Amen.  We're going to start a new sermon series this morning and we're going to do a three-part series for the next three weeks on Sunday mornings. I don't usually have a series on Sunday mornings, but we're going to have one for the next three weeks and it's going to be on the family and the structure of the family which is being covered in 1 Corinthians 11. So we're going to basically this three-part series of a head and title for it to be called The Household and we're going to talk about the parts of the household. We're going to talk about the men today. We're going to talk about the women next week and then we'll talk about the children in the week following. So let me say first about the sermon this morning. We're first going to focus on the men. So this is going to be one of those sermons this morning and it may be for the whole series that you probably won't hear at many other churches. So that's the first warning I want to give you. The second thing I want to say this morning is if I could go around giving out free passes to all the ladies this morning, I would do so. So ladies, this sermon this morning, you have no right to be offended this morning, ladies, because I'm not talking to you. This morning I am talking to the men. So ladies, sit back, relax and enjoy the show. So men, maybe I should have told you 10 minutes ago so you had the opportunity to leave if you wanted to. But let me just say that this is about the men this morning. So it's a three-part series. Look, 1 Corinthians chapter 11 is laying out the structure of the family. And the structure of the family is something that you don't see talked about much anymore at all. It's pretty much everybody's in charge. Everybody's has equal say. You know, you'll even find in families, worldly families today, that it's the wife and the husband and the children all ruling together. Everyone's supposed to have equal say in everything, but that is not what the Bible teaches at all. So we're going to talk about that this morning. And I'm going to make it very simple for the guys this morning. I'm going to make this sermon this morning as a litmus test for you.   Okay? But this sermon this morning, I want to give you some specific details where you can compare yourself and say, is this something that I need to work on? I'm going to give you some actual details that you can look at from the Bible, reflect that onto your family and say, you know, am I doing things right in this area? Now, men, with a biblical church, you know, the Bible does teach that the man's in charge and, you know, you'll see a lot of men, especially young men, that really like this.  When what they should be doing is they should be reading what the Bible says about the family, about the structure of the family, not just in 1 Corinthians chapter 11, but many other places in the Bible. And they should be saying, oh, man, I'm in charge. Is the way they should be looking at things. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 11 and verse number three. It's the verse of the week. It's also on your bulletin. The Bible says, but I would have you know that the head of every man is Christ and the head of the woman is the man and the head of Christ is God. So, men, you are clearly in charge of your family.  Even the IRS knows this.   Look, men, the Bible says that's you, that you are in charge. You are in charge of the family. Turn to 1 Timothy chapter three. 1 Timothy chapter three, and I want to just focus in on verse number five for now, but I want you to keep your place in 1 Timothy chapter three. 1 Timothy chapter three is talking about the qualifications for somebody that wants to go into the ministry. The qualifications for a pastor, for a bishop, for someone that wants to lead a church. And look at verse number five. The Bible says this. So, men, you're in charge of your household.  Yes, that's what the Bible says. If you get married, the man is supposed to be in charge. That is God's plan. You're not going to hear that much anymore, but that's what the Bible says and that's what we will teach and preach here always. 1 Timothy chapter three, look at verse number five. The Bible says this. We're talking about the qualifications of someone that could be a pastor. Think about how serious this is. For a man, know not how to rule his own house. How should we take care of the church of God? You, men, are supposed to rule your house. That means you're supposed to be in charge of your family.  You are the boss. So this morning's sermon, again, it's a litmus test. It's a litmus test. One way or the other, the goal of this morning's sermon is to find out whether or not you are in charge of your home. Next week, look, next week we'll focus on the wives and their role in the home. And then the following week we'll focus on the perspective of the children. But this morning, we're talking to the men. So I want to give you some signs this morning, some signs that you are not leading your home according to the Bible. You're in charge. You say, what am I in charge of? You're in charge of everything. First of all, you're in charge of spiritual matters in your home. Turn to 1 Timothy chapter four. Turn to 1 Timothy chapter four. And I'm going to get specific with you this morning. The first couple are going to be easy because I don't really think that they apply it to too many men in this room. But look at 1 Timothy chapter four and look at verse number one. Look what the Bible says. I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead that is appearing in his kingdom. Preach the word. Be instant in season, out of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all along suffering. Telling Timothy, look, you must preach the word. He's talking to someone who's going to be a young pastor. He's saying, look, you must preach the Bible. Well, why would I have to tell him that? Because of verse number three. For the time will come, well, they will not endure sound doctrine. He's telling Timothy, you must preach the Bible. It's kind of like this morning. You must preach the Bible even when people don't want to hear it. You must preach the doctrine even when they don't want to hear sound doctrine. But after their own lust shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. So, you know, they'll want to heap to themselves people that tell them what they want to hear.  What everybody else's issues and never focuses on them. Itching ears. Tell me how bad everybody else is and how great I am. That's what people want. Verse number four. And they shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall be turned unto fables.  Sign number one that you are not leading your family is if you don't decide where you go to church. If there is a man who does not decide where his family goes to church, that is a man who is not leading his home. Because people, people and especially before church, before this is a sign I've seen over and over and over again. When a church goes liberal, you'll find you show me a liberal church and I'll show you where the women are leading. I'll show you where the wives are leading their husbands. Look, it's just a matter of fact. It's just the way it happens. The men are supposed to lead their families in this way and they are to decide they are to keep look even when there's you know, they're hearing things that aren't itching their ears.  Where what? Sound doctrine is being preached. And they're supposed to be guarding against you know, their family, whether it be their wives or their children, wanting to turn their ears away from the truth, away from that sound doctrine. Whether it's in season or out of season, you lead your family to a biblical church and you go there. Turn to Hebrews chapter 10. So sign number one, if you don't decide where you go to church, you are not leading your home. Period. Sign number two, if you don't decide when you go to church, you are not leading your home. Turn to Hebrews 10. Look at verse number 25. The Bible says this, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is but exhorting one another and so much the more as you see the day approaching. It is your job men to decide when you go to church. And according to the Bible, you should be in church when the church assembles. So it is your job to lead your family in that direction. And look, I'm going to give you, I'm not just going to give you all the problems you have this morning. I'm going to show you how to solve them too.  I'm here to look at the Bible because the Bible tells you how to solve these problems too.  That's your responsibility. When I, when I see, you know, somebody that doesn't come to church, a family that doesn't come to church, look, that is nobody's fault but the man. Period. That's what the Bible says. Matters of the home. Look back at 1st Corinthians 11-3. Actually, go to 1st Timothy 3. I'll just read again for you 1st Corinthians chapter 11, but I'd have you to know that the head of every man is Christ and the head of the woman is the man. The man is in charge of the home. 1st Timothy chapter 3, I already read for you verse 5, but I want to read for you verse number 4 as well. Look at verse number 4 of 1st Timothy chapter 3. Now we are talking about the qualifications for a man who is going to be a pastor of a church. And the Bible says one that ruleeth well his own house. Look, that says that this man, if he wants to be a pastor, he better rule his house well. You know what rule means? That means be in charge. That means lead his house. And have, whoa, there's more detail. Uh-oh. Having his children in subjection with all gravity. You know what that means? Seriousness means it's a serious thing. Look, the qualifications that you say, I'm not going to be a pastor. Listen, the qualifications of a pastor apply to you too. Did you know that? All this is saying in 1st Timothy chapter 3 is it is giving biblical doctrine and it is saying, look, this will cut, this is a job you can't have if you don't follow these things.  It's not saying that everybody shouldn't follow them.  There's consequences that are coming for your family. However, in this particular case in 1st Timothy chapter 3, it's saying, look, these particular things, if you don't do them, can cost you your job. They can cost you, because look, if I'm in a job and I'm all of a sudden no longer qualified for that job, can I stay in that job? Look, I have seen and you have all seen men who are pastors, many different men who are pastors who violate or go against these qualifications, maybe these specific ones or other ones, and it costs them their job. That's what it's talking about. But look, but they still apply to all of us.  Now, this is what I want to talk about right here. I'm going to rabbit trail this thing for about 10 minutes, because I want to explain the gravity of this situation to you. Turn to Deuteronomy chapter 21, because I want to do a little bit of a Bible study on disobedience. That means, look, if my children are not in subjection to me, it means they're disobedient to me. It means they're being disobedient. And I think, look, I think you all know what disobedience is. I'll give you some specific examples. However, I am pretty convinced that you all don't know how serious it is. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 21. I'm very convinced that with many people, especially the men of this church, that the seriousness of disobedience is at least underestimated. Look at Deuteronomy 21 verse 18. Let's look at what the Bible says. The Bible says, if a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father.  I'm going to keep using that word. Then shall his father and mother lay hold of him and bring him out under the elders of this city, unto the gate of this place. You're not going to hear this anywhere else, by the way. And they shall say unto the elders of the city, this is our son. This our son is stubborn and rebellious, and he will not obey our voice. He's disobedient. He won't listen to what his parents are saying.  Underline that. And with all the men of the city shall spank him. No! All the men of the city shall stone him with stones that he died. So shall thou put evil away from among you, and all Israel shall hear, and what? And fear. Now everyone's like, oh man, they executed kids in the Old Testament. Well, first of all, I mean, you know, I'm thinking we're dealing with a young adult here, but this is a, this is a rebellious young adult that will not obey and is a drunkard and glutton. And I don't think that this had to happen much, because basically the end of verse 21, the whole point was to, you know, make this not happen. So people would fear. They would hear, and they would fear. But my point I'm trying to make is, is that disobedience is a grievous sin in the Bible. A disobedient child, a disobedient child at a young age will lead to outright rebellion at an older age that we're looking at in Deuteronomy chapter 21. Turn to Titus chapter 1. You say, that's the Old Testament. You see, you see the, the, the seriousness or what, what's that word? The gravity of disobedience. Look at Titus chapter 1 and verse 16. So disobedience is, is not a small thing. And the New Testament does not, I mean, you're going to see how this all matches up with the New Testament and how serious it talks about disobedience. They profess that they know God, verse 16. But in works, they deny him being abominable and disobedient and to every good work reprobate. These people are rejected from God. And the word disobedient is used there. Turn to, turn to Romans chapter 1. Romans chapter 1. Look at verse 30. We're talking about reprobates, people that have been rejected by God. They've been given up by God. They're done. The worst type of people. Yes, it's possible. It's possible. Look at verse 30 of Romans 1. Backbiders, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things. Disobedient to parents. Do you see how serious this is? When disobedience of children is listed in the description of the worst type of people. Now, I mean, do you understand how the gravity of the situation of a disobedient child? Am I getting through to you? Moms, relax. I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to the men. Turn to Proverbs 23. Now knowing this, now knowing the gravity of the situation, Proverbs 23 makes perfect sense. Proverbs 23 makes perfect sense. When you realize, when you realize that if you raise a disobedient child and they grow to a disobedient adult and you see what happens in Deuteronomy, I mean that's why that punishment was so serious in Deuteronomy chapter 21. Because God knows how serious that sin is. Because God knows what it leads to. Now it makes perfect sense in Proverbs 23, when the Bible says in verse number 13, it says, withhold not correction from the child, for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. You know what that's implying?   You see, it's a life and death situation. This disobedience. Proverbs 23, look at verse 14.  I mean we're talking about physical life and death and salvation.  It's bringing up death. Look, this is what could be at stake. Do you understand the gravity of the situation now? Disobedience is serious. And look, I'm telling you, men, I see it here. I see disobedient children here. I see it here. This sin exists here. So, sign number three that you're not leading your home. Men, if you have disobedient children, you are not leading your home. I'm sorry to hit you in the face with the truth this morning. But if you have disobedient children, you are not leading your home. You say, what are signs of disobedience? I'll give you specific signs. What are signs of disobedience? Kids that say no to you. This one shocks me every single time I see it. There is no better example of in your face disobedience men than a child that will say no to you. That is a child rebelling against you.  If you tell your child to do something or to not do something and they say no, that is rebellion that you are dealing with. Look, them not doing it. If you say, hey, stop doing that or hey, do this and they don't follow that command, that's disobedience. Them saying no to you is rebellion. That is rebellion. Turn to Exodus chapter 20. Turn to Exodus chapter 20. Look, I'm trying to get across the gravity of the situation to you this morning because just because you see everybody else out in the world, you know, dealing with this and doing things this way and parenting this way, forget that. Forget that. They're going to deal with consequences that you don't want to deal with. So you must do things different if you want different results. Look at Exodus 20 verse 12. Honor thy father and mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord giveth thee. Again, showing the seriousness of children obeying their parents. Now here's some irony for you. Here's some irony for you. Children, you know, look, kids that say no to their parents are the same kids whose parents never say no to them. Isn't that ironic? But I've just noticed that. I've just noticed that over the years that, you know, parents that never say no to their kids are the same parents that have their kids saying no to them. So men, here's an experiment for you. Here's an experiment for you. Go an entire day saying no to everything your kids ask for.  Feed them, clothe them, teach them, take care of them. But everything that they ask for say no.  I mean, what in the world? I mean, you make me feel like I haven't been doing a good job here, if that's what you think. I mean, there is no way, I mean, nobody thinks that. Nobody thinks that in their head. No father in here thinks that I should give my kids everything that they want and that's the right thing to do. Yet, why do you do it? So why do you do it then? You know, here's another test. Here's another test for you. When you when you give your kids a command one time, do they do it? When you give your kids, dads, I'm just talking to the dads. Moms, relax. Dad, when you give your kids a command, stop doing that. Does it stop once? If not, you have a disobedient child. I know we have this here because I am constantly seeing parents beg their kids to stop doing things or to do things. When, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't do that. Instead, you know, you got, instead you want to try to find something more fun for them to do and get them to stop doing what they're doing and you're trying to convince them to obey you. No! No. It's not about convincing them to obey you. Stop doing that. Why? Because that's what I said and I'm your dad. That's it. That's how simple it is. It's not that complicated.  I mean, this is horrible. Bribing them with food. That's even worse. Notice in Deuteronomy 21, by the way, notice what were the two things? What were the two things, this kid, this young adult that's about to be executed by the tribe of Israel? What were his sins that they listed? Gluttony and drunkenness. You know why those two sins were listed? It's because it's, this is why, because that is the child with no self-control. That is a child who has never been taught what no means. That is a child who has never been taught to obey their parents. So instead, they're bribed with food and whatever else, fun things and all this. I mean, first of all, like half the kids in this church are going to be diabetic before they're 30. It's not funny.  It's ridiculous. Bribing them with food, you're going to turn them into gluttons. And those two things go together, drunkards. Because they have no self-control. Oh, I want to eat this. No self-control. Man, it's your fault. It's your fault.  You got to say no to them because it teaches them to control themself.  I mean, if I ate Big Macs every day, I'd be a huge guy up here. I'd be like, there's no way we'd be going on hikes like that. I'd be like, we're going to get together to do a men's activity, and we're going to take a nap together at the church.  That's what we'd be able to do.   It's serious stuff, folks. Okay, and so when I see parents around here that, that are putting up with this and they're trying to convince their kids to obey them, I, I know I, look, when I see a man doing it, especially, it makes me die a little bit inside. Because I can't believe it. I mean, why are you not leading? Why are you not disciplining your children? I mean, why am I not seeing a stream of, of parents constantly going in the back and spanking their kids? I mean, why am I not seeing that? You know, I mean, it's just, look, here's another sign. Let me give you another sign. When your kids don't listen to other adults, that's a sign of a disobedient child. When I'm out soul winning and, you know, a parent is giving the gospel and I try to, you know, look, we're not big on, we're not really big on, on telling other people's kids what to do here. I, I, that's a good culture to have. However, when we're out soul winning and someone's, you know, parent is giving the gospel and I, you know, try to talk to the child and say, hey, you know, quiet or whatever.  I know they don't take you seriously. I know if they don't take other adults seriously, they just look right past you and just keep going. Look, I know that they don't take you seriously at home. Look, if my kids, I mean, if my kids didn't listen to me, I would go nuclear. Like it's a huge, do you guys understand that if I would go and I would tell Garrett, you say Garrett, he's, he's 19. You say, if I would go and I would tell him to do something and he would say, no, do you know that I couldn't be up here? That's how serious it is. He's 19 though. He's 18 and he can, he's an adult and he can do what he wants. Where does that say in the Bible?  You have to do 10 push-ups right now. And he doesn't do it. Look, that disqualifies me from being, leading the ministry. But it's not reasonable that, you know, you had him do 10, whatever. He's not obeying me. So, I mean, I don't understand why that doesn't exist in other men. Why is that? Why do you not demand that obedience? You should. You should start demanding that kind of obedience.  Because Dad said so. That's not fair. Life's not fair. That's another thing they need to learn. They do what you say because you said it. That's it.  That is not leading. Back to signs of disobedience. Turn to Proverbs chapter 6. So, if you have disobedient children, you are not leading your home. Men. So, don't say, oh, I'm the leader of my home. I'm the leader of this house. Look, if you have disobedient kids, you're not doing it. Look at Proverbs chapter 6. Here's another one. Here's another sign that your children are disobedient. Look at verse 16. These six things doth the Lord hate. Ye seven are an abomination unto him. Notice how all these are very serious things. A proud look. A lying tongue. And hands that shed innocent blood. Pretty serious sins right there. Hands that shed innocent blood is listed in the same sentence as lying. A heart that divides wicked imaginations. Feet that be swift to running to mischief.  Do you know that twice lying was mentioned there? Look, if you have children that lie to you, that is serious disobedience. That is a serious sin. If you have children, kids that lie are disobedient. Kids that lie are in serious sin. It's mentioned twice here. Here's another one. 1 Peter chapter 5 and verse 5. Likewise, you younger submit yourselves unto the elder. I'll just read it for you. Look, kids that are disrespectful to adults.   Because that is disobedience. That is a child that has no respect for their elders. And that is a child that if you don't have once again, you don't have respect as a child for other adults, they don't have any respect for you. That's what that shows. So look, men, you know what you will have? Here's another sign that you're not leading your home. You know what you will have if you don't discipline your kids and you have disobedient children? You will have a stressed out wife. You show me a stressed out mom and I'll show you a dad who's not leading every time. You show me, I mean, I mean, why is it that some women can have eight kids and it's totally fine and some women have one or two and they're just like, they're just basket cases? It's because their kids are disobedient. It's because the men are not leading their homes. I mean, you take a man that's not leading his home and then he goes and he has, you know, eight kids that are all disobedient and I'll show you a disaster right there in the making. Look, I don't have to preach another sermon on spanking your kids but look, you just need to start being a leader in this area. And you say, well, you know, I just don't know and all this. Well here, let me just, let me just beg you now.  If I can't convince you that way, how about, how about for the church? How about, you know, just think about the church. It affects the church. I mean, soul winning, I'm going to go out and I'm going to talk to pastor and I'm going to get us a circus tent because soul winning is turning into a circus.   We're, look, we're giving the gospel to people here. I mean, what must I do to be what? To be saved from hell? We're, we're talking about people's eternal destination out there and we've got a circus going on. Let's get some clowns and monkeys, at least make it fun. Look, it, it's a horrible testimony for our church. It's a terrible testimony for the church. I mean, we're out there and we're trying to pitch a family-integrated church. Hey, we have the kids in the church service. You know, these people from Verity Baptist Church, they showed up. I mean, their kids were just well behaved and disciplined. They have a family-integrated church. The kids listen to the preaching.  What is that doing for the testimony of our church? We have a family-integrated church. It's a circus there too. Come on, stop by. We've got monkeys and clowns. Look, that's not the testimony that we're looking for. What about visitors when they come here? What are we saying to visitors when they come here and they see a bunch of undisciplined, disobedient children in this church? I mean, can you help me out with this? This is about the testimony of the church. Look, there's responsibility that comes with this family-integrated church, folks. We do have the kids. Look, you're held, look, we're in a Bible preaching church. We're preaching the Bible. Most of the stuff that I've read you this morning, nobody would ever mention. No preacher would ever be crazy enough to mention this kind of stuff. And look at the kids here. Look, we've got a lot of good kids here. I'm not trying to beat you into the ground, but the point is, we're at a higher standard if we're following the Bible. We're at a higher standard here. We're at a higher standard where family-integrated, the kids are here. That means we have to be up at this church at this standard. Because it doesn't work following the Bible and preaching the Bible and having a family-integrated church and not disciplining your children. It doesn't work that way. It doesn't work. Those two things, it's oil and water. It's not going to go together. But we're at a higher standard.  And signs of that are if you're not leading spiritually, you're not deciding when you go to church, you're not deciding where we go to church. You know, you're not leading your home. You have disobedient children. That's a sign you're not leading, man.  Look, you must lead here.  Because that's not it. Just be against spanking, then. I mean, do it right. Just do it right. Look, you'll be less stressed out. Your wife will be very happy. Just do it right. You know, don't, don't fall into, I was just talking to, to one of the kids the other day about this. Look, don't fall into emotionalism. That's your wife's job is to be an emotional being. It's not your job. Don't fall into emotionalism. That's the California man. It's not you. That's not the Bible man. The emotionalism is, oh, but I don't want to spank him because look at how cute he is. Look, they're all cute. Okay? He's not going to be cute when he's 18 and he's punching you in the face. And you have no control over him. The, the man is, you know what? I, I came home from work and, and you know, I want to hang out with my, my three-year-old and four-year-old because these kids are awesome and they're good and all this and I want to play football and I got to spank him. Oh, oh, but look at him. That's not a man. According to the Bible. You get the spanking done. You do it right.  You do it right.  I mean, that is a man. Don't fall into this emotionalism. You're a man. You do what you know you're supposed to do no matter how it makes you feel. That's what not being an emotional being is. I feel this way but the Bible says this way I go the Bible way. That's a man. And do it right. That's loving your kids, man. That's loving your wife, man.  But you say, I told you I'd give you solutions. Okay. You say, you say, but no one will follow me. You say, but my turn to 2 Kings chapter 10. I'm going to teach you how to fix this one too. Look, now if your kids, look. If your kids won't follow you, you're not listening to what the Bible says. All right. You're not listening to what the Bible says. Look, if you got older kids that won't follow you, you raised them wrong. How's that? You got older kids that won't listen to you, you raised them wrong. That's simple.  Wrong.    Even an eight-year-old and nine-year-old and 10-year-old, it's pretty easy to get them to obey you. But you never discipline them. Now when they're 11, 12, 13, this is why you hear so many people, by the way, like, I don't know, when they get to be teenagers, they just go crazy. It's because you raised them wrong. Did you have a Bible in there? No, they didn't. Because look, you're going to be one of those people. When your kids turn 12 and 13 and, you know, they just go crazy, it's because you raised them wrong. Because you didn't follow what the Bible says. I've got two older children that have already been through crazy zone. Where's crazy zone? Where is it? Yeah, they change and they're different, and things are different. And the corrections, you know, I mean, look, it's different parenting in older child. I get it.  Because the Bible works every time for every person. That's why the Bible was a miracle. The Bible was a miracle because it applies to everybody. It applies to everybody who's ever lived on planet Earth from the beginning to the end at every stage of their life. Show me another book like that. There isn't one. If it went wrong for you, it's because you decided, I'm going to go my way, not the Bible way. You didn't heed biblical advice. It's that simple. Man, listen to what the Bible says and just do it that way no matter how you feel. Your wife. You say my wife won't listen to me.  You heard about these people? Men going their own way. It's a whole group of people out there. It's a whole group. There's so many groups of people I've never met until I moved to California. But the mig-tow idiots, right? They're like, oh, no, the laws.    They're never going to have a relationship with a woman. And I'm not going to get into, like, probably what they do on the side of all that.   That's what sums these guys up. So you're like, man, how could, my wife, but she won't follow me. All right. Let me explain something to you. And I'm pretty sure I can blanket statement this one for every woman in this room. Your wife wants to be led by a godly man. I can pretty much guarantee that. Now, especially for people, maybe they're saved later in life. And this Christian life, the separation, this, you know, going to church, maybe it's a big change. It's an actual lifestyle change for them. This is all new, what to do. Look at 2 Kings chapter 10. Here's how you do it. Here's what you do. Here's the answer. How do we do it?  What is it? 2 Kings chapter 10. Look at verse 15. Jehu is clean in house here. Jehu is going, he is wiping out the house of Ahab. Jehu is not messing around. And he's going, and he's in the middle of this task. 2 Kings chapter 15. He runs across someone. And when he was departed thence, he lighted on Jonah dabb, the son of Raycab, coming to meet him. And he saluted him and said to him, is thine heart right as my heart is right with the Lord? And Jonah dabb answered and says, it is. He basically says, are you with me? He's like, are you on my side? He's like, I'm going and I'm cleaning up the house of Ahab and Jezebel. You know, I'm taking care of this wicked family. He's like, are you with me? And Jonah dabb answered, it is. If it be, and then back to Jehu, if it be, give me thine hand. And he gave him his hand and he took him up into the chariot. And he said, Jehu said, he said, come with me. He says, come with me and see my zeal for the Lord. So they made him ride in his chariot. This is how you lead someone who is hesitant to follow. You show them your zeal. You show them your zeal. That's what you inspire them through your actions is what you do. What many men can't get themselves off the couch, much less inspire others. Okay. But see a good leader, look, a good leader, men, a good leader will take someone who is weak and make them strong. You know what a bad leader will do? A good leader will take someone who is hesitant and make them confident. A good leader will take someone who doesn't know, who doesn't know what to do, and they will show them the way. They will show them where to go. You notice what Jehu said? He says, come with me. He says, come with me and I will show you the way and I will show you what to do. He didn't say, is your heart with mine? Is your heart with mine, brother? Yeah, it is. It is. Okay, great. What do you think we should do? What do you want to do about it? No. He says, yes, my heart's with you. He said, come with me and I'll show you the way and I'll show you what to do through my actions. That is Jehu how he inspired others. That's the way you need to be. You inspire others through your actions. And it works. Look, it works.  A bad leader gets somebody that comes work for him. And maybe that person is struggling. I mean, let me just give you an employer example. Somebody, that person is struggling. And I'm like, this idiot's not like me.  And then they mess up. No, a good leader says, come with me. And I will show you the way. And through your actions. Look, not the actions of the person who's coming with you, through your actions. You inspire that person to go from weakness to strength. To go from hesitancy to confidence. I mean, haven't you ever been inspired by others? Think about a time personally, everybody in your life, when you were inspired by somebody else. Not something you did. But you were inspired by somebody else. You saw somebody else do something great. And you're like, man, if they can do that, maybe so can I. Man, if they can do such a great thing and get those results, maybe that's possible for me to do that. That gives, I mean, inspiring others makes people think, it gives people hope and encouragement.  Listen to me, man.  Let me give you an example. When I want to go out to dinner with my wife. When I want to go out to dinner with my wife, I don't call her up and say, hey, what do you think? Should we go out to dinner tonight? Where would you like to go and all this? You say this sounds like a normal conversation that an American man would have with his wife, right? Doesn't that sound like a normal conversation? Hey, honey, would you like to go out to dinner tonight? Where would you like to go? That's not how it goes.  You know where that conversation will lead? It'd be like, yeah, I don't know. I can cook. It'll save the money. She's smiling. It'll save the money. It's like, no, we're going out to eat. We're going to this place, get in the car. You know what I'm doing? You know what I'm doing? Because I call her up and I say, no. It's like, you're not cooking tonight. We're going to this place. We're going out to eat. You know what I'm doing? I'm showing her my zeal for her. I'm taking charge of the situation.  Because if she had say in it, well, we could save the money and she'd start thinking about other things. And this and that's not that she doesn't want to. It's like women want you to lead. It's what I'm trying to get across. Get in the car. There's no choice. We're going out. This is what we're doing.  That's what it means to lead. Too many men think that. You know, good luck with that. First of all, we'll talk to the women next week. You know, if your husband says, do what I say woman, you should do it. But that kind of leadership, look, it's not going to work. I don't know what to tell you. You know, it's not going to work. You look, she should, she should follow you. But no, you need to, you need to inspire her and show you her, you know, show her your zeal for her. Show, I mean, show her, show her your love for the word of God. Show her, show her your love for the word of God by implementing that on how you raise your children. Show her your love for your children, knowing that you will do what the Bible says, raising your children despite what your emotions tell you. Show her your love for her in that way. Show, show your love for the kids. Show her your, your zeal for well-disciplined kids. You know what, if you show her your zeal for well-disciplined children, that will show her your love for her. Because she will, she will care. You know why? Turn to Proverbs 29 verse 15. Look, you got to listen to what the Bible says. You got to listen to these words in the Bible, because every single answer is here. Turn to Proverbs 29 15. If you show her your zeal for the word of God and implementing that in your household, that you rule, you will show her your love for her. And she will, look, she may not even know it's happening, but she will feel loved from that. She will feel it. Look at Proverbs 29 15. Why? Why?  And we know how that turns out from a couple of weeks ago. But look at verse 15 of Proverbs 29. The rod and reproof give wisdom, but a child left to himself bringeth his whole family to shame. Wrong. A child left to himself, an undisciplined child, brings shame to his mother.    And I mean, implement the Bible in your home.  Of God. For this life that God wants you to have. For this way of ruling your home. Show her that you're going to rule according to the way God says. And then just show her and bring her with you. Pull her up into your chariot. And then, you know what? Don't pull her up into your chariot and say, where do you want to go? Be like, hey, are you with me? Here you go. What are we doing? I don't know. Standing here. Pull her up into your chariot. And then show her where you're going to go. I mean, just imagine a man whose wife could convince him not to go to church. I mean, or to go to a lame church.  This is a man with no zeal. And that's a man that is leading no one, is what that is. It's not, folks, it's not about control. It's not about control. It's about inspiration. It's what it is. And this is your job. I mean, so how did you fare on the test this morning? Men. Too many men, too many men, they gain Bible knowledge.  Yet, they're failing in their fundamental responsibilities as men in the Bible. Look, lead, you ever heard the statement, lead, follow, or get out of the way? Look, there's no choice. If you're a man who's in charge of a family, the Bible says lead. If you're going to say I'm going to follow or get out of the way, fine. But that's not what the Bible says. And there's going to be consequences to going outside God's way every time. Now go back to Hebrews chapter 10 and verse 24. I didn't read this on purpose. Go to Hebrews chapter 10 and verse 24. We read Hebrews chapter 10 and verse 25 talking about going to church and assembling with the believers all the time. But look at verse 24. Again, this is Jehu. This is Jehu right here in the New Testament. And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works. Provoke your family. Provoke your wife. Provoke. That means to inspire. That means to bring them up with you in your chariot and then move in the right direction is what it means. Look, Proverbs 29 says where there's no vision, the people perish. Look, if I pulled your wife, if my wife, if we talk to your wife folks and said what is your husband's vision for your family, how many wives would say where's your vision for your family? Do you have one? Do you have a vision for your family? Do you have a vision for the health of your children? Do you have a vision for the education of your children? Do you have a vision for a biblical marriage? Do you have a vision for this? Because the Bible says if you have no vision, it's going to fall apart below you. Where there is no vision, the people perish. Where a man has no vision. You know, the vision is where Jehu was going. You know, he pulled him up into the chariot. He was with him. He had him at that point. You can still wreck it if you don't have the vision of where to go. You got to know where you're going. And then Jehu didn't say, here's another one. Jehu didn't say we're going to go over to Rahab's house and we're going to clean house and we're going to take care of this wicked royal family, as God told me to do and then didn't do it. He went and did it. Jehu had a vision. He brought Jonah to have with him and then he went and he executed the vision. He must have a vision. Look, provoke, lead man. That is what you're supposed to do and it's not about talking about it, it's about doing it. You know what, and you know what you guys hear? You guys know what to do. Don't tell me that you men here don't know what to do. You guys know what the Bible says. I've preached enough about this. You all read your Bibles. You've got to step ahead of the game. You know where to go. You know where to point the chariot. Pull your family up in the chariot and get moving. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, I thank you for today. I thank you for this, these verses, the story in the Bible, Lord, that you just...


Welcome folks, we are the Dow Industries, finish up 418, Nasdaq up 92, S&Ps up 44, Gold, Gold contract down $2.1654, we had Silver up 11 cents, $19.18, Announce, LightSuite crewed down 38 cents, $84.66 a barrel, notes and bonds, a 10-year note, traded down 4 ticks at 109.22, the 30-year off a full point plus one tick at 118.03 in Kingdala, Flat, $1,2008, the euro is at 98, the yen is at 148.98, the British pound is at 112 to $1 at U.S. dollar. Well you know what I'm going to take a look at the spy folks, bottom line is that we had volume on Friday, got some pretty good volume today, you know, we needed for an ABC up on the spy, we needed 97, we didn't get it, what the spy did, the spy closed at 378.80, so that's going to have to build some cause to get over this swing point, because the swing point we're trying to get into also is shy of that swing by 10,000 shares. NDX100, we take a look at the 3Qs, this is going to be a little bit closer on the 3Qs, 3Qs, they needed $70 million, we needed $69 million, did $61 million. The difference, now this is deviant man, because the Qs have been the weakest, and the difference is the Qs are almost closed, it's a high, so my take is this Q is going to go right after this 284 tomorrow, you know, you're at 278 right now, the B point was 277.21, it took it out by a buck 20, different ball game, and of course we go over to the diamonds, the dowels are strongest man, the dowel, bottom line is off the races, and what you can use the dowel for folks, I suspect the dowel is going to be running all the way up to this 325, the diamond is in right now you're at 315, the cool thing is you want to watch the dowel, how it goes, because when you have the leader like that, the bottom line is that if that's faltering, the other ones will falter quicker, and if I'm just going to go to Germany for a second and look at the DAX, because the DAX was up a couple hundred bucks today, and I can tell you man, I'm going to have the volume tonight, okay, I don't think I have it just yet, let me see this, come on, come on, fast, no I don't, but I get a feel when the DAX is in an ABC up, so stay tuned in the morning, because I'm going to make sure that Tommy has this volume on the DAX, because the bottom line, if that's an ABC up, man we get action, we're going, have a great one folks, have a safe one.


time speaking at work in London I graduated to the big kids room this is the first time I speak in this room it's kind of really big but thank you thank you for being here first thing in the morning so my name is Francesca you probably already know from my accent that I'm Italian this is the very thick accent I'm from Torino I am the WordPress community manager at Siteground the international web hosting company before doing that I was a freelancer building websites for other freelancers and my first year in business was a complete disaster so this talk was born from that experience and I'm honestly very happy to be the first speaker here it's always a bit intimidating to be the one that breaks the ice for everyone else but I'm happy because I think in the next few days you're going to learn a lot about WordPress and hot topics as Anna said and that will help you become a better professional you improve your professional skills but if you're not a good business owner and you don't know how to run your business then you have a problem you can be the best developer in the world you can be the best web designer in the world but if you don't know how to run your business that is a problem so here we go last week I heard Marco Chiesi who's also Italian who's also speaking at work in London in track C right now that we all learn from mistakes and if we can learn from someone else's mistakes it's even better so I hope that by sharing my failures I will save you some hot burn headache and some money I don't normally talk a lot about myself but this is really the topic of the talk so I'm gonna go through a brief history of my business in 2008 I opened the website of workers.com as a new mom to talk about my kid like most new moms do we think they are the most special creatures ever so I started a blog to talk about that and share pictures and then in 2010 I moved it to WordPress.org I remembered I took an HTML class in 1998 and I was like why not tinkering around with this website so I started to change my template add stuff and suddenly people asked me can you do the same for me I will pay you really you're gonna pay me to do this to play around with a template yeah so I started having clients unwillingly basically and in 2011 I felt that was going pretty well had a bunch of people asking me to do that so I started freelancing as a side gig and then in 2012 I thought I was ready to go I was gonna become a web designer or a website builder or whatever you call the people that tinker around with templates it went horribly in the first eight months of being in business I spent way more than I earned half of that money went into life so it was money well spent bills rent food but I have to be honest a good part of that money went in things that were not so necessary for my business a lot of it well into self-training now don't get me wrong continuous learning is very important as a professional no matter what you do but I found out that for me the self-training method e-courses e-books they don't hold me accountable so I just have a huge folder in Dropbox with e-courses e-books e-something that I never finished I also bought myself a new computer because obviously when you invoice only 2,000 euros you need a 2,000 euros machine and they say that's not the tool that make the professional stuff like that well I believed I really needed a good computer to do that and then I'll be honest I took a lot of days off because what's the thing we're going to business as freelancers because we want to be free we want to work our own hours we want to have a good work-life balance well that made for very few billable hours so that was the wrong thing to do in the first few months of my business so I had to go back to work in an office at the time I lived in Israel I find the work as an administrative manager and I did that but people kept asking me to do the website I gained some popularity through my blog and social media so people are keep asking me to build a website and I decided to do it so I was working during the day as an administrative manager and at night and during weekends as a website maker not so great for your work-life balance but it gave me the opportunity to go back revisit my mistakes learn more about WordPress and become a better business woman fast forward a year more or less and I was able to quit my job again and go solo again at the end of the 2013 I built about 18,000 euros which might sound a very little money especially if you live in London that's probably three months rent but at the time I lived in Israel and I had a very very good fiscal format that allows people that start up their business to invoice up to that point without basically paying any taxes so that was tax-free it was great it allowed me to live comfortably so what happened in those more or less 12 months how I was able to go back and get to a point where I was able to sustain myself as a free dancer I read this book which is called the right brain business plan by Jennifer Lee she's an American coach and I like my first attempts at self-straining this one went very well because get was I didn't talk I did the work I read the book and I did the homework and at the end of it I had this crazy looking business plans that I brought here for you if you want to pass it along I brought three funny looking business plans and please pass it along appreciate the navy tail of them they helped me make money and they helped me earn a living with my job so I'm very grateful for that so they helped me doing this business plan helped me get say what my goal was and get to the end of the year with that thing in mind and having a route to follow and I did it for many years to follow so what is this business plan we're talking about are you familiar with a business plan does any one of you have ever seen a business plan okay a good number of people so this is the definition you can find on Wikipedia and it's pretty accurate it's a formal statement of business goals reasons they're attainable and plans for reaching them it may also contain background information about the organization or team attempting to reach those goal except I think this is the reaction of 95 percent of the creative types when they hear a formal statement like who no no nothing formal I want to be a freelancer I want to be a digital nomad I want to kill it with my wordpress skills I don't want a formal statement well guess what you don't really need it to be so so formal so I'll break it down in plain language in Italian we have this way of saying parla come and Angie which means speak as you eat simply we eat simple food in Italian in Italy so speak as you eat and this is how I break it down so it's a way to find the clarity amongst all the wonderful ideas you might have creative types and I include developers in this category because all the developers I know have notes and notes full of ideas for new plugins how to contribute to another open source project how they can improve their talks or stuff like that so put them together okay find some clarity in all those ideas that you have and pick the one that will successfully get to the end of the line you need to write them down so ideas have this funny way of behaving when there are too many of them in our brains they tend to become all messed up and they're all you know they tend to become one so as soon as you have an idea just write it down it will help you also free space to have another awesome idea and finally it's a map you know it's like a GPS that will help you navigate your business when things will be unclear and things will be unclear believe me so after working on the business plan of my own I came up with this definition which sounds much better in Italian but this is what I came up with in English so it's a plan that will allow you to earn a living from the things you love doing and it includes goals you want to reach and metrics to check how you're doing because it's always important to check how you're doing right you don't just say what you want to do but you check yourself against those goals and since I am a creative and I was happy with the book that I read but I wasn't too happy with some of the methods and some of the exercises I came up with my own method so I wrote a book that it's available only in Italian in 2014 that it's called who's afraid of the business plan and I created a class that was taken by about 200 people online and offline so what does a business plan look like so if you're one of the people that raised their hand and say yes I saw a business plan you probably have seen something like this like a bunch of sheets that contain a lot of words and a lot of numbers this is a business plan for Yahoo for real that you can find it on Flickr so this is what a business plan looked like for me before I read the right brain business plans I did a bunch of business plans in my life as an administrative manager but these are also business plans actually in fact these are two business plans for people that took my classes and today they earn a living from what they love doing and they put on car how do you call this cardboard stock yeah and I would say that's a hen that's another word that I don't know in English hand curd cheese and stuff so they do make a living with their business with a business plan they put together like this when we when we did the course so it really doesn't matter what it looks like okay forget about it the endless papers words numbers you need a way and it doesn't matter which one it is to fix somewhere the ideas you have for your business and it really doesn't matter the format there are some sections that you always go through and I'm really fond of this format because you can keep it on your desk and peruse it every time you need it and you're going to need to do that all the time every time you need to take a decision for your business you're going to look into your way into your business plan and if it's you know easy portable format you can just keep it in your desk and use it so I did it for five years the funny-looking business plan that year I hope you're passing around were vital for my business so also I must confess in the first few months of being a freelancer I developed an insane passion for stationery so I had a lot of cute stuff to use so this is also why they're so cute and then in 2016 and 2017 I focused more on finances I tweaked a little bit the target because at that point I wanted to cater to a different audience but I put down the numbers so you know the mission was there values were there I just tweaked a little bit the finances it was important for me to know how I was going to make money so it doesn't matter if you go for a classical approach or if you go for the funny-looking website but I keep saying website that there's something fraudulent about it because I don't build websites anymore so the business plan so use the format that you want but start doing it as soon as possible so if you have pen and paper here or fire up your laptop open up a note every time I tell a rule just scribble down some words that come to you as soon as you hear me saying something and you got yourself a draft for a business plan so let's do it the first rule of the business plan is do it we all talk it's amazing even in big businesses I used to work for a company in Italy that like the first year in business they had about a million euros turn around turn over and they didn't have a business plan so it doesn't matter they started out strong they failed in about three years so a lot of companies talk about a business plan not a lot of companies have one and so this is why a lot of freelancers don't have one because we think I don't need a free a business plan I'm just you know I'm gonna do 30,000 in a year so who cares well you want to make those 30,000 so you better get yourself a plan for making that and really do it remember 2012 minus 14,000 2013 plus 18,000 the last year was in business as a freelancer I made more than 50,000 euros which is about 20,000 euros more than most of my colleagues in Italy because I had a plan I had a goal and I had a vision this is the founding concept of any business plan everything else comes from that you need to define who you are and why you do what you do use whatever method you want this is a judgment-free zone you want to do a meditation you want to do a vision board you want to ask your friends what do they think you do that's a very interesting question to ask your friends and family if they know what you're doing if they can't define what you're doing write down 10,000 words I don't care just tell yourself and then you will tell the word who you are and what you're doing it cannot be I'm here to make money well duh we're all here to make money none of us unfortunately lives off love and air so you making money is your goal but also think how you want to help other people what can you really give to them be very careful this is a very powerful statement so be very careful what you pick for so my first mission was help people give birth to their online presence in an affordable and easy way result I just got pinged for 200 euros project with a two weeks time to build the website but I said it I said affordable easy so people were asking for affordable easy and it just took tweaking that a little bit and say something like help creative people build an online presence to get me a completely different kind of requests so this is a powerful statement be very careful peek a target there can be only one the easiest way to not make money is trying to sell to everyone everyone is not a target a target has a name as a hey age has a place of living they are a person Google business personas or ideal clients you'll find a lot of templates on on Google define them as precisely as possible if you already have clients it might be easier because you might see patterns emerging if you don't have clients yet work a little bit with your fantasy but also make it believable like I wish I could say that all my clients had super Instagramable studios and amazing branding they didn't some of them that had horrible logos that were very tricky to work with and they worked out of their cabinet or basement or stuff like that so that person that target is a real person and they have a problem and you can solve the problem so this takes us to the offer so the offer when you start thinking about your offer forget about yourself you're not important here your skills are but the important thing is that you can solve someone else's problem immerse yourself in your potential client word what are their paints what are their problems what are they lacking this is where you come in so I have a very hard time when people say turn your passion into a job well if your passion is a business model that doesn't make any money don't you'll be broke make sure that your passion is marketable and someone needs it okay so solving someone's problem it's a good way to make money because they need you they need your skills so pick a target offer them something make them an offer they can't refuse so now you have a mission you have an offer you have a target you're good at what you're doing you need to market yourself and sell yourself now basically every creative person I met in my life hates this and I think Alex has a business that it's called marketing for people that hates marketing is it true Alex I'm seeing you you have a business that the tagline is something like marketing for people that hates marketing yeah everyone hates marketing who's not in marketing you know even if you check all the boxes you have the product you have the pricing the pricing is right you have the skills you still need to tell people that they need to buy your product otherwise again broke you have a passion you have a hobby you don't have a job so at first you probably be getting a lot of work by word of mouth at some point it won't be enough so you need to go and get clients I I so wish work camps had more talks about sales techniques because sometimes we get the marketing right and then when it's time to close the deal we completely miss it so sales and marketing are important again you might be the best developer in the world and you find that solution to I don't know a massive problem in WordPress but if you don't tell people that you do have that thing that you do have that service or offer it's useless all your skills are basically wasted so hustle I love it I'm a massive fan of rap music and hip-hop and when I think about myself at the end of the month getting my money and I'm really seeing myself like in a rap video making it rain like the dollars everywhere you put like envision yourself in that position envision yourself as a rapper with a dope chain made of 24 karat gold because that's the goal that's the goal you want to make money out of your business you want to make money out of the skills you have so the first year as I said it was 18,000 euros it felt good it was a bit you know comfortable not not really making it rain 18,000 euros but then I said I think I deserve more so I doubled my prices and people kept buying my services and then the third year I kept doubling my prices and people still wanted to buy my services so I learned that the first year in business I severely underestimated my services and I sold website for I don't say how much because it's degrading for the whole industry so the first year I worked on a staggering number of websites I put on like 24 websites in a year I mean if that's not hustling I don't know what it is and then the last year as a freelancer I made the same amount of money with five websites so it's possible raise your prices don't be afraid and also track everything I bet you're spending way more money than you think you are it's that new laptop it's that conference is that e-book is that oh god that pen is so nice I must have it on my desk it's the new I don't know adapters and then you keep losing them and then you keep buying them back all of the money comes up to you huge sum at the end of the year so track everything track income track expenses check your cash flow as a freelancer we have one of the worst business models ever because we get paid only when we deliver and we get paid only for billable hours so check the cash flow at all times and you need a squad again big rap and pop music so you know Taylor Swift do you know who Taylor Swift is she's a pop singer she has this Instagram account that it's full of squad goals where she takes picture of herself with her models the singers that's your mindset you need a squad you need people that will help you get to the end line there might be some other professionals you might need an attorney an accountant and notary it depends on the where you live and what kind of business you have but you need contractors don't think you can do it all by yourself you're probably gonna end up messing functions dot php file and you're gonna make a mess so get yourself a developer if you're not a developer get yourself a designer if you're not a designer you need support from your family especially the first year in business they won't see you a lot so you need to make sure you're solid there France peers people to talk about your business and rent and vent if necessary and you need to know your competition so for years I was in this wonderful pink land full of unicorns where I thought competition didn't exist we're all peers we were all sharing our knowledge there was enough work for everyone and then I went to the other side I wanted all my competitors to dial slow and horrible death so I could get more work because at that point I was getting more money and I wanted more money so the truth is somewhere in between of course competition exists you have to do research on your competition you have to see what they do how they do it what they don't do spot the opportunities in the things they don't do and even if your competition has the exact same skills that you have and they sell the exact same thing that you do you have to find a way to position yourself in a different niche use a different tone different branding go for different things don't copy the competition those things are so lame everyone will find out in about five minutes the internet is a very small place so if you start copying your competition they'll find out in about a week probably don't do that study them to do differently and to do better and finally be yourself so when my kid who's actually the reason why I had a business in the first place making websites had this wonderful book when it was growing up that was called you are you and you are special and it is true you are special now go back to your business plan see if the person the professional that you are that emerges from those pages is really you because if you need to go against your values your beliefs your lifestyle the things you like doing to get to that goal it's going to be very hard because it's going it's really hard to pretend being someone you're not so your business should reflect who you are that will make it a lot easier because you need your strength to get to the end line and this is how you do if you need to pretend so for example one in my business everyone had this lovely the business was making websites for other women in their 30s and 40s that were going through a career change that was my target so in this target if you wanted to sell something to those ladies you needed to have a super cute Instagram profile you needed to have funny videos on Facebook you needed to be really witty on Twitter I'm not like that so I did it for two years and I was like no that's not me and that's not me so I had also had to change a little bit my business because I couldn't keep up with that kind of communication okay so look carefully through this business plan and say is this me I am willing and able to provide a service like this then yes go for it otherwise change it so now there was really one thing next to do is just go to your business plan thank you I'll be here all weekend at the side ground booth so if you are more comfortable on one of one conversation just come look for me at the booth we're here at the rocket thank you yeah thank you very much for this insight for an inspirational talk thank you I'm actually was wondering when building the business model I don't think I got the question like you asked if I also looked into the business model before doing if you build a business model okay I wish I could say I did it will make me look very cool I didn't I just you know for the first part of it I winged it and I did horribly and then I thought that doing a business plan would be enough for me it was especially because the business model was pretty clear a freelance web designer so I didn't really reinvent didn't need to reinvent the wheel the wheel was already there what I did look into was my value proposition and this is why also I worked with a very specific target and the very specific target was someone like me that didn't have the technical knowledge to do what I was able to do so I worked I started my business when I was about 38 I was going through a relocation I moved to another country my marketable skills for what I did in Italy were not so easily marketable in Israel so I you know I played around with it when I was in Italy as a freelance and doing it as a side gig and then when I decided to go on business it was also because I couldn't find anything better to do in Israel that would have paid me good money and also allowed me to go to the beach when I wanted to which was very important and and so I found out that at the same time that was you know the first years of this decade of being a woman and running an online business in Italy it wasn't so common so the target was already there I just needed to reach out and grab it basically and I did so by writing on my blog for example and sharing my own experiences as a new business owner so so the business plan was already a step up on my planning but I didn't go through all that planning by the way what's your name Michael is referring to the business model canvas I think which is a very important tool also that you should use especially if you have an idea for a product or for something that it's more innovative than being freelance web designer so there's a canvas you can print it out on a big piece of paper it has nine keys I think nine areas that you will feel that's more or less the same sections that I told you about there's a there's also a book called the business model you I'm gonna I'm gonna tweet about it after the talk because those are very very good sources to get information about it so yeah that's that answer to the question I think we have other few minutes for questions hi thank you very much for your talk Francesca where are you here I'm one of those freaks that really enjoys marketing could you give us some examples of hustle that you've had to endure first of all I used my kid I not endorsing this but the dude got me a lot of money now more than he's super cute he's very nerdy he enjoys computers and stuff since he was a little kid so you know I posted and that felt horrible now that I think about it so you do this only if you're very comfortable with this so like he was playing with his computer I was working on my computer and I would take a picture of the two of us and be like working hard or stuff like that which was super embarrassing like how would you do that to your kid so I did that because like I really like money I wanted to make good money so I did that which is something that I suggest you do a if you're very comfortable be if your kid is okay with that the other thing I did is was blogging blogging was very a very good strategy for me when I started writing my blog again there weren't many women in business in Italy that were having online businesses so we kind of banded together and I created a website for a creative female in Italy that it's called the chip you because a pubo tega which in Italian means the studio and home where we started sharing our knowledge it's completely volunteer run it started out as we need a place to cry and it has now 60,000 readers every month in this super tiny specific niche that it's creative female entrepreneurs in Italy which is a kind of a big deal so blogging definitely I hate social media so I did Facebook I hired someone to follow my page and I got good results from that but I hated doing it again get yourself a squad a social media manager if you hate doing social media hire a social media manager I spoke at conferences so I lived in Israel and then my business started picking up a little bit so they started inviting me to conferences in Italy doesn't matter like Yorkshire pudding fair I'm gonna go do you want me to talk about websites no problem is this ten people a hundred people one thousand people it doesn't matter I'm gonna go I'm gonna talk about websites I'm gonna talk about why a website is so important for freelancers and what you should have and what you shouldn't and stuff like that so I took every opportunity to talk about websites so blogging social media I did horribly with a newsletter although everyone was like create a list get a list get people on your list which is very important but I didn't know how to do it so I felt misery at that networking there are groups of female freelancers in Italy and I also used to go there that wasn't a really good target for me because there were a lot of beginners and they all wanted to work together for free no guess what again make it rain so yeah did that answer to your question okay and I think we had a question here if we still have time and please come and ask me about all the other failures that I didn't put in this presentation because I still wanted to look good but if you want I'll be here the whole weekend so don't be afraid I screwed up so many times just come and ask me I'm sure I have an example yes one of the things I've struggled with is I've tried to kind of narrow down and find a niche and you know that's really good advice but I think there's a point where you have to start saying no to people if you're a bit of a generalist I'm just wondering what your experience was sort of when you did find a more narrow scope turning people down potential clients and maybe deflecting them to to other people who can help I only I want to look good so I want to say that I refer them to other people but I know the other people have to work hard like if they want to find the clients they have to find themselves at the beginning I was referring people to other people to other freelancers and guess what all those other freelancers wanted to grow so they didn't want to do in Italy is very common to do websites for 1000 euros like very simple no I wouldn't say very simple sometimes people do very complex websites for 1000 euros so you know you refer them to the people that do websites for 1000 euros and guess what they also want to do the 5000 euros websites and they will not refer them back to you so like uh-huh you have to work hard find your niche find your clients but yeah referrals are a good thing if you have a good group of people that you know they're generally going to share clients with you so you can put together a good group of people that refer to each other that's great I wasn't so lucky I actually had some of the people I referred the clients to then it came back and beat me on parts that we cannot mention so it really depends the other thing you can do it's create a product so if you find that a lot of people ask you for customization of Genesis themes or DV or whatever you can create a product where you go for example through some steps will do say which template they want what font what colors and then at the end of the process you charge them a fee and that's very easy to put together you can even hire a junior professional to do that for you and split the revenue and stuff like that also this thing about saying now it's again something that people like you have to say no more but I want to pay the bills so you know so it's a tricky why it's another thing that I think a lot of people say to make themselves look good in fact very few people turn down job jobs especially as freelancers so don't feel bad if you sometimes still get a crappy client that it's not really up to what you want project about yourself to the word sometimes you really need that thousand euros to go more to the beach so does that answer yeah yeah oh yeah it's if it's if it's something that you completely don't want to do then by all means pass it along to someone else but if it's more like you know more a question of this is not exactly what I want in my portfolio or this is not exactly the prices I'm gonna charge now well it really depends on what you're going through at that moment I think the time's up so thank you very much


Hello, I'm Jean-Marc Slim of JSA. There is no question that the next decade offers tremendous opportunity for digital infrastructure globally. I was able to take a closer look at one-of-a-kind markets, India, looking through the lens of Adani Connect, a 50-50 joint venture between Adani Enterprises, the flagship company of the Adani Group, a leading edge data center provider, Edge Connects. To serve these rapidly expanding markets, Adani Connect is focused on building out digital infrastructure to meet India's growing needs and requirements, helping to realize the vision of a digital India. Sitting down with Randy Brookman, CEO of Edge Connects, and Jay Akumar, Jana Karaj, CEO of Adani Connect, the two talk about what's ahead on their new endover as Adani Connect breaks ground on one of the largest multi-billion-dollar data center projects in the industry. Stay tuned and listen in.


What's going on? How are you guys today? I'm down here at Frankie's pre-range meat all by my lonesome on Monday Which is actually Memorial Day, so I hope you guys had some fun yesterday. It's been like horrible horrible weather in New York I think Friday or Saturday was literally 40 degrees outside I thought it was about the snow and it actually just cleared up a little bit and it is much nicer today Still a little chilly and I'm just down here getting some stuff ready This is one of the few days per year where there's a holiday So UPS is closed FedEx is closed Nothing shipping so we can't send our orders out on Monday as usual Which means Tuesday we're gonna be a little busier. We have to get everything out, but I Didn't do any promotions last week. I didn't really do any product focuses The overall order volume is much lower Therefore it's actually going to be less work than we normally do on just a Monday by itself So I have to maybe get 25 30 orders ready in the freezer I got to fill some foods orders and organ supplements orders so that the post offices can pick them up early tomorrow And I don't get in the way of my guys when they're filling the meat orders and I also Have to organize the freezer Which shouldn't take more than 15 20 minutes I just you know, I got a suit up in my telly-tubby eskimo outfit and I'll show you guys that I'll try not to complain this video, but you know coming down here every day I'm just getting more and more to the point where I feel like I need a permanent vacation So I'll see you guys in a few minutes It wasn't too bad today, maybe an hour and a half.  I'll have some heated gloves on sometimes my hands do get a little cold But you know, I'm basically sweating right now in this outfit So I guess we could Take a quick look around the freezer. I mean, it's more organized than before I mean, that's all I have to say I have the orders ready for next week We don't really have that much product in stock But what I did was like for the bone and ribeye steaks. I sort of them by weight So instead of getting an approximate two pound steak now you can go on the website and get a 1.8 1.7 1.6 and it's all correspondingly priced Same with the venison loin steaks and the venison Denver steaks They're packaged by five ounce four ounce three ounce and two ounce It's it's a little bit crazy and it's a lot of work on my end But it's the only way you guys really get to pay a fair price We definitely have a lot of lamb burgers to move. This is one of the products that's been in here for a little while a couple of these prime rib roasts are left Incredibly affordably priced guys. I think these are $95 and you get you know, it's crazy You know and I'll sell stuff like this at this price. We still have these really nice Tajima grass fed wagyu strip steaks That we looked at on a couple weeks ago Yeah, I'm happy we're getting products in but I'm just so stressed out with these suppliers Like I've been trying to get pecania in for months and months and months and months And we had some a couple weeks ago, but sold out very quickly and and the supply is really low so I'm really banking on getting this slaughterhouse within a couple months and Look, I don't mind being in a freezer for eight nine ten hours a day It's just when I'm down here, you know in New York City and like I'm scrambling to barely make money and all this stuff It's just it's just nothing in comparison to actually having your own operation Living closer by so you don't have to commute as much having more employees so you can delegate certain tasks You know, I'm looking forward to you know, you know the future of this business But right now I'm just kind of over everything and going through the motions and That's definitely not reflected in You know the products and the results because everything is better than it ever has been. It's just Yeah, I'm just I just don't feel happy about anything. I Guess we'll take a another look around show you guys what products we have show you guys what's going on All the salts are back in stock We got the beef tallow the wagyu tallow the pork lord and the lamb tallow if you guys ordered on the foods website I'll get these orders out by Tuesday or Wednesday Fortunately, I have to make some more water kefir. That's the main thing. I'm waiting on we have plenty of best bars for you guys berry vanilla chocolate extra chocolate and One thing that I will be doing is instead of having chocolate and extra chocolate We're getting rid of extra chocolate and the chocolate flavor is going to be extra chocolate So, you know, don't be worried that extra chocolate is leaving because It's what the new chocolate flavor is going to be everyone likes the extra chocolate a lot more I really want to keep things simple. I don't want to do you know four or five six seven flavors of the best bars So as soon as you guys buy the rest of the regular chocolate and the extra chocolate All of the chocolate are going to be extra chocolate. I don't think that's too confusing These are the salts back in stock the Bolivian rose mountain spring salt and the Peruvian pink salt you guys like that a lot And I don't really make any money off stuff like this.  So When we get that meat dehydrator and then we start doing that Hopefully I have the HVAC set up nice So so that's not too much of an issue and I really am looking forward to that You know, I said I had the the chocolate and the beef jerky earlier And when we start making the chocolate Pemekin again, I'm probably gonna be practically living off of that stuff So I think that dehydrator is still a month away The good news is the Chinese Brethren have set it up for 120 volts. So I don't think I have to pay that much for electrical work or an inverter It's just gonna be the HVAC stuff So we'll see that's gonna be that's gonna be a big project It's it's a pretty high capacity dehydrator You know, I bought I mean five thousand dollars is a lot of money for a commercial dehydrator They have you know, it ranges from like two or three thousand to fifteen thousand depending on the size So with that capacity if it's a 24-hour drying period, you know I'm gonna have guys in here basically cutting meat and and doing that almost every single day all day and Hopefully I can employ like two or three people consistently and keep that going so There's a chance I might be able to buy High-volume like dried ground beef from somewhere and then just make the jerky and stuff myself Which would be you know make a lot more sense depending on the price. I could get it for Otherwise, you know drying out the the ground beef myself. That's gonna be a pretty tall task. So We'll see so Frankie through range foods is looking good. We're out of the nature's glucose I don't know when that's gonna be back and I think I've mentioned it before I can get like a pure 100% organic glucose powder It's just really expensive and I'd have to import so much of it I might actually do that because I was thinking of launching another product on the side I just have so many ideas in my head that You know even the businesses I have now it's just you know, I want to do so so so much more Frankie's naturals is looking good.  So my parents stopped complaining that everything's in their garage Wi-Fi shielding. I'm buying fabric this week. Hopefully we have all the clothing back within a month for you guys I've been procrastinating on that as well Oregon supplements. We're out of some of the powders. I'm trying to get more in I'm working on everything I'm trying to get more and it's just with you know with the coven nonsense and Importing stuff. It's very very difficult and I don't know what's going on in these countries sometimes It's very difficult to get high quality products now I would I mean if I had the business connections before all of this crap started I might be able to get them easier But I'm trying to get everything back in stock for you guys and hopefully all of these businesses materialize and work out Well enough to the point that I have enough of an income where I can do all of the things I want to do and in the in the interim in the Moderate future. It's it's the slaughterhouse. It's the dairy and egg operation, which is going to allow me to Raise beef pork and chicken how I want the big three. There will definitely be some culinary stuff with charcuterie bacon prepared meats Definitely have to hire a chef to do that up there When I get all that stuff up and running which is going to be Basically the the main core of my business then I can hopefully open a soup kitchen Somewhere in New York City Maybe once or two days a week where we can use up like the extra stuff and there's also a lot of potential for Fresh organs and a lot of fresh glandulars from that slaughterhouse But that's if I don't lose my mind and disappear to some beach Which I would rather do at this point We got the protein back in stock too. I Don't really think there's anything else For me to touch on besides complaining about how hard it is to do everything I reached out to Mountain Valley to try to get some bottled water in here like six times and no one's This people just don't know how to do business so Thank you guys for joining me today Hopefully you enjoyed your weekend.


Y'all I'm frustrated I have never had since the history of my channel beginning this many Untold stories I say untold stories. I'm basically talking about Unfinished videos incomplete videos the floods of just buggerbeard Everything what I really wanted to do today was go out and show you guys some of the new baits Carl's bait tackle history tackle box. They've got a new website now Carl's bait tackle They basically gives you 30% off if you join as a member and they add like hundreds of new baits Every month they're adding them like crazy right now There's a bunch of new one a lot of which you've probably fished before and some you had but yesterday I went out and tried to bass fish and it was just so bad I said no you know what this is not gonna be It's just not gonna be good then I was trying to do a carp video Which I got washed away one of my cameras got washed away looking for pigs got another update on that I haven't told you about plus. It's opening week of archery season y'all. So just on that alone is a sign I do not need to be fishing today. I need to be hunting. I think what I have decided over my years of experience with Fishing in the month of September From now on I'm gonna take the month of September and I'm gonna fish for other species or I'm gonna bass fish in other Places that aren't Texas gonna focus on hunting Every September really until like mid-October. That's when bass fishing in Texas really gets good again when the water reaches 72 It has been a doozy especially with all the rain right now I'm on my way to a hunt and hopefully this is going to be a complete Video you guys know how that's gonna be like you can film You know 10 videos trying to go get a hunt kill a deer or whatever and it not be done Today is all about preparation getting ready for the hunt We're gonna go set up cameras and check cameras and things like that just to make sure whether it's kind of getting warm again y'all First week archery season Bows dialed in I'm ready to go never shot a big buck. I hope we get this done It's time to go get some sustenance in our outdoor life y'all.  I don't want to say I'm trying to get away from baby That's not what I mean, but the outdoor activity right now is not good around the house And I'm used to traveling and going where the bite is it's a big week too because it's first time traveling since baby was born So it's time to get our outdoor activities on y'all loaded down. I got boots. I got waiters. I got poles I got guns. I got archery equipment arrows sharpen ready to go y'all It's time to be an outdoor man here at supply check saw 35 for another adventure Had some daggum fishing freaks inside of the the store there. I love running into you guys movie pigs right here Look these daggum Rubbin snooters out there Rubbin snooters There's a lot of snooter rubbing that goes on down here if y'all missed my hog on video that I did What a doozy overrun with hogs, but that's not too far from where that sign is right there No, I just showed you guys. There's hogs all over Texas. I'm not here for hogs this week though guys I'm here for whitetail the hardest part about filming hunts It's making sure you're not gonna get seen Man, excuse me again. I'm allergic to not catching fish, which is pretty much what I've done the last couple days So then the mics right now we're gonna get some camera gear tree stand situation set up kind of get everything organized Because when you go out there in the morning And you're blind you don't have time to set up everything You got to be real still plus or the deer are gonna be coming in super early. You don't want to be jacking around That's why we're going kind of middle of the day right now because that's when the deer just bedded down not doing anything It's so hard to film hunts, especially deer hunts. I used to do it for a living. I was a camera guy There's so many times Where you just can't move you're frozen. You're dealing with two people instead of one and It could be cold there could be bugs crawling on you there could be a rattlesnake in your underroofs But you got to stay still so you can get that shot Just has an extra element of difficulty to the whole situation, but I enjoy it right y'all We made it here. There's a diesel firing up my car. He went out this morning after some does Got skirted Sniffed him out. We got something else going on here. Remember those hogs Well, those are the skulls right there the snooters the double snooters just like that We're on the Slava check sign. I'll check this out Look at these teeth These tusks that came out of there y'all Is that big or what? So those are those two pigs that we shot a couple weeks ago And so I'm gonna do a cool Euro mount I find me the right piece of drift driftwood Mike for for that your amount when I'm do do something cool with that You're a skull driftwood Think about it. Maybe even put a crappie right under it Double the double the fun. There's Mike's kitty cat Hopefully we get to put that four-wheeler to some good use tonight on a big gear and then this is an airboat situation Also for another video if you guys forgot who Mike is he is the guy that Owns this company or air the double on the harness. It's a Bino harness that you put the binos on so you look But you don't have to like stick them in your pocket or your backpack They just hang like right here something nice like high quality high quality units. I'm sure we'll be Putting that to use tonight looking at some big old bucks. What are your thoughts and feelings right now? Feels like we should be at the state fair eating hot dogs not going deer hunting Stay fair right now. Stay fair right now. Do you get your fried Snickers for $4.99? Get a what now? Fried backstraps possibly Mike. I've never killed a big deer I've never even seen a big buck up close when I'm actually got an arrow to throw at it I might freak out if I start shaking like a leaf Horns the power. Horns the power of calmness. We out here Getting ready to actually go do it. No, I didn't think we were hunting today Mike was like, hey cat man.  Let's go. It is so hot Persevation, I just made that word up. Persevation. That is a combo word powerful of perspiration and perseverance combined together. That's what happens when you work hard you get Persevation We got to do some setting up cameras and whatnot I didn't think we're gonna be on today, but we are we got a front coming in it's still about 85 degrees out here It's hot front is gonna help us out the wind direction. It's perfect We're gonna sneak in here. We don't want to do much talking once we actually get in there I'm gonna back. This is always a hard thing to get where I'm taking my big camera the one that I'm filming on right now And I'm gonna try to attempt to hunt with that. I haven't tried to fill the deer on with that Yet for you guys, so this should be very interesting I could just one-handed I guess No, gonna be hard then. I Guess you go ahead and go up and use the string. This tree is serious y'all It's a two-hand kind. It's a very skinny tree. It's a little sketchy to be honest


When this world was made up, it was made up as a defense mechanism against love. They tell me, and I've been told for years, love makes the world go round. It's actually guilt that spins this world. Guilt is behind gravity. Guilt is behind black holes and stardust and everything. This is a world made by guilt. Jesus even goes so far to say, the world was made in hatred. Oh come on, now that's a little bit too harsh. Come on Jesus, you can come up with a better world than hatred. The world was made in hatred, the body was made in hatred. Come on, give us something else. What's the say of the workbook? The world was made as an attack upon God, a place where God can enter not. Okay, got it. So if I'm going to wake up to the Kingdom of Heaven, if you know that form, if you're guiding me to let go and forgive illusions, and to come back to the truth, and accept the truth, then I must really need to be free of all attack thoughts and all judgments and all grievances in my mind. That fits with everything you've taught. That fits perfectly with the Sermon on the Mount. Judge not, let's you be judged. That fits absolutely perfect with everything that Jesus ever taught in the Bible.  Our Kingdom, our home is not of this world. God is an eternal Creator and God creates with eternal creations. And everything of perception is a veil drawn over the truth.