Speaker 1: 0:52

Thank you, welcome to the Never Been Promoted podcast and YouTube channel. I'm on a mission to help you cut the tie to all the things that are holding you back, so you Never been promoted. Hi, I'm Thomas Helfrich, your host. I'm excited for today. We are joined by a very fun guest, very important guest. He doesn't know how important he was until I met him for the first time, but Bruce Music.

Speaker 1: 2:07

We are going to be talking about his ability to be the couple's whisperer. He's a TED Talk expert, an entrepreneur, a musician I think he's actually a salsa dancer, according to these classes we took but he is the founder of Love at First Fight. I can't even say the word emotionally, it just brings things up, but he is about making emotional connections. He has a whole different perspective on relationships and how to grow, and we're going to talk about how that affects entrepreneurship itself as well and how you go through these normal things, these power struggles, these phases, all these things. We're going to go, we're going to dive into this a little bit. He's even a musician. So, even though his last name is Slovak, in nature of music I think he's South African and he lives in the Dominican Republic. It's confusing, I know, I know, but we're going to get through it. I'm going to bring Bruce on here in a minute.

Speaker 1: 2:55

Before we get going, though, I want you guys to do one thing for me. You may love or hate it, but if you do love the show, if you don't mind a little bit, go to NeverBeenPromotedcom. Subscribe at the YouTube channel. If you're listening to the podcast, do the five-star review. It means so much for our mission to help make more entrepreneurs in the world. Help them cut the tide, all the crap that's holding them back, and that's what we're going to try to go through today. So only thing we have to do here let's go and bring on Bruce. Bruce, come on in here. Let me figure out how to bring you in.

Speaker 2: 3:24

Technology Hello.

Speaker 1: 3:25

Welcome to. I hope I didn't overbuild that up.

Speaker 2: 3:30

No, that was a rad intro, man. I was grinning all the way through it.

Speaker 1: 3:34

The little little you popping up with the arrows and the you know good job you got, you got to, you got to entertain people while you're trying to sort out technology.

Speaker 2: 3:43

You're good at it. I'm going to subscribe.

Speaker 1: 3:46

Awesome, I look forward to it. You're joining us today from Dominican Republic. Now you're South African, from originally there. Were you asked to leave South Africa or did you choose to go to Dominican Republic?

Speaker 2: 3:58

Yeah, I was evicted from my country. No, living growing up in South Africa it's kind of we're the arse end of Africa, in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by not a lot, and as a kid you watch American TV and you're like everything cool in the world is outside of this country. So when I was 17 and I graduated from high school, I jumped on a plane and never really returned and started traveling the world and ended up arriving here 15 years ago in the Dominican Republic on a kite surfing vacation and fell in love with the place, and what was supposed to be a one month trip ended up. Well, 15 years later, here I am married to a.

Speaker 2: 4:37

Dominican.

Speaker 1: 4:40

I've been Dominican or we've been my family, Santa Domingo side and the Punta Cana side. Where did you decide?

Speaker 2: 4:47

I'm in Cabarete on the North Coast. It's much more rural than Santa Domingo or Punta Cana. Punta Cana's got all the nice white beaches with massive all-inclusive hotels. We have only one all-inclusive hotel and it's just average people in board shorts and bikinis. It's pretty cool.

Speaker 1: 5:03

I like that. I like that. That's pretty good. Well, let's okay.

Speaker 1: 5:07

First of all, you're a, you're the founder, you've done a lot of things and we'll get into kind of your entrepreneurial journey here in a second. You know, the thing I met you through and I wanted to be clear with everybody was you know you, you go through relationship challenges and you know you, you try the traditional counseling and we tried that and it wasn't. You know, you're building a company. You're just growing as a person and my wife found this thing called love at first fight via Facebook ad and as a marketer and someone who gets a space fantastic ad. This thing is like it hooks you in. And next thing I'm watching an ad for like four to five minutes and next thing I'm on the 45 minute thing with a little timer and all those things Well done, but it's love at first fight with a little timer and all those things Well done, but it's love at first bite.

Speaker 1: 5:45

And the idea and you're going to talk about this a bit is you focus on connection, not communication, not restating the problems over and over, but the root cause of why you've gotten apart. So we did this. We watched these videos, we worked through the books and had really good conversations and in doing so, helped take a step towards connection. It really was an actual fundamental thing and our kids were like, are you watching your videos? And that's awesome. Yeah, so you want to talk about maybe just back up far enough wherever you'd like to, from the music days. You know you teased a little bit.

Speaker 2: 6:20

Give us your journey story of how you came to finding that, because it's not just so like linear. No, when I was a kid I wanted to be a rock star. That was my dream. I was going to be a rock guitarist and really all I really wanted was girls. I was a geeky nerd with big, thick glasses and skinny as a rake and nobody was really interested in dating me at all. So I needed all the help I could get and I figured that if I put a guitar around my neck I might just be cool enough to attract some girls.

Speaker 2: 6:48

So that started my music career, which was a pretty amazing 12-year journey, the highlight of which I path in a tiny little country like South Africa, where our music scene is tiny and during apartheid eras we had sanctions so we didn't really get international music coming in and I was like if I go to the States I'm competing with the rest of the world. I don't want to end up in a pub band at 60 years old playing till midnight somebody's cover songs. I need to change career. I didn't know what I was going to do, but I ended up in a personal development course one day, with an amazing seminar leader on stage and this guy, larry, from the Bronx. He flew over to South Africa. He was black. So he flew over to South Africa just after apartheid with 110 white people in the audience, which for in South Africa it's a big deal. Taking advice from a black person straight after apartheid was something that wasn't common and he transformed 110 people's lives. And at the end of that weekend I was like I want to be you, I want to do what you do, I don't care what it takes, that's all I'm interested in doing. And that began my journey of learning how to teach and lead public seminars. So that was kind of career number two. And career number three was as a marketer and I got fascinated by psychology and teaching and that limited me to marketing hypnosis and down a whole rabbit hole of neuro-linguistic programming and psychology and influence.

Speaker 2: 8:30

And all throughout this time I was cheating on my ex-wife and that kind of came to a head after three years of being married. I eventually couldn't take it anymore. My belly had grown to the point where I couldn't see my toes and that really pissed me off and I just woke up unhappy, sad and hating myself every day. So I took an enormous leap of faith and I went to her and admitted what I had done, and we ended up getting divorced. It took all of three weeks and it was amicable and it was a huge relief for her, a huge relief for me, and we both finally told the truth about what we'd done and we'd gotten married for all the wrong reasons. And that left me in a kind of I don't know what I'm gonna do with the rest of my life. I have several online businesses. I've got enough passive income to not have to work from the online businesses. What do I want to do next?

Speaker 2: 9:32

And it kind of led me into three years of an early midlife crisis. I ended up moving to the Caribbean because I wanted to live on a beach that was a life dream of mine and kite surf, and I started out in the Turks and Caicos, ended up here in the Dominican Republic and started dating and after my third or fourth kind of relationship here ended in the same way that all my relationships ended, which was basically me being abandoned and us ending up fighting about the same thing I had the startling realization that the common denominator in all of my relationships was yours truly and that I was always there when the relationship went to shit. So that was a wake-up call for me and I started kind of voraciously reading and learning about relationships and I just consumed anything I could find. I flew around the world to study with couples therapists, even though I wasn't a couples therapist, and after a couple of years of this, some of my friends started asking me for help and after helping a couple of them, the, the feedback that came back was dude, you really are passionate about this and you're really good at it.

Speaker 2: 10:48

Like the information you gave me and the tools you gave me. I tried them last night. They worked. You should consider doing this for a living. And I thought nothing. I was like no, no, no, that's not glamorous enough for me. I probably won't get girls that way. How am I going?

Speaker 1: 11:03

to get a girl with that Talking to her and hearing her and understanding her. Why would she want that?

Speaker 2: 11:10

Wait, I mean I jest a little, I wasn't that shallow, but I was deeply yearning for purpose. I know my life and how good it feels when I feel like I'm on purpose and I have a mission and I'm making a difference in the world. And I started thinking about it. I thought, well, maybe I could. And one day I was walking down the beach and the name Love at First Fight popped into my head like a gift from the heavens and I was like Love at First Fight, now that's a business that I can get behind.

Speaker 2: 11:42

But I still wasn't sold on being, you know, helping couples. But being a marketer, I was like I need to go buy that domain immediately. And of course it was taken, like they all are. So I was like, okay, I can't quit. This is life testing me. So I've tracked down the guy who owns the domain, loveatfirstfightcom, and he's like I'll sell it to you for a thousand bucks. I was like I can afford 500.

Speaker 2: 12:04

Cause at the time I hadn't been working for three years. And I was like, okay, so he gave it to me for 500. I was like, now that I've spent 500 bucks on a domain 50 times more than I'd ever spent before I have to do something with this. So I went and got qualified and Love at First Fight was born. And as the years went by, um, it grew and grew and couples therapists started referring their toughest clients to me. And then couples therapists started calling me for relationship advice with their husbands. And then therapists from harvard university started attending my courses and asking me to train them in what I was teaching. And kind of now, 12 years later, here we are and that's kind of what brings me here.

Speaker 1: 12:49

Are you still doing the speaking and engagements or have you toned it down and you're thinking what's next?

Speaker 2: 12:54

I toned it down, and mostly because I got burnt out from flying around the world. I was living in airports and hotel rooms At the time I started. That was very glamorous and very exciting and I felt very important, but then after two years, I just I couldn't do it anymore. I missed having a home base, and so I decided I was going to move my business online until such time as I chose to speak again or somebody was going to pay me enough money to inspire me to speak again.

Speaker 1: 13:24

I meet a number of speakers and you've been on TEDx and other things. But what they do now is where they can move, take their family with them for a vacation. That's where they target their things Like, hey, you guys want to go to Hawaii for a week, it's full paid, and they're like. And all of a sudden it's like because I think what you got a perspective of is what a lot of like people do, right, when they're, they're traveling every week for consulting and I've been, I've lived that life, it's fun and what else but then it starts just grinding you down, yeah, and the success is no longer worth the, the, the acquaintances that you're just surrounded by, and the hollowness and all the and the sense of, hey, this had a purpose. But now I just feel like I'm. I know that maybe it's different for you, but no, no no, that, no, that's exactly it.

Speaker 2: 14:03

I got tired of trying to help people make more money. That's kind of the niche I was in at the time when I was speaking. I was in the mindset of money niche, but I think the most important part of my story was and this is the gift that the Dominican Republic gave me was meeting my wife, and, as an entrepreneur, I've come to realize that the most important person in your life is your spouse. That will determine how successful you are in your business. Your relationship influences everything, and when I arrived here, it took me four years to meet my wife, and when I did, I was convinced that she wasn't the one and broke up with her being the idiot that I am, and then went on a motorcycle trip around Europe for three months to try and figure my head out and really started missing her and realized that I was a real idiot for having broken up with her. I begged her forgiveness, came home and asked her to marry me, and that was kind of how that started. I asked her to marry me, and that was kind of how that started.

Speaker 2: 15:07

But what I didn't ever realize was that building a secure relationship, a relationship that feels safe and solid and that I can count on. That perhaps wasn't as exciting as all the drama that I'd had in my previous relationships, laid a foundation for my nervous system to relax. I'm certain although I never had these measured my cortisol levels must have halved. I became so much more peaceful inside, which inspired me to take bigger risks, knowing that in my business that if anything you know, if I fell short of what, I screwed something else up. I had a partner who had my back, who was going to love me anyway, that if I ended up on the streets broke again.

Speaker 2: 15:52

Then you know well, I never lived on the streets, but if I was, you know, lost everything and I ended up on the streets, broke, that she would still be by my side and that the research shows can have you live 10 years longer, make 20 to 30% more money than people who don't have a secure relationship and have you report your nervous system being able to idle in.

Speaker 2: 16:29

I'm comfortable and safe in the world and everything's fine and I can go and do whatever I want to do versus the world is not a safe place when you're on your own and nobody has your back, or you're in a relationship where you don't trust your partner to have your back, and then you end up feeling insecure or anxious a lot of the time, and that raises your cortisol level, because your brain is wired to perceive a lack of connection with your partner as a threat to your life. Because if you were caveman and cave woman on the plains of Africa back in the day which was like only two weeks ago in evolutionary terms and your spouse didn't have your back, yeah, you would be eaten by a lion and you would die. And so we partnered up to not only help each other survive but also help our children survive, so that we could reproduce and the human race continues 100%, so just in part of your love at first fight.

Speaker 1: 17:24

you know, to be very clear, I I think if we hadn't found that, we would be in different spot right now, like from like a an exiting a relationship potentially versus okay now we got a repeating mistake and I'm being dead serious I wouldn't have reached out and said hey, I gotta have this guy on here. I don't think what he's done, um well, congratulations well, we're not there, right, it's never. But thank you, but it's, it's. It trended the other way.

Speaker 2: 17:47

You change the direction of your relationship, it's never going to be ultimately there. There's always going to be things to work on.

Speaker 1: 17:54

You gotta, you can't. You know it's easy to slip back into old habits and you got to fight that. But but the thing that I think you were discussing there and I think this is super important to anyone and I try to focus the conversation typically around entrepreneurs though this applies to anyone but specifically when you're out there taking a risk on an idea that that most people around you and you've been an, you are an entrepreneur, you get this are looking at you going. Don't do it, just get a job. You know everyone's trying to. You know everyone's like water trying to pull you downhill, and sometimes you just got to be ice cold. So you can, you can plow through rocks uphill, right. And and I find that unless you have the ability to be vulnerable, available, authentic which I certainly wasn't, you know, for you know, as my kind of career took off and then I just got laid off, and laid off or this happened, this happened. I wasn't vulnerable, I wasn't available, I wasn't communicating, I was, you know, just putting on the facade, and so I think what you described sometimes, too, allows for that.

Speaker 1: 18:48

Now, maybe talk about this idea of connection over communication, because we were in couples therapy when we started watching your program and we were looking at this this lady is just focusing on. She was almost like a referee and though there were some ideas of accountability, it didn't help. It didn't help to say, yes, we know that's a problem and and then we went to connection. It was more of like it, it took away the problems and it just hadn't opened a conversation. So, tying that to vulnerability and authenticity specifically to men here I mean cause I think men are probably on the side of the shit into that stick a bit how do you tie your connections with what you do, even today, to that vulnerability, authenticity piece, that available piece? Because I think that's the most important part of the whole thing, the foundation of success, so to speak, is on that. I think that if you cannot be vulnerable, available, authentic, you cannot make a connection with any other human.

Speaker 1: 19:40

And you're kind of screwed across the board. I'd love to hear kind of how you I can't imagine you haven't thought through that problem, because I know it's part of your stuff but it's-.

Speaker 2: 19:48

No, I have.

Speaker 1: 19:49

Do that and what's your kind of deeper thoughts on that topic specifically?

Speaker 2: 19:53

Well, I think you've asked two things in there. One is about vulnerability. The other one is about connecting first before communicating. So I'll address the vulnerability idea first, and the best definition I ever heard about vulnerability comes from my friend, annie Lala. She's also a relationship coach and she said to me once Bruce, vulnerability is just emotional honesty, it's just being honest about your emotions.

Speaker 2: 20:16

And that's why vulnerability is so important, because if you're not being vulnerable, you're lying, you're not being honest, and when you're not being honest, people can't know you. And when people can't know you, you feel alone and they can't help you, they can't support you because they don't know who you are and what you're really really feeling and thinking and going through and experiencing. And for most of us, we are not being honest a lot of the time. Every day, when our partner says, how are you doing? You say I'm fine. When you're not, that's a lie. When we tell our partner how angry we are, that's a lie because we're not telling them how sad we are underneath our anger.

Speaker 2: 21:02

And so vulnerability to me is the key to being known. And you can't help each other or support each other as partners on a team because your ultimate business partner is your spouse. Whether or not you're in business together, they're the one who's got your back. You can't help each other if you don't know each other, and you can't know each other if you're not vulnerable.

Speaker 2: 21:23

And then all you're doing is presenting a mask to the world that you want people to see you as, and so, for me, what vulnerability is is removing the mask, being courageous enough to risk removing the mask and expose your humaneness, your raw emotion, disdain your raw emotion and risk being rejected or criticized or shamed.

Speaker 2: 21:47

Your partner would probably never do any of those things, but that's often what our amygdala, our reptilian brain, perceives might happen if we were to take the mask off and show our authentic self to our spouse that bad things would happen and we'd end up alone and then we'd die. So of course, our reptilian brain doesn't want us to be vulnerable, but once you get over the hump of being vulnerable and you get over the initial fear and you realize that it turns out really well most times and it becomes a natural way of life, life becomes so much richer because suddenly you can just be you and you save so much energy, not wearing a mask and having to put up pretenses and pretend that you're the successful entrepreneur or the amazing husband and dad and parents.

Speaker 1: 22:31

You can just be you, with your foibles and your flaws, and you know, yeah, and that's so refreshing well, and let me, before you go in the next part, like I think that's a big piece, because I think that you know my case. I was the one that wasn't available. My wife certainly is, and she's. I knew, even even though I knew I could be that way with her. I wasn't because of my own fears with her else, but a lot of relationships, personal or even business one of those people are not going to like. If both are like that, that's a massive problem. One of those people are not going to like. If both are like that, that's a massive problem.

Speaker 1: 23:03

And so how is there, is there a point where you're just like you know we talk about cutting the tie? Is that when you're like listen, I'm trying to make a connection At some point you just say you know what Life's short that's. It Is that I mean like there's gotta be advice. You never hear a therapist say like you two should be done anyway and it's your fault. But what do you do in that spot? How do you identify when you're like I'm there and they continually not, because I'm managing my wife's other side, because if you don't have both, or one's always judgy, or one's always, I think, the lion, not the rock right behind the bush. You're going to get eaten. Every time At some point you're like I'm tired of getting eaten.

Speaker 2: 23:43

Well, as someone who helps couples, I don't tell people that they should break up. I tell them that I think if they carry on doing what they're doing, they're going to break up anyway and that they have a choice. You can carry on doing what you're doing and you'll end up not together in the next six months, maybe sooner, or you can make a change, which is it going to be? Because if you carry on doing what you're doing, there's no hope for you that. I'll be straight with them about the choice they've got to make for themselves, because I really believe that most couples can be helped and mostly they don't need therapy, they need education, and the difference being it's kind of like you don't need to go to a therapist to learn to drive a car. However, you don't get driving lessons. You're probably going to crash the car and hurt yourself and hurt others before you ever figure out how to drive on your own balance. The clutch and the accelerator change gears, you know. That's why we have driving instructors and driving teachers, yet nobody says go and get a marriage instructor to learn about how to do relationships. So half of our struggles are because we don't have the correct education. We don't have any education. What we have is what we saw our parents do, and you know that may or may not be informed by the latest research. Probably not, and you know so.

Speaker 2: 24:52

If you were lucky, you had parents who happened to have parents, who happened to have parents who were secure, and through generation they passed down how to have a good relationship and you infused it as you were growing up. But for the rest of us we never got that lucky. We need someone to show us, and I think there's a stigma that if I ask for relationship help there must be something wrong with me. I should know this, and so what I also try and do is remove the stigma and then that helps the person who's kind of got their walls up and their mask up to relax a little bit. And the most important job I have with my clients is to connect with them first. Once I don't, they trust, they'll risk removing their mask and opening up and becoming a bit more vulnerable.

Speaker 2: 25:36

But if one partner flat out refuses and has no intention of being vulnerable, there's not a lot you can do in that relationship to deepen it. It can stay going on the surface, but the other partner is going to feel dissatisfied and they're going to get frustrated and they're going to feel lonely because they're yearning for something deeper. But before those of you watching this now start jumping to conclusions, you heard, I need to leave my partner. My partner does not want to be vulnerable. Very often the reason why our partners don't want to be vulnerable is because we're freaking, scary, we're terrifying right. We end up triggering them, pushing all of their hot buttons, and we have no idea that we're doing it. Most of my clients who have partners who are shut down don't realize that they shut their partner down. They just assume their partner is shut down. But very often they shut their partner down with all of the criticism, the nagging, the complaining and I'm not talking men or women?

Speaker 2: 26:39

here the complaining, and I'm not talking men or women here. So to then move on to the breakthrough that really makes the difference in relationships, I was reading attachment theory. I was learning attachment theory, which is the science of how we bond together as couples. It started off studying how parents bonded with their children and then it developed into one of the top three most important theories of our time, according to Ken Wilber, probably the greatest living philosopher around and it describes why we do everything that we do in relationships incredibly well.

Speaker 2: 27:22

And I had an insight while learning attachment theory, and the insight was oh my gosh, relationship therapy the old generation of relationship therapy, which it sounds like you went to teaches us that in order to get along, we need to be able to communicate. Well, that's not wrong, but they try to teach us how to communicate. And I kind of jokingly say to my clients you know how to communicate, don't you? Like you speak english, don't you? And they've nodded me and went yeah, you don't need communication tools if you speak english. I was like did you have any problems communicating when you fell in love? I'm like no, it was great. I'm like great, so you know how to communicate.

Speaker 2: 28:01

Why are you asking me for communication tools Wink in my eye, obviously, and it turns out that, with the latest research into our nervous systems and how they work, what we need in order to communicate naturally is to first feel safely connected to each other. And when we feel safe, we drop our guard, we stop relating to our partner as the enemy and instead we relate to them as our partner, somebody who's on our side. Then it's much easier to risk being vulnerable, and when we're vulnerable, then we can actually get our needs met and communicate from the heart what's really going on, rather than have our walls up, get defensive and cycle into the attack defend, attack, defend, attack, defend dots.

Speaker 1: 28:54

You're spot on with it. And just so you know, some people just joined like we're talking about how relationships and connections matter in building any relationship. And we're talking about how relationships and connections matter in building any relationship and we're talking about couples and stuff like this now, but the idea is an entrepreneur and keeping this focus on that. This is you already have enough stress, as it is starting a business, not having someone on your back, or you feel even more like it's bound to. Honestly, the chance of success have to be like so small because it's just too much. And and I know that the guys that I've met and the women who have gone through it every one of them, they didn't get me. That's what they never. They didn't understand I was trying to do. And so there's all these seated problems. Already You're kind of like you know you're in a, you're in a bad spot. Have you ever worked with like a business couple in the same time?

Speaker 1: 29:37

So let's take that, that piece. So you know, I'd love it first fight in a business couple where, hey, we can't separate. We got way too much going on here.

Speaker 2: 29:46

And we live together and work together at home 24-7.

Speaker 1: 29:51

So I don't think people realize this. The relationship with a founder lasts longer. The data show it's longer than a marriage. So if you get a co-founder for a company, it is a longer relationship than you do typically with your spouse. That's insane. So when you've worked with business people, is it the same new data point for your thing? Like, did you know you guys have been? Have you talked about how that dynamic changes then in the business sense? Because when you're trying to find connection in your program there's hugs, there's a four minute stare in the evening with your business partner might be a bit awkward, but how do you transpose or transcend your sense of connection into the business world for business partners?

Speaker 2: 30:31

Before I answer that question, I'd like to offer one other idea about being an entrepreneur and being in a long-term committed relationship. Yes, and being an entrepreneur and being in a long-term committed relationship.

Speaker 1: 30:42

Yes.

Speaker 2: 30:45

And I think this is a piece that many entrepreneurs miss because we're so passionate about our mission. You were talking about your partner, just didn't understand what you were up to in the world. And for any relationship to become the foundational piece that builds your, that supports your entrepreneurship, the relationship has to come first, before the business. Now I hear you entrepreneurs in the background going what? No, never. So let me say this, not at the beginning you have to earn the right to have your relationship, has to earn the right to have number one spot in your lives. But the way I think about relationships is the relationship is like the third entity. So there's you, there's your partner and then there's the relationship that the two of you co create. And if that relationship that the two of you co-create is treated like a baby that the two of you give birth to, your baby has needs. The baby cries. One of you runs. You drop everything to go and nurture the baby. The baby's sick. You drop everything, including work, to go take it to the doctor. Your entire lives revolve around the baby for its first 10 years of life.

Speaker 2: 31:58

The same thing happens when you give birth to a relationship, and if you want your relationship to turn into a thriving partnership that supports you becoming the best version of yourself you can be, where you can really think we're better together than we are apart, then you've got to put the relationship first, not your partner first, the relationship first, and I think this is something that many people get confused by. They put their business first and they go. I'm earning money for the family. I'm earning money. If I don't put the business first, we won't be able to pay the rent, and that's true. If your business fails, you may not be able to pay the rent and your business has a much higher chance of failing if you put it first, because when your which it will be if you put your business first you are going to be under such emotional stress, even in the back of your mind. You're going to go to work every day and be only three quarters present, only three quarters productive, only three quarters energized, because of the absolute energy drain that having an unhappy marriage is causing me, whereas if you put your relationship first and you nurture it like you'd nurture a young baby, then you've got to work 100% present, maybe even 110%, because you're so energized, you feel calm, fully present.

Speaker 2: 33:22

You don't need stimulants. You're on rock solid and you're on top form, so that I want to put out there, because that's something I'm sorry. You're rock solid and you're on top four, so that I want to put out there, because that's something I'm really passionate about teaching entrepreneurs, because many entrepreneurs have it the wrong way around and their families suffer. They pass on the legacy of insecure attachment to their children and they end up regretting it later on in life by putting your relationship first. I'm also not saying that you should neglect your business. You do need to nurture your business as well. It just comes second to making sure your family and your relationship is nurtured, and if you do this well, nurturing your relationship only needs to take 10 minutes a day. It can be as simple as 10 minutes a day, whereas if you don't nurture your relationship and you put all your energy into your business, one day in order to save your marriage, you'll be spending hours and hours and hours every week fighting or in therapy or trying to fix something that you've broken.

Speaker 1: 34:25

Yeah, I mean you'll go to loveatfirstfightfightcom.

Speaker 2: 34:33

You'll be downloading some weekly videos under time pressure that you only have one week to watch. I just want you to know this is how it works and the time pressure is there for a reason, I know.

Speaker 1: 34:39

You've got one week to watch.

Speaker 2: 34:43

It works Otherwise people just forget about it. Did you know that 73% of people who buy online courses don't finish them?

Speaker 1: 34:54

so how many?

Speaker 2: 34:54

how many buy it and don't even start it yeah, exactly and and so the only way I get people to actually go and do the work and this is why I have thousands of raving testimonials is because they finish the course, and if you finish the course, you're going to get the results, so I'll manipulate you. However, I need to manipulate you in. If you finish the course, you're going to get the results, so I'll manipulate you. However, I need to manipulate you in order to finish the course yeah, psychology of buying was in there.

Speaker 1: 35:18

The uh uh. I just like to use uh humor to deflect serious situations. It causes a lot of fights at home. Hopefully in this interview as well, it'll be great great the uh.

Speaker 1: 35:29

So let's let's pivot here. Just you know, just you're you. So I'm gonna do a little plug for you. You can do here in a second. Well, if you guys are in a relationship of any type I don't care if it's going splendidly and perfect or you're about to just jump off the cliff I would actually check out this love at first, uh fight, because if it only will help you have more fun and and connect and I do mean it. I get nothing, nothing for saying that. I've been through it. I'm telling you.

Speaker 2: 35:53

He gets nothing for saying that. I promise you, I'm not paying you. I don't, I really don't. He's paid me, though, right, because you built my course.

Speaker 1: 36:02

Actually, no, I have paid you, that's true, you got paid for that.

Speaker 2: 36:11

And that's how you do marketing people. You get people to pay you for it, and then promote you for free.

Speaker 1: 36:14

I'm very grateful. You can make sure. So let's look forward, check it out, listen, even if you're a I would even say if you're a you do say this a lot in these videos even if you're in a relationship where somebody doesn't care, you don't actually need it helps to be in the current relationship. But I think you know we've said this about some other people we know, as it'd be great if you know she had done this. You know, I know I don't want to say their names, but because the other person would never do it, it's only going to help her if she moves on. It's going to help her discover something about herself and not and so I think, even if you were, no matter what, I'll get off my promotional bucket there, but it's really well done.

Speaker 1: 36:50

I am interested now in the entrepreneurial side of you. So you've already said you kind of tapered it back, which usually means, like you know, you get burnout, you get um, it's been done, it's been repeated it creates money, Wasn't you know you already talked to you, had a calling and a passion. But entrepreneurs do these cycles where they're like what's my next thing? You know you're a young guy, so you know you're, you know you're 28 years old, gray beard, you've uh, you should did there.

Speaker 2: 37:13

You didn't even I got it, I got it, I got you, didn't flinch at that my god, all right.

Speaker 1: 37:17

So what's next? What, what's, what are you crafting on what's what's are? Are you in that phase like I'm really trying to figure out what's my next, next seven years?

Speaker 2: 37:27

yes and no. I have spent so much of my life flailing around without purpose. I've had a few moments in my life where I felt on purpose, and you know this experience. I'm sure, thomas, you're doing something that makes a difference in the world and you wake up every morning and you're like I wake up to emails of people thanking me for my podcast. You're obviously making a difference, and I suspect you are, and there's nothing better than feeling like you're helping people.

Speaker 2: 38:00

And for me, when Love at First Fight came to me after three years of feeling lost and without purpose, I made a promise to me and my God, whoever that is that I was not going to fuck this up.

Speaker 2: 38:13

I was not going to quit this after seven years, like I had done with many of my other businesses, and moved on, that I was going to see this thing through and I was going to transform thousands and thousands of couples' lives. And I still feel that way, like I love this work, I love working with couples. And I still feel that way, like I love this work, I love working with couples. And my next mission is how do I turn Love at First Fight into a real business, not a hobby? It's not that it's a hobby, but there's only so far I can go on my own. As Bruce, ceo of Love at First Fight, course creator at Love at First Fight, marketer at Love at First Fight, you know, shack of all trades, master of none. At some point I have to hand it over and give it away, and give it away to people who are much better than me at the business side of things, and that is causing me a little bit of anxiety.

Speaker 1: 39:18

Action word. I forget how you named that, but that was a real. I don't.

Speaker 2: 39:23

A soft emotion, because my my position then will change. I will become, instead of having the freedom to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it, as this business has given me such gifts, it's really been the greatest business for me as a lifestyle business. I need to grow it up and stop being a teenager in my business, because I am the limiting factor here and I've got to give it away, start training other people or you know. So that's the process that I'm in at the moment is how do I do this? Where do I find these people? And how do I remove myself from my business, which is my baby, and still enjoy what I'm doing? Because I know, if I, you know, we've had such growth in the last couple of years. We've hired more people and my role has been shifting from helping couples every day to managing my team, and while I'm an okay manager, that is not my gift.

Speaker 2: 40:21

My gift is teaching. That's always been my gift, and the more I take myself away from my gift, the less I enjoy my life, and I think for many of us entrepreneurs, part of success as entrepreneurship defining success is that you wake up every day giving your gift to the world and I fortunately still get to do that, you know, a couple of days a week, but the other couple of days I'm managing and dealing with marketing and all that stuff. That is not my gift. I can do it, but it's not my gift and there's people in the world a lot better than me and, like many entrepreneurs, I suffer from the jack of all trades, master of none. I can do a little bit of everything, so I need to do everything and I have trouble letting go and I'm learning that lesson. Now. I'm growing up a little bit every day, trying to become an adult in the entrepreneurial world.

Speaker 1: 41:12

This is a number of roles At 50. Other side I'm going to help you on this side. Okay, this is where my expertise can take over a little bit more. So you're in the scale work on, not in phase right.

Speaker 1: 41:23

Exactly, exactly you know you're not alone. Every entrepreneur goes through this. I meet hundreds every month. You're smack dab in a spot of also the toss between I really like my lifestyle business, why do I want it bigger? Yeah, I could. But then you're also in your brain going. I can feel my neurons are going to slow down with this and as soon as those go down then I'm out like that's, that's, yeah, I'm over life. Um, it is, and, like you know, once you lose passion and interest because it's boring, you're just then go bad.

Speaker 1: 41:49

I will tell you you live in a pretty top of brain stormy. You live in a beautiful area. You want to get the one to many. Make them come to you. Have people come down, do some seminars in your hometown, so to speak, in Dominican. Go train a hundred people every couple of months. They come to you, you have fun for a week, they leave and that hundred is multiplied by how many hundreds and thousands they touch and then now you're. You're doing exactly what you want to do, except you don't have to fly. People come to you for it. So bring, bring them to you, because you're very good on stage. I've seen your Ted talk. I've seen the stuff you do uh, as good as you are on camera with the stuff, like you're 20 times better on stage because you know the stories and you can riff and do some stuff. But you're going to work through that and if you already see yourself hating the management side of it, then don't Get rid of it fast.

Speaker 2: 42:40

Just get rid of it because you're going to be like I don't want to do anything. And this is exactly what I'm wrestling inside of me. I know I need to get rid of it. I've just got to get myself to get rid of it. Throw myself in, make the commitment, put the ad out, hire someone to manage and stand back and go. I don't know where this is going to go, but okay, we'll roll with it.

Speaker 1: 42:59

I think you cut the tie.

Speaker 2: 43:01

Yeah, exactly how many of those have you cut, by the way?

Speaker 1: 43:06

It's the same one over and over. You get one, though, once you're in the show and you're not a what over. You get one, though Once you're in the show and you're not a what's the chance of having two serial killers on the show Really low. And so as long as you're not a serial killer, you get one and you get invited into a community of other entrepreneurs that are there to help you solve that problem and you're there to help them solve other problems. And it's not so much financial driven, it's more of a passion and focus on a mission to help entrepreneurs in the world. So I only cut one and I got a stack of them, but just one. Just retie it. You know, as you're going through your own journey with this, do you ever find sometimes the Taylor's kids are naked? You're, you know. You're sitting there arguing exactly like. You're just marketers, like amnesia. You're just like why am I saying these words to my wife right now? Or to my team? Do you find yourself and catch yourself and be like holy cow?

Speaker 2: 43:58

I'm always catching myself because that's just how my brain works and that I've realized that's probably never going to change. And if it does change, I'm in trouble because that means I'm growing. The minute I'm catching myself, it's like oh well, there's my next year of growth. But the part of the Taylor's kids being naked is where I'm trying to use the tools that I teach my couples that work phenomenally for them. I'm trying to use those with my wife and she's like don't use your marriage counseling bullshit on me.

Speaker 1: 44:29

I'm like, well then, what have we?

Speaker 2: 44:30

got.

Speaker 1: 44:31

It works. We have a reflective conversation. She's like no, we're not, You're just patronizing me. Why do you think we have? I want to yell at you. She says so here you have your technique, but then you have the technique of your wife. You're like okay, how do I do this where she doesn't know I'm doing this right?

Speaker 2: 44:48

now, well, I mean. So this is something we talk about a lot in the course, as you know co-regulation, helping soothe your partner, no-transcript and save the day and that I'm always refining because I'm always learning more about my wife, even after all of these years. As I learn, learn more about her, I get the subtleties of how her past influenced her present and how her upbringing left her with x, y and z wound and how, if I can comfort that part of her psyche, she can melt in my, in my hands, right in my and my mom's, right in front of me, and she's doing the same for me.

Speaker 1: 45:55

You talk about the broken toes idea that you're stepping on her toes all the time. Um, you're like this guy actually listened to our content, man. Um, so the broken toes concept of? I didn't know, I've been doing that for years and we talked about that as part of our piece of and the. The idea being is that there's things that people have in their past and you're sitting there standing on their toes breaking them further and then you don't realize you're doing it. And I wonder you just mentioned your own broken toe of, like I had done on my other businesses, quitting after seven years. Seven years is a long time to try something out and do it. Is that a broken toe for you to navigate away from something that's successful, that works?

Speaker 2: 46:31

No, because I get bored after seven years and then I'm like I want to let it go. That's what you have Okay.

Speaker 2: 46:39

But you know what I also think if I look back. I'm glad I quit all of that because it led me to here and this. I don't want to quit and I think I had to go through that zigzag of trying a whole bunch of things and every skill, all the skill sets that I learned in all of my businesses, led me to be able to do what I do now and grow Love at First Fight into what it's become. The teaching skills from being a motivational speaker have helped me deliver the relationship information in a way that's compelling and interesting and entertaining. The marketing skills I learned from hypnosis have helped me promote Love at First Fight. Even my music producer days have helped me create the music and the videos and it all kind of came together. So I don't see it as a broken toe. I'm kind of glad I quit all that. I miss the music sometimes. It was nice, that was fun you, uh, you know you, uh.

Speaker 2: 47:37

Nothing stops you from picking up the guitar and playing, so I've got nine of them here and I've started building them now and uh, fun, yeah, so, uh, maybe one of these days I'll have to you ask you for your address and you might receive a guitar in the mail.

Speaker 1: 47:55

Well, I would be like the, I need it signed though, okay, and and and I need her, like the love at first fight sticker and some kind of that would be awesome. I would definitely play that and there would be some definite attention on social media for that one. So go ahead and send it. I have a question for you. So so I. I do these kinds of brainstormings just on the fly and the best part of entrepreneurs, they always offer advice on solicited. So here you go In the theory of connection, when I was listening to this and I was going through this and you have people kind of graduate, they buy into it and they do it.

Speaker 1: 48:25

It would be very cool from additional connection, because other humans, as they get older, don't make friends as well to bring them together in some kind of like an event. So if you think about how your business could evolve as bringing in your best use cases and you got all your testimonials and all the things, you'll build a film for social media to build your business even bigger. But Dominican sounds like a great place to say I want my top 10 success stories, tell me why you should come and I'll invite and you go down there and you just kind of do a one-to-many with the idea that it's all your social media, it's your content and I get to meet 10 other couples possibly and I get 10 new friends and it's fun and people will pay for that. People would go do that for sure, because that is an extension of connection.

Speaker 2: 49:00

That's a great idea, thank you. Thank you for that idea. That alone is worth showing up for who's going to produce all that Awesome I love it.

Speaker 1: 49:11

So it extends the story and it extends the brand. And if I just hear what you had said, if I was to reflect back that you don't like travel, because it feels hollow and empty and it seems a bit more vanity-based that you got away from and, anyway, because it's like I'm important but yet the important stuff's back here, right?

Speaker 2: 49:28

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 49:28

Make them come to you.

Speaker 2: 49:30

Okay, great, easier, great here, right. Yeah, bring them, make them come to you. Okay, great, easier, right. That's beautiful and I love the way you just frame that with your top 10 clients and make it fun, make it, make it an amazing with people that also bought into it.

Speaker 1: 49:42

They get to tell their stories and I'm the marketing business side and he goes well, there's all your, their, your content to take it to the next level. And then now the 10 becomes 25 next time and now it it's the. The hundred was small groups, and now you're just running an awesome event once a year and you're making a ton of money from it and you're everyone's paying, they're loving to be there and they're having a great time. It's the one all inclusive resort that's near you, in board shorts and bikinis. You nailed it. Just don't do it all day, just make it like two hours and go to the beach.

Speaker 1: 50:14

Okay, this is your format. Now, this is a shameless plug time for you. I love shameless plugs, but you have to do this when I did the last. So who and what? Who should get ahold of you and how do you want them to do it?

Speaker 2: 50:24

All right, awesome. Well, if anything that I've shared with you today resonates at all, if you're in a relationship and you're struggling with conflict with you today resonates at all, if you're in a relationship and you're struggling with conflict, head up to loveatfirstfightcom. There's a bunch of free material there. If you sign up for my free course it's called love unlocked. You'll find it on the home page there. I'm going to send you five short little videos over five days. Five minute videos, one a day for five days. You'll discover your attachment style. You'll discover how to communicate safely. There's a bunch of amazing information there that will help you whether or not you end up buying my courses further down the funnel. Just do the free thing. It'll make a difference. Your spouse will thank you for it and if you enjoy it, you know where to find me.

Speaker 1: 51:06

I love it. And I'll tell you one thing he didn't say is who. It's. Anybody who's in a relationship, I will tell you you want to be niche. If you're starting to see it one way, you don't connect. I'd say, even if you're having a perfect relationship, do it because it's actually fun and it will actually reset your thing to back. There's so much to it. But you'll work through a phase of your relationship that you'll realize is so normal and when you're in that spot you feel like you're the exception, like how, why are we here? And I want to tell people that, like you are not alone with it and if you actually go do this and break through, you'll actually be the exception that makes it. So I think it's super important for any role a couple to do it. And, dudes, if you're all bro and you can't do it, stop being all bro and get in and try. Okay, that's the guy who can't do it. Just stop being a wimp.

Speaker 2: 51:57

It's so much more fun when you're real?

Speaker 1: 51:58

Yeah Well, maybe. Unless, if you're a psycho, maybe just keep lying to us. That's fine, we'll just figure that out.

Speaker 2: 52:04

You just told me to go ahead and do the whole sales pitch on my own, and you just did it for me. You just took over.

Speaker 1: 52:09

I'm giving you content to cut up later. That's what we're trying to do here.

Speaker 2: 52:12

For sure, I'll send you your tip later. Thank you, that was awesome.

Speaker 1: 52:17

Thank you so much, bruce. Bruce, I'm going to put you in the periwinkle room. I'll be right back. There are no snacks in there because I ate them all. Thanks for coming on, guys. Thank you so much for listening and watching.

Speaker 1: 52:33

If this is your first time being here, you've hit a really good show. This one's really dear to my heart because it's been a very crazy ride as an entrepreneur and personal growth through a faith journey a little bit, with trying to become more vulnerable, more open, and what it's undone for me is improved relationship with my wife and kids and everybody else, but also unlock parts of my business, that I look at my customers, what I'm doing, a whole new light. I look at it a way of being more altruistic, to ask questions, not assume and and and really share how I feel and stuff, and it makes people in your life connect better with you, not just your spouse. So the stuff that that Bruce teaches at love at first fight is really good. It's centered around couples that are, that are in need, but anybody really honestly can take it and you should check it out.

Speaker 1: 53:13

Once again, thank you for listening to today. Until we meet again, I want you to get out there, go, unleash your entrepreneur, cut the ties, all that shit that's holding you back. You get one life. You want to sit there in your deathbed wishing I had done anything, or you want to go for it. You got to go for it, thank you.