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Feeling overwhelmed by your family's daily grind and looking for a way out? Welcome to "Dig the Well," the podcast that empowers you to build the life you deserve. Your hosts Vikki and John are top earners at Neora. Vikki is a # 1 best-selling author and John is a retired Los Angeles Police Officer. Together they’ve navigated family challenges, raised successful kids, and achieved financial freedom.
In each episode of "Dig the Well," they dive deep into the strategies and mindsets that can help you break free from the constraints of the traditional 9-5 lifestyle. They understand the unique challenges faced by stay-at-home moms and families who are juggling multiple responsibilities and struggling to find balance. Their mission is to provide you with the tools and inspiration you need to create additional income, gain more family time, and ultimately, transform your life.
Throughout their journey, they’ve had the privilege of working with renowned figures like Jack Canfield and Jeff Olson, whose wisdom and insights have greatly influenced their path to success. They’ve also celebrated significant milestones, such as raising two valedictorian children and supporting their son, an Olympic weightlifter on Team USA. These experiences have equipped them with valuable knowledge and practical tips that they’re eager to share with you.
"Dig the Well" is more than just a podcast; it's a community of like-minded individuals who are committed to personal growth and financial independence. Whether you're worried about your family's financial security, longing for more quality time with your spouse, or simply seeking a way to reignite your passions, this podcast offers actionable insights and real-life stories that can help you achieve your goals.
Our mission is to inspire you with the belief that if we can do it, so can you. We want you to feel empowered, educated, and ready to take control of your future. By tuning in to "Dig the Well," you'll gain the confidence and knowledge needed to break free from the daily grind and create a life full of possibilities.
So, if you're ready to transform your family's future and discover the greatness within you, join us on this journey. Subscribe to "Dig the Well" and start building the life you deserve today!
This is the EWN Podcast Network.
John:Ever wondered how you could turn your side hustle into a full time gig and spend more time together?
Vikki:Hi. I'm Vikki, a number one best selling author.
John:And I'm John, a retired Los Angeles police officer. Welcome to Dig the Well, where we help couples navigate the world of business.
Vikki:We've been married for thirty five years, and because we built successful side business, John retired nine years earlier than he originally planned from the Los Angeles Police Department after twenty five years on the job. Now we spend more time together, and we want to help couples like you do the same.
John:Join us as we help you overcome common obstacles, and we show you how to make extra income without sacrificing family time.
Vikki:Ready to dig deep and build your well? Let's get started. Welcome back. Welcome back to dig the well.
John:The next episode of dig the well.
Vikki:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is gonna be a fun one.
Vikki:We did some research, and we asked ChatGPT, actually, what the top seven trending topics that entrepreneurs want to know about. And we've got those for you today.
John:Yeah. Interestingly too, the the the seven things, really applies to what we're doing.
Vikki:Yeah. Right? Yeah. It's really cool. Absolutely.
John:All seven of them.
Vikki:Yeah. All seven. So
John:So I guess the key there is and we'll go over each one of them, obviously. But if you find if you're already involved in something that kinda ticks all the boxes, or if you find something that ticks all the boxes, then you're ahead of the game.
Vikki:Yeah. Right now. So stick with it and be consistent. Don't give up.
John:Yeah. If you haven't found it, we'll we'll help you with with this because it's just, it's just amazing.
Vikki:Yeah. Yeah. So these are the seven trending topics that are going on right now in most entrepreneurs' minds. So number one, you know, you're probably thinking, what could that be? And the number one, topic is AI.
Vikki:And I'm sure you've seen a ton of advertising about it. Everybody's now expert on AI. I'm seeing it. I have friends that actually have been teaching AI for years, and it's funny. Now all these other people are popping up teaching people about AI, and, I I just trust the ones that I know that have been doing it for years.
Vikki:So, but this episode is a big not reason, but we actually used AI, like I said at the top of it, used ChatGPT to come up with some topics that we knew would be interesting to you to you all. So, and and, actually, the, like, the main thing that, that the that ChatGPT said was AI for solopreneurship specifically. So not if you have a bunch of business partners and you're starting a business with a group. It's it's really the solo entrepreneur wants to know more about AI, how they can, you know, do more with AI.
John:So Sure.
Vikki:I know you've used it too.
John:Yeah. Because it it it actually allows one person or just a few people to do the jobs of so many, because AI is actually handling that for them. And it's interesting too if you follow the world trend toward AI, and it's basically we're all in a race for AI technology. And there's a lot of there's a lot of talk about China right now, more or less being the leader in AI, which is which is kind of scary if you look at world politics and whatnot, because we don't want China to be that powerful because of their ambition, their kind of ambitious nature, so to speak. So there's a big race for The United States to to really develop AI, and as they develop this new technology, we're gonna benefit from it.
John:Right? It's just like when you think about the space program by sending sending, people to the moon. What did that do for us? It brought in a ton of new technology that we're all enjoying. Look at our personal computer.
John:Everybody does a personal computer. Right? Right. A lot of a lot of our computers, a lot of that that technology came out of the space program because obviously their their equipment's run by computers. So anyways, we're gonna I think we're gonna have a huge jump in AI technology that's gonna help us all.
John:So if you're, like you were saying, Lavik, a solopreneur, or if you're like for us, it's us. Like, the dog's kind of a help, but not much.
Vikki:He's entertainment. Yeah.
John:It's you're right. It keeps the same. But it's mostly us, so now we can also lean on AI to help do some of the other tasks that we would normally do and Right. Take up so much of our time, it frees it it frees our time up to to actually grow and build our business and do the things that are that, move the needle.
Vikki:Right. Exactly. Yeah. Like, if you, are on social media and you're using that as your platform to share your business, AI is perfect for that. You can I I use it all the time?
Vikki:I put in there what I wanna say, and I ask, AI to make me sound more eloquent. You know? Because, you know, when you're typing something out, it just sometimes it sounds great, and sometimes it doesn't. And so when it doesn't, I ask AI to polish it up a little bit. It's still my words.
Vikki:It's still my whole thought process, but just getting a little help, and that's amazing. Yeah. Even, you know, I I do some speaking. We both do some speaking gigs. And when they ask for a bio, I've got what I have come up with for the two of us.
Vikki:But if it's a specific group, say it's a realtor association, and we've been asked to speak on entrepreneurship, you know, I'll plug in or buy a regular bio, but I say, could you please tweak this, mister ChatGPT, to whatever, to x y z Realty Association? And then guess what? It goes and learn you know, searches everywhere and learns about that association and what their, you know, pain points and hot buttons are and says all the right things that would be great in a bio coming from us. So, I mean, it is it's actually brilliant.
John:Yeah.
Vikki:It's and, you know, I've had people say we've talked about this on another episode that it's like the antichrist. Right? There are some people that have said that. But I feel like it's you do need to be careful what you put in it. Right?
Vikki:Don't put personal information into, you know, any type of AI, whatever you're using. You don't want your personal information out there. But like you've always said, our information's out there. So it's not finding anything new, or strange or different about you if you're not giving it up, if you're not putting it out there. So just be careful.
John:Mhmm.
Vikki:Right? Have you heard any other, people, you know, knocking AI in any way?
John:No. Other than the fact that I know a lot of folks think think, and probably rightfully so, there's gonna be some jobs lost due to AI. They're gonna if you think about what you just mentioned about writing your own your own bio Mhmm. For like an intro or like folks that need resumes written. So, you know, there are people who, you know, that are that are good with they're very articulate, and they could write write those things for you.
John:Well, now it's being replaced by a computer generated version of it, so they're out of work in that regard. Right. I think there's some creatives that are that'll be out of work. Like for instance, for my screensaver on my Surface computer, I asked AI just to give me a generated image of our two dogs. Right?
John:The dog that passed away last year or year before last now. The dog that just passed away, the Akita.
Vikki:The
John:Akita, the Akita, and then the dog we have now currently, which is our daughter's dog who's rooming here with us.
Vikki:Teng. Teng.
John:Yeah. Which is a Shiba Inu, white Shiba Inu. So I asked just to create this image of Akita, black and brown brindled Akita, and a white Shiba Inu walking through a Japanese, an old Japanese village. It's like they they knew exactly what the two dogs look like.
Vikki:Right. It is crazy. Right.
John:And I shared that with our family, and they're like, oh my gosh. And I told them how it was done. I just asked AI to do that one time, and they produced that image. And I had to say, it why haven't I'm walking through a different different village? And sure enough, there's just a different villager walking down the street, and it's an old dirt road village.
John:Really cool. And how it knew what our dogs look like is I mean
Vikki:Yeah. There's a chance, like, is yours do you have it saved to who you are a little bit? Have you plugged in some okay. Because I was gonna say, I've been taking a lot of courses on AI, and I have an, a ChatGPT where I paid extra, and it remembers who I am. So it I was gonna say it could have searched your Facebook and seen that picture of Kuma and Tank as your profile picture, I mean, there's a chance.
John:It could have, but I don't think so because that's no longer the profile picture. I don't even know if that picture's still well, I'm sure it's probably somewhere in there. But
Vikki:But this
John:was just AI that this is the first time I ever used this version of AI. It was Copilot that comes with Microsoft Surface devices. Yeah. And that I'd never used the or no. It was either Gemini or There's so many.
John:Which one it was. But it was whichever one it was, it was the first time I had ever used it, and it popped that thing out in seconds.
Vikki:Yeah. It's really amazing. And I didn't tell you yet. I haven't showed it to you. I guess there's these action figures that are all the rage right now.
Vikki:And because ChatGPT just got an update where it it even they it's always done images or has not maybe not always, but it does images. It just had an update. Well, people are making action figures, and I have to show you. Did I show you?
John:You did.
Vikki:Okay. I did show. It's a police wife, and it shows them three little things, gadgets that come being with being a police wife. So one was my book, police wife survival guide. They it just put it in there.
Vikki:Chat GPG knew. How crazy.
John:Yeah.
Vikki:It put a cell phone and something John would have texted me and then, a coffee mug. But, yeah, AI, it's super fun too. That's the other thing. So if you haven't really checked into it and played around with it, just just do. You know?
Vikki:And back to the to people losing their jobs, I just think the the people that are worried about losing their jobs, like a copywriter, for example, or like you said, somebody that might write resumes for people, they should actually plug in lean into AI and use it to their benefit to still do what they do, but up leveled. You know? Personally, that's what I think they should do. You know? Don't give up on your industry.
Vikki:Just use it to your benefit. Yeah. Mhmm. So cool.
John:Alright. We beat that one up.
Vikki:Yeah. We did. Okay. You wanna tell everybody number two?
John:No. You can beat the piece.
Vikki:I'm gonna do number two. Sustainable business practices. Right? And so I'm pretty proud of our company. Like John said at the top of this, we tick all these seven boxes that we're gonna be sharing with you and not we didn't pick this on purpose.
Vikki:Like, we we put it in ShoutJPG. It spit out these seven things, and we're like, wow. You know, our business, our company does all this. And one of those is that we're all about sustainability. We're all about trying to be as green as possible.
Vikki:Like, our boxes with a lot of our products have the instructions printed on the inside of the paper box, and we use paper paper box. And that way, there is no extra paper being used. Some of our products, do have a paper insert, and like John pointed out, I I asked him, why is that? How come we don't do all? And he said, I bet there's some regulations, you know, from the government or what have you that there has to be a separate insert.
Vikki:So that would be the only reason. But, you know, look into businesses that are forward thinking in the same sustainability, factor. You know, I know also sustainable are ingredients. We do the best we can to source our ingredients from sustainable plants and and actually farms, sustainable farms. So with that, you know, that's their focus.
Vikki:Can you think of anything else on that?
John:No. I was just gonna say that it's not only the right thing to do, but even if you personally don't really care that much, you're not a you figure like, hey, I'm not a tree hugger. I'm not really that concerned about whether there's a paper insert in that box or whether it's printed on the box. But think about it, if you're building a business, you want to appeal to as many people as possible, and there again, there are going to be people that would be maybe turned away from your business if it wasn't a sustainable one. Right.
John:So I think it's important not just from your own point of view, but look at it from another's, you know, someone else's perspective, that it may be important to them that your company, your product, what you're what you're, offering them is also environmental environmentally friendly and sustainable. Right?
Vikki:Yeah. I love that. Yeah. And I've got if you're looking for a packaging, say you have a product and you need a great packaging company, it just came to mind as you were sharing all that. I have, two really good business friends that, are women owned.
Vikki:It's kinda cool. And, I know they have a focus on sustainability. So reach out to me in the show notes. Get my emails if you're kinda curious about that, if you need a good packaging person. But, yeah, really, really cool that that's number two.
John:That brings up another interesting thing. You know, we've been talking there's so much talk about, you know, men and women's sports, and are there really any differences between men and women. I've actually heard people say that there are no differences, that women are just as strong, just as big as men, and it's kinda weird because there are a lot of differences between men and women.
Vikki:Yeah. It's a fact. But
John:one of the things I've noticed is that I think that's another area that women are more concerned with is sustainability and the impact of what we do as human beings on the planet Earth. Right? Right. Yeah. It's kind of interesting.
John:So that's another thing to if you're a man and you're in a business or you're looking at a business that caters mostly to women, then and you may not care about sustainability, you better. Because I think there are a lot of women who do care.
Vikki:Yeah. A lot. A lot. Yeah. That's a good point.
Vikki:And you wanna be open to all people. Right? Yeah. So Right. Your wider net for sure.
Vikki:Yep. Alright. Number three. I guess that's me again. John will I don't want Some of the other ones.
John:Adding a little bit here and there.
Vikki:It's funny. We talked about before going over these seven tips, and, and some are my forte and some are John's. So seven is the social media commerce boom or just social commerce boom as it is put here. It's all about how social media and ecommerce are connecting in a huge way, and you see that if you're on social media. You see friends sharing about their business.
Vikki:Yes. They share about their personal life, but they're also talking about their business. Maybe it's a graphic design business. Maybe it is, a laser cutting wood business, that's really cool. You know, whatever the business is, you're seeing it all over Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, big time, if you have something to sell.
Vikki:And so wouldn't it be smart to not just keep poo pooing social media, but instead integrate that in your marketing plan? You know, wouldn't it be smart? And the answer is yes.
John:It would be smart.
Vikki:Yes. Because that is the wave of the future. You know? People it goes back to even our brick and mortar days of prestige because we talked about that before that we paid for advertising on TV. We paid for commercials.
Vikki:We paid to be in print ads, and we polled our customers. And we found out it was word-of-mouth that brought more people than in than anything else. Yeah.
John:By far.
Vikki:Right. By far. So that's what social media is. It is word-of-mouth. It is a friend sharing about a product or service that they use or it could be their business getting the word out, and it's your friend.
Vikki:Wouldn't you wanna buy from your friend? That that always cracks me up too when some people do buy from their friends and other people, like, run away from their friends, and I've never understood that.
John:Yeah. That's kind of weird.
Vikki:Yeah. It's if you trust your friend, put the jealousy aside. We've talked about that. The crabs in a bucket on a previous episode too. Put the jealousy aside that they're doing well, and maybe you recognize that they're doing well, and seek out information on what they're doing and buy from them.
Vikki:You know, I would much rather buy from a a mom and pop, husband, wife, single husband single man, single wife, a single woman, and then a big box chain any day.
John:Yeah. Right? Why do I wanna help the Waltons out anymore? Yeah. So And it's funny because we've we've bought things that we don't need or really sometimes we don't even want, but it's because our friends Yeah.
John:Someone we know, and and that's what they that's their business. And so, well, like, you know what? We're gonna, you know, we're gonna help you. We're gonna support your business. Yeah.
John:It may not be it wouldn't have been my first choice, but you know what? Let's let's go ahead and and help you out.
Vikki:Yeah. Exactly. So I don't understand what the yeah.
John:It's weird to me that that friends and family.
Vikki:Right? Family too.
John:Family's a really big one. Like they say, you can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family. Yeah. But it's true. You know, we found so many people, not just us personally, but so many people in our business have the hardest time struggling with getting their family to get on board Yeah.
John:And even support them.
Vikki:Even just to buy a product or service.
John:Yeah. It's almost like they're they're, like, anti supportive.
Vikki:I know.
John:They actually don't want to help them at all.
Vikki:Yeah. It doesn't make any sense. I thought family was supposed to support each other.
John:Anyway, sorry sorry if some of you have that kind of family, but we do.
Vikki:You know? And I bet I do.
John:Yes. I do.
Vikki:Yeah. Me too. I wanna bring up that story of my grandmother and back at Prestige Motoring Accessories. If you're new to the show and you haven't heard us talk about it, it was an automotive accessory window tint, car stereo alarm, all aftermarket, high end, company that we owned right out of college. And my grandmother who was married to a man well, it was their delicatessen, but but he ran it.
Vikki:They had immigrated from Denmark to Brooklyn, New York and started their own delicatessen. So she was business minded. She understood, you know, purchasing a product or purchase support. Just, you know, just a a pat on the back. A purchase of a product or service from a friend is really just like an attaboy keep going.
Vikki:And that's what she did. She bought where none of our other family members or friends bought a thing from us. And so
John:You know, it's funny. And and it unless they needed it. Right? Unless they needed something, and then they, of course, they expect, like, us to do it for nothing for them Yeah. For free.
John:Well, it won't actually deal. Yeah. It was actually a deal.
Vikki:Yeah. That's shocking too.
John:Yeah. I'm gonna I'm not gonna say name. I'm not gonna mention her name. But anyways
Vikki:So support your friends in business. And back to ecommerce, you know, get over the fact that you've gotta learn something new. Just learn it. Spend some time. Learn a little bit or hire a VA.
Vikki:Hire a social media person to run your social media for you. There's excellent ones out there. I've got great ones to recommend too on that. But You know and I'm sorry. It's the wave of the future is all Yeah.
Vikki:Wrapping up there.
John:I was gonna say you're you were just saying that, you know, even if you're not unfamiliar with something, just learn it, do all that. You know, that's that's a point that I think so many people that are that are they claim they're entrepreneurs, they claim they're business owners, yet they don't want to do the things that true entrepreneurs and business owners do. And I and I you're shortchanging yourself if you don't try and learn something new, because that's the whole point of owning a business, or it's one of the many points of owning your own business is it pushes you out of your comfort zone, it forces you out of that comfort zone, so you have to learn new things, you have to figure things out on your own and how to do them and how to complete them. That's the beauty of having your own business, because once you've done that, there you get this huge sense of accomplishment. Yes.
John:You don't get that going to your job, for most people at least, you don't get that going to a nine to five job working for someone else. You're told what to do, when to do it, and how to do it, and you just you're like a robot, you're a drone, for the most part, not everyone. But when you own your own business, you're figuring things out on the fly, you're making things work, that's part of it. Don't short your change yourself and not want to learn that. Learn to do new things.
John:Embrace these new things that that you've never seen before. Because once you start getting out of that comfort zone, that's when the real magic happens.
Vikki:It is. It is.
John:Yeah. And you've got to get out of it. So business ownership forces you out of that if you wanna survive. Right? If you wanna be successful and survive, you're going to be forced out of your comfort zone.
Vikki:Thank God. Yeah. Yeah. Embrace it. That's so good.
Vikki:Absolutely. Yes. Okay. Number four.
John:Okay. Building a community around your brand. Right? Did I get that?
Vikki:Yeah. That's right.
John:You know, that that's one thing that I've noticed about what we do. Right? And and we've we've talked about it before. We we keep going back to that, but it's so true that, like Vic said, it ticks every box of the seven that we've that we're talking about today. And part of it is building a community.
John:Right? And and I remember the CEO was always saying that we're gonna build a community, and and it was so important to have this community. And it it From day one? Yeah. From day one.
John:And we've noticed that that is it it's exactly what's happened. And by building this community, we attract the people we want to be a part of this community, whether we know it or not, or whether we overtly go out and and try and and, I guess, show folks that that we're about this community, they see it. Right? You you can't miss it. It's a community, right, of like minded people.
John:Quality, ethical. Right. And you repel the people who aren't of good character and the people you don't want. And because they're uncomfortable around you.
Vikki:Right? Right. Yeah. Like the big egos, there was a time we had a lot of big egos in our company, and they're gone. We repelled them, and we're like, stay away.
Vikki:No
John:big egos. Good. It it kind of, we kinda thin the herd that way.
Vikki:Yeah.
John:Right? And it's nice because we don't have to try and make a decision on someone. They just aren't comfortable. Like, thieves aren't comfortable around policemen.
Vikki:That's such a good statement.
John:Go hang out at a cop bar. Yeah. And that's fine. We don't want them at at our bars, right, that we're hanging out. Yeah.
John:So but anyways, that's whole another story. But, yeah, this community is is amazing, the community that that we're a part of, and we're just happy to be a part of it.
Vikki:Yeah. Yeah. And that's and that's cool that it's like one of the big trends that entrepreneurs are looking up entrepreneurs what was that? Entrepreneurs are looking at when they're starting their business. They wanna they wanna build community, and they wanna know how important that is.
Vikki:So very, very cool. Yeah. And, actually, I did wanna touch on one thing there. When it comes to social media, you know, when you're on especially on Instagram, it's crazy. You go on there, and you'll get messages from, you know, bots, probably they're probably bots, a lot of them.
Vikki:But some are, you know, fake people on there, and they're pitching that they're gonna help you get all these followers. But what it is, it's fake followers. And they'll tell you, you pay me, you know, $20, and I'll get get you 10,000 followers. And then you can pay me more to get you more. So it looks good.
Vikki:Right? When you when people go to your social media, they see all these followers. Well, guys, if you don't know this, there are insights and reports like crazy where anybody can find out if you have fake followers or not. So stop doing that. You don't want fake followers.
Vikki:You would rather in my opinion, I'd rather have less followers, but ones that engage, that are my community of people that get me. And, and if they don't get me, they don't have to follow me. Right? But you don't want a bunch of fake followers. So I wanted to throw that in because we're you're building a real community of of cheerleaders for you, and so you want them to be real and not fake.
Vikki:So we also have Dig the Well podcast. We've had so many people, reach out on from YouTube and say, hey. We'll help you boost your subscribers. Right? Like, create and I've talked to you about that.
Vikki:And it's like, no. I'd rather do have us do it organically. So that's a tip. Please do comment. Please do share our message with friends.
Vikki:Share this podcast with friends. If they like it, they can subscribe and join our community here at Dig the Well. We're all about you, the entrepreneur, and helping you grow. So, that's a plug for for that in the middle there. Alright.
Vikki:Number five. Do you wanna hit on that one?
John:No. I think you're gonna do this one.
Vikki:Oh, I am. Okay.
John:Yeah. You are.
Vikki:So, number five on our top seven list is generational entrepreneurship, And this really tugs at both of our hearts, for sure, because, like I said, my grandfather was an entrepreneur. Actually, John, your side of the family in Japan, we should talk about that. Japanese people are entrepreneurs big time. Like, your grandmother wasn't it your grandmother or great grandmother that owned that coffee shop that you actually went to? My aunt.
Vikki:Your aunt. Okay. Yeah.
John:So Like, when when we've gone I don't know if how many y'all have been to Japan, but every time we've gone, we always say, oh, yeah. You know, we we went to all these little mom and pop places to eat, and that's all there is out there. Right? So The only, like, recognizable chains or there are only restaurants that are chains are American. Right?
John:There's Mc McDonald's. There's k f KFC is really popular in Japan.
Vikki:I know. I don't
John:know. I don't know if they don't have a lot of chicken there or what the deal is, but man, Yardbird is like the thing. But those are it's mostly those chain, like Burger Kings, I think, were there. Yeah. There's all those chains, and some of the stuff that you used to see in The US that were like huge out here have kind of faded away, and you think, gosh, are they still in business?
John:Yeah. In Japan. They're in Japan. Place. Right.
John:And there are other countries too, but that's the thing. And then, you know, you're not getting authentic food. It's weird how it tastes the same, though.
Vikki:It is weird.
John:Don't know.
Vikki:Must be all spicy.
John:McDonald's. We went to McDonald's. We were in a hurry one time. We were going to a speaking engagement in Fukuoku. And we'd gotten off the train, and we were rushing to get over to the place, and there was a bunch of us, remember
Vikki:Yeah.
John:In this group. And then you and I figured, hey. We we needed to eat. So we stopped and at a McDonald's of all things. Right?
John:And we ordered, like, a quarter pounder with cheese, whatever the heck it was, I tell okay. Let's see what this is gonna be like. It's probably gonna be like a fishy quarter pounder with cheese. It tasted the same exactly.
Vikki:It was. And we were looking at each other. This is weird being in a total different country.
John:The one thing that's weird though, if you go to a pizza place we went to a Pizza Hut, and we ordered pizza, and Vic loves onions. Right? Yeah. Actually, I've gotten to like onions more lately.
Vikki:Yay. That's kinda weird.
John:But anyway, so we ordered, and Vic ordered the pizza with onions, and it had remember the onion? We had long slices of onion on it. Yeah. It was the weirdest thing. Was weird.
John:It wasn't diced, and it wasn't small little slices. They were like they used a massive onion, I guess, and just cut it so there was like long Yeah. Crescent shaped things of onions.
Vikki:So clearly, didn't have a good system the way McDonald's does of teaching franchisees how to do the recipe anyway. Not. Right?
John:But, anyhoo, what were we talking about?
Vikki:We were talking about generational entrepreneurship and how your aunt
John:Oh, that's right.
Vikki:Your aunt had a coffee shop, but you were talking about how
John:Everybody owns businesses out there. Little business, and they're tiny.
Vikki:I mean,
John:you walk into a little place to eat, there's maybe two tables.
Vikki:Yeah. How many how about those sushi places where there's there was like a shack on the side of the street. There's a bunch of shacks in a row, and they all have curtains, and you don't know which one to go into. And I'm also wondering what's going on in there.
John:Yeah.
Vikki:You can see a sign for food, so we would go in and it's every place we went to was great food.
John:Mhmm. And it's all family run. It's like, dad and son are behind the Yeah. Mom's in in there working. This, you know, little sister's out there doing whatever she's doing.
John:I mean, the whole family's in these at the restaurant, the little bars that we went to, just wherever. It was all family run little businesses. I think the way The US used to be way back when Right. Before these mega corporations, like or even think about Walmart. Right?
John:They put so many mom and pop businesses in the area that they open a Walmart, they put them out of business. Yeah. It's a shame. Crush them.
Vikki:And yet still America is still we have more small business owners than anything.
John:Yeah. You know, I
Vikki:love It's amazing.
John:I love it when they do, like, I think it's Small Business Saturday. Yeah. And also, American Express was doing it. I don't know if they're still doing it, but they were promoting a lot of small businesses. And they were if you use your American Express card at these small businesses, you would get a little little something for it.
John:And I think you earned a little a few extra membership rewards points. But the small business would get something from it. Right? It was like free advertising for the small businesses and kind of encouraging people to go and and patronize these small businesses. And I think that's great.
John:Yeah. Like, there are oftentimes we spend a little more money to buy something from a local business rather than ordering it on Amazon. I mean,
Vikki:if Yes.
John:If I don't yeah. Right? If I don't need it, like, sometimes Amazon delivers it later in the afternoon, the same day we order it. But if it's not a if I'm not in a big rush, I'll just drive to the local store and just pay a little bit more and buy it from there.
Vikki:Like, honestly, like Ace Hardware, I like way better than Home Depot. Ace Hardware, you could tell it's a franchisee and has a family, and he's sometimes employing his family members. That's what it reminds me of.
John:But the other great thing is there's so much I know Home Depot hires people that, like, a lot of times they'll hire, like, retired retired plumbers. Like like, when I've asked for help over at Home Depot, I always look for the old guy. Right? Because generally speaking, they're a tradesman, and they're retired, and now they're working because, you know, they probably didn't have a they don't have a lot socked away for their retirement, so they have to go back to work. I'm sure they're not doing it out of the kindness of their heart.
Vikki:They should have a side gig.
John:Right. And to them, that's their side gig. Get a job of Yeah. Home Depot, but they put their knowledge to good use. And sometimes, I I've talked to some of those old guys and ask them, hey.
John:I'm doing this project. And they're they're more than happy to sit and help you. And and then it's like, wow, you really know what you're doing. And he's like, yeah, kid, I did this for thirty five years. I'm like, I can tell.
John:Right? But what I've also noticed about Ace Hardware is they're all like that. Yeah. Everyone I you talk to someone, they know exactly where to find what what it is that that I need. They'll tell me where to go, where to find it, and then they'll say, hey.
John:You know, I've got have you thought about doing it this way? Have you thought about using this instead? Right. I was like, wow. No.
John:I didn't. But thank you for the Yeah. I had a get that from Amazon.
Vikki:Yeah. We generally are just telling you, you know, our our thought process and our belief system here on our on our podcast. But I was just thinking we should get Ace Hardware to be one of our sponsors. I just after that. But really yeah.
Vikki:But back to entrepreneurial entrepreneurship, that's really what we're talking about. And so, you had a family of entrepreneurs even though you said to me, you know, at one point, you know, my dad, you know, worked for the railroad. No. You know, not necessarily. My mom worked at a rest at a Chinese restaurant.
Vikki:Yeah. You know? But actually, you know, your aunts and some relatives were entrepreneurs.
John:Yeah. My mom's side. Yeah. For sure. On my dad's side, I don't I can't think of anyone that was an entrepreneur on my dad's side of the family.
John:Although my dad was very supportive. I mean, he's the one who encouraged me when I was in high school to, yeah, start something.
Vikki:Yeah. That's
John:Run it from the garage, which I did.
Vikki:Maybe he realized, you know, I wished I had. And so that's maybe why he was encouraging.
John:Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting because now that I think about it, one of the things he said was because if you don't start one now, he said you're gonna get later in life. And they were talking about conventional businesses. Right?
John:Right. Not like what we have now. Now, there there's nothing to stop anyone. Right?
Vikki:Right.
John:But back then, if you want, we're talking only a conventional, like a brick and mortar type business, where you couldn't have a side gig. It wasn't a side hustle. It was that was the worst chosen career. Right? Yeah.
John:And he was telling me that if you start it now, he said, you'll never take that. You'll never start it. You'll never take that risk because you're gonna have a family, you're gonna have obligations, and you're gonna need just a job
Vikki:job. Yeah. Exactly.
John:Then you're never gonna be able to start your business. Thank goodness things have changed that
Vikki:Right.
John:You know, you can have your job job, right, that you're doing forty to eighty hours a week because some people you know, I mean, their their jobs really take a lot of time and effort, but you can still have a side hustle.
Vikki:Right. And you should. Definitely. And that's gonna lead into the to number six. But just to finish off number five, generational entrepreneurship, you know, talk to millennials.
Vikki:Talk to Gen Z. They do not want to have that forty year job to get, you know, forty years of a paycheck that they can't make it on to then have the retirement that they can't make it on.
John:Yeah. And they work in Home Depot. Right. Sorry, Home Depot.
Vikki:They are entrepreneurs. They see the value of doing multiple things, having multiple streams of income. So that's gonna lead right into number six. Multiple
John:Which we covered at another on another podcast, really. We did. And, you know, I'll tell you, it it is not just something smart to do, something that you should do. It is absolutely essential. I mean, who can I mean, very few people can make it on sorry?
John:I have to
Vikki:We can't hear it. It's okay. There was a cute little tune being played.
John:It had what I was saying is that, you know, you just you have to have multiple streams of income. I don't I don't understand how anyone could make it on a single income. And and back, I guess, in the forties and fifties, it wasn't such a big deal because I remember, like, for my family, my dad was the only income earner for the longest time. The only reason why my mom finally got a job, and that was wasn't until I think my sister and I were either in junior high or maybe even high school, was just she was kind of bored, think. You know?
John:Because we weren't home. My sister and I weren't home very much. We were out with our friends, you know, were at school.
Vikki:Gen X were always around. Involved
John:in some sort of sports, something, and we're out and about.
Vikki:Right. Without your parents. That was the day, you know, you rode your bike everywhere. Yeah.
John:I wasn't gonna invite my mom over to hang out with my buddies and I after after school.
Vikki:Yeah.
John:So I think she was just probably really bored because my dad was at work until the evening. And then so she thought, well, you know what? I'll get a job. So she's working lunch lunch at a restaurant. Yeah.
John:And then that turned into then she got greedy. Right? She got greedy.
Vikki:Why? What? How did she get greedy?
John:Because she's making money on tips and whatnot.
Vikki:Oh, okay. I didn't know what he was getting at.
John:She had her own spending money, and so then she worked she's working nights too, you know, working dinner. But anyways Anyway. I digress.
Vikki:Multiple streams.
John:You gotta have multiple streams of income. You know, back the the days of of, like, what my mom and dad could do on just my dad's income, I think are long gone.
Vikki:My parents were the same. It was only my dad's income.
John:Yeah. And and the thing is the more streams of income, the better. It's like filling a pool. Like, we've had to drain our pool before, and we had to fill it with a garden hose. Yeah.
John:And there's also a line that runs directly into it. But again, it's comes out of a tiny little pipe, and it's only filling it at so much and it takes a long hours, right? Hours, most of the day, in fact, I think. And so what I did was I ran a couple of hoses out there from a couple we have a couple of hose bibs in the backyard. And I fired them all up with with all these garden hoses.
John:And the second time we had to fill it, and it filled up in in really quickly, you could actually see the water rising in it. So it's just could could you imagine if that's your bank account. Right? Yeah. You want your bank you want to to fill that bank account, the more those the more sources of income, the more streams of income you have going into that account, it's gonna start filling up a lot faster, or at least it won't drain as fast.
Vikki:Yeah. So what tips do we have for everybody? I was thinking about that on minimizing risk, but having multiple streams. You know, what let's let's give them some good tips.
John:Well, if you're are you looking at, like, at a side hustle kind of Yeah.
Vikki:To have multiple streams.
John:Yeah. So one of the things that we're that I think Vic and I, and we haven't even talked about this before, but I think we're we're against are those businesses that have high startup costs.
Vikki:Right.
John:Right? That are kind of front loaded.
Vikki:And And what's high to you? Like, $5, 10 grand? That's not even that much money, but that is a lot.
John:Yeah. Especially if it if it costs that if if that's basically a almost like a fee to get involved, don't like that at all. Right. I mean, it shouldn't it shouldn't be like that. And and and if you're considering something like that, I I would strongly suggest that you look at your options.
Vikki:Reach out to us for counsel. You know, seriously. Please
John:do. Because a lot of a lot of the the of that business model where it has a lot of high upfront cost, that business model is basically your recruiting model. Right.
Vikki:It's also archaic. It's also archaic. Yeah.
John:But there's still a lot of businesses that are still set that way. Their compensation plans are set in such a fashion that it's just a high recruiting model. It's not actual sponsoring anyone. It's not actually helping people to build build their business and grow their businesses and be successful, because there's really no incentive to do that. The incentive is to get them to sign on and get them involved because of that high upfront cost, and then after that, there it's there's not much there.
John:Where what we do, it's just the opposite. There's very low upfront startup costs, so we're incentivized by helping grow their business and helping them be successful. When we do, then our commissions from the company become greater.
Vikki:We we actually have them help them have actual customers, because in the models that you're talking about, it's like It's recruiting. Recruit recruit recruit these business owners, but nobody's getting customers. So how is that a business
John:Yeah. And if you
Vikki:at all.
John:If you're in a business like that, I'm I'm gonna say your days are numbered, because the Federal Trade Commission is gonna be knocking on on that company's door at some point. Right. Because they do not believe in any type of recruiting business. It has to be a customer based business. Right.
John:And what's happening is
Vikki:Recruiting only, though. Let's clarify.
John:Yeah. Recruiting only is what I mean. Yeah. Right? And what's what's going to happen is these companies that are that are mostly just recruiting only, and they're not they don't have a customer model built onto that, they can't pivot and they can't adjust to this.
John:And so they're going to have the only way they're going to have to the only way they're gonna they're gonna comply is by cutting out their compensation plan. Mhmm.
Vikki:Right? Yeah. Scary.
John:It's already happened to numerous we've got a list of companies that have done exactly that. They've changed their compensation plan, cut out the people that actually help build their business, you know, make their business viable. Now they've been cut out of that compensation plan. It's a shame.
Vikki:Do we wanna talk about photography, you know, businesses like that? Do we wanna talk about anything like that? What do you think?
John:Yeah. Another another thing you wanna look at if you're looking at another stream of income is, hopefully, you can find a stream of income that, provides passive residual income. Mhmm. Something that you don't have to keep repeating, over and over and over again. So Uber, Lyft, I'm talking to you guys.
John:That's not passive income at all. That's not residual income at all. You have to repeat those drives over and over again to get paid. So in other words, if you drove someone to the airport yesterday, you're not gonna get any money on that today, unless you drive someone to the airport again.
Vikki:Right? Right.
John:It's just not gonna happen.
Vikki:Have to repeat the sale, basically.
John:Yeah. So we we talked about before in another podcast, one of the businesses that I ran that I did from home was a photography business. And, sure, it I had I'd already had a lot of the equipment anyhow. Let's face it, I didn't buy the equipment for the business. I actually bought the equipment for the kids to photograph the kids as they were doing
Vikki:Doing sports. Yeah. Yeah.
John:So then I thought, well, I've got all this money invested in Why couldn't I just start taking some other photos? And I was approached then by by another director Yeah. And so I started shooting professionally, got media credentials and whatnot. But the beauty of that is the pictures that I it ends up it ended up being passive residual income because I've talked about it now. This I stopped shooting gosh.
John:What was it?
Vikki:Than '10 years '11, '12, maybe '13. We were still we had started on your business
John:It was more than ten years ago for sure. Maybe more like twelve twelve, thirteen years ago. But anyways, I haven't in fact, I've sold some of the equipment, so I couldn't go back and do it. But the point is
Vikki:You shut the door.
John:I still make money on that. I still get direct deposit from from different sources, but one of them is through CBS, which is now Viacom. I don't know what it is. Anyways, but they they still send me money because images are still being purchased or used for in some fashion from photos that I took over a decade ago.
Vikki:That's what I was gonna clarify. Pictures that you took are still being sold, so you're getting a commission. I just wanna make sure they fully understand that. Yeah.
John:And, you know, it's kinda curious because sometimes I look to see, okay, which one which one which one was it? Right? Because they sent me a little statement showing me what's sold, and then what my what my cut is on that. And it's kinda cool because some of them go back to high school sports, and I think it's probably now dads and moms. Right?
John:Yeah. That they're saying, hey. This is hey, kid. This is me back in the day.
Vikki:Oh, I see what you mean. Yeah. It's them. It's their but now they're a mom or a dad. You know, when they're talking
John:to their kids and maybe mom says, you know, your dad used to play football when he was in high school, and he was the he was the shizzle. He was good. Right? Yeah. And then they're like, really?
John:And then they'll buy the picture. Or they'll show the picture online. They'll find it and show it, and then they see the option, they can buy it. So then they buy it, I think. I think that's some of it.
John:Right?
Vikki:That is happening, because there's some kids that are starting to have kids, so that makes sense.
John:A lot of it's high school stuff. And I I remember there there's a lot of it. I I shot a lot of championships here in California, there's CIF championships. And then I would always do a team photo, and then I put graphics on on that team photo. Some with I do a one version without any graphics, and always one version with graphics.
John:They had their school name in their school colors. I would go find their school colors and download those colors so that the graphics were all done so with their school's spirit in mind. Right? And it tells what they were, CIF whatever champions, CIF Southern Division champions, or whatever it is on the bottom and the year and whatnot, those sell like crazy. Almost everybody on that team who's part of that team wants to buy it.
John:And so for years, I I just keep I just keep getting this residual money on it. That's a great thing. If you can find a business like that, go for it. The problem with photography is it's really expensive, again, too high upfront cost, and it's very time consuming.
Vikki:Right. Yeah. The editing is the most. Yeah. So, you know, hopefully, we've given you some tips on multiple streams of income, some ideas on the fact that you honestly really want to have something be a residual income fact you know, that's gonna pay you years after you've done the work.
Vikki:I mean, that's huge. Yeah. And a lot of people don't do that. They don't even think about that.
John:Which the business that we've been talking about that we're now a part of and have been a part of for a while, again, over a decade Yeah. It ticks that to another box it ticks. It's it's we have passive residual income built into that too.
Vikki:Yeah. Again, so yeah. It's pretty pretty awesome. So reach out to us if you're curious about that. It's definitely something you can do alongside all the things you're already doing if you're a coach.
Vikki:Even coaches, John, there's so many business coaches, marriage coaches, all types of coaches out there. AI coaches, like we talked about at the beginning, and they can also, have some residual income too. If they create an online course and promote that, you know, work that they did, those courses they created can continue to pay them. Right? So that's, you know, something for you coaches out there too.
John:Yeah.
Vikki:Think about that factor.
John:And and for those that are considering coaches, I think we've said this before, you know, be very choosy. Be very picky on who you decide on as your coach. Right. Because we know so many coaches who basically live in a single wide. Right?
John:They just not that if you live in a single wide, I'm not meaning to put you down, but they they pretend that they live in a mansion, and they have all these luxury spoils, if you will, and they live like a extravagant lifestyle and all this all these great things, but then we know what goes on behind the scene. Right?
Vikki:Yeah. And you find out they don't.
John:Yeah. How many of them claim to be business coaches, yet all they've had were failed businesses?
Vikki:Right. That that's always shocking to me. And I I find out time and time again that's what's happened.
John:Yeah. It's it's odd.
Vikki:It's almost like, don't they also say, and I'm not saying this for all psychiatrists and psychologists, but
John:Oh, boy. You know,
Vikki:those that are coached in that field, they've usually struggled with something so much themselves.
John:And it's not to say that they that if they have if they've experienced something like that and they've overcome it, that they don't have something really great. There's something very valuable. Right? Mhmm. They they talk about that with a lot of ex cons.
John:Right? They they turn their lives around, and most of the time it's because they've they've they've gotten some religion. Right? And I think they are they they do have something of value. I think they do reach out to maybe people going starting down the wrong path, especially young young men going down the wrong path.
John:I think these these some of these ex cons that have turned their lives around, they do have great value. I think they do at times affect other people's lives and influence them in a good way. Good. You know, not always. I mean, look at that.
John:Look at the one that was just recently arrested from Roland Sixties, who has a nonprofit that's supposed to be helping helping the youth, and it turns out he was just embezzling a bunch of money, or at least that's what he's charged with. But, you know, you're gonna have you have bad actors and everything. Right?
Vikki:Even the police department. Careful.
John:Yeah. Yeah. There are bad actors even in the police department. So, I mean, I'm not saying that we're we're all a bunch of angels, but be careful about who you choose to follow and and really who you want to
Vikki:Take advice from.
John:Yeah. Have be your mentor.
Vikki:Yeah. For sure. Alright. And if you need help with that, just, again, also reach out to us on that.
John:You know, just on the something on that just made me think about it, was I remember there's a piece of advice someone had had given given us, and I don't remember who it was, where it was, but they always said that, you know, take a the the person that you you follow, whether it's at work, as your mentor at work, or or with your relationships, or whatever it is, finances, whatever, look at them, and do you how do you see them ten years from now? What where were they ten years ago? Have they changed? Is their lives are their lives better ten years forward? And if it's if the answer is not really, then why would you take their advice?
John:I don't get it. Right? Or like if it's someone at work and and you're you're that's your kind of your mentor, and do you really wanna do what they do? I don't know.
Vikki:I know. Yeah. It's serious questions.
John:It made me it really made me think about, okay, who is it that really that I would want my life to be more like, you know, or or whatever aspect of it that it is. And it made me really really give a lot of a lot more thought to who I follow and and whose advice I actually take.
Vikki:Yeah. Definitely. Okay. Okay. And the last, number seven, overcoming fear of failure is one of the top seven.
Vikki:Number seven, that entrepreneurs want to know about and learn about. And, oh my goodness, that is a whole episode, I'm sure.
John:Yeah. I mean, the failure is gonna happen.
Vikki:You know? Yeah. It's the whole A little failures. Yeah. Perfectionism has to be pushed aside, in my opinion.
Vikki:You've gotta stop trying to be perfect because nobody is. Right? And so and you've gotta learn that you're going to fail. And if you don't fail, that's there's actually something wrong because you're not gonna learn anything if you're always winning. How are you gonna learn how to tweak something, change something, get better at something if you're always winning?
Vikki:And I just I don't think the life is set up to always win. I was on a Zoom this morning, and they said, you win sometimes and you fail, but they turn the fail into you learn. So you're winning or you're learning. So if you could just twist in your brain how you think of failure and think of it as in a learning example, learning time, that's huge. It's a big mindset shift.
John:Yeah. And if if you're gonna set out and have your business and be an entrepreneur, you you're gonna have failures. Right? You're gonna have little failures here and there.
Vikki:And a lot in
John:the beginning. A lot. Yeah.
Vikki:Get over it.
John:You know? I mean, just learn from it.
Vikki:Yeah. Yeah.
John:And especially if you made a mistake and it ends up being something that ends up being a failure or whatever, well, then just learn from it and don't make that mistake again. Right. And it always I've I've said this before. It always reminds me of I follow SpaceX because I just find it really fascinating and remarkable that we now have reusable rockets. That is incredible.
John:Make a bunch money that's saving all of us. Because now they can launch satellites into low Earth orbit, and they can do it very inexpensively because they're reusing the rocket. It's not just being sent up and then just being destroyed or lost. These missions to the to the International Space Station, they're returning the the rockets that actually launched the capsule up to the International Space Station, that Dragon rocket, that the Falcon nine comes back to Earth, and it lands all by itself.
Vikki:It's it almost doesn't seem possible. We watched it together the other time, and I'm like, how is this even humanly possible?
John:Well, that's what they always said. It it was not possible. That's why all the Saturn rockets were were were were just basically they're out in space junk. They just continue out out in outer space. Think about it, and this is what someone brought up, and it was really interesting.
John:They said, how much does it cost to fly from LAX from Los Angeles to New York on a, like, a seven forty seven, a marine jet, a seven thirty seven, whatever jet that you're flying on? How however much it costs. Right? 4 or $500?
Vikki:First class, 15.
John:Could you imagine how much that ticket would be if when it landed at JFK, they had to destroy the airplane?
Vikki:Yeah. Oh my
John:gosh. Nobody could afford almost nobody could afford to fly any longer. Right?
Vikki:We couldn't.
John:That's what we've been doing with with our rockets. And now we have this Falcon nine rocket that comes back to Earth, lands by it looks like a pencil. These little legs come out, fold out just before it touches ground, and it lands vertically like a pencil sitting on its eraser. But the point I'm getting at with the failure part of it was, this has been in development for many, many years. And I remember Elon Musk was being interviewed.
John:They were at one of the one of the launches of this or the tests of this Falcon nine, set it up, and then they were bringing it back down. It was supposed to land on a barge, think it was, out in the ocean. And the reason why they chose a barge was they knew it was gonna crash. They didn't want it to land on they wanted it out in the ocean because it Soft landing kind of? Well, So they wouldn't they wouldn't injure people.
John:Okay. Like, what if it went astray and landed in someone's neighborhood, right, and killed a bunch of people. Gotcha. So they had it on they put a barge out in the ocean, and they said they're gonna land on this barge, and it actually hit the barge. Wow.
John:But it didn't land successfully. So it crashed and burned in this big fiery mess, and you guys can see there there's videos of it. And I remember the interview that Elon Musk did, and they said that, basically, the reporter says, well, that was a big failure. And Elon's on, no. It wasn't.
John:He said, we actually knew it was gonna crash. We did he said, if it had landed and if it was a successful landing, we wouldn't have learned anything. He said, we knew it was gonna crash. We know that. He said, next time it's gonna crash again.
John:He said, but we'll learn from that. And every time it crashes, we learn something new so that we'll get to the point where it won't crash. And now look at it. They they land I saw two of them. They landed in in a tandem on the two pad.
John:In fact, that was the last one, right, that you saw. Right. It it there's two landing pads, and they both come down and land almost simultaneously. One was just ahead of the other by a little bit. But it's just it's fascinating.
John:If you guys get a chance, we'll look at that, and it it it's just amazing what we can do, but we can do it only because we had failures. And we learned from the failures. We didn't cry, or he didn't cry. All the all the engineers at SpaceX didn't didn't mope and go home and and and whine about it.
Vikki:They expected to fail. That's what's helpful.
John:Yeah. Or because they had failure, they didn't say, I give up. I quit. Right. That's the ultimate failure.
John:That's the only failure you're not gonna learn anything from other than you're just gonna learn to be a quitter. Right? And and nobody should be a quitter like that.
Vikki:Right.
John:Fight hard.
Vikki:Right.
John:Fight harder. Yeah.
Vikki:There was something else you were telling me about Elon, that he spoke publicly about just everything that he's ever done. It's failed and failed and failed and failed over and over again until, yes. But if
John:you think about it, he's had so many successes because I think he's always had that mindset of, hey. I know I'm gonna I know it's gonna be if there's gonna be failures. I know there's things that I need to learn, and that's the only way I'm gonna learn them is through the failure.
Vikki:Yeah. And I was just thinking about we have some, patented ingredients from our Princeton University laboratory, Signum Biosciences, in our products. And, one of them is Sig twelve seventy three. Well, the reason it's named sig twelve seventy three is it went through 1,272 iterations of that molecule, that ingredient until they so it failed. You know, an iteration is when they're working on it, doing it over again because clearly, it wasn't the outcome, you know, didn't didn't do what they wanted it to do.
Vikki:When it got to 1,273, then it was then they succeeded. So even just like that is such a good example. There's another one, Sig fourteen fifty nine. You know? All it's it's crazy.
John:The numbers just show how many times they did had a had a nonworking result that they they didn't give up. They learned from it and then just move forward.
Vikki:And that's a Princeton University laboratory. So just examples. How about even, president, Lincoln? Lincoln talked there's so
John:much wrong
Vikki:about him. How many times he ran for office and failed?
John:I believe he failed every time except for when he ran to become president
Vikki:Yeah.
John:For The US.
Vikki:And look what he did for our country and really changed the trajectory of our country.
John:Right. Right.
Vikki:Wow. And if he had given up when he after he failed.
John:Yeah. How many more years would we have slavery?
Vikki:Yeah. It's I mean, that's a huge accomplishment. Super scary to think about. So, you know, hopefully, you're leaving this podcast, knowing that, you know, failure is part of it. Embrace it.
Vikki:You know, it it can hurt sometimes, but in you know, embrace it anyway. Kick the garbage can if you have to. You could be frustrated, but pick yourself up and do it again and do it again and do it again too.
John:It's not a it's not truly a failure until you quit.
Vikki:Yeah. Yeah. That's for sure.
John:Yeah.
Vikki:And did you have anything more on that? I had couple books that I was gonna recommend on failure. No. I don't have anything. Yeah.
Vikki:So, there is a great book called Feel the Fear and do it anyway because a lot of people just are so fearful of failure. They don't attempt anything. If you don't attempt anything, you're gonna just live a mediocre life your whole life. It's kinda what you were talking about in the beginning. And then I have another great book, the success principles by Jack Canfield.
Vikki:So I have plenty of other books if you want more on get overcoming fear of failure and failure itself, well, you're gonna fail. So there is no book on, not having failures because you're going to, but overcoming the fear of them, let me know. So Yeah. Yeah. And what were you gonna say?
Vikki:Nothing. Did I cut you off? No. No.
John:Not at all.
Vikki:So we really hope these seven trending topics, you know, hit some hit a hot button with you. Maybe you were thinking about some of them, hopefully that unlocked something for you and your entrepreneurial brain, and you're gonna step out on faith and go for it, have childlike faith, and just go for it. Remember, we we coach a lot on that childlike faith. Just if you do have a coach, just do what they say. You know?
Vikki:Remember what you were like as a child, and your parents, you know, were helping you walk for the first time, for example. You know, you fell a lot of times. That's definitely failure, But you didn't just give up and not try to walk again. No. You kept walking.
Vikki:And just the same thing with just having childlike faith in whatever you do, you can accomplish it on your entrepreneurial journey, but it takes that drive and determination. Yeah. So For show. Yeah. For shizzle.
John:I
Vikki:have to say one of John's words. Alright.
John:I don't she say that.
Vikki:Just for fun you do sometimes. You're always just joking around. I say for show. Oh, I thought you just said who says shizzle then?
John:H s h o, show. Okay.
Vikki:Well, if you love this episode, please share it with a friend.
John:Yeah. For show.
Vikki:And we'll see you back on the next one. Have a great day. Bye bye.
John:Bye.
Vikki:Thanks for joining us on Dig the Well.
John:We hope you feel empowered and ready to take on new challenges.
Vikki:Remember, if we can do it, so can you. Keep learning, keep believing, and going after your dreams. And if
John:you enjoyed this episode, share it with someone who needs a little inspiration or maybe a nudge in the right direction.
Vikki:Help us grow this community of go getters. Together, we can achieve greatness and get back to family.
John:Thanks for listening, and let's keep digging the way.