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Hack & Grow Rich Episode 123 Pt 2:
The Spaniard

DESCRIPTION

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, negotiation, business, amazon, called, adaptable, book, supplement, real estate, dollars, negotiating, thought, fucking, world, mark, started, deal, money, important, mindset

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, book, business, amazon, money, talking, kid, world, distribution, fucking, create, build, thought, sell, bezos, dude, realize, buying, teach, dollars

SPEAKERS

Shaahin Cheyene, Chris Brenneman

Shaahin Cheyene 00:00

See?

Chris Brenneman 00:02

So Shaahin and I just met and we have an on an unknown to me commonality. And that is what Shane will just elaborate a little bit on what you and I were talking about, because I think if nothing else, they built a solid rapport with which to continue the rest of this conversation.

Shaahin Cheyene 00:16

Yeah, man. Well, we're both martial artists, and both students of Brazilian jujitsu and the striking guards. And I think that's always a connector, because if you meet another Dude, that's like doing that same kind of thing you always have, there's a mutual amount of respect, because you know that, you know, that person has been to battle more or less, right.

Chris Brenneman 00:37

Yeah, and Jane was talking, he's on the west coast, and I'm on the east coast. And he was talking about where he would train with some of the graces out that way. And I had the opportunity to train with the Gracie, mainly Hanzo on the East Coast, and then Ricardo Almeida, and we're just talking me about

Shaahin Cheyene 00:58

just complete your UFC career,

Chris Brenneman 01:00

career and Hanzo I can think of his name, and just what, what solid people they are, and he is. And john Donahoe and it, I don't often talk about those things anymore, really, you know, I speak I write books, I have a podcast where I interview all kinds of walks of life. So it is cool to, you know, reconnect with that world that I was once a part of that really I'm pretty disconnected from.

Shaahin Cheyene 01:26

Yeah, well, it's becomes a part of you, you know, it's funny that you mentioned and we can, you know, we can go into more kind of my story as it revolves around business and whatnot. But, you know, when we came here from Iran in the 1970s, and it was the worst time to be an Iranian kid, cuz I remember going to school here and just getting my ass kicked every day because people were super racist. And you know, it was like townhead, camel jockey, all this stuff. And I was like, Well, what? Well, I'm just moving here. And somewhere along the way, I decided to pick up a book. So I picked up this book, and I'm in my folks get it for me, called the Tao of G kundo, by Bruce Lee. And I was so excited that I watched all his movies, here's this like, skinny Chinese guy who's just taking no shit from anybody. And everybody knows you watch those movies, he was just fucking the badass that we all want it to be. And he was fighting for what was right. And he stood up for himself. And I was like, I want to be like that fucking dude. So I started off, you know, taking martial arts and I, you know, I started off in karate, and I was like, oh, man, I'm gonna do this. And I was like, Wait a second, you know, they're punching like this and blocking like us. And I tried that in the playground, got the shit kicked out of me again. And I was like, Alright, this is not working. And I noticed in his book, that, you know, I learned later that Bruce Lee had died, I think in 73. So I was devastated by that, because I was devoted to becoming his like, biggest disciple didn't happen. But the guy who put together his book, post, his post mortem, was this guy, Dan inosanto. And he had an Academy here in Marina Del Rey. So I was like, dude, I'm gonna go train there. And they were like, well, at the time, Dan didn't have a kids class. Now. He's got the best kids class in the country. And I said, Hey, you know, let me just train with you guys. And I was like, a kid, I was like, you know, I don't know, 1213 years old. And they let me come in there and train with them. And I train, you know, some VA Thai kickboxing with Master Thai, who like, brought Thai kickboxing to the US, and all the different, you know, Filipino martial arts. And it was spectacular, But to your point, a lot of these like old school guys like Dan, like Dan inosanto, they're just amazing people, like they live their lives through the lens of martial arts. And they approach the world with respect, and humility, which is, you know, probably the two qualities that I think you and I both share, you know, and that we see most and others were like, wow, yeah, that's awesome.

Chris Brenneman 04:00

I agree. 100% so I, you know, as part of my podcast, I have a weekly kids episode. And, and the, the premise of it is a kid's resource most of the time a kid's book, and it could be you know, chapter books, picture books, etc. And every once in a while, I'll just put out references tools for parents, guardians, teachers, educators to use to kind of teach life lessons to young people. And today I I'll be releasing an episode later today as we're recording this. And I highlighted highlights magazine Ranger Rick, but then also this movie that I just saw with my kids called Riah in the last dragon. And that I wrote, I generally write some themes to the the books or movies I talked about and respect and honor. You know, you mentioned respecting humility, but respect and honor were two of the themes that I wrote down and I find myself to kind of tie it back to the martial arts and your initiation of Bruce Lee and, and the martial arts training, whether it was a necessity, like because you moved here and you dealt with that, but I just I'm captivated. I'm captivated by both the virtues, the principles of respect and honor. But then I'm also as a human, maybe as a guy, just infatuated with that, like, kick ass mentality. Like, it's a real like, for me as a fighter, it gives you a competency and a confidence to just feel pretty good in general, just your state of being your status is, is pretty calm, and that the physical aspect of that with the mental or the mindset aspect of continuous learning and growth, I think, is indispensable. And those are two of the major major moreso the learning than the physicality of it, but that I try to pass on to kids, you know, through those weekly shows, but also speaking and interacting with students. When you when you moved here, from Iran, and you, you said you're 14,

Shaahin Cheyene 05:58

no, when I moved here from Iran, I was like four or five years old, oh, four or five, okay. Yeah.

Chris Brenneman 06:04

Imagine the the interactions, the bullying, that the name calling, prior to segwaying into what you do for a living and the businesses that you've built over the years, it takes me back to that, because I talk a lot about that with kids. I have two little kids. But you know, speaking in schools, just talk a little bit about your memories, right, as a grown man, because I connect to the things that happened to me. And I think the reason I do what I do is because of what happened to me in middle school. But just take me back to that time for you and how you got through it.

Shaahin Cheyene 06:34

Well, yeah, totally, totally. And I you know, and we can talk about my upcoming book that's going to be out in August, I talked about this a lot in my book. But you know, look, I in Iran, it was a different story. You know, I was the country that I was from, I spoke the language, you know, I was king of the heat, no problem, right? We'd go out on the street, you know, if there was an issue, you handle it, right, somebody pushes, you push them back, you're good to go. And we came here. And you know, it's funny, because I have a seven year old boy myself. And it's a totally different world. Now, as I'm sure as I'm sure, you know, as far as that kind of stuff goes. Because when I came in the 80s, I mean, I would just get the shit kicked out of me. And I go tell I'd be like I tell the teacher should be like, what do you do? like that guy, just, you know, he's just, he's just like, you know, clobbered me with a haymaker from the back. It's like, well, you think about what you do what you did. And it was, you know, it was a much tougher time, I think, as a kid to grow up, because I think they weren't really taking all that bullying and stuff seriously. But at a certain point, you begin to realize that it does build grit and fortitude, and that you've got to just fuckin stand up for yourself. Yeah, I mean, you know, I think there's probably a lot of guys around right now from our, you know, our age group, I'm probably a little bit older than you, but who are just crushed in life, because they didn't stand up to that bully. And I look, I tell my kid, right, Mike, my kid trains, Brazilian jujitsu, he trains over at the Academy, and they tell him to, like, we don't instigate any kind of violence. But if somebody hits him, or threatens him or tries to injure his body, I fucking dude, do what you got to do, you know, you got you have to defend yourself. And you know, that I don't think I am of the mind where, you know, we should be raising, you know, especially boys. And this might be a controversial thought, but that are less than confident and capable of standing up for themselves and, and taking care of themselves. I think that crushes, you know, I think later on in life that crushes their self identity and their confidence.

Chris Brenneman 08:50

I agree. 100% that confident capable, I think are two really good words to us in that sense. And I'm the same way and I'm always drawn back to the Speak softly and carry a big stick idea it's that it's it's you don't just like you mentioned the what you went through as a kid on the other side of it. It builds grit and resilience and toughness and something you would never want that for anyone but you haven't gone through it on the other side, but realizes the value in it. It very much the same way and then the confidence and competence that comes from just physical capability. And I also feel that way, with your mind with your brain with learning with reading books, because you're able to enter a conversation with all when you read books consistently when you learn this, this interview with you. I mean, I'm going to pick your brain about specifics about your business, how I can apply to my business. I think just that that side of it. The mental training is equally compatible and beneficial as a physical training to create a strong well rounded person. I think they work hand in hand.

Shaahin Cheyene 09:53

Yeah, you're right. You know, I mean, once I got proficient at fighting and martial arts, you know, as a kid You know, I'm still a student still learning. But you know, as a kid went once I got proficient I gotten a lot less fights. And I think it's one of those things where it definitely gives you you know, I heard Jocko will Nick, you know, the Navy SEAL who's got a podcast and a great book and he talks about how jujitsu is a superpower. It really is not so much so because you have this like tool that you can use as as a superpower, but much more so because it gives you this inner fortitude, this knowledge, it almost like implants this Mojo, like dudes that know how to fight. Like you just see them. You might not be a fighter, you might not know anything, but you just look over and you're like, yeah, I'm not gonna fuck with that dude. Right? You don't even have to be like, you know, I mean, in our world, we look you know, we see like dudes with a, you know, cauliflower ear or whatever. I can't see your ears, but you probably got them. Or you look at the ears and you're like, Oh, fuck, yeah, I'm not fucking with that guy. Like, when I'm in the studio, and I see a dude come in, His ears are fucked up. I don't care what belt he is. I'm just like, not fucking with that guy. We're going easy.

Chris Brenneman 11:02

Dude, I enjoy I enjoy Java this stuff cuz I never do it, it is an acquired taste. And some people might be rolling their eyes right now. But it really is what I kind of thrive on. As a human I, I practiced it, I lived it. And now at this point, I kind of value and respect it. So I look at it a little differently. But it's funny too, you know, walking into the room, it's it's easy for me to kind of sniff out legit and not legit. And it's you can't fake it. You can't, you know, it'd be it would be like being inauthentic on a stage or on a microphone. It's just like you can see right through it as a former fighter, like someone who's trained and capable yourself as well, like you can tell legitimacy versus non legitimacy.

Shaahin Cheyene 11:45

Absolutely. Yeah. And you know, similarly. So, to your point. You know, look, I've, you know, my first business, we created over a billion dollars in revenue, and now I've got a multi million dollar Amazon company where we teach and train people how to make money on Amazon. And we can we can get into that later. But the fact is that being a black belt in business, is kind of the same thing. Once you get proficient you build that foundation and those skill sets. When I go into a meeting in general, people don't fuck with me, usually. And it's for a number of reasons. But it's that same kind of thing where there's, you pick up something that other people pick up just intuitively they go, Hey, I can sense that this guy is not the guy you know, you want to fuck with. So it's almost like, like a business cauliflower ear that people might pick up on, you know,

Chris Brenneman 12:37

100% in that comes through evolution. And I do want to get in, you know, now I guess to your business building, there's a lot of a lot of alignment, correlation to things we're talking about physically fighting to building a business. And I've, you know, wrestled fought and built a business and they're all terribly difficult, right? And fighting and wrestling might, I think, be easier only because in business, there's not an opponent, there's not a person I'll choke or punch or kick or take down or slam or try to defeat. It's kind of like this, this opponent that's out there that has 1000 different heads, and you're trying to contain it. And it's just so difficult, and it's so overwhelming. So all of these things we're talking about from your youth from training, martial arts, had to lend itself to the strength, anxiety, frustration, all the other negative stuff, tough stuff that comes with building a business. So can you just elaborate on the similarities of those two things?

Shaahin Cheyene 13:43

Yeah. And I think, you know, after this, we can i can tell you briefly kind of my story, so you guys can get a little bit of background. But let me let me let me speak to that. Because that's a really good point for us to pick up

13:51

on. So

Shaahin Cheyene 13:54

here's the thing. My wife asked me a while ago, like, why do you go like, I come back from the studio, like, there's blood all over my gi like, you know, my arm is like I'm icing every part I'm putting that free stuff on. Like, I've got every rehab thing here. Like, known to man, I got crale I've got a son, like I'm doing she's like, why do you do this? And I thought, you know, there's a moment of purity that comes in combat, and I mean, actual physical combat with another person with another practitioner, where in that moment, the world falls away and I am sure as a UFC Pro, you've you've experienced this where, you know, the kids crying that the house, the mortgage, payments, the car, whatever you have going on, disappears and you're in that zone, you are in that flow. And in that moment, it's pure, because you can't fucking bullshit. It's just you and that guy. It doesn't matter what belt you have around your waist. It doesn't matter what your credentials are. It doesn't matter how How many knockouts you've had before? Nothing matters. All that matters in that moment is your performance then and there. You know, Tyson fury, one of the great interviews, I have it up on my Instagram where he's talking to somebody and saying, you know the difference between me and Deontay Wilder. And he's like, that guy's a businessman. For me. He's like, All I care about is knocking motherfuckers out, I don't care about any of that other stuff. And I watched that interview, and I thought, this is a guy that self realized that's why he's the champ, because he understands that in that moment, that's where truth is found. And you can't bullshit you can't get on the mat with another dude. And, and pretend like you're better, you know that that guy's gonna fucking crush you. Right? So there's, it's, it's pure. Now, let's take this one step further. In business, similarly, you just have one metric, man, are you making a profit? Are you not? It's, it's it's absolute purity, I traded highly leveraged commodities for years, gold oil, all that stuff, hundreds of millions of dollars of commodities were traded through me and my companies. And trading is the ultimate vision of this, because there is nothing, you're producing nothing, you're bringing nothing into the world. All that matters at the end of the day, is when you look at your balance sheet, and you made $1 more than you spent, you know that you made a profit. That's all that matters. And businesses the same way, when you become a black belt in business, you realize like none of that other shit matters of people talking shit competition, competitors, you know, marketplace, all the like, none of that stuff fucking matters, all the matters is that you are you are this much ahead than where you were yesterday, and you make more than you spent. That's it, making a profit.

Chris Brenneman 16:55

And that to add some real life of of my business kind of journey to what you're just saying, I'm, it's been a long process, and I started fifth 2014 and 14, basically 15 got my feet wet, like 1516 business wise. So I would say like three to five years into my business. And so I'm an evolution in current, you know, progress in any evolving, but what you said there to put some, you know, black and white to that for the listener. So, it's easy to make noise, it's easy to create fluff, it's easy to just just just act like everything's going well. And and then behind the scenes, we as the viewers, consumers, we don't know like, what's what's the bottom line look like? So for me, you know, I can get lost and go to what you said, I can get lost into how many likes Am I getting on my social media posts, etc, etc? Or how many this how many downloads? How many that? But if I'm not selling, if there's not a transaction, if there's not an execution of a sale of my product, because it is a business, then what am I doing? And I'm realizing now during COVID, and coming out of COVID I've got to put as many touches on the prospect as possible. If I want this to be a really good business, not just sustainable but ongoing and growing. Like I've got to put the right touches with my philosophy, the least amount of stress and energy on me, how do I automate that? How do I systemize it? How do I put it in front of the right person? Because I'll make I might get 200 likes on a post but guess what? No, no one bought like, it feels good, but like nothing happened. And so the very black and white that's the reason I love following nature's metal which I send my on Instagram if you don't watch that it's a nature account that shows some really gruesome stuff. And it's not like I'm a sadist. And I like seeing it. But to me, that's a reminder every day of truth of the the the truth, actuality, and the black and whiteness of am I moving forward? Or am I not moving forward? And I like to get in front of that stuff, rather than dance around it and create fluff but rather being honest with that bottom line.

Shaahin Cheyene 19:16

Yeah, talk to your point. Well, we were talking about earlier with the kids and bullying in school. Dude, you got to make a choice. You can either become a predator or become prey. You got to make a choice. There is no middle ground. You look in nature. watch those videos. Is there somebody who's like Dude, I'm fucking Switzerland. I'm neutral. No, every single animal organism situation in the natural world revolves around this predator prey relationship. And if you don't choose, it will be chosen for you. It's harsh to say people don't like to believe it. But the fact is that, you know, you you you got to learn that you got to pick

Chris Brenneman 19:53

on my show this week on the podcast this week. I'm covering Danny Trejo, his books called Trey Hill my life of crime, redemption in Hollywood. And in the book specifically, he says in prison, you're either predator or prey. And you know, we're not in prison. We're not talking about prison, but we are talking about life. And that idea translates across the board.

Shaahin Cheyene 20:11

Yeah, yeah, I met him a while back. He makes good tacos man. He's got those those those amazing taco restaurants.

Chris Brenneman 20:17

Yeah, the book, I recommend it to everyone. It's a it's an awesome book. So let's get into the business side of things. You started your first business when you were young. And you start a lot of businesses you've handled, made a lot of money and help product development help every aspect of business Amazon mastery course, I'm someone who has two books on Amazon that wonders. How does anyone sell any books on Amazon? Because I am selling no books on Amazon. So it is. It's with Ernst, that we dive into this stuff. But talk a little bit about your early, early business, that your start evolution kind of you know, like a version of the evolution of it. And then I want to get into some of the specific some of the lessons that you as a successful entrepreneur have learned and can pass on to me and anyone else that's interested in business.

Shaahin Cheyene 21:14

Yeah, totally, I could probably kill those two birds with one stone. So I started off. Of course, coming in from Iran, like we were saying, and getting the shit kicked out of me in school. And by the time I was 13, even though I could handle myself, I was like, oh, man, I gotta, I gotta find an exit plan. And then I hit 15. And I was like, You know what? Fucking out, done. dropped out of high school. I was like ninth grade out, and started sleeping in the band buildings on the beach, wherever I could tell, I figured out what my plan was. Now I was reading, I was reading all these great books. augmentee know Napoleon Hill. You know, back in those days, I was really impressed with the fact that you can buy a book and learn from somebody who spent 30 years living a life. So I would read a lot, but I didn't have any money. I didn't have any friends. And I found a mentor. And I started getting involved in the rave scene, the electronic music scene, the EDM scene at the time. So what happened was, was that basically, I realized that these clubs started late. So I could go there. And there usually be like a behind the speakers, which was, you know, there'd be like, a nice hum, I could sleep for like three or four hours, and then wake up and you know, go about my day. Plus, I'd meet some people, the music was fun. It was a cool environment. I never did any drugs in those days. And I was like, You know what, this is kind of cool for me. Let me check this out. So I started hanging out at these raves and I started looking around me going, Wow, these happen every week, more than several times a week. Who's making money? It's got to be the promoters. Nope, the promoters always would bail. Nobody would get paid, they'd be broke, it would be a whole thing. I thought, well, I got it. It's the musicians, musicians make money, right? musicians, you see him on TV? musicians make money? Nope. Those guys were always broke the DJs were always out with their hands out stretch, being like, when's the promoter gonna pay me like, Sorry, buddy. Never, they never got paid. So I was like, well, it's got to be the real estate real estate, right? The people Nope, those buildings were mostly break ins, people would somebody would find a key to a warehouse or they, you know, hop in through the back door and open the warehouse and the parties would be there. So I thought to myself, someone's making money. And I would see these guys hanging around the club, they'd give the DJs a little bit of money. And you know, they just make sure things would run just an minimal level, but they'd be smiling. They'd have a nice car, nice clothes. Guess who these guys were? I'm trying to think of who's who's involved in any of this. And it's, it was a drug dealer.

Chris Brenneman 23:51

So I thought it's such a terrible, such like a terrible truth. So as you're talking, I'm thinking, you know, when you really dive into businesses or systems or whatever, it's like music is a great example. You'll find out that musicians get screwed oftentimes are actors, you know, I I'm actually watching Val Kilmer has a new documentary out prime. And this was and I'm not saying he got ripped off because it didn't allude to that. But you know, it was after Top Gun, and he just got in situations where he was not did not have a lot of money. And I'm thinking like, how does this happen? He had his reasons, obviously. But back to what you're saying. It's like, come on, man. It's such a terrible reality that that that was the truth.

Shaahin Cheyene 24:35

It was the truth. And these guys were making money. And at the time, the supply of ecstasy, which was the big drug, Molly, MDMA, whatever, whatever you call it had gone down because people didn't know how to make it here in this country. It was coming from Europe and the supply chain dried out. And so I thought, Man, you know, if there was a way where I could make a natural legal version of this and Why legal? Because I realized that as being an incredibly neurotic human being that I would be really bad at crime, I saw all these people who did crime, and most of them did a really shitty job, I knew I would be really bad at crime. So I thought, you know, right away, the crime would not be a good move for me. So I started looking for this hack. I thought, hey, maybe I can make a legal thing. And so eventually, I figured it out. And I went up to the club, and I found the same dude. And I said, Hey, buddy, you want to sell this stuff? And he said, fuck off, kid. And I said, Look, okay, I gotcha. But here's the thing. A, you're gonna go to jail eventually. Be even if you don't go to jail, you don't have supply. And right now, you've got customers that are eager and want to use product, but you got nothing to sell them. So what do you have to lose? Sorry, let me give it a shot. hour later, dude came back. And he told me like, this was the most incredible thing ever. People in the club were dancing. Everybody was pointing at me. And he just looks at me and he goes, how do I get more? And that was it. It was on. It went from one guy to 10 guys, to 100 guys, and to 1000 guys to one day, I woke up, and I walked into my office in Venice Beach. Hang on one sec. So I walked into my office inventing Venice Beach. And I got the news that we had broken a billion dollars in revenue. I had 200 employees. I was I had I was employing all of Venice. It was like a crazy thing. And I got this news. Hey, man, you know, you just made a billion dollars in revenue. CNN wants to interview you. sam donaldson wanted me to have me on nightline, which I did. Montel Williams wanted me on a show everybody wanted. And I remember having this moment of incredible anxiety and panic, thinking, fuck, I don't know how much a billion dollars is like, I didn't know what that number meant. It was 1000 million 100,000,015. Like I didn't know. And this was pre internet, pre Facebook, pre cell phones. And I was just having mine, then people call me down and they were like, bro, you're okay, no one's gonna ask you that, you'll figure it out. By the time they just want this lawncare kid that's selling these pills. And from there on out, it was a wild journey. We were the largest supplement company in the world at the time, creating these products that people were just fanatic about and had gone crazy over. And we were selling them everywhere. And to the state and not a single person ever got injured from them. We've created so many millionaires over the years from that product. And you know, it was it was a really good time. And I write about it, there were some some insane times. And you know, my books coming out in August, it's called billion high became king of the thrill Poe calls. And for any of your viewers or listeners if they're interested, I've got the first chapter up on my podcast billion. So if you guys want to check it out, you get the first chapter for free on there.

Chris Brenneman 28:16

Yeah, what a cool story. And I have a few things to unpack from that. It's funny, this this kind of is off the subject, but it's a relevant experience. You know, I I come from very middle class Central Pennsylvania, you know, they're there. I guess there's some millionaires, but not many houses don't cost a million dollars. The majority, you know, it's a lot different than North Jersey, California, etc. And I remember the first time, I was talking to a millionaire friend of mine, a legitimate millionaire friend of mine. And I it was just it, he exposed me to a world that I didn't even know existed before. And I remember hearing slash figuring out his monthly income and paychecks. What's like, you say, you didn't know what a billion was like, I didn't realize that, too, when you're a millionaire multimillionaire, and you actually break it down into like paychecks. Your income. Yeah, a lot of freaking money. Like, it's a lot of money. And I remember the first mental like, Oh, my gosh, you hear millionaire, but you don't understand $50,000 every two weeks or you know, whatever it is. So that's a funny thing that is memorable for both yourself figuring out what a billion is. And for me realizing what a millionaire actually looks like.

Shaahin Cheyene 29:34

Yeah, you know, in my case, I was so busy, you know, on this wild ride, that I wasn't even keeping track of like, the money that I was making. And it's it's funny that you say that, you know, because I would like, people would invite me to lunches and dinners or whatever. And I'd like hanging out with a dude who'd gone to school for eight years and became a lawyer and he's like driving a Porsche. And I'd be like, dude, like, how much money are you making? And he'd be like, you know, I'm making like, In those days, like 150,000, which would be like 300,000, I'd be like, I made that like, yesterday, like, you went to school and like, you know, there was no calculation, I remember, you know, I write in the book, The story of, you know, I had this dog. And my dog was like my best friend, cuz I couldn't trust anybody, I had so much money that like, everybody wanted something. So you know, and I was young, and everybody's taken advantage. So the dog was kind of like, my comfort animal. And I had the dog up in my office, and there was like, papers everywhere, you know, and I was like, going through, there's checks for 1000s of dollars, and I would just grab them, throw them in a pile or whatever. And the dog knocked down this pile of, like papers with checks and stuff. And I reached down and there was a check for a million bucks. And I remember looking at it, and just putting it back on the pile, and then going, what the fuck that I do. That's just yeah, it was just a million. That's, that's how little I actually cared like that mattered. And, you know, it's a really good lesson about life about, you know, not leaning into things, which, you know, one of my teachers used to always teach us that, you know, anytime you go after something with desperation, without the thought of, I want to bring something excellent into the world, but rather, I want to just chase money, or I want to get that hot girl or I want to, you know, do that thing. Anytime you lose track of bringing value and bringing excellence into the world, the thing that you want most is pushed further away from you. And when I learned that, you know, it became easy, making money became easy. And that whole lesson of not leaning into things. If it happens, great. If it doesn't happen, that's okay, too. I'm busy doing this thing that brings me purpose in life. And that's really how you win. That's really the most important thing.

Chris Brenneman 31:54

And I think what you said there that add a little bit to it. I think what you said there is, it can be like an actual tactical and strategical thing that you do, like what am I trying to do create value or make money like that can actually dictate your your actions that you take. But I also think that that's a psychological decision that you make, in your mind, almost like one of those karma or energy things that, you know, you could be doing the same thing. But if your mindset, your intention, your focus is money versus value, I think that can help dictate you know, it's getting a little bit out there. But I do think that can that does play a role in dictating your success one way or another. Yeah. let's backtrack a little bit. Because you mentioned the the the rave scene, the drug dealer, coming up with a legal version of ecstasy, my words. But there's a lot that goes on between having that idea who's making money, drug dealers? How can I create that, to walk up to that guy with a finished product? So did you know, I just talked to I don't know when it would be published. But I talked to a guy who has a nick Bear Bear performance nutrition, and he was talking about developing the product line as well and sending away measuring etc. Did you have a background on that, like the I don't even know what the word is substances, chemicals, whatever is that that pole is comprised of,

Shaahin Cheyene 33:21

no, I just made shit up as I went along. And, you know, one of my mentors at that time, went a long way to teach me and you know, now I teach my students, you know, on Amazon, and how to make money doing that using the same elements of influence. You know, my mentor taught me, he said, Hey, you know, if you can influence somebody to do what you want, you don't really need money. Money's The easiest way to influence somebody. But there's so many other ways, like you and I were talking about, you can do it by building rapport. You can do it by bringing value, and there's lots of different ways you can bring value. So I pulled out the Yellow Pages back in those days, we used to have these books that were printed with all the phone numbers of everybody on the planet. And I reached into the yellow pages, and I started calling people I called herbalists, I called manufacturers. And sure, most people told told me to go fuck off, or they wanted some crazy amount of money. But there were some people who were willing to entertain, you know, if I could manage to take the bus out there, they're willing to entertain a meeting with me. And I found enough people to make my dream a reality. But also, because I didn't know I could fail. It was it was not in the realm of possibilities and back to you know, our examples of fighting. Like when I look at style Bender, for example, he's awesome. You ever watched his fights? He's amazing. And there's this clip of him where he's like, before he goes into the rink every single time he tells himself that he is ready to die. He's ready to die. He's like, let's fucking go. There's nothing left like he's either gonna win. Or he's gonna die. You believe that when you see that guy, and I think I think to myself, it was the same for me in business. I had nothing to lose. I came from absolutely nothing, zero less than nothing. I was in debt. And when I went into business, it wasn't a question for me that I was going to succeed. It was just how fast and sure I got knocked down a lot along the way a lot. There were a lot of things that happened. But at the end of the day, I didn't let those things keep me down. I just kept getting back up. And what's the name of the pill? So the the pill was called herbal ecstasy. And it was an alternative to ecstasy back in those days. But it crazy. Crazy thought crazy. Yeah. Let's check it out for for you guys are on the radio. That was me when I was in my teens. So

Chris Brenneman 35:56

I've been trying to I've been trying to measure that picture versus what I'm seeing now. Yeah, right. It's very different.

Shaahin Cheyene 36:04

It's had a little more hair than I had a little more hair.

Chris Brenneman 36:07

And so then did herbal ecstasy, like, open up. You had been in business prior to that. So but did that open up doors and pathways and opportunities that you hadn't had before?

Shaahin Cheyene 36:19

Yeah, it's like anything in life. You know, once once you're successful, success, find success. Successful people want to be around you, you know, I had all kinds of you know, I was dating supermodels. And I was being flown out on private planes and yachts and hanging out with celebrities, and everybody wanted to have me at the party because they wanted that long haired, you know, teen kid that's making the pill that everybody's raving about. You know, I was doing TV shows and flying out meeting all kinds of millionaires and billionaires and, you know, once you're in that circle, that's, that's who they feel comfortable with. Successful people feel comfortable around other successful people, famous people, if you look around at famous people who are their friends, other famous people, because they feel comfortable around that.

Chris Brenneman 37:10

Yeah, people they can relate to. And so I want to get into Amazon. But yeah, I'm interested in Amazon because my partner and I dread you know, we I have two books up on Amazon, he actually just in 2020, self published 20 books, a variety of different styles of books, but we're, I hate to say trying to figure out Amazon because that's such a novice that's like someone coming in day one and saying I want to fight UFC How do I do it? You know, like, I'm well aware of the fact that quote, figuring out Amazon is a job right? That's that's like a huge part of what you do is teach people that. But prior to jumping into that, what do you think of that guy? Right, Shaahin from back then what do you what? What do you think of that guy? Who you were your experiences, the lessons learned? Not necessarily positive or negative. But you know, when I look back at myself early and fighting and then when I look back, you know, you mentioned at a Sanya style Bender, looking at himself and saying you should willing to die. I never thought that but I never didn't think that want to have kids? No, I'm not willing to die. Absolutely not like they're more important to me than this. So I just observe right? When you can observe you back then from you, who you are now what comes to your mind? What do you think?

Shaahin Cheyene 38:32

I think about how dangerous a lot of the thoughts and strategies I had were. And it's that risk, that ability to take that risk that allowed me to have this astronomical success that I had in those days had I had kids and a mortgage and all these things to worry about, I probably wouldn't have taken those risks. And risk to a great degree is proportionate with the amount of reward you get on the other end. Of course, a guy walking into work in a McDonald's who's just going in and getting a paycheck day in day out has very little risk is risk the company might go down he won't get paid but that's you know, infamous, testable small. The guy who owns the business runs ultimate risk. So he sees ultimate upside

39:24

Shaahin Cheyene 39:26

a guy with a chip on his shoulder back in those days. I don't feel much that way. Now. I think I could have done better seeking counsel, having mentors around me in all areas, not just personal development and physical development and what you would call spiritual development but also in business having people who've done what I want to do, I probably would have saved hundreds of millions of dollars. If I had known what I know now. And you know, after the ecstasy thing, the herbal XC thing I started Another successful company, that company went public. It was the first vaporizer company, we built all the technology for digital vaporisation, portable digital vaporisation. And that became a hugely successful company, we built all the forerunners of what you see now as vapes and jobs. And I'm buying, by the way, I'm not a proponent of smoking or vaping, in any way whatsoever. But we built the technology as a as a harm reduction measure. And I'm happy that I did. And so after that, I decided, Hey, you know what, like, I'm getting in my 30s, we're gonna have a kid. And my mental functioning isn't as sharp as it was when I was in my 20s. I'm sure you feel the same way. So I thought, Hey, man, I'm going to go and develop another pill. So I developed this, this brain pill, the stuff called bookseller, all it was spectacular. did all that stuff that you thought it was funny. The idea came one day when Bradley Cooper, who was in the film limitless was at my house, and we were hanging out a long time ago. And then he went off to make that movie, and I didn't think much of it. And then I created this brain supplement. And then somebody told me, you know, Bradley was at your house, and you guys were talking about that. And I was like, holy shit. Okay, that happened. That's, that's so funny. That is fine. It was a great movie, by the way. But I think that, that, that that's a that's a longer story. So I made this pill. And I was like, Alright, it was expensive, because we use really good ingredients. By the way, it's available now on Amazon. And we use really good ingredients for the stuff and I thought, well, it's going to cost $100 a month, who's going to buy that? Where am I going to sell it? I started thinking distribution first, which is one of the big lessons that you know, we teach, especially to our Amazon mastery students is don't create a product and go out there and try to find a place to sell it, find what the market wants, what the market needs, what the market can't do without and feed it what it needs. It's a much easier path.

Chris Brenneman 41:56

So I have a sorry to interject, but it's a big question I have and I bought it with this. So you know that that's a sound principle, right? And you'll hear it as a solid kind of time standing principle.

42:08

How do you

Chris Brenneman 42:11

because artists, right, original singers, creators, they, they a lot of times they they are them, right? They are themselves. Lady Gaga, there was no market for Gaga before Gaga was Gaga like, is that just like an anomaly? Or how do you explain that?

Shaahin Cheyene 42:30

How do you explain so so what you just said is, is

Chris Brenneman 42:35

don't create it first and then look for the way there's a distribution or customer base, rather look for that, and then create what they need or what they want? Gotcha with music. I'll say music because I know that sure. They're not thinking that they're thinking, I guess they could Some are, some are born boy bands are put together to feed. But like someone like an original singer, like Lady Gaga, or Bob Dylan, or Jimi Hendrix, like, to my knowledge, there wasn't a study saying the world could use this type of music right now. Rather, they created in the world was drawn to it.

Shaahin Cheyene 43:13

Right? So the answer to that is that I'm going to give you two answers. Answer number one is that I'm not saying that it's not possible to innovate. I'm just saying it's the loneliest, longest and hardest path to becoming successful. Secondly, if you look at it, their music was innovative, but their distribution was not the distribution with their we were coming out all those artists that you mentioned, like Hendrix, Joplin, Dylan, they came out of the 1950s. Were in the 1950s, you had this very restrictive white picket fence, right, two and a half kids, you know, all American family to the 1960s. And Americans hit the 1960s thinking, whoa, right. It was free sex. It was free, free love. You had the psychedelics revolution at Timothy Leary, you had all that stuff happening, and the market was ripe for music, that would be very impactful. I'm very passionate about that particular genre of music, even though has nothing to do with my business. So I know a little bit about that. So if you look at those folks, you could make the argument that they didn't invent a new genre of music. I mean, Dylan definitely didn't invent folk Hendrix didn't and then, you know, although one of arguably one of the most innovative artists of his time he didn't invent you know, guitar riffs or experimental guitar, but the market needed that Woodstock was was growing the beatnik movement, all that stuff was there. They just were feeding the market. What it needs is the argument that I would make but you can innovate look, with the vaporizer I was making those things for in you know, in the early days when we invented the vaporizer, it was the size of a ketchup bottle. And eventually it got down to the size of a cigarette. But when it was the size of the ketchup bottle, I was making them for 20 to $40. And we were selling them for $400. All day long. It took me close to four years and millions of dollars to build that technology to innovate, just to watch hundreds of other people come in after I built the market, and make many millions more than I ever made on that technology. Similarly, with herbal ecstasy, it wasn't really so much the innovation of the product, the product was great. But it was the distribution, the fact that I found these drug dealers that were out of drugs, and I fed them something that they could sell a lot of those guys became millionaires legally, from selling my products, they created legitimate distributorships. And we're selling to shops all over the world. I mean, at a certain point, we were in a warehouse records and Tower Records. And they were selling us in bookstores. And you know, we were we were everywhere, because of our distribution. So what I teach people on Amazon is don't go out there and create and invent an innovate Amazon is not the place for that. What you want to do is to find what the market needs. And feed is the shortest path. It's like, instead of going all the way around to get to where you want, you just go direct to it. That's different. So back in 2009, Bezos opens up the platform, we get a notice from somebody we know this was these were the days where you could email Jeff Bezos, and he'd get right back to you, which is hilarious. I exchanged several emails with him. Nice guy. And I was like, oh, they're opening up this platform, you know, and Bezos wants to invite you guys to sell whatever you want on this platform. So third party seller, most people don't understand this. When you buy something from Amazon, you are not buying from Amazon necessarily. If it says for sale and shipped by Amazon, you're buying it from Amazon as a store. If it says anything else, you could be buying from one to 5 million different sellers. Anybody like yourself, like me, who's put the product up on there and is selling it and is just using their platform. And Amazon takes a commission. And they pick pack and ship the product. And they and the end, they sell it free, which was the one of the biggest innovations that Bezos made for sellers. Allegedly, Bezos went out there and poached, one of the best fulfillment guys from Walmart. Allegedly, Bezos, who people think oh, he was this humble dude. You know, he just sat in this like tiny office, he was using cinder blocks and a US door that was his desk. No, he was a motherfucker. Bezos worked for d. h. Hutton, one of the biggest venture capital investment firms in the country. And he was highly sought after and he had access to cheap capital cheap money from Wall Street, when he took those dollars, said guys, you're going to realize a loss. I don't know how long, five years, 10 years, 20 years, but I'm going to create the most valuable company on earth. And he did that. He did that. Because similarly, but what we're talking about, he had nothing to lose, he did not give a fuck. And he went out there. And he did that. So right about the time when this is happening. I'm in the right place at the right time synchronicity, and we launched this accelerated product, I go to sleep, I don't think anything about it. I just put it up on there. wake up the next morning to 1000s of orders. And I thought to myself, dude, this is it. This is distribution. This is the thing that's happening. And I decided I stopped everything that I was doing. And I said, You know what, I'm going to become a master of Amazon. I'm going to learn how to do this. And I'm going to teach other people how to do what I do. And

Chris Brenneman 48:58

again, I'm I said at the beginning of this, there's like specifics of what you're talking about that I'm I don't know if the audience is going to appreciate this. But it's it's what I strive to know as a business owner. So a couple questions. When you say distribution, are you referring to the market? Or are you referring to the warehouse, the trucks, the pick, pack and ship? side or both of them?

Shaahin Cheyene 49:22

I call that fulfillment. So that is not what I consider distribution. When we talk about distribution. I'm talking about distribution channels. So have you ever gone to the theater and seen a movie? That was so bad, you want it to fucking go up there and punch somebody and be like, I want my two hours back? Have you ever had that experience? Right? And have you ever gone to the movie theater and seen like an amazing movie and thought to yourself, Wow, man, I just paid 20 bucks and I got to see this like 100 million dollar blockbuster. Those two things have one thing in common. Distribute Imagine how many amazing movies that are out there that have great acting and script and all that stuff. But they don't have the distribution. A way of getting to the masses. That's right. Art. There's so many amazing artists out there. But if they don't have the distribution, they will never be seen.

Chris Brenneman 50:24

So So where do you put that? The market, right? The customer that the desire, the want for your thing? Does that come after the distribution or before the distribution, and you're kind of prioritizing?

Shaahin Cheyene 50:36

So what you do, what I teach people to do is we use all kinds of tools, I'll give you a very real life example. So I teach people how to start Amazon businesses, normal people, I've got engineers, I've got attorneys, I've got people who start businesses for their wives. They're like, Hey, man, my wife's been home all during COVID. She's going nutty, like just taking care of the kids, she needs to be doing something. Let me Can Can I start a business for her? And I say, yeah, let's start an Amazon business. And then, you know, they start, you know, making 510 grand a month extra money, and then they get it up to 50 100 150 grand, very normal numbers on Amazon. And this is how we do it. We use very specific tools, where we look on the Amazon platform, and we start spying on sales. So we start spying on what like for you, I would just go into the backend. And I'd be like, Hey, dude, let's check out your Amazon cart. What are the things you bought? What are the things your wife spot? What have you bought for the kids? Oh, this is interesting. Do you bought a baby Sansa? Well, let's look at that. Let's spy on the sales. How many sales does it have? How high is the competition, and we use these very specific algorithms that I've built since 2010. To go in there, and to find vulnerabilities in the marketplace. I know you wanted to dig into the minutiae of this. So we can we can really get into this. And what we do is we find niches, and it's all about getting into those niches that have vulnerabilities. So maybe somebody has in the example of the baby carrier, a baby carrier, but maybe you can't see that it's got a zipper pocket, and moms like to have their wallet and everything in one place, and maybe a thing for their phone or whatever, whatever it may be, but they're not showing it. So all we have to do is we don't have to innovate, we don't have to build the baby carrier, we can find that same carrier. And by the way, we've got tons of resources, and we teach you how to get it from China, or wherever it is that you want to get it made and shipped here. But we find that exact same product. And now all we have to do is show that it's got that zipper. So we tell a better story. Again, we're not innovating on the product. And the fact that we tell that better story, it might just entail us doing a little bit more research than the average company. There's so much shit on Amazon where people just don't give a fuck, and they just listed on there. And they're just okay, whatever. But like you and me, we need to know like, dude, my baby's gonna be in that thing. Is that cotton organic? Does it have led? Is it BPA free? Like, there's all these things we want to know. So maybe you just do a little bit more research. And you find out hey, this company actually has a certification and their Cotton's actually organic. Well, the other guy's not telling that story. Now, I have that knowledge. We always talk about knowledge, courage, action, the three pillars to success on Amazon, but the three pillars to success anywhere. By the way, I have a one hour course if it's cool with you, any of your folks that are listening to this, I want to share that with them. It's normally 200 bucks, I'll share that absolutely for free. And anybody that's listening to your podcast, so we can include the links below. And you know, you don't need any money to start doing this stuff to start an Amazon business. You don't need to buy anybody's course. I'll give you this absolutely for free. And you know, hopefully it'll empower you that you're able to try. No, it will me. Yeah, totally. I'm happy to do that. So what what you do is you find these niches, and then we we find that product and we tell a better story. Again, we haven't innovated now we might, we might be like, Hey, you know what the zipper shitty on this all the reviews are saying the zipper shitty. So we're going to call the manufacturer and you call the manufacturer manufacturers like yeah, it's 12 cents more for a better zipper and you're like, no brainer. Let's do that. Why don't you do that? Well, they didn't ask us. Okay, great. Let's do that. And, and then we'll show in pictures, we'll show in videos, we'll get it out to all these mommy influencers and have them using it. And we'll create a great brand that people can associate with will offer a lifetime guarantee on it right? How many how many people are going to return a baby carrier, it's going to be less than 1%. But you know what? The fact that we're willing to stand behind it and offer a lifetime guarantee is going to make a difference to people who are buying it and we're going to build that credibility. Maybe we will and these are all elements of influence. We will influence them through authority. So we will find whoever the mommy doctor is or the mommy influencer and half Her be part of our marketing efforts, bring them on board. And this is all part of the building of this business on Amazon that you can build, and set and forget. And we hire people I've got VA is from all over the world, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, South and Central America, we just hired a bunch of people in Nicaragua, you know, because of COVID. They close down all these call centers. And these people are near MBAs, college educated, family, people, totally trustworthy, hardworking, and five to $10 an hour, you can get these people to work for you. And there'll be the best employees you ever had. And super smart, super hard working just good people all over the world, and you have them running your business. And while you're sleeping, you're creating predictable recurring revenue, month after month. And it's not look, it's not the only thing that you need to do. I talk to people often about finances, and I say, look, it's foundational. Just like in martial arts, you know, if you went to UFC and you just knew punching, you wouldn't do very well. So in business two, you got to build that foundation. So you need to have one pillar, which is whatever is bringing in the money that's paying for the diapers, paying the mortgage, whatever that is, until you're secure. That pillar has to be there. It's a table with four legs. The second one is you should be thinking at the very least, about something and cashflow, positive real estate, we teach this foundational thinking, right now the market is crazy. So I wouldn't be buying real estate right now. But I would be looking because it's going to change the third pillar having some money that's compounding with interest in the markets buying whatever that stuff is. And the fourth pillar is an e commerce business. And the best place to do e commerce, I believe it is Amazon, but we teach Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Walmart, the story is the same, you're doing the same thing. You're finding the distribution, then you're spying on what the distribution needs. And then you're just telling a better story. And it's the easiest way to do it. It's the least amount of possible effort. You don't need to reinvent the wheel. And that's that's what we teach at Amazon mastery. That's that's been the crux of my work for the last five years.