Unlocking Fulfillment: Alan Lazaros on Redefining Success

In this episode of "Conversations with Rich Bennett," sponsored by "Maryland Pickers," Rich engages with Alan Lazaros in a transformative discussion. Alan shares his journey from a life-altering accident to redefining success through fulfillment, rather than external achievements. He offers insights on developing habits for peak performance and balancing professional success with personal well-being. This episode enlightens listeners on pursuing a fulfilling life by investing in growth and embracing continuous learning, aiming to inspire actionable change in their personal and professional lives.

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Transcript

Rich Bennett 0:00
Thanks for joining the conversation, where we explore the stories and experiences that shape our world. I'm your host, Rich Bennett. And today, I am excited to have Alan Lazarus on. Alan's not just a CEO and founder, but also an esteemed peak performance business coach with his unique blend of technical expertise and business savvy. He has excelled in empowering businesses to maximize their growth and profitability. Alan's journey is nothing short of inspirational, marked by personal challenges and a transformative quest for self-improvement. Influenced by profound insights from the top five Regrets of the Dying and motivational talks by the man, Tony Robbins. Allen has dedicated his life to guiding others in designing fulfilling lives and thriving businesses. His expertise in people performance, productivity, organizational design and optimization is unparalleled. So he's here to share his insights on optimizing for fulfillment and creating daily habits for success. First of all, welcome, and it's good to finally meet you in person. I mean, we're friends on Facebook, but yeah, I've talked to Kevin, but it's great to finally meet you, Rich. 

Alan Lazaros 1:15
Thank you. Thank you for having me. Thank you for that awesome intro. And I am super passionate about everything you just described in that bio. So let's let's talk about it and hopefully we'll add some value here. 

Rich Bennett 1:30
Yeah, because before we were talking, you mentioned something about, you know, being in sales and how you did it. You about explain that to everybody the outside in and then you turned it around. 

Alan Lazaros 1:42
Yeah. So growing up, I definitely had some adversity, but I always aimed really high. You know, my mom kind of taught me that lesson of aim High and you'll have choices. And so I did. And in corporate, I was in sales. I was a sales engineer. I did an inside sales team. And this is actually I never connected this before, but an inside sales team. And then I went to outside sales, the whole inside out thing. But essentially when I got in a car accident at 26 years old, it was nothing short of super, super traumatic when it comes to physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. Physically, I was okay, actually. But mentally, emotionally, spiritually, I was not because my father passed away in a car accident when he was 28 years old, when I was two years old. So I'm 26. I'm working in corporate America as a sales engineer on the road and I end up in a bad car accident. I've seen pictures of my dad's car and they I saw pictures of my own car and they don't look very different. So this really rattled me a lot. A lot, A lot, a lot. It was definitely a reevaluate my existence. Existential Quarterlife crisis is what I call. 

Rich Bennett 2:50
It, right? 

Alan Lazaros 2:50
Because I was 26 at the time. I still look 15. But, you know, I'm hoping to hit puberty at 36. I'm 35. Now. 

But anyways, so the inside out versus outside in that you referenced. I didn't realize this at the time because I was a young man just trying to do my thing. But I was very successful from the outside in, you know, I was a 1% earner, it's important to say earner, not net worth, but earner. I was making almost $200,000 a year at the time, which back then was globally a 1% earner. And I was doing really well at $150,000 in an investment account. And I had no kids, no family, very, very little responsibilities. So it was just it was $12,000 checks bi weekly. It was I was doing very well as a computer engineer, sales engineer on the road selling industrial automation equipment all across New England, Western New England, in particular, Connecticut, Vermont, 

Western Mass. And after the car accident. Before the car accident, I was successful from the outside in beautiful girlfriend, that kind of thing. And then I had that sort of quarterlife crisis, and then that's when I flipped the script, which is what you referred to, which is realizing that I was deeply unfulfilled. 

Rich Bennett 4:04
Mm hmm. 

Alan Lazaros 4:05
And I was not. I was not successful from the inside out. 

I was successful from the outside in, but I was not successful from the inside out. And I was not fulfilled. And I was drinking too much. And too often the company I was working for, their motto was Work hard, Play hard. I used to say, Work hard, play harder. 

And I grew up around a lot of drinking, a lot of partying, a lot of alcohol. And I didn't realize how much of how much of that got me, for lack of better phrasing. And I struggled with drinking too much and too often. And after that car accident, I really reevaluated my life and I started taking my fitness seriously. I started taking my health seriously. I started taking my core values seriously. I started taking the inner work more seriously and I got into personal development. And that's, you know, when I kind of, for lack of better phrasing, became obsessed with personal development, I think at this point that's probably an understatement. But here I am nine years later, and I'm very grateful to say that I am successful from the inside out and ironically, maybe in some ways maybe less successful from the outside in, but from the inside out, I feel a million times better than I did back then. And I'm not really trying to put on a show anymore. And I think that I think that that's the key. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 5:21
Is that company still around by chance? 

Alan Lazaros 5:23
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 5:24
They are. Same motto. 

Alan Lazaros 5:26
Same motto. God, yeah. 

Rich Bennett 5:29
It's because one of the thing. Yeah, I've worked for companies like that. And then one of the things I learned, it's better to work smart, smarter, then work harder. 

Alan Lazaros 5:40
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 5:41
And so my father always taught me because, yeah, you could be making all the money in the world working your ass off. But if you're if you don't have the time to enjoy it, and if you're not having fun, it's time to find something different. Going out, drinking all the time. Even though you think it may be fun at that age, it's not. 

Alan Lazaros 6:01
Yeah. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 6:03
I mean, you think about what do you. What do you have to show for it afterwards? 

Alan Lazaros 6:06
It's, you know, you have a hangover. That's what you have to show. 

Rich Bennett 6:10
Exactly. So what is actually the difference between fulfillment and happiness? Mm hmm. Because a lot of people may think it's the same thing, but it's not. 

Alan Lazaros 6:20
Yeah. And I think that even the word you think of an empty cup versus a full cup fulfilled, you know? Yeah. And so I think even the word is a better word. But, but the difference in happiness and fulfillment, this is the way I try to explain it. I don't even know if this is a true story or not. But John Lennon, apparently when he was a kid, you know, had this homework assignment of what do you want to be when you grow up? And he said, happy. And the teacher said, You don't understand the assignment. And he said, you don't understand life. Now, I don't know if that's a true story or not, but it's a famous story. 

Rich Bennett 6:55
And yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 6:57
Either way, I think that that's the problem with that is, is I do understand the point and I do agree, you know, that is the purpose of life is to to enjoy your life, to be fulfilled. But I think happiness, the label in particular, is kind of I don't know if anyone really understands what it means. You know, it's something you pursue, but you never catch, you know. So if I were to ask someone and I do this in my coaching, like, are you happy people are taking it back, it's well, what do you mean? Are you happy? Like, Yeah, I think so. It's like, But then your head goes to all these places. It's like. 

Rich Bennett 7:32
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 7:34
Well, not as happy as I could be, but I'm more happy than I used to be. And I'm like, kind of hungry and I don't really feel great right now, so maybe I'm not that happy. What is it? It's like chasing butterflies. You don't. You don't ever catch it. And so I am a computer engineer by nature. So. So forgive me for formula formulaic thinking. I just. I am obsessed with formulas. And so I tried to figure out this formula. And when I was in my early twenties, my mom kind of confronted me about like, why does intelligence matter so much to you? And I'll circle this back to fulfillment in a minute. 

Rich Bennett 8:08
Wow. 

Alan Lazaros 8:09
Yeah. And I she's like, Why isn't it enough to just be nice, right? And I said, I think that's really ignorant question. Remember, I was in my early twenties. It's kind of like my ego version of it, but I said, I said, What's the difference in a smartphone in a dumb phone? The smartphone is more capable. So intelligence is important because what's the difference in a human being? In a dog? A dog can't contemplate its future and design a life and build buildings and do these incredible things because it's not intelligent enough. It doesn't understand how the world works, why it works that way, how humans work, why we work that way, that kind of thing. So I said, I'm trying to figure out the formula to not end up old and miserable like everybody else. 

Rich Bennett 8:51
Whoa. 

Alan Lazaros 8:53
Yeah. Now here's the thing. I was so naive as a kid that I actually thought truth was like, what everyone wants, right? And now I'm 35, and I understand how harsh that probably was, but I was a computer engineer, so for me, it was just like, I'm I'm not kidding. I look around and everyone's miserable, you know? And I looked around and it scared the hell out of me. I grew up in an area in an environment that had a lot of miserable human beings. They hated their jobs. They definitely weren't fulfilled in their marriages. There was a lot of drugs or alcohol, a lot of a lot of mediocre lives that that, quite frankly, as harsh as it sounds, they just were not deeply fulfilled, heart driven dream chasing people. They weren't. And I can only think of two married couples growing up that I could even find that even looked reasonable, never mind something I would aspire to. So. So anyways, computer engineering minded in my early twenties, that was my answers, trying to figure out the formula. So here's the cool part. I spent the next several at this point almost decades, decade and a half, trying to figure out the formula to be fulfilled, to not end up old and miserable. Because in high school everyone always said Alice, at best years your life. And I remember thinking, God, I hope not. 

Rich Bennett 10:07
Mm. 

Alan Lazaros 10:08
Oh, my God, I hope not. The high school was awful, right? And turns out they were the best years of their life. Definitely not mine. Yeah, yeah, definitely not mine. But anyways, so fast forward. I figured this out. I figured this out. Now I give speeches on this, but essentially what it is is three components. I think of fulfillment as one third of happiness. So happiness equals joy 

plus 

pleasure plus fulfillment. Now joy is being in the moment, enjoying what you're doing. So hopefully you and I are enjoying this moment, right? Okay. I am. I hope you are as well, because that's joy. 

Rich Bennett 10:51
Absolutely. 

Alan Lazaros 10:51
Yes. That's one third of the equation. The second part is pleasure. I actually think pleasure is the trap. We already talked about it earlier. Going out and partying is pleasurable and that's the problem, right? If it wasn't awesome, it wouldn't be a problem. You know what isn't awesome is the hangover, right? And then the third one and the most important component, in my opinion, is fulfillment. And fulfillment, I believe, only comes from doing all you can with all you have within your unique calling. And so I often say this quote of fulfillment is a byproduct of the soul's recognition of alignment with its highest calling. Meaning are you doing all you can with all you have? Are you contributing beyond yourself within your passion for a purpose and doing it in a profitable way where you can have a high quality of life as well? And I used to be deeply unfulfilled, didn't know why I was way too focused on pleasure. 

Rich Bennett 11:51
Right. 

Alan Lazaros 11:52
And now I flip the script and I focus on fulfillment. And then I also have some pleasure along the way versus I focus on focus on pleasure and then hope I get fulfilled. 

And so for anyone listening, I hope that if you focus on what fulfills you and you know intuitively, you know what fulfills you, like right now, us doing this is going to be fulfilling, even though it's going to be challenging. Challenging things that aren't pleasurable are often the most fulfilling. 

Rich Bennett 12:24
Overcoming that challenge. 

Alan Lazaros 12:25
Right. And growth that comes from that challenge. And. Whereas the pleasurable stuff is fun and easy and shiny, but often the least fulfilling. Yeah. And so we all have a choice. And I just never understood why this wasn't taught in school or why it wasn't taught anywhere. And maybe it's unique to me. 

Rich Bennett 12:43
Because it makes sense. 

Alan Lazaros 12:45
Yeah, Yeah, exactly. 

Rich Bennett 12:50
I love that. Yeah, it's a to me because I love challenges and I always. You got to got it. That's how you learned from it. And to me. Yeah, that that brings pleasure, that brings fulfillment. And it's a joy just facing them. When I was in the it world. Oh, my God, Give me something now. I was. I was more hardware than anything, but somebody told me. Yeah, somebody told me they had a printer they could I fix give it the better. He'll get it. Nice. I love that. I just I loved those challenges. And even if it was a computer problem, even if it was a software problem, I would still look at it. I was not going to let it be. I loved loved working on computers that had viruses. I loved it. I purposely had a computer at home that I would use and strictly put viruses on to. So I could figure out how to get rid of the virus without having to reimagine a whole computer. I mean, I always look forward to that stuff. 

Alan Lazaros 14:00
That's very unique. It's very. 

Rich Bennett 14:03
Unique. Yeah, it's but it was it to me, it was a challenge. And then when I finished All Mad Challenges. 

Alan Lazaros 14:11
Of the Filling channel, they are saying if you grow and learn. Yeah yeah some channels. 

Rich Bennett 14:17
Are. 

Alan Lazaros 14:17
Are brutal. But I think at the on the other end if you can come out of it better, stronger, more resilient, more intelligent, I do believe that that's what helps us grow because. 

Rich Bennett 14:28
Oh yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 14:28
You know, if life was easy every day and I think that's the irony, right? We all think we want an easy life, but the things that mean the most always were the most challenging. Mm That's the irony. That's so true. But then when you're in the dark, in the challenge, like the car accident, I didn't want that. No, that was terrible. After it, it was so hard, you know, I kept getting pulled over because I was too far on my side of the road because yellow lines scared me. You know, I was claustrophobic for a time. I had all these challenges, 

but in hindsight, it was the most meaningful growth period of my life. And I wouldn't be the man I am today without it. And so that's the irony that if we can just remember that while we're going through it, I think it will help. 

Rich Bennett 15:17
Yeah. So actually, how do you how do you balance the pursuit of professional success with personal well-being and fulfillment? 

Alan Lazaros 15:27
Mm hmm. I think of it the only way that I can honestly answer that question in a way that maybe isn't sort of fortune cookie, you know, work life balance type of stuff is is I'm trying to get more and more percentage of my time invested in the things that I am actually passionate about. But but here's the thing. And this is the irony, right? The duality at the beginning of an entrepreneurial journey, you have to do everything yourself. And while I love podcasting and I and I enjoy having deep conversations with great people live for that, I love it. 

Most of the stuff behind the scenes to actually scale, grow and monetize a podcast sucks. Yeah. And so, you know, it's almost like at the beginning of an entrepreneur journey, you're doing 20% of the stuff you love. For the 80% that sucks. And then it's 

7921, and then it's 7822, and then it's 77, 23, and now later on. Now I have a 21 person team and Kevin and I have, you know, multiple podcasts each and we've got a business underneath it and brand and we have a production company, all kinds of cool stuff. And now it's more percentage, more percentage, more percentage. The things that I do actually enjoy and that do fulfill me, I should say, and less percentage of the things that are just a grind. But make no mistake, you're always going to have some grinds. So the first answer is I try to do more of what fulfills me, but what fulfills you is not always profitable, especially not at first. 

Rich Bennett 17:08
Right? 

Alan Lazaros 17:09
And then in terms of personal well-being, the only other thing I can say is I break my days into thirds. I do. The first third is for me, that's where I do my journal. Got my journal here. I know we're not on video, but that's my journal and call it the Dreamliner. And I do my journal. I do my my morning routine. I do my mobility. The first thought is for me, that's where I pour in. So I listen to my own personal development stuff. I have a course. I'm taking on leadership, that kind of stuff. So first third is for me and I don't do my first call till 11. Now remember, I didn't start there. It sounds really nice. It didn't start there right then. My second third is for service. So this right now is service. This is this is contributing all that pouring in. 

Rich Bennett 17:55
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 17:56
Out into the World Service and profitability is the second, third the third, third is for fitness, food and family. 

And so that's how I, I don't know if I like the word balance, but that's how I harmonize my well-being. 

Rich Bennett 18:12
With. 

Alan Lazaros 18:13
My professional life as well. And then obviously sleep right And but I don't count sleep because that's a given. But I try to get 8 hours of sleep. I wake up the first third's for me, second, third for service and profitability, third, third is for fitness, food and family, which is rest and relaxation. 

Rich Bennett 18:29
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 18:30
And then I recharge and, and I do six days a week. So Sundays we, I don't say off but it's more back office stuff. But six days a week from 11 to 7 p.m. I'm doing service Right. But the mornings are for me and the evenings are for my relationship and my fitness. 

Rich Bennett 18:47
Huh. Maybe I need to do that. Break it up into thirds. I like that idea because. 

Alan Lazaros 18:54
I think you'll enjoy. Wow. 

Rich Bennett 18:55
Oh yeah. I will end with this because the way this is grown, 

I'm a Chris. My daughter gets on me all the time because I'll go up and I'll cook. Dinner was the day I have dinner and I'm right back up coming back down to work some more, you know. And but now I'm a workaholic too. I love working, but I don't consider. And I remember when my father said, You got to have fun doing it. And this is the most fun I've ever had. If if you would have told me this years ago when I when I was in the field or even before that in radio, that I'd be doing this, number one, I would have said, What the hell is a podcast? 

Alan Lazaros 19:40
You were in radio way back. 

Rich Bennett 19:42
Yeah, Yeah, I got my degree in radio. 

Alan Lazaros 19:45
Cool. 

Rich Bennett 19:46
Yeah. And it's funny because I started out as a deejay in the clubs before I got into radio, and there was a guy that worked at a local radio station that would come to your club. He's a major. You got to go to broadcast school. You need to get into radio. So I did. And I hated it. Really hated it. Yeah. Because I was. I mean, I love music. The first station that I interned at, I loved. But then when the first then the first station actually hire me where I started getting a paycheck, I couldn't use my own name. 

They couldn't even use my nickname. Yeah, in the clubs, a lot of people either knew me by my regular name or as rocker 

on the radio. The first show I went into was a country station and he's like, Well, you can't get by Rich Barrett or Rock or what your who's your favorite country artist as a Johnny Cash? These are your rich cash. 

Nobody knew who the hell I was. 

Alan Lazaros 20:48
No cash. Rich Bennett actually. Sounds good for a country station to. 

Rich Bennett 20:54
Yeah, I guess he sounds better than Rich Cash, but I just. Yeah, I just didn't like it. You're a robot. They're telling you what to say, when to say what to play, when to play it. 

Alan Lazaros 21:03
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 21:04
And nowadays of radio. 

Alan Lazaros 21:05
You know, I actually coached someone for a long time. She wouldn't mind me sharing this. So Danielle Murr, she has a she was on the a big show in Boston and she's a dear friend of mine and she was a client for a couple of years there. She talked about how hard it was to have such little blurbs. 

Rich Bennett 21:25
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 21:26
It's like short form. And I've been on a couple of radio stations now at this stage, and it was it was hard for me because I like to go deep. 

Rich Bennett 21:33
Yeah, yeah. It's, it's, yeah, I just now this I love more because you control it more. Yeah. It's not regulated by the FCC yet. Hopefully it never will be. 

Alan Lazaros 21:45
Yeah. Oh yeah. 

Rich Bennett 21:46
But then again when I was in radio, I didn't do interviews either. Well, I don't even like to say interviews. I like to call them conversations. 

It just, yeah, I didn't care for too much. I loved doing sales more than anything and after I got out of the i.t. Feel fixing computers, I got back into sales and just love that from selling cars. I even sold radio advertising. So copiers, I just. 

Alan Lazaros 22:15
Well, sales is nothing but building relationships with people. 

Rich Bennett 22:17
Yes. Yeah. And even that has changed a lot too. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, back in the day we went in when we went to a sales call, the idea was to go in and close that call on the first trip. You can't do that today. You have to build a relationship. You have to get the conversation going. 

Alan Lazaros 22:34
Yeah, it's a lot more noisy. Yeah, there's a lot more options for everybody online, you know? 

Rich Bennett 22:39
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Actually, what. What common misconceptions do people often have about optimizing their lives for success and fulfillment? 

Alan Lazaros 22:50
Well, first and foremost, that the the word optimization. I think that so Emily and I my my beautiful girlfriend and I say future wife and then everyone says congratulations and we're not engaged yet. But when I say future wife, I just that's our intention. So we have over our kitchen, we have like a, you know, opening to our kitchen. We have our three core values. It's it's optimized align and area date so optimize Yeah a line and erudite so erudite means knowledge expertise. Okay aligned means to stay in alignment with your core values and your goals and then optimize. So optimize is a word that I don't think we were taught. Most people weren't. What it means is what are you optimizing for? And what I mean by that is 

right now anyone listening to this is optimizing for listening to this. But let's say you're let's say you're listening to this and you're in a car and all of a sudden you you are lost and you don't know where you are. You're going to your brain's going to flip, to optimize, to get found. Again, you ever be in a car and you get lost and all of a sudden you're like, Wait, turn everything off, Everyone shut up. Like, I need to be where I'm at. Yeah, that's your brain. Re optimizing on the most important thing. So optimize the word means you can only really optimize for one thing at a time. So right now I'm optimizing for this conversation with you. If something happened with Emilio or my pets, I would optimize for that and you would understand that because that's the most important thing at the time. Right? And so, so multi-disciplinary optimization, holistic optimization is this really complex. So how do you take a company, how do you take a team? How do you take a business and optimize them all in the same direction when you have all different core values, all different core aspirations, all different people, unique strengths and weaknesses, complementary or not, and how do you harmonize and optimize everybody in one direction? And if you can do that, you are you have what I believe to be the most marketable skill in the world. If you can lead a rich, dynamic, positive, holistic group of people from all different cultures, all different backgrounds, all different generations, all different races, all different ethnicities, all different countries now in one direction toward common goals. I mean, that's a powerful skill. And so that's what optimization means, is it's this duality between you can only focus on one thing at a time and optimize for one thing at a time, but you have to do a bunch of stuff in that direction. 

Rich Bennett 25:32
Hmm. Okay. That makes sense. Yeah, 

it makes a lot of sense. If the thing hanging over your doorway optimize aligned. And what was the third one? 

Alan Lazaros 25:45
Erudite. 

Rich Bennett 25:46
Erudite. Mm hmm. And what's that mean? 

Alan Lazaros 25:49
It means to be of high knowledge and high expertise. It's. It's a very 

sophisticated, quote unquote, word. I remember when I first told you, meaning that she's like, What's that word? She's like, I love that word. Yeah. And so it means knowledge to be to be okay. Extremely knowledgeable and aware 

and I think sophisticated on some level. We could Google it. I should probably know the actual Webster's Dictionary definition, but at the end of the day, you know what? I found it a little embarrassing. There's a there's a movie called Divergent that was based on books. Yes. You ever seen. Okay. One of the factions is erudite 

and they're the quote unquote, smart ones. Right? 

Rich Bennett 26:31
Okay. 

Alan Lazaros 26:32
You know, there's the dauntless, the erudite. Yeah. All the different ones. There's the ones with courage and and the cool part about that movie that I like is, you know, the main character is what's divergent, which is I'm, I'm courageous and I'm smart and I'm, you know, why does it have to be in or why do we have to be all in one box? Why can't we, you know, have all the virtues or at least aspire to, you know? 

Rich Bennett 26:56
Yeah. Hmm. I yeah, I got to go watch that movie again. 

Alan Lazaros 27:01
Well, now you'll recognize Erudite. 

Rich Bennett 27:03
Yeah, Yeah, I know. I heard about it before. I just didn't. Didn't click at first in your experience, how does one's mindset influence the development of effective habits for success? 

Alan Lazaros 27:20
So mindset is kind of like if you've ever been sailing. MM And this is a great Jim Jim Rohn quote, but I also, Amelia's father is a he does sailing and he taught me sailing and he said the cool thing about sailing is that when you, you have a heading, you have to use the wind regardless of where it's coming from to try to get in, you have to zigzag to get there. I think mindset is kind of like the set of the sail. So no matter what blows on you or what comes your way, you find a way to get that port progress toward, again, optimization toward an ultimate goal. But that's how I think the mindset affects is two things in mindset matter. 

Number one is self-belief, also known in psychology as self-efficacy. I don't know why, but for whatever reason, people don't talk a ton about self-belief. They how to build it, what it is, whether or not you have it. They talk a ton about confidence. I think confidence is a momentary version of something far deeper, which is how much you believe in yourself. So number one is self-belief. Number two is self-worth. The second one I didn't have at all the first one I had a lot and I'll explain. The first one is your your belief in your own ability to achieve what you want, your belief in your own ability to figure it out. So, for example, you obviously have high self-belief with computers. If you were purposely putting viruses on them for the challenge, whereas someone else would look at that and be like, I don't know enough about computers to overwhelming like me with cars, I have no idea. I mean, my car breaks, I bring it to a mechanic. I don't know anything about cars nowadays especially. Yeah. But now. But, but I'm a computer engineer, so I used to build computers when I was young and, you know, motherboard and random access memory, all the different components. So I have high self-efficacy with computers, high self-belief, and I have low self-belief with cars, but my global self-belief is high in general. I feel like I can figure things out. I can problem solve that I believe in my own brain, that kind of thing. Okay, so that's number one. That's self-belief. Number two is self-worth. So self-belief is I can earn this and I can do this and I can achieve this. Self worth is do I deserve this? 

So self-belief is I can build the castle and I know I can and I'm going to do it and I'm going to do whatever it takes. Self worth is once I build the castle, I'm going to let my friends in and they're going to spill spilt beer on the carpets. And I'm okay with it because I don't I don't respect myself unconsciously. And so a lot of us who grow up in really tough environments are really poor or whatever. 

Rich Bennett 30:08
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 30:10
Abuse is sexual abuse, physical abuse, mental emotional abuse, all that kind of stuff. A lot of times we have really low self-worth and we all kind of know what high inflated self-worth looks like, like a spoiled brat. Like think of someone who never had any challenges, who was given everything, and now they think they just deserve stuff with very little effort and three easy payments. 3995 Right. Those people, it's obvious. It's like, Oh, you're super entitled, right? And people with low self-worth have a really hard time with people like that. It's like, listen, you've got to work hard. So like, so for example, you know, America's the biggest economy by far. It's 20 trillion GDP. And some of the kids that I see now, again, now that I'm 35 and I'm looking back, I mean, some of these kids listen, I know your minimum wage is high and I'm not trying to be unkind about this, but some of these kids are super entitled. I mean, I made $7 an hour, $5 an hour when I was a kid, and I was grateful for it. And some of these kids are making 18 bucks an hour and they are so entitled. It's like they don't they don't believe in hard work. It's obvious you don't believe in work ethic. You think you deserve something and you're in trouble. You're in trouble cause short term, that's cool, right? It's cool not to care. It's cool not to work hard. But long term, you're in some serious trouble, especially when globally, I've got some team members on my team that are willing to do ten times more for half the price. Right. Who who grow up in in areas that are that are far less economically abundant, if that makes sense. And I don't want to get into the global economy, but essentially what I'm saying is people with inflated self-worth, people know it's spoiled, spoiled brats, people with deflated self-worth, low self-worth. They just get stepped on, stomped on repeatedly and those are the diamonds in the rough. I think those are the people that are not entitled and they want to work for every dollar and they want to prove themselves. And they believe in themselves and they're amazing. And when they do get around a leader that really cares about them, they they they build self-worth and when they do, they stop tolerating being disrespected. And so those are the two main parts of mindset that I think are important self-belief and so forth. 

Rich Bennett 32:29
You want to think all to do instead of making the minimum wage. Was it $15? I think, yeah, I believe in mass. 

Alan Lazaros 32:36
I think it's 15. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 32:37
Let's let's if you want to see people work hard, get rid of that minimum wage and make them work on commission and commission only, I guarantee you you're going to see them. People start Boston. 

Alan Lazaros 32:50
Cars, of. 

Rich Bennett 32:51
Course, they're going to learn how to work. Coming from a sales background, you know, how hard you gonna work to do that? Yes. I think Lee Iacocca said it best when he was head of Chrysler. He was asked to run for president. He said, I could never run for president because I would put Congress and the Senate on commission. They would only get paid if they did something to earn it. 

Alan Lazaros 33:15
Yeah. Yeah. Well. 

Rich Bennett 33:19
You look, I'm looking at the time real quick. A couple other questions real quick. So 

if you could give one piece of advice to someone at the start of their journey towards fulfillment and success, what would it be? 

Alan Lazaros 33:40
Yeah, so it would be 

this is this is again, formulaic thinking. So my math brain, there's four modalities of thinking, I'll go quick with this. There's numbers and math. That's number that's the rarest, I think, statistically. But of course, I would think that since it's mine. Right. But number two is words. So words is the most common. Most people think in words, language. And the third is pictures, thinking, images, imagination, images. And then the fourth is actually energy. All of us think in all four, but we have a main modality of thinking. Mind is numbers. So I'm very formula based. So one piece of advice that I would give is you only have three resources in life and I didn't have any of this figured out when I was a kid. I just figured it out through massive pain and failure, quite frankly. Number one, you have time. Number two, you have effort. And number three, you have money. I believe that the quality of your life will be determined based on where you invest your time, effort and money. 

Now, here's the thing. What determines where you invest your time, effort and money. 

Rich Bennett 34:53
Right? 

Alan Lazaros 34:54
And it's what you focus on, who you learn from. So, for example, right now, anyone listening to this after this, assuming you don't hate me, 

you will invest your time, effort and money a little better. 

Rich Bennett 35:09
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 35:10
And a little better. A little better, a little better, a little better. And when you do a little better over time, the numbers get wild. And so, you know, I started out at $5 an hour. Eventually seven, 25, eventually eight, And then eventually I remember my first big pay raise was 21 bucks an hour. I couldn't believe it. I worked for a company called iRobot. I was on the Roomba. 

Rich Bennett 35:35
iRobot okay, I know it sounded familiar. 

Alan Lazaros 35:38
Yeah, I was on the Roomba team. I was on the Roomba team. I had to actually do some studies with the Roomba versus the competitors and stuff was really cool. 

Rich Bennett 35:45
Or or as some people call it, the cat mobile. 

Alan Lazaros 35:48
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The cat car. That's what they should do in their marketing. They should just put a cat. On that thing. Oh yeah. So. But anyway, so I was on that, that global product team and then I went from $21 an hour to my first job was 60 5ka year. First job out of college, first job out of college. Then I did 65 to 85, then I did 85 to 1 or five. Then I did 105 to 125 and then I got almost to 200 and then I quit corporate. And I actually am very grateful now at this stage to actually have finally surpassed that, even though I was a broke entrepreneur for like four years, going from a lot of money to almost no money, right, like a long time. And I liquidated all my stocks that I had and I actually went past zero. They let you go past zero. You can just go right into that. Yeah. 

Which I did. But anyways, now I'm finally in a place where I actually am the most profitable I've ever been. But here's my point of all that. Where I invest my time, my effort and my money has the choices that I made was determined based on where I focused. So I had a lot of mentors, I had a lot of coaches. I have a therapist. I tried to have conversations with great people. I interviewed hundreds of people on our podcast. Some of the most peak performing people on the planet. And you just learn, learn, learn, learn, learn. And I just became obsessed with curiosity and trying to understand what makes the difference in people's lives. And so the last piece to answer your question is what choices you're making with your time, effort and money. What persons, places, things and ideas do you focus on and how do you make sure that you don't get this shiny object syndrome of. The last thing I'll say is I was at Thanksgiving and you know, it was a wonderful day and everyone was talking about the Thanksgiving Day parade and shares hair. And I had this moment where I was like, Oh, God, I can't. I can't do it. I just shut. Off. It's like, are we seriously talking about chairs here? Hair right now? And so here's my point. If you are worried about shares, hair, your futures worse. If you're. Listening to this show and trying to learn and grow, your future is getting brighter. And I know that sounds mean, but I will risk you disliking me to. Tell you the truth, 

if you're worried about Cher's hair more than Cher, you're in trouble. 

Rich Bennett 38:19
Oh, I didn't even watch the parade. I'm glad I did it. 

Alan Lazaros 38:22
Yeah. Yeah. You were probably working. 

Rich Bennett 38:27
Who was I doing? You know what I was? Yeah, I think I was working things. No way. MIT, I can't remember. Who knows? 

Something very important. Tell everybody your website how they can get in touch with you. Because you do coaching. You guys offer some great courses and a freakin podcast are awesome. Thank you. It's still seven days a week. Still seven days for the one. Yeah. Jesus. 

Alan Lazaros 38:55
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, God. Yeah. Our production team is awesome. Otherwise, we could never do that. Right? Right. But all our episodes are, you know, anywhere from 15 minutes to a half hour, seven days a week. But the idea underneath that, I'll just share quickly if you can get just 1% better per day, just a little bit better each day, that's the goal. So yeah, so you can find us at next level. Universe dot com. We have an awesome website, very grateful everything you need to know on there. You can also email me Alan Excuse me Alan at next level universe dot com we have a podcast called Next Level University. The person who owns that URL is asking for way too much money. 

So we decided to go with next level universe. Mm hmm. Kevin Joe. 

Rich Bennett 39:49
Martin. 

Alan Lazaros 39:49
One day we're going to buy that thing, you know, we'll see. Right now it's like, no, no chance we're going to we're going to change it to next level universe dot com. So you can go to the website, you can email me, you can check out our podcast. And yeah, I appreciate it. I appreciate. 

Rich Bennett 40:03
It. You guys have to podcast, don't you? 

Alan Lazaros 40:05
So he has one called Podcast Growth University that it's all under the same umbrella. It is. It's on the same company. So next level University is the main company next level universe dot com is the main website. Kevin has a podcast called Podcast Growth University. Then we have the main podcast next Level University. I have a podcast with my beautiful girlfriend called the Conscious Couple's podcast, and that's about relationships. 

Rich Bennett 40:27
Really. 

Alan Lazaros 40:28
That's about relationships. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 40:29
Oh, you. Oh, I'll have to look for that one now. I didn't know that. 

Alan Lazaros 40:33
It's I'll. 

Rich Bennett 40:34
Be. 

Alan Lazaros 40:34
Darn, we just crossed hundred and two episodes. We do one a week. I mean you want to so challenging for me I'm Mr. Computer Engineer figuring out this relationship stuff and she is leading the charge because she's so good at this. I was not, you know, if anything, I was emotionally immature. I didn't understand any of this. But it's been super beneficial because my IQ, I was I was grateful for my IQ needed to come up desperately, 

you know. 

Rich Bennett 41:02
Oh, jeez. All right. So my last question for you. I don't even know if I asked Kevin this. I don't know if I was doing this at the. You've been interviewed. God knows how many times. Is there anything and it doesn't necessarily have to be about this could be about anything. Is there anything, A who says never asked you that you wish they would have asked you, and if so, what would be their question and what would be your answer? 

Alan Lazaros 41:26
What a great question. Holy crap. That's the question I wish I was asking. 

Rich Bennett 41:31
People tried that. 

Alan Lazaros 41:32
It's not that's not going to work. What's a question I wish I was asked? 

Yeah, I think a question that came up for me is, you know, what's the what's the thing you're scared to share that is true. That actually is the is the reason why you've been able to to like my father died when I was two. I had a stepdad from 3 to 14. I essentially lost in some ways three families. By the time I'm 14 years old. It was my childhood was it's so interesting. People see me now and they see, you know, 

way Caucasian American, male, you know, 

corporate, all that stuff smart. And I appreciate it. Right. What's been really interesting is that to be to be seen as not an underdog. Yeah, but to have always have been an underdog has been has been really challenging because I think a lot of people think I'm arrogant. I think a lot of people think I had a silver spoon. 

I think I think I can unintentionally come across, as you know, this six foot two tall, you know, But I didn't start out that way. I mean, I was a prepubescent, you know, tough childhood last, didn't have a male role model anywhere. Just unbelievable adversity When my stepdad left, we didn't even know how we were, how I was going to go to college because we I was getting free lunch at school because of how broke we were. Mm hmm. 

Rich Bennett 43:04
Wow. 

Alan Lazaros 43:06
And I was grateful to be born in a free country, of course. And luckily, there was something called Equal opportunity where I got scholarships and financially and I got to go to my dream college. So I'm very, very grateful for that, because without that help, I wouldn't have been able to. Yeah, but that's the question I would want to be asked, which is like, what's the one thing you're scared to share with people that you know made the biggest difference? 

Rich Bennett 43:29
And it would have been that. 

Alan Lazaros 43:31
Yeah, it would be wow. It would be. There's two ways. There's two types of adversity. There's the adversity life throws at you. Yeah. And that's inevitable. And then there's the adversity of setting ridiculously large goals. And I didn't know this at the time, but I chose both. 

Rich Bennett 43:48
Yeah. 

Alan Lazaros 43:49
And I think that's what's made me maybe different or, or a lot of the things that I do, A lot of people are like, whoa. Like, you know, how do you do that? I think it's just the compound effect of just constant adversity. And then even when I wasn't in adversity and abuses, I had the adversity of climbing really big mountains, metaphorically, right on my own accord because I had such high self-belief. And so I just hope everyone believes in themselves more, and I hope that we can flip the script on wanting an easy life. I think wanting an easy life is a losing game. 

Rich Bennett 44:23
Yeah. Oh yeah, without a doubt. And then you're going to try to focus on me, you know, making that easy life, trying to get it, which is just going to make it harder. 

Alan Lazaros 44:33
100%. 

Rich Bennett 44:34
100%. I agree. I agree with you there. 

Alan Lazaros 44:36
If you choose easy, it's going to be it's going to be brutal. And if you choose hard, it'll be brutal, but meaningful. 

Rich Bennett 44:42
And nothing's ever easy. 

Alan Lazaros 44:44
I know everything. Even Myers said and done, everything. 

Rich Bennett 44:49
Looks. 

Alan Lazaros 44:49
Easy in comparison to what it really is, right? You look at some of these athletes and it's they make it look easy. Trust me. It's No, it's not. It's not. The person on the stands saying, Why didn't you catch the. Ball? Because it was coming at me at 70 miles an hour with a £270 person coming at me at 50 miles an hour. You know, it's like, I'd love to see you catch the ball. So. 

Rich Bennett 45:14
You know. Well, that's a whole that's a whole nother episode they're just talking about. Easy. What is easy? 

Alan Lazaros 45:22
Nothing. End of episode. Exactly. You know. 

Rich Bennett 45:25
Exactly. Alan, I want to thank you so much. And like I told Kevin, the door is open. Any time you guys individually want to come back on. Well, before we before we start it, you have to come back on so we could talk about the other thing that we mentioned earlier. But thank you so much continued success to you and make sure you tell Kevin I said hi as well and yeah it was great talking to you is definitely an honor and a true pleasure. So thank. 

Alan Lazaros 45:56
You. Thank you for everything. Your humility, your kindness, your your obvious eagerness to learn from other people and just the laughs. We had a good time with a good time. I appreciate it. I will tell Kevin that you said hello. I know that he remembers you and he remembers being on this show. So appreciate it.