Unlocking Your Calling (grieving & transitions)

God said, "I will never give you a word for people that you hate." And you know what blows my mind? They get the business advice, and then they want to talk about Jesus. When your assignment changes, He makes sure you understand it. There's no room for plausible deniability. You're either going to hear it and disobey, or you're going to hear it and obey.

If you're writing the songs, but you're not living the songs, there is no power in the song. No one is teaching people how to get rich by telling them to really enjoy being poor. The thing I am the most afraid of doing, period, at all. Everyone wants to get to the high places, but if you want to go high, you first have to go deep.

All right, what's up, crew? Welcome to the deep end. The deep end. We're going off the deep end today. Um, today is going to be, I think, a really vulnerable time. It depends. It depends on if we're feeling it or not. I want to talk a little bit about, I actually want us to have a discussion about seasons, grieving, obedience, disobedience. MH. Something I am quite familiar with. And how do you handle transition? People get their identity and their assignment confused. And God will take you through seasons where you're, you have an assignment that is good, and it's fruitful, and it's fun. And then sometimes God will change your assignment. But if your identity has gotten woven into your assignment, you can't get out of it. And if God actually cares about you, which I believe that He does, I don't know if you've ever experienced this. Mhm. Where you won't let an assignment go, He will remove that assignment from you in an effort to help you and get your attention. Yeah.

Do you want to talk about any of the comments from, uh, I don't think they're going to be super relevant to this. So if you want to still hit him, we can. But dive right in. If you're watching this, just a reminder to, um, so we post clips from this on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, YouTube Shorts. I mean, people literally lose their minds. Did you see my TikTok I posted yesterday? Mhm. Did you like it? It was funny. Dude, and we're po-, we're talking about how God wants to be involved in the little details of your life. And it's like, dude, people are, um, it's the Christians that don't agree with us. They don't believe that God wants to talk to them. And then you have this man who says, "I'm a Muslim." And we have this phrase, and he's like, "I believe this." I'm like, "How Muslims get it." Mhm. Hindus get it. Even Buddhists get it. Christians don't want to get it because they're, they're actually in religion. So anyways, let's talk about seasons. Uh, are you ready to talk about this? Yeah, for sure. Been through a lot of changes in seasons in the past, past couple years. Yeah, you have. It's been great.

I want to write, I want to, I want to share this post first, okay? If I can. And for the record, if I'm a little somber today, it's not because, it's not because I'm not passionate about the subject. It's because in my life, there are some changing assignments. Dude, someone sent me a, uh, did I text you that picture of someone who got this word from Holy Spirit? They've been trying to teach this person to listen to the Holy Spirit. M. No, someone texted me and they said, "Hey, I've just got to tell you this. I, I've been, I've got a friend that I've been trying to teach them to listen to Holy Spirit." And I watched your "How to Hear from God" video, and they watched it. And then they texted me ecstatic, really losing their minds. And they said, "I finally heard from Holy Spirit." And I was like, "What did they say? What did, what did He say?" And, uh, her friend, she's, her friend says, "Holy Spirit said, 'Prepare yourself, because there is an apostle coming with an anointing for business, and it's in this place, and it's in a place that I'm going.'" And I don't think this person made the connection right away that it was me until I talked about it. And then she was like, "That's, that's you." And you would think that, dude, honestly, you would think that if anyone in ministry got that text, I think they would be ecstatic by it. Yeah.

I don't actually like that because, and I'm going to share with you why. Like, I don't actually, I'm being called into some things right now that I actually do not like. People are not used to this. I don't think people, I don't think anyone is really vulnerable about it. Maybe a couple of people that I listen to. Mhm. But people should know right now that I do not want to be, uh, the person talking about this stuff. I want to grow businesses, buy farms, trade. I want to, like, go, I want to hide. And so I'm going to read this post, and then I think we can talk about it because it's, there's a lot of stories that we can tell.

So here's the post: "Confession: I did not want to talk about Jesus." So sometimes I still don't. I grew up in church. I left ministry to escape, if we're being honest. When I say grew up in church, I mean I was literally born into the mega-church scene. I've been a part of five churches, and four of them were mega-churches. I've toured hundreds of churches, and I spent way more of my life doing ministry than doing business. From the ages 0 to 9, I was at one of the biggest Assemblies of God churches in the country in Louisiana, then Memphis. Grew into a sprawling church with tons of locations, then Missouri. I met my bride, Lindsay, at church. Bro, she was leading worship for, um, Easter Sunday. Mhm. 30,000 people. I mean, it's a huge church. Uh, we would do, we would do like worship, um, conferences outside. 110,000 people. There's like 20,000 people a service, right? Yeah. But like outside, 110,000 people at one time. Oh, wow. So like, they would have literally racks of, of, uh, speakers every four or 500 feet. And anyways, for most of my life, I played and led worship on staff. And in Memphis, we would do 10 to 13 services a weekend. I got really burned out. All of these churches were great, but they were run like businesses. And one day I thought, "If I could go into business and use what I learned on staff, I will make a lot of money, and maybe I won't burn out." And then I scaled everything I touched for almost a decade. 00 staff, millions of leads, blah, blah, blah. When I left church life, I was accustomed to working 50, 60, 70 hours a week. 40 hours a week was a joke to me. So I pulled my full work week, and then I started other things on the side. Years later, I landed in Nashville and have been at the same church since 2016. I love my church that I'm at right now, and we actually have a video where I talk about that story because it was like a God moment. Mhm. And, uh, that's, that's been my life since 2016. Play, play on the weekends, business during the week. Back to that was the forgiveness. I think that was the post about forgiveness, right? Yep. Grow up and forgive them. Yes. Grow up and forgive them. That's the video. Yeah. Yeah. I completely walked away from music and church in general. And anyways, um, the stuff I used to share on social media was way more comfortable for me. Do this, run ads, here's how to make money, get rich, blah, blah, blah. You know, it was, it was easy for me. I can take something and grow it pretty effortlessly at this point. But the latest stuff, this stuff, this that's coming from this show, it's vulnerable. It's scary because it's real, and I've wrestled with it a lot for three years. Jake, talking about you in this post, who runs all of our content. And I gave you a nice little plug in this too. Thank you. I'm just going to send you some clients. You're going to send me some clients. Dude, make some money. Uh, Jake, you tried to get me to talk about spiritual stuff for years, and it was always an instant shutdown. I was like, "Nope, that's not what I do anymore." You remember those conversations? In the first interview that we had, you, you want me to bring this up? Oh, yeah, let's talk about it. The first call after you made a post about on Facebook that you want a brand manager, before I even came in to be interviewed, you called me on the way to Carbon, on the way to the gym. Mhm. And I remember you called me. I still have a journal entry somewhere, and it said, "Remember, it said, 'You told me God told me to share the gospel through the lens of business. That's what I'm called to do, and I cannot find anybody who seems to to get that vision.'" Those were your exact words. Yeah. I've got it in a journal somewhere because I wrote every word. You had done a SC-, what's funny about that is I knew sometimes, Jake, that's so powerful what you just said because when, when God's calling you to do something, it ain't a surprise. You know? And usually the, the problem is, I was like, "This is what I'm called to do." And then for about a year and a half, you were like, "Let's do it." I was like, "No, no, no, no. Let's talk about sales. Let's talk about advertising." Um, but I didn't feel comfortable with it until one day it just accidentally came out, and I couldn't take it back, and it blew up. That was like one of our first pieces of content. And, and you were like, "I remember when that, when that happened, you were like, 'Bro, look at your Instagram.' I mean, it's, it's 50 times as much engagement as all of the other stuff." Mhm. But I didn't want to use God to grow brands because I had seen that in the mega-church world. And people, pastors, pastors, you know, I love these people. None of them feel like they're doing that, but a lot of them are. Mhm. I was trained on this stuff. I know how these are the, dude, these are the best speakers in the world. It's like, you can control the population of a small city in a 45-minute sermon. And I just didn't want to do it, and I wasn't going to be a part of that. But I told you, I was like, "Okay, well, let's do it one more. Let's, let's do it." This was only like a year ago. Mhm. And even still, I was like, fighting with it. But people started messaging me, and they started engaging with this content. And a video with 200 views would get more messages than a video about business with 20,000 views. And Holy Spirit started speaking to me. And I was telling one of my, cuz I, I work with one-on-one clients, and I'm partnering into these equity things. And bro, my one-on-one clients are awesome. Like, we don't have, I'm on a waiting list for it. And, uh, people pay like $100, $50 grand a year just to get business advice. And you know what blows my mind? They get the business advice, and then they want to talk about Jesus. It just happened a couple days ago. Yeah. And someone was like, "How did you learn this?" And I was like, "Well, um, I'm walking back around out back by the pool, and I started sharing the story, and I was like, God just started talking to me, and I couldn't ignore it." Didn't you have a moment a couple years ago where someone paid like $10,000, got into your program just to ask you why you're rich and still a Christian? Yes. 2018, way long ago. Um, but yeah, so Holy Spirit started getting my attention. He started to speak to me. You should watch the video from last week if you want to learn how to like tune into that. Um, and dude, you know what I told him? No, no. Cuz no. And then, you know what he did? He just, just started sending people with like random prophetic words like that text message. People would show up in my house and be like, "God told me to tell you this." And that's the thing about God. Back to the post, is, is the thing about God is, is when your assignment changes, He makes sure you understand it. There's no room for plausible deniability. You're either going to hear it and disobey, or you're going to hear it and obey. There's no such thing as like, "Well, I just didn't know." And this is also why it's important when you feel something you're supposed to share something with someone, you should, you should do it. Because because you could be what God is using when someone's not listening, right? And sometimes we, we hear things. In fact, I'm not going to give you any details about this, but there's someone that I was at church on Sunday, and Lindsay leaned over to me, and she said, "God told me you had a word for this person." And I said, "Nope." And the Holy Spirit gave me a, a word, just a name, just a name. He said, "He is this." So I looked it up. I never heard of this name before. It's a Levite in the Old Testament. And I started studying, and that's how you know, I'm like, "There's no way I would have come up with this name." And, you know, I haven't shared, I'm not, I haven't shared this with, I don't know how to share that with this person. But that's the thing is, God will use you. And a lot of times, it's like, gonna feel uncomfortable because this dude is a big deal, and I do not want to have a word for this guy. I do not want it. Don't want it at all. Anyways, that's a different, that's a different thing. Back to the post. If you're spiritually tuned, whether you're a Christian or not, you're going to feel a lot of stuff from now until the end of the year. It's, it's pretty wild. Like the currents are strong. I texted you this, Jake, the other day. Um, you can't run from the things that you're supposed to say anymore. For some of you, the most important thing that you can do is the thing you are most afraid of doing. The most important thing for you to say is the thing that could be amazing, or it could get you ostracized. It could get you canceled. Getting in flow is dangerous. You will have to give up your fake version of control and step into a river that is moving way faster than you are. But the adventure is unbeatable. There are mountains that you are called to climb that no one else in history has been able to climb. Most people might not even know that the mountain exists, but you will climb it. You will be the first in a long line of generations to break the cycle of apathy, debt, stagnation, decay, and suffering. But to do it, you're going to have to open up your mouth and begin to say things that you have never given yourself permission to say. Part of why I exist is to help you break the patterns. With enough exposure and repetition, I will help you believe what is already true: that you can do anything, become anything, that nothing can really kill you unless you choose to stay hidden in the dark. Your past is not a liability; it is your degree, your tuition, your training, your title. To move into the land of your future, own it one scary step at a time, and I'll be going with you."

All right, so that's the frame. And then when you read that, you feel really good. You feel lit up by it. You know, like, yep, you're not alone. When you read it, I think you probably felt the same thing that everyone else felt. Mhm. And that thing blew up. And people are like, there's, there's one person in particular. She's a friend. Uh, she runs a big business, and she's awesome. And she, she commented, "La la la la la, that's me plugging my ears because I don't want it." She knows. Yeah. But there is always a time when you have to make space to grieve the changing of assignments and the changing of seasons, for sure. So I thought, you know, basically, um, we can have a conversation about this because this is the last conversation I want to have on a YouTube episode because it is scary. So that's one you want. Doesn't mean it will be. Not if I can help it. Yeah. But, you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. It's not always fun for, it's not always fun to be in the public eye or to have to, have to deal with people's opinions. Aren't that big of a deal. It's just that you have to constantly build up the strength to reject them. Yeah. Or just ignore them. That's not fun. Yeah. Yeah.

So I can, I just share how I feel right now? Yeah. There was, um, I was, I was driving home from, uh, the office. This was probably three years ago. And, uh, I've shared the story before, but I'll share it again now because it's super relevant. I was driving home and I was listening to, uh, Spotify, like I was just listening to a playlist. Mhm. And somehow, you know, when you like, um, get into your car and it's Bluetooth, it'll start playing like a random thing that wasn't even, yeah. So it starts playing this song, and it was not what I had on my playlist at the office. And it wasn't even in Spotify, it was a Dropbox. It was a Dropbox link. And, um, I was like, "Oh, that's interesting because this, this is my song. I wrote this song." And so I opened it up, and I like flipped through, and I started playing old stuff and listening to old stuff. And at this point, I had moved on from music and I was doing my own thing. And a song came on that was by one of my old, um, pastors. His name is Jared. And something about this song made me just start, like, I'm just driving in my car, heading home, normal night, and I just start crying. I get to the house, I park in the garage, and Lindsay texts me because she heard the garage go up. And she's like, "Hey, are you coming in?" I was like, "I'm having a bit of a moment because I don't know what's going on, but there's something in this car and I'm like feeling it heavy." Um, and I sat in the garage, this in my car, for like three hours. And just, dude, I literally cried the whole three hours. And God told me that the reason that I was unable to move forward is because I hadn't grieved a season that had ended. So I went eight years, seven, seven years without grieving, and it was chaining me to something in the past. And you can't move past it until you grieve it. We've talked about this before. And now I'm in a, I'm not, I don't know how much to share about this, but now I'm in a in a similar position where there are things that I'm supposed to do, and people need to see me like, eat my own cooking. Mhm. Like, they, you've, people have gotten to see like, no fear. Like, remove fear. But then for that to work, they also have to see what I do when I feel fear. Yeah. When I feel afraid. So all of this stuff, it doesn't work if you don't live it. If you're the, if you're writing the songs, but you're not living the songs, there is no power in the song. If you're writing the books, but you're not living the book. One of my really good friends, his name is Benjamin Hardy. Um, when he wrote the book "10x Is Easier Than 2x," and everyone should read that book, he said it was the hardest book he had ever written because he realized halfway through it, he wasn't living the material. Oh. And I said, "Whoa, what did you do?" And he said, "I had to live the material." Which meant I had to go cut out everything that was 2x, and I had to create a vacuum. He says, "That's why I got stuck in the middle." He's like, "I almost didn't finish the book." Wow. Because I was like, "I can't publish a book if I'm not living the book." In a similar way, I'm at the same crossroads with with my life because this type of stuff that we're recording, you, you can't just speak it, you have to live it. Mhm. It's one thing to teach like, "Here's how to make money," and I'm doing that, and we make money. It's another thing to teach, "Here's how you can get in flow, here's how you can remove fear, here's how you can be obedient." Because there's a heavier, there's a heavier cost on not doing that than there is on not making money. Um, there's a short from that that three years, 3 years ago that the season with a guy named Brian where we're talking to him about about that. And I'm in this, I'm in the same exact position that he was in three years ago right now. And I'm figuring out my way through it. Yeah. And by figuring out my way through it, what I really mean is I'm just unyielded to it because I don't want it. What does that mean? Like, you just, you refuse to get under it, or you're just, you know, you're getting sucked into the river, you're just hanging onto the tree that's keeping you from going downstream. Yeah. I don't want to get in that river. Yeah. I don't want to get in the river. Yeah. Because when you get in, when you get into real flow, when, when your life actually begins to, uh, when you exit this like Newtonian cause and effect world of like, "If I do this, I make XYZ," all of the videos that are that, that people are consuming on on like YouTube for education right now, they sound the same. Mhm. It's like, "Do this, make XYZ, how to get so rich, you have so much money, how to hack your mind and be productive." They're all cause effect, cause effect. But the realm of the spirit is effect then cause. So it works completely opposite. This is like, this is what Jesus was talking about. Like the, the way that we're instructed to use our words, and the way that we're, we're in, like, the only path forward is through surrender. And surrender is a dangerous recipe because if I fully get into this river, there's no life raft. And I know that I can't ever get back to this place and time right now where I feel like I have control.

Is there any part of you that is, is there any part of you that feels like you haven't made the most of the season you've been in? Is that why it's hard to let go of, like, you still feel like you have things to do and you don't have enough time to get them done? That's a great question. I think it's more so that I like the, [Music] season. I think it's more that there's, uh, there's good things to the way that life has felt up to now. And you never quite know where God's going to take you. M. You never know. There's a difference between trusting in God and trusting God. Because when you trust God, you have to trust Him for you, and for your kids, and for your, for your friends. And there's no back door to this. And I think that's how it's designed. I think that's why, that's why when you see how Jesus lived, He was constantly flowing with it. He was just going with it. Yeah. He was very present. And His biggest thing was, anytime it got, it wasn't even when it got crazy, it was just that anytime you had spare time, it was like time with the Father all the time because that was His place of refreshment, replenishment all the time. That was His like safe haven for everything. So it usually just means like, it seems like it normally it means just more intimacy with, for Christians at least, the Lord. I don't know what that means for other people. But it seems like it usually just means like a, a like an anchoring down to something that you're supposed to get closer to. Yeah. And, and you only have so much time to hang on to the tree without getting into the river. Mhm. You only have so much time before eventually that tree is going to be uprooted. M. You know?

So what are the lessons that you have taught other people that you feel like you're going to have to learn and that, well, not learn, but you're going to have to live that you're either most afraid to, or the ones that you're already having to learn or go through? What does that look like? Um, probably the biggest one is letting go. There's a great book actually by Dr. Hawkins called "Letting Go," and he talks about the, he, he even talks spiritually about the principle of letting go. So much of the world is based on control, game theory, how do you control the elements? And that's great to to have a, a measure of control. Like when you wake up with an alarm clock, that's a version of control. Mhm. When you put a promo out to the marketplace, that's a version of control. But there is a level where you get high enough that you realize that you don't actually have control in the first place. It's all an illusion. So that's the biggest thing that I think that I wrestle with, especially right now, because if, if I go down, and what I'm talking about with this is not like, not being in business anymore. It's more this wrestling with this idea of like, I don't want to be the person that talks like my examples of people who talk about God. I don't think that they're very credible. Mhm. I actually don't really, I don't have any examples. Some, when, when God gives you a real calling, like a real one, like a big one, you're not going to be able to find many examples for how to do it because it's, it's never been done before. And in any example that, that you to use a, to use a religious term, any example that you do find is likely an older wineskin. It's not going to work. Anyways. MH. So you get into this really weird, uncomfortable place where you're being instructed to do something, but no one has ever done it before. And you don't have anybody who you can be like, "Well, they're, they did it, and they turned out okay. They did it, and it works for them." There's no model sometimes. And that's, that requires you letting go of the perceived safety of the old way. Like, the new version of yourself doesn't just show up. You actually have to kill off the old version of yourself. And in that vacuum, the new version is Rises up. But for a season, you have a vacuum where there's nothing. And nature, when there is a vacuum, it causes things to grow. When there is no vacuum, it doesn't produce anything. You picture this, um, you know, rainforest. The plants at the bottom can't get enough resources, and so they just, they don't grow. They don't grow taller than three feet tall. Mhm. But when there's a fire that comes through, fire is nature's way of eliminating all of the constraints on resources, and then new things can grow. It's creating its own vacuum. So I feel like right now, I'm in a bit of a vacuum. And, and the biggest lesson that I'm, I'm still wrestling with is, there's, there are some things that like, I know I'm supposed to say that I do not want to say. There are some things I know I'm supposed to do that I do not want to do. And I think people will feel this because if you feel like you're on a, if you're on a precipice, one step, one more step. Same wise, Gamgee. He stops. They're running away from, uh, from home. Mhm. And you got Frodo and Samwise, and they're both racing through, away from the Shire. And then all of a sudden, Samwise Gamgee stops. And Frodo turns around, and he's like, "What are you doing?" And he's like, "One more step, and this will be the furthest I've ever been away from home." Yep. That's what it feels like. It's not that you don't want to keep going. Yeah. It's that there's something in your spirit that is recognizing the size of the moment. And when you recognize the size of that moment, you stop, and you have to make it a choice. Like, do I go forward and forgo the protection of the Shire, forgo the pro-, the protection of home? Or in the interest of self-preservation, do I stop and go backwards? In my wrestle right now is, we can either keep going, and if we keep going, there will be people who do not like it. There will be people who do not respect it. And there will be a lack of perceived safety from me being able to hide. And so I'm sitting in that moment, and it's like, I almost have like 10 days to sit here. And after that, the calling goes forward. The current doesn't stop. So I either jump in, I got to catch up later, it all hell breaks loose, or, uh, or I stop, and then we just have to go through the entirety of the last year and a half again in two, three, four years. Yeah. You know? Do you feel what I'm saying? Mhm.

I think it's also interesting that you needed to grieve the old season of what you had, yeah, and then you got into a new season, and now it's like, uh, you had to grieve the old season because you loved it, and now there's a piece of you now that's like, "Hmm, I love it, and I hate that season." Like, it's a both-and type of thing. It's always a both-and. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's very interesting. And I think there's a lot of people out there where there's, there's a lot of people who are like, for example, they're like, "Oh, I feel called to music." Like, for me, I thought I was going to be a musician for a lot of my life growing up. And the more I grew up, I was like, "This sounds horrible." And then I was doing the content for those bands. I would go work with big bands, and like, I would go to their concerts for free and just shoot their stuff. And I was like, "Oh, what if I go on tour?" And they're like, "We can pay you $10 a day and provide you pizza for four months." I was like, "Are you kidding me?" And I tried to get a record deal in Nashville, and that was the worst thing. And then I came here and worked in sales, and that was actually what I wanted. But then I had to grieve like an old season of, "Oh, it was fun making a lot of money but absolutely being miserable and not who I could be." It takes like a year and a half to just like chill out. And then here I am back in content. But I had to go through that season in the side of, and I'm going to have to go through that cycle again. But in my life now, if I hadn't gone through sales, there's no way I'd be as good at content as I am now. I wouldn't have understood the psychology. There's so many pieces I didn't understand. And now when I meet musicians, I'm like, "I just don't relate at all." When I meet content people, I just don't relate. A lot of times it's no shame, there's no judgment, it's just like, it's been wildly, it's been a wildly uncomfortable four years. Yep. But letting go of those seasons has allowed me to really enjoy and get the most out of the next ones. Yeah. Because I think that people, I think people forget, like, you're supposed to be unique. Like, you are very unique. You probably, I think probably the entire, everybody I've ever met, you're probably the most unique person I've ever met. Really? Guaranteed. Wow. Yeah. Like the most unique person I've ever met. And I have stuck with you as long as I have because when I see you actually jump into you being unique, then I'm interested. I'm very interested in you just being unique because that's uncomfortable. Most people hate being unique. And when you talk about like the content that we used to talk about, that content did so horrible. It, it yielded horrible results. And it's just funny when we started doing this, you were like, "I hate it." You're like, "I don't want to talk about this." But we just, we were talking about this. Like the first thing you talked about was God and business. And that's the thing is that the thing you don't want to talk about more. Am I, am I correct or no? It, yeah, I just don't want, like, it's very, it's very confusing. Uh, it's, it's confusing. The only way I know how to process it, I'm an internal processor, but this is one of those rare things where like, I've got to process it out loud. Goa. Um, but so I'll tell you, I'll, I'll try to take you into it by sharing another story. One of your pastors, um, two weeks ago, came up to me. He was like, "I've got to tell you this. Um, I feel like God kind of gave me this thing to to share with you that you need to hear. It's like, when you left ministry and you went into business, that was strategy. God is being a strategist on that. And what your, what you said your mission is now is to bring business owners closer to the truth because when you get closer to the truth, your whole life gets better." I don't believe that when you give your life to Jesus, it's like non-stop suffering and you get, you know, boiled alive. Like I think that that's sometimes there are nuances too. Like sometimes you're called to like, yeah, sell everything, go to Africa, be a missionary, whatever. But you should be, we need more missionaries in America than we need them in Africa, to be honest. Like the spiritual climate of Africa is way healthier than the spiritual climate of America. Oh, yeah. For sure. By a lot. Yeah. Um, so you should, if you want to be a missionary, like, you know, move to Baltimore or Memphis. Like, be, become a missionary at home. And so he's like, "You, you feel like your mission is to bring business owners closer to the truth, but I think what, what I'm hearing is that it's, that's part of it, but the other part is for you to use your business acumen to teach God's people how to be fruitful and prosperous." And I was like, "No, I don't want to help Christians." Nothing personal. If you're a Christian, you're watching this, it's great. I'm glad you're a Christian. But, um, similar to the, the conversation we had last year in Tampa where God said, "I will never give you a word for people that you hate," I was like, "Okay, well, that's a problem." There's a similar thing going on where it's like, "Dude, I spent my whole life. I've lived seven lifetimes, and I'm only 35. But there's been pain and betrayal, trauma upon trauma upon trauma upon trauma." And the thing I am the most afraid of doing, period, at all, is going back into a group full of Christians and trying to help them. Yeah. Now, I don't know if that makes sense or not, but that is because of my past. And there is a part of me that's like, "Dude, the reason that I speak to business owners and there's the reason that I'm not speaking to churches is because I don't like churches." You basically just quoted Jonah. Yes. You just quoted Jonah. It's like, Jonah does not want to talk to the Ninevites. He did not like them. No, not at all. And even when he, and I don't want to be Jonah either. Sure. So like, even when, but, but, but the thing is, Jonah, people, I think get Jonah wrong because part of the reason that he was put into the, onto the ship, and then put into the ocean, and then saved by the whale, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, is that story is, is not just to save Jonah, but it was to give him a measure of empathy for people who did not have any control or power because they were uneducated. They had never been preached to. And so when, when Jonah looked at the Ninevites, he had no compassion for them. He said, "No, you're just stupid. Like, why would I speak to you?" And then he was put into a position where he had no control, no authority, no autonomy. And what that situation was designed to do, I think, is to give him a little bit of understanding and empathy. And he didn't get it. He just didn't get it. So God still used him. Yeah. But who missed out on that? God didn't miss out. The Ninevite didn't miss out. Jonah's the one that missed out on it. And that's why I'm telling you, I know enough to know that I'm going to have to do it. But people should, it would be a mistake for people to not see me wrestle with it. Yes. I don't want anyone looking at our videos or my posts or my books and being like, "Whoa, this guy has just figured it all out." No, no, not even close, bro. This morning, how long did it take us to just record this episode? We wasted like an hour and a half. Hours. About an hour. We wasted an hour and a half because I'm just sitting in my dysfunction, not wanting to move forward. I don't want to move. I don't want to talk about it. People should probably know that. I think so. Because it, it would be, it would be a discredit to to them if they think that, yeah, man, when you meet Jesus, you just automatically obey everything. You have a desire to obey. Sometimes you don't. Like, sometimes you just don't. And that's where I'm at right now. Like, speaking on these topics, um, I'm, I find myself trying to not delete Jesus from it, but to compartmentalize Jesus from it. You've seen this. You've seen this a million times. Yeah. I'll go speak it. I'll go speak in an event about belief architecture. Mhm. And I'm like, "Here's the science, here's everything," and blah, blah, blah. And Jesus is there, but it's compartmentalized. Mhm. But it's real. You don't really, you can't really do that. Yep. It doesn't give people a full answer. No. They have no, they have no, no real utility in it. Mhm. You know? And so music is another thing. Uh, bro, you wouldn't believe the prophetic words I've started getting on music. Well, you just said you had one yesterday. I wasn't going to, you weren't going to say anything. Nope. It's like, Taylor's not going to hear this for, look at you being disobedient. I'm not the only one. Yeah. Yeah.

I was going to say, um, when you, going, the reason that I even originally trusted you though, in 2020, because you say you don't like Christians, but I'm a Christian. I like you. Yeah. But you hated me at first. Not literally, but strongly disliked me. I have a bias. I basically had to force my way into your life, essentially. But the only reason, one of the biggest reasons I wanted to work with you, is like, we know this. There are other people in the industry that I could have worked with. There were other people that I could have gone with. I had a, I think I have over 150 webinars under my belt when I came to sales mentor, when I came to work with you. And I knew that I needed to work with you, and I was supposed to buy everything that you sold. So I did. I was like, "Cool, we'll do it." And it, I decided to stick close, close because I just didn't know who I could trust. Mhm. And I was like, "I'm so sick and tired of having to question everybody's motives." That's the difference. And it's like, if I know your motives, then I can run with you. And more people will naturally run with you. It's just that that's vulnerable. Yeah. So I wanted to see it, and I basically forced my way in. So. And you made it here. And why do you, like, why, I think this would be interesting. I think something, if somebody's listening to this, if you're listening to this, hopefully I'm reading your mind correctly. I think people are going to be like, "Well, why doesn't Taylor like Christians? And why does he seem to like Jake?" And obviously, as Christian friends, like, what is that discrepancy? Can you, can you explain that in a way that doesn't like trigger you and freak you out? Or like, how would you explain that? I don't think I'm not going to get triggered, dude. I'm not going to get triggered. Um, no, I, I hate religion. I really hate religion. I don't love, I don't, I don't, there's like, you, if you want to know why I don't, why I really have a bias, like, just go through the comments on on stuff on social media. Mhm. Um, man, like people have this rules-based system, dude. Somebody called me a witch on TikTok. Really? Yes. Because I was tell-, saying like, the difference between New Age, clean New Age and real Christianity is nothing, just Jesus. Jesus is the big difference. And dude, people are like, "Man, you're a blasphemer." Like, the audacity of you. And I'm like, "Dude, the, the ability to judge other people quickly and without any context, Mhm, is a skill specifically reserved for Western Christians." M. If the only tool you have as a believer is taking a stand against somebody on an Instagram story, you're worthless. Like, you're worthless. You have no spiritual power. You have no authority. The waves aren't going to listen to you. Don't, please don't try to go do an exorcism because they're just going to rip you up. You have no authority because when you have real authority, you are, you're slow to judge and you're slow to anger. M. You have, what do we read this morning in Ephesians? You have compassion with people, and you demonstrate kindness to people. The Bible doesn't say that it is your ability to take a stand against the Olympics that draws people closer to Jesus. It doesn't say that. Yeah. It says it's the kindness of God that leads people to repentance. Mhm. And my bias towards towards most Christians is that, dude, they are so, they're just judgmental narcissists. The thing that was like, that stood out to me that I was reading was so many Christians are so focused on like holiness and repentance. And while that is like the, like a big, big part of being a believer, Paul's first thing to say to be more like God or to live in the fullness of God wasn't, it wasn't repentance, and it wasn't holiness. It was being grounded and rooted in love. That was his first response. And that, what I see is you, I think you have like a, you are so tired of having to rip down ego. I think that seems to be your main thing. You want to rip down is like taking down the ego and getting back to a place of humility, being open, and coming from a place of love. Yeah.

Dude, while we were talking about this, I just looked up. Have you seen that picture? I did notice you changed that this morning. My friend sent me the most incredible gift that I've probably ever gotten, like, sent in the mail. Yeah. And it's this picture. For people who can't see it, well, I'll send you a picture and you can put it on there. Yeah. Um, Eli, Eli sent this to me. Really? Yeah. Wow. It's a, it's pictures of Theodore Roosevelt. And, and I pulled it out of the box, and I could just feel something was like, like, I, I just pulled the picture out of the box, and I was like, "This isn't normal." Almost like an energy current to it or something. Yeah. And so I text him, I was like, "Hey, what, thank you for this. I love Roosevelt. I've studied him. I've read all of his books and biographies." Uh, but I was like, "Is, is this different? Like, sorry, what is, what is this?" And he was like, "Pull out the letter that's in the box." I was like, "Oh, I didn't even know there was a letter." And I pulled out the letter and said, "Authentication letter." Those are the original? No way. Photos from 1902. And that's an authenticated signature from Roosevelt? No. Yeah. Underneath it? Are you serious? 100%. That's incredible. I was like, "Bro, this is, I was like in shock. I couldn't believe it." Wow. Cuz dude, he's one of the, he was one of the craziest people in history. But when you talk about Christians, this actually applies. Look at us. We're dovetailing politics into Christianity for.

The for the only time ever. But this quote is why this, what this is part of, like this. This quote is actually very sounds from a theological standpoint. You every once's heard this quote. It's not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out how strong men stumble. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who HS, who comes short again and again because there is no efor without error and shortcoming. The man who actually strives to do the Deeds, who knows great enthusiasms, great devotions, who spins himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the Triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold, timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. That's my bias towards Christians is right there.

M. It's like the only, if if Christians spent as much time evangelizing as they did taking their little stand on social media, world would be a different place. So I don't, I don't think I respect them. And then the last thing I want to do is to help them, you know? Yeah. And coochini is the same in my defense. Yeah, probably one of the smartest people I've ever met. But it's like, when you read your Bible, you get this idea that nothing really matters and everything matters. M-hm. And it's all good, and it's all bad, and it's all the same. It's a movie, Everything Everywhere All at Once. And that's where I am learning to step into that river. But once you step into the river, there is no going back. And the moment is monumental. And people might be like, this has nothing to do with business. I want to learn how to do XYZ. Yeah. You know, you can make 10, 20, 100 million, but if you die without seeing color, then you just die color blind with a lot of money. Money is not, money is easy to get, and it's easy to lose. And it's like gasoline. If if your car runs out of gas, you just go get more gas. That's what money, money is. But spiritual tuning is way more important, and it's way more intense, and it's way more scary. True. So I feel like we're like literally in the deep end of everything, and we're not doing any teaching. But this is, uh, just me wrestling with it.

Sure. What's your, um, what's your plan moving forward? Like, what are you, in terms of, are you going to be, do you have time that you're blocking for it? Just on, like, a little bit of a more tactical level, how are you, or are you not there yet?

No, I'm there. Um, I know, I know like, cuz I've prayed a lot about it, and I've got, um, and like people keep sending me random stuff, which I've also asked for. You you can ask for, um, confirmation, and God will give it to you. M-hm. So I've sort of asked for that. Y. But but usually what I've done in the past is I've asked for, um, confirmation as a copout. If I don't get it, I'm not, I'm not going to take it seriously. And so this time is different because this time, um, me asking for confirmation is my, my heart posture right now is, I already know that it's real. I already know that I'm supposed to do these things. And so tactically, what I'm doing is I'm spending time going through old memories. I want to look back before I go forward. Uh, I'm not, I'm not making it a bigger deal than it is. I just know because I've been through this before. If you're watching and you feel like God is kind of moving some things around, make sure you go back and you memorialize where you are. Every time, like the Israelites would cross through a major victory or a battle, they would build an altar for it, and they would really memorialize it.

What? Yeah, I've not got that. Yeah, like you look at, um, Joshua when they crossed the river that dried up, they built a an altar, and then they named it. They named it so they could go back and remember. And these seasons of our lives are the same way. It's not like we're literally walking through a physical river, but we are, we are moving through time. M-hm. And when one season ends and another one begins, you memorialize it and you name it so that you can go back and see that what God did in that season, because you'll hit a point where you lose touch with it, and that's why we don't move for forward. M-hm. You know, like I don't, I I really, really, really loved the season of dude, as scary as everything was with like the FTC and giving away the businesses, like in the middle of it, I just wanted it to be over. But now that I'm moving past it, there's a part of my heart that's like, dude, it was just really pure and really simple. Like the only goal I had was to survive. When you're poor, it doesn't seem like you can enjoy it, but you can, you can enjoy it because there will be a time when you're rich, especially if you start hanging out with people like us. And there will always be a piece of you. I was just talking with Dean about this yesterday, where you will remember with fondness the season where you had nothing. M. And you're living in an apartment, and yeah, you got nothing.

But do you see why I don't want to talk? I'll talk about this. Yeah. Like, no one, no one is teaching people how to get rich by telling them to really enjoy being poor. And God's like, hey, this is actually the secret. I'm like, okay, whatever. And people are like, you're an idiot. I'm going to go listen to somebody, somebody different. And it's not that I'm like worried about that. It's more of like, even for me, I'm like, this is such a different way to live. You know?

Well, why would you build a skyscraper if you don't know why you're supposed to build it in the first place, or what it was supposed to be built for, or that you were always meant to build it? What would be the point?

Yeah, it'd be very pointless. And so I think we have a lot of people building these really tall, empty skyscrapers, nothing inside them. And they're like, well, this was the wrong color, the wrong size. Bro, this said the net worth. Yeah, it's all that matters. It's like, tall. But it's like, okay, well, now might as well just take this one down, use the materials and maybe build something else. But you got to break that one down, do it again. So it's like, I love, I personally love what you're doing because you are the guy that's not saying you are the guy that's going, hey, I built it up and then I had to break it down. It's like, why don't you not build up the skyscraper 2,000 feet tall while you're still here? Like, if you're already up there, you can learn from this too. But if you're down there, here's how you build it, here's why you need to build it this way, here's the color, here's the size, here's how you figure it out because you have to build your thing that you were supposed to go build. Yours might, somebody's might be really wide and really short. Yours might be really tall and really narrow. It depends on what you're doing, but it's all gonna build into one big awesome thing. And then you build it, and you got to let it go and move on to the next thing. M-hm. You know?

So I'm doing that. Um, I'm also doing little things like, um, just asking Bas, even last week, will help the video from last week. I'm asking God for specifics on what it looks like. Um, I want to feel it before I get there. That way I can, like, I don't want to be led into something that is me, it's not God, because that's really easy to get trapped into, especially if you, if you're smart and you're intelligent, you can build your own Tower of Babel, um, that you never were given a blueprint for. You just created it. Anything that you're not given a blueprint for is ultimately a fabrication, so it's just going to be a counterfeit. Um, in fact, when you look at, like, when you look at, I was say 80% of the business owners who love Jesus, this is a big statement, maybe more, maybe 90%. They're great people who just decided to go have an Ishmael instead of wait for Isaac. Isaac. And so they're stewarding and Ishmael. Most people, most of them. And how do you tell? There's just a signature. There's a signature difference. Like, when what you're building creates drama, toxicity, politics, infighting, stress, chaos, hey man, you're building an Ishmael. You're not building, you're not, you're not raising a son.

Bro, do you remember that word from, uh, six months ago where someone, I forget who, said it to you? It was a church that I had been at for a bit, uh, over the last year, and they, pastor was like, the Lord told me, like, business owners are actually apostles that got rejected out of the church. Most entrepreneurs are. M. I remember someone told you that. Yeah. Just remembered that. Yeah. It's true. Yeah. I mean, it might not be true for everyone, but it's definitely true for a good, good portion. I mean, the people on that post, it was pretty wild. People were like, oh yeah, I grew up in the, in the church world too, and I ended up left. Well, dude, this, because the church is failing. The church has failed. And there are some good churches, yeah, for sure. But most good churches are just really good businesses that don't pay taxes. And that's not what it was set out to be. That's not what it, that's not the original blueprint. You know?

So it all comes down to this, bro. Stay locked into Jesus and make sure that when you feel your heart getting into a place of of possessive control, those are the opposite. What's the opposite of surrender? Possession, control. Uh, dominion is able to hang on to both surrender and accumulation at the same time. That's dominion. So think of it like a, almost like a checks and balances in your own heart. When anything is building your own status, when anything is tied to your own name, M. and advancement, in most cases, it's because you were promised something, but you have gone the alternative route instead of waiting for the main son, you've tried to create another one. And therefore, it's all become about you. So you're trying to keep something going. And for me, um, I'm having to be real careful that I'm to do that, cuz I just go push a couple of the buttons and scale everything into infinity and beyond. And if I'm not instructed to do it, and then I, then I have to wait. Wait, you know?

Sounds like dominion is understanding responsibility and submitting to authority. Yeah, like two things hand in hand.

Yeah, dominion is basically our spiritual title. It's like, um, like when you, when you are, if you're, if you're going through a season where you feel like you're being, uh, unfairly treated, and there's like a spiritual attack against your resources, your businesses, your family, you know, people getting sick. M-hm. Business failures, partnership betrayals, you should look at that because sometimes there can be spiritual assignments against you. And what dominion does is it shows up and it's like a, a lean. So like you have a lean on everything the enemy has taken from you, and that lean will be taken from his own assets. It's going to get paid back. Does that make sense? Says dominion, there's nothing that outranks dominion for authority to work on earth. Authority has to move through the integration of the physical and the spiritual. So principalities have no dominion because there's no physical presence. The only ones with dominion are us. And so there doesn't have to be a lot of fighting, like spiritual warfare doesn't have to be this laborious, exhausting, do a bunch of rituals. Dominion is is instant. I have it, you don't. You're on my land, I have the title for it. Here, read the document. M-hm.

Ejected. And that's a different episode. We should talk about that. We should talk about spiritual warfare. I think we need Lindsay for that one. Um, but yeah, long story short, I don't even know what we talked about in this episode, but grieve the past, let it go, build an altar, memorialize it. And then if it's not a little bit scary, it's probably not real obedience. If it's, if it's not a little bit scary, it's, it's pseudo obedience. It's half obedience, half disobedience. Use that as a radar because right now, there's a lot. I'm, I'm like, not comfortable with certain things, which means that it's probably full obedience for me to step out and do them.

That's good. That's good. Got anything else you would say?

I love you. Thank you.

What do you want me to say?

I know. Whatever you want.

Uh, see you next week.

All right.