Episode 273: How to Become a Conscious Millionaire with JV Crum III

Hal: Goal achievers, good morning, afternoon, or evening. This is Hal Elrod. Welcome to the Achieve Your Goals Podcast and we’re going to get right into it. If one of your goals is around finances, and specifically if it’s to make your first million or to make your next million or you just want to achieve financial freedom, whatever that means for you, the freedom to do what you want, when you want, having enough money to support all of your goals and dreams, then today’s show is for you. Named by Inc. Magazine as one of the top 13 business shows in the world, my guest today, JV Crum III, host of Conscious Millionaire Podcast and Radio Network with over 1,800 episodes. I think we’re like 250. He has 1,800 episodes and his show is heard in 190 countries. He is a number one best-selling author, speaker, and serial entrepreneur who made his first million at age 25, and JV is also a high-performance coach to entrepreneurs and business coaches who want to scale their first million or make their next million. Conscious Millionaire provides accelerator masterminds to help entrepreneurs accelerate in just 30 days. Help me welcome JV Crum III. He is the author of Conscious Millionaire: Grow Your Business by Making a Difference.

 

[INTERVIEW]

 

Hal: JV, welcome to the show.

 

JV: Hey, Hal. Thank you so much, and a huge hello to everybody who’s joined us today. I am so excited you’re here with us. And, Hal, I’m ready to rock ‘n’ roll and have an amazing time. And just a big shout out and thank you for being on Conscious Millionaire Podcast. It was amazing.

 

Hal: Yeah. I know. I was so impressed with what a great interviewer you were with just how thoughtful your questions were and how smart you were in your contributions to our conversation. I thought, “Hey, will you come on my show? I want you to share your wisdom.” So, let’s start with your book, Conscious Millionaire, which I’m reading right now and I’m really enjoying. I want to say I wanted to share the tagline again in case anybody missed that. I said it kind of clicked to their Conscious Millionaire: Grow Your Business by Making a Difference. And, of course, that tagline just resonates with me. It’s like that to me is what this is about, this life meaning this business, professional life is, how can we help as many people as possible to live the life that they want and if you earn money by doing that then to me that’s a great way to earn income. So, what inspired you, JV, to write your book, Conscious Millionaire?

 

JV: Yeah. Such a great question. The short version of the story is that I, the first companies I built were really about the money. I took over what were basically bankrupt trucking line that my father had at 23, turned it around, and we made a lot of money and at 25 I had the four-story home and the Mercedes and, on the water, and all that. But within three months, I one day was looking out at the bay, the sailboats, the blowing palm trees. It was sunshiny and I kind of had a meltdown, Hal, and I realized it. As I recall it, every time it was like 60 seconds. I realized I didn’t like myself. I was lousy at relationships. My life wasn’t great. All I knew is I had fulfilled my little boy dream of becoming a millionaire and I made money but I said, “There’s got to be a lot more than this because something’s wrong. The picture doesn’t seem to work.” And I went off on that journey to Wayne Dyer and Tony Robbins and sweat lodges and all kinds of retreats searching for what was the answer.

 

And what I ultimately determined was that I was living a purposeless life. I didn’t have anything that I was doing with my life that I thought made a difference. So, ultimately, orchestrate selling the companies and as any red-blooded American boy would do, I went and lived in a Buddhist monastery for a while and then Esalen on the Big Sur coast with Human Potential Institute and then what I called the Big Monastery Esalen and that’s Boulder, Colorado and I go camping for two or three weeks at a time asking what I call the universe euphemistically saying, “Why am I here? What’s my purpose? How can I take my talents, my skills, all the things that I’ve learned and put them to use to making this a better world and making lives better for people on this planet?” And ultimately, out of that came this inspired moment and this phrase, Conscious Millionaire, and when I wrote the book I kept wondering what was the right subtitle and ultimately, that was the one actually through research, I ask a lot of people who I knew fit the model of people I wanted to help, entrepreneurs who wanted to make money consciously by making an impact with their life and that’s the subtitle that came out of it, Grow Your Business by Making a Difference.

 

Sometimes you hit the nail and sometimes you really hit the nail and I hit the nail because this is five years later and that’s still the deeper and deeper, deeper theme of Conscious Millionaire. It only deepens and it’s what the podcast is about. It’s what my trainings and coaches about, helping people take that internal piece of purpose and internal power that I help them generate their personal power piece and bring it to the external to create impact and wealth with their lives. And that to me is what I call the inside out approach and when I got my MBA, it’s the exact opposite of what I was taught. I was taught just start outside, do a bunch of research. We still do that, but we start on the inside because if you start on the outside and you just find some want that’s missing or a problem that exists and then you saw that it may ultimately still be an unfulfilling journey for you, Hal, because if all you’re doing is trying to build the business and your only objective is to just see how much money you can make, I can tell you, having taken that journey, it ultimately becomes empty and it doesn’t fulfill you.

 

And so, I say, “Let’s put them all together from the beginning,” so that you’re, by golly, building the business that actually is going to resonate with you and at the end of the day, you’re going to feel like you did something that matters. I know that’s absolutely true about you, Hal, and you’ve built a very financially successful business but it started with the miracle of Miracle Morning as opposed to how can I go find something people want and sell it to them?

 

Hal: Yeah. I know. I’m with you. I think like I love the Zig Ziglar quote, “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” Right. I think that’s very much in alignment with what you’re talking about and we see the opposite with so many wealthy people whether they became wealthy, whether they’re famous actors or actresses or singers, you see a lot of wealthy people that thought wealth was the goal, and when they get to that goal and then it doesn’t fulfill them, they turned to drugs or alcohol or some other vice that’s detrimental to their downfall.

 

JV: Exactly. And the distractions in life that any of us choose, I think every time we choose and I’m saying this for myself, for everybody, because all of us at some point choose a distraction on some day we choose a distraction. It might be TV. It might be the food that we ate. It could be that night you had an extra drink or whatever it is, we’re human beings that every time we distract ourselves, I think it’s because we’re not deeply connected inside at that particular moment. And that’s why I’m so passionate and I’m actually feverish in a way about entrepreneurs choosing paths that can be very financially successful, but the irony is I think the most successful entrepreneurs today I think is the entire direction we’re headed is it’s people who are focused on making a difference, making an impact, transforming other people’s lives, uplifting them, which is exactly what you’re doing and I know that if you’re listening today, this is probably resonating with you, because it’s common sense that doesn’t it just make more sense to get up in the morning, doing something that excites you, and you feel makes a difference versus, “I’m just going back to the grind and all I’m going to do is split test only to make more money.” You’re still going to split test like you’re split testing because you’re also impacting people’s lives.

 

Hal: Yeah. You said something a minute ago that I’d love for you to expand on if you can, and it was something along the lines of when we are distracted because I think whether you’re an entrepreneur or not, about 80% of our audience are entrepreneurs, maybe a little more. I think the last time we serve it was 82% give or take, but you said something about when we choose distraction whether it’s drugs, alcohol, or just Netflix, just surfing the net, we choose to be distracted you said it’s because we’re not connected, I believe. Is that what you said?

 

JV: Yeah. At that moment in time I think every time we distract ourselves, we’re distracting ourselves actually from being connected with ourselves.

 

Hal: And so, what does the opposite look like? What is being connected with ourselves look like or feel like?

 

JV: Yeah. That’s a fantastic question. I will answer for me. I think it’s true for many other people because I’ve worked with so many clients on this and talked about a lot on the podcast. When we’re connected, we feel more alive. We feel like we’re thriving, but we didn’t need caffeine or drugs or an alcohol, or carbohydrate, or an exciting movie to make us feel that thriving. We’re feeling that thriving because we’re being more who we really are, for lack of a better word, authentic, real, truthful, in the moment, and that to me is the greatest gift that we as entrepreneurs or just as human beings can give one another. And I think as we move forward, we’re moving into we talk about services and products of what we’re selling. Increasingly, it’s the experience that people are buying and if you think about Disney, how come Disney I plug only because my parents took me out of school and I went to Disney World the day it opened along with 10,000.

 

Hal: Oh wow.

 

JV: I looked it up recently, Hal, and I think the child’s ticket was $3.75. That’s not $375.

 

Hal: $3.75.

 

JV: $3.75 and I think the adult was $6.50. Wahoo. And, well, what Disney is selling? And apparently, a lot of people want to buy it. It’s an experience. And I think that we as entrepreneurs whether we’re saying we’re selling a service or saying we’re selling a product, I think it’s an experience that really matters. I mean, I’m not going to name this coffee shop by name but we all know this coffee shop and most of us go to this coffee shop every once in a while. I would say we don’t go there because it’s the best coffee on the planet. We go there for the experience of it’s replaced the general stores’ checkerboards from a century ago. It’s a community meeting place and we’re all hungering for connection. I think that’s the experience they’re really selling. Not coffee.

 

Hal: Yeah. No, I’m with you, and I think I have an idea what company you’re talking about.

 

JV: Yeah. It starts with one of the letters of the alphabet. That’s a good clue right there.

 

Hal: So, your expertise, JV, is helping entrepreneurs to either scale their first million or make their next million. And so, my question for you is how can entrepreneurs and being that I am one so I’m curious about this myself but how can entrepreneurs become high performers? Because there are a lot of wantrepreneurs. There are even more starting entrepreneurs but actually succeeding as an entrepreneur and being an entrepreneur are two very different things. So, how can I become a high performer?

 

JV: Absolutely. My fastest, easiest answer to that is actually the formula that goes all the way through my book, Conscious Millionaire, and it’s a formula for creating wealth and that formula is conscious focused action. Now, there are pieces to each of those steps, but in the short version, it’s being laser focused on one specific outcome at a time and consciously choosing that because it’s the one outcome that will most move your business forward. I love working with people, not just in 90-day increments, but saying every month what is that one outcome that if you accomplish that one outcome, it will make more difference in your business than anything else you can do. Well, that’s what you should be focused on. And most entrepreneurs, I mean, I’ve been asked this question in a lot of shows and this is the answer I’ve given because it’s right. When I look at people who are under 100,000 which by the way that’s 90% of entrepreneurs, they’re going in 10 directions. They’ve got to have all these products, all these different things. They’ve got to do, you can do these 12 things on social media today. They’re going in all these directions.

 

When I talk to people who are six and seven-figure which are the majority of the people that I work with privately, they’re sometimes with my help, but they’re leaning it into that one major direction. I mean, you think of something. Let’s think about a company that probably everybody’s familiar with if you’re an entrepreneur and that’s Leadpages. They’re on my show, but I’ve really looked at them and admire the way they grew so quickly. They only provided one thing, lead pages that were already developed, you use them, they were tested, and they worked, and you paid a low monthly fee. And I can tell you on lead pages they back in the old days when they give you the stats they’d say, “Hey, this lead page does 20%, 25%,” maybe in that range, and I’d get 50% to 70%. So, maybe my headlines were better. I don’t know. But that’s all they sold and they grew really big, really quickly. They weren’t trying to do other things.

 

It wasn’t until they were very successful, they added Drip. They bought a company and then they had a CRM which logically fit with Leadpages but they didn’t start out that way. They start out with what is it that we do? And that’s why at Conscious Millionaire when everything is said and done either you want to make your first million or you want to make your next million. And if you don’t, that’s fine and you want to do it by making a positive impact with your life. And as I say, if you don’t make a positive impact, that’s not us. There’s lots of other people who can help you but it’s very laser focused. It’s for entrepreneurs and coaches and that’s what we do. You’ve got to be laser-focused, you got to be providing one kind of answer, and that’s how you grow your business and that’s conscious focused action.

 

Hal: I want to echo that for my own life. I was interviewed recently by an author and I’m trying to blank on which interview. I do a lot of interviews as you do. I can’t remember which one this was but they essentially said, “Hal, I’ve been so,” I don’t know if impressed was the word they used, but with, “Hal, you took one idea, The Miracle Morning, and well most authors launch their book, launch it hard for a month, maybe two, and then they focus on their next thing. They shift the gears. They do something They’re working on the next book. They’re working on creating the course of the book or whatever.” For me, I came out with the Miracle Morning and I just focused on sharing I believed and that’s the thing is to your point, JV, if you’re focusing on one thing, providing one service like Leadpages and you believe that that one thing is valuable for people that will help them, it will transform their lives, then you should be putting extraordinary amounts of focus and energy and effort into getting that message, that one thing, that one product, that one service out into the world in the biggest way that you can like Leadpages did and that’s what with Miracle Morning.

 

I believe, I said this can change people’s lives, so I have a responsibility to share it and, well, rather than focusing on creating different brands, different programs, different products, it’s that one book, that one message I promoted for the last 10 years, and now it’s become a multimillion-dollar brand based on that one concept of waking up early. And what I love about your, I look at all of your everything you do, the Conscious Millionaire provides the accelerator masterminds. Everything you provide though is all around the Conscious Millionaire concept, the brand, the theme. It’s all reinforcing what you have seen in your own world, and what you help people to do in their world this Conscious Millionaire strategy, this whole the entire everything that you teach in the book in the accelerators on the podcast. Just you’ve gone all in on that and because of that, you become externally successful. Is that accurate to say?

 

JV: Yeah. It is all focused that way and I actually want to compliment you and we interviewed for my show, gosh, four to six weeks ago I think at this point, and in that time period, I’m proud to tell you that this last week I did it three times. This week as we record this, it’s on a Monday that we’re recording. I am scheduled and I will show up every morning for their 6:15, 6:30, and it varies depending on the day. Orangetheory, so I was there this morning and I am not a morning person. It’s like God meant for me to see sunrises because I was still awake, not because I got up to see them. And so, I now committed to working out early five days this week, five days next week because two weeks from today, Hal, I am doing a 10K marathon and the big deal about that is last year I had a major heart attack that I was probably two or three hours away from not being here so I’ve gone from a major heart attack to doing a 10K and I’m getting up in the morning because I see the value of it, but it also means the other side of that, that I’m appreciating so this is the miracle afternoon is that I say, okay, if you’re going to freaking get up before 6 o’clock every day, you get off by 6 o’clock also.

 

Hal: Yeah. Sure.

 

JV: And so, yesterday I was biking, which was more exercise at 6 o’clock and I think that it’s absolutely we’re both saying the same thing here is that you got to be hyper-focused on one specific outcome and what is that one specific message and don’t have 12 messages?

 

Hal: Yeah. Well, on that note, so the last question I asked you was how entrepreneurs can become high performers and your answer was that 90% of entrepreneurs are under 100K and they’re dividing the focus between far too many things.

 

JV: Correct.

 

Hal: Whereas the formula for creating wealth is conscious focused action, choosing one specific action at a time, one project. I mean, it really is one of my favorite books, The ONE Thing, which I’m sure you’ve read.

 

JV: I’ve had Jay Papasan on twice.

 

Hal: Yeah. I’ve had him on once or twice. Yes, we both had Jay on. So, we’re fans of that concept of, you know, focused conscious action. In terms of keys to scaling a business to your first million, are there other keys that you would add to that, that complement that or is that really what you would say is the key to…

 

JV: Yeah. It’s interesting. Everything that we do at Conscious Millionaire focuses on three specific things. So, the formula is conscious focused action but in terms of the exact things you need to be doing in your business, we focus on the internal part. So, the internal part it’s your power, it’s your purpose but it all comes together under the heading of your core perception of who you are. And I would say it is almost impossible to get to your first million if you don’t create a perception of yourself as being a millionaire. The second thing and the second and third thing are external, but it’s just that there are two pieces out there. One is strategies because that can include your business model and the second is execution which can include accountability. So, you’ve got to change your perception. You’ve got to change the internal part and from my experience, that’s actually really the starting place and the most important part. Well, you’ve got to have the right strategies and execution. No question about that. In and of themselves, they won’t get you there because if you’re working with an internal set of power that’s outdated, if you’re working with being out of touch with what’s that purpose that really motivate you to move forward. If you’re dealing with a perception of yourself that is not in alignment with your goals, it’s going to be extremely difficult for you to get to that first million or that next million.

 

So, that’s a huge piece that we work on with every client, with every program. If it’s a group program, there’s still a piece about changing their perceptions of who they are so that it’s in alignment with how they want to show up in the world and who they want to be, where they want to head. That’s got to shift and then you’ve got to have the right strategies and execution. With those three pieces, you can scale quickly because the strategy can be part of how you scale. The strategy can be we’re only going to produce this one service or this one product. We’re only going to solve this one problem and this is our solution, but it’s all got to be laser-focused your perception, your strategies, your actions all on that result that you want. You can’t have multiple outcomes all the time. Really, the more you get it down to this is what we’re going to accomplish so like what I’m doing in my own business is like this quarter I’m working on one particular outcome. And I keep having people go, “Hey, will you get involved with me on this?” And I go, “No, I can’t because it would actually take brainpower away and distract me.”

 

And then we’re going to work on one of – I’ve narrowed it down to two initiatives and it’ll be an important pivot point is to which one we choose, but we’re only going to choose one, because we can only do one initiative well and that’s not true about JV and Hal. That’s true about human beings. And people who achieve the most really get clear about that big outcome they want and they just become I call it consciously obsessed. That’s a nice turn of words, right? You’re consciously obsessed with that one outcome but you cannot be consciously obsessed with three outcomes. It’s not possible.

 

Hal: No. You’re right. We were interviewing at our so I run a mastermind called the Quantum Leap Mastermind with my business partner, Jon Berghoff, and we were interviewing Jeff Hoffman, the billionaire Jeff Hoffman, founder of Priceline.com and I’ll paraphrase what he said. I think it was, “Olympians don’t try to win gold medals at more than one sport.” It’s like when someone decides to become an Olympian, and I think there’s a few exceptions to that. You can be a triathlete or whatever, decathlete, whatever those few options. But the most part, like Michael Phelps doesn’t try to be an Olympic swimmer and an Olympic javelin thrower and an Olympic ice skater. He picks one thing and focused on being the absolute best in the world at it and I think that is great.

 

JV: And I think that’s a great and, in fact, I’ve been coaching, it’s been interesting. It’s the first time I’ve ever done this and I’m really proud of him. Jason Paul who’s a triathlete. He’s a professional triathlete and I’ve been coaching him on the mindset piece and creating a custom empowerment audio for him to reprogram his mind and someday he ran in an Ironman race and was in the top five. So, that was the first time he got in the top five and now he’s going to go be in the world champions in Paris but he’s only doing and he’s devoted the next 10 years of his life to become number one as a triathlete. That’s his outcome, but it’s only number one as a triathlete as you’re pointing out and so that is one sport in and of itself. It just happens to have three aspects to it. But I think that’s really, absolutely, if you study people, look at Napoleon Hill and Think and Grow Rich. He was only going after how do people become successful. He wasn’t trying to build a railroad empire at the same time. That was his outcome.

 

I want people to make their first million, but I want to help a million people do it consciously by making a positive impact. I’m not trying to come up with other things to accomplish. I’m obsessed with figuring out how to do that one, because nobody’s done it, so I think sometimes and I know that you’re that type of person, Hal. So, if you’re listening, I’m going to give you a challenge. Think of something just mega big that it’s something that you could devote your entire life to and then figure out what’s the underlying cause of it for you. Like, I’ll give my example and I’m curious for you. So, I want to help a million entrepreneurs become conscious millionaires. Nobody’s done anything close to that. Underneath all of that, it’s about empowering people to make their difference in the world and changing the face of commerce so that it’s about providing services and products that actually uplift people as opposed to just selling what I call widgets that go to the landfill that nobody really needed. So, their underlying purpose is to helping entrepreneurs become millionaires.

 

I want to help empower them so that they’re really making a big wave with their life so that they’re going out with your life and making their difference in the world. That’s underlying it. And your Miracle Morning I know it’s the same type of thing because you’ve touched so many people and it’s not about selling books. It’s about transforming lives. I know that about you.

 

Hal: Sure. Yeah. The underlying why is to elevate the consciousness of humanity one – it was one morning at a time, but now we’re realizing, “Well, hey, why don’t we have in the afternoon, in the evening, and all the time?” So, now it’s really one person at a time and, yeah, but that’s it and I see it happening because as each person elevates their own consciousness through daily personal development, well, then they can’t help, but if you’re a mom and you are practicing the Miracle Morning, you’re elevating your own consciousness, well, then now you’re all of a sudden a better mom and you’re impacting your children in a way that you wouldn’t otherwise.

 

JV: And I think that’s why we’re so aligned because I think it’s the third paragraph of my homepage and it states my purpose is identical almost to uplift humanity and support the evolution of consciousness. And that’s why so it’s really interesting is that people would go, “Well, that’s your real purpose and for you, Hal, it comes out and let’s get up early and really get going and create an amazing day. And for me, it comes out with, hey, let’s build businesses that make a difference, but it’s all about elevating humanity and taking the evolution of consciousness to a new level.

 

Hal: Sure. You’re doing it more at the business level. I’m doing the personal level and kind of shows a lot of overlap in between there.

 

JV: I think there is a lot of overlap.

 

Hal: So, let’s talk about that. Well, how does making a big impact, help entrepreneurs make bigger money in your opinion?

 

JV: Well, that’s a fantastic question. To me, the only thing that anybody will consistently buy from you is a positive impact that they want. If you think about it, that’s it. It comes in different forms and maybe services, products, experiences, whatever, but people buy a positive impact. They may not have thought through it like that but what is a positive impact? A positive impact is a solution to somebody’s problem. You’ve positively impacted them by solving their problem on a practical level and then you look at Conscious Millionaire and I say, “Well, start with your purpose,” which is the impact you want to make, the solution you want to provide, and then I tell every entrepreneur, there are 100 niches you could work with. There’s no lack of people you could choose. Your goal is to choose the one that’s the best fit and the best fit is always going to be someone whose problem that you’re solving shows up in a way that excites you because there are ways the problem could show up and you go, “Yeah. But that’s not going to get me. I’m not going to have a Miracle Morning. I’m going to have a dead morning because I don’t want to get up.” Right?

 

Hal: Sure.

 

JV: Then there’s got to be enough of them. So, this is the practical research that you do. There’s got to be enough of them this is going to work and they either have to have the money or access the money to pay you at whatever level you need to reach the financial target that you’ve chosen. And when that fits then it’s like a glove. You’re providing a solution. You just started at the solution level, the impact level, rather than the problem level and then you go find the people who have the problems but I can tell you if you’ll do it that way, you’re going to be much more fulfilled and at the end of the day, you’re going to feel like you did something that mattered and the irony then, to circle back to you to your question, is that you’re going to be so driven to make this impact that other people want and/or will eagerly buy because this is what they’re looking for that your business will become mega-successful because you’re really selling what the marketplace wants, a positive impact in the way that they want. As I say, your purpose maybe let’s just take in, in our case, is your purpose may be uplifting people and giving them a path to you personally access their potential and bring it out in the world.

 

But they may want that in an audio format, not a video format and so you sell the audios because you learn that your audience wants audios and not videos. That’s how you craft the impact in a way that your audience wants or they want it delivered in a blue box, not a green box. Well, once you discover that, don’t be stupid. Put it in a blue box. If you change the impact you’re making, all I did was make it accessible to people in a way they want it. So, you still have to do all that marketing research and figure out what they want and split test. But you’re split testing based upon an impact that’s going to change people’s lives as opposed to split testing to find out, well, what will they buy but you really don’t have a clue about how it’s going to impact them because you’re not thinking about that. Those are two very different ways to approach the business. I think the impact one is where we’re at. See in the past, we were at a different place. We were at the first stage of the evolution of capitalism, but I say we’re at a second stage now. We’re at a stage where people want to work for companies that are making a positive impact, people want to buy from companies that they believe in what they’re doing, and they feel better because they bought it. People are making different buying decisions than they’ve ever made before and I think it fits the impact model, not the old model.

 

Hal: I agree and I think that for anybody listening, if you are at the beginning stages of entrepreneurship or early stages and you’re going, “Gosh, but which niche should I go into? What audience should I serve? What impact should I make?” My personal opinion and I guess it’s really based on experience and, JV, I love it if you have any thoughts on this. I’m sure you have thoughts, but I’d love your thoughts on this. And that is to me the more organic the impact can be based on your life experience, the better. Meaning instead of you going, “Hm, what’s a hot topic right now? What’s a hot market? What’s a big problem that needs to be solved?”     Nothing wrong with that. You can definitely go that route but for me, it was always in my own life like when I first left sales after six years with indirect sales, I went, “What am I qualified to do?” And I thought, “Well, all I’ve really done at this point is I’ve sold a lot of Cutco kitchen knives.” And at that point, I had already died and come back to life and gone through that car accident.

 

So, those are my two things but I thought, businesswise, I’m really qualified to coach Cutco sales reps on how to be more successful and double their sales or whatever and so I kind of went with the low hanging fruit and I thought organically that’s what I’ve done. That’s where I’m really passionate about it and so I started out my first dozen coaching clients were 90% of them were Cutco sales reps. And then second thing I want is, well, I also had this horrific car accident. I thought I overcame it and I’m also a young person at that point. I was like 25 and I looked even younger and then I thought, “I am qualified to speak to young people about overcoming adversity.” And so, I started speaking in high schools and colleges. So again, that came from I’m sharing that again if you’re looking at your life, look at your past experience to figure out, well, what have I done? What have I overcome? What have I accomplished that I can share with other people?

 

And one more thought on that couple episodes ago, I interviewed Jesse Harless and if what I’m about to share resonates with you, you can go listen to this episode at HalElrod.com/270 but Jesse Harless, he’s a member of our Quantum Leap Mastermind and he came to our Best Year Ever Event a few years ago and when he did, he got inspired to leave his job to pursue his passion, his dream. He is a recovering addict. And so, what he decided to do was organically thought, “Well, I’ve overcome  a drug addiction as well as some other addictions.” He goes, “I am qualified and I’m passionate about, it’s meaningful to me to help other people overcome their addiction.” And so, now he is the founder of Entrepreneurs in Recovery and he’s out there and his business is just absolutely blowing up. So, again, you look at the formula. He is earning now a lot of income because he is impacting a lot of people and where that impact and business model came from as he looked at his own life and organically what am I qualified to help people do? What impact have I made in my own life that I can now pay forward and help other people with? So, anyway, with all of that and I know I said a lot there, but JV, what are your thoughts on for someone…

 

JV: Yeah. This is so interesting and that’s one of the things I love about podcasting. I go, “People, if you even get this, it’s a great gig because you get to talk to interesting people. So, in my case, I get to talk to Hal and I’m getting interviewed no matter which way it goes. So, actually, I go with masterminding right now because this is perfect. I love your insight there and it’s a perfect fit with starting with your purpose. I go start with you. Start with your purpose but here’s the part that you didn’t know. It’s actually in chapter 4 of my book is that once you get clear about the purpose then you look at what are your three top skills? What is it you’re qualified to do? Because one person may bring out something that’s stated on paper as your purpose, a completely different way than you do, and it’s going to have to do with, well, what is your past? What is it you bring to the table that makes it unique? And I think that’s exactly what you’re talking about.

 

So, the two milled together really well so if you go, “Well, I really want to empower people to be more powerful salespeople, to get out there and be able to sell products and services that are making a difference in other people’s lives, and that’s what really turns me on and then I have this experience at Cutco and therefore doesn’t it make sense that I start with Cutco people? But I find Cutco people that meet the values and the outcomes that I have. I want to help people really get out there and play big.” So, then you might differentiate I call it a big wave. I say I want to help people create a big wave. If you don’t want to create a big wave, that’s fine. It’s not a judgment. It’s your life, but I help people create big waves because that’s what I like to do. And so, you might I’m talking to you if you’re listening today might want to say, “Well, I have this sense that I want to make this difference in the world. That’s the purpose. I have these people skills or background experiences that I could organically use those to get started and I particularly like working with people with these characteristics. That’s going to be a great match for you getting started.

 

Hal: I love that. So, what is your purpose? What are your skills and/or knowledge that you’re qualified to help people with?

 

JV: The organic teacher you’re talking about. But they didn’t get clear about the criteria. I did this on a whiteboard several years ago and I continue to refine it and I do it with so many clients as well. So, like one of the things on my criteria list is I don’t work with people who are negative. I don’t want to listen to it. You cannot pay me enough money to just have me spend an hour listening to all the things you want to complain about. I’m not interested in that. I work with people who want to change the world in some way. They want people’s lives to be better so I’m clear about that criteria. If you aren’t going to – I actually tell people this, Hal. So, it’s kind of an interesting one. I got a certification in accountability coaching and ended up coaching the person who trained me because he said I never met a more natural coach and he needed an accountability coaching so I did that. And so, now I tell people right up front I go, “Here’s the deal. If you show up and you consistently aren’t doing the commitments that you agreed to in the last coaching session, I will fire you. I will not work with you.”

 

Here’s what happened, Hal. Nobody shows up without doing this stuff because I’ve already told them up front. I said, “I’ve got a certification and accountability, but I don’t plan to use it because I think that’s a waste of your time and money. So, just if you’re going to commit to something,” and then I say, “Now, it’s my job to get you to make as many commitments as you’ll make. I want to stretch you. It’s your job to tell me your plate is full but if you take the commitment, I expect it to be done,” and people get results because of that.

 

Hal: I love it.

 

JV: And it sounds like a Hal Elrod type of thing. I can imagine you coaching somebody that same way like we’re going to have this nonsense stuff. You said you were getting up in the morning. What’s the issue here?

 

Hal: Yeah. Either you’re doing it or you’re not doing it. You’re not a child anymore. And for anybody listening, I want to just to give it a real tactical example so I mentioned so I started, JV, I started coaching Cutco reps and I think my first like six clients I told them, look, my fee is 500 but because you’re my first few clients I was very transparent. I said I’ll cut that in half for six months and then if you want to keep working with me, it’ll go up to 500. So, they were 250 a person and then I got to where I’d be coaching let’s say 20 people at a time at 500 a month so if you do the math, that’s $10,000 a month. I want to share this because I’m going to share two different business models for people to consider that are completely using your own knowledge, skills, and expertise. So, the first one was one-on-one coaching, $500 a month which is about average 20 clients and I would talk to each one of them for my calls were about 45 minutes so it’s 15 hours a week. So, 15 hours a week of work to earn $10,000 a month. Not a bad model.

 

Now, then I had a handful of clients. This happened very organically. They reached out and they said, “Hal, we are new Cutco managers actually.” They said, “We can’t afford $500 a month. We’re just starting our businesses. So, we’re wondering if we get five of us together and we jump on a call with you, a coaching call and we each pay you $100 and we just get clear on what we want coaching on together beforehand. Would you do that?” And I said, “Yeah. Let me think about it,” and I thought about it for like a few hours or a day and I thought I don’t see why not. It’s kind of different but it seems the same amount of time. Sure. So, I said yes. And then after the first week, I got an email from one of them and he said, “Hey, this was so valuable. I’ve got another manager that wants to join. Can he jump on the call for an extra $100 a month?” And, JV, as you might imagine, the same light bulb that maybe is going off for you, I went, “Wait a minute. Why don’t I have 100 managers on this call paying $100 a month if I’m just coaching them all on the same thing?”

 

And so, within a matter of a few months, I had over 200 Cutco reps and managers on these calls at $100 a month. So, it was now $20,000 a month income for two 45-minute group coaching calls. So, you think about that. I would have to work 15 hours a week so 60 hours a month to earn that $10,000 in one-on-one coaching to 60 hours a month and now it went down to two hours a month to earn twice as much income. So, I just wanted to share. That just popped in my head and I thought maybe it’s valuable for you to consider.

 

JV: Right. Because if you’re getting started, I mean, we’re giving you really the golden goose eggs here, right? You got to have a sense of purpose because that’s what drives you forward and that’s what’s going to help you build the business and it’s what’s going to give you the fulfillment and meaning in life. And, folks, just trust me, after you’ve made millions of dollars, if you don’t have fulfillment and meaning, you’re still going to just not have fulfillment and meaning and all of a sudden, the money doesn’t matter. It’s a nice house but you’re going to feel pain inside. I don’t want you to feel that pain. I mean, a lot of conscious millionaire to me and I think a lot of great entrepreneurship is built on you’ve had a wound. You don’t want other people to have the wound. You want to save them from it. You want to uplift them and I think that’s a lot of miracle mornings is you want to uplift people to go to higher places and then you get clear about, well, what is it I’m really good at that could be a way I bring back to the marketplace as a way of bringing this purpose forward and then you get clear about who you really want to work with.

 

And then what you’re talking about, Hal, is really the genius part of, well, what are the different ways I can build this business model? Because there’s not just one way and you’re talking a lot about organic-ness, what happened, what just tends to happen? What is somebody asking for? It’s like me coaching the triathlete. We actually met on New Year’s Day at the spa and within a week, he’d hired me and I’d never worked with a triathlete before but like I use my same skills to empower them. Why not? I don’t think it’s going to become a new branch of Conscious Millionaire. But why not? Why don’t we just see where it goes and it’s turning out. So, I love this approach and this is fun. Thank you for inviting me on to play.

 

Hal: Absolutely. I just have a couple more questions for you before we finish up here. One is I’m a big believer. I think this came for me I’m a big believer in anticipating what the potential problems or roadblocks are going to be and then planning for, okay, well, how am I going to handle these when they come up? And I think it was when I was 20 or 21, I think I worked for as an assistant for Anthony Burke who was the CEO and co-founder of a company called Afterburner Seminars. Are you familiar with them?

 

JV: Actually, I’m not, so I’m curious.

 

Hal: Yeah. So, they’re a group of former top air fighter pilots. It was like three friends that were in the Air Force together and then they realize that the model that the Air Force uses to plan their missions could really be applied to business and I believe the guys that founded it, they applied to their own business and go, “Wow. This really works.” And one of the things that they do in the Air Force and I think they did in all branches of the military is called planning for contingencies is how I learned it, which is where they go, “Okay. What could go wrong? As we are planning this mission to fly three F-16 fighter jets into enemy territory where they’re going to be shooting at us with cannons and tanks and missiles and bombs and other planes, what could go wrong? We should figure that out so that we have all of our backup plans if things don’t go perfectly, which they rarely do. So, with that setup, I want to know in your opinion, in your experience, I should say, what are the top problems that entrepreneurs have when it comes to growing a business?

 

JV: That’s a fantastic question. The number one problem that every entrepreneur has and I’m going to put every person that I know who’s an entrepreneur, it doesn’t really matter what level they’re at is I think the number one problem is ourselves is that we have to constantly be willing to look in the I call it the Zen mirror and I call it the Zen mirror having lived in the Buddhist monastery so I actually went there to learn to meditate, that was my number one outcome I wanted, along with looking at the Buddhist approach and understanding it, is it’s looking in the mirror of truth about ourselves. What’s true about us? That’s our internal challenge or internal fear or our internal habit that we have that comes out that’s actually holding us back because, at every moment, that’s the thing I love about coaching people is if you’re a six and you want to seven and you’re a seven and you want to go eight, it doesn’t matter. The process is the same. You simply have to constantly be willing to look in that Zen mirror and say, “This is what’s really going on that is how I’m holding myself back and this is the change that’s needed.”

 

So, number one is ourselves. We have to constantly have the guts really to look in the mirror and be truthful about what we need to change next because there is no end to what we have to change. No matter where we are if we want to get better, we have to constantly look at what’s going on with us. So, I think it starts with us. And then the thing that we were talking about earlier today, Hal, what really can get you off track is having too many tracks that you’re on, to begin with. You’ve got to figure out and I’ve talked to a lot of people. I really want to make it clear if you’re listening today, I actually know how scary it is, myself, and because of all the clients I’ve worked with, how scary it is sometimes to commit to that one track because I’ve talked to lots of people who will say things like they’re floundering and they go, “Well, I’ve got to take every client that comes my way, even if they have nothing to do with one another because I need the income.”

 

And ironically, that’s what’s holding them back is not being willing to commit to the one track because none of us in this small business world and actually it’s true with any business, but it’s just more of blatant with smaller businesses. We don’t have the time, we don’t have the capacity, we don’t have the money, we don’t have the resources to market to all these groups and to talk to them in the way that they need to hear it, so they understand that we actually have the solutions to their problem. So, it’s getting on that one conscious focus action train track. I think that’s another thing that can actually hold you back.

 

Hal: You’re absolutely right and actually I was looking, I opened up my, I have this, I use an app called Google Keep and I keep my breakthroughs in it whenever I have a breakthrough and that  was a breakthrough I had the other day is that I wrote down, “I really need to re-examine and be honest with myself about changes that I need to make rather than doing what most of us human beings do, which is ignoring those changes to just stay comfortable.” And so, and then I went down and listed a bunch of different changes that I needed to make or just things to examine and that sort of thing, but I think that you’re right to really be honest with us. And I think that to do that, it’s really valuable to have other people whether it’s a coach or a mastermind or yours, I think that’s extraordinary because we can only see ourselves through our lens. And so, I think often the biggest breakthroughs I have are when I have the conversation with a friend. I’m like, hey, can you tell me, do you see any things that I really need to improve or let me share with you where I’m struggling and give me some feedback? And it’s always really, really valuable.

 

So, last thing I want to end with, I know there are seven habits in your book that you talk about and if an entrepreneur or a coach can only choose one of those seven habits, which one do you think is the most valuable?

 

JV: Without question, it’s number four. They’re all incredibly valuable, but number four, I had six, Hal, and then I kept auditioning habits for the seventh one that ended up being in the middle and I like go, “That’s a great habit,” and then I think about it for a week or two and I go, “Yeah but it’s not yet,” because I realized when you’re down to the seventh, it’s got to be the quintessential one because the other ones couldn’t leave because it was so important. And then it was clear one day. Always do the right thing. That to me is the quintessential habit, at least for Conscious Millionaire it is because here we are wanting to consciously impact other people’s lives and consciously uplift them and consciously do business in a way that’s right. So, when I look at businesses, when they forget their policies and they constantly do the right thing, that’s when you get wow audience fans that are real deep audience fans because you do the thing that’s right. And I want to be clear that that’s the most soul-searching one for you and your team and your brand and your culture because every person could come to a different conclusion about what’s the right thing.

 

It’s not black and white. It’s a very gray matter and a lot of times you have to grapple with it, and this is where you have to make some decisions about, well, what does the right thing mean for you? The right thing, ironically, because we’ve all been ingrained with something that just isn’t true. The customer is always right. Well, that’s just actually not true.

 

Hal: Yes, sure.

 

JV: That’s just absolutely not true. And so, you go, well, the right thing, part of us wants to go, “We’ll make the customer happy,” but not always, because sometimes what the customer is doing isn’t good stuff and the right thing is that you have to set a boundary and sometimes that is the right thing and so you might end up with an unhappy customer occasionally but you actually did what is the right thing for your team, for supporting everybody in your company for your brand, for moving forward. Because if every time someone came and wanted to in essence to change your rules, your brand, or misperceived things, you can’t have a whole new rule for every new person. So, doing the right thing is the hard thing but it is always the right thing and I’ll guarantee you this, if you set your compass on doing the right thing, your company will grow. You’ll have a good culture. Your team members will support one another because they know that this is really what you’re about. And you’re about it because you know that what you want to do is create a better world than create better services and products and impact people positively. And so, doing the right thing you’re willing to grapple with it, and sometimes throughout every policy and every rule that you have because you realize in this situation, those actually aren’t the right thing to do.

 

Hal: JV, I’m so excited that you said that. That is literally when I was 20 years old or 19 years old I guess when I started in sales, my mentor like my manager’s manager, he ran the division that I was in in Cutco and he taught us do the right thing, not the easy thing. And everything you just said I could not be more aligned with it. You use the word compass and I’ve always said that became my guiding compass and to this day, 20 years later when the alarm goes off in the morning I go, “I don’t feel like getting out of bed,” my compass it is so deeply ingrained, “Hal, do the right thing. Not the easy thing,” and I literally that voice in my head pulls me out of the comfy covers and upright to do the right thing. Whenever I go, when I’m looking on a menu and I go, “Mm, that fried chicken or that pizza looks really good,” and I go, “But that salad would serve my body.” I go, “That’s the right.” Literally, I’m glad you said that because that is the guiding compass.

 

And last but not least, JV, the timing couldn’t be more perfect this morning about two hours ago I spoke in my six-year-old son’s classroom to 20 other six-year-olds and when I was preparing for this 20-minute speech that I gave this morning I was going, “God, what am I going to teach them? Of all the things I could teach them, what do I teach them?” And that was, I thought, well if there’s one thing they walk away with, that’s it, do the right thing, not the easy thing. So, yeah, I think that’s the greatest advice you could give and that for me has kept me on mine. And by the way, for anybody listening and you’re going, “Okay. Well, how do you figure out what the right thing is?” just my way I define it is it’s whatever is in alignment with your values and moves you closer to your ideal objectives like so it moves you where you want to go but it is completely in alignment with your personal values. So, with one without the other. If it doesn’t move you where you want to go but it’s in line with your values, well, that’s still may be the right thing but if it moves where you want to go but it’s not aligned with your values, it’s definitely not the right thing.

 

If you have to lie, cheat, and steal to get your ideal outcome, you’re not going to feel great about it. So, JV, I love that of all the habits that you felt is most valuable, I could not agree more that that’s the one.

 

JV: Well, I really appreciate that and as you were talking, I was thinking through this thing that we’ve all observed in many areas of life and it can be business, it can be politics, and I think we find lots of – just I never, never discussed politics so I’m just going to say in politics I can find a lot of examples of this today everywhere where people justify they hold this ideal, but then they justify breaking the ideal to promote the ideal. And you go, “Something is seriously wrong with the picture.” And you really hit it on the nail, Hal. It’s because it’s impossible to break the ideal to promote the ideal and be in alignment with your values because the values would have to be schizophrenic, right?

 

Hal: Yeah. That makes sense.

 

JV: You can’t both hold an ideal and break the ideal as a way to promote the ideal and be in alignment with your core self of who you are.

 

Hal: Yeah. You hit it right on the head. JV, what is the best way for people to interact with you, engage with you, get your book, Conscious Millionaire, follow your podcast? Where’s the place to find you?

 

JV: Yeah. Well, of course, go to ConsciousMillionaire.com. I’d love for you to listen to the podcast. The podcast is right there. It’s one of the header tabs, Conscious Millionaire Podcast. Whether you want to sign up on iTunes, Stitcher or need the other places, I think we’re listed in 15, 20 different hubs that you can sign up for. We’d love to have you come listen to it and I always like to give something in and it seems today the right thing to give because we brought up high performer a number of times is the high performer formula and you can get that absolutely free. Download the PDF of it at ConsciousMillionaire.com/HighPerformer. I’ll give that again, ConsciousMillionaire.com/HighPerformer. And if you want to get to your first million, you’ve already established a six-figure business or you’ve passed the first million and you want to get to another million, I seldom do this but, Hal, I’m just going to give you my cell phone. You’re welcome to text me. Just tell me your name. What it is you want to accomplish and I’ll get back to you and that’s area code 303-641-0401 so that’s Denver so it’s mountain time. Please don’t text me at 3 AM but 303-641-0401. I’d love to hear from you because I specialize in helping people who really want to make a big wave and change the world and change people’s lives and make money in the process.

 

Hal: JV, well, I don’t know if you made a huge mistake to give out your cell phone number but let me know how that goes.

 

JV: We’ll find out. If I get a lot of 3 AMs.

 

Hal: Yeah. You’ll find out. But no, I mean, my experience with you has been getting to know you is that you walk the talk and you are genuinely someone who is doing what you just said that you do, which is helping to make a big impact, make a big income, do both simultaneously so thank you for your time that your time today, JV. Really, I got a ton of value from our conversation and I’m imagining our listeners did as well.

 

JV: Hal, it was great being here and I want to thank everybody who showed up. On my podcast I say this so I want to say it, I don’t believe there are accidents in life. I think you’re here because this was the information you needed to take your next step and I just challenge you to take that step and really make a big difference with your life because that’s why we’re on the planet.

 

Hal: I love it. I could not agree more JV. I love you. Goal achievers, I love you, I appreciate you. Thanks for tuning in to my conversation today with JV Crum III. Check out ConsciousMillionaire.com and the other resources that he shared with you about a minute or two ago, the other URLs. And again, I love you and I appreciate and I will talk to you next week, everybody. Take care.

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