September 2, 2024 • 60 mins
What if letting go is the key to unlocking your true potential? Join us on this episode of the Bamboo Lab Podcast as we sit down with Richard Adams, a resilient financial advisor from Charlotte, North Carolina. Richard's journey from a small-town upbringing with a population of just 150 to his current success is nothing short of inspiring. Raised by a single mother after his father left at 13, Richard faced numerous educational and personal challenges that shaped his character and career.
Richard opens up about the transformative power of shedding emotional baggage and unhealthy relationships. He shares profound insights from his own experiences, emphasizing how releasing what no longer serves us can lead to significant growth. The conversation touches on the importance of vulnerability and the strength found in building a supportive network. Richard's personal anecdotes and hard-earned wisdom provide a compelling narrative on the necessity of collaboration and emotional support in achieving professional and personal success.
Listeners will be captivated by Richard's reflections on pivotal moments of self-realization and the importance of continuous self-challenge. From his baseball days to his early career struggles, Richard illustrates how feedback and discipline have driven him to his true potential. This episode also delves into the rewarding experience of helping others achieve their dreams and the profound fulfillment that comes from it. Richard's story is a testament to the fact that success isn't just about economic gain but also the joy found in positively impacting others' lives. Tune in for an episode packed with valuable lessons on growth, resilience, and the power of community.
https://bamboolab3.com/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello and welcome to the Bamboo Lab Podcast with your
host, peak Performance Coach,brian Bosley.
Are you stuck on the hamsterwheel of life, spinning and
spinning but not really movingforward?
Are you ready to jump off andsoar?
Are you finally ready to sculptyour life?
If so, you've landed in theright place.
(00:21):
This podcast is created andbroadcast just for you, all of
you strivers, thrivers andsurvivors out there.
If you'd like to learn moreabout Brian and the Bamboo Lab,
feel free to reach out toexplore your true peak level at
wwwbamboolab3.com.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Welcome everyone to this week's episode of the
Bamboo Lab Podcast.
I am your host, brian, andtoday we have a really
interesting, unique fella on theshow.
I've known Richard Adams nowfor four and a half years.
I got the privilege of meetinghim at a company Christmas party
Well 2019, I believe it was inDecember and I instantly struck
(01:05):
by this guy's energy and hisdrive.
So I've had the pleasure oftalking to Ricky quite often
over the past four and a halfyears and I asked him to come on
and he thankfully took time outof his busy schedule to join in
.
So a little bit about Ricky.
Well, ricky Richard.
Richard is a 30-year-oldfinancial advisor out of
Charlotte, north Carolina, wherehe was born and raised in the
area.
Currently, he is the owner ofhis own branch of CG Financial.
(01:29):
With the encouragement of TonyMazzelli and Jeff Casey, the
founders of the company, heleads both his clients and
employees through the journey offinding financial independence
and security.
With a focus on authenticityand I like this part and a
refusal to conform to theindustry norms.
He's been able to find successand happiness in being a
financial advisor.
He's got a ton of numbers oralphabets after his title very
(01:51):
accredited Really cool thing,though, he was named by the
National Association of PlanAdvisors as a top 100 retirement
plan advisor under 40.
When Richard's not working, heis an avid sports fan, loves to
travel to the beach and isgetting annoyed by his dog,
ramsey.
He's also an aspiring home chefand grill master and he hopes
one day this is something I justfound out today to be a jet ski
(02:13):
tour guide in the Caribbean.
Richard Adams, my friend,welcome to the Bamboo Lab
podcast.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Glad to be here, Brian.
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
How come you never told me about the aspiration to
be a jet ski tour guide?
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Man.
I don't think many people knowthat, but it's definitely on the
retirement list of when I'mdone with this.
I'm going to go out, get acouple and just take people
around an island all day andthen be every day Saturday at
that point.
So that's the plan.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
That's cool.
Well, I'm here to tell you.
A lot of people know about itnow.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
I think so.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
All right.
So obviously I call you Rickymost often.
So, folks, Richard, Ricky,you'll hear me go back and forth
.
Ricky, I know a lot about you.
I've gotten to know you verywell over the past almost five
years now.
But can you please share withthe audience members out there a
little bit about yourself?
Speaker 3 (03:08):
your childhood, growing up, your family, who or
what inspired you?
Yeah, absolutely so.
Born and raised in Charlotteand for those of you that don't
know why that's a big deal.
You never find someonebasically born and raised in
Charlotte.
Everybody's kind of a you knowa melting pot here and you see
people from New York, new Jersey, florida, you name it.
(03:29):
Everyone comes here.
But I was actually born andraised Um funny story about me.
Um family structure on eitherside mom or dad wasn't extremely
strong.
So since I can remember it'sjust really been me and my mom.
My dad was around for forbasically the first 13 years of
life and then after that greenerpastures came and took him away
and he decided to to uh pursueother, um, I guess, adventures
(03:51):
in life and then had some, youknow, have brothers and sisters
not by my mom and dad, by, um,you know, kind of uh mixed
families.
And then you know you get kindof used to doing your own thing
because you didn't grow uparound many people.
So that's kind of my firstintroduction of who I've started
to become is you got used tobeing alone, kind of a very
(04:13):
interesting part about me.
I don't think anyone knows thisother than one person.
The first 13 years of my life Ilived in an extremely small town
.
One grocery store, onevolunteer fire department at one
church.
That's really all we had forthe first 13 years of life, and
if there was more than 150people in this town I would be
extremely shocked.
Um, one of the gentlemen thatlived behind us said that when
(04:35):
he was 10 or 11 that he used torun to the front door when he
heard a car coming, because youwould only see two to three a
week.
I mean, that's how's how smallthis town was.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, a lot of people didn't.
And then we actually had to usea fake address for me of a
family friend for me to go toanother school district.
The one that I would have beenappointed to was not the
greatest from a public schoolstandpoint.
So my mom would take me backand forth 30 minutes one way
(05:07):
every single day and we wereusing a fake address.
So that was kind of the schoolside of things.
Then once the summers came,pretty lonely, because you can't
have friends over.
At that point If you get foundout that you're not living in a
school district you're prettymuch kicked out.
So summers was just workingwith my dad in the garden, which
was a quarter of an acre, halfan acre, and then, um, my mom
(05:30):
would take me to baseballpractice.
But again, again, when you lookat the formative years of my
life, it was a lot of alone time, right.
So you know you fast forward acouple years.
Dad moved on to greenerpastures.
As I said, after a severe headinjury um that I uh had during
baseball, um thought I was 10foot tall and bulletproof at 13,
14.
Ball caught me behind the earwhile I was still in batting
(05:53):
practice and it really, uh,really damaged me at that point
in time.
So that was a.
It was a pretty critical moment, um, from life there on,
because then it started toreally clue in that life is not
as simple as you want it to be.
Almost immediately going tofreshman, sophomore year of high
school, my mom gets sick over asimple hysterectomy gone wrong.
(06:15):
Fast forward, a lot of thatpart basically just doctor made
a bad move and she was in andout of the hospital quite a bit.
So then again it goes back tobeing alone a lot, 14, 15, 16
years old, didn't really haveanyone around because she was in
and out of the hospital.
And then around that time Istarted going through life and I
had to give up baseball.
(06:36):
Um, I just could not get pastthe head injury you know people
call it the yips or whateverthat may be and kind of um
athletic terms but at the end ofthe day I just had to give it
up.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
And you were pretty good weren't you.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
I would like to think so.
I mean, there was a point intime where I definitely thought
I'd play at the next level,being collegiate.
I don't know if pro was aheadof me.
I got to play against some guysthat are in the major leagues
now and I don't know if thatwould have been my kind of
career path, but I mostcertainly probably would have
played at the collegiate level.
(07:11):
So that was tough to give up.
I mean, that was my first,second, third love.
So giving up baseball was toughand it was really a crossroads.
So I went through a majoridentity crisis when that
happened.
So when you talk about truepeak identity, I had one
identity.
It was really a crossroads, soI went through a major identity
crisis when that happened.
So when you talk about truepeak identity, I had one
identity.
It was a baseball player.
That's all I ever knew.
And you go through that andyour prior friends were still
(07:34):
playing baseball and we prettymuch stopped talking almost
immediately, like they're doingtheir thing.
I had moved into Mooresville atthat time because after my dad
left, we were no longer livingin the small town.
We actually had to move intothe school district.
At that point.
Tom was very lonely.
Your friends that you had grewup with and played baseball with
(07:56):
.
Through that time they're gone.
Then a still friend of mine,tyler Bell, who I hope is
listening to this.
He really saved my life becausehe included me in almost
everything and he really helpedme understand the value of a
community.
And if you fast forward some ofmy story you start to see where
I started realizing where youcan't just be alone all the time
(08:18):
.
But not all of it is sad.
I mean I applied myself in theclassroom, was accepted at UNC
Charlotte, I got a full ridebetween academic and needs-based
scholarship, which was great,and then now I am on your
podcast speaking to you and I'ma professional.
So not all of it was sad.
(08:38):
Definitely was eye-opening attimes and it helped me get here.
But yeah, that's a little bitabout me and kind of my family
upbringing and how I got to thispoint.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
I've learned two or three things about you since you
called in today that I didn'tknow.
After four and a half years,Maybe I should just put every
client on the podcast within thefirst month of coaching them,
get everything out and then gofrom there.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Like I told you, some of my equipment was going to
fall Absolutely side of somepretty driven people.
You're definitely at the top.
You're in the top five.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
Who or what inspired you or does inspire you to do
that?
Yeah, I mean, when you gothrough life and you see some
turmoil, you can go back to someof the books that you've had me
read.
The Obstacle is the Way, orwhat inspired me the most.
One of the people was my mom,for sure.
I mean she truly tried to makeit a better life, and no parent
is perfect, right, I mean Idon't think anybody's ever going
(09:52):
to get on the show and say Ihad a perfect parent.
They might, but I really saw mymom just from start to finish,
even when my dad was away.
She saw me through everythingLosing baseball, starting,
starting college, starting acareer, um, making sure I always
had transportation, a roof andand and food on the plate and
food on the table, which washuge.
(10:13):
I mean, when you don't have toworry about some of those, you
know hierarchy and needs, thefirst levels there, it allows
you to focus on you and then itbecame a you know, do I want all
this to be my excuse for mystory, and for a long time and
when you first met me I'm sureyou could echo this statement I
was.
I think I let a lot of anger inwhat happened to me fuel me to
(10:34):
say you know, I'm not thatperson I'm going to show them.
And a lot of that came from justsaying you know, I was forgot
about life, I had to give upbaseball too quickly and I just
I kept a chip on my shoulderthat sometimes probably didn't
need to be there but was there.
And then the drive came from.
I was just so done making anexcuse of why I couldn't go on a
(10:58):
vacation or why I couldn't dothe things I wanted to do, and I
told myself you can work yourway out of this hole.
You might not want to and itmight be hard work.
You absolutely can do that.
Then I fast forward and look atsome of the other people that
were formative.
You know, all of the men andwomen at CG Financial definitely
helped me to get to where I wasat.
I mean, I look at my firstinterview, and it was with Matt
(11:21):
O'Neill, and I came to theinterview in a black suit with
brown belt, brown shoes.
We want to talk about a work inprogress.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
I think I would still do that today.
I don't know fashion, so I'mgoing to take your word for it,
that's oh it was, it was.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
uh, I was a misfit for sure.
I mean I remember him asking mewhat skills do you have?
And I said I really do not haveskills, I just work really hard
.
I don't.
I don't have, I don't haveskills.
I I said I really do not haveskills, I just work really hard.
I don't, I don't have, I don'thave skills.
I just know that I can come towork and do what I'm told and
work really hard at it.
And you just had a lot of peoplearound you that dared you to
dream big.
And I was never asked to dreamresponsibly in life, which I
(12:00):
think helped me out a lot.
I was asked to dream as big asI wanted to, and I think that
was huge for me as well is thatI was allowed to dream as big as
I want to, and the world waskind of my oyster at that point
and I could look at it and saythis is what I want.
And between my mom and thepeople at CG, they allowed me to
work as hard as I wanted to,didn't hold me back.
(12:21):
And you know, I sit here now,um, some eight years later,
thinking to myself wow, withoutthem, where would I be?
Speaker 2 (12:29):
Ricky, I remember when I was, when we were in
Grand Rapids, when I first metyou and I obviously I knew I was
going to be coming into thecompany to do some consulting
and coaching.
So obviously you know Tony hadinvited me to the company
Christmas party and I was livingin Grand Rapids so it was very
convenient.
So I remember going aroundobviously talking to Tony and
(12:51):
Jeff and Dave Robinson and allthe people I had known prior,
and then I was getting a drinkat the bar and you came up to me
and I don't think you left myside the rest of the night.
Speaker 3 (13:04):
I remember that you were stuck to me like stink.
On't think you left my side therest of the night.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I mean you were I remember that you were stuck to
me like stink on a turd man andI'm like at a point, like this
guy.
I told Tony, what in the hell?
Who is this guy?
He's most intense man I've evermet and uh, lo and behold,
you're on my, one of my firstpeople with the company that I
got the privilege of workingwith.
So it that that was a big uhsign for me that you were going
(13:26):
to be successful.
At that time you were alreadysuccessful.
For what?
25 years old or whatever.
But the steps you've taken in,not just your professional
growth and your financial growth, but what I've seen from you is
such a huge leap in yourpersonal development over the
past few years.
I mean just almost miraculous,the transformations you've made.
So, man, kudos to you.
(13:46):
You're still that intense guy.
You at least now you're notfollowing a bald guy around in a
, in a company party.
You're actually chasing off bigclients and COIs and chasing
after them.
So, um, richard, what do youthink?
You've had some big changes inthe last several months of your
life.
You know, obviously youbranched out on your own as a
(14:08):
branch of CG Financial.
I think you've got a prettyamazing woman in your life.
If I'm not mistaken, you justyou've changed a lot.
You've hired Lucky.
Who not gotten kudos to you?
She's incredible.
What do you?
Speaker 3 (14:25):
think your biggest learning has been as of late?
Yeah, that's the, that's themillion dollar question there.
To say the biggest, it's hardbecause I've learned so much and
you know I would honestly saythat what I learned is you
cannot keep things in your lifeonce their reason has been
fulfilled, once their reason hasbeen fulfilled, and I had such
(14:46):
a hard time letting go ofanything.
Right, it was almost like yousay, all the time driving around
with your emergency brake, butit's almost.
You know, a rocket ship has toshed so many things to get to
its final destination and Iwould hold on to so much baggage
, whether it was bad, you knowbad things that happened to me.
(15:08):
Uh, potentially people, um,sometimes, you know, wanting to
have recognition or job title,whatever that may be, and, um,
you know, I've seen it the mostwith personal relationships,
whether that's friends orsomeone you think it's a partner
, and definitely the job,positions and roles.
Everything has a purpose or areason to be around, for sure.
(15:30):
But when you hold on to it pastthat reason, the law of
diminishing returns kicks in,and it kicks in quickly and then
it starts to deteriorate allthe progress you made.
So for me, when I look at themost impactful learning.
You can call it a monkey trap,like I said, driving with your
(15:50):
emergency brake on.
Whatever you want to call it itreally comes down to has this
object, activity, person,whatever served its intended
purpose?
And if it has, you have to behonest enough with yourself to
say you cannot confuse movementwith progress.
It's time to let go and moveforward.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
Okay, I want to stop just for a minute.
I want to reiterate to theaudience out there what you just
said, because I think there's alot of power in those
statements.
So what Richard just said is Ilike this right here you cannot
keep things in your life oncetheir reason has been fulfilled.
So I want everyone out therethink about the things maybe
people, maybe it's old bad ideas, baggage, emotional mental
(16:32):
baggage, spiritual baggage, oldprocesses or systems, whatever
it might be in your life and askyourself has their reason in my
life been fulfilled?
Because, like Richard said,everything has a purpose.
But many of those things, at acertain point they reach a point
of diminishing return and ittakes a lot of balls and courage
to be able to say, to cut thestring and say I'm done with
that, now I'm going on tosomething better.
(16:54):
And we're not talking aboutlove them and leave them, type
things with women or men.
Obviously, some relationshipsserve their purpose, but a lot
of it's just the emotionalbaggage and mental baggage we
carry in life and some of thosethings that we once, that now no
longer serve a purpose, at onetime might have been the most
important thing to you.
You know I always tell the storyand I sometimes, when I speak
(17:15):
in a crowd, I wear this old it'skind of a satin, looks like a
bowling jacket, but it's my highschool football team.
It just says Saints on the backof it.
I remember when I was afreshman I got that jacket.
It was the most.
I loved it.
I wore that all the time otherthan the warmest days of summer.
I was so proud of that thing.
And about seven, eight years agoI was in my mom's attic and I
(17:36):
dug it out and again, this wasmy most prized possession in my
early high school years.
You know, until I earned myletter jacket and I put it on.
I have a couple of pictures ofme.
I can't even button the darnthing.
My shoulders are obviouslybigger, my stomach's bigger
Hopefully my chest is a littlebit bigger than at 15 years old
(17:56):
and I thought this is a perfectexample of something that was so
valuable to me now, so precious, or was at that time, in the
early 1980s, so precious to me,so valuable Today, if I wear it
in public I would look like adamn fool, and that's really
what you're saying.
It served its purpose.
There was a point ofdiminishing return.
I still have it because I useit as a prop when I speak, but
(18:19):
it's not something I ever wearin public or around my house, so
I think that's incrediblypowerful.
Do you think you've learnedthat, richard, more in the last
year, or is that somethingyou've been learning over the
past several years?
Speaker 3 (18:33):
I think that you understand how to articulate it
in your mind.
You definitely learn it overtime.
You understand how toarticulate it in your mind, Like
you definitely learn it overtime, but you don't understand
how to apply it to a situationand over the last year I learned
it more of.
It's just life, right, and youcannot hang on to things that
(18:56):
could hurt you, and it becomesdecision time and something
that's through therapy.
It'll be a little bitvulnerable here.
I mean, you know, you go totherapy, you learn that you're
not 10 foot tall and bulletproof, which was hard for me to hear,
Um, and then, and then youstart realizing, yeah, you know,
this is the issue and you haveto move on.
So I think I learned how toapply the logic over time.
(19:16):
Of course you you're doing it,but I think I learned how to
apply it and just put things ina silo over the last year.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Well, you had mentioned the term monkey trap,
so I just want to steer theaudience members out there too.
If you want to go back toFebruary 21st and 28th of 2022,
and actually March 7th as well,I did three podcast shows on the
concept of the monkey trap andwhat that means, so I'd refer
back to one of our earliest Ithink it's in the first 10 or 10
or 11 shows.
(19:47):
We did three episodes on monkeytrap.
So thanks for bringing that up.
All right, ricky, this is amillion dollar question.
Actually, this is a question.
I think that really, I audiencemembers identify with this very
well.
They connect with you throughthis question.
Oftentimes, they learn a greatdeal through this question and
answer what do you think is oneof the most difficult things
(20:08):
you've ever gone through in yourlife and what did you do to
overcome it and scale the wall?
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Yeah, um, yeah, that is a good question.
I believe it or not, it's notanything that happened in my
youth.
I kind of come to terms withthat, but I would say the most
difficult thing that I've beenthrough was having to admit that
it was time to really grow upand start over.
On a few things where I hadthis utopic mindset of man, I
(20:38):
filled up the struggle meter andnow it's nothing but success
and freedom and easy living fromthis point, because, you know,
in my mind it's.
I come out of 2021 and Ithought to myself you know,
ricky, you made 49,000 coldcalls real number.
You had to give up your firstlove in baseball.
You didn't have, you know, youdidn't have the best life
growing up.
(20:58):
You had friends and loved onescome and go on some questionable
actions and behavior.
So you've overcame all thoseobstacles.
You're good to go.
Um, and I really, I reallybought into that.
And then some real humblinghappened between 2022 and 2023,
where I had people that Ithought were forever walking out
(21:18):
of my life.
I had financial, financialsecurity in question a little
bit.
I had a secondary identitycrisis.
I mean, some things reallystarted happening and I didn't
have that same resilient mindsetthat I had when I was younger.
So I basically had becamecontent and when people and
(21:38):
security started leaving at apretty rapid level, I became
lost.
As I mentioned, I was used tobeing alone earlier in life, so
I tried to do the same thingagain of isolate figure it out
on your own, you're good to go.
It became extremely obvious thatat that point in time it was
(22:00):
time to build a support systemand I had to develop trust in
the right people.
Now some people may belistening and say I'm a lone
wolf, I'm good to go.
I want to express that trustingthe right people is 100%
(22:21):
different.
It's a different type ofrelationship and everything when
it's the right person.
And then you know to let thingsgo that were killing me slowly.
And that was the lesson thathad to be learned from that
experience to scale that wall.
And I, for you know 28 years um,28 to 29 years was so worried
about getting all the credit formy success and say look at
(22:42):
where I'm at, look at what I did.
Against all odds, I did it and Iwas holding myself back.
I mean, it became ever moreobvious that I had set such
lofty goals in my life thatwithout a team of people and
that means colleagues, friends,employees, supportive clients
(23:04):
You're not getting there withoutall of those people and if you
want to do it on your own,you're not going to hit those
goals.
So to scale that wall, it hadto be an ego check, it had to be
a trust in the right people andthen it had to be.
It's okay to be vulnerable, butyou have to find the right
support system.
So that that was definitely themost difficult time of just
(23:27):
basically having to rip up thetrain tracks of what was
considered success to this pointand say, just because that
success doesn't mean that you'redone with it and it also
doesn't mean that you're donestruggling.
So that was, that wasdefinitely the most trying time
of my life so, so, you literallydid 49,000 cold calls in 2021.
No, no, no, no.
It was over the course of from2016 to 2021,.
(23:52):
I'd made 49,000 cold calls inmy career to that point.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
That is a lot of cold calls, it is.
It is so what you're saying.
If I just could encapsulatethis and summarize this, it was
going from that grind, grind,grind, really type of work that
you can't maintain forever.
You know you're going to weardown, so you replace that with
bringing more talented,supportive, trusting,
(24:15):
trustworthy people into yourcircle.
So you replaced thatback-breaking work.
You know, you and I talked onetime.
You're a natural check playerin hockey but you have to be a
finesse skater.
So you went and you added thatfinesse skating to your check
playing mentality, which whenyou did that, you didn't have to
check people against the boardsas much because you were a
(24:36):
better skater.
Is that what I'm hearing?
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Yeah, I would say that for sure.
It's a you.
You know, harry truman had thisquote of it and I'm going to
butcher it, but it was basicallyalong the lines of you will
reach a level of success if youdon't necessarily care who gets
the credit right.
And for me, um, the hardestthing to do was to say that I
(25:03):
needed people in my life and Ineeded more than just me and
rely on myself.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
I like what you when you said you just had to be more
vulnerable, because that's adifficult thing.
It's more difficult sometimesfor men to admit vulnerability
than anything else and I knowI've had problems with that when
I was younger and I was a lotlike you, richard.
We've had this conversationmany, many times where I just
(25:32):
would grind, work out so muchand I isolated myself, just like
you did, and I didn't learn atage 30.
I think I didn't learn it untilprobably 40, in my 40s, but
when I started just really notjust you know, it isn't just
your team of people around youprofessionally, it is that but
it's also the type of clientsyou bring in and becoming
(25:54):
friends with your clients.
It's also how you treat youractual friend group.
For me, it's also how I justtreat strangers, your actual
friend group.
For me it's also how I justtreat strangers.
I realize that I treatstrangers much, much, much
better than I ever have, becauseI feel the solidity and the
stability of having such a greatgroup of people around me in my
personal and professional lifeand it gives you a kind of a
(26:16):
confidence or a foundation andif you don't have anybody in
your life, professionally orpersonally, you're going to
treat strangers like crapbecause you need that foundation
and overall, just to be abetter human being.
I think, and I know in the lastsix, seven months you brought
on an employee.
What do you think of that?
How's that going for you?
Speaker 3 (26:47):
it has been.
Yeah, so it's been fulfillingand it's been um fear.
You know it's.
It's instilled some fear in youat times that you keep a very
humble mindset when you do that,because you know the fulfilling
piece is obviously you'rehelping someone reach their
financial security, independenceand they are growing their
family, and it's definitely coolto see how hard you've worked,
(27:10):
be able to help someone else.
The fear piece is is that youknow now that every decision you
make right when you get up inthe morning if you want to mail
it in, if you want to run astoplight, if you want to be
lethargic, that you want to runa stoplight if you want to be
lethargic that does rub off onpeople that are not just you
anymore.
You know I don't have kids, forinstance, so it was the first
(27:30):
time in my life where you can'tjust wake up and say, eh, not a
big deal.
Today you do have to wake upand have a certain level of
compassion and empathy foreveryone around you and say I
have to go do this because Ihave someone relying on me and
it really helped me become abetter advisor and it helped me.
(27:52):
It helped me with relationshipswith clients as well, because
now I understand the peopleaspect of things more.
When you, you are definitelydealing with a person at all
times which you knew, but nowit's just more realistic than it
was before.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
It is.
I think when you bring onemployees, you get that same not
reliance commitment, I guess,or dedication, similar to having
children and, of course, now me, having grandchildren.
Yeah, you do think of thingsdifferently.
It's not just you, or you andyour mom, it's now you have
Lucky and you have now you'vegot all these clients too that
(28:28):
are relying on you.
You put things into perspective.
Like you said, you don't runthat's a good metaphor.
You don't run the red lights asreadily as you probably did
when you were, you know, youngand dumb and free Nope, Ricky.
Right now you've got.
As your company is growing andyour branch is growing like it
is, I've always said there'snever a chance.
(28:48):
Richard Adams will not behighly successful.
I mean, you were designed to besuccessful and I think and this
is something I learned againtoday I didn't realize something
you said is you were taught todream big, not necessarily
responsibly, and I think thatthat has carried over from your
youth working in the garden withyour dad to playing baseball in
your early teens, then becominga professional and now
(29:08):
branching out on your own.
You've had these stages whereyou've always applied that kind
of big dream, but yet you're aunique individual where you do
dream big but you are not a pipedreamer.
I always say there are threetypes of people in the world
there are visionaries, there arepipe dreamers and there are
apologists.
(29:29):
Now, an apologist is somebodywho, just like it, says they
apologize for taking up space onthe planet.
You know they wander around,you know they live life through
nine to five.
They come home.
Nothing ever changes, theynever think about the future,
they never dream about thingsoutside of their captive little
world.
But then you have pipe dreamerswho dream a lot.
They dream big, they talk bigI'm going to someday, someday
but they never put anything toaction.
A visionary does both.
They dream big, but they putshit into action on a consistent
(29:50):
basis.
And I think that's somethingthat I noticed in you right away
is, even though, yeah, you hada lot of your baggage, as you
claim, you were a big dreamer,you knew you were going
somewhere and you always appliedthe grit and the grind to get
there and constantly modifyingyourself and doing things
(30:11):
differently, and to the point of, at times it was a little
annoying to me as someone whowas working alongside.
I'd be like dude, just stick tothis, stick to this.
Stick to this.
It's going to work.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Stick to this, stick to this, stick to this.
It's going to work.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
I mean, you were the perfect example of what's I
think it's the guy who had Intel, I think microchips Something
about all winners are paranoidsor something like that, I don't
know, but you have that.
You're always looking at thefuture.
(30:41):
You're always looking at tryingto change things that you're
currently doing and adapting andexpanding them, but yet you're
also right there every daycalling on clients and prospects
, servicing your clients,calling on centers of influence,
traveling and speaking anddoing all these different things
.
Is it?
Does it ever get where?
Where you're thin at all?
I mean?
Speaker 3 (31:04):
now you're still young, you're 30 years old, but
does it ever get where you'relike, oh my gosh, this is
wearing me down.
So it it does.
(31:29):
Um, and I have faced burnout.
I mean, don't get me wrong,I've definitely faced burnout
now and this is super vulnerable.
I don't think I've everexpressed why, um, but I felt,
uh, that my dream of baseballhad to be given up because I
really did not apply myself thenthe way I do now and what I
mean by that is, is that I feellike I've shortchanged myself at
16, where I didn't, I did notput in the work necessary to see
where it would end up.
And now I live in this kind ofnot necessarily fear, but I live
(31:51):
in this world of you.
Better not leave anything lefton the table, because you're not
going to go back in high schooland ever pick up a baseball
again.
You're never going to be ableto figure out if that dream was
going to be fulfilled.
Well, you cannot let thathappen again.
So, while I do get tired and itdoes wear me thin and people
around me see it, you know, I dowear my emotions on my sleeve
(32:14):
and I think people that know meknow that if you get me wound up
, you're going to hear it.
Get me wound up, you're goingto hear it.
I cannot deal with the thoughtof I'm melded in and I don't
know anymore, like that is thebiggest regret of my life has
been the reason why I work sohard now.
(32:34):
So while it does wear me thin,that constant reminder of you
didn't apply yourself then youcan't do that again.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
So I'm going to share two stories.
Ricky, I couldn't agree withyou more and I think you know
you and I are cut from the samecloth in so many ways.
When I played high schoolfootball, I remember after my
senior year, we all, after thesenior season, all the seniors
went into the football coach'soffice and he just talked to
each of us privately, you know,just basically you know thanking
(33:04):
each one of us and sharingstories, and one of the things
he said to me is he said youknow, every time you were on the
field I knew you had more togive than you gave.
He said, in practice, you hadmore to give than you gave.
You know he was so nice becauseyou know he said your brother
always gave everything he had onthe football field.
He said you always had more togive that you didn't give me and
(33:24):
that set hard with me.
So then, obviously, I playedrugby a couple years later and I
put a whole new level ofintensity in that.
But then I graduated collegeand I went to, obviously, ids
Financial Services with Tony andwe were in a training class and
Dave Robinson was our trainingmanager, and he were in a
training class and Dave Robinsonwas our training manager and he
(33:45):
was like a year or two moreadvanced than we were, maybe two
years or I don't know how longit was, but he was the training
manager and I remember in atraining session one time he was
doing something pretty cool andDave was and I yelled out in
the room overachiever.
And he turned around, he lookedat me, he goes underachiever.
And I'm like that shit hit melike a ton of bricks and that
was in my first six months in mycareer and I was out of 29
(34:11):
financial advisors.
To his credit, I was rankednumber 29 out of 29.
I was the bottom of the barreland that stuck with me.
That was 32 years ago maybe andthat thing he said to me stuck
with me and it was a mentalswitch for me.
I decided, okay, that's not whoI'm going to be and so you know
, had those certain learnings,like you with baseball, me with
Dave and my football coach.
Had those not happened, I haveno idea where you would be or
(34:35):
where I would be.
And those are the things.
Those moments that we regretcan sometimes be the most
powerful moments in our lives.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
Yeah, I mean you run.
You run faster away fromsomething than do something, and
I think that's that's been myexperience to this point.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Well, I always tell somebody if you put a hundred, a
hundred thousand dollars at theend of a finish line, I'll run
really fast to it.
If you put a grizzly bearchasing me behind me, I'm going
to run a little bit fasterwithout the $100,000 reward
We've also talked, ricky, about.
It's in those dark times of ourlife and those moments in our
lives where we a lot of timeslook back and wish those
wouldn't have happened.
(35:12):
You for baseball, me for beingan underachiever, my first six
months as a professional.
It's within those moments.
If you look back and reflectand dig into those, it's where
oftentimes we find our truepurpose in life.
It's in those where ouremotions are at a certain level,
where there's that learning.
I did a talk on this last Friday, a virtual talk, to a team of
(35:34):
people, and I shared that withthem.
I said when you look at thedarkest moments of your life,
when you're feeling the mostvulnerable, most scared, most
broken down, that is where yourpurpose begins to be forged.
You just have to notice it, youhave to look for it and you
have to take action on it andbuild it from there.
And I see now where yourpurpose in life is really never
(35:55):
to repeat, never to go.
And my friend Dave Dick said itbest.
He said when I die on mydeathbed I want to shake hands
with the man I could have become, and when I do that, I want to
be looking in the mirror and Ithought man just saying that
gives me goosebumps.
And I look at this.
(36:15):
I was driving yesterday, richard, coming back from my daughter's
house, and I was picturing inmy head it's the first time I
ever pictured it this way isthere's an ideal version of each
one of us out there, right?
They're not necessarilyrealized yet in the physical
form, but you have an idealRichard Adams, out there
somewhere.
I have an ideal, brian Bowles.
That would be the man thatwould be us in almost a perfect
(36:40):
form, having reached our fullpotential in all areas.
And I look at it like sometimesthat man is way ahead of me
because I've done somethingstupid or I started picking up
bad habits.
But then there are times Ireally start to gain on that man
.
I'm like, oh no, I can see him,he's ahead of me, but at least
I can see him.
And I think our job is to everyday gain a little ground to the
(37:01):
point where we become that manor that woman eventually, where
we become our true, realized,full potential in life.
And I like that thought of thatmetaphor because you know, when
I go, when I do something stupidfor a few days, or maybe even
just as little as I don't workout hard for a week, I'm falling
behind that ideal man.
When I drop, you know I'm notreading as much.
(37:21):
I'm doing too much a day.
I'm scrolling behind that idealman.
When I drop, you know I'm notreading as much.
I'm doing too much damnscrolling on YouTube.
I'm falling behind that man.
But when I decide to do somehard things in life, some
challenging things, and stretchmy comfort zone, I'm now
catching up to that man.
I may never reach that man, butman, I hope I'm within arm's
length when I leave this earth.
You know, and I think that'sexactly what you're doing in
your life, but I really dobelieve that and you've got a
lot of years behind me.
(37:41):
So when I was your age and Ithink we've talked about this I
think you started your, youbranched out on your own at 30,
right, or were you 29 still?
Speaker 3 (37:52):
I was 29.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
And I was 29 when I left American Express to start
this coaching process.
So you've got a good journeyahead of you, my friend.
Okay, so now you're severalmonths into your own branch.
You've got Lucky backing you up.
You've got the full support ofCG Financial, which is an
incredible firm to support youRight now in your life, either
(38:13):
personally or professionally.
Ricky, what would you say is awin or a victory for you?
Speaker 3 (38:26):
victory for you.
Yeah, from someone that's hisown worst critic and I don't
cherish wins much at all becauseof because of the contentness
that I've had in life and itscared me out of that Um, it's
tough to even say, but I wouldsay the biggest win for me, or
what a win looks like right now,is when a friend you know, my
(38:48):
mom, a loved one or a clientachieves their goal, and I know
I had something to do with it.
I would say, you know, justhere in the past 12 months I've
had clients come back justbeaming with joy.
Um, one lady got to take hergrandkid on vacation and she
said well, it was because of you, you helped me do it.
Pretty humbling to hear that.
(39:09):
And then I had a lady.
She flies cross country to seeher family and she has more time
to do that now and she thanksme for it.
And it's extremely humbling toknow that people that worked
their entire lives had nothingto do with them getting a job,
them saving money.
The only thing I had to do washelp them, basically be an
(39:31):
architect and put this alltogether and give them some
peace of mind that they thank mefor this and say that they
couldn't have done it without me, when really all I did was just
give them an idea.
Right, that's all a financialadvisor is at the end of the day
.
They're just a bundle of ideasand if you align with their idea
, typically you pick them.
Uh, I look at my longtimefriend and the employee of Lucky
(39:54):
, um, buying her first home.
That's a really cool thing tosee.
I mean that's that's awesome.
Um, that's a really cool thingto see.
I mean that's that's awesome.
Um, someone very near and dearto my heart, um, you know the
lady in my life having thecourage to explore a different
career and look at me and sayyou know, you're helping me do
that.
That's that's extremelyhumbling.
(40:16):
So it's it's being able to saythat I had some sort of effect,
that it was never because of me,but I just injected myself in
their life at a, at the righttime, potentially, and just had
a reasonable enough mind to say,hey, this is how I would look
at it or this is what I would do.
And then people are eitherhaving an experience they didn't
(40:38):
think they would have, orachieving things quicker than
they thought they would, orhaving the courage to go do
something.
That has been a win to me,because if you'd have asked me
this question two to three yearsago, it would have been
something around economicbenefit or freedom.
That's just not a win to meanymore.
Anything.
That's not the money, it's notthe freedom or ego of owning
(41:02):
your own business.
That's not there.
It's seeing other people happyand knowing that I had something
to do with it.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
So it's that making that impact on those around you,
on your clients, your lovedones, your friends, for sure
that's, and it really I.
There's a lot of that sentimentI hear in the financial world.
I hear a lot of it at CGFinancial.
There's a lot of desire toimpact people's lives.
I think you do take it to thenext level.
I know you and I have talkedabout purpose in life many times
(41:31):
and every time that's come upit has been that for you making
a positive impact on the peoplearound you, personally and
professionally.
We've got to keep developingthat a little bit, by the way.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
This is probably my favorite question, richard, and
I call it the time machinequestion.
And so let's just say I'm goingto come down to Charlotte today
and we're going to jump in mytime machine and you can pick a
time in your life where I don'tcare if it's when you were 13,
when your dad left, or it was 16, quitting baseball, or I don't
care if it was 10 years ago.
(42:03):
Go back to a previous, younger,more inexperienced, more
immature Richard Adams, and youget to sit down and talk to your
former self.
What would you say?
What words of wisdom, recipesfor success would you share to
yourself?
Speaker 3 (42:23):
success would you share to yourself?
Yeah, I think if I could bottleit all up into like one main
idea.
It's that look kid, you do nothave to struggle and have this
amount of and have like acertain amount of disdain or
discomfort, or just you don'thave to be miserable to be
successful.
And I know that sounds so weird, but I designed myself behind
(42:49):
closed doors to be miserable anddiscontent with my surroundings
, so I would strive for success.
And then I had thisteeter-totter in my mind of if
you have this much amount ofstress and this much amount of
misery and this much amount ofdisdain, you're going to get
this amount of pleasure andsuccess.
And they're not correlatedright.
(43:11):
And that held me back for solong and it damaged
relationships with people.
It damaged relationships withfriends.
It stole years of my life.
It was something that if Iwould have known that then hell,
I don't even know if we'rehaving this conversation now I
might be retired already.
I mean, I feel like it was sucha narrow-minded way to live
(43:36):
life.
But I just rationalize it in mymind that if you go through
this pain and suffering, you'reawarded something like no one
gets anything handed to them, soyou have to put yourself
through this amount of uh, pain,suffering, whatever that may be
, to get this huge piece ofsuccess you want, and if I could
convey that message to 18 yearold me, 22, 22 year old me, I
(44:01):
can almost guarantee you that myjourney would have been a whole
hell of a lot different, forsure.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
Well, I, I do.
You know, obviously, whenyou're, when you're chasing
dreams and you're dreaming bigand chasing them you're going to
go through enough.
You know just, naturalchallenge and obstacles and
you're going to have, you know,days when you're worn thin as an
old knife blade, naturally.
But I think you're right, a lotof people, they proactively put
that, that crap on themselves.
(44:28):
They think that that's theticket to success.
No, that's just a by-product ofsuccess.
That's what we have to gothrough some of those things.
But when you put the unnaturalones on there, there's this,
there's this.
I don't know if you everwatched Seinfeld much, but
there's this one of the episodeswhere George, I think, works
for the Yankees or works forGeorge.
The character on there worksfor somebody and he doesn't do
anything all day.
(44:48):
So what he does to make peoplethink he's working is every time
somebody walks by his office helooks like he's mad, he throws
things around, he has adisgruntled look on his face
which means to them oh, he mustbe working hard.
And I've had people in my lifeand we all know these people
where, when you say how arethings going?
Oh, I've just been so busy, sobusy lately, and I'm like, well
(45:08):
then you're stupid.
And if you're busy all the timeand yet and it's stressful busy
, that's on you.
I had this guy years and yearsago.
He built, I think, my firstwebsite and I think he was a
client for a while too.
But we kind of became friendsand every single time I talked
to him or saw him on the streetshe'd say, oh, it's just been so
(45:31):
busy.
I'm like dude, I know what youdo for a living.
You aren't busy, you don't evenknow what busy is.
But his perception was if hesays he's busy, people are going
to think he's successful.
I mean, you walk into it when Iused to.
You can sit in a restaurant andyou can tell when a person
comes flying through real fastand then another person comes in
(45:51):
walking very slow andconfidently.
I'm going to bet, 99.9% of thetime, that that guy who's
walking, or woman is walkingslowly and confidently is by far
the most successful, not theone who's scurrying around like
a shrew.
It's always that person who isin full control of themselves.
You know, physically,emotionally, mentally and
spiritually.
And that that was one of mybiggest learnings in life.
(46:14):
I know that is.
I used to be that same guy.
You know I would work like Itold you when I first started in
2006, 2026, I don't knowwhatever 28 years ago, this
November, whatever that is, Iwould, you know, work 80 to a
hundred hour weeks and all bymyself, kind of like you, I'd
isolate and I'm looking forclients and and I would I would
be so proud of myself because Itracked my hours when I'd get to
(46:37):
like 80 hours, but I wasn'tmaking any money.
I literally had, I literallydidn't even have a phone.
I had a pager and when aprospect or client would call me
I'd run down and thankfully Ihad.
I had calling cards.
When they had, uh, I'd run downto a little corner gas station
and call them back on a callingcard.
I didn't even have a car,richard.
My car broke down, I think, andI had to borrow my first ever
(47:01):
client Thank God for Scott dealsat a S deals architect in Ann
Arbor.
He was my very first client andwhen my car broke down he let
me his 16 year old daughter'scar for like two months until I
could afford a new car.
That's not success, but yet whenyou looked at me, I was working
a hundred hour weeks, 80 hourweeks, and proud of it.
I mean you do you get work doneduring that time, but I could
(47:24):
have done the same on 40 hoursand I could have had a much.
But I look back and like, asyou do, you look back at those
moments in your life when youwere doing that, you look back
on it favorably.
It's like that was fun, man.
It was stressful, you know.
Digging for money out of myknow, robbing money for my
daughter's piggy bank to getgroceries, digging for money out
of the couch just to you know.
You know, put a little gas inthe car and you know, because my
(47:46):
girl thankfully my girlfriendhad a car, so we did have one
car in the family and where welived.
But, um, I look back now it was, it was fun, but, man, I could
have.
I could have saved myself a lotof headache had I known what we
know now.
Speaker 3 (47:57):
Oh, absolutely.
I, you know.
To finish that point up, I yougot onto me one time about this.
I would and if anyone'slistening that does this, you
don't have to self-punishyourself, please don't.
I would punish myself and noteat lunch Like I would have the
money to go eat lunch, but if Ididn't bring my lunch or if I
did something incorrect in life,I punished myself.
(48:18):
Very, very, very detrimental toyour mental health.
Don't do it.
But that is just because youdid that does not mean that
tomorrow will be better.
Like the world doesn't keep atallying system of well, your
life sucked just this much thisday, so now we're going to give
you a better day tomorrow.
That's just not how it works,and I think that would be again,
(48:41):
if any, you know, even for myyounger self or anyone you know.
If you take anything away fromit, it's just don't make
yourself miserable, for the hellof it.
Speaker 2 (48:50):
Yeah, misery is not a game, it's not a sport.
No, there's enough damn miseryin the world.
Don't put more on it.
Correct?
Well, Richard, what's next foryou on this journey?
What's the next big thing foryou?
Speaker 3 (49:03):
yeah, I mean.
Now it's how do you give back?
I mean, I am so unbelievablyblessed and I say that from the
fact of I've had clients believein me since 2016.
I think every one of them ummore than they could possibly
know.
I've had great mentors, whetherit it be you, dave Robinson,
(49:23):
tony Matt O'Neill, eric Fritz,brent it does not matter who you
name at CG They've helped insome way.
It's time for me to figure outhow, what capacity do I have to
give back?
And then what do I want to dowith that?
So I've kicked around the tireson scholarships for kids that
(49:46):
maybe came from a similarbackground as mine, and they
need that support through anacademic journey and a life
journey as well.
I've thought about, you know,using a platform such as yours
and trying to create my own andhelping people that need
financial literacy and need theunderstanding of how to dig
themselves out of a badfinancial situation or just make
(50:08):
the right money moves.
I mean, a lot of families, in myopinion, are one decision away
from a gallon of gas to a gallonof milk of putting themselves
in a bad financial spot.
Bad financial spot and now thatI have become so incredibly
blessed turning around andhelping um the masses and
influencing the world in eithera big way or a small way.
That's kind of what's next,because you know I've jumped up
(50:33):
on these platforms and achievethe things I want to achieve.
But the big platform is how canyou really give back and help
the next generation achieve whatyou achieved, and potentially
even quicker and even, you know,an even higher platform than
where you're at today?
Speaker 2 (50:49):
Right, you know we've talked about this in the last
month or so.
You and I and I don't know whowas the guy Zig Ziglar.
We talked about this quote.
Speaker 3 (50:58):
Zig Ziglar.
Speaker 2 (50:58):
I don't know.
Do you know the exact quote?
I don't.
I know we butcher it every time, but we know what we mean by it
.
I was just looking up one ofthese days.
Anyway, the sentiment is youknow, in order to be truly
successful in life, just help alot of people achieve their
dreams.
You know, help if you.
The more people you help, themore success you're going to
realize.
And but to help people withoutthe intent of getting anything
(51:19):
back, right, you know, I'vefound that the last six months,
I've given out several speechesfor free.
You know, some virtual, which Ihate, some live where before I
would have just negotiated for afee.
And I just negotiated one lastweek and I said whatever you're.
They asked me what I charge.
I said whatever your budget is,just pay me whatever your
budget is.
(51:39):
And I still don't have a priceon that one.
I think we're talking tomorrow.
But I think when you do that,you get this fulfillment that
you can't put a price tag on.
But I do believe that theuniverse, or God, or whoever,
however you want to say it lateron does put a price tag on it,
and I think that when you getwhat you give or you you get
what?
Yeah, you you get what youreceive, what you give.
(52:00):
And I do believe that when youhelp a lot of people, we think
we're doing it Um cause we wantto to help other people, with no
desire to gain anything back.
But I do think not justemotional gain, but I do think
there's a lot of financial gainthat comes back down the road
and I think a lot of it's.
I think when you chase money allthe time, it's very elusive.
But when you sit back and say,okay, I'm going to chase my
(52:22):
dreams, I'm going to help otherpeople chase their dreams, all
of a sudden money kind of comessneaking back around in your
life.
You know, it's like when youbreak up with somebody.
If you beg them to come back,they don't.
But when you say, yeah, I'mokay, I'll be, I'll be all right
(52:47):
without you didn't learn thatuntil far, far too late in my
life, in my 50s actually, butthat's a great lesson.
So we're going to talk furtheron that.
I like that scholarship idea.
I think that's pretty cool.
All right, my friend.
We're down to the finalquestion here, and that is the.
I call it kind of a netquestion because it catches
anything I may have not asked?
Is there any question, richard,that I did not ask, that you
wish I would have?
Or is there any final messageyou want to leave with that one
audience member out there rightnow who is glued intently to
(53:09):
your message?
Speaker 3 (53:11):
Yeah, I would say both Kind of the message
standpoint is and I just said tome fairly recently, spite is
drinking poison and hoping itkills the other person.
And that was something that wasso impactful to me, because
sometimes in life and this couldbe winning an arcade game,
(53:34):
getting a promotion reallydoesn't matter what it is.
Sometimes you're in acompetition with someone else
and if you're not doing it foryourself and you're hoping that
when you win, that person looksat you and you're like man,
you're the better person, or ifyou hope that confetti and
balloons are going to come downfrom the ceiling, I'm here to
(53:54):
tell you it's not so doinganything out of spite and that
could be anything right itdoesn't really matter what it is
.
I've never been on the and evenwhen I succeeded in a spiteful
event that it went the way Iwanted it to go.
So alleviating yourself of that, I think, is the biggest one
(54:16):
for me.
And then the question I would goback and probably listen to
every single episode for a lotof you I shouldn't say every
single episode, but I would fora good majority of your guests
if money was never a decidingfactor, what would you have done
and why?
That would be the one questionthat I would want to hear from a
(54:39):
number of people.
You know, for me, my professionwould be gone, so my life would
be totally different.
But yeah, if money was never adeciding factor, what would you
do and why?
Speaker 2 (54:51):
Okay, I'm writing that one down.
Well, let me ask you thatquestion If money was not a
factor, richard, what would youdo in your life?
Speaker 3 (55:00):
and I don't even do that.
I honestly don't know.
I mean, if I, if I were to putmy thumb on it, it would be
something outside by the coast.
It would be giving someone anexperience.
It would definitely be helpingsomeone, um, because I do love
helping people and I do lovebeing outside by the water.
(55:21):
But that was a tough questionand I've contemplated that
question for days, thinking tomyself like how would I even
answer that?
And I truly it's been tough forme to figure that out.
But you know, it would probablybe on a boat somewhere out in
the middle of the ocean,potentially either helping
someone or fishing to providefor a village.
(55:42):
I would have to be a provider.
If it just went to sticks andstones and we're all back in the
nomad phase.
I know I'd have to be aprovider because I don't have a
sense of self-worth outside ofbeing a provider.
So I know that I would have tobe a provider for something or
someone, for sure.
Speaker 2 (56:03):
And that's really what you do professionally.
So obviously, if money wasn't afactor, the financial industry
wouldn't be around.
But you do that, you provide,you serve and you impact other
people.
You just happen to do it in thearena of financial planning.
Speaker 3 (56:18):
Absolutely.
I mean I'm lost, like me at acore.
When I went through some of thethings I went through earlier
in life, especially in 22 and 23, when I had nothing to provide
for outside of clients, I gavemy clients my 110%.
But once I clocked out of workI felt like I had nothing Right.
So I know for me like that ispart of my moral fabric, like I
(56:41):
have to be a provider or else Idon't feel like I have a
self-meeting.
Speaker 2 (56:46):
I love that, anything else, richard, you want to
leave man, this has beenfantastic and we talk so much on
the phone I feel like we're noteven doing a podcast right now.
Speaker 3 (56:55):
I know I can feel the same, Honestly, for those that
are listening.
If you're going throughanything, I would say find a
support system, find the rightpeople, trust the right people.
If you've been contemplatingneeding the help, seeking out
the help is there, whether it bein the form of someone like
Brian or someone therapy,whatever that may be.
(57:18):
You're never weak.
No one ever looks down on you.
I think you might think thatbecause you might feel alone in
a room full of people, but I cantell you that someone out there
is willing to help and you haveto be able to trust that and
trust the right people andyou're going to be a much better
person professional, familymember after that.
So I would just encourageanyone that's listening.
If you're on the kind of thatteetering moment of do I need
(57:40):
help, Do I not go find it,Because the only thing it's
going to do is slingshot youforward.
Speaker 2 (57:49):
Amen, great, great.
Final message Rich, Iappreciate that I'm going to
leave one quick story before wewrap up.
This has you've done this inthe right way.
But there's a story by a friendof mine by the name of Ray
Kelly, former executive atAmerican Express Financial
Advisors, now a leading man atThink2Perform, an amazing
company out of Minnesota, and hetells a story that was reminded
(58:09):
to me yesterday by my friend,dave Dick, and it's the story of
five, and I'm going to butcherthis.
This is Ray's, and Ray, I'm nottrying to offend you, I think
you.
Actually, he was a guest on thepodcast a year or so ago and he
shared this.
There are five frogs sitting ona log and one decides to jump
in the pond.
How many frogs are left in thelog?
For sure, I'm going to ask youthat.
Speaker 3 (58:31):
Say that one more time, so I can't.
So I want to make sure that.
Speaker 2 (58:35):
I'm hearing all of this.
Five frogs are sitting on a logand one decides to jump in the
pond.
How many are left on the log?
Speaker 3 (58:46):
I'd say four.
Speaker 2 (58:47):
You would say that that's what I said yesterday,
having known this no five,because one decided to jump in
the pond, but he didn'tnecessarily jump in the pond, he
just decided to.
So, everybody out there, I justwant to remind you jump in the
damn pond today, stop thinkingand overthinking and
overthinking.
Just jump in the pond, readyfire, aim.
Richard, you are an amazing man, you're an amazing friend,
(59:10):
you're an amazing professionaland I can't thank you enough for
being such an amazing guest onthe Bamboo Lab podcast.
Speaker 3 (59:16):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (59:17):
Oh, my pleasure.
All right, everyone, I want youto please smash that like
button, please rate and reviewus and please share this episode
with three people.
The message I took, anotheragain, another page of notes.
I learned more about Richardtoday than I have in four and a
half years.
There's a lot of wisdom, a lotof experience that many of you,
as a listener out there and as asubscriber, are going to
(59:38):
benefit greatly from it.
But so many of the people youlove and care for can also
benefit, so please share.
In the meantime, I'll talk toyou a week from today, same time
, same place.
In the meantime, please get outthere and strive to give and be
your best.
Please show love and respect toothers and don't forget to
share that with yourself as well, and also live consciously and
live with a purpose.
I appreciate each and everysingle one of you.
(59:59):
Until next time.
Hello and welcome to the Bamboo Lab Podcast with your
host, peak Performance Coach,brian Bosley.
Are you stuck on the hamsterwheel of life, spinning and
spinning but not really movingforward?
Are you ready to jump off andsoar?
Are you finally ready to sculptyour life?
If so, you've landed in theright place.
(00:21):
This podcast is created andbroadcast just for you, all of
you strivers, thrivers andsurvivors out there.
If you'd like to learn moreabout Brian and the Bamboo Lab,
feel free to reach out toexplore your true peak level at
wwwbamboolab3.com.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Welcome everyone to this week's episode of the
Bamboo Lab Podcast.
I am your host, brian, andtoday we have a really
interesting, unique fella on theshow.
I've known Richard Adams nowfor four and a half years.
I got the privilege of meetinghim at a company Christmas party
Well 2019, I believe it was inDecember and I instantly struck
(01:05):
by this guy's energy and hisdrive.
So I've had the pleasure oftalking to Ricky quite often
over the past four and a halfyears and I asked him to come on
and he thankfully took time outof his busy schedule to join in
.
So a little bit about Ricky.
Well, ricky Richard.
Richard is a 30-year-oldfinancial advisor out of
Charlotte, north Carolina, wherehe was born and raised in the
area.
Currently, he is the owner ofhis own branch of CG Financial.
(01:29):
With the encouragement of TonyMazzelli and Jeff Casey, the
founders of the company, heleads both his clients and
employees through the journey offinding financial independence
and security.
With a focus on authenticityand I like this part and a
refusal to conform to theindustry norms.
He's been able to find successand happiness in being a
financial advisor.
He's got a ton of numbers oralphabets after his title very
(01:51):
accredited Really cool thing,though, he was named by the
National Association of PlanAdvisors as a top 100 retirement
plan advisor under 40.
When Richard's not working, heis an avid sports fan, loves to
travel to the beach and isgetting annoyed by his dog,
ramsey.
He's also an aspiring home chefand grill master and he hopes
one day this is something I justfound out today to be a jet ski
(02:13):
tour guide in the Caribbean.
Richard Adams, my friend,welcome to the Bamboo Lab
podcast.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Glad to be here, Brian.
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
How come you never told me about the aspiration to
be a jet ski tour guide?
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Man.
I don't think many people knowthat, but it's definitely on the
retirement list of when I'mdone with this.
I'm going to go out, get acouple and just take people
around an island all day andthen be every day Saturday at
that point.
So that's the plan.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
That's cool.
Well, I'm here to tell you.
A lot of people know about itnow.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
I think so.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
All right.
So obviously I call you Rickymost often.
So, folks, Richard, Ricky,you'll hear me go back and forth
.
Ricky, I know a lot about you.
I've gotten to know you verywell over the past almost five
years now.
But can you please share withthe audience members out there a
little bit about yourself?
Speaker 3 (03:08):
your childhood, growing up, your family, who or
what inspired you?
Yeah, absolutely so.
Born and raised in Charlotteand for those of you that don't
know why that's a big deal.
You never find someonebasically born and raised in
Charlotte.
Everybody's kind of a you knowa melting pot here and you see
people from New York, new Jersey, florida, you name it.
(03:29):
Everyone comes here.
But I was actually born andraised Um funny story about me.
Um family structure on eitherside mom or dad wasn't extremely
strong.
So since I can remember it'sjust really been me and my mom.
My dad was around for forbasically the first 13 years of
life and then after that greenerpastures came and took him away
and he decided to to uh pursueother, um, I guess, adventures
(03:51):
in life and then had some, youknow, have brothers and sisters
not by my mom and dad, by, um,you know, kind of uh mixed
families.
And then you know you get kindof used to doing your own thing
because you didn't grow uparound many people.
So that's kind of my firstintroduction of who I've started
to become is you got used tobeing alone, kind of a very
(04:13):
interesting part about me.
I don't think anyone knows thisother than one person.
The first 13 years of my life Ilived in an extremely small town
.
One grocery store, onevolunteer fire department at one
church.
That's really all we had forthe first 13 years of life, and
if there was more than 150people in this town I would be
extremely shocked.
Um, one of the gentlemen thatlived behind us said that when
(04:35):
he was 10 or 11 that he used torun to the front door when he
heard a car coming, because youwould only see two to three a
week.
I mean, that's how's how smallthis town was.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
I didn't know that.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, a lot of people didn't.
And then we actually had to usea fake address for me of a
family friend for me to go toanother school district.
The one that I would have beenappointed to was not the
greatest from a public schoolstandpoint.
So my mom would take me backand forth 30 minutes one way
(05:07):
every single day and we wereusing a fake address.
So that was kind of the schoolside of things.
Then once the summers came,pretty lonely, because you can't
have friends over.
At that point If you get foundout that you're not living in a
school district you're prettymuch kicked out.
So summers was just workingwith my dad in the garden, which
was a quarter of an acre, halfan acre, and then, um, my mom
(05:30):
would take me to baseballpractice.
But again, again, when you lookat the formative years of my
life, it was a lot of alone time, right.
So you know you fast forward acouple years.
Dad moved on to greenerpastures.
As I said, after a severe headinjury um that I uh had during
baseball, um thought I was 10foot tall and bulletproof at 13,
14.
Ball caught me behind the earwhile I was still in batting
(05:53):
practice and it really, uh,really damaged me at that point
in time.
So that was a.
It was a pretty critical moment, um, from life there on,
because then it started toreally clue in that life is not
as simple as you want it to be.
Almost immediately going tofreshman, sophomore year of high
school, my mom gets sick over asimple hysterectomy gone wrong.
(06:15):
Fast forward, a lot of thatpart basically just doctor made
a bad move and she was in andout of the hospital quite a bit.
So then again it goes back tobeing alone a lot, 14, 15, 16
years old, didn't really haveanyone around because she was in
and out of the hospital.
And then around that time Istarted going through life and I
had to give up baseball.
(06:36):
Um, I just could not get pastthe head injury you know people
call it the yips or whateverthat may be and kind of um
athletic terms but at the end ofthe day I just had to give it
up.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
And you were pretty good weren't you.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
I would like to think so.
I mean, there was a point intime where I definitely thought
I'd play at the next level,being collegiate.
I don't know if pro was aheadof me.
I got to play against some guysthat are in the major leagues
now and I don't know if thatwould have been my kind of
career path, but I mostcertainly probably would have
played at the collegiate level.
(07:11):
So that was tough to give up.
I mean, that was my first,second, third love.
So giving up baseball was toughand it was really a crossroads.
So I went through a majoridentity crisis when that
happened.
So when you talk about truepeak identity, I had one
identity.
It was really a crossroads, soI went through a major identity
crisis when that happened.
So when you talk about truepeak identity, I had one
identity.
It was a baseball player.
That's all I ever knew.
And you go through that andyour prior friends were still
(07:34):
playing baseball and we prettymuch stopped talking almost
immediately, like they're doingtheir thing.
I had moved into Mooresville atthat time because after my dad
left, we were no longer livingin the small town.
We actually had to move intothe school district.
At that point.
Tom was very lonely.
Your friends that you had grewup with and played baseball with
(07:56):
.
Through that time they're gone.
Then a still friend of mine,tyler Bell, who I hope is
listening to this.
He really saved my life becausehe included me in almost
everything and he really helpedme understand the value of a
community.
And if you fast forward some ofmy story you start to see where
I started realizing where youcan't just be alone all the time
(08:18):
.
But not all of it is sad.
I mean I applied myself in theclassroom, was accepted at UNC
Charlotte, I got a full ridebetween academic and needs-based
scholarship, which was great,and then now I am on your
podcast speaking to you and I'ma professional.
So not all of it was sad.
(08:38):
Definitely was eye-opening attimes and it helped me get here.
But yeah, that's a little bitabout me and kind of my family
upbringing and how I got to thispoint.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
I've learned two or three things about you since you
called in today that I didn'tknow.
After four and a half years,Maybe I should just put every
client on the podcast within thefirst month of coaching them,
get everything out and then gofrom there.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Like I told you, some of my equipment was going to
fall Absolutely side of somepretty driven people.
You're definitely at the top.
You're in the top five.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
Who or what inspired you or does inspire you to do
that?
Yeah, I mean, when you gothrough life and you see some
turmoil, you can go back to someof the books that you've had me
read.
The Obstacle is the Way, orwhat inspired me the most.
One of the people was my mom,for sure.
I mean she truly tried to makeit a better life, and no parent
is perfect, right, I mean Idon't think anybody's ever going
(09:52):
to get on the show and say Ihad a perfect parent.
They might, but I really saw mymom just from start to finish,
even when my dad was away.
She saw me through everythingLosing baseball, starting,
starting college, starting acareer, um, making sure I always
had transportation, a roof andand and food on the plate and
food on the table, which washuge.
(10:13):
I mean, when you don't have toworry about some of those, you
know hierarchy and needs, thefirst levels there, it allows
you to focus on you and then itbecame a you know, do I want all
this to be my excuse for mystory, and for a long time and
when you first met me I'm sureyou could echo this statement I
was.
I think I let a lot of anger inwhat happened to me fuel me to
(10:34):
say you know, I'm not thatperson I'm going to show them.
And a lot of that came from justsaying you know, I was forgot
about life, I had to give upbaseball too quickly and I just
I kept a chip on my shoulderthat sometimes probably didn't
need to be there but was there.
And then the drive came from.
I was just so done making anexcuse of why I couldn't go on a
(10:58):
vacation or why I couldn't dothe things I wanted to do, and I
told myself you can work yourway out of this hole.
You might not want to and itmight be hard work.
You absolutely can do that.
Then I fast forward and look atsome of the other people that
were formative.
You know, all of the men andwomen at CG Financial definitely
helped me to get to where I wasat.
I mean, I look at my firstinterview, and it was with Matt
(11:21):
O'Neill, and I came to theinterview in a black suit with
brown belt, brown shoes.
We want to talk about a work inprogress.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
I think I would still do that today.
I don't know fashion, so I'mgoing to take your word for it,
that's oh it was, it was.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
uh, I was a misfit for sure.
I mean I remember him asking mewhat skills do you have?
And I said I really do not haveskills, I just work really hard
.
I don't.
I don't have, I don't haveskills.
I I said I really do not haveskills, I just work really hard.
I don't, I don't have, I don'thave skills.
I just know that I can come towork and do what I'm told and
work really hard at it.
And you just had a lot of peoplearound you that dared you to
dream big.
And I was never asked to dreamresponsibly in life, which I
(12:00):
think helped me out a lot.
I was asked to dream as big asI wanted to, and I think that
was huge for me as well is thatI was allowed to dream as big as
I want to, and the world waskind of my oyster at that point
and I could look at it and saythis is what I want.
And between my mom and thepeople at CG, they allowed me to
work as hard as I wanted to,didn't hold me back.
(12:21):
And you know, I sit here now,um, some eight years later,
thinking to myself wow, withoutthem, where would I be?
Speaker 2 (12:29):
Ricky, I remember when I was, when we were in
Grand Rapids, when I first metyou and I obviously I knew I was
going to be coming into thecompany to do some consulting
and coaching.
So obviously you know Tony hadinvited me to the company
Christmas party and I was livingin Grand Rapids so it was very
convenient.
So I remember going aroundobviously talking to Tony and
(12:51):
Jeff and Dave Robinson and allthe people I had known prior,
and then I was getting a drinkat the bar and you came up to me
and I don't think you left myside the rest of the night.
Speaker 3 (13:04):
I remember that you were stuck to me like stink.
On't think you left my side therest of the night.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I mean you were I remember that you were stuck to
me like stink on a turd man andI'm like at a point, like this
guy.
I told Tony, what in the hell?
Who is this guy?
He's most intense man I've evermet and uh, lo and behold,
you're on my, one of my firstpeople with the company that I
got the privilege of workingwith.
So it that that was a big uhsign for me that you were going
(13:26):
to be successful.
At that time you were alreadysuccessful.
For what?
25 years old or whatever.
But the steps you've taken in,not just your professional
growth and your financial growth, but what I've seen from you is
such a huge leap in yourpersonal development over the
past few years.
I mean just almost miraculous,the transformations you've made.
So, man, kudos to you.
(13:46):
You're still that intense guy.
You at least now you're notfollowing a bald guy around in a
, in a company party.
You're actually chasing off bigclients and COIs and chasing
after them.
So, um, richard, what do youthink?
You've had some big changes inthe last several months of your
life.
You know, obviously youbranched out on your own as a
(14:08):
branch of CG Financial.
I think you've got a prettyamazing woman in your life.
If I'm not mistaken, you justyou've changed a lot.
You've hired Lucky.
Who not gotten kudos to you?
She's incredible.
What do you?
Speaker 3 (14:25):
think your biggest learning has been as of late?
Yeah, that's the, that's themillion dollar question there.
To say the biggest, it's hardbecause I've learned so much and
you know I would honestly saythat what I learned is you
cannot keep things in your lifeonce their reason has been
fulfilled, once their reason hasbeen fulfilled, and I had such
(14:46):
a hard time letting go ofanything.
Right, it was almost like yousay, all the time driving around
with your emergency brake, butit's almost.
You know, a rocket ship has toshed so many things to get to
its final destination and Iwould hold on to so much baggage
, whether it was bad, you knowbad things that happened to me.
(15:08):
Uh, potentially people, um,sometimes, you know, wanting to
have recognition or job title,whatever that may be, and, um,
you know, I've seen it the mostwith personal relationships,
whether that's friends orsomeone you think it's a partner
, and definitely the job,positions and roles.
Everything has a purpose or areason to be around, for sure.
(15:30):
But when you hold on to it pastthat reason, the law of
diminishing returns kicks in,and it kicks in quickly and then
it starts to deteriorate allthe progress you made.
So for me, when I look at themost impactful learning.
You can call it a monkey trap,like I said, driving with your
(15:50):
emergency brake on.
Whatever you want to call it itreally comes down to has this
object, activity, person,whatever served its intended
purpose?
And if it has, you have to behonest enough with yourself to
say you cannot confuse movementwith progress.
It's time to let go and moveforward.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
Okay, I want to stop just for a minute.
I want to reiterate to theaudience out there what you just
said, because I think there's alot of power in those
statements.
So what Richard just said is Ilike this right here you cannot
keep things in your life oncetheir reason has been fulfilled.
So I want everyone out therethink about the things maybe
people, maybe it's old bad ideas, baggage, emotional mental
(16:32):
baggage, spiritual baggage, oldprocesses or systems, whatever
it might be in your life and askyourself has their reason in my
life been fulfilled?
Because, like Richard said,everything has a purpose.
But many of those things, at acertain point they reach a point
of diminishing return and ittakes a lot of balls and courage
to be able to say, to cut thestring and say I'm done with
that, now I'm going on tosomething better.
(16:54):
And we're not talking aboutlove them and leave them, type
things with women or men.
Obviously, some relationshipsserve their purpose, but a lot
of it's just the emotionalbaggage and mental baggage we
carry in life and some of thosethings that we once, that now no
longer serve a purpose, at onetime might have been the most
important thing to you.
You know I always tell the storyand I sometimes, when I speak
(17:15):
in a crowd, I wear this old it'skind of a satin, looks like a
bowling jacket, but it's my highschool football team.
It just says Saints on the backof it.
I remember when I was afreshman I got that jacket.
It was the most.
I loved it.
I wore that all the time otherthan the warmest days of summer.
I was so proud of that thing.
And about seven, eight years agoI was in my mom's attic and I
(17:36):
dug it out and again, this wasmy most prized possession in my
early high school years.
You know, until I earned myletter jacket and I put it on.
I have a couple of pictures ofme.
I can't even button the darnthing.
My shoulders are obviouslybigger, my stomach's bigger
Hopefully my chest is a littlebit bigger than at 15 years old
(17:56):
and I thought this is a perfectexample of something that was so
valuable to me now, so precious, or was at that time, in the
early 1980s, so precious to me,so valuable Today, if I wear it
in public I would look like adamn fool, and that's really
what you're saying.
It served its purpose.
There was a point ofdiminishing return.
I still have it because I useit as a prop when I speak, but
(18:19):
it's not something I ever wearin public or around my house, so
I think that's incrediblypowerful.
Do you think you've learnedthat, richard, more in the last
year, or is that somethingyou've been learning over the
past several years?
Speaker 3 (18:33):
I think that you understand how to articulate it
in your mind.
You definitely learn it overtime.
You understand how toarticulate it in your mind, Like
you definitely learn it overtime, but you don't understand
how to apply it to a situationand over the last year I learned
it more of.
It's just life, right, and youcannot hang on to things that
(18:56):
could hurt you, and it becomesdecision time and something
that's through therapy.
It'll be a little bitvulnerable here.
I mean, you know, you go totherapy, you learn that you're
not 10 foot tall and bulletproof, which was hard for me to hear,
Um, and then, and then youstart realizing, yeah, you know,
this is the issue and you haveto move on.
So I think I learned how toapply the logic over time.
(19:16):
Of course you you're doing it,but I think I learned how to
apply it and just put things ina silo over the last year.
Speaker 2 (19:27):
Well, you had mentioned the term monkey trap,
so I just want to steer theaudience members out there too.
If you want to go back toFebruary 21st and 28th of 2022,
and actually March 7th as well,I did three podcast shows on the
concept of the monkey trap andwhat that means, so I'd refer
back to one of our earliest Ithink it's in the first 10 or 10
or 11 shows.
(19:47):
We did three episodes on monkeytrap.
So thanks for bringing that up.
All right, ricky, this is amillion dollar question.
Actually, this is a question.
I think that really, I audiencemembers identify with this very
well.
They connect with you throughthis question.
Oftentimes, they learn a greatdeal through this question and
answer what do you think is oneof the most difficult things
(20:08):
you've ever gone through in yourlife and what did you do to
overcome it and scale the wall?
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Yeah, um, yeah, that is a good question.
I believe it or not, it's notanything that happened in my
youth.
I kind of come to terms withthat, but I would say the most
difficult thing that I've beenthrough was having to admit that
it was time to really grow upand start over.
On a few things where I hadthis utopic mindset of man, I
(20:38):
filled up the struggle meter andnow it's nothing but success
and freedom and easy living fromthis point, because, you know,
in my mind it's.
I come out of 2021 and Ithought to myself you know,
ricky, you made 49,000 coldcalls real number.
You had to give up your firstlove in baseball.
You didn't have, you know, youdidn't have the best life
growing up.
(20:58):
You had friends and loved onescome and go on some questionable
actions and behavior.
So you've overcame all thoseobstacles.
You're good to go.
Um, and I really, I reallybought into that.
And then some real humblinghappened between 2022 and 2023,
where I had people that Ithought were forever walking out
(21:18):
of my life.
I had financial, financialsecurity in question a little
bit.
I had a secondary identitycrisis.
I mean, some things reallystarted happening and I didn't
have that same resilient mindsetthat I had when I was younger.
So I basically had becamecontent and when people and
(21:38):
security started leaving at apretty rapid level, I became
lost.
As I mentioned, I was used tobeing alone earlier in life, so
I tried to do the same thingagain of isolate figure it out
on your own, you're good to go.
It became extremely obvious thatat that point in time it was
(22:00):
time to build a support systemand I had to develop trust in
the right people.
Now some people may belistening and say I'm a lone
wolf, I'm good to go.
I want to express that trustingthe right people is 100%
(22:21):
different.
It's a different type ofrelationship and everything when
it's the right person.
And then you know to let thingsgo that were killing me slowly.
And that was the lesson thathad to be learned from that
experience to scale that wall.
And I, for you know 28 years um,28 to 29 years was so worried
about getting all the credit formy success and say look at
(22:42):
where I'm at, look at what I did.
Against all odds, I did it and Iwas holding myself back.
I mean, it became ever moreobvious that I had set such
lofty goals in my life thatwithout a team of people and
that means colleagues, friends,employees, supportive clients
(23:04):
You're not getting there withoutall of those people and if you
want to do it on your own,you're not going to hit those
goals.
So to scale that wall, it hadto be an ego check, it had to be
a trust in the right people andthen it had to be.
It's okay to be vulnerable, butyou have to find the right
support system.
So that that was definitely themost difficult time of just
(23:27):
basically having to rip up thetrain tracks of what was
considered success to this pointand say, just because that
success doesn't mean that you'redone with it and it also
doesn't mean that you're donestruggling.
So that was, that wasdefinitely the most trying time
of my life so, so, you literallydid 49,000 cold calls in 2021.
No, no, no, no.
It was over the course of from2016 to 2021,.
(23:52):
I'd made 49,000 cold calls inmy career to that point.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
That is a lot of cold calls, it is.
It is so what you're saying.
If I just could encapsulatethis and summarize this, it was
going from that grind, grind,grind, really type of work that
you can't maintain forever.
You know you're going to weardown, so you replace that with
bringing more talented,supportive, trusting,
(24:15):
trustworthy people into yourcircle.
So you replaced thatback-breaking work.
You know, you and I talked onetime.
You're a natural check playerin hockey but you have to be a
finesse skater.
So you went and you added thatfinesse skating to your check
playing mentality, which whenyou did that, you didn't have to
check people against the boardsas much because you were a
(24:36):
better skater.
Is that what I'm hearing?
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Yeah, I would say that for sure.
It's a you.
You know, harry truman had thisquote of it and I'm going to
butcher it, but it was basicallyalong the lines of you will
reach a level of success if youdon't necessarily care who gets
the credit right.
And for me, um, the hardestthing to do was to say that I
(25:03):
needed people in my life and Ineeded more than just me and
rely on myself.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
I like what you when you said you just had to be more
vulnerable, because that's adifficult thing.
It's more difficult sometimesfor men to admit vulnerability
than anything else and I knowI've had problems with that when
I was younger and I was a lotlike you, richard.
We've had this conversationmany, many times where I just
(25:32):
would grind, work out so muchand I isolated myself, just like
you did, and I didn't learn atage 30.
I think I didn't learn it untilprobably 40, in my 40s, but
when I started just really notjust you know, it isn't just
your team of people around youprofessionally, it is that but
it's also the type of clientsyou bring in and becoming
(25:54):
friends with your clients.
It's also how you treat youractual friend group.
For me, it's also how I justtreat strangers, your actual
friend group.
For me it's also how I justtreat strangers.
I realize that I treatstrangers much, much, much
better than I ever have, becauseI feel the solidity and the
stability of having such a greatgroup of people around me in my
personal and professional lifeand it gives you a kind of a
(26:16):
confidence or a foundation andif you don't have anybody in
your life, professionally orpersonally, you're going to
treat strangers like crapbecause you need that foundation
and overall, just to be abetter human being.
I think, and I know in the lastsix, seven months you brought
on an employee.
What do you think of that?
How's that going for you?
Speaker 3 (26:47):
it has been.
Yeah, so it's been fulfillingand it's been um fear.
You know it's.
It's instilled some fear in youat times that you keep a very
humble mindset when you do that,because you know the fulfilling
piece is obviously you'rehelping someone reach their
financial security, independenceand they are growing their
family, and it's definitely coolto see how hard you've worked,
(27:10):
be able to help someone else.
The fear piece is is that youknow now that every decision you
make right when you get up inthe morning if you want to mail
it in, if you want to run astoplight, if you want to be
lethargic, that you want to runa stoplight if you want to be
lethargic that does rub off onpeople that are not just you
anymore.
You know I don't have kids, forinstance, so it was the first
(27:30):
time in my life where you can'tjust wake up and say, eh, not a
big deal.
Today you do have to wake upand have a certain level of
compassion and empathy foreveryone around you and say I
have to go do this because Ihave someone relying on me and
it really helped me become abetter advisor and it helped me.
(27:52):
It helped me with relationshipswith clients as well, because
now I understand the peopleaspect of things more.
When you, you are definitelydealing with a person at all
times which you knew, but nowit's just more realistic than it
was before.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
It is.
I think when you bring onemployees, you get that same not
reliance commitment, I guess,or dedication, similar to having
children and, of course, now me, having grandchildren.
Yeah, you do think of thingsdifferently.
It's not just you, or you andyour mom, it's now you have
Lucky and you have now you'vegot all these clients too that
(28:28):
are relying on you.
You put things into perspective.
Like you said, you don't runthat's a good metaphor.
You don't run the red lights asreadily as you probably did
when you were, you know, youngand dumb and free Nope, Ricky.
Right now you've got.
As your company is growing andyour branch is growing like it
is, I've always said there'snever a chance.
(28:48):
Richard Adams will not behighly successful.
I mean, you were designed to besuccessful and I think and this
is something I learned againtoday I didn't realize something
you said is you were taught todream big, not necessarily
responsibly, and I think thatthat has carried over from your
youth working in the garden withyour dad to playing baseball in
your early teens, then becominga professional and now
(29:08):
branching out on your own.
You've had these stages whereyou've always applied that kind
of big dream, but yet you're aunique individual where you do
dream big but you are not a pipedreamer.
I always say there are threetypes of people in the world
there are visionaries, there arepipe dreamers and there are
apologists.
(29:29):
Now, an apologist is somebodywho, just like it, says they
apologize for taking up space onthe planet.
You know they wander around,you know they live life through
nine to five.
They come home.
Nothing ever changes, theynever think about the future,
they never dream about thingsoutside of their captive little
world.
But then you have pipe dreamerswho dream a lot.
They dream big, they talk bigI'm going to someday, someday
but they never put anything toaction.
A visionary does both.
They dream big, but they putshit into action on a consistent
(29:50):
basis.
And I think that's somethingthat I noticed in you right away
is, even though, yeah, you hada lot of your baggage, as you
claim, you were a big dreamer,you knew you were going
somewhere and you always appliedthe grit and the grind to get
there and constantly modifyingyourself and doing things
(30:11):
differently, and to the point of, at times it was a little
annoying to me as someone whowas working alongside.
I'd be like dude, just stick tothis, stick to this.
Stick to this.
It's going to work.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Stick to this, stick to this, stick to this.
It's going to work.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
I mean, you were the perfect example of what's I
think it's the guy who had Intel, I think microchips Something
about all winners are paranoidsor something like that, I don't
know, but you have that.
You're always looking at thefuture.
(30:41):
You're always looking at tryingto change things that you're
currently doing and adapting andexpanding them, but yet you're
also right there every daycalling on clients and prospects
, servicing your clients,calling on centers of influence,
traveling and speaking anddoing all these different things
.
Is it?
Does it ever get where?
Where you're thin at all?
I mean?
Speaker 3 (31:04):
now you're still young, you're 30 years old, but
does it ever get where you'relike, oh my gosh, this is
wearing me down.
So it it does.
(31:29):
Um, and I have faced burnout.
I mean, don't get me wrong,I've definitely faced burnout
now and this is super vulnerable.
I don't think I've everexpressed why, um, but I felt,
uh, that my dream of baseballhad to be given up because I
really did not apply myself thenthe way I do now and what I
mean by that is, is that I feellike I've shortchanged myself at
16, where I didn't, I did notput in the work necessary to see
where it would end up.
And now I live in this kind ofnot necessarily fear, but I live
(31:51):
in this world of you.
Better not leave anything lefton the table, because you're not
going to go back in high schooland ever pick up a baseball
again.
You're never going to be ableto figure out if that dream was
going to be fulfilled.
Well, you cannot let thathappen again.
So, while I do get tired and itdoes wear me thin and people
around me see it, you know, I dowear my emotions on my sleeve
(32:14):
and I think people that know meknow that if you get me wound up
, you're going to hear it.
Get me wound up, you're goingto hear it.
I cannot deal with the thoughtof I'm melded in and I don't
know anymore, like that is thebiggest regret of my life has
been the reason why I work sohard now.
(32:34):
So while it does wear me thin,that constant reminder of you
didn't apply yourself then youcan't do that again.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
So I'm going to share two stories.
Ricky, I couldn't agree withyou more and I think you know
you and I are cut from the samecloth in so many ways.
When I played high schoolfootball, I remember after my
senior year, we all, after thesenior season, all the seniors
went into the football coach'soffice and he just talked to
each of us privately, you know,just basically you know thanking
(33:04):
each one of us and sharingstories, and one of the things
he said to me is he said youknow, every time you were on the
field I knew you had more togive than you gave.
He said, in practice, you hadmore to give than you gave.
You know he was so nice becauseyou know he said your brother
always gave everything he had onthe football field.
He said you always had more togive that you didn't give me and
(33:24):
that set hard with me.
So then, obviously, I playedrugby a couple years later and I
put a whole new level ofintensity in that.
But then I graduated collegeand I went to, obviously, ids
Financial Services with Tony andwe were in a training class and
Dave Robinson was our trainingmanager, and he were in a
training class and Dave Robinsonwas our training manager and he
(33:45):
was like a year or two moreadvanced than we were, maybe two
years or I don't know how longit was, but he was the training
manager and I remember in atraining session one time he was
doing something pretty cool andDave was and I yelled out in
the room overachiever.
And he turned around, he lookedat me, he goes underachiever.
And I'm like that shit hit melike a ton of bricks and that
was in my first six months in mycareer and I was out of 29
(34:11):
financial advisors.
To his credit, I was rankednumber 29 out of 29.
I was the bottom of the barreland that stuck with me.
That was 32 years ago maybe andthat thing he said to me stuck
with me and it was a mentalswitch for me.
I decided, okay, that's not whoI'm going to be and so you know
, had those certain learnings,like you with baseball, me with
Dave and my football coach.
Had those not happened, I haveno idea where you would be or
(34:35):
where I would be.
And those are the things.
Those moments that we regretcan sometimes be the most
powerful moments in our lives.
Speaker 3 (34:43):
Yeah, I mean you run.
You run faster away fromsomething than do something, and
I think that's that's been myexperience to this point.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Well, I always tell somebody if you put a hundred, a
hundred thousand dollars at theend of a finish line, I'll run
really fast to it.
If you put a grizzly bearchasing me behind me, I'm going
to run a little bit fasterwithout the $100,000 reward
We've also talked, ricky, about.
It's in those dark times of ourlife and those moments in our
lives where we a lot of timeslook back and wish those
wouldn't have happened.
(35:12):
You for baseball, me for beingan underachiever, my first six
months as a professional.
It's within those moments.
If you look back and reflectand dig into those, it's where
oftentimes we find our truepurpose in life.
It's in those where ouremotions are at a certain level,
where there's that learning.
I did a talk on this last Friday, a virtual talk, to a team of
(35:34):
people, and I shared that withthem.
I said when you look at thedarkest moments of your life,
when you're feeling the mostvulnerable, most scared, most
broken down, that is where yourpurpose begins to be forged.
You just have to notice it, youhave to look for it and you
have to take action on it andbuild it from there.
And I see now where yourpurpose in life is really never
(35:55):
to repeat, never to go.
And my friend Dave Dick said itbest.
He said when I die on mydeathbed I want to shake hands
with the man I could have become, and when I do that, I want to
be looking in the mirror and Ithought man just saying that
gives me goosebumps.
And I look at this.
(36:15):
I was driving yesterday, richard, coming back from my daughter's
house, and I was picturing inmy head it's the first time I
ever pictured it this way isthere's an ideal version of each
one of us out there, right?
They're not necessarilyrealized yet in the physical
form, but you have an idealRichard Adams, out there
somewhere.
I have an ideal, brian Bowles.
That would be the man thatwould be us in almost a perfect
(36:40):
form, having reached our fullpotential in all areas.
And I look at it like sometimesthat man is way ahead of me
because I've done somethingstupid or I started picking up
bad habits.
But then there are times Ireally start to gain on that man
.
I'm like, oh no, I can see him,he's ahead of me, but at least
I can see him.
And I think our job is to everyday gain a little ground to the
(37:01):
point where we become that manor that woman eventually, where
we become our true, realized,full potential in life.
And I like that thought of thatmetaphor because you know, when
I go, when I do something stupidfor a few days, or maybe even
just as little as I don't workout hard for a week, I'm falling
behind that ideal man.
When I drop, you know I'm notreading as much.
(37:21):
I'm doing too much a day.
I'm scrolling behind that idealman.
When I drop, you know I'm notreading as much.
I'm doing too much damnscrolling on YouTube.
I'm falling behind that man.
But when I decide to do somehard things in life, some
challenging things, and stretchmy comfort zone, I'm now
catching up to that man.
I may never reach that man, butman, I hope I'm within arm's
length when I leave this earth.
You know, and I think that'sexactly what you're doing in
your life, but I really dobelieve that and you've got a
lot of years behind me.
(37:41):
So when I was your age and Ithink we've talked about this I
think you started your, youbranched out on your own at 30,
right, or were you 29 still?
Speaker 3 (37:52):
I was 29.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
And I was 29 when I left American Express to start
this coaching process.
So you've got a good journeyahead of you, my friend.
Okay, so now you're severalmonths into your own branch.
You've got Lucky backing you up.
You've got the full support ofCG Financial, which is an
incredible firm to support youRight now in your life, either
(38:13):
personally or professionally.
Ricky, what would you say is awin or a victory for you?
Speaker 3 (38:26):
victory for you.
Yeah, from someone that's hisown worst critic and I don't
cherish wins much at all becauseof because of the contentness
that I've had in life and itscared me out of that Um, it's
tough to even say, but I wouldsay the biggest win for me, or
what a win looks like right now,is when a friend you know, my
(38:48):
mom, a loved one or a clientachieves their goal, and I know
I had something to do with it.
I would say, you know, justhere in the past 12 months I've
had clients come back justbeaming with joy.
Um, one lady got to take hergrandkid on vacation and she
said well, it was because of you, you helped me do it.
Pretty humbling to hear that.
(39:09):
And then I had a lady.
She flies cross country to seeher family and she has more time
to do that now and she thanksme for it.
And it's extremely humbling toknow that people that worked
their entire lives had nothingto do with them getting a job,
them saving money.
The only thing I had to do washelp them, basically be an
(39:31):
architect and put this alltogether and give them some
peace of mind that they thank mefor this and say that they
couldn't have done it without me, when really all I did was just
give them an idea.
Right, that's all a financialadvisor is at the end of the day
.
They're just a bundle of ideasand if you align with their idea
, typically you pick them.
Uh, I look at my longtimefriend and the employee of Lucky
(39:54):
, um, buying her first home.
That's a really cool thing tosee.
I mean that's that's awesome.
Um, that's a really cool thingto see.
I mean that's that's awesome.
Um, someone very near and dearto my heart, um, you know the
lady in my life having thecourage to explore a different
career and look at me and sayyou know, you're helping me do
that.
That's that's extremelyhumbling.
(40:16):
So it's it's being able to saythat I had some sort of effect,
that it was never because of me,but I just injected myself in
their life at a, at the righttime, potentially, and just had
a reasonable enough mind to say,hey, this is how I would look
at it or this is what I would do.
And then people are eitherhaving an experience they didn't
(40:38):
think they would have, orachieving things quicker than
they thought they would, orhaving the courage to go do
something.
That has been a win to me,because if you'd have asked me
this question two to three yearsago, it would have been
something around economicbenefit or freedom.
That's just not a win to meanymore.
Anything.
That's not the money, it's notthe freedom or ego of owning
(41:02):
your own business.
That's not there.
It's seeing other people happyand knowing that I had something
to do with it.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
So it's that making that impact on those around you,
on your clients, your lovedones, your friends, for sure
that's, and it really I.
There's a lot of that sentimentI hear in the financial world.
I hear a lot of it at CGFinancial.
There's a lot of desire toimpact people's lives.
I think you do take it to thenext level.
I know you and I have talkedabout purpose in life many times
(41:31):
and every time that's come upit has been that for you making
a positive impact on the peoplearound you, personally and
professionally.
We've got to keep developingthat a little bit, by the way.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
This is probably my favorite question, richard, and
I call it the time machinequestion.
And so let's just say I'm goingto come down to Charlotte today
and we're going to jump in mytime machine and you can pick a
time in your life where I don'tcare if it's when you were 13,
when your dad left, or it was 16, quitting baseball, or I don't
care if it was 10 years ago.
(42:03):
Go back to a previous, younger,more inexperienced, more
immature Richard Adams, and youget to sit down and talk to your
former self.
What would you say?
What words of wisdom, recipesfor success would you share to
yourself?
Speaker 3 (42:23):
success would you share to yourself?
Yeah, I think if I could bottleit all up into like one main
idea.
It's that look kid, you do nothave to struggle and have this
amount of and have like acertain amount of disdain or
discomfort, or just you don'thave to be miserable to be
successful.
And I know that sounds so weird, but I designed myself behind
(42:49):
closed doors to be miserable anddiscontent with my surroundings
, so I would strive for success.
And then I had thisteeter-totter in my mind of if
you have this much amount ofstress and this much amount of
misery and this much amount ofdisdain, you're going to get
this amount of pleasure andsuccess.
And they're not correlatedright.
(43:11):
And that held me back for solong and it damaged
relationships with people.
It damaged relationships withfriends.
It stole years of my life.
It was something that if Iwould have known that then hell,
I don't even know if we'rehaving this conversation now I
might be retired already.
I mean, I feel like it was sucha narrow-minded way to live
(43:36):
life.
But I just rationalize it in mymind that if you go through
this pain and suffering, you'reawarded something like no one
gets anything handed to them, soyou have to put yourself
through this amount of uh, pain,suffering, whatever that may be
, to get this huge piece ofsuccess you want, and if I could
convey that message to 18 yearold me, 22, 22 year old me, I
(44:01):
can almost guarantee you that myjourney would have been a whole
hell of a lot different, forsure.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
Well, I, I do.
You know, obviously, whenyou're, when you're chasing
dreams and you're dreaming bigand chasing them you're going to
go through enough.
You know just, naturalchallenge and obstacles and
you're going to have, you know,days when you're worn thin as an
old knife blade, naturally.
But I think you're right, a lotof people, they proactively put
that, that crap on themselves.
(44:28):
They think that that's theticket to success.
No, that's just a by-product ofsuccess.
That's what we have to gothrough some of those things.
But when you put the unnaturalones on there, there's this,
there's this.
I don't know if you everwatched Seinfeld much, but
there's this one of the episodeswhere George, I think, works
for the Yankees or works forGeorge.
The character on there worksfor somebody and he doesn't do
anything all day.
(44:48):
So what he does to make peoplethink he's working is every time
somebody walks by his office helooks like he's mad, he throws
things around, he has adisgruntled look on his face
which means to them oh, he mustbe working hard.
And I've had people in my lifeand we all know these people
where, when you say how arethings going?
Oh, I've just been so busy, sobusy lately, and I'm like, well
(45:08):
then you're stupid.
And if you're busy all the timeand yet and it's stressful busy
, that's on you.
I had this guy years and yearsago.
He built, I think, my firstwebsite and I think he was a
client for a while too.
But we kind of became friendsand every single time I talked
to him or saw him on the streetshe'd say, oh, it's just been so
(45:31):
busy.
I'm like dude, I know what youdo for a living.
You aren't busy, you don't evenknow what busy is.
But his perception was if hesays he's busy, people are going
to think he's successful.
I mean, you walk into it when Iused to.
You can sit in a restaurant andyou can tell when a person
comes flying through real fastand then another person comes in
(45:51):
walking very slow andconfidently.
I'm going to bet, 99.9% of thetime, that that guy who's
walking, or woman is walkingslowly and confidently is by far
the most successful, not theone who's scurrying around like
a shrew.
It's always that person who isin full control of themselves.
You know, physically,emotionally, mentally and
spiritually.
And that that was one of mybiggest learnings in life.
(46:14):
I know that is.
I used to be that same guy.
You know I would work like Itold you when I first started in
2006, 2026, I don't knowwhatever 28 years ago, this
November, whatever that is, Iwould, you know, work 80 to a
hundred hour weeks and all bymyself, kind of like you, I'd
isolate and I'm looking forclients and and I would I would
be so proud of myself because Itracked my hours when I'd get to
(46:37):
like 80 hours, but I wasn'tmaking any money.
I literally had, I literallydidn't even have a phone.
I had a pager and when aprospect or client would call me
I'd run down and thankfully Ihad.
I had calling cards.
When they had, uh, I'd run downto a little corner gas station
and call them back on a callingcard.
I didn't even have a car,richard.
My car broke down, I think, andI had to borrow my first ever
(47:01):
client Thank God for Scott dealsat a S deals architect in Ann
Arbor.
He was my very first client andwhen my car broke down he let
me his 16 year old daughter'scar for like two months until I
could afford a new car.
That's not success, but yet whenyou looked at me, I was working
a hundred hour weeks, 80 hourweeks, and proud of it.
I mean you do you get work doneduring that time, but I could
(47:24):
have done the same on 40 hoursand I could have had a much.
But I look back and like, asyou do, you look back at those
moments in your life when youwere doing that, you look back
on it favorably.
It's like that was fun, man.
It was stressful, you know.
Digging for money out of myknow, robbing money for my
daughter's piggy bank to getgroceries, digging for money out
of the couch just to you know.
You know, put a little gas inthe car and you know, because my
(47:46):
girl thankfully my girlfriendhad a car, so we did have one
car in the family and where welived.
But, um, I look back now it was, it was fun, but, man, I could
have.
I could have saved myself a lotof headache had I known what we
know now.
Speaker 3 (47:57):
Oh, absolutely.
I, you know.
To finish that point up, I yougot onto me one time about this.
I would and if anyone'slistening that does this, you
don't have to self-punishyourself, please don't.
I would punish myself and noteat lunch Like I would have the
money to go eat lunch, but if Ididn't bring my lunch or if I
did something incorrect in life,I punished myself.
(48:18):
Very, very, very detrimental toyour mental health.
Don't do it.
But that is just because youdid that does not mean that
tomorrow will be better.
Like the world doesn't keep atallying system of well, your
life sucked just this much thisday, so now we're going to give
you a better day tomorrow.
That's just not how it works,and I think that would be again,
(48:41):
if any, you know, even for myyounger self or anyone you know.
If you take anything away fromit, it's just don't make
yourself miserable, for the hellof it.
Speaker 2 (48:50):
Yeah, misery is not a game, it's not a sport.
No, there's enough damn miseryin the world.
Don't put more on it.
Correct?
Well, Richard, what's next foryou on this journey?
What's the next big thing foryou?
Speaker 3 (49:03):
yeah, I mean.
Now it's how do you give back?
I mean, I am so unbelievablyblessed and I say that from the
fact of I've had clients believein me since 2016.
I think every one of them ummore than they could possibly
know.
I've had great mentors, whetherit it be you, dave Robinson,
(49:23):
tony Matt O'Neill, eric Fritz,brent it does not matter who you
name at CG They've helped insome way.
It's time for me to figure outhow, what capacity do I have to
give back?
And then what do I want to dowith that?
So I've kicked around the tireson scholarships for kids that
(49:46):
maybe came from a similarbackground as mine, and they
need that support through anacademic journey and a life
journey as well.
I've thought about, you know,using a platform such as yours
and trying to create my own andhelping people that need
financial literacy and need theunderstanding of how to dig
themselves out of a badfinancial situation or just make
(50:08):
the right money moves.
I mean, a lot of families, in myopinion, are one decision away
from a gallon of gas to a gallonof milk of putting themselves
in a bad financial spot.
Bad financial spot and now thatI have become so incredibly
blessed turning around andhelping um the masses and
influencing the world in eithera big way or a small way.
That's kind of what's next,because you know I've jumped up
(50:33):
on these platforms and achievethe things I want to achieve.
But the big platform is how canyou really give back and help
the next generation achieve whatyou achieved, and potentially
even quicker and even, you know,an even higher platform than
where you're at today?
Speaker 2 (50:49):
Right, you know we've talked about this in the last
month or so.
You and I and I don't know whowas the guy Zig Ziglar.
We talked about this quote.
Speaker 3 (50:58):
Zig Ziglar.
Speaker 2 (50:58):
I don't know.
Do you know the exact quote?
I don't.
I know we butcher it every time, but we know what we mean by it
.
I was just looking up one ofthese days.
Anyway, the sentiment is youknow, in order to be truly
successful in life, just help alot of people achieve their
dreams.
You know, help if you.
The more people you help, themore success you're going to
realize.
And but to help people withoutthe intent of getting anything
(51:19):
back, right, you know, I'vefound that the last six months,
I've given out several speechesfor free.
You know, some virtual, which Ihate, some live where before I
would have just negotiated for afee.
And I just negotiated one lastweek and I said whatever you're.
They asked me what I charge.
I said whatever your budget is,just pay me whatever your
budget is.
(51:39):
And I still don't have a priceon that one.
I think we're talking tomorrow.
But I think when you do that,you get this fulfillment that
you can't put a price tag on.
But I do believe that theuniverse, or God, or whoever,
however you want to say it lateron does put a price tag on it,
and I think that when you getwhat you give or you you get
what?
Yeah, you you get what youreceive, what you give.
(52:00):
And I do believe that when youhelp a lot of people, we think
we're doing it Um cause we wantto to help other people, with no
desire to gain anything back.
But I do think not justemotional gain, but I do think
there's a lot of financial gainthat comes back down the road
and I think a lot of it's.
I think when you chase money allthe time, it's very elusive.
But when you sit back and say,okay, I'm going to chase my
(52:22):
dreams, I'm going to help otherpeople chase their dreams, all
of a sudden money kind of comessneaking back around in your
life.
You know, it's like when youbreak up with somebody.
If you beg them to come back,they don't.
But when you say, yeah, I'mokay, I'll be, I'll be all right
(52:47):
without you didn't learn thatuntil far, far too late in my
life, in my 50s actually, butthat's a great lesson.
So we're going to talk furtheron that.
I like that scholarship idea.
I think that's pretty cool.
All right, my friend.
We're down to the finalquestion here, and that is the.
I call it kind of a netquestion because it catches
anything I may have not asked?
Is there any question, richard,that I did not ask, that you
wish I would have?
Or is there any final messageyou want to leave with that one
audience member out there rightnow who is glued intently to
(53:09):
your message?
Speaker 3 (53:11):
Yeah, I would say both Kind of the message
standpoint is and I just said tome fairly recently, spite is
drinking poison and hoping itkills the other person.
And that was something that wasso impactful to me, because
sometimes in life and this couldbe winning an arcade game,
(53:34):
getting a promotion reallydoesn't matter what it is.
Sometimes you're in acompetition with someone else
and if you're not doing it foryourself and you're hoping that
when you win, that person looksat you and you're like man,
you're the better person, or ifyou hope that confetti and
balloons are going to come downfrom the ceiling, I'm here to
(53:54):
tell you it's not so doinganything out of spite and that
could be anything right itdoesn't really matter what it is
.
I've never been on the and evenwhen I succeeded in a spiteful
event that it went the way Iwanted it to go.
So alleviating yourself of that, I think, is the biggest one
(54:16):
for me.
And then the question I would goback and probably listen to
every single episode for a lotof you I shouldn't say every
single episode, but I would fora good majority of your guests
if money was never a decidingfactor, what would you have done
and why?
That would be the one questionthat I would want to hear from a
(54:39):
number of people.
You know, for me, my professionwould be gone, so my life would
be totally different.
But yeah, if money was never adeciding factor, what would you
do and why?
Speaker 2 (54:51):
Okay, I'm writing that one down.
Well, let me ask you thatquestion If money was not a
factor, richard, what would youdo in your life?
Speaker 3 (55:00):
and I don't even do that.
I honestly don't know.
I mean, if I, if I were to putmy thumb on it, it would be
something outside by the coast.
It would be giving someone anexperience.
It would definitely be helpingsomeone, um, because I do love
helping people and I do lovebeing outside by the water.
(55:21):
But that was a tough questionand I've contemplated that
question for days, thinking tomyself like how would I even
answer that?
And I truly it's been tough forme to figure that out.
But you know, it would probablybe on a boat somewhere out in
the middle of the ocean,potentially either helping
someone or fishing to providefor a village.
(55:42):
I would have to be a provider.
If it just went to sticks andstones and we're all back in the
nomad phase.
I know I'd have to be aprovider because I don't have a
sense of self-worth outside ofbeing a provider.
So I know that I would have tobe a provider for something or
someone, for sure.
Speaker 2 (56:03):
And that's really what you do professionally.
So obviously, if money wasn't afactor, the financial industry
wouldn't be around.
But you do that, you provide,you serve and you impact other
people.
You just happen to do it in thearena of financial planning.
Speaker 3 (56:18):
Absolutely.
I mean I'm lost, like me at acore.
When I went through some of thethings I went through earlier
in life, especially in 22 and 23, when I had nothing to provide
for outside of clients, I gavemy clients my 110%.
But once I clocked out of workI felt like I had nothing Right.
So I know for me like that ispart of my moral fabric, like I
(56:41):
have to be a provider or else Idon't feel like I have a
self-meeting.
Speaker 2 (56:46):
I love that, anything else, richard, you want to
leave man, this has beenfantastic and we talk so much on
the phone I feel like we're noteven doing a podcast right now.
Speaker 3 (56:55):
I know I can feel the same, Honestly, for those that
are listening.
If you're going throughanything, I would say find a
support system, find the rightpeople, trust the right people.
If you've been contemplatingneeding the help, seeking out
the help is there, whether it bein the form of someone like
Brian or someone therapy,whatever that may be.
(57:18):
You're never weak.
No one ever looks down on you.
I think you might think thatbecause you might feel alone in
a room full of people, but I cantell you that someone out there
is willing to help and you haveto be able to trust that and
trust the right people andyou're going to be a much better
person professional, familymember after that.
So I would just encourageanyone that's listening.
If you're on the kind of thatteetering moment of do I need
(57:40):
help, Do I not go find it,Because the only thing it's
going to do is slingshot youforward.
Speaker 2 (57:49):
Amen, great, great.
Final message Rich, Iappreciate that I'm going to
leave one quick story before wewrap up.
This has you've done this inthe right way.
But there's a story by a friendof mine by the name of Ray
Kelly, former executive atAmerican Express Financial
Advisors, now a leading man atThink2Perform, an amazing
company out of Minnesota, and hetells a story that was reminded
(58:09):
to me yesterday by my friend,dave Dick, and it's the story of
five, and I'm going to butcherthis.
This is Ray's, and Ray, I'm nottrying to offend you, I think
you.
Actually, he was a guest on thepodcast a year or so ago and he
shared this.
There are five frogs sitting ona log and one decides to jump
in the pond.
How many frogs are left in thelog?
For sure, I'm going to ask youthat.
Speaker 3 (58:31):
Say that one more time, so I can't.
So I want to make sure that.
Speaker 2 (58:35):
I'm hearing all of this.
Five frogs are sitting on a logand one decides to jump in the
pond.
How many are left on the log?
Speaker 3 (58:46):
I'd say four.
Speaker 2 (58:47):
You would say that that's what I said yesterday,
having known this no five,because one decided to jump in
the pond, but he didn'tnecessarily jump in the pond, he
just decided to.
So, everybody out there, I justwant to remind you jump in the
damn pond today, stop thinkingand overthinking and
overthinking.
Just jump in the pond, readyfire, aim.
Richard, you are an amazing man, you're an amazing friend,
(59:10):
you're an amazing professionaland I can't thank you enough for
being such an amazing guest onthe Bamboo Lab podcast.
Speaker 3 (59:16):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (59:17):
Oh, my pleasure.
All right, everyone, I want youto please smash that like
button, please rate and reviewus and please share this episode
with three people.
The message I took, anotheragain, another page of notes.
I learned more about Richardtoday than I have in four and a
half years.
There's a lot of wisdom, a lotof experience that many of you,
as a listener out there and as asubscriber, are going to
(59:38):
benefit greatly from it.
But so many of the people youlove and care for can also
benefit, so please share.
In the meantime, I'll talk toyou a week from today, same time
, same place.
In the meantime, please get outthere and strive to give and be
your best.
Please show love and respect toothers and don't forget to
share that with yourself as well, and also live consciously and
live with a purpose.
I appreciate each and everysingle one of you.
(59:59):
Until next time.
Popular Podcasts
Boysober
Have you ever wondered what life might be like if you stopped worrying about being wanted, and focused on understanding what you actually want? That was the question Hope Woodard asked herself after a string of situationships inspired her to take a break from sex and dating. She went "boysober," a personal concept that sparked a global movement among women looking to prioritize themselves over men. Now, Hope is looking to expand the ways we explore our relationship to relationships. Taking a bold, unfiltered look into modern love, romance, and self-discovery, Boysober will dive into messy stories about dating, sex, love, friendship, and breaking generational patterns—all with humor, vulnerability, and a fresh perspective.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com