Mark Pentecost - Life of Your Dreams: Strategies to Escape Survival Mode

In 3, 2, 1.

Welcome back to Becoming Preferred, the podcast where we talk to the leaders and visionaries who refuse to settle for good enough.

Today we are tackling a psychological trap that captures thousands of high performing professionals every single year.

It's called the dependence dilemma, that invisible ceiling of financial obligations and the false sense of security that keeps brilliant people stuck in survival mode.

Our guest today is a man who didn't just break that ceiling, he shattered it.

He started in the classroom as a high school math teacher crunching numbers just.

To make ends meet.

But he decided to stop playing it safe and started playing it big.

That shift led him to found a direct sales empire that has cleared over a billion dollars in global sales.

He is a world renowned philanthropist, a cancer survivor who turned his battle into into a multimillion dollar research mission, and the author of the transformative new book, Life of youf Dreams.

He's here to show us that the.

Gap between where you are and where.

You want to be isn't a matter of luck.

It's a matter of mindset and seven specific transformative steps.

Join me now for my conversation with Mark Pentecost.

Well, hi Mark.

Welcome to the program.

We're delighted to have you.

Great to meet you and thanks.

I'd have some conversation.

I like your humor.

I like when I can have fun today.

And I think we're going to have fun.

I think we are going to have fun.

I'm really excited about this one.

I love talking to entrepreneurs.

And as an entrepreneur and my whole life I'm always looking at, hey, how did people do that?

And I love people who take the risks, who are bold, go out there and go out of the comfort zones because I know what that feels like.

And it's something we always have to wrestle with.

And I want to kind of unpack that because in your new book, Life of youf Dreams, how to Take youe Family, Fun and Financial Freedom to A Whole New what do you call another level?

That's right, level that up.

We want to share some of those insights with the audience, are interested in their entrepreneurs.

They're business people, CEOs, executives.

So it's our kind of audience.

And I know as a professional speaker, I always enjoy talking to other professional speakers.

So we got lots to talk about.

So.

But before we get into it, let's talk about how did Mark become Mark?

So you're back in high school.

I think you're living in Michigan at the time.

What are you figuring out?

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Interesting.

Writing the book really kind of made me reflect on that a little bit, because my family was from Tennessee.

They were farmers.

Farms were playing out, so they moved to Michigan to get jobs at the factory.

And nobody had gone to college.

And so I was the first one go to college.

I thought I'd be a teacher, love sports.

I wanted to be a basketball coach.

And so I did that for 16 years.

I went.

Took me about three to get to the top spot.

I was the varsity coach, having a good life.

But there was something stirring in here that there was more I wanted to do, and I was impacting the young people there.

I was teaching and coaching.

I had three kids.

We're raising our family, but I was one of those guys always reading a book or always.

There was an old Tom Cruise movie back then called Cocktails, and he always had a book under the bar on how to get ahead at something.

That was me as a teacher.

I always had a book on how to make money in real estate, how to use direct sales, how to get ahead in life.

And, you know, there's just some stirring all the time.

Well, it's that curiosity.

I.

This is what I loved about your story, is I can relate completely.

18, 17, 18, I started reading.

And back then, that was the tools we had.

It was just books, and we didn't even have audio books.

That wasn't a thing.

You had record players, and that was it.

Try and tell that to young people.

So they go, what is that?

But it was.

But we didn't have YouTube.

And if you had any kind of condition, if you were dyslexic, if you were on the spectrum anywhere, if you were neurodivergent, you couldn't learn, you were stuck.

And now all these modalities have come into the marketplace where we have no excuse not to learn.

So I definitely want to unpack part of that.

All right, so you're going through.

You're looking at it, you're reading books.

You knew there was something more.

You were a math teacher teaching math.

So you're doing the math on your income, salary.

And if I do this for 30 years, I can predict and forecast what my pension and wealth is going to be.

So take a leap.

And how did that work?

What was going through your mind at the time then?

What was the final catalyst for you that you went, okay, I got to do something different.

I'm just going to do it?

I didn't realize back then we'd say I was an entrepreneur today.

I didn't know that back then, but My wife and I both, we were doing things to add income.

We were about $500 upside down each month with teaching, coaching, and she was doing childcare, cleaned houses, summers I was running basketball camps.

I was lining fields for baseball and softball and anything to make extra money, but we still were upside down.

So I had read on real estate.

So I bought a fixer upper house and flipped that.

Found out that wasn't my strength.

I was not very good at things with your hands, plumbing and wire and all that stuff.

So, you know, we did it.

I had a couple rental units and that was terrible.

I didn't enjoy collecting rents and.

And of all things, my dad, who had worked 30 years for GM and only did GM didn't called me from.

He had retired back to Tennessee.

And he said, hey, there's a network, you know, about direct selling.

And I said, well, in Grand Rapids, so there's this big company up here that I hear about all the time.

But no, I. I'm coaching, teaching, I don't have time to add.

And he told me about a company, and about the third time, he said, if you don't do something different in 20 years, you're going to be doing the same thing with the same issues.

And I went, hmm, that's probably true.

So I looked at a direct selling company and got involved with the idea of making $500 a month extra so I could level up.

And we hit that.

Then I started thinking, hey, I think we can pay off some of our credit cards and stuff, so let's see if I can get a couple thousand a month.

And we did that.

And then we sat down and said, what would it take for me to go full time now again, I'd gone to college to be a teacher and a coach.

I had done it for 16 years.

And so it's not normal all of a sudden to say, no, I'm out of here.

And.

And so I started really dreaming about that, and it just seemed like something huge maybe.

And you know, in the book we talk about taking calculated risk.

We didn't just go all in.

We set a goal of what we had to a month before I could.

And it's funny because back then I think I was making 40,000 a year, coaching, teaching, all in.

And so I'm like, I need 4,000amonth.

And then we hit four.

And then I said, well, I don't have summers off and I got to get my own health insurance.

And so I bumped it to six.

And then it was starting to really move.

I found out I had pretty good talent for selling it.

And it went to 10,000.

And a friend of mine said, you said if it hit six, you'd walk out.

And I said, I know, I know.

That's a big step.

I'm coaching.

I had a team that year, we were 18 and 2, and I had every player back the next year.

So most coaches don't walk away from that kind of a year in the next season.

But, you know, it was a chance to change my life and help my family.

So.

So I went full time with that.

And, you know, we were laughing.

You and I were talking about different things.

It was long distance on a wall phone.

I mean, these young people today would be like, what's a wall phone?

And you know, we didn't have cell phones yet, so.

But it was a great concept.

It went real well, made a lot of money.

But then they didn't change product when cell phones, computers came out.

And so it crashed and burned.

And now I'm like, wait, I know about this other side of life.

I really thought I'd probably do that, rest my life.

And now it's not.

And that's when I realized, if I do this again, I'm going to own the company so that I can control my future.

And that's when we decided like 24 years ago to start It Works, which was my first company.

Yeah.

And once you see the model, and again, it's taking that risk and sometimes the circumstances, you need to have those bridges.

And we'll talk about that as well.

Mark, many of our listeners are currently stuck luck in a career, much like you were as a high school teacher.

So they're feeling that they have to settle what was the exact moment or spark that made you realize your survival cycle was actually what you call a dependence dilemma.

Yeah, great, great question.

Because when I wanted to write a book, I didn't want to write a book if it didn't give value back or do something.

I actually started a book before COVID and when we got done, I didn't like it.

So I let it set.

And then just this last year, my daughter had come and said, dad, we gotta tell your story.

It's unusual and you know, people have gone to the level you have.

And I said, well, I only want to do something of a help.

And so that was the number one thing, what you just said.

I think people that get out of school, that could be whatever level, but they got all these dreams, they're going to change the world, and then life happens.

And I think people get stuck and don't even know they're stuck.

And I've been going around talking right now, and I've had so many people come up and say, I didn't realize I had quit dreaming.

I had big dreams.

And.

And dreams can be vision, too.

A vision.

And so the whole idea of the book is to get people unstuck.

And we came up with seven steps that I think are very pivotal.

And it can be just one of them that's stopping you or blocking you.

And the first one, which I think is the biggest one, is getting the game.

So many people.

I was a coach, so you'd have people in the sense watching.

Then on Monday, they want to tell you everything you did wrong.

You know, Monday morning quarterbacks, we call them here.

And for me, number one is realize, get in the game.

You know, what was it you dream?

Get older.

You know, people get older.

That happens.

But young people are first coming out and going, oh, I can't afford a house.

I can't afford getting a game.

I believe that we have the control right here and the ability to do things.

Yeah, no, I think you're right.

And you talk about dreaming bigger.

And I often wonder, like today, you look at the younger people today and where you and I are baby boomers.

Did you have a paper route when you were a kid?

I had a paper route.

I did.

I mowed yards with a push board.

Yeah, I did.

I'd go.

I'd go mow.

They always had money in my pocket.

Minimum wage was two bucks, 2:30 an hour.

And when I talked to successful entrepreneurs, and they're all hard workers, they all had paper routes.

They all know how to go talk to customers.

They all went knock on the door.

I'd rent a rototiller in the spring for 50 bucks for a week and then go around, charge $30 a day, road to a neighbor's garden and using someone else's equipment.

So I learned real early, which was an advantage.

And today everybody wants to be an influencer.

And they go to college and they come out and the skills just aren't there.

And even our daughter, we have five daughters, and they've got.

One's an engineer, but the rest with communication degrees.

None of them work in the field they got their degree at.

They're all.

They're entrepreneurs, they have their businesses, they do their thing.

But it's kind of like the new high school, right?

So how to learn?

So when you talk about the dream, why is it that we have those limitations put on us?

Are Those taught to us.

Or do you think as a teacher.

As a teacher, if you look at the system, it's designed for conformity.

You've got the manager up at the front, and you had your floor manager up there, your factory manager, everyone with the number two pencil, and you're doing your work.

And is it our system?

Is it our education?

Because I didn't learn about money in school.

I don't know about opening a business in school.

I didn't learn about entrepreneurship in school.

So, as a former teacher, is that part of the problem?

You know, that's a great question, and I think it is.

I mean, we use the word conform, and I think we did.

We just said fitness box, and this is the only box.

And that's what we're going to do.

Because I didn't know I was an entrepreneur till later in life.

I didn't know that these feelings I was having for wanting more was good.

It was okay because I went and got a degree, I got a job, I promoted up.

I could project 30 years from now what I'd be doing, and I didn't want that Life, it starts and it ends.

We know that.

It's all that in between.

I call it the dash.

But, man, there was so much more I wanted to do, and I found out I had control of that.

Yeah.

When you talk about.

Exclusively about the dependence dilemma in your book, you know, for a business professional who feels successful but unfulfilled, how do they identify if they're actually trapped by their own success?

Because I think that happens.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that sneaks up on you.

You don't realize it because.

And what that means is.

So when I left teaching, I knew what I was making.

I knew what I need to do.

We have three kids, you know, to support, give Cindy security about what I was trying to do and to take care of the bills.

We had calculated how much we needed, what we needed to do.

And here's what happens in that situation.

If you're the money earner, you know, you got to keep making that money or else you can't pay the bills.

And so you're in that trap, and yet you want to go out and create more.

And you got people depending on you, and you're like, wait, these people are depending on me?

I just can't go out there and take risk.

But then you're also depending on the guy or the lady, whoever it is, writing your checks.

So you're depending on them.

So you're trying to make them happy, and you're stuck in this trap back and forth and all it does is stress you out and give you a headache and you're not happy.

Which if you're not happy, then nobody around you is happy.

Yeah, well, and I think luck has a little bit to do with it.

I mean, it just does.

Timing.

Timing.

Yeah.

Like I remember in the 80s I was going to be a doctor and I had to.

I borrowed $75,000 to open up a video store because they were just starting.

I thought, well, that'll be a good way to capitalize med school.

Well, sure.

So I ended up with a nice little chain of them which I sold out in the mid-80s and then leverage that.

So it's nice because luck come into play a little bit.

It can go either way.

You have to show up, you have to, you know, as you talked, you got to dream big and then you kind of work on your journey there a little bit.

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And now back to my conversation with Mark Pentecost.

They often struggle with that fear of the leap entrepreneurs.

So in your journey, how did you reconcile the fear of losing what you had, all those financial obligations with the drive to reach for what you really wanted?

Good, good question.

Because you know I as a math teacher, one on one is two and yet I found in business and what you said, you know, luck.

But I think you're also putting yourself in a position to do that where one and one isn't equal to two.

It's momentum and it's the right Timing and it can explode.

And that's what happened to me in the first business.

But it opened my eyes to, first of all, get in the game.

I had to say yes.

I kept trying to find all the reasons wrong why I shouldn't do these things instead of the one or two reasons why I should.

And when I realized that, and one thing, and I encourage people that all the time, is the communication with the family.

When I got into direct sales, I told the kids I'd been a teacher.

So I was at every game.

Everything they did, I was there.

We sat down and said, hey, I'm going to go out and chase this and I'm going to be gone.

I'm going to miss some games, some recitals.

But because of that, if we hit this level, this is what we're going to do as a family.

We included them.

You know, we're like, hey, what do you want to do?

They want to go to a water park.

They want to go Chuck E. Cheese.

They want to have date night and go to the movies.

We started putting that in.

So, you know, when I talk to the kids today, they don't remember that I miss games and stuff.

They remember all the things we did.

And then when my spouse, if you have a spouse that's not supportive, find out the sweet spot.

And, you know, if it's them going to a spa for a day, pay for that.

Spa for the day.

When you're starting to have some success.

So instead of going, you going again for that thing, they're like giving you a list of people to talk to.

And my grandpa was a farmer, and he would always give me these old wisdoms, and he would say, mark, you can't force a horse to drink, but you can salt the oats.

So I have this crazy idea in my head whenever I'm trying to solve a problem, I'm like, how do I salt the oats?

Oats here.

When you salt the oats, the horses thirsty.

They go drink.

And if you came to my office today and we're in some business meeting, the people working for me, I go, mark, how do we salt the oats?

But I'm like, oh, my gosh, Grandpa lives on.

But, you know, I think in life that we need to be intentional.

And for me also, I didn't realize it at the time.

I have a whole chapter on say it and see it.

And when I decided to move the company from Michigan to Florida, I realized people didn't want to come visit us in the winter in Michigan.

And so we picked Florida taxes were great.

They offered me a nice package.

Bring the company down and you're looking out on the Gulf, you're watching a sunset, there's so much adventure here.

And so I went around the office at that point, I think I had 25 people working for me and I would say they could have moved in the company to Florida.

I thought I was educating them and seeing what they thought.

I wasn't.

I was self talking, I was talking myself into it.

And I realize over time, say it and see it.

You know, some people need to write it, see pictures of it, dream.

We call it a dream board at our company.

Some just need to verbalize.

Even now I find myself the next big thing I want to do, I'll walk around and start talking about it.

And it took me years to realize I wasn't telling the person I'm talking to.

I was saying to me.

And so I think whatever that dream is, whatever that thing you really want, I think saying it, seeing it is important.

Yeah, no, I think so too.

It's what we say when we talk to ourselves and we have those visions and really why we're doing it.

I think at the end of the day, I think it's that illusion of security.

And you talk about that and how do we overcome that?

Because it's that fear of the leap.

So in your journey, you had to reconcile it.

You look at those financial obligations, you started to do it, you had your side hustle, your side gig, which was your life raft until it became a yacht, right?

Yeah.

With the challenges as you're scaling to a billion, let's say a big business, what was the leadership shift for you like?

So going from a one man show to a, you know, a million dollar sales company requires massive leadership evolution.

And not everyone can make that transition.

Usually you'll have to bring in other people.

What was the biggest trait that you had to develop to manage at that scale?

You know, there's two things that I'll say, but before I say it, I'll say I didn't go to college or educate be a CEO.

And so when I first started being that, I'm like, oh, I don't.

I had a guy working with me who started a business and we'd both say, oh, we're just teachers.

And finally I said, doug, you got enough experience in this.

Quit saying you're just a teacher.

Because being a CEO was like a head coach.

You had to get the right people in the game, you had to get them in the right seats, you had to have people where they could use their skill set to be successful.

And so I think realizing sometimes we say ourselves down instead of up.

And when I think of two things, the first one is who you surround yourself with.

You know, I have sayings.

I come up with these sayings and I love them.

I have one and I say, dreams plan in the right environment will thrive.

Dreams plan in the wrong environment, dies.

And I think sometimes people's dreams haven't happened, not because they did anything wrong, but the people they surrounded themselves with.

A lot of people have a friend or relative even that is Debbie Downer.

They're like, oh, you'll never do that.

You'd never been sick.

Successful.

Old Uncle Joe tried that and he failed.

And I realized who I surrounded myself with.

And at every level is different people.

It was always evolving.

So when I was coaching, I wanted retired hall of Fame coaches to come into practice and watch and give me some pointers.

I wanted to pick the brains of.

When I started in direct sales, I went to people.

I've been very successful in direct sales and surrounded myself.

When I started the business, I had a guy, a neighbor, owned an asphalt company and had been very successful.

And I would take the finances over to him and say, look at these financials.

What do you think?

And I did that five, six years in a row, picked his brain.

He'd go, well, you're trending in the right direction, but you still owe more than you make.

And I remember the first time that I couldn't wait for him to look at it and give me.

So the people you surround yourself is so big.

And then I said two things.

The other one is I decided to live on the offense and that changed everything.

Because life's tough.

You're always getting punched, you're getting knocked back, and when you're defensive.

And I always say, I compare it to football over here, when you're on the offense and you score, you get to do the end zone dance, right?

I want to dance in life and defense.

Whenever the teams are just playing defense, it seems like the team score and they lose.

And so I decide, be sure intentional, who I surrounded myself with.

And I was going to play go for it in business now on the offense, I was going to make plays to go for it.

Now some things wouldn't work.

I love Rocky with Stallone.

You're going to get knocked down, get back up.

I arm my people with that.

I tell them, hey, things are going to happen.

So that when it does, they don't go, I'm terrible.

I can't do this.

They're like, oh, they told me about this.

Just got to get back up, stay on the offense, and surround yourself with good people.

And I think to surround yourself sounds easy, but more people lose at that.

They have people that are toxic around them.

Yeah.

And they're not helping them, they're hurting them, and they don't even realize it.

Yeah.

I think our society and our culture fosters that sometimes.

And we troll things.

And it's who you surround yourself with.

It's starting with young kids and everything.

And as you say, there's things in life that can knock us down.

Let's talk about that.

Because that happens.

We move on our journey, and all of a sudden, something comes out of the blue.

You face challenges that money couldn't solve, specifically your battle with cancer.

How did that experience change your definition of a dream life?

And how did it influence the writing of the book?

You know, great question.

Even in business, I look at.

We had a couple things happen.

We were just getting going in our business, and our main product, we had a shortage.

So we're just going, we're rocking, and all of a sudden, the manufacturer can't keep going.

And, you know, I sat in my room going, are you kidding me?

We battled for nine years.

What?

And then one other time, we just moved to Florida, and I decided to be.

I knew I wanted to go beyond a billion.

And so we were.

What could hurt us?

And I really felt it was our IT system.

So I went to a Inc 500 company rising.

I knew people on their systems, and we decided two years ahead of time to get on that system so we'd be ready when we really took off.

When we migrated that system, it fell apart.

It broke.

We couldn't put people into the system.

We couldn't sell product.

We couldn't.

So both those things could have sunk the ship.

And I had a good team around me, which was good.

But I ended up.

I would start naming our issues.

We had the great reps shortage.

Our number one product was a rep. And so when people were like, I can't do this business.

We don't have a rep. And we'd be like, hey, it's like an iPhone.

We got a long line out here and get in line.

They're coming.

And so, you know, I always try to change that into a positive.

And I would name it.

I would name it something so people would say, oh, yeah, they'd wear, like, a badge of honor.

We made it through the great rap shortage.

We got through the migration we had to do things by hand.

Nobody had done it by hand before.

And, you know, when cancer hit, we're at the all time high.

And when I got the call, no one in my family had had it.

My.

My parents, nobody had this.

And so when I got hit, I was like, it really makes you pause and go, okay.

And I hadn't built the team for me.

Not there.

I never thought of that.

If I was building a new company today, I would build it where it didn't rely on me so much.

But at that point.

And then we went down while I was out doing treatments and I said to somebody, what happened?

They go, we didn't know if you're living or not.

We.

We froze.

And I was like, you know, that wasn't their fault.

It's because they cared about me.

And so even the cancer journey made me reflect that someday it ends.

So what value am I bringing and what do I really want this to do?

What do I want to hand to the kids and grandkids?

And.

And so it did make me reevaluate what was really important.

My personality is very competitive on the.

And I realized sometimes my greatest strength was my greatest weakness.

I could crush someone because I didn't understand why they didn't want to work as hard as I did.

Or, hey, this is taking care of your family.

Why are you going home, putting your feet up, up, having a cocktail instead of, you know.

And I realized we're all different.

And I needed to shift that intensity.

So I think when you do have things, it's identifying it for me, it was calling it out.

I would name it.

I think maybe in the book I called a few out and said we named them and took it like a badge of honor instead of trying to hide from it and say, woe is me.

I can't believe this happened.

I look now, the type of cancer I had, it was like a five year sentence.

And it's been eight years now.

And I was out.

And then I came out of remission just recently.

But there's better studies, better stuff today.

I'm funding.

I'm up here funding research labs.

And where I was at, they wouldn't use a cure.

Where they would say, we got to control it.

And I was just at a board meeting a few months ago where they were so excited about new cures, how close they are to cure in some really amazing cancers that people would have died from.

And I'm like, maybe that's why I'm here, was I got to fund that and be a Part of it.

And I wouldn't have been as tuned if I wasn't going through the journey myself.

And especially for kids, we do a lot with pediatric cancer and the V Foundation.

Dick Vital, I don't know if you know the sports legend, but it's one thing to do it at my age.

But kids, you just.

So we're literally given every.

Anything that goes.

All profits are going to cure and cancer.

I didn't want to make money from this.

I wanted to help people and then help make sure we got some good causes.

So name them.

They're going to happen.

Take it like a badge of honor and how you're going to fight through it and it'll just make your story stronger.

No, that's.

It's clever.

They use that in cognitive behavior of therapy as well.

Name the issue, label it, and then you can kind of deal with it.

Because we're all.

Everyone's facing and dealing with something.

Right?

Exactly.

What's interesting to me is because you and I, we study the same things.

And just looking at your background and what we're interested in is.

It's that mindset.

Like, for me, my parents were immigrants.

They came in from England.

They landed with a nickel.

Always had two jobs sometimes.

My dad was a musician in the service 29 years.

Taught music.

All of that.

It.

So all I saw was parents working.

That was it to have something.

Right.

You couldn't even buy things.

We didn't have all of those things.

It's like Rockefeller, you know, in Cleveland, he had an outhouse.

Like, no running water.

Like.

Right.

What's the point of being a millionaire if you can't buy anything with it or do something good with it?

Right.

But I work with entrepreneurs and it's interesting to see, as you're saying, it's that offensive mindset.

I love that because I call it being proactive.

You're either, are you reactive to life or are you proactive?

Do you have a rudder on your ship or is the wind just blowing you wherever you go?

So let's say you're talking to your kids today.

You're raising them up.

You're maybe in front of a classroom of students.

Right.

And traditional education.

I went through the traditional way, as you did, you know, degrees.

But you know, to me, if you have a PhD in something, all that means to me is that one time in your life you used to know a lot about something because it's changed so much.

And with AI, with some of these new tools.

Yeah.

Advice would you give to younger people today?

Would you tell them, go vocational, work on skill.

Like, what path?

Path.

If you were going to be the career counselor to the masses, what advice would you share with them?

You know, that's really good, good questions there, because I, I believe this is still the greatest time in the world.

You know, my parents didn't have education.

They worked at the factory.

And for me to be worth what I'm worth today, to own what I own, to be able to impact people the way I can, was because of our systems.

And I still believe it's the greatest.

There's no excuses.

Somebody the other day, I'm sure they wish they hadn't opened the door afterwards, but they said, kids can't afford houses today.

They can't afford houses.

And I said, when I first graduated from college, now I know it sounds like my dad walked uphill to school in 14ft of snow both ways, but I said, guys, my first teaching salary, I signed at 11,6.

I made $11,000 the first year, and interest rates were 16%.

And when I went in to get a loan, the bank laughed at me.

And so I started reading how to Buy a House with no Money down.

So I keep a picture at the island.

We have, I have a picture of our first house because I, I can't believe Cindy stayed with me.

This thing looks like a auto tire place.

Those that glass, that little blocks, and it's ugly as could be.

And I bought it on a land contract.

And back then I went to the bank, told them all the repairs I were going to do.

They loaned me the money for that.

I used that to.

To buy another house with no money down.

And so I created a way.

And my point today is if you really want something, there's ways to do it.

We got to go to work.

And it might be being an influencer, it may be.

But I truly believe that the dream is still alive today.

And it doesn't matter your name, your education, it matters your grit.

I think in the book I call it grit.

Cue, I don't care about your iq.

What's your grit?

Cue, you know, how bad do you really want this?

And there's no way.

Someone told me the other day, from zero to a billion, faster than anyone they know outside of Silicon Valley and private equity.

And that wasn't my goal.

My goal was to pay off debt, get debt free.

I tell people, you sleep better in a house that's paid for.

They don't believe it.

I have a ranch out here with cowboys working for me.

And one of them told me this week he just paid off all his debt for the first time in his life.

Life.

He doesn't owe any debt and has money in the bank.

He goes, mark, I never.

This guy's just turning 60.

He said, I didn't think that would ever be possible until you started challenging me and saying, why not?

Why can't you do that?

And I'm like, it just filled me up because I was given that message.

I wasn't giving it to him.

He was working at the ranch, at the people I was talking to, but he was listening.

And I think today, people listening to us today, it may seem like a mountain in front of you, but if you've got the grit for that and you're ready to go on the offense and number one, get in the game, I. I think dreaming is like a muscle.

The more you dream, the bigger it gets.

My dream was to make 500 extra so I could pay my bills.

And today they'll say, oh, did you dream of your ranch and your island?

And I go, no, that was not even.

But each time I had a dream and it came true, the dream got bigger and the dream got.

And I think it's the same in giving what we're able to give today, I couldn't have even seen it at all.

And yet I think that muscle grows.

You give, you feel good, you're helping a cause.

Maybe it's finding cures for cancer, helping a school, helping a church get debt free.

The more you give, the more you want to give more.

And I think that's what changes the world, not our government and all this politics junk going on.

I think it's about us being able to as responsible that we make it and we help others and we give it back.

Yeah, no, I think you're right.

I think it's persistence too.

And because not everything works like you said, you try it, you do it.

Some experiments work, some don't.

Who cares?

A lot of people just don't take the first step.

As you've seen, they don't even take first step.

Like, you know, as I've been a speaker for 30 years, writing books, doing that.

But that was easy for me.

It was easy for me to actually go and do that.

Some people look at it and go, oh, I could never be a public speaker.

I could never talk to.

For me, it was like, oh, yeah, I found myself calling in life early.

Right.

Thank you.

And so I'm like you.

I'm not good at fixing things.

I married that.

I married the handyman who's Everything and fix it all.

So my job's in the kitchen and that's it.

So grocery shop and cook.

But I look at things and whenever I've attempted them, they actually went easier.

So then the podcast was a challenge.

You know, we're in season six now, and I remember going, well, what if this sucks?

Or what if that?

And just self doubt things.

And then finally it was like, just go do it.

And my wife says, hey, get eight episodes in, because most quit after five.

We're up, we're coming up 200 now.

And in six seasons.

Well, it saw it after, which is nice, which is good.

They're coming to a first year or two.

We had to go after everybody.

Year three, four, five and six, it's season they're calling us, which is a nice thing, but it's taking the leap.

And now I've been waiting on another book and again, I've got a new one coming out.

But it's again, it's that confidence and it's that resilience.

It's.

We had the pandemic hit.

Everybody got messed up with that one.

For me as a speaker, and you, you know how that went.

Killed that, right?

So we have to pivot.

And life's full of pivots.

You got cancer, you have to pivot.

You got.

It's just part of the journey.

And at the end of the day, you know, I've got to open for Warren Buffett speaking on several conferences.

And he's got a great line, one of my favorite lines.

He's giving all his money away, as you know, about 99% of it.

And he says food always tastes best when you're hungry.

And I've gone, you know what is exactly right?

So it's why when you made that extra 500 and you got that thousand and all of a sudden you can send your wife to the spa or we're gonna have pizza tonight.

We're going out for beer and pizza or a glass of wine, and we're not worrying about it.

It's a great feeling.

And people don't realize because they have that illusion of security.

They have, well, I've got a job, but that's not security, all right?

That could go away and disappear.

And we see it all the time.

So from the book, let's say that they've read your book.

Live the life of your dreams, right?

They get through the last chapter.

What's the one preferred action you'd love people to take in their first 24 hours after reading the book?

Great question.

I like that.

So I have seven steps.

Seven steps in life of your dream.

And I've seen this in my own company, we do what's called a dream board.

When they first join, I'll say, all right, come on, tell me some things you want to do.

Trip, you want to take vacation, pay off something.

Tell me.

And I found that it's like dipping your toe in the water.

See, if it's cold.

They'll do a little bit.

But then they go through this with me, the seven steps, they work on it, and they'll come back and say, hey, I want to do mine over.

I didn't go big enough.

And so we started calling it the redream.

And so what I hope when they're done, they see the seven steps.

I always say the dream you're most proud is the one you're afraid to say out loud.

And everybody has one.

They have one that.

So they may not give me that one in the beginning, but once they read this, once they start following the steps, then we re dream.

And that's why I think dream is like a muscle.

I couldn't dream of being full time.

I couldn't dream of billions.

I. I could dream of $500.

But after that, I wanted another chance.

And so I hope that people will, you know, one of the seven steps.

Surround yourself with the right people going on the offense.

One of them, calculate your risk, could change it all.

Once you got that going, then at the end, I want to make sure you're like, okay, I want bigger.

I want more.

And unpack that.

I found that fascinating in your bullets, as one of the bullets in the book was calculating the risk.

Can you unpack that just a little bit?

Give an example of that.

Well, sometimes people hear the word risk, and they immediately go, I can't take risk.

I don't like.

I can't.

We take risk at every.

You calculate what.

So I tell people, I don't want you to go to Vegas and take all your income and put it on the table and say, I'm all in.

That's not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about Cindy.

And I looked at our budget, how much we had to have each month before I could say, I'm not teaching and coaching anymore.

I'm out of here.

You know, the scariest day, the best day of my life was the day I resigned and walked out.

I walked out right in the middle of the year, and they worked with me, and it was so scary at the time.

I walked out going, I Went to college for this 16 years and now it's on me.

And it was so funny.

I parked in the back of the school, I drove around on the marquee sign.

They said, good luck, coach Pentecost, thank you for your 16 years.

And he spelled teaching wrong.

It said teaching and I just started laughing saying, that's so appropriate now.

I was a math teacher.

My English is terrible.

But you know, here there's in the path.

I was we teaching and we spelled the word teaching wrong.

And you know, and I remember the very next month my money went down and I'm like, what are people gonna think?

Oh my gosh, I'm gonna be a failure.

They'll say, you went to college and a guy walked out of it.

And yet four months later, it started multiplying at a huge rate because I got the time to put in, take care of business.

And so to me, it's getting started, taking that first step.

It's calculating the risk.

There's good risk, good risk.

As you said, if I don't do this, what's the definition of insanity?

Do the same thing, expect a different result.

So calculate the risk.

And I have a whole chart in there on what's good, what's bad so that you realize, oh yes, you're right, that's the way we should think of this.

And it truly makes a difference of what you're going through.

Yeah, no, it's interesting.

And what's interesting about the risk, you look at it, we care a lot about what other people think.

Right.

And I think that's a lot about our behavior.

And if you can, if can develop your boldness and like you say, surround yourself with a good community of like minded people and networking groups or what, because people will tell you it doesn't work.

And then it's also, I think, finding balance.

I don't know about you, but I'm finding as I'm older, like I find a new way to make a million dollars every week.

I tell audiences, I every week say it's every two weeks.

I just don't have the energy to put into that I'm doing what I like to do.

And I have more than enough for my needs, which is one thing I've learned is I actually have enough meaning.

And it's learning, hey now, it's quality.

We have, you know, eight grandkids now and we like spending.

I've reclaimed Fridays, that's grandkid day.

We're hanging out with them, Starbucks, whatever it is, swimming where we are, all of that Because I was like you.

I was gone for the first few years and a few of my older kids got ripped off because I was gone.

So I'm trying to make up for it now, right in this last part.

Focus on health and those things, but wins.

Enough, enough.

And it gets to where, hey, you take care of the basics and this Maslow's hierarchy, right, it's all over.

It's that simple.

And you're at a stage now where as you work towards and we move up and down this pyramid, so there could be a time where all of a sudden you're in self actualization zone, you're helping people, you're donating millions to different causes, you're helping things out.

And all of a sudden you get an issue yourself or a family member or something.

And all of a sudden right down to the bottom where we're surviving.

So it's a very fluid pyramid, in my opinion.

Right?

Moves up and.

But once you've been up there, you know how to get up there again.

So let me ask you this question.

It happens in failure.

Let's say we took it all away from you.

All right?

From you.

I had a couple mountaineering buddies that were entrepreneurs and they've done all well and they've climbed Everest three times and whatever, and they're looking for the next big challenge.

And I said, said, I've got it for you.

And I said, give everything you have away and start over.

And they looked at me and they went, oh, that would work.

That'd be a job.

So we took everything away from Mark Pentecost today.

What would Mark Pentecost do tomorrow?

Well, you said some really good stuff in there.

I actually had someone come to me, very close to me and say, when is enough enough?

And it was a sucker punch to me because he said it in a way like I'm doing something wrong.

I had to ponder it all night, but I woke up the next morning almost mad because I thought if you have the skills, the worst thing is to go bury it.

If you have the ability to create jobs, you have the ability to help others.

And so I went back and I said, you know, I got thinking about that.

I said, we're helping find cures for cancer.

We're helping build some schools right now.

Kids that don't have school.

We're helping to send people, whether it's technology school or traditional college that we're helping.

I said, enough is enough.

When there is no poverty all over the world, there is no need for that because governments don't Fix that.

It's us, the people that have the heart and do it.

And I believe once you have the knowledge, I wouldn't be afraid of that if you said, you're taking everything away tomorrow.

Yeah, I know.

With these seven steps to separate, find the right people on what I want to do, I know how to educate on what I want to do it.

I kind of.

I don't want to, like, say I do it, but I like the challenge because I feel like it's what's up here.

When we said calculated risk, you know, it's calculated instead of counting on luck.

It's logical instead of impulsive.

It's clarity instead of confusion.

When we went into risk, good risk, bad risk, you know, good risk is recoverable.

Bad risk is because you're.

Everything's destroyed.

Yeah.

And so to me, once you have the system and the knowledge and the confidence, I think it's applying that.

And today I actually.

Funny you say I was looking at AI and I could start my same company I started back then, you know, 25, 30 employees.

I could do it with three or four.

And so I think once you have the education, once you have the confidence, once you have your own system.

You know, when I was coaching, there wasn't one system wins all.

Somebody was playing zone, someone's playing man to man, someone runs set play.

Some says, take it and do what feels natural.

And to me, in business, it's the same way.

It's not one system, but when you're confident in what you're doing, and I think that's the biggest thing, I hope people listening today, if you're stuck or you realize you didn't even know you weren't dreaming anymore, just get in the game, Walk down the stands, get in the arena and get ready for a fight that's going to be up and down, but it's going to be exhilarating.

And at the end, you're going to go, I did that.

And when, like meeting you today, we've had similar backgrounds, we can grin at each other because we've been through the wars and here we are, and we want to impart that on the people listening for you, saying, you got this, but you got to get in the game.

Yeah.

And to me, whatever the goal is, if the goal is to make a billion, terrific.

You know, I. I remember, I think it was Dempsey was talking, who sold Twitter for 4 billion, and then he started a payment program.

I'm trying to remember which one now it was.

But he came out with that, and that was worth another couple of billion.

He's being interviewed and he goes, how's this going to change your life?

And he goes, oh, it doesn't.

He goes, I can't even spend what we have.

Like.

And if you think about it, go back to the Rockefeller example, it doesn't matter where you are in life.

Most people have a flag, flat screen TV and a cell phone.

So they have all of that wisdom on their phones and they spend five to six hours a day, screen time, scrolling, doing things.

And the answers are there and it's free.

You.

And I started with books, big books.

I book a week for me, book clubs.

But now there's no excuse.

So if you're on the spectrum, you can't read.

You don't learn that way.

There's no, I'm too old, I'm too young, I don't have just no excuse.

And you know what?

You can have a nice life.

And if your goals are in a couple hundred thousand, great.

Once you do it, you'll know how.

Now like I said, I think if I took everything away from you, you'd have to do your math, figure it out and go, hey, you've been there once, you know how to get there again.

And it's kind of like golfing.

If you get into the 90s, you'll always get into the 90s.

Then once you get into the 80s, you'll start breaking into the 80s more often.

70s, okay, that one got a little luck there.

If the balls are dropping 15ft up.

But you can, but it's the muscle, it's learning that muscle memory and going for it.

And at the end of the day, none of it is coming with us.

We're playing a big game of Monopoly and you decide how you want to play the game.

And I think you play that game really well.

The book is called Life of your dreams, how to take your family fun and financial freedom to a whole nother level by Mark Pentecost.

I know you got it in every format available, so if they want to listen to it, if they want to read it paperback or hardcover, with some of the website pentecostgroup.com they can find out more about you.

Mark, anything else you want to add here?

Mark?

You know, once we had success there, I just became a big kid.

We, we did three movies.

Now I did two western movies because I wanted my grandkids to know what that generation was about.

And we started Impact Professionals, which is like Netflix for entrepreneurs.

And so the fun part, once you are starting to have a success, you can really find value in other channels and help support it and move it.

And that's what I love right now.

I'm a big kid.

I enjoy that.

Follow us on Instagram.

We're just having fun right now because once you realize it can be done, there's so much more you can do.

Yeah, it's like you said, it's step number one, dream big.

What's the dream?

Start moving towards it.

And it was kind of shoot for the stars, hit the moon.

I remember just to cap that.

I remember I was wanting to make my first million at 30.

That was my goal, right?

Hey, first million at 30.

And I told everybody just to your point, I'm gonna do it at 30.

I gotta do it, so.

And I remember being 30 and I'm sitting around to some relatives that were the naysay, you know, the negative ones.

Hey, I thought you were supposed to.

Vickers is supposed to be a millionaire at age 30.

30.

And I said, yeah, no, not there.

And my wife pipes up and goes, but he's halfway there.

And I just went, yeah.

And of course, the look went, oh, well, here we go.

And then it's building.

And I've been up and I've been down, and being up is way better.

Like I've been richer or it's rich is definitely better.

I highly encourage it, but it's really taking the fit.

We always learn from those mistakes.

Right.

We always learn from that end of it.

And then it's take the step forward again, get up and do it again.

And none of it's going with you.

You so just enjoy the trip.

And I. I think it's that journey and that whole work, life, balance.

I know you believe in that again, life of your dreams.

So I'm sure you'll do well with that book.

I'm excited to read it.

I've had a chance to go through the overview on it, but definitely going to be a read for me.

Mark, this was a real pleasure.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Appreciate it.

As you are listening to this episode, what is one idea that you've heard that has caught your attention?

And why does it matter so much to you?

And who is one person who you can share that with with either sharing this episode or just sharing that insight that occurred to you while you were listening?

Perhaps it is learning that the risk of staying the same can be greater than the risk of trying to do something new.

Or when your motivation is about helping others or making a difference, you unlock greater persistence and fulfillment.

Success becomes about legacy, not just achievement.

Thank you for listening, for learning, and for investing in yourself so that you can become the best version of you.

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This podcast is created and associated with Summit Media.

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Goodbye.