S2E2 Cult Dynamics for Entrepreneurs: Fear, Reward, and the Business of Belief

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Having that level of discipline to follow the rules
you set out is so important,even down to like when people
say, hey, the sale ends atmidnight Monday, the 31st, and
then you go there, you know,tuesday.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Oh, it's still accidentally.

Speaker 1 (00:16):
And it's the sale still on.
You now question everything,right?
Welcome everybody to anotherepisode of Paid to Create.
I'm your host, aj Roberts, andalongside me, as always, is the
beautiful Sarah Jenkins.
Awesome.
Today we're going to be divinginto a topic we're going to be
talking about cults and,specifically like for you as a
listener, you know there's a lotto learn from building a cult

(00:39):
right, and you can look at it asgood, look at it as bad, but
the truth is is they're able topeople who run cults are able to
get people to follow them,believe in a movement and, again
, cults are normally labeled asbad, but you know you have
different cults around the worldthat I don't know if you'd
consider bad, because they'rethey're movements for good.

(01:00):
So, um, keep that in mind aswe're going through this.
We have a little uniqueperspective here, because Sarah
actually grew up in a cult.
So let's just start there.
What the heck was that like?

Speaker 2 (01:14):
Well, growing up it wasn't called that at all.
It came out later, after, Imean, I graduated going to that
college.
I graduated the college butstopped going.
Then it came out like later onand a couple of the girls that
I'm still really good friendswith because we went all through
all that together, we're like Ican't believe it's labeled the

(01:35):
cult.
Now it's like, well, when welook back, some of it, does you
know, fit all of the checklist.
So I get how it turned into thecult.
But when it was started back inthe day I don't even know if it
was late 70s or 80s my dad saidwhen he was in high school this
guy, bill Gotham, would comeover with his dad, my grandpa,

(01:56):
and they'd do good things forinner city teens.
Really, their heart was in theright place.
Like, hey, we live by God'sprinciples and that is how you
get the life that God wants foryou.
You're honest, you know, don'tmurder.
Like all the basics was honoryour father and mother, you'll
be happier.
Don't lie, like if you followGod's principles for the
happiest life God's trying togive you.
So starting base was, like yousaid, very genuine, very awesome

(02:17):
.
Like you're trying to give yourkids this upbringing, trying to
make sure that you'reinstilling in them all these
great beliefs so that what's thebible say, when you teach your
kids something it doesn't leavetheir their brain.
But then my dad said, actuallyyou're not going to leave it,
you're going to decide to goback to that path.
I'm like, well, if it's goodstuff, then great.
Um, but some of it came outlater that it wasn't following

(02:38):
true to the religious path thatmy parents were going for.
It was going more down thatcult street.
That made it a little moreinteresting too, a little more
fun.
A little more fun to say no to.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
I think if you look at and there's a lot of
documentaries, a lot of booksand obviously, being a marketer,
you go into that because youwant to learn how to build a
tribe, you want to learn how tocreate mass influence, and again
it's really down to theindividual.
Um, and again it's really downto the individual what your
ethics are and how you use thoseUm, but what it seems to be

(03:13):
pretty standard is that theyhave a core set of beliefs or
principles that they adhere to.
Um, that usually is is it's aposition, us versus them thing,
right, when it's like thingsaren't going so good because you
live in a certain way and wethink, if you live this way,
life will be better.
In this case, backed by God, asthe, as the you know source of
ultimate authority, ultimateauthority, you know, looking

(03:36):
back, obviously, like you said,when you were in it you didn't
really notice, but looking back,were there any kind of rituals
or you know um ceremony typethings as you went through?
You mentioned graduating earlierbut, like a lot of times, these
things are, uh, are done in away that is like it's like an
Ascension, right.
You feel as if you're moving up, you feel as if you're

(03:57):
accomplishing things, um and it,and it's kind of a show to
everybody else that like, hey,if you follow these paths too,
you can.
You can ascend in essentiallypower and authority.
That seems to be normal.
So was there that kind of stuffthat you saw?

Speaker 2 (04:12):
It was a lot more heavily male driven, that power
and authority belongs to the manover the woman and then she's
in charge of the children, likethe hierarchy, and I don't
follow that umbrella ofauthority rules at all, but the
standard of it you know.
Getting up and doing yourdevotions, getting up at 6 am
and going to the Bible studyfirst, like all those things,
were good things.
So you didn't really see themsort of the manipulative way

(04:33):
that it came around to gettingyou to do whatever they said to
do which is some of it was weirdnot overly weird, like fun or
cults, but I see it.
It gave me a good perspectiveon the different ways that
people market.
Honestly, you look at the waypeople want to handle.
I mean I'll even just go toanyone that's really really
great at marketing understandsthat the way people think and
the way people feel to get themto the solution that you're

(04:57):
offering, you take them downthat path.
It's good marketing.
So if you're running a cult,you're very good at the human
behavior and the marketing partof what you're selling and for
this it's the kingdom of God,it's the higher blessings of the
Lord.
So people obviously want tofollow that.
But then it gets a little weird, like if your skirt's above
this high, you're gettingkitchen duty and early bedtime.

(05:17):
I'm like man every time youcan't have shirts higher than
right here.

Speaker 1 (05:29):
I'm obviously violating it right now with
three bare fingers.

Speaker 2 (05:30):
You mean lower, I know it's well higher they'll be
happy with.
Yeah, just cover your face,you're good.
Just do turtlenecks all day,that would be best.
Yeah, um, but those rules, Ithink, were just the school.
Being overbearing on the littletiny bullshit that they told
you was is condescending andsinful.
I'm like no, it's not.
That's not the way's not theway the Bible is at all.
It's actually living by God'sgrace and that part wasn't part
of the equation at all.
So now that it's called thatcult thing, it makes sense to me

(05:51):
.
The way that they managed theschool that I was attending for
a while and the school that Istopped attending when we
mutually agreed I shouldn't goanymore also wasn't allowed.

Speaker 1 (05:59):
Yeah Well, we'll get back to your internal compass,
because that is an interestingconversation.
But just rewinding to, youmentioned doing the things daily
.
Can you walk us through whatthat day would look like?
Because what's very importanthere, with people listening, is
when you're trying to look atthese principles and how maybe
they apply to business.
One of the things you mentionedwas you do your daily devotions

(06:20):
, and, and, and he continued on.
But what's really important isis like when you can get your
audience to follow a set of um,you know daily activities.
Like every time they do that,they're reminded of the cause.
In this instance, it was theultimate prize.
It was the glory of God,kingdom of heaven.
Like this, this amazing lifeyou'd be blessed with, right?

(06:42):
So that's a big prize, but youhave to do these things daily.
Um, but you see this like withyou know, if you want to work
out like there's daily habitsyou have to do.
If you, you know there's dailyrituals in terms of prepping
your food, eating correctly, solike these things play in
everyday life success.
It's not just you know what'slabeled as a cult that this
works.
But walk us through what a daywould look like, because I think
it's important to people to seethat, because a lot of

(07:04):
businesses don't think about the, the like, when they, when they
get a customer or client, theydon't really think about how do
they integrate with their entirelife.
Right, it's like, oh, here's aproduct, and then what you do
with this, what you do with it.
But if you really want to havean impact and have influence,
like that, like integration withtheir daily life, is very key
and very important.

(07:24):
And you know, and we see itwith social media, right, if you
watch the documentary onNetflix, social Dilemma, you'll
see how aggressive they've beento keep us on the social
platforms all day, every day.
But anyway, walk us throughwhat a day in the life would
look like normally.

Speaker 2 (07:39):
Well, a day in the life of me not falling out of
bed and my roommate waking me up, so we're not late for chapel.
Wearing the outfit I'llprobably get in trouble for
anyway, because the skirt's thismuch higher than it should be
or I don't know.
Something's wrong withsomething I'm wearing.
Maybe my mascara was too thick,I'm not sure my nail polish
color was off.
I'm always in trouble, but if Igo down to chapel at 6 am, then

(08:00):
7 am.
You're done traveling.
You've started your dayappropriately.
You've started your day withfocusing on the Lord.
You're starting your day withthinking of God first.
You're thinking when the Biblesays, take into captivity every
thought, it means you'rechoosing first thing to think
about what God wants for the day.
Great, I don't have a problemwith that.
That's awesome.
I do have a problem with all thelittle nuances of getting in
trouble every time you wake up.
Even if you are actually tryingto obey the rules, which I did

(08:22):
most of the time actually try toobey all the rules, I still got
in trouble constantly.
So I lost my drive to followall the rules and the fact that
they'd had it like this is whatyou do.
Those are good things.
Dressing appropriately is agood thing, especially for the
Bible, versus their teachingthat men and women need to dress
whatever.
I think starting off your daywith Bible and your devotions is
absolutely great, awesome.
But if you don't now, you'refailing, now you're criticized.

(08:46):
But if you take thoseprinciples and put them towards
your company, you say, hey,start your day.
How are you going to start it?
Take some time to think aboutthe creativity of your business.
Where are you going to grow it?
How are you going to get moreclients?
Those are the same things.
This one's just based onreligion and, honestly, the word
of the Bible says somewhere inOld Testament and they said Old
Testament's not valid.
But then we're going to followall these rules over here, but

(09:07):
some of them I'm like what inthe world?
You're just pulling stuff outof nowhere for us to follow and
if we don't, you're failing.
So you can make up a rule justbecause it doesn't make sense to
me.
So if there's six of you downyour chapel, then you go to
breakfast.
Then you go to breakfast, thenyou go do your studies.

(09:27):
Is it always the same food?
Oh, it's very similar.
It's the kitchen duty was.
I was on kitchen duty often sothe eggs, breakfast potatoes.
Maybe you know grits and eggs,but very healthy base and very
cheap and easy to follow andeveryone is fine with it.
It's the food of the buffet orthe school.
Just like every school you goto, the buffet is going to be
the same five meals.
From there you do your studies.

(09:49):
If you are in the lobby of thehotel that the school was in, if
one of the gentlemen evenlooked at me and said, how was
your day?
The dean of men is coming overand he's in trouble.
I'm not in trouble, I'm justthe girl.
They're in trouble immediately.
So I was never encouraged to godown to the lobby, even though
you have to go to the lobby tohit all your classes, chapel and

(10:10):
food.
I avoided it a lot, though it'seasier.
And then the whole multi-genderthing was the weirdest part.
It wasn't just they're tryingto keep men and women away from
each other until marriage, thatwhole way that you have to court
through the father's permissionIf it's a girl.
There's women that were 30 plusthere trying to find a husband
that believes the same as themand the guy would have to call

(10:32):
the dad and see them on the sidefor 12 weeks, like there's a
whole bunch of weird rules thatdon't come from Bible.
They don't come from anythingthat's going to actually benefit
you, I guess in heaven later.
We live by grace.
Every Christian is in the Bible, saved by the grace of God.
So when you don't go to chapelwearing the right skirt, you're
not failing.

(10:52):
Your religion isn't failing.
The same thing with business.
If you don't get up and spend30 minutes doing the creative to
grow your company or find a newlist building skill, you're not
failing your business.
You may not get ahead as muchas you can, but business there's
a financial reward immediatelyif you do it right.

Speaker 1 (11:11):
How much do you think those, the rules that they put
in place, were, um, they soundkind of traditionalist, right?
They like old, old beliefs interms of roles of men and women,
that kind of thing.
How many, how much of that doyou think was just that versus
how much was a control thing?
To create guilt and shame, tomake you feel like because I
think you're more vulnerable,you're more likely to follow
when you feel like you're not agood human, right, when you're,

(11:34):
when you're made to feel as ifyou're worthless, you're not a
good human.
You can't ever do anything right.
Nothing you do is good enough.
And then there's all thesepunishments.
Essentially, um, what you'resaying you know, like, as a boy,
a natural instinct is to talkto a beautiful woman, and then
you're being chastised for itand it's not the right thing.
So now you have all these weirdemotions because what you, what
is natural, is being told isnot natural, right?

(11:55):
How much?
How much do you think was acontrol thing versus just, these
are our beliefs and you andwe're trying to train you to
follow the beliefs.

Speaker 2 (12:08):
So in the beginning, the starting point, you know, my
grandpa kept on being theBaptist pastor in Windsor,
canada, and Bill Gothard wentdown to Chicago and did a lot
more good for the inner cityyouth but then grew it and the
people that he put in charge ofit in the different areas that
he grew the religion part.
They made up all these newrules and I think as Bill got a
little older some of those rulesmade sense to him.
They made up all these newrules and I think as Bill got a
little older some of those rulesmade sense to him.
But most of it, most of it'sthe control, most of it is
you're forgetting that you liveby grace.

(12:29):
You want to be encouraged to dothe right thing.
If you're choosing an outfitthat's not appropriate,
shouldn't you know what that isfor you?
Shouldn't you be able to sayI'm making a mistake and you're
either doing it on purpose ornot?
When someone says you've made amistake, you're like what are
you talking about?
Like it's very much controlaspect, but it's based on

(12:51):
punishment and fear.
We know that sells more thananything.
Right, if you're sellingsomething based on reward.
That's the other reason to buysomething is based on the reward
.
So if you're living by grace,you should feel like you want to
do those right things that theBible says and not be punished
into making you do them.
It's weird, it's a differentstyle.

Speaker 1 (13:06):
Yeah, I like what you said about you know you
mentioned if getting up and youknow spending those 30 minutes
or whatever on the focus thatyou need to grow your business,
and if you don't, it didn'tnecessarily fail your business
you just might not get ahead, itmight be longer, it might be
that I think a lot of people youknow what they need to
understand as we're goingthrough this is kind of like we
mentioned rituals, right, thedaily rituals, the daily habits,

(13:28):
like again, these can bepositive, they don't have to be
a negative.
And then like rules, right,like, if you're teaching
something, there's normallygoing to be rules and a lot of
times you have to understand whoyour audience is.
I'm working on a new bookcalled Breakthrough Marketing

(13:49):
that goes into kind of consciouslevels and who you're marketing
to.
But the majority of people arerule followers, not rule
breakers.
Right, like, as you go up, rulebreaking becomes, you know,
entrepreneurial and things likethat Cause you're going against
the status quo, going againstthe mass movements.
But when you look at, uh, uh,if you're trying, if you're
serving, you know the masseslike a lot of times they believe
in rules because that's whatthey've been conditioned their
whole life to believe in, and soI think that having rules in

(14:09):
place a very important part ofbuilding a culture for you,
whether it's for your T,internally for your team, or
whether it's externally for yourclients and customers.
Um, and I think how you respondand react to the way they do
those is very important.
And you'll see leaders who dopunish or chastise, right, like
and I've been at conferenceswhere they made people, like you

(14:31):
know, do pushups and like allthis stuff in front of everybody
because they screwed up or theydid something like that, and so
you do get compliance, but youget compliance out of fear,
right, you get compliance out ofembarrassment, and so, while it
works in that setting,long-term probably going to end
up getting some negativefeedback, probably not going to

(14:51):
be everybody's thing.
So there's ways to do it.
I think it's important, as wego through With the different
aspects of you have the rulesand the rituals when it comes to
the leadership, right,obviously, that's.
It's interesting because in thiscase, god was the ultimate
prize.
But was there a hierarchy where, like you know, the, the, the

(15:16):
people who found it like, wasthere?
How did they keep compliance?
Like with the, like with theorder, like how was that done?
In order to constantly positionthemselves, because I'm
guessing at this, but I'm goingto assume their role suggested
they were closer to God and thisis why, like they're further
along in the journey, they'recloser to God.
Therefore, they're the model,they're the people we should

(15:38):
aspire to be like and satisfyand make happy.
So how was the leadershipstructure and how was the I
guess power balance maintained?

Speaker 2 (15:47):
It was mostly geared towards the young teens, right,
and the kids growing up, to makesure they set the right way
growing up.
And a lot of it was great.
But when it went too farbecause I know that when you're
having problems with your kid tosend them off to one of these
training camps, that puts themin a room with a Bible and a
pillow, that's all you get.
And you have to see yourcounselor or pastor who I think
took the pastor thing way toofar, like to make this kid sit

(16:11):
in a room with a pillow and aBible to get them straight.
It's like, oh man, that'scausing so much more damage.
That's not how we live by graceat all.
So that's where they've takenit.
Like they're going to look tothese pastors or these people
that are put in charge.
Here's the leader for this team, here's the leader in this team
.
So then you send your kid tothose leaders and it's like man,

(16:33):
it was just so much stricterthan you thought it was.

Speaker 1 (16:35):
So, essentially, if there was noncompliance, there
was a punishment, and thepunishment was isolation.
They didn't phrase it like this, but this is how it seems, as
if you felt I got a lot ofkitchen duty and a lot of early
curfews yeah, a lot of time.

Speaker 2 (16:48):
Well, so you have to sign out and ask the dean of
women if you can leave thecampus.
But I'm from there, it'sMichigan, so I'm like I'm out,
like my family's house is 45minutes on the street.
I might need to go home.
My sister can pick me left allthe time.
But if nobody else can leave,the permission from the dean of
women, I'm like we're adults andyou're raising your kids, like
a lot of them came with, havenever stepped outside of their

(17:10):
little little, very small farmwith their parents who's raised
in this very, very strict way.
Even the men and I, evenstricter than we, were raised.
They would send comfortablekids there.
Because you can't leave thebuilding without talking to dean
of women, and they weren'tallowed.
Their parents said no, even ifyou're 20.
The dean said no.
Your parents said no, you can'tleave the building without
talking to Dean of Women, andthey weren't allowed.
Their parents said no, even ifyou're 20, the dean said no,
your parents said no, you can'tleave.
Like.
The reason I actually got kickedout was I was talking to a boy

(17:31):
on the phone who I thought wasvery cute.
Never met him.
But they said you can't do thatbecause your dad didn't say yes
.
I said what are you talkingabout?
I'm 18.
I had a boyfriend when I showedup and you didn't have a
problem with it.
So yeah, but your dad said youcould have that boyfriend.
I was like but he doesn't get a, say now I'm an adult.
And they're like, yeah, he does, you're dishonoring your father
, mother 10, commandment five.
I was like I disagree with that.

(17:51):
I would never dishonor myfather, even in the comments,
like when I talk about anythingmy parents have done.
If it was negative to me in themoment, I still value the
lessons it taught me.
I still value the way that theywere trying to raise me in the
right way and love me the bestthey can.
So it's not a negative, but itis to everybody else.

Speaker 1 (18:08):
So it sounds like because of your family's
relationship and because ofproximity, you actually had a
different, quite slightlydifferent experience than the
other girls and so, likenormally people fall in line
because they just get tired ofbeing punished.
But you kind of had this oldalternate view because you were,

(18:29):
you were leaving and doingthings that weren't necessarily
normal.
So that's kind of like mostpeople, like they they end up in
in staying in cults and being apart of cults because there's a
sense of belonging, there's asense of these are my people,
like we're all misfits, we'reall all broken, we all have the
same thing and and this personthat, usually the person in

(18:49):
charge, has the solution for oursalvation, right, and and I'm
using those words because it wasa religious cult.
But you know, you look at anycult and it's like that.
It's essentially some form ofsalvation from pain, from
whatever it is, you know, andand you get swayed, persuaded
and into belief systems.
Was there ever a sense ofbelonging for you or did you
always feel like you were out ofplace?
Did you always have this likeinternal thing that was like

(19:11):
this isn't right.

Speaker 2 (19:13):
Well, I've always been out of place, just in
general.
I mean a family of nine kids.
I'm the one that didn't reallyrespond well to certain rules
that were in place in the housethat everybody agreed with, and
I didn't follow them.
I was in trouble often, which Ishould have been in trouble
often If I was disrespecting therules in the house.
That's what should happen.
But I was comfortable and usedto that part of it.

(19:33):
So actually, when I went to theschool and people were in this
Bill Gothard way of thinking thedad's authority, the mom's in
charge of the kids, and you'rethe kid and you have to obey
your parents or you're going togo to hell for sure.
They were raised stricter thanI was and it was started in my
dad's home.
So I thought it was prettyfunny.
They made me room with a secondgeneration IVLP-er and I was

(19:54):
like, oh yeah, because I don'thave any rules.
That's so weird.
I watched some TV and I worepants.
So obviously I have no ideaabout these rules.
And it was just funny whensomeone realized when Bill came
to our school he's like Hi,sarah.
They're like oh, no, like MrGothard's coming, and I was like
Bill's coming.
Cool, I know him, he knows mygrandparents, he knows my family
.
He's super great in all hisways of starting the cult based

(20:22):
on the drill down little stupidrules about the color of your
shoelaces.
It didn't matter, it's just thecontrol thing.
I thought it was funny.
They put me with experiencedIBL peers because I'd watched TV
, I'd worn pants, so I didn'tfit in and didn't know all the
rules.

Speaker 1 (20:36):
I knew most of the rules, just thought they were
all stupid well, I think whenyou, when you, when you have a
different relationship with aleader and you see them in a
different light, there's adifferent level of thought
process and, rightly or wrongly,it's a sense, a little bit of a
sense of superiority over theother students, right and

(20:58):
rightfully so, like if everybodyis enamored by someone.
Oh, you know, like such andsuch is coming on and it's like,
just, it's someone you know andyou've been around.
You're like, what's the bigdeal?
So there's not the same effect.
Right is what I'm getting at,and it sounds as if, like that
gave you this underlying thoughtprocess when some of these
things were happening.
We're like, wait a minute, like, why are we doing this?
Because, like, for you, therewas a different level of

(21:21):
understanding.
There was a different level ofunderstanding, there was a
different level of experience.
One of the things, though,obviously, cults do really
really well is rewarding peoplethat do follow them.
Right, it's kind of like.
It's kind of like.
It's kind of like, if you wantattention, you do good stuff,
not bad stuff.
Right, because if we give bad,if we give the negative the
attention, then then more peoplewill be negative.
But if we essentially and thisis something businesses can do

(21:45):
and do well with, like a rewardsystem or prizes.
You know it's like people hitcertain certain benchmark and,
whatever it is, you're workingwith them on and and they're
rewarded for it, whether it's uh, you know publicly or whatever.
Um, it's like showcasing thesuccess as an example to the
other people of of hey, if youfollow, if you follow my

(22:06):
teachings, you know like you canhave this success too.
Right?
So was that?
What was the system?
It?

Speaker 2 (22:13):
was the opposite.
So now you can say, okay,someone that went to chapel
every day, got the best on theirhomework, got the best
devotions, did the 300 page or300 word verse synopsis you do
every week was awesome.
So they get no kitchen duty,they get to.
You know, go to the park withtheir best friend, like every
week, whatever.
If there's reward systems fordoing the best, that's awesome.
But then it was always thepunishment for not doing good

(22:35):
enough.
It was the opposite.
So you're doing bad, you're out, you're kicked out.
I even got kicked out usuallyand I show back up and there's a
slit in my skirt that I ownfrom working in this high-end
boutique that I love.
It's this brown leather skirt.
It's fantastic and beautifulbecause my parents had me go
back to the school to do thebasic seminar, which is the
basics you know, do yourscripture, love God, grace, all

(22:57):
the good things.
I'm like we just want to giveyou back that perspective.
I was like awesome.
And the pastor that I didn'tlike called me and he's like you
know, we need to have a talk.
I was like first of all, youcan't bring me in your office
without the Dean of Women.
But secondly, what?
And he's like well, you followuniform when you're in the
school because you know, even ifyou're schooling from home, you
have to follow the uniform.
And I was like not doing that.
He's like what do you mean?
I was like, exactly, thank you,I'll see you later.

(23:17):
I was like why are you sopertinent on demanding that I
wear the right skirt when I'malready kicked out and coming
back to learn the basic seminar?
I'd be like welcome back.
I hope this encourages you tofollow the rules again and come
back to school.
No, it was.

(23:38):
Can we get you in trouble again?
I'm like no, you can't, I'm out.

Speaker 1 (23:44):
It sounds rebelled.

Speaker 2 (23:47):
I followed all the rules of the school and then
they thought I wasn't all thetime and I was like I had to
wear pants under my skirt whenI'm playing volleyball in the
ballroom because I have scars onmy knees from falling and
diving for the ball.
But my dean of women's, likeyou're trying to disobey the
rules, you have jeans under yourskirt.
I was like they're the onlypants I own.
I don't have any money.
I've never bought anything notjeans.
Hand me down for my sister, likeeveryone else, had leggings

(24:09):
because their parents would buythem for them.
I didn't ask my parents forthat.
I thought that was a ridiculouswaste of money.
I've got jeans.
You have to wear pants underyour skirt, no problem.
But then I get early bedtimeagain.
I'm like why I'm following therules.
Jeans are even more modest thanthe leggings most of the time
was weird.
It was very tricky to try tofit in.
Try to do the right thing, bemotivated to try to do the right
thing.
Be motivated to try to just domy best and graduate and then

(24:30):
just keep failing.
I'm over it.
Pick me out.

Speaker 1 (24:34):
So this happens a lot , where you get like a group of
people who don't want to followthe rules right and they kind of
grow and they end up gettingremoved or removing themselves
because they don't agree andthey don't want to follow the
rules.
So, like, did you create thislittle rebellious group, or were

(24:55):
you the odd one out?

Speaker 2 (24:57):
Like how did the dynamic I actually played poker
and didn't invite me Not thatI'm going to tell on them
because I didn't disobey therules.
Alcohol in their bedrooms.
I didn't know about the pastor.
He goes.
You know there's alcohol in theschool and I was like what he
goes.
I think you're lying if youdon't tell me where it is.
I'm like I don't know whatyou're talking about.
I've never drank.
I don't want alcohol.
That sounds terrible.
Why would they bring it in here?
There's a bar down the street.
Holy crap.
It's just the weirdest thingthat they had rules against.

(25:20):
They got mad at me for it.
I didn't do anything.
I didn't do it well, had agreat time.
And then my older brother and Iwent to a pool table bar to
just hang out and play some pooland then he dropped me back off
at school and I had such a goodtime.
I got back I said I'm doingreally well, I had a great
weekend, my parents were lovely.

(25:41):
I've got a little paycheck fromthat job so I can get lunch and
stuff with the girls.
And this one girl went and toldon me to the dean of men's wife
or something and they saidSarah's bragging about going to
bars with men and I was likethey called me to the office.
I was like what are you talkingabout?
I went and played pool with mybrother, which is no one's
business.
I'm talking about it at lunch,like well, you should keep your

(26:02):
private life quiet when you'rehere.
I'm like not a chance, there'sno chance of somebody that you
think is doing better out in thereal world when they take a
vacation with their family andyou think I've done something
wrong, which I didn't do, thatI'm going to shut up about it.
Absolutely not.
That's a double standard that Idefinitely fall into a couple
times, sometimes on purpose,sometimes on accident, but

(26:22):
mostly on accident.
So I didn't care to disobey therules.
I'm like I'm at school to dothe job and get home.

Speaker 1 (26:27):
Now, you're from a big family, right?
How many brothers and sistersyou have?
Nine.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
I have six brothers, two sisters, nine total.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
I'm third of nine.
So with that was your whole.
Were all your siblings in thesame school or was it just you?
How?
How did this cause?
Cause like here's?
Here's where my thought processis with this question is you
clearly had a differentperspective and the fear and the
control and everything theywere trying to put on you

(26:55):
constantly failed.
Right, and we go into why andyou know if.
But if you're hopefully like,if you have all those brothers
and sisters and they're all inthe school and they're all
following the rules and they'reall doing the example, it's kind
of odd that you were rebelling,but it but it seems as if,
potentially, you had a lot ofexamples of a different life in

(27:16):
your own family which made youquestion what the heck was going
on at this school Because,again, you weren't fully
indoctrinated, it wasn't like.
It seems like you had a wholedifferent perspective,
consistently to give you theseother ideas of what is right and
what's wrong, because usually,as a kid, when you're told
what's right or wrong, youeventually bend.
You know, if you go and sit ina room on your own with the

(27:36):
bible long enough and on apillow, eventually you're going
to just break and you're justgoing to follow the rules, but
I've been a couple times.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
everyone to their beds, for someone didn't cop to
putting the milk in the fridgeand dad's like someone's got to
confess and they get a spankingfor leaving the milk out and
we're all sitting on our beds.
I'm like you know what, fine.

Speaker 1 (27:51):
It was me?

Speaker 2 (27:52):
It probably wasn't, but I'm like we're going to get
spanked anyway.
Might as well be me this time.
Some of us took one for theteam so we can all get off our
beds.
Michael took one for the team acouple times, josh did.
We all have an example where wedecided to just take the raised
in was Amway, and so Amway islike if you get people that buy
these products that are, youknow, more organic and more
healthy, that will improve theirlife and they get paid back for

(28:13):
the vitamins and stuff likethat.
It's a reward system.
Now you can raise higher in theranks of Amway, get a little
more recognition, get a littlemore clients, get a little more
income.
That was a totally oppositesystem than the school I went to
, not my home life.
My home life was my mom raisedus very independently Watch the

(28:36):
kids, we'll be home later.
We're like great, clean thehouse, do lunch, fine,
homeschool, awesome.
But seeing the differencesbetween the punishments don't
matter.
If you go OK, if you don't doany, you don't make any sales.
You'll never be a diamond.
You'll never make more money.
We're going to kick you out.
You be like OK, who cares?
But if you do become a diamond.
You do grow your business.
You're helping other familiesgrow their income.
This is a benefit, a positive,a positive influence, a positive
financial reward, somerecognition, some you know good

(28:59):
behavior, high fives and stuffLike it's a positive thing.
I was raised in both of thoseplaces, which is extremely
telling, because the punishmentsat the place I was at didn't
matter.
Like one kid came from a ranchin Texas, I mean, I've got a
million stories.
But they said you can't smoke.
We have our no smoking schooland it's bad for your health or
whatever.
He's like well, I've beensmoking since I was like 16.

(29:19):
He's 18.
They're like well, then youhave to go to the roof where no
one can see you.
I was like see, this is what Imean, but you don't.
If it fails and someone has areason for it failing, that's
not hell.
You give in, but you only giveinto that kid and it's a secret.
What the heck?
That's not okay.
So I found that their rules ofstrictness and you get early
curfew.
Or they did have a family daywhere parents are going to check

(29:42):
out the school, which I went towith my parents.
It was really fun.
They said you should, youshould stay in your room.
I was like you don't want tomeet the new parents thinking
about sending their kids here.
They're like no.
I was like, well, fine, stay inmy room but you had, so that
that's interesting.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
Um, you bring up amway and you, you know, you
immediately mentioned somelevels, like immediately, like
there's, uh, cult principles inamway for success, but the
difference, and stark difference, was one was a reward system,
one seems like it was apunishment system.
And you know, having thatcontrast, you just saw, well,
wait a minute, like as a kid,you kind of go, well, I like

(30:17):
this system better than thatsystem.
And then when you saw thecracks in the rules, you're like
, well, wait a minute, they'repick and choose, like depending
on who you are, which I couldsee again creating those cracks,
who you are, which I could seeagain creating those cracks.
Um, you know one of the thingsthat that cults do really really
well and great companies, who,who build amazing tribes, do
this as well as like, kind ofcome up with your own language.

(30:39):
You know, um, kind of your ownterms for things and you know,
uh, it's what bonds.
You know, fans of Holly Davison, fans of, uh, you know, justin
Bieber, the Biebs right, theSwifties that you know, justin
peep of the beebs right, theswifties that you know, like, uh
, lady gaga has the littlemonsters right, and other
companies have this kind ofstuff where when you're inside

(30:59):
it's like a secret club and thatagain creates some separation.
Obviously amway has somelanguage like that inclusivity
inclusivity.
What kind of symbols rich, youknow symbols, or you know
language or things that did youexperience.
That kind of was unique withinthe walls of the school.

Speaker 2 (31:18):
Oh man, I found that the dress specifically because
we weren't raised to wear skirts, you know, down to our big toe.
But a lot of those girls were,a lot of those guys were.
So when we went to the schoolwe couldn't leave without the
dean of men saying we couldleave.
But then I don't.
I mean if I left with family orfriends, I had the okay.
I'd walk down the streets ofFlint Michigan, which is never

(31:40):
safe, and people would ask me,are you from that cult?
And I was like no, clearlywearing all of the uniform that
the cult says.
But but to me I wasn't shockedwhen I went to the mall and saw
women in pants.
But the people from the schoolwere Like they'd go to the mall
and be like oh, my word, it'sjust oh, it's almost lending
them a temptation.
You didn't let them experienceor see normal behavior that

(32:02):
they're going to go out into theworld.
And now have're in FlintMichigan, of all places, to not
be experiencing the world.
You leave the building, you'regoing to see some stuff.
You see drug dealing in thefront of the school, super
interesting.
But it just didn't help.

(32:22):
It didn't help them.
Now they have to be, they haveto find their wife and they have
to lead their family orwhatever they're going to do,
and you've chained them down tothis one way of thinking and
it's like not asking you toexpand your views to a billion
other things, but there's anormal range of you know, women
in pants aren't sending you tohell like that's too far.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
It was interesting because I think that that's like
so one of the things and againit's can be used good but like,
one of the things mostbusinesses or cults will do is
to create separation.
Right, it's like we're normal,they're not normal, or we have

(33:05):
the way, they don't have the way.
The way, and you know, even ina, even in regular churches,
like when you, you know,especially for new people, when
they join the messagesimmediately, like don't hang out
with those sinners anymore.
Like your entire life should becentered around the church,
because you know you want thiscertain outcome and it's
temptation and I agree with,like, if you're a drug addict
and you get go to rehab, thelast thing you do is go start

(33:27):
hanging out with the samefriends as you did before.
You have to change yourenvironment, you have to change
your circle of influence, youhave to do these things and it
sounds like you know, for someof these kids and again I think
you had a different worldview,so you, your experience was
different because youimmediately, like had a
reference point to go against.
Right, it's like, well, wait aminute, this goes on over here.

(33:47):
It's not like, why is this hereFor those kids that were raised
differently, with that, wherethat's what's acceptable, and
they've never seen anything else.
When they see the short skirt,it's an immediately a shock
factor and, oh my gosh, thatperson is a heathen, that person
.
So there's an immediate like-.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
It's putting a motivation on that person for
wearing a pair of pants that'ssupposed to choose to make you
stumble.
That's not even fair to giveyour emotions on what you
perceive they've done to harmyou.
It's very weird.
It's creating a very funky,you're a bad guy type of
situation, which is not true.
I had a girlfriend in highschool.
She said her and her mom werefighting and she like yelled at

(34:26):
her and then she felt bad.
So she came down and apologizedand I was like, oh my word, I
would never yell at my parents.
They would murder me for sure.
But I just never thought.
I was like she must be a reallybad Christian to yell at her
mom, Like that's sodisrespectful, not honoring your
father and mother.
And I was like, uh-oh, I seeher parents.

Speaker 1 (34:51):
I saw her with her mom and it was.
I was like how crappy of me.
But it's a great way to controlpeople right when we go out in
public and they think everybodyis like temptation and dangerous
.

Speaker 2 (34:58):
Nothing wrong with wanting your wife to wear a
skirt because it's lessrevealing and you like your wife
to be yours and your family.
There's nothing wrong with that.
But when you look at someoneelse wearing a pair of pants, is
they're going to hell becausethey're trying to make other men
fall because of their ass?
It doesn't exist.
That's not true.
It's creating a very negativeview in your own head of
everyone else.
Where is her grace?

Speaker 1 (35:19):
Where is your nonjudgmental side that you have
to live in the world with?
I think unfortunately that'sspilled over into mainstream now
.
You know how many kids do yousee playing outside?
Hardly any.
Why?
Because some creeper's going tocome pick them up.
In fact, there's less of thatcrime now than before because
these creepers are online.
They're not driving around incandy vans anymore trying to
pick kids up.
They're grooming onlineOnline's.
Where you've got to worry aboutwhen are all the kids?
They're indoors online.

(35:39):
They're not outside right.
So these things spill over.
But again, it's a mind controlthing and going trying to say
extract some business lessonshere without it sounding like
you know, negative, like you dowant.
You do want certain thoughtprocesses right, like if you, if
you're a successful person, andsomeone is coming to you and
saying how do I be successfultoo?

(36:01):
And you say you got to get upat 5am.
That's not true, but it's truefor you.
So you know, when you passcertain things on, oftentimes
it's passed on around like whatit took you to be successful,
you know.
So you've got different camps,you've got the hard work, work,
you know, 18, 20 hours a day,sleep as little as possible,

(36:32):
which is more about success withat least amount of effort and
allowing it to flow, and havingbalance in all areas, and
neither side's right or wrong.
It's just what's right for theindividual.
But as a business owner, ifyou're in a field or in an
industry where it lends itselfto giving people these rules or
these things to follow, you knowyou want a reward system if

(36:55):
they do it, because they're morelikely to be successful.
You want rules for them tofollow because without rules
they're just going to make it upand there's a higher chance of
failure if there's no blueprint.
Right, you know what is thatgoal without a plan is a dream,
you know.
Sometimes that's true, I knowpeople who would disagree with
that.
Right, but you, you have thesethings in place because and I

(37:17):
can look back to a lift in rightwith the lift in background
Like I follow a certain systemcalled the conjugate training
system.
Is it the best system in theworld?
I don't know.
Is it the best system in theworld?
For me, 100%.
Do I often have a bias when I'mtalking to people and think
it's the best system in theworld?
Absolutely, but it's based onmy personal experience.
Someone is going to be betteroff following that program than

(37:40):
following no program.
But I will fall into that trapof it.
But without the process.
The process was created for themajority of people.
Without the process, what dothe majority of people without
the process?
What are the majority of peopledo?
They run around like headlesschicken, not knowing what to do.
So you kind of have to createrules and you kind of have to
have these things in place.
And if you want it to besuccessful, you do need to

(38:01):
reward people, you do need tomake them feel special and those
kinds of things.
Um, looking at the situation,usually, obviously Ascension is
a piece of it, but usually in acold or something, there's like
there's a big promise, right,and obviously if you're waiting,
if you're in there and you'reyoung, you know 16 and the
promise is when you die you'regoing to go to heaven.

(38:22):
That's a long time to keep.
Someone you mentioned earlierthere was like 30 year olds
trying to meet a husband andthey're having all these issues.
So what kept people a part ofthis system?
Was it literally mind control,where they just believed that
they couldn't leave, that they ahusband and they're having all
these issues?
So what kept people a part ofthis system?
Was it literally mind control,where they just believe that
they couldn't leave, that theywere trapped there?
Or?
It's interesting, right, thatlevel of control?
30 years old and, like you, youwon't talk to a man because you

(38:42):
have a certain belief system.

Speaker 2 (38:43):
But if you decided that the woman that does go talk
to a man without the father ofall or without the organization,
okay, and it means you'refailing and you're doing wrong,
like that's the, you keepyourself inside that.
It's a fear-based thing.
That's why I like that we hadthe and we have been bringing of
rewards and levels andfinancial benefits and that's
why we never, ever marketedbased on fear.

(39:05):
You can make more money whenyou sell based on fear.
But we never did so.
We did webinar jam.
We did all the marketing stuffback in the day.
We only sold based on rewardbenefit and this is going to
help your business, make iteasier, make it cheaper.
You're helping someone.
That's the only way I can getmyself to sell.
Anything is if I know I'mgiving you a good price, I know
it will help your business.
That's the only way I can do it.

(39:26):
I can't do it from thefear-based place A.
I don't believe in that butalso didn't help me.
So I'm looking at the NY thing.
For my parents was this huge,really fun place to be a part of
and then they got to make somemoney and have cool products
that were quality and they couldbe proud of it.
But in that school I was at, itwas everything was a failure.
And you're the failure andyou're doing wrong.
You need more punishments andearlier or curfews, and I'm like

(39:47):
that's not working for me.
So I don't like.
And even at home, when my momraised us very independently, my
dad's at work, my mom's goingto go to the bank or store or
whatever she needed to go do.
She's like hey, you know, getup by 10, have your rooms clean.
So there's rules.
We're not sleeping until noon.
Probably wise.
10 am was the cutoff, not 7 am.

(40:09):
Built us with rewards.
If the kitchen's clean, you getto go to bed or watch Monday
Night Football or whatever.
But if she comes home at two inthe morning and the kitchen's
messy, you're getting out of bedto clean it because you didn't
follow the rule.
There is a punishment.
But we didn't clean the kitchento not get the punishment.
Clean the kitchen so we couldwatch Monday Night Football or
do something fun.
We finished our homeschool sowe could run out and play in the
neighborhood because we had allthese.

(40:30):
If you do this, then you getthis.
It's positive, it's a rewardfor your hard work.
You get paid, you get to starta business.
We're always raised, but that'swhy I didn't fit in, probably,
to the cult thing with all ofthe, the super, super rules.
You're going to hell becauseyour heart is wrong.
When you disobey a rule, you'resinning.
Some things are sins, great,but not the.
Your skirt being this much toohigh, isn't?

(40:51):
You?
Didn't choose it on purpose,you're not.
I'm going to get away with this.
No, that's a hard issue, but wedidn't have that.
We had mistakes.
And now you're like you early,curve you in bedtime.
I'm like why?
Why wouldn't you just say, hey,don't wear that again next time
.
Do better, okay, great time,nope.

Speaker 1 (41:14):
So how old were you when you went into this 17?
Okay, so this was, this wasalmost a later education for you
.
So did, were they?
What did they start youngerwith most people is that well.

Speaker 2 (41:21):
So most people that I was in school with had.
They had a section for girlsthat taught them about no
running in the hall, wear yourhigh heels, put your skirt that
low, whatever.
They had a bunch of rules teachyou how to be a lady very
strict, strict, not my thing.
Then they had a thing for boysalert for boys, like almost like
a military training, sort oflike discipline, you know
whatever.
So teach the men to be men,like a lot of it was started
with the best, the best thingsand then they made it so rulesy

(41:43):
and condescending and horribleIf you didn't follow the
littlest thing.
It was like man.
I don't know how it worked, butthey started kids young and I
didn't start that.
We started with the basicseminar that came from.
You know, my dad going to thesebasic seminars and having it
being raised that way in hishouse, which was a positive that
we got that too.
We, we didn't mind going tobasic seminars.
We wrote out how you know 10commandments.

(42:04):
We had this guy, charlie Weiss,on give us.
He goes if you learn the tencommandments, you memorize them.
I'll give you 10 bucks.
Right now.
We're like studying, studying,and we all got 10 bucks and I
still know them now, like byheart, because we decided to
memorize them based on what wewanted the 10 bucks.
Now we know the 10 commandmentsby heart.
That's amazing.
What a great thing to do foryour kid, instead of saying, if
you don't learn the 10commandments, you're going to
bed early and you don't get togo out on saturday.
Oh man, I'm not.

(42:26):
I'm gonna learn them, but it'sgoing to take longer.
I'm going to hate it.

Speaker 1 (42:29):
Yeah, so for you your worldview was different going
in.
And so it was clashing, like youactually were clashing, you
didn't have an issue.
And so all of a sudden you'rein an environment that's
basically telling like when Isay you didn't have an issue, I
just mean you weren't at a pointin your life where you were
lost.
You were 17.
You were still young.

(42:51):
You weren't some drug addict onthe street searching for
salvation.
You already had salvation.
By the sounds of it, god wasalready a part of your life.
All of a sudden you're in anenvironment that's saying
everything you've grown up on iswrong.
So I could see how thatworldview and then for you there
was probably lack of trusttowards the system because it's
contradicting what you wereraised on.

Speaker 2 (43:07):
And you're saying my rules they don't even uphold for
all the students.
So I'm like you don't get todecide.
You're not God.
So when you tell me my heart'sin the wrong place because my
skirt was one inch shorter thanit should be, you're wrong.
I did that on accident.
Jeans under my skirt wasoffensive to you.
Where is that in the rule book?
It's not there.

Speaker 1 (43:20):
I didn't choose that naturally going against the
curve.
Because of of your, yourworldviews and your upbringing,
it was, uh, it was going to be,it would.

(43:41):
It would have been a big taskfor you to overcome all of that
and fall in line, right.
Basically, oh, did other peoplestruggle there too, or or was
it?
Were you like, was it one ofthose things where you were like
what is wrong with these people?
Like, whether was it was it,was everybody else super
indoctrinated, super into it andand you just seemed like the
rebel, or was it?

Speaker 2 (44:00):
There was a couple of me's in there like a little
more, we're going to go aheadand go around the world rules.
We're going to have pokerparties, we're going to go out
with the boys and not tell deansof women and stuff like that.
And I didn't have a lot ofrespect for that because I'm
like look, you signed up to behere.
Our dean of the school was aNavy SEAL and he said look,
shape up or ship out.
These are the rules.
If you don't like it, there'sthe door.
He's like I have no problemwith you leaving if you can't

(44:22):
make it, but you're agreeing tothese rules.
You got to obey them.
So that's why I didn't bring inall the contraband that all the
some of the other kids chose todo Like I had.
I was walking through the lobbywith a CD and one of the other
pastors was like I need that CD,I'm confiscating it.
I was like it got approved andthen the, the Dean of music got
in trouble because it had aslight beat to it and you're not
allowed to have anything with abeat super Christian CD.

(44:44):
But I'm like but they thought itwas like an NSYNC CD, which it
wasn't Cause I brought thosethings to the school being like,
eh, no one's going to care.
And then when I heard theycared so much, they're going to
toss your room, I'm like then Ijust put them at home.
I'm like it's not worth it.
I'm not going to bring thesehere.
I'm not.
I'm not going to get in troubleat school for disobeying the
rules because they don't matter.
It's fine.
I can get to chapel on time.
I can, especially my roommatewakes me up.

(45:06):
I can get dinner done.
I can do my kitchen duty.
It's not a problem, I don'tmind the rules.

Speaker 1 (45:24):
I mind the whole stigma around.
Usually when someone leaves acult there's a lot of
excommunication.
And I've seen this done well inbusiness, where it's like you
know when you're in the group,everything, and as soon as you
leave, it's like you're cut off,cut off from the group.
Other members cut you off, andI've seen that in business and
rightly or wrong.
I've also seen the other thingwhere when you leave, the leader
keeps in contact with you andcontinues the relationship and
usually they end up coming back.
What was your experience likewhen you?

(45:45):
So you mutually agreed that theschool was no longer the right
fit.
But obviously you have friendsthere, you have like
relationships.
Your parents, your grand, yourgrandfather's involved the
founding person of thiscommunity.
So what?
What was that transition like?
How were you treated?
And and uh, you know, what?

Speaker 2 (46:05):
what was the experience?
It was weird.
They said if I don't apologizeto the whole school for
dishonoring my father, mother,for talking to a boy on the
phone, which I agree wasn't theright thing, but it doesn't mean
kicking me out of school,whatever.
It was okay for me to be datingwhen I joined the school, but
not now.
It's.
It doesn't match right.
So they said, take a few days,go home and think about it.
My parents were trying to helpme make the right decision, but
I was like I don't think I'mdone with the school.

(46:26):
I went back to go get my stuffand most of it was stolen.
So I was like in this schoolreally oh, come on, you guys,
missing half my teacups, like mygrandma gave me.
A bunch of my clothes were gone.
I was like man, I stole mystuff.
And then I went back, one ofthe pastors who I had a good
relationship with, the Navy SEALand his wife she actually
passed away and I ended up goingwith one of the girls from the

(46:47):
school to the funeral and abunch of the students came up to
me like they've graduated andthey're like you're still here,
people at the school a lot, andyou know, so I'm here.
You know like, well, youshouldn't be here, because we
all told the dean of uh theschool that all those cosmo
magazines and teen people thatwe found were yours.

(47:08):
I was like why I feel likebecause you weren't there.
I'm like, oh, you know, you dowhat you got to do to survive.

Speaker 1 (47:16):
You became the scapegoat.

Speaker 2 (47:17):
I became the one that all the contraband was.
I never brought any contrabandto the school, but now all of
it's mine.
I'm like, okay, well, you know,it is what it is.

Speaker 1 (47:27):
That said, obviously you know there's a lot of
experience.
It doesn't sound like you had abad experience in terms of like
.
Obviously it probably wasn'tfun, but obviously it probably
wasn't fun, but it doesn't seemlike anything too bad happened
with you.
There wasn't the punishments,although isolating.

(47:48):
They weren't that, you know,abusive in that sense.
Um, when you look at it andobviously you've built
businesses and been part ofbuilding businesses and we've
built businesses together whatelements from that experience,
or even from the Amwayupbringing because Amway has a
lot of a lot of things that Ithink you know a lot of people
are cringing, probably listeningIf I say they have good things.
They do.
A lot of these companies don'tstick around unless they have
good things, like they mighthave bad things, but you have to

(48:10):
do something right in order tostand the test of time.

Speaker 2 (48:12):
Practices are solid.

Speaker 1 (48:14):
What would you, what would you say, were the
positives of growing up in acult and being a part of this
kind of experience?

Speaker 2 (48:21):
Well, the first thing was being in Amway, my dad.
I don't know how, but hemanaged to be the backstage
sound guy and he either figuredit out or he already knew, but
he was really talented at makingsure the sound was perfect for
all the people in the States whodon't know about sound don't
really care.
So now he's back with all thesemultimillionaires that are the
most successful in Amway, karen.
So now he's back, all thesemultimillionaires that are the
most successful in Amway, and wecan go backstage and see our
dad whenever we want.
And then we got to work in thetool room selling the books and

(48:43):
tapes which I read and listenedto, for all those motivational
ones, all those businessbuilding books that we all talk
about.
I read them all when I was 12,13, 14.
And we had the business tapesin the car talking about the
reward and the working hard andlike doing it right.
That's how I was raised withthose other things.
So there's a lot of rules,there's a lot of reward, there's
a lot of punishment, but Iliked.

(49:03):
I liked the happiness.
Everyone was excited to see mydad.
Oh, dave's here Sound guyAwesome.
Oh, it's your Dave's kids,awesome.
Come on back, be with themultimillionaires.
I'm like they're just like cool.
And with multi, multimillionaires, we had a Denny's
at two in the morning.
This is awesome, how specialfor me and I get to learn all

(49:24):
this stuff and I get to see howpowerful and rewarding they can
be in their own lives.
They get to travel when theywant, they get best cars, best
clothes.
I'm like this is awesome, likethey're doing well and they're
happy to sit with us at Denny'sand talk about it and what they
did, right, like it was verypositive.

Speaker 1 (49:39):
I think people get that Like.
Like, when you go to an eventand stuff, right, you got
different levels of tickets andand although, like, your dad was
volunteering, which I think isvery normal in a lot of
situations, and so you know, ifyou're listening, and like
you're a business owner, butmaybe you're a solopreneur or
you're someone that like like,going to events is a really good
place to find people who havewhat you want or have achieved

(50:00):
what you want or what you thinkyou want, and get around it.
And oftentimes it just costsmoney, right, like, if a regular
ticket's $500, maybe you haveto buy a $10,000 ticket, but
with that $10,000 ticket you geta day before with the host, you
get dinners, you get VIP events, you get things like that and
that gives you that interaction.
So that's something that youmentioned.

(50:21):
I think, oh, there's a lesson inthat.
Just that, what else?
What else do you think from allthe experiences?
Like was positive because itdoesn't.
You don't seem to have too muchof a.
Obviously you disagreed, but itwasn't.
It's not like this huge,painful, negative experience for
you by the sounds of it no, Idecided, what if you're punished
me?

Speaker 2 (50:41):
I mean I'll take it if I earned it, but it's not, it
doesn't change me at all.
The rewards didn't change meeither, but they are motivating
me to do this thing or thatthing.
Like I had um worked in alittle specialized boutique
where I would go at 15 and servecake and coffee to an 80 year
old woman who was looking for anew you know, grandmother,
grandmother of the bride dress.
I'm like, sit here, have somecake, I'll bring you several in

(51:01):
your size, what colors do youlike?
And at 15, I'm specializingselling to these older people
that really liked working withme and it taught me that I enjoy
that.
So if I enjoy helping that ladyfind a dress for her
granddaughter's wedding, it wasreally fun.
So the reward system wasmotivating that I know I could
do it.
I actually got hired after beingan intern because I sold so
well and the woman that was theboss was teaching me about the

(51:24):
sales, the hiring, the sales tax, the property tax, all of the
liabilities insurances, all ofit.
She decided to teach me aboutbusiness because my mom got me
the job there when she asked mewhat I wanted to do, I wanted to
own a business.
Mom's like, ok, go learn.
No, we've been learning ourwhole life and I think that the
fact that people get driven downby the negative of you get

(51:45):
kicked out or you're a failurelike I don't understand any of
that, why Don't let it get toyou?

Speaker 1 (51:49):
Well, a lot of people , especially in a religious
setting, they're more likely torun away from hell than they are
to run towards heaven.
Right, if you tell someone'slike bad, like, like uh, trying
to think, like when my kid, whenshe's climbing, like if I'm
scared, like and I have fearthat she's going to fall and
hurt herself, cause I understand, like the height she's at and
the danger that's there, I don'ttry to give pain a positive

(52:12):
picture for her.
You know, I try to paint anegative picture, thinking that
it might get her to come down.
Oftentimes it doesn't work.
She just knows it's my fear andshe's like whatever, um, you
know, but if I'm like, oh, youknow, come on down, we get ice
cream.
If you come down, like, like,she's not going to change her
perception, right?
So oftentimes I think negativeis used, um for, for reasons

(52:33):
like that.
But I do think that you know,at the same time there is a way
to do it from a place of loveand that, and especially, you
know, from my understanding andmy beliefs, like God is is a
loving God.
He's not a God who's punishedme.
He's not a God, it's like.
I don't buy into that, but alot of people do and I think
that that's kind of the thingyou have to play into and I
think really, like there'sdifferent styles and and you

(52:56):
know, as a leader you have tokind of pick and choose what
they are.
But if you want to be inbusiness for a long time, like
it is probably better to figureout how to operate from a place
of love and abundance than it isfrom fear and hate, right, um
and negative.
Because I think long-termmotivation, short-term
motivation, oftentimes ismotivated by fear.
But it's kind of like thatwhole saying you know, sell them

(53:17):
what they, what they what theywant, give them what they want,
give them what they need.
So maybe you have to use someof that in the front end to get
them in, because that's what'sgoing to get them to action.
But, like, long term, you haveto be at a pivot mindset and get
them to stay for reasons beyondthe fear.
Because if someone's operatingfrom fear, shame or guilt, like
they're always in a state ofscarcity, and when they're in a

(53:39):
state of scarcity you can neveroperate at your best self, and
cults obviously want people inthat state because they want to
be able to control them.
And I think that the problemwhen you're a business and you
do that is eventually it breaks.
Eventually it breaks, peopleleave, you're exposed, and you
just have to look at all thedocumentaries and all the things
out there.
The outcome at the end is nevergood, right, and I mean some of

(54:02):
these guys even will getexposed and then they go to a
new place and start it all overagain.
So it's not like humans don'tfall for this stuff.
It's not like this stuff's notgoing to work.
It's just a case of what do youwant to build your business on?
And if you want a businessthat's going to go beyond you,
you want to build a legacythat's able to be passed down or
sold.
It's probably not a good way tooperate in this negative space,

(54:24):
so I think that's important.

Speaker 2 (54:25):
That's one of the inconsistencies.
If you say, hey, gambling's aproblem, If you go gambling,
there goes your family's money,your kid's school money, all the
things that you're going toruin your family by becoming a
gambling addict, they're correct.
That's a fear thing.
So then you see your bestfriend buddy go and win two
grand on the football game.
You're like you know he's allright, he didn't blow his friend
, Maybe I'll try it.
It's that temptation leadingyou down the path of the

(54:46):
gambling addict.
So the fear didn't stop you.
Because you saw theinconsistency when you've based
it on the reward, you understand.
If it's the religion, it's thatGod forgave you for the worst
thing you could ever do.
It's the grace that you'reliving with is so much more
natural and fulfilling to wantto do the right thing than want
to do the right thing and belike he'll forgive me.
That's not because you'll falldown that gambling path.
You're going to go do the wrongthing over and over and over

(55:07):
again.
Now you're so far from thegrace aspect.
You've lost view.

Speaker 1 (55:11):
You said something earlier and you said it again in
the rules, and there was a lackof consistency that made you
immediately start to questionthings even more.
I think, as a business owner,if you are going to put in core
values or you're going to put ina community guidelines,
whatever it is, you have to bewilling to live and die by those

(55:32):
.
And what I mean is is, ifsomeone doesn't fit you, ha, you
can't bend it for people, and Ithink that's what you saw and
what you're getting Like.
The lack of the inconsistenciescreate exposure and create
problems right.
So if you are going to say youknow, if you don't, like I have
a friend who I gamified hiscoaching program and if you fail

(55:56):
to do the task, like, and thesepeople sign up for this, it's
not like they're unaware andsuddenly, but it's a daily thing
.

Speaker 2 (56:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (56:02):
They have to do stuff daily.
And if you fail to do the stuffdaily, you get locked out and
you have to then complete it toget allowed back in.
If you do that three times,you're removed from the program.
No refunds, right, and it hascreated an immense completion
rate of his course.
Right, because people want theaccountability that's part of
the process, you know.
But if he allowed someone whofailed three times to then come

(56:26):
back in the course, it ruins thewhole thing.
And so it's tough because,clearly, if you kick someone out
who's paid money and do notallow them back, they're not
going to be happy about it.
Right, they get, and they'regoing to make a lot of, they're
going to make a lot of noise.
But having that level ofdiscipline to follow the rules
you set out is so important,even down to like when people

(56:47):
say, hey, the sale ends atmidnight Monday the 31st and
then you go there.

Speaker 2 (56:55):
You know Tuesday and it's the sale still on, you know
.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
Tuesday and it's the sale still on.
You now question everything,right, and it's these, in
today's day and age, it's thissubconscious communication,
things that are happening, thataren't said, but it like reveals
a lot, right, and we've all hadthose emails from internet
marketers where it's like, oh,the site crashed.

(57:18):
We're extending the sale onemore day.
And it's like, when?
When did the site crash?
Show me the crash report, CauseI know it's not, it's a tactic.
Right, In the beginning thosethings worked because it was new
.
But when you've gotten one fromthree different people, you
start to realize, oh, wait aminute, this is just a tactic,
this is not the truth.
And as soon as you create umdoubt with a buyer or potential

(57:43):
buyer, it makes a sale that muchharder.
So you know, once you've soldthem, to keep them in the
community, to keep them a partof the tribe which, hopefully,
is going to strengthen thebusiness, and you know
reoccurring sales and thingslike that, you have to be
consistent, not just in the salebut in the community, and you
have to be willing to live anddie on the rules you set forth

(58:03):
or you can't have the rules.

Speaker 2 (58:05):
I don't mind the rules.
Like I said, I didn't mind whenI was late for chapel.
If I could kitchen duty duringbedtime, yeah, too easy to get
up on time.
Absolutely, I know the rules.
I for some reason didn't getthere.
But the attitude of you have tobe at chapel half an hour early
tomorrow because you failed,that's fine too.
I know the rules and I didn'tabide.
You should say, oh, you have tohave extra devotions because
you didn't make chapel on time.
Yeah, you're making it an issuein my head and heart.

(58:26):
You don't know anything aboutand you don't get a say.
So now I have an issue with theconsequences.
But when it's just a real thing, if you say, hey, we're, and
then it is and someone doesn'tget it, that's a consequence of
their own actions and that'sokay.
People don't mind consequence.
If you're speeding, you get aticket.
You can be mad all you want,but you're getting the ticket,
you know the rules and you justdecided to go over the limit

(58:48):
anyway.
So it's like that's thedifference.
That's a consistency thing.
When I look at the way that theschool I was in was working,
they, they made everything thatyou're wrong and your heart
issue and you're going to hell,like you have to be straightened
out.
It's like no, no, no, no, it'sa mistake.
So there's consequences foryour actions.
That's fine, and I acceptedthem.
When they said you shouldapologize to school, you're out,

(59:09):
and I was like pack my shit.

Speaker 1 (59:11):
Yeah, I think honestly, we'll start to wrap it
up, but I think the biggestthing I have taken away
listening to you is, if you'retrying to build a tribe, really,
what we talked about today isall the things you shouldn't do
in terms, because because it iswhat drove you away right, you
were putting into environmentand it from what you're saying,

(59:32):
you were very open to a lot ofstuff, but it was the
inconsistencies, it was, it wasthe punishment that didn't match
the the crime, right, like youknow, if you drop a piece of
trash, you got arrested and putin jail for three years.

Speaker 2 (59:43):
That's a little excessive.

Speaker 1 (59:45):
And you know, you end up with clean sidewalks.
But the first person who getspunished it's probably over the
top, right.
And so my point is is, if youhave a community or you have a
group and you're wondering whypeople aren't sticking on,
you're wondering why you can'tretain members, maybe you start
to look at some of theinconsistencies in the product,
inconsistencies in the community.

(01:00:05):
It's logic, because it's, itseems like a lot of time, a lot
of things for you is like.
I mean, you even went back.
So it wasn't like you were likeI got to get out of this place.
There was a lot you liked, youknow, because, again, this is- I
signed up for the rules.

Speaker 2 (01:00:18):
I understand the rules.
When they were nuanced with,however, someone was feeling.
I was like, no, I'm not havingit.
But the reward, consequence,behavior thing was generally I
was fine with.
These are the rules I signed upfor.
Oh well, it's what I've chosento go do, so I'm going to do my
best.
But when they come and say, hey, you were late for chapel, you
get a punishment.
And say, hey, you were late forchapel, you get a punishment
and said, hey, is there a reasonyou were late?

(01:00:39):
Did your alarm clock break?
Do we need to get you a new one?
How do you need help with this?
Is this a prayer issue?
Are you just not wanting to goto chapel?
Are you angry at God for somereason?
That's a whole different issuewe should go to chapel extra for
.
But it wasn't a.
The attitude of even the deanof women was to make sure it's

(01:01:03):
the right length, like theydidn't give you the benefit of a
doubt in your own attitude andyour own heart issue.

Speaker 1 (01:01:06):
For me it was a huge, not a chance.
You know, all those littlethings are done for control,
because if you can't do thoselittle things, they can't
control you on the big well,they didn't do that either so
you know that, yeah, butobviously reasons why your
worldview going in wascompletely different.
If you had been indoctrinated inthat thought process from
childhood always had to haveyour ankles covered, you would

(01:01:26):
have.
You would have had been soself-conscious you would have
never allowed your ankles toshow because you weren't raised
that way.
Like you put your dress on andmaybe it's a little shorter
because you've grown, and you'relike all right, whatever,
because, like, your mind's notin a, in a.
This is a horrible thing.
I'm going to go to hell becauseI'm enticing men and they're
going to want to attack me orwhatever.
So, but again, it's like youlook at how other cultures

(01:01:50):
indoctrinate their people intofollowing rules that in the West
we don't necessarily agree with.
And it's from childhood, right,like you don't have agree with.
And it's from childhood, right,like you, you don't have.
You don't have a lot of peoplewho are converting to terrorist
organizations in their forties,right, they're usually, they're
usually a part of it.
Something crazy has to happenfor that.
But but like most of the time,these people are raised in these

(01:02:16):
situations.
It's the same of racism andthings like that.
Nobody's choosing at 20 tosuddenly be racist, like, oh, I
haven't been racist my wholelife, but I think that's the way
I want to go, like normally,it's an indoctrination.
They're grown up that way,those beliefs are imprinted on
them and so they don't have theother side.
And when the other side ispresented to them, you know many
people have converted, havegiven that up because they see
the lack of logic in theirthinking.

Speaker 2 (01:02:37):
Well, we had some of it that I agreed with, like my
mom and dad's like no spaghettistraps, no matter what, and I
was like that's weird, but okay,I feel like it was modest
enough and I snuck one in onetime when I was a senior in high
school, but that's.
I was like now that I'm aparent too, I get it Like, oh,
you want some modesty rules, andeven my mom, high school you're
taking it off.
I was like, oh, okay, so we canput it on, but it's not

(01:02:59):
overbearing and overwhelming.
Trying to make a statement Likedad said no dark nail polish.
I was like why he goes?
It looks like you're trying tobe a goth.
We don't believe in fear anddeath.
You're going to be saved and goto heaven, but we do believe.
It looks like you're trying toact rebellious and gothy.
So I don't like it.
It wasn't a Bible thing, itwasn't.
You're sinning by cutting yourhair, you can.
But he's like, oh, I wish itwas longer.

(01:03:19):
I was like, well, I got it nowand I like it too.

Speaker 1 (01:03:22):
Yeah, that was the big mistake.
If your dad's principle is wedon't believe in fear and death,
and then you go to a schoolthat everything is fear and
death.
I can see the difficulty.

Speaker 2 (01:03:35):
No, we live by grace.
We made mistakes and a lot oftimes, if my parents talked to
us, there was a consequence foryour actions.
You're getting up at two toclean the kitchen, or my dad
would sit down with us and belike, listen, we're going to
pray about it, we're going totalk about it.
You know where is this comingfrom?
Like they're curious on whatwe're doing wrong.
Is it an actual issue they haveto talk to us about?
Or is it just a mistake?
Or we didn't think clearly whatwe were doing at the time?
Because we're kids.

(01:03:55):
Don't steal the golf course.
Man should have known Stealingis wrong.
You're right, that's bad.

Speaker 1 (01:04:01):
Look how that turned out.
Is there anything else like fora business owner listening, you
know, when you're looking atcults and cult principles.
Is there anything else youthink or things you wanted to
share today that we haven'ttouched on?

Speaker 2 (01:04:13):
I think it's been extraordinarily negative.
It was my school upbringing wasvery negative in that regard
and it gave me that vision ofwhen it came out later, the
whole you know happy, shinypeople, documentary and the
Duggars and all the stuff thatfollowed the rules that I
actually don't agree with.
That made sense to me.
That now it's been labeled acult, whatever, but when it
started the principles weregreat and it was to help others
and help you have the mostsuccessful, best life.

(01:04:34):
So the same thing with theEmily thing and the way that we
help people run businesses.
When somebody asked us on ourpodcast last season how do you
determine the price point ofyour course?
It's like well, you understandyour value per hour, what you're
giving to that client.
If they do follow the course,go to the event, get motivated,
If they learn something thatwill bring $10,000 into their
business, that $10,000 ticketwas worth buying.

(01:04:55):
It was worth being there,because now you're going to make
that 10,000 over and over andover again by something you've
learned.

Speaker 1 (01:05:00):
Yeah, I think you know, and just to finish that
thought, it's the value oftransformation you know, in when
you understand, when you havethe thing the person wants.
Well, you have the path to thething the person wants.
Well, you have the path to thething the person wants.
Sometimes, you know you have tobe willing to show them because

(01:05:26):
they might not know.
They don't know what they don'tknow, and so the price of your
product you know what's fair,based on the value of the
transformation and, depending onhow you look at it, it's going
to change right, because you canlook at it as a gym membership.
You know average gym membershipwhat 29 to 15, 49, 99 at a big
box gym.

(01:05:46):
But let's just say that someonewho gets a gym membership and
then starts working out loses ahundred pounds, gains a ton of
confidence, meets the love ofthe life, has three children
like they're an amazing dad.
Their children grow up, theyhave grandchildren.
Ask them what they would havepaid for that life.
Then the $49.99 a month ispennies, right, and so that's

(01:06:10):
why you have gyms that are$150,000 a year.
And the environment.
Maybe they have a betterstructured way to get you there.
Maybe they have more helpbeyond just the workout right,
nutrition, recovery like mental,all the different stuff, the
holistic approach.
So it's very important tounderstand a lot of these things

(01:06:30):
, especially like cult buildingprinciples.
The reason you do want to lookat it as a business owner is
because what you're trying to do, hopefully, with your products
is you're, is you're trying tochange someone's life, and that
goes even for, like that's thedifference the one pastor
downstairs who's running theschool that works from home, or
the the the church in thebuilding.

Speaker 2 (01:06:51):
I was always after you to show you that his kids
are best or you're going to getin trouble if he catches you
doing something wrong.
And I was like I don't evenlike you.
You're obviously doing thingswrong we don't know about and
we'll never know about and Idon't want to know about.
He was like, came off as likeslimy, controlling, manipulative
, kiss ass to Bill Gothard whenhe walked in the door.
And then, you know, papaShoemaker, who called himself
Papa Shoe instead of the dean ofthe school, was like hey, you

(01:07:16):
know the rules, come on, you getkitchen duty now.
Now you get kitchen duty, getup for chapel.
Tomorrow they get a different.
He's not trying to control you,he's like trying to keep you
accountable.
This person is trying to be adick to you and control you and
show that he's better.
You can tell, though, now whenyou go to a business meeting.
If you're looking at a seminar,you can know that those people
on stage are either trying, whenyou start to feel a person out,

(01:07:37):
where they're coming from.
So I say it's logic andmotivation and reward versus
fear.
But when you do go and talkabout the fear, if it's for your
benefit, it's still good.
Go to the gym, eat less breadAll those things are good rules.
If you eat the bread well, nowonder your scale didn't drop.
Bread's delicious, but that'show I got to know.
That helped me the most inbusiness is human behavior.
When I go meet someone in theroom if it's a seminar of 50

(01:08:04):
people we've been in many andspoken we go meet all the people
that we just talked in front ofand told them how to run
somewhat of a decent business.
When somebody is asking usquestions, you can feel if
they're trying to take somethingfrom you, if they're trying to
manipulate you or get you togive them something, or you can
tell when someone's genuinelythankful that you talked, has
questions for you, are trying tobetter themselves and you now
want to help them.
It's a different dynamic and sobeing raised, the way that I
was raised, taught me so muchabout human behavior and that
you understand where thatperson's probably coming from,

(01:08:27):
without judging them Like, oh,that's not for me.
They probably are in adifferent mind state than I want
to be a part of.

Speaker 1 (01:08:32):
Yeah, yeah, I think it's good to look at stuff and I
think if you're an ethicalperson, you can figure out how
to use it for good, you know.
It's why I like to studyeverything that I can.
When it comes to certain things, I like both.
You do a lot, but I like bothsides of perspective.
I don't want to like, I don'twant just to follow one bias.
I want to hear the other sideand sometimes it's just to like,

(01:08:53):
solidify my idea.
Like they're wrong, like.
But I want to hear youropinions because I want to
understand why I'm wrong.
And, interestingly enough,typically what I find is we're
actually closer to the middlethan people realize.
We just have a different, umway of applying the knowledge.
So we have a different.
We disagree on the application,but when you actually look at

(01:09:14):
it, we both actually believe thesame knowledge.
Like we have the samefoundation.
We just like.
And look at the denominationsin church right, same text, same
belief system, completelydifferent application across,
across, like most denominations,right and um.
I don't know why I went there,but my, my point with that was

(01:09:34):
just simply that oftentimes weactually agree more than we
disagree.
I think if you have an ethicalcompass, you can learn all about
these cult principles andyou'll figure out how to use
them in your business, becausethere's power to it, there's a
reason it works and, like yousaid, it comes back to human
behavior.

Speaker 2 (01:09:49):
Every 10.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:09:51):
All right, everyone.
I think that's it for thisepisode of Paid to Create.
Make sure you like, subscribewhatever channel you're on
YouTube, spotify, itunes.
We'll see you next time.

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