Brains vs Brawns with Tony Kassei & Steve Kuclo Ep 82
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From the art of the deal to keeping it real. Live from the Simply Vegas studios, it's The Power Move with Jon Gafford. Back again for another episode of this week's Power Move. Today, joining the studio, man, I got some ballers up here today. I'm not going to lie. I got some ballers. No Colts, no Chris, but you know.

Can't always, every day can't be Halloween. Today you just got me and yeah, but I brought in some friends, man, to spread some knowledge, spread some joy, spread some wisdom to the people out there. So two special guests today in the hot seat. First of all, I want to introduce one of my friends, one of the guys I met at Mastermind that I love and he's just such a great dude. And he's the guy that like, if you want to invest in something, if you're like, hey, let me take a look at something. This is the cat that you kind of run it by.

And he looks at it in two seconds and goes, that was bullshit. Don't do this. And that's Mr. Tony Kasai, who runs his mastermind. We'll talk about that, which is...

Your deal. So, Tony, welcome, man. Welcome. Thanks, man. Thank you for having us here in Vegas, man. This is a cool little spot. This is a very cool little spot. Sorry, we had an additional camera in front of a camera, which was not good, so I had to do that. Yeah, thanks for having me on. And you brought with us a new friend of mine that I met yesterday at a dinner last night. You know, once a friend, always a friend. You go to dinner, we're good. And that's Mr. Steve Kuklo, who is a five-time IFB coach.

bodybuilding champion. Yes, sir. Which means you eat good and you pick up heavy stuff. Pretty much. That's how it works. But again, man, that's one of those things where it's the lessons you learn through all of those things, through both of those. And you guys both have some stories of some struggle and coming through some adversity and things. And I think that

You know, obviously there's lessons and there's clues that get left behind that we like to help the people out as much as we can. So I'm going to start, we're going to do a double up today. We're double up and just for you guys out there, a little secret behind the scenes. We're just pinched for time. This was supposed to be two podcasts, but we're doing a two for today is how it works. Both of these guys totally worthy of their own segments in their own well.

but, but we're doing the two for today for, for times purposes in a non-sexual way. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it's early. So, you know, we're in Vegas. Who knows what's going to happen here. But Tony, let's start with you, dude. Cause, cause I know that you got it. You got a killer story, man. And, uh,

And you had some serious adversity. Things were good, then things were bad, and then things are good again. So walk me through, man, your, you know, we don't have to go back to kindergarten. But let's start where, you know, it picks up in the business world. When did you first get started in business? What was your, this is the first question I ask everybody. What was your first hustle, man? This can be a good answer. Dude, I loved selling that lemonade stand. My first dream was that little Fisher Price machine that you put in a little plastic coin and

I just loved money as a kid and all the movies about wall street, the, from the very first wall street movies, just anything about money excited me. Uh, we immigrated to this country, moved to Dallas. I actually was back then. It was a shithole from Iran. Yeah. You came from Iran. Yeah. Back when, before like it just back then it was a cool country and,

Now, you know, lunatics have taken over. But, you know, but yeah, man, growing up, you know, watching your parents kind of put every last dime into their children and sacrifice a lot. So you really appreciated that. Moved to Cal, Socialist Republic of California when I was 15. And now I still live in California. But that first hustle as a kid was the lemonade stand? The lemonade stand. That was the first one. What about you, Steve? What was the first hustle? What was it? Cut.

Cutting grass and killing bugs. Killing bugs? Yeah, my football coach in high school had a pest control company, and he brought me on, and I kind of mentored under him, worked under him for many years. So he kind of gave me that entrepreneur spirit. I could contribute a lot to him. Did you take it to like the Huckleberry Finn thing where you started recruiting your friends to like, hey, dude, I'll pay you three bucks an hour to cut this grass when you're making six? Did you pull that off? No, I didn't. No, no scale. No, no.

I didn't have that. I didn't have Tony in my side. I didn't have the power move to listen to. Tony would have taken one. Tony would have taken one look at that business plan and be like, nah, this is bullshit. Killing bugs is for nobody. But, uh, but Tony, man, so, so you started in finance relatively young, right?

Yeah. So we, uh, if you've ever seen the movie pursuit of happiness with Will Smith, very accurate depiction of my life. And the movie was actually one of those movies that was really dead on. He gets started at Dean Witter, which was Morgan Stanley. Uh, he gets his test. He goes to the world trade center. I was in the building about a week before the planes came in and I was supposed to move there. I got my licenses. I was pumped. I was the youngest kid at, and, uh, at Morgan at 21.

And I was a superstar as the youngest one there and met my future business partner there. And we stayed partners for about 1520 years and kind of went to LPL, Citigroup, went them all and then started my own firm. Wow. All right, cool. So how old were you when you started when you started your own firm? How old were you then?

I started working at 21, started my own firm probably about 31. So 31. So 10 years. So you did 10 years into the big thing and then you went your own way. Yep. So things were going pretty good for you at 31, yes? Yep. Doing pretty well. I went through the recession. I made, you know, just like everybody else, I bought a restaurant. Thought it'd be great to own a bar. It wasn't. Why do people think restaurants are fun? Like I spent a solid 15 years in the restaurant business, man. I promise you, there's

nothing. Well, here's the deal. Nothing glamorous about it. Well, here's the problem. This is what I, this is what I found. If you own a restaurant, a bar and I own some cool stuff, the cooler it is, the less money you make. It's kind of how it works. If it's just, you know, the ones that are just like the rundown kind of place with the board that says hamburger cheese, they're making money. They're printing money, but fancier. It is hard to make money. No way in our next door, right? Yeah. Cause you either got to be, although we'll say one of the smartest things I ever saw anybody do. And this is a funny story real quick. I'll digress from our conversation. So,

A buddy of mine named Jeff Hansen in Tallahassee, Florida, a million years ago. He was one of the bar owners there. I owned a bar there. And Jeff, who wound up later in life becoming the manager for Creed, which was funny, but Jeff had the best hustle ever. So we had two locations, right? And all the Florida State College kids would go home for like,

the summer, right? And then Jeff would like move all of his crap from one location to the other one. And then they would come home, they would come back for fall and be like brand new bar, just you open it up, brand new bar. And all the kids would be like, oh my God, there's a new club. And it was just the same light and sound and everything else. Paint the walls a little different and just be the new bar.

And then right towards the end of the semester, it'd be like, ah, start leaking it out. Things aren't going so well, we're gonna close down. And then right before the semester was over, he'd be like, it's the last three nights ever of Metropolis or whatever. And they would be packed for like the three nights before they went home. They would go home for Christmas, he'd move all his shit to the other building. They come back for spring, brand new bar. So he was...

always either brand new or like about to go out of business. And he just was packed and just bounced back and forth between these two spots for years. It was genius. Like those, uh, furniture liquidation places that are always going out of business. Yeah. The day they opened going out of business is how it is. So you took off on your own firm and that's doing well at 31. That's going well. So everything was going great. Uh,

My business partner at the time, he had a, right after the recession hit and in Southern California, you know, you were getting these $700,000 houses being foreclosed for one 31 50. So he had this vision to start buying them using first trustees, using some of our old clients, brought them self-directed IRAs. He resigned his licenses. I still had a passion for the business.

Kind of went our separate ways. Fast forward a few years later, dude's got like 30, $40 million worth of real estate. And I'm like, shit, I should have been doing that because I was breaking three, 400 grand back then. I didn't really know how to market. You couldn't use social media and I didn't have wealthy family or network to tap into. So I was really just grinding to make it into that industry.

And the average financial advisor is only making three to 400 grand. I mean, to get to the upper echelon, you really got to put some time in. So long story longer, one day one of our employees comes to us. And during that time period, I'd refer him business, he'd refer me. And I started kind of my mom, you know, half her life savings cycle. I'm like, well, fuck, invest it with Francisco. I call him fuck face.

invested with fuck face can we curse sorry not as god given not god given name that wasn't on the that wasn't on the actual funny story of that the grand lady so this grandma who lost money with them she was 86 years old she goes tony i've never cursed in my life but i refer to him as fuck face

She's on the stand and refers to him as fuck. - Yeah, when you get an old lady, Kurt Carson, that's a problem. You're a real winner. - That's a challenge. - So yeah, man, so we started doing some business together and I thought I had about five, $6 million worth of real estate with them because we'd be buying shit together. Families referred to him, referred to him about five, $6 million worth of clients assets.

And one day one of our employees comes to us and says, "Hey," comes to me and says, "I need to talk to you." And usually when an employee says that they want to borrow money. In this case, he starts crying and he says, "It's a Ponzi scheme." I'm like, "How's that possible? I've seen the tenants." He's like, "Yeah, but 10 people think they own the same house." So, yeah, if you've ever had those moments where you just want to throw up, I literally threw up. I just went to the bathroom. - Okay, so you get that piece of news.

And, you know, I mean, that's a level 10 issue, I would say. But I think in business, we all get problems. How do you process that information and get to a point where you can make a logical, decent, decision-based path forward? Like, what is that?

Like, do you take it? Do you, did you, did you wallow in it for like a day or two? Did you fucking booze yourself to pieces? I mean, like what was the process of getting to where you can make a logical decision? No, I, uh, I wish I could say that it was that quick, man, that it was one or two days, you know, but when you, when you came from nothing and then you thought you had it and when you grow up poor, uh,

you don't know you're poor. Everybody's playing stickball on the street, you know, but when you have money and then you look back, you're like, Oh shit, we were poor. But then when you lose everything, then you're like, Oh shit, I don't want to be poor. Um,

But I do remember like, you know, when it happened, I just knew if this is true, I need to find the tallest building and just jump off because it's not just me. It's not losing your own money is one thing, but when you have to look into people's eyes and to know that they're just, you have to deliver this news, you lose money to bad investment. Like we've all done. It's a bad investment. Well, it's just fraud and pure greed and evil. That shit really hurts my soul, you know? And so for 10,

know i knew that if that was true it wasn't just my clients because my clients maybe lost 10 20 with them he took every penny from some of his victims like every penny and this shit was devastating dude so no man there was about three four years really dark times uh i was we were talking about this last night with a good friend of ours tommy vex who's a more of a sober coach now and

And he was, you know, he confided in me a lot and kind of just gave me some things that really made me realize like the trajectory that I went through. But now, man, for three or four years, I did everything I could to hurt myself physically. But I always say I have an army of guardian angels that I owe because I would put myself in a car, drive 130 miles an hour, blasted, hoping that I would either die or get pulled over. And shame on me that I was putting other people in jeopardy. Nothing ever happened. Yeah.

Yeah. Somebody out there was looking out for me and now that's, that's kind of the mission to share. Let me ask this. And you don't have to get too deep if you don't want to, but did you find some redemption in making some people whole out of that? In two ways. One. Cause I know you and I have had conversations about the importance of even if you're the mouthpiece, you,

it's your responsibility to make people whole. And we, and we both taken some pretty decent hits from that. So there's certain clients that I knew, you know, they're 89 years old, this 500 a month that he'd promised him was everything. Yeah. So there's to this day, you know, there's sometimes that I would drive myself all the way down and make those payments for him, even though I didn't have to, I was not required to, nobody sued me. None of that stuff happened to me, but yeah,

I think the path forward for me, my mom one day said, you know, how do you get out of bed every day knowing you just lost everything plus five million of your own? And I said, maybe God did this to me today. So one day it saves me $50 million in a bigger lesson. Now, while that hasn't manifested itself in those big of a numbers, it is in this movement between inside investor club, partnering up with people like Steve, spreading a message of just, man, these

you and i see right now on facebook facebook automation spotify automation all this bullshit that you just look at i'm like dude these are scams and people are handing over billions of dollars to these assholes so that's why sometimes i get called i call out big people and i'm like dude that's bullshit what these guys are doing well i i love that we've we talked to last night about we won't name names but you and i were at an event yeah where quote unquote

you know, real estate guru, which is, you know, that's, that's my house. That's my, that's my will. And you know, I don't have a TV show yet, but you know, it's one of those things where I'm like, yeah. And this guy might not actually know what the fuck he's talking about. And you called him out. You've literally stood up in the stage and called him. We're not naming names, no names. There's shows on TV that you see like, you know, flipping shit. Yeah. But those guys don't know shit about real estate. Yeah.

And you called this dude out people called this dude out from the stage and he didn't know what his own offering was and it was It was pretty funny man. It was you know, I I find personally and this is always my first red flag You said something a minute ago that that you hear a lot especially like in real estate with some of the creative stuff When it's like well, it'd be better if you didn't have a license It's like when I hear that

That's a little bit of a red flag that jumps up when you're like, wait, I kept my security license. My other guy let it go. So it's like, that's like, that's if anybody ever says to you in a business deal, like, don't worry, I gave up my license. So it's fine. That's probably a problem. Would you agree with that? Did you give it up or was it taken?

No, no. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Did you voluntarily dig it up or was it just marked, you know, deleted one day? I will be honest with you guys though, man. I, uh, I, I, I had the hardest licenses to get the seven 24 66. Like I could license you to be a financial advisor. Anybody. And, uh,

Another thing, and this is another show, another segment, we can digress, but all these organizations, the three-letter acronyms, SEC, FINRA, they're not there to protect the investors. This is all some bullshit pyramid scheme of hierarchy of the five top firms, Merrill, Morgan, Goldman. It's just one big financial mafia, as I called it.

All the things that I'm talking about right now, I'd be banned or I'd get fired. I'd get censured. So I literally told FINRA to fuck off in a meeting. And I said, I want, you can have my licenses because I want to be able to share this message. Cause otherwise I'd write a book and it would come back censored from the firm. Like, dude, it's like Susie Orman wrote the book. It's not even me, you know? And you couldn't, you couldn't talk about those things that I wanted to talk about. Yeah. So,

You know, obviously being in that place, man, you know, part of a big part of the messaging here is trying to help people escape the drift. So when you've lost something, you've done that. I mean, I know we talked about you talking to Tony Vext and that and him kind of getting back in the path. What are you know, we talked a lot about depression on the show as well as about how you get out of those funk modes and those those those periods of time when you're in a funk. Like, what did you start to grab on to to start building momentum to putting this back together?

- You know, as cheesy as it sounds, this whole concept, especially when now people say, "What do you invest in? "If I have $10,000, what do I, I'm sure people, "if I have $50,000, what should I buy?" Like, if that's all you got, invest in yourself. And it sounds weird to say, but personal development, putting myself in the right rooms, proximity is power. These are all little buzzwords we hear in our industry.

But man, it was true. And one of my first mentors, Ryan Steumann, who we both know, he said something to me that really resonated. When he first heard my story, and I didn't know who the hell he was, God put me in a moment that I ended up on a private jet in Cabo with the last few thousand dollars in my pocket. You stayed at Casa Cabo? Yes, in Pedregal. I love that house. I've stayed at that house twice. I love that house.

- Dude, imagine like I've just lost everything. These people think I'm ballers. The requirement was to be a millionaire. Somehow I end up, and that's a whole other story of how I end up on the trip. I'm on the trip. I'm there with Steve Weatherford, Super Bowl champ. I meet him for the first time on the plane. I got Steumann who I had no idea who he was. So I'm starting to realize like, you know, these people are interested in my story. I still had lessons to teach, but he said something to me. He says, man, after he listens to it and in Steumann's way, he's like,

well i'm a double felon divorced three times if i can i can't get a job at mcdonald's what's your excuse and i was like i couldn't debate that you know so i think i think that the path out of uh depression path out of like what do i do now what's my next chapter uh we talked about this on the podcast with elise today waylon said something to me on one of those cabo trips too and he says man

i just turned the page and what if your whole life's a story and you just turn the page and you can write a new book tomorrow yeah and that was so simple but it resonated yeah it was a line from him you know what i know where it's from not necessarily that version of that but it was from young guns man uh keifer sullivan says at one point to the the uh the

the Asian lady that's the concubine to the bad guy or whatever. He says, you know, your past is like a paper book novel. When you're done with it, you throw it away and buy a new one. I didn't know that. That's the same thing. Yeah. So not to say that we'll plagiarize. We all take each other's shit. Exactly. Exactly. Um,

You know, it's funny that you say that. And I talk about frequency a lot with people and frequency with who you listen to. Because at the end of the day, it's funny you said we all steal from each other because...

That is true You hear the same thing there's stuff that you know, there's days when I've posted stuff and then two days later I see it essentially come up Reworded a little bit from somebody else and I'm like, you know and everybody kind of borrows But I think it's okay because I think in the in the in the framework of trying to help people You find a frequency that works with you. You find a frequency that resonates with you and like I

You can kick somebody the nuts all you want But if you're not resonating with them like you probably had people tell you Tony you turn around you need to pick it up You need to you need to pull this together. But for whatever reason I

It just happened to be Stuman that was on that frequency with you, that you heard that. - Correct. And I think the authentic gurus for lack of better word, right? If they're intentional or if their intention is to do good, they don't mind if you spread the same message. Like you were talking to Waylon and he started in his thing and he says, "I'm really following your path." And he says,

take my shit. So if you're not afraid, like your integrity and what you do with your real estate business, you want to share it. You're like, fuck it. I know how to make money. Let me show other people how to do it. Right. Well, I think, I think that's the mentality of understanding that it's not a zero sum game, right? Like I don't have to lose for you to win. It doesn't have to work that way. And I think,

And I think it's funny when you look at a lot of people that come up from humble beginnings, you know, they, they, they go through this process where it's this, this mine, mine, mine, mine, mine. And I've seen some people go and make a shit ton of money in real estate and do very, very well. And it's like, but what are you doing for somebody else? Like, are you, are you giving, are you reaching back as you strive forward? You know, are you doing that? And, and I've seen people that make a lot of money in this business that are very unhappy with

Right. They just, they never get fulfilled in it because they're not reaching back to help somebody else get forward. So, and I think that's anything I think, I think the people that are really trying to help in this, you know, education, investment, you know, health, whatever it is you're doing,

there's people that are out for a quick buck and there's people that really want to help people. And I think that's, that's a huge difference. So how do you tell the difference, Tony? You're the, you're the, you're the bullshit sniffer. I love it. How do you tell the difference? I think there's a lot of red flags, you know, and I think when you've been around the block a few times, it's, you know, when somebody is constantly telling you they're not something, you know what I mean? I'm not here to sell you. I'm not here to sell you. There's no pitch at this event, but run to the back and buy five of them and I'll give you the six free. Get the fuck out of here.

So there's a lot of that. I think there's a lot of, I also see, I always tell, I have a lot of girlfriends who are single or going through a divorce and always got sob stories. And somehow I become the therapist, my therapist, and I'm on white knight syndrome. I'm like Captain Save-A-Ho or something. I don't know. You bleached the red flag, as they call it.

But no, I always tell people, if you look at someone's life, their socials or whatever they are in their public persona, and they don't have a lot of friends from five, 10, 15, 20 years ago, that's a fucking red flag because that tells you that these people are recycling and churning their business friendships,

relationships i look first time i met you you know he's introducing his mom dad his cousins childhood friends uh you look at my lifestyle like i got friends from when i was five to 15 20. you like like you guys got a core group and that's why i was really aligned to you know fleischmann i look at him like one of the dudes that i've idolized fanboy from when i was like 20 years ago playing commerce casino and i didn't know who the hell he was

Funny story about him. I'm playing poker with the guy. I didn't know who he was. I just thought he was some nerd at a table. He's telling us to buy Ethereum at 37 cents. What?

- I'll buy a coin for 37 cents, wrote him off. 20 years later, I hit him up about it. He remembered the exact hand that he cracked me on, dude. - Dude, I will say that, I'll say that about Fleischman, man. His memory is terrifyingly good. - It's terrifyingly good. - The answer to your question is the people, you are who you surround yourself with. - Yeah. - You hang out with five alcoholics, you'll be the sixth.

So I've learned that I've tried to really align Steve, Steve's showed me on that a lot too, with faith and, and being around good people that are spiritually grounded. Yeah. Well, I think it's funny you say that because.

you know, the five friends and you talk about people that are around new people. And that's a red flag for me too. Like, like I've been to parties with very successful people where I got invited and they're like, oh, this is my best friend. You're like, oh, what's up, bro? And you'd seen your casualty off to side, like how are you guys? You know, high school, like how he's like, no, bro. I met him like six months ago. And I'm like, huh? He just described himself as your best friend. And you know, for six months, like my best friend, like went to camp with him.

with me and shit, right? It's like, that's kind of how that went, right? Saw me do some really stupid shit as an adolescent. The other guy we spoke about last night too on the crypto side, same thing. If you think about it in hindsight, they have a lot of friends from the old days. Yeah. Think about it. No, that's true. That's true. I missed that red flag. I'll tell you another one that I hang my hat on. This. And this is...

A little controversial with some people 'cause I understand maybe some shit happens. I don't like to do business with people that cheat on their spouses 'cause I think if they'll fuck them up, and literally, almost every single person that's ever fucked me over in business

cheats on their spouse. So I did it in front of me in some cases. And we supported it at the time. And for me, fuck face. I remember, you know, the dude had been married for 20 years. Yeah. His wife was an attorney. She put him through school. He got here as a dishwasher, worked at Denny's and he had two beautiful boys. And I would see him have this life.

and then go out we go to strip club he's banging hookers in the back has a mistress with the mistress and at the time i was just like i was just a guy being a guy maybe it's just this culture but if you're gonna cheat on your wife of 20 years with two young boys who the fuck am i of course you're gonna cheat on yeah of course of course of course so yeah man and it sucks when when people you know that comes out that happens because you know you're like try to do the

ah, you know, I'll walk in another, you know, I'm not gonna, I don't, I don't know what their life is like. I don't know what's happening with this, but at the same time, it's like, you gotta, gotta throw that caution flag up pretty hard. Oh yeah. Yeah. So, um, Steve, man, let's talk to you a little bit. Bring it. Yeah. Cause you, dude, you're just sitting there looking swollen. What not?

It's so funny because normally when I have two people on the couch like this, they're both kind of in frame, but you're just ginormous stuff. Like I got half of Tony's face on. Cause it just keeps leaning farther and farther away. I think it's like you have a gravitational pull. So let's talk about your story, bro. What's so I,

I know you were a firefighter. I know that's where it kind of started. So is that what you always, when you were a kid, like, I want to be a firefighter? Was that the goal? Was that the dream? No, I was actually, loved athletics growing up. Very successful in athletics. National champion in hockey. Actually got in the Hockey Hall of Fame as a youth. Where did you play? Up in Michigan. I grew up in Detroit area.

Really? I lived for a very short amount of time. I lived in Detroit. Okay. East side. I lived at 13 Mile and Ferris in Royal Oak. Okay. Yeah. I got transferred in a much younger version of me, in a mid-20s version of me. I was upper management for Hooters of America, which is a fucking great job if you're 20 years old.

It's a great job when you're 24. Again, didn't make a lot of money doing it, but it was a great job. And at one point I got moved up to Michigan to run all those restaurants there. And I was from Florida. First time I'd ever lived anywhere where it snowed. Not fun. Sky went gray in...

probably September and stayed gray until April. Seven months of depression. Yeah. I spent the, I spent, I spent the cyclical. I spent the winter there. I called my boss who was the vice president. I said, let me tell you a story about a guy, John. You said, what's that? And I said, uh,

I'm moving back to Orlando or Atlanta in two weeks. And he goes, you're quitting? I go, that all depends on you. But I'm telling you, I'm moving back to one of those two places in two weeks. And he's like, fuck, let me call you back. He's like, Orlando. I'm like, what the matter? And normally it was funny because I went all over the country with that company. And when I would leave a place, I'd be like to the girls, I'm like, oh, come back and visit you guys. I'll see. When I left Detroit, I'm like, I won't book a fucking flight over this city. If the flight path is going over this, I'm going to take a connection so I can get around it.

I've heard it's changed a lot. I heard there's a lot. It's a lot different in Detroit. A little bit. But we'll go. Okay. I heard you wouldn't even recognize it. It's a beautiful place now is what I hear. I mean, it's still the gray skies, but I hear that they built it up. Okay. It's like waxing your armpit. It's still an armpit. It's still an armpit. Okay. Fair. Fair. I had good times in Windsor. That was fun. Over the bridge in Windsor was good. There you go. Anyway, so grew up in Detroit, played hockey. Yeah, I was big in athletics. I mean, fuck, doesn't that kind of tell you everything you need to know right there about the guy just going into it? Yeah. Yeah.

And very successful in that. Could have pursued professional sports on that route. Loved training. Training was kind of, that became a passion, a true passion of mine. I loved being the biggest, strongest, fastest guy no matter what I did. I played football in high school. In hockey, I loved being. You couldn't have been this big playing hockey.

though. No, no, no, no. I mean, I was still a big, I was genetically a big kid. So it wasn't like I was 150 pound kid that got picked on in school and decided like, I'm going to take a bunch of steroids and get huge. You got the ad in the back of the magazine where they're kicking sand in your face. You're like, yeah, that's what I'm going to do. No, I had a purpose and an intention of like why I wanted to do it. And I just responded really well. And I was like,

I was one of the strongest guys, you know, I just had success in, in that area. Um, I was actually going to school to be a mechanical engineer in the automotive world. Back up real quick. You mentioned the East side of St. Louis, St. Detroit. Okay. Of Detroit. Sorry. So you're talking about like 13 and Gratiot. You said 13 and Gratiot. Okay. All right. So you're talking about like Roseville. You're talking about like, okay, there you go. All right. So, so you,

not exactly the mean streets, the roll them up. I went to high school on eight miles. So a lot of people were like, Oh, way over. I was in East Detroit in that area. Okay. Yeah. So East Detroit, nicer part of Detroit, Sterling Heights. I moved to Dallas 20 years, almost 20 years ago. And that's,

you know, the ghetto parts of Dallas. I'm like, this is really nice. You know, I'm like, the nice parts of Detroit are like the ghetto of Dallas. I can tell you some here. So you're in school for mechanical engineering? Yeah, mechanical engineering. Did your parents work for the automotive? No, no, blue collar. My mom was a hairdresser. My dad was a chef. Well, can I ask you a question? Because one of the things that was fascinating to me about Detroit, and we have talked about this at length on this podcast, is...

the hamster wheel trap that seems to happen to people in that area where it's like Midwest, you are born. You literally go to the same high school that your parents went to. You marry your high school sweetheart work. You play golf. You buy a house. You buy a house, you buy a house, three, three streets away from your parents.

next door to your buddy from high school and you just wash and repeat. And they get stuck in this life. People from Detroit are going to hate us right now because we're spilling tea out of Detroit. Yeah, but it was the hardest place I ever lived to make friends. It really was because people are like, I already got fucking friends. I got my friend from high school. I don't need more friends. I already got friends. It was like the most difficult place to break in. Great people. It's blue collar to a T. How did you get out?

I just decided to make the move. Well, so I'll finish my story about going to school to be a mechanical engineer. My grandfather was in the automotive industry, a designer draftsman. I was like, I love vehicles, love, you know, race cars. I had that passion too. Um,

during that time, the automotive industry was just tanking. It was when they were laying off three, five, 10,000 people at a time. And I'm like, why am I going to school for to try to fight for a job that I'm not going to have? It's not going to be there. So I went to my parents one day, I had some friends in the, in the fire service and I love learning about the body as well. And I ended up, I said to my mom, I said, I want to go be a firefighter paramedic. You know? So then I put myself through school, uh,

applied all over the U.S. It was still a difficult time because it was kind of going into the 2004-2005 where everything was just starting to decline. Ended up getting hired for the city of Dallas in 2006. Moved down there, started a career. At the same time, pursuing bodybuilding at higher levels. Started off winning some pretty big shows as a teenager, Teen Nationals.

That led into some national level shows winning the overall at a very young age. Don't skip over that because I think here's the deal. Dude, look, obviously you can tell I know everything about bodybuilding just from the fucking ribs. You're like a Greek guy over here. Come on. Chisel, chisel. But no, but the point is like the level of dedication that you have to have to that, to –

I mean dude ice cream tastes good Brownies are good. You're a fried chicken delicious, but to just have the dedication To even I mean forget the hours in the gym and everything else, but just the complete dedication to the diet that is a level of Commitment that most people just don't possess right? So the question is

Is that innate or is that learned or is that decided? How do you get to that level of commitment to fucking anything?

I think it's a little bit of each one of those. It's definitely decided because you have to make the decision to do it or not. Yeah. It's kind of in you. I think if you have that drive and that discipline, I think it comes from your childhood where you disciplined as a kid. Like, did your parents discipline you to not do something stupid or not hurt yourself? Yeah. So I think there's a few aspects of all those into it.

you know, becoming ultra disciplined or being willing to make sacrifice to have success. Were there moments of great adversity through your life as a kid or were they manufactured adversity through sports?

which is, which is why I love you sports. That's why I love it. It was more sport driven. Like I, I, I had a very promising future in sports. If I wanted to pursue that route, my parents and family were huge supporters of me into this day, still come to my bodybuilding shows. I mean, biggest fans, everybody knows me in, in the, in the industry, any competition to go to that I'm competing in. I mean, I have a huge fan base. My family's there screaming. Like it's just, I've always had that support system. Love it. Um,

But yeah, there's been adversity. I mean, you know, you don't win every show. You don't win every title. You don't win every championship. And you hear stories like, you know, I came home when I was 10 and my parents were gone and I had to raise myself. And you're like,

fuck, well, that didn't happen to me. What's my excuse? You know, but you know, that's why I love, cause I mean, one of the hardest things and you guys are, you're about to be a father for the first time. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm telling you, you don't even realize how much you're going to worry about this, but you are going to worry every day about screwing your kid up by just like,

letting them tag along with your lifestyle. Right. Like it's going to be such a concern of yours. And like, I'm so concerned every day that we're screwing our kids up. I'm like, Oh, we're going to the beach in Newport. Oh, we're going to take the jet. It's like, Oh my God, am I screwing these kids up? Right. So I love sports. I love athletics because in, in,

situations like us where dude my kids are never going to worry about where their next meal is coming from they're never going to have to worry about are we going to lose the house they're just not going to have to worry about these things but if i can manufacture any type of adversity to put in front of them through sports i think it's a good plan and i think probably somebody you had a good upbringing there's no you know crazy stories of you know dad comes home and smacks you right this doesn't happen so i think by your early involvement with sports at a very high competitive

thing probably developed that level of commitment that you were able to take into bodybuilding. Correct. 100%. All right. So-

You're doing well in the shows. Yeah, so... You're fighting fires, but dude, you're like a superhero. You're like all jacked up and you're like fighting fires. Okay, so... Yeah, I mean, from my first show, people were like... Were you doing it in a mask or just no cape? No, no. Okay, there it is. People see who you are. A little Speedo, that's all I have. You Google me, you'll see the Speedo. Awesome. Anyways, no, we...

Everything kind of led into my bodybuilding. Like you said, the sports, the discipline, it's all kind of funneled into there. And having – from my first show, I had people come up to me like, you have something. And I always thought you had to be the top of the game to get on stage. I always thought you had to be Mr. Olympia to compete. But obviously there's a starting point, entry point in everything. Every industry, every sport, you have a starting point. For me, it was –

it was success because I did do well, I did win. And that just kind of steamrolled in the industry at the time there wasn't social media. It was very magazine driven, very, there was like internet forums and stuff like that. And, and, and I got a lot of notoriety at a young age from my success, you know, and people ask me today, how do I, how do I get, you know, sponsored or how do I do this? Well, let's back up. What age? Like 19, like 20, 19, 20. All right. So dude, you're yoked. You're 19. People are talking about you. How do you,

Or was there a phase of complete asshole, Steve? No. No? You never got there? No, I never was asshole, Steve. How? Because some of the best advice, and I owe this a lot to my football coach who I told you I worked for in high school and...

I saw the way he treated his wife and I had a lot of great examples that I'm more of an observer than I am like just do something off the off the whim you know I like to watch people and and not overly talk and definitely like to absorb a lot more so never had an asshole phase because some of the one of the best advice I ever heard and I carried this through my career because I've had been on you know flex magazine the magazines all over the world been on covers and big net you know titles and all this

And the advice was the same people you see coming up are the same people you see coming down. Mm-hmm.

And, you know, like when your friend from high school, they always say, don't forget about us. And there's some truth to that because, you know what, you may get to a point at some time that you're not going to be riding that wave and being like the top of your game. And, you know, you're going to come down a little bit. You're going to have that success story, but you're not going to be like in the spotlight. Yeah. And in sports especially, you see as soon as somebody stops competing or retires, people forget about them. They're like, you know –

Fuck them. Who is it? It's a shame. Until they show up in bankruptcy court. Yeah, it's a shame that it's like that. But if those people treated a lot of those people bad along the way, if the athletes, if the...

you know, popular person, however you want to say influencer was an asshole along the way. Like why somebody that you treated like shit going to bring you in and be like, yeah, that's fine. Like you treated me like shit, but we can be friends now. Like if somebody did it to me, I'm not going to be cool with them. Is it, let me ask you, is there big dollars in professional bodybuilding? Does it seem like, I mean, it seems like you probably have to work way,

way harder than a lot of the other sports. - I think the way you explained it to me from a business model standpoint, that whole industry has shifted now, right? - It has changed because of social media a bit and you don't have to have accolades now to get sponsorship

by companies you know if you have a big following you can get a a sponsorship and they'll pay uh you know six figures for doing stuff but back in the day you you know you were a guy that showed up in expos you shook hands you traveled made appearances and i did that to the last until a couple years ago probably pre-covid was i mean every weekend i was making appearances you go to expos you don't have to do that to keep yourself out there was that it's a

it's not necessarily a requirement, but it's, it's a requirement in a way to, to keep you, you know, your fan base building and to keep, you know, when people get to meet you, like, man, you're really nice. I'm like, what'd you expect? Like I just, a big muscly asshole. Like, it's funny. Like people really think that that's, I mean, I didn't think that I'm not saying I thought Tony told me you were an asshole. That's funny. At lunch today, his wife says, you know, when I first met Steve, I was like,

I don't want to date an asshole bodybuilder. I also believe if any woman you ever meet doesn't think you're an asshole when you first met them, you're not going to wind up with them. They got to hate you a little bit when you first start out. So it's got to work. So now you've taken the idea. So you took all the bodybuilding, took the dedication, took all of that stuff. And you've now kind of turned it into a,

a program and it's not just about health and fitness it's not that i love that when you were telling me about that last night you're like look bro this isn't just another let me show you how to get a six-pack yeah because we all this is another 90-day challenge yeah look i mean my buddy bradley says that all the time i everybody knows how to get a six-pack you just don't want to do the work to get it right and that's just how it is um but you've turned it into

an event, a mastermind group that is about more than just fitness. So I want you to talk about that, man. So,

So my vision with things and being in an industry where I've helped people in bodybuilding, it's crazy because it's a very selfish sport. But at the same time, when you'd meet people and people would come up to you and say, man, you saved my life or you inspired me to get back in the gym and I lost 100 pounds. Like you think, man, that's really rewarding. And also being on the fire side, you save somebody's life and they thank you. You do something. You may not even get thanked. It's a thankless job most of the time.

And but, you know, you did something to help people. And to me, like that generosity is a core value of mine. And I believe in that. And I'm very much a giver. I love to connect people. And but I don't respect expect anything out of of doing those things. Yeah. So to me, it was like I want to create something bigger than me and I want to be able to pour into people, bring value to people that are going to help them level up all areas of life.

Because like you said, somebody may be super rich and doing great in business, but they're miserable at home. Their wife hates them, their kids hate them, or their health is deteriorating daily. Those kind of things. And it's like, okay, how do we level up those areas? And an example, as I was telling this to a friend of mine when I was kind of pitching this idea in my vision with this, he's like, you know, I see it. He's like, it's actually Steve Weatherford who's actually speaking at my event. Amazing, amazing human being. He's like, it's like a decathlon.

He goes, you may be great at one event, but you may suck at all the other ones and you're never going to win it. But you may get third or fourth place in all the events and you're going to dominate. You know, one of the things that I don't know where I got this. I know I stole it because I didn't come up with it. But one of the things that I do for my team is I have this exercise where I've got nine spokes on a piece of paper, right? And I say, okay, here's what I want you to do. You take this and I'll tell man, I don't know what they all nine of them are, but it's like faith, family,

you know, relationships, you know, spiritual health, you know, all the, all these things. And you write a number between one to nine for each of them, nine being the highest and one being like a suck. Right. And then I have a piece of paper that has all of them out on a thing. And then you draw a dot, however far it is away from that. And then you connect all the dots to make a wheel.

And it's amazing. And you look at your, and everybody's wheels are flat, you know, they have flat sides and it's like, it's a metaphor for life. Like your life won't roll properly if you're not balanced in all areas. So I think what you're trying to do and bring balance to all of that stuff. Yeah. Correct. It's helped. It truly is helping people create the best version of themselves and leveling up those areas. I think we all need help.

I think if you're willing, like Tony just said, the best investment you can make is in yourself. If you're willing to pay the price to be in the room, to meet somebody, align with people. And I spoke on that a little bit last night. The alignments in my life have led me to where I am right now. It's not based on what I've thought about in my own vision and everything like that. It's been the alignments that I've established in my life that have led me to where I am right now. Yep. Yeah, I never say no when I tell my wife all the time. One of the advantages of living here is...

There's always somebody coming into town to do something. There's always somebody, and we get a lot of calls, like the one Tony's like, hey, come to dinner. I just always say yes, because I just always assume there's going to be cool people there, right? And it never disappoints. That was a cool dinner. It never disappoints, man. It never disappoints. It never does. So if I'm somebody that is looking to, man, just maybe change my room a little bit. And I like this, and I talk about masterminds a lot, and I'm a member of several, and I've drifted in and out of several of them.

And, you know, it's good to change the room sometimes, man. It is. So if I'm looking at somebody like maybe, maybe I'm not getting everything. Maybe I'm not feeling like I'm getting everything out of life. You got an event coming up. Yeah. Talk about the event, dude. May 26th. It's called Upgraded Human Mastermind. And that's the mastermind that I'm creating that I'm launching into my group training stuff that is, it's called Upgraded Human.

So again, you know, we all need an upgrade. I think if you're okay with where you're at in life, like you're just, you're going to decline and people are just going to pass right by you. So to me, it's like, let's make a, even if it's just a one degree shift into something new or something better, those small nuggets each day that are going to just build up over and over and over and go just help you. So May 26th, Tony's going to be one of our speakers. I've

I've established, again, I'm a relationship guy and I have seven amazing speakers, including myself to be eight and my wife speaking. Sean Whalen's a speaker. Jesse Lee's a speaker. Steve Weatherford. Jesse's awesome. Jesse's amazing. I got anabolic ducts. So I got a health aspect of things. I got a business aspect of things. I have faith, relationship. Like we're going to hit on all these areas and I want people to walk away and be like, man, that was the best three or $800 I spent in, in,

to be in a room with people and just really like walk away. Like I feel like a new person, man. I gotta tell you, all those guys are great. And I'm going to, I'm going to go deep on Jesse Lee right now. If you don't know who she is, Google boss Lee, look her up, dude, watching her, who is such an incredible baller deal with her very public, uh,

battle with colon cancer right now is fucking amazing. Yeah. It's, it's, it's amazing to watch. She's, she is an amazing human being. And, uh, I, I think we both are, I mean, I'm a huge, huge fan of hers. Yeah. Um, I think it's a testament to the level of event this is gonna be. Yeah. For this being, I mean, he's, this is also his seventh year that he's thrown the Kukla classic, which is a qualifier for the Schwarzenegger, which is the next day.

So all our event attendees get to come to that event as well. So it's kind of a way to kind of mesh these cultures together, if you will. I know how much you love rolled up guys. Thanks. Thanks.

But no man, I mean, I think it's really cool to, you know, you and I both met in a mastermind. We've been involved in several different ones and each one of them has a strength and weaknesses, but I think what we're doing a little bit different, if I could give you a little bit of credit on this one, like he hits me up yesterday. I mean, we've had a three day long kind of long session started in Frisco came out here, but he says, Hey, can I come to your room and talk?

Like, I'm tired, man. And he comes in with a notebook. And he's sitting here. And for two and a half hours, it turns into deep conversations about, let's just make this the most powerful event that anybody could come to. And I think the biggest differentiation this is going to be, when you look at the caliber of speakers, and you just nailed it. And that's why I'm elaborating on this. It's Jesse Lee's vulnerability. Tommy Vax talking about coming from like--

you know, brother murdered him to homeless to now triple platinum recording artists to being canceled by, you know, mainstream media. I can't get a recording contract, but he's got Trump on speed alley just because he wanted to sing a song. And bro, and bro, I'm not going to lie.

I did some Tommy vexed Googling this morning on the, on the Google machine. I watched, I watched some, I watched dude, his shit is great. No, you're listening to this. Like my wife walk in and she's like, what are you listening to? What is that? Like, is it what you listen to? Like God smack? I'm like, no, it's just cat. I was at dinner with last night that,

You know, this is his only outlet for his art is to put it here because nobody will sign him because he said some political shit. He had the number one song on iTunes. And right now, if you go to Spotify and you say, play me this song by Tommy Vex, it'll play you something else. Like he's so canceled at such a high level that it's really, because he said he supported Trump. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? And it's crazy. You know, the vulnerability there, the vulnerability that he talks about, you know, my story isn't like, Hey man, I'm this Rolex drive in McLaren, dude. It's like,

And I'm still trying to figure shit out. I paid a bigger tax bill last year than most people make in a year, you know? But that's because of the fucking hole I put myself in. Did we all. The vulnerability, I think, that somebody can speak at from stage, whether for the first time I heard him in Cabo, it brought me to tears. You know, dude wins the Super Bowl, puts a gun in his head that night because his father didn't tell him, like, was like, hey, didn't even say good job. You know what I'm saying? So when you have an event that you can actually pour into people but leave them with an actionable manual, here's the things you're going to do

Here's what you're going to do if you want to improve your faith with your family. So I'm excited, man. May 26th, May 25th is going to be a VIP night at Jerry Jones' private club. If they want to find out more about the event, how do they find that? Website, upgradedhumanmastermind.live. Upgradedhumanmastermind.live. And if they want to find you guys, how do they find you guys?

- Throw the gram out, dude. - Yeah, yeah. For me, it's @theinsiderinvestor. That's on Instagram, probably the easiest, @theinsiderinvestor. And then if you guys want more info on our private mastermind, it's just @insiderinvestors. We just like, you know, try to provide value to people. I don't sell shit. We invest in things together. If you and I are gonna buy this building together, let's get a good group of people together, cut out the middleman, cut out the bullshit. - No carve out. - Yeah, no finance, acquisition fees, disposition fees, and all this bullshit. Don't get me started.

And how do they find you? Well, I mean, if you're not blocking out the sun, how do they find you? Same way, social media. I think that's an easy way to access people now. Yeah, always. It's kind of great. At Steve Kuklo, K-U-C-L-O. They can follow, send me a message, anything like that. And then Upgraded Human Mastermind is good. Well, Jed's...

I appreciate the time so much today, man. It was a good conversation. I wish we had more time. Unfortunately, I got to go. John, one more thing. We're going to come back. I actually just, I always forget about it because I'm so excited about this shit. So I just got a deal on iHeartRadio. My boys who've been on CT101 out in Cali on Power 103

six with big boy in the mornings and Ryan secret. I mean, these guys are legends in the scene, but they started a movement about 15 years ago talking about legalization of cannabis when cannabis was illegal everywhere. So they have the number one show on I heart radio for 13 years running 164. They've now honored me to be on every Friday, financial Fridays, talking about shit like this. I'd love to have you on there. Yeah,

man. And we can smoke a fake doobie for all the people in Texas. I gotta tell you, God bless you. You want to smoke it? Smoking dope makes me tired and hungry. I'm already tired and hungry. I don't need any help with that. Right. I need no help with that. Anyway. Well, Jen, thanks so much for coming in. I appreciate it. It was an awesome episode. If you like this man, give us a like and subscribe. That's my pandering. Give us a follow, hit the notifications, do all that stuff, whatever, you know, four star, five star, whatever the highest star thing you can do, do that.

That's fine. Anyway, we'll be back next week with another episode of the power move. Thanks guys. Thank you, brother. Hey, it's John Gafford. If you want to catch up more and see what we're doing, you can always go to the John Gafford.com where we'll share any links that we've things we talked about on the show, as well as links to the YouTube where you can watch us live. And if you want to catch up with me on Instagram, you can always follow me at the John Gafford. I'm here. Give me a shout.

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