Lessons - From Homeless Addict to 9-Figure Entrepreneur | Ryan Zofay - We Level Up Founder & Author of The Unlikely Businessman

In this lesson's episode, discover how belief systems shape decisions, ambition, and long-term growth. Understand why celebrating wins builds confidence and momentum. Explore how relationships and complementary skills accelerate progress. And uncover why trust, consistent action, and investing in a future identity can help turn bigger goals into reality. as a business owner, you deal with this shit all the time where like you, you, so you focus on these massive negative things because as humans, the negative imprints on our brain much, much easier than the positive. For sure. But then, and I'm curious how, I'm also just very curious how you found Tony Robbins because I know Tony is all about playing bigger and I think there was like an intervention that he had with you at one point about you're playing too small even though you're building a massive business and his mind is too small. Outside of somebody hanging out at Tony's house, which is not everybody can do that. Right. I even speak about what he taught you and what he sort of opened your eyes to. But when somebody's dealing with all the day-to-day BS of a business, assuming everything else in their personal life is going fine and with their kids or spouse, which is also not always the case. How do you, after you cross a certain threshold where most people do not have experience, say you build a $10 million business, $50 million business, $100 million business, not very many people, there's not many people you can go to say like, hey, what do I do next? How do you always think bigger, think next, when every day is like an absolute battle? Yeah. So what I learned through this journey is your level of decision-making has everything to do with your belief systems. And so whatever I believe, I'm going to make decisions based on that belief. So if I think I can, then I'm going to make a decision that is going to emulate that I can do it. If I don't think I can, then I'm going to make a decision that emulates that I can't do it. And so one of the most important things that Tony taught me is that I am the creator of my life. And I know you hear this. I know it seems cliche. But if you just like really stop for a second and unpack that, When I went to Tony August 2018, I got there by my ex-fiance, by the way. She went to the event at UPW and she's like, oh my God, you got to go to Tony. So I went to Tony. I went to Tony with the idea of like I needed to learn more business skills. I went to business mastery. Then I find out it was a psychology problem. And so one of the biggest things that Tony taught me was like, Ryan, like whatever you want in your life, you can have it. So you can be the creator. So I was like, wait a minute. Like, you're telling me anything I want? Yeah. But at this point, you have a business already. I was doing $10 million a year in revenue. Yeah. So it's not like you screwed up as a business owner. Right. You're killing it. Yeah. And so, but I needed evidence. I just needed evidence to support that belief system. See, the mind is designed to look for evidence to support your belief system. Yeah. And so if I believe I can't, then I'm going to look for evidence to support that. And so going to Tony was like, no, you can, Ryan. Yeah. So that was the evidence that I needed. And so somebody at his caliber just telling me, like, you can do this. I was like, oh, my God. I was like, holy shit. I was so scared. But what happened is I collapsed space and time and I became that person just because he believed in me. And so I left Tony's July 2020 in the midst of the whole country shutting down, watching his business go to bankrupt overnight. I watched him apply everything that he taught me real time. And the lesson for me at that time was the playing small... was the level of impact that I was creating in the world because I've been through so much, I've overcome so much and I'm not teaching. And so that's when he was like, dude, like the people are starving out there for this and you're not out there teaching this. But that's when I changed my whole approach to business. And that's when I started to identify like, I'm in the impact business. I'm in the results business. I'm not in the making money business. I'm in the results business. I'm in the impact business. I'm in the transformational business. If I transform somebody's life long enough and impact somebody's life long enough and provide the solution to somebody's problem long enough, eventually the byproduct of that is income. And that's exactly what's happened for me. So like I obsess with how to solve somebody's problem. So when somebody comes to my seminar, I am literally obsessing, figuring out what's going on unconsciously in this person's life that I can give them a shift so that they believe in themselves because that's all it is. People that believe in themselves make decisions and take action towards their future self. People that don't believe in themselves make decisions and take action that brings them to the part of them that doesn't believe it. And so it literally goes down to what you believe, as simple as it may sound. And then like when you're going through like an experiential process, It's real because you can see energetically where people are at. Do you, outside of like just words that like unlock this sort of awareness of what you can potentially do, tactically, maybe it's something you did through recovery. I'm curious because it's something that I do. I do this. I sort of keep track of my wins. I keep track of the things that have gone right in my life. So when that's like when I'm not sitting in a seminar, when I'm not sitting in front of Tony Robbins and that self-doubt like creeps in, I remember that I've won 2000 times that week and like 50 million times over my life. So even if I get sued that day or an employee quits that day or I lose that deal, I've won X amount of times. And that gives me the confidence to sort of like reset and get back on track. I'm curious if you do something like similar to that process at all, just because I know that no one's perfect. So even though you're teaching people up here, I can guarantee you there's times when people are not in this room and you're sitting in your office and you're like, what the fuck are you doing? Yeah. Because yesterday actually, it's always really worth it. Exactly. A hundred percent. So how do you get- I love that strategy, dude. Because think about it. What you just said was that now you have evidence and references where you can go back to and look- And then it propels you forward. It's no longer emotional. It's just logic. It's just logic. It's the data in front of you. 100%. So yeah, I mean, I definitely have a version of that. And see, for me, it's like, it's not so much what's talked about at the meetings, like, although that's important, the strategy is important. It's showing up every single week, meeting with my team and having those conversations. So I actually start off, and Tony taught me this, we always start off with every single meeting with jackpots, wins and celebrations. And so we're always conditioned and trained to find what's right in every situation and to celebrate the wins because you can't, Tony taught me this, you can't build on failure, you can only build on success. And so the momentum of like, yo, you just won, now what's the next best thing to keep winning? Because if you're looking at what's wrong, now you're always stuck in like what's wrong and what do I do now? Am I a failure? And you stay stuck. It's all about motion. It's all about momentum. Yeah, and how do you keep that momentum going? As you look at the wind going. What did we not talk about today? We talked about a lot of shit. Talked about a lot of stuff. I mean, I think something that's really cool, man, is like how I met you. You know? Yes. It's so crazy. I think that people overlook like relationships. And I think... What I've learned from you, you know how nervous I was the first time I met you because I was coming into something that in my mind you've done for like, I don't know, when I first met you, just so people know, like I was doing an event and you came and spoke at our event and like I've never sold from stage ever. Like my background is like jump, like it's like B2B enterprise software. It's like jump on a zoom call and it's, I mean, I was even more removed from the sales process. in my last time when I did that because I had sales reps that worked for us to have inside sales rep, jump on a Zoom call, pass it over to an account executive. I would get involved like two months later when we sit down with the CEO of the company we're going to sell to. It was not go in front of a room of people that you never heard of or spoken to before and then try and sell something. I like speaking, but I like teaching. But then it was very uncomfortable for me to ask people for money from the first time I ever met them standing in front of them. It's like stage fright compounded with the pasta syndrome compound with all this other shit. Yeah. Anyway, you come out and and I'm nervous as hell because I'm like, oh, God, like, I don't know what the fuck I'm doing like this. And I'm like, this guy's been doing it for forever. And like, you're you're a you're a phenomenal speaker. And and I was like, he's going to think I'm an absolute idiot. Like. You screamed at me. One time I didn't think that. No, I don't one time. But that's how... that's how powerful your mind is. Yeah. That's all I'm thinking the whole time. Right. Now we're like friends. Oh yeah. So I thought you crushed it, bro. I was like, wow, he's actually really good up there. I swip it again. I was like, I like this. But also that's another lesson. Like you always feel like you're worse than you are. Yeah. A hundred percent. You always feel like you're worse than you. We always think that we're unqualified. But the point is like, so out of nowhere you had me coming from something that was a totally different industry. Partnering with somebody who knew this industry. I mean, even you've been doing it for a while, but you're also not Tony Robbins either. He's been doing it for, I don't know, I've seen videos of him. Fuck it. It's like 40 years. He was like a kid doing this stuff too. And now he's, he's not young anymore. So you partner with somebody that knows this industry well, and you like, you compliment your skill sets and you compliment what you know, what you don't know. Right. A hundred percent. Yeah. That is a cool story. Yeah. And so I think what's interesting is like people like, like, There's so many ideas or perceptions around sales, like what sales is. And so some of the most influential years that I had was doing the commodity stuff because I got no's every single day, like 300 no's a day. It was like people are cussing at me, stop calling, all the different things. And what I realized through all of those calls and through all of the stage opportunities I've had It's all about trust. People just say no because they don't trust you. They don't trust that they can do it. They don't trust that they're going to be able to follow through. A lot of it's like sales is calling people forward, calling people to be a better version of themselves. And so once I understood that, I stopped worrying about if somebody's going to say yes or no. I started worrying about, Am I building trust in this person's life? Am I showing this person what's possible? Am I being the example that they need to see so that they can become a better version? Because here's the thing. Think about this, Scott, right? Let's just use the example. I want to become a motivational speaker. You have the idea of it. And then let's say there's this version of yourself that you see in the future that's And there's a gap in between where you're at and where you want to be. As soon as you make the investment, you collapse space and time, and you become that future version. Because now you're executing. You're taking action. And so people... overlook how important it is to make investments. And so as soon as you make an investment in your future self, you automatically condense space and time. And now you're that version. Now you're literally sitting at the doorstep of like, okay, my new life, my new version. But then obviously there's follow through and you have to be commitment, you know, committed. Yeah. Thanks for tuning in. If you found this valuable, don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. And if you want to dive deeper into this conversation, check out the links in in the next one.