The Secrets To Success - Interview with Alex Charfen

SPEAKERS

Joy Nicholson, Alex Charfen

Joy Nicholson: 00:02

Good day unleashers. Today I have an extra special guest on my podcast. And I'm so excited while you guys I'm always excited. But today I'm extra excited. Today I have the one and only Alex Charfen. Now I have been following Alex for years, I was in one of his programs, which was cool foundation at the time. And I have learned so much. And one of the things that stood out for me was reduced pressure and noise. And it's amazing how things happen. And I'm not going to dive into more details. He's also known for the billionaire code and a lot of other amazing things, which I'm going to dive into this episode. Hi, Alex, how are you doing? I am so excited. Like I'm literally shaking of excitement, which is, you know, it's just, I'm just so pumped up. Can you tell people who is Alex on a normal day when you're not thinking about work, which obviously is hard to switch off as entrepreneurs. But who is Alex on a normal day?

Alex Charfen: 00:52

When I'm not thinking about work? You know, I think for me, there's always a baseline level of thinking about work, because it's not really thinking about work. You know, I'm 48 years old. And I've been working with entrepreneurs and been an entrepreneur my whole life. And so on any given normal day, it's near impossible for me to get some thoughts of helping entrepreneurs or understanding entrepreneurs or moving our business forward or connecting to people not to sneak into my mind. But if we're talking about a day where I'm not fully immersed in work, you know, I think first I'm a husband, and then I'm a father, I, you know, been married to Katie for 16 years, this year, we just had her anniversary October 1. Thank you. We've been together for 18 years. And I'm 48. So I met her when I was 30. And prior to that my life was kind of all over the place. And so I'm extraordinarily proud of not just marrying Katie, but the time and the effort and the deep work that we've done to create the marriage of the relationship and the connection that we have. And in addition to that, we have two incredible daughters. They're 15 For 14 and 12. Reagan is the older one and Kennedy's younger one. And so I was recently in an event and somebody asked me like how do you have when you if you had to say you know, high level? How do you break down your time? Like, what percentage do you do what I said, you know, we're talking waking hours, I would say probably, you know, 20 30% Bond learning another 15, or 20%, with my opponent another 20 or 30%, learning 20 or 30%, with my family 20 or 30% working that pros a lot of time into staying healthy and connecting with friends. And so I think, you know, I, the older I get, the more I realize how important relationships are. And so that's been a, it's a very high focus for me and a high level of focus.

Joy Nicholson: 02:40

And it's so incredibly important to keep those relationships intact. And actually like as I work on them, because as entrepreneurs, we tend to be so emergent our business, we forget the people around us, you know, that's like any start when you start up in entrepreneurship. That's something that a lot of people struggle with. Do you feel like when you started, obviously, you've been doing this for many, many years. But when you had when you started your journey when you when your early 20s Right, actually, even before that, I'm sure you did you feel that you struggled to find that balance between relationships and actually having business on the side?

Alex Charfen: 03:16

Oh, joy. If we go back to the beginning, I was there was no balance. When I was in my teens, late teens and 20s, I was obsessed with grading some level of success. You know, I attended some college and college got increasingly irritating because I was running businesses on the side. And I remember being in a marketing class and the teacher in our marketing class was talking about direct mail responses. This is a while ago, I'm 48. So I was probably 2019 at that time. And she was talking about what you could expect from direct mail responses. And I had a company that was doing direct mail, and we were getting three or four times the response response rate she was and she didn't believe me. And she was saying to get one to 2%. I was saying well, we get 4% to 10%. And she didn't she didn't believe what we were talking about. We had targeted mailer with targeted message, customized, customized envelope, and we were crushing it. And so you know, I did not do really well in college. But my my balance back then there was in my 20s. I worked all of the time I worked seven days a week, I read a article about Bill Gates, who back then was kind of the the Elon Musk of the time, the guy who was breaking all the barriers and breaking all the the glass ceilings that were in place for entrepreneurs. And they said that he never took a day off in his 20s. And rather than taking that as a wow, that's curious. I took that as an instruction. And I didn't take a day off in my 20s. And so, you know, when I was 30 I prior to turning 30. In my late 20s I started to really struggle with what is life all about and do I want to keep doing this in fact, it's that I read a book when I was younger called the monk who sold his Ferrari by Robin Sharma. And I remember I had the application to buy the Ferrari and the book on a coffee table in my house and they were battling each other. I didn't even read the book because I was afraid it was going to talk me out of buying the Ferrari. And I didn't fill out the application because I was afraid I would read the book and then have the Ferrari and want to sell it. And so finally, one day, Oh, yeah. Finally, one day I opened the book and read it. And you know, that book made a major impact impacted my life of, you know, searching for more meaning and more understanding of what I really wanted, who did I want to be. And in the last, when I was about 2928 29, I went to this this huge shift where I didn't want to work like I was working, you know, 100 hour week was normal for me. And I didn't want to continue to burn the candle at all that I was, when I started my business at 21. The business I ran in my 20s, I was I had just been a runway model in California, I'd done some hair models, not not anything spectacular, like some very low paying gigs, but I was I was well enough to be able to get on a runway. And by the time I was 30, I was almost 300 pounds, probably over I didn't wait for a while. I had four different prescription drugs, I felt terrible. Every day, I had a pill that I took to eat up, I had chosen to put me to sleep. I didn't really understand what I was getting in my body. And 28 or 29, I started kind of turning things around. But things really shifted for me when I met Katie. And I decided I wanted to try and with life a different way. I didn't want to burn the candle at both ends. I you know, I had this this crisis where it was like, why am I doing all this, you know, I'm not enjoying any of it. I'm creating some level of success. I had a multi million dollar company and I was doing extraordinarily well for somebody back then my age. But I didn't even enjoy it. And every day, I felt like I got up and got into this horse race that never ended. And so I exited my business, primarily so I could spend more time with her. And we started some real estate businesses in South Florida get her which is a whole nother part of the story. But it was a massive shift for me. And so I think a lot of people do that when they're young. And you know, I think we're sold this this. No, I used to call it a bill of goods or alive. But for some people, it's true for some people in order to run a business, we have to sacrifice we actually for some entrepreneurs actually have hard wired. If I'm not sacrificing I won't be successful. So they actually do have to sacrificing I see it all the time with people who we coach and we can we coach them out of pain. And then they put themselves right back into pain. And we coach them out of pain again. And then they like fires in their business. And they go right back. You know, if somebody is always putting out fires in their business, we call them an arsonist. You know, that's kind of how it works. So, yeah, and so so you know, for me, it was a matter of trying to find a different way to live. That was more intentional. And that included more joy and more happiness and more actually absorbing the experience rather than just focusing on whatever was going to happen next.

Joy Nicholson: 07:56

Yeah. It's amazing when you dive into those type of things, what the outcome, you know, like how you actually know how you have grown. And if you had to say that you would have been a problem. Now,

Alex Charfen: 08:07

it's interesting, just just as an aside for that story, yeah, years later, I was in a meeting at Genius Network that Joe Polish, and I got up to speak. And I hadn't noticed that there was this guy in the audience who had a hoodie on, and you couldn't really see his face. And he was wearing sunglasses. And I spoke and sat down and there was a no pass from him to me that the room was in a big U shape. The table was ambiguous shape. So I got up and I spoke about the entrepreneurial personality type. And I got this No, no pass down to me. And I looked at it and it said, Hey, we should connect a lot of your speech resonated with me, Robin, and I looked over and it was Robin Sharma. And it was like, I'm getting chills right now talking about it. It's like this magical connection. And so like an absolute amateur, I took my phone out and took a picture of the note. Because I wanted to make sure I had it for forever. And then I'm like, oh my god did Robin Sharma just see me take a picture of that note. And so I handed him a note back here that said, you know, you've had a massive impact on my life, I'd love to talk. And I ended up forming a relationship with Robin and speaking at several of his events, and you know, actually speaking for a while, you know, what, for several years, we spoke very, very often. And we check in every once in a while now. And so it's interesting how circular the world is this this book that had this massive impact on me, years later. I'm friends with Robin. It's like, you know, when I was a kid, Tony Robbins was the first influences I had in personal development, and now been at four or five events where we've shared the same stage. So it's interesting how equations are set up in our lives.

Joy Nicholson: 09:37

That I love that that is so amazing. Can we can we dive into your book? So for anybody that's watching this on YouTube, this is amazing. Get this book. Alex, can you talk a little bit about this book and I know that you have read 1000s and 1000s of books in your lifetime. And this This was kind of born from understanding entrepreneurs right like diving into there. Can you tell people a little bit about your entrepreneurial? Yeah,

Alex Charfen: 10:04

you know, whenever I started talking about this again, I get chills because as a kid, when I was young, I was different than all the other kids. And I knew it. You know, I was the type of kid that was so different. I didn't really get along great in school, didn't get along great with my peers didn't really have a place that I belonged. And so I knew I wanted to have some level of success. I'd seen my father lose a business and really struggling his business. My family struggled for money when I was a kid. You know, I grew up working with my dad and a swap me on a border town in a border town. So it was sitting in a booth all day, 120 degree heat. And if anybody challenges that temperature, we were in Yuma, Arizona, or Calexico, California, which was ridiculously hot. And I would sit at an intersection where my dad had one of the bigger stands, and there was a guy who was pitching mops on one guy who was pitching shammies. And another place and the guy was pitching food slicers in another place. And so I'd sit there and listen, these people sell all day. And you know, as a kid, I thought I was so far away from this thing called success. You know, my family didn't have a lot of money, I saw opulence and a lot of wealth around me. We lived in Orange County, California, I have friends whose families had a tons of money, so I know what it looked like. And I started trying to read personal development. And one of the first books that I read was unlimited power by Tony Robbins, then which was like this, and I read it when I was really young. In fact, when I was 10 years old, I read and listened to the tape set for Dr. Wayne Dyer, his own awakened life and actually ended up meeting him later in life too, before he passed away. And so as a kid, I you know, I wrote read Tony Robbins at read Wayne Dyer and I started reading more personal development, there was so much conflict in the books, that they started arguing with each other and it got overwhelming. And as a kid, I couldn't reconcile it. And so I started reading about successful people. And I obsessively have chased the stories of successful people my whole life. You know, I would wait to hear about somebody historic that resonated. And I read about them, you know, Einstein stood out to me. So I read about Einstein and I found out that he failed Algebra, he can tie his shoes until he was four, I started seeing this reflection of the kind of sensitivities and weaknesses that I had. You know, I read about Newton's Sir Isaac Newton, who supposedly said under an apple tree, and Apple hit his head, and he discovered gravity. Well, the real story is, Newton was such an antisocial person, that they made up the story about the apple tree, it was an apple falling out of the tree that he saw, but he was because he was by himself most of the time. And so the more that I would read about successful people more I absorbed about successful people, the more that I found, they had the sensitivities and challenges and the issues that I did. And so that that quest to understand successful people went on for years. And one weekend, I was trying to write a book called constructive company. And I couldn't, I couldn't write that I was actually trying to write the book proposal for constructive company, a major publisher wanted me to write a book. And I got to the point where you talk about who's going to buy the book, describe your market, and I had 300 words to describe entrepreneurs. And I couldn't I was so blocked, it should have been easy. You I worked with entrepreneurs, I was an entrepreneur, I coached entrepreneurs, there shouldn't been any type of walk or hesitation, but I couldn't do it. And I remember getting up and going and telling Katie, I was struggling, I had a glass of water I, I came back to my desk and I'm like, Okay, I'm just going to remove the 300 word limitation. And I'm going to write whatever comes out. And joy. I started typing. And it was a Saturday. And by the end of the weekend, I had 25,000 words, and I just didn't stop. And we ended up taking that everything that I wrote and editing it down and putting it in order. And it became that both the entrepreneurial personality type, we actually pulled a lot out of it. I know entrepreneurs like to do things fast, they like quick information. And so we want it to be about under a two hour beat even for someone who's dyslexic, like me. So if you read really fast, it's 45 minutes, if you really slow it's about two hours. And the book is my hypothesis on why people like us are who we are. And I wanted to write a book that explained our behaviors in a way that made everything makes sense. And when I look at entrepreneurs throughout history, you know, Steve Jobs is an interesting example because he clearly was one of the most brilliant visionaries of our time, and he got the best work out of people and he inspired so many different industries. He changed the world in so many different ways. Still equations that are running right now that had Steve Jobs not been there who knows if they wouldn't be and at the same time, he was difficult and challenging and he hurt people's feelings and he did not create safe spaces like we talked about these days, like all of Apple was not a safe space to Steve Jobs was in building and you know that dichotomy that that that that kind of bipolar type behavior, not to use not not in the psychological sense of the world but in being polarity having clarity It's so common in entrepreneurs, you know, the Einstein couldn't tie his shoe and failed Algebra became one of the greatest businesses of all time, you know, those types of things you see over and over again. And when I look at, you know, who we are as entrepreneurs. For me, I have this hypothesis that we the definition of an entrepreneurial personality types, we are physiologically sensitive momentum based beings that are highly reactive to constraint. So when jobs was in mum and dad, when he was excited when things were going his way, everybody loved him, he could get up on on a stage and inspire literally the entire world in 20 minutes. But when he was unconstrained when things were slowed down, when things got in his way, he was a tyrant, he was terrifying, and all those other things. And when you look at any entrepreneurs, positive and challenging behaviors, I feel like it's when we're in momentum and adding momentum when the pressure and noise goes too high, we show up as challenge we show up as symptomatic. And so the argument I make is that the entrepreneurial personality type is really the evolutionary Hunter, we've been programmed for millennia to get up every day, go into the future, create this new reality of being on the hunt and getting something done, we come back to the present and we demand it becomes real. And the energy, the the psychic power that it takes to do that the psychological power that it takes that is not resonant in the average human being. But for people like us, it doesn't go away, and you can't turn it off. And so we are fundamentally different than the rest of the world. And I feel like we are the most misunderstood population there is.

Joy Nicholson: 16:31

And it's so incredibly hard. Because sometimes you feel so alone, especially if in a society we it's it's not a norm. You know, if you're not surrounded by people, like yourself, it's like, you just feel so incredibly alone. And it's so sad. And that's one of the reasons why I started this podcast, because the entrepreneurial journey is quite lonely. And sometimes you just surrounded by people that just don't understand it. I don't get you. When I read this little book, I was almost in tears. Well, actually, I was in tears, because it was for the first time I thought somebody actually understood how I feel. Next, one of the things that is also which I have right here is the billionaire code. And I know you've spoken a lot about the billionaire code. And I don't want to dive too deep into it. But can you just give us like, how did the billionaire code come about? How did it really start?

Alex Charfen: 17:20

It's interesting, if you if you look at the entrepreneurial personality type, there's this chapter called The entrepreneurial life of questions. And when I would, you know, when I read the stories of entrepreneurs, I started to see patterns. You know, one of them is the contribution equation, I think every great entrepreneur in history did four things to be successful. First, they lowered the pressure and noise in their life, you know, by lowering the pressure and noise. I mean, they started eating the right foods, they started taking care of themselves, they started saying no to the things they needed to say no to it's actually in the story of every wildly successful entrepreneur, they started flying private jets, they started getting assistance and help and, and you know delegating the tactical. And the second thing is they started, they didn't just lower pressure noise, they increase protection and support, they started actually asking for help. It's one of the hardest things for us to do. Asking for help is, as I call it, entrepreneurs dilemma, we need far more help than the average person, but every request for help leaves us feeling or leaves us feeling vulnerable and exposed. But if you look at successful people, they did it. And the third thing is if you lower pressure and noise and increase protections for your strengths and abilities, so you don't have to do anything and have to go out and teach yourself anything, you just get better at everything. If you do those two things. Far too many entrepreneurs, increase noise won't ask for help. And then go try and learn how to fix it. And it just doesn't work. And if you do the three things, you lower pressure, noise, increase protection and support your strengths and abilities show and you'll make your greatest contribution. Every successful entrepreneur I ever studied did those things. Well, that was one of the first equations for me that emerge from studying entrepreneurs. But if you read the stories at 50, or 100, entrepreneurs, they kind of look disparate. They look different. If you read 500, or 1000, or you get to where like I've studied so many I've lost count. I don't know how many books I've read, and how many articles and third party accounts and synopsis and biographies and articles. And Anytime somebody's successful, I like chase it down. I want to figure out how they got there. And the entrepreneurial life of questions is the nine questions that I believe get us from where we start to where we want to be. And you know, it's it starts with how do I stop pressure noise? I think every one of us has been in that place where we don't want to have the noise anymore, then the second one is what is wrong with me? And because we feel like there's something wrong with us, this equation opens up like how do I get ahead? And you know, the how do I get ahead? And then how do I get even further ahead? It's like we figure something out. Now we want more. And then most entrepreneurs never make the sleep. But next question is how does my team give me how do we how do we surround ourselves with the people are going to help us? And then we have this tectonic shift from me to we, where it's instead of how does my team get me ahead? How does my team get ahead? How do these people around me how do I focus on that? And then how does my team get even further ahead? And then how do we help others get ahead and how do we help everyone And that became like this meditation for me for years. I'm like, I think this is the path to entrepreneurial success. And I went to a to an event where clay mask the CEO of it. No, you know what, that's not what happened for it. Yeah, one of the first things happened CEO of Infusionsoft shared. And he shared this matrix where he had kind of put numbers to what, what, to those questions, and I looked at it, and I thought, You know what, it's not just the entrepreneur level questions, this is what we go through to start a business, you start the business, and you're the very first phase and it's like, how do I stop the pressure noise, then everybody seems like they're doing better than you and what is wrong with me. And so what I finally did was assigned categories to it like, this is this is the first category, the second category, the third category, then I got some numbers from the US Small Business Administration. And the numbers line up with those questions. And so I kind of backed into the billionaire code first by at understanding what is the base level question that entrepreneurs ask at each level of growth? And what should we be asking? And so it developed into this matrix that now we use as the back end for our coaching program, it's been downloaded about 10s of 1000s of times. It shows up in a lot of different books with different names on it shows up in a lot of other people's products with different names on it. But and I think it's because you know, joy, I've gone out and shared it tons of times. And nobody ever comes up and says, Hey, I think you're off. Entrepreneurs just look at it and say, our code is just truth.

Joy Nicholson: 21:28

It's surprising. Yeah, I have shared it with so many people, because when you look at it, it's like, wow, and it's amazing how something so simple can be so impactful. You know, obviously it is it wasn't formed out of simplicity, but it's just, yeah, it's quite, it's yeah, it's amazing. You can download this on your website, right?

Alex Charfen: 21:45

You can you can actually go to billionaire code comm you can download the matrix, we've actually added a ebook called The billionaire code decoded. And you can also watch me present the billionaire code on a video.

Joy Nicholson: 21:56

I strongly recommend you guys get your hands on this one as well, because this is really good. Now, Alex, there is again, so I'm a mom. I've got a four year old and a seven year old actually, remember, I had an Instagram photo once we tagged you with my four year old watching videos with me, your videos be more specific, because it doesn't matter if I get up at four or I get up at five my kids wake up. I don't know why. So I've given up on that. But and being a mom, it is you see your kids go through this now. I don't homeschool yet. But I think it's on the cards. My kids are so small. I've got a four and seven year old so they're not you know, I think when we get to the team, that's where things get serious, right? Yeah. But as a parent, how do you juggle all of this because I'm sitting at home when we had lockdown. For example, we had lockdown for almost a month unit Zealand and juggling business and kids can be really tricky. If you're not in that, I guess momentum of of balancing it all. Now now you guys homeschool. And you know your kids are extremely smart. And you know how to handle this. But how do you deal with that?

Alex Charfen: 22:58

So first, I just want to share we don't homeschooling. Last year, in the middle of last year, our kids really started talking to us about needing more social interaction, more social engagement, that they wanted to be able to be more around people their age. So we haven't been to an alternative school here in Austin, that is extraordinary. It's kind of a kind of a homeschool transition school. It's actually in a home. And there's a limitation of 82 kids, and it's run like a liberal arts college and my kids, when there's, it's incredible people are moving from around the United States to go to the school, but it's sold out right now it's completely at capacity. We're actually the owner of the school is actually one of our members. And we're showing her how to increase the capacity of by opening other schools and by expansion. And so we're really excited about it. And I mean, it's so intense when there's a vacation, the first vacation that they had my 11 year old cried when she was 11. So Kennedy, my younger daughter, she was upset that you didn't go to school. So we know they're in a great place. But before, you know, I think again, entrepreneurs have been sold this bill of goods that you can't do it all. And if you have the right process and the right structure and the right routine in your life, you can have a business that is extraordinarily successful. You can't have investments that you make, and you make your money making money. You can have an incredible relationship with your spouse. And you can also have a connected and authentic and real relationship with your kids. And you know, when when we're with our kids, it's either one of two things, we either focuses a family together or when we're around other people and our kids, they hear everything. They're not left out of conversations. We don't tell them they need to leave the room when we're talking to somebody. And I just had my cousin and his husband. Were out here this weekend. And Jim Thomas's husband said my cousin's Thomas and Jim, his his his husband, and Jim said, you know, I'm really impressed with how transparent you are with the kids like you just have every conversation you have with adults in front of your kids and I'm like you had You know, I think one of the biggest issues with with being an entrepreneur is that we try to compartmentalize. And pretend like we have this over here and this over here. And over here. We don't do that with our kids, you know, I have this podcast called tell your kids everything. And it's a belief that I have the children really need to understand way more about being adults, while their children, because we shelter them until they're, you know, 1516 1718 when they started getting included in adult situations, and then wonder why they fall flat when they go out in the world, or why they get knocked down and punched in the face over and over again, when reality is they haven't had the the ability to understand what's going to happen. And so I don't compartmentalize, you know, when I when I need to work, I tell the kids, I need to go work, and they understand what I'm doing. And, and I also have a ton of routine and structure around making sure that, you know, we have dinner every night as a family that every morning when they wake up, one of us is there, or both of us is there with them. And so when you have the right routine and the right process, and you're willing to ask for help, you don't have to sacrifice a lot of life.

Joy Nicholson: 26:03

Now like that. Now, this podcast is about diving in behind the scenes to understand what makes successful people successful. Alex, you've just talked about routine. Can you please tell us what would your daily routine look like?

Alex Charfen: 26:17

Sure. So I get up, I get up relatively early, not as early as I used to, I used to be like a four or 430 person and now value sleep a little more, I've learned just how much recovery the body needs when you're really active. And so these days, I sleep in until 515 or 530, which for a lot of people still feels early this morning, I think, yeah, this morning, I think I was up at five. So I get up early. And the first thing I do is clean my mouth brush my teeth, scrape my tongue and that have a ton of water. Usually somewhere around like 2030 ounces of water just to get the body started. I come down to my office and I have a nice cold morning routine. But but it's so much of the joy has converted to ritual, you know, I have a space in my office, which a lot of people in the spiritual world would call an altar. It's kind of a 3d vision board, where you put the things you want to attract into your life. And so I have some books that really mean a lot to me, I have pictures of Katie and my kids. We recently bought land here in Texas that we're developing. So I have the survey for the land. I have some crystals and some stones and some candles and some awards that we've won that I want to repeat. And I stand in front of that altar. And I say my intention for the day, you know, it often sounds something like I want to call in my guides my higher power my higher self, my guardian angels to help me through this day to understand what I should do. And to move my family forward my business forward my relationship forward. And I say it in a way that makes it so that I have a body response. So when I'm getting chills when I'm feeling feeling connected, I know that I'm doing the right thing. And I like the candles on the altar, then spend some time at my desk, usually the journaling, I like to get a few things out in the morning, I feel like you know that first 90 minutes after you wake up, it's so crucial because your mind's activating the way it won't be for the rest of the day. Then I do to spend some time learning you know, before my kids are up before Katie's up, I'll watch a video for a course that I'm in right now. I'm one of Dean Thomas's course called, of course is called Light bringers. It's amazing. So we watched some of his stuff, or somebody else's, or read a book. Then I go up when I get Katie up. And Katie and I take our dog for a walk. And that's like the first connection point in the morning while we wake up the kids, we take the dog take by this little sheezy that we have robots. And then I come back. And depending on whether I'm driving the kids to school or not, there's a routine that I go through and you know includes almost every morning is a cold plunge in 39 degree water for at least three minutes, sometimes four or five or more. Yet, every day I do I do want the most difficult like I have a fear of cold water like a still today I have this massive vehicle of water I've been doing everyday for over a year. And one of my coaches Shane Saunders calls it stepping into discomfort on purpose. Like if you bring discomfort on purpose, you know how to keep it out of the rest of your life. And so I'll do the cold plunge. Then I'll come back and get help get the kids get ready. And if I'm driving them to school, I take them to school me up connection time on the way and if I'm not driving them, then I'm here and I probably do more learning some meditation, spend some time really understanding what I want to get out of the day. And every morning, I go through what we call our momentum planner. And so this is one of our I think it's the most effective product we have for anything that anybody wants to get done. And so each morning I write down from the day before what I was grateful for and where I won the day before I write down what's my intention for the day where I was uncomfortable the day before and I make a to do list. But the important thing is I pick out the top three things that I want to get done. And before I drive the kids to school or Katy drives the kids to school we get together We share this with each other with intention. So every day, we have this alignment around those six questions. You know, what, what, where did I when? And what am I grateful for? What's my intention today? Where was I uncomfortable yesterday, what are the top three and then anything we have to show off the to do this. And that level of intention, that intentionality even though it's maybe five to 15 minutes that we talk, the fact that it happens daily, the fact that we do it every day, there's not a lot of drift in our relationship that creates a massive amount of connection. And so and then I go into my day, and then includes I start with a conversation with my operator, Haley, that person helps us run our business, that our leadership team that our daily huddle, and then whatever's on my schedule for the day.

Joy Nicholson: 30:42

And do you because you okay, one of the things that I've learned in your program that is going to stick with me until that I one day, I'm sure is is having that structure, routine and process in your business. Now, it's one thing to have in your business, but it's also incredibly important in your personal life. Because I mean, they work together, right? It's just a circle of how they work together. And they can work against each other joy, that is true as well. And I have noticed that as well. So when it comes to the structure, team and process, and obviously you know, momentum planner, because I have one right here as well, here's my thing. It's right here, it's written, it's you know, I'm on a mission with it. So this is a game changer, guys. So definitely. But when I look at my momentum planner, for example, and Marta de luz is the dialers I know you'd call it that as well, because you forever just sitting because you always have a million things to do. It's just a problem, I guess, in life in general. But when I look at the to do list is always this long, but I know you have to dump it all. And then I look at my intention. And then you look at the top three things. Not the correlation, I guess, between the three of those and how Brian, I tried to explain this correctly, so you can understand my question. So when I look at their tension, I look at the to do list and I look at the top three things. Sometimes they they don't gel together very nicely. Because it's you have so much to do. And you have to prioritize that feeling of overwhelm comes in then how do you? How do you fix that overwhelm using your planner?

Alex Charfen: 32:16

So every day, here's what a lot of people skip joy. The question, Where was I uncomfortable yesterday? Yeah. If you're feeling overwhelmed on a daily basis, then the next day you should be writing down, I was overwhelmed by my to do list, I was overwhelmed by my intention wasn't matching with my top three. You know, I was uncomfortable with those things. Because as entrepreneurs, we are the ultimate optimists were people that do what the rest of the world feels is impossible. What we're doing right now speaking, in an event like this, like being on a podcast, where other people are going to listen, the average person feels like they're dying, you and I actually walk into this on purpose. And so when we don't recognize where we're uncomfortable, we do not open the equation to where we can solve things. And I think so often entrepreneurs step down and where they're uncomfortable and go right back to the to do list. And instead, when we ride, let that discomfort rise when we recognize where those moments in the day where we were uncomfortable when we recognize the things that made us uncomfortable. I mean, whatever it is writing it down. When you get in the habit of writing it down, after two or three days of that, that recognition, your mind will start to find other equations, when we stuff stuff down. Our conscious and subconscious mind do not work on it, they're just bothered by it, they're pressured by it, it creates anxiety, it creates symptoms in entrepreneurs, it actually increases the pressure and noise. When we recognize it, we create the possibility of solving it. And so when if you're in a place where your days aren't matching, if you're in a place where the top three doesn't really feel like momentum, write those things down and ask yourself why. And just the recognition of the issue starts the equation that your mind can actually create a solution.

Joy Nicholson: 33:57

Yeah, I love that. That's amazing. Hashtag goals. That actually be that was born from a joke I used to coach because I'm a marketing, I'm heavy into marketing. It's my I've got an agency etc. And I used to coach one on one businesses. And for some reason, they just people, it's easy for people to set a goal, but it's very hard to be able to achieve a goal, right? It's just it's just not. And that was born from that because I used to irritate them every day, hashtag goals. Where are you today with your goals? How do you set goals in your business, Alex?

Alex Charfen: 34:31

You know, Joy these days, I have a team of about 17 people. And so I am involved at the very high level and our goal setting and the direction of where we want to go for the year in the direction of who we want to work with what movement we're serving in the direction of some of the products, but most of the goals and outcomes in my business are now set by my team. You know, we use our planning process, where on a annual basis we get together and we try to determine where we're going for the year. Then every quarter we get together and we choose We're going to delegate to what people are going to hire, what projects are we going to accomplish? what processes are we going to document, what policies are we going to put into the company, the team brings most of those forward. And then they're they're arranged and then prioritized by the team. And so we walk in every 90 days, then every 30 days, we get together and they come up with what are the outcomes for those 30 days that are going to get us to those higher goals. And then every week, we do our weekly commitment. And so when it comes to goal setting, in our company, I'm involved in the very top of that structure. But as at what we call our strategic plan, a waterfall, as it waterfalls down through those different gates, most of the goals are set by my team, I'm there and I can say, I think this is unrealistic, or I don't think this is enough, right? I don't think this is the direction we want to go. But um, but you know, we don't even look at them as goals, we look at them as outcomes. And we know we're going to achieve those outcomes. Because we have a process through which we execute, so that we know every day, if someone's executing something in our business, it means that it fits into a weekly and if a weekly fits into its into a weekly, it fits into the monthly and if it's into the monthly, it fits into the quarterly. And then that fits into the annual goal, which is going to achieve a client centric mission. So everyone in our organization knows what they're doing each day is going to get us to our long term results. And so for me, personally, I do the same thing. We have a personal planning process, Katie and I get together on an annual basis. And every year we set these goals where each year we've been a little more bold and a little more audacious. And in one way or another they come through

Joy Nicholson: 36:31

I waterfall, because obviously, you know being in the end, I went through a predictable system and planning system and I do have the waterfall. And it's amazing that when you structure your day like that, and I've always been pretty good with setting goals and achieving them. And that's why I'm borderline obsessed with it. Hashtag goals is the reason they're exactly that. And also I've got, you can see this sort of got a hashtag focus to this part of the the podcast, but just getting focused and focused on your day. And like you said, the intention that word intention is so incredibly important, right? As entrepreneurs challenges is the thing. I mean, it's the entrepreneurial journey is like this is not never a straight line. What has been the biggest challenge that you faced in the last year or two

Alex Charfen: 37:22

biggest challenge I've faced in the last year or two. You no joy, I think if we're going to take this specific last couple of years, I think that we've entered into a time frame in the history of humanity, where the level of judgment and the level of clarity and the level of conflict is at the highest I've ever seen in my entire career my entire life. You know, I think the number of people who have decided to cancel other people, the number of people who have decided that they're on one side of an argument, the other side of the argument isn't valid, it shouldn't even be listened to, you know, the situations in the world right now, where people are being shut down and censored and cut off and really pulled out of the the dialogue is incredibly challenging from you. I think, when you look at so much of what's happening today, you know, we are dealing with a brand new type of crisis, we're dealing with a brand new type of issue. We're dealing with solutions that we've never had before and are completely unproven and a lot more terrifying. And we have these this polarity in society where some people are like, everything is true. And we need to listen to all that you can even do your own research. And if you don't line up, you're not a good person. Like, that's actually an argument I see made. It's like you're a bad person, because you don't have the same level of certainty around what's happening that I have. And you know, I think for me, one of the biggest challenges has been having beliefs that I have, that people have judged me at such a level that they just don't even want to want to hear it anymore. You know, they've just completely walked out of the conversation. And I've never had that before in my career. You know, I've been an entrepreneur my whole life. I've had a coach that works with huge groups of entrepreneurs. And I've always been pretty open about my beliefs and who I am and how I look at things. And people a lot of the time they've been like, Okay, well, you know, I have different beliefs, but we can still agree to disagree and get along. And I think that in the last two years, the level of societal pressure, the level of governmental pressure, the level of let's get real propaganda that has been shared everywhere, has created this environment where we can't agree to disagree anymore. It's either you're good or you're bad. And I just I feel like that's, that's a challenging place for humanity to be. I feel like it's a very challenging place for all of us to be and so I've been challenged by the number of stories of people who've been disowned by their families or kicked out of groups of friends or encouraged to leave neighborhoods because they have beliefs that in some way are different than the beliefs of the people around them. And there's been some of that in my life. There's been some of that in our families. There's been some of that in The people that we know, and thankfully, it's not that much. But I've just I've watched a lot of friends and a lot of people that I respect struggle because they're on one side of the argument and they're not willing to even see the other side. I think that when one of the one of the darkest places a human can go, is when they believe they're 100%, right, and they get into a place of self righteousness. I know that if I'm ever self righteous in an argument, I'm probably, and not probably, if I'm ever being self righteous in their arguments, something is. And I think that there's just we've gotten to a place where self righteousness and one side of the argument and censoring and not even listening to the other side is normal. And that's been a massive challenge.

Joy Nicholson: 40:42

We live in a crazy society at the moment, it's just, it's just incredible. Like, you kind of just wish you can reset three years ago, right? We things can be normal again, and everybody contribute to your success.

Alex Charfen: 40:58

Um, man you know, I, I contribute to my success. I think that when you look at the entrepreneurial personality type, you know, and, and the, the attributes that we have, that the rest of the world looks at as being unhealthy or wrong. I'm proud to lean in, you know, when somebody says, Oh, you're obsessive about that, I take it as a compliment. When somebody says, you know, you, you, you're always changing directions, you always have new ideas. I'm like, Of course I do. That's who I am. And I think it you know, when you say what you contribute to your success, you know, I often joke with people, once I stopped trying to be who everyone else wanted me to be, and just was myself. That's when everybody thought I was cool, wanted to listen. But as long as I was trying to play some character be somebody else. It didn't ever work. And so I think there was, there was a time in the last probably only 10 or 15 years, where my father in law had passed away. And from the time we found that he had cancer, the time he had passed away was 72 days, I was giving his eulogy at his funeral. He was 58. So super, super young to die. And I was wearing a really itchy, uncomfortable suit, or it wasn't uncomfortable in the morning. But during the eulogy, it became the most uncomfortable thing I've ever been in. And I decided I'm not doing it anymore. And I came home that weekend, I got rid of all my suits, I started wearing what I wanted to wear, I wear clothes that I only feel comfortable in both, like pajamas, and they need to, and I am 100% on a daily basis, trying to be my authentic self. And when I when I say authentic self, I think that word gets those words get overused. What I mean by it is I want to be who I'm happy being every day. And you know, I had a certain level of success before I took this tone. And before I change this, this way of looking at the world. But as soon as I made the decision to do that, as soon as I gave up suits and started wearing T shirts, as soon as I stopped trying to say the right thing and said what I was really thinking as soon as I stopped trying to like fit in and I was fine with being the only person at a wedding wearing a t shirt and sweats like I don't care. That's when people started listening and talking about me. And that's when I got on the biggest stages. That's when I was in the same program as Tony Robbins and tons of other people you know. So I think when you ask, what do you attribute is mindset, what do I attribute my success to today? It's that I allow myself to be exactly who I am. And I think that has a resonance and magnetism in the world that we overlook. I always tell people any, any attempt to be anything other than yourself will only cause pressure and noise in your life. But the opposite is true to when you are willing to be fully and unabashedly yourself, when you're willing to put yourself out there, you become magnetic and magnetic people change the world.

Joy Nicholson: 43:45

I love that magnetic people change the world. I'm going to put that on my wall, actually. Because you've got a lot of awesome cars actually have a few quotes of yours. But that's like I like that one. A quick, just a few quick more questions. So what is your top three success habits of all time?

Alex Charfen: 44:04

I think having a real morning routine that I put time into is huge. Yeah. I think also having a process and structure in my business is a big one. But never since I've been married. I always tell entrepreneurs if you're married, the key to success is number one, put your marriage first and number two, be completely transparent in your marriage. I'm 48 and Katie, and I've been married 18 Or sorry, 16 years, like I said before eight together a team and today I can honestly say that there are no secrets in my marriage. Like my wife knows everything, even the really uncomfortable stuff, even the stuff most people are ashamed of. And I think she would say the same thing. And having that level of transparency in the most important relationships in my life is like a backstop that most people don't have. Because until you're fully real and fully transparent with your spouse, there's always something that's causing a level of anxiety, that background level of anxiety relationship when you put yourself completely into the relationship and you share everything the good bad, the challenging all of it, it becomes this foundation from which everything else in your your life and your business and everything else can grow. And so I didn't say it earlier about what do I tribute my success to, I think a lot of it is that too if I if I can be completely authentic and real in my marriage, it makes it that much easier to do in the rest of the world.

Joy Nicholson: 45:21

That's amazing, and etc, as well. So this podcast, like I said before, is behind the scenes of successful people. And some of the people listening to this podcast are people that they've started a business, but they're really stuck. Or they're sitting on that fence, and I'm like, can I really do this? What advice would you have for somebody that is either sitting on the fence or they just stuck in their current place?

Alex Charfen: 45:44

Yeah. You know, if you're even considering doing something different if you're even thinking about changing your life, you know, if your mind is creating the question, can i The answer is absolutely 100%. Yes. And I think for so many of us, the challenge is accepting that the challenge is accepting ourselves in saying we want something different. And if you're sitting on the sidelines, if you taking the first step, but the second one's even more difficult. If you've gotten to a certain place, and it feels like you're jumping off of a cliff, I want you to know something about people like us, your mind wouldn't ask the question unless you have the capacity. That's just how the universe works, we will not even have the thought of something that we can't bring into full fruition. And so if you've thought about it, if you're thinking about it, if you're in that place where you're ideating, around doing something, I want you to know something, you're one of us. And if you're one of us, it means you're different than the rest of the world, it means that the destination is not the goal, it's the journey, it means that you are an evolutionary Hunter, or Huntress. And for people like us, if we're not on the hunt, we don't feel like we're fully alive. And so I want you to fully lean into those feelings, I want you to get emotional about those feelings, I want you to start letting those feelings out to Stop stuffing them down. Because here's what I know, with all the reading and research and time I've spent with entrepreneurs, is it doesn't matter what barrier you're facing, it doesn't matter what issue you have in your life, it doesn't matter what diagnosis you have, what challenge what illness, what problem, what lack what constraint, whatever it is, there is a story of someone just like us who's faced those same things, or worse, and gone around them, through them under them, oh, that over them or whatever they needed to do to get into momentum and take the world with them. And if they can do it, you can too. Because if you're an entrepreneurial personality type, and you're feeling those feelings, this isn't just who you are. This is your birthright, you were put here on this planet, to change the world to make a difference and to make an impact. And so if you're thinking about doing that, I want you to know something, not only can you but you must, because the world needs people like us more now than it ever has. And I want to leave you with one thought. It doesn't matter what's going on with you. There is nothing wrong with you and you are not alone. Because as soon as you begin this journey, you will attract the people just like me and joy and others who will come into your life, become part of your tribe, part of your family and help you move forward. Have faith in that because that's how it works for people like us.

Joy Nicholson: 48:19

So powerful. I'm like almost emotional here. Alexander's just and it is. Thank you guys. That is like the best advice. So definitely follow Alex's advice on this. He's been doing this for many, many years. I've got two very fun questions to answer to ask actually because I put a price on on like, if you guys can ask Alex any questions, but we'll be So Andy, Andy Griffin, you should know him. And Crispin at So Chris is asking Alex, why are you so awesome? I don't know.

Alex Charfen: 48:48

Chris and I are really close friends. And I think it's funny that he asked that question. I think it was probably the answer that I gave before. You know, I think it's funny, you know, I do not wear the cool shoes and I don't wear the clothes everybody wants to have and I don't you know flash around the things that I think make people awesome in today's society or give the impression of being awesome. But I show up as myself and I show up as myself consistently in the same way I'm on this podcast is the same way I'm with my team is the same way with my kids. And same way I'm with my wife. And I think that that makes people magnetic makes you different. It allows you to resonate in a different place. And so that's why we answer progress. And hey, hope you're doing well at boxer them this morning, so I know he is.

Joy Nicholson: 49:32

Yeah, he's pretty awesome. And Andy is asking if you can buy anything under $100 What would it be?

Alex Charfen: 49:39

And it's so hard for me to answer that question because if I need something under $100 I just buy it that minute and then don't even think about it. And so I have no idea I mean, just this morning I ordered some oils so that my wife and I can make some some of our own skincare stuff that we wanted to try and I think that robot an art lighter so that I can light my candles easier and I think I ordered In a few different types of leads, so I can make a couple of bracelets that when it comes to under $100, it's not even a thought for me, I just get it and move on to the next thing.

Joy Nicholson: 50:09

I love it. Alex, as a last thought, Do you have anything that you want to say to somebody on the spot or the listeners to this podcast that I might not have covered?

Alex Charfen: 50:19

Yeah, as a final part, you know, draw I've had a lot of people ask me some some interesting questions these days, like, what do you think's going to happen? How are we going to get out of this? Do you think things are going to get better? Do you think things are going to improve? Is the world really going to implode as the United States going to go away? Like really,

Joy Nicholson: 50:35

really challenging questions, deep questions, too?

Alex Charfen: 50:39

Yeah. And I, and I understand why they're being asked, but I have a different perspective on what's going on today. I've studied crisis for a lot of my life. When you study successful people, you always study crisis, because you want to know something. It's interesting. A lot of people became successful through crisis. FedEx was born in the middle of a crisis. Revlon was born in the middle of crisis, you know, suddenly, multi billion dollar companies were literally born in the middle of a crisis, Katie, and I experienced our highest levels of success today, in the middle of the foreclosure crisis. And so when anybody asked me, you know, things gonna get better? Are we going to be okay? You know what, here's what I want everyone to know. History has shown us what will happen in this crisis, because it's exactly what's happening. Every other crisis in history, people just like us, the entrepreneurial personality type, elevate above the noise, ignore what's going on society create a bubble around them of momentum. And they look around and they identify the opportunities, they look at what's possible, they asked for questions, they do their own research, and anybody's telling you not to get away from that person. Because right now, is where someone like us is going to elevate above the noise, identify an opportunity, get into momentum, and take the world with us. And we of course, will get out of this. And of course, we will move forward. And of course, we will all grow. Because the bigger the obstacle, the bigger the opportunity. And that's how it's been throughout history. And so anyone discourages you from looking at things differently, from stepping out of the accepted narrative from doing something different than the rest of society from being the one person who's saying no, where everybody else is saying, Yes, I want you to know, if you have those feelings, I lean into them, because you are part of what's going to save us.

Joy Nicholson: 52:20

Amazing. Thank you so much, Alex. And where can people reach you

Alex Charfen: 52:25

know, joy, if you're a podcast listener, one of the best places to go is to our podcasts, you can go to momentum, podcast.com, and it has all of the different sites where our podcast is played. And it's also on iTunes. It's called momentum for the entrepreneurial personality type. And then also, one of the best places to see our information is to go to billionaire code comm download the matrix, download the book, and if you want to, you can set up a call with our team. We help people simplify their operations and grow in in ways where they're supported as a visionary and they don't feel like they're doing everything themselves.

Joy Nicholson: 52:59

Thank you for that. And guys, momentum is amazing. Alex, you probably like 700 Plus episodes.

Alex Charfen: 53:04

Yeah, we're almost at 800. And we're approaching 3 million downloads. Yeah,

Joy Nicholson: 53:09

it's amazing. Like that is my that's my daily like, like, I inhale Alex's content on his podcast. It's really, really a great, great book. I highly recommend it. Alex, this has been fantastic. I appreciate your time. So very much. Thank you for doing this. And yeah, thank you so much for you.

Alex Charfen: 53:27

Thank you joy. This was this was an absolute pleasure, and I look forward to doing it again sometime.

Joy Nicholson: 53:32

Thank you.