#2: Erwin McManus

Erwin McManus is an author, futurist, filmmaker, and founder of the Mosaic spiritual community in Los Angeles. He's a sought-after expert on creativity, spirituality, personal capacity, and well-being, and has lectured in nearly 50 countries across the globe. Erwin's books include The Last Arrow and The Way of the Warrior.

Erwin's charitable cause: Mosaic Global's work in Malawi

What is The BetterLife Podcast: Real Estate Investing | Wealth Building | Life?

Uncover the secrets to living a BetterLife with us - investors and friends, Brandon Turner & Cam Cathcart. Join our conversations about real estate investing, wealth building, and lifestyle design with industry experts and seasoned entrepreneurs. Join us as we explore the habits, actions, and beliefs that will lead you to your BetterLife without losing your soul.

Erwin McManus (00:00:02):
You're not supposed to just pass your money onto generation trips to pass your values. Yeah. And if you raise up a generation that's generous, that has integrity Yeah. That lives their life for the good, they're the ones you do wanna entrust them with. The problem is when your kids become a trust fund kid. Yeah. And they're, and how do you avoid the dirt? And they're, they don't express any positive ethics. Yeah. And then, you know, if you're only passing on your money, and you're not passing on values and integrity and character and generosity, then you're destroying the generations to come

Brandon Turner (00:00:34):
Welcome to a Better Life with Brandon Turner. That is me, where world class guests share their wisdom on building a better life. Join me as we explore the habits of the actions and the beliefs that have guided their journey with the aim of helping you apply those lessons to your own.

Brandon Turner (00:01:00):
You are a business guy who became a pastor, not the other way around. So I wanna, maybe we start there. What does that mean?

Erwin McManus (00:01:06):
Well, I think part of it is that people see things so segmented. Yep. And if you're a, a husband and a father and an employer or an employer, and they're all segmented, you're probably living a really broken life. And you need to really live an integrated life. I didn't grow up in religion, I didn't grow up in church. I grew up irreligious. I didn't have anything against religion. I just didn't have anything for it. And my mom studied Buddhism and then became Jewish and born into a Roman Catholic world. And so we went on a spiritual rollercoaster the whole time growing up, I became a philosopher in college. I would've never said I was an atheist. I would've said I was a mystic. Okay. I believe there was more than the material world, but I didn't know what was there. And it was always searching. My earliest memories of searching for God were probably when I was six, seven years old, and really desperately trying to figure out if there's any meaning in my life. You know? And so when I became a person of faith, when I had a life changing encounter with Jesus, I didn't know being a pastor was a career. I thought it was just an expression of your passion and calling and gifts and talents. I didn't, I didn't know I could communicate. Yeah. And no one knew I could communicate. Could you

Brandon Turner (00:02:11):
Communicate then,

Erwin McManus (00:02:11):
Like, strangely enough, I could. Okay. I didn't know I could. Yeah. I, I was super shy, incredibly introverted, really socially reclusive. Yeah. And I lived in my inside world. I was in a psychiatrist office by the time I was 12 years old, in and out of hospital for six months. And was so introverted that I just didn't know how to interact with people in the outside world. And I had relatives who didn't even know. I mean, they would joke with me, can you talk? Yeah. You know, I mean, I, I could be silent for three, four days without even realizing I hadn't said a word. And so, when I became a person of faith, and now I've discovered something that has given me meaning in life, I, for the first time had something to say. I felt like something I wanted to talk about.

(00:02:51):
And I, and I think that's where, for me, communication became really essential. I wasn't a person that needed to be on a stage. Yeah. I was a person that was happy to talk to a person one-on-one. And that seemed to work really well. And then it went to one on 10, 1, 100, 1000, one 10,000, 100,000. And it just kept expanding. But for me, I was always just talking to one person. Yeah. I've been a pastor, but I've never called myself that as a career. Yeah. And I, or nor my core identity, my core identity is, you know, that I'm Irwin. You know, I have a relationship with God and I'm here to create and make the world better. And it can be through art, it can be through film, it can be through fashion. It can be through starting Mosaic or church here in Los Angeles. Or it can be through working with elite performers in the business world. It's all the same. To me, it's all just an expression of life.

Brandon Turner (00:03:35):
Do you get a lot of pushback or whether online or in person of like, you shouldn't be focused on money, you shouldn't be focused on business, you're about, God. You should be doing that only like, do you get that criticism at all? Of

Erwin McManus (00:03:45):
Course. And I realize most of those people are ironically Christians. Mm. Yeah. Yeah. People who are not Christians never have a problem with . They make sense to them. Yeah. People who are Christians want to tell you who you should be. And I always think to myself, wow, did those people actually read the Bible? Mm-Hmm. , you know, because Joseph actually became the most powerful man in an empire that was anti-God. Yeah. And so did Daniel. And Moses became the leader, the founder of a nation. When you look at people in the scriptures, especially the whole testament, they all rose the massive prominence. They actually had incredible wealth and power and influence. And Solomon, who's considered the wisest man who ever lived, was also the wealthiest Israel who ever lived. Yeah. And God didn't seem to have any conflict between living a life that he called them to live and living a life that created an incredible wealth and and wellbeing for other people.

(00:04:36):
Oh. The craziest thing is when I designed clothes, there are a million people who make Christian t-shirts. Yeah. I make $10,000 jackets. Yeah. , there's a difference. And, and, you know, and then you get all this criticism going, you know, why would you make a jacket that's so expensive? Yeah. You know, I mean, it's not accessible to all of us, and you're just going after whatever money. And I go, wait a minute, if I make a $30 T-shirt Yep. To make money, I'm making money on people poorer than me. Yeah. If I make a $500 jacket, I'm making money for people who are of my income. Yep. But if I'm making a $10,000 jacket, I'm actually pulling money from the wealthy Yep. To pay for the work of people who are tailors and sewers and pattern makers. People don't seem to understand how economy works.

(00:05:21):
Yeah. . And that's my biggest critique a lot of times with Christians, is that a lot of the critique is really a huge amount of naivety about how the world actually works. Yeah. And so I actually make high end clothes because I didn't want anyone thinking as a pastor, I was trying to sell clothes to my constituency. Yeah, yeah. . Yeah. No, no one at Mosaic can really can afford my clothes. And I love that. Yeah. And, and also I, I have a particular sense of calling to create things that are beautiful and elegant and extraordinary. Yeah. And so I don't really have any interest in creating things that are average. Yeah. I have a masterclass called Art Communication. It's $5,000. Yeah. And of course there's a lot of criticism. Yep. You know, going Well, why don't you make it for $50? And I go, because I do not create $50 products. Yeah. I just don't. Yeah. I, I wish I did because that would really scale. It's the $50 product that's the $250 product that actually scales. Yeah. The $5,000 one doesn't, it filters the person who's serious about becoming a world-class communicator. Yeah. And so I use it as a filter to find people who are determined to become the best. Mm-Hmm. And that's pretty much what I do in everything I do.

Brandon Turner (00:06:24):
Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. You know, I, I used to be very against, like, I, I do a lot of real estate, so I buy a bunch of real estate and I taught real estate on a podcast for a long time. And we were so, me and like the whole company, the podcast was very anti, don't pay for education, don't pay for it. You can get it for free. But then I started noticing this pattern that everyone that I knew, almost everyone I knew that paid a lot of money was way more successful. And it wasn't because they were successful so they could afford it, which maybe was a piece of it, but it's like they've invested heavily. And then those groups I saw just like ridiculous levels of success. And so I've realized if I want to be in that, I gotta maybe pay to get in that. And so it almost like self-selected a little bit, and there's still lots of stuff for everybody else to learn from. There's still like $30 t-shirts people can buy.

Erwin McManus (00:07:02):
No. And those are wonderful. Yeah. Except, you know, when people say that, I go, well, did you check the process of how it was made? Yeah, yeah. Like, who didn't get paid so that you wouldn't have to pay?

Brandon Turner (00:07:11):
Yes. Ooh, ooh. That's a great

Erwin McManus (00:07:13):
Question. Yeah. See, when I'm making something that's really expensive, I know everyone Yeah. In our entire process is being paid extremely well. Yeah. And so I don't mind charging the end consumer Yeah. So that everyone else can have a really good livelihood. I don't know why, but a lot of faith thinking is magical thinking. Mm-Hmm. , we just hope everything just happens Yeah. Magically and happens, you know, in a, in an ethical way. You have to work to make things ethical. Yeah. And that actually costs, yeah. Yeah. I love Mosaic. Like I don't have to pastor. Yeah. And I think in fact, when you see a lot of, like, I don't wanna go into that too much, but a lot of pastors who, who fall Yeah. A lot of, lot of church systems that just collapse all around you, it's usually because their entire identity fall around being the pastor of a church and their entire economy is Yeah.

(00:08:00):
And for me you know, for the first 30 years of pastoring, I don't think I ever made more than 30,000 a year. Yeah. And, and that would be included entire package. You know, for the first 15 years, I never made more than 16,000 a year. Yeah. And so it was more of a tip, you know, and and I lived in LA Yeah. I had to work and I had to create Yeah. Make, well, I had to take care of my family and I'm really grateful for that. If I'd had a church that could have funded me Yeah. And paid me whatever it was worth, I don't think I would've had the hustle and the drive and the innovation and creativity to create other things. Yeah. I find that to be a great tension. I tell, usually I tell church starters when they're gonna go start a church, move to a place and start a career. Yeah.

(00:08:44):
A hundred percent agreed. Yeah. Get a job. Yep. Like, do something that integrates you into the city, don't get funded, and then feel like you're gonna be relevant to that area. Yeah. Because everyone's gonna ask you where are you getting your money? Yeah. You know, and I could say, Hey, I do this, I do this, I do this. And, and it was so much fun, even starting Mosaic, everyone knew I was a futurist. Yeah. And I got paid to be a futurist. And I would work with, or universities and companies, organizations that I would come in and help them understand what was happening in the world and how to meet the future. It's intersection. Yeah. And it gave me so much credibility when I walked up on the platform and talk about Jesus, because they knew I wasn't paid to talk about God. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:09:22):
That's cool, man. Yeah. You know, there's this in a related way, the idea of building wealth, I get this criticism constantly, and I'm sure you do as well. And it's this idea I didn't have, I post an Instagram, I bought a new rental property. I get somebody, and they're always Christians that'll say, when's enough enough? Brandon? Like, when is enough? Enough? Like, why do you need another property? Why do you need another apartment building? Or whatever, like, launch some product. Why do you need another thing? Like as if Christians are not supposed to have, well, you know, you mentioned Solomon, you mentioned all that. So how do you balance that? How do you balance, I like to create, and maybe there's a, I don't call it game, but there's some, there's fun. They're creating something that then the world wants and then pays you money for. Right. How do you balance that and that desire for wealth, but also the fact that there's so much needy people out there. How do you do that and how do you advise people on that?

Erwin McManus (00:10:03):
First of all, I think that we need to understand people are not the same mm-hmm. . And it's not even a biblical idea that everyone was designed with the same gifts or talents or intelligence or ability or even energy. Yeah. We're all just different. Yeah. You know, and someone says brand new win's enough, enough. You know, really the truth is it was already too much for them. Yeah. Yeah. And they don't understand what drives you. And you can say, well, when there's no more poverty. Yes. Yeah. See, when there's no more need in the world, then enough will be enough. Yeah. But until then, I'm gonna keep creating. Yeah. I'm gonna keep generating. Yeah. And, and I'm gonna keep being a generous person. And there's also this other dynamic of, there's just the challenge, you know, the big story in the Bible is about David killing Goliath, but then I think his four brothers were later killed.

(00:10:48):
Yeah. There's only one verse on it, because once one person kills a giant killing giants becomes normal. Yeah. And Brandon, what you're doing is you're killing giants. Yeah. And what you're, what happens when you accomplish something, it helps someone else go, oh, if he can do that, I can do that. Mm-Hmm. , I love being the person that proves that something can be done. Yeah. So I know when I started 30, 40 years ago, no one thought pastors could be artists. Yeah. No one, you know, no one was starting churches in nightclubs and no one was the naming of their churches, just one word, like mosaic. Yeah. All this stuff. I was considered a heretic. Right. You know, and now there's a whole generation of guys pastures who are designing clothes, pastures who are musicians, pastures who are artists, pastures who are entrepreneurs, pastures who are creatives.

(00:11:29):
And I know I was seminal in that journey for them, and they're better than me. You know, , I just, you know, just cuz you're the first one doesn't mean you're the best one. Mm. Mm-hmm. . And I knew so many times in my life that what I'm doing is not just to break me free, I'm doing it to break someone else free. Yeah. When you sell Walmart house, when someone's gonna sell that house. Yeah. Yeah. Why shouldn't it be you? Yeah. Right. Yeah. And, and what, what's the solution? Have someone who isn't generous or someone who doesn't have faith, or someone who has really bad intention to sell that house. Yeah. And it's so much better. Yeah. When it's a person who wants to live the life to make the world better. Yep. I want you to sell a lot of houses and I want God to expand your generosity. Yeah. And that to me is the better question.

Brandon Turner (00:12:06):
Yeah. Yeah. And at the end of the day, like, we can't take it with us anyway, so Yeah. I think people get this idea that the wealthy people will just keep collecting and then it goes go in the family. Maybe a lot of times it does. Right. What are your thoughts on like, where does your wealth go? Assuming you continue to build wealth, you're smart with your money, you invest it, by the time you're ready to pass away, you probably have a substantial chunk. Where does that go? Your kids? Do you give it away somewhere else? What does that

Erwin McManus (00:12:24):
Look like? What's interesting is that people who are Christians and believe the Bible don't seem to believe the Bible. And it says you should pass your wealth degenerations to generations mm-hmm. That a wise man actually gives express kids. Yeah. Passes on to children, grandchildren. Grandchildren. I think it's perfectly biblical and actually incredibly healthy to pass things on to generations. Mm-Hmm. What are the options? Who gets your money? The government. Yeah. . Right. And I'm going, which

Brandon Turner (00:12:49):
For most people that's the case.

Erwin McManus (00:12:50):
Yeah. And I'm going, the last institution I would ever trust with my money to do something meaningful with there's the government. Yep. And so I'm going, okay, who, who am I gonna give it to? Someone who is going to use it for their own greed? You're not supposed to just pass your money onto generations, chip was to pass your values. Yeah. And if you raise up a generation that's generous, that has integrity Yeah. That lives their life for the good, they're the ones you do wanna entrust 'em with. The problem is when your kids become a trust fund kid Yes. And they're, and how do you avoid

Brandon Turner (00:13:20):
The

Erwin McManus (00:13:20):
Dirtbag problem? And they're, they don't express any positive ethics. Yeah. And then, you know, if you're only passing on your money, you're not passing on values and integrity and character and generosity, then you're destroying the generations to come. You know, when Solomon writes in Proverbs, he's actually talking about passing on wisdom mm-hmm. and passing on wealth. I hope my great-grandchildren get the benefit of the hard choices I make today. And the idea that the world should be equitable is not even a biblical concept. You know, when, when Jesus talks about comparable of talents, he talks about one who's trusted with like five talents and two talents and one talent. And he, you know, the master comes back and, and what's interesting is one has five gets, you know, has 10, one has two, gets five, and the one has one. Barry doesn't multiply it and Jesus takes that one from the one who did nothing and didn't give it to the guy who had five to make them more even. Yeah. He gave to the guy who went 10 because what God cares about is who will multiply. Yeah. The benefit he gives you, he's not worried about keeping the scale even. Mm-Hmm. And frankly, God should not have trust me with wealth if I will not do more good than someone else. Yeah. He should have trust someone else with it.

Brandon Turner (00:14:30):
Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. All right, so let's shift, I wanna talk a little bit more about the giving wealth away, but one segment of the show that we're trying to do is when we have sponsors on the show, which we're gonna start having sponsors on the show paying ad revenue, we wanna give all the avid revenue for each show away to a charity of the guests choosing. So the question for you is, what breaks your heart right now? Like what ministry, charity group? Cause do you care about that this show should generate profits to

Erwin McManus (00:14:55):
Give? Yeah. My wife Kim runs or leads all of our humanitarian projects around the world and she's doing two things in one spot that I think are really significant. She's working in Malawi and in fact she's been there seven years and last year ended up meeting with the president of Malawi. And that's the level of influence her work there has had over the years. And there's one village we started working with and there's about four months of the year where there's zero food in that village. So for the past five years as Mosaic have invested $10,000 in that village and it gives them enough grain to not starve to death. And this year there is like a triangle of three different villages. So we're, we've been putting together $30,000 to help those. So that's one side of it. I'm going, if someone felt passionate about just helping people in the most desperate situation, I would love for people to help that.

(00:15:45):
We help them in that transitional period. We're also teaching 'em how to move toward the kind of farming and agriculture that will eliminate that four month period. But until then we don't want them to die. And then at the same time, we, in that same village, we built the premier school Yeah. For the whole country. It cost us a million dollars and to hold 1600 kids and feed them every day. And we brought energy, electricity to that city, that village for the first time in history with solar energy on that campus. And so right now we're building facilities for the teachers cuz they live in slums. And so the teachers were teaching the kids now have this beautiful school and we didn't want them to be living in slums next to this really nice school. So we're literally building 20 teachers houses around it in each house cost about $40,000. So someone cared about either education I would love for them to give to helping us build that, that school campus, or they care about hunger to give to helping alleviate the hunger of that, of those villages.

Brandon Turner (00:16:43):
Yeah. I love it. Well, yeah, we'll definitely say I'll add revenue from the show into that. And then we'll put a link in the show notes where they can donate more

Erwin McManus (00:16:48):
And my wife will love me so much. Yeah. Here you go. Because she's, she's there several times a year now and at such a passionate heart. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:16:55):
How does she get connected with that? Like where did that come from?

Erwin McManus (00:16:57):
You know, she's been all over the world and she was working on projects in Bangladesh, in India, Syria, Lebanon, even Ukraine. She was there in the middle of the war. Wow. And she was invited to go see what was going on in Malawi and they went and started looking at different places in the country, found a village that was just completely overlooked because they didn't have enough mineral value or geographic benefit for anyone to help them. They just picked probably the most dire village in the whole country and said, we're gonna transform this one village. Yeah. This

Brandon Turner (00:17:26):
Is gonna be our thing. Yeah. Oh, that's

Erwin McManus (00:17:27):
Powerful. And it, it was pretty cool. I was there last year meeting with the chief. They, she meets with like 40 50 chiefs from all the villages mm-hmm. , they consider her a chief . And and, and she is. And and so she sits at the chief's table and and she listens to them and they tell her what they want. Yeah. What they need. And it was actually because chief Caliza, when they asked him, what do you want? He lives in a swallower, he could have said like a new home or, and he said, please educate our children mm-hmm. So that they can have a better life than us. And that's where building this school actually was born.

Brandon Turner (00:17:59):
Yeah. That's powerful. Reminds me of the starfish analogy. I'm sure you've heard that right? Like that. Sure, of course. Yeah. The little kid on the beach throwing starfish and says it matters for that one. Yeah. You know, like Yeah. You might say, oh, that's just small. One small village in one small country in the giant world. But to those kids, the 1600 kids was at the school. Like, and what a difference that makes for them.

Erwin McManus (00:18:16):
Yeah. And because of that work, that's how we've end up ended up meeting with the president and with the cabinet and the people in parliament. And it's amazing how if you bring transformation just in one place, the light shines in that darkness. Mm-Hmm. We all talk about Jesus. Yeah. All over the country. It's amazing.

Brandon Turner (00:18:32):
Yeah. Okay. I got one more Jesus question for you, and then we'll go into some business stuff and entrepreneurship, all that good stuff. Your kids, you have two Correct? They both seem to, they both seem to be pretty good kids. Like, I mean, they're grown up now, right? But they're Yeah. They're adults now. They're adults now, but you got two children. They're, they're grown up. They love Jesus. They've ones a singer, right. A musician. Mm-Hmm. . Yeah. and then one works with you here on the podcast. Mm-Hmm. . I got two kids, six year old and three year old. And my biggest fear in life is that they grow up not knowing Jesus. Mm-Hmm. , like what did you do? Right. What advice do you have for a guy like me? Like how do I raise and for those listening to the show that don't follow, you know, Christianity or Jesus like, but you just have good solid kids that you did something. Right. Right. Despite building multiple businesses, I'm sure you were busy mm-hmm. , how did you do that and what advice

Erwin McManus (00:19:15):
Do you have? Yeah. We also have a foster daughter named Patty that we raised for 12 years. Oh, cool. We brought her home one day my wife said, good, bring Patty home today. She needs a place to stay tonight. She stayed 12 years after that. Wow. Put her through kindergarten, through college. And she ended up getting married and went and became a missionary in Maduro, Indonesia in the most militant Muslim island probably in the world. And I remember when she was in high school, she came home one day and said she was gonna become a Muslim and Kim freaked out and went nuts and everything like that. And, and I sat down with her. I said, okay, well let's, let's study Islam and let's see what you need to do to become a good Muslim. And yeah, I walked her through the whole process and one day she came back, goes, I don't, I don't think I'm gonna be a Muslim.

(00:19:53):
And, and so some of it, and I tell that story is because you just can't panic. Yeah. , you know? Yeah. And when Aaron was probably maybe not even 10 years old or driving the car, and he said to me one day, dad, I don't think I would be a Christian if I was not being raised in a Christian home. Mm-Hmm. . And I said, why? Why is that buddy? He goes, well, I just have too many questions and doubts. Yeah. And he's 10. Yeah. Right. And so inside of me, I feel this turmoil. Right. You know, but I just stayed super calm driving and I said, oh, doubts and questions. Those are okay. I have those too. Yeah. And he goes, you do? And I go, yeah, I have so many of them. You can have those and still really believe in Jesus. And he goes, Hmm. I said, and they got quiet. And I said, so what do you think you're gonna do? And he said well, I've already met Jesus, so what can I do

Brandon Turner (00:20:44):
? It was almost like a

Erwin McManus (00:20:46):
Resolve of what I'm, can I do. I've met Jesus, but I have all these dowson questions and Yeah. Mariah and Erin are different. Erin was questioning like from day one and Mariah, she has a universe of faith. Like I think Mariah has more faith than I'll ever have in my life. Yeah. Like, she just believes deeply, it resonates with her soul at the deepest level. They're different people. I just related to them differently. But I think the main thing is I like my kids. I don't just love my kids like I like them and I wanted to raise people that I liked. If I have to interact with them, I wanna like these people. Yeah. And I knew that the only way they were gonna see God was through me. I really believe that if they trusted me, they would trust God if they thought I was safe.

(00:21:32):
Yeah. They would believe God was safe. Mm-Hmm. , if they felt that I'd listened, they would feel like God would listen. Yeah. And so my biggest advice is just realize that you're the singular reflection of God in their life. Mm. And if you are like harsh and judgmental and condemning and they're never good enough and you know, you get angry when they don't get an A because that makes you look bad. Yeah. You, you get outta control or you lose your temper or you spank them out of anger, that's how they're gonna see God. Yeah. You know, if you're inconsistent to what you say to what you do my kids will tell you, I don't think this is true, but that I never told them what to do . And I never told 'em not to drink. Yeah. I didn't tell them not to do drugs.

(00:22:13):
I didn't tell 'em all that. I just told them what to do, not what not to do. Mm-Hmm. . And, and when they would come to me, because they were always like free to ask me about anything, we could just enjoy life and look at it from third person and go, well look, look what those choices are resulting in that person's life. Yeah. Is that the life you want? You know? And it was almost, and they say, what do you want me to do? I said, no, I'm not gonna tell you what I want you to do. I want pull out of you what you feel you should do. Yeah. And I would force them into an ethical dilemma. Would they had to choose for themselves. I, I felt like if I choose for them, I'll make them weaker if I guide them toward good choices.

(00:22:50):
I really believe in parental guidance. I don't think you just let your kids do whatever they can do. Sure. And but I guided them not with authoritarianism. I guided them with, you know, with like wisdom Yeah. And, and adventure. Yeah. I took 'em all over the world. I wanted make sure that following Jesus was the most exciting thing in the world. Yeah. Aaron especially cuz he traveled me first, went to some of those dangerous places in the world with me and just learned to live a life on the edge and live a life of adventure, live a life of risk and faith. And Mariah has been to over 30 countries with me around the world, and they never saw Jesus as something safe or boring or predictable. They saw Jesus as the epicenter of, of like creativity and artistry and innovation and risk and courage. Yeah. And that just makes it much more compelling.

Brandon Turner (00:23:35):
It reminds me of the line in lion in the woods in the wardrobe, right. Where the beaver is talking to the kids and is asked about Azlan and they're like, well, is he, is he safe? And Mrs. Bieber of Mr. Beaver, but goodness, no, he is not safe. Yeah. You know, of course he is not safe, but he's good. Yeah. And I've always loved that line. I want that like tattooed on my body someday like that. Yeah.

Erwin McManus (00:23:51):
And that's the thing is I sit in my mind early if they want a boring life, they're gonna have to walk away from Jesus. Mm-Hmm. Jesus is going to be the most exciting space in the world.

Brandon Turner (00:24:01):
Yeah. Now how does that reconcile what those who look at the Christian faith and they're like, no, I just see stuffy people go to church on Sunday, usually judgmental, and then they go yell at the waiters at, you know, red Robin after church. Like, how do you reconcile like, like that? Cause that's not the Christian faith that is for some people and it's not for others. So how do you view that? Like how does somebody make faith more dangerous?

Erwin McManus (00:24:18):
Yeah. I think the reality is that we tend to look at people as segmented expressions, but there's something more integrated. Like there's a huge number of people who are what would be called early majority, late majority people. They're not innovators, not risk takers. Hmm. They really are prone toward leaning towards safety and security and comfort. Unfortunately, American Christianity has created churches that draws those kinds of people, the church. Yeah. So when you look at the church across the board, it looks like a very safe culture. Yeah. And, and then part of the reason is because people who are really driven, passionate, intense, ambitious, they're almost pushed out of the center of the church. And so what people are seeing are, are the really safe, predictable, kind of boring, bland, mundane expressions of not Christianity of life. Yeah. But they happen to have God. And I think it's really important for people to do what you're doing to be a new expression of what it means to follow Jesus, to be courageous, to be risk taking, to be ambitious, to be passionate, to be creative, to be crazy. Yeah. And so that people go, oh no, that's what Christians look like. Yeah. And that's for me is the only solution is for us to live bigger.

Brandon Turner (00:25:22):
Yeah. Yeah. I've said that actually for years is like, like my ministry, if you can call it that, is I just want people to know that like there are such thing as not weird Christians like boring. Like it's okay to go and make millions of dollars trying to invest in property or you know, build a side company or you know, whatever, like go do extreme sports. Like you can do that, like you said earlier about being a pastor, it's okay to be both. Like you can be a Christian and have a cool epic life. And I think once I give people, like my thought and my theory is once I give people permission, like it's okay. They might look at Christianity in a different light. Yeah. And that's all I'm like, okay, I don't need to convert you and sit you down and yell at you. I'm just like, this is what I believe and I have a cool life and I live in Hawaii and I do surf. Like that's cool. Like you can do that.

Erwin McManus (00:26:00):
Yeah. And, and by the way, if people who love Jesus and want to live lives of integrity and want to live lives to reflect his character, if they're not those people who create billions, people are gonna be convinced that only unethical people can create billions. Yes. Mm-hmm. . And they're not gonna see the other pathway toward that kind of success. Yeah. And that's why it's so important. Poor people who do have faith and are grounded in their faith to achieve at the highest level possible. Or we're gonna think, oh no, you can't be a world-class musician if you believe in God. Yeah. Or you can't be a world-class filmmaker if you believe in God. And that's part of the problem is that a lot of times the Christians are really comfortable with average. Yeah. That's that's so true. , you know, that's so true. Hey, we have to, and press and press Christian movies, we wanna be the best in the world. Yeah. You know, I mean, Christian should be the best communicators in the world Yeah. And the best artists in the world and the best entrepreneurs in the world. Yeah. There shouldn't be any domain in human society where we're not pressing to become the best of the race.

Brandon Turner (00:26:56):
Yeah. I love that. Yeah. I was telling your team earlier, I'm, I like to make things competitive that aren't competitive. Like I, I see your guys' YouTube videos, I'm like, that's the standard. Like, we're gonna do better than that. Like, we, like, I want to be better and not because like, I wanna like show anybody up, but I'm just like, I want to continually strive for that greatness if somebody else is doing something better. Like, you guys got some lights that we don't have, I'm like, oh, we're gonna, well I gotta do that now. Which is

Erwin McManus (00:27:16):
Like, I, I I had a beard, but you know, I'm coming on your podcast, you have to way better beards. I just

Brandon Turner (00:27:21):
Shave. She might as well shave it all off. Yeah.

Erwin McManus (00:27:22):
I said I can't compete.

Brandon Turner (00:27:23):
Yeah. So I'm tapping out sometimes you just gotta give up, man. And that's

Erwin McManus (00:27:25):
What a lot of people do. They just, I can't compete. I'm just tapping out. Ah

Brandon Turner (00:27:28):
That's okay. I I, I'll relish in that. So let's go to this idea of mind shift. Is that the, that's the book right? That you're going with? That's my next book. Yeah. Yeah. I wanna know about this. What does that even mean, mind shift and why is that important to you?

Erwin McManus (00:27:40):
Yeah, for me, the most exciting project I've worked on in a long time, I mean, the art communication for me was a, a breakthrough, revolutionary kind of space for me. But mind shift is basically my response to the endless number of questions I got around the world. If you were a 26 year old what would you say to your 26 year old self? Mm-Hmm. Yeah. You ever heard that question? Yeah. Like what would you say to your 26 year old self? Everyone I went around the world would keep asking me that question. What does anyone have another question? And I realized, oh, I'm at the age now where everyone thinks I don't remember my 26 year old self . And and so I just sat down at first and I started asking myself that question. Mm. What would I say to my 26 year old self? And, and at first I was writing the book as hindsight just looking back, but I realized I can't write hindsight because I still have a huge future to create. So I'm not ready to just, but

Brandon Turner (00:28:29):
You're writing your memoir like

Erwin McManus (00:28:30):
Yeah. I can't do it

Brandon Turner (00:28:31):
Here at the end of my life.

Erwin McManus (00:28:32):
So instead what it, what it shifted to, to what was, what were the mental structures that I had to move inside of my own brain to live the life I've created. Mm-Hmm. And to remove all those internal limitations. One of the things I talked about is how the whole book is about destroying internal limitations. Yeah. And I feel like that's my calling in life. Yeah. And because most people think that their outside circumstances are what are limiting them. Yeah. And it's really their internal limitations. So this book is about 12 mind shifts that we make that we need to make to live our lives at an optimal level. Yeah. And I think it's pretty

Brandon Turner (00:29:07):
Excited. What's an example of one of them?

Erwin McManus (00:29:09):
I'll give you an example. There are two conflicting chapters. I like it. And one that basically says it's all about people. And the other one says you take, you can't take everyone with you mm-hmm. . And if you just take those two chapters and turn to one book, it would feel like ying and yang or black and white or, you know, fire and water. Because there's this tension that if you don't understand that people are the highest value Yeah. You're gonna burn everything in your life. I mean, I remember sitting down with these 150 guys whose companies all I guess make over a hundred million a year. I got up there and I said, Hey, I'm not gonna tell you how to make more money, but I am gonna tell you how not to die alone. Mm-Hmm. , and most of those guys are gonna attract to die alone.

(00:29:48):
And a huge part of that is because they don't understand the economy of people and how that's the greatest value in life. But there's this other tension that you can't take everyone with you. One of the greatest challenges of my life is I have this really, really high empathy and it's hard for me to leave people behind. Yeah. And what I began realizing eventually in my life was that I was trying to carry so many people in the future who did not want to go with me. Yeah. And they didn't even want to go into their future. And they were choosing to drown and their mediocrity and they were gonna drown me with them. And I eventually had to make a really difficult choice. I can't save them. Yeah. And, but they can drown me and do I cut off the line to move into a future?

(00:30:33):
I'm using a really harsh metaphor, ocean training when they drop helicopters to save people from ships or boats that have crashed and there's people in the water, they're taught to save the people who are swimming toward the helicopter. Mm. Not the people who are frantically swimming away from it. You can't save the people who don't make the choices to move toward their best future. And having been a pastor for, you know, 40 years, you feel a moral obligation to save everyone. Yeah. You know, you feel more obligation to bring everyone with you. And probably the greatest pain in my life in Kim's life has been all the people we invested so much in Mm. Who eventually said, Hey, we're out. Yep. And we realized, we just spent five years or 10 years thinking that eventually that person would grow and they never made a choice to grow.

(00:31:24):
Yeah. And then this consultant once told me one of the most dangerous things you can be is a person who tries to make someone something they don't want to become. Mm-Hmm. , if you see someone in, you know, they have addictions and you want them to be clean, you can't make them clean, they have to want to be clean. Yeah. If you love someone and they're satisfied with mediocrity, you cannot force 'em to want excellence. And if you want people who are trapped in their past, you can't force 'em to go into a future. And so I think one of the more challenging chapters is even the one just trying to figure out who are the people that you carry with you no matter what, and who are the people you have to leave behind no matter what.

Brandon Turner (00:32:05):
Yeah.

Erwin McManus (00:32:05):
And that's hard. I think that's one of, one of the life's great tensions.

Brandon Turner (00:32:07):
Yes. How do you do that? I mean, how do you, like, let's go to the drug example, right? So there's a lot of people that dig, I mean, you work a lot of inner city stuff here. Mm-Hmm. , there's drugs are everywhere. Somebody doesn't want to, do you just leave? I mean leave them. Do you stay at arm's length? So how do you deal with situations like that, whether it's drugs or other, you know,

Erwin McManus (00:32:24):
Issues? Yeah. When I, I spent about 10 years working with drug cartels mm-hmm. And people don't really know that mu about me that much, but I feel like

Brandon Turner (00:32:30):
We need to dig in on that. Dig in on that , we need to dig in on that, but Okay. Keep going.

Erwin McManus (00:32:34):
and with people coming out of the, the world of gangs. Yeah. prostitution, people who rolled in the world of assassins and Yeah. And one of the things early on when I went to work with the urban poor, I actually was probably more of a person that believed the man was holding everybody down. Mm-Hmm. , you know, this ethereal man. Yeah. And if the poor just had an opportunity, they would rise out of poverty. Yeah. And 10 years of just getting my butt kicked, you know, I realized, oh, I cannot give people determination, but I can't give them opportunity. And what I began to distinguish was that my responsibility was to create opportunity, their responsibility to create determination. So I would look for people who already had determination, but did not have opportunity. Ah, yeah. And when you find a person who's trapped in poverty or a person who's trapped in addiction, or a person who's trapped in some spiraling behavior, but they have a determination and then you give 'em opportunity that they fly and you look like you're a miracle worker, you're like, how did you change that person's life?

(00:33:39):
All I did was create an opportunity. They brought the determination. So that's one of the things I look for. Now. I no longer feel a moral obligation to impose determination in another human being. Mm-Hmm. , see if, if someone else doesn't want to succeed, I have to just accept that that's the life they've chosen. Yeah. And if someone else doesn't want to be free of something, I can't be more determined than them. Yeah. But when I find someone who's determined, I'll do anything to help 'em find the opportunity.

Brandon Turner (00:34:03):
Yeah. Good buddy of mine Liz out in Maui, he owns a big construction company. He was just telling me this, like his strategy, all his team, his best people, his coo, all his best people came from like out of prison. Mm-Hmm. because he would look for the people who had like chain and determination and they would never have opportunity. He gave him the opportunity and now they're thriving. And the loyalty that book leads to it's, it was an incredible story to hear

Erwin McManus (00:34:25):
Our campus pastor in Mexico City, Emerson ney. He was in federal prison for at least five years trying to sell seven kilos of cocaine. He should have had, I think, seven life sentences. Wow. And I think he was out after five years and then was sent back in for two more years. And when we met him, he had really, he, he, his identity was still, he was an excon. Yeah. But I saw his determination, this guy was living in San Diego, driving to LA every week to volunteer with me. I saw this guy just unwilling to not be present. Yeah. Any opportunity he stepped into, anytime we invited him, he was there. And then he's so artistic and so creative that began giving him projects, Hey, let's create this. And he would, with his own hands, design tables and chairs and Yeah. You know, and just, and even if he didn't know how he'd figure it out. Yeah. And over time he started a campus with my son in Venice Beach and that thing just erupted. And then he came to me, said, I, I wanna go to Mexico City. And he, him and his wife and their little boy moved to Mexico City without any team and within probably two years had 2000 people coming to their campus to Mexico City because that guy had been through just the most incredible hardships in his life and was still determined to live a different life. Mm-Hmm. , all he was looking for was opportunity. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:35:40):
You know, on a much less drastic scale. When I look at my, you know, two businesses now, probably more than that, but two primary ones, a real estate one, we were, we have almost, I don't know, call it almost a billion dollars of real estate that we own. My coo of that started as an intern. Right. He was an intern, he was 25 maybe at the time. And I gave him, like, I saw a determination. He was working a full-time job and then like every break he was out there on a laptop trying to analyze deals for us for no money. . And like I give him a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more. And now he runs the company. In fact, in the other company as well, same thing started as an intern. So now I've got these two multi, you know, million dollar operations that are both run by former interns that just saw opportunities. So have you found that in your case as well, where a lot of your best people came from just proving themselves? Is that a, a path

Erwin McManus (00:36:20):
They've seen? Yeah. We, we've never hired from the outside. Yeah. , you know, so we, we only hire people who fight their way up from

Brandon Turner (00:36:26):
Bottom. Yeah. Yeah. That's

Erwin McManus (00:36:27):
It. And it's kind of funny cuz I, for me it was reverse when I started making band studios years ago, Aaron came to work with me and I made him an intern. Yeah. And he was my lowest paid

Brandon Turner (00:36:37):

Erwin McManus (00:36:38):
Employee. And for years and years, he would come to me, he goes, dad, how long am I gonna be an intern? Yeah. And you didn't make that guy intern. You didn't make that guy intern and you didn't pay that guy. Darn. Yep. And I said, yeah, I know, but you're my son. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:36:49):

Erwin McManus (00:36:51):
And I, I don't want anyone to ever say you started at the top. Yeah. And, and because of that, he got that grit. Yeah. He got that drive and that hustle that a lot of times people lack. Yeah. And so, yeah. It's, it's always about looking for that hustle, looking for that person who does more than their ass. And if you do your job, you'll always have that job. Yeah. But if you do more than their job, you'll be too big for that job very quickly. Yep. Anyway, that's what you want. You want the person's always volunteering to do more. Yeah. That person's asking, is there anything else that needs to be done? Yeah. That person will become so valuable that you'll, you'll give him the company virtually because you're like, I can't do without that person anymore.

Brandon Turner (00:37:25):
Yeah. Yeah. And that's what happened. Especially like I gave my coo you know, my real estate thing, just more and more equity. Yeah. Now he'll make just ridiculous amounts of money because he just showed up and just continually drove more. Yeah. Everybody that we, almost everybody I have hired internally somehow, whether internship or some low level and they rose up. So, and I think, I, I tell a lot of entrepreneurs this all the time is like either there's a great quote in the that book minority or the movie Minority report Yeah. With Tom Cruise where he says, there's one crazy guy says in the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king. Mm-Hmm. . And I don't know if that's a real quote from somewhere else, but the movie says it. And I've always thought that in entrepreneurship, if you have a successful business, even moderately successful in anything, you are a king. And to all those people who are younger, usually that have like dream of entrepreneurship. Yeah. So if you can find those people, like basically bringing back the app apprenticeship model mm-hmm. Into modern business, I think is something that's not been enough of. But I'm just fascinated by it. I think that

Erwin McManus (00:38:17):
Yeah. Well, I mean, right now if you wanna learn, you can learn. Yeah. I mean, you can get a PhD course just on Instagram. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:38:24):
Go Exactly. Go to YouTube, you'll figure it all out.

Erwin McManus (00:38:25):
But I'm sure going, man, if this was available when I was, you know, 23, I think I could have changed the world by the time I was 27. I mean, it's like you just have so much access. Yeah. You know, back then I actually had to read books Yeah. And go to libraries and, you know, I mean, there was no computers when I was growing up. You can't just ask chat. G p t didn't tell you the answer. No. You know, so I mean, I was in the library reading, you know, the books I needed, you know, and borrowing books and I didn't even have the money to buy books back then. Yeah. Now you can just grab everything. It's, it's incredible. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:38:56):
It's wild right now.

(00:39:02):
Hey yo, it's Brandon. This is that ad spot we mentioned earlier, like you heard a hundred percent of this week's ad revenue is going toward a charity of the guest choosing. So here's that ad spot by listening, you're making a real financial impact on the world. Today's sponsor is the Real Estate Investing Summit in Maui. Yeah. That's actually the conference I'm throwing here in Hawaii. It's gonna be a two day in-person event at the Grand Hyatt in Kop Poly Hawaii on Maui May 22nd, 23rd, 2023. This is a dual track event, which means we're gonna have two tracks at one time. One for new investors, one for experienced investors, and you can pick whatever one you want to go to. We got speakers lined up like David Green, host of the Bigger Pockets podcast, Jay Papa, investor and author of The One Thing Wendy Papa, tar Yarber, AJ Osborn, rich and Kathy Faki, Brian Burke, and me of course, and a whole lot more.

(00:39:48):
And while this event is part of the accountability Mastermind now run called the Better Life Tribe, we're actually opening up the few remaining tickets for the general population right now. So yeah, that actually means you can come if you hurry and get your tickets and you should, if you wanna lean into investing in real estate to fund your future, you'll network with speakers and attendees. You'll get a ton of knowledge and wisdom about strategies and tactics that are working now. And you'll make some great friends at the same time. Now look, we only have 300 total spots for the event. This is not one of those huge two, 3000 person conferences where you're gonna get lost in the crowd. This is intimate, powerful and life-changing. But because it's small, it's also gonna sell out quick. So for more information, if you wanna come, I'd love to have you go to re ei maui.com. Again, that is r ei maui.com. You mentioned futurist, you said, I'm a futurist. I'm like, what does that mean? I'm assuming that means you care about the future, but what does that mean to you,

Erwin McManus (00:40:39):
? Yeah, I think that there's been an evolution of my work from starting as a futurist to now being a mind architect. Mm. Where early on, I, I had some good moments where I was really accurate in predicting cultural trends and movements mm-hmm. . And so I, you know, I mean early on before people were talking about it, I would start predicting things like the elimination of the middle class. Mm-Hmm. the economic bi polarization of American society between the rich and the poor. Yeah. Now that we created a different kind of class system and cultural conflict and how there were 40 years ago was this, I was predicting an America moved toward tribalism toward like the far right with like white supremacy, far left with socialism, communism. These are things I was predicting in my twenties. And then some of them were, you know, economic things, you know, and you can't become a futurist just because you go, I'm a futurist.

(00:41:24):
You actually have to be really good Yeah. At accessing data, information, trends, movement and seeing the invisible interconnections and where the world is going. So I work with universities and companies and organizations and help them understand how these factors would affect their company. Like with some universities that would come to me and say, we want to produce this kind of student, like we want produce the best math students in the world. Yeah. And I told 'em, I said, university just isn't that good. You can't produce the best math suits in the world. Harvard does not produce the best business students in the world. They recruit the best business students in the world. And if you want to be known for having the producing the greatest mathematicians in the world, then it's all about the entry level. It's how you recruit. So you have to convince that student in junior high and high school that your university's the one they want to go to.

(00:42:14):
And so it's really about, a lot of people think it's the end game, but it's actually the beginning game that changes the end game. Mm-Hmm. . And so if you want to be known for producing the greatest musicians in the world, you need to be able to track the greatest musicians in the world. And then you refine them and you get to, in a sense build on the brand of that talent. Yeah. And so I would help universities know what program, what master's degree. So I helped start several masters in doctoral programs so that those degrees would draw a certain kind of student because the moment they see that degree, a master's in future of studies or you know, a master's in entrepreneurial leadership or a doctorate in futurist, you know, research, it draws a certain mind and poses people in it also help them realize there's some courses that really will have no functional value in the future.

(00:42:55):
Yeah. And because most students are gonna go to school and never do what they studied. Right. And so if they learn how to learn, that's gonna be a critical thing. And so when I was working and sometimes I would work with like denominations and go, if you don't make these changes, your dominations cease to exist. And they wouldn't make the changes and they ceased to exist. And and I began realizing that for most organizations, I didn't need to be able to see the future. Yeah. I only needed to be able to see the present cuz they were living so far in the past that for them to future, it was really just the present. Yeah. It's about clarity and it's also about not having preconceived expectations, what the future must be like. Mm-Hmm. and most organizations have so much skin in the game that they can't see the future.

(00:43:39):
And you can find so many companies that even inside of their company, the research that ended their company came outta their company. They didn't bother to trademark it cuz they didn't think it was possible. Someone went out and started at the company and bankrupted them. Yeah. If you like football, I remember when I was living in Texas, there was a Southwest conference. It was basically all Texas teams and I think Oklahoma and Arkansas. And even back then, I remember doing this research and using this as an example saying, this conference will cease to exist because they refuse to identify themselves outside of Texas. Yeah. And Oklahoma and Arkansas are not going to want to become Texas teams. Yep. And eventually that conference ceased to exist. It ended, and while other conferences starts swallowing up teams and it's really, are you able to reinvent yourself? Are you able to create a perception that you are in the future rather than the past?

(00:44:31):
Because people are not gonna move to something that looks like it's in't pass. Yeah. It's just like with the church, you know, when you look at the architecture of a church or you look at the dress code of a church or the language in a church, and then you're talking about the future. If you walk into a church where everyone's wearing clothes from the 1950s, everyone's singing songs from the 1820s and then you're talking about how God's the god of the future, no one's gonna believe you. Yeah, yeah. because your your, your whole marketing and branding's off . Right. You know, but over time, what I began to realize was that as a futurist, I was trying to help organizations move in a direction. But really what I find to be more fascinating and I'm more passionate about is helping people restructure their thinking.

(00:45:06):
And that's why I kind of shifted from being a futurist to a minor architect. Yeah. Because if I can change the way a leader thinks, I can change their whole organization. Yeah. And if I can change the way a husband thinks I can change his family. Yeah. Where this really came to me was, oh wow, this was so long ago, but I can't remember the exact year. I think I was living in Dallas and I was driving in my car. I was listening to something like ESPN or Sports Center, Buster Douglass had just fought Evangel Hall Field mm-hmm. and got knocked out. And just before that, if you remember, Buster Douglas knocked out Mike Tyson. Yep. And everyone was shocked that he, you know, this noname guy beats the greatest fighter in the world. But then in his rematch, he's at McDonald's eating, he's at the mall, he's incredibly overweight, like 50 pounds overweight.

(00:45:47):
He didn't prepare for the fight. And afterwards they're commenting on it and they said, why do you think Buster Douglas didn't even try? And the other guy says, you know, everybody loves Buster Douglass. They say he's a really good man. And the other guy said, yeah, he's even a person of faith. He, he's like a Christian. And and he goes, so why do you think he didn't even bother to tried to defend his title? And then someone says something that haunted me. One guy said, said, some people are simply structured for failure. And when he said that, I just like, it just thundered in my soul. Some people are simply structured for failure. And I stopped thinking about Buster Douglas Yeah. And started looking at myself going, am I structured for failure? Yeah. Have I accepted internal limitations that will keep me from living the life I'm created to live?

(00:46:36):
Yeah. And I had to conclude that I had, there are some structures I had that were clearly there for success, but others that were actually limiting my capacity. And so I began a journey then going, I'm gonna make sure that I destroy every internal limitation. Yeah. And I have to spend my life identifying them. I've been married to my wife Kim for almost 40 years. And she'll tell you that she'll even say to me like, who are you? How did you change so much? You know, she goes, cuz who I married and who you are are not the same person. And I'll say, no, it's true. It's because that person had internal limitations that shaped me in a certain way, maybe from my upbringing or from my experiences or from trauma, whatever it was. And every time I removed another internal limitation, I changed as a human being. Yeah. And I grew and my capacity expanded. And, and even one of them, I remember one year my wife and I slept on a floor cuz I wouldn't buy a bed cuz I said it was a luxury. Oh.

Brandon Turner (00:47:36):
, .

Erwin McManus (00:47:37):
That's, that's who she married. Yeah. I was like a monastic, I lived out of a paper bag. Yeah. And for 10 years, I never made more than 12,000 a year. I,

Brandon Turner (00:47:45):
To judge people who put decorations on their walls. I'm like, huh, heathens. Like that could have gone to the poor.

Erwin McManus (00:47:50):
Yeah. No, I was Exactly. That was me. Yeah. Yep. And I remember coming home one day and I said, honey, I think that God's given me permission to create wealth. Mm-Hmm. , she goes, what? She goes, yeah. I think that guys was like speaking to me and telling me what am I doing? Why am I living beneath my capacity? Yeah. And she goes, you have the ability to create wealth. I said, yeah, I've always had it. I just fought it. Yeah. I just thought it was wrong. It was evil. Yep. So I was trying to be like Jesus. Yep. And, and she goes, well it'd be great if we had something .

Brandon Turner (00:48:22):
Yeah. Maybe we started a lower rung there. Let's pay our bills

Erwin McManus (00:48:25):
And get a bed. And what I would find is that every time I achieved a level of success, then I would get madly criticized by the Christian world Yep. And I would move into self-destructive behavior. Yeah. And I would minimize that success and actually lose it. Yeah. I would consciously take myself back to zero so that no one could accuse me of, of anything. Yeah. And eventually realize and, and it was a huge internal structure. I need to stop living a life of obligation and live a life of intention mm-hmm. . And I need to stop caring so much about what everyone says about me. Yeah. It sounds easier than it is. Yeah. Especially when you're a pastor, you're trying to represent Jesus. I didn't really care about what they said about me. Yeah. I cared about what they said about Jesus because of me. Yeah. And it felt like a massive weight on my life. I've known over this life journey that every time I changed my mind I changed my life. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what this book is about. And that's why I think mind shift is, is really significant cuz it incredibly practical. It's just, it's gritty. It's down to earth. It's not like these it theory formulas. It's just really simple things that get into our heads. Yep.

Brandon Turner (00:49:33):
Like, you, like Christian should not have wealth or you should not have wealth or, or that rich people are bad. You know, when I was growing up, I had a friend whose parents owned a very successful plumbing company mm-hmm. . And I judged them because they had a house cleaner. And I was like rich people with a house cleaner. And, and for years I judged them as like the rich people who are too lazy to clean their house. And it wasn't until years later that I realized they weren't so rich, they could afford to hire a house cleaner. They were rich because they hired a house cleaner because they had a different mindset. If when I shifted my mind into that, I was like, oh, what if I hired people to do the lower dollar per hour tasks so I could focus on higher. All of a sudden my income went up. I'm like, oh, that was an internal limitation. Yeah. Not an

Erwin McManus (00:50:10):
External one. And you know, my wife was an orphan. Mm-Hmm. , she grew up in a foster home from the age of eight to 18. Wow. She had nothing. And sh her clothes was Salvation Army. Wow. Yeah. And so we, we had that in the mix of our marriage and of our relationship. And, and and I remember that same conversation at one point where she would say, why won't you fix this stuff around the house? Or why won't you mow the lawn? Or what's I used to? Yeah. You know, but there's several factors here. One is if I mow the lawn, I am taking that hour to do something that if I was doing something else, I would be able to pay for a hundred people to lawn. Yep. Yes. Secondly, if I'm mowing the lawn, I'm taking a job from someone. Mm-Hmm. Yeah.

(00:50:50):
Who their best job right now is mowing a lawn. Yep. Now, I'll give you an example. This week we're living in, in a home and didn't have a very big yard, but I paid someone from El Salvador cause I'm from El Salvador and I wanted to help people who came from my background. Yeah. And he was mowing my lawn One day I walked outside, he was crying, so what's going on? He said, someone just came and sold my lawnmower and my edger. And I said, oh, I'm so sorry. And he goes, and I just replaced them. They were stolen last month. Oh no. So I said, okay we're going into business together today. Yeah. And I funded his company and then I taught him how to scale his company. And, and, and then the first day he came back to mow my lawn, he said, he said, no, don't pay me.

(00:51:33):
He said, no, you're my business partner. You can't afford not to be paid , no freebies. And not even for me, not for anyone. You know. And I remember three years later he dropped by the house. He wasn't mowing lawns anymore, he bought a house. Yep. And he had all these employees at Moin lawns. And when we moved to a bigger house with a bigger yard, he goes, oh, I can't do that. I can't manage that yard's too big. And that's, I'm going, no, you have to learn how to scale. Yeah. You know, so you're gonna scale with us as we scale and love that. And I think if we just thought in terms of everything that you don't have to do that someone else does have to because that's how they bring food home. Yep. It's actually an incredibly ethical mm-hmm. thing to do to employ people.

(00:52:14):
So my wife always employs people. Yeah. I mean, you know, there are times we have, you know, 15, 20 people she's paying Yeah. And because one, she becomes everybody's friend. Yeah. And they're all in our home and they're eating with us and they become a part of our lives. And for me, one day we were walking down the street and there were these two construction workers, clearly immigrants with a paper bag eating a sandwich out of it. And and I said, you know, honey, how people say thereby the grace of God go lie. Yeah. Yep. And I said, that's not my statement. That was me. Yeah. I was the guy working construction. I was the guy eating my lunch out of a paper bag. I was the immigrant who was working the, the hard physical labor job. That was me. And now we're walking to our house. Yeah. And it's different. But because that happened for me, not only do I know it can happen for others, but I wanted to. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:53:02):
That's powerful. Yeah. Yeah. You know, the, I've had a mindset coach for 7, 6, 7 years now. Every other week we meet together. Yeah. People ask 'em all the time, like, what do we talk about? Why do I do it? I'm always like, I don't know. But it al it's, it's working. Right. Like some of the limitations I've had things like, I don't deserve to be wealthy. I don't deserve, when I started working with 'em, I was in a tiny little 800 square foot house, like in like the rainiest part of the country up in Washington State. And like, that's where I thought I deserved to be. Right. And now, like, you know, I, I've got obviously a little bit different life now, but we just keep breaking through these limitations and all of a sudden I'm able to grow. And if you look at the business world, I see like this is a framework I'm playing with right now, but there's like four things that really drive a, a business to grow.

(00:53:39):
If you think of a table, I like the idea of a table, right. Four legs of a table. And if you wanted to lift the whole table up your business to go, you got four legs and the four legs, and I gonna give 'em all an M because I'm trying to be a pastor and put a framework to this. Right. You got, you got money so the company makes money or you, you know, it's profitable, you raise money, whatever the money side of the business, you have the marketing for leads, how do you get people business, whatever. And then you have the management, all the internal external management data to go. But like you can do those three just fine, but your table stills tips over if you don't have the fourth, which is mindset. Mm-Hmm. . Like if you don't have the right way to think about it, your business cannot elevate and cannot grow. Yeah. Just the idea of hiring somebody to push you on the mental side of your business. Mm-Hmm. is one of the greatest investments I've ever made. So I'm excited about your book.

Erwin McManus (00:54:18):
Oh, thanks so much. Yeah. You know, one of the things I found I think on two sides, one is that when people are uber successful, like, you know, in the billions Yeah. They're really bored. Yeah. A lot of times. And one of the things I discovered by accident was they just like access to good thinking. Yeah. And I realized, oh wow. I actually have a commodity. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:54:39):
.

Erwin McManus (00:54:40):
Yeah. And which was one side of the table. But the other side of it is that there is never a place where people no longer have challenges. Yeah. Like, no matter how wealthy people are, no matter how successful they are, they're still fighting stuff. Yeah. You, I, I remember years ago I was in New York with a woman whose company was at, at a few billion. She asked me to come in and, and give her a day to consult with her. And, and it's never just a day, but you know, it always starts like that. It starts like an hour and then it goes off forever. Right. You know, and I remember she was walking me through all these different things that this project and this project and this project and this project. And she goes, I just can't seem to finish any of them. And, and if with each one of those projects, she had a friend that she kind of was helping and a friend she was doing it with and a friend she was doing with.

(00:55:20):
And, and I said, I, I know you're not a football player, but it seems to me like you get everything to the one yard line and never scored a touchdown. Mm-Hmm. And she goes, yes. And I said, well, I, I know why that is. And she goes, well, tell me why, because that's what I've been trying for, for the past, you know, multiple years. And I said, and I said, I'll be right back. I said, I gotta, I gotta take a break. I came back and, and I said, I want you to know that even though we've been meeting for half a day, I've known this from the first five minutes. And she goes, why, why can't I score? And I said, because you don't really care about any of those things. Mm-Hmm. , you only care about those people. None of those projects matter to you. Yeah. And so if you actually score a touchdown, you'll lose the people cuz they'll succeed and you don't, they don't need you anymore. Mm-Hmm. . And and then she started cussing at me,

Brandon Turner (00:56:02):

Erwin McManus (00:56:03):
And said, you knew this the whole time. And I said, yeah. She goes, I don't like people playing with me . And and I said, no, actually it took me one minute to know the solution. It took me six hours to get you to be able to hear it. Mm-Hmm. . And that's the challenge is that when you're working as a mindset coach, a lot of times actually no. Yeah, yeah. Right away. Yep. Because been doing this so long. Yeah. It just, it takes a while to get people Yeah. To the place where they can hear it. Yeah. You would've

Brandon Turner (00:56:27):
Walked in and said that right away. She would've, you know, okay, thanks. Get out at my office. Yeah. Yeah. I don't Yeah,

Erwin McManus (00:56:31):
Yeah. You, you have to like move all the pieces on the table. Right. You know, and I I, I agree. I mean I, but I think kind of think it does start there. It starts with the mindset leg of the table. Right. Yeah. You know, because you have to decide that you want to do something that matters. Yeah. And I've never been one of those people like this. I'm just not driven by money. Yeah. And, and I know people who make money who are driven by money. Yeah. They, they, it's what fuels them. Yeah. You know, I love freedom. Yeah. I, I was thinking this morning that I think probably my optimal reward for the work I do is I get to live the life I want. Yeah. I get to choose what I do during the day. I get to, you know, I get to have such immense freedom.

(00:57:05):
I I've been to 70 countries around the world. I love to travel. Yeah. I get to meet new people. I felt guilty for living this life. And then the other side of me is I've worked really hard for this life. Yeah. And so the only way I think I can alleviate some of that guilt is try to help as many people as possible live the life they long to live. Yeah. I have a friend that I was talking to about a week ago, he's in my house and, and he asked me, Hey, what do you see in me? You know, what could I be doing to scale? What could I be doing to maybe do more? And he's one of the kindest people I know. I really love this guy. I enjoy him tremendously. And I just said, you know, you've never asked me, you know, I've been your friend for a long time and I've never, I never imposed my views on another person. You know, I said, you're the kindest person in the world, you're just not dangerous. . He goes, what? How do

Brandon Turner (00:57:49):
You take that ?

Erwin McManus (00:57:50):
Yeah. And I, and I and I, you know, kind of tapped him on the chest and I said, I just always wanted you to be a little bit more dangerous. Mm-Hmm. just wish you would take some risk. Yeah. And be a little more fearless and Yeah. And fail somewhere. Yeah. You know, lose something, you know, I said, but you have a great life. You have, you're a great husband, great dad and you've built a great family. Yeah. You know, I won't, I'm only answering this cuz you asked me. So you have to decide is the life you have enough? And if it is, then celebrate it. Yeah. You know, and then if you feel like you're created to do more, then we'll talk some more. Yeah. And he's been texting me going, maybe I'm just designed just to do this. Yeah. You know, and I said, your problem is that you're a great employee. Yeah. You have a real skill that people want to pay for. I said, I didn't have a skill. People want to pay for

Brandon Turner (00:58:36):
.

Erwin McManus (00:58:36):
Have a terrible employee, so I needed to create my own universe. Yeah. Like, you know, and I said, you have a great skill so your boss will love for you to always give him your life Yeah. To give him that skill and he'll pay you for that. Yeah. Or you could figure out how to start a company around that skill. I just try to help people go, if I'm a great employee one day I can jettison and be the great employer. Yeah. You know, nothing wrong with being a great employee. Yeah. I need great employees. Yeah. And you do too. Yeah. We all do. But I do hope for most people eventually, if that job gives 'em the freedom they long for Yeah. Then keep that job. Yep. If that's creating the life you're going, wow, I get to surf every morning, you know, I'm, yeah. I'm working 60 hours a week for this guy and I'm making this much money, but really the amount of money I need to live the life I want. Yeah. Enjoy that. It's not about comparison and it's not about, you know, being better than another person. It's really optimally living the life you long to live that you're created to live. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (00:59:32):
Yeah. Yeah. You know, that's one of the, the mindset shifts I had to go through was you mentioned earlier like there's a little bit of guilt, right. Like living an, an epic life, we'll call it that. Right. Or great life traveling or, or building cool things. Right. Yeah. But I, I heard this quote years ago and I'm gonna butcher it, but basically like nobody's served by you living a small life. Like, so when I can live, in fact the fact that I live in Hawaii, I would've never occurred that that's a thing. Right. Except for I was at a kid's birthday party and this guy I'm sitting next to is like, yeah, I just moved to Hawaii a couple years ago and I was like, what do you mean you moved to Hawaii? Like people don't move to Hawaii. It's like, yeah, I just got a shipping container, put everything in it and shipped it over. It was like 10 grand and it blew my mind. So his ability to live a, a bigger life, like for him Yeah. Gave me permission to start thinking that way. And a year later I'm living in Hawaii and so sometimes like the things that we do, like we're filling that guilt of like, well, should I really do this thing? Or even, I mean obviously we be careful by like posting on social media, but sometimes like our, when we do great things, it inspires other people to do great for themselves.

Erwin McManus (01:00:24):
Yeah. It's funny, I have a friend who does some of the similar stuff, but he's always posting me on his airplane. Yeah. In his Lamborghini. Yeah. You know, his houses Yeah. And houses. And houses and houses and, and and I love him. Yeah. I mean he, he's great And one day I think he was just feeling like he needed to justify it. You, you know, but I wasn't asking him to . Like I was just, I was just celebrating him going, I'm calling you from an airplane and go love your airplane. Yeah. Like, that's all I do. Like, you know, you know, take me on a ride one day, you know?

Brandon Turner (01:00:50):
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

Erwin McManus (01:00:51):
Yeah. And Wendy goes, well you know, I have to have this house because it's where I bring people cuz I need to live an aspirational life. Mm-Hmm. And I remember one day is saying to him, you know what's crazy? I think if I own nothing, my life would still be aspirational. Yeah. I think that's the goal. Mm-Hmm. is to live a life that's aspirational, having nothing. Yeah. And then adding to that because you can't Yeah. Because it's not the wealth that makes your life aspirational. Correct. It's the courage. Yeah. You know, it's, it's the faith. It's like, it's, it's not the stuff, it's the adventure that you went on. Yeah. That whole journey and that process that created that. Yep. I've told people, look, fame, wealth, power, prestige, they're like really great outcomes. They're just terrible life goals. Mm-Hmm. , , you know, and if your life goals are integrity, compassion, kindness, generosity. Yeah. And those things all become an outcome. It's gonna be a beautiful thing. Yeah. And I think the problem sometimes that people lose their purpose because they lose their stuff. Yep. Because their stuff was their purpose. Yeah. If you, if your purpose is your career or your job or your house or your mm-hmm. You know, your company and you lose that, then you've lost your meaning. Yeah. But if your meaning is the person you're becoming, no one can steal that from you.

Brandon Turner (01:02:05):
Yeah. I mean, how many people do you know who've sold? I know a lot of 'em Sure you do. Sold their company tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars. Yeah. And all of a sudden they're just lost for years. They're just like, what do I do? Like I was the CEO of a massive company and it's like they can't find that identity because their identity was that business. Absolutely. And it's sad. It's something I wanna always, like, I'm not the real estate guy. I'm not the, the podcast guy. I'm not the author. I am like, I'm Brandon. Mm-Hmm. like this is like, I'm, I'm a dad. I got a good wife. Like I like adventure. Like Yeah. That, that you can't take from me. Right. Like Yeah.

Erwin McManus (01:02:34):
Yeah. Funny. One of my friends call me to give him some counsel on his company and he was gonna have a pretty nice buyout. He said, if, you know, if I saw my company I'll clear about 68 million, which is, you know, pretty good. Yeah. It's a good

Brandon Turner (01:02:44):
A

Erwin McManus (01:02:45):
Tuesday morning . And he, he said you know, I'm just not sure if I should sell right now or if I shouldn't, but I'm feeling like maybe I should because I'm having these tensions in my life. And I said, well, okay, let's paint a picture of the life you could create if you had all that money. Yeah. And the life he could create was the life he would have if he had the company. Yeah, yeah.

Brandon Turner (01:03:05):
.

Erwin McManus (01:03:07):
And I said, so in other words, if you were completely free Yeah. You would be running your company. Yes. Cause you love it. Yeah. And he goes, yeah. And I said, so why would you sell your company to give it the very thing that's giving you all your pleasure and joy and meaning in life? He goes, well, yeah, but I got these other tensions. Like, okay, so why don't you fix those?

Brandon Turner (01:03:24):
Yeah. Let's fix that problem. Yeah. Like,

Erwin McManus (01:03:26):
And, and I think a lot of times people, it's a self-destructive personality of like, of a super athlete. Yeah. Where of a John Moran, right. You're going, this guy has all this money and all this, you know, talent, he's a great basketball player, why would he like flash a gun on a video? Yeah. And you know, and at a club it's almost like he doesn't know how to handle all the success. Yeah. And I think a lot of people make self-destructive choices Yeah. Because they don't want to say, I can't handle the success. Yep. So they make this choice to jeopardize the success. Mm-Hmm. , I agree. And I'm going, no, no, let's create the psychological infrastructure Yeah. So you can handle more success rather than destroying your life. Yeah. You know, there've been quite a few times along the way in my life where I thought, I don't know if I can take this.

(01:04:06):
Yeah. I mean, I've had moments where I just, I don't know if I can take the, the abuse, I dunno if I can take all the criticism. I don't know if I can take all the hate. Yeah. And cuz I'm a fairly public person Yeah. And my life is like everywhere. I mean, Wikipedia, there's nothing but life about . Like, there's no truth on that thing. Like, you know, , I'm going, you know, can I live this? And, and I had to realize that I was having to fight some self-destructive tendencies and go, I just wanna blow my life up. Mm-Hmm. . And it's not even because I like anything that would blow it up. Yeah. It's just, I just, I'm not handling the pressure of this. Yeah. And fortunately I've been able to at each time make the psychological and spiritual shifts and go, okay, Jesus isn't saying any of these things about me. . Yeah.

Brandon Turner (01:04:49):
Oh yeah.

Erwin McManus (01:04:50):
You know, because I, I actually really do believe in Jesus and I'm going, you know, he's like really good with me. Yeah. And and even when I'm doing bad, he's good with me because he chose me when I was doing terrible . Yeah. So I can't really upgrade his affection for me. Yeah. And I've had to really learn how to create that, that perimeter of input Yeah. In my life. And, and I think it's why now I'm 64, I've been married 40 years, have great kids and starting another career. Yeah. You know, and every 10 years of my life, by the way, I've started a new career mm-hmm. and when I became a writer, my first book won an award. You know, I, when we had our fashion company, one of our fashion lines won that Goodman award in the first year.

(01:05:32):
We, you know, when we did commercials, first commercial came out, number one ad rate for the Super Bowl. Wow. Like each time we moved into a new career, we broke new ground and people thought it was crazy. And it's because I dreamed about it for a long time. Yeah. It turned into a hobby, then started playing with it until I realized somebody would pay me. And then I end up turning it into career. Yeah. And that's why in this journey I go, I'm not done. If I lived three more decades, I'll have three more careers. Mm-Hmm. . Yeah. And cuz every 10 years I wanna challenge myself. When I keep expanding, what I keep growing, I want to keep destroying more of those limitations.

Brandon Turner (01:06:05):
Yeah. That was a great episode of the Derek Derek Severs was on Tim Ferris's podcast, maybe I'm probably a decade ago. It was a forever ago. But he tells the story and I still remember it is like, he's like, there's a donkey in the middle. He was starving and thirsty and donkey. Right. And on the left is water, on the right is food. And so he looks to his left and he looks to his right, looks to his left, looks his right, and then eventually falls over dead. Cause he can't make a decision . And he uses that and he, and he turns into the idea that people oftentimes are stuck in this, what do I do with my life? Do you? And he brings us this amazing mindset shift for me. And I, that's why I still remembered. He said, you can do a different thing every decade and have like nine lives, like nine different careers and do an entire, I mean a decade is a long time.

(01:06:41):
So I love that you brought up decade. Cause when I look at my life, yeah. My life has operated in decades. I mean like, I'm not still a fairly young guy, but from 20 to 30 it was my wife and I grinding, buying little rental properties. And then from about 27 to 37 was me like building this real estate podcast that I was on. And now I'm in this new decade, I'm like, for the next 10 years I'm gonna do this better life thing. Cuz this is super cool and this is where my passion is. So it's okay to have multiple things and not try to cram it all in at one time. Oh yeah. Then it doesn't work.

Erwin McManus (01:07:06):
Yeah. I think that you can live a lot of lives in one lifetime. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (01:07:09):
Yeah. That's

Erwin McManus (01:07:10):
It. And enjoy it the whole time.

Brandon Turner (01:07:11):
Yeah. And so if we remember, especially us, like we will likely live a lot longer than our parents. Like the technological advances, we'll probably, you know, so maybe I'll live to, I dunno, one 20, my kids might live to one 40, who knows, right? Mm-Hmm. , like, you know, we can hope, but like we have long lives ahead of us and we'll probably be healthier. I'm hoping at the end of our life also than like earlier generations who by 50 they were already like too sick and overweight to do anything. Yeah. So hopefully I'll be healthy till nineties. So we'll have a long life. It reduces a lot of the stress of having to do everything.

Erwin McManus (01:07:36):
I can tell you this at, at my stage of life Yeah. Here at 64 that two of the things are, are really important for me are one is mental agility. Yeah. Yeah. The other one is mental toughness. Yep. And with mental agility is to stay curious, to keep learning, to keep growing, to not feel as if you've already hit some pinnacle of knowledge or learning or insight. And I'm more curious now that ever been in my whole life mm-hmm. and I feel like I'm learning more and I feel like a novice, like I feel like I'm just starting Yep. And in my life and I'm so excited. The other part of it though is mental toughness. It's going back and sometimes fighting fights. You, you had fought before and won, but then kind of lost ground. Yeah. like I told my wife at 65 this August, I wanna be in the best physical shape of my life.

(01:08:19):
Mm-Hmm. . And it's hard. I mean, I've, I've torn things and broken things on every part of my body. Yeah. And I mean, from torn Achilles to brain damage, to broken jaw, to, you know, just everything. And so every and and remember the last time I think I torn my hamstring and I thought to myself, I don't know if I can recover from this. Mm-Hmm. . Like, I literally had an internal challenge of going, I think this is the one that brings me down. I was playing basketball till the time of 63. Wow. And I haven't played in the last year rehabbing my body. And I came to a certain point. At first I was like, ah, I can't do this, I can't do this, I can't do this. And then I had something happened to my eyes and my eyes kind of exploded and I can't see as clearly.

(01:08:58):
And I was playing pickleball with this guy that's never beat me. And it just, my eyes actually had this trauma that week and I didn't tell him. And he beat me three games in a row. And he's like so excited . And, and I remember after the first game and I lost, I thought to myself, oh, I can't see. And then by the second game, I thought to myself, I think I'm not gonna play pickleball anymore. I think that mm-hmm. I, or paddle tennis, I don't think I can win anymore. Then by the third game, which I lost as well, I told myself, this is a new challenge. Mm-Hmm. I'm gonna learn how to see with this deficiency. I'm gonna learn how to win and I'm gonna come back and I beat 'em all. Mm-Hmm. . And, and I actually felt myself going through these, but it wasn't like a, a loss, a draw and a win.

(01:09:44):
It was three losses. The only thing that changed were my internal frameworks. And and so then I just, I joined this gym, I got myself in there. I've been in there all the time. I'm like, you know, I'm doing everything I can physically to get myself back in shape. I'm, and I'm, you know, going with a specialist to get myself healed. You just have to be tough enough to endure the pain. Yeah. And that's something early on I learned in my life was that if I can see pain as, as a threshold between average to greatness, it will change my life. Hmm. And most people see pain as the threshold or their capacity. I see. Pain is the threshold of my mediocrity. Mm-Hmm. , those two things. As you grow older, mental agility and mental toughness will carry you for decades.

Brandon Turner (01:10:25):
Mm. That's powerful, man. Yeah. All. Well, I wanna mo start moving us towards the end here and I'm gonna Oh, okay. Shift to this last segment inspired by actually a mutual friend of ours, Lewis House. So Lewis he's really good at asking these questions instead. And like, when we've ever hung when we hang out, he'll say something instead of saying, Hey, what's the best food for lunch today? We can go eat. He'll say, what are the three best things you like in Maui? He always asks us three question. I'm like, why does he do that? And it's cuz like, I I, I don't know why he does that, but it, it works actually really well. So I'm gonna throw that at you. I had a couple, three questions. Ask you, first of all, what are three things you've done in the past, we'll call it year that has given you a better life? Could be a new habit, new action, a new mindset, a new something that you've implemented in the last 12 months. Three things that have improved your life.

Erwin McManus (01:11:04):
I think one of the things I've done is I've surrounded myself with the highest caliber of people that I've ever been round in with in my life. Mm-Hmm. , I just gave myself permission to have friendships to people who want be my friends that I never gave myself permission to. Yeah. You know, and so, you know, I'm friends with guys like Lewis and Yeah. Guys like John Gordon and guys like Ed Myk and guys like Jamie Paolo and Jamie Lima. Yeah. You know, both as a couple. They're powerhouses and, and I know it sounds weird, but you have to give yourself permission mm-hmm. to realize, someone called me, a guy named Edwin Ave. He's a wonderful guy. He said, my, let's been trying to contact you for years, but you just haven't responded. Would you give him 30 minutes? And I realized I'm spending so much of my life trying to help everyone who's drowning, that I'm missing opportunities with people who are really thriving. Yeah. And being around them changes me. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (01:11:57):
It and the multiplier, the multiplier effect. Right. Like, you, if you can help Ed who goes on his podcast and broadcast it to millions, like Yeah. Yeah. What an impact you can help make versus a one-on-one.

Erwin McManus (01:12:07):
Yeah. And so when I did his podcast, he said it went out to like 6 million people. Yeah. It's just crazy because when he kind of came out with his faith and Yep. It was like a beautiful thing. And we've been friends ever since. And, and I feel a little greedy. I started these two masterminds and they're really with just people I love to hang out with, you

Brandon Turner (01:12:22):
Know? Oh, I did, I did

Erwin McManus (01:12:23):
The same thing and they all joined and I said, well, I get to spend time with these guys. It's kind of incredible. That's one thing I think I just gave myself permission to have friends of the highest caliber in the world. Yeah. I think a a second thing is I've consecrated a lot more time to focus on keeping myself well. Mm-Hmm. , I'm such a driven person. And I mean, I think last night I had one minute of deep sleep and I've been averaging about seven to eight minutes. Ugh.

(01:12:49):
And so I've always had a sleep kind of disorder, but it's just a lot of it, my mind won't stop and I'm driving and I'm thinking and I'm creating. And so I'm just giving myself time, permission. I, I go into this little gym where no one knows me. Yeah. And listen to books. And so, you know, the last few weeks I've been listening to mindset by Carol Dweck. Yeah. And listened to Ed's book the Power One More and John's book, training camp. And Patrick McConney was also a friend, six kinds of geniuses. And I've just been, so I go, I get to do multiple things. I'm in this gym, I'm working out, I'm by myself, which I need time alone, I'm learning, I'm listening the books and I'm restoring myself. So that's the thing that I'm just giving myself permission. I'm not being greedy by spending a couple hours a day Yeah. On my own physical and personal health. Yep. I'm trying to think what the third thing might be.

Brandon Turner (01:13:40):
That's why Lewis does the three things. Right? Yeah. Because the first one's usually easy, the second one's a little harder, and the third one's like, yeah, I just dig

Erwin McManus (01:13:45):
Deep, be boring,

Brandon Turner (01:13:46):
. Exactly.

Erwin McManus (01:13:47):
You know, and but cuz you know, cuz there's a whole thing around health, like, you know, eating Right. And Yeah. You know why somebody told me, Hey, if you'll walk 10,000 steps every day, the fat will melt off. So I'm, I'm believing them. They're my guru

Brandon Turner (01:14:01):
Right now. There

Erwin McManus (01:14:01):
You go. And and trying to do that. Yes. They

Brandon Turner (01:14:04):
Yeah. What do you got right now? I'm at I'm gonna find out I'm not doing well. 2000 steps today. Oh, it's bad.

Erwin McManus (01:14:09):
But I think the biggest thing I've done this year that has been most significant is I've given myself permission to go public about what I do. Mm-Hmm. , I've always just been so private about working with business leaders and entrepreneurs and coaching people and doing my private work in the business sector. I don't know why, but I've always felt like I just need to not let anybody know. And, you know, no one knows who I've coached over years and years and years. And then so I gave myself permission this year. I'm gonna, I'm gonna go public. I'm just going to, I'm gonna live in this space. My wife sees me and she goes, you're so happy when you're mentoring top tier leaders. Yeah. Yeah. She goes, that's where you're like, you're alive. It's just like when I honestly, when I design clothes, my daughter and he will go, you're never happier than when you're designing, creating something. And I'm giving myself permission to things that I really just, that make me happy and I love Yeah. Yeah. And I think it gives me more to bring to our community at Mosaic. Yeah. I'm more fully alive. Totally

Brandon Turner (01:15:05):
Agree. Yeah. Yeah. See that was, see Lewis has a thing, right? Yeah. The three thing. All right. Second set of three questions three books that have impacted your life.

Erwin McManus (01:15:12):
Yeah. The first one is kinda obscure, it's by a writer named Robert Hein line. He wrote a book called Glory Road, not necessarily recommending it to everyone, but I read it when I was maybe eight years old and it's probably more of a post-college level book. Yeah. Exploded in my mind the possibilities of the impossible. Mm-Hmm. It's about a guy scar who reads an ad in a newspaper that says hero for Hire. They need to hire a hero. And he responds to the ad. And I think from the age of eight, I always believe there was a hero inside of each person waiting to be awakened. And that book takes him into another dimension, to another universes. And, and there are things in there very metaphysical. Like he has to kill this org that cannot be killed. And so he shoves its feet into its mouth and it keeps rolling it in.

(01:15:55):
It disappears cuz it eats itself and mm-hmm. And the reason I bring that up is because I think the greatest talent I have is my imagination. Yeah. And that, that somewhere is maybe if I have any creative genius that's in that space, that book Seated My Mind to Believe the Impossible. And then a Man Search for Meaning. Yeah. It might be the second book. It was originally called From Death Camps to concentration camps. Really? Yeah. And because that's where, you know, he began his journey. And that book I think has a real significance to me because a person who went through the greatest level of pain and suffering discovered that you could live if you had a reason to live. Yeah. If there was meaning to your existence, you know. And so that would be maybe the second book that has been the most significant book in my life while being too cliche.

(01:16:44):
Actually the Bible Sure. Is the third book. When I became a person of faith in college, I didn't know why I should believe the Bible. Yeah. Like, I'm like, why do people follow this book? And it's kind of weird. And, and I didn't know if I, how you could validate what it said about God, cuz it's a very hard book to, you know, to bring, how do you validate whether something about God is true or not? Mm-Hmm. . And so what I did is I studied the Bible as an anthropology and I said, if the Bible is accurate about humanity that I can trust is accurate about God. Mm-Hmm. , I don't know if there's a book that has ever been written that more powerfully dissects the human psyche, the human spirit and who we are and why we do what we do. And and frankly like in this mastermind that I'm starting in May, all I'm gonna do is take 'em through a biblical anthropology Yeah. And help 'em understand who we are as human beings. And it's funny to me when people, I've been at different experiences, at different events and people think, oh, what you've said is just like genius. And I'm like, actually all I've done is is pulled this out of the Bible Yep. And applied it in a way that's real and true. And so those are the three books I think that stand out to me right now. Yeah.

Brandon Turner (01:17:49):
That's awesome, man. Awesome. Yeah. My buddy Alex here, who's our, you know, kind of producers been talking, we've been talking a lot lately, how there's a million business books out there, personal development books mm-hmm. All these, and they're great. There's some great advice out there, but almost every single lesson from every single one can be distilled down to a lesson that's taught in the Bible. Yeah. Because like, you know, all, all truth is God's truth. Yeah, of course. Right? So like I love that idea of like, we can back that up and say, well, does this line up with scripture? Probably. Yeah. It's probably good advice. All right. Well, final question. Where do people, where do you want people to most follow you online internet besides coming to your church? Where do people follow you and I get to know you more? Well,

Erwin McManus (01:18:20):
That's a great question and I don't actually know because I am the worst sales and marketing. I guess I'm actually probably good at branding. Yeah, I think so. So this is where you go. All right. Because they just wrote this down for me. Nice. All right. All right. Go to irwin mcmanus.com. Okay. they're building that out. We're just centralizing everything there. Yeah. because we do a lot of work with the seven frequencies of communication and teach people how to become like top tier communicators and, and then we're doing stuff with the masterminds and coaching and just, just bring it all under irwin mcmanus.com and we're working at it. There. There you

Brandon Turner (01:18:50):
Go. Yeah. All right. Well thank you, man. This has been phenomenal. Better than I could have expected,

Erwin McManus (01:18:55):
So thank you. Oh man, it's so much fun. Yeah. I do have to envy that beard . But then again, we'll get you

Brandon Turner (01:19:00):
There, man. I can touch you on it. A professional

Erwin McManus (01:19:01):
Person. I'll be working on it. All right. Thank you much.

Brandon Turner (01:19:04):
And that is the show. Thank you everyone for tuning into another episode of A Better Life with Brennan Turner. I hope you enjoyed the insights and the wisdom brought to you today on this show. If you found value in this episode, please consider leaving us a rating and a review on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback actually does help us improve this show. We look at the feedback, I look at the feedback, and we can reach more people with our message of living a better life. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. Follow me on social beardy, Brandon, and hey, before I go, this show is all about the habits, actions, and beliefs that can give you a better life. But in case you're interested and you want to know my opinion on what it takes to live the best life ever, and that includes some of my kind of weird spiritual beliefs, maybe check out a better life.com/best life, a better life.com/best life. Thank you again for listening, and I will see you next time on a Better Life with

Brandon Turner (01:19:56):
Brandon Turner.