From Broke to Billions: Sir Darren Jacklin on the Mindset Shift That Unlocked His Financial Freedom

Petter Erik: [00:00:00] welcome to this episode with, uh, sir, Darren Jacklin. I remember that you were speaking in Norway and I had went out to be organized for some years back and I get so many feedback from this because you will saying like You will never succeed before your haters. I think that’s a really cool statement. Can you tell me more about what you mean by that? [00:01:00] Yeah, so in life, you’re always going to be hugged and slugged. There’s always a balance of being hugged. Some people are going to hug you, and some people are going to slug you. Some people are going to kiss you, and some people are going to kick you. Sir Darren Jacklin: And some people are gonna support you and some people are gonna challenge you. So there’s always a balance of hug and slug, kiss and kick, support and challenge. And so with that come as you grow and scale and develop your life personally, professionally, you take on doing new things like you make it a promotion, for example, in a job or career. And other people wanted that promotion. They wanted that raise increase. So you’re going to have some haters. if you go out and you’re. Walking every morning, you’re exercising in your neighborhood and other people are driving to work thinking, I want to be like that guy or you’re going golfing or going hiking or playing tennis. Other people in your neighborhood, like, oh, it must be nice for you. You know, you’re always playing tennis, always going hiking. You’re going to develop haters. And so it’s just part of the game. If you play sports. Or anybody watching playing sports, you know that people are going to be cheering for you. The people are going to be booing for you. so what you want to do is celebrate haters. So I love haters. I look at [00:02:00] haters as research and development. But I listen sometimes what they say to give me feedback. One of the things I’ve really learned in my life, though, Is the importance of integrity without integrity, nothing works, right? And so one of the things to really consider is that when we’re operating from a function of integrity, of keeping our personal promises, being our word. That’s so important. I’ve met so many people throughout my life as I’ve traveled this world multiple times who say one thing, maybe on social media and do something completely different. I’ll give you an example. Just the other day, I was traveling. I met somebody who through LinkedIn. Yeah. And what met this person at the hotel? I was staying at the restaurant person showed up. Their photo on LinkedIn profile was like 20 years ago compared to who they are today. Completely inauthenticity And so to me, I get repelled by that versus attracted. And so I hated on that person because of that. So the key thing is authenticity, vulnerability and integrity and staying humble. Is so important, right? Because as you [00:03:00] grow and scale and develop your life, you’re going to have people who support you and challenge you. And so the key thing is to be mindful of that is not to get confrontational and aggressive and stuff like that. Realize that, Hey, it’s part of the game. So when people hate on me, I know if I’m a man of my word, I’m coming from authenticity, vulnerability, coming from heart centeredness and staying humble. that it doesn’t bother me cocky, a little bit arrog then the haters going to bring me down and humble position. So as you’re bu you’re growing, expand yo as you grow in scale, you to have support and chall It’s all part of the game. Petter Erik: So I actually, I have a really good story about this. What happened last year, I think it’s, uh, five, six weeks ago because, yeah, we have our new webinar that we are promoting and, uh, using face to calcium and, uh, one and a half, two years ago, we was 22 people in the company and now we’re down to nine. So I wrote the ad saying like, Hey, I’m still ambitious. I’m still want [00:04:00] to make more money. I’m still want to reach more people. But then now I, I figured out that I can use AI. Come from 20 to nine people and guess what I get so many haters with this text on the app. It’s like so many Writing things about me and they start I I answer them because I like to Do you know one like you said I like to get haters on facebook ads because what is happening when I get haters It start to go viral. It’s like people start to comment on it and start to get shares and likes and so many of my Comments Clients come over to me and saying, what should you do with this ad? Do you need to stop it? Do you see everyone who are hating what they’re writing? And I say, Hey, it goes viral. I get cheaper leads. I get better leads for it. And, some of these listeners, I think this is really important for many of them are so afraid of getting haters in social media. Haters that start to follow them and, and they don’t know how to handle them. Sir Darren Jacklin: if I can share with you, one of the ways to handle it is our life is about questions, right? The quality of our lives is determined by the quality of the questions we ask ourselves. [00:05:00] So I always share with people, write down on a piece of paper, what are the benefits to having haters? Because we look at the drawbacks, but what are the benefits? And when you start to look at what are the benefits, you’ll, you’ll welcome haters Petter Erik: I will tell people that and please do it when they’re listening to this episode. So when we met the last time, uh, yeah, you had a great business and it was scaling and all those things. But from. I think it’s maybe seven, eight, eight years ago. we met last time. Uh, so much happened in your life. So, uh, and you have scaled so many businesses and I think. it’s impossible to scale a business if you’re not scaling your personal growth and your personal life So, What have you done over the last nine years and what have you done for scaling your life? Sir Darren Jacklin: What I realized as I was traveling the world, doing corporate training and advising some of the greatest companies in the world, some of the top CEOs and executives and boards of directors and some great teams and having great breakfast, lunches and dinners and collaborations and conversations with these men and women was I realized that it’s [00:06:00] easier to acquire revenue. To actually create revenue. So a lot of times people wanna create a startup company and they wanna go to friends and family and go to investors and go to trade shows and conference and seminars and raise money for their startup business. It’s high risk. There’s a lot of risk. A lot of heavy lifting going on for the first three to five years to get that up and growing. And we know statistically how many of those startup companies go bust in a very short period of time. Most of them don’t even make it one year, 18 to 24 months, they go bust. So what I realized in terms of scaling was I looked at opportunity zones as I was traveling around the world. Talking to a lot of very influential people and I would see different opportunities. For example, one of the things I’m doing right now is we’re scaling accounting and bookkeeping firms across North America. We’re actually doing what we call a roll up strategy. We’ve already bought a few accounting bookkeeping firms, and we’ve got a whole pipeline of potential acquisition targets across North America, and we’re buying these bookkeeping accounting firms.[00:07:00] Because there’s a big problem right now in North America with an aging population of what we call baby boomers, the average CPA charter professional accountant in the United States of America and Canada is 61 years of age, according to the data, 61 years of age as a baby boomer. So their children don’t want to get into the accounting bookkeeping world. They want to start transitioning towards their sunset years, towards retirement. But nobody’s buying their book of business, their human resources, or their practice or their firm. So what I’ve done is I’ve went out to people. I know we’ve pulled capital together and we’re doing these acquisition targets and rolling them up and build it as to a 50 million a year revenue company. And then in a few years, my partner and I will exit from that and go through a liquidity event. And we’ll sell it to one of the big four accounting firms or one of the private equity firms across North America internationally. So we build it to sell it. So we buy, build, and sell. Okay. Right. That’s what we’re doing to scale. So that’s just in the bookkeeping accounting industry. Then [00:08:00] I have a big real estate portfolio across North America of single family homes, now getting into commercial real estate as well that for cashflow purposes. you know, Tetien and I, we have our own international foundation called Link Foundation. We’ve committed a hundred million dollars over the next decade towards global philanthropy. So I’m all about building wealth. So that I can pay it forward and pass it on because, my success is someone else’s miracle. So I want to become more abundant, more prosperous in my life by buying income producing assets to produce monthly recurring revenue. Right in terms of predictable income and then from there solving some of the greatest biggest problems around the world through humanitarian Efforts and through philanthropy, so I I love to you know profit for people. I love to create jobs I love to create opportunities So I love scaling businesses and growing business and have other people run the day to day operation. So i’m the visionary And I get people based on their personality style, their history, their experience, [00:09:00] their skillset, and their expertise Cause here’s something to look at. So in my life, I have over 7, 000 written goals, over 7, 000 written goals. And when I show people, people like, wow, like, man, I don’t have 10 written goals or five written goals or 50 written goals. You have over 7, 000 written goals. I said, yeah. And I’ve been working out for many years, but here’s the key thing. Most of my goals and dreams do not require my actions. And Think about that for a moment. Most of your goals and dreams do not require your actions. What it requires is creating teams and teamwork so that you go from working in the business or working in the businesses to working on the businesses. Otherwise you just create or buy yourself a job. And I don’t want a job. I want freedom in my life. I want to be able to go wherever I want, whenever I want, whoever I want. So scaling life, which I love what you have is this podcast is really about, you know, a lot of people today want to get into business for themselves. They want to take the startup route. We had there’s so many operating business out there right now. They’ve been around for 3 or 4 [00:10:00] years where the owner is exhausted him or her. They’re tired. They’re going through divorce. They have a medical challenge. They just, they’re done. They want to retire. And so there’s so many opportunities of off market businesses that are for sale. Because a lot of the businesses that you see on the internet today that are being listed and advertised for sale, well, there’s so many other businesses. If you just went out there and knocked on some doors or went to some trade shows or some conferences or Rotary clubs or chamber of commerce or women in business and started having a network of conversations, I talk about my international book until I become I talk about that all we are is a network of conversations and opportunities live inside of conversations. So if you’re not getting the opportunities that you want, I recommend that you just start going out there and having conversations either online, or Or in person, but the drawback to online is a lot of people are hiding behind the keyboard on the computer and you got to do your discovery. You got to go through your discovery process and your due diligence, because there’s a lot of fake people out there. You know, I’ve met so many people in my lifetime that when you get [00:11:00] out there and you start going through the discovery process asking questions through the discovery process, and then you do a deeper dive into the due diligence. That people exaggerate things. They embellish things. They make up stuff. So you really got to do your homework and that’s where it comes as a really smart, educated, talented team of people. They’ve got your back to support you. That can see things from all angles because as human beings, we all have blind spots. and that’s why there’s a strength in numbers and a strength in teams. And that’s one of my big successes today in my life in terms of growing and skinning. Since you and I met last time in Oslo, Norway. Was that I was, I was all by myself traveling the world, doing corporate training seminars as a solo person, but I didn’t have a team. Now you look at me, I’ve got teams of people that are working with me all over the world, virtually and in person. And my life has just gone to a whole new level. Financially prosperous wise, successful eyes in so many ways, because most of my goals and dreams don’t require my actions. It’s all about creating teams. you know, so since we’ve met, I’ve been knighted by the royal family of [00:12:00] Spain, the real order of Cappadocia became a Sir Darren Jacqueline. 2022. I’ve been to Nasdaq three times in New York City to ring the closing bell at Nasdaq. I served on the board of directors for a decade of EXP World Holdings from 2013 to 2023. Helped get that company from a startup. As a team member to 85, 000 licensed real estate agents in 24 countries on four continents. I helped take another company, an artificial intelligence company, from, you know, startup to being publicly traded on the Siebel Stock Exchange in Chicago. So I’ve had some pretty big wins in my life. And, you know, at 51 years of age, I feel like I’m just getting started. you know, two years ago I took my health to a whole new level because I used to be a sugarholic and a food addict and eating a lot of fat food or fast food while I was traveling so much. So I really dialed up my, my health fitness and nutrition last two years. I did Mount Kilimanjaro last year. In Tanzania, East Africa at 19, 340 feet. And now right now I’m training for, [00:13:00] for January, 2025 to summit Mount Vincent in Antarctica. and now with our foundation, we’re going to build a hundred schools around the world for global philanthropy through link foundation. So a lot of stuff has unfolded and transferred since the last time you and I had a conversation, but it’s been massive action, right? Writing down my goals. Scheduling things into my calendar because if it’s not structured into your calendar, there’s no evidence exists in your life and instead of reminders for accountability and responsibility and then having a daily report and then also having a calendar review every day. So there’s certain daily habits and daily routines that I’ve incorporated into my life That make my life workable today and allow me to have the freedom and, and the lifestyle I live today in my life, which I’m so abundantly blessed and grateful for. Petter Erik: Yeah. And it’s so important what you’re saying about having things written down. I also know when I also use like a weekly planner and I write down the long term strategic project. And if you don’t have them written down now, you don’t see them. You just forget them. And I think this is so important that you have the big goals [00:14:00] and you have all this thing that you’re thinking about, because. He’s also driving the right direction I guess, you know, in Dan Sullivan, like a mentor for some years. And yeah, Sir Darren Jacklin: so Petter Erik: uh, he has the book called who not how, and it looks like it’s kind of that mentality that I implemented in your life you’re not looking for. Because I think a lot of entrepreneurs are thinking, how can I make this happen? He said, well, who can help me with that? What you are talking about is more the mindset about who and many of. The listeners here, they are thinking like, Oh, I want to scale because they are selling online courses or online coaching program or, and they, many of them have a really good business, but they want to scale. so when I’m listening to you, I got this Thoughts about, so instead of trying to scale to a new market, for example, in a new language or whatever, is it better to look at a competitor in another language and try to buy that business? Sir Darren Jacklin: Well, first of all, key thing is you want to, you, what I do is I watch and observe people, right? So one of the things I do is I go hiking every day. Now I’m [00:15:00] obsessed with hiking and you know, we do millions of dollars of business deals out hiking and people say, why would you go hiking? Well, because here’s the thing about hiking. If you and I go play pick a ball or we go golfing or play tennis or racquetball, that’s great. But I don’t get to know you the deep level. If I take you out hiking into the wilderness, you have to trust me. So what we do is we compress time. So if you and I meet at a seminar or a conference and I want to get to know you, like for example, next week, I’m in Tampa, Florida, and I’m going to a big event. And I’ve already reached out to some participants in that program to go for walks before the event starts in the morning. We’re going walking around the city, going to do a few miles. Now some of these people I don’t even know. I just know there are attendees going and I put out a request on one of the bulletin boards to see if you want to join me. The key thing is, is now I get a chance to spend one on one time building relationship equity. So people get to know me, like me and trust me. So I become relational versus transactional. So a lot of people today on the internet are transactional. They’re not relational. It’s all [00:16:00] transactional. So I’m about the long game building longterm relationships. So what I do is I go hiking when I take people out hiking. I said, we’ll say, I don’t, I’m not interested in hiking. But here’s the key thing, do some physical exercise with somebody because if you go meet in a coffee shop, it’s great. But if you do something physical together as a physical exercise, you bond together. It creates different chemicals in your body when you’re moving your body, right? People that are first responders or people that are military or people that play sports, they bond together as a team. People that are in college universities that have that alumni, they’re like, yeah, man, we played hockey, we played football, you know, so the thing is, is that you want to build relationships. So, what I do is through the networking community of hiking, people get a chance to trust me because I’ve taken out the wilderness because I think, oh, my gosh, is there wild animals out there. Then the guard comes down, then the authenticity vulnerability comes out. And then what I do is I make requests. So like I talk about in this book, like this is until I become my book. I created that went global [00:17:00] in this book. I talk about the importance of making requests for every question that we don’t ask the answers always know. So when you make a request. People only do one of three things. Step number one is they’ll accept the request. Step number two is they’ll decline the request. Or step number three is they’ll counter offer the request. So the key thing is, you want to take on looking at how many requests I’m going to make this week. Okay, who do I need to have a conversation this week that can help move my life forward, help move my business forward, help me expand internationally? So I’m always playing games with myself, looking at ways that I can grow and scale. So I ask people that are hiking with me or people I’m walking with or collaborating with, hey, who do you know that’s in Vietnam? Who do you know that’s this type person? I want to expand my business internationally. So I’ll give you an example. We’re doing a hiking fundraiser coming up in, uh, in a few months here in Vancouver, Canada, uh, through link foundation and people go to hiking fundraiser. com and my focus over the next five years [00:18:00] is to grow and scale this into multiple cities in multiple countries all over the world. So we’re working with people on their mental health. We’re working people on their longevity, their vitality, their energy, connection, community. We’re bringing people out into nature and people are having an incredible experience while being out in nature will support a great cause. And so you take a hike, you build a school. So one of the ways to grow and scale this Is leveraging celebrities. Okay, so I’m, I’m reaching out to Olympic athletes, professional athletes in hockey, football, soccer, baseball, tennis, all these different professional athletes where health and fitness, nutrition is very important to them. I said, Hey listen, would you love to take a hike and build a school? We’re committed with Link Foundation and E two E. Elevate Educate to build a hundred schools around the world through hiking fundraiser.com. They’re like, yeah, I’d love to do that. Great. We’d love to have you come out and I actually have them register and actually pay money. So they got some skin in the game, but also they’re committed because now they voted with their wallet or their purse or their credit card. And [00:19:00] I’ve got celebrities, I’ve got top CEOs, executives, high net worth, ultra high net worth people, that come out to take a hike and build a school through hikingfundrasia. com. Now, how do I grow and skill it? See, I can go to the hype community and just talk to the average person, which is great. We’ll have the average ordinary person coming out from all walks of life, all different age groups. But when I get centers of influence of celebrities, people want to come out and take a photo with them to put on their social media. People want to come out and collaborate and network. Some of our high net worth and ultra high net worth investors, they’re looking to allocate and deploy capital into businesses. So now you got somebody who’s got a business that’s looking to raise money and now the next few hours you’re going to spend on a hiking trail networking with a decision maker who can write you a check somebody who’s your hero that you see in the Internet or television who’s a sports show. Now you get a chance to bring your kid out or your children out your niece or nephew out. To come hike for a cause and build a school. Now they get a chance to get an autograph and get a photo with one of their celebrity heroes. [00:20:00] People that want to say, Hey man, I want to, I want to have a billion dollar company. I want to have a company worth a hundred million dollars. Well now you can network with CEOs that you normally would never get access to because of the gatekeepers. Because here’s the thing to look at all successful people do two things in common, no matter where you live on the planet. Step number one is they qualify their time. It’s number two is they protect their time. When you come out and take a hike and go to school, when you’re out in nature, people lose track of time. They surrender to not because they’re there for the day with us to support a great cause with link foundation. So we build this community of a few hundred hikers and networkers that come out and they support a great cause. But here’s the cool thing. At the end of the day, at the end of the event, Now everybody’s connected through a network of conversations because now we start to build the school. So our next school we’re building is in the country of Honduras, right? We already did West Africa. Now we’re going to Honduras. So now some of these influential people that you respect and admire, you would love to get into close proximity because proximity is power. [00:21:00] Now you’ve got access to these people. And now guess what? In the next couple of years, we’re gonna be doing humanitarian trips a couple of times a year through link foundation, where people get a chance to be in a small intimate group for a period of time and come up, build relationship equity and do things, and you’d be amazed at the amount of business deals and opportunities to get created because you’re doing a humanitarian product that supports a greater good ability to school some of the most impoverished children on the planet. So people are having a great time supporting a great cause, making a difference at the same time, networking and moving their lives forward. And also when you’re in close proximity, you get a chance to see I’m 52, almost 52 now. So I’m looking at the guys are in their sixties and seventies and eighties. I’m looking at guys like that. That are in great physical vitality and shape, right? Because we look at people who are older than us for their, their history, their experience, and their wisdom. And we look at the younger men and women for their creativity, their imagination, and their energy. So I’m always chasing people that are further than me. Because when I was in my twenties, I was looking at the guy that was in his thirties and forties and [00:22:00] fifties. I want that guy’s lifestyle. So when you come out to hiking fundraiser, And you can take a hike, build a school. The cool thing is you get a chance to be around people. So you get a chance to touch your dreams of how you want to live your life. Cause like, man, I don’t want to be like that guy. I want to be like that woman. want to have be a father, a mother like that. So I like creating environments where people get a chance to be part of that community and culture, where they get a chance to touch their dreams in terms of dream building, but also be in the environment, because if you’re not succeeding or winning. The thing is, you get around people who are succeeding and winning because in a knowledge transfer takes part and also energy transfer parts is might be financially broke right now or not winning as an entrepreneur. Things are not going your way. You had some adversities and challenges. So that’s which I’ve had in my life. But when you get around people who are supporting the great cause and winning, that energy rubs off on you and it raises you up and your vibration up that you feel like, oh, my gosh, people can relate to me. This is my tribe. This is my vibe. These people are just like me. Oh, my gosh, I [00:23:00] can get back up. I can go out again. I can go out there and succeed. So it’s very important because a lot of entrepreneurs do life by themselves. But a lot of us are lone rangers. I’m guilty. I did that for many years of my life. But now there’s a strength and support in teams and getting around the right environments of people that have got your back that will support you. So important. Petter Erik: I think many are struggling with this thing. Like they are in a spot where they have a business and they’re almost alone or maybe a small team, they are. So good in something. So the ego is driven. So they can’t come find someone in the company that can replace them because they’re afraid of doing it. so you went maybe from that mindset that you think like no one can do corporate training from me, then it’s talking about how you can, how we can leverage on other people. So what happened? Sir Darren Jacklin: So, so a couple of things. One is to unpack this couple of things is I, I travel, as you know, almost 300 days a year globally, and I was always up and down financially. I didn’t have predictable income. you know, I had a lot of financial overhead [00:24:00] expenses because of traveling all the time. you know, I would pay for my travel upfront. They get 90 days for some of these big corporations. So I had to carry it on my credit cards, which is, you know, sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars. some scary nights, scary days, man, times I go into hotels and thinking my credit card is going to decline. I was 38 years of age, and that was a turning point in my life where I was up and down. And I realized, my gosh, I got to start creating multiple revenue streams. You know, the average millionaire in North America has seven revenue streams of income, whether it’s active or passive, they have seven revenue streams. And I realized that I was always trading time for money. If I wasn’t doing a corporate training seminar and traveling somewhere and speaking in front of a different audience, training them, I wasn’t getting paid. I’ll share an interesting story with you. years ago, I got invited to a mastermind group And I went out and there was all these successful men and women in this room that were kind of like a YPO, young presence organization. They’re all, all highly successful, accomplished [00:25:00] people. I was earning 200 a day. Plus my travel expenses and a per diem doing corporate train service. This is my early days. Okay. and I was making 400 cold calls a day, 2000 cold calls a week out of the telephone books. Okay. Now I got trained on how to make all those cold calls because I used to be a telemarketer for a big national magazine here in Canada. Can I used to make 400 cold calls a day, 2000 cold calls a week calling across Canada between five and 9 PM, Monday to Friday, selling magazine subscriptions. So after seven months of selling magazine descriptions to a telemarketing firm, my boss said to me, Darren, this is a dead end road. You should go out and create a corporate training business. So I’ve, I’m a couple of years in my corporate training business. Now, full disclosure, cause I’m all about integrity and authenticity. The first 10 years of my corporate training business, I only had one suit. It was my high school graduation suit that my parents bought me from my high school, because that’s all I could financially afford. I wore the same suit for the first 10 years. Now, what’s interesting is that we didn’t have social media back then. This [00:26:00] is back in the 1990s when I started doing corporate training, right? But if you would have followed me, if I would have been documenting my travel on social media, if we would have had it back then, you would have saw the same suit for 10 years, almost 300 days a year. that I wore So I go to this mastermind one day and I walk in as a guest, really uncomfortable. Don’t want to be there because I’m not making money. I’m not getting paid. See if I’m not making phone calls and dialing for dollars and closing deals, I’m not getting paid because I’m not booking corporate training, speaking seminar opportunities, right? So to me, this is a shiny object. It’s a distraction. So I’m in this room for a couple hours. Okay. Pissed off upset that i’m in this room. I shouldn’t be here, but I said yes to a friend of mine Okay, fine. I’ve invited him out to things i’m returning the paper back to him So anyways, we get to about the final hour of this mastermind group and they do a thing called the hot seat peter And they take one of the entrepreneurs in the room who’s dealing with a problem or challenge Per se [00:27:00] professionally and they go up to the front of the room They’re voting on they vote on who’s going to sit in the hot seat And then they, they pick you apart. They give you constructive feedback. They coach you, mentor you, they challenge you. So anyways, the group, they’re looking at different people, entrepreneurs in the room that are members of this mastermind. I’m just a guest. And they turn to me and they go, Darren Jafflin, you go to the hot seat. I’m like, no, no, absolutely no. And he’s like, you’re in hospital. I said, no, I’m just a guess. Listen, listen. I’m the, listen. You got people in this room who have much bigger challenges and problems than than me. I, I, I decline your request. Sorry. No. So I get into this argument with this guy who’s the facilitator, and he said, Darren, listen, are you gonna keep arguing for your limitations? You gotta get to the front room and sit in the hot seat. I said, no. He goes, if you don’t say yes, I’m going to come get you and bring it for the room. I said, no, I’m not coming. Non negotiable. No, I’m not coming. So what is finally the group, you know, leverages themselves and they get pressure on me. And I finally came in and I go to the front of the room. So guy says to me, he says, uh, what do you [00:28:00] do for a living? I said, I’m a corporate trainer. How much money do you make a day? I said, 200 plus travel expenses. He goes, so You’re here in British Columbia, Canada. If you had to be in New York city for a corporate speaking engagement, would you fly from Vancouver, Canada to New York city for 200 bucks? U S he will say, you’re going to take a day of travel with time zone differences and airport connections to fly from Vancouver, Bruce can be Canada, New York city, fly all the way across North America, then spend hours preparation. Then the flight there, hotel, and then flight back. So you’re going to take three days of your life. Plus all the preparation for 200 bucks. And I said, yeah, yeah. He goes, that’s ridiculous, man. He goes, you’re, you’re going nowhere fast. He goes, you’re gonna be fricking broke the rest of your life. And I’m like, Oh my gosh, like that just stings. Right. But it’s true. So they started asking me all these questions in this hot seat. I’m really uncomfortable. I’m sweating. I’m shaking. I don’t want to be in the front room. I’m embarrassed. And the guy goes to me, he says, Darren, are you open to a challenge? And I’m like, man, I’m an entrepreneur [00:29:00] bringing on what’s the challenge. He goes, How many phone calls do you make a day? I said, I’m making 400 phone calls a day. These are cold calls. Are the telephone books 2000 cold calls a week. It’s all documented. It’s all verified. It’s metric. I have flip charts whiteboards. I keep track of all the numbers of what I’m doing. He goes, what’s your success rate? I said, 2 percent conversion rate, 98 percent rejection rate, selling corporate training service over the telephone. he goes, how much do you think you’re worth a day? I said, I’d like to get my ultimate target is 500 a day. I want to go from 200 to 500 a day. That’s my stretch goal. He goes, no, no, you’re going to be in this mastermind. No. I said, what do you think I should charge? He goes, I want you to start asking for 10, 000 a day. I started laughing. I said, buddy, listen, come on. I said, I’m not drinking the Kool Aid. This ain’t a Kumbaya thing. I said, listen, there’s, I don’t even make 10, 000 in a month. I said, I’m already getting high levels of rejection, making all these cold calls over the telephone. I’m not going to start asking [00:30:00] for 10, 000 a day, or I’m going to get evicted and living on the streets. I’m not going to pay my bills on time, which I’m struggling to do right now. I’m not even living paycheck to paycheck. I’m living panic to panic. And he goes, do you accept my challenge? I said, no. No, because you don’t understand my industry. You’re not making the cold calls like I am. And you’re not talking to the people every day. Like I am, I’ve got evidence that I’m making 400 cold calls a day, 2004 calls a week. He goes, I don’t care. He goes, listen, we meet on a monthly basis. He goes, here’s the challenge. I want you every time you get on the phone with a decision maker and they ask you how much for a day of corporate training. I say, I want you to say 10, 000. And I said, listen, man, I’m getting rejected at 200 a day plus travel expenses for anywhere in North America. 10, 000 is way out of the league, man. You don’t know what you’re talking about. He goes, do you accept my challenge? I said, I’ll accept your challenge. I’m going to tell you right now, what you’re telling me is not valid. Like your coaching is not working, my friend. It’s not working. You don’t know. You don’t know your coaching because you don’t know the industry is I don’t care. I don’t care what you know. I make a lot more money than you listen to what I’m telling you. So [00:31:00] fine. That’s okay. Fine. I’ll accept your challenge, but I don’t agree with you about accepting challenge. Fine. I know you’re going to lose, but I’ll take the challenge. And so one of the things I’ll share with you, if I can just be fully transparent is on this mastermind coaching. One of the guys told me in the group, he said, Darren, if you get uncomfortable asking for 10, 000, remember everything in life results to pain or pleasure, pain or pleasure. He goes, reach down and start grabbing your balls and squeeze your balls. When you start to say 10, 000, I’m like, this is ridiculous, right? This is ridiculous. Stupid. Like where do you, where do you get this coaching from? Right? So I’m like, okay, fine. I’ll accept your challenge. I’ll reach out and grab my balls and feel the pain I’ll ask for 10, 000. So I’m thinking nothing’s going to happen out of this, right? I’m skeptical, pessimistic about it. Don’t believe these guys wasting my time being there. Shouldn’t have said yes to this mastermind thing. So I left not happy. And it was two days later, Peter, I get a telephone call from a guy who’s an executive with a major company in North America, very, very big company. And he says to me, he says, I [00:32:00] may speak to Darren Jaffe. I said, speaking, he goes, this is so and so calling from, he goes, listen, about 18 months ago, I met you at this conference. You know, I know who you are. I’ve had a lot of my team members go there. He says, we want to bring you in for a quarterly off site in the Canadian Rockies near Banff National Park, uh, at this place in Golden, British Columbia, Canada. It’s like four months from now. And he goes, I want to just talk to you about how much it’s going to cost for you to be the corporate trainer to come in for this quarterly off site. They want to do it with 12 of my executives. And I pause and the first thing goes through my mind, Peter, Is, oh, I got it. These people in this room, these people in this room have set me up, but this is a setup call, right? So I, I pause and I freeze on the telephone and I go, oh my gosh. So I start grabbing my balls for real, squeeze my balls and I say 10, 000. And all of a sudden there’s a silent pause on the telephone. And in my mind, it felt like five minutes, probably maybe 15 seconds, but it felt like five minutes that, that pause all of a sudden he goes, [00:33:00] done. Yeah. my assistant will call you back within 90 minutes. We’re going to FedEx you, um, a 50 percent deposit and the day of the corporate care will pay the other 50 percent and then we’ll reimburse you for your trial expense that you can give us to make your invoices and receipts. I own money. Like I’m, I’m struggling financially panic to panic and I owe my friends and family money, so I’m thinking I’m getting 5, 000 tomorrow, I’ll wait to pay my taxes and I’m going to pay this money that I owe outstanding to restore my integrity because I’m out on my integrity. So I get off the phone, I start calling people and say, look, I’ve got some money coming in. I want to catch up to you because I owe you some money. Let’s play catch up. When the check arrives tomorrow by FedEx, I’m going to run to the bank, deposit the check, get the cash, and I’ll start dropping off cash to you because I want to do it in person because I want to restore my integrity because it’s important to me. So the next day FedEx arrives, I run up to the FedEx truck, I grab the FedEx envelope, open it up, run to the bank, so excited, go in. Now here’s one problem. I’ve never cashed a check for 5, 000 before because I [00:34:00] wrote some NSF balance checks before. I don’t have a good credit rating. So I go deposit the check in my account. And the bank teller, she said to me, is there anything else I can do for you today? I said, yeah, I would like to withdraw the 5, 000 Canadian. And she goes, Mr. Jaclyn, you can’t withdraw the 5, 000 Canadian. There’s a five day business hold on the funds to make sure they clear. I’m like, I can’t wait five business days. That’s like seven days. I need the cash today. I need to talk to your manager, the branch manager. I need to do this. I can’t leave this bank without 5, 000 Canadian cash. She goes, I’ll see what I can do, but I can’t promise anything. So she takes off, goes off for a couple minutes. I’m sweating. They get, Oh my gosh, I just made some promises that I’ve done before. And I couldn’t keep my promises and I’m going to be out of integrity again. And nobody’s going to believe me again. Cause I can’t keep my word. She comes back with the branch manager. Branch manager says, sorry, Mr. Jafflin, you have to hold for five business days. I’m like, what’s some other options. You can take the check and go to some [00:35:00] other bank and see if they’ll cash it for you, but they’ll probably hold it for five business days. So I’m like, oh my gosh. So as I leave the bank, I’m stressed out, panicked, right? Living panic to panic, not even paycheck to paycheck. Call these people back, Darren, another broken promise. Can’t keep his word, completely out of integrity, not trustworthy, not reliable. I’m thinking, oh my gosh, going backwards again as an entrepreneur, right? Anyways, check clears. I go pay these people, get them caught up, restore my integrity, deal with the uncomfortableness of this, the embarrassment of this four months. Goodbye. I go to this resort in the Canadian Rockies to do the corporate training. Do a phenomenal day, like gold medal day for me. Like I was on, I was so in the zone. At the end of the day, the people fill out the evaluation forms and then they’re going white water rafting, the executives, the 12 of them. So this guy, he says, I need to talk to you. And he’s got his pack of cigarettes here, his player cigarettes. And he goes, I need to talk to you. He’s a real redneck. And he goes, you and I are going to go for a walk down the riverbank. And this is where the life [00:36:00] lessons, this is where it all unfolds. We walk into the riverbank and he’s got his cigarettes here and he’s got his 5, 000 check behind there that I need because I owe money. he said to me, he says, I got to ask you a question. Four months ago when I called you on the telephone and I asked you how much for a day of corporate training, why did you tell me 10, 000? Now, Peter, I am freaking scared. Like going to crap my pants. I am freaking terrified because if he wants a refund, I don’t got the money. Like I can’t pay the, I’ve already spent the five grand before. And the money right now it’s in his, in that envelope is already spent for taxes and bills. And playing catch up with people like it’s gone. The 10 grand is gone and I’m scared. So I’m nice and calm. I’m like, okay, breathe and I’m thinking, oh, my gosh. And so I said to him, I said, you know what? I prepared well for this for this corporate training seminar. I focused. I’m here to deliver results, practical results. He looks at me, goes. I got to give you some feedback. He goes, the [00:37:00] next time somebody asks you how much for what you’re worth and how much you’re proctor services, you don’t start negotiating with yourself and say 10, 000, whatever your number is, because you asked me what my budget is and what I’m willing to pay you for it. I’m like, okay, where are we going with this? Right? I’m a little confused. Where are we going with this? And he goes, you know, Darren, he reached into his pocket. Takes up the envelope with 5, 000 Canadian. He hands to me, he goes, you know, Darren, I was willing to pay you 25, 000 for the day plus first class travel expenses. But she only asked for 10, 000 and I would have paid you 15 grand more because you’re worth it because you make me a lot of money with your corporate training seminars. Here’s your five grand. Let’s go back to camp and grab something to eat. I hope you learn something today. And what I realized in that moment was that people believe in more than me that I believe in myself. I didn’t know my value. I didn’t know my worth. And that day transformed my life where when I started doing corporate training seminars, I started asking for [00:38:00] $25,000 a day and I started getting, I got to $40,000 a day for corporate training seminars and people didn’t even like 25 grand. Okay. Done. I asked a company just recently to work with them. I asked for a signing bonus to come on and they gave me a 100, 000 signing bonus, and it was done in like 10 seconds. And I thought to myself, do you know how many days I had to travel on the road to do corporate training centers to make 100, 000? And I did it in less than 30 seconds just by making a request and asking for it, because I got the value. Like it just, because, because my self worth increased. So I hope people that are listening to this realizing that people believe in you. You never realize, cause we’re always scared to ask, well, this is what I want for my product or my service, or your coach, or you saw an online price. Like, are people going to pay for this? And you’d be surprised if I would’ve asked for, can you imagine if I would’ve told this guy? I wouldn’t have went to this mastermind two days earlier and got the feedback and the coaching, which I was totally resistant and uncoachable to. And I would’ve answered that phone two days later and said, yeah, [00:39:00] it’s 200 a day. He would’ve hung up the phone. Cause he says, I’m not putting a guy worth 200 a day in front of my people who I’m willing to pay 25 grand for. Not going to happen. And what I found out a few months later was 10, 000 was his minimum that he was going to pay. Petter Erik: I started to think like entrepreneur when I get something that I resist, I should try it out. Instead of like use, you almost say no to it when someone told you to raise your price. And I want to tell a story similar from other perspective, because in 2010, I didn’t went to business master with Tony Robbins and I had a computer company, and I decided I want to bring personal development to, to To Scandinavia, uh, and also speakers. so I went to this, uh, business mastery and, uh, I used business mastery to design my new business with all the things that I was going to do. And it’s come out speaker up there. Maybe you know him. Um, his name is Scott Flansburg is called the human calculator. so he come up on the stage and this was a business event, but he just blew my mind [00:40:00] because he was talking about math and how we can turn our inner calculator and, for me, he was the biggest speaker for, because it was so wow, what he did. He just showed how we can use your brain to calculate big mathing. after his speech, I ran over to him and I say like, Hey, I wanted to Norway and he had been an Oprah Winfrey show. We have been to many shows around the world and he was a super famous guy. It was the best friend was, uh, uh, I think it was Alice Cooper or something was his best friend. I’m playing golf with him and knew all this people. So, so in a way, I, I, I made a deal with him. So I was going to Norway and he was going to speak for my first personal development event, and I was expecting 500 people to this event. And we was five people sitting day in and day out calling people and it was cold market. I believe that I was so, I was so naive when it comes to personal development. And it’s like, if I find five, six, Really good speaker. They were not known, but it was good in personal development industry. People will just join this three days event. And I remember two, three [00:41:00] weeks before the event, we have 73 people signed up and it looks like I was going to lose 100, 000. And I didn’t have the money to pay the flight ticket for them. I didn’t have the money for anything. I was like there, what should I do? So one of the things I learned on Business Mastery was to get press released. So I started, I need to use all the things that I learned on Business Mastery. So I start to contact, newspapers, so first I get a big page about international speakers and pricing. And some of the biggest speaker costs a hundred K, uh, dollar to get to Norway. So that was our article. There was a two page article and it was an interview with me. So it was kind of a good promotion for us. Of course, I didn’t get sales on it, but then I had a press release on Scott Flensburg, like the human calculator. And I get the first page on the biggest, finest newspaper in Norway and also two in the middle and the day after, I don’t know the word in English, but the, uh, the board of schools in Oslo, like the community, uh, call me and say like, Hey, can, uh, can we have a meeting with you? Because we’re interested [00:42:00] in speaker. And I was like, I think I need a 60, 70 K to make this event go around. And I go into this meeting with them and they said, Oh, I want to have a day for kids. We want to have a thousand kids with him. How much did you charge? I’m sitting there. What should I say? It’s like, and you know, everyone that I talk with is like, Oh, school’s doesn’t have money. What should I charge for it? And I was thinking this could save my life, you know, I could save the event. So in the end I was saying, I think, I don’t remember exactly, but approximately, I think I said 35, 000 euro for one hour speech. and I think it was four hours later, they called me, don’t deal. We do it. And when I tell this story, it’s like, no one believed that the school community can pay that month, but this saved my ass. It saves everything. I think we are so protected of this thing, what is possible and not possible, and how we leverage over time and what we can do. so this was a good story about how you change your mindset, but how have we used this story with this [00:43:00] mastermind thing further in the life? Sir Darren Jacklin: when you get around other people who are more successful than you always be open to receiving feedback. I was resistant. I was not coachable. I was stuck in my own way. it was a blind spot for me. So that was first thing was being open and coachable. listen, ask questions. Because sometimes I would get nervous and I’d just start talking more versus listening, asking questions to the wisdom. And it’s in the room, but people have more history and experience. Another thing is, is realizing the value of what I do and how much time and effort and energy that I put in to my, career, my business of what I do. I invest a lot of hours. I’m obsessed with this. So that’s a key thing is that and then realizing the value of that, you know, it’s a fair means of exchange, you know, I, I look at my life with a lot of the corporations and organizations I’ve worked with over the many decades now and, and how much money I’ve made through introductions. for mergers and acquisitions for exits of selling companies. I never got it. I’ve never even got a christmas card from a lot of companies. Uh, how many [00:44:00] times i’d make introductions to people? So realizing now, you know, i’m involved in a lot of deals a lot of all over the world But now I get paid I get cash and I get equity And I’ve made millions of dollars doing this. And so I now see my worth. Whereas before it’s like, I don’t want to ask. I don’t want to put myself out there. But now I just put myself out there and say, look, you know, if I’m going to bring you two together, like, you know, then I’d like to, I’d like to be the toll booth and get something in the middle. A full transparency, full disclosure. You know, it’s all papered up with legal agreements and both sides know what I’m getting. Because I’m fully transparent and people have no problem with it. You know, I did an introduction recently with a, um, a chief financial officer, a CFO, a guy I know in my network and, um, he had finished working in another company and was taking some time off. I made it into an introduction to another company that was looking to hire a CFO through a recruiting agency. And I got paid thousands of dollars. For two hours of the work, more money in that two hours and most people make in a year just [00:45:00] for the introduction. Now, the return on investment of this company is going to be huge. But I was, you know, a few years ago, I would have been scared to ask. It would have been very awkward on composition, but I’ve grown into that now where it’s like, you know, I’m just gonna put myself out there and train and develop myself. There’s sometimes I still feel nervous with certain things, but I keep pushing myself into that because fear does not live in action. So realize that in life we don’t have money problems in life. We only have thinking problems in life. And when you’re around really successful people who’ve done well financially, if you’re around the right people who’ve got integrity and ethics, ’cause money comes in all different shades of grain. I always hang out with people who’ve got ethics and character and stuff, which is very important to me because in life time will either promote you or time will expose you. It’s just a matter of time and I want to get around people and associate with people who are getting promoted, not getting exposed. Right? And that’s so important because that’s risk management. I look at my life now is that, you know, I’m around people who stretch me, make me uncomfortable, but that’s where I [00:46:00] grow the most. And that’s why I’m doing some of these big mountains hiking, why we’re committed to building 100 schools, why we’re building a portfolio of companies, because to me, it’s the game, it’s the hustle, it’s the grind, it’s the challenge, but also it’s the self actualization of human growth and potential, because I look at my life as I get into my later years. I want to look back and say, you know, I have no regrets and I played and lived the life full out, right? I took this meat suit, this human body and man, I would do a lot of incredible things with it and I served a lot of people and made a huge contribution to the world because that’s what enriches my life, Peter. That’s where I get so much joy and fulfillment is being of service and contribution and love and generosity to other people. I just get so much enrichment and joy out of that. Petter Erik: I am inspired and thank you so much, Darren, for, having time for this. I think you will inspire a lot of, entrepreneurs in Europe with this, um, with this entry. So thank you so much ​[00:47:00]