ISI Brotherhood Podcast

105. Should I Turn My Hobby Into a Business?

• Aaron Walker & Kevin Wallenbeck

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Should you turn your hobby into a business? Jim Cockrum joins us on today's episode to give us a fresh, Biblical perspective on whether or not you should follow your passion–and his countercultural answer will probably surprise you! 

Jim is convinced that the key to business success is explicitly much easier than you think, although it might ruffle some feathers. Hint: It's not about whether your passionate about your business or not. 

Key Takeaways:

  • Why you're asking the wrong question
  • How to decide on turning your hobby into a business or not
  • Rethink the role of passion in your professional life
  • The PROVEN way to find fulfillment and success in business

Join us for an enlightening session as we explore a countercultural way of doing business with our guest, Jim Cockrum, who wrote Silent Sales Machine 9.0. He provides a wealth of wisdom on navigating this transformative journey from hobby to business (or not?) in order to be successful.

Our conversation boldly questions conventional ways of creating a business idea, proposing that true fulfillment in business emerges from a much different angle than the world comes at it. Through compelling stories and real-life examples, we share how passion often follows one key idea which Jim reveals in today's episode.

In the final chapter of our discussion, we challenge you to rethink the role of passion in your professional lives.

Iron Sharpens Iron Community: https://isibrotherhood.com/community
LinkedIn Group: https://www.viewfromthetop.com/group

Connect with Jim Cockrum:
Jim's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimcockrum/
Jim's Free Business Owners Community: https://silentjim.com
Silent Sales Machine 9.0 Book: https://www.amazon.com/Silent-Sales-Machine-9-0-Cockrum/dp/0692516603

If you want to hear more speakers like this every month and be with the guys on the call, join the Iron Sharpens Iron Community today: https://www.isibrotherhood.com/isi-community

Connect with Big A:
View From The Top Website: https://isibrotherhood.com
The ISI Newsletter: https://www.isibrotherhood.com/newsletter
Big A’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronwalkerviewfromthetop/

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, welcome back to View From the Top podcast, where we help growth-minded men who desire momentum in their business, their family and their finances get through the valleys and up the mountain to your very own view from the top. Hey guys, I am personally super excited about our conversation today. A question have you ever wondered if the passion project you love so much could actually turn into a thriving business? Or could turning your hobby into a hustle backfire and ruin what once brought you joy? Well, that's exactly what we're going to do today. We're going to dive into that topic and, as we do, let's get the man, the host with the most, the legendary Big A, in the studio. Welcome, big A. Come on, wally. How's it going? Good man, do you feel old? When I say legendary, I'm just curious.

Speaker 2:

Part of me feels that way, but that's okay, I'm happy to be old and still here, and so it does. Man, I don't know about you, but I've been enjoying these crisp fall mornings. This weather has just been incredible. I was outside on a coaching call today, walking up and down my driveway, I was like I can't go inside, like I got to be outside right now. You're used to this, though. You're from Michigan, so you're used to this. I'm used to being colder.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, I'll take this in the mornings for sure. Yeah, oh, this is good.

Speaker 2:

You've been doing good, Wally. I just got off a little break, kind of enjoyed myself.

Speaker 2:

for a couple of weeks Robin and I took a cruise, went down the Caribbean and relaxed. Those are the best vacations for me because my phone doesn't work, but Robin's thrilled. She's like just put your phone in the safe and that's where you need to leave it. And so we did and really got a lot of good rest and ate too much food. I got a lot of good rest and ate too much food. I got a few pounds I got to shed. Now.

Speaker 1:

I'm glad you had that time. It's not that way for me. I feel like I've been burning the candle at both ends lately, and yeah, but that's a good thing. Sometimes we have those seasons and so we lean into them and we work out of them.

Speaker 2:

Later on, we need to have an episode about that, because you know, we very strategically plan for time off and for rest and renewal, and so that was my time. So, hey, back to the mission at hand today. I'm really, really excited. This is, I think, going to be a really good episode. Answering this question and I got to admit right out of the gate where some of the content came from. As a result of this episode, is a situation I'm dealing with personally right now in my own home, and so I thought you know what, while I work through this, why don't we do an episode and talk about turning your hobby into a business?

Speaker 2:

Robin has been an all-star quilter for 40 years. I mean, it's amazing Her and my mom get together. They've made hundreds of quilts. She's never sold one. She gives them away to family and friends, and so I hope people realize what they're getting, because it costs a lot for the material and the time is endless.

Speaker 2:

And Robin came to me about a year ago and she said hey, I'm thinking about maybe turning this into a business and I'm like what you haven't worked in 45 years? What are you talking about? She said. I really think I want to maybe get a website, start promoting what I'm doing. It's a sizable investment that we would have to make to do that, because some of these quilting machines are 50, 60 grand to do this automatically, and so she can do it at scale. And I'm like Robin, are you sure you want to do that? Like there's a lot more to this than just starting to make these and sell them. I mean, there's a lot of business on the backside of this. So we've been talking through that. I don't want to discourage her, I want to encourage her if that's what she really wants to do, but I want her to be informed. So then I started thinking about man, who knows the most about this and we were able to get Jim Cockrum.

Speaker 2:

Jim and I've been friends for about 20 years. We were in a mastermind group together with Dan Miller years ago. Dan has since passed but Jim and I still stay in contact together. He's been helping entrepreneurs for about 25 years, coming up on three decades. He's been confronted with this and he's got a company Silent Sales Machine that he runs. He's got about 7,000 people that he's helped launch businesses before. He's got over 1,000 verified successful stories that he can tell and to verify. Here's the cool thing, excuse me. He's got 64,000 people and growing daily in his community. So, man, what a man of God. He loves God with all of his heart. That is his first priority and I love the priority that he's put his life in the way he's built his heart. That is his first priority and I love the priority that he's put his life in the way he's built his business and it's just a delight today to be able to have Jim come on and co-host this episode with us man, I'm excited.

Speaker 1:

This sounds great, man. Hopefully will this be the first one that Robin listens to the episode.

Speaker 2:

I don't know, I don't know, we'll see Well.

Speaker 1:

I'm excited. Let's dive in with Jim, let's get him in here, Jim.

Speaker 2:

good to see you, buddy. How's it going, hey?

Speaker 3:

fellas, thanks for the invitation. Looking forward to this great meeting. Good to see you. Big A, this is good.

Speaker 2:

We've done some episodes together before, but never really on this specific topic, and so it's pretty cool. But before we get get into business, catch us up for so tell us something that's exciting.

Speaker 3:

That's going on for you. Oh, man, off the off the top of my head, it doesn't get any better than this, brother. I just had our 30th anniversary, got to take a trip with my wife and we're so blessed, man. We got to homeschool five kids. They all turned out okay, okay, so the experiment was a success and three of them were married. I I got one grandkid two more on the way in the spring and funny part of that story is two of my sons both married great girls. We found out the same day that they were both pregnant, wow, and they're gonna be due within about a week of each other here coming up in the spring. So we are blessed, man. What a blessing it is to raise kids according to godly standards and have them just equipped and out there tackling the world with the same worldview and loving God and marrying good people. Man, it's a great season of life.

Speaker 2:

Isn't that cool, man, when your kids start growing up. And it's surreal because it happens. All of us have adult children and all of us have grandchildren that are hosting this today, and I told Robin on our trip. I said, robin, it seems like, literally, that this just happened, like it seems like it doesn't even seem possible that we have grandchildren as old as we do now and you guys are raising. You're a little bit behind me as far as age goes, but it just happened so fast.

Speaker 2:

So my encouragement to the audience today is to enjoy the journey, right, don't speed it up. Just enjoy the process. Enjoy where you're at right now. Well, listen, let's dive into the topic today. I think it's fun, it's exciting, but I think it can be risky. I think the opportunity of turning what you love into a business has pros, it has cons, and what we want to answer for you today, or help you answer for yourself, is is this the right move for you? Is this something that you've been toying with? You're like, hey, I'm good at this. Whatever it is, should I turn this into a business? So there's pitfalls. There's potential success as a result of it. So, jim, I know you've got some varying thoughts around this topic. You're the perfect person to be co-hosting this episode because you have decades of experience. So yeah, start us off. What have you seen as a result of people turning their hobby into a business?

Speaker 3:

Well, you know, to be perfectly honest, I can be a little controversial on this topic and I'm okay being disagreed with. You know I actually enjoy You've been that way.

Speaker 2:

Since I've met you, I enjoy poking people in a little uncomfortable way, right.

Speaker 3:

You know I'm not a big fan of the phrase turn my hobby into a business. It's always kind of rubbed me the wrong way and some people love it and to me I think it starts the premise. It starts the conversation at the wrong place. It starts the conversation with me. With me, I want to turn my hobby into my business. And it may seem like a minor point, but the whole premise of business, from my vantage point, the framework that I want to lay on this conversation today, is business is about serving others. So I'll illustrate with a short story. We can go wherever you guys want to go. We can dive into specifics, but actually I had the honor. I've only done this one time in my life. It was a huge honor. It was a small private high school, christian school. They asked me to come do the convocation, the speech for the graduates, and I only had like 14 minutes and they were holding me to it. But one of the stories I told was and I thought it was it's apropos to this conversation we're having today, guys was if one of you runs up to me and says Mr Jim, mr Jim, guess what I want to be when I grow up, guess what I want to be when I graduate. Guess what I want to. I said that probably one of the wisest things, if not the wisest thing, I could say to you in that moment is I don't care, and no one else will either, because if it's what you want, on your terms, because this is what you want to do, have you taken it to God? Have you said, god, what are the gifts and talents inside of me that I can use to serve others? Let's start the conversation there. Instead of what you want to do, let's say what talents are inside of you that can be used to serve others. That's a better place to start and that's so. That's where I go.

Speaker 3:

When someone says I want to turn my hobby into a business, it's like well, if you're good at it, you could probably already have a business going with that. If you're good at it, you should have a business going, and I don't want to go into rant mode. But here's the false premise that a lot of people fall into when they think of starting a business is it's going to be expensive, it's going to cost a lot of money, it's going to cost a lot of risk. The way the internet changed the game and what I've been teaching for 25 years.

Speaker 3:

Big A is big risk, or any risk doesn't have to accompany launching a new venture that serves others with purpose and intention and profitably. So if you eliminate the big risks of the expenses and you apply your talents to serving others with excellence, suddenly you've got a powder keg of opportunities that are out there on the horizon, and if you're serving others with excellence, it will be monetized eventually. It's my premise. So that's a lot to absorb. I've given us a lot to talk about and we've only got a limited time, so I'm going to turn it back to you guys. What comes to mind as I say those things? Any pushback, because I could get deeper on it.

Speaker 2:

Give me an example of someone maybe that came to you that had something for the sake of this conversation. It was their hobby, what? How did you work through that with them to get them to reframe their positioning, and have you had success at getting people to reframe their position?

Speaker 3:

I do this all the time. Actually, I commit a significant part of my book to let's forget about the hobbies and things you like to do in your spare time because you enjoy them. Maybe it's poetry, maybe it's painting, maybe it's some other. For me it'd be sitting on the bank of a river fishing, for example, if I'd have finished high school and I'll tell the story specific someone else too. But if I had had someone give me the terrible advice as a graduate saying, hey, pursue your passions and you'll never work a day in your life Like, well, I'm passionate about sitting on the bank of a river with a cane pole, I can really get into that. I wouldn't have a business, I wouldn't have a family, I wouldn't have there's a lot of things that wouldn't happen. So it's not about doing what you want to do, it's about finding a way to turn those gifts into serving others. So my premise is you don't set out saying what are the things I'm passionate about. You set out saying what are the things I'm passionate about. You set out saying what does the market need? Where's the demand.

Speaker 3:

So we've had people come to us and say well, you know, I've always kind of wanted to do this. I've always kind of wanted to do that. The road I put people down is how about we find a need in the marketplace and begin meeting it? Because here's the secret. I can give you so many stories of people who never grew up being passionate about selling random items online, but now they're passionate about it because they've got these. As our friend Rabbi Daniel Lappin refers to the profit from your business, these certificates of gratitude rolling in. You become passionate when you see people lining up to say thank you certificates of gratitude, money. You become passionate about whatever it is you do so most of the success Because you're meeting a need right.

Speaker 2:

You're meeting a need, whatever that is.

Speaker 3:

Exactly. If people are lining up to say thank you, it doesn't matter what the service was that you provided is what I'm trying to say. The fact that it might also line with one of your passions, that's a bonus. But you're going to become passionate about serving others when you're effective at serving others and it doesn't really matter. God made us this way. It doesn't really matter what I did to earn that gratitude. I'm going to find fulfillment and passion in meeting that need, and sometimes those words are wise.

Speaker 2:

Let me throw a curve into this, because I've had this discussion recently with someone. When they say, what is it that you're doing that is meaningful and purposeful, that's changing the lives of others, and we put that in a separate context or box of its own. And if it doesn't appear that it's scriptural in nature or spiritual in nature, I should say then maybe it's something that's not the right motivation. But what I hear you saying is is, if it's selling baskets and there's a big need for that and you're meeting the need, that is purposeful, that is meaningful, that does have value.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. One of the dangerous messages that we have to push against as a culture, as believers, as Christian entrepreneurs, is that somehow, once it's monetized, it loses virtue. That's wrong. There's nothing, there's no scripture to back that. There's no sound spiritual principle behind that.

Speaker 3:

Actually, you have evidence of your service once it monetizes, whereas, if you're just kind of, the example I give in our community is the difference between helping people and helping people succeed. A lot of people say, yeah, I wanna help people. I feel like I'm just supposed to help people and I'm like, yeah, that resonates. Yeah, that's good. Okay, if you wanna help people, go empty your bank account, turn it all into $50 bills and just walk down the street.

Speaker 3:

But God hasn't called any of us to do that. He's called us to build relationships, to build accountability, disciple, to help people succeed. That requires relationship and reciprocity, right and time commitment, both directions. That's what a business is right. Okay, I'm going to truly give people something that they're grateful for. There's going to be a reciprocity there that's going to fuel the machine and make it bigger. That is a virtuous endeavor and it doesn't have to start with your passion is the point I'm trying to make. You can start by serving others. You can start by being other-oriented and I see that theme in the scriptures a lot be other-oriented, think of others first. So I try to get people out of passion mindset, passion pursuit into others pursuit and that solves a lot of these problems.

Speaker 2:

Well, it opens up endless opportunities as well. When you view it that way, it's like there are so many opportunities that present themselves when it's outside of your passion, outside of your passion when it's about serving others. There's a litany of things that you could do, that could turn into being profitable, successful, and which you then can take the resources and even be more meaningful and helpful and purposeful in helping others.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely yeah. Whatever that passion purpose you feel God's calling you to, you can now fund it. Yeah, whatever that passion purpose you feel God's calling you to, you can now fund it. You know we, our family, we've been able to internationally adopt, you know, because we three of our three, of our five kids, because we were blessed with the finances to be able to do so. If I had just started with a passion of international adoption and made that my focus, we'd have had a hard time funding it. Instead, I focused on others and the money started flowing and I became very passionate about those services I was providing. I didn't grow up thinking I want to sell random things to strangers online for a living. That's my passion. No, I saw a need I met it, became passionate about it, became good at it and it allowed me to fuel all these other things that I am also passionate about.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 3:

So I hear you.

Speaker 1:

I hear you, I'm hearing and I'm thinking of the hundreds of guys that are listening to this. And I've been here myself myself, you know, decades ago, right when I first started off, had the full-time job, and I started something that I was passionate about, something I enjoyed, and so we've got hundreds of guys listening to this that are like I hear what you're saying and it sounds really good and I want to. I want to think that way, but the reality is like you know, I've got this, this full-time job I'm doing over here, and I've got this hobby thing that I do. Maybe it's woodworking, maybe it's, maybe you're just really good at HVAC and you enjoy fixing HVAC units in your neighborhood. I mean, whatever it is right. Maybe it's an online thing, maybe it's a course that you develop because, because you're just really passionate and excited about, about, you know, marriage or kids or some type of ministry thing, but that's all of us.

Speaker 1:

I'm. I've been guilty of that my whole life. I've never thought about the way, specifically, you're talking, and so I'm stuck a little bit in that. Yeah, but it is a hobby, it's a passion that I have, it's something I'm excited about. Shouldn't I just pursue that? Can I turn that into what I heard you say was. Maybe I didn't hear it correctly, but what I thought I heard you say was maybe I didn't hear it correctly, but what I thought I heard you say was don't focus on that. Focus on, like the marketplace, what the marketplace needs.

Speaker 3:

Yes, it sounds good. But, man like, Let me connect the dots a little bit Now. If you've got a passion, a hobby for something where there's actually a marketplace need for it, praise God, man, that's going to be a much easier road. But I run into people with passions and hobbies that are so niche and so hard to reach and so hard to monetize and they're convinced that just because I have a passion for this, it must be the business that I'm supposed to pursue. That's good, Because the premise there is I won't enjoy it unless my passion comes with me into the experiment. That's what I'm pushing back against, because we all know this is biblical, this is scriptural, this is sound teaching. Feelings trail actions. Our culture would tell us differently. Once you feel like it, then you act. No, that's immature. That's what toddlers do. Men, providers, guys taking care of our home. We find great pleasure in presenting our family with the paycheck. What we did to earn it is almost irrelevant in that moment. We did what we had to do. Now the feelings come. So you apply that same framework to pursuing what business should I get into? Don't start with what am I passionate about and interested in, because you're assuming that you'll need that in order to succeed, you will not. That in order to succeed, you will not. The passion that's generated from the action of serving others effectively will ignite.

Speaker 3:

I had a guy I played basketball with. Here's a great example. He said I'm thinking about starting a business, man, I'm just looking at all the landscape of what's available. I think I'm going to start one of those businesses you know, picking dog poo out of people's yards, and he felt kind of humiliated even saying it. But he saw that there was a need for it and he started the business and suddenly it exploded and he wasn't playing basketball anymore. I ran into him and he's like yeah, dude, it's crazy, I've had to hire a bunch of guys. He's not the one picking poop out of the yards anymore. He's got a team doing that. He's making a killing doing it. He's got a team doing that. He's making a killing doing it. He's built a beautiful business.

Speaker 3:

Was he passionate about picking poo and like who wakes up in the morning one day going, oh, I'm so passionate about making sure that people don't have dog poo in their green grass? No, no one. He saw the need. He became passionate about it. He's passionate about his team. He's passionate about his reputation. He's passionate about the certificates of gratitude that are rolling in and he's probably sold that business by now. It's been a long time since I saw him. So if you wake up saying, well, here's the two or three things I'm passionate about and I want to turn one of them into a business, that's the bad starting point. That's what I'm trying to say. It doesn't mean that just because you're passionate about it, don't make it into a business. I'm saying make sure there's a market need and there's demand there and your passion will trail your actions.

Speaker 2:

That's good, Jim, in your experience, if we stay the way we're going right now. People that are passionate about their hobby and they attempt to turn it into a business is there a success story that you can tell? Is there a place that you can say, yeah, they discovered that that wasn't the right move, and why Did it disrupt their love and passion for the hobby by turning it into a business?

Speaker 3:

Two different questions you just asked, right, I did so. Can turning your passion into a business disrupt what God's called you to? I mean, worst case scenario is you're kind of right where you started, unless you pour a whole bunch of stupid money into it. Right? So you can just kind of organically. You know, I watched my grandpa one of the most giving, caring, kind men you could ever possibly meet World War II hero. His brother was actually killed on board the Arizona when a bomber Japanese bomber dropped a shell right through the middle of the ship. It's the biggest explosion if you ever watched the old video footage from Pearl Harbor. So my grandpa's brother died below deck.

Speaker 3:

Kenneth Cockrum my brother's named after him, but my grandpa, robert Cockrum, my dad's dad, made stained glasses the last 30 years of his life, just stuff that should have cost thousands of dollars. He never charged anyone a penny, gave it away, gave it away, and they lived very humbly. So he died with a list of 1500 projects that if he just would have monetized this thing he could have gotten to. But he didn't. Does he regret it? Probably not. Ultimately, he gave a lot of great stuff to a lot of great people. It was a hobby that never really monetized into a business. I would have loved, however, for him to have turned that into something more intentional, to where maybe some of us kids were in on it and I had the art now and I had the supplies and I had the book of business and he's you know, big businesses contacting us saying, hey, you know, so now we've got this team over here monetizing and we got the hobby thing, we can do the hobby thing. You continue doing the hobby thing. So turning it into a business doesn't kill the hobby. I've never actually seen that happen or turning it into a business because, again, if your premise is turning it into a business somehow devalues or pulls the virtue out of the activity, that's faulty thinking.

Speaker 3:

Business done well is very virtuous. Samuel Johnson he's a British writer said seldom is a man more innocently engaged than when in the pursuit of profit in his own business. It doesn't matter what the business is. If you're serving others with excellence and they're willingly paying it, that is a very virtuous thing to do. Now I've seen it go horribly wrong. All you have to do is get on Google and search for blogs that have been abandoned Tens of millions of them abandoned blogs.

Speaker 3:

Right, I'm going to start a photography business for dog owners that you know I don't have to photograph people's dogs and they make five posts and they get two clients and it just kind of fizzles because it was their passion. It wasn't necessarily a market need, they didn't focus on the marketing and meeting a need, they just focused on what they felt like doing with their time and it fizzled. Those are everywhere, everywhere. So a lot of people that come into our community have those failed, fizzled ideas because it started with what was in their heart as a passion instead of starting with what's out there in the marketplace as a need, knowing that their passions would eventually follow.

Speaker 3:

That's the piece that's missing. Your passion will follow. You become very passionate when people line up to give you money. Passion will follow. You'll become very passionate when people line up to give you money. And I can give loads of examples of people who put their passion on the shelf, kept it as a hobby and decided to go meet market needs and build something amazing. I've got stories for days on that because that's what I teach.

Speaker 2:

Give us one or two examples. I know you, even personally, at some point throughout your career have had the number one, number two selling products in a category on Amazon. Yeah, and I know what some of those products were, and so you couldn't have just woke up and said oh yeah, I'm passionate about that.

Speaker 3:

No, but it has served you well, no, anytime I find here, in fact, and I may be pushing back too hard here. This is why I got to take this one to God, but anytime my passions and interests start sneaking into my thought processes and conversations and ambitions, I hit the brakes hard. The only person that cares what I want is me. No one else out there does, and God doesn't care what I want. Ultimately, now, if he places those desires in my heart, there's scriptures that say you know, if I pursue God, he's going to put desires in my heart. If that's a desire that God placed there and it's taken me towards something that God wants me to be doing, yes, but it was just like you know, what I've always wanted to do. I've always wanted to, just you know, ride across the country on my Harley and just turn off the world and spend money how I want to spend it and stay where I want to stay and catch up with my family. Six months from now, you know, like no, that God didn't put that inside of me me getting. That's why retirement is so dangerous, as guys say. Well, I'm going to get to that stage where I stop serving others and it's all about me enjoying what I've accumulated and turning off every like, that's a death sentence. Man, that life insurance tables will tell you guys, retire and turn off serving. That's a death sentence. We're not built for that, we're built for others.

Speaker 3:

So let me tell you a specific example of a guy who didn't necessarily pursue his passion, but he had a marketing idea, made it huge and now he's very passionate about it. He's actually in 35,000 grocery stores now. His name's Mike Brown. When I met him he was living in his mom's garage behind her house because he had a small, struggling coffee shop in Saratoga Springs, new York. I think the shop's still there, but that's not how he makes his money anymore. He had the idea for coming up with what he would call the world's strongest coffee and he wanted an edgy, hardcore name to accompany the concept. And I think you've heard of this, Mike. Have you seen these guys around? Wally Death Wish Coffee you ever seen?

Speaker 1:

them. I've heard the name, yeah.

Speaker 3:

They're in every Walmart, costco Kroger. They're Target. They're everywhere now. Walmart, costco Kroger, their target. They're everywhere now. But he wasn't necessarily passionate about coffee. He does drink coffee, but it was the idea hey, there's a need in the market. I think this could be something. So we coached him, we helped him along. The full story is at a free website. There's nothing for sale on it. It just tells the story. Because it's such a great story, pickmikebrowncom, because our community got behind this guy. He actually ended up winning a Superbowl commercial based on social media voting. Business blew up.

Speaker 3:

I talked to him every couple of weeks or so, mentoring him along in life and in business, and he's since had a, had a somewhat of an exit and did really, really well. But he's still on the board with this company. But he's able to do the things. He now has the money and the time and the flexibility. Whatever it is he's passionate about, he can do it. He didn't start with his passion. He started by meeting a need in the marketplace. If you start meeting the needs of a lot of people, what did Zig Ziglar say? You help enough people get what they want, you'll always have everything you want, something like that right. So it's not about what you want me personally. It's about what the crowd wants, and what gifts and talents do I have that can begin to serve those needs. Once you look at this conversation through that lens, it opens up thousands of opportunities and you can be passionate about any of them. That's my premise.

Speaker 2:

I love the opportunity and looking at it from that vantage point, because it affords you so many other opportunities to serve well and then develop the passion for that and do with the resources to help other people. It seems like the odds are so much more in your favor of being successful than it is to align with three passions that you have and how would I ever monetize this? And so it just seems like it gives you such a better opportunity.

Speaker 3:

Yes, you can start to see, hopefully, I'm creating a thought in your guys' minds, the listeners and yours that as soon as I start saying, well, am I passionate about this or not, when you're trying to make a decision about an important direction, how do I feel, am I passionate about going in this direction? Those are the wrong questions to be asking. Here's a story that illustrates this very well.

Speaker 3:

I had a young man come to me, a guy in his early 20s, and he said Jim, I've got two major business opportunities ahead of me, path A, path B and he started breaking it down for me. He's like I kind of like the idea of doing this for a living, but you know, this one over here isn't too bad either, and the pay over here is X and the potential over here is Y. He's just dropping all these. I'm going to have to learn some new things here and over here it's kind of more in the zone of stuff that I already know, and he's blah, blah, blah, blah, going, going, going. And I said timeout, timeout. Let me ask you what, hopefully, is a very clarifying question Path A, path B, which one takes you more into the relationships that you feel God is calling you to. Does either one of them cause you to abandon relationships that you know are valuable? That God has put these men and these people in your life?

Speaker 3:

Does either one of them and I had no idea he hadn't brought up the topic of people at all and it's breaking down the stats and the numbers and what's about? You know how it's going to impact him. So let's talk about the relational aspect for a second. Who are you going to be in front of when path A? What kind of people are you gonna be working with? Who are you gonna abandon path A? Path B, right? So as soon as he thought through that lens it took him 10 seconds he said I know exactly what I'm supposed to do. You just clarified the whole thing.

Speaker 3:

I heard from him about eight or nine years later and he said dude, I gotta tell you, remember, when he had that conversation, I said you steered me away from a bunch of clowns because I was getting into some uncertainty, some guys whose reputations I didn't know. I was going to be tying myself to, some guys who could have done some crazy stuff. And they did do some crazy stuff. And the other path that I went down, I maintained the relationships that God had put in my life. The momentum of those relationships continued and it was a very natural. It was a little less money but it turned into way more money. So, thank you, he was just thanking me Because he put through the lens of okay, others. Let's put others at the front of our vision Others who is it you're calling me to serve? God, who needs the services I can provide? And you put that front instead of what are my passions. And now you make really good decisions.

Speaker 1:

How does someone that I feel like I have a limited scope of again, I know you don't like the word hobby, but those passions and hobbies, the things that people do, what's a good example of somebody that you've experienced that's been able to remove themselves from the focus on them and be able to think about marketplace? I mean, you talked about the coffee shop guy, Mike Brown, which is an interesting name. It's like the two most common names in the world, which is great, and yeah right Mike Brown's great.

Speaker 3:

He's a very funny guy too. He walked past you in the street you'd be like, yeah, that's a normal looking dude. He does. That's awesome. His drink, his coffee drinkers have tattoos of the death wish coffee on there, Like if he's the Harley Davidson of coffee, like this plain cut white dude. That's just like non-assuming, doesn't like to talk and he doesn't have any tattoos.

Speaker 1:

That's great, but you mentioned that he had a coffee shop, so there was some connection in that, in that story. Do you find that there's always connection, or do people really step out of their, their comfort zone and separate those two things from like a hobby to finding you know something in the marketplace, or is there almost always a connection? I you know?

Speaker 3:

I almost feel called to say it, just like I mean, I was given a few minutes on stage in front of graduating seniors and I said it nobody cares about your hobbies, no one cares. Your mom might, your wife will pretend to Nobody cares. Man, just because you're into it doesn't mean the rest of us have to care, right, that's just a harsh and it may sound harsh, but the quicker you come to terms with that, people do care about how you can serve them and they do love reciprocity, right? So I'm not saying turn off your passion. Some people say, oh, jim doesn't want me to have any hobbies. No, I'm saying don't start there as your source of potential business ideas, because there's a much bigger landscape.

Speaker 2:

That's my main takeaway from today is we're asking ourselves the wrong question.

Speaker 3:

I believe so. As a culture, we're telling our young people to pursue their passions, and I think that is disastrous advice, and they're stuck and they can't make any money because they've got some passions that don't equate to a business Right. They don't even know what their passions are. I think I might be passionate about this, I don't know. I mean, I kind of like I'm passionate about video games, you know. I mean, like you know no, don't start there.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, don't start there. It seems like a lot more honorable question to ask how can I serve others well and become passionate about those abilities that you have to serve them well, which fuels the rest of the business? It's like now we're onto something that I can get excited about.

Speaker 3:

Yep, yep, don't wait for that passion dude. Mike Rowe says don't pursue your passions, take them with you. Dirty jobs guy. I love that quote, that's a great quote, that's good, that's good, that's good.

Speaker 3:

Another story is told of a gas station owner who hired all the local high school kids and paid less hourly to work at his gas station. But kids lined up to work there. Why? Well, the guy paid his staff less and he had, as a result, he had more overhead. He's very profitable, ran a very clean operation, but he taught all his kids you're going to have the nicest cars and the nicest people coming through our gas station, and one of them. If you learn to conduct yourself properly. You bring your passion to work. You serve with excellence. You will not be a minimum wage guy very long. One of them's going to hire you. That's why the kids lined up to work there for less money than they could make just about anywhere else in town. Wow, because this guy emphasized relationships and excellence. So if you bring your passion with you, you'll find yourself elevated very quickly. That's a biblically sound message.

Speaker 2:

Jim, those that are listening today. How can they get more help? Like they're listening to you, they don't really know you. How can they first of all get in touch with you? What is a program they could go through? Where can you direct and send people to really discover more, how they can learn to serve others better and do it and monetize this to be beneficial for them and their family?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, you know, if you want to learn to serve others better. I'm not necessarily the best guy. I mean, I know how I feel about it. But you know, man, get into the word. You just don't see a lot of stories of guys saying, okay, I'm passionate about this, god bless this, so I can, you know. No, they go before God and say here, am I send me? What are you calling me to? Are you guys hearing me? Okay, I just had a little internet connection. No, we're good. Okay, I just got a little notice on my screen.

Speaker 3:

You know, get into the word, man, as men. You know, I'm reading through Samuel right now, just the way God called men. You know what is it you've anointed me to do? What should I be doing? And it never starts with hey, I've always been passionate about this. I don't see that word. Actually, as I'm thinking about it, I don't see that word passion in the Bible at all. Like no one cares what you're interested in. That could change tomorrow. You could read an interesting book and become passionate about something else. It's not important.

Speaker 3:

What is God calling you to to effectively serve others? And once you look through that lens, man, there's opportunity everywhere. And I will say there's more millionaires being made in the world right now online using e-commerce and the creativity there saying what does the marketplace need? You know, amazon is exploding and everyone has this impression that it's kind of taken over the world, but it's only Amazon is, and I say only it's. This is a big number, but they're still only about 8% of retail in the U S. Sometimes people think they're not by 8% of retail. E-commerce itself, all online shopping, is only about 20% of all retail in the US. It's going to be 30, 35, 40 in our lifetimes. Finding a way to plug into e-commerce. There's thousands and thousands of different strategies that you can use. It's wide open If you come out, not from the lens of what are my passions, but what does the marketplace need?

Speaker 3:

And that's what we teach in my organization and that's why we have, you know, large conferences and we say you know, we're going to teach you what works. We're going to teach you how to serve the marketplace using the tools and strategies that work. Bring your passions with you, apply it to this business model. Now let's build something special. So silentgymcom is the main website, my podcast, the Facebook group you mentioned earlier, and we've got a $39 a month course people can get into if they want to pursue this business model. But it opens up doors and relationships and opportunities and you can plug your gifts and talents and skills into this arena beautifully. And again, our podcast. We've got hundreds of interviews I'm coming up on a thousand episodes before too long and the vast majority of them are interviews with our successful students who have done what I just described.

Speaker 3:

They set their passion aside, pursued marketplace needs and serve as serving excellence and allow them to do all kinds of incredible things Become self-funded, forward missionaries, take care of special needs children in their community, hire special needs adults that come to work. One lady has a blind guy on her staff. Couldn't find work anywhere. Now he's performing beautifully in her profitable business, contributing with dignity in a business. So business allows you to do beautiful things. She didn't start out passionate about selling the products she was selling. She was passionate about helping special needs adult find meaningful work. So she started a business where she saw a need and hired those people in to roles. Now she's seeing her passions come to fruition through a profitable business, right. So those are the kinds of stories we love to tell. And then silentgymcom that's me. Some people spell it G-Y-M, like it's a workout. No, it's gym J-I-M, like you see on the screen here Silentgymcom. That's how you can find me.

Speaker 2:

That is so good man. Thank you so much for being with Wally and I today, Really encouraging others. I've learned a lot, quite honestly, myself, and that's how to reframe what it is that I'm asking myself. Guys, as we end today. Ask yourself the right question what is it that you want to accomplish? How can I serve others? How can relationships mean the most so I can go out and use the talents and the skills that God's given me to serve others and watch the passion develop from within you? So really take those to heart. Think about your hobby. Think about is it something that is serving others? Well, If it is, as Jim said, that's a bonus. If it's not, think about ways that you could serve, so that you could turn that into something that you could become passionate about. And all the reasons that we want you to do this is so that you, too, can have a view from the top.

Speaker 1:

Thanks guys again for listening to this week. What a powerful conversation around some things like. Big A said that I just hadn't thought about that way before. So, man, I hope you got something from that. Just a quick reminder that our episode this week most every week actually is brought to you by isibrotherhoodcom. We encourage you to go check that out. It's a community for Christian businessmen. Really, they desire momentum, they want to find success, they want to find significance in all areas of their lives. So go check that out at ISIbrotherhoodcom and we will see you next week.