Mike "C-Roc" Ciorrocco

The Joe Costello Show

Mike C-Roc Ciorrocco is the CEO of People Building, Inc., and the powerhouse behind the "What Are You Made Of?" movement.

He is a performance coach, author, dynamic public speaker, visionary, and thought leader. He has been featured by Yahoo! Finance as one of the Top Business Leaders to Follow in 2020 and is on a mission to build people. He is driven to inspire others and he measures his success on how he is able to help others achieve greatness. C-Roc had a fire lit in him at an early age. That fire has ignited him with a fierce desire to compel people to see the greatness inside themselves using past life events to fuel their fire.

Past hardships can be a powerful gravitational force that keeps you down and forces you to think small.

To get out of orbit you need Rocket Fuel.

Mike "C-Roc" Ciorrocco shows you how to convert past adversity into ROCKET FUEL to break free from the negative pull of pain and despair.

In his new book, C-Roc offers life-changing lessons in personal transformation by asking yourself What Are You Made Of? This powerful question will ignite within you a thrust to greatness! Learn how to overcome painful past obstacles and achieve a fulfilling life where you're in command of your future. If you're ready to shoot for the stars, C-Roc says, "Thrust is a must!"

Strap in and get ready for the ride of your life.

Mike's latest book: https://amzn.to/3wwkTX5

CEO - People Building, Inc.

C-Roc's Website: https://www.mikecroc.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mikeycroc/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mikeciorrocco

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGWHuKojqZfcXmvGCAi_t1Q

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-ciorrocco/

Email: [e-mail]

Podcast Music By: Andy Galore, Album: "Out and About", Song: "Chicken & Scotch" 2014

Andy's Links:

http://andygalore.com/

https://www.facebook.com/andygalorebass

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Transcript

Joe: Ok, welcome, everybody. Today, my guest is Mike "C-Roc" Ciorrocco. I'm really excited to have this talk with him and I know you're going to enjoy this. Mike, thanks so much for coming on. I appreciate it.

Mike: Thank you, Joe. I'd like to start every interview that I go on with gratitude and just really express that to you for allowing me to come on and share with you. And thank you to your audience for listening and showing up.

Joe: Absolutely, man, I love that gratitudes a huge thing in my life, so I'm right there with you. I appreciate it. I think it's important that everyone has their back story makes up sort of what they've become in life. You know, it doesn't define who they become. But there is something about what has happened throughout your life leading up to where you are now that has molded this person that you've become. And I

Mike: Right.

Joe: Am interested in that. And and I always start with this, just like you always start. What is it? What are you made of? Right. That's what you

Mike: They

Joe: Start

Mike: Had to turn your head sideways, I love

Joe: perfect!

Mike: It, you know, now, you know, I came from a broken home. I don't remember my parents together, Joe. I grew up around a lot of broken people, alcoholics, drug addicts, people suffering from anxiety, depression. My grandmother committed suicide after taking too much anti anxiety or depression medication. You know, a lot of things I went through as a kid just watching just destruction. And, you know, I think that decisions we make and Focus's that we have either go towards living and surviving or destruction. And I was seeing the destruction part and I wasn't OK with that. And I didn't want to accept that. So I would always try to help people switch around even from a young age. I was just not OK with what I was seeing. And, you know, my mom when I was three or four years old, I just remember her always telling me that I inspired her and I was going to be a leader. And I think subconsciously, subconsciously, she was doing that because she knew what was going on in the family and knew that I was gonna have to deal with some things. And so I had that programmed into me. So I was always just looking for people to help, looking for people to show them a better way and not buying into what they were telling themselves. And so, you know, that's just something I experienced at a young age. And really when it came down, what lit my fire and what I made of, I would say, is rocket fuel. Because when I was eight, my mom was moving on to her third marriage and I wasn't really up for going into another man's house and learned another man's rules

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: And but decided to give my dad a try who was moving on to his second marriage. And at that time, you know. I broke my mom's heart by doing that. I didn't know that at the time, but she told me later on that, you know, she cried herself to sleep at night when I left and I was our first child, you know, and when I moved to my dad's, everything seemed fine at first. But after three years, you know, during that three years, there was a lot of conflict. You know, there's a when you had step parents into the mix, any time that stuff happens. The kid is the only link between the past relationship and so a lot gets taken out on the children and anybody that's been in a broken home that dealt with child support, custody battles every other weekend, things that parents jealous, things like just everybody that's been through that knows what I'm talking about. And so a lot of that time they're in from eight to 11 hours, experience a lot of emotional, psychological abuse threats, things like that that were really probably not directed towards me, but came my way. And at nine years old, I would sleep with my baseball bat a lot of nights

Joe: Wow.

Mike: Because I was scared. And no kid should have to go through that, through that, of course. But that's what went into making me look. I went through these things. I went through court, child psychologists, to see if I was mature enough that at a young age to figure out who I wanted to live with, like all that kind of stuff

Joe: Make

Mike: And.

Joe: Your own decisions, all of that, that crazy.

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Yeah, yeah,

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: And seeing parents fight

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: And, you know, just just not not happy environment, and so that's what went into me. But the thing is, is that I was always on the right side of the track. Thank God. I was always looking at how can I be better not being accepting of it. Let me look at the bright side of things. Let me look at, OK, what is this doing and how can I take advantage of using this to a better life? So one weekend I was coming home from my mom's house

Joe: And

Mike: And

Joe: So

Mike: I

Joe: I don't mean to interrupt. Was this

Mike: Noticed

Joe: All

Mike: For.

Joe: In Maryland or all back on the East Coast or.

Mike: This is in Pennsylvania, outside of Philly.

Joe: Ok, cool.

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Ok.

Mike: So so my mom was living in Maryland, and you know what, I got to about 10, some 10 years old, give or take. I was coming home from my mom's house one day, one weekend after being there and my stomach was in knots. I was anxious. I don't want to go back. And my mom was saying something was wrong. She questioned me and I told her, you know, when you go through abuse, anybody that's been through abuse, you can probably relate to this. That one you don't just like to share because you're afraid that people won't believe you, too. You kind of you're so accustomed to going through it, you're not sure how bad it really is. Somebody on the outside would be like, holy cow, you're dealing with that really.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: But as you're going through it, you just think it's ordinary. Another thing, maybe you're embarrassed that you let it go on for that long. And then the weirdest thing is that you're actually concerned with your abuser. You're like, what will happen if I share this to them?

Joe: At.

Mike: You know, just a weird thing. So I finally came came to the realization that I need to share that my mom said, you know, I'm going to get you out of there. I'm going to file court papers. You don't need to be going through that. That's not ordinary. You need to, you know, in a better situation, she said. But if you do if I do this, you need to stick to your guns. You've got to be like really, really firm because they're going to try to talk you out of it. And in life, when you believe in something, you've got to stick to your guns, man, because people will have agendas and they're going to try to talk you out of it, move one way or the other. And at the end of the day. If you do that, you're not going to live the life you want to live, so she reminded me that, you know, 10 years old, you know, filling my head with great stuff, you know, and I went back home that day and waited and waited weeks went by and waited for those court papers to be delivered. You know, I just knew it was going to happen. And I didn't tell my dad about it, of course. And then finally, one day I come home from school and the tension in the house, you could feel it like it was something was up. And I knew what the deal

Joe: Mm

Mike: Was.

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: I had to feel the first. I thought I did something wrong. You know, I'm looking around like, what did I do today? He had his papers in his hand. My dad did. And I knew, like, oh, here we go. And he told me to go to my room. Now, my dad was my hero. He had a successful masonry business, very hard worker, big forearms, rough hands.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: You know, you tell he's a hard worker and he always cared a wad of hundred dollar bills in his pocket. And I thought that was the coolest thing and had a rubber band around

Joe: So

Mike: It

Joe: Did

Mike: And.

Joe: My partner, it's so buddy.

Mike: Yeah, yeah, it must be the last thing

Joe: Yeah, and.

Mike: He would always show me the money, and I thought it was a cool hundred dollar bills,

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: You know, so he came back in front of me and I didn't get into the discussion with him because my mom said, stick to your guns. So he proceeded to tell me how my mom would have guys coming in and out. Why would you want to go there? You have it made here. You have everything you need. They're poor. They don't have anything. You know, my mom was I mean, we look at the houses. Twenty five, thirty thousand. Our house broken down cars in the driveway. You know, we went on vacation to the Jersey Shore.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: But we stayed in a rundown motel, one room for kids, two adults, and we were I just remember just the other day, we were actually able to bring some friends with us sometimes, which just makes it like just I don't even remember how that worked. And we would take black trash bags as a suitcase. So, you know, share my story. By the way, back in the day, I was kind of embarrassed by that. I just didn't like to share that, you know.

Joe: Yep.

Mike: But I started to realize that the more you share your story, the more impact you can have and the more people that can relate to it and maybe change your life for two

Joe: Yep,

Mike: Or millions,

Joe: Yep.

Mike: You know. So I started sharing that. But just to wrap it up real quick, so when I did confirm that my dad took that wad of hundred dollar bills out of his pocket, peeled one off, crumpled it up and threw it at me and said, if that's the case and you want to move there, you're going to need this when you're living on the street with your mother one day. And I remember that 30 some years I lived off that spark that was lit right there because I'm stubborn, my shirt that I think is, say,

Joe: And.

Mike: Stubborn, perversely unyielding, it's a good thing when it's on the right thing. But, you know, I was like, I'm not going to let that happen. And so 30 some years, I was driving off that spark until two years ago. I really subconsciously I was doing that. I really realized two years ago, wait a minute here, there's something magical that's going on. My life keeps going on its upward trajectory. No matter what happens, no matter screw ups, let downs, disappointments, what is happening here and what I found, which I wrote in my book that's coming out Monday, May 3rd on Amazon Rocket Fuel, I was taken everything that would stop normal human beings or slow them down, store it in my fuel tank instead of my truck, would weigh you down and converted it into rocket fuel for my future to become unstoppable. And I found that and I realized, wait a minute, this is not just a concept. This is an this is a law. If you do this, you really are unstoppable to live in the life of your dreams until you're plucked from this planet. So that's why I decided to write this book that Grant Carter wrote the foreword because it was so powerful. I got to get this message out to people. So that's a little bit about the story. There's you know, that's the short version, actually.

Joe: No, that's all good. That's exactly what I wanted, the only piece that I still need to figure out is what did you do? How did you figure out what you wanted to do in life in that middle section of where people go to college or they get a job? Or what

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Did you do during that time?

Mike: Well, I played football and I didn't drink any alcohol or party all through high school, I played football, baseball wrestled, but football was my love

Joe: Mm hmm.

Mike: And I just I always thought about I want to go to Ohio State, play football, because I just love their team. I watched them play Michigan all the time growing up. And I never grew tall enough, never grew fast enough

Joe: I feel your pain.

Mike: That. Yeah. So five, six and three quarters, you got to be really, really fast if you're five, six

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: And three quarters. So I decided to go to Division three. I played football in college study business. But when I got to college, Joe, I lost my focus and I started chasing girls and party in which I never did before. And it was like Disney World first, you

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: Know what I mean?

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: And I just lost, man, I four, five, six, seven years in that range. I was just it's all I cared about was parties where the girls at and I need to be around people. And so that's that's the lead up to that. And then eventually I met my wife, who just the commitment to my wife straighten me up. And I was off to the races. I think that my thing with my wife right now, I joke with her all the time, is I have to outsource. I have to earn her spending on Amazon and deliveries to the house. So it's constantly like this. The other day she's like, I look I go up in the kitchen and there's a piece of decking, like the composite decking.

Joe: Oh, you know

Mike: We

Joe: That

Mike: Have

Joe: That's

Mike: A wood

Joe: Going

Mike: Deck.

Joe: To be redone.

Mike: And I'm like, I already told you, oh, not right now. It seems like I already had somebody come over measured

Joe: Oh,

Mike: On my car and drive back down into the cave.

Joe: That's

Mike: I call this my studio, my cave. I got to go make some money now.

Joe: That's so

Mike: A

Joe: Funny.

Mike: Great motivator.

Joe: That is awesome. All right. Well, that's where and was college.

Mike: Salisbury University in Maryland.

Joe: Ok, and then ever since you've stayed in Maryland,

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: But

Mike: I

Joe: Now

Mike: Moved

Joe: You're

Mike: To

Joe: In

Mike: Connecticut

Joe: Ocean City,

Mike: For a period of time,

Joe: Yep,

Mike: But we moved to Ocean City

Joe: Yep.

Mike: Now. Yep.

Joe: Which is beautiful. I love it there. OK, cool. Yeah. And I'm

Mike: Thank

Joe: On the East

Mike: You.

Joe: Coast. I'm originally from New

Mike: A

Joe: York.

Mike: Cool,

Joe: So.

Mike: Cool.

Joe: So this leads right into the question that since you're going to do the decking, are you still doing. Are you still in the mortgage business because that's your.

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Ok. OK.

Mike: Yeah, we have a have a division that I run with three best friends, they take care of the day to day operations

Joe: Yep.

Mike: And it's a large division under our nation's lending. And we run it like our own business. And it's great people, great culture. It's just phenomenal.

Joe: And

Mike: So.

Joe: You've been doing that quite a long time, right? I've saw

Mike: Yet.

Joe: You've gotten rated as number number one in Yahoo! Finance are right. I mean, you have.

Mike: Yeah, so 2006, I got into it and started as a loan officer and just went from two employees and started a branch and vision and two employees up to 40.

Joe: Wow, that's incredible. OK, cool. So when did you make this shift of and you talk about this in one of your videos about sharing your story and you share. You also mentioned it when you were giving your story, how important that is. And when did you make this when did you allow yourself to say, OK, I have this business and I have great partners and people to run this business? When did you decide to at least start your company now with what you're doing with your podcast, in your book and everything? What was the trigger for that?

Mike: Yes, so early, twenty, nineteen, my stepfather, George, she took over from my dad when I was 11. He was a great guy and he passed away in twenty eighteen and a heart attack suddenly. And I wrote about this in the book, the story about how he found out and everything. It's it's you know, but but at the end of the day, he had a passion when he was passionate about something like football, baseball, hunting, fishing. He would get up and just go nuts, like deep voice, like everybody couldn't, like, really understand him. He was like so passionate, like they would be taken aback by him. And when he passed away, you know, a couple of weeks after he passed away, I had this passion or energy, something spirit come inside of me. Like, I just felt different. And I realized that I wasn't playing a big enough game in life. You know, I was doing well in the business and the mortgages and all that. But it just that's not the game that I was designed for. I was playing small and I started to realize, wait a minute, I need to open myself up to other opportunities, because if I just focus here, this is where I'm going to stay. And I was having truths that I was telling myself and beliefs that I was telling myself is that this is it for me. This is I'm stuck, you know,

Joe: Mm

Mike: And

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: I don't necessarily love the mortgage business. It's great and all that. But the end of the day, I just had a bigger, bigger calling. And so I started trying to figure out, OK, how can I get known in this calling of building people? Because that's what I actually do at the mortgage business. It wasn't the mortgage business. It was I was building people. I was helping develop people. And so I said, how can I get known more in a bigger, bigger scale mystate instead of just my town? Then I was like, that's not big enough. I'll come up short. How about the country and then the globe? And then I was like, you know, what? If I start really expanding my mind, I'm like, if there's aliens, which I've never seen one, but if there is, let me see if I can get aliens to know who I am and really go for that and then come up a little short and I'll be all right. And that's the way I started thinking about things and started trying to impact and share my story with tens of millions of people, hundreds of millions of people. How can I do that? And I started to obsess about that. And that's when the podcast came. The book idea came and and I just started networking like an animal and going on. You know, I've done three hundred interviews in the last year.

Joe: Oh, that's crazy.

Mike: So just really lean into it and that's how it all started, and then now I'm into tech, into the tech world where I'm developing a tech product. I co-founded the company. And also we have other we're creating a tech portfolio of other co-founders, non tech entrepreneurs that have ideas that think that they can never do it. They usually go to the grave with those

Joe: Mm

Mike: Things.

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: We're bringing them into the world and giving them the resources they need to actually co-found their companies and creating unstoppable people. Because my mission, Joe, is all people are unstoppable to live in the life of their dreams. And so everything I do, I filter through that mission.

Joe: It's so cool, man, and it's so funny because you hit it right on the head with with the same thing with me, it's like you don't have a successful business. But I know it's not my calling. It's not what I was put here to do. And and everything that I do should be so much more impactful and so much bigger. And I've had this I had the conversation with David Meltzer. And at the same

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Time, he brings you back in focus and he's like, yeah, but you should know that you you have everything you need. You just got to get out of your own way. It's not a matter that you should focus on wanting more. You have it all. You're just

Mike: Yep.

Joe: You're literally getting in your own way of getting it done.

Mike: Yeah, and that's the thing, it's the truths that we tell ourselves we're living an illusion, we let the illusions that we have based on our beliefs and past experiences, and we let that affect us and limit us and block us. And really, at the end of the day, you know, we'd rather explain our life instead of actually intervening in it. We'd like to explain with excuses, you know, and justify things and, you know, at the end of the day, man, we just tell ourselves what we can tell ourselves that helps us survive. And to me, that's not good enough, because you're going to always come up a little short, so why not thrive and really go after it? And, you know, there's not everybody that's going to be able to do what we do. So why don't we take it up a notch and get get really abundance, like go after abundance so that we can help other people and distribute this information to other people. So that's the kind of things that I started thinking. I started hanging around people that coach and mentor me the right way, thinking big, you know, also, you know, still like Dave Meltzer talks about, you've got to be happy now. It's not like later,

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: So.

Joe: Yeah, so I don't want to go down the current path, I follow him, I love the stuff that he does. I know that it fits the mold for a lot of people that are in the real estate world. And but

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: I also know that he's doing a lot of other things. But how he wrote the foreword to your book, which is amazing, how how much did he influence you making this jump to doing what you're doing now?

Mike: So when George died, my stepfather, my brother was read in the next room and he said, Mike, you've got to read this book, this guy sounds just like you. I'll take a look at it. I started I saw Grant before and like pictures, but I thought he was like a real estate.

Joe: Yep,

Mike: I thought he trained realtors,

Joe: Yep,

Mike: I wasn't even sure,

Joe: Yep.

Mike: Right, so I read the book and I'm like, holy cow, this guy speaking to me, he's going through similar situations that I've been

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: Through. Like, I can totally relate. And I but but the big thing was about it was I've always had this big think, but I got cocooned for a while by people that I surround myself with that were broken thinkers, broken mindset, people, people that didn't fit my culture, but they produce. So I kept them around and people that quit on me. And I let that affect me personally. And I got into this situation where I was invalidated, me myself. I felt invalidated on being the animal that I actually am. And so when I was reading that book, I'm like, wait a minute, this this shows me something. I'm not the crazy one. Those people are the crazy ones. I have an animal. So I did unleash it. So I was able to unleash the beast and that's what it did for me. And then I just immersed myself in this content, hung around with all these people, build relationships inside his company, because I just want to be around those types of people.

Joe: Yep.

Mike: Great, great friendships. Like I said, Jerry Glantz, a friend of mine, I just you know, I'm proud to have them in my in my circle. And so when when I wrote the book, the book actually came from an idea that I got while I was interviewing grad on my podcast about I asked him the question, what would it take to get into outer space? Not like literally, but figuratively speaking, getting away from all the gravity and negative suppressors of people and things that can mess with you. When can you get that amount of money or that amount of whatever it is? And he said people aren't ready for that discussion. He said that's just something the answer doesn't people don't like the answer to that question and I'm like, well, what would it take? You know? And I started thinking about rocket fuel. Rocket fuel is what it would take. Take it all that stuff, converting it and fuel your way up there. And then once you do that, you remove all that stuff out of your way. There's nothing to stop you and you become unstoppable and indestructible. And that's the thought that started going through my head and I started obsessing about it. I'm like, I got to write this. So when I did that, I'm like the only person that would make sense to be writing the forward for this book is Grant. I don't know if he does afterwards. I don't know if he charged me. I don't know anything. I'm going to make it happen, though. And that's what I started thinking all the time. I just dwelled on it, wrote it down and. Book is almost done, and I made a phone call and there are some details that went into doing that and I just got done and his name is on the cover of the book is for Written

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: By Grant.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: So that adds to credibility that I may not have had before, but the content in the book is just so powerful, man. It's just I actually can be honest with you about something like like I'm always honest, but like just totally transparent. I read that book over and over again during the editing process. Right. And I got so sick of it and because I've read it so much, but then I haven't read it in a while and I went back and my team, we go through in the morning and we'll pick a passage to read out of it just to see what what we come upon. And I don't even remember writing some of the stuff. I'm just like, wow, this is like this is really good stuff.

Joe: That's cool,

Mike: So it's a weird

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: It's a weird mind game when you're writing a book and then to see the actual finished product. It's a good time.

Joe: That's really cool, yeah, I look forward to reading it, I it's, you know, just talking with you, I can tell we're in sync on a lot of this stuff. You're ahead of me because you wrote a book and I haven't done it yet, but I know that it's a good process to go through. Where did you figure out where you wanted to start in the book in regards to your life?

Mike: So, you know, I started share my story that I share with you and I have other parts of my life in there, too, that are just crazy, blew people's minds. But I really what I did was I started writing in my phone while I was on airplanes and I would just write ideas in my phone and and I would write stories that happen in my life. And then my podcast, we transcribe the podcast episodes, the first few that were a monologue style, and we just created a framework. And then it doesn't look anything like it started. That's how I got started with it and just started, you know, what kind of what went into me, what am I made of? And I just went into that and started sharing it. And then the lessons that broke off from each of those things, because, you know, a lot of people have been through there's people that have been through a lot more than I have. But my story is pretty crazy. Like there's some stuff that happened to me that nobody could imagine going through. But I'm still here, brother, and I'm still going hard.

Joe: I hear you. I see that and you brought up a good point and one of the videos that I watch where you said people discount their story, right? They don't think, why would anybody care? It's not that

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Special. Well, when were you able to actually take your own thoughts as part of your own story and make that switch where you said, wait a second, you know, what I've gone through is important. If it can help one person in the world, that's value enough. I mean, when did you or did you not ever doubt that your story was powerful?

Mike: No, so I would I never shared it and I saw Pete Vargas share his story on the 10x growth conference stage in twenty nineteen, I'm sitting there watching and this is the first big stage, I think, that Pete was on. He was nervous and scared and his face, you could tell, is sweating and he would tell you this. I'm friends with

Joe: Mm

Mike: Him, so

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: It's not something I'm talking about.

Joe: Yeah, no, no.

Mike: But I thought to myself, I'm watching that. I don't know who he was at that time, but he was telling a story about his father and he was like really connecting with me and the relationship and how he grew up in a rough spot. And then they came back together and how it all worked out. And I'm like, wow, this is just like powerful. I felt like everybody else disappeared in the place and it was just him talking to me. And I'm like, I need to learn how to do that. And if he can do it, I know I could do it. That's what went through my head. And I told the guys I was with when we got in the car afterwards, I'm like, I'm going to be on that stage. I'm going to share my story one day and I know I can do it. And so then I started sharing the story of one person, two people, five people. And they were like, that's all. I really can relate to that. Then I said, Well, shit, I need to go to ten million people

Joe: Mm hmm.

Mike: If I could do it and how can I do that? And that's when I started obsessing about getting known and sharing that story. And, you know, I was able to talk to Pete after that and actually learn from him how to share your story. And but I shared that that that story about seeing him in the audience and how everybody just disappeared and how he connected with me. And so it's pretty powerful stuff,

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: Man.

Joe: That's really powerful, but that's got to be a little eerie to just be sitting there

Mike: The.

Joe: And all of a sudden it's just like a movie where everything around you blurs out and it's just

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: The two of you. Yeah,

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: That's incredible. Something real light like question I have for you. The logo is it is a logo. And I'm going to take a guess and I'm probably going to be wrong. And you're going to say, well, nice try, Joe, but does it have anything to do with the Lynch?

Mike: So the sirocco, the blue.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: Yeah, so it's just upside down, see, and in two hours that are, you know, for Cerak and then it just has a little dude in there holding up the world, if you can see him. That's what it has now. It doesn't. I

Joe: Ok,

Mike: Didn't see that. So linchpin,

Joe: Only because

Mike: Huh?

Joe: When I read some stuff from you talking about, you know, in some of the verbiage that I read about you and on your website, you mention

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: The word linchpin. I can't remember the context, but it was.

Mike: Yeah, no, you know what, I.

Joe: And then when I looked at a picture of a lynchpin, I was like, wait, it is

Mike: I

Joe: Round.

Mike: Got to

Joe: And

Mike: See what a picture of a linchpin

Joe: You

Mike: Looks like

Joe: See

Mike: Because

Joe: Now

Mike: Because,

Joe: I have

Mike: You know,

Joe: You thinking.

Mike: Like that's. Yeah, I got to look at this because maybe maybe, yeah, maybe it does,

Joe: The.

Mike: So I didn't design the logo myself I had professionally done, and maybe he had that in mind as well.

Joe: Only because it's mean you could kind of say it a little bit. I don't know.

Mike: Yeah, yeah, I see what you're saying,

Joe: Right,

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: It's

Mike: No,

Joe: Round

Mike: I didn't

Joe: With

Mike: Have

Joe: The

Mike: That.

Joe: With the thing through it, and I'm thinking, OK, well, maybe it's kind

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Of hinting towards it and and I

Mike: Now,

Joe: Said,

Mike: It was really just the sea

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: And the two hour and holding up the world and helping lift up the

Joe: That's

Mike: World,

Joe: Cool,

Mike: That's what

Joe: That's even cooler, so you can

Mike: The.

Joe: Throw my idea right out the window,

Mike: Now,

Joe: But

Mike: I

Joe: I

Mike: Like that, I like that.

Joe: Do I do some upfront investigation of the person I'm talking to in the life and all of that stuff. And I saw that, you know, because you're doing your mortgages. And I saw that Jennifer is in real estate and I don't

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Know if she still is, but.

Mike: Yes, yes.

Joe: So that's a really cool synergy between the two of you, first of all, I think that probably works really well. But just for the people in the audience who had a great relationship with their significant other, how important has that been in the balance of your life, especially what you went through as a young, you know, a young man being able to have that support in and you found the love of your life and it's you know, there's that whole synergy there between you.

Mike: Yeah, I mean, it's it's everything, I mean, like I said, I made a joke about trying to earn her spending with that, but then on the day she does a great job, she did she was a stay at home mom for a while until our youngest was in school. And then I said, you know what? I'm going to try to you know, we've got to figure out something because I'm giving deals away

Joe: Uh huh,

Mike: To people.

Joe: Yep.

Mike: And, you know, it would be great if you get a license and she ended up doing it. And she's just the type that if she gets into something, she goes hard with it. And she did great the first two years, just fantastic. I didn't even realize how much money she made last year until I saw ten ninety nine. I'm like, wow, you did great. But she's just phenomenal and aligns well with our business. Obviously I don't do mortgages much anymore.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: I don't do it all. I just I work on the business maybe an hour a day. My team runs the day to day. They do a fantastic job. And so but it aligns well, obviously in a lot of our people, their spouse got their real estate license, too, because it aligns so well.

Joe: Mm hmm. Yeah.

Mike: So, yeah, but but at the end of the day, we are you know, I'm very clear with what I'm trying to do, my dreams. And she is clear on the fact of her dreams and the fact that she's willing to support me and run through fire for me. And

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: It's just a great feeling because I can't do it without her, obviously.

Joe: Yep, yep, I just wanted to sort of bring that up, because I think it's important I have the same sort of relationship with Joel

Mike: And

Joe: And

Mike: It's

Joe: My significant

Mike: Awesome.

Joe: Other. So it's

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: To me, it's super important. And with what happened with covid, you know, a lot of things just stopped. Right. And

Mike: Mm hmm.

Joe: Changes were made. And so she got furloughed from doing her day to day job and has not been brought back. But she's always had this dream of doing photography. And so now I basically have said to her, you are not going back and you are going to from this point forward until whenever the world ends for you, you're going to follow your dream. So I

Mike: Awesome.

Joe: Think it's important. Right. And to

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Support each other and it's nice to see that you have that same relationship.

Mike: Yeah, so, so, so important that it aligns I mean, so much conflict comes from just not being aligned with the mission,

Joe: Yep,

Mike: You know,

Joe: Yep.

Mike: And I think that people need to realize that their personal dream, their mission, I call it their purpose, their mission. It's it's more important than anything when it comes down to it really is.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: And that's why it's so important to share that with your partner, to make sure that they're on the same page with you.

Joe: So let's talk about that. I'm sure I'm probably older than you at this point, but we're

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: At

Mike: Definitely, definitely. Now

Joe: The.

Mike: I'm 40, I'm 40 for some, I'm

Joe: Oh,

Mike: A

Joe: My gosh, I'm so

Mike: Young

Joe: Old,

Mike: Pup,

Joe: I can't.

Mike: But I am going on 18 years of marriage. This May so.

Joe: Congratulations, that's awesome, yeah,

Mike: Thank

Joe: Joel

Mike: You.

Joe: And

Mike: Thank

Joe: I

Mike: You.

Joe: Are 20, I think, at this point.

Mike: Ok, cool, congrats.

Joe: Yeah, I turned fifty nine this past February, so,

Mike: Oh, man, I

Joe: You know.

Mike: Can't tell. I really can't

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: Tell.

Joe: Well thank

Mike: Maybe

Joe: You.

Mike: That's why that's why you shave your head, because that way you can't see any

Joe: That's

Mike: Gray hairs.

Joe: Exactly, exactly right. They got my eyebrows

Mike: Hey,

Joe: Are still dark,

Mike: Look, I'm with you the way the.

Joe: So do you ever look at where you are now and you look back and go? I mean, and I think we've talked about this with some of the great people, like, you know, we can bring up David Meltzer again because he's just he's like one of my mentors. I love the guy at the

Mike: Is

Joe: Death.

Mike: Awesome.

Joe: You know, what is what's the saying? Something like the the teacher. The teacher appears when the student is ready,

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Right?

Mike: Yeah, yeah, yeah, teachers.

Joe: Yep.

Mike: Yep, exactly.

Joe: And it's the same thing with life. Like things come when the time is right. And some people would argue against that. Some people would say whatever. But you just started on this path now, right. Something flipped when you're 40, when your stepfather passed away, it said there's you know, and you might have felt that your whole life because you people like you and I always were pulled towards something. Right. We're entrepreneurs. We've always worked towards a greater goal of whatever. Do you ever look back and go, God, I wish I had started this sooner? Or is it like, no, it's this is the time. This is the right time. It's happening now. You know, I'm interested in what your thought process is on that.

Mike: Well, I'm curious, asking the question, you must have felt some kind of feeling about that in the past, maybe.

Joe: I constantly go like I had, I chased another dream up until this point, and that

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Dream didn't happen for me and I openly admit all the time that I didn't put in the work to make that dream happen. I'm

Mike: The.

Joe: I'm a trained you know, I went to college for music. So my whole life has been surrounded by music. And one day I was going to tour the world and be this famous drummer for and I always use the example because I love his music. John Mayer.

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: That never happened for me because I know now I can look myself in the mirror and go, You didn't put in the work. You didn't put in the

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Tent.

Mike: The commitment,

Joe: Yeah. You

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Didn't do the ten thousand hours. You

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: You would rather had gone down to the college campus bar and had a bunch of beers and chicken wings with your buddies

Mike: Yep.

Joe: Instead of going back into the practice room and spending another four hours at night. So I am fine with I get it now, but now

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: I'm trying to take like the rest of my life and make it amazing and live much

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Bigger. And so I am at the stage right now doing that change, shifting

Mike: Mm hmm.

Joe: My my frame of mind. I know the world is abundant. I know that everything you know, I just have to look towards the good of everything. And the more I focus on the good and the abundance and the gratitude, more of it just keeps coming in. In the last two months, it's been incredible for me. And so and it's I always was the oh, woe is me. Like I work my ass off. Why am I not getting that? Why am I not

Mike: Yep,

Joe: Doing that? So

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: That's why I asked you this question

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: When that,

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: You know, was the shift with your with

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Your father, your stepfather passing away and you just saying when you said you felt it in your heart, you were like, I need to do something bigger. Was that the pivotal point for this?

Mike: Yes, it was, and I did look back and be like, man, I cannot believe when I started finding out things and becoming aware of things, I cannot believe I didn't start this sooner. I didn't know that. Like, I just felt like I had wasted I went through a period of time where I felt like I wasted time and time is so valuable. And I said, you know what? I don't know how much longer I have on this planet, but you know what, at this point, the window keeps shrinking. I got to pick up my urgency. I got to move faster. I got to demand more and be louder and be more impactful and be just more intense than I would have had to if I started a long time ago, that's all. And so at first I did look back and with some regret. But then I quickly got out of that and said, OK, what have we got to do to get this done in the window that I do have left? So, yeah, I definitely and that was the pivotal, pivotal point, of course, working towards it my whole life, not knowing it.

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: You know, there's a story in the Bible and they made a movie about it with Steve Carell about Noah's Ark. You know, it was told over some years he took to build this big arc and he didn't really know why he was doing it, he was just being told to do it by God. If you believe in God,

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: Which I do, or if it's intuition or whatever. And he got these animals and people were laughing at him and discouraging them and he just kept doing it anyway and building a ship in a place where there's never rain.

Joe: All right.

Mike: And did it make sense, it didn't seem to make sense at the moment, but he kept doing it and he kept being committed and doing it and doing it and doing it before you know it. The rain came, washed everybody away, and he survived with all the animals that he had and his family. And so I look at that lesson and I started to see this now. I started to see that the things when I'm committed and obeyed to my purpose, my mission, and I filter things through that, whether it's the people I hang out with, my actions, my words, my thoughts, my environment, when I start to filter through that mission. I'm obeying what I'm supposed to be doing and things just magically work out and I start to see opportunities everywhere, but when I don't do that, they're missing. And so you don't need to know what the end game is necessarily. You should be shooting for something, but just be looking for the opportunities. As long as you're obeying your mission and filtering everything through your purpose or mission or whatever you want to call it.

Joe: Yeah. All right, well, that makes me feel good that I'm not the only one that had some regrets, so thank

Mike: The.

Joe: You for being vulnerable and saying that because I definitely have gone through it and I have like I said, I'm older than you. So I think, you know, think,

Mike: None of us are alone, Joe. None of us are, you

Joe: Ok.

Mike: Know, I've anything that you go through, there's somebody else out there experiencing it for sure.

Joe: Right, and I think that's what you're a lot of what you talk about is it's so important to share your story because it literally could help one person, which would be a huge help. You never know where they are in their state of mind. And if it lifts them, that's awesome. But imagine being able to help tens of thousands of millions of billions of people. Right. So I understand that's what the goal is for people like us who want to do that. So I I wish you the best of luck in doing that. And and same

Mike: Thanks.

Joe: With myself.

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: They've

Mike: You,

Joe: Got

Mike: Too.

Joe: To get it done.

Mike: That's right,

Joe: Ok,

Mike: That's right.

Joe: So you said something earlier about the book, which is the name of the book is Rocket Fuel. And you said it's May, May 3rd.

Mike: Yeah, May 3rd, Monday, May 3rd, it's coming out on Amazon, and, you know, it should be a best seller based on we have we presold it. So I'm thinking that it's not going to have a problem being a best seller, number one best seller.

Joe: Yep.

Mike: What we shall see. But I'm going to do a bunch of lives that day, Instagram and Facebook lives, and just have some fun with it

Joe: Cool.

Mike: And celebrate.

Joe: Ok, cool, so let's talk about it a little bit.

Mike: Sure.

Joe: You said something earlier that I thought was really cool, which was taking you said something about taking whatever comes in and not putting in it in the trunk, but putting it in the fuel tank and making rocket fuel. So explain

Mike: Yep,

Joe: That again

Mike: Very

Joe: To me, because

Mike: Good.

Joe: I I loved

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: It when you said I was like and I didn't even write it down.

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: I was like, no, that's got to go up here in my brain. So I would love to

Mike: Well,

Joe: Hear that again.

Mike: Well, when you want something in life and things come your way to stop it or slow you down, if you remove a one thing, obviously that's going to help. But removing is not good enough for me. So I take all that stuff. Haters, people that discourage me laughed at me. What I'm trying to do, screw ups of my own people trying to screw me, all that stuff I just stored in my fuel tank. And usually people put it in their trunk and that weighs them down. You know, most people quit on their dreams because other people are talking

Joe: Mm hmm.

Mike: About them and saying, no, you're not the same. Why are you doing that? In all kinds of different things? I take all that and say, you know what, like here's an example, by the way, I stored in my tank, my fuel tank, to convert it into rocket fuel rather than my trunk, where it weighs me down. And some of the people closest to me, you know, like some of my business partners and friends and they know who they are. I talk to them about it. And I said, you know what? You keep saying the stuff like, hey, why don't you go do your podcast? Hey, you know, just this stupid digs like that, right? At the end of the day, they're trying to get at me, but they're really just talking about themselves, reflecting upon themselves and the fact that they should be doing that and they're not. And so I know that. And I tell people, you know, you want to say that, great, you're not going to achieve what you think you're going to achieve because all you're doing is giving me more fuel and I'm going to push it even harder. So when somebody says that to me, I'll do it on purpose, where I'll push harder and then I'll show it up in their face a little bit more to about. They're seeing so many posts on Instagram, I'll make sure I send it to them in a direct message, because that way it shuts them

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: Up

Joe: Yeah,

Mike: For

Joe: It's weird, I don't

Mike: Not

Joe: Understand,

Mike: Being.

Joe: I don't understand, like people want to bring you down to their level, right? We deal with that all the time. And and social media has done so much to expose those people. And I just don't understand why they can't be happy for you. But they.

Mike: Well, they can't because so I've already realized this in my mind now I know this, it's not them personally, it's their mind. And what it's happening is they just the subconscious mind just justifies where you are. It's trying to justify the truths that you told yourself and when something comes in to threaten that. You have to basically there there things fire off to protect their subconscious beliefs, and so it's not really them personally that's doing it and that's why you can't take it personal. You need to understand it. And then when they're doing it, you need to lay it out to them and let them know, hey, listen, I know what's going on here. I get it. You're where you are and you're trying to justify where you are. And you're saying this stuff to me. I don't take it personal, by the way. I use it as fuel. So thank you. And if you want to say more, continue to give me fuel. Great. But I would rather be able to help you. On break the like, just open up your truths and change them, change your beliefs. And expand your mind and see what you can achieve instead of worrying about what I'm doing and that's the way I handle it, I don't really get fired up or angry or take it personal. It's just a situation where they're going through it. And I think we've all been through it Zoom. I think I'm more understanding of it,

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: But I will not. But if they don't listen to me when I talk about that, I will not spend time with them because I'm not going to spend time with people that don't align with the mission.

Joe: Totally agree. So the book Rocket Fuel coming out May 3rd on Amazon, who is this book for?

Mike: Specifically, this is for people that have gone through things in life. And they feel like they keep getting held back or slowed down by things are stopped and they're just they're just done with it. They're they're at the point right now where they've had enough. They're getting sick of where they are and they want to do something about it. And they are looking for that breakthrough that that that superpower, because really it is it's like John Maxwell, House leadership, because this thing is so powerful. And I validated it so, so thoroughly that it's a law, it's the Rockefeller law. And so it's for people that are just sick and tired of being where they are. And they want to advance. They want to have a better life, life of their dreams. And I believe, like I said, my mission is all people are unstoppable to live in a life of their dreams. And so that's what's for.

Joe: Yeah, and I saw that it seems like part of the focus is about past pains and obstacles and how you you basically help with the book to to change, take people and turn it around and say, you know, like you're saying, use those things as rocket fuel to get you to the next level. So don't lean on them. Don't have them in the trunk, don't have them as baggage, but instead take what you've learned, take what has happened and convert it to rocket fuel by doing whatever you talk about in the book.

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: Right.

Mike: Yeah, the magic, the magic, here's the magic, right? The magic is when you have something happen and you get that feeling in your chest, that's where it hits me, by the way, like something

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: Bad happens and like this speed to which you can recognize that and convert it and look for opportunity. That's when you master the Rockefeller law. That's what it's all about, the longer time it takes, the more doubt creeps in,

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: A more negative energy creeps in, the more victimhood creeps in. And the missed opportunities happened during that period. So you want to shrink that window to as little as short as possible because we all feel it. We're all going to still feel it when something bad happens at first, but recognize it as fast as possible and start to look for the opportunity, not play the victim role, take responsibility for everything.

Joe: Yeah, that's great. OK, I want to honor the time we have that we so we're going to do an hour or so. I want to just go through this real quick. So you have your own podcast, which is what are you made of? Which is on the wall behind you, where you interview. I assume, you know, other entrepreneurs and people that have amazing stories to tell and share. You release one week, twice a week with a human.

Mike: Well, it started out once a week and then I had so many that I was doing, I had to do two weeks. Right now we're on a two week schedule.

Joe: Ok.

Mike: So, yeah, I just load up. I go hard, man. Like, if I see somebody I want to show, I go after him like an animal. I get them on the show and I don't care how many I've already had in the can. I just still just keep loading them up

Joe: That's awesome.

Mike: And uh. Yeah. So.

Joe: Ok, cool. Besides that, you are you do some performance coaching, correct? You do some coaching in general, you

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: Are doing some speaking. You're going to continue to to build that

Mike: Yeah.

Joe: That part of your career. You're going to be on stage with Grant one of these days.

Mike: Well, yeah, but so the coaching part, I want to do, the coaching part of switching that into, you know, I still have a couple of clients, but really focusing on the tech side of things and developing these entrepreneurs and young entrepreneurs into this tech world and using my specialty performance and business coaching and what have you into that, not getting paid directly for it. But but from the companies that I'm developing,

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: I'm really focused on that. And then I was on a 10x growth stage this past March.

Joe: Oh, congratulations.

Mike: Let me tell you, it took me two years to step on that stage.

Joe: Hey,

Mike: Thank you.

Joe: That's awesome. The tech thing is it is there more that you can tell us about it or a way that people can find out about it or a.

Mike: Yes, so the best thing to do, really, I mean, if you if you message me and follow me on Instagram, you're going to see all kinds of stuff coming out here very shortly on it. But I have a tech product called Blueprinted. It's being printed. This is my the one I co-founded. And this product basically, I looked at digital training and video training and I saw, like, how ineffective

Joe: Mm

Mike: It was

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: And the fact that only 20 percent of people actually complete the courses. So that means the people that are marketing these courses that are good at marketing are making money without concern for the

Joe: Correct,

Mike: Success

Joe: Yeah.

Mike: Of their student, their clients. And I thought that was an ethical problem. And I looked at why people get bored. They don't finish it, they get distracted, they don't retain the information. Or when they get done, they're like, what's the next step? Like, what am I supposed to do? Where do I put that

Joe: Mm

Mike: And

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: Where where do I take that and how long do I do that? And so I thought to myself, what if there's a way to have a project management based software technology that has a marketplace where people that have had success can come in and algorithmically step by step, put the success steps to what they've done, whatever vertical,

Joe: Mm

Mike: And

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: Build that blueprint in our platform and then sell it on the marketplace to to people that want to know how to be successful in that area. So it could be anything from a business to a podcast to digital marketing agency, whatever it is. Because if you look if you're going to build a house, you wouldn't want to watch a YouTube video. And on building that house,

Joe: All

Mike: You'd want the blueprints.

Joe: Right.

Mike: So this is a market disrupter, industry disrupter. And I can also see another industry being created from this, like there's web designers when websites came out. Well, there's going to be a lot of people that don't want to build their own blueprints. They want to take the content and give it to somebody and have them do the blueprint for

Joe: Mm

Mike: Them.

Joe: Hmm.

Mike: So there's going to be a whole industry just on blueprints. And so, yeah, this is a phenomenal thing. And it's coming out hopefully in the next 60 days, give or take. And I'm just fired up to get it in people's hands, man.

Joe: That's great, man. You got a lot of irons in the fire. I like

Mike: Yeah,

Joe: It.

Mike: But

Joe: That's

Mike: Thank

Joe: Awesome.

Mike: You.

Joe: All right. So I want everybody to go and check out your podcast. The book is released on May 3rd called Rocket Fuel. Get in touch with you on on any of the social media. What's the best way to get in touch with you

Mike: Instagram,

Joe: On.

Mike: Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, either one, but Instagram, it's Michy Cerak.

Joe: Like you see rock on Instagram.

Mike: Yep.

Joe: Perfect. All right, man, this is a pleasure for me. I love talking

Mike: Metohija.

Joe: To another person

Mike: Yeah, buddy.

Joe: And it was great. And I really wish you a ton of luck with the book. I'll make sure when this episode gets released, I'll have a cover of the book. This will also go like you do on your podcast, will go to the YouTube channel so people will

Mike: Thank you

Joe: Be able to

Mike: To.

Joe: See it. I'll put the link to the Amazon in there. Anything else I can do to help? Let me know. But it was a real pleasure to speak with you. I appreciate

Mike: Well,

Joe: Your time

Mike: Thank

Joe: And.

Mike: You. Thank you, Joe, I appreciate it was a great interview. Great questions and I really enjoyed it.

Joe: Thank you, ma'am. You take care. Good luck with the book. Good luck with the podcast. Good luck with the tech software and

Mike: Thank

Joe: Everything

Mike: You.

Joe: Else. And just have an amazing year.

Mike: Thank you, you, too, bye.

Joe: Thank you.