Welcome to behind everyone podcast. My name is Wilson Lee your host today Behind everyone there is a story a story of how they're faced with their biggest fears Rejections and challenges a story of where they rose up to occasion and transform their lives The turning point of where it all began be inspired by the raw stories from top performers and entrepreneurs across industries So you can start unlocking your potentials and start living your dreams now. Let's die right in You know what we're gonna start that right awesome. Thanks so much Matt for doing this interview with me. That's freaking awesome I I actually forgot where I met you, but it's been a while. Yeah We've had at a mastermind pretty much. Yes. Oh, it's being a mastermind. You are the founder of The biggest internet mastermind in not in Vancouver, but in the world We are we are the largest internet marketing meetup on meetup.com Okay, and in and it's called internet masterminds But I don't think the internet masterminds is a traditional mastermind like we were at where there's a small group of people sitting right at boardroom Sharing ideas and solving problems. Yeah internet masterminds traditionally has been a place to Educate the public about the best practices of internet marketing by inviting a local speaker to come and share their case study It's something that they did locally internationally and some of the past be a marketing campaign Yeah, they basically share what they did to achieve that success Yeah, and we typically get dozens hundreds of people coming out to hear those stories Yeah, so it's a little bit different than like a typical mastermind that we're part of that's awesome. Um, and How many people are in this meetup group of yours? So right now our meetup is that over 7,000 members? Yeah our goal over the next two years is actually to get to a hundred thousand members and Through growing globally and getting to a hundred groups around the world My goal is to be within at least ten countries a hundred groups and a hundred thousand members in two years Why originally just made up that goal and then I actually researched to find out for this feasible and I found a lot of other organizations that actually exceeded that goal Yeah, not even trying within a two-year period and so I'm really excited now that we actually have a plan in place We're actually building technology. So actually have our own platform that we can actually do this to scale So yeah, really excited about it. It's what we've been working on for the last little while.  Wow. Is that another hashtag brand of yours?  I know at the same time you also have your social media director License, I actually have a few friends actually took it I think the impact that you're able to make in other people's lives has been tremendous because you know these kids that come our university They have nothing to do or even these moms They just take your course and then now they're killing it through Facebook. Yeah. Yeah I mean traditionally our course is you know Facebook ad and sales funnels Yes, we've had people that come out of school college, right? You know college you're learning Textbook material it's good Lot of people come out not understanding, you know the world of business one thing from learning from someone who's Actually done it is that you're learning like real-world business practices and strategies versus again to somebody who's you know I only teach stuff. I actually do yeah stuff that I just I read in a book, right? Yeah, and so not too, you know to yelling horn No, no, I mean I'm not trying to talk bad about college universities I think they help a lot of people But I have noticed that people who study, you know marketing specifically and get out of marketing I don't know a lot. Yeah, and again some some people are you know good and they you know They're reading books and they're you're looking up blogs watching YouTube videos like while in school Well, there's others who just rely on the information. They're getting called university. They come out and like You know, they still need more real-world experience And so that's why I think whether it's our course or someone else's course learning from someone who's actually in the industry Yeah, I think it's just the best way to learn. I think the whole info marketing world I think that's why it's grown so much over the last decade And I think for sure you grow is because you're learning for people who are actually in it And I think that's the reason why you're so influential in this space like any internet marketers that I talk to you They all know who this mad guy is and I'm like wow like your stuff is actually really really good now before It actually got to be such the scale it is now that you're able to touch thousands of lives like How did it all began for you and like was it as easy as like, you know what I came out and this is why I started I started the internet master Masterminds and it's super well or where are there any stories where you like oh fuck this sucks so You know originally I think the way it started was I started my company Which is web-friendly and I started the internet masterminds meet-up group around the same month It's in like a one to two month period Both so I started my company and then you know internet masterminds kind of happened very organically you can talk about that I was originally my goal was to be able to be a public speaker Oh, so they're going like toast master and things like that and I remember someone I actually was Roger killin Yeah, we said you want to get good at speaking you just got to go out and just speak more Yeah, you know and so I think I'm actually and then I heard someone else say like do something every day That scares you or something. I was like well public speaking here is me So any opportunity I would get to be able to speak in front of a group, but I would do it So I was part of this internet masterminds group, which was originally started from a craigslist ad But it wasn't my craigslist ad it was somebody else's ad and basically a setting Mondays seven o'clock Inside this dingy old hair salon. Yeah, you guys can come in and we're gonna talk about internet marketing originally We were watching videos of Frank Kern and other internet marketers that we'd watch a video then like discuss it, right? So these other guys were like organizing this event and then one day I show up and you know, there's you know before we had like 56 people coming out and this one day I show up and there's like 20 people there And the main guys who are organizing it didn't show up and they decided it wasn't for them anymore And we didn't have an email list or a meet-up or any way for them to communicate that yeah The guy whose hair salon I was had the doors still open the projector was set up and you know Whatever but the guys didn't show up, right? So then everyone's just sitting there like what do we do now? Yeah, and then I was sitting in the back and I you know Shily put my hand up and I said I Saw a video online Vicky to watch yeah, and I played them a video of Gary Vaynerchuk And at that time this is 10 years ago. This is 2009 Yeah, nine years. Yeah, it was almost 10 years ago and at the time, you know Gary Vee was you know I think he had 30,000 followers on Twitter You know he wasn't as popular as he is today And so yeah show them this video and everyone's like wow this is amazing And he was talking about how social media was gonna be like the next big thing so Social media sounds amazing. Can you teach us more like what's Twitter, right? Yeah, they really like what's Twitter, right? And this is like, you know, we're talking Twitter before Justin Bieber was there or Oprah was there Ashton Kutcher like once those celebrities started getting on that's when Twitter really blew up, right? This is a prior to that area, right? So they said can you teach us about Twitter so then the next Monday came along and I was getting to my very first like public Speaking presentation, and I was so worried. I actually there's another friend that was in the group And I asked him if he would present with me because he had some public speaking experience I said just in case I screw up so bad that like you just pick it up in case I don't know what to say I ended up being able to fulfill and like I did most of the presentation And taught everybody about like how Twitter works. Yeah, it's basics They're like, that's great. Can we learn more, right? So, you know fast forward six months later every Monday night We're doing a type masterminds, and I was just teaching what I knew. Yeah, and then I thought started thinking well Like I'm not getting a lot of value to this like all I'm doing is teaching everything that I know But like I want to learn stuff too. Yeah, I didn't realize at the time. That was actually quite naive I didn't realize that when you teach you learn, you know, you process things, you know the information in your mind You basically it's kind of like blogging or writing, right? You actually can like figure out what you actually know by the time I didn't know that so I was like I want to find other speakers to come in here So then I started finding other speakers every Monday night. We'd have a new speaker and And then that grew and grew and grew and then that's what really became what internet masterminds is today So you're teaching your course in the back of a salon for the longest time. Yeah Just doing these little workshops like one hour top. Yeah, and then eventually I said hey I'm gonna do a weekend workshop. Yeah, the first time I did it. I charged $375. Oh, yeah, I just came up with that number somewhere and then I filled it up We did it inside of a small board room in the back of a coffee shop Okay And then I remember that we had our projector set up in the small room and the projectors the heater in the Projector would get so warm so by the end of the day this room is so hot Yeah, we're all sweating if you look at the very first picture of our first workshop You see everyone had like armpits wet It's really bad then you know slowly I you know I raise the prices You know more and more then I realized that I was able to fulfill my the lifestyle ahead of the time Yeah, not an elaborate lifestyle writing means but I was able to pay my own bills Yeah, that's what I think by just you know working one weekend a month And I you know I kind of in a sense like I achieved the four-hour work week nice plus a weekend Yeah, and then you know I continued going eventually moved all the courses online And that's what really scaled the business for sure where it's at today now you charge in like thousands for your course Yeah, right now our course is $2500 Yeah, I mean, but it's much more than what it was for sure Yeah, it's like before like it was like literally like how to set up a social media product How to set up a Twitter I had a set of a Facebook I was logging people in creating accounts on Facebook Twitter LinkedIn YouTube Yeah, now it's like we're actually teaching like how to like actually get leads From 375 to 2500 USD yeah that growth in that valley that you bring and the scalability that's huge That's awesome cool that now from during that phase like how you grew Were there any times where you like screwed over because we kind of talked a little bit about that you like You know what let me talk about it later on sure So, you know, I try to put the you know the past behind me. Yeah times like that, but I Will share the story only because I think that it is an important lesson to anyone who's maybe facing this right now or I'm just thinking about becoming an entrepreneur and afraid of getting screwed over.  I think it always doesn't work out for the best so what happened when we started to masterminds it was started between me and the other gentlemen who owned the Property in which we're hosting the events Yeah, and What happened was we had to buy a projector and a screen made to buy chairs up like that And it was all coming out of our own pockets So we say well we should start charging something for this event They were originally just free So we started charging like five bucks at the door just to cover our costs, right?  We had to Needed a projector we need to grab chairs would break or you know, whatever would happen, right? One time we did like a barbecue for everybody Yeah, we bought all the burgers for everyone. It was just like a you know, whatever Community event we took it out of our So then I started getting this idea I said hey, it would be great if we could film all of our talks Yeah, and people would always say I can't make it the event, but I'd love to see it and I'll pay for the video So I said it would be great if we could film the events Put those videos into a membership site and then sell a membership that we include Access to all the videos as well as access to all the events. Yeah, let's build the technology to do that And so I said let's count our cash because we have them all you know I thought we had them all into separate envelopes for every night There's how much we made who showed up and like like they were always a sealed envelope that was going into a safe Yeah, and I started asking, you know, the other you know You know co-organize here at the time and saying hey like let's meet up and let's count the cash Let's figure out what our budget is right? Yeah, and I noticed that there was this avoidance and avoidance and avoidance and it went on for quite a while So one day I showed up before an event and I said what's going on and He said basically that he wanted to be able to have a share of those funds to basically pay for rent And so, you know, I said, you know fine I mean it's fair enough, but the challenge was that he wanted to be retroactively paid For for that three years. Yeah, and then apparently the calculation that he made apparently equaled all the money And just so happens a so yeah, I mean I you know, I'm gonna I had the ballparking because I don't know how much money was actually there I just you know the number that he gave was in range of the number that I thought we might have or whatever so We actually got a mediator involved. There was other people who we call our founding members that were there as well Mostly everyone was kind of in a sense. So I want to say kind of siding with me or you know, trying to we were trying to find a resolution and We were not able to find a resolution and basically I said I see you containing your anger inside. You're like, no, I'm not. I'm not just like all these like words I'm not angry. I'm actually really disappointed because this this person was actually a friend of mine at the time Yeah, I think you might see this, you know, and I don't Look to start sorry. Sorry. I don't know. Yeah You know, it is what it is right, but the point being that you know at the end, you know I just you know move forward on my own. I said, I'm gonna let this go behind me, you know And you know, we just moved to a new location. The new location was only few blocks away We now needed to raise money because I wanted to fill my dream of the o3 cord Made this site. So we started charging 10 bucks at the door or sorry 10 bucks to get in So our reasoning was $10 online and we made it $10 online 20 at the door Yeah, you know get people to register earlier or whatever And then within that first year, I believe that we raised More money than what we had in the previous three years, right? And and then I built the site and I now we have a membership site and now we're doing this and now I I'm gonna go globally. So, you know, it was It was a hard business lesson at a time. I remember I was really angry I wrote this long letter that I was gonna send to the home eat up being like This is what's going on and did it, you know, whatever and I sent it to a few We're gonna call the founding members that were kind of there at the beginning and I said guys This is what I plan to send out. You know, I am feeling angry. What do you think? So yeah, I hear one person ready to just don't send it don't say anything Nobody knows.  Yeah, any of this stuff what's going on, right? So they just don't say anything. Okay, so I just never said Yeah, I mean it was hard at the time but now the group has, you know, continue to grow and You know, I've always I want to create kind of an environment that I want to be a part of so when I do an event I organize the event that I would go to if I'm a speaker when we talk about the topic We talk about the topic that I'd want to learn about No, for sure. When I get out of my office or out of my bed or out of my house or whatever to go to this event If the answer is no, I'm not gonna do it even though I'm the organizer. Yeah. Yeah for a long time we were doing events where We were just, you know, anyone who wanted to speak about what topic you want to speak about they would do it And I had sit in the back. I planned my phone at the door during the event So that I almost shut the group down because I wasn't really feeling like I was enjoying it Yeah, but people were coming they were learning so as soon as I switched it to be like the kind of environment kind of event community that I want to be a part of Yeah, you know the value of having your own in-person community like that is Like I think that's like my whole business was basically based off of that There's so much value I've actually realized that I think that I've created more value You know in the world or the community through internet masterminds. Yeah, even though it's not me Teaching people internet mastermind. There's people bringing people together. No for sure I realized I'm so much more of like a connector who always come to me and say hey, can you connect me with this person? Do you know somebody here? Right? So it's like we've done a lot with social media director and I love that and I You know, I could take a little bit more credit because I'm showing people specific strategies that I spent Oftentimes hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars to try to figure out Well, you know, what's gonna work and then I just give it away, you know Where as an internet masterminds, I'm bringing people together giving them insights giving them inspiration and And I've seen that create a huge impact in the community as well So I guess like the biggest lesson that for our viewers is that, you know set the The foundation right right from the get-go right have everything out in the clear Hey, like where does the money go instead of being like, hey, you know what? We're buddy buddies, you know what we'll deal with it later kind of thing, right? Yeah, yeah Sort of yeah, I mean I read or it doesn't have Like how the money was collected. No, it's more so like hey, you know what for for entrepreneurs or leaders Or whatever it is that you know what what can learn from your stories from just now Yeah, I think that You know, if you're gonna do a community event like that, I think it is a good idea to charge something Sure, like at the time I don't think we made a mistake by saying let's just charge my box and figure it out later What we have to do right because we're not trying to make money I still don't make money from the internet masterminds meetup right like our profit per event is in a few hundred dollars And when you look at them at the time invested and so on in it It's not it's you're not gonna do it to make money Yeah, you do it to build a community to build the connections build your influence There's other ways that you can profit from doing something like that. Mm-hmm. So the intention is always to not make money I actually always look at how do we spend this money to market our events to bring more people in Yeah, we have expanded our marketing budget per event to bring more people in We've done deals where we actually fly speaker in and we pay for their expenses And you lose money on an event, but we've made money on the last three so it works, right? So the intention was never to try to make money from the event. So it's more so that like I Think I'm gonna go into that in lesson where I just kind of like I wrote the angry letter And then I just didn't send it and talk about it. Just that was it right? I didn't go out and try to Refash this guy's name retaliates Right Yeah, you just just move on, right? I mean there was another time too where like we did some consulting work a consulting we actually built an attire we rebuilt an attire business and It was a large project for us in the time We got a small deposit that hardly paid for the expenses of rebuilding we built sales funnels new copy new website New logo we actually rebranded the name but the domain like we helps this this organization like rebrand everything and then at the end We were we were delayed like by like about three weeks or so because we had some video guys They were doing some work for us that you know They're they're doing for a little was a small cost compared to what we were getting and you know They were late it was during Christmas time Like I want to say a month late, and they were just like you're a month late We're not paying and the whole thing was like dude like we made no money Like this is an agreement that we had you spent that your initial deposit was to get all this up done This is all like in writing this is our deal right it was really pissed right because I was like We were expecting one is that we're supposed to get a percentage on the sales I was supposed to get this other part which is our actual profit for doing all our work So the way that we structured the deal we were being very generous and fair we want to work with these guys let's let's let's make it happen and You know they didn't pay us and then you know my initial thought well, well, but they were even right here Let's go to court. Yeah, this is a small claims court This is pretty opening up close. Yeah, it's like, you know, we are deserving of this funds And I was doing that with another partner at the time and we both agree that it just wasn't worth our energy Yeah, all the negative energy of going in and you know finding them about it We're a court and like you know it's like going to court alone We probably take us, you know one day or two days, you know, it's like if we just spent a day or two Prospecting for a new client will get a new client. That's gonna be worth way more. Yeah So just kind of like just like okay, we got screwed over let's just move on. Let's let's go on let it go Yeah, that sort of thing great. I actually have a similar story like that We remember a bank every winter on the land. Yeah, I got two guys That wrote me a check that bounced. Yeah, and just went on and on and on back and forth back and forth It was like I think it was like for grand I was trying to fight like actually asked these guys for it And they're like, you know what don't worry. I'll send you guys a new check better that and so on so forth Send me two checks both checks bounced and then they timed it so perfectly that by the end of the event Like that was when I was cashing on my check That was when I would get the notice that oh my bound my check was bounced So once again, I was in the same issue as you as like, hey, should I go to same the small courts or and deal with it Or should I just you know move on from that whole thing because it's already on the bridge There's really honestly, it's probably not their first time doing something like that. They are pretty kind of Educated in their field to keep pulling this stuff off, right? So I'm like, you know what? Let's just bite the bullet and just move on. Yeah, I think just not letting that negativity Consume who you are and just being positive and just you know what? Let's let's move on. Let's move on I learned this concept a long time ago. It's like whenever there's friction in your life. Yeah, whatever that might be You have to either deal with it or let it go and I remember when I first learned this concept And I I did the 80 20 principle on it Yeah, so I wrote down all the areas in my life where I had friction Yeah, and then I ranked them. Yeah, and then I say well if I just dealt with You know, maybe made a list of 10, but I'm not just let you know dealt with the first two Yeah, it would lift so much, you know Stress off my shoulders or whatever it was and I remember at that night. I remember my things were your girlfriend This is a long time ago. Actually, I was was a girl There was yeah, an ex-girlfriend where like we broke up and decided that we just wouldn't talk for a while Just so we'd have some space, right? And I felt like I needed to get like closure or something. So I like the guy Called a message or text or something.  Yeah, but he didn't We were talking for like a month or something and I just had like hey, man Sorry, I'm making fun of your mom whatever you know and And the other person was like I was in an argument by dad about something I can't remember what it was that was well, and I called them. I said, let's meet for a coffee We hadn't talked for I don't know how long it was a week or something about two weeks We met for a coffee and I just remember like feeling this release of stress immediately happening and And then yeah, I just always now whenever there was some friction in my life It's like how do I deal with it or let it go because if you don't It's gonna stop you from maximizing your output in the world and your productivity and your creativity Yeah, you know all that kind of stuff. So yeah, I've been really big on that anytime. There's something like that It's like try to avoid in the first place. Yeah, it is great. It which is bound to happen. Yeah, you got a deal of it So I guess that theory or that concept and Has been part of your success Absolutely Do you have any secrets or not even secrets like epiphanies or theories or principles that you think has been like just super Life-changing for you Aside from you know deal with it or let it go like for people who want to excel in business or even within their industry or just excel as a self-development Because I know you're really into this kind of thing like that's the reason why I'm like I want to find out if you have any Yeah, okay, so there's something that's been coming out for me lately And I've been hearing more and more of it and it's around this idea of like having a scarcity mindset, right? Like being afraid that There's not enough for everybody You know holding your cards tight, you know, and and I didn't know that I am I don't have a scarcity of mine I think there was areas where maybe I Maybe did in some areas of my life, but for the most part in business I don't and I thought was great and I started I started noticing people around me who did and There was you know one particular person that I was working with very closely that was you know Always kind of assuming that I was going to do something wrong or you know Rip them off or you know, whatever and I was insulted by it, you know internally I was like, why would you think that I would do that? Yeah, it's not even it's beyond my character It's not logical right now. I realized it was more in the mindset So I heard somebody say this this concept. I don't know where it came from But basically like if you look at yourself five years from now and you think You know if I lived every single day Meeting everybody and thinking what can I get out of this person? What's your life? And what's your business want to look like in five years? Versus if you go out every day and every person that you meet you think about how can I add value to this person? Yeah, and then what's your life? What's your business look like in five years? I really sat down and I really thought about it Right, it's like I don't want to see my head light in five years where I'm just going to see what can I get out of somebody? What can I get out of somebody right? so it just like I know to me just like opened up my mind to The fact that you know the more value that you had it's not doesn't just you know Happy make more friends or whatever, but it's it's a mindset that Applies your entire life, you know, so in all aspects of life. I think coming like working in abundance is what you're saying Yeah, don't work in a mind frame of Scarcity, yeah Yeah, so and again, I think just because I've been over the last couple months kind of dealing with some people in my life that I felt were Coming from that place and I wasn't able to pinpoint identify the kind of what it was about a personality that we're kind of not Managing then when I started hearing it with this concept, you know, I see you know became You know, you know, it's you call like a mental model, but I was I realized that people were into and So yeah, so now I'm able to identify people, you know based on their character What they say and so on and if I feel like they're in that scarcity of minds if I know them close enough I might address it with them. Otherwise. Yeah I You know, otherwise it's just like don't don't deal with those kind of people right and just kind of like let it go It's the same thing looking back at those two people that You know, that's gonna be over and to get back to them and their personalities There was definitely scarcity mindsets in both both places, right? And now that I know how to identify it if I meet someone would be a client or potential You know student or business partner or whatever once I see that they have that sort of a mindset I know to kind of back away from that. It's not not gonna be like that. So wow, that is actually a very very profound Principle and I find that as a recurring Theme when it comes to like super successful entrepreneurs or industry leaders is that they're so giving Yeah, whether it be their time knowledge value, whatever the case may be and The law of attraction just brings it back. It just bounces it back right the more you give the more you receive and it's It's such a mental thing that it's not something you can teach Yeah, absolutely. It's like something you gotta feel for and yet it's such a profound thing that But I said I just I don't know if I really believe that there is Like like karma, I kind of believe in karma But I don't think that it is like karma or like the way the world for sure It's the way that one will react react to a situation psychologically Yeah, that makes a huge difference You might think well if I'm giving more in the world and I will get more back It's like the more value you create the more you receive it's it's not karma, right? It's it's how you actually reacting to things and you're you're looking at opportunities in different ways And so it's you know, it is your actions. That's that's creating the value It's not just like the way of the world kind of thing So I thought a lot about that as well. Oh, so you don't deep into that. I used to really be a big believer in karma Okay, yeah There's this technique with with running a business where if you give something to someone They're more prone to buy from you Like that's the reason why people give samples because like oh shit I feel like I owe this person something so you know what I'm gonna buy a bowl of tea or I gotta buy Yeah, yeah, it's something along the same principle of human psychology that If the more you receive the more you kind of have to like on now after get back or something like that, right? Yeah Yeah, I just thought of another point. Yeah, I would be interested to just I'd be curious as a chat with you about it, too Because it's probably gonna be relevant to when this gets uploaded to yeah Yeah, so we talked about like, you know influencing people by giving away free things. I think about the book Persuasion yes, Robert Caldini, right? I think that's marketing If anyone hasn't read the book persuasion by Caldini, you know, it's always anybody who asked me You know, he's gonna get the marketing. It's what book should I read? It's always like you have to read that book, right? I've read it twice anyway So I think it's interesting So he when he's really when you read in the book and what the way that he was written is like He's very much saying like he was writing it not so marketers could use it for evil to persuade people But so consumers could understand what marketers are doing to persuade them So it's written in that context. It's actually written for a consumer Yeah, right, but of course marketers eat it up, right? So, you know and he knew when he read it wrote it back marketer's gonna want it however There's all this news happening right now around Facebook and You know the Cambridge and we're just talking about it. Yeah, right and it's interesting because you know at the time of this recording You know face Mark Zuckerberg, which is up the Senate answering questions or at the Congress answering questions And they were you know referring to this, you know Cambridge thing about how they were using this information to influence people during the election And I'm not sure I'm curious your thoughts and this is more of just a discussion And I would love to this be a discussion. Maybe in the comments for this video. I'm curious. I When I heard that I was like, isn't that what a good marketer does? if I were to go and You know do proper market research Yeah, I go out to Google and I find out a lot of my audience so that way I could write a better ad Create better content and persuade them to buy Is that wrong, you know And by the way, just so nobody freaks out I understand why it was wrong that they got the data the way they got the data. I get that part I'm gonna get flamed and my video is going to take a ticket taken down because of your question I would I think that marketers and entrepreneurs kind of get it. I think it's a consumer's work for the understanding Right, it's kind of like why Kelly wrote the book is to educate the market, right? But they seem to be saying like oh that uses data, you know Influence people during the election and I was like, but that's what you need to do Yeah, that's what you're supposed to do, right? So yes, I get that the way that they claim the data is up But there's other ways to find the information beyond that like Facebook alone if you look at this tool is probably gonna be gone That's how this goes up, but it's been around for a long time, but it's called audience insights You look at Facebook. Do you think it's gonna be gone? So Facebook audience insights if you go on there right now and you yeah, you type in Women in Canada that are between the ages of 21 to 30 it will tell you what kind of shows they like books. They read whatever, you know, whatever you want Yeah, and it'll tell you that kind of stuff, right? So it's like that data is already there and Facebook is just one example There's a lot of ways you could find there's a lot of market research Oh, I know the Vancouver Public Library I think it was like last year I heard that they bought a whole bunch of data That's actually available in the back in the library if you want to do lots of market research for your business, right and Especially marketing research right anytime. I'm gonna do a campaign. I'm gonna do a lot of marketing research about the audience, right? So but to backtrack on this as well This is another interesting thing is a friend of mine took me to landmark. Yes Yes, I was totally turned off by landmark So wait a second you give us some more context for people that don't know what landmark is is basically a three-day Discovery or as actually they provide you with a tool To view what the world is like is I could sure it's a personal development workshop Yeah, so no look up landmark a lot of people have probably been there probably Yeah, they either love it or they either hate it. Yeah, so my thing with landmark was I was there and the whole time I couldn't get over why Was all the staff by all the staff are volunteers. Yeah, I was like, why are they volunteering that's I couldn't I was like trying to figure it out the whole time in my mind. I was like because these are very successful business people You know CEOs of large companies CFOs a little woman who led our workshop I think she was like a CFO of like a multi-billion dollar company milestones CEO of milestone. Yeah, we're right Like they had like influential people that are smart, you know, they lemon They they put all their staff through landmark as well. Yeah, right So I was like but I was like why are these people volunteering so I was trying to like what did they do to persuade them? Yeah influence them to do this, right? So I was it was going my mind, right? And then you know for me I was listening to the words that are being spoken very carefully. I'm familiar with NLP hypnosis and so on and My perspective. Yeah, okay, and let's not don't bash me in the comments here But my perspective was that they were using a lot of that. Yes 100% and they were They were shifting the mindset of people during the audience, right? And in order, you know, get them to enroll. Yeah, they specifically use the words enroll Which is also, you know, something to be looked at right and just the psychology of the wording that they're using and so on It's not wrong, right? Yeah, but they were persuading people in that sort of way influence people in that way Then there was the people who were actually Leading these workshops. Yeah volunteers, right? And I know why were they volunteering like well I had such a big impact in this they would give this like a rational reason or rational I don't know like they were giving this reason that was just like but why like what do you mean? Like why don't you just do your own workshop or what? You know, like, oh, but this is a community And like, you know, then there's this whole thing about like having a significance Community around you a lot like I know when I was at Tony Robbins When people would go to the back of the room and you sell something He would bring them on the stage so that way they She would show them significance a community on the stage, you know, I noticed that as a marketing thing I didn't think it was wrong if it was interesting, you know But there was something about landmark that turned me off and so later I told my friend I was like, I'm not sure, you know, whatever by the next day. I was like, dude, landmark is bad You got to get out of there, you know, whatever and I was like really turned off by it later We had dinner as with a group of friends and I was you know We're kind of doing this whole back and forth about is landmark right or wrong I couldn't pinpoint what was wrong about it. And then you know, we had a lot of discussion about it and by the end I Felt that because they weren't being upfront with people about what they were what kind of tools they were using to Shift their their minds which they were doing in it They're they're shifting their minds in a positive way to impact them in a positive way in the world Yes in their life, right? Yeah, but they were still using these tools to influence them, right in order to make them better people Right. Yeah, so we were discussing whether it was right or wrong to be using these types of tool when I say tool I'm talking language patterns and you know physical movement with their bodies and so on, right? That's like, you know familiar in psychology psychology a lot a lot of human psychology techniques and everything, right?  No, sorry, I'll say like 60% sales and 30% of real content And that's how I see it and if you can see bass the sales techniques and everything and not them not letting you stand up You know putting you through a 12-hour day of just sitting in a chair and listening to people cry and just About all the emotional shit that they put you through if you can just take the content for what it is I find it very useful. Oh, yeah, and a lot of people do, right?  Yeah, it is by the way that they were doing it Yeah, and I'm not and I do believe that their mission and what they do is actually a good thing So I'm not I'm not I don't think their landmark is a bad thing or anything However, just going back to the discussion on what is fair use of Techniques, yeah People yeah, like yeah, okay Cambridge Analytica found out certain information about a certain demographic that they could change their messaging based off of that You know like where do you draw the line on what's right and wrong, right? And I think it's really interesting because I had this whole like, you know, I was like In kind of an argument with a really good friend, right about like this whole thing and I was healthy debate It was a healthy debate. Yeah, it actually definitely turned into a healthy debate But yeah, it was but now looking at you know marketing in general, right? It's like now we have all this knowledge and now it's like our society, you know based on the news and media saying it's not right to Research your market to influence them. It's like what do you draw the line? I personally think that you know, that's a very good example either like Facebook marketing or Whether it be landmark marketing whatever the case may be people are using these techniques and I think it's free for all It's it's up to like what you're saying is up to you to get the knowledge What happens when the government has all these crazy technology that's not Public access yet. They're using these on us Yeah, exactly like I already are right exactly and then who are they to judge people who are using public access? Information on telling people that they're wrong Yeah, right. So I mean I'm not trying to draw a line here or whatever the case is But hey if you are so against it Then go ahead and do something about it like as in hey I'm gonna start something that is counteracting what you're doing with the same principle of techniques Like for me, I think that's a much better way of doing it because it's a free world That's the beauty of what we're living at right now I think the other side too is that if consumers were to be more educated about What marketers are doing What is their choice though? Like people don't want to be educated they love lying in the freaking the sofa watching Kim Kardashian like even my wife Like I'll be like, hey, what are the self-development course with me? She's like no I want to watch my reality shows because I love being when not my brain being numb like Yeah, it's the same thing as marketers like I love to buy stuff, but then they don't like to be sold So it's our job to make them want to buy and sell shit But to the point of like the government stepping in saying You know you unfairly in or this company and unfairly influence people and then they're looking at Zuckerberg saying what's the solution, right? I Think what a potential solution is is that the types of material in the book like influence Yeah, should be in the curriculum of like high school Right, so that way we're treading on like waters. I think so. I think that like that way people understand You know what you know what they're you know how they're being marketed to and how they're being influenced and stuff So you can be more aware of it because when I went to landmark because I was aware of what they were doing I was like, no, I don't want to I don't want to be a part of it for whatever reason. I didn't like the Feel the board of a reason I didn't like it, right? But I got to make that decision if I didn't have that knowledge of what they were doing or whatever You know, I never I would never even thinking about I go other things I would just like yeah, this is awesome.  So, you know before we get sidetracked too much. Yeah, this is a good healthy debate, right? No, but thank you so much for dropping so much knowledge and bomb and nuggets for us because you know, that's exactly what we that's exactly the whole point of this show is to Allow us to look behind of people who are successful who has done it and look from their lens to see how You can take from what we have in our brains and go and create your own success Your own aspiration or whatever you want to achieve, right? So that on that note I really appreciate your time and thank you so much for you know coming on this interview and just dropping so much bombs for Thank you. Thank you Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode Really hope that you guys enjoyed it and took away things that you can take action right away If you guys enjoyed it leave us a review That's gonna mean a lot for us if you guys don't like it also leave it below So I know how to improve for future episodes until next time. See you guys later


Amen. So keep your place there in Genesis chapter 37. We're going to be looking at this story in some detail. We're looking at the story of Joseph this morning in Genesis chapter 37. But just a little bit of introduction this morning. We're going to be talking about a topic this morning that you hear a lot about today. And, you know, there's a lot of concern out in the news and from parents all over from all different parts of, you know, society and life are worried about this topic. But let me just say this, before we get into the topic itself, we're going to look at this topic from a Christian perspective. We're going to look at this topic from the perspective of the Christian parent, from the perspective of the Christian child. So what we're going to look at this morning is this topic of bullying. Bullying from the Christian perspective. Why does it happen? What should we do about it? You know, are we going to deal with it as adults? Are we going to deal with it? Are children going to deal with it? And what should we do? So that's what we're going to look at from a Bible perspective. Look at the source of it as well. You know, look at the source of it especially. We see that in this story with Joseph, son of Jacob. Look at Genesis chapter 37. And look at verse number three. So we have, Jacob has all these children and we have this one child, this one son that he has. His name is Joseph. Look at verse number three of Genesis chapter 37. We're talking about bullying this morning. We're going to look at what the Bible says, where it comes from. Will kids deal with it? Will we deal with it? How should we handle this situation that everyone is so concerned about today? I'll explain all that from the Bible to you this morning. Look at Genesis chapter 37 and verse number three. Now Israel, this is Jacob. Love Joseph more than all his children because he was the son of his old age and he made him a coat of many colors. And when his brethren saw that their father loved him more than all his brethren, they hated him and could not speak peaceably unto him. So that's an interesting statement at the end of verse number four there. You know, we're talking about bullying this morning. It says that his brothers, his brethren, they could not speak peaceably unto them. This is a nice way of saying, or a general way I guess I should say, that they were harassing him. They were speaking badly to him. They were not, you know, they're saying, look, it says they couldn't speak peaceably unto him. It's like they were saying bad things directly to him. Okay. They were harassing. This is what harassment would look like if we looked at, you know, what this is, they're harassing him what people would say today. So look, we'll look at that in detail this morning. But just to say this, that they were speaking bad things to him right away we see in verse number four. Look at verse number five. And Joseph dreamed a dream and he told it his brethren and they hated him yet the more. And he said unto them, here I pray you this dream which I have dreamed. For behold, we were binding sheaves in the field and lo, my sheaf arose and also stood upright and behold, your sheaf stood round about and made up obeisance to my sheaves. Like your, your sheaf was, was being, you know, my sheaf was, was over your sheaf and your sheaves were worshiping mine. So look, I mean, he's not trying to upset them, but this isn't helping his case here. Look at verse number eight. And his brethren said unto him, shall thou indeed reign over us or shall thou indeed have dominion over us? Keep, keep in mind he's the younger of the brothers and they hated him yet the more for his dreams and for his words. And he dreamed yet another dream and told it his brethren and said, behold, I've dreamed a dream more. Behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his father and his brethren and his father rebuked him. His father's looking out for him. He's saying, quit saying these things and make people mad at you. He's like, you know, his father loves him. And what dream that thou has dreamed shall I and my mother and thy brethren indeed come and bow down ourselves to thee, to the earth. And his brethren, verse number eleven is a key here. And his brethren envied him. But his father observed the saying. So his brethren, so this dream happened. Look, Joseph, he's not making this up.   It's going to make people mad. But his father listened to him. His father actually listened to him. But his brothers did what? His brothers envied him. Go down to verse number eighteen for just sake of time. Just look at verse number eighteen. Now here we see that, so they envied him. That's a very important verse right there. We'll look at that in just a few minutes. But it's verbal harassment, but we see it turned into something different in Genesis chapter thirty-seven. Look at verse eighteen. And when they saw him afar off, even before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to slay him. Look, they're going to try to kill him. That's how serious this got. And they said to one another, behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now therefore, let us slay him.   And we shall see what would become of his dreams. So look, go back to verse number eleven. So we see just all this to point out this in introduction. So he was dealing with verbal harassment from his brethren, from his brothers. And then that actually turned into physical assault in the case of Joseph.  But look at verse number eleven. Let's look at the source of what we would call today bullying. Okay, let's look at the source because Genesis chapter 37 and verse number eleven points out why he was being bullied or harassed. Okay, but people would call it, today they would call it bullying is what he's going through. Look at verse number eleven. It says his brethren envied him. His brethren envied him. The source was this. Turn to James chapter one. The source of bullying and the source of all bullying is this. It's envy. That's what it is. The source of bullying is envy. Look, I'm less focused this morning just so you know. I am less focused on knowing the source than I am of taking action to correct a situation, especially with our children and ourselves in our Christian lives. But just know this. I mean, we might as well be educated. You know, if the Bible tells us anything, it tells us why things are happening around us. It has the answers for everything. So the source of bullying is envy. Period. Look at James chapter one. Look at James chapter three. James chapter three and verse number sixteen. The Bible says for where envying and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work. Look, envying is this. This is what envy is. Envy is desiring what is not yours. Somebody else has something and you want it and the Bible says that will create envy and strife goes together. So it says where there's envy, there will be strife. That's why it uses that logical word and. So envying goes with strife. Because look, if brother so-and-so has something that I don't have and I envy, I covet, I lost after that thing, look, that's going to cause problems because it's not mine. It's his. So that's where that strife comes in. But the Bible actually says that works come from that. The Bible says in James chapter three sixteen here it says where envy and strife is, what? Where envy and strife is, there's bad feelings. Where envy and strife is, people are silently mad at each other. No, it says evil work comes from that. Evil work. Those are actual actions that flow from that. Is that not what we see in Genesis chapter thirty-seven? We see his brethren envying him for whatever reason. We'll get into the reasons here in a little bit. But the point is, is that it leads to actual evil being done. This is where bullying comes from. Turn to Proverbs chapter fourteen. Turn to Proverbs chapter fourteen. Look, Joseph's brothers, they didn't just speak against him. I mean, not that that's a work. Look, speaking against someone is also a work. But they actually did physical work against him. They physically assaulted him, as you would call it today. Go to Proverbs chapter fourteen. Go to Proverbs chapter fourteen. Remember Proverbs. Remember the philosophy of Proverbs. In many Proverbs, we see opposites in the same verse. We see, we see, if you do this, you know, this won't happen. We see two sides of a coin in Proverbs. That's what makes Proverbs so brilliant in so many different cases. Look at Proverbs fourteen in verse number thirty. Talking about bullying this morning. Talking about how envy is the source of bullying or of harassment, if you want to call it that. And envying and strife go together. Envying is wanting or coveting something. Look, it's not just, it's not just brother so and so has that thing. Now, that seems nice. It's like, no, he has that and I want that thing that he has. It's wanting that thing from him. It's not wanting that same success as him. It's wanting his thing. OK, jealousy is different by the way. Jealousy is different. Jealousy, jealousy is OK in the Bible. God is jealous. Now today in our English, today people use these words as synonyms. You know, envious and jealous. They're not the same. In the Bible, they're completely different. It's OK for me to be jealous. It's not OK for me to be envious. The difference being jealousy is something, it's I'm jealous over something that's mine. It belongs to me. I'm jealous over my wife. Why? Because she's mine. My wife is jealous over me. Why? Because I am hers. That's why. God is jealous over us. Why? Because we're his. So when we go and we start serving other gods, I am a jealous God, the Bible says. So God, I mean, unless God can sin, jealousy is good. Jealousy is a good thing. That means you're protective over what's yours. Envious is wanting, is coveting, is lusting after something that is not yours. Completely different. And envying goes with strife and evil work flows from it. Two completely different things. So these two words that are being used the same today, it's, be careful with those two words because they are not the same thing. Look at Proverbs chapter 14. Look at verse number 30. Proverbs chapter 14 and verse number 30. Remember the opposites of Proverbs. The Bible says a sound heart is the life of the flesh. But here comes an opposite. Okay? So it says a sound heart is the life of the flesh. A sound heart, what is that? A solid heart. A stable heart. A person that knows what they stand for. A person that is founded on the rock in their life. This is the person that built their house on the rock. This is a sound heart. You're not going to shake a sound heart.  But, look at the other part, next part of the verse. Envy, the rottenness of bones. You're like, whoa, what does envy have to do with that? It's giving you an opposite here. It's saying somebody who is a sound heart is solid. They're built on a rock. They're rooted in the Bible. They're rooted in strength. But the opposite of that is someone who would be envious. Okay? This is someone who is very, what you would say today, insecure. They're the opposite of a sound heart. They're a very insecure person. So somebody, what can we take from this? Somebody that is not, that is, that is envious is going to be someone who is not of a sound heart. So that's why you see people that are envious are very insecure people. So the bully today is a very insecure person. By definition from the Bible, it is an insecure person that bullies someone. Okay? So this is the source of bullying. Is envy? And envy comes from someone who is very insecure. They're not sound. They're easily shaken. They're all over the place. They don't know what they believe in. They're insecure. They're don't like their life. They're just like this is the bully today. This is the bully today. Alright? So now let's talk about kids and bullying. Because kids, this is the context that you hear bullying talked about all the time. It's kids, kids in school, school-aged kids. They're going through bullies, you know, bullies. This is the main focus today. I mean, schools today, public schools, they can't seem to stop this. This bullying. They just can't get across. But we're talking about Christian kids today. Okay? Because I believe that the bullying is way misused today outside of the Bible and outside the Christian culture. I'll speak to that at the end. But we're trying, look, here's the thing. We are trying us, Christian parents, we're trying to raise kids with standards today. We're trying to raise kids with standards in a world that doesn't have standards. We're trying to raise a different product here. You know, guess what? Go back to verse number 3.  We're trying to raise kids that are, they're going to stand out today. If we're doing it right, they're going to stand out today. Look at Proverbs chapter 22 and verse number 6. Notice the code of many colors before you turn there in verse number 3. So here's Joseph. He's walking around with this code of many colors and he looks quite different than all the other kids. It's something that they definitely notice about him. And look, they were mad about that code. They were envious about that code. It was something that he had that was different that they didn't have. That's the Christian child today. That's the Christian child that walks into a public school today. He's going to have something that nobody else has and he's going to stick out like he's wearing a code of many colors. He's going to stand out. Look, if he doesn't stand out or she doesn't stand out, you're not doing it right. You're doing something wrong. Look at Proverbs chapter 22 and verse number 6. So here we have these kids. Look, you know what that code of many colors was for Joseph? That was a sign of how much his dad loved him.  It was the sign that their dad loved him more than he loved them. That's how they took it. So the Christian child today is going to stand out, the Christian child being raised by a mom and a dad that have all these standards put on their life and that look different and that speak different. That's being trained up, as the Bible says in Proverbs 22. Go to Proverbs chapter 22. He's going to look different and he's going to have a sign of how much his parents love him or her. It's going to be like a code of many colors that he or she is walking around with every day in a society, in an environment where the kids have no code. That's what the Christian life, the Christian standards will be like to a child that is growing up in the right way. So if you're doing right, if you're doing it correct, they're going to have trouble. Is what I'm trying to get you to understand. Look at verse number six in Proverbs 22. The Bible says train up a child in the way he should go. And when he's old, he will not depart from it. Look at Ephesians chapter six in verse number four. Ephesians chapter six and verse number four. So here we are. We're training up these children. We're training them. We're teaching them to be different. We're putting a code of many colors on them. They are going to stand out. If we are training them properly, they are going to stand out. They better stand out. Look at verse number four of Ephesians chapter six. It says, indeed, fathers, provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. So here we are. This is what we're supposed to do with our children. This is what we're supposed to do with our children. We're supposed to look. They're supposed to be taught. They're supposed to be trained up. They're supposed to be nurtured, the Bible says. This is their coat. This is their coat that we're giving them. And look, here's the thing. We need to protect them. We need to protect them from anything that would stop or hinder this training, this nurturing, this teaching. They need to be protected from them, from these things. Look, these kids, Joseph was one of 12. These kids are going to be the extreme minority today. It's a very good analogy for the Christian child today. They are going to be, especially in a public school system, they will be the extreme minority. The Christian child, if being trained, nurtured, and taught right, will have a hard time here in the public school for, sure, because guess what? That kid with the bad home life. That kid without the parents. He has no coat. He has rags. I'm speaking philosophically. He doesn't have a coat like that. He has rags and he will envy the coat. And he will harass the coat. He will bully the coat. He will physically assault the coat. This is what will happen. They will zero in on the Christian with the coat very quickly. That child. And guess what? This will break down. If you go and if you're wearing a coat and you go into an environment, I mean just think of yourself as an adult.   But guess what? There are 50 other restaurants in town. But every time and you love to wear this coat, this coat, you're told this coat, you must wear this coat everywhere you go. You must wear this coat. So there's 50 restaurants in town. When you go to one restaurant, you get beat up every time you go there because of the coat. What are you going to do? You're either going to stop going to that restaurant. You're going to take the coat off or both is what you're going to do. People wonder so much why kids are walking away from the Christian life. Is it a mystery?  They're getting harassed. They're getting pounded on for their coat. I mean, what do you expect the kids to do? I mean, you read so many articles about kids walking away from the Christian life. They measure it by if they go to church when they, you know, they turn 18, they don't go to church anymore. So the tune of like 87%, people are like why? Because they're getting beat up for the coat. That's why they stand out because like if their parents raise them properly, they have a coat on. It makes them look completely different than everybody else.  That's it. The point of trying to make is that you must put them in an environment that builds them and not breaks them down for wearing the coat. You cannot have, look, and here's the thing, folks, you can't control what other people do with their families. If that's not obvious today, I don't know what is. You as a Christian parent cannot control how other people raise their kids. You'll never be able to control that. And this will break them down. This is why kids are walking away from the Christian life. There's your answer. Let's pray. But here's the thing. As they are nurtured, look, the word nurture says it right there. As they are trained and they are taught, they need to be nurtured. Kids are not soldiers. They need to be trained to be soldiers. They need to be trained to be strong. They're learning. They're learning. They're learning the basics of wearing this coat. They're not armored and ready for what's coming. So they need to be protected as they grow and protected as they gain strength in their lives. Go to James chapter two. Look, they also need to be taught as they get older to not allow themselves to be bullied, to stand up for what they believe. And this is where you come in. But look at James chapter two. Go to James chapter two real quickly. Go to James chapter two real quickly. Look at first. So remember we saw that we saw the source of bullying, right? The source of bullying is somebody who's insecure, who's envious. But you know what parents do? You know what parents do? They do James chapter two. That's what they do with their kids. They want to raise a kid. They want to raise a child with Christian standards in their life. A child that's not going to do what every other kid's going to do. They want to raise a child that's free from, you know, just that looks different, that speaks different, that acts different, you know, doesn't just go into fornication and drugs and alcohol like all these other kids like what's becoming normal today. They want to raise children that are different. And then that child gets harassed and bullied. And they say, yeah, but you know, the reason the bully does that is because they envy you. Oh, thanks, dad. Thanks for the help. Look at James chapter two and verse 15. You know what that parent is? That parent is this person right here. If a brother or sister be naked in destitute of daily food, and one of them say to him, depart in peace, be you warmed and filled. That's what you're doing to your kids.  They just breaks down their Christian life and they come home as they're being beaten down and they tell you what's happening.  They're envious. They just want to be like you and you send them right back in the next day. What is wrong with parents today? They're not reading the Bible. Look, that is what you this is the this is the people will say if you actually do something to protect your children, people say you're like a helicopter parent.  Or at least they're trying to they're trying to do something wicked to you.  I'm a bulldozer parent. That's what I am. Anybody. I'm training my kids to wear a coat. I'm training them to have standards in their Christian lives. And I'm like a bulldozer.  That's the way that's what you need to be. You need to be a bulldozer parent. Next, somebody says, oh, you're right.    They won't say it that way. But you want to raise kids that don't drink.  You want to raise kids that I don't know. Think about this one for a second. They get married in purity.   Get away from me. Get away from me.  That's the way you need to feel about that. You need to get up in the bulldozer. You need to drive those people over with your bulldozer. That's what you need to do. Say I'm a bulldozer parent. I'm going to bulldozer you. You can keep bringing this stuff up to me or my kids. Period. That's the way you need to be. Because sending your kids. Look, I'm sorry. There's no success for the Christian child in the public school system today. I don't like to report that. Look, I wish there was a way.  And then just telling your kids as they're getting beat down every single day, hey, they just do that because they don't have a good family at home. Oh, okay, that may be true, but that's not any action that's going to help anybody. This is why kids are walking away from the Christian life. Because they don't have, look, they don't have a bulldozer blade. These kids should be walking and learning these standards and learning how to wear this coat and learning how to defend this coat as they're walking behind a bulldozer blade is what they should be doing. As the path is being cleared for them. And how do you clear the path? How do you clear the path? Well, here's one way. Adults, you cannot allow yourselves to get bullied. You know as an adult, you know as a Christian adult, you will be bullied. You know Second Timothy chapter three talks about this as persecution. All that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. You will. That's the persecution.  You know, you know what the funny thing is today though? People are gonna come up to you and like want to fight you. I wish they would, man. I wish that's how it worked. But it doesn't work that way.   I mean, it's just these subtle little manipulative tactics, which has been like, it's been a huge issue in this church, quite frankly.  You just see, it was like, I guess it was a play in the 1930s where this guy was, this is where the term gaslighting came from. And I'll explain to you what it is and you've experienced it for sure. I guarantee it. But what it is, there was a play in the 1930s where there was this guy and he wanted to get rid of his wife, right? He was trying to get rid of his wife. So he just started doing all these subtle little things to make her think that she was going crazy. This was where, this is where the term gaslighting came from. The, the psychological definition is this. It's a covert type of emotional abuse. Look, listen to this because you are going to deal with this. I am sure you already have as a Christian adult. It's a covert type of emotional abuse. Where the bully or abuser misleads the target, creating a false narrative and making them question their judgments and reality. Ultimately the victim of gaslighting starts to feel unsure about their perceptions of the world and even wonder if they are losing their sanity. That's an extreme, like if you just let it go forever and you listen to it. But look, here's the thing. Examples are like people doing sneaky things and then like denying that they are doing sneaky things.  You know, maybe you're in a conversation and people say something and you're thinking like, was that a shot at me? What he just said right there? I've had this happen and I just like, look, I'll talk about myself and how I'm starting to deal with this better in a little bit. But it could be simple things like just withholding information from you. Maybe like not inviting certain people to things like on a consistent basis. Like you just subtly just leave people out of things. All these subtle little manipulative tactics, here's another one. They show inauthentic concern. This is why the gas lighter or the bully is always a gossip many times. But they come to you and they say, oh, you know, did you hear about so and so? And the only reason I'm telling you this, brother, is because I'm just really concerned for you. It's always out of concern. Oh, the only reason, did I ever tell you about this?  And the only reason I'm telling you this, sister, is because I'm just really concerned for you.  Like, oh, but this is why this is the manipulative little tactics, these subtle, like this is this is subtle, subtle bully is what this is. OK, I mean, gas lighting people, they thrive on gossip. They thrive on it. It offers them a sense of validation and control. You know, these are the people that you'll see. They always have, you know, well, well, many people, I mean, you'll see this all the time in our church like the ladies are just always in this big group. But then, you know, and look, this isn't an issue here. OK, but I'm just giving examples. You see people talking in a big group all the time and laughing.  Those want to have people pulled off and like having secret private conversations all the time. You just kind of have to ask you, you know, what are you? It's nothing you could really put your finger on. But it's just kind of like, you know, what's going on here? It's always, it always leads to a bad place. So here's what you do. So here's what you do. Say I've got somebody in my Christian life, you know, I mean, we hang out with certain people, we go certain places and people will take these shots at us, you know, in our Christian life. Look, here's the thing. Here's the thing. You just got to call it out. That's what you got to do. That's what you got to do. You just got to call it out. I mean, look privately at first, follow Matthew 18. I mean, if it's happening in church, do it privately. But here's the thing, the gaslighter, they will never admit it. This has happened many times here where people have come to me and like, I think somebody saying stuff to me.  I'm like, you just got to go talk to them about it. You just got to go talk to them about it. But if it's a gaslighting person, that by the way, it's just it's born out of narcissism, envy and insecurity, just like we talked about. They will never admit it. They will never admit it. If that person goes to the person and says, hey, you know, you made a couple of comments. By the way, you might have to make notes about things. You might have to say like, okay, you said that. You said that.  You've been saying a couple of things because they'll deny everything. You've been saying a couple of things. I was just wondering, you know, what's that about? They'll deny. Oh, I didn't mean it. They'll try to make you sound crazy. I didn't mean anything about it. But a lot of times it will stop. If at least you call it out. Like, you know what? I'm not letting that stuff slide. And what I'm going to start to do, what I've changed my tactics a little bit, I will call it out privately. But if it keeps happening, you know, and like I said, this is nothing of anybody here. But the things that have happened over the last three years, some of these things where I've talked to people individually multiple times, they happen public, I will call it out publicly. Because, you know, the benefit of the doubt is, can endanger other people. The benefit of the doubt can endanger other people. And if you've been given multiple warnings privately, it's time to start calling things out you know, as it happens. I mean, you wouldn't believe some of the things that people just come up to me and that they've said to me. Like, and I'm just like, why are you asking me this stuff? People in groups, asking me like, private personal financial information. And I'm just like, why, but they're trying to get me to say things. Now I know. They're trying to get me to say things. They're trying to get me to like, say the wrong thing, maybe? I don't, I mean, now I know. But I mean, at the time, I was just like, why are you saying things like that? Why are you asking me these private questions?  I'm just like, why would you ask me that question? So it just needs to be called out. It can't be let go. Turn to Proverbs chapter 35. Proverbs chapter 25. I'm sorry, there is no Proverbs chapter 35. If you have it in your Bible, you have the wrong Bible. Proverbs chapter 25. Proverbs chapter 25. Many times this, the Bible is so smart. The Bible is so smart. Look at Proverbs 25 and verse 23. Many times this is all it takes. Right here. Proverbs, this is, I'll tell you what, this will shut down a gossip. Proverbs 25 and verse 23. Look, the North wind driveeth away rain.  Many times somebody comes up to you and they're like, hey, I'm just concerned.  That you're just, you're not happy with what's happening. And I'm told that I have a pretty good one. I'm told that my wife tells me all the time, she's like, you gotta get better at that. When someone's saying something you don't like, it's so obvious. But you know what? I like it. I like it. Because guess what? You may not like exactly everything I do all the time, but I'm real, I'll tell you that. I'm real, I will never lie to you. And you know, you may do things different in every scenario and you can do that when you run your own church or whatever.  That you know, I don't like that. I don't like that you're doing that. A look sometimes is just enough. But the point is, all this to say, all that to say this, don't allow this stuff to go on. Think about it outside of church. Look, outside of church, I am sure that you are going to run across, socialize, whatever with people that don't have your exact standards. I am sure that that is going to happen in your life. Okay, but look, it just, if you don't call things out, it will encourage bad actors and it will just become bigger and bigger problems. You need to stand up for the standards you are living. And guess what? If you don't, if you don't, you will produce weak children. Because guess what? As you stand up to those standards, your children will see you standing up to those standards. As your children are walking behind the bulldozer, they're going to see like, you know, the body's flying out the side, right? They're going to see like all the trees being cleared and they're going to be like, oh man, look at, look at this, that is this bulldozer. My mom is this bulldozer and they're going to learn to be bulldozers themselves for their families one day. And that, look, that's what it's going to take because it's a jungle out there. It's a jungle. We need to, you need to clear the rainforest. We need to cut down the rainforest. Someone will take that clip. But no, but you need to bulldoze the jungle for your kids and they'll see it happening. And so not only are the trees going to be clear but they're going to learn what they need to do. This strengthens them and you won't produce weak children. All right, so look. You just can't put up with it no matter how subtle it is. I mean, just think about all these things that people will say to you, we've dealt with this so much in our lives, especially since we should, we took such a hard right turn in our lives. We took a hard right turn in our lives. We started living completely different. We started, you know, attending different types of churches.  Maybe people know that you don't, your kids don't watch TV. Maybe they know that you don't allow your kids to watch the latest new cartoon that came out. And then people just start like bringing up like, oh, did you see the new Disney movie kids or whatever? And they do those things on purpose to try to attack your standard. Stuff, I go. I don't let that stuff go. Like I call that stuff out. And if it continues, we will not be in those situations anymore. So you gotta call those things out.  Oh, did you go to the new fun water park or are your parents denying you that too? You know, these types of things. People will attack your children many times. Look, many times when you're not there, which is we have to be careful who you leave your kids along with, by the way. But many times when you're standing right there, you can't let that stuff go.  Because look, that's an attack on them. Because they're trying to plant seeds inside your children. Be like, oh, oh, all these other kids here, they all saw the movie. And I didn't see it. I'm missing out on something. It plants a seed. Am I missing out on something? Should I take this code off? This code, I can't go to movies. I have this code on.   Look, these are evil seeds that are being planted in your kids, and you need to burn these trees down. You need to bull those, these situations. And look, if they don't stop, here's the fundamental philosophy from the Christian parent right here. If they don't stop, zero tolerance, zero tolerance. If they don't stop, then essentially if you keep putting yourself in positions where these attacks keep coming and you keep putting your family in these positions where these attacks are constant, you are putting yourself in a situation that you can't control. You are putting yourself and your family in a situation where you can't control it. And look, you need to be able to control the safety of your family. The safety of your children as they wear that coat. Whatever it takes, that may mean some uncomfortable conversations in your life. If you never had an uncomfortable conversation about your Christian standards in your life, maybe you need to work on your bulldozer, your bulldozing skills. Because look, you can start and just be nice. You just be like, look, you know, you can't do this.  Like I don't want to tell you what to do in your house, but if there's going to be alcohol there, we're not going to be there. Very simple. I'm not trying to control your own home, but if those things are going to be there, we won't be there. It's very simple. Look, that's an uncomfortable conversation for a lot of people, but it's best to get used to it. So look, bullying comes from envy. We see that from the Bible. It could be verbal, it could be physical, but here's the thing, Christian kids will be given a hard time in public situations, especially the big one for kids is the public school system. There's no success there. There's no success there. Christians today just can't figure out why kids are rebelling against their, their upbringing, it's mind blowing to me. Because this is why the homeschool groups, and this is why a church family is so important because what we're doing is we're just sharpening, the kids are sharpening each other's confidence, because they're building each other up. Look, I'm not saying the kids are going to have any conflict in church. I mean, kids are kids, right? But you know what they're not going to do? They're not going to be busting somebody down for their Christian standards. They're not going to be breaking them down for their beliefs. They're not going to be coming after them for the coat that they're wearing. You know, kids will have conflict. That's just the way it is. No kids are perfect. But the point is, is that they need to be built up as we're raising them. And then they need to be trained to stand up for themselves and that primary training is going to come from you standing up for your family. That's where that primary, primary by seeing you that, hey, no one messes with us. We have these standards for a reason which hopefully you're teaching your kids and the Bible is going to teach your kids. And anyone who would attack that kids, we will not tolerate. And that's action. Okay, that's action. That's not just words. Okay, so look, we see where it comes from. We see how important it is for the kids. We see how important it is for us to stand up against it. Let me talk about just the secular world and their use of this word bullying for just a few minutes. Okay? Kids go, you're going to see this again and again and again. Kids go and then they do evil things like we saw last week. And then inevitably they do evil things. They do reprobate things. Like they murder other kids like we saw in Texas last week. And then ultimately, and if you haven't seen it, you're going to see more and more and more articles like this. Oh, it was because he was bullied. That's why he did it. Turn to Romans chapter one. Look folks, most people are not capable of what was done last week. Most people, most children, the vast majority of most people, I'm talking unsaved, unsaved people. Vast majority of unsaved people who have never been to church in their life are not capable of what happened last week in Texas. You say, so what's happening? And then the news and all the psychologists will say he was bullied. No, he was the bully. They have it exactly wrong. He was the bully. What have we learned about bullies? Let's look at Romans chapter one, look at verse 28. What have we learned about bullies so far this morning? Look at Romans 1, 28. And even as they did not like to retain God and their knowledge, here we're reading about people that have been given over, given up by God. God's like, you're done. They're not dead. They're living life on this earth and God's like, you're done. They were given over to a reprobate mind. They did not like to retain God and their knowledge. God gave them over to a reprobate mind. He rejected them to do those things which are not convenient, what things?  Full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity, whispers, backbiter, haters of God. This is why the Columbine shooters like literally like sought out people with the coat on. They went into the school and they were like literally looking for people with a coat of many colors. They were seeking them out, because why? Because they hate God, that's why. Despiteful, proud boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents. I mean, do these things all not fit what we just saw in Texas? Without understanding, covenant breakers. Look at this one, without natural affection. Look, we're not just talking about homosexuality here. Like, it's not natural to go and murder a child. That's not a natural thing. Most people are simply not capable of that. Thank God, thank God, who knowing the judgment of God, but they that which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but what? They have pleasure in them that do them. Look, these are people that they have pleasure in things that most people would abhor.  But this person, like, he was not bullied, he was the bully. He was the bully. He literally was full of envy and insecurity and murder. And the Bible tells us why this happens. He turned on God. He was a hater of God. Look, this is not a debate on what you can purchase at the local sporting goods store. People just bark up the wrong trees like crazy. Where are these monsters coming from? The Bible is telling us this. Turn to Isaiah chapter 54. Isaiah chapter 54. Let's look at a contrast to this. Isaiah chapter 54. So, he is the bully, but they will get it exactly wrong. People without the Bible are so confounded that they will get things exactly wrong. They will come up with the exact wrong answer every single time. Just think about somebody who would take a test that way. You need to take a math test and you just come up with the wrong answer every single time and it's not even close. It's like opposite.  You're just like completely wrong. You're as wrong as you possibly could be. Look at Isaiah 54 and verse number 13 or just look at the front of your bulletin. Now look at this. Here's the contrast of this. Here's the answer, folks. If people are looking at what's going on in our country today, well how could this be stopped? Look at the answer here. Isaiah 54 verse 13, it says, all the children shall be taught of the Lord and great shall be what and what comes from that? Right shall be the peace of that children. So, this is how it's supposed to go. You're supposed to teach your children in the Lord. You're supposed to train them, nurture them, bring them up in the Lord. And you know what?  You're clearing the path because guess what? They're supposed to have peace. They will have peace in that. Unless someone takes that piece from them, unless someone starts whipping that coat off of them, they will have peace from that. They'll have peace from it and that's the answer. So look, this is something we need to, you must make sure that your children are not dealing with right here. They'll bark up all these trees, these other trees. It's the guns. I mean, give me a break. We all had guns in our cars in school. Every single one of us. There were so many guns in the parking lot of our school. It was ridiculous. We were better armed than, my wrestling team was better armed than the police department.  No, we fought all the time. Like two of us getting a disagreement and go to the park. We just beat the living daylights out of each other. And we'd all get in our cars. They'd all had the guns in them and we would leave and like go hunting or whatever. But it's the kids. It's not what you could buy at Cabela's, folks. And it's gonna get worse. Why? Because we're not teaching the kids of the Lord. That's why. It's gonna get worse. We keep walking away from the Lord. There will be less and less peace. I mean, the Bible's not that complicated. We go into a lot of deep doctrines in the Bible. But really the Bible, I mean, I was just talking to my wife about this a couple of days ago. The Bible's pretty simple, actually. There's a lot of deep doctrines. There's a lot of prophecy. There's a lot of deep things you could find in the Bible. It's an infinite book. Don't get me wrong. But the general idea is pretty simple. You teach your kids of the Lord. You get in the Lord. You get in the Spirit. You will have peace. And it applies to you as an individual. It applies to you as a community. It applies to you as a state. It applies to you as a nation. With the Lord peace. Against the Lord. No peace. With the Lord. Freedom. We all like freedom. Freedom! Without the Lord. Servitude. That's just, look, that's just the way it's gonna go. That's just the way it's gonna go. Just like being saved. Freeze us. We were slaves to sin. We were slaves to sin. We were being hanged over this cliff of death. Of eternal death, the second death. Imagine. And we're completely free from that. How? Through Christ. That's how. It's the same thing in our physical lives and our individual lives in our nation. So look, I mean, since we know the answer, right? What's the advantage for the Christian parents? We know the answer. We can prepare for it. Right? We know the answer. We can prepare for it. These kids, these kids need a bulldozer. Is what your kids need. And you're like, well, I just, I just can't control. I can't control what happens when I take them here or when I take them there or when I do this. This is the problem. The parent may agree. The parent may be watching this on YouTube today and they'd be saying like, you know, I agree with you. We need to protect our kids. We need to be a bulldozer. But I can't help what happens to them when I take them to daycare. I can't help what happens to them when I take them to school. I can't control that. Then if you can't control it, they need to be out of there. That's it. You don't wanna hear that. People don't wanna hear that. Because guess what? That takes a major change. That takes a major change in a society where both parents are working and everyone's just addicted to money. They're addicted to nice houses. They're addicted to cars. They're addicted to a lifestyle. But guess what?  I want you to be Warren brother. That's what you're doing to your kids. It takes action to actually be that bulldozer. You can't just talk about it. I mean, you have situations where kids are being bullied unto death today. And parents are literally help us to do nothing. They were help us to do anything. If we take no action in our lives, what is the point of knowing? If we take no action, what is the point of knowing all this stuff? What's the point of knowing the Bible, knowing all these answers, listening to preaching? We take no action. What is the point? Go to Ezekiel chapter 33 in verse number 11. We'll close here. You need to protect our kids. We need to clear the path. Look at Ezekiel 33 in verse number 11. Look at Ezekiel 33 in verse number 11. Look at how God here is talking to the nation. He's talking to the nation. And he says, say unto them, in verse number 11 of Ezekiel 33, as I live, sayeth the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked. But that the wicked, what? Turn from his way and live. And again, he says, turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways. Why, for why will ye die? Oh, house of Israel. He's talking to the nation of Israel here. He's saying three times he says, in order to live, you have to turn. You know what that means? In order for you to, you're like, I agree with this. This sounds good and bulldozer, yeah. I'm gonna say that next time somebody calls me a helicopter parent, but you have to do something. You have to take action. Otherwise, it is nothing. It means nothing. We are to teach our kids, train our kids, nurture our kids, teach them to be strong enough, not to tolerate it. And the way that they are gonna understand how to be strong is to see us doing the same. That's it. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.


Next up it's Python on hardware time. Yes, we have a newsletter you can sign up for it a different daily calm and Gonna show a little bit about it gonna save this part for the end because I have a separate thing Okay, I'm gonna do with this right we're gonna skip to this part over on Tom's hardware they covered the Micro-python and circuit Python merge just kind of cool We have more and more of Micro-python and circuit Python. We're all caught up coming together. Yeah snake friend This young person showed how to mix Micro-python and circuit Python code In the same file using Raspberry Pi Pico. You can check out some of the Pimeroni circuit Python they've baked in to their platform to tech libraries and their Micro-python helper library as We talked about On show-and-tell One of the new features we have is you can disable this circuit Python USB devices in boot.py. So basically like in seven It's easier and better to use it as like a keyboard or an HID device. This is really cool Just make sure you know what you're doing with some of this stuff and then you can see our Desk of Lady Aida coverage and when we talked about the RP2040 Trinkie We'll have that out soon and then do check out the giant amount of I-thon on hardware news from Recaps It's got hanging out with a purple snake and then a purple lady hanging out with a Scott snake. I thought this was kind of neat Guy in the middle. You're missing a snake Where's your purple something or snake? I thought this was cool. Yeah, but I thought this image was neat This is from the Python software foundation Language no real snakes were harmed in any of these photos No from the language some of the lightning talks to check that out So we have all those things and you can get a recap from the deep dive with Scott and many other things So there is so many keyboard projects and so many different Python things and then the creator of Python just did some recent interviews we posted up that and There were some follow-up stories and we have those as well. So check this out. I guess one one big headline or phrase is Believe it or not from Hacker News and Yeah, well, so the quote is circuit Python is my go-to for teaching people how to program and Read the whole story But you can start to see what we've been seeing because we're like, you know We pay very close attention to what the community Says why they like the stuff we do and it's it's become the tool or the thing to get people started so quickly and Even for kind of a tough crowd, which I'd say Hacker News is high price So anyways check that out and check out all the news and more We're almost up to 9,000 subscribers So if you haven't please sign up on a different daily comm one of things we do is it's completely disconnected from our shopping site Because we don't like when we go to shopping sites and then someone all of a sudden start sending us newsletters We do not like that so you go to for daily comm will never spam you and you get the newsletter so the big news for this week is Ti Who makes these calculators? This is a ti 84 now in color the ones I remember the one that's coming out has a fork of Circuit Python on it and we were like, huh, that's interesting and Apparently a teacher already got it and they're like yep, and they tweeted about it And then we're like that's interesting. We like we want to know more friend of ours Well friend now Chatted with ti and that was on their live chat and says what are all the modules included with it? And they sent me a screenshot of their chat and I'm like this is looking pretty good It looks like this is real the fork of circuit Python is shipping on ti 84 calculators in all of them Then they tweeted Mac at us and says hi our Python app on the ti 84 Plus see Python use circuit Python with some modifications. The other components of the apps were developed by us the ti 84 plus see Python graphing calculators are coming soon in the US and we'll be available For the back to school season so the big news the big news for us is We we emailed with them and they said I can interview their developers So I'm gonna find out why they chose it why they chose to have a fork of circuit Python on there and more Is this kind of big deal? It's a big deal. Yeah, so anyways


Brainard taking on the top team in their conference, St. Cloud Tech. In the first half, Warriors down one to nothing. Nick Whiteman off the set piece finds Jack Thorkelson, who goes back post just how they drew it up to pull even with Tech at one. Second half, the Brainard Warriors down three to two. The throw in clears. All the defenders lands right at the feet of Thorkelson, who taps it in to tie the game at three.  Somehow Brainard able to get a foot on it and put in the back of the net. Who else but Thorkelson with another goal that put Brainard ahead for good four to three. That would be St. Cloud Tech's first conference loss of the season. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.


Arkansas first responders on April 1 will sift through debris for more possible victims after a fierce tornado sliced through the Little Rock area and northeastern part of the state, killing at least two people and injuring dozens of others. On March 31 evening, the twister sheared roofs and walls from many buildings, flipped over vehicles and downed trees and power lines, officials said. Drone footage showed the massive damage caused by the tornado to neighborhoods in Little Rock and to a shopping mall. A blast of extreme spring weather swept much of the United States on Friday, menacing the nation's midsection from Texas to the Great Lakes with thunderstorms and tornadoes. Two fatalities in Arkansas were reported in wind, about 100 miles east of Little Rock, Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders said on Friday night. One person was killed and more than 50 people hospitalized in North Little Rock, Pulaski County spokeswoman Madeline Roberts told The Washington Post. Although more than 30 people were taken to hospital in the Little Rock area, none had died as of Friday night, said Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott Jr., who added that the count remained imprecise. The turbulent weather occurred one week after a swarm of thunderstorms unleashed a deadly tornado that devastated the Mississippi town of Rolling Fork, destroying many of the community's 400 homes and killing 26 people.


All right, Bolo buddies. I told my husband to be on the lookout for goodie, the brand goodie. If you don't know about it, it is definitely a Bolo. Now, this one is not a huge money Bolo, not even a big money Bolo, but it is a nice bread and butter. This sold for $14.63 plus shipping on eBay. And my husband picked this up at an estate sale for $1. And look at that advertising. How incredible is that? So vintage goodie, be on the lookout. Thanks for watching.