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Hey hey, hey, oh we are back. We are black extra black. You're gonna see why in a minute.
Back in blacker than ever.
Yes, and we're broad Ambition. Hey Manja, are you excited about today's show? Like I'm excited about today's show?
I mean, you know, when you get a couple of y chromosomes in the mix, you know that aren't related to you, you might like, put a little extra, something extra, put a little messcar on, get all excited. Yes, I'm excited because I feel like these guys from Earn Your Leisure,
where the hell did they even come from? I know it was like we were out here, you know, doing Brown Ambition, doing our thing, and then all of a sudden, it's like wait, or eyl is everywhere everywhere and they have blown up and it's been I almost thought, where have I been? These guys must have been around for years, but no, they've only been around for a couple of years. Eyl is everywhere and Tiffany, they're on the show today.
You're going to talk about some investing. We're going to talk about some very important questions such as which of these guys is single.
Because you guys asked, don't act like you wasn't in my DMS. Some of you, I'm not going to name names. We're in my DMS asking.
So it's been very lonely, lonely in this virtual world for a lot of people. So we'll try and help me all out. But how is book launch week going? Wait? This is book? This is two week two week one? Whatever?
Well this is like almost like basically the completion of the first week.
Yes, you're still standing and we are sitting you look for listen for having just launched an international bestseller.
I'm just like, it's a little bit of makeup. I'm not gonna lie no, but honestly, I have to say I feel really good because and I'll be able to share because I think it's you know, aside from like you know, this is not even book promotion, but it would be nice maybe if we had a show to
talk about, like what does it look like? So I like write a book and put one out because there's so many things that we learn and I have to say my I'd asked my agent, Heather, you know, to give me some numbers, like what is good as far as first week, what is great and what is unicorn? And Heather doubled what unicorn was because I mented it today to Penguin. I was like, okay, so I hear
these are our numbers. This is really great. Heather told me that's unicorn, that that good is five thousand, greatest, ten and twenty is unicorn. She's like, no, ten is unicorn. Hardly anybody does that in the first week. I'm like yeah, but but she's like, yeah, Heather motivated you. And we've done more than that. And it's been and I didn't
have a concept what's the lot? And all of my friends in the book world are like, uh, Tiffany, because I'm like, well, that doesn't seem like that much considering how side the audience are like, no, people don't buy books like they used to, and money books especially, they're not exactly you know, people would like to beat fantasy and you know, honestly, romance novels are still killing it children's books, but money books not so much. So we've
unicorned out and my team is amaze balls. And I will know very soon actually today when this podcast comes out, I know by the end of the day whether or not I've hit specific lists that I was six, I don't want to drink you.
Know what list or no list? It is. So I got my book by the way, finally, I don't know why it took forever. I was like Amazon, where are you? But what there was and I've seen it, like I'm looking at the cover right now behind you that beautiful you know, Michael's portrait at your book cover. But there was something when I held it and I just felt that and this is so good. This is like I don't know, Tiff, I don't know. I think when you told me you were writing a book, I didn't really appreciate.
I mean at the time I was like, of course you are, you've done. You're like, yeah, it's like a book, but there's something about whole I don't know, it just really hit me. I'm just so I'm just gushing. I'm so happy.
No same. I think it's like when you do a thing, it's like I knew that you were gonna because where you work now was like my dream bank. Like when they first opened, I was like, oh, it's like the bloodgates opened, like you know, a sizeable bank that actually like it was good to people and had a great customer service, like it was my dream bank and now here you are with a C in front of your your title. It's like, wait, what a minute ago it was Hi, my name is Mandy, would you up? I
would love if I could interview you for business. Inside, I was like, I don't know who she is, but it's a theo to be here with you. Honestly, it's it is. I just love to see our growth together, you.
Know, like, yeah, yeah, it's a privilege, it is it. There's just it just feels like I don't know my experience seeing you grow and seeing you always talk about the acorns? Is that the kind of tree that you plant? And then it's like, you know, you grow whatever analogy that was that Proverbs? You know, I feel like I was I got to see the acorn planted and how you tended to it, and I'm gonna I don't My gardening knowledge is not that. But you like watered it and you gave it fertilized.
Let the sunshine sign. But yeah, yes, yeah, podcast. Remember I told you, like, I'm just so used to because I've known you for so many years now, and we get out here, we chit chat, and it didn't hit me just how big our reach was until I was in Chicago a year was it two years ago? Two years ago for Lovey's wedding, and it come downstairs my African garb ready to go, and someone said and I was like yeah, and he he meanwhile said abission. I was like, wait what He was like, I don't he
didn't know me from any other place. He was like from bran ambishon is manny with you? And it like it was like the first time that I realized, yo, what we've built this thing? You know that like and then after that, everywhere I was going, like I went to I was at home depot buying plants and so I was like, oh my god, tifp me from b bish Tiff. So I know you don't like hugs, but I gotta give you one and give one to Mantua.
And I was just like yeah, because we like, I feel like I feel so low key about what we do. But the number of lives that we've touched, we have been consistent for for over five years, and Dawn, it's not easy for a podcast to.
Do, no, but it never I mean there's obviously some days it felt like work. Yeah, but from like ninety five percent of the time. It's a joy. I don't know, it's just it's a joy. So and I and I am just I am just dancing in the sunshine, all this glitter spark around you. I'm just at the party. I'm just here whatever. So, but congrats on all the success. Get It with Money dot Com, y'all. It's not too late.
It's not too late to buy your book. And are you doing I mean where you're I feel like you're everywhere and that you're on the Today Show today or you were if people are listening to the show now. But what are you doing a like a live event tour? Where are people gonna like? Where is this going?
Well? I do have so I did like a like a I guess like we did a virtual like launch like the day of on the thirtieth. I'm not gonna say, I know, Lovey did like you know, six events. I was like, the way my I want to stay married is set up, plus I want to sleep, So not that. But what we are going to do is we're doing a virtual summit. So it's gg WM Virtualsummit dot Com for Get Go with Money. So we're doing a virtual summit with.
Them have all the domains.
Yes, with about I think it's six of them six five oh five of the of the women that I that I interview as for their expertise in the book are are going to be speakers at the summit. So that will be really awesome if you want to join us GGWM Virtual Summit dot com. I don't know, like I'm actually taking six weeks off. I can't wait.
Yeah, I mean I'm excited for you. I'm also excited for BA because you're gonna got some special guest co hosts.
Because Sis needs to bring. If y'all know me, I have not taken a true, true break in so long. So this is as a result of doctor green shout out to her. She's like, I think I want you to take a month. I was like, oh, I can't do a month. She said, oh, you're right, six weeks. I was like, wait what because she was like, no.
No, you have to put on your French. They do it all the time.
I know. But plus two wild good behavior. You know what I told Doctor Greeny the other day, like, I remember when we had our rich journey on what.
Their name Christina and Aman, Yes, and.
Remember the level of joy they were emoting, we were like, what are you guys on?
Yeah, you know, I had the same reactions as we talk later on the show with Ernier Leisure and their friend Ian, who was like, I want to hang out with y'all because I just want to be just some of that to rub off on me. So yeah.
So but I told doctor Green when I first started working with her that I wanted that whatever they were on, and it wasn't because of money, it was they had
created the life that they truly loved. And I told that to doctor Penne and she reminded me of that when I spoke to her last and she said, you were sounding closer and closer to that the way you described to me, and it just made me feel really happy because remember before I was like, I'm not crying, I'm not happy, and that said I cry away more now, which is great, not in a bad way, but like, you know, just like in a feeling I'm feeling.
Yeah.
So yeah, I just you know, I try to be transparent here for y'all. So it's because I don't believe, like I love the way Mannie you were so transparent about the struggles with being pregnant and what does that look like? And how we couldn't do the podcast because it's so overwhelming. And I think it's important for people to see as much as we've achieved these markers of external success, that it's hard, you know, and what it
looks like to try to readjust to recalibrate. And you know, I don't want you to look at my life and think it's perfect, because I'm always trying to make things better and sometimes quite honestly, it sucks and I'm trying to realign so I could be happy again. But I'm feeling like that more and more. But yeah, I'm just like I said, I'm just proud of us over we've really grown up together. I feel like we're just like these like real real grown ups, you.
Know, yeah, and that we're achieving joy. And I mean, I don't know. I at this point, I feel like life is icing, you know. I've been blessed in so many ways and I just wake up. I don't know. I'm trying to pinpoint when when was the shift. Probably when the baby started sleeping through the night, when I started to feel this sense of I was like I made it through something and now everything is icing. And if we can. I just got my first dose of the vaccine today. I've never been My arm is so sore,
and I'm so happy because I know it's working. I'm just like I wanted it to be sore, you know, like just let me know. Like when you put your fancy face stuff on and it stings, it's like, yes, yeah, it's wurky, but I just so grateful. It just yeah, I'm grateful.
And it's how you're on social I'm like, oh, Mandy is living her best.
I'm living. I don't know what it is. I'm just I love myself, I love my family, I love this body that I'm in. I love I don't know, man, I guess I'm just tired of not I'm tired of being the reason I'm not in a good mood, you know what I mean? Or I was. I mean, there's obviously some things that you can that you're out of your control and all that kind of thing. And I have been dealing with mental health, and I will say shout out to zoloft and all of my my psychiatrist
and my therapist and all that. But yeah, I just I choose joy, do you know what I mean? Like I just I try to choose it every day. My husband's like, why don't you choose joy more when you're yelling at me for like washing the car for five hours on a Saturday. Anyway, anyway, just more of this, please, I'm more joy is good for everyone. But yeah, first dose of the vaccine. Have you gotten your vaccine yet?
I don't think we've talked about that, because yeah, honestly, I was afraid of being down, and I was like, I don't you know, I don't have the two days to be so Thankfully in newer now anybody can kind of walk up. So I'm looking into the go next week. But I do have to because I even pause the IVF because you know, we have our one good embryo left, okay, and I did not. My husband's like, but I thought we were gonna say I was like, honestly, the level
of although it's exciting, it's still very stressful. I did not want to try to battle like book launch and then also like doing my shots and everything else. So now that like the heaviest of the heavy lifting is for the most part over, So I'm going back to IVF, so I have to check, like what you know, like you know what I mean, like when can I do IVF and the shot? Do I have to if I do this shot this month or I have to wait? So I'm actually checking in with my with my doctor
this month. So who who wished me look on that? I just feel and also too, I really feel just on a better spot space where like, you know, because you want if you're trying to have a baby, you know, you hope that you're able to do so from a place of calm, enjoy and happiness. Doctor said it best. She said joy is a creative space, that it's fertile ground for creativity, it's expansive and so I just feel, you know, I feel just really like really good and
blessing to your point, life is certainly certainly icing. Speaking of icing, we're about to have our interview with the boys and we have the icing is Ian?
Oh, yes, Ian Dunlap. Who who you know? When you like see someone after a while, you're like, where do I know you from? Because when we first got on, I was like Ian, uh huh, Ian, Yeah do you want to know you?
Oh?
You're with them? Okay, now I know who you want? But yes, Ian from what is that market? Monday's the podcast. They're they're huge podcasts. So yeah, well we are. I mean, without further ado, let's yes, let's let's let's let the people have what they want, which is a conversation with the earn your Leisure Gentleman Rashad bi Lal, Troy Millings with special guest Ian Dunlip. This was one of my favorite uh DA hosted video guest interviews ever, So I
hope you guys enjoy all Right, we are. I can't even tell you, guys how how long this has been in the making in my own dreams, but it hasn't been that long since I was like, Tiffany, do you know do you know Troy and Rashaw? Can you can you them on? You know, Tiffany's friends. I'm always trying to just like weasel my way in there, but I'm so excited to have you guys on the show. The Biggest can we say the Biggest business? Okay, Ian's got it. I do you want to do.
Then leisure platform?
There is.
Platform, there is.
And trug gonna be humble. You know they went to church yesterday.
I didn't.
The Biggest.
Let me finish. Let me finish for those of you you may be living under a rock, but I have a feeling if you're listening to Run Ambition, you must have seen Troy and Troy and Rashad's podcast Earn Your Leisure, which is so much bigger than a podcasts. They have a podcast network. Some of our friends around that network. We've had Cash Cash on the show before. We are so thrilled to have you guys here. So welcome, first and foremost to Troy and Rashad, Welcome to them an Ambition.
I want to thank you for having.
This is the girls room. This is like the Girls done.
Yeah, you're ready.
We have a handful of dudes that listen house plans we do. We always teach them like we're not talking to you right now, but you can listen. No, it's so excited for you to be here because everywhere I go, everywhere we go people we go, people are like, have you heard of Earned your Leisure? Or they're like, you know, Tiffany,
I heard you on Earn your Leisure? You know, and so you have transformed the culture as it relates to personal finance, and so for that we are appreciative because normally, like you know, our audience is typically women, right, Mandy would say, like I said, we've got guys, but.
We got some guys, right, But yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. But you know, but our mission when we started was to you know, this was six years in the making, this six years ago that we were starting to make the show, and our mission was there's no black women talking about finance and career and investing in all of all that and all that, and that's why we That was really the audience we were speaking to. And I
feel like y'all have just exploded. And also, you know, y'all, y'all are helping normalize black and brown black people, black men, especially talking about finance and business.
And I never have more men slip into my DMS in a respectful way than when I'm on yourself for real, because nobody knows I'm married my husband sixty six. You don't want it and he's from there. But I love like queen. I think you want what l.
Queen.
Gentlemen gentlemen, So no, yeah.
So welcome, welcome, welcome. So we're not going to we want to maximize your awesomeness. I am going to me and Mandy, well, well, we'll shoot and fire away at some questions. Well, and I'd like to know some like origin stuff before we get into like actual like technical questions. So like how did this all begin? Because you guys have had like an like a shot like shot of rise to like start them honestly, So how did it? How did it start?
Yeah, for sure, I'll give you the whole story. So we started. Me and Troy been friends all our lives pretty much ever since like middle school, so you know we always was friends, always talking about you know, sports and rap and all that kind of stuff. And me, you know, being a financial advisor after I got finished college, and Troy being a teacher. You know, he brought me in the classroom and he started teaching financial literacy to kids,
and that was really the start of it. And then from there that kind of blossomed to me, you know, developing an Instagram page, and you know, from there that that led to people asking for a podcast, that led to you know, starting of Earning Your Leisure, which you know, we started off talking about you know, backstories of entrepreneurs and the backstories and different businesses things of that nature, and then that kind of transformed into deep dives into
different industries that transformed it's like a domino effect. Then that transformed and to where we have now, which is a platform so earn your leasure, not just the podcast as a platform. So like we have Inin on with us right now, our partner on market Mondays, and that's the first show that we actually like executive produced, if you would say, Umbrella and Now's the stock Show, And that became one of the top investment shows on the internet.
So one domino kind of led to the next. But it really all started in the classroom and then from there, which I know you can appreciate, Tiffany, you being a teacher, a former teacher, and then that from there that just kind of led to what we do now, which I still feel like is a form of teaching, just in a different variety and not in a classroom, but you know, on the internet for the whole world to see.
Yeah, I mean there's so many similarities. And from what we were doing the summer internship program. Kids would come in, we would interview them and they would tell us about the future aspirations, and then we would go out in the community and try to pair them up with that future aspiration, whether it be a pediatrician, electrician, an architect, and so they would get the six weeks of experience of being what it's like, seeing what it's like to
be in that profession. And so if you think about it, that's kind of what we do now. We just we're actually showing people the professions, whereas the kids were going to see it and they will report back to each other. And two things I always say that can happen from an internship. You can say, yeah, I really like this, I want to pursue this in the future, or no way, this is too boring, I never want to do this.
But you're getting that experience at fourteen, whereas most people are getting that after they've graduated from college, which is going to cost you a lot of money. And so that was our goal. And now we're doing that to the world. Right We're introducing them to so many different careers so they can say, you know what, I want to pursue this, and they might be doing it at sixteen, they may be doing that at fifty, but they have their eyes open to so many different fields now.
So it started from an internship program, correct.
Yeah, So at the end of the internship, the kids were going to get paid like five hundred dollars, and so it was their first time at fourteen, it's your first time coming in contact with money. I knew that, and I said. He was like, you said, he was on his financial advising career. And I'm like, I think you should come and teach these kids about money.
Man.
It's probably vital that they know what the value of it is, what they should do with it, because most of the kids at fourteen's like, all right, that's back to school shopping. I'm buying the new Sniggers. I'm buying some jeans. And they didn't realize after they bought the singers and the jeans, they had more money left.
That's like half an AirPod? Why are they so expensive?
Will you'll?
Girl just lost? I'm like, you've got your pop money. She actually does, because she's like, I work for you, so I send you.
The Metro North still has one half of my AirPods, and I will be not forgotten. Speaking of the Metro North, I was going to work this in do y'all Are y'all from Westchester?
Yeah?
I read them right.
I live.
To the town.
I live in Greenberg.
No you don't, I do, I do.
I just moved here a few years ago. Yeah, my husband's from Manhattan. Y'all are from the Bronx.
Right, originally born in Where do you go when.
You're from the Bronx, either Westchester or Jersey me and up going to Chester.
It's not to late for Jersey. You can come on.
It's an interesting dynamic because it's like your your husband.
He's black, he's Dominican.
Dominican. Okay, so he's black my book.
But you know, we have those discussions, but we'll continue. This isn't about that.
But that's a different that's a different conversation.
But now, you know, growing up, that was the thing, like you know, if you if your parents did decent for themselves, like you said, and where we're from, Greenberg is actually one of the only towns in America where it's like a suburb, but it's like ninety percent black.
Yes, it's a black like middle class That is what we loved about it.
Yeah, working class suburb, which is an interesting dynamic because what's justter County, like where we come from, is very segregated place and you know, majority of it is like very well to do white neighborhoods, but then you have pockets where it's all black, Like we're from Greenberg, Mount Vernon, South Yonkers Peak Skill. So it's interesting. That's an interesting
study in geography. You know, it's kind of off topic a little bit, but we're still talking about finance where it's like, you know, segregation is still alive and people just don't realize exactly. It's like they just are forced to move to certain neighborhoods, or they move to certain neighborhoods, and it's like, it's just interesting that this small town that we live in twenty minutes outside the Bronx and ninety percent of the people migrated from the Bronx and it's all black.
They could have moved anybody.
Crazy, many is that in that in the program, we actually did a project on the segregation of our town because it's tool.
I want to read it. I love the history. Yeah, I don't want to know everything about it.
It's very interesting, especially when you break it down to the school districts. So yeah, we'll talk, we'll talk after this.
Yeah, well we talked about this on the show, just like you know, as an investment home ownership being this
you know pathway too. We're gonna talk about investing home ownership being this traditional form of wealth building in black and brown communities, and seeing why I had to reckon with the fact that, oh, I could afford a house here, because unfortunately it seems like home values have been yes, increasing, but not as you know, not as expensive as other areas in Westchester, and you have to think about, oh, well, there's racism.
And the homes don't appreciate the same level where we're from. Like any other place in Westchester, the homes appreciate much higher, but ironically, for some reason, in the Black neighborhood, the homes don't appreciate the same value as anywhere else in the county. So it's an interesting study. I actually would like to hit Ian's perspective on that too, because.
I was going to say, I would like to, like, I think, because having Ian here is special as well, and I'd love to hear some of the background, like how did you get here? How did you link with your leisure? You know, but how did you even get to the space where you knew? Like honestly, like my sister loves you know, everybody knows on the on the show, they're always like, bring care along. That's my sister who
gives us all of our our stock tips. Who she's like, now, I'm good, but she you are one of the few people that she's like, Yo, he's dope.
You know.
Yes, I'd love to know. How'd you get here, how'd you learn what you learn? How'd you connect with her? Your leisure?
It came out of pain. So I went to Indiana University. I'm from northwest Indiana. I grew up twenty minutes from Chicago. In nineteen ninety nine and two thousand, my dad gave a guy some money because he was in construction, got lost all the money lost one hundred and fifteen thousand on like three months doing option trades. And there was a guy's first three months with the firm literally told him, hey,
it just happened. And my dad was like, what do you mean, It just happens, like there was no care, no compassion. So that was my first introduction. Second introduction Indiana University. I'm walking from Valentine. Kudos Andy Shiftman, he's an agent now in the NBA, and he was like, Yo, Cuban made this crazy trade with Yahoo, which crazy enough.
EYL went to interview him about, you know, fifteen years later, but Mark Cuban had She's so broadcast dot Com to Yahoo and then got the stocks and then shortened it as a FELLO took that money and then invested long term into the market. So I had an exposure to what happens when things don't go well and then this other side of like, even when the market goes down, you can make money. So one of my buddies worked for JP Morgan in two thousand and seven. He worked
for a big firm. He told me everything to invest in the recession. Guess what I did did not listen. He called me four months later and he was like, Okay, I'm about to retire. He was thirty five. He was like, you can liquidate everything that I told you to get and I was like, loqu what He was like, no, I'm about to retire. He was like, you didn't buy what I told you. And he was already rich. But he still retired to this day from two thousand and
eight from those investments. And I was like, see what had happened? Was I was going to I went on a day too, And that was my first lesson of like, these recessions and huge crashes are immense opportunities to us.
We panic, but for other people, they end up profiting from it.
So from that point on, I was like, I'll never get called not knowing what a recession is and how to take advantage of it, and I will post on Facebook and share stuff with my friends for free. And then one of my friends Jury introduced me to Troy Rashott and then of course, you know, they didn't know me, and it's so many we all know this. We see people people who post online who act like they're the greatest, but they're not good at their craft. So it took
them a while to like warm up to me. But after we connect and did episode seventy end up being a classic. And then from there goes to the Power Partnership. I'm like, hey, we should do a podcast together because I like working with other people, but in particularly I
like working with us, because let's be honest. In twenty ten, when I was talking about investing and using rap references in basketball references, it was looking down upon it, like, no one wants to hear that perspective of the market from Alanovs, you know, And I'm like, but my people in the barbershop get that they don't understand what a derivative is or a synthetic instrument.
They're like, oh, what is that? A beat machine?
Like?
What's that? So making it plain made it fun.
And I think we should in a wave to make it acceptable for us to be us and invested in the market. And last year I think our growth was the biggest in investing in this entire history.
So who can I ask y'all a question going back to your origins? What I know? So Rashad financial advisor? I and you also worked in wait, JP Morgan or is that a buddy No, that was.
My buddy mom. I'm an investor. I just didn't learn how to.
Do it on my own d y investing. So Troy educator teach? What did you teach?
I taught health science and physics.
So I was like, coach Troy, you can call coach exactly right. But but y'all, I mean, and I know Ian you kind of shared some of your early financial inspirations. But for Troy and Rashad, I mean, who was it? How did you end up here? I think for personally, you know, I accidentally ended up in personal finance, you know, kicked on my butt as a millennial in the Great Recession, Tiffany's story. I think it's very well known about, you know,
a similar comeback story after the recession. But yeah, what what what what drives y'all? What's your inspiration financially? Who or what is your inspiration? What was that moment for y'all?
I mean for me, I think my dad was definitely a major inspiration for me. Like I grew up in the household. Like my mom is a teacher and she's like very you know, ultra paycheck, Like she has no heart to be an entrepreneur, like she needs to have a paycheck. She's not feeling an entrepreneur life. And part of that is that, you know, my dad's entrepreneur's whole life,
but you know, being an entrepreneur's ups and downs. So, you know, I grew up in the household where you know, I saw like, you know, financial issues, like you can see.
Like you know what I'm saying. As you get older, you start to you.
Know, realize what's going on, and you know, you see fights and arguments and it's like you said this last time, I'm not you're not.
Borrowing more money from me.
DA, So it's like you start to see, like there's good months and then there's bad months, but that's the life of an entrepreneur. But I always appreciated that, you know, he didn't have to work for anybody, and you know, he he always had that that like do self mentality, and that's something that I always wanted to do. I never really wanted to work for anybody. I never was good at following orders or following directions. It's something I never never was good at. So I always knew I
wanted to be an entrepreneur my whole entire life. I just wasn't sure exactly what direction I wanted to go in. So, you know, business is something that I always fell in love with, Like even when I was young, I loved the stock market, like just movies like Wall Street and Barbarians at the Gate. Like I was watching these movies when I was twelve years old. It was just something
about I wanted to be a corporate takeover artists. It was just fascinating to me, Like you know, growing to Wall Street when I was a kid and just seeing everything move so quickly, it just was like fascinating to me. So I always wanted to be involved in the stock market. I always wanted to, you know, be in the industry.
But you're different. You weren't like most twelve was. Do you think it was because living in Manhattan, you know, Wall Street was so close but so far. Do you think that was part of the allure?
Nah, not really, because most of the people that I grew up with didn't share the same ambition or the same passion for business or stocks that I had. So I don't know, I don't I don't know what it was, but I guess. You know, sometimes in life, you just you know, you can just see a kid and you're like, he's going to be like that help too, yeah, seeing it, Yeah for sure. But even now, I mean, I have siblings and they're not entrepreneurs. They didn't they didn't go
down that route. And they're older than me, so I'm the youngest. So you know, I just think sometimes you just have things that's just wide in your brain. And like I said, I always had an issue with authority, like you know, even playing basketball player.
But no, you don't really me and Mandy ben hard headed.
I think that you know that that's a gift that the courage, but more of a gift, more of a gift because it forced me to figure out you know, I never really had a real job. So I had a job one time at Target for two weeks when I was in college.
I got fired. I got fired after I think like ten days you just left kind of. I got fired at me.
Like a two hours un I feel like.
Like a two hour lunch. But they're like, look, this isn't gonna.
Work out the thirty minute lunch break trash though.
You know that's a true story. That's a true story. Yeah, I came home from college. He's like, what I'm gonna do? He's like, Yo, you think I could teach. I'm like, I don't know if that's gonna be fair.
Wait so rashad. Okay, so you're this like budding entrepreneur very you know, it sounds like you're very risk tolerant. If we can use some you know, investing speak. So Troy public Education, I'm sensing maybe you were. Well, you tell me your story, because y'all.
The my parents, I'm first generation. My parents are from Jamaica, and so we would you know, we would exactly exactly. I mean they installed hard work, hard work, hard work, and they instilled like being a certain profession, and teaching wasn't one of them. I kind of just stumbled upon it because I naturally had to work at kids. Our first job was working at a community center as counselors, and so I always worked with kids, and I love sports.
I thought it was gonna play sports, and so my biggest inspiration with athletes and rappers like straight up like Jay and Puffer with inspirations for me, obviously, Michael Jordan was an inspiration, and I thought like, you know what if I can't play sports, I want to be around it at least, and so I initially wanted to be a physical therapist, and very quickly I was like, why am I doing this? I hate science, Like this is
just too many science courses. I'm not going to make this, and so I just put the two natural things that I knew. I knew working with kids, I knew sports, and so I said, I'm going to teach his head. So my biggest inspirations with that. And once I knew that I wasn't going to make money from sports, I said, let me find a professional in sports that I can make money. So sports medicine became a thing, and then obviously it fell out, But you know, my inspirations are
around me my friends. Like I said, I've know Shotty pretty much my whole life. He's been an entrepreneur most of my entire like since i've known them, right, And so our other partner, Mike, is an entrepreneur as well. And so imagine the text messages as I'm going to work and they're just waking up. But I was thinking, they're like, look, man, you know what, You're not going to be doing this for long, And I'm like, now,
I really love this. You know, like when you when you're working around kids and you see your purpose and you realize how different you are in the education field, and you know there's not going to be anybody that replaces if you leave, you become more passionate. But I've always had the entrepreneurial mindset, and I think we had an argument once. He was like, yeah, you got a boss, and I'm like, no, I don't have a boss. I
work for myself. Do the real bosses of the kids that I'm so those kids were my boss because they would be able to tell me how I was doing on a daily basis, whereas the principal, I know more about this profession that I'm doing than he does. And so if I do my job, I look good and so to see and if he does his job, we all look good. And so we work in this together. I always looked at everybody as my colleague, and they were like, yeah, sounds good, but you got a boss.
People always hating on teachers, but you know, like sure, you know, like when you teach, you are literally equipped to do just about anything, anything anything, because like you're like a psychologist, You're a CEO of that classroom. You're the CFO. You got to deal with teacher social work, and then every year it flips and you got to.
Learn and readjust the relation skills a great every kindness like you two are too, the kindness like we're shouting out rough that authority thing. We'd be like, all right, like we're shouting failed in just fail.
You guys are a lot more patient, like you're gonna get it.
Yeah.
When he came into the classroom, I know, joke, when he came in and he credit to him because he's gotten a lot better with actually being in from the classroom, he would get their attention like all right, all right, all right, all right, and like going to work, I'm like, now we got to ease it. We got to ease it in. Then we got to ease this this thing again. But yeah, me so, And this is something that I want people to realize, Like I don't come from a
business background. My business comes from watching my brothers and watch my friends be entrepreneurs and learning that. And so it's encouraging because it's like, look, you can do this. It takes a lot of research, it takes a lot of homework and touches a lot of discipline, but you know, anybody can do it if you put the right the right amount of time in.
Yeah, well we're coming up on well, we've already passed the one year pandemic adversary, which is seems dumbed to even call it that because it's such a traumatic, traumatic year, especially for black communities, especially for black and brown communities. But let's talk about the market, because I know a year ago markets were down. Were they down? I don't know if I'm getting it's April now, what is even time?
It was a scary time for some people, but to your point, Ian, it was also a time of opportunity. How do you think people So let's say let's say Ian, people you know, had a year like you did ten years ago when your friend told you to invest and they were like, I'm not going to do it. I'm a little too afraid. So they feel like they've missed the boat. Now we're a year post pandemic. What what message do you have to people who were like, damn, I didn't get hurts. I didn't people.
When she means people, she meets me. I was like, my sister was like me walking over the wired I don't know. I invested me. I have a wealth group. Carol was like get this, get this. I was like, h tell me how it works out. She's like, I'm up a thousand percent. What about you? I'm like, I mean I'm up a thousand percent and business. So yes, Ian, how can I stop up my tears and be ready for the next time?
For me, it took me twelve years to get ready for this moment.
But I would tell anyone that missed out use that as motivation to never get caught in this again, because like, imagine, so I.
Looked like I visited Westchester's nice.
When I looked at the houses, I'm like kind of pricey because I'm in Houston, So like five hundred thousand get us a mansion. I'm like, gotta wait to move out there, right, But imagine if houses out there that are the prices now they dropped eighty percent, we would be like, girl, we got to go get get all friends and go buy as many houses as possible. Last year happened in everyone panics and so in real time I was telling people how far the market was going
to drop and want to buy. So last year we did the collaboration with stock Club. Like at one time, I was like by Apple, Microsoft's Maderna Tesla AMD and video, Microsoft Shopify jkhy in five nine clouds. So on average, for those who got into stock Club last year, they have like five hundred and thirty five percent indexes and right, and if you missed out, it's like, damn, I should have took advantage of it. But the great part is
the market drops every month. It's just as sure as the sun is going to shine, rain is going to come. We have to take advantage of those moments. But when those big drops happen in quality companies, and Rashad said that what we're doing market money is like do you think eighty percent of value of Boeing left just because the market dropped with fifty percent of Apple actually left.
No, those are the greatest times to buy.
Of course, do your research if you're super serious about investing. I'm telling everyone to read one hundred pages a day. If you're beginning to start with ten pages a day, you'll be surprised the attraction that you can cover, and you will be able to beat ninety nine percent of people. But if you just buy every single month and when we have fifty percent drops, if you buy quality companies, like top ten companies, you'll go to My formula is
two index funds and then two technology companies. That's all you need, equally weighted. So if you have ten thousand dollars, split the money up amongst the four and you'll be fine. But those opportunities when the market crashes, I'm going to be very honest, those of us that are investors were a smile.
And ear to ear and be like, thank you God. I appreciate you.
In a sad way though, because you know for some well also too, but I have so many questions, but for me, so for example, I got a call from my cousin Tilla and Atlanta. I'm from Atlanta originally, even though I wrapped the burg. Now, I don't know any young people around here, so I'm just like an old married lady.
With a.
The burg.
Well, Greenberg one of those. I'll bring it to your house, y'all.
But really, when we find out we live two streets away from each other, that's going to be the real because green is tiny. All right, mom, brain, where was my question?
All right?
Listen my cousin Tiya, that's right, she calls me, and listen as Rishad and especially in Ian probably too. You know that you can't just like give I have so many cousins, you know, some of my couple of my siblings too, who you want to just like give them a financial advice, but they have to come to you. You know. I have learned people don't want you preaching to them. They need to come to you. So finally, after years of like text me whenever you got a
question to you, she finally text me. She's a preschool or preschool teacher in Atlanta, really hurt by their recession, and she's like, hey, my coworker was talking about game Stop. Should I buy some? And my first reaction was like, no, this was not when GameStop was this was when it was in the news to the point where you know, my cousin was hearing about it. But I like what you said about education because for me, I wanted to
be like, yes, you know, buy some stock. But for me, I hesitated because I knew that she didn't have the education part down. Like it's almost like you need to read and be educated so that you can take someone's advice and you can you know, make an educated decision about investing. So what would you say to and you know Tiya When I when she came to me and asked me about that, I was like, do you have a four to one K? And she hadn't, and she
was like leaving a match on the table. So for people who are maybe they haven't you know, they're not ready for the moment quite yet. It's not their time. We call it financial double Dutch. It's not their time
to just jump in, you know, just quite yet. Backing it up, I mean, do you feel like you know, it doesn't matter just jump in any way, or because I tend to be more risk averse, or do you feel like some people should just start with you know, four one K start with I or Ray start with emergency fund first and foremost before.
And I'll piggyback on that question, like, and then what does someone start to read? Like if someone's like, okay, I want to prepare, you know, like you know, what what books would you suggest someone start with and start to accumulate that kind of knowledge. To piggyback on Mandy's question, well, if they want.
To be financially whole, they should probably get your book.
I mean with money, can we take any in the camera and just a little bit it's.
Always but seriously, like, I have a fourteen year old step daughter and I want to because she's making like money from me and everybody else that she's been working with, and I want, you know, she knows how to budget, she knows how to save, but I'm like, I want to sit down with her to be like, let's let's invest together. So I'm like something that's simple enough that I think if a fourteen year old can start, then anyone can. So I'd love to know.
I'm going to let Ian answer this, but I think that first we have to get out of the the thing of like what books to read, because as a teacher, you understand that there's seven different I think seven different learning styles. Everybody learns differently. Everybody does not learn by reading. Like me, like, I don't really read that many books. If I read a book, it's going to be I'm listening to the book on audio. I can remember something a lot better than reading something like my brain is
not working that manner. And I feel like I feel like you know, even now in this generation, people are learning differently, so we can never discount the value of how someone learns. So one of the best ways to learn is podcasts are do.
You know any investing podcasts?
People should.
Podcast?
YouTube? Even instagram you learn. You can learn if you follow the right the right pages and the right people. So that's the first thing because I feel like just still. I remember I was telling my cousin before. He was like, here were books you reading. He was in jail at the time, so you know, in jail like they reading scrolls, like they're reading everything. Like I'm like, you know, I'm listening. He's like you listening to an audio? Like he was like,
you know, like that's not learning. I'm like, wow, the same thing. What if I'm listening to somebody tell me something, or if you're reading it, what's different about it? So that's the first thing. I feel like, you know, in the age of information, there's so many different ways to learn, and me personally, I learned better from listening to podcasts, watching videos, and actually even you know, buying courses than buying books. I'm not going to read a book this big I ain't gonna do it.
If you send him a long text, you're not reading.
And that's good, thank you for because you righte the educated. To me, it's like you're right because there are differentiated learning says that, like, you know, everybody absorbs knowledge differently, and you ought to find the way that you best learn, you know. So no, that makes total sense.
And then for me two things. We need to stop saying that investing is hard. It is not for us because the greatest risk that we will take is not being able to have our money work for us. And I've been saying this in twenty ten then last year hitting everyone's like, maybe you had a point, because what if I was talking to a guy to day who came to put a desk together for me. He has a friend that is working with businesses to automate eighty
percent of employees out of businesses. It's a business owner, I'm like, what's the automation? The other side of me, I'm looking at them like, well, my aunts, my cousins, my relatives, they're going to be out of work. So if we're not putting our money into the possession of these companies, and you're actually buying a part of a business which we already know what to wants to invest in, I think the greatest risk is not investing in them. My favorite book is Money Master the Game. It is
that thick. So what if I sat you down with Drake Tupac Lee or whomever in the music industry and that was their bible, which you read it. I think a lot of times people don't know what the outcome is going to be. That's why they don't want to read. But I'm like, hey, if you invest one thousand dollars a month, you should probably end up with a minimum of five hundred thousand. That would entice people a hell of a lot more. I think we were more than capable of being.
Able to invest in the mark.
I think they still I think they still won't read it, I think, and that.
Which is sad.
But the thing is also you don't need to read a book to know how to just in a target date fund, you know, and that's what you're talking about. It's not for us often it's like the the literature, the written tips about investing. It makes it feel like and my cousin Tia, all she had to do was go to her you know HR website. Often they automatically
put her in a target date fund. And you know what, if that had happened ten years ago, she would have been ready without reading a book, you know what I mean. I was ready for this recession because baby man Mandy at twenty two or twenty three open a four to one k in twenty eleven, you know, and I just put in my fifteen percent however much a month since then.
So yeah, we always send that message. And I think where Tiff and I kind of you know, are always kind of towing that line is for some people, that's good, like you're doing it, you're investing, you know, if you got a four to one k in Ira. But then where you guys are more comfortable playing and as the individual stock picking and things like that, that I think that is the point where I'm like, probably read a book.
I think you have to meet people where they're at and that's one of the things that our platform has grown. It's not like we're the first people to ever talk about investing or real estate, but we have created a platform, probably the first platform of any real you know, stature, that delivers the information in the language that the people
can understand, and it's very it's very digestible. So we understand that people have a lot of stuff going on, so you know, they might not want to invest in reading, and hey, that's that's their prerogative. Now they can just tune us in and they can listen and yeah, no, we start with the basics before you actually should invest.
Me.
I'm a financial advisor, so my whole background is basics as far as you know four one k's iras that all of these things, emergency savings. I was talking about that stuff way before we had an investment show, like you should have three months minimum, six months recommended, twelve months maximum. As far as emergency savings, this stuff is not really sexy and nobody really wants to talk about that, but you know, Tiffany does a great job of explaining
that in great detail. And that's that's the fundamentals. When I used to play sports, you know, learn the fundamentals. You can't shoot a half caught hook shot before you can make a layup, like you know what I mean. Like you try to skip the basics and you're gonna hurt yourself. You try to jump into cryptocurrency before you actually have done anything, and you're going to lose everything because it's not based off of information. I always say investing is a game of knowledge. Gambling is a game
of chance. You co mingle the two when you don't have knowledge, so you can gamble by investing if you just a lot of people's research is with somebody told them. So if my research is what Troy told me, no matter how knowledge you could research, no matter how knowledge, I'm still relying on for somebody information. Right, that's like a game of telephone. So we have to we have to start at the basic levels. And it's not complicated. But it's just a matter of just doing some investing
in yourself. Investing in yourself and investing yourself could just be time, like just taking an hour out your day. And I feel like, now there's so much information now.
So easy gonna add to that. A lot of times we and I did this too, right, especially in education, you get your summer reading log and it's a bunch of books that you don't want to read, and since you didn't read them, that didn't count. And I used to think to myself, like I don't read enough. I don't read enough. And I started discounting myself because I didn't realize like, wait, I'm reading the daily News every day. I'm reading ESPN magazine every day. What I'm reading is different.
It's not a book on literature. It's actually your book on sports or I'm learning something from it. So that led me into reading websites, like going to websites every morning. Right, So when we started, I had like fifteen publications I would read every morning, so I would wake up at like five o'clock and read them. I had CNBC Business Insider, Fox Business. I mean like literally every morning. This was
what I was reading and finding articles and learning. Every time I read, I learned something new and that just became a habit.
Right.
So I know they say if you do something for thirty days, it becomes a habit. Tried doing that for like two years, right, So the amount of information that I'm learning again, I told you, like, education is my background. But now business is my life, and so it becomes that because I'm learning every time I read. I don't want people to discount the things that they read. Yeah, you may not have read Money Masters a game, but
you can go to CNBC dot com. You can go to your leasure, or you can read two pages of this here an article.
But we have to stop looking past our institutions. Like a lot of times, we we have the answers in front of us and we make it more complicated. Like so the question is like where to start? Get that question a lot. So like Tiffany has several books, that's a starting point. Earn your Lisia has over four hundred videos on YouTube and three posts on Instagram a day. That's a starting point. Market Monday is the starting point. We have Eyo University. That's a starting point. Red Panda
stock Club that's a starting point. So before before I lead people to any other direction, I'm gonna lead them to where we actually started, because this is a language that we speak. I personally don't read the Wall Street Journal. Of course, the Wall Street Journal is very valuable.
It's a highly.
Respected newspaper, but I don't read it, so I can't recommend something that I don't do.
Myself, but you are executing on the part.
I listen to market Mondays because I'm on market Mondays. I know I was trusted. I do watch CNBC from time to time, so I can't recommend that. But other than that, I don't really think like we have. That's an issue. We always look like the holy grail of something.
But yeah, what's the one thing I can read every day? And it's a lot of pressure. I like what you said about you know, you put too much press. I don't read enough. You know, if you're waiting for the one thing you're going to read that's going to change your life and be waiting a long time. It's more, it's the it's the sum of everything that you've read, you know, and it takes time. And you're right, people don't want to hear that. Let's talk about the network.
E y L is not just one podcast. How many shows do you guys have? Now?
Four?
Four?
Four shows?
Okay? Okay? Five?
We got five okay, name them, name them, Market Monday's Inside the Vote, Social Proof Podcast, and then we have dream Nation, dream Nation and we have in a Wealth podcast and Wealth. Those two are coming, they're coming Okay. One is a mental health podcast, one is a real estate podcast. And then we're doing a limited limited edition podcast with John Henry, our friend John Henry.
That's I know who you're talking about episode that's the.
Guy from that show that sounds very vague.
No, there was a show. He's light skinned with glass.
Yes, entrepreneurs like MTV but anyway, he's like vice, Okay, thank you, yeah, MTV? Whoa anyway that you don't know what that is today? What's the vision? Because and also helped me understand. So y'all have been around for only a couple of years now two years? Right, how did you get this far so quickly? Is this full time for you guys? Because I and listen, I you know, Tip and I had done the show for six years. It's not our it's not our sole focus the podcast.
We each have our own things. But but for people who are looking at y'all and saying like, oh, they have a podcast, they made it. This is their empire. Talk about where you guys are at. Is this is this your sole venture now? Or if y'all quit your day jobs and this is it y'all putting all the cards on the table and what's the vision, what's the vision for for eyl Yeah, I.
Mean I'm still I'm still a practicing financial advisor, but that takes up less and less on my time these days. And you Alidia takes up probably ninety five percent of my time.
And Troy, Yeah, Andrelius is my life, my life. Yeah, So I don't work for I always. I still educate. I just educate in a different medium now, Coach Troy, Yeah, I don't. I don't belong to a school district. I belong to the world.
But how we how we was able to grow so fast, it's a couple of different things. Teamwork, you know, we have a strong team. Shot to Mike's shot out to Ban, shout out to Jamal, shout out to everybody that's a part. It's not just us. People see us, but it's more to it than that. And then we learn. We learn a lot. You have to learn very quickly in this world that we're in right now. Things move so quickly that you have to pick up the information to be
able to process it on the go. So just being around so many entrepreneurs, our friends and things of that nature, and we established strong relationships. So like you know, even you know, we could have just probably did a stock show ourselves, but it's like that's a lot of work. So it makes sense for us to partner with Ian where he obviously does this all the time, like you
know what I mean, this is what he does. So now it's less work as far as for us just making a whole nother show just by ourself, but we just we're still a part of it. So that's a strategic alliance. And a lot of times, you know, people look at like they want to do everything themselves. They want me to start everything. They want everything, Like you know what I'm saying, You're only going to go so far that by yourself, No matter what, you're only going
to go so far by yourself. You go a lot further with it a team, and you go a lot further by helping people too. That's you know, we try to even with the podcast net Worry, that's us helping people.
The only person that had a podcast already was Dave Chance.
Shout out to him, but you know, Ash Cash, he wanted to come because he's like he sees the value, you know, like you know what I'm saying, he didn't have a podcast.
I was the first one, I was like, hey, uh for y'all take off from I've never tem like hey man, before we get busy.
You know.
I think that's important for entrepreneurs to keep in mind that the more people. It sounds cliche, but it's true, the more people that you help, the further that you will go.
Was the message that really hit me when y'all were celebrating. What was it, did y'all get number one of business wait? Number one of all podcasts?
Y'all head business business podcast?
Yeah? Knocked that on that other guy d R. I don't we don't even know him around here.
I don't know right out.
Yes, yeah, he's not our favor over here. He's so just yeah.
So that was But but what you said real quick, what you said during your IG live that night, which I was tuning into, is exactly that it was. You had your friends on and you were talking about how we didn't do this alone. And it struck me because I was talking to a fellow podcaster and she and I was telling her because Tiff and I have signed with a new network shout out to Westwood One in February,
and that was a big step for us. And I remember telling her that we were signing with a network, and the vibe was very much, oh you souldow I want to keep doing this. I just really want to own everything. And I was like, yeah, we've done that, and I would also like some help.
Now.
Yeah, I didn't take maternity leave hardly at all when you know, when we did the show and Tiff and I have just been grinding. But yeah, I would love to talk a little bit more about that. So what do you think you have gained, like you know, specifically from those partnerships. Is it? Is it the amplification of exposure?
Is it? Is it just bigger dollars because now you have more minutes of podcasting that you can sell ads on, Like how does the how does that translate into what people really want to know, like money, revenue and all that.
I mean for us, more so than our business model is a little different than most podcasters because most podcasts they make the majority of their money off of ads and things of that nature, where you know, ads and more like supplement income. For us, we have different like programs, products and different things of that nature. How we you know, we we attain revenue. So for us, you know, brand exposure, you know, and adding value. Once again, it might sound corny,
but it's true. I feel like the more value that we can add, the more valuable we become. So you know, everything is not about you know, just making money upfront and then there's always there's always money on the back end that with a big, big payday come. But for us to be completely honest with you about it, we're not making a bunch of money off of our podcast network.
Our podcast network was.
To grow our brand, to add more value, to grow exposure, and to really build those relationships with people. Because we feel like, all right now, if we do have a strong four or five shows, now, that's that's something that's valuable down the line. And you know, how that comes to fruition is still to be determined. But it's like, if you never try something, you never know. What I'm saying, you never know.
I think that's one of the biggest things with us. It's like there is no fear of any type of failure. Failure never comes into our mind. We're just like, we want to do something that can help creatives expand their brand. Let's do it. We want to see everybody win. And it's kind of where when we come into spaces and people are like, wait, y'all don't really want anything else, and like, nah, we just want to see you win.
You win, we win, you know what I mean. And when we talk about community, that's what we're building, a community. I know, somebody told us, like, a school's only as good as as as students that graduate from it, right, And so when we look at it, if ash cast does well, then the next person who wants to start our podcast is like, that's the place to go, right, And if Dave Shan does well, that you know what I mean. Market Monday's is doing well, we become the
place to go. And everything that we do is to support each other, right, So, like the goal is to like build a brand, help everybody else who was trying to build theirs. Expertite that because we've been through it for two years. We hit number one, so we know what it takes. We're gonna you're gonna you're not gonna make the mistakes because we're gonna give you the game.
Right, we become.
Mentors in essense. So yeah, I mean we saw a brand build non podcasts and then a big payday game.
Right.
So when he's like, yo, we're not talking about upfront money. We're talking about the long game.
Yes, please, let's talk that long Because as someone when I started Budgetista, everybody was like, I don't get it. So these things are free? Yes, so you do all these lives for free? Yes, so you do all this like nobody could like wrap their mind around why. Well, because my intention, just like any teacher's intention, was to teach, to transform, to make my community better. And I understand,
I didn't know I was gonna make money. I was like, you know, I mean, I did speaking engagements here and there the supplement, but I wasn't really sure about how I was gonna monetize. But I knew that if you
build something great, you can and now I will. And I told you, guys, I think this before when I first came on Earned your Leisure, we had, like I felt like, the real talk was after we hung up, and I told you, I'm like, please, like you will get to a space in a place because of the way you're building that The money is the easy part easy, you know, Like it took me probably five or six years, you know, but now I can do something and I've done this and make seven figures in a weekend, So
I don't worry about like, you know, but that's when you build the way you're building. You're building this solid foundation, you're building off of network, you're building off of making sure that everyone is good, that the money will will be like the you'll be able to flip a switch. I was telling my sister Tracy, my publicist, Ian's.
I feel fresh pricks.
Because she's building her business and I was telling her She's like, oh so much. I was like, yo, Sis, Honestly, you will get to point where you realize you are the bank. At any moment, I could tap into myself and make money, produce, you know, Like, so not to worry so much about that part if you're willing to do the work. But I guess my question is, and this is a question that I get and I still struggle with the answer, is what's the desired outcome? Like what are you?
Like?
I would love to hear from youw Ian Troy Rashad, like, how do you where do you see this going? Today? I had a meeting with my business coach, Shout Out Design. I've got several coaches, but he's like my executive business coach, and he said, just so you know, you're sitting on a billion dollar business and Zion's not wanted to just be blowing smoke up yere behind. And that was just like yeah, He's like no, I have speak spoken to the SEO guy behind Voldemort and he helped him grow
to four hundred and fifty million dollars a year. And he was looking at your stuff and was like, oh, easy, we could we could get her there. And I was like what so, but it depends on what is it that I'm wanting. So my question for you is like what is it? You know, like, what's the big mission five years, ten years from now? What would you love to see?
Yeah, I mean for us, there's a few different things that we're working on. You know, we have an education platform. I mean the world is run by education and media. If you really think about it, you know, we're controlled by media what we see and we're forced to learn. Education is something that's not even optional. Like if you don't go to school as a kid, you can get arrested in truancy cops. They have cops like just to make sure kids go to school. Before COVID. Now COVID
everything changed. But so I say that to say that's like really really the most important parts of life. So we have an educational platform called Eyo University. And with Eyo University, we really just like kind of made that it's not like specific, it's not a real estate school, it's not a stock school.
It's everything. Everything.
Every single week is different classes, it's a book club, it's a movie club, it's a real estate course. Inside of it, we have investment conversations, all kinds of stuff. So we really wanted to give like every single thing that you can really you know need as far as personal finance investing and grow that. So now that community has well over like nine thousand people something like that.
So we want to make that like a Phoenix University, like bigger than Phoenix University and make that you know, rival any any university out there, make it, you know, a huge, huge, huge platform, over one hundred thousand students with graduations and all kinds of stuff like that, you know. So that's something that we are really excited about. We want to continue to grow that. And of course the media side, you know, for Early Legion, look at Early
Leasion as a podcast. You know, we have a podcast network, but even bigger than that we're a media company, so you know, we want to keep growing as a media company, produce other shows, and you know, have strategic alliances and things of that nature. So now we have a corporate for our media division, we have you know, our educational division, and then of course there's a bunch of other ancillary stuff.
We just got, you know, a truck that was.
Dope, you got a truck.
Yeah, but they're wrapped on like what's the name truck?
Like a freight truck. Yeah, So you know stuff like that. You know, it just comes up randomly. So yeah, the other side businesses, opportunities, things to that nature. But yeah, those are those are like the also on the immediate vision board for us. We don't really have a goal to be like the top podcast or something. I mean that's cool, but they do.
Well you already did it anyway, so it's done.
That's like what Jordan one or third ring here like, oh yeah, it means it's.
It's like you know, like I used to say, like I want to go into Target. You get to go to Target one day and you see like I don't know a mug and it says like budget needs to approved, Like I want to reach that level of like when you put your name on something and moves mountains, you know, because people have come to trust you that much. I just was wondering for you, like, what does that look like? What's that kind of like pie in the sky?
And before I'm gonna let you in, because I'm sure he has a crazy vision for what he has going on, but I want I want entrepreneurs to be valued the same way as sports entertainment things. That's something about something that I think is very, very obtainable, and that's something that not just for celebrity status, but I think it's
important because especially in our culture enough forget. We was talking to somebody that was extremely high up in the music business and he was saying that, you know, he used to work at a major, major record label, and he was saying that he doesn't let his kids listen to rap.
He's black.
He doesn't let his kids listen to rap, and he used to work at a record label. So why don't you let your kids listen to rap? He was like, because, like, you know, white kids, the kids listening to rap, they know it's entertainment, like they listen to little fill in the blank, but they do and they want to do for you know, medical school, and then when they graduate and it's like, you know, that's just a fat that's
just a moment in their life. Black kids is listening to that, and they think it's a career option, a viable career option, and it's hurting a lot of people. It's hurt a lot of people. So it's helped a lot of people too. But it's also hurt a lot of people because there's only so many people that can become professional athletes or professional rappers, but anybody can become an investor, stock trader, real estate agent or whatever like you know. So I feel like it's important for us
to champion that. And it's also unproportional, like Rolling Stone is big, but forbus it is also big, you know, Like you know, Donald Trump was a celebrity, no matter how you feel about him, he was a celebrity our Cuban and celebrity. Like, where's our celebrity entrepreneurs that has nothing to do with sports entertainment. It's not really there.
I think we're looking at them, I don't know.
So that's that's that's on the vision board too. To kind of push that wave to the point where now we have more than just sports and entertainment.
Yea, I'm gonna take thirty seconds because I know you're gonna go. So one of the other things is that we come across a lot of businesses and we just had this conversation last week about, you know what, becoming a holding company for a lot of businesses, right because if you look at Shark Tank, it's very similar to what we're doing. People are coming in, they're telling us our businesses, and we be foolish not to take advantage of saying, you know what, let's invest in this and
eventually potentially, you know, taking out our company public. That's something that it crossed my mind with the past mother, like when have we ever seen that? How many people that we know that look like us have done that and you can actually talk to them, And so that's something that is heavy on my mind right now, and I know it's on shots as well. It's something that we're looking definitely to doing in the future.
EYL private equity.
Yeah, what about you, what's your what's your big big goal over the next five years to help two billion people?
Whether you.
Think about it like this when you wake up or go to bed, you're either thinking about how to make money or how to retain it.
Number one reason people get divorced. Fellows.
I'm sorry, if you're cute, great, but my grandmother used to tell me there's no romance for not finance. Baby, you're cute, but you got to get your money, It's true. And then also how to keep that's a big thing. So even with what they're building at the network, I know if I can get them to trust on the investment in then how to be disciplined, they'll listen to a relationship mental health because the money is just one part the thing we were talking about, like even on
CETA and I'm like, I just want peace. So for like me, I have like my golden rules. I'm like, don't interrupt me when i'm Wxander my family and friends, time is off, Like I don't care what the deal is. If I'm w Wasander, that's my too, because I know there's going to be a time where he doesn't want to be around me. He's going to even now he's six and he's like on Easter, he's like, Dad, you can't kiss me.
It's inappropriate. I'm like, I'm your dad, what do you mean? So I'm like at nine, I'm like.
I can't even go with you to the park at that point, So I'm like, I want to have all those moments. But let's be honest, like corporate was designed to take us away from our family and control our time, so we wouldn't have time to think about how to build our own thing. Not anti corporate, I'm not anti school, but even the way people are taught to communicate it
is a non wealth based strategy. So I would just want to help as many people as possible, because let's be honest, Like COVID posed the way that we work wrong, the way that we picked our relationships wrong, because a lot of people decided, Hey, John, who I'm with now? John Henry, kudos guy, But John that I'm with, I don't like him as much because now that I'm spending five hours a day with him, I don't like him as much. And then we need more time with our kids,
more times with our friends and family. So that same thing that Rashad was saying, and me being around my dad and having that kind of freedom, you know, I know Dame Dash gets beat up for how he delivers, but my dad was like that, and so was my granddad because he was in the military. My dad was like, your number one goal has to be freedom. Everything else is an illusion. If you have a bunch of time
and no money, what difference does it make. So that's my goal to be able to help structure that and help people to get better returns in the market.
So it's interesting that leisure is in the title of the show. I don't feel like y'all know how to take us like it sounds like y'all work real hard.
Alcoholics.
How leisure?
I feel like, I feel like, you know, I'm a very appreciative person and as far as like little things in life, like just being able to wake up whenever you want, you know, that's a blessing, and it's like, you know, we you know we I was with my son yesterday in scallops and lobster. You know, we really blessed to be able to eat scallops and lobsters and clans and things of that nature, and we really are
like little things like that. For me, that's that's leisure because I know people that are starving and some people, you know, have to wake up at four point thirty in the morning and they work until you know, one am. So for me to be able to wake up whenever I want, go to sleep, whenever I want, travel whenever I want, you know what I mean? Like that thing, Little things like that, they don't get lost on me.
And sometimes it's just like we have to be appreciative of the things that we have because you know, we work so much and we compare all live to somebody else, and it's like, all right, of course it would be great to you know, buy island and do all of
these things. But you know, coming from, like I said, working class environments where you see people that you know, work their whole life for they have fifty thousand dollars and trying to work it out, trying to figure out what they're going to do, you know what I'm saying. So to be able to have a level of financial freedom and to be able to provide for your family, we earned that, you know, that's earned, that's earned your leisure.
That's it right there. I mean what he said is one thousand percent truth. For sixteen years, that was me waking up, going to school doing the same thing, being stubborn about, you know, my financial freedom. And I tell it now because obviously I have a bunch of colleagues who's still practicing in education, still teaching, especially in COVID,
which is extremely difficult. I told him I wouldn't trade this for anything, right, The amount of leisure that I have now, the ability to wake up and take my kids to school, it's something that I never was.
Able to do, you know.
Being able to make parent teacher conferences now it's something I never was able to do, picking them up from school, you know what I mean, being super involved. It's just like these little things that you miss out on that I wouldn't have been able to do it had I not earned it this time. So the money is great. The ability to have some of these luxuries I call them luxuries because not every parent is able to do that.
It's incredible. And my wife as well, like you know, to see her be really frustrated at work and into one day say look, you don't have to go back tomorrow.
That's all the flex to say, baby, don't And can we be honest. Look at our grandparents, Like my granddad was in the military. When my grandmother moved from Midway, Alabama to Chicago, Indiana, she had to sell pop bottles and coat hangers to make money.
What we're doing is not hard. We're not making steel.
Like our family that worked in the steel mill still there today, the stuff that they go to work in the sixteen hour shift. But I took that blue collar mid West to work ethic and it just applied it to white collar stuff.
How hard is.
It to hop on live and talk?
We like this is like barbershopping beauty songs. Talk like we're.
Getting paid and getting the chance to influence like so, but even like watching them and learning, like even with he told you, like, Bro, you got to relax and.
Travel like COVID. I wasn't. I'm like, I'm not getting the virus.
I was doctor.
I got the mask on in the house. I'm not going anywhere like.
Bro, you gotta travel like I want to go in the house.
It's a balance of everything, but to have the time to be able to spend. I've been an entrepreneurs since I was in college, so before it was popular, and then even when you were like because in four or five it was like your entrepreneur can't get a.
Job said nothing.
That was a perception, but the world kind of caught up O seven. Then once again, what we're doing is now hard. It does take a lot of effort. But what I will say about what I think about their growth outside looking in because I was a fan of them first. The work ethic is insane, Like Allison, the message wouldn't get a reply. And then I met them and I was like, oh, I see why, and I'm a workhorse. There's never a time that I talked to them there. I'm like, hey, what y'all do. I'm in Miami.
I'm like, I know y'all getting up with calid Or.
I said on the show.
I'm like, we do best come up. I know them.
Rashad's like me too, Rashad luck because we that authoritarian things. Whenever someone tells us we can't do something, and it's like does this you're in trouble, It's like that next chess move is coming right.
Y'all are proof positive of that expression. You know, you're the average of like the five people you spend the most time with. I was telling my cousin that, I'm like, you need to really be picky. You know, quality over quantity. You spend the most time your time with.
So because they normalize excellence, or they normalize mediocrity, or they normalize failure like yeah, you know. I'm like, no, I don't know. I was doing something until I spoke to well, I don't know if you can put her financial business out there so I won't say her name, and she was like, yeah, I try to make fifty million this year.
I was like, what those conversations are different when yeah, I.
Was like say what while I was like no, Si, you know, we crossed over ten and she was like, oh this. I was like that's cute. And I was like, can we talk every week? What you doing on Thursdays?
The first time I heard that you needed sixty months of revenue to be safe and you need a minimum twenty eight streams of revenue, I was like what.
He was like, get there?
But he opened his phone, hopped and chase and showed me and this business and personal it blew my mind.
Yes, yes, and it stands. And a lot of them look like you and so. And what I love is that that's why burn your Leisure shows me that they look like me and they sound like like my husband because he was born and raised in projects like you know, brick City for life. But I love the fact that he can look and be like, oh, because he's like,
what are you listening to? Because you know the rest of the stuff he's I want want, want, want, But he's like, oh, okay, I could do that, and I'm just like, yeah, five more years we need that insurance. So but I love that because it never would have appealed to someone like him, you know. But he's just like, yo, they sound like me, they look like me, like this is possible, this is doable. And to see him translate that for his boys, because like I'll talk to my friends,
but his boys don't listen to me, you know. So to see him like, nah, yo, because you guys said something for he was like I heard him tell his best friend, now you gotta let your assets pay for your assets. I was like, oh, where you get that from? He was like, oht know that show you'd be having to listen. I just thought that was so dope because you know New Jersey drive like Newark used to be. That was him for years old, like just like stealing cars.
I'm like, just literally used to go to school and then on Fridays he said, we didn't steal cars during the week because we had to go to school, but on the weekend it was on we were like local celebrities, like the old people will bring their tears downstairs and just watch us. Like through Newark zip zip and jar. We would cut gates to know like okay, if we
do get caught, we could slip through this gate. So to hear him tell his wild stories, to see him this forty year old man who was like, you know, working our investment property, talking to our investment like our certified planner about like our like our our stocks and things, and yeah, you just I just thank you guys what you're doing, because I don't know that these men out
here that need to hear it. But it's not going to be for me that they're gonna like it's gonna land or certainly not from everybody else that's out there. They have this opportunity to hear it from y'all and being like if they can do it, so can I. So we just thank you for.
That, and we definitely listen to you.
I'm kind of sitting here like yeah, yeah, but also they need to listen they let's normalize listening to Tiffany some toxic masculinity I'm sensing here, but you know, we'll get we'll get there. But Thank y'all so much for sharing your positive energy and your passion with us because it means a lot. And congratulations on all the success we wish. I mean, I wish nothing, but I want to see y'all.
I want to see Tip.
I'm just gonna come in the back. I'm just gonna be in the window of your house next time you're on Today Show, just anytime of the day, just pop up. Should be on some TV network.
Care promise, but I am going to be on Today's Show on Wednesday when this comes out, and if you know, I can keep it concise with you know, that's not my thing. But one other thing they asked me was one of my favorite podcasts, and let's just say, you know, two of them are right here. And I literally just text a producer like, no, this is the this is the picture. This is the picture to you, so we'll see if you know, because you know how it is
a TV shows. I believe in that too, that you know, like as you go you bring along and so you know that's critically important. But yeah, this is this has been awesome. I think our audience is going to be like, yeah, so where can people find you? What's your social media handles. What products and services do you have out how they can how can they continue to connect?
Yeah for sure.
Thank you again for having us, both of you guys. Thank you for your advocacy and the work that you do.
Earn A. Lisia.
You can find us on all social media platforms YouTube, Earnalisia dot com.
Yeah, earn Alisia podcast.
Also Market Mondays, which is a live show on YouTube at eight o'clock easton Standard time every Monday. Also it's on you know, the playback is on YouTube and also the playback is also on podcast Networks. At e y L University, that's our educational platform which has over one hundred webinars, real estate investment course, monthly financial Planning, calls, a bunch of stuff. So all that information is on e y L University dot com. But the mothership is
Earning your Leisure dot com. And once again thank you for having us. We appreciate it.
Thank you so much. This was a dream when brought in.
Where can they find you?
Instagram? My tag is the Master Investor. You can find me my name Ian. Don't lamp on any of the social and then join Red Panda dot com is my site if you want to join the stock club. That's my primary product. I tell you where to get in and where to get out, what companies are good, what companies are bad. So tiya if you need some help.
My cousins are like, stop, get your other names out of your mouth on that.
Because my girlfriend touched me. She's like, Tiffany, is anybody single ready to mingle? Because you know we have our ladies. I'm like, I know, I know, Troy, you are taking.
I'm taking.
Hey, don't kill me.
Don't.
I mean like loky. We know they all asking about We're just.
Talking about hypergamy, any hypergamas?
Yeah? Are you single ready to mingle? Or is this going to be mad if?
I no, No, I'm single single?
Okay, well don't hey, those are his d M. Don't ask me no other questions.
I can't believe.
I got like play. I got literally like ten. DM was like, you have an earn your leisure on no money questions. I know nothing. I know Ian's taken. I'm like, oh my god, this is a question. You can get your whole financial life.
Listen.
One time I thought Troy said, uh, hello to my wives, and you said.
I was like, bro, it's this when.
You get off set. You know what, I went upstairs. My wife was like your wives, really, I'm like, there won't be another show ever.
Project.
Now, when you see us in Greenberg, you know you can act like you know, it's okay.
When I see that, I'm jumping it. Just look, it'll be the hair first to see in the glass all the time. No, but no, we definitely should chat because whenever COVID is over, it would be great to meet up and talk about Geberg. I want to see that project that Troy. You had a project you said something Greenberg History.
Yeah, it's it's a very enlightening, uh, information that you will learn about a town and how it was built and how it was designed and redlining and all that I had. I actually had fourteen and fifteen year olds do it and what they found was pretty interesting. I would love to tell you about it.
Yeah, And I'm my day job, I'm chief consumer advocate for Ally Financial, So I'll definitely keep y'all in mind if I because we're I just started a couple of months ago. But Tiff notes, I'm looking for all the ways that I can spend their moneycers. So yeah, I can't wait to meet you guys hopefully one day in person. But thank you so much and Ian, thanks for joining. That was a bonus.
Yes, it was.
I'm honor to I'm happy to be here, and thanks to the guys for inviting me.
We shot. I'm gonna pray for you. They hit me too. Let's tell what you got like.
It's a photo of my brother if he's in the background, b A. Listeners are all over.
Her brother looks exactly like Drake, exactly like.
Drake, but it's so annoying but thirsty, and it's a pandemonium.
The pandemonium.
We appreciate you.
All, and it's time to boost break Boost Break. I'm really got a high from that interview. It was just honestly, it was just awesome and awesome and awesome. We need definitely more male energy around here for our well, not often, because you know, we like it. We like it here with the girls.
You know it's good. It's good energy, positive male.
So not to be a Debbie downer, but I'm gonna break today. So what are you going to do.
I'm gonna boost.
Okay, well, do you know what I'll go first because we like to end on a high note.
Okay, go ahead, bring us down, and I'll bring.
Us So did you hear about the drama with Rachel Hollis? No, so Rachel House is that woman ever like girl wash your face a girl? Oh yeah?
Yeah yeah.
So lately, you know, the non brown social media streets have been coming for her and some brown as well, because she I guess she must have she must have been doing a live or whatever, and someone in the comments said to her because she had a cleaning lady, was like behind her and someone said, oh, wow, you have a cleaning lady, and she said, yes, you know,
you know that's my cleaning lady. And then the woman said something while you don't you realize you're really privileged as a result, right, And Rachel said, yes, I am. And then she was like, well you're really unrelatable as a result, and that exchange in itself like I don't believe. So, I mean, you know, I have a cleaning lady, Juliana.
She's really awesome. But the way Rachel describes her cleaning lady, I don't think I'm surprised she didn't understand that people were like, no, one's upset about you having a cleaning lady. People have cleaning ladies, but she kept referring to her cleaning lady as the woman who washes my toilets. Like it was almost like, is she purposely trying to be demeaning and dismissive. She was like, Yeah, that's the lady she cleans my toilets. She cleaned my toilets. She kept
saying that. People were like and then she was like, she did a video to address the woman who I don't know if she's a woman of color or whatever. And she's like, cis which I'm like, oh, which in a positive way? Okay if not? She's like, what would make you think that I'm trying to live my life to be any way relatable. This is her video. If you get a chance after we jump off, Mandra.
How do you have news nuggets? You've been in book launch mode. I'm like, I've not been watching the news, like Tiffany has given me news alerts.
Because I saw someone and posted like on Facebook like I never liked her, and I was like, who I knew about Rachel Hall? So I looked and I went to look and I saw lovey Rachel Carlisle all my brown face, Nicole Walter. It's like in addressing it, I was like, wait, what so I couldn't believe with her own mouth, this is Rachel's explanation. She's explaining, so what if I have a woman who watches my toilets? We're like, oh, once again, and she's like, what make you think I
would want to be relatable to you? I was like, oh once the two and then it just was really bad. And then she was like then she listed all these women that she claims are not relatable in her in the the comments of her thinking, as if to say, somehow she's at that level. Let me list some of the women Harriet Tubman, because Rachel Hollis is clearly hurt the actual.
No white lady. She's a white lady.
You know she is. No shout out to the white ladies. I'm just saying, but yes, no, I.
Mean she listed Harriet's context.
She listed Marie Curie, I mean, Amelia Earhart frieda callo, like, I mean literally she said, all unrelatable, Oprah Winfrey.
Oprah Winfrey, Susie who was shot in the head.
I mean, people are like, are you are you comparing yourself to these women? Like it is? It is so and the fact that she's still up there, still up here, So then what she did was even worse. Instead of saying, you know, what mistake is mine, she blames her team. She's like, oh, I made a mistake because my team told me. And I'm like, yeah, so it was really
it was real, really bad. And so my break is for I mean, I don't you know, like, you know, cancel culture, you know, honestly enough, and I don't you know, like needing obviously for her to be canceled. But I do think it is important, just like remember what happened with my mentee, and I said, you're gonna have to take your lumpsys. I'm not throwing you out the window. You know, you know, I know that you made a mistake, and you know you compounded that mistake by doubling down.
But I still message her, we still talk, I still counsel her. But when you mess up, you have to stand in it and say I messed up, not oh my, you know my you know, my team messed up. Or I don't see what the big deals about me having a cleaning lady. Oh something else that she said too, which I don't even Sometimes people are so wrapped up in their own as people will say they're feeling themselves. She said, yes, I have a cleaning lady, and I'm lucky to be able to have one. But most of
I work my ass off. I'll wake up at four o'clock in the morning and I'm like every mother I know, Like, what do you say? It was? It was this like almost like this condemnation of like if you would have worked as hard as me, maybe you'd be here, not mentioning that she's married to a Disney executive who is very wealthy, but this this this indictment of women that if you don't work hard, that's the lefe you get.
That's just not true, Like you can work really hard and do all the things, and I don't know, it's just like remember I said, like I was telling telling a man that I work with that he had some unconscious bias, and he said, no, I don't. I said, it's unconscious. That's the way it works.
I love how you said that, because I told someone at work that I felt like they steamrolled me in a conversation because I was presenting something and they just talked over me. My hair is crazy. I don't like being on video. I'm like my proof is on anyway, and the response and we still haven't talked, hope anyway, whatever, I'm just gonna say it. I didn't say any names.
And response was while you caught me off guard about that, and your your comeback with amazing unconscious Yes that means that doesn't it make sense that you don't know you did?
Yes, I'll yes, I'm putting high conscious so it's clear that she so, I just, you know, a break on that kind of judgment, especially amongst women. You know that I'm sure that woman has a name she you know, is she is a you know, your housekeeper or and I'm sure she has a title, not your toilet bowl cleaner, because like, what does that even mean? You know? And you working hard is not the only reason why you are where you are, because lots of people work hard.
Lots of people work hard and they have not been met with the same privileges as a result of life, just like you know, I know, I've grown up with privileges. The fact that I have both my parents, the fact that my father taught me financial education at home, privilege, the fact that at thirty I actually had a bedroom. To go back to, the fact that I could live
on my sister's house. These are all privileges, and I can acknowledge that and know that, you know, you know, these are these are some of the legs up I was able to get, you know, to get to where I am now. So yeah, that was just a break for that kind of like toxic positivity, if that's even a thing. Yeah, yeah, so there it's away from Sunday.
God, I miss everything.
When I'm missing in a video, Manda, You're gonna be.
Like stuffing Easter and Easter eggs and blowing up balloons. I started reading a new novel. Actually, that's where I've been. I haven't been on my phone very much. I've been reading The Parable of the Sewer by Octavia Butler, which is a Yeah, I had heard of her, but I hadn't read these books ever. But she's a she's one of the few. She's what what was one of the first black female science fiction writers. But anyway, it's like
a it's a female protagonist book. But it's amazing to your point about reading fantasy, that's where I wanted to go with my books. But hey, I got good with money too, get good with money audio and a book form because I like to be able to switch between the two. But no, that's a I just feel like
people once people stop being so defensive. And I was actually talking about the same thing with someone in my family on a smaller scale, about how recognizing someone else's pain it doesn't necessarily it doesn't negate your pain or
negate your story. And some people react from a place of defense and defensiveness because they get so caught up they don't want to acknowledge someone else's pain or someone else's story because they are only thinking about themselves and almost as if, oh, but if I have acknowledged that, then that takes away something that I've earned, and that's just not true. There's space for everyone's story and everyone
so it's it's a scarcity mindset. Again. I feel like that's scarcity, and it's just manifesting itself in someone not wanting to see their own privilege. But AnyWho, let's let's be brought us down. Even though I will, I will be catching up on that. After we got this call, I had the tap open. I wanted to do a quick boost because I saw that thing. And you know the actress Sandy Newton, she was in I know her from Crash. But I think she was also in UH but the West World West Wing, no.
West, something with the West. I do know what you mean.
It's with the robots and the Western and I did not watch it, obviously, but she's gorgeous. I know her daughter was in the live action remake of Dumbo. I don't know why I know that, but it's the thing that I know. Sandy Newton she UH recently decided she's going to start spelling her name the way that her parents spelled it when she was born. So I actually don't know how to pronounce it. So Sandy has a W at the end. It's done. I don't want to say it wrong, but it's Zimbabwe, and I think is
the origin of it. I had it open and then when we were talking to the ern.
Making you call me by my African name, maybe.
Well that's why I wanted to bring it up, because not because of you specifically, but you're not the You're not the first person I've met who has gone by a different name of my One of my best friends immigrated here from Vietnam when she was a baby and her name is not her birth name. So and it's
an interesting time too. I think, you know, I can't believe it was only just a couple of weeks ago now, but there was a shooting in Atlanta where six Asian American people were murdered, and several of them in the news. When they were reporting on it, they actually weren't putting
their full names out there. They were or they were they were putting their full names out there, but because they weren't recognizable to I don't know, a Western like an American point of view, they were flipping the names backwards or referring to them as only one part of their name when it's really important to have all of them together, treating a middle name as if it was a middle name when really it's part of the full
name anyway. So yeah, I wanted to boost you know, Thandy for standing in her her truth and going back and saying this is who I am. I'm going to reclaim my own name and kind of get your thoughts about it from a you know, being Nigerian American and you've talked about, you know, choosing your name of Tiffany and kind of get your take on that.
No, I think that's great. I actually did this podcast with with Lovey the other day with for NPR where we talked about that, like how our names define where we were in life? You know. Then if you call me Adochi and you're not family, then I'm like, you knew me before sixth grade? And I'm like, wait, what do we meet? You know? And if you call me Tiffany, obviously you know me now. But if you call me Tiffany Alice Smith, you know, then it's like, oh, you
knew me post marriage. So how our names really helped to define I think that that's beautiful. I tried to reclaim my name in college, but I'm not gonna lie. It was brutal to hear people take Adochi so with the Nigerian inflection is Adochi. So my dad would say Adoci like so ado Chi Alice right, So even Adochi is okay, But I uh, dough Chi. That's it people Adu Like, Honestly, it hurt my heart. And for me, my name is precious. It literally means gift from God.
And not only is it precious, it's precious because it is also indicative of the dialect of my region or we're from. Because Agochi is it's the same as Adochi. But if you're from my region. It's said Adochi I actually met and another I've like Harley. I probably met two Adochies in my whole life. Someone messages me from Because of them, we can shout out to the unique. She owns that platform which like showcases black excellence. Someone emailed me and her or she messaged me on Facebook.
Her name is Adochi. I was like, shut up. She's like, hey, Tiffany, I love you. I'm like, your name, your name is adoch. My name is Adochi as well. She's like, what, I've never met another Adoji. Like literally, I've met one other Adoche. But I was like her last name, and so to meet someone not only because look how special names are. Not only because because her name is Adoche. One I
know she's Nigerian. Two I know she's evil, and three I know the region that she's from because her our name is dialect based and so I just think that, like for Thandy, I'm going to look to see how to say her name properly. It's super important because even like my my financial planner, her name is Angelie and when I first met her, Angelie is this Indian. When I first met her, I was calling her Angelie because that's what that's how it looks spelled. And she allowed it.
And it wasn't until I was interviewing her for the in Shorance chapter of the book and I was just asking, like, you know, like what's your name, like can you say it? Just because we were recording it, and she's like Angelie. I said, wait, Angelie, how did you say your name? She's like, well, it's like, uh like underrated Angelie. I'm like, since it's been two years, She's like, oh, everybody does it. I said no, No, from Adoti to Angelie, We'll be saying your name correctly.
Yeah, you know.
And it was funny because when I take that NPR podcast with Lovey, the producer's name was what Angelie, and she was like, you said my name right. But because if Angelie did not correct me, then she will too be Angelie and I will go through life not making the effort, not knowing like this is your name.
It's special.
And so no, I just say all that to say that I think Fandy doing that is going to allow other people to step forward and save me too, especially people from the region of the world that she's from.
Yeah, And I mean she's doing it at a. She's obviously very successful as an actor and all of that. But I think you know, when we decided what to name our son Rio, Rio Francisco. I know, my husband, Enrique Raphael, he was like, you know, I don't want He really did not like the name Rio. He did not want to and he's like, I don't want him to be penalized. And to your point, you can tell a lot about about someone by their name sometimes, which is not a good thing in some in some circles.
And I was just like, I'm going to name him for the hope the world I hope will exist when he's when he's adult, which is that wherever he's going, people will be thrilled to see Rio Francisco on a resume or whatever. Or forget a resume, he won't need one because he'll have his own thing, or you know.
But I understand that. I completely understand why you know, you chose your name, and why others I know have have decided to not hide that part of themselves, but to shield it, to shield it, yeah, and protect it. And I like the way that you even explain that to protect it, you know, so that it was yours and no one could could touch it. I've known your name, I've known your real name since you told me you know, years ago, but I still don't feel like I don't
know adoci something about it. It because I've only known you because I knew you as Tiffany first. It feels like I don't know if I'm allowed to go.
If you can say it right, and you will, then yes you are, because I love it means God's gift. Like literally, think about what you're saying to me. This is why we're named in this way, Like, think about what you're calling me When you say that, you're literally saying, hey, God's gift. Like how beautiful is that? So when someone says it incorrectly or mistakenly, so fine, but like really
kind of wantonly is not wanting to fix it. I'm like, you're not going to take my name, which means God's gift and call me anything else other than God's blessing, God's gift. If you can't just say Tiffany, that's fine. Tiffany is fine, you know what I mean, which is fine, And you know I mean, you know it wasn't really my choice, had nine my father made that choice for us and knowing what I know now, would I do that?
Now?
I don't know, you know, but you know here we are. But yeah, it's sometimes it's protective message because, like you'll hear, Love's name is actually not Lovey. That's a nickname you know that she took on because her real name. She found it. She too wanted to protect it and knew that the kids and the teachers whatever they were, they were verbally abusing it. So she was like, no, you can just call me Lovey.
So yeah, well to anyone out there, well you can. You don't call me Amanda though, because I don't. I don't. I feel like I'm in trouble when someone calls me. But these parts man, and I know where you know me from. If you call me a Mandra.
You did a podcast I love when someone said can you tell me Andra? I could tell they try to be in I'm.
Like, I get it all the time. No one called me Mandy. It's either well honestly, it's either Mandy with a wire or Mandra, So it doesn't just it's all good, all right, Tiffany, Well, I wonder I was like, I'm just imagining the book cover adoce A. First of all, it sounds so good together. Adoce ad adoce a like, yeah.
It's so like no, And I honestly, I was so excited to have Alicha on the cover because my dad didn't have any sons, and he always you know, in my mind, I thought to myself, it was really important to me that like alich was. Like, I remember thinking, I hope I get married. I hope I get married after I write my first book. But I was this is what I was saying when I was little, when I realized my dad was not gonna have these sons because having sons and that during culture huge because your
name is carried on. And I thought, because even if I can't carry his name on, at least the book will have a leech on it and it'll carry on. So it's like, you know, like the consolation prize I guess for not having a son.
Listen, he's fine. I hope your dad knows he's fine.
My dad teaches his friends who have sons, like what are your sons doing for you? Did they pay off your house? My daughters bring food to me every single week. My dad will text me like from Humba eats. I would like, so my dad.
Please tell me that they are so gassed, like so geeked out about your whole work, like they have not.
My mom says.
She says, she is the president of my fan club. Told me I'm the president of your fan club. I'm like, I don't have one. You have one. I was like, oh, She's like she has decided that all the sales are as a result of her. You know, I've told everybody, I mean, you have sales. I mean not to say it's me, but it's me.
My face hurts. I feel like I've been smiling for two hours, just like between you and the earl, I'm like massaging my es like that's so.
We are we going to share this video? Are we going to do a little I don't know.
I would fix my hair if we are, because I just keep looking. I'm just falling apart. I'm sure we're going to share it, yes, on our YouTube page, but probably exists. I will find out.
We should do bonus like bonus bonus, because I feel like some of sometimes it's just it's just worth it to have, like the little bonus video. So you guys can go check it out.
You can see the zen Den and Tiffany's beautiful little corner of her fabulous office. Every glimpse into your house, I'm just like I wish I want.
No, No, this is the one place. So you'd be like, this is I this is the only this little box. Everything else is trashed, but house is gorgeous. I'm always like, whoa more please, I'm like, weal move so I can see these cabinets.
Well, when we are back open, we're all vaccinated. You and the earn your leisure guys will have to have a little party in Giberg. Yeah all right, my dear, all right, go forth and keep killing it. I can't wait to see you on all the things.
You as well, man, all the things.
Yeah, yeah, I'd be out there all right. Seriously, my face hurts time. H