Retiring Early And How To Do It With Joe DiSanto On The Steve Jobs Inspired Join Up Dots Podcast

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Introducing Retiring Early Master Joe DiSanto

Joe DiSanto spent his childhood riding BMX bikes, break-dancing, and memorizing 80’s movies, but the carefree days of youth wouldn’t last long.

By 13 he was working as a busboy, helping his recently-divorced mom, and picking up some of his own tab.

A valuable lesson was learned: If you don’t deal with your money, your money will deal with you.

From that point on, he made it his mission to learn everything he could about making smart money moves.

It paid off.

By age 30, Joe had wiped out $70k in student loans, bought his first house, and started a post-production company in Los Angeles.

How The Dots Joined Up For Joe

Over the next decade, the company grew to 30+ employees with over 5 million in annual revenue, while producing two critically-acclaimed documentaries and an Emmy-winning HBO series.

During this time, he and his wife also transacted on 15 residential and commercial real estate properties.

But nothing had more life-changing impact than the birth of their son.

After a successful 19-year run in L.A., the couple decided to slow down and invest in their new family.

They cashed out of the business and bought into small-town life on the Florida coast.

Having semi-retired at age 43, Joe’s efforts are now focused on his educational blog Play Louder, where he shares a lifetime of fiscal know-how to help individuals and business owners navigate
their finances, increase their net worth, and plan better for their future.

So why does he think the money lessons came to him at such an early age in life?

And where does he want to go, now he has achieved what most people want in life, and has a foot off the gas?

Well lets find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr Joe DiSanto

Show Highlights

During the show we discussed with Joe DiSanto such weighty subjects such as:

Joe shares the secret message that he lives on everyday which is contra to the idea of success.

Why you have to forget the ego that can take you over when building a business online.

How refreshing it is step away from your life defining job and have conversations that dont involve what you do.

and lastly……..

Why it is so powerful to look at what you shouldn’t be doing instead of what you are doing.

How To Connect With Joe DiSanto

Website

Facebook

Linkedin

Twitter

Finance Business Referenced On The Show

Return To The Top Of Retiring Before 40 With Joe DiSanto

If you enjoyed this episode of Join Up Dots then why not listen to some of our favourite podcast episodes such as Jim Brown, Jimmy Burgess,  Michael Dash, or the amazing Cody Butler

Or if you prefer just pop over to our podcast archive for thousands of amazing episodes to choose from.

Full Transcription Of Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto

Intro [0:00]
When we’re young, we have an amazing positive outlook about how great life is going to be. But somewhere along the line we forget to dream and end up settling. Join Up Dots features amazing people who refuse to give up and chose to go after their dreams. This is your blueprint for greatness. So here’s your host live from the back of his garden in the UK. David Ralph.

David Ralph [0:25]
Yes, good morning to you. Good morning to you and welcome to another episode of Join Up. Dots. Well, we’re gonna get straight into it with today’s guy because he’s, you could go into so many different directions because he’s kind of at three lives really. And as you’ll see, it’s a life but it’s about taking bold action, taking control of your situation, and also keeping control of your money. Now, as a guest, our guests spent his childhood riding BMX bikes and breakdancing and memorising at school. movies, but those carefree days of youth wouldn’t last long by 13. He was working as a busboy helping his recently divorced mum and picking up some of his own tab. Now, a valuable lesson was learned. If you don’t deal with your money, your money will deal with you. And from that point on, he made it his mission to learn everything he could about making smart money moves, and it paid off by the age of 13 wiped out 70 grand in student loans, bought his first house and started a post production company in Los Angeles. Now over the next decade, the company grew to 30 plus employees, with over 5 million in annual revenue while producing two critically acclaimed documentaries and an Emmy winning HBO series. Now during this time, he and his wife also transacted on 15 residential and commercial real estate properties, but nothing had more life changing impact than the birth of their son. Now after successful 19 year run in LA, a couple decided to slow down and invest in their new family and they cashed out of it. business and bought into small town life on the Florida coast and having semi retired at age 43. His efforts are now focused on his educational blog play louder where he shares a lifetime of fiscal know how to help individuals and business owners navigate their finances, increase their net worth, and plan better for the future. So why does he think the money lessons came to him at such an early age in life? And where does he want to go? Now he’s achieved what most people want in life and kind of has a foot off the gas. Well, let’s find out as we bring onto the show, to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr. Joe DiSanto. Morning, Joe, how are you?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [2:44]
I’m great. Oh, I love that intro. I have to say he may try it. But I do love a good intro.

David Ralph [2:53]
I don’t try to be humble at all. I think now, if somebody gives that to you, you’ve taken a lot of action. You you thing you know you, it’s not gonna be I sat on a sofa with a bag of Netflix bag of Doritos and Netflix for four years. He did stuff. Let’s just jump to it because we’ve got so much to talk about, okay. I’m interested why at the age of 13, you certainly got that big life lesson. Because most kids don’t have that. But hang on, I need to look after my money.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [3:25]
Uh, well, let’s see. I mean, really, it was kind of, you know, not to go too deep into my own personal life. Not that I wouldn’t because I’m pretty, pretty open dude. But yeah, my parents got divorced when I was 10. And,

like, my, I’ve had kind of an interesting childhood and like, my dad is pretty successful. He had a plumbing and heating business. And, you know, we did pretty well and my mom didn’t work. She was a stay at home mom, and you know, she was her age kind of, you know, I guess she was born 43. So it’s like she didn’t even really have that many career prospects. backs you know, at that time for women, I mean, it’s kind of crazy. You don’t have to go too far back before where in time where women really just didn’t have that many career options available to them. It was like teacher or nurse, you know. But anyway, she didn’t work and then my parents got divorced and it was kind of a tough divorce and we’ve pretty much completely stopped communicating with my dad for like four years, I think. And so my mom kinda was in control the money now and she just had no money skills. and bless her she’s a good person and

David Ralph [4:37]
Joe was she not told or it’s just something that now as I know, my wife,

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [4:43]
I think at that era, number one at that era, women were taught taught largely, you know, get a husband and get security that way and have kids and, and maybe work but if you get a good enough husband, you won’t have to work if I feel like you know, from what I know about that area and where I grew up. That was kind of what it was. And you know, more than that, like, they don’t teach financial education in schools today to boys or girls. So they’ve been not practical financial education. So I think, you know, there’s just a giant void of financial education all around. But it was it was a huge void for her. So she just kind of got the money she got from the divorce, which wasn’t a tonne, and we were on our own. And, you know, she didn’t, in addition to not having a lot of like financial clout, she didn’t have any earning potential because she hadn’t worked. So she got a job as a secretary. And she has two kids, and she’s alone and she’s making like $22,000 a year or something like that. And so, before you know it, you know, the money just was gone. And yeah, I was always you know, I was kind of mature for my age, and I feel like I helped her through the divorce a lot. So I was Kind of dealing with more kind of adult things as it was anyway, and I was comfortable with that. But one day, like, you know, she would periodically talk about monies, troubles and as I got older, I got more attuned to it. And then I knew she kind of mortgage the house at one, you know, at some point and then eventually, one day I was just like, so mom, like, How much money do we have left? Like, what’s what’s the deal here? And she looked at me and she’s like, we don’t have any money left. And I’m like, what we have no money. What do you

David Ralph [6:34]
relax by base? Because, you know,

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [6:36]
I’m always she was a little she was a little, you know, I think kind of embarrassed by it, I guess. You know, it’s like, you don’t want to admit it as an adult that you don’t have, especially to young kids. He kind of like don’t really have a handle on things. So that really like blew my mind. I was like, wow, we just don’t have any money. What about what are we and so she He just, you know, kept paying for things with credit cards and, you know, the debt kept piling up. And she mortgaged the house and like was kind of just paying for everything with debt. And eventually she did file bankruptcy. And so at that point, I was like, Well, you know, I can get a job, I guess and make some money. You know what I mean? To help out it wasn’t that, you know, crazy. I was working basically Saturday nights as a busboy and I’d make like 4050 bucks, but that was good for me, you know, at 13 and helped me like, you know, just pay for little things and buy my own stuff. You know, I buy my lunch at school and whatever.

David Ralph [7:39]
Do you think that that was a sort of, as we say, on the Join Up, Dots timeline, do you think that was one of your big dots? The fact that you saw how easily debt can spiral out of control?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [7:51]
Oh, yeah, totally. I mean, I was it was very obvious that if you don’t keep an eye on things, number one, it’s going to Quickly spiralled out of control on you, but also, more importantly, you know, the best way on a debt is to make more money. I mean, it’s, you know, it’s not a popular answer, I think to that question because making more money is really hard. You know, and especially if you’re like, you know, don’t have the right education or whatever, but, you know, that is the quickest way and my mom just didn’t have a earning potential. She just didn’t have it, and she wasn’t going to be getting it because she had two kids, and, you know, it’s like, she didn’t have a lot of free time. So pretty much she got the job she could get and that money went as far as it went, but it wasn’t enough and just slowly, you know, we got into more debt and eventually, you know, it’s like almost, she managed to finance you know, our, the rest of our growing up I think with debt largely. And then I left for college. And I was basically on my own at that point. Anyway, I worked through college and I paid for my college and you know, and come in high school. I I was working like you know by junior high school I was working like 30 hours a week now at the supermarket so I was making you know a few hundred bucks a week and paying for most of everything for myself at that point my dad popped back in the picture eventually and he always had money so it was like weird I had like this kind of no money side of mine growing up and then my dad had money but my

David Ralph [9:25]
dad poor mom book that you could hear

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [9:29]
that’s actually true. Yeah, but it’s like weird You know, my dad and money like you know, he’s just he’s just an interesting character as another story but I didn’t want to take money from him because anytime you take money from my dad like it was going to be held against you at some point in the future. So it just was not for having any kind of relationship my dad like avoiding taking his money was like number one priority. So

David Ralph [9:54]
so let’s wait from that because you much to talk about on there. Sure, I claim to, I’ll be interested in your point because I disagree with you on certain regard about the quickest way of getting out of debt is make more money, because I always think the quickest way is make more money, more money, but actually assess your lifestyle. And it always blows your way where people you’re spending things on, like Amazon Prime and Netflix and stuff, when we’ll get rid of that just get rid of all the ones that you don’t actually need. And one of the things, Joe that has become prevalent, I think, after locked down and so many of us have been locked away for a while, for the first time in our lives, you know, more often than not, is how little we need to actually survive. Would you not sort of go along that route?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [10:46]
I can go along along with you on that for sure. I mean, you know, a lot of what I kind of teach people is, you know, making the most of the money you have number one, you know, in some of the people I work with, actually Have you know they make pretty good money but they’re not keeping enough of it right? So there’s, there’s you know, all sorts of techniques that you should be employing to make the most of the money you have. But if if that money is limited you will be limited in your pace to get out of debt but I agree what I’ve definitely learned as you know, in this time is that you can do without things and find alternatives like a great example is going out deed it’s something I really like to do I like to get to the house and we don’t have that many hobbies because we have a young kid but we we don’t do that anymore. So we’ve pushed ourselves to go look for outdoor and often free stuff to do not because we’re trying to save money per se but but a lot of outdoor things like at parks and whatever often is free as we’ve been able to replace you know, a kind of an expensive hobby of eating out with you know, far less expensive free pastimes that are outside. And that’s been actually Good. I mean, it’s actually taking something like this to break those habits, you know, because you get in these habits of spending and you know, it’s hard to get out of those sometimes. Because it’s just the way your life setup unfolds. So yeah, I agree with you in that it has it has opened my eyes on on some of my own habits for sure.

David Ralph [12:19]
is one of the things that me and my, my son is 18 years old now we realise that we reference Ferris Bueller so much as is between us and that the classic line life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while you could miss it. I absolutely That is so true. And at least since locked down. I’ve been a totally different person. I’ve been somebody that would look at the sky. It sounds like I’m going mad, but you know, taking my foot off the gas and realising but actually, I don’t have to chase to do that thing. Because things are as they are. And I think That’s one of the things where people get pressurised with money, not about actually paying their bills, but almost status, where they feel that they need to be chasing to get a bigger house and a bigger car. But actually, we, as we are, what do you think, Joe?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [13:16]
Yeah, well, I actually have kind of a secret saying, always share outright, like on my website or whatever, because it’s not very, you know, proactive in terms of you know, building a business or making money or whatever is the quickest way to happiness is to lower your expectations.

Unknown Speaker [13:36]
Yes, no, I agree with that.

David Ralph [13:38]
I agree with that. And I’m gonna give you applause

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [13:44]
sounds lame, right? It sounds like you know your Oh, yeah. Well, that’s, that’s lame. You’re not gonna get out there and make it yourself and you’re like, Well, you know what, like, no matter what you do, how big you are, whoever you are, in the end, we all die you will be brought back down to the basics. scenario that we all, you know, will succumb to and a lot of like, a success and turn on cheap things is very ego driven also, which is not particularly a great endeavour to just feed your ego. And it’s like, if if you just kind of enjoy life and smell the roses and look around and not worry so much about some of these things, you will be happier. I mean, and I feel like a lot of achievement and success is also this drive to find some better version of happiness. And it can be I definitely do think having enough money where you don’t have to stress about money is a sweet spot, but you don’t need gazillions of dollars to be happy. And frankly, I think it could do the opposite and make you unhappy if you have too much. So I give you a lot of time thinking about that in the last two years specifically, I’ve been reading some books about it too. And you’re right, you know you just looking around Going out, looking at the trees, looking at the flowers sort of being in awe of the natural, like amazement that’s out there is is a great endeavour and something that will make you happy far quicker than money.

David Ralph [15:14]
Yeah. Now, I will tell you maybe two years ago, three years ago, something like that. I was there. And I didn’t realise I was doing this at the time. But I was very much ego driven by my business and my status. So in mind, even if I’d had a six figure month, then the next month had to be six figures, or it was a bad month. And I sort of lost track of myself at that period, where my dad and I talk about this a lot on the show, but it’s important. I want people to understand this. My dad sat me down, and he said, How many dinners do you actually need? And I say this phrase on the show a lot because I think it’s quite powerful. But do you need 100,020 200,000 do you need 400 Do you need X amount of clients? You know what, what are you actually aiming for? And I think a lot of businesses out there are aiming for status and ego based on what other people are doing and not actually what is right for their own life. Does that make sense to you?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [16:18]
100% Actually, this reminds me of one of the greatest 80s movies of all time and one of my top five all all fit up. Top five top all time favourite movies. Number five on the list is Wall Street. Yes and Charlie Sheen’s character. Bud Fox says to Gordon Gekko in Gordon Gekko is going to buy his dad’s airline and dismantle it for money. He’s like, how many how many boats can you water ski behind Gordon? Yeah, yeah, and it’s true. Eddie Gordon goes it’s What did he say? It says something but it’s not a matter of how much man but it’s a it was a great scene in that movie is awesome to me because I love money and i and i like the game. Trying to get it. But it really does also get your ego like all you know, kind of out of whack and there’s now I’m reading this book called while I’ve been listening to it actually for a year now over and over and over again called a new earth by Eckhart. Totally. Okay. Yeah. And if you’re interested in learning about the ego, I mean, this guy is pretty amazing. It’s kind of a spiritual book, but it doesn’t subscribe to any religion. The religion is basically being the moment and appreciate the world around you. That’s basically the religion

David Ralph [17:33]
is all about the power of now at the moment. Oh, there you go. Yeah,

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [17:37]
go to another great. Yeah, another great echo totally. But have you got to read the new word. It’s like if you’re tapped into the whole ego thing. And thinking about it, he he’s German, we used to work with German directors in the filmmaking biz, and they’re always the most like just the work ethic and like the precision of the German director was like second to none. And this is Guy Eckart tolle. He is like the German spiritualist where he breaks down the spiritual ism like in such like a deep technical way. It’s very German. But you really come out of it like, wow, this guy really, really has thought about this. And he’s covered every single base. And he just like untapped all the things that you just, you know, kind of rub up, you know, unconsciously living with, and it’s really fascinating.

David Ralph [18:26]
And let’s listen to Jim Carrey. And then we’ll be back with Joe.

Unknown Speaker [18:29]
My father could have been a great comedian, but he didn’t believe that that was possible for him. And so he made a conservative choice. Instead, he got a safe job as an accountant. And when I was 12 years old, he was let go from that safe job. And our family had to do whatever we could to survive. I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which was that you can fail at what you don’t want. So you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.

David Ralph [18:55]
Now, while we’re on 80s films, I don’t know if it’s an 80s movie. But it was certainly a 90s film. I was watching a doc Hollywood with my daughter the other day so

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [19:05]
great. Yeah. Michael J. Fox,

David Ralph [19:08]
Michael J. Fox. And if you’ve seen cars by Pixar, it’s a complete ripoff of Hollywood. It’s the same story. And the story is basically some guy who wants to go to LA and be a plastic surgeon because he wanted to get away from small town life. And he ends up in a small town and then realises Actually, there was no reason to run away from that. That is what fuels him. So in your life, Joe on the on that same kind of logic, by taking your foot off the gas, have you found yourself in sort of that comfortable small town mentality? Have you gone back to where you was as a child and actually thought No, actually, this is me. This is I don’t need to prove anything. I’m just happy with what I’ve got.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [19:53]
Yes, well, I’m working towards that. You know, and getting to the I’m happy with what I’ve got is a process It just doesn’t happen, like when you move or whatever I will. But we are kind of living this small town. I mean when I grew up in Providence, Rhode Island, so like it’s not a small town and we were, we were on the north end so it was kind of like a blue colours, you know, sort of city city suburb neighbourhoods. It wasn’t a small town vibe at all. But then I moved to New York and LA so bigger cities. And now I’m in a small town in Florida called denita which is like what I call a coastal suburb of Tampa and yeah, it’s just more it’s more mellow what it’s very interesting to go from LA to a place like Denise and because in LA like everybody’s working on their career, you go out what do you do it like this race of like, what are you doing? What are you working on? Like, who are you working with right now? Oh, my God, that sounds awesome. I think that’s more awesome than what I’m doing shit. Am I you know, do I need to keep doing due to work harder. And like for the Indonesian being it’s a small town but uh, Because it does have a lot of like older people being Florida people retire there. It’s like, no one’s talking about any of that at all. Like, they’re just like relax, to figure out, you know if they can get to happy hour on their discounted drinks. And it’s so funny because my wife and I was like, it’s so refreshing to like, not talk about our career with whoever we end up talking to, like our neighbour or like, you know, the waitress at the restaurant or whatever. But it took, it took a while for us to downshift out of that whole mentality because, like you were saying about your business and stuff, your ego is wrapped up into it, you know, it is a mix of positive and negative things. And like you, you know, we were totally defined by our business like that was our kind of our personality, whereas like, we were people that lived in LA and worked in entertainment and advertising and had a business. We were business owners and you know, that That’s kind of how we define ourselves, I guess. So when we left and like we didn’t have any of that we weren’t any of that anymore. We were kind of like, well, who the hell? I don’t even know who we are. And so we’ve that’s where we started to do some of the more soul searching and we bought the book The Eckart totally book was which is sort of been like our, like rock, I guess, of this transition. And in which it totally randomly we found that the crypto was at the dentist. There was like, on the on the the table was like really old magazine. So she picked up this Oprah Magazine and it was like from 2016. And she was thinking to herself, well, how this dentist office really needs to like, you know, up the surface here and get some current magazines. But anyway, she’s like, whatever. She’s reading through it and she finds the Eckart tolle a book, and then she’s like I, you know, came home I found this book, I’m gonna read it, and it just like opened up our minds and we’ve literally been listening to that. But like on repeat for the last year, but yeah, it takes it takes a lot of time to kind of unwind from that and and then kind of decide like, Who am I now? Like?

Unknown Speaker [23:10]
Nobody?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [23:14]
Well, I don’t know, you know, I’m working on that. I think that that that is kind of like an endless you know life, Work in Progress kind of situation. You know, I do when the reason I kind of started doing what I’m doing is because I was I was the boss, you know, at my company, we had about 30 people and we all we hired a lot of young people, we had an intern programme that is kind of how we found our young talent and it was always very successful and it’s finding really great people. And we had a very open workspace like I didn’t believe in like having an office for myself because I just, I felt like I would hold up in there, you know, men and not communicate enough so I was just in an open space with everyone else, you know, but I would be doing some of my real estate stuff. And I’m obviously doing business and mega deals and whatever. And so the young kids would, you know, they’d want to learn from me and and i was there to teach them. So I kind of had my own little education system going. And they and they would jokingly, like, earlier days would be like, you should teach like a class at the community college or something. Like, that’s so funny nowadays, you’re like, would you go to a community college to teach a class, you can teach it online? But that’s what you did back then I guess. And I was like, yeah, someday I might do that. That might be fun, because I do like teaching people stuff. And that was just in the back of my mind. And then when, you know, cut to kind of wanting to leave after we had our son and try to figure out how to have more family time and spend time with him. I was like, yeah, maybe I could teach some of this stuff to people. I don’t know. I mean, and I had one of our side businesses, we would always start extra businesses. I call it piggybacking and it’s it’s a bit of a philosophy. I talked to to people that and teachers, like whatever you’re doing, you know, if you’re spending money on something, or you have excess capacity with what you’ve invested in, you should try to create additional business, you know, businesses or lines of revenue, that take advantage of those things like, what can I do that takes advantage of the investments I’ve already made? That, you know, are slightly different, you know, in our case, we decided to get off into producing our own content because we had a studio. And we could do a lot of that work, essentially, you know, in our own studio, and that did well, we produced those documentaries you mentioned, and that led into producing the HBO TV show. So you’re saying Don’t

David Ralph [25:41]
run away from your experiences, but look at Burma and think, what ones can I use to transition to?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [25:48]
Yeah, well, well, that was this is a long story to say one of the side businesses we got into was a website, a comedy website called worldwide interweb. And we grew up with Pretty well it ended up with a pretty good audience that you was getting about. And it’s still there, it’s still going we have other partners in it now but a half a million like unique visitors a month. And but that’s when I was learning about SEO and kind of learning about stuff for that. That’s kind of when I learned about this authority, blogger, you know, thing that was going on there, these people, you know, taking their knowledge and becoming a teacher and I was like, hmm, someday, someday, I think that way be a good fit for me. I, you know, I could I could do that, quote, unquote, community college class that’s been in the back of my mind with this authority blog. And that led to me, you know, when I left, I was like, Alright, well, I guess this is the time I’m gonna, like, do this website and see if I can sort of push out some of my knowledge that’s been successful and beneficial for me to whoever wants to read it, you know, and we’ve been doing that for about a year and a half and it’s been good and then what ended up happening was is, you know, I had a pretty good reputation and business and I always I did the business side of our business among many other things like the finances because of my, you know, my background like you mentioned in the intro. And just friends companies were like, Hey, I hear you’re, you know, kind of available Do you want to like do the finances for our company because we really need someone to help, you know? And I was like, yeah, so that kind of helped me like bridge the gap of generating you know, the income that we feel like we need. And

David Ralph [27:31]
because it’s become prevalent, more often than not when I speak to people, that they people will not use their history and their experience. They they want to create a new thing. They want to be a new authority. When I say to him, why don’t you just do what you’ve already done, but just sell it to more people? And they go, Oh, no, no, I’ve tried that. And I didn’t like it and I go, Yeah, but that’s your knowledge base, actually a skill. Why don’t we find a way of pivoting back into something new Why don’t you think they do that?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [28:02]
Well, I think it’s just fear. You know, it. We all we all fear, our abilities, I think in life and like trying to, you know, when you when you go off and put yourself out as an authority, you have to question like, Am I an authority on this like, and you know, am I real? Or am I sort of faking this or, or what’s the deal? So I think that is probably the number one reason why people don’t go off and do something like that, because, you know, they just fear that maybe they’re not good enough to do it. And I can relate to that. I feel the same way seven times, you know, you’re always wondering, am I, I think they call it imposter syndrome or something like that.

David Ralph [28:45]
Yeah, but you have to be an imposter syndrome, do you because you’ve only got to be two pages ahead of the person behind you.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [28:53]
That is true. That is something that you kind of have to accept, but it takes it takes a little while to realise that that’s the case and then you really Kind of realised that by reading and, you know, doing research and and deciding to look up this kind of stuff, and then you kind of realise, yeah, there’s a lot of people basically just sharing what they know, maybe they don’t know everything and you don’t have to know everything in order to help people. You just have to know more than, you know, the person that’s looking for that information, because I was quite lucky. beneficial that if you know, it’s nice if you know a lot though, and you really can, you know, yes, absolutely.

David Ralph [29:30]
And that’s when obsession hits, isn’t it? Because I used to stand up and do insurance courses. And they would say to me, can you do a course on? I don’t know, doors and locks or something? And I’d say Yeah, no problem at all. I didn’t really notice subject, but I was like, 50% i’d learnt it and 50% confidence. And so I got through it. And people never really question because I was the person standing up there talking. I could have said anything. I wanted really I would have believed me. But it’s when you’re doing something that you actually want to become better and better at, then that two pages becomes four pages and five pages, and then you’re you’re cooking on gas and you’re sort of flying through. So I don’t think the imposter syndrome should apply to anyone who wants to do something, as long as they keep on doing it because their audience will always be the people that haven’t done it and up behind them.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [30:28]
I can’t disagree with that. I don’t think imposter syndrome should stop anyone from doing anything. But, you know, you talk a lot about in your, in your podcasts and talk to people about psychology and positivity. And I think it goes to that the imposter syndrome thing and it is the answer your question of why people don’t do stuff, I think largely is the psychology of just feeling like, you know, one, they can do it. One they’re worthy of doing or two, they’re worthy of doing it. And you know three are they enough of that already so, you know psychology is a big part of of getting out there and doing things number one and then also being successful at it and it is something that sort of you know, once you get going and you have success and you have you know, some some proof your site your positivity increases and you know, you get you get the better of the site, the psychological aspect of things, but I you know, I was in good a good place with my old business in that sense. And then we laughed and like I said, we’re kind of in the weeds in terms of like, what we were who we are and that sort of stuff and and now I’m rebuilding that with the new thing and so it’s it just takes time you know, it’s a process but like it’s a good it’s a good process. I think going out and trying to teach people stuff and and make the most of your knowledge is is a really good thing. For your overall mental health, to be honest, but it but it is challenging, you know, certainly at times,

David Ralph [32:08]
I’ve got a friend through the show and I’ve never actually personally met her, but her name’s Amy O’Brian, Amy O’Brien. And she worked for an investment bank. I think it was an investment bank in Indiana. And I’ve referenced her a few times. And I kept saying to her, why don’t you just do your own thing? Why don’t you do your own thing? Me? And she was like, Oh, no, you know, my, my bank respect me. And did you know this is this is where I’ve been working towards. And it was so many sort of excuses. No, over about three years, she finally got to a point and she’s launched a life by design, financial services.com, which is the world’s longest URL. But anyway, yeah. And I keep on saying, Yeah, you do your spec. Make sure it’s right. And I spoke to a and I said to you know, how’s your life and she said, you know, she said, I’m sitting In a small cottage that’s been lent to us in the woods in Indiana. I’m reading a book on sipping coffee. And she was like her whole life was in control. And all she’s done basically is exactly what she was doing. When somebody said, you got to be there at nine o’clock, you can’t leave at five o’clock, this is what you’re worth, this is what we’re going to pay you. And she’s doing it for people that are, you know, it’s scalable, and all the profits come to her. And she just seems so relaxed and sort of enjoying, and she’s got her website up. And as I say, I’ll give it a name check again, a life by design financial services.com. She’s done all this herself. She’s got it up there. And I just look at it and I think this was a woman who had everything lined up. But there was a rope around her there was an anchor, there was what people would think and once she’s caught that she’s just like a beautiful red headed butterfly. floating up into into success and ability to control your life. I think

Unknown Speaker [34:02]
that’s a great, I don’t think it’s quite easy.

David Ralph [34:05]
You know, one of the regrets that I have Joe, and it’s only a tiny regret is when I look back on Join Up Dots right in the very beginning, I was all about hustle muscle, flexing the old hustle muscle when working harder than anyone. And now I look at it. And I think if I could go back and edit, I would take that out because it’s not about working harder. It’s about knowing what you’re after. Knowing how much money you need to earn, knowing what value you can provide to the right customers, and then making it happen. You shouldn’t be sitting like mad, you shouldn’t be wearing yourself out. You should just be doing the right things. Would you agree?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [34:43]
I would agree as part of one my slogan is work smarter. You got to work smarter. The hardest worker doesn’t always win in the end. smarter worker wins in the end. Ah, well, winning in the spring a good thing to say but you get what I’m saying. I do agree. I’m You know, I, it’s like weird I have a love hate relationship with like, hard work and lots of hours because I really like working. And I and I do think that at least in the business I was in willingness to put in the hours early was it was a key ingredient, and I’m not gonna lie. But I’m trying these days to just like, not work as much because I’m like, We left our lives that we would work less. So it’s a little bit of a struggle for me because I like you know, to dig in and I like to build things and solve problems. And that’s why I like, you know, having my own business because I can sort of like, guide that and do it the way I want to do it. So I’m, you know, I’m working on finding the more relaxed version of mice and that’s a you know, it’s, it’s kind of can be challenging sometimes. But yeah, it is part of doing that is being more effective, you know, spending less time but having that time be like really valuable time and it’s you know, it’s a learned skill is not something that you know, you just decide you’re going to do and all of a sudden you do it, you know,

David Ralph [36:06]
as reference. Bueller again, as I like to do and if anyone hasn’t there hasn’t seen first. I always love that bit when he says, the question isn’t, what are we going to do? The question is, what aren’t? Sorry, the question isn’t, what are we going to do? The question is, what Aren’t we going to do? And I think that’s one of the things that is very prevalent in my own business and in my own lifestyle. It’s more about what I’m stripping away more than see what I’m doing. And I think once you get that, it’s like that beautiful, nice block, but you chip away, chip away, chip away, and then something is something marvellous. And at the beginning, when you’re starting your business, I think people try to do too much, because they haven’t given that Ferris Bueller question of, what Aren’t we going to do? So they do everything? What do you think?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [36:57]
Yeah, I agree. And I’ve been experiencing that it’s hard when you get into this kind of online business, especially if you’re not if you haven’t been in it and my experience has been that there are so many things that you quote unquote should be doing if you know you’re going to move your business along, like as in doing the blog, or doing social media or doing this marketing or doing paper got, you know, there’s just so many things, it’s hard to know what the best thing to do is that is going to be the most efficient. I mean, therein lies you know, getting some courses and, and, and all that but all of those things could potentially be a valuable thing, but you just don’t have enough time to do them all. So at some time, at some point, you have to kind of commit to what you know, make the decision of what you think is going to be the most beneficial thing for you and, and what you’re trying to do, and focus and kind of push everything else aside, at least for now. You know, and just say I’m gonna, I’m gonna focus on on this avenue, I’m gonna do really well and I’m not going to dilute, you know, a solid effort in one category by trying to do a little bit of everything, you know. But that can be a really hard thing to decide to do. I it’s been challenging for me, you know, and I have a lot of business experience and I got 20 years of knowing like, what what works and what doesn’t often but you know, it can, it can be tough. So if anyone’s out there, you know, starting their business and feels very scattered. You know, you’re not alone. I’ll say that, you know, it can it can be tough to figure out what, you know, to focus on.

David Ralph [38:31]
Yeah, yeah, no, I agree. I’m still in that process of being able to do many things. And wanting to think it’s only an afternoon I just do that, you know, and I’ve kind of become the person that I hated. When I first started listening to podcasts. Where I used to say, Yeah, I don’t really work Monday, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and I spend half an hour on a first day and I used to be For God’s sake, how do you get anything done? But now I look at it. And I think what actually what they’re saying in a different way is I know exactly what I need to do. I know exactly how to do it. So I’m not having to do a load of other stuff. It’s the pure, it’s not even at 20 it’s like the 95 principal, but 95% of their rewards come from 5% of their efforts. I know what it is. I now kind of admire that. But there was a time I used to listen to him. I think I’ll get a live you know, it was it was Yeah, that’s not what life is all about.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [39:36]
Well, that is a bit I mean, I feel like being able to be that way is a bit of a bit of a reward for being successful. Part of the reason you can you know, take that cap there and be very selective is because you’ve got a good income stream coming you know, you’re not nervous anymore, you know, to me and you’re you’re feeling very stable and you’ve got things really moving. So now you can say, Okay, I’m comfortable. I don’t have to say yes to everything. It’d be great. You know, there’s probably a case to be made for being judicious like that at every step. But it’s hard to be that way at the beginning when you’re sort of like nervous. It is gonna work out, you know, like, so I, I guess I’m the kind of guy you know, I go against a lot of like, the things people say out there in the blogosphere about, you know, the certain You know, I’m the guy who’s like, just put in a lot of hours. just just just be take the safe route, put the extra work in a run. And, you know, if you get to a point where you can be more judicious great, but like I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t start out with that mentality. Personally, you know what I mean? I do, I do think that putting in putting in lots of time to something you want to be successful is is a key ingredient. Eventually, though, you can dial that back, enjoy life a little bit more and and not be so and saying about it?

David Ralph [41:00]
Well, I would say Joe desanto, I would say I agree with you 100% that you really got to do the work you it’s not going to occur on its own. But I do think that when your body says I’m knackered, then get a break. You know, you’ve got to listen, you can’t just keep on ploughing on ploughing on thinking that the work is going to be as good because it’s not it’s rubbish work anyway, because you’re just tired, you’ve got to walk away, you’ve got to have breaks, you’ve got to see mates. And don’t ever think that it’s wasted time. It’s actually making the next time that you work on your business stronger.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [41:37]
100% and I mean, I in when you’re in when you’re in it, you know, and you’re doing the long hours, I really do think you have to be judicious about like, I’m going to turn my phone off and my email off at this time today and I’m just gonna like, you know, avoid the temptation of going back to it, you know, because you can just be sucked back in even when you don’t want to be and you know, you need to just like relax. Oh, You really do have to set some, some more intense sort of guidelines about like, I’m these days, I’m gonna stop here and just like, just don’t look at anything anymore and like recharge. So I think you have to be pretty judicious like that, like, you know from the beginning. But as you get more successful, you can increase the amount of that stuff and increase, you know, the amount of saying no to things, you know,

David Ralph [42:27]
but lets us know,

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [42:28]
you can say notice, you know what, you know what you can say no to later on, because you’ve probably tried it and it hasn’t paid off too, by the way. So until you try to enter things and figure it out, like, you know what, what’s the sweet spot for you, you might say, notice something that could be good.

David Ralph [42:44]
But listen, listen to the words of a man that would say no to lots of things, and it is about what is left. That’s important here, Steve Jobs. Of course,

Steve Jobs [42:53]
it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college, but it was very, very clear. Looking back 10 years later, again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something, your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. Because believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path, and that will make all the difference.

David Ralph [43:28]
So now you’ve got to that point where you’re not nervous, you’ve thrown off the imposter syndrome. What do you trust in now? Is it just the experience that things are gonna work out or obviously something else?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [43:41]
You know, I actually I’ve gotten to a good place of like, trusting my instincts. And I I feel like I can only I’m only able to be there because I’ve done enough things and it’s worked out. And not just that it’s worked out like luckily it’s worked out where Mike is. I actually thought that that would be a good idea. And it turned out it was for some very specific reasons, you know, much in line with why I was thinking was going to be good. So that’s happened enough for me where I’m like, you know, what if I’m thinking this is a good idea, and I see like this steps ahead of me. And it’s, it’s making sense. And I feel like, you know, the lightbulb sort of gone off, like I have a lot of trust in that it will eventually get to where I think it can go or somewhere in that vicinity. And also, I also believe that a lot of things happen that you don’t even think about, like if you’re on the right paths, and you’re like doing something that that is kind of quote unquote, correct and will lead to a good place like other things will, like get attracted to it along the way. And you’ll end up with some like strange winds that you really didn’t like, see coming. And that’s not luck. It’s just that like you’re doing the right things and you’re sort of attracting Good things along the way. So it’s like, it’s a little hard to you know, it’s kind of an abstract thing, I guess. But I’ve, I’ve just like, I’ve gotten a good amount of trust in my, my ins instincts about the abstract, I guess and like, I just kind of, I don’t I just go forward and, you know, trust in that it will work out if I keep putting the work in and stay on, you know, this course that makes sense to me. And but it’s hard to do that if you haven’t ventured out on something completely on your own and had some success. You know, quite frankly, the first time out. We were, we were young when we started our business, you know, we were in our late 20s. And we’re like, Well, you know, they don’t have debtors prison anymore. And we don’t have children, you know, so they won’t starve and, you know, if it doesn’t work out, we’ll we’ll just start over. So we kind of laughed that confidence about our own ideas. You know, we, we were like, you know, what’s the worst that could happen kind of approach. But over time, as those things worked out and our plans came to fruition, we’re like, okay, we we kind of had enough experience and know how to do this. We just needed to, like, you know, have our first proven case study. And let’s go try more things, you know.

David Ralph [46:24]
And that’s it. So join up don’t know. They do.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [46:27]
Yeah, I mean, we had a lot of great things that just kind of came about, that we didn’t expect, but also many of the things we did expect came to fruition and, and it worked out. It was it was tough, though. And, you know, it’s scary. I’ll tell you what I mean, I be the first to admit it. When you go out on your own and kind of abandon what you’re used to. It can be very scary. You know, it does take some courage. And you also have to, you know, confidence isn’t something you just you know, have at the beginning and then you’re stuck with it and then it’s constantly shaken and some days You go to bed and you’re like, you know, it should get this, you know, you’re constantly always trying to reassure yourself, you know, in the psychological sense to and that can be really challenging you have the reality of where you’re at and how it’s going and then you have the psychology you are dealing with too. And it’s, you know, it’s part of the game. And I you got to try to look at that as like kind of the fun things of life, I guess, but it but it can be challenging, like keeping your positive attitude and all that stuff can be tough on some days, and then other days, you know, you can’t lose in your mind. You know,

David Ralph [47:37]
I almost ended up being in the grave and, you know, not flippant about that it was it was touching go I push so hard that he, it was life changing. It really was but um, I wouldn’t want that on anyone. Anyway, this is the part of the show that we’ve been building up to, this is where you would have been leading up to, and this is the part that we call the Sermon on the mic when we’re going to send you back in time to have a quick chat with the young Joe. Now if you could go into a room and speak to the young Joe, what advice would you like to give him that could ease his way to where you are today? Well, we’re going to play the music. And then when it fades is your time to talk. This is the Sermon on the mind.

Unknown Speaker [48:24]
With the best bit

Unknown Speaker [48:25]
of the show,

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [48:41]
man what a setup that was. Okay, sermon on the mic. Let’s think there’s one thing in my life that’s actually it’s I think it’s a big thing really, but it’s it was it was a small thing kind of when it came up, but I would go back to my young person and say, Do not Be afraid of small talk. You know, as much as I can be outgoing and I’m like willing to go on a limb and do and do stuff. I have a lot of initial resistance, and it’s in and talking with new people that I don’t know. And like breaking the ice and all that sort of stuff is really challenging for me, and I have to force myself to go do it. And there’s this thing of like, people think making silly, stupid, stupid, small talk about the weather or whatever is is kind of a dumb thing to do and disingenuous. But at some point in my late teens, early 20s, I read a book called what do you what do I say next? And it basically gave me permission to go have simple, meaningless, small talk with someone as a way to stop start a conversation and be like, Hey, where do you live? Like, oh, how long have you lived there? Blah, blah, blah, like the most basic set of questions, and that always leads into a more interesting conversation. Usually I obviously depends on the person you’re talking to a little bit. But more often than not starting with simple basic questions that seems stupid to ask, eventually lead to a really good conversation. And I kind of gave myself permission to do that eventually. And it really like made a big difference. And amid talking to people a lot easier. And if I kind of knew that earlier on, I would have started employing that in all sorts of ways, both in business and social life and whatever. And I think, you know, might have propelled me a little bit more or and or opened me up to, you know, different things and different opportunities. So don’t be afraid to break the ice and make that first contact with someone when you’re out or wherever. And start with some simple, stupid, small talk. Why not?

David Ralph [50:50]
Is advice I haven’t heard before, but his advice I think can really be powerful. So Joe, what’s the number one best way that our audience can connect with you?

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [51:00]
My website play louder.com I just have all my information there, it’s all free. I mean, I do a lot of my work for businesses, because obviously they have bigger budgets and things. But I make my information and knowledge available on my website to anyone. Pretty much all for free. I have I have a few courses now that one that actually isn’t free. It’s pretty inexpensive about incorporating yourself and the value of having at least a side business and an entity for tax purposes and also building your income. But by and large, it’s all free info. And then otherwise, you know, Facebook and LinkedIn are probably my two other main areas.

David Ralph [51:41]
We will have all the links on the show notes to make it as easy as possible to connect with you, Joe, thank you so much for spending time with us today. joining up those dots. Please come back again, when you’ve got more dots to join up because I do believe that by joining up the dots and connecting our paths is the best way to build our futures Joe desanto. Thank you. So so much.

Retiring Early With Joe DiSanto [52:01]
Thank you, David. It’s great being here.

David Ralph [52:05]
Mr. Joe desanto. So yeah, you can see there’s, there’s a kind of theme that I’m trying to get through Join Up Dots more and more now. But it’s about doing the right things. Entrepreneurship, there is a dark side to it. And you can get overcome by working on things that are ego based that you think it’s gonna make you look better to your friends and your colleagues and stuff. But actually, the big question is, do you want that? Is that what you started your business for? At the very beginning? Do you say to yourself, yeah, I’d like a business where I sit in front of a laptop for 20 hours a day with a curtains drawn? Or are you trying to start a business that gives you the lifestyle to, you know, walk through the country in the afternoon or whether whatever you do is out there for you. But you got to be careful because if you’re working based on what other people expect of you, or what you think other people expect of you, then it can be Come quite difficult to say the least certainly the case. That’s why I spend all my time saying to people, let’s find an easier way of doing it, there’s an easier way to give you everything you want. Until next time, my friends, thank you so much. I really do appreciate everyone who’s joining up the dots and leaving iTunes reviews and everything else. Hope to speak to a lot of you I know a lot of you are lined up with zoom calls so that we can talk about your passions in your business ideas and just help you in the right direction. If you want a free chat with myself, just come across to the show and connect with myself. And then we will speak until next time, I see you again. Bye bye.

Unknown Speaker [53:40]
You ready to make a full time living online? Check out the amazing Join Up Dots business coaching. Hello, my name is Alan. And I’ve just completed the excellent eight week course with David

Unknown Speaker [53:50]
before I started working with David actually I had no idea at all where to start.

Unknown Speaker [53:56]
I had a lot of ideas about while I probably

Unknown Speaker [54:00]
thought was going to be good business.

Unknown Speaker [54:02]
David was able to help me through that, though, to find that passion. Within literally minutes. We had,

Unknown Speaker [54:08]
we had a business idea. And for the last seven weeks, we’ve been building on it and building on it. And the position

Unknown Speaker [54:13]
I’m in now, I don’t think I’ve ever

Unknown Speaker [54:15]
got here

Unknown Speaker [54:16]
on my own because of the amount of information that David gives the structure. He’s got the full package here, and he explains it in a way that I can understand. His support is is phenomenal. I feel like this is the way business is supposed to work. They

Unknown Speaker [54:31]
helped me understand Okay, what were the next logical steps that I should do? How can I get this up and running? So I would really recommend this as an excellent course helping you if you have an idea if you have no idea, really teasing that out and some of the practicalities and steps to take to really launch your business whether as a full time job or as a side hustle. So it was really excellent. I recommend it for anybody thinking about setting up their own business, or both. It’s an exaggeration to say David will totally save you yours.

Marni Spicer [55:00]
Thank you, David for all your amazing help and support which keeps on going. And we certainly couldn’t be where we are today without you so you’re awesome.

David Ralph [55:11]
So if you would love to become my next success story and have your own life changing online business following my step by step system, being tuned over many years to take away the effort and expense that others struggle with, and come across to Join Up dots.com and book a free call with myself. Let’s get you live in the easy life as it’s there waiting for you to get it. That is Join Up dots.com business coaching.

Outro [55:37]
That’s the end of Join Up Dots. You’ve heard the conversation. Now it’s time for you to start taking massive action. Create up, create your life, busy only life. Will be back again real soon. JOHN God’s joining the gods joins us God’s God’s Joy Joy