[00:00:00] Hala Taha: What's going on YAP fam? In today's YAP Classic, we're replaying my conversation with Joel Brown. Joel is a motivational speaker and the founder of addictedtosuccess. com, a top motivational website,  and he's built multiple seven figure online businesses. 

In this episode, you'll learn how to build a 10 year vision. The difference between inspiration and motivation, and how to live in alignment with your values. I absolutely loved this interview.  Joel's outlook on success and motivation is so fresh and actionable.

And guys, all the successful people that we interview on this podcast use these strategies. They live in alignment with their values, they tend to have a 10 year vision,  And they don't let their subconscious minds dictate their behavior. So if you're ready to level up your mindset, stay tuned and take notes.

With that, let's dive straight into my interview with Joel Brown.

[00:01:04] Hala Taha: Hey, Jo, welcome to Young and Profiting 

[00:01:06] Joel Brown: Podcast. Hello. Thank you so much for having me. Appreciate you inviting me on this show. I'm 

[00:01:11] Hala Taha: excited. 

me and Joel have Very similar journeys. And we've done a lot of the same things. So talk to us about how you got into the music career, because from my understanding, you know, your high school dropout, but then you had a very successful music career. And even I think dabbled in radio at one point.

So I'd love to hear about how you got those opportunities when you actually didn't have the credentials. So how did that happen? 

[00:01:34] Joel Brown: Yeah. Great question. Yes. Oh man, you're taking my mind back. This is awesome. I love it. So I was very much into my hip hop, hip hop and R& B. That was my jam. I used to listen to, well, what was I listening to DMX is dark and hell is hot.

I used to listen to, you know, Dr. Dre chronic 2001 when I was in high school before I dropped out. I remember, um, 50 cent had come out, get richer, die trying. It was like a big, big, uh, classic album. And so I was, you know, very much in that space. So I, uh, I practiced. Producing music, I DJ, but what I was really good at just, you know, when you look back in your life and you kind of challenge yourself and I challenge anyone that's listening right now, like look back and, and have a look at the pinnacle moments in your life where you had like great achievements or breakthroughs.

What skillset were you using often? What was that consistent skillset that you, we brought in? For me, when I looked back at it in retrospect, I realized my, the power of networking, you know, I have had this knack that I had developed where. I was very dialed into being able to pretty much create opportunities for anyone I was connected with, right?

Like, I'd just be able to like, look at a situation and go, there's a way to create a win win in this. And this is how you're able to bring value to a person in this way. And if I was able to bring this, this person in, or I was able to utilize whatever this is in my platform, that would be able to create a win win situation.

And I just got really good at identifying that. And I think. Um, a lot of it comes down to, you know, I had a conversation with Dr. Joe Dispenza. We talked about this, right? And, and he said, Joel, you know, I think one of our greatest weaknesses in humanity is the fact that we're just poor observers. And I just remember I'd observe a lot, right?

Like I kind of like noticed what was happening in the scape and I would then go and utilize that and that would become my strength. So I started using that when it came to music and I started noticing talent, you know, DJs that were good, producers that were good, songwriters that were good. And I'd like.

pair them together and we create demo tracks and then I would utilize, I remember I used like, uh, I was using MySpace, right? I created a website called stadiummusic. net. You probably can't even find it anymore. I don't know if it's even around. Stadiummusic. net. It was a mixtape website. It was a hip hop and R& B mixtape and I was very much, um, I, I connected with a guy called DJ Clinton Sparks.

I don't know if he, I think he's on, um, I've heard of him. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sirius Satellite Radio, I think. Yeah, yeah. So, I know you were on Hot 97. And so, you know, I saw a lot of inspiration in him. I got to connect with him when he came out to Australia. And, you know, I was selling mixtapes at the time, ordering him into Australia and then selling him off.

I don't think I've ever shared this on any interview. You're getting exclusive right now. Look out. And, uh, and it just kind of like went from like, a leverage point to a leverage point where because I had these mixtapes, other artists and people wanted to get on to being able to be a part of what I was putting out and distributing.

And then on top of that, I was using MySpace to reach out to artists, people like Fat Joe, Talib Kweli, Pitbull, T Pain, these type of artists to get them on a radio station in Perth in Western Australia. And see, I don't even have the radio station. I volunteered to see if I could produce. And I just kept showing up.

I kept knocking on the door. I went every single week. My dad used to drop me off because I hadn't got my license yet. Right. I was getting my P plates training for my license, but I would show up every week consistently and just keep knocking and keep asking. And finally they said, look, you can sit in with the producer, um, and just kind of see how it all works.

And that was when I met a DJ that was there. His name's DJ Fanatic, um, which is, we'll fast forward it soon and you'll see who he is. It's pretty interesting. And what I did was I thought, man, there's a way I can bring value to this. to really start like moving up the ranks. So I would jump on MySpace and I'd reach out to these artists and I'd say, Hey, I can get you plays on Western Australia's biggest hip hop and R& B station if we do an interview.

So I used to get like, this is before Skype was big. Just remember this, like this is getting resourceful here. Like it's another thing for anyone that's listening. Like what resources can you use? Get resourceful, like look around, find out what tools you can use to make it happen. Right. So I would get. An old school telephone, you know, like the ones where you have to like pick it up and it's got a cord.

I had one of those, right? And I'd run a really long, like 12 meter, 15 meter cable out into the kitchen in my parents room, um, parents house. And I would buy an international dialing card. And it would cost a lot. Like, I, if I was on an hour conversation, that was like a 10 card. to call America from Australia, but I would do it and I'd patch it into a microphone, uh, into a, into a mixer.

And I would run that into my computer, into my sound card. And I used to record through some program. I think it was like Gold Wave or it was some, some sort of program. And I would be interviewing these artists. And then what I'd do is I'd get exclusive tracks from them and I would have their interviews wedged in between the exclusive tracks.

Plus I'd like get more exclusive mixtape stuff from other artists that wanted to feature and we'd play it as like a mix on the radio show. And I got into a conversation with T Pain's manager and he was linked with a guy called Jim Johnson. Now Jim Johnson produced Lollipop for Lil Wayne. He produced T.

I., Whatever You Like, Soulja Boy, Kiss You Through the Phone, Sweet Dreams for Beyonce. Yeah, he's so many tracks, right? And, um, he was looking for some apprentice producers at the time. He's like, I want to like build out my production team. So I, My buddy, DJ Fanatic, who is a Scratch Battle DMC champion, uh, DJ.

I linked him with a guy that could play piano and was an audio engineer. So they came together to make awesome music, scratch up samples and play keys over the top. And Jim Johnson loved it so much that he flew us all out to... So that's kind of where it all started. And we signed a subsidiary deal under Atlantic Records.

Then we're working in the studio, uh, meeting people like Usher and Pharrell. And we worked with the Evanescence, um, piano players. And yeah, we just, we worked with the guys that did all the violins for Linkin Park and, you know. Nelly and Kelly Rowland and Ludacris. And as a matter of fact, you know, my producers at the time, Fnatic and Zac, now they've, they produced a bunch of tracks for Kanye West.

They produce A$ AP Rocky's, uh, tracks. You know, they've worked with a lot of awesome artists and they've just been doing that this whole time. They've been staying in and committed. But at one point, I'm going to be honest with you, Hala. I started to feel like I would wake up every morning. This is about three years in after all, like the awesome red carpet events and hanging out with all the, you know, the celebs and stars.

And I used to wake up every morning with this knot in my stomach and this, this like looping line in my head of, I'm not supposed to be here. And I couldn't understand it at the start. I was like, what, why am I being ungrateful? Am I, am I in fear? And it wasn't, it was love. It was like, I'm passionate about life and I want, I know there's more in me.

And it was really hard for my producers at the time to understand that when I told them I'm not going to continue on the journey, they were like, and people thought I was crazy. Like I had friends, family, people were like, why would you do this? Why would you throw it in? I'm like, I think, you know, life was supposed to have multiple passions.

Some of us have the bandwidth for that. And I said, I'm just ready to go to another chapter to just, I need, need the next challenge. 

[00:08:47] Hala Taha: Yeah. Hold that thought for a second. We're going to get there. I love this transition, but I do want to talk about networking because you brought up something so key that I just want to drill home and I'm very, very similar.

Networking is bringing people to, it's just connecting dots. And that's the best way to maintain relationships when you can be like, I know this person, I know that person, they need to know each other and do something together. And that's such a great way to like keep your connections warm and keep in touch with people and make yourself relevant 

 That's like a master networking technique. So talk to us about that a little bit in terms of like, Your top tips for networking 

[00:09:25] Joel Brown: That's a great question. You know, I I think from a Psychological standpoint like let's go there.

I don't think I ever looked at it in a way where oh I want to hook that person up. So it's a it's a win for me. It was always about It was always about the excitement of creating something more than what was already in reality. Like, I love that. I'm a creator at heart. Like, I love creating content online.

I love creating things for my coaches. I love creating new frameworks and, and coaching tools. I just love it. I love the challenge that like, no one's created it in this way. I want to create this. And maybe that's why I had an affinity for music, you know, is I really appreciate creation. And, and for me, I always looked at it like, You know, if I, if I could come in and share ideas and those ideas were able to be like, we do it every time when we create events and workshops and retreats, you know, when I work with my speakers and my business partners that I've worked with before, it's like, we've got an idea.

Okay. This is how the event will go. And it's crazy. And I say it sometimes, like I'm standing on stage and we've got all these people in the audience. And I tell them like, You guys, this was just, I want you to know, this was just an idea months ago. This was just an idea and now we're all sitting in the idea right now.

Like this is manifesting in reality and it's so gangster. It's so cool. That's what I want people to be able to know that they're able to do this too. And, and that's the fun thing about. success. For me, it's not about the bling, bling, the material. It's actually being able to manifest what started here and has become reality, knowing that, man, I'm powerful in my creation.

I'm a weapon of mass creation. And unfortunately people stay in stagnation because they're not tapping into that incredible weapon of beauty and love that they can share with the world. And so for me, I look at it like, man, if I can just show someone that, that like creation is possible. And I always say this, this to.

people, especially when I'm doing sales, right? Like if I'm having a conversation with someone and they're looking at coming in on a program or, or they, they just feel stuck and they, you know, they're coming up with some, some reasons as to why they can't afford or invest. I asked them, I go, look, if you don't, if you don't challenge yourself with this question, I want you to really think about this.

Ask yourself this, what must I create in order to make this possible? And I leave him with that. And I'm like, you go work out whatever that is. You know, I'm not a person that's going to say, go get your credit card, go get a loan, go get, I would say, just, just walk away with this one question that you ask yourself, and then just let me know in 24 hours.

And I can't tell you how many times other people have come back to me to go, Joel, like, I've worked, I've found a way. And I'm like, of course you have, because there always was a way. It was a matter of resourcefulness and willingness. Like, are you ready? Are you actually really, how bad do you want it? Are you willing to play all out, even if you don't know what's coming next?

Because what's coming next is going to be greater than what you've ever achieved. 

[00:12:13] Hala Taha: and I love what like when you're talking about being resourceful and kind of using your leverage It's something that I talk about a lot You need to kind of take an inventory and see like what do you actually have like what connections do you have?

What platforms do you have? Like what are your resources? A lot of people kind of fall to the excuse instead of thinking about like creative solutions It's for how you can get what you want, right? I think it's, I think really a lot of success is about having these creative solutions and just asking, you know?

So I totally agree with everything 

[00:12:44] Joel Brown: you're saying. A thousand percent. A thousand percent. You get it. You just hit the nail on the head. And this is a word of wisdom that I live by. I remember when I first heard this, I just went, wow, like it just resonated in everything in my being. And I've embraced it ever since.

And it is, you don't get in life what you think you deserve. You get what you negotiate. Everything's a negotiation. Like, it's not even just what you say, Hala, right? If you're listening now, I want you to really challenge yourself. Have I just been saying things or am I actually doing it through my actions too, because we negotiate through the way that we show up in, in how we be as well.

[00:13:27] Hala Taha: I want to talk about your next phase in life. So you were just talking about how you were in music and you decided that this wasn't really fulfilling for you anymore. What happened? You went back to Australia after that?

What happened next? 

[00:13:41] Joel Brown: I went back, yeah, I went back to Australia. You know, there's like this instilled belief within me. I call it the whispers of wisdom, right? It was like God was tapping me on the shoulder. And he's like, and I remember just feeling these times where I noticed that I started to feel like I wanted, I had a hunger and a thirst to go into more self development.

And I didn't quite work out like what I was going to do with it. I just, I took up a sales job. I started reading Grant Cardone's sales book, Closer's Survival Guide. I think it was Closer's Sales Survival Guide. Uh, one of those books. And reading Stephen Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, I was listening to Jack Canfield, I was listening to Les Brown, and I, I, I started to feel within myself like, hey, it'd be really cool to be able to do this, you know, to be able to speak and to inspire others, I think is what I was trying to do in the space I was in, but as a manager with Producers and songwriters, I was in the background, you know, and I, and I like, I was like, man, I can do more with this.

I want to actually be with people. I want to talk with people. I want, I want to hear people's stories, you know? So I got really good at, at, at my sales and I got really good at applying a lot of the, the habits to my life. You know, I started living in what I call the four dimensions of excellence, values, beliefs, habits, and skills, right?

Which is your, your values is your compass. Your beliefs is you got to be ready. You're willing and your skills is are you able, right? And so I, I really just started living in this space where I committed myself to sticking the frameworks and really seeing like, Hey, what would I, what would I do if I played at my highest level more consistently?

And I did really well. And I worked my way up the rungs in a sales company. And I had the opportunity to sit in a room in a sales environment. It was a training workshop. This guy walks out. You know, he has this, this white button up shirt. It is, you know, like these shiny little cufflinks. He had a Rolex watch.

He had these shiny shoes and slack pants. He's like, ladies and gentlemen, my name is Jordan Belfort on the Wolf of Wall Street. And I'm here today to teach you how to be a force to be reckoned with. 

 I just remember feeling like, wow, like I'm blown away this, this dude is an actual live speaker in the flesh. And I listened to Tony Robbins on his field, but he was staying, I sat right at the front and he was there and he challenged me.

So he challenged everyone in the room to cast a 10 year vision, but he turned to me and he challenged me to get up and command it to the room, declare the vision. And, you know, I got the CEO of the company that expects me to go under the wing of the manager of the company to like work my way up. And my, the manager was like, you're going to be here.

And kind of like, Oh, this will be yours. You know, looking out of the ivory tower, like the city, they're like, they're all buying Aston Martin's that it was kind of like the boys club. And I was like, okay, I got to work my way up to that. But once I was in the room that day, and I actually was challenged to write out what I truly want to do.

And I got clear. And at the start, I'm going to be honest to you, it was kind of uncomfortable. It was like, you know, my limiting beliefs were in the way and all this stuff. I was like writing it out and I felt excited and then I read it out. And I remember the CEO in the back of the room was just like, what the, like you could see him like kind of caressing to himself and he's shaking his head.

He couldn't believe the declaration I was making because I was basically saying, I'm going to leave this job and I'm going to be running this big self development company. And they're all kind of like, well, you're going to put resources into this kid? You know, this 20, 22 year old kid that that's saying that he's going to be, you know, using all his time to build this up.

And, um, I ended up wrapping up pretty shortly after that. And crazy story. I ended up working up north in the deserts of Western Australia, catching snakes and lizards and kangaroos. Um, sounds kind of out there, but I did that because in my vision, I mapped out this like one big swing. It's like, what would you do in your 10 year vision?

When I was reverse engineering, it was like, if I was to make this 10 year vision. a two year vision or a three year vision, like what would be the one big like outlandish swing that you would do that would like catapult you closer to that 10th year. And for me, it was leaving the day job that I was in to earn double the money so that I can invest even more faster back into build addicted to success.

And it was like, put me in prison, seriously, because it was like, 12 hour days. Uh, in America, you'd say it'd be like 120 degree Fahrenheit heat. Uh, you know, like 28 days straight with only like four days off, you know? So it was intense, but the whole time it was just, you like, listen to Think and Grow Rich.

I was just listening to Tony Robbins. I was just centering on my vision the whole time. Like it's going to this, it's going to this, I'm building that, it's going to happen. 

Oh 

[00:18:13] Hala Taha: my gosh, that's such an inspiring story. I love this. So 10 year vision. Talk to us about like, if you can just give us a guide in terms of how do we create our 10 year vision?

What is the relationship of goals within that vision? from my understanding, you actually accomplished your 10 year vision in six years. So you just talked about the swing. Is there any other tips in terms of how we can accelerate that? 

[00:18:36] Joel Brown: Yeah. Yeah. 10 year vision process for a long time now, and I was blessed by Jordan because he, he, Introduce me to the concept of it.

He essentially said, you know, write out a script with as much detail. Um, there's a few things he taught me in there, like some words of wisdom. He said, uh, and I remember this cause I felt a bit of a block while I was writing out my vision. I felt like I was dark. I felt like I had done things in my past.

You know, I got into drugs and alcohol and, and you know, like sexually deviant and. And like, I was beating myself up for it, right? I was like acting as if like, you know, I'd made all these mistakes and I wasn't worthy of being a positive, inspiring person. Like what if, you know, the imposter syndrome, what if I get caught out?

What if people think that I'm not positive and I've done all these things when I was younger, you know? And, and he said, you know, you are not your past. You are the lessons and the resources that you glean from it. And I remember that day I realized like, no one's going to write me a permission slip. No one's going to come along and do that.

I've got to write my own damn permission slip. You know, that's what I, that's what I got to do for myself that day when I did it. And I noticed myself shift and I gave myself permission to create and to go, I'm going to do something new here. And so that was a really defining moment for me. And I think for anybody, when you give yourself permission to just do something different for once, it's like, you're going to wait to feel worthy or do you negotiate it?

Right? The same thing as I said, like when you say like, just because you think you deserve it, that's not enough. It's part of it, but it's not enough. I've got to show you that I'm willing to step in and do it anyway. I want it anyhow, no matter what the cost, like I'm there, you know, and I, and I keep showing up at it consistently.

And so he taught me this concept just by just dropping that word of wisdom and I pieced it together and, and he's, he shared to reverse engineer it. Start with the 10th year. What would you do in the 10th, the 9th year to get to the 10th, the 8th to get to the 9th and like write it back. I wrote so many pages, like 16 or 17 pages.

But the thing that I've come to realize just through really just going around, traveling around the world, teaching this to tens of thousands of people, I actually tweaked it a lot and I added in my own frameworks and other things to just really supercharge the vision process. The one thing I'd say, like, if you really keep this in mind.

It's not even about you achieving the vision. It's not about the things that you get in the vision. It's about who you become in the process, right? Like when I write something down and when you write something down and you follow through, you're a woman of your word. I'm a man of my word that in itself is worth his weight in gold.

Like to be somebody that rides something down and shows up and follows through. That's an incredible skillset to have because a lot of people don't take ownership. It's a huge thing. I do a lot of trauma work, right? So we do a lot of work around healing. And a lot of people don't take ownership for their wounds, because it's easy to blame somebody else.

If I'm getting triggered, it's them. It's not me, it's them. Well, guess what? You'll never change. Because you're not like it starts with you. And when you start to, you know, go into this and realize, wait, I get to actually create what I want in my life. And I believe that you don't, you get to have it all.

Just not all at once. It comes together in time and you have patience and that's why with the 10 year vision process, I go through the eight categories of life. And then you map out the vision based off your eight categories to have the most harmonious life, right? Because I believe everything is touching everything.

So you have one, I'll break down the categories for you if you don't mind. Write this down if you're listening right now. We've got business and career. Okay, that's the first one. Second is finances. Third is health. Really important, Fourth one is romance. Right? That might be a bit of a trick of some people too.

Romance, right? Then we have family and friends. Then we have fun and adventure. Then we have self development. And for some of you, it may be spiritual development, depending on how you feel yourself. And then the last one is physical environment. And this is one that a lot of people miss. It's like, do you actually feel inspired where you live?

Do you have natural light coming in? Are you close to the places where you want to be? Do you have to like, you know, commute? Like I used to when I was working a nine to five job for one hour there to work one hour back and I started crunching the numbers. It's like two hours a day, 10 hours a week, 40 hours a month, 470 something hours a year, I felt like I was wasting my life.

You know, so like all these things are important because we even consider physical environment. Our physical environment has a 40 percent effect on our mental state. If you stay in an environment long enough over a longer period of time, in a matter of weeks to months, it's going to have an effect on your mental state.

[00:23:12] Joel Brown: I'm going to structure so that I'm doing more of what I desire that I value in my day, because that's where I'm in spirit.

That's where I'm inspired from within. You don't need to motivate yourself anymore. Motivation's on the external. I want internal. I want in spirit. I want inspiration. I want to have the torch lit from within and be creating what I desire to create in my life. Not what society tells me I should do. Not what mom and dad think is a great idea.

You know, not what my, my best friend will drop in every now and then, you know, in a conversation of like, you should do this and that. If it's not in alignment with what I truly value, then no, you don't. Because a lot of people will often do things to be able to get significance and validation and approval from others.

It's very liberating when you create from a place where you realize you don't have to do that anymore. That you're actually, you can accept who you are yourself and you can create what you want yourself. And you can be a good human in the process too. I think some people think they've got to sacrifice, I've got to be this type of person in order to get this.

You don't. 

[00:24:16] Hala Taha: Let's stick on motivation. Verse inspiration because I know that there are two very different things. Talk to us about that and, and why we kind of need to focus on inspiration and how we can do that.

[00:24:29] Joel Brown: Yeah. Well, the reason why I'm not the biggest fan of motivation is because it almost AMIA killed me. Right. And I mean that in a sense that it almost killed my flow and it killed my dreams. I started to lose myself in the game. I call it the game. Uh, because there is, there's a game that's going on right now and a lot of people are caught up in it.

We see it on social media, you know, people are, they're acting in a certain way to be able to be popularized, to be able to be accepted, to be validated. that's coming from lack and scarcity and it's filling a void essentially. But the problem with it is that it becomes just like vacuum, right? And, and it's just never enough.

And so I did this for so long. I mean, even the name Addicted to Success, I'm going to be honest with you, I was creating from that place when I created it. Now, I can embrace it and like kind of be like, Hey, cool. That was my journey. And that's what it is. And it still applies today. It's just my definitions of success changed, you know, because some people will go, well, success to me is getting a bunch of money.

It's about having the status and the significance and it's having the fancy house on the hill and it's having the awesome network of like people that respect me because I'm doing great things. But the question is, can you go to bed at night feeling good about who you are as a human being? Do you go to bed at night?

crying yourself to sleep? Are you proud of the type of relationships that you can have in your life? Or do you just, you ruin each one that you step into? Or are you attracting ones you don't want in your life, right? Because these are the things that matter more. I know this, but it's like, I had to achieve a lot of things to realize like, the things, the material is not it.

It's how I feel about who I am. And it's how I feel about my mission. Is it meaningful? Is it actually something that I can get up and go, you know what? I'm moving the needle today. And I'm surrounded by people that also have great virtues in their life and they're great people like some of my friends They don't have big businesses.

They don't have you know, the the money coming in and all the other they're just really good people and I trust them and they Really stand by their integrity and they have great loyalty and they're very compassionate like that to me That's way more valuable than somebody that has a verification badge I've hung out with centillionaires and some of them, I'm just not impressed.

I just wouldn't hang out with them. It doesn't matter who they are, what they have. And I think a lot of people hang so much of like an emphasis on things that are so shallow and so surface. And I think to some degree, we all got to go through that experience to realize that that's not it. And it's just because they're coming from lack.

And often we come from lack because we have trauma that we've experienced in our life. You know, when I do my trauma coaching, we work through 10 layers of trauma and I got to be honest, Allah, so many people, you'd see them and you think they got their life together and I get in and like by the 10 layers and out of 10, they've got eight, like eight, like they were physically whipped, smacked, beaten when they were a kid, they were told they weren't good enough.

[00:27:30] Joel Brown: They were told they can't show strong emotions like anger or joy. They were shamed by their family or their friends. They were held to a responsibility of their, their parents happiness. They were emotionally neglected, right? They felt like they were walking around on eggshells. They, they felt abandoned.

Like there's so many different levels of trauma. Like when we hear trauma, we think it's just getting hit or like a car crash or something like that, but it's not. Trauma works on a, on a mental and emotional level too. You know, and a sexual level too. So I think a lot of what we do is if we're coming from needing motivation all the time, we're going to come from force.

We need to force it. We're forcing up the hill, forcing all the time, trying to beat the clock. It gets glorified so much in entrepreneurship. You got to like. Run till your feet fall off and your face melts and I just it doesn't impress me because I know what's coming from lack And if you want to operate in a higher frequency it's about coming from power like true authentic power and creation and the way we do that is we move to a place of Forgiveness first forgiving the things that have happened in our past Reconciling with it in the subconscious mind and meeting with that shadow and working through the inner child and showing yourself, Hey, I'm on your own team.

And no matter what's happened in the past, we don't have to necessarily forget it. We can accept that it's there and we get to let it go. That's having taking power back, right? And working through that, because a lot of the time when people are dependent on motivation, it's because they, they're using desire, but a faulty desire.

I think desire is great in a sense of passion, but a lot of the time they're using a faulty desire that ends up being that the outcome, if it's, if they go at it long enough is disappointment.

 So, you know, whether you're an entrepreneur, like I'm sure everyone can relate where they've done things where they've gone. Yeah. I'm not so proud of that. Cause I knew I did it. And that's because you're trying, your actions that are coming from you is coming from the subconscious and 95 percent of our thoughts are the same as the day before.

We only think 5 percent new thoughts on, on average, unless we are being intentional. And so a lot of what we do, we think we're so conscious, but we're not. We're really not. And if you've got invisible anchors that are holding you in the past, and you've got mom and dad issues, and you've got unresolved trauma, and you've got the thing that you've never worked through with, uh, happened with your ex, you better bet a lot of that's driving your, you into your destiny.

[00:30:01] Hala Taha: I want to go back to your four dimensions of success, which is you've been like touching on this the whole time. And I want to talk about values because I know that's kind of step number one is really Understanding your values.

Is there some sort of a methodology that you have that you can walk us through in terms of like really identifying? Cause like what you're saying is like, you don't want to be guided by all your trauma, but you need to be guided by something. And I think that's your value. So how do we get there? 

[00:30:29] Joel Brown: Yeah, absolutely.

So your values are, this is how I see it. Your values is your compass, your vision, when you map your vision game plan out, it's like you're taking off in your landing strip for your dreams, right? And then when you look at your values, I want you to go deeper. I'm going to challenge you to do it now. If you're listening is to write this down.

The first, you've got two types. The first type of values is vocational values. So vocational meaning like fitness. Reading, writing, traveling. It doesn't always end with a in, but it's like a doing, right? It's a, it's a, it's a doing type of, uh, value, right? And, and it's like usually hobbies and things you like to fill your day with.

Okay. So getting clear on like, what are my top three or top four or top five? vocational values. Then the other side of the coin is your core values and your core values may be peace, uh, loyalty, it could be integrity, compassion, joy, creativity, you know, and sometimes they feel like they kind of cross over a little bit and that's okay, you can have that, but it's just really about getting clear on like who I be.

which is my core and what I do is my vocational. So, getting clear on those and making decisions more from that place because when you think about it, Hala, every decision you make is driven by your beliefs and your values. Okay, what I believe to be true, my perception of the world and how I see it and if somebody came along and said, Hey, Joel, do you want to go down the alleyway and shoot up heroin?

I know it sounds kind of intense, but to me, it's like, well, that's on my hierarchy of values. It's number 199, 000, 900, whatever of me being even interested in that. So in that split second, the word values comes from the word evaluate. In that split second, I'm evaluating to go, is that a yes or no? Do I want to involve my time in this?

Because time is the most important thing. Like right now, seconds are going by, we're never getting this back again. Like money comes and goes and creation, you can keep creating, but time doesn't. Right? So values are really important. A lot of people waste a lot of time filling most of their day without their top values and then they wonder why they're not actually living a fulfilled life.

Right? And when you're living in what fulfills you, you're in spirit more. So you're more powerful and more inspired. You don't really need the external energy and motivation to light you up. You're already internally lit. from within. Uh, and then we look at, remember I said beliefs, that's, that just speaks for itself.

You, you know, the importance of beliefs, right? So many people have invisible anchors that are holding them down. And so really working through the belief clearing, the trauma, the shadow work, the inner child, all that stuff, super important. But our, our habits, which we have next, if you look at this, it's really interesting.

Your habits are like the energy bolts of action that you take each and every day that inches you closer to success. And you're either moving closer to it or further away from it if you're not committing to your habits, right? So, If our beliefs and our values drive every decision we make, well guess what?

Our habits and our beliefs shape our identity. Because what I believe about the world and about myself to be true, and I keep showing up in it, it actually forges my personality. Because how we think, how we act, and how we feel determines our personal reality. through our personality. And hey, if you're not getting great opportunities in your life, and you feel like you're disconnecting or like work through those things, because there's that you're probably creating invisible wedges between you and other people.

It's like, if I know somebody's centered in who they are, there's like a power to them. You know, when you walk in the room and you go up and you introduce yourself. And you know more of who you are and you're not insecure in who you are because you've done the work and you've worked through it. There's this frequency to it where I see that and I'm like, man, I want to give this person an opportunity or I want to be friends with this person.

I think we could deliver great value and you want to help people like that, people like that, that are like fulfilled and that have that energy. They tend to have a lot of people around them that want to support them and that want to work for them or work with them, right? So. That creates a massive win for you.

And then we have the last element of the four dimensions of excellence, which is skills, you know, the skills, which is able, and I don't just mean like any old skill, it's, it's. What you can either hire or acquire, okay? Because sometimes, like for me, I don't like accounting, but I'm going to hire someone for the accounting because I want my business to do well.

So it's like, well, someone's got to manage it. It's not me. I, it's like the last thing on my ladder too, is write down lowest values. Someone else can crunch those numbers, right? And then we have acquire. Now I challenge people with this because there's a, there's a breakdown of studies and research around skill development.

And it says in order to go from, this is generally most skill sets, right? Like Photoshop, learning music, learning software, learning hands on skills and so on, whatever it may be, speaking, copywriting, whatever it is, in order to be able to get to a level of like above average efficacy in your skill set, you want to be able to develop at least 20 hours.

Okay. 20 hours of learning. So cognitively understanding, but also applying and practicing and getting feedback and learning how to fine tune the art. Right. So 20 hours. Now, I say this to my students and my clients all the time, I say to them, okay. Uh, there was someone that wanted to go for a pay rise in their job.

They want to get a promotion. I said, define the skill. Which skill is it? And they're like, well, for me, it's actually, it's negotiating because they wanted to get into a sales position and it was going to be, it's crazy. Like the jump between the pay brackets was literally like 50 grand a year to like 90 grand.

So it was like a 40 grand jump. And I said, okay, if I came along and I said to you, I'm going to give you a 40, 000. pay jump this year, year in, year out, you, and you could even go higher down the line because you have no capital commissions. Would you commit for just 30 days straight, 40 minutes a day, learning the skillset of negotiation and sales?

Would you commit to just 30 days straight to learn that skillset? It's only 20 hours. every time I ask somebody like that, that question, they'll say, of course, Hey, if you can make an extra six figures this year or multiple six figures a year, would you commit to 40 minutes per day for the next 60 days?

Would you do that? And, and remember, you don't lose it. You could take it with you for the rest of your life if you want and add on top of it too. And you can train it and you can teach it and everything else, right? So I, I like to challenge people to think like this, you know, pull it apart. Like I, I love creating frameworks.

I love getting really complex teachings and then like simplifying it so I can teach it to the masses and go like, let's compartmentalize this, break it down, make it actionable so you can commit to it. And like, then let's see if your life improves. I've been testing this stuff for more than a decade and it works.

[00:37:20] Hala Taha: Yeah, I could tell and if anybody's interested in that 20 hour rule, I actually interviewed Josh Kaufman, who I think is the one who developed, uh, that. And so if you guys want to check that out, uh, just look for Josh Kaufman on my feed. So this has been absolutely amazing. You are so inspirational, so talented.

[00:37:38] Hala Taha: I want to ask one more question before my last kind of question, and that is. about self sabotage because from my understanding, you believe it doesn't exist and I think it's a really important lesson to teach everyone and so I just want you to, I want to make sure that you give that message before we go.

[00:37:53] Joel Brown: You did some research. You know me well. You know me well. You must have looked at a lot of my content. This is great. Thank you. I appreciate that. I really do. You know, it's, it is refreshing, you know, cause it means that we're able to go even deeper on the stuff that. That is good work that we can share with your audience and um, they're lucky to have you seriously.

This is great so yeah, I I don't believe it exists and the reason being is because There are two worlds that exist within us. You got the aware and the unaware. And the question is, like, which part of you is getting what it actually wants? Is it the aware part of you? Is it the unaware part of you, which is the unconscious?

Okay. And like I shared before, so much of our traumas and our lack and our scarcity and our voice are coming from the unaware. There's some good things in there too. I don't want to just make it out like the subconscious is responsible for every, you know, like bad thing that's happening in your life.

It's not about that. Um, there's some great programs in there too that have worked really well. It's just a matter of like, I want to do even better and I want my people to do better. So it's like, let's look at it and see what we, what can we tweak? What we can, what can we improve? And And self sabotage for the most part is when you haven't integrated and brought the unconscious into the conscious.

And Carl Jung says this, uh, he says that unless we make the conscious unconscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate. Okay. So a lot of people are like bouncing around like a pinball in a pinball machine, not bringing any of the unconscious to their awareness. So it's like, you know, if I'm in a situation where let's say I'm trying to do a business deal and somebody walks in the room and they remind me of my father and I haven't healed And then I feel like they may be narcissistic, not, not that my dad was, I'm just saying that as an example.

Some people experience that and then it starts to trigger them and then they start like looking at that person as a representation, as an avatar of their father and then they don't know how to connect with it. And then it like, they lose a deal. They could get triggered in that moment, their stuff comes up and they may not consciously be wanting to do that.

It's just that it starts to, because your body is the unconscious, the unconscious is the body. You start getting the feelings and you're like, Uh, I don't like this and you become disempowered and it's very evident in a room, especially when you've got business deals going on, negotiations or, you know, like people are very attuned to seeing like who's the alpha in the room and who's handling this and who's stepping in with confidence.

It happens a lot in the business world. I'm sure you've, you've witnessed that. So, the more that we can work on that, what it means is that your unconscious isn't playing sneaky games anymore. It's like it's not popping out here in front of you. You know, it's kind of like, you know, let's say like you have a friend that goes to hide behind the corner because they want to scare you and you've already seen them go and you're like, I just saw them try and hide because they're going to jump out and like try and scare me.

It's not scary, is it? Like you walk up and they're like, ah, you're like, ah, I saw you there. It's the same thing that happens with your, your unconscious too. So. If I'm catching those things out and acknowledging that they're there, I've identified, acknowledged, and then I've let it go, and I've healed it, and I've reconciled with it, it can't play sneaky games anymore.

It's like I've shone the torch on it and gone, ah, gotcha. So it can still be there as like a part of me that I was, I experienced it at some point, but it no longer has power over me. So it lowers the charge in the unconscious, which means that it also lowers the signal it sends to the gut and the body.

So then I don't feel like I'm in fight or flight when I'm in those situations anymore. I'm no longer triggered. 

 that's great advice. Okay. So the last question I ask all my guests is what is your secret to profiting in 

life?

I give it back to God, give it back to Him. Because as much as I like to think that I created absolutely everything, it wouldn't be possible without Him, and I'm not trying to make this like a Grammy speech or an Emmy speech. I, I truly, I truly believe, you know, in my, in my beliefs, in my views, that, that We have the opportunity and I experienced the opportunity to co create with God.

I don't see him as somebody that just predestined my whole life that he's got everything all mapped out. I think he'd be probably a pretty angry architect by now because I've gone against the plan many times, but I do believe that he's, he's there co creating, you know, with me in that. And, and it's very powerful.

And I can say that because I've experienced it on many different levels and I've come to understand that. We're not just dancing with our DNA, like we didn't just pop out of nothingness, like we're here for a reason. You know, when, when he brought us out of eternity and placed us into the finite, into time, he did that for a reason.

There's value in our heart. Your life has meaning and so does mine. And I never go a day without remembering that and thinking about that. It's really important. We're all really important, and I think the world lose, lose a side of that a lot, especially now. There's a war on reality, and I think a lot of people are confused about what's up and down, and left and right, and and then things are politicized, and there's, there's, there's, you know, a lot of confusion in the space, and it's like, who do we trust now?

And, and so for me, my big thing is making sure I'm surrounded by great and powerful people, and powerful in, in the fact that they're coming from the truest power and the most potent power, which is love, you know, and creation. And, and, uh, yeah, my spiritual walk is, is super important for me. And that's where I profit.

I don't look, I don't measure money. Like, yeah, we could say money is profit ultimately. I want my soul bank to be full. Uh, you know, my bank account can have some dollars in it to build some structures, but I want my soul bank to be full. I want to feel like what I said and did left a great impact on somebody that when they walked away from me, they felt seen, heard, and understood.

You know, like that's, that's powerful. That's how I want to feel. And that's how I want others to feel too. 

[00:43:32] Hala Taha: That's beautiful. And where can our listeners go to learn more about you and everything that you do? 

[00:43:37] Joel Brown: Yeah, thank you. Uh, you can check me out on Instagram. So. I am Joel Brown. Uh, we also have the Addicted to Success podcast.

I also have another podcast called The Unknown God, and it's a podcast for people that don't like church, right? It's very much about spiritual transcendence, and we go into very theological conversations. We talk about escaping the matrix. We talk about transhumanism. Uh, we talk about creation, we talk about, uh, world of good and evil and how to make sense of it.

We talk a lot of philosophical things and I've got a really incredible co host on there, Marcos Torres, who, who's this guy's incredible. So anyway, you can check that out and also go to influentialcoach. com. If you are inspired to become a coach yourself, uh, there are a lot of people out there that, that will proclaim that they're a coach and they can put a title on there.

But truly being a coach means that you're able to actually have the tool sets and the frameworks and also know how to hear the things that are behind the things that are being said and knowing how to listen and have that presence and, and to be the space with others to be able to facilitate transformation.

It's about getting results. It's the only thing that really matters as a coach. So if you want to learn how to do that and how to build a coaching business. In an authentic way, not selling yourself out and, and really doing it from a place of where you value the craft of coaching the most. And, and you just really love being able to support others in a, in a healthy and powerful way.

Then, uh, head there and apply, and just message me if you've got any questions. I'm approachable. I'm not gonna bite , , you know, if they just reach out. 

[00:45:18] Hala Taha: Awesome. And I highly recommend his stuff, guys.

If you're going to go with a coach, you better go with Joel. He is absolutely amazing. So thank you so much for your time. Wonderful 

[00:45:27] Joel Brown: conversation. You too, Hala. Thanks a million. I appreciate you.