Escaping Communism and Finding Success in America with Joel Gandara

Josh (00:00:02) - Good day, fellas. Welcome to Uncensored Advice for men. Today's show, we're going to have a conversation with my buddy from South Florida who I just went to visit. And, uh, we we had good conversations about men of today, 2024. What are some of the things that they're struggling with? And I, I just recently crossed over the 40 mark. I'm 42 guys and I don't know about you, but you know, with 40, with 30 came new challenges. I was able to rent cars though at cheaper prices. But then, uh, when 40 happened, different things happen in my world. And and Joel seeing that firsthand. So, uh, Joel, welcome to the show. Glad to have you here, my brother.

Joel (00:00:40) - Hey, Josh, great to meet you. You know, I don't get to be on a podcast where I got to hang out with the podcast or the week before, so this is awesome.

Josh (00:00:47) - Yeah, man, what an experience. And we'll talk about our our time together, because I thought it was very special.

Josh (00:00:52) - And I got to see firsthand your the results, the fruits of the kind of man you are because I got to meet your family. And that was a very special experience. But let's start with this. Who is Joel?

Joel (00:01:07) - Um, well, that has shifted over the years from where I started out to today to I'll jump right to today and we can talk about anything you want. But today I'm a guy who just recently sold his business and and that was great, you know, worked really hard for decades to build it up and, uh, built a really good business and just sold it. So now I get to be who I really am. Because you want to hear something interesting. I've never said this on a podcast. I've been on a lot of them. I've never said this out loud. I was selling underwear for years. I built it, you know, seven figure profits every year. I mean, it was phenomenal. Grew it from a garage sale, from a flea market.

Joel (00:01:47) - So from nothing. And, um. But I was selling underwear to gay guys. Nothing wrong with being gay. If you're gay. Go for it. Have fun. But it's not my brand. It's not me. It's not who I am. So I really wasn't living this authentic life. What would I rather have been selling? Jiu jitsu guys? Baseball bats. You know, just things that I'm into, right? Yeah. Um, so now I could say that after I sold the company just a few months ago, this is me. Like I get to be exactly who I am. I don't have to live a pretend like I wasn't living and pretend life. It's just I wasn't enjoying what I was doing. Now I get to do exactly what I love.

Josh (00:02:21) - I bet you kept some of the underwears for you and your wife. You're like, hey babe, look at these things, man. Look at this. Right?

Joel (00:02:26) - The last thing she'd want to see is me wearing any of that stuff.

Joel (00:02:31) - So in.

Josh (00:02:33) - That story. Right, you your your story is unique because, uh, your family early on took some major risk to step into this world we live in today. And, you know, you had challenges growing up. Kind of walk us through age three, age four. Where were you? What what kind of things were your family focusing on? And, uh, talk to us about that journey here.

Joel (00:02:57) - Yeah, I was born in the communist country of Cuba, in the Caribbean. And, uh, so automatically you already know it means less access, no access to freedom, zero freedom of speech. Um, no firearms. Um, to protect yourself? No. Just nothing that in this country I hope people value. But. But we didn't have any of that. And limited food. Not a good life. Communism might look beautiful on paper. I can tell you it doesn't work. Uh, I read the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx when I was in college. And as I was reading it, remember, somebody was warning communism.

Joel (00:03:32) - As I'm reading, I go, wow, this stuff's really beautiful. And then I went, wait a minute, I finished the book, but I thought, this stuff doesn't work. So that's where we were born. Got on a boat, took 12 hours to get here. It was a legal immigrant. Uh, Mariel boatlift, 1980. It's where the movie Scarface was made. Because what happened is people raided the Cubans, raided the Peruvian embassy. Actually, a couple guys stole a van, and everything's government property. So you're stealing it from the bad guys, and they ram the gate at the Peruvian embassy. And the moment they got on the ground, they're in Peruvian land by law. And they said, please give us exile. We want to go to Peru, get us out of here. And Peru said, yes. And once that gate got blown open, Havana emptied and everybody was on that little bit of land and they just kept processing people out of there in Peru. Open that up.

Joel (00:04:19) - The United States then opened it up. And but Castro was evil, but not stupid. He emptied the insane asylums and he emptied the prisons. So a lot of those people on the boat with us were bad people, uh, or sick. Got here, uh, got into Key West after a 12 hour boat ride. That was very rough. It was a rough. Uh, we talked about the, uh, the storm that was going on for four of those hours. That boat was up and down. It was really scary. And then we got to the United States, got to Key West. It was beautiful. The airbase there, the naval base, the sea was calm. It's a bay. And we just went right in. And there's all these volunteers handing chocolates and soups and an American soldier greeting us and welcoming, welcoming us to America. What a drastic change from where I was 12 hours before. I grew up in poverty in California. It was fine. It was great, uh, just to have this opportunity to be in this country.

Joel (00:05:10) - And I took I think I want to say that I took and I'm taking advantage of the situation of being here and the gratitude that I have for being here. And, uh, that's helped me push hard and not make excuses. So very grateful to have been born where I was born and to grow up in poverty and all that, because today it's all way more enjoyable. Yeah.

Josh (00:05:30) - Your mother and father took a risk with you and your brother, right? To go on that boat. 12 foot seas or, you know, really rough. You're you're standing side by side with, with potential criminals and people who are, you know, unstable, sick, took a major risk to do that. There was something in a in a mother's heart. Right. You got to see the interview on what was it, Dateline or something like that. Later on.

Joel (00:05:58) - Telemundo, the big Spanish network.

Josh (00:06:01) - Telemundo, you got to see the story from your mom behind the camera for the first time in, you know, a few years ago, not too long ago there, what was so what was going on in your mom and dad's world that was so bad that they were willing to risk life to cross over with, with a group of people, 120 people or so on a boat made for 80, 70.

Josh (00:06:24) - Right. What was going on?

Joel (00:06:26) - So. Nobody's. For the most part, nobody's happy in communism except for maybe the generals. And up right, the top people are happy there. So my parents knew there was something better. In fact, when my dad was 17, he was sent to a work camp and forced labor camp. And his family then visited him one day and said, we have an opportunity to get out of here. Your brothers or sisters, your mom, your dad were all leaving. It's your choice though. Do we stay or do we leave? And my dad said, leave. Get me out of here one day. Well, he saw them again 13 years later. By then he was 30. 31 years old. Had a 12 year old sister he never met before. Um, so my dad already started with that at 17 years old. Yeah. Hatred for this government that treated him that way. Forced labor almost killed them. Uh, they let him go after three year sentence.

Joel (00:07:12) - They let him go after six months, nine months back home to an empty home by himself because he almost died from all the work. And the brutal Cuban son out in the field. Very limited food. Some days he'd have a cup of water with sugar. That was his dinner. That's all they had. So really rough. Uh, my mom had all her family in Cuba. My dad did not. But my dad always pushed her till, hey, one day we're going to get out of here. And she was on board with that. So I had a camera crew here years ago. A few years ago, not that long ago. And, you know, you've heard the stories from your parents all the time about growing up. And that was very clear. But this time I got to hear a different story because a multi Emmy Award winning, uh, newscaster was in my living room doing an anniversary of the successes that have come out of that 1980 Mariel boatlift. And so they featured my parents the first night here at my house.

Joel (00:08:00) - The next night he was on it Was me, but they were there filming both interviews. And man, it was hard to do my interviews because when it was my parents interview time ahead of that, they were sitting on my couch telling the story. The story I've heard a thousand times, and I'm there. I see the producer, the anchorwoman, everybody there, the cameraman, and I'm behind the camera just listening until my mom said a few things. She said that what happened? What convinced her to. Yes, we got to get out of here is they were sending all these young boys to Angola to fight a civil war in Africa. Uh, for the side of the communists. Right? To go crush these people who just want freedom, and they're crushing them on the side of the guy. My mom said, I'm going to have my two boys, and a bunch of them are getting killed. Sent to Angola in Africa to fight a civil war. What is that? What is that for us? And to fight on the side of the bad guys.

Joel (00:08:49) - So that's the decision my mom took for us to. Yes. Let's go. And then number two is my mom had it rough, man. She's sitting on that boat hugging my brother and I. And we're going up and down. And it's very stressful, very scary. A bunch of boats went down during that whole boatlift and people died. We didn't have enough life jackets. There was no preparations. These are rickety old fishing boats that were allowed to cross into Cuban waters, because there were Cuban Americans and Americans who went to pick up people. And, um, my mom is in front of the camera and this is on TV later, uh, crying, saying all she was doing on that boat was praying to God for forgiveness because here she brought these two little boys out to the ocean to die because we're going to die. There's no question we're dying today. We're going to die in the next ten minutes. That's how convinced she was for me. I didn't know that. I never knew that I was just scared of, you know? Whoa.

Joel (00:09:42) - Up and down the rollercoaster. Non-Stop for four of those 12 hours, it was like that. But to hear my mom and then feel that pain as a parent, to say, man, you imagine that you're on that boat and you don't even have a life jacket, you're going to die if that thing tips over like others did. So yeah, that was huge for me. It was very impactful and made me feel horrible for my mom. But man, it makes me appreciate even more the sacrifice of the decision that they made to get on that boat to come here for freedom. You know, it's funny. I gotta redo this room. I'm the one who should have that American flag because I have it everywhere else in my life.

Josh (00:10:12) - Yeah. Man. So here you are. You land in South Florida 4 or 5 years old, and then, you know, talk to us about your your upbringing, man. You come in here. Did you did at that point, did you know English? Did your family speak English? Or was it like pure out, like, we got to figure this out fast.

Joel (00:10:31) - My parents learned three words and they taught it to me. So I got here thinking I knew English, I knew coffee, milk, banana. Those are the three words I knew. I got dropped in the school three months later, got here in June. September started school. Man, I didn't hear. I didn't understand one word that was said in that classroom like zero. I don't know what they said. So the next year I flunked and I had to do it again. So by then I had a broken English. My cousins have reminded me over the years because they were all born here. How funny I spoke, you know that, uh, it was hard to understand me. I remember going places. We go to a restaurant and maybe I spoke a little bit better than my parents. They picked it up quicker because I was a kid. They were in the 30s, and so I'd order. But people never understood me. It's very frustrating. But, you know, it's all part of the game.

Joel (00:11:16) - It's all part of what you have to go through. I grew up right outside of Oakland, California, because we landed here in Florida and South Florida and Key West and Miami, and then went straight to California after a few days, because that's where my grandparents had settled, and my grandfather had a factory job, and that's what he did for all those years. So, yeah, grew up kind of always feeling a little left out, whether it be because I was the only kid who never bought snacks or I brought different food for lunch, we didn't have any money, so I never played on a little league team. I never was in karate or Cub Scouts. I never had the normal American experience in that way. I always felt we were different. Go to a friend's house. They had a bunch of toys. I didn't have any toys. Uh, they had cable TV. I never had cable until I don't have cable TV now. Um, so I was always an outsider. I always felt there's something different about me.

Joel (00:12:03) - There's something different about us. And, uh, I kind of sticks with you and probably molds you to become who you are, whether you take that for good or bad. Yeah, I was always the oddball kid in that. In that sense.

Josh (00:12:13) - Yeah, yeah. You can. Life happens at four year old kid. You don't get to choose. You don't have no you no choice in the matter. You. You do what Mom and Dad say or what in this case, what the government says or whatever. So, you know, talk to us about your upbringing because, you know, here you are feeling left out, you know, having, you know, getting thrown into, you know, English speaking classes, flunking, failing, no money. Right. You know, you had, uh, you had some run ins with, uh, with the authorities that at some point talk to us about your journey there.

Joel (00:12:46) - Yeah. And it wasn't even, uh, it was as a young guy, but I wasn't a kid anymore.

Joel (00:12:50) - I just turned 18. So here's what happened. First of all, I want to start off by saying it was all my fault. I did stupid things. I'm not blaming anybody. But sometimes we become a product of our environment. And if we don't have proper mentoring, if we don't have proper guidance, we are more susceptible to go the wrong way. You could probably verify that with statistics from criminals, you know, where are they from? What neighborhoods are they from? Okay then that makes perfect sense. It's not an excuse. It's just it makes sense. So I grew up right outside of Oakland, California. Rough school. Um, I remember my high school. I was always a little timid because there were gangsters. There was a real gang there, and they were shoot people and it was bad. I remember a friend flashing, lifting his shirt and showing me his firearm in class. Uh, a 38 in between classes where he goes, check this out. 38 revolver. Um, and it was loaded and and and walk in those hallways and people say, what are you looking at? You know, some six foot three guy muscular and you just sorry you walk away.

Joel (00:13:50) - That crappy environment in my neighborhood, my dad would point out if there was a teacher to say, that person has it made. They've got a good salary, they've got time off, they've got a pension. That was a big deal in my neighborhood. You could be a teacher. You're probably making great money compared to everyone else. It just has blue collar jobs. So right down the street, the guy I saw every single day since I was a little kid was a drug dealer. His name was better and better, had everything that a young kid would want. He had a cool car. He had all these tough friends. Yeah, pretty women coming by, and he was just selling drugs all the time. And I knew that that was wrong. I never got into selling drugs, but I envisioned, man, if I could have a nice car, right? If I could just get out of here and do all the things I want to do. Um, so when I was 18 years old, 17 days after my 18th birthday, so an adult now, I got caught doing something I had been doing for months anyway.

Joel (00:14:45) - And it was I was working at a department store. They're no longer in business. I think I had something to do with that now. Not really, but I was I was in the shoe department and friends would come in and I'd have them come in and try on some shoes, and then I'd load their bag with four pairs of shoes. And the deal was you get to keep one. But when I see you tomorrow at school, you give me the other three pairs, right? And that was the deal. And I did that for a little while, for a few months. I, I don't know how many shoes I must have taken. Uh, 150, 200 pairs. Quite a bit of money, I think. Dress, shoes, sneakers, whatever. And then I would sell them. These are probably $50 shoes that sold for 25 out of my trunk. And and I thought, well, okay, I'm not selling drugs. Yeah. I'm stealing. I knew I shouldn't be doing it, but I go, how else do you get out of the ghetto? Because my $6 an hour job is not going to do it.

Joel (00:15:31) - My parents making $10 an hour in the Bay area. Very expensive. We're not going to get out of here. So that was my stupidity. Got caught. It's a good thing that I got caught because it stopped at the media. I've never stolen anything since. And so yeah, 18 years old. I was a senior in high school and I was in jail spending the night, and, uh, that was a little scary. It was intimidating. Um, a bunch of guys knew each other. I didn't know anybody that kind of ganged up. They told me they were going to take my shoes from me. All this stuff. And, uh, big lesson learned. But guess what happened? A year later, when I was 19, I. I got arrested again. And this time it's because I thought, okay, I'm making money. You know how I'm doing it now. I was selling chocolates at school. I was netting $30 a day. I had a job making like 6 or $7 an hour.

Joel (00:16:16) - No, $6 an hour. And then I also was loaning money. The little bit I had, I would loan it to somebody. They'd pay me with some interest. I'd make $50, you know, and that was cool until somebody didn't pay me back. And I told my friend, coincidentally, the friend that I told is the guy I got caught stealing shoes with. I told him I shouldn't have been friends with him anymore. I should have learned, like, okay, I got to change my friends, I tell him and he goes, let's go pay him a visit. Let's go to his work. Let's go to the parking lot, because all his idea. And I was like an idiot. I'd go, yeah, yeah, yeah, let's go get our money. And he goes, I'm going to break his window, give me a little something. And I gave him this little wooden bat and he walked right up to the window, broke it, jumped in my car and we took off.

Joel (00:16:58) - Got caught, got arrested, and then, uh. That's it. Never gotten arrested since I was 19 years old, so it's been quite a while. I'm 48 years old. But yeah, those are some low points in my life where I said, what have I been doing? So at that time, 19 years old, I made a decision. I said, I'm just going to work a lot. I'm going to get two full time jobs. I'm going to kill myself working. I'm going to save all that money, and I'm going to buy a house. By the time I'm 22 and a 22 years old, I put $32,000 down. I was making 1050 an hour and my main job, that's it. But I was loaning money, not breaking any windows. I took some hits sometimes, I guess, uh, working two full time jobs, doing a lot and about that house and ever since then has been a lot better. Now there's been massive ups and downs. Uh, but but I stayed out of trouble since then.

Josh (00:17:45) - So I grew up. I love your story, man. I grew up in South Florida with a bunch of Cuban families, like all my best friends growing up or, you know, Latino and Cuban and, you know, like, I felt like a lot of times, like I was the the minority there. And it was such a beautiful upbringing. And, uh, but one thing I learned about Cuban moms, you do not cross a Cuban mama. Like, what was mama saying to you when you got arrested?

Joel (00:18:09) - Yeah. So my parents are pretty quiet people in general. Um, but but very religious, very Southern Baptist. Religious, I mean, very. And so this broke their heart right here they have this hoodlum son, and, um. My mom didn't didn't say a lot of things other than like, you know what's right and you know what's wrong. I'll tell you this. And my mom is a very strong person. I've never seen someone get up so early and work in the house.

Joel (00:18:38) - From the minute they get up till they got to go to work, and then she'd work all day, a physical job. My mom was a physics teacher in Cuba, but here she didn't speak English, so she cleaned hotel rooms. She worked in a cassette department, building cassettes and all this stuff. And back in the day. And then she'd come home and iron, wash clothes, cook, clean, do everything. And when everybody was asleep in bed, that's when she went and worked. I mean, went to bed, right? So she worked from the minute she got up to the minute you went to sleep, she's almost 80 years old and she's still like that. So, you know, for somebody with that kind of a work ethic, I'm sure it had to hurt her tremendously. The thing is, like I said, she doesn't talk that much about things like that. So it was just a very stern like, you know, better than that. And that that's pretty powerful.

Joel (00:19:20) - I didn't need to get yelled at for sure.

Josh (00:19:22) - So so fast forward, you know, by your first house at 22, you were, you know, you were a lender, a street lender, you know, lending out money, making money over here. And and you learned to work hard. You made a vow to yourself, I will outwork anyone. Right? And you did that for decades. You showed me something. I don't know if you want to talk about this. You showed me something that you've never showed anybody before. You keep something in your wallet that's pretty important to you. Do you mind talking about that?

Joel (00:19:47) - Oh, I'll talk about it. Um, I've showed it to my kids. My wife. And maybe, um, I don't know, a coaching client or something like that. So at one point, I think it was like 2008. I, I've never been good at writing goals because I didn't know why. They say if you write down goals, you're more likely to complete them and hit them and all that.

Joel (00:20:07) - You're X amount percentage. I never understood it. How is the magic of a piece of paper going to make something happen? I didn't know. The next step is you got to create an action plan, but whatever. I was always leaning toward action. So I got a little I typed up on the computer and I printed a paper and it said the year and how much money I'm going to make next year, but then below it, I put the next year. Call it 2008, 2009, 2010. I went down that way and next to it I kept adding 15%. So that was putting some pressure on me to net profit, 15% more every single year. And um, at the time, now that I think about it, at the time, my wife worked. So that may have included both of our income in the beginning, but then she stopped working. That was all on me. So when I hit targets, it was all me. Um, so what happened is I. I let it up to $1 million because that was my goal is to one day net profit.

Joel (00:20:58) - I make no partners, just I make $1 million for the year. And it was funny because as those years went on, I would track it, right. Uh, I would take that little piece of paper out, I'd scratch out the 400,000 and I'd write what I actually did right. And but I could see both. And I did this every year for all these years until I hit a million. And what's interesting is sometimes I was above track or above. Sometimes I was under where I should be. But the year that it was a million and it hit a million, I hit a million and I went over it. And man, that was a I still have. I showed it to you because it was many years ago. It was decades ago. But I still have that piece of paper in my pocket. I never tracked it after that because the goal was to just to net $1 million. And I did it. And, you know, I think it's good to people have these vision boards and I think they're great for the future and what you want to accomplish in the future.

Joel (00:21:51) - I think it's good to have some things about where you came from and where something was a big deal, and then you can appreciate it. So it's important to have those reminders, and I keep it in my wallet for that reason.

Josh (00:22:00) - Yeah. It's special when you hit that, you know, I just spoke with a guy who built and sold his company for a lot of money, and he said he sat there because he had he always had this goal to build something and sell it and have X dollars x commas in his bank account. And then the day he sat across his financial advisor, when the money cleared, he looked at it and he goes, now what? Right. Like I, I hit this goal, this carrot that I've always my whole life. When I have this, I will be happy. When I, when I hit this, I will be fulfilled. And then a lot of guys hit some level of their goal. What was it like for you the day you hit that goal? Like what was going on in your brain, or maybe even the day after you sold your business?

Joel (00:22:45) - Yeah, I think sometimes.

Joel (00:22:47) - So first of all, there's a big problem for guys who sell their business. Sometimes they go into like a depression and that's normal. I read a novel. I think it was a Wall Street Journal article years ago, and I sent it to my mentor, who sold his company for well over 100 million. And I said that this didn't happen to you. Right. And he goes, absolutely. It happened to me. He was so tied into that. And that was his life and that was everything. And when he was gone, it hurt. Well, it didn't happen to me. When I sold the company. I was so happy. Um, because I think I've developed myself beyond a dollar figure or a net worth number because I did the work. I've been doing this work for years before I sold the company, for even years before I hit that million, I was already working on myself, and I knew that. Did it not define me? That's one of those things I get to check off, right? I was always scared of the water because of my upbringing, because of coming here on a boat and the rough seas and all that.

Joel (00:23:38) - So the day about six, six months ago, I got scuba certified. That's one of those things I just get to check off, like, okay, I did that. I heard about ultramarathons once and I go, I want to do that. One day I ran a 50 K, right? So I just want to check off things. And I've been working on myself in that way. So not one of these things can define me if I failed at running a big race. Okay, well that's one, but I got all these other things that I've accomplished in a total of them. I feel good about it. So yeah, I hit that million and and I didn't think that I arrived. I've done it. I probably said, all right, let's see what we can hit next year. But I got to tell you then here's a juxtaposition of what happened. I was, uh, bought a house. I don't know if I told you the story when we were together the other day, but I bought the house that I will never buy a bigger house.

Joel (00:24:26) - I will never buy a nicer house. I don't care to. I don't need to. However, you could buy that house. Oh, and by the way, professional athletes live in this neighborhood. It's very nice. Um, so you should be super excited when you buy that house. And guess what I was. Every day I drive into my community, go through the guard gate, see the country club, the golf courses, my house. I felt this wow. But then after three months, it kind of started slipping a little bit. Why? Because complacency and getting used to stuff, right? Yeah. So then what happened is I was writing bike. It was middle of the summer, middle of the day. We'd lived here about three months and I'm riding bike with my boys, my two older boys. The other two were little babies back then, and I take them two blocks down to a neighborhood I had already jogged through. I'd already ridden bike, but they had it. And I said, well, wait till they see this.

Joel (00:25:12) - And we drive in, we ride in and they go, wow, look at that house and look at that one. And each house was bigger and fancier than the next. And I'm talking close to 20,000 square foot homes on golf courses. Beautiful. And, uh, my kids say, why didn't we buy a house in this neighborhood two blocks away from where we are in our same community? And I said, you know, guys, I could have bought a house here. I could have afforded it. The only problem is, see, we don't have a mortgage on our house. It's paid for. That's nice. If I bought one of these houses, I would be always stressed. Maybe I got to pay an extra seven, eight, 9000 a month property taxes. I'm explaining all of this on the bike ride. I go the property taxes. We have a cleaning lady. Imagine the cleaning lady we need there. It's got to be like every single day. And we all this stress and the air conditioning bill, everything.

Joel (00:25:58) - And I said, but here's the kicker. If we had that house, I'd be so stressed that I'd be at work all day and you guys don't hardly ever see me go to work. I'm always here because I've hit these numbers that I needed to hit, right? But I realize now, after hitting $1 million, my next goal actually became how do I keep it there or keep it going up and not work anymore? So I read the book, uh, Tim Ferriss Four Hour Workweek, and I applied it. And for the last eight years that I ran my company, I was working about four hours a week. So when I explain all this to my boys on the bike ride, we were probably eight and seven at the time. They both said to me, you know what? We don't want one of these houses. We prefer that you're with us all day. And so I got to ride bikes with them, go to the park and do all these fun things. So that's really been my evolution of looking at my.

Joel (00:26:42) - So now I come to my house and I get that feeling I got the first three months. It's magic. It's amazing to be able to get that back, man.

Josh (00:26:49) - I tell you, it's so easy. When you, you know, we went bankrupt and going through the process of bankruptcy because it's like pretty much thrown in a flag, like red flag, like I am a failure. Like you could look me up on public records. Josh Wilson failure. Boom. Right. And then, you know, you start making money and you have some successes and then you, you know, buy another car and then you get the RV, and then you go on these family trips and you and then you start looking at these things of like, oh, when I had that, I'll be happy. And the, the, the problem with that is it the, the line always moves because you get the thing or you achieve the goal. And then there's that law of diminishing marginal return. Like it's just it doesn't bring that same level of satisfaction.

Josh (00:27:35) - And that causes a lot of people to, to become depressed or whatever. So for that. You have devoted your life to personal growth and development, and also personal growth and development of other men. Right. So that's a that's a lifetime goal. It's not associated. Now you have some metrics that you could share, but it's associated to a journey not a destination for you. Do you find that that. Is missing in a lot of dudes. Like we're always looking at the destination, the car, the house, the the boat, the the ring, the the, you know, the girl with this or that, right? Like, what are your thoughts there, man?

Joel (00:28:13) - Yeah. It's like you're focusing on this outer shell. That doesn't matter. Um, I think we have to focus on the right thing. So beautiful house, beautiful car, all these things. But your marriage might suck. Why? Because your focus has been on all these exterior things. And first of all, sometimes I've heard I don't understand this, but sometimes I've heard that people will buy things so that they look good to others.

Joel (00:28:36) - The secret for me, one of the secrets for me, I think I figured out a few things and I'm always learning more, is that I don't care what other people think. I do care what my kids think. I care what my wife thinks. But I mostly care what I think. Um, I haven't bought a new car in years. I buy two year old cars. They've depreciated a ton. I learned that when I was 22 years old in The Millionaire Next Door. It's a great truck. And when they were doing that, I go, I'm doing that. So I'm focusing, I think, on the right things. Um, yeah. But I see guys every day focusing on things. Look, I spoke to a guy yesterday and $3 million house, $300,000 in cars. He has $7,000 in the bank today. He is very stressed out. What do you think those cortisol levels are like? Oh, by the way, not exercising. He's too stressed out to exercise. Um, it's going to cause tensions in his marriage if it hasn't already.

Joel (00:29:27) - It doesn't let him be the best dad he can because he's got two little boys, five and three, and he's busy. He's got a lot going on. Um, he bought this house because it's this big dream house. But isn't part of the dream to be happy and enjoy? He's not enjoying it. Oh, and by the way, it's 45 minutes from his office. Uh, the other one was ten minutes away, and the other one was just fine. It's just that we have this thought of what? I'm going to get this. I'm going to get that. So I can tell you personally, once I start chasing exterior things, my life just took off. What's inside of me now? It's so powerful now. It's not me. It's. It's a way of developing and getting to there. Like someone who can maybe sit and meditate for an hour. I can't do that. But I could be wherever I am, and I'm going to be happy and content and look, it may not be sexy or fun and it's not on Instagram, but.

Joel (00:30:15) - I like having, knowing that the cash flow will be there for life and it's actually going to be there for my kids if that's the way we played it. Um, and I don't have to worry, and I don't care what it looks like on the outside. I remember sitting working a couple hours, a few hours a week, and I'd have my laptop at a Starbucks and it'd be middle of the week. I'd be in shorts, a t shirt and flip flops, just working for an hour. And then I'm going to go out and bike ride or whatever. And I'd see all these guys walking in suits, and I saw the cars they pulled up and and I remember thinking, I would never flash this or say this to anyone, especially make a person feel bad. But I remember thinking, I make more money than all those guys put together, and I have way more money in investments and saved than these guys put together. But it's funny. Look at the life they're living, they're buttoned up and the suit, and I don't know if they're comfortable or not.

Joel (00:31:01) - They're living a dream life. But I can tell you, I'm here flip flops, and I'm living a dream life and making a lot of money and enjoying it and not chasing so much. That's why I started working less. So that's what I try. That's one of many things I try to help people see and once they start seeing it, I've seen those turnaround stories with these guys where they they make that switch and then they become very happy.

Josh (00:31:20) - Yeah, for sure. I'm guilty of that. I am so guilty of that because, you know, you start to gather a following and then you're on, you know, different shows or they, they see you on different platforms or on different stages or something like that. And I remember I was building a media brand and it was iTunes top of charts. And like, people were like, Holy moly, you must be balling. Like you must be making so much money. Like. And they would send me pictures of like, hey, I saw you in this.

Josh (00:31:48) - Whatever. I was going broke. I couldn't even afford the $20 a month like, uh, service fee to keep the podcast going. And I just remember, like, I spent so much time and energy trying to get people to like me, trying to get people to respect me, trying to be this false self. Josh of look at, you know, look how successful Josh is. And it wiped us out. My ego ate all of our money, ate all of our opportunity, and probably through so many hurdles. So what advice do you have for dudes who, like me, struggle with what people think I do? I'm guilty of it. What advice do you have there?

Joel (00:32:29) - All right, so if you are a middle school girl.

Josh (00:32:33) - I act like it sometimes. And I feel like it sometimes.

Joel (00:32:36) - Exactly. If you're a middle school girl and there's that. Oh, I gotta look good. Do I have to wear this face cream on my face or my nails and maybe my outfit? And I get it, because I got a middle school girl, three boys and a girl, and I get it.

Joel (00:32:50) - That's just built in them. They're like that. I would just say, stop acting like a middle school girl. Who cares what anyone think? You're a man? You think your great great great great great great great great grandfather in a cave was like, I don't know, I don't know if people like my my leopard skin that I made myself an outfit with. You wouldn't be alive if that's who you came from. Yeah. You're alive because this guy hunted meat and fed his family and fought off a saber tooth tiger. Be more like that. That guy doesn't care what I drive. Uh, I don't even know it's a Kia, but I don't even know what it's called after a Kia something. And I've had, like, a BMW 740 lie that I bought a year used, so it was less. And I've had convertible Mustangs and I've had nice cars before, all mostly bottom used. But I realized none of that brought me happiness because three months later they come out with a new model and yours is worth way less.

Joel (00:33:44) - So, well, what was I chasing? What was the point of all of that? I went to go see a friend who is an attorney in Boca Raton, Florida, and he has big clients, and he said, hey, I know you've already got all your finances in order and, uh, your trust and living trust and estate planning. Everything's done. But bring it to me. Let me look at it. And here I show up in my normal car and I he opens everything and he's going through stuff, and he goes, dude, this is such a breath of fresh air. And I was confused, like, what are you talking about? And he says, you pull up in that car and these are your finances. I'm impressed. And I go, dude, you, you're in Boca Raton, you have this beautiful office. You see, big time people. You must see this is nothing. This is not that much compared to everybody. You must have. And he says, no, no, no, no, no.

Joel (00:34:32) - They pull up here in Rolls-Royce and Bentleys, and then we look at everything and I go, what a mess. Yes, you've got a $5 million house, but you owe $5 million on it. Yes, you have this and that and they're a mess. So that's not the road. That's not the secret. That's not the trick. In fact, I think that direction will destroy relationships. And it's going to destroy your your self-worth and all of these things, all to chase something that's just illusionary. It's on the outside. It doesn't count.

Josh (00:35:01) - It's fake. It's it's a it's a lie.

Josh (00:35:04) - It's a facade.

Josh (00:35:05) - And and I get caught up in it so easy. And then I have to remind myself, like, what am I grateful for? I have to teach my kids this because my kids, my kids are going to copy and mimic everything I do, good and bad, right? And I just have to remember so many times going, what are we thankful for? What are we? We pause and we're like, we pray and we're like little things like, hey guys, are you thankful that you have air condition? It's cold outside.

Josh (00:35:28) - Are you thankful that you have heat? Right. Some people don't have this right. And I'm it's you have to be so intentional. And I even think more important now in the last 20 years with like social media and seeing, you know, everybody else's perfect lives out there or semi perfect life, you know what I mean? It's we have to be intentional on that. Um, you and I are going to do more of these interviews, but, uh, in the future. But I want to I want to help share, you know, your message and some of the things you're working on. You you wrote a book, you gave me a signed copy, and I'm really grateful for that. Uh, tell us guys about your book. And why are you doing this?

Joel (00:36:04) - Yeah. So I can't do it for free because I noticed then people don't really give it a full effort right at the end. I'll tell you what I charge them. It's a joke. But, uh. Um, so I did a challenge series.

Joel (00:36:18) - I read this book, and I did all the challenges for all these days, and I did it perfectly. And I go, this was amazing. If you put it into it, put in the effort, amazing result. And then I did it again. But this time I told like 20 friends and they all jumped in and did it with me. And we developed it like it wasn't a business. It wasn't for me to write a book. It was so organic, and I love that. It just turned into, hey, a lot of the guys were local near me. Not all of them, but some were. And we said, why don't we do a workout on Friday mornings? All right. I got a three car garage gym, and so we started working out. 6 or 7 would show up on a Friday morning, worked out six in the morning or earlier. That was awesome. And then someone said, why don't we do a zoom? So we built a zoom into it once a week.

Joel (00:37:01) - It was awesome. And then when it was going to end, one of the guys says, dude, you can't end this, let's do it again. But the next time they said, Joel, you put a lot into this charge us. And I didn't even. I was like, no, I don't want to charge. And then they said, look, just charge them and convince me. And they go do it for $199 for 31 days. We're gonna go over all these. We have a WhatsApp group. We communicate every day. I put little lessons in there. Some of these guys are guys I coached before. So then that second class, some of those guys said, you know, the day about finances, it was good. The day about this was good. But you've worked with me on all those things and I like your approach better. Why don't you write a book? And then like, seven guys told me that. And then a friend of mine in jiu jitsu, he's an army captain.

Joel (00:37:39) - Uh, he's out of the army now. He's an attorney. Uh, and he's written, like, seven top selling books. He's talking to Netflix about a series. Now he goes, you want to write a book? I go, yeah, I think I'm going to do about this, this and this. And it was around Halloween. And he said, there's no reason you don't have that done by the end of the year. I go, thank you. That's my I love that. So I had it done on December 30th of last year. So uh, or I guess now a year and a month. And so I wrote the book, put this program in place, and now it's 24 guys go through every class. It's $199 for the 31 days. Now. There's software to it. There's a there's all kinds of stuff I built around it now, but that's it for 31 days, $199. I gave him an accountability partner within the group. We do all these physical challenges as well as mental and self-development challenges.

Joel (00:38:24) - And I tell the guys, if this doesn't have an impact on your life, I'll give you your money back. I don't need your money. I want to be around guys who just succeed with this. And that has led to something amazing again, organic. This was in a business I was trying to help my friends keep getting better. And, um, what happened is one of the guys in day two, uh, class two on the finance day found $50,000 of leaks in his business, meaning he was overpaying on this contract. He was doing this. He wasn't negotiating rates, and he did it. And he found 50,000 like that saved in one year. Guess what? This year, second year, he's saving that again and saving. So he said, you can't let this go man. Let's create a maintenance program and not just keep doing the same class. So we created the Brotherhood. Uh, it started less than a year ago. We have 64 guys in there, and I bring them amazing speakers, an annual retreat, uh, just, you know, business speakers, uh, MMA fighters, UFC fight.

Joel (00:39:18) - I brought them all kinds of interesting guys that they really get a kick out of and self-development and all this which, by the way, that it's all organic. I had about 20 something guys ask me, dude, that's changed my life, can you do a women's program? And I kept saying, I'm not the guy. I'm not going to teach women. That came. Then came my wife alone, retired registered nurse, cancer survivor, mother of four. Works out 1 to 3 times a day. Six pack. Uh, jiu jitsu, a badass girl. Amazing. Beautiful, I love her. Been married over 21 years. Like yesterday, before class in jiu jitsu. Someone said you guys never fight, huh? And she says, 21 years. I don't think we fought. We have. We really know what we're doing. I think because we work at it really hard. I'm not focused on buying the Lamborghini. I'm focused on building a great relationship with her. She wrote a book.

Joel (00:40:02) - It's called It's My Turn. So now she just kicked off her first women's class. 24 women are in it. They're in day 14 right now, and they're doing it and they're building a sisterhood. So this is what we get to do now. It's an absolute gift. I get the most beautiful life because I get to be around these guys, and I'm seeing the impact it's making.

Josh (00:40:19) - Yeah. Now, you haven't fought in 21 years. And she's, you know, she she's the jiu jitsu girl and your jiu jitsu guy. If you did fight, could she take you?

Joel (00:40:29) - Uh, she could defend better now than she would have.

Joel (00:40:32) - Because after.

Joel (00:40:34) - Being in it for over two years, I noticed when I roll with her now, her defense has gotten good. She can't tap me. I'm a guy and I weigh £3,540 more than her. But. But she's tough. I told her the other day, I said, I never want you to get attacked by a guy. However, if he's not trained, I think you're going to choke him out.

Joel (00:40:54) - You're going to be able to take his back, put hooks in and and put him to sleep and put him to sleep big time. Uh, you know, if he's attacking you, he's got a knife in his hand, so I hope she never gets attacked. But, God, if it happens, I hope it's on film so I can show that to the world and get more women involved in jiu jitsu.

Josh (00:41:10) - Yeah, well, you're awesome, man. For guys who are interested in your book, interested in your challenge, and maybe, you know, becoming a part, you know, earning their way into the Brotherhood, where could people go to do that?

Joel (00:41:22) - 31 Daily challenges.com. Uh, if not, I mean, that's the website, but if they ever go to Joe gandara.com, it transfers you right there. The number three the number one daily challenges.com.

Josh (00:41:33) - Yeah. During this interview there's probably a question that I should have asked you or a topic that I should have, you know, dove in before we say goodbye.

Josh (00:41:40) - What is that question I should have asked you? Hmhm.

Joel (00:41:45) - Well, the last thing we discussed. You. You made a good point about being grateful. Um, I think that we have to find. I agree. And moving forward with action, I think relieve stress makes you feel better, makes you happier if you're growing, if you're learning stuff, if you're getting better in a sport, whatever it is. The other trick is grateful. You have to be grateful. Gratitude. And that's what you were touching on. Um. I found a trick. Look, I have a lot of tricks, and I. My kids call them Gandara tricks because I always, when they go. Oh, when I teach them something. And I'll tell you a stupid one. I don't if you come over to my house or I go to your house and you say, hey, Joel, here's that wrench I borrowed from you, and I grab it, I'm not going to hold it the whole time we're together.

Joel (00:42:32) - I'm not going to put it in my pocket. That's uncomfortable. I'm going to put it down. Put. I'm gonna put my keys on it. Right. That's a Gandara trick I taught my kids. Do these Gandara tricks. Only we know about it. I tell them this when they're little. And now all these tricks are normal and they live a more productive life, is they're not looking for stuff. They're not wasting time. But one of those hacks that I found is to be grateful. But you have to have something, not a thought, because a thought is fleeting and it goes away. But I have something in my closet that every day makes me happy, but to the point where not just for one second, it's changed my life. Um, all my shirts are like this in my closet, all in order, but there's one shirt that's facing me, and it's the one when I walk in, when I come into my room, my closet. And it's the shirt that I wore on the boat when I came from Cuba.

Joel (00:43:16) - And for me, it is the most powerful thing. I walk in and every I walk into my closet a couple of times a day and I go, oh yeah, oh yeah, life could be way worse. I could be like those other 12 to 15 first cousins of mine that I've never known and visited. I could be like them and not have an opportunity. So it does two things. It makes me grateful for what I have. And then it's the other one is a reminder of, oh yeah, I'm like the chosen one. I got this opportunity, I better make it happen. And if you don't have something like that in your life, honestly, it should be something like an American flag. Go to poverty stricken countries and go see what being born there and losing the birthplace lottery looks like. Because you could be that same person being born in Somalia and in Chad and some Haiti and some very poor countries. But you were lucky enough to either be born here or became a resident here, or a citizen.

Joel (00:44:08) - That alone should be a massive opportunity. When I had my warehouse, I had a massive American flag. I don't even know the size hanging from the rafters. And some American clients of mine came over from Virginia and they go, what do you have that flag for them? So big, right? There they go. What, are you kidding me? Is the best country in the world. I'm so happy to be here. And they were a little confused. Maybe because they've been here for 20 generations and they don't get it. But if you can find how much better you have life than how bad it could be. And that's one of those tricks.

Josh (00:44:37) - Yeah. So beautiful.

Josh (00:44:39) - One more time.

Joel (00:44:40) - Your website 31 Daily challenges.com.

Josh (00:44:44) - Cool fellas listening in. As always, reach out to our guests. Hey, thanks for being on the show, for sharing their journey, sharing their story. Uh, connect with them and say thank you first of all and then find ways to work with them. Like if you are needing help or needing, you know, this kind of advice or support in your world, reach out and ask for help.

Josh (00:45:02) - Say, hey, I heard you on the show, I need help, so do that. Um, if you are dude out there or person out there who has some good advice for for men, head on over to Uncensored Advice for men.com. Fill out a quick form and maybe get you on the show here to share your uncensored advice for dudes. I love you guys and we'll talk to you all on the next episode.

Josh (00:45:21) - Bye bye.