How $150M Made Mike Beckham Rethink Money & Happiness transcript

Mike Beckham is the CEO and co-founder of Simple Modern. You know Mike because he is one of the hosts of the Operators podcast. He is a known commodity in the DTOC ecom space, which is a good thing cuz he has a lot of good stuff to teach you about how to grow your business. And on this episode, we're going to talk about very little of it. Instead, we are going to talk about what he's actually building towards and what is the point of making the kinds of money that Mike has made.

If you're interested in thinking about how wealth generation leads to joy in your life, that is really what we are going to talk about. Mike is a friend in the space. He's been extremely successful. He has a lot of great thoughts about this. I think you're going to like this podcast a lot. And I don't know if you've heard Mike talk about this before. Probably somewhere. We'll see. Let's get into it with Mike Beckham from Simple Modern. >> Is that like a bad hook, Mike?

Telling people you're not going to you're not going to teach people how to be successful today? >> No, I love it. I mean people have to there's a lot of content of me talking about running a business and operating a business and so if they want that they can go to other places. This is >> operator podcast go to it right now. >> Exactly. Like we literally talk about it every week. So this is a great place to talk about uh kind of like why why be good at being at operating a business?

Why start a business at all? >> So you can sit on the porch on the deck in Florida where you are right now. That's not a Zoom background. That's actually the ocean behind you. >> You're background. Yeah. And so if you hear kids running around or something that's that's real. That's uh we're we're at a house here with my my my kids and some extended family. But uh yeah, flexibility is for sure one of those I I think like one of those things that you enjoy about having a successful company. >> Do you take your when you take off of work like on vacation right now what you're doing right now could could reasonably be considered work in some respect, but uh do you take the time completely off of work?

Like is it like a don't call Mike? >> No, not really. I It's interesting. my co-founder Brian Porter, he is a like he'll literally delete Slack off his phone. It's like not even like he puts the out of office. It's like, you know, basically like break the phone in half, throw it in the ocean, like there's no way to talk with him about work. Um, for me, I actually really enjoy just cycling down to like 15% of work mode. partially because uh a lot of my best business thoughts actually happen on vacation when my mind is kind of relaxed and enjoying time with my family.

Part of it also is like I just have a really high motor. And so I'm usually, you know, from the moment I wake up to when I go to bed, I'm kind of going and my brain wants to be focused on something. And so, uh, like for example, when we would go to Disneyland or Disney World with the kids when they were young, it's like we go to the park for a few hours, I'd bring them back, put them down for a nap, I would work really hard, then we go back to the park.

And this kind of hybrid model actually works really well for me. Some of my favorite work is actually done while I'm in the middle of a vacation. >> I'm gonna push you on that in a future podcast episode and tell you to take more time completely off. Uh yeah, I probably my brain turns completely on it and I've been I've been amazed at how much the value of the thing I try to do is one day a week, I don't know if you do this, one day a week, uh try to take a day without looking at work at all. uh like like a a Sabbath basically.

Um and I have found that a daytoday end to end no work has a different effect on me than a dayto-day with 5% of work. It has a meaningfully different, you know. Uh so anyway, that's a that's a conversation for a future time. But I love it. I love being pushed there because I think the research would say like you're at a brain level like your brain waves and stuff it is different. And uh so and it's probably an area where if anything one of the downsides to my personality is that I so much like puzzles and challenge and things like that that uh you know I've loved that business has provided that but also sometimes you're like am I kind of using this as a drug or a crutch you know that I just want the stimulation and so it's easy it's an easy thing to go get that from >> the business being fun to work on is precisely the problem actually.

Uh, I think when people um conceptualize the idea of overworking, what they're thinking about is the idea that like some boss or client is breathing down their neck and making them work and they really wish they didn't have to, but they have to do it cuz that's what they do to get their paycheck and they're a slave to their company or whatever. But in my experience in the DDC world, especially with a bunch of entrepreneurs, it's not that at all.

It's that it's really fun to solve the problems. It's really engaging and stimulating. And so it is like more like a drug. like it's like it's like the the appeal of it, the pleasure of it is the is precisely the problem and it's precisely the thing that you that I I'll just speak for myself that I have to actually resist in some ways. Um because I want to work on it because I like my business and I like the people I work with and I and and it's also another thing I've said it's so much easier to work than it is to downshift my brain to play with my 5-year-old.

It's like drastically easier. Um, and so but I that I mean that nicely leads into the conversation point here, which is that I don't actually think that will yield the long-term joy. I think that's going to be a short-term pleasure that is going to hurt my long-term pursuit of joy. And so I have to resist it, even though I don't think it's like evil or something like that. It's just if I'm optimizing my life for joy, which I'm trying to, then I'm just not sure that's going to work very well. >> Yeah, I think it's good.

And I mean I think with digital businesses in general there is so much dopamine of uh dashboards that you can refresh and look at a new number you know like there's there's just always some new metric or some we joke about monitoring the situation and like ecom is the ultimate monitoring the situation you know like we launched a new product last Friday that's probably the most successful a weekend of any product we've ever launched and it's like yeah but yes awesome but also like you know how tempting it is to just be like pounding on the dashboard, you know, every sale. >> Uh, >> I'm going to have to resist it during this conversation.

I'm going to have to try my best to not while I'm at my computer pull up a Facebook ads dashboard and check how my ads doing or whatever. >> Um, okay. Uh, so here's here's what I want to know. You've built Simple Modern into the like high 100 millions or something you've said publicly. Just like extremely successful. You're one of the most successful people in the e-commerce TDC landscape. That has been covered. I think it's great.

I love it. I know you. I know a number of the people on your executive team reasonably well. Have worked with you in some, you know, for a short engagement along the way. I've been out to Oklahoma City a few times to to um experience the promised land. Just I was just I just wanted to go to Oklahoma City. That was the reason. But I I stopped by Simple Modern while I was there. Um and uh and all those things. So, I've gotten to know a little bit of that.

And it's just an incredibly impressive thing that you've built. So, here's my question for you to start this off uh a little bit more earnestly. Why not sell the business right now, cash out and make the money? Cuz you you did it. You got you got to a number. You could generate for you and the shareholders who are your friends and executives with you could generate never work again money in life and and your company would be extremely appealing for somebody to acquire.

I mean, we haven't talked about all the specific financials, but I just know that's true. Uh it's really well-run company. It's successful. It's growing. It's at a real scale at this point. You've got omni channel. I mean, it's just really good company. So there is there you could right now enter a sales process where by the end of next year or whatever it is, you know, whatever the timeline it would take, cash out, have an incredible amount of money, be one of the richest people to ever walk the earth on the grand scheme of things, and go back to that deck that you're on in Florida and just and hang out all the time.

Um, or whatever else you want to do with your free time. Play a lot of golf, whatever, right? Whatever your thing is, go to even more thunder games. Why don't you do that? >> Yeah. Well, I I think it's a great question and before I get into some of the answer, I'll say that >> or by the way may maybe you are doing it by the way. I I don't know like are you entering a sales process? I don't know. >> No, I'm not. And and there's no intention of doing it.

Uh I think I've been fairly public about like I really just don't see myself selling the company for for a variety of reasons. But I I think it starts with the question of just uh what am I trying to get out of life and how is the company a part of me getting that out of life? And that's I think that a pretty central question. And a lot of times when you start a business it's just like can I make a profit? That's the central question.

Can I sell anything? And then can I sell anything and make a profit? Uh and then can I make enough to support myself? Um, and so I'm in 2023 we had our first really big year. Like uh I don't know if you'll want to bleep it out or not, but it's like we did any of it that year. So really big year. You were you were around like >> I don't need to bleep it. Do you want me to bleep it? >> Hey, jumping back in super fast just to say that after Mike and I recorded, Mike thought it was probably wisest not to share the actual specific EBA number uh that Civil Modern had done.

And so we bleeped it out for this part of the conversation and there's a few more bleeps later in the conversation as well. Uh the thing is it doesn't really matter because the point is that it's a really big number and uh a bigger number than most people are dealing with and the kind of number that makes you rethink your financial life. And so that's really the point. So the specifics don't really matter that much. We did bleep it.

That's all you need to know. Let's keep going. Um and then the next year in 24 we followed that up with a similar number. This year we won't be as high um thanks to tariffs and a whole number of things. Let me ask a question about that before you finish, which is >> was much of that available to you in cash? >> A decent amount. And we even the way that we approached some of that like we did some share buybacks from minority owners like we wanted to have uh some of that disproportionately flow to some minority owners, but obviously at that point personal finances are not a huge stressor.

And I think what it triggered, I walked into that period with probably one of the more uh thought through viewpoints on, hey, you know, what's the point of money? Why am I doing all this? And it was still fairly disorienting. I mean, I've said this before publicly in another talk, but there's a book in the Bible uh written by King Solomon, Ecclesiastes, where he basically is like, I got all the stuff. I caught all of the cars.

You know, I use this analogy of a dog chasing a car and you know, he's like, I caught all the cars and then I was like, I what do I do here? You know, what's what's the point? And I really think it's almost impossible to have any kind of experience with extreme wealth without having somewhat of that kind of dark knight of the soul or whatever. And and like I said, I went into it probably fairly prepared. And uh but it really does it.

One of the things that it does that I think is counterintuitive is when you get to like that level of wealth, it's like it makes you take a step back and say where does my drive come from? And why am I driven towards really anything? Because now I have enough money that I could ostensibly pay for everything to be done for me. I I could never have to be driven towards anything again in my life. And it was good. It was good but challenging of just re-evaluating all the things I said I believed.

It's one thing to say, hey, if I ever had just like extreme generational life-changing money, I would do X. And then it's a different thing to actually experience it. And I think that I've walked through that period over the last maybe year or two, and hopefully I've come out um a better person on the other side. But it's also one of those that you don't exactly know how it's going to impact you until you do it. But going through it, I think ultimately has uh probably deepened my convictions about some things of how I think about my worldview about how I think about money, how I think about trying to get what I want out of life.

Um the role of working, the role of my company, uh in such a way that I I would not want to sell it at this point. Um and happy to get into all that. Uh >> well, you just gave us a nice layout for this podcast. So let's start before the and and go back to what were what were your thoughts then as best as you can remember them that you said were really developed at the time and then I have some follow-up questions but let's start there.

So you said you had thoughts about money and all that stuff. I think I mean I you know you and I are both Christians. That's definitely I I know we're our commitment to our faith is informing our worldview on this and that's is probably dishonest in this podcast to not to not say that that's a part of the conversation and part of how we've connected. So I know that's in there, but that's I mean there's a lot of Christians and a lot of people with all kinds of different views who who um would call themselves Christians and things like so um so yeah, obviously people's in these kinds of conversations, religious commitments, faith commitments, worldview on the broader sense is going to inform the way they approach the question.

So I know that's in there and you can say as much or little about that as you want, but um but uh but yeah, what what were your what were your convictions before um before that moment happened? And then later I want to get to the part about what was disorienting about it because that's an interesting question too. >> Yeah. Well, so it's interesting. I I want to touch on all that. One question that you have to answer is like what really brings me fulfillment or joy in my life.

And that's actually a pretty difficult question because some people don't actually have an answer for it because they've never really experienced it. I feel fortunate that I have through a variety of things, really healthy relationships, meaningful pursuits, um my my faith, uh like I there's so many things where I feel like, okay, that really does bring me fulfillment and joy. And honestly, until you kind of have a a framework of that or an experience of that, it's very difficult to answer any of these questions.

I think this is where a lot of people get um kind of backwards is they're like, "Well, I've never really experienced it, but I think I would I would feel it if only this happened." It's really kind of a circumstantial view towards towards joy or towards uh fulfillment that uh I haven't experienced it yet, but the reason is that my circumstances haven't quite aligned, but once my circumstances, whatever I think that is, a certain number in my bank account, uh the right people around me, my wife looking a certain way, whatever, then I'm going to actually experience it.

And one of the things that's really helpful is when you kind of disabuse yourself of that thought process. You realize no, it's actually not circumstantial. I mean, circumstances matter, but it's not it's not exclusively circumstantial. That's not what makes you really satisfied as a person. So, on the faith side, I think I'll just comment this. I think having a larger dream for your life and a sense of why your life has meaning and purpose, I it's really difficult to be fulfilled if you don't have an answer to those questions.

And we live in a very cynical culture that kind of says there's no answer to that and so every answer is perfectly valid and equally fine. And I like kind of reject that idea. I think that's kind of nonsense and it doesn't hold up to any kind of intellectual scrutiny when you think about it. But for this per the purposes of this conversation, there's a lot of people that that probably uh have a faith background or faith is part of their lives and people that don't.

I would just say this. Uh we don't have to talk about anything post death. like we're going to talk about life on this earth and why is this stuff relevant for this although I think when you're a Christian obviously you're thinking about both hey how does this impact my life this yeah but how does it impact things after death um so I you know like one of the more formative things for me obviously was I was in nonprofit work for the first 10 years of my career I raised my salary u we were you know for college graduates we were relatively poor um my first year uh that working in this nonprofit ministry I made $18,000 And those years were very influential mainly because I think a couple things happened.

One was that I realized how much of my joy, happiness, fulfillment, purpose, all that stuff came from being around uh the right people that um I I think when you have control over your environment and the people you spend time around, I think that's one of the maximum drivers of satisfaction in life. And so if you believe that to be true and and there's a lot of research that says this, you know, there's that that phrase that you're the the average of the seven people you spend the most time with.

Um, but once you believe that to be true, it's like, well, hey, really being engaged in something that allows you to have high agency with that, right? Instead of being like totally accidental with who am I going to have to spend my time around every day, I'm going to be highly intentional. Like entrepreneurship makes a ton of sense, right? Like I'm not going to go work at XYZ Corp where they could bring in whoever and put them in the cubicle next to I could have Milton in the cube next to me or whatever.

Like, I'm going to actually get to to choose this stuff. Um, and it's funny, even with myself, I didn't realize how early that thought process had taken root. I was talking to a guy that uh I I mentored for a little bit when I was 23, and he was like, "One of the big things I heard you say then was that you were going to be super intentional with who you worked with because you felt like that was the number one driver of satisfaction." And I'm like, man, okay.

So, I really have been saying this for now for like multiple decades. Uh, but it's it's played out. So, like one of the ways I describe it is I think uh we we obviously believe this like you pick a spouse and you pick a spouse cuz it's like this is who I want to be around and you have kids and you invest in your kids and you hope that you want to spend a lot of time around them. You pick the the neighborhood you live in, the friends you're around.

Uh to me it was always been a really natural that like being in a work context, whatever it is you do for work where you're surrounded by people that you enjoy being around and that um kind of push you towards the version of yourself you want to be is an incredibly huge uh driver of happiness. And so that's one big piece of the simple modern story that I can't tell enough is it's like our balance sheet is great, but like kind of the the personal balance sheet is unbelievable.

Like there's kind of an embarrassment of riches of people that are inside that company. Uh and that far outweighs the financial balance sheet. Uh like you've spent time with like you said several people in the company and it's like you spend time with some of these people and you're like man what a joy that I get to spend time with these people every day. So, one of the things I've started to think about is um a company is a container for organizing another sphere of your life in the way that you desire.

And I knew that being around the right people or people that I wanted to be around was one of those things that I wanted to have high agency over. And so, I've used the container of entrepreneurship and simple modern to be really intentional about that. In fact, and just to take it a step further, we started another brand this year. Trevy uh promoted one of the executives from Simple Modern. And I have spent a ton of time with Corbin Wallace over the last year uh because we are building that company together.

And so I have actually started I've thought about it at this level of deliberateness. Andrew, anything I start from here on out, I'm going to start the company as an excuse to spend a lot more time around the person that is leading my company. One of the great joys of my life and business is working with my friends at More Staffing. More staffing is a staffing agency in the Philippines that connects you and your business with really good e-commerce talent from the Philippines so that you can plug into your business highly qualified, excellent professionals from the Philippines.

And you can do that while maintaining a lean opex and staying affordable as you build your team. I would not have the business that I have right now without my friends from More Staffing. I really mean that. They touch in some ways every part of what I am doing. You've heard me say I'm launching a brand. I fully intend to build every part of that brand primarily with my Philippines first mentality where the first place I'm going to look for talent is in the Philippines across the business.

If you're still thinking about Filipino talent in your business as extremely low-level entry level, $3 an hour, $5 an hour, virtual assistant kinds of things, uh there can be value in those positions as far as they go, but it is really missing out on the opportunity, especially because more staffing was built and formed out of deep e-commerce profiles and resumes themselves. They've worked in US-based e-commerce businesses for a long time.

They know what the needs are. And so if you need help across any part of the business, whether that's supply chain or operations, um you finance, marketing, graphic design, video editors, there's all kinds of places where more staffing can make an impact on your business with incredible talent. You should take a call as you begin to scale your business and keep building while keeping your opex lean. It is an incredible value proposition for you and for your business.

And it's an also an incredible way in the context of this episode to create value for people who are incredibly hardworking elsewhere in the world as they join your company and experience what you are building and get value from it. Uh so go check out more staffing by going to morestaffing.co/af more staffing.co/af. The link for that is in the show notes or or the description of this episode. They're going to help you with every part of the process.

Recruiting, training, coaching, onboarding, all of it. They're really great and they even give you a one-year guarantee. So if talent doesn't work out for a year, they'll help you replace that talent at no additional recruiting fee. That's a really good deal, way longer than most head hunting groups will give you. Go check it out today. I know I mean I had Corbin on this show to talk about Trevy and the opportunity with it.

And I know that it that didn't mean that you had to make a bad business decision to do it, right? Like Trevy is a really good opportunity. I don't know how it's going. It seems like it's going really well, but uh but like it, you know, there's a >> it's at about a $10 million annual run rate right now. And and it's it's breaking into profitability. And so for whatever we're at 250 days in, I think that's pretty good uh out of the gate.

And but but you know, it's like the way that Trevy has made my life richer this year is not it's not primarily the valuation of the company. It's that I you know, I've spent a lot of hours with Corbin. And the the other piece that I kind of alluded to, I have to have challenge in my life. Not everybody's like this, but I am. If I don't have like we I'm at this, you know, I'm in Florida. You know what I was doing last night till midnight?

I was working a puzzle. They they they I they I never get to work puzzles, but they bring puzzles here. They bring these big thousand piece puzzles and we we work this thousand piece puzzle. I just need it. I need it for the way that I'm wired. And so like I that for me like being able to work on a really challenging problem with somebody I really enjoy has been huge value ad to my life. Right. >> There's two there's two things that I think about all that.

One of them is you brought up this idea that people will say like I'll be joyful when you know I'll be content I'll be satisfied when whichever word you want to use. I think joy and contentment satisfaction those are basically three words for the same experience. It's really hard to be content if you're not joyful. Um, and and uh it's really hard to be joyful if you're not content. So, uh, so you could say for me, like my little phrase, optimize for joy.

That's what I'm trying to optimize my life for is for joy. And, uh, and you could really substitute any of those words. And in my estimation, the there it cannot be the case that I need more money for that. Well, and I just mean this at like almost like a math level. Um, and this is why like I just I really tr I think you're right that if I ever made a huge amount of money, it would be disorienting to me even, >> you know, I had a Yeah.

Anyway, doesn't matter. I'm doing very well financially and by all accounts, you know, nowhere close to the numbers that you're talking about, not even in that neighborhood. I couldn't stop working, right, if I wanted to, but I'm doing very well. Okay. So, um, >> I'll make your argument for you, Andrew. We are richer than any society has ever been. And the number of people on anti-depressants is like you know I mean like it's like you have to be blind to not see the irony of for all the abundance and for all the stuff we have it clearly is not driving the kind of sat satisfaction contentment quality of life that we would expect.

So I think it's oversimplified to say that money doesn't bring happiness because clearly getting out particularly of like abject poverty uh does on average I think bring people more happiness but even there even there I will say there are very poor people who are extremely happy and this is one of those things that everybody says who's ever gone to a third world place and been around people who have so much less than them and they all they come back with this you know they always say the same thing anybody who's done that whether it's like a church mission trip or you some somebody you support with your business's generosity program or something like that.

Everybody comes back and says the same thing. I couldn't believe how much joy I they had and uh I learned more. I got more from them than they than I gave to them. That's what people always say in those situations, right? And there's all kinds of reasons why you might nitpick that example and I get that, but just the basic point I think is basically true. And to to your point more specifically, and this is where I think it's a math thing, in the history of the world, there have been about 117 billion people who have ever lived.

And by any account of that, I am one of the very richest. I'm I'm actually beyond the 1%. I'm I'm nearing the 1% of the 1% even without being nearly where you are. 01. >> So So if it's the case that that I need more money to be happy, that is a devastating view of humanity because what it means is it means that almost nobody in the history of the world has ever been able to experience joy because there was an amount of wealth that that they could there was no chance they could ever achieve, right? the the GDP literally didn't exist, right?

So like so so so I just think like that is just an unsatisfying view of the world to me. And then that means if I am not feeling joy right now in my life, then it can't be because I need more money. It has it has to be for something else. And if I believe it's because I need more money, um then I am I am u deceived. I'm telling so my beliefs are wrong about all kinds of things, I'm sure. And so, so I've started to sort of think about that math and you you basically laid out the same point about this sort of like my relationship to money now versus what I want.

And that is what I'm trying to have drive the way I'm thinking now about my actual business decisions in some ways like in like the things I'm aiming at is if I actually apply that characterization to my life then then um then yeah, then that's kind of where I land. Mike Beckham has become a friend of mine in the e-commerce space through all kinds of connections and it has been a really important relationship in meaningful ways in my life in business.

When I went out on my own for the first time starting my own company, I did that uh with Simple Modern as a client of mine. And that relationship with Simple Modern and their team and Mike and their team was really important. Those relationships will be really important for you as well. And that's why you should join Workspace 6. Workspace 6. Go to workspace 6.io. O is a private community for e-commerce operators and executives from your team to meet, connect, build relationships, build network, share help with one another, and access all of the knowledge that people like Mike who um who are members of Workspace 6 uh who have built big companies, who are ahead of you in the journey, who can tell you what it is like to um to have success and to have challenges both and can talk you through those, can talk you through simple tactical questions like what's working and not on meta for them, what's working or on Google or apploven and they can help you vet those kinds of questions.

They can help you sort out all kinds of supply chain questions, operational questions, all the stuff that comes up in the day-to-day of running a business is accessible to you from other e-commerce operators who are doing it alongside you and they are there in Workspace 6 as a private Slack community. I love the Workspace 6 guys. They're just great. They've been helpful to me along the way. They have a giving first mentality in the e-commerce community to where they're building something that really is trying to create impact and value for other operators.

A private closed community like this just is uniquely valuable because there are problems that will come up in your business that somebody else has solved and you just need to have access to them, which is what you have with Workspace 6. Go to workspace 6.io. It is not too expensive. The first month is only a dollar and you can go check it out for yourself. There's really no risk. Workspace 6.io. Tell them that I sent you. >> I've got an analogy here.

I don't think I've used this analogy before, but I think this holds up. >> Money is a tool and that tool can do things. uh it makes it easier to do a lot of things that you could do with other tools. Uh it makes it possible to do certain things that you can do with very few other tools or maybe not at all. Um and so saying I would like to have more of that tool in my tool belt is a very logical thing, very rational. Believe in that idea.

The problem is the more of that tool you have in your tool belt, the more you feel like you just have to use that tool and that is the trap with money. The more that you feel like you have to use it to drive joy, happiness, contentment, whatever. And then it's quicksand. And this is what most people don't realize. So it's like the idea that if I always had this tool available and there was a situation where that called for it, I could use it.

Would that make my life better? Answer unequivocally. I think is yes. Right. The problem is that you know you have $10 million in the bank or whatever then you start thinking it's like the the phrase uh when you're a hammer everything looks like a nail. When you have $10 million in the bank it starts to look like every problem is a problem that you should pull the money tool out for. And that is actually what makes people really unhappy.

If you can keep it in its proper place in your life and view it as a not a like a good or a bad thing, but just an amoral neutral tool and that you can use that tool in the proper context, I think it's great. Go nuts. Get as much as you can because it's a great tool to have and there's a lot of great things you can do with it. The problem is that that's not how we work. The way that we work is when I start feeling a little bit down, a little bit bored, a little bit unsatisfied.

I'm like, you know what? If I just used more of that tool, I could make myself happy. I could make myself content. I could change this part of my life. And that is where it starts to go the other way. And you actually drive as much misery as you do satisfaction. So, it's a little bit like fire. Like I've heard this analogy with fire. Like it's great if it's in your fireplace and if it gets out of your fireplace, it burns your house down.

And I think it's the same kind of uh mindset like money when it's properly contextualized in your life and used properly as the tool that it is, it's great. The moment that you start asking it to be more than that, it'll burn your house to the ground. >> Is something about what you just described, the experience you had that you said is disorienting it done? >> Oh, for sure. For sure. Because like even in myself, I saw myself starting to do it.

I mean, it's just you just start to be like, if there's anything I don't like about the world, I'm just going to pay to change it, you know? And I knew that that was a pitfall and I still saw myself doing it. And uh like I realized that there is tremendous danger. I I think there's tremendous responsibility to my community, to my family, to a bunch of things to have the kind of amount of worth that I am in charge of stewarding.

But there's also just a lot of danger to to me. And so like actually being thoughtful about how much I give myself access to in some ways is also a safeguard to myself. And I don't think that's a cop out to say like, oh well, I don't trust myself or I'm kind of mentally weak and so it'd be bad for me to have $100 million in my bank account. I think it's more just saying and and as a side note, even if you think you can be very disciplined with that tool, can everybody else in your life be disciplined?

Can your kids have that similar level of discipline? Can your spouse? and your friends, you know, and the that is what sadly the more biographies you read uh and I've read a lot, you know, like I read Titan for example about Rockefeller, super interesting, but one of the things that is sobering is like you just look at his family and it's like it didn't go well. It did not go well. Um and there's a lot of stories like that.

You look at second and third generations typically having a a great abundance of this particular tool goes poorly. So it's not even just about your own ability to steward it. So anyway, I I have this kind of view where I can >> really fast on that, Mike. I want to hear I want to finish. I'm sorry. I on that point of passing on money, Morgan Hel has a comment that's really stuck with me in psychology of money. He says um >> he I think I think it's psychology maybe just a tweet or something, but he said basically in so many words, nobody's figured out what to do about money for your kids.

Like he just he just he just frames it like it's like this for wealthy people. it's just this big problem because you give them too much uh and it creates the Rockefeller problems that you're describing or whatever where it's just like entitlement or ease or something like that. Um and >> and if you give them too little there's another problem. So I've talked to the Yeah. Well, or or like I've talked to it's interesting.

I've talked to quite a few of in Oklahoma the the families that have uh multiund million multi-billion dollar uh estates and the ones that I'm really interested in talking to are the ones where they're on a third generation. So not their kids but their kids' kids and where there's normaly you know cuz I'm like okay so they've obviously had something go right if they're on third generation and things have not gone off the rails and one of the things that's super interesting is that I've had them describe a variety of approaches sometimes even polar opposite approaches and and it really emphasizes the point that like even the like it's interesting how much time as a society we devote to the pursuit of money and how little we devote to the psychology and the management of wealth when you do have it.

And uh the wealthy have not figured this out. And it it's really if you think about it like what a what a sad thing to potentially happen that you're so successful and you build all this wealth only for it to be the thing that eats your family, you know, that cancerously eats your family. So I I another story here. I was meeting with a wealth adviser of some kind. I sat down with him and uh his his kids are great. Uh and I was asking him what he did and he said, "Well, when they when they got in their 30s, I started passing the entire state on to on to them." And the reason I did it is a conversation I had years ago.

He met a guy, I don't know which family from Chicago, one of the big money families from Chicago. Um he met the I think the son uh the father made a bunch of money. I don't know if it was like you know I don't know which family it was but one of the families that made a ton of money in Chicago. The son of the of the patriarch that had made all the money um he had become friends with them and the guy said you know the worst part of my parents leaving me nothing is that they did give me their name and they didn't give me any of the money.

And so what I have is basically the expectation that I have a lot of money from any room I walk into but I don't actually have the money. So, like if my, you know, whatever my community is raising money for X or Y, of course they're going to ask me because they assume I have all that, but I don't I don't have any of that. And so, that that stood in my mind also that my kids just because they're going to have my last name and people are going to know that they're my kids, they're going to be treated and viewed differently.

So, there's no there are no easy answers here. Unfortunately, the right answer, but this gets in fact, Andrew, this gets to the very point that I've been trying to make. We're like, what's the right answer? How much money do you give to your kids? What are the trusts? What are the mechanisms? And you know, the only answer that really works here is that you just have to teach them about the tool and the right way to view that tool mentally and emotionally because regardless of what you choose, it can go poorly if you don't give them that education.

But we get much more focused on like what's the right amount or what's the mechanism. And so I my guess is that my kids could probably thrive if I pass nothing to them or if I pass the entire company and and all of the wealth to them if I set them up well from a a like a uh a mental emotional perspective uh about how to think about it. And if I don't do that well, they're probably going to have a really hard time no matter what. >> It's uh it's there's a there's a few things that get circled in that answer.

One of them is I always think I think so much right now with the Thomas Soul quote, the economist, right? He says there's no solutions only trade-offs. Um that is like that is so helpful to think about here because um I but I think the thing is people approach money as if that's not true. Like there are no solutions only trade-offs. If unless having you have all the money, the more money you make, it's all solution and no trade-off.

And I think almost everybody underrates that. And I've actually picked some of this up from talking to you um specifically um about some of this where I've you know the the passing wealth to your kids thing is a big is a big question here. Uh which I think is a is something that everybody sees almost like a universal people just clearly agree that it's it's a very hard thing to do very well. Not that it's never done gone well but it goes wrong a lot.

Um and and that is an indication uh of the relationship between wealth and relational fracture. I think when you look at um some many of the very wealthiest people not all of them but many of them they have uh divorces and their families fall apart and some of those things that is an indication of relational fracture and connection to success. Um >> one of the biggest trade-offs it doesn't it doesn't protect you from that at least.

Yeah. Go ahead. No, not at all. The biggest trade-off I think that I've seen so far is that uh people will treat you different the more money you have. And most of that seems awesome on the surface. It's like everybody is going to want you to be their friend. Everybody is going to want you to view them positively. Man, well, yeah, sign me up for that. Everybody will do whatever you ask them to do. But what it does, I mean like just as some examples of those trade-offs, it is much much much more easy for people to view you transactionally.

I want to do this for you to help you or so with the hope that you know down the line or next week I can ask you for money or you will do this thing for me. It is uh much harder for people to feel like they can emotionally relate with you. And because one of the examples of this is that uh I think generally we can empathize with other people and what they're going through. You know, somebody says, "Well, my kids got this new thing, this new, you know, uniform they want for their sport.

It's expensive." And you're like, "Yeah, sports are expensive." But it's like uh I don't get a lot of the kind of your life is similar to mine uh or you can empathize with what I'm going through with the way that I'm currently situated as I am exceptionally intentional about it. And so it's not me crying about it because it's just an understanding of like it's part of the package that comes with things. It's funny because my wife and I, we we grew up in this doing nonprofit ministry in our first years of our marriage and we just don't think about money, I think, as much as most people think about money.

I think that's an interesting irony here. Uh I don't think about money nearly as much as most people do. It's just not as interesting or captivating to me. But we'll have these conversations where it's like, why did this one person say that one thing? Why did this happen this way? And like 90% of the time the answer is like oh it's money and it's like it doesn't even dawn on us the person. It's like oh that's why this per this thing happened this way.

And so the trade-off in how you are viewed how people react to you the the level of honesty and transparency people will give to you uh it is it's a significant loss. I miss it. I mean the I believe that you this point landed on me most when when we were together last year at one point with some other folks talking about this kind of stuff and you you told a story I think at some point of somebody coming to you and asking for some simple modern stuff you know some bottles or some backpacks or something like that and um and the way you framed the story and you may know exactly what I'm talking about but like was like the person asked it with like an utter certainty that you were going to give it to them and like essentially they were not asking for it.

They were demanding it. They they were expecting that. And you in that situation cannot turn them away and say no without them just saying like because they just they know you have enough. >> Yeah. It's like what a Right. >> Yeah. Right. And therefore >> you have the ability to be generous. >> That's that's that's right. Yeah. Exactly. And and that's the transactional component. It's like you you Mike the person are now no longer part of this conversation.

You are just a pathway to their giving and and as you said then you know the thing that the sort of irony of this is that the mission statement of Simple Modern is we exist to give generously. You guys give a lot of money away and a lot of gear away. It's core to it. I know for a fact that you like shut down the company's operations at points to bring in your charitable partners. So you're not just scratching off a check so you can put it on your checkout and people can feel good about making their Simple Modern purchase or whatever.

You guys are like actually engaged with the charity. So like generosity is tied into the culture at Simple Modern. I've been around it. I know it's true and and you guys care about it a lot and yet actually like you said like in that interaction there's like this this caution because of the transaction is and and what that latters to is something that also I've heard you point out that is really really stuck with me which is that if relationship is the core source of joy in your life that one of the problems with wealth that people underestimate is that it actually works directly against relationship.

And if relationship drives more joy than money then that's a real cost. It's a real cost. And by the way, nobody will be sympathetic to it because I'll be like, "Oh, boohoo." Uh, like you're so rich, like whatever. >> Yeah. Go find grind or gold gold Kleenex. Right. >> Yeah. Right. And and that point, that relationship is actually the source of joy has really stuck with me and and almost every story you're telling in this, I'm I'm actually I've been listening for it and I hear it in almost every one of them that in some way the achievement um cuts against a relationship, whether that's family, friends, something else. and and and unlike actually in your business culture where you've actually driven relationship into the business culture so that the people who are working with you the success is actually part of the joy.

You get to experience it together. People are sacrificing together to do it. People are working hard together to do it. And now now it's sort of a natural that now the the success is the natural end of the hard work and it's sort of organically connected to it as opposed to this thing that lingers over the relationship from the outside and creates a cost or something. And and again, people are going to say boohoo even to me saying that.

They're going to make it sound like these these two rich white guys sounding off on a podcast about how hard it is to be rich. And it's and and that's exactly the point again, which is like, well, I'm not saying that exactly. I I feel very grateful and and blessed and all those things. I'm just saying I think your point about that is is important because if it's true and if it's true that money has an inorganic relationship to joy, at at the very least that it's not directly correlated to it, right?

If you did the R squared on money and joy, that there would be a small correlation, especially at the lower end of the income bracket. And I again I just want to be conscious of that reality. I'm not talking about like getting out of poverty. Like this it's good. Get out of poverty. I want to give people right. Like that's just that's an unadulterated good. I I just will say that clearly. Okay. But like uh at the same time that sort of beyond some some of those scales like it's really hard to to see what the correlation is.

So if you if you ran the R squar it's not it's not clear to me that the relationship is correlated at all. Uh certainly that it's not obviously positive and I think there's a chance that it's negative though I'm not really willing to say that. Um so because I you know and I think the research says that the research says it's mixed and it's it's not a simple story we can just say oh it's definitely negative or it's definitely positive.

Again I think it's a reflection on the person who wields the tool. But I will say this that um I I think about the life business as somewhat like a settlers of kan game where you're trading one thing for another and like we we we trade our money for or our time for money and we trade that money for inventory so I can make more money and then I trade that money for you know a room on this beach so that hopefully I I can be happy and like we're I'm kind of constantly like trading resources for each other and that usually in the business world there's a lot of people that are really driven been really good at trading uh their their intellect, their drive, their their time for money.

Um people do not spend nearly as much time trying to figure out how do I trade my money for meaning, purpose, time, happiness, connection, relational closeness. I I've given this example before, but it's like the thing that makes a vacation awesome is if you have some people that are worth taking a vacation with. And you know, like if I was just sitting in this big house by myself, it would suck and it would really drag.

I mean, if anything, it would be the opposite of joy. It would be lament. I I think you made a good point. And it's important like I mean, I love uh Breaking Bad's a great show. And really, the premise of the show, there's this meta arc where he's telling himself, Walter White is telling himself the entire time, I'm doing this for my family. And then it's not until like the last episode of the show that he finally admits, I've been doing this for me because I wanted to do this.

It was about his drive. It was about his ego. Um, I have a desire to achieve and a a desire to solve problems. Um, and it is uh one of my most defining characteristics and it has the chance to be the absolute worst part about me or the be or one of the best parts about me. And just like money, it's all about how I choose to focus that. And what I know is I know that that drive and that ambition pulls against relationship and that I have to find a way in my life to channel the good parts of it to the to the best extent I can and to minimize the negative aspects of it.

Um, and so as I mentioned earlier, one of the reasons I wouldn't sell my business is I would I don't know. I'd go crazy if I didn't have something to work on, Andrew. If I didn't have something to be driven towards and something to work on, like I' i'd invent something, you know, I'd go buy a bunch of puzzles or I would I would create something. And so the business is incredibly healthy. I'm kind of like uh it's kind of like with border collies.

If you if a border collie doesn't have anything to do, it'll just start like hurting the couch, you know? It's just like it's bred in it to do things and and there is some of that in me and I think uh many of the people who listen to your podcast it's the same thing. It's like we're so naturally driven. Um and I've learned how to kind of funnel and focus that with this larger knowledge that okay what I'm really after in life actually isn't problems to solve or or boxes to check, achievements to accomplish.

It is connection to people. But a lot of the time, I sure feel like what I really want to do is just go accomplish and and it's crazy, by the way. They they've got this helicopter. They just they just f people up and down this beach. Um Yeah. Yeah. Um but anyway, like I I'm learning to kind of balance that duality in myself. And I think anybody who's honest with themselves, you have to look inside and say like, okay, who, you know, who am I really?

And what are the parts of that? and how do I kind of uh create the best version of myself with with the the kind of the tools that I have? And so for me, that's that's what part of it is is like, okay, I've got this ability to make money. I've got this ability to achieve. This could be a really bad thing. This could be the type of thing that leads me to being divorced and lonely and not in in healthy relationships. Uh but this also has a way to really be a thing that that drives uh joy not just in my life, but in the lives of other people.

And so I'm going to try and apply it in that way. And I I've said this before to I I I have kind of like a a niche uh kind of specialty in mentoring really driven men. And one of the big best pieces of advice that you can give and this works for really driven women uh as well. Um is that the biggest risk is not that you're going to find something and work really hard on it. It's having the judgment to know what those things are.

Um because your drive, you're going to see anything, any challenge you see, any mountain to climb, you're going to see it and be like, I can do that. I should do that. And I I think what I've learned probably is I'm in my mid-40s is I'm just more selective. I don't have to take on every challenge. I don't have to to conquer every everything that needs to be conquered. Uh and I can think about it in this larger context of like, hey, what makes sense in my life?

So like, could Simple Modern be a billion dollar company? Probably. Uh, am I driven to do that? Not particularly. Like, I'm going to grow it at a rate that makes sense where I can make the kind of impact and be the type of leader and the type of husband that I want to be. Um, and and I've I tell people all the time at work, if I if I end up being a better CEO than husband or father, then like I've failed somewhere along the way. >> Yeah.

Yeah. You know, you said something else earlier in that and it was something that you said about that you're how you had to have a puzzle and you stayed up till midnight working on a puzzle. And I I think a lot of people recognize uh that the sort of truth that is in that story which is that um discomfort and struggle and challenge is like really good that you you you want to have that in your life and if you don't have that in fact that in some ways you start to seek it you start to go like I need that and I need to think about it now you can just like everything you can overdo it.

Um but but that it's like a really important part of purpose and joy in life and you have to have struggle and challenge. But one of the things I one of the connections and this is just my my view of the the landscape of sort of the entrepreneurial world that you and I live in every day and sort of with with founders in the community is people will almost all agree with that statement. I think most people listening to this or watching this will say that's right.

Yeah, discomfort is really important for joy. But then they will organize their lives around an with the hope of an exit and in their minds the idea of producing the end of all discomfort in their lives, right? So, so they'll say on the one hand, it's really important to have discomfort, but then they're like, okay, I'm going to exit and then I'm going to have after that I'm going to have all this money and I'm going to have a bunch of luxury and all my whole life will be luxury all the time.

Basically, I'll fly first class or private or whatever on everything I do. I will never have any I will never experience that. And it's a it's a and I don't think people are lying when they say discomfort is good. I think they're just not realizing that's what they're trying to do. They're not they're not going wait a minute that actually might not be the outcome that I necessarily want and that perhaps I ought to think about my goals and wealth not in a way to minimize my discomfort like that actually that's not the goal of this.

Uh because if I do that again it will create a cost on me which is that it will shrivel my soul. That's what it will do. >> Well you see people you see rich people doing this. It's like I'm rich. I'm going to try and climb Everest. So like you you'll see you'll see even the wealthy pursuing it. But I do think one of the things that can happen. I I was really intentional about building the culture the team at Simple Modern so that I would never get to a point where it was like I have to get away from this.

And I do think entrepreneurship is unique and that for a lot of people they're like I've been going through extreme discomfort for the last 3 years, 5 years, seven years. And it's easy to want to go ditch to ditch. It's like man I am just tired. I'm just ready to be done with this grind. And I can really get that like I I think everybody, you know, like there's a finite amount of just challenge that is healthy. And so I think the thing that really extended my runway and helped me to keep a positive framing on all this is that I tried to build a company that I'd want to work at for 40 years.

And that most of the conventional wisdom out there is like, well, here's how you build a company that you can sell for the maximum amount or whatever. And when you you know Warren Buffett used to tell his managers like you know I want you to run this company like it's the only stock you can hold you have to hold it for the rest of your life you have to hold it for 40 years. Okay. Now, how would you operate the company?

And I think my advice to anybody running a business is like, yeah, don't build a business to sell it. Build a business that you would want to work in for 30 or 40 years. And then, hey, if the right offer comes along, I'm I'm not against the idea of selling something that you've created a lot of value in. But don't do it to run away from a thing. And a lot of times it's like, oh, you know what? It's kind of actually kind of toxic environment.

I don't really get along with my co-founder anymore. You know, things are really hard. Uh, and this this just feels like the right way the right way to get out of that. And it's like I think you're especially vulnerable to not getting what you want out of that transaction when that's true because you're running away from something. And uh the the healthy place to to sell is when you you really do value something and you're like, I could do this indefinitely.

And then it's like, okay, well, in light of that, now there's an offer that makes sense. Hey, that's that's fantastic. As you and I know, what most people do that go through an exit, a lot of them, they take a couple years off and then they're like, I think I need to start a new thing. So, there's something interesting. >> My incoming COO is an example of that. >> Well, it was the first question Patrick I asked Patrick when he was telling me about his acquisition.

I said, "How you been doing?" And he was like, "Ah, not great." you know like it's he was like the first two three months were were okay and then like you know months three through seven I can't remember what number he gave me but he was like that it was pretty rough and so like I I I definitely try to talk to a lot of founders that have gone through exits and I think that that has informed some of my view uh as well is that the the track record of people postexit is that it's very difficult to go through an exit and not experience some level of depression.

I think some of that is that you get a lot of your identity tied up in the thing. It's not just a thing to work on and a thing, you know, to to funnel your achievement towards, but it's also a sense of your identity. And so, you know, again, that doesn't mean that nobody should ever exit, but like people should be uh should be eyes wide open about what's on the other side of that. So the if we circle the kind of themes of this conversation, I think you I don't think either of us is against making a lot of money or exiting your company or building for for I mean it sounds like building for an exit maybe you wouldn't exactly say that but like >> I'll go a little step further in I think it's awesome.

I maximi I am trying to I wouldn't say maximize how much money I earn but it is it is important to me to grow the amount of economic uh influence that I have with my life but I'm able to do it I think now because of some of the things we talked about I think I'm able to handle that where it doesn't burn my house down you know and now that I I think I can handle it a little bit more wisely I see all the good stuff I can do with it and and like you said there's going to be a lot of things where I kind of get coerced into giving to this or that and I just view it as a tax that comes with extreme wealth but I still can make more of a positive impact on the world.

I still can have a higher quality of life by maximizing the economic influence I have. Uh there were just some steps I had to go through before that would be true in my life. Um so this this is exactly what I was say is like the point of this is not to say like don't go try to make money. Uh the point is go try to make money. So, but this is sort of maybe the this gets us to the last part of of the story, right? We talked about the the thoughts you had before the disorientation.

Um, so what I am now curious about is to take that to another step, which is okay, in light of all of those things, in light of what you believe about money's the place of money in your life relative to the joy in your life and relative to the purpose of your life, what are you what do you why why do you want to maximize your money? You just said you want to you want to make as much as possible. So give me the positive version of it.

What are you trying to do? If money is not the end in itself, what is and and what is what is the purpose for which you are trying to keep building simple modern and spinning off huge profit numbers and launching products that you're checking excitedly, you know, when it launches on Friday and feeling great about what what is the point of that? So I think my worldview and I I've never articulated this fully clearly so I think I have a qualitative idea but I'm going to try and put this into words.

I think my view is that the world is uh full of people and there's a small percentage of those people that the decisions they make with their lives have a dramatic disproportionate impact on the way that all humans experience the world. and that there is a significant amount of responsibility and opportunity that comes with that. That uh I did not do anything to, you know, quote unquote deserve or earn my IQ, for example, or my good health or the the different things that have helped me to be successful.

I'd like to think that I've worked hard along the way and I've made good choices, but a lot of it is just gifts that I I inherited really. And >> and that's before you talk about the fact that you were born in the US and not >> Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. It's funny. Aside from your not born in Bina, you know, >> I'm I'm so in the weeds here, but like I was playing this game with some friends of mine, you know, you you've played those video games where at the beginning you've got like a certain amount of experience and you can kind of divide it up under different characteristics of your character.

And I was like, "Okay, imagine before you're born that you, it's just like a video game that you get to choose. You get to choose when you're born. You get to choose uh where you're born. You get to choose your gender. You get to choose your race. You get to choose your IQ. You get to choose, you know, all this different stuff. But you have a limited amount of uh kind of uh points to decide what are the things that would matter the most." And I think you nailed it.

It's like when you really start to go through that exercise, you really do come to that more than anything else, being born at this point in history and being born in the the geographic location I was put you ahead of 99.999% of human lives that have ever lived. And it's like I didn't choose that. That's just where I got dropped into the narrative. Um, but so I I feel like I've got all these gifts and that if I use them well, not only do I have the opportunity to live a really fulfilling and meaningful life, but also I have the opportunity to really make a positive impact on the lives of many other people.

And that brings me happiness and joy. Like I I think that it's it's interesting. I think when somebody says they're truly altruistic, this idea that I am just about other people being happy and I I don't really care how it impacts me at all. I think that is usually the sign that they're like a sociopath or somebody that can't be trusted. Um because it's it's just not true. Like we know we know that's not how people behave.

There's always got to be something in it for you to do something that's in the best interest of other people. Uh even in the Bible, it's interesting Jesus invokes the prophet motive a lot of the time. Um that you you have to have some motivation of how does it impact me as well as the idea that it's going to positively impact other people. >> The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. If somebody sells all that they have in their joy, they go and buy the field.

The point is the reason they sell all the stuff they have is because the field that they buy in Jesus's parable is more valuable, which means it's it's a profit motivation and and and they get joy out of it. So they get joy and profit on the on the transaction. So it's definitely self-interested. >> So I'm just like my my joy, my meaning and purpose will be maximized by uh actually helping other people as well as helping myself.

And it's interesting because what I just said is throughout most of human history has been such a clear that people have understood that and that's just been part of street smarts for most of human history and we've basically lost that as we've become more technologically advanced and more disconnected. We have less communal time with other people. Like we just forget that honestly what will bring you joy is being relationally connected to other people and being a part of making their life better and them making your life better.

And so it is awesome that I can spend my time figuring out water bottle design. I can turn that into millions of dollars and then I can send like we had a girl Olivia who has a terminal illness and we sent her and her family on a Makea-Wish uh vacation to Florida last week and I can do that. I can turn my drive and my ambition and these gifts I have into making her life better, but that also makes my life better. And it's like, man, that is awesome.

It's awesome that I can create the economic value to be able to hire people that I also want to spend all my time around because they are great and because they challenge me and make me a better person. And so there's so much optionality that does come with building a business and with economic power. Um, and and now that I know how to use that optionality, I I get really excited uh about it. So that that's the way that I would say it is that I've kind of come full circle.

It's like, you know, it's kind of like that that bell curve where like the far left is I want more money because I can do things and then there's the middle one it's like, well, more money, there's all these new all these problems, you know, do you really want that? And then like the far right is like make more money because you can do things. But the key part is what are the things you want to do? And I don't want to buy 50,000 square foot houses, you know.

I don't want uh to run away from difficulty or challenge in my life. Uh I I want to pursue joy and connection and relationship in mind. I want to make the lives of other people better and find meaning and purpose through that as well. And because I know those things to be true. Um and that's not going to be true for everybody. Maybe maybe other people are going to find that question, but at least for me, it's been very motivating.

And I think it's also why I'm like I'm I'm 10 years in with Simple Mod and we have our 10 year birthday next month and I I could easily do this for 10 or 20 more years. I'm not in any way tired uh or out of gas uh in many ways. I feel like I'm as juiced up as I've ever been. >> What is the place of luxuries and comforts in the midst of that? You just described a lot of purpose. You're also in Florida looks like right next to the water.

I think they're seen lots of lots of photos and videos of you at Courtzside at the Thunder in the Championships. >> I have grown up here. I've grown up a lot here, Andrew. I used to have a very like >> uh nice things are bad and uh I've grown out of that. >> I think the way that I the the trick that I've learned is that um it is good to have things to look forward to. And so when you buy the nicest of anything, just know that you don't have anything left to look forward to.

Um, it's kind of like the Thunder. I set Courtzside for the Thunder winning an NBA championship. I'm never going to get back to that level of feeling ever. That's the peak. And it's like I I don't regret it, but it's like that's the peak and I should know that's the peak. And it's like when you buy the nicest car, you buy the nicest watch. One of my favorite things I did uh is like I would sometimes set in goals for myself of like when we achieve X I'm going to buy Y as a as a reward or kind of a momentto of that and I think that's really healthy.

Um but I think the other side of it is for me am I balancing it out with being sacrificial in some areas of my life. The reason why that's important is if I start to like view like my money is exclusively for me to buy things for me, then I'm really running into that danger of that tool like kind of burning my house down. And so, but when I'm like, I can use it to do nice things for myself and my family, but also I'm going to use this to improve the lives of other people and I can find some balance, I think I think that that's probably the place to be.

I mean, the other thing that's super interesting is I used to have this zero sum mentality of like nice things are bad because um you're using that money here instead of over there. And what I've kind of learned over time is it's like well I can create more value. And so so anyway, I've grown up a lot there. My brother my brother helped me. I there's still things I don't do like I flew I flew coach here, you know, in the back of the plane and like I don't fly priv I've flown private twice in my adult life, I think.

Um, but I'm I'm not I'm not judgmental about it and uh it's more of like a personal challenge of like am I viewing everything as for me or >> do I deser do I do I become the kind of person who can't sit coach? That's I actually think that's a big deal. Like I think that sounds probably silly but like and like I'm six almost four. A little more leg room goes a long way for me on an airplane, right? like uh but like it's but I still want to be able to say like I actually already can fly from California to New York in 5 hours and it's pretty comfortable.

If that's not good enough for me like then I then like there's actually a problem with me there like I've become too accustomed to the comfort at that point and I I know that sounds silly to some people but I just it's that same thing. It's like relationship and care. So yeah, I think finding a way for those things to fit into um into at the same time when I get bumped up because my credit card points, I'm going to sit first, you know?

So it's like, you know what I mean? Like I have a business and there's there's expenses and stuff like that. So yeah, I like it's there's like a some kind of mix there where I don't feel bad if that happens, you know? I'm like pretty stoked if that happens, you know? So >> well, and you you and I both have kids, but it's like it really is like what what are you modeling to your kids? I think I think that I've found myself What are you modeling to your employees?

Um what are you modeling to your other owners? I think is something like when you have co-owners like I want to I want to model that I am content. Like there's a great uh going back to Rockefeller I think this is a Rockefeller somebody asked him how much is enough and he said just a little more. And I actually want to be a person where my answer to that question is a heck of a lot less than I already have. And that I think that's a really healthy place to be is where it's like, you know, like so my attitude with the money has always been I guess I frame it like this.

You're going to die and you're not going to have your money so you're going to lose it. So really it's just a question of how is it going to exit your possession? Is it going to do happen during your life? Is it going to happen when you die to be squandered away by future generations that you probably won't even know, you know, like how's it going to happen? And once you get like open-handed of like, oh, I don't get to hang on to any of this and it's definitely going to leave my possession, then it really opens up being a lot more intentional about, okay, well, how do I want it to like leave my possession?

And and that's probably the easiest kind of word picture is that uh I'm not close-handed with it. I'm open-handed with it. So my view's always been the money's here till it's not, Andrew. And when it's not, I'm gonna be fine. And if that's because I died, that's fine. And if that's because I go through a bankruptcy, you know, >> when I'm >> You were pretty happy at $18,000 a year with your wife. >> Absolutely. I mean, I like I think that that was probably the formative thing is that I was content and I loved my life that year.

And so there's a kind of a cheat code in that once you've experienced contentment uh with little then you don't fall into that circumstantial like lie that oh what I really need to do to feel happy or to feel like my life has uh is the way that I want it to be is to is to get more. So I don't know I don't know how well we've covered it today. Hopefully it doesn't come across uh as as preachy to anybody because it's really not that I think I figured this stuff out um or that I've got some kind of special.

I I just think that uh going through the last two years especially has helped me to take it from having some strong opinions about this, living through the ups and downs of seeing how my own like I wrestled with it personally and then coming out the other side hopefully uh a better person and a better a better operator. I think I'm going to be a better business person as a result also. >> I bet that's true. you um you know you said preachy I yeah I really don't I mean I am thinking about this you said you're not thinking about money that much I I think about it a lot in part maybe because there's some similar background where I had a ministry background but but actually because I just never expected to make money in life and that was also fine with me I again I made plenty of money before we were fine like wasn't I wasn't suffering or anything but um but there's the possibility of getting like really crazy rich just because I I own companies you know and so you just can happen.

And I I just think about it a lot. Um and and I and I'm puzzling over this cuz precisely because because I've watched it go great for some people. Like you gave some examples of people where you feel like they are just doing this awesome and there some rich people you've been around where it's like they're just it's it's been really good. Um and then I've watched it go really badly. Like I honest honest to goodness when I see the stories of people like um you know Jeff Bezos and and I I wish no ill ill will on him but like getting divorced in the midst of all of his success it just is like I I would not trade all I would not trade my marriage for all of his money.

I would not do it. And if that was the cost that was that is too much cost. And so now I'm not I'm not sure that those were directly connected to each other. I'm not you know who knows, right? But like you've just seen enough rich people have things go wrongly like and I and so I'm just so I'm I'm puzzling on it a lot and my own comments in this episode and my the reason to talk with you about it is I know you've thought about it a lot too and I'm just I want to understand as best as possible.

I'm also extremely personally unsatisfied with the notion that um that the only thing that I should be chasing is like a really big exit. And and I think I think that is an unspoken assumption in e-commerce land sometimes that that's the way you've reached the top is when you've had a really big exit. And let's just be really clear, I just was like gra super congratulating Taylor on CTC's exit because >> if you Yeah. >> Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Not like Taylor did, but like you know >> Yeah. Then you'd be happy if you had gotten Taylor's money then you'd be happy. That's the problem. No, but the point is the point is like that's a great friend of mine and I like I just the whole time I was like I have watched how hard he has worked. I feel nothing but uh excitement for him about that, you know. So the point is not to like pile on anybody's exit or anything.

I I love bringing people on here. I build Alexandra on after he exited, you know, and just like tell us how it went, tell us all things because it's it is an incredible achievement and I appreciate that. So that yeah, that's the point. It's just I'm I'm trying to sort this out as best as I can. Certainly within the lens of my faith, but also but also within the lens of of there's a lot of people who are not Christians who have have good wisdom on this too.

Um I don't know if Morgan Hel has any faith, but that's a name that we brought up earlier. Like that's a guy who's been really helpful on this point. Um so yeah, anyway. Um thanks so much. Here's a simple way to say just a simple way to say what you said is my hope for anybody who listens to this is that the best thing that ever happens to you is not that you sold your company for a big amount of >> Yeah, that's great.

That's great. That like it's great if you go through that, but if that's the best thing about your life, then I'm I feel badly for you because it's not going to bring the kind of fulfillment, the kind of meaning that you want it to bring. And so, like, maybe I'll go through it someday, you know, maybe I'll go through it. Who knows? But I I won't if it's the best thing about my life, then my life has taken a dramatic beer off a cliff, you know, bad turn.

And and so keeping that in perspective has been really helpful for me. >> Really good. Um, I would love anybody who is watching or listening to this, especially on YouTube, if you're watching it, to leave any comments or thoughts about it. Uh, I'm I'm certain Mike will not be monitoring the comment thread, but if there's a really good one in there, I'll send it to him. And so, see if you can jump in there and respond.

We'll see. Um, and um, and I would love to hear what you have to say about this. If you think we're just off our rockers, just say it. That's just fine. Your your comments are welcome. So, um, leave those there. Mike, thanks so much for your time. Everybody should go listen to and watch the operators. You don't really need me to tell you that. If you listen to or watch my show, you are aware of the Operators podcast and and you should go check it out.

Uh it is amazing that people like Mike give you their input and Sean Frank and Matt Patuli and Jason Panzo give you their input for free. It is incredible. It is incredible. And so uh so go do that and you know maybe buy something from one of their sponsors too. All right, thanks so much uh Mike. Appreciate it. Have fun in Florida. >> Thanks for having me. >> Thanks so much for watching and listening. As I said at the end, I would love your thoughts on this episode.

Leave them in a comment. That's the best place to do that. also helps me. So, if you like this and you like my content, leaving comments really helps. So does subscribing uh and liking wherever you're doing those things. And of course, you don't want to miss all the content that I have coming. I've got a lot more really good stuff. I'm going to start a new series soon with my friend Richie Masho, who is the CEO of She's Birdie, which was last year $6 million in debt.

Uh and and Richie became the CEO to turn it around. He's going to tell you how far he's brought it since he's become the CEO, how he's digging out of debt and what that journey is going to look like. It's a crazy story of massive success eighth degree e-commerce business that got really turned around and how Richie's been a part of that. I'm going to try and bring him back a bunch of times to talk through each part of the journey.

By the way, as he tries to rescue that company from debt, he cannot run ads on Facebook cuz he has an outstanding bill there. So, he has to find ways to generate revenue, repay debt, etc. without running Facebook ads. It is really fun to talk to him about this. He's a really smart guy. You're not going to want to miss that. So subscribe wherever you are watching or listening. It's going to be really good content. It's coming on to interview next week and it'll be out a couple weeks.

First episode will be uh also go visit Workspace 6. Workspace 6.io. They are awesome. Like I said, uh private Slack community for e-commerce operators and executives. And my friends at More Staffing can help you build your business with incredible talent in the Philippines. Uh go to more staffing.co/af. If you want to work with uh AF Growth as your agency, I'd love to talk to you. uh fill out the form on my website at afgrowth.com and of course you can send me any other thoughts or comments at uh podcastfgrowth.com.

Also on my website you can sign up for my newsletter. Just drop your email in the pop-up or in the footer. That's it. That's everything for this episode. Thanks so much for watching and listening. I'll talk to you next time. [Music]