Breaking Through Walls By Tapping Into Listening and A Higher Energy

 

Today, we operate in a “microwave society” –  we want things to be fast and often get disappointed when they’re not. We are so good at talking …. yet lack the patience to listen. In this episode, Adam Markel sits down with Ken Walls, a #1 bestselling author and CEO of Grow Live Academy, a web development and social media firm, to discuss some important wisdom that gets lost these days — the power of tapping into and listening to a higher energy for building resilience and breaking through obstacles. Ken shares techniques and rituals to help you gain access to those skills. He also discusses his podcast, Breakthrough Walls, where he helps people get unstuck. Join Adam and Ken for this rich conversation and more.

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Breaking Through Walls By Tapping Into Listening and A Higher Energy

I’m sitting here with a cheesy grin on my face partly because it’s a brand-new day and I feel lucky to be here. I was lying in bed and I found my mind was wandering into the cobwebby places of the past and thinking about things, people even that I no longer am connected with. I’m trying to make a little heads or tails of that, a little sense of it. As I was lying in bed, I came to the conclusion that the most important thing I can do is to be here in the moment, which filled me with a lot of gratitude. I didn’t have to go, “Move to gratitude, that’s the secret elixir.” It’s always the thing, you can go right to gratitude, which is true. It is a tremendous shortcut. Everything I’m looking for I can find in gratitude. I didn’t even have to push that little button that I know is always there in an emergency. It was sitting in the present and realizing that was where I had actual freedom. I don’t want to go too far afield with this. I wrote some notes. I’m going to tease this out for myself a little bit more.

Our freedom of choice is our one true freedom. We choose what we think. We choose where we put our focus. I choose where I put my attention. Nobody can do that for me. The president can’t do it for me. Other friends, family can’t do it for me. I’m the only one. I have that responsibility, but I have the freedom to choose that. In that moment, I made that choice to be there and lying in bed without having to fix anything or rehearse or redo or any of that stuff that the mind can go there. I don’t know if that’s the same for all of you. I find that happens in getting myself right back in that moment. Experiencing that moment was joyful. I felt joy. I felt real, true freedom of choice. I started in that way and the day has gotten better and better.

I am sitting here with a new friend. I say friend and I don’t use that word loosely or lightly. Anybody who’s been around long enough and maybe has enough experience knows that true friends or friends at all are hard to come by. You think maybe you have friends, sometimes you think you’ve got a friend. Maybe you can help them the way you used to be able to help them or something changes in your life, you got an illness, you’re not at your best, you get divorced, or your business goes bust. All of a sudden, some of those people you thought were friends, like the cliché goes, they find the exit.

This gentleman is somebody that I’m going to enjoy his company for many years to come. I hope he feels the same way that he enjoys my company. I’m going to say a little bit about him and read a bit of his bio and then we’ll dig in. Every time I’m with this guy, the conversation is rich, fun. I giggle a lot. I like to giggle. I like to laugh. It’s one of those guys where, maybe in some past iteration of existence, we were schoolyard buddies. His name is Ken Walls. He said to me that he had to ask his wife, his business partner, to send over a bit of words about him because he doesn’t describe himself. I thought that’s so rich because he’s this well-regarded business mind and influencer.

The prevailing thought was, maybe his wife would say, “Ken is a stud. He’s my husband.” That’s his all bio. His lovely wife did send something over. Ken is a number one bestselling author and CEO of a web development company and social media firm and the creator of Grow Live Academy, a comprehensive course on how to successfully live stream to build your personal or business brand and generate revenue. Ken’s passion is helping people succeed. Ken has a podcast called Breakthrough Walls. He interviews celebrities and successful entrepreneurs who share their stories to help people to get past the influences that may be keeping them stuck. Ken, it is a pleasure. Welcome to the show.

I am honored to be here. I get interviewed a lot. This is going to be fun.

Share with our audience one thing that’s not a part of your bio that we got that you’d love for people to know about you. I already took the, “My husband is a stud thing.” You can’t use that.

The number one most important thing to me in my life is the fact that I meditate every single morning of my life. I’ve meditated every day for many years and I will not miss a day. I will be late for a meeting before I miss meditation. I don’t know if that’s an important fact about me, but it’s the most important fact about me to me. That’s how I roll.

Meditation is not negotiable for you. Why is that the case?

When things are hitting the fan, we're all famous for calling on God. Share on X

I blame it on Dr. Wayne Dyer more than anyone. He’s one of my favorite authors. I’m transparent about myself. I’m a recovered alcoholic with over eighteen years of sobriety. Before that, I was not a good person. I was. Deep down, my moral compass always pointed North. It doesn’t mean I followed it, but it was pointed in the right direction internally. Life was not fun for me back then when I was drinking. Although, I masked it well. I had two Mercedes, a big house. From the outside, I had my crap together. On the inside, I was hurting. I was a wreck.

I got into recovery on August 10th of 2002. I lost everything. I called the police on myself because I hear my car start up in the middle of the night and it’s cold. There’s snow on the ground, in fact. I hear it pulling away on the snow and I’m like, “Somebody is stealing my Mercedes.” It was parked outside. I come to find out that they were in fact not happy that I hadn’t made all the payments or something so they took it.

About a year into sobriety, I learned about meditation. I had probably heard of it, but I had never done it and didn’t know how to do it. I started reading books by Dr. Wayne Dyer and then I was watching videos. There’s this woman, she’s a Buddhist monk, her name is Pema Chodron. I started looking into this going, “What is this?” Most incredibly successful and happy people that I know meditate, if not daily, they do it a lot. There’s a variety of forms of it. I wanted peace in my life. The program of Alcoholics Anonymous, there’s a saying and it goes like this, “We’re all here because we’re not all there.” I’m like, “That makes sense.” There are some major rock star celebrities that are in recovery. I’ve been in meetings with some of them and it’s like, “That dude, I didn’t know.”

For the longest time, I did not feel like I fit in anywhere. I could be in a room of 100 people and feel like everybody in that room hated me or didn’t want me there. I started digging into this meditation and it gave me peace. If you ask a group of 100 people, “Everybody close your eyes and point to yourself,” 99 of them are going to point right to the center of their chest. They’re not going to point to their head. They’re going to point to their chest. What does that tell us? That tells us that there’s something in the middle of your chest. It’s some form of energy that you’re drawn to. If you’re drawn to that energy with your eyes closed upon questioning, “What is that energy?” That’s what I’m curious about. What is that energy? I close my eyes. I meditate. I attempt to quiet my thoughts. I don’t know that I ever have. Dr. Wayne Dyer says, “The beauty in music is the silence between the notes.” He talks about the magic of life is in the gap. It’s that space between our thoughts. I’m looking for that. I haven’t found it. I have moments where I’m like, “That was cool.” I’m still looking.

Ken, is it right thinking that we’re after? Is it not thinking that we’re after?

It’s scientifically proven that we have 60,000 to 80,000 thoughts a day. I’m not sure that it’s possible to not think. Pema Chodron talks about watching the tiger run. She says, “If you’re meditating and in your mind crap is hitting the fan in your life, all this crap is happening, that’s the tiger. The tiger is going to run.” If you ever try to close your eyes, “I’m not going to think.” You’re thinking. Saying that you’re thinking. For me, I stop and I focus everything I have, this beingness on the breath entering and leaving my nostrils. I focus everything I have on that point of my body thinking, “Breathe and let it go.”

I don’t know if it’s right thinking. I know that there is incredible magic. The woo-woo, foo-foo stuff is, “You can manifest.” There is this power. If we get all religious, Jesus said, “You’ll do even greater things than me once you tap into this power.” He was talking about learning how to shut your mind off. Learn how to chill. You don’t need marijuana and all that stuff. No judgment. If you do it, you do it. It’s not a necessity in life. You can go inside and find these gifts. I’m still looking. I found some magic, but I think there’s so much more that we’re not even aware of.

This is the place in this show where we’re going to pause and bring in the hookah or a big bong or something. You and I are going to do a Joe Rogan. You’d have a giant Rastafarian spliff and you carve a joint. I’m like, “Ken, what happened?” It seems like a good idea. I’m staying present. In this present moment, this seems like a good idea. For me, I can only come from what I know of myself. I can’t stop my thoughts. I can quiet my mind. Quieting the mind is a wonderful thing. I’m into peace. Peace in my mind. Peace in my body. Peace in my heart and my soul. Peace is not a thing like tranquility, stillness, serenity. It’s abundant. It’s everywhere. All at once accessible in any second and yet it is far from us at times. It is distant. You might think it didn’t exist at all.

 

There’s a story that I wrote about in a chapter in my book. It’s Chapter Six. It’s called Look Inside. There’s this old Hindu story about the gods all got together one day and they were ticked off that they had given the humans this free gift forever. The gift that they had given them was the ability to know the answer to any question they could ever have instantly. They saw that the humans were abusing the gift and not using it and all of these other things. They decided that the best thing to do would be to take it away from the humans and hide it. They have to do some work to find it.

One god said, “Let’s put it on the highest mountain on the planet.” They all thought, “They’ll learn how to climb. They’ll find it. That’s too easy.” Another one says, “Let’s bury it in the deepest part of the ocean.” “They’ll learn how to swim. They’ll find it too. It’s too easy.” The wisest god of all of them said, “Why don’t we hide it deep within the humans themselves? They’ll never think to look there.” It continues. The answers to everything that troubles us, everything that we have questions about, it’s there.

We are God and God is us. We are the cells that make up the body of God, that energy of the Creator. Whatever you call it, I choose to call it God. You can call it whatever. It doesn’t matter. That energy is part of all of us and we deny it. We live entire lifetimes denying it until the moment we’re taking our last breath and we go, “It’s beautiful.” You hear many people say in their last breath, he said or she said, “It’s beautiful.” That’s there. You don’t have to die to experience that. You need to die to maybe some of the beliefs you have. You don’t have to physically die to experience that. That’s what I’m looking for.

I have this great friend I’m going to introduce you to that you’re going to love. His name is Martin Rutte. He has a book out about experiencing heaven on earth. That’s what you’re explaining. You’re giving expression to that concept of how it is that you can experience heaven right here. Tell us about your book. You told that story. It was great. I’ve heard it before, but it doesn’t matter how many times I’ve heard something like that. The punch line is poignant. It goes right to the heart.

How often it is that what we’re looking for, the answers we’re seeking, are within us all along. It’s a miracle. Often people say, “Some people believe in miracles.” I’m a God guy. I don’t mind saying that out. I used to temper that some way. I have to explain, “I was not religious, but I’m spiritual. I wasn’t spiritual until a long time later.” I was making excuses for the fact that I believe in God. I’m not making those excuses anymore. That wasn’t about anybody else. That was about me.

In this moment, the idea that answers are within, that miracles are within, things that you would love to see different in your life. You could create the right environment for yourself to thrive. The same way as if you were planting a rosebush, you probably wouldn’t throw those seeds on concrete. You’d create a different environment for that thing to grow, nurture it and look after it. To me, what we’re talking about isn’t a discovery. It’s not like finding America or finding gold or discovering that Airbnb can save your financial life or cryptocurrency or something. It’s more of the daily work. You’ve been sober for many years. That, I can only say because I haven’t had that experience. I have my own thing to deal with. It’s daily work.

Yes, it is. I have to maintain a strong spiritual program. I haven’t been to a meeting in years. In the beginning, you have to peel away the layers of the onion, get rid of, go through these twelve steps, and dig into what’s going on with you and why. A normal person doesn’t go out and drink an entire bottle of Crown Royal plus a twelve-pack of Bud Light in one day every day.

That would be ridiculous to combine Crown Royal and Bud Light. Those two things don’t seem to match up.

You only do it when you run out of one. “I’m not in a blackout yet. I’m going to need some more.” A normal person doesn’t do that.

We're good at talking to God, but few of us listen to God. Share on X

On the one hand, you’re messing with my practice, which I thank you for that. I feel like I must practice the things that are most important to me. I must give my attention and my focus and create a form of practice to be better at it. I meditate a little bit. I’m not that great at meditating but I practice it. I practice it in different forms without even calling it meditation so that I can get to a still play. It’s not a practice of not drinking. It’s a practice of replacing a habit or leaning towards something for solace and support. We get out of that and replacing it with something else. At a certain point, did it get replaced, and then the tipping point happened, and then you don’t have to be focused and mindful of it? Is your practice a little bit different than maybe the way I framed the question?

My practice is I sit in a somewhat darkish room and I put in air pods. The new air pods have noise cancellation, and I play soft music like massage parlor music or nature sounds or whatever. I quiet my mind. It does not mean that I stopped the thoughts. You said something that you can’t quiet your mind, something to that effect. This isn’t a judgment. I’ve been there. My challenge would be, imagine if I took you on a rocket into deep space and said, “Here’s your oxygen. Get out and float around out there for a little bit. I’ll be back in an hour.”

You’re going to have thoughts, but you’re going to find a level of magic that you didn’t even know existed in your mind and in your beingness. When I meditate, I’m trying to reach that place where I feel like I’m floating in existence and that’s it. Here’s the thing. When shit is hitting the fan, we’re all famous for calling on God. “God, if you could help me get out of this situation, I promise to never do it again. Your word says you got my six. What’s up? I’m feeling way uncomfortable right now.” We’re good at talking to God, but few of us listen to God. Prayer is talking to God and meditation is listening to God.

As you already know, if you’re the one doing all the talking, it’s impossible to find the answers. You have to shut up and listen. Maybe God is trying to give you the answers and you’re busy with your mind running, your mouth running, and everything else. Not you but anyone including me, we’re busy trying to manipulate the situation and we’re trying to figure out the solution. “I’m a chess champion. I know this stuff.” “I know how to solve problems. I can beat anybody in four moves on chess.” That’s awesome, but have you ever just shut up and listened to God?

It’s such a great question you’re asking. With practice, my mind will still. What helps me the most is asking questions. This dovetails with what you’re saying. Whether you’re listening to God or you’re listening to whatever you would call it in this instance, doesn’t have to be anything that is spiritual or religious. We have our own internal guidance system where there’s a guidance system all around us. It comes from nature. When the wind blows at 100 miles an hour, you might want to get out of your house and go somewhere else.

There’s a guidance system that’s all around us. When fires are burning uncontrollably and millions of acres are burning in California, it means something. We’re not going to get into politics here about that, but there’s something to take notice of. We’ve got to ask questions to be able to get answers. A lot of times, what I find for myself and for other people that I have had the privilege to spend time around and work with is that we don’t ask a lot of questions. You tell me what you think about this.

When we were kids, starting in kindergarten, if somebody asks questions, people would make fun of you or I get made fun of if I ask those silly or stupid questions. Asking questions was annoying. People didn’t have patience for you. You get that whole vibe that you shouldn’t be doing that. You’re in a job and you’re new in your job, if you ask questions, it makes it seem like you shouldn’t be there. You don’t deserve to be there and they shouldn’t have hired you. You’re a pain in the ass.

We get programmed to stop asking questions. That’s coming from the Bible. If you ask, it’s always given. Question and answer is cause and effect. You can’t ask a question in my estimation without at some point, receiving an answer. If you want to hear the voice of God or you want to hear the voice of your soul or of the guidance system that’s around you, you might want to stop and ask. Am I tracking what you’re saying?

Ask and then shut up for whatever period of time that’s required. I can remember in the beginning, I was meditating and I had all these questions and desires. I was single. I lived in a luxury apartment complex. It was a one-bedroom apartment on the third floor. The people on the first floor were from India and they cooked a lot with curry. It would come up through the chimney into my apartment through the fireplace. I love Indian food, but you don’t want your whole little tiny apartment smelling like curry all the time. I was asking, “Where’s my mansion?”

I’m 35 at the time. I had a Mercedes, little C Coupe and I’m like, “I drive a Mercedes. I’m somebody important. You know that God, so why am I living in this little one-bedroom, curry-smelling apartment right now? Why am I not in a mansion? Why am I not in a 10,000 square foot home by myself?” which is odd. Who would need 10,000 square feet by themselves? We’re all looking for these answers. I’ve learned this and I’m sure you have. Sometimes, we want these things that are not necessarily good for us at that moment. The answer sometimes is yes and sometimes the answer is no. More times probably than anything is not yet.

 

Do you think we’re a patient society?

We’re a microwave society. Ever since they came out with the microwave, everybody’s like, “Do you mean I can have it now? Cool.” This isn’t a judgment. I’m just as guilty as anyone else. I want what I want and I want it now and I will throw a tantrum if I don’t get it. I picture God sitting back with his arms crossed laughing. One of my favorite quotes is, “The predecessor of all wisdom is pain.” At 35 years old, one year sober, had God said, “Here’s your $125 million. You just won the lottery. Congratulations,” Adam, I would be dead right now.

There is absolutely no way I was wise enough, strong enough, or anything else enough to handle that windfall of cash. I would have been like, “I’m David Lee Roth now and it’s time to party.” I’d spent $50 million of it on a jet and I would have just done stupid things. I’d be broke and dead. God knows what God is doing. I don’t need to play God. I need to listen to God and ask for that guidance. I don’t know how we turn this into a whole big spiritual thing, but I love it.

Listening is one of those skills that most people are honest about. If you say, “Are you a good listener?” A lot of people say, “No, I’m not.” If you ask them, “Is your boss a good listener?” “No, definitely not.” We’ve seen statistics that 98% of people that are in a work environment where they have a supervisor of some kind, you ask them, “Does that person listen to you?” They’re like, “No, they don’t listen to me.” Listening is a tough thing, and that’s its own separate topic. The metaphor is important and the idea that we’re listening.

Whether you’re listening to something you call God or you’re listening to something that’s outside your door, it’s a sense. It’s one of our senses. To be able to actively listen for answers, and then to be able to hear those answers, that also has a lot to do with why meditation is important in a world that is noisy and crowded. There are many things that are vying for our attention all the time. If you pick up your phone, there’re a thousand things that are vying for your attention. You go, “Is it possible even if I am listening and I am asking questions? Is it possible that I won’t hear the answer that I’m looking for?” I think so.

Yeah, if we’re constantly running our mouths. Dr. Bernie Siegel is a friend of mine. He’s a legend. He’s written nineteen books and he’s an MD. He was a pediatric surgeon for years, and I interviewed him. He talked about the importance of listening. I’m a fairly good interviewer because I do ask questions, and then I just let people run and they run too. Bernie says, “I had this talk with this woman one day and I said, ‘Tell me where you’re from.’ That’s how the conversation started something like this. She goes on for the next 30 minutes. I didn’t say another word in the entire conversation and in the end, I said, ‘Time is up. I have to go.’ She said, ‘Dr. Bernie, this has been the most fantastic conversation I have ever had with anyone in my life.’ I didn’t say a word to her. She loved the sound of her own voice and that’s how all of us are.” People are like, “No, I’m not like that.” Yes, you are. Denial is not a river in Egypt. It’s okay. We’re all the same.

You wrote a book. I want you to talk about your book a little bit. Give us the title. Let’s start there.

I co-authored another book with Dr. Bernie Siegel and James Redfield that wrote The Celestine Prophecy. It’s called Crappy to Happy. The thing hit number one on Amazon. My book that I released in 2017 is called Walls of Wisdom: Turning Pain Into Profit. It’s a 73-page book. Some people make fun of it and call it a pamphlet because they haven’t written their books yet. When I wrote the book, there was this voice inside of me, and I know that sounds crazy, saying, “Get your book out now.” I was like, “Okay.” I wrote it in seven days.

There are spelling errors in it and there are even grammatical errors. My wife was editing and she’s a professional editor but I was like, “You’ve got to get this done today.” She’s like, “Today?” We had moved across the country back to Ohio from Las Vegas, so she’s trying to unpack the house and I’m trying to work. A couple of things slip by but that’s alright. It’s a number one bestselling book on Amazon. It’s not a number one best spelling book.

Prayer is talking to God, and meditation is listening to God. Share on X

Have you ever said that before what you just said?

I got that from Grant Cardone.

There’s a habit that a lot of people have that they don’t do things they want to do or they say they want to do because they think they have to do them perfectly. I love that you’re sharing that because it would be great if there weren’t spelling mistakes or the thing was somehow perfect, but most of those books don’t exist. I find errors in major books all the time. It’s life. Isn’t there a Japanese term for that? I wish I was playing off like I know this, but I can’t remember it. Somebody is reading this and going, “It’s that.” I got it, wabi-sabi. Isn’t that what it is?

I don’t know. What is that?

It’s where the imperfections and things are what make them perfect. That’s the essence of the whole thing to look to find, examine a leaf, or examine a rose. It’s gorgeous the way it is. When you look at it, there are all these little imperfections or things you could find that would be wrong with it.

General Patton had a saying. I’m going to screw it up, I’m sure but it was, “A violently executed plan now is much better than a perfect plan executed next week,” or something to that song. It goes something like that. So many people, including me, don’t take action. We have these thoughts and ideas. I talk to people, I help some people, I’ve helped people write their books, and they don’t do it. They don’t take action. I’m a coach. I’m a business coach. I coach people.

The biggest challenge for me as a coach is getting people to take action. I hold them accountable. I say, “You’ve got to do A, B, and C tomorrow and I want you to take a picture or a video of it or something, and send it to me so I know that you’re doing it.” Sometimes I’m talking with 50 to 60-year-old business people like I’m talking to one of my kids. That level of accountability for us to take action is necessary for some events in life for people. Writing a book is a big deal. We know some authors. You’re one and I am one. It is life-changing. If you write your book and you get it out, it will change your life.

There are so many options to get something that you have on the inside that he is seeking an expression. There are so many ways to get it out. We won’t digress there. I’d love to know a little bit more. There are two things I want to track before we conclude. One is I want to talk about resilience and the other is I want to talk about the show that you had me on as a guest. You have a number of different shows. You’re doing some wonderful, fun and interesting work in the world. I’d love for people to know a little bit about that. It’s germane to who you are and how you influence people that we touch on that on the platform you’ve created and what you do there. Take a couple of minutes if you could share a bit about that.

Let me summarize it by saying I started a show called Breakthrough Walls a few years ago. It felt like I needed to go out and knock on doors for my business, my brand, and start spreading the word, “Adam, I want to tell you about me and who I am.” That’s the old school approach or I could have picked up the phone but what I decided instead is I’m going to start interviewing people on the show and have them come on and tell their life story about who they are, where they came from. I’m going to learn how to do this, do it and listen and so I did that. I have you. You’re a massive player. Mark Victor Hansen and his wife, and Grant Cardone. I’ve had massive people that I’ve interviewed and had on my show. That’s free to do. I created a course teaching people how to do it but it’s free to do if you want to do it and fumble your way through it. It’s free to do that and people don’t do it.

You didn’t wait until you were a celebrity. You didn’t wait to do it perfectly. You got out sloppy as it might have been but you were successful.

It’s evolved. I now have an intro video I play that’s cool. I’ve met people like Glenn Morshower. You know Glenn. He’s been an actor for many years. He and I now have a couple of different shows we do.

Was he in CSI? Was that his show? I’m trying to remember what.

It’s 24 with Kiefer Sutherland. He was on there for several years.

He was a general or something like that?

He was a general in all The Transformer movies. He was in Black Hawk Down and Air Force One. He’s been in 250 movies and TV shows. He’s amazing. He’s my best friend in the world. We did a show, The Ken and Glenn Show. He’ll call me and he’d go, “We’ve got to go live.” These movie stars and their wants and needs. Drop everything and go live with Glenn.

Do you think you’re living in your green room or something?

I know. I love Glenn. The guy is probably one of the most infinitely wise people that I know. He is brilliant. All of this has happened. My point of talking about Glenn, Mark Victor, Grant Cardone, and all these people that I’m friends with and I know well now, I got involved through Mark.

It’s how you and I got introduced. It was through Mark and his beautiful wife. They’re incredibly, awfully generous, sweet people and thoughtful. We were each making some introductions to each other and it was so personal and was so thoughtful. Mark and I’ve known each other in I don’t want to say a superficial way, because we had some business stuff that we did, stage work and things several years ago or whatever. Not everybody who’s a big name or a star, whatever you want to say, is all that in person. They’re not all that they’re cracked up to be when you meet a person. They’re human beings. Some are interesting and some aren’t. Some are super generous and fun to be around and some aren’t. I know that’s shocking for everybody to hear.

Mark is one of those people. The guy holds the world record for the number of books sold, $600 million books.

It’s him and Jack. The only thing that’s outsold them is the Bible. That’s it. Nothing else is even close to that. We talk all the time. I have him and Crystal on Amazon Live again. To your point, somebody on his level, he hangs out with Richard Branson. He’s the dude. He’s emailing me and going, “I told this guy that you’d be on his podcast. Email him.” I’m like, “Mark is referring me to be on that?” Cool. Let’s do it. He’s incredible. He’s such a giving dude and that’s what I found about people up here. The old saying, “You’re the sum of the five people you hang out with the most.” I never believed that. It makes sense. How do I hang out with Trump or whoever? That’s on a high level that I want to get to. How do I hang out with a guy like Adam Markel or Mark Victor Hansen?

You give to them first. You give them something that they can’t get on their own. That’s what I’ve learned. You give and give. That’s what I do. I give and give and I try to figure out how I can make Adam’s life better? How can I make Adam Markel more successful? How can I get more people to know who Adam is? How can I get more people to buy Mark’s book and Crystal’s new book? How can I help Grant Cardone get to the levels that he wants to get to? He’s only worth $500 million? How would I help him out? Getting more attention. That’s what people want. When you learn how to do that, you could be the wealthiest man on the planet. You still if you’re alive, there’s a reason and you know there’s a reason deep inside so what can we do? We can help others become more whatever.

At the risk of a Kumbaya moment, we need each other. Black letters are etched in stone. We need each other and anybody thinks that they are better off or can be better off on their own, there’s work to be done there. We all have work to do but that’s not right not thinking to come back to that concept. I’d love to conclude with a two-part question. The compound question here. I’d love to get your definition of resilience and I want to also have you share with folks what it is that you do. You’ve already answered that when it comes to the meditation piece. If there’s something in addition to meditation that you consciously do as a ritual to create that greater resilience for yourself, share that, but otherwise, let’s go to how do you define it to start with.

Resilience is not giving up, no matter what. Share on X

Resilience to me, I’m going to sound a big old cliché, but it’s not giving up no matter what. Giving up and running from my problems, hiding or whatever was the old me. The new me is, “No. No matter what.” I’ve been down to negative money in my bank account. I didn’t go to college. In fact, in my senior year of high school, they said, “You didn’t get a biology credit in tenth grade.” I said, “That was a bullshit class. I hated it.” They’re like, “You needed to graduate.” I’m like, “There’s some more bullshit for you. That’s crazy. Why do I need biology? I’m never dissecting a frog again. What do I need biology for? I hated that class. It’s stupid.”

They’re like, “You need that credit to graduate. You’re going to have to come back next year.” I said, “You have a better chance of winning the lottery than me coming back to this school next year.” They said, “You have to.” I’m like, “I’m out.” I walked out and this was three months before graduation. I walked out and I never looked back. I made the decision that day that thoughts originate somewhere. The dude that wrote that history book in 1952 that I’ve been learning out of for the last four years, where did he learn that stuff? Who taught that person? I’m like, “The answers are in books. I’m going to start reading like a maniac and I haven’t stopped yet.” Resilience to me is, don’t give up. Do whatever it takes to make it and be ethical about it.

Thank you for that. The way you encapsulated it is so simple. Sometimes the simplest things we overlook like that riddle about where the answers reside. I appreciate the simplicity and depth of that answer. What’s the one thing that you count on? If it’s meditation, great. If there’s something else you do to build your resilience even when things are tough, you’re that guy who’s so tenacious, you’re not going to give up, that’s not going to happen on your watch. What’s that you do on a ritual basis?

This is going to sound crazy. I love this because I love being the crazy one. It’s the crazy ones like Steve Jobs. He was considered one of the craziest people alive. Ben Franklin was a complete nut job. Einstein was insane. I write out I am affirmations almost daily. I am strong. I am capable. I am a genius. I am a multimillionaire. I am changing the world. I am impacting millions of lives in a positive way. I am happy. I am grateful. I am all of these things. I write them out and sometimes I’ll make up a song about I am whatever in the shower or when I’m getting ready. I look in the mirror and I’ll say I am powerful. I am strong. I am capable. I do that every single day of my life and for people that don’t do it, you don’t even know what you’re missing out on.

I’m going to do something that I never do. You’ve inspired me to do this. We speak to organizations. Part of what I do for a living is I’m a keynote speaker and we present. In the middle of a corporate training about resilience, I talked about how important it is as part of resilience that we’ve got to be able to reframe the whole conversation about that. We’ve got to be able to reset and regenerate. That’s what resilient people do. The ten-second reset is this thing where we can come up with a ten-second reset and my ten-second reset is what you said.

I have them there and write down their I am statements because in the middle of the shit storm the wind is blowing. You got an email where a client said they don’t want to work with you anymore. They’re going to end their engagement or God knows so many worse things that can happen in the middle of a day. What do you do at that moment? What do you say to yourself? What’s your go-to? You shared your go-to, that ritual. I couldn’t agree with you more. You and I are so simpatico. We always have a lot of fun together. We are new buddies and everybody gets to hear us say it. The word you call this is a bromance. That’s what my wife would say, “You’ve got a bromance happening.” I appreciate your time. Thanks for giving it up for all of our people.

Thank you. I’m honored seriously.

For everybody out there, if what was said is something that might help somebody, please share this episode. Subscribe if you haven’t done that. Share with friends. The community has grown so much, not because we’re paying to play using a whole lot of marketing dollars for it. It’s because you are spreading the word about it to other people. I appreciate that. We’d love to get your feedback and your comments. You can go to AdamMarkel.com/podcasts, leave a comment, which I will personally respond to and it’s always a joy to do that.

Lastly, as we always end every one of these shows, my waking ritual is the one go-to I’ve got for my own personal resilience. Every day that I get to wake up that is the first step, wake up. We all want to wake up again tomorrow. I haven’t met anybody yet that has a guarantee of that. I haven’t met anybody who’s got it in writing a contract that says they’re going to wake up tomorrow. I know that I don’t have it. When you wake up, not if, but when you wake up tomorrow, for a second there, we were talking about a ten-second reset, ten seconds to feel what that feels like to be given another day. It doesn’t mean you were given another easy day.

I know a lot of days for a lot of people are tough and I have my tough days, so does Ken and so does everybody. You’re given a day, what does it feel like? What does that mean to you? How do you want to experience yourself being today? That’s the question. For me, I start out with my statement out loud, which is not an I am statement, but it’s born out of that. The four words I say when I wake up is I love my life. I love my life because I want to love my life. I want to be in love with life. I want to love myself and that’s the low hanging fruit for me when I start the day. I hope you all wake up tomorrow that you will feel gratitude for something and that you will say something out loud or to yourself that feels true, feels right, and puts you, as my grandmother would say, on the right foot. This is wonderful and I can’t wait to talk to you all again soon. Ciao.

Important Links

• https://www.KenWalls.com/
• Grow Live Academy
• Breakthrough Walls
• Pema Chodron
• Dr. Bernie Siegel
• The Celestine Prophecy
• Crappy to Happy
• Walls of Wisdom: Turning Pain Into Profit
• Guest – Adam Markel episode on Breakthrough Walls
• Mark Victor Hansen and his wife – Previous episode on Breakthrough Walls
• Grant Cardone – Previous episode on Breakthrough Walls
• Amazon Live – Mark Victor Hansen and Crystal Hansen episode

 

About Ken Walls