels like there's this disconnect. Uh and I'll tell you the disconnect. They everyone's had this runup, right? If you got in business from 2010 to now, you've had

32:12nothing. I don't care what business you're in. The world has just been going like this for 15 straight years. Probably most years you're making more money. Um, even if you're not getting better, the market's just giving you a lift. And for the first time, you know, I always say like today to me feels like 2008. And it feels like it. It's just weird. It doesn't make sense. It's harder. You know, people are today, they're hurting, but yet they're still spending money because they're charging it on their credit cards. And a lot of the leaders I talk to aren't willing to change their behavior. They they want what was happening in 20, they want to wrench their time machine back to 2022 rather than get in the field. And so, one of the conversations I have my clients, it's like, you know, the general, sometimes they're in the back and the army's up there going to battle. Sometimes the general's out actually in front of him and he's out there leading the charge down the hill. Today's the day we got to get back in there and do it. So when you think about because you you work and you coach and you influence top CEOs and executives. Am I the only one feeling this or are you having some

33:15of this conversation with some of your people that there's just a disconnect? That's part one of the question. Part two is how do we speak to them right now? What would you say to them to put the train back on the tracks and win in this weird time that we're in?
You know, I I try to stay in my lane and I go I defer to people like you to tell me what's happened financially, right? I I that's one of the reasons I I just value you and what you do so much because I look at behavior. I don't look at financial trends. That's not my expertise. And as I'm listening to you say that I'm like and I going, "Wow, that is kind of weird. that is kind of happening. People do get stuck in in this behavioral cycle and then they tend to blame the market.
Very few people.
Yeah. And they very very few take responsibility and you know we look at we say okay there's so many predictable things that are going to happen in mortgage and real estate. The winter is going to be slow. Okay. So then I should work like goddamn madman four to 6

34:21months prior to that to just ensure that that activity flows through the winter and my winner is awesome. And it's like the person I read this article saying, you know, if you're approaching a hill and I'm running, there's a lot of people that will walk up the hill, but what if I trained for the hill where I ran and I ran through that hill and you know, it's almost this this um you know this if you're for example, if you're in a race and all of a sudden the power went out, okay, well, who did the power go out for? Everyone. Okay, so it's not it's even equal opportunity. Nobody can see. And what do people stop doing when they get scared? They stop running. So they go, "Okay, if they stop running, what if I ran faster? How much market share could I take?" Question is all of it. Cuz if they're not running and I am, and I run for 2 to 3 months and they're 2 to 3 months into it, they're like, "Yeah, I probably should start running again." I'm 2 to 3 months ahead of them. They could run as fast as they want because they won't catch up to me at the same pace because I'm still

35:25running. So they have to run my speed plus some to make any ground on me. So to me, when it's slow, run faster and run harder. If it's a hill, run up it faster because you will you'll gain way more market share. If the market's great, everyone's running and you're trying to run one mile hour mile in front of them. You're not going to gain much market share. But the moment the market sucks and they stop running, I'm running faster. More phone calls, better presentation, invest heavier into marketing, put more videos out. No one else is, why not own the dialogue during that time? So if this is one of those times, the hell are we waiting for? And I did this when when CO happened, people would attest to this. I started laughing. I lost 100 events in a week. Do the math on.
Let's be clear. You're in the live event business and they shut down the live events. And it's kind of a it's not like you are AMC, right? You're in the theater business of sorts, right? And they say, "Hey, you can't go to movies." So, like, did you ever see that that CEO when they were interviewing him and he's like, "Guys, we planned for everything. You know, we planned for a writer

36:26strike. We planned for an aggra. We didn't plan on shutting down the theaters." I mean, they're like, "That's not something we can do." Hey, if you're getting value from the show, do me a favor. Take less than 10 seconds and hit subscribe. Whether you're on YouTube, Apple podcast, Spotify, hit subscribe. Leave us a review. It helps us immensely. Our goal is to help more people and you are one of the keys to doing that. So, please do us a favor and leave us a review and also subscribe.
No travel, no inerson gatherings. So, basically everything that I know doesn't exist. It's like, well, you can't uh real estate, you can't sell a home, but go make money. How? And so, I looked at that and I started laughing and everyone's like, my my my my colleagues and my uh my team's laughing. They go, "Why?" I go, "Well, it's not my first time." They what do you mean? It was the same thing happened in 911. I go, "But this time I'm I'm ready." And um I also know what's going to happen next. And and quite frankly, I don't have much. And I'm more comfortable not having anything than having a bunch because I can't up nothing.
And most of my life, I haven't had that

37:29much. So I'm actually just fine like this. You can take away everything. I'm going to be just fine. I'll go sell something. I'll eat tonight somehow. And the I started laughing. I go, I do know what's going to happen. Fear and panic and irrationality. And that's the one thing we know better than most. So, we're going to make a video series and we're going to live what we've been talking about. What do you mean? I said, 'Well, we're going to talk about the lighthouse series and we're going to guide people through the emotional irrationality of what's going on. We're going to teach them how to sell even harder right now. We're going to give the leaders the tools to lead. Pretty simple. And great, what are we charging? I said, nothing. So, we're going to make the best videos we've ever done with your best content. We're going to give away free. I said, yeah. Why? I said, 'Well, if you saw someone drowning and you had a life vest, would you monetize it or would you just throw it? It's a pretty simple answer. We'll figure out the money later, but I promise you, those of you who save will never forget you. And it's just the right thing to do. I didn't also believe in the energy of it, right? For whatever you want to believe. I wasn't a specific person. Do you

38:30remember I threw that life? It wasn't about that. It was just doing the right thing. And what ended up happening is that the latter 6 months virtually we made more money than the previous year in live because we had figured out studios. We'd figured out audio, camera, lighting, location. We were doing we we were blowing other speakers out of the water with virtual events cuz we actually knew how to do them. I I understood the neuroscience of capturing attention online. I understood I talked to actors and directors and producers who were able to catch our attention on a little box. They said, "You can't build trust." I'm like, "Bullshit. Yeah, you can. We just don't know how to do it. That's why we watch full-length movies with our families, binge watch our favorite TV shows. It's it's possible. We just have to figure it out. And but that ability to sort of maneuver and reinvent is sort of been the story of my life through this stuff. And so what I tell people is that if you know how to maneuver, reinvent, and sell, you're not scared of any market. Bring it. It doesn't it doesn't I don't want it, but if it happens, so what? You know what I am scared it was the grid shutting down because I I have to learn how to do some like you know make you

39:31know kill my own food and uh start a fire and all that sort of stuff. I do have a book that I bought on that but that stuff like imagine if you knew how to survive in the winter no matter what it was. You could create your own ice. You could filter your own water. You wouldn't care if the grid went down. You'd survive and the rest of us would die. And so it's kind of the same thing in the marketplace. And so I know how to survive that market.
I I love that you said it. I think innovation, right? I think what's missing today is people going in and doing what you did in co right you're like okay the whole world changed my entire business model doesn't exist for the time being cool let's reinvent it let's go you know Michael Dell had this thing I listen to a recent uh podcast with him
and basically said like I can't remember it was every year but he's walking to his team and say we're going out of business
every year and they're like what do you mean he goes our competitors are getting they're better than us they're coming along quicker they're more hungry man the day we quit innovating and going out and making it different. Um, we got to think that way and that and that's what you did. I think that today people you what you always did today, you may have to change it, right? It it literally what are you willing to do different in

40:35today's world? So, I want to talk a little bit I want to talk about your narrative gap here in a minute. I want to go there. But I think right before the narrative gap, um you've taught me so much, but I I want to talk about the power of the frame cuz you know, in my mind, when someone's selling, uh in my mind, and I want you to correct me if I'm wrong, I think frame is kind of one of the first things you got to think about like what's that person's frame as we're going to enter a conversation. And I think this is I think this is what people fundamentally do wrong in sales. So, I want everyone that's listening to this or watching it to put down whatever you're doing on the side and listen to René because if you understand the frame, you can have a different conversation, you can impact people differently. So, what is the frame, René? And why does it matter if we want to influence people?
So, what's crazy is the deeper I got into neuroscience, the uh the more I understood what selling really was and what I understood what persuasion was and truly honestly what leadership was. And to get into this, you have to understand in selling, leadership, parenting, friendship, life, it's about

41:38how we view the world and the the rules by which we understand the world and how it works. If this then that uh these certain people are this way, this industry is that way. It's just there's that and that's all what's called a frame of reference or frame. The window by which I view the world. And when you realize there are certain frames and we use frames to construct reality, our understanding of reality. And so within that we say that perception equals what?
Reality.
I have to add two words to that. Perception equals reality for me.
Well, there I I'm not doing business with me. I'm doing business with you or them. So there's a lot of meis at the table. Well, how are they perceiving things? Which would be what are their frames? What are their frames of reference? If somebody grew up in the south, there's a whole slew of cultural frames of reference. If you grew up in Russia, you have a whole another window that you look at the world from. You look at if you grew up in Africa, United States, in Minnesota versus New York

42:41versus California versus Miami versus Chicago, if you're black, if you're white, if you're Hispanic, if you're female, if you're a male, there's these are all frames of reference, different perspectives, all offering different perceptions for them. And so we go, okay, if I'm about to sell you cookwware and your frame of reference is cookwware is something that's handed down to me by my parents. I don't spend money on it. The metal does not matter. It's just a heat conductor so I don't burn it on the stove. And if it doesn't matter, then why would I pay you for that? Well, that's a frame. I The whole purpose of the presentation is to show you that heat conduction does matter. Not all metals conduct heat the same way. Some metals are dirty and poisonous, that you can cook without water. Well, I didn't know water mattered. Well, then, yeah, I'll show you how water matters. And I I'll shred a a carrot, have you taste the carrot, and you go, "Wow, tastes like a carrot." I'll take a glass of water, lukewarm water. I'll put that shredded carrot in there for about 5 seconds, stir it around, pour out the water, and all of a sudden that water is orange. I have to explain that that color is where vitamins come from.

43:44Minerals is flavor. I take the the the the carrot that I just touched with water for a second, put it back in the bowl, have them taste, and they go, "Oh my god, that's horrible." So, what do we lose? They go, "Minerals." "Oh, let's grab a mineral, put it back. What's the mineral that brings flavor?" Salt. Put a little salt over the top. That should taste good. They go, "Oh god, I want the original one." Oh, so you want the natural vitamins and minerals in it. What do we do with this water goes down the sink? That's why um Roger Mayo said that the best fed fed member of the family is the kitchen sink. That's a frame change. It's great presentation. It's a great metaphor. It's a great experience, but I'm changing the frame of reference. And so the whole presentation is full of these changes of reference. So, if you're selling real estate, well, I know people then in the Hispanic Latino community that they would tell stories of their parents driving by homes and they they look at a home and they go, "I would be more likely to get a spaceship than that home." Right? It's a belief system. I know people that say, "There's no way I can make $100,000. There's no way I can be a millionaire." I mean, you're in the business of changing people's frames. That's why I love

44:46working with you is because I think I do pretty good, but I'm like when I'm around you, I'm like, "My frames around money suck. they're wrong and I do pretty well. And I'm going, man, I mean, I'm not doing what Brett does. I don't think the way he does. And then my first thought is, how do I hang out with him more? Well, how value can I bring to Brett? And that's that's what my brain goes. And so now the frame is usually unconscious, too. If I were to say, you know, here's a way to kind of pull it out. Um, I'm going to say a profession, Brett. Tell me what word comes to mind. used car salesman.
Oh, you think slimy, right? Slippery.
Slimy, right? Slimy. It's always the slimy, sleazy.
Yeah, it just feels, you know, a lot of like your immed your mind goes to a
Yeah. Exactly. So, here I did was give you a profession with no frame, which means the only way you understand this profession is your frame of reference. Because I didn't provide one, you're going to provide your own. and you went back to your past frame of reference and

45:48then put the slimy, sleazy, dishonest frame around this person, constructing the reality of this person's dishonest, which is why when I say something against your frame, it's funny when I say, "Hey, you can trust me. I'm a used car salesman." That clashes with the frame and it's so blatantly clashing that it's hilarious, right?
And so, how do I do that? If I say I'm in, oh, I'm a keynote speaker. I'm a coach. I don't like being called a coach because this whole life coach coach thing has been ruined. Everybody is a coach. I hate being a coach. You know, that's why this meme, by the way, uh clashes a current frame of reference and and releases the tension of of of the unspoken truth. I'll give it to you. It says, "Lord, give me the courage of a 25-year-old life coach."
So true.
Right? Because like you're 25, you don't have life experiences yet. And but yet there's so many of those gurus out there. And so when we think about the frame, how would I shift that frame prior to selling? If I if I needed to eliminate the slimy, sleazy frame from used car salesman, I'd have to I'd have to do that before I even told you

46:50anything. Like you it's like you can't plant a seed in cement. Well, if I see you that way, I'd try to plant an idea of trust. You're not going to do that because that frame of reference is dominating anything that I say. And so like my grandfather was in Cuba right before the Cuban revolution and he saw that this revolution was not good for his family. And so he had this bright idea. They write a letter to the president of the United States at the time saying if you get me and my family out of this country, I'll come in and fight for yours. So that letter made it to the right person. They pulled my grandfather out, my grandmother, my aunt and my mother. And he served in the American armed forces for 8 years. After those eight years, he landed in the American dream, Homestead, Florida. Now if you know Homestead, Florida, at the time, there was nothing there except for Patrick Air Force Base. So his American dream was limited to how far he could walk. But there was somebody who believed in my grandfather saw what he did for this country and got him into this older vehicle. And that older vehicle extended his reach by 25,50 even 100 miles changing the trajectory of his life, my mother's life and ultimately my life. And that person who believed in my grandfather was a used car salesman. So now did you have any negative

47:52thoughts about this person?
Now you've now my frame is
Yeah. What what a great person, right? I mean that's a great person. What a Yeah. And so the battle and the race is to who claims the frame first. So if you're selling and you understand what frame of reference this person is going through, I don't spend money on cookware. I don't invest in homes or the interest rate is the number one most important thing in the transaction. Or maybe um I'm doing this and we have to be home. We have to be close to a school. We can't have a pool because pools are expensive and we only we don't use them. Like there's all there's all sorts of decisions and sort of um rules frames that people make. And before you sell, if you can understand where they're coming from, then you can use story, metaphor, listening to help shift the frame. If some people think price is the most important thing versus quality, well, I have a story that shifts that. Have you heard of uh Alan Shepard?
Yeah. He was the first American to enterpace. It was May 5th, May 15th,

48:541961. He's sitting on top of the Redstone rocket on the Freedom 7 mission about to be launched off into space. And now think about this. First American. So he's sitting on this big hunk of metal with full of rocket fuel about to be launched off into space with a bunch of engineers standing way back saying, "We think it'll work this time. We'll stand back here, but good luck."
Yeah.
And there was a reporter that got a chance to ask him a question. They said, "Mr. Shepherd, you're about to be the first American launched off into space and the world wants to know what is going through your mind and is responsible forever going on in history when he says the fact that every part of this rocket was built by the lowest bidder. So now you think about that as a frame reshift. Promise you at the time of purchase at that moment of purchase they were cutting corners trying to stay on budget making sure that they did not overspend on this thing. But they forgot in the future is going to be this time of performance where what you're investing in is going to have to do what it promised. In his case, bring him home alive. And I promise you at the time of performance, he's not thinking budget and he's definitely not thinking lowest

49:56cost. He is thinking, did you buy the right You better have bought the best stuff cuz my family, my life depends on this. The job of a salesperson is to shift that perspective. And that story does such a beautiful job of reminding people that there's a time of performance. And so if you're a real estate agent and they're saying, "Well, I want I want a discount agent." Okay. Well, you can do that. And when your family is sitting in the in the driveway in the U-Haul and that loan hasn't closed because they've hired the wrong loan officer for the lowest interest rate, because remember, talent costs money. Talent doesn't work for free. And that money they're spending is about guarantees. And it's not about, you know, they say, "Well, it's like you don't you not all stakes are the same." I don't I don't know if that's the best analogy. It' be a better analogy would be like, you know, hey, we're going on Disney. You get one chance to go this year and it's going to cost you about $10,000 to go, but I could get you there for two. I'm just not going to tell you the day that it's going to be give or take two or three days. I don't know which hotel you're going to stay at. You're going to

50:57be at a hotel. Don't know which one. I don't know if it's going to be close to the park or further from the park, but you can get to with in a window of two to three days. Well, we've only got five. So, if I miss on the back end, I lose three of those two days. I don't Give me the 10 and I know exactly when I land. I know exactly when I get there and I know exactly where the hotel is. It is worth that premium. That's the premium that you spend buying the right working with the right agent and the right loan officer. And you think about it, you know, I'm at $35 to $55,000 for a keynote. So for one hour, there's plenty of speakers that will do it for free. $1,000, $2,500. Plenty. They just might not be as good. And I think, you know, there's a difference between the brand new a person that does it versus somebody who's done it. And there's people there's $200,000. Jaco is like $300,000. Well, you're getting a very different uh value proposition. Jako will bring people to the yard. He'll bring masses there. So will David Goggins. I'll bring some. You know, I'll bring some. Not that not as many as they will, but I'll bring more than the guy who's free. And so there's this, you know, there's a sliding scale of what you're paying for.

51:59And the same is true in real estate. And I promise you, most real estate agents charge the same as the person that just rolled out of school. They're 18, 19 years old. That is should not be the case. I need somebody that knows this home, that knows what I'm getting, that's going to say with that crack on the wall, this is what that means. We're looking at the foundation over here. Well, this neighborhood has a history of X, Y, and Z. You don't want to be near this because of that. That's valuable. And I will pay a little bit more for that. But we have to be able to undo and reshift that frame.
So, what I'm hearing you say, Rene, that was so great on on why the frame is so important. And what I'm hearing you say though, a lot of the way we shift frames or create them is through stories.
Yeah.
Is that a fair is that the best tool we should be using to change that frame?
It depends, right? Sometimes I only need one word. Like if you say, hey, can you come to the party? Ask me that.
Yeah. Hey René, can you come to the party?
No, there's no frame. I'll add one word. Ask me again.

53:00Hey René, can you come to that party?
Unfortunately, no. That's a frame combined with body language. H. Unfortunately, no. The first one killed the relationship. The second one preserved it. Now, some people say, "Get right to the point." It's like, "Yeah, I know that." When you do that, I know how amateur you are. You've never had to have you never had a game-winning shot. You never had to face the team that need to engage them in a process. Realizing that people have emotion involved. The importance of framing is making sure that people understand that you don't kill people along the way. You don't leave dead bodies in the wake of your communication and poor communication skills. You want to bring people along with you in that process. And so storytelling is probably the most powerful origin. Now we get we zoom in on or on storytelling. Your personal origin story is probably the most powerful. I the most vulnerable. Then you get into signature stories which are stories as unique to you as your own signature. Like you your first experience with me would be a signature story. My first experience with you is a signature story. Um, you know, there's there's uh the um anything that's just unique is a signature. Origin stories

54:03happen between the ages of 9 to 13. That's where our values are formed. And if we can understand that origin of you, then I understand the values that you bring to me as a business person as well. If I align on those values, I align with you in a business professional and current here and now. But there's props that are um that are frames, jokes, statistics, all those things are frames. And so you you have to follow those frames with this phrase that we call what that means to you is and that's the title as well.
So it is uh it is so good and people could learn so much more by getting your book. Everyone out there should go should go read your book. You know obviously follow you leave links the show notes. You probably got it right here. Amplify your influence. Incredible book. Um I I want to go to one of the the at your event. Um, I mean, I had pages and pages of notes and I've told you this many times. I I I think this idea of a narrative gap is in our communication or our day-to-day, whether it's with my wife, whether it's with my staff, whether it's I'm leading others. Um, I think in my opinion in

55:05communication, this is one of the biggest mistakes people make.
Yeah.
Is the narrative gap. What is the narrative gap, René? And and how can we be better at this?
Yeah. The narrative gap is sort of is sort of a continuation of understanding the frames. And the best way to understand is narrative is to understand really what narrative is. And and I know I could do it too long here on a podcast, but here I just stopped talking. What did you feel when I did that? I just stopped talking.
Oh, right now I mean I know that every listener thinks what what's going on, right? I think is he frozen? Is he checked out?
Yeah. you know, did did someone just bust in doing something crazy? Did his dog get out the side door? Right? I mean, I think all those things and immediate panic ensues. So, if you think about it, I do this on stage all the time and and to understand it because it's better to have an experience of what the narrative gap is versus an intellectualization of it. What happens is is we use narrative as a construct of reality. And frames are really what create the narrative. So, if you go

56:07frames and go a little bit beyond, frames create a story, a be a beginning, a middle, an end. And we use that frame or that narrative to construct our understanding of reality. And so when that narrative stops like that, your brains go haywire. Why? Because a narrative is a construct of reality. So if I have a gap in the narrative, I have a gap in what? Reality.
It's a glitch in the matrix. You can't do it. You can't have it. And so your brain in real time pays attention to body language sequencing, timing, voice inflection in context and goes puts that algorithm together, goes and accesses back past frames of references and stories and experiences and says, "We know what's going on. We're on Zoom. He's glitching. Somebody must have walked in. He had to pee. Something happened." And they'll grab a story and fill the gap. It doesn't matter if it's true. It just needs to be something. And so it fills it with this level of assumption so that we have a continuous understanding and experience of reality.

57:10We have to have continual reality otherwise our brains have experienced massive anxiety. And so that and we will have anxiety until we fill the gap. By the way, it's really really wild. And we will stop working. We will stop doing anything until we understand the outcome. That's the beauty of of cliffhers. By the way, there's a narrative gap. We have to watch the next episode. You ever been watching your favorite show and it's like I got to wait a week or they end a season and I got to wait a year and a half for the next one. You know, it's so painful that I will stop watching these shows until the whole thing comes out so I can at least binge watch it, right? I don't want that pain. I'd rather just be in it doesn't exist until the end, right? And so the narrative gap, if you think about it, when there's a gap in the narrative, our brain makes an assumption and to continue the gap. So the question is why don't we make the same assumptions and that's the crazy part. So the example I give is if we're we're working for the same company and our CEO doesn't show up. One person says, "Oh, John didn't show up. He's probably buying another yacht. I don't know how many yachts he

58:12needs." It's one way to fill the gap. Somebody over there in the same room says, "Wait, John didn't show up. Let me call and see if he's okay." So here we have two different assumptions. One that went to greed and the other one went to empathy and concern. Constructing two coexisting realities. And then you go, "Wait, I thought reality was just reality." Okay. Well, why why weren't they the same? Why didn't they the same? Well, because they had two different sources. The person maybe that said agreed in a yacht, maybe they tried negotiating with the CEO last year and he said, "No, we don't have the budget. The following week, he's in his yacht taking selfies." Okay, well, that's one way to fill the gap. The other person, maybe they knew John's story and that his daughter was sick and in the hospital. He was going to come to the meeting after he visited his daughter. He didn't show up. Something must have been wrong. Let me call and see if he's okay. both assumptions, two different sources. And so if you think about it on that line of that narrative line of understanding, how many gaps are happening on a daily basis? Too many to count. Well, we just proved what does a brain do the moment there's a there's a gap. It makes an assumption to fill it based on a different source. So if you

59:14think about the continuous line, our understanding of reality is based mostly on assumption. And what if our sources were wrong? What if the sources of those assumptions were manipulative? What if those sources of those assumptions were trying to get us to do something? Well, that explains what's happening in the market right now. That explains the mass gaslighting in the media. That explains politics and the race to fill it. That explains Fox versus CNN. That explains why the news in the United States is different than the news outside of the United States. It explains how people gaslight and lie. It it explains so many different things. But what a leader should do, a sales person should do is saying, "Wow, how many gaps am I creating with my family, with my friends, with my my team and how do I become really good at that? More importantly, how do I equip my team to say, hey, there's a gap here. Can you fill it?" I do that with my closest people. Hey, they go, you know, I got something important to talk to you about, uh, but I can't do it now. I can talk to you later. No, no, no. Please don't create that gap.
Yeah.
At least give me a gist. Oh. Oh, no. Everything's fine. I was just thinking I

1:00:17have an idea of what we can do this weekend. Oh, okay. I thought something really was going on, you know, like, okay. And so the gaps create all sorts of assumptions. That's why we jump to conclusions. That's why an unanswered text can send us into a frenzy of insecurity. That's why rumors spread faster than official communications in companies is because of the gap.
And I think I love your example of that's the one you you told before is the CEO, right? Hey, I'm just not going to make it in today, right? Harmless.
Yeah. Yeah. But left uns like you said, one person goes to Yeah. Good. Yeah. He's just out on the golf course and, you know, buy another yacht. Right. The other person goes, "Oh my god, is his family okay?"
Yeah.
Right. Totally. But we've got to do a better job of leaders of filling in the gap. Explain. I'm not coming in today is I've got to go take my mom to the hospital and unfortunately something came up and I I can't be here today, guys, but I'll be available. Or I'm going to take the day off and and I needed a break and I've got to meet with some friends and go do. But filling in that gap without it to your point, your

1:01:18brain, it's funny when you said that though. Our brains just race to come up with an answer
immediately. It's neurological.
It's not a choice.
It it a 100. So I I want to we're going to wrap here in a minute. Um and I know you spend so much time uh with leaders, right? CEOs. Um when you think about all the people that you get the chance to interact with and you think it maybe some of the mistakes we could learn from any top you know there any top things that you see leaders mistakes they make where they drop the ball any narrative gap no question one of them but are there anything else that you see like you know in your work with coaching and influencing and and people hire you to help you know them be this leader there any things lessons that come to mind? Yeah, I mean I think it's if I were to continue on the native gap, the solution to it for leaders is to share their story. That's what I've come to because what you can't avoid the fact that there are gaps. I can't avoid that. There's going to be gaps about me, gaps about

1:02:20you. But what I want, by the way, is the benefit of the doubt when the gap happens. How do I create that? The only way to get the benefit of the doubt when there's a gap is to share my story. so that they the source becomes my story, not their past experience. And I want to account for negativity bias. Negativity bias is when we don't know something, we're going to default to the negative. We're going to find and pay attention to the negative because the more negative things I pay attention to, the more I can prepare myself to survive. So, from an evolutionary standpoint, we we live longer. And so, I want to take that that that cognitive bias out of out of the picture by just sharing my story. Here's who I am. Here's where I come from. Here's my family. Here are my concerns. here's where I'm going to be today. And if I know your story and where you come from, then I go and I know your values, I'm going to pull from that to fill the gap in. And so leaders that don't share who they are are there. And so the solution to that, how do you share? Well, leaders need to start thinking about social media not as a sales and marketing tool, but a trust and communication tool.

1:03:22I may not have thousands of followers, but I got all 500 of my employees follow me. Imagine that. And that I showed my family what I believed in, where I gave my money to, what I was doing, my frustrations, and you know, where I was, you know, um, you know, the funny quirks about me. And if I did enough of that content and there's a narrative gap, they go, "No, no, no, no. You know, Brett, I know where Brett is. He's probably fishing. He's doing it with his family. Thank God. The guy works non-stop." And so, there's so many different uses of social media beyond followers. I love that you shared that because I think that today a lot of social media content feels like it's um a combination of narcissistic FOMO and a fake reality. Uh and I love that you put it in this context of no, it could be just you're telling your story to your employees and just a way to get your message out in a way that fills the gap and allows you to be authentic. you know, there there's so many positive uses of it and I love that you're leading that charge by by sharing things that are valuable and improving people's lives.

1:04:25
I I do a poor job of sharing me myself personally on online if I'm transparent about that. I I and that's partially by choice. Um it's you know the I don't I don't have many employees and so uh I have people that want to hire me for work and so I tr I that that's my use of it and but I think that you know if I had a bunch of employees I think it'd be much better suited for those that don't need social media for business. You got enough revenue you got you have the you you have the clients you're established that's a great way for your team people you're trying to recruit to really get to know you. That's so good. René, I uh in wrapping up here, I ask every guest three questions and I'm gonna ask you the same three. So, when you look back at your your whole career, top three books that had the biggest impact on your life.
First one that always comes to mind is Let's Get Real or Let's Not Play.
Oo, I haven't heard of that. So, what's that about?
Yeah,
that was written by Mahan Khalsa. He's a Harvard guy. He partnered with Cubby for

1:05:29a while and he was outlining a complex sales process, consultative sales process to get at reality and the truth with customers that it's a let's get real or let's not play and he and he outlines an order process o rde e r opportunity resources decision-m process exact solution and results. I've read this book 15 times. Listen to the audio 200 probably. And when you're building the business case for something and it applies to anytime you build a business case, you're looking for three things. One, you got to move off move off solution and and make no assumptions. He's like no guessing, no assumptions and move off solution right away cuz how arrogant to offer a solution without understanding other things. So the first question is do an exercise of understanding the issue. What are the issues you're facing? And I want to ask that question. And then I'm going to ask what else and what else and what I'm I want a page of issues and when they said there's no more I'm like I know there's not many more but there was what what and then usually towards the bottom I get the most important issues and then I have them rate them I take the top three four whatever it is and I say so I want

1:06:31evidence how do you know that's an issue and there's two types of issues evidence there's anecdotal feels like it one and there's data I want to stray away from it feels like an issue because when it comes to price this can make it really weary but if I have data to show that there's an issue I have this report. They go, "We have a report." The next question is, "So, who has it? And how soon can we get it?" So, I know this is an issue. Here's the issue. Here's the evidence of the issue, and I got the report in hand. Next is impact. What is the impact financially, emotionally, culturally, and I want to calculate the cost of this issue? Now that I have the cost of this issue, I understand the decision-m process typically covers decisions like this made in your organization. Right? Okay. And then now I can finally offer the exact solution. Not just a solution in the beginning, the exact one based on issue, evidence, impact, and the resources that are involved. Do they have the resources to solve this? All that stuff. And so that was one of the best books. Um, next book I just gave to my son. Yeah.
It was uh uh You can have it all. And not a popular book. It was recommended by Oprah back in the day, but it was

1:07:34just more of just this book of mentality of of how to create what you want in this world. It made me make a um mission statement. He was probably 19 years old when I read it and it was it was so good. It was so good. Third book I would have to say h I probably would say recently this book the four questions and um I I'd have to get it but these four questions were so good and the one that just keeps going is this question of what's my purpose? And if you can take what's my purpose into the most mundane things. Going to the grocery store. What's my purpose? Get food. No. No. No. No. What kind of food? What's my purpose? Food. No. No. What's my Actually, I'm trying to be healthier, so I should probably get food that fits my diet and goals. And just by being that intentional about the grocery store. I'm going to get my mail. What's the purpose? And if I just keep that question, what's my purpose? And every single action that I do, the

1:08:35intentionality goes through the roof. Through the roof.
I I love that. One of the things that changes on that same line is I'd go to a meeting and you know, sometimes you go to a meeting and you're just looking to do the meeting.
Uh there's another time where you actually René, you're you ask yourself before you go in there, what's the outcome that I want to have happen at the end of this meeting? And and I actually when I lead a meeting with someone I don't know, we sit down and I go, "Hey, we're we've got an hour scheduled here and at the end of this meeting, I would love to know what's a win for you and what outcome you want and I'd like to share with you my ideal outcome and then we could start the meeting and work towards our two outcomes. But you want to talk about how meetings are different when you do it because otherwise where are you from and let's talk about some stuff and let's circle back later." But if I know Rene's outcome is we've got to solve this very specific thing and my ideal outcome is I just want yes or no on this other thing. We now have a totally different meeting. Totally different.
All right.
Yeah. The other other questions on that are what's my purpose? How may I be of

1:09:38service? What is the lesson? And where am I investing my attention right now? Like
so good.
Four. The book's called the four questions. Four questions by Byron Katie.
You uh René, you just listed three books because I uh I consider myself to be uh an extreme reader. I mean, I read about 50 books a year. You know, the first guest I've ever had to name three books that I haven't read.
So,
it is a extreme honor because and I've already I made a note of all three and I'm going to buy all three. So, I'll text you. We'll we'll have a conversation about those books because uh
Perfect.
That's how I do it. So,
listen. Yeah, but listen to the Mahan Khalsa book with the Let's Get Real because his voice is like this and it'll annoy you at first, but then you'll grow to love it because the guy is a genius and he's he's just beautiful. I love it.
All right, next. Uh, what's the best purchase you've made under 200 bucks in the last 12 months that's most improved your life? All right, if you've been listening to a show for a bit, you've likely heard that I run a wealth-b buildinging mastermind largely around

1:10:41some of the same concepts and content that we talk about here on the podcast. We have an upcoming mastermind. We've got two seats left for it. If you want to come shadow our mastermind, take a look at what it's like, get an actual feel for what it feels like to be with a tribe of people that are on the same journey as you. We've got a completely risk-free way to do so. Just go to bewealthy.com, navigate over to our mastermind, and book a call with one of my team members to learn more about our mastermind, and you can how you can come completely risk-f free and check it out. By the way, while you're thinking, I'll give you a minute. When I go to dinner with if it was you and me and six of our peers, if I'm at dinner with really smart people, it's my favorite question. I go around and I want the best. And by the way, cuz sometimes you're the thing you're like, you know what? I'm trying that thing and it's usually incredible. So for you, what best purchase under 200 bucks,
folks. Uh uh digital or or tangible. I got
anything. Give me Well, you can go one both. Go one of each.
So I'll give you from a productivity standpoint, it's Wispr Flow.
You You turned me on to this. And by the

1:11:46way, you gave me two gifts. One was the Osmo Pocket 3, which I'm filming this on today. It was a complete game changer. I have used Wispr Flow every day since you told me about it. So, tell people what it is. It's unbelievable.
It So, when I tell people, they go, "Yeah, I have voice dictation." I'm like, "You do, but you don't." Right? There's levels to voice dictation. And what happens is the typical Notice I'm defining a problem first is when you use the voice dictation, you have to use inapp voice dictation. Whether it's if it's on my phone, I have to click the little button. If it's in Word, I have to go to dictate and it's going to dictate exactly what you say. Pretty cool. Wispr Flow uses AI to dictate what you're trying to say and it does the formatting for you. All of the dictation doesn't do any formatting. If I want a list of three things, it's just going to put them in one line. I got to go enter, put a one, I got to do these things. And if I go, you know, hey, I was thinking about doing this. No, you know what? I'd rather do this. It's going to take out no, I'd rather do and put in what the sentence. It'll format things, the two and the commas and the spaces and the paragraphs. And what it does is it associates to two keys or one key depending on what kind of computer you have on your computer. So I could be sitting here and I hit a button, I'm

1:12:48starting to think. For me, it's taking content at the speed of thought. I have a thought, I hit a button, I dictate. And if I use that with AI, if I'm using that to correct a document, it's just it literally it's 100x the productivity. It's it's insane. I can give you
I'm using this I'm using this on my I will absolutely put your link in there. I I'm using it on emails to reply to emails and I just hit the button and I'm like, "Hey René, thanks so much. I'm thinking about three things. One, we got to go hang out. Two, I'm excited about our PL." But like to your point, if I saythe the 'the', it knows I didn't mean to say three in a row, so it just gives you the one.
But I can talk much faster than I could type. First of all, my punctuation and stuff if I regularly send an email just, you know, I I signed up for Grammarly and it just highlighted the whole thing. It's like, well, that's not helpful.
Exactly.
Uh, you know, that it's all bad. But, you know, Wispr Flow, total game changer. So, that's the digital. That's a good one. What's the non-digital one?
Uh, my Ninja Creami.
Okay. What's that?
Yeah, it's it's a Ninja blender for creating ice cream and it's about 150 bucks

1:13:51
and you take you I what I do, I just make protein ice cream. So, I take uh my favorite protein like just like a premier protein and I put it in there and it's just a little bowl. Put it in there. I take a/4 teaspoon of zantham gum. I put it in there and I put a cover on it and I freeze it for 24 hours. Then I come out after 24 hours and I put it in this Ninja Creami and it takes a blade and it spins it at a speed that it turns it into ice cream. Then I put it out and then I add whatever toppings. If I want to put like Heath bar, if I want to put like 10 chocolate chips, um I take my favorite uh protein shake and then I'll take three shots of like espresso, put it in there, freeze it, and then I blend it with, you know, you a little bit of like, you know, like Splenda or whatever. I got Hagen's ice cream and it's protein. 50 g of protein, no fat, no sugar, no nothing. Depends on how you want to make it. I can have it every single night. My trainers have made this. They told me they do it every single night. It is the most delightful, amazing thing, and you can just have fun with it. Ninja Creami. You're welcome.
All right, that's a uh that's a huge

1:14:52one. All right, last thing. René, you got 60 seconds to talk to 21-year-old René.
Knowing everything, you know, what do you tell them?
Save 50% of everything you have made. Keep your expenses low and don't touch it. Do what you read about. And that that compounding interest thing is really true. Put that money away and don't touch it. Period. Oh, and don't eat like an Work out, eat good, and save money. Boom. That was uh that was incredible. René, if our audience wants more, René, I uh we're going to put links to all your social media. I know Instagram is is huge for you. It's massive. You've got so many followers. Uh, where else should they go to get more René?
Yeah. Uh, yeah, Instagram is is going to be great. We We're at Tik Tok. We've we surpassed a million on Tik Tok, but that's that's a it's a very weird environment. Um, we're going to be doing a lot more on YouTube coming in this

1:15:54year, but I think Instagram will sort of be that that honing place. You go to our website, meet René.com. It's me T, not me a t. Um, me ren.com. Rene is one e r ne. And yeah, that's going to be fun. And hopefully in the next year or so, you'll see the narrative gap book come out.
I uh I love it, René. We'll include links to all of your stuff. Everyone hold your book up again. Everybody go out and get Amplify Your Influence with René Rodriguez. If he comes speaking anywhere new, you go see it. René, thanks for all you do to help so many. We've got to have you back here because every time you're here, I learn something and I'm grateful for my relationship with you. Thanks for being here and thanks for helping the be wealthy.
Anytime. The answer is always yes, brother. And um I need to have you on mine because that's more selfish cuz I uh I need everything that you teach. So we're uh I'm looking forward to our relationship and as it grows and uh looks like we're actually going to be on stage together at Dan's event. Daniel Beer, those guys.
I'm looking forward to it. I will I'll see you there. Thanks, man.
Take care.
Bye.