Creating Community | The Better Than Rich show Ep. 15

Upgrade Your Circle

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Upgrade Your Circle 〰️

Creating Community

Community is important because it provides support and empathy to an individual with their current situations. Community is a safe place where one can share their darkest fears along with their biggest triumphs.

The idea of “Your needs are my needs my needs are your needs” is extremely important within friendships and sometimes it gets overlooked because of the overwhelm of surface-level friendships. We need to fight against a culture that is constantly attempting to isolate us.

We all have needs, human beings aren't meant to be isolated. And to receive we should give. Whatever you aren’t receiving in your life, start giving it.

If we want to create a more positive community where we can be fully and openly honest about our situations and be held and supported in those feelings, we should start doing those things for the people around us right now!

The right people will start to gravitate to us when we begin acting the way we want the people around us to act.

Expressing Vulnerability.

Sometimes instead of expressing support and understanding, people pass judgment on others' thoughts and feelings which leads to them feeling lesser and being scared to express their feelings at later times or be their true selves.

If we are being ourselves and we are rejected for being open and sharing, those aren’t people we want inside our community. And if we aren’t aligned with those people now, it’s good to know that we aren’t compatible or aligned with certain people now because if not now, then we most likely won’t be in the future.

Being authentic is one of the most desirable characteristics when creating or joining a community. When an open person is open and honest it paves the way for more brave souls to do the same.

More than likely if we are experiencing pain, there is a whole community of people who can benefit from us expressing it, that not only are also experiencing that pain but also don’t want to stay in it.

There is a common pain and also a common desire to help. Through pain is a great place to start.

Every person who doesn’t agree with us shouldn’t be excluded from the community, having people with different ways of thinking brings enormous value to the group and the level of support that can be provided. Sometimes friends don’t agree, that doesn’t then make them any less beneficial to each other.

Creating A Sacred Safe Space

We want to create a space where like-minded people can come together and feel heard, supported, and secure. This space should feel safe for everyone sharing and deciding to be vulnerable in the presence of their community.

A great way to ensure that the community stays a sacred place for the people in it is to have rules of engagement. These rules of engagement help ensure everyone can speak their mind while feeling seen and secure in what they are sharing.

Openly sharing is extremely powerful, but holding in feelings and thoughts can be just as powerful and negatively affecting.

A few examples of rules of engagement are:

When someone is speaking we do not interrupt them, we wait for them to fully finish, respond, then begin a new topic.
Trying to sell to or recruit the members of the community is not allowed.
No one is in charge of leading the community.
What is said in the community is safe within the community.

Network and community are two very different things. Networking is where you cast the net and put people to work while community is common unity.

Being Intentional with Our Needs

How do we know this is what we need or these are the people we want to surround ourselves with?

Let us start with being humble and honest. When we start with honesty we can step outside our comfort zone and into the realization of the things we are missing. Then from that honesty, we can be humble enough to go look for help to solve the frustrations and challenges we have. If we stay in our comfort zone or our strength we begin to create surface-level communities because it’s easy.

No one wants to be needy, but we all do have needs. So if we can all be honest and humble we can find a community to support us through it.

Being Comfortable In Your Position

In a community there is no telling what season everyone will be in at a specific time, some people might be in a winter period while we rock out in a summer period of our lives. That is why the saying ‘your needs are my needs and my needs are yours’ is so important. This means there will be times when we are providing and receiving support to and from the community. This leads to individuals playing multiple roles within the community that change often.

You get what you give.

To be in a community without a specified designated leader we need to be comfortable playing both the role of a leader or teacher and that of a follower or learner. The best leaders are also the best followers.

The best leaders are willing to learn, listen, and receive.

Mike Abramowitz 0:11
Welcome to the better than rich show with your hosts Andrew Biggs and Mike Abramowitz. The better than rich show helps ambitious leaders who are on a mission to leave the world better than they found it changed their perspective on what's important, increase their income and impact and systemize their life and business. If you've ever struggled with finding your purpose and felt disconnected or distracted or found yourself going through the motions, this show will remind you that what you do matters and will re inspire you to chase your highest dreams. It's time for you to become better than rich.

Andrew Biggs 0:46
All right, all right. All right. Welcome back, everybody to the better than rich Show. I'm your host, Andrew Biggs. I'm here with my co host, Mike Abramowitz. Mike, how are we doing today?

Mike Abramowitz 0:54
Feeling good feeling recharged. It's getting back from an awesome trip. drive him back into the groove.

Andrew Biggs 1:03
Let's get I was. I always feel so strange with that opening line. I'm like, What am I supposed to say? What should it it's like that. Ricky Bobby moment? Like, what am I supposed to do with my hands sort of thing? I'll have to come up with like a go to phrase for our, our starting off point. But yeah, dude, tell me more about Colorado. What were you doing there? And what was the purpose of that trip?

Mike Abramowitz 1:24
Yeah, well, we definitely missed you. Would have been,

Andrew Biggs 1:27
would have been? Yeah, I would have loved to be there for sure. Yeah.

Mike Abramowitz 1:30
It's a good experience. So we, this was our first healthy CEO dad tribe retreat. And we've been, you know, doing our sessions over zoom for the last couple years, I guess a year or so. And we were to finally get a live retreat with five of the men. And it was a really great experience to just unplug and just bond and have deep, deep conversation, deep connection, just be able to be fully present, and also explore a lot of cool adventure. We skied and take great food, and it was just a really, really great time, you know, obviously could go into more like specifics. But you know, it was it was really an excellent time to just bond because especially for men, I mean, sometimes, you know, men will like go to like a football game and like, Yo, go to, you know, the party or go to a comedy show or like, like, it's a different type of activity with this face was like sharing an Airbnb, and it was, you know, sitting on the couch, round table and like sharing some of our like, deepest passions and, and darkest places, and how we had to overcome them. It was really, really special.

Andrew Biggs 2:45
Mm hmm. Absolutely. I mean, that definitely ties into, you know, our topic for today, which is the power of community and talking a little bit about what is community, how to find a great community, how to upgrade your community, if you're not happy with where you're at right now. And if you don't feel like you have a circle, like Mike was just describing a place where you can share your biggest triumphs and have a bunch of people cheering for you, and also kind of your darkest, deepest fears, and be held in those in those moments and be led through them, then this is the show for you today. And, you know, don't skip this one, I think you're really gonna like it. But as a starting point as a leaping off point, why is community important? What do you see there, Mike?

Mike Abramowitz 3:29
Well, I mean, I, for me, specifically, I could talk to, and then, you know, on a broad scale, but for me, specifically why communities important is because anytime I found myself in the past where I felt stuck or feel felt like unsafe or felt like, I just just didn't feel like I had, I don't know, I just didn't have like, true friendship around me or people I could trust or, like, anyone that can relate to me, like anytime I had those Valley moments of life, I there was a craving for, like a brotherhood and, and there was a craving for people that have a common interest that I do are in, you know, can empathize with the experiences that I'm currently going through. And then on the cop, complete opposite end of the spectrum, it's when I'm driving and having an awesome experience and celebrating something. It's like, you know, you don't want to be too braggadocious with people that aren't and you want to have people that don't, you know, belittle you or make you feel weird for winning. So it's like having this this safe place of individuals that are like minded, that are able to empathize and understand and are able to be with you for your highs unable to be with you for your lows. That's what was important for me, for me to be for that them. My needs are their needs, their needs are my needs. We can all show up for each other. And, you know, that's the It's important, I think it's I think it's very often overlooked. When it comes to friendships, I think the especially with social media, it's very much like surface level type of things where it's like, everyone wants to, you know, chime in with their opinions. But I don't know, there's just something when when it's real like minded, my needs are your knees, your needs are my needs. Y'all work, we have a common unity amongst each other. It's something more special, it's more unique. And that's my take on it. What

Andrew Biggs 5:30
do you think? Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, that that phrase is something we use a lot in our retreats when we when we put on an event is my needs, your needs, your needs, or my needs. And basically, what that you know, philosophy kind of boils down to is, we're all in this together. And as much as I want to make sure my needs are met, I also am going to be fully committed to making sure your needs are met. And as I do, we're both able to have our have our needs met in the process. And that's what really community is about right community is about recognizing that we all have needs, right? Human beings are not made to be isolated. And that's why this huge experiment of COVID-19 and all these things was was a failed one, in my opinion, with all the lockdowns and the ramifications, not just economically, but if we just look at the cost to like human flourishing in terms of, you know, suicide rates, and depression rates and anxiety and addiction issues, and all these different things that have come out of isolating people and kind of moving them away from their, their communities, there's a huge cost to that. And so we have to fight against a culture that is consistently kind of moving us into isolation mode. You know, social media isolates you, your phone isolates you. So if you're not being extremely intentional these days, you're gonna wake up one day and say, You know what, I don't really know that I have that many close friends, maybe I have some friends, maybe I have some acquaintances, maybe I have someone I could call up, and we can go grab a few margaritas on Taco Tuesdays together. But if the conversation is just about sports, or it's just about, you know, something frivolous, or they're just making it all about themselves, their narcissistic person in the first place, and, you know, it's like, man, is that really the type of relationship you're looking for? So this is a really good outline, in terms of the importance of community, one of the biggest questions that I get asked a lot is just how do you find, you know, good, good people? Like how do you actually look for people? And I would say, in some ways, it's kind of like you have to give in order to receive, right? If you can start, you know, there's kind of the old The old adage, right, I think it's a cliche, but it's a cliche for a reason, is whatever you're not receiving in your life, start giving more of it. And you'll start receiving more of if you're not getting love from your spouse, start showing love to your spouse, if you're not, you know, having people be generous with you start being generous with them, if you're not getting people's time, start getting more of your own. And all of a sudden that reciprocal nature, whether it's the law of attraction, or it's simply the law of reciprocity that all people want to uphold, in a common society will start to come your way. And so in when it comes to community, if you want to have people have deep connections, where you can share anything that's on your mind and be held to be seen to be appreciated for whatever you're going through, or supported and challenged, why don't you start right where you're at, with some people in your life and start doing it for them. Right now, by the way, when you first start doing this, that might be a little jarring, especially if all you ever talked about was the game last night? Or you know, what are you doing this weekend? Or the latest news or whatever. So it might be a little jarring to them for you to actually ask them an interesting question, you know, for a change, but what I find is the right people will start to gravitate towards you when you do that. So if you go ask 10 people, like you set up 1030 minute calls with people just to catch up, and you have 10 interesting conversations, maybe three or four of them are gonna like really start to head in that like vulnerable direction. And again, you're gonna have to practice vulnerability yourself so that they can trust it, that they can open up to you. But if you do that three or four are probably going to be really interesting. And those are the relationships you want to continue to pursue and maybe deepen in terms of community. So that's, that's one tip I have in terms of how to begin to create that community. What other tips do you have Mike, that come up for you on that topic?

Mike Abramowitz 9:22
The idea of what you just said about expressing vulnerability, and as long as you're willing to be vulnerable, they're going to reciprocate. And I think that that us, especially with how many people pass judgment on to others, because they don't have the same belief. So it's like, a lot of times people bite their tongues. It's like, Ooh, maybe I don't want to say that out loud. Because what if they're the opposition like, it seems like there's there's almost like in our community of the United States, there's like these two polarities that are opposite. So it's like Like, if I speak something that is what I think is my truth, but it's completely opposite of what somebody else thinks. Now I have like this opponent that is casting judgment over me. So, you know, my my thought is, is how how does someone offset that, that, that concern that potential concern of being vulnerable? What do you what are your thoughts? And I have one or two, but I'm curious, what

Andrew Biggs 10:27
shows you one thing that comes up for me is, if I'm, if I'm myself, and I'm rejected for being myself, then that person who rejects me is probably not someone I'm interested in being community with anyway. So as a starting point, that's my general approach is if I'm willing to open up and somebody judges me for that, and therefore they don't, you know, want to be community with me. Great, you'd have a bow I know that they don't want to be community with me right off the bat, I don't have to waste time is one thing I see. You know, the other. The other thing is, like I in an ideal position, even if someone disagrees or has this other players, we have close friends here in town. And they're very different from us, in terms of how we see the world and our philosophies and our ideologies and all those different things. And people we get along great, you know, like, they are just the sweetest people, we love hanging out together, they're our kids get along, we get along, we have really interesting conversations, we don't always agree, but like we treat each other with respect, right. And I think in an ideal world, that's where we would want to go. And actually, that diversity of thought actually makes things more interesting, in my opinion. So I know I answered your question, and also through a segue in there, but

Mike Abramowitz 11:43
Perfect, yeah, that's a, that's an excellent response. Because, you know, ultimately, if you're not accepted for your authentic self, then you probably don't want to be in that community anyway. And that's, that's a beautiful response. If you said it way better than I could have. That's that's kind of where my thought was going is, is being authentic. And is, is one of the most desirable characteristics when it comes to be creating a community or being a part of a community. So if you're willing to express your authenticity, by being vulnerable, and being courageous to share openly, now you're you're inviting others into the space to do the same. And it's interesting when you're coming back to the tribe, I made the list of these people. So Lindsay and I, we went through a full cycle of IVF. And at 20 weeks, we delivered a sleeping baby and it was a stillbirth. And we named Brianna. And it was really challenging. And, you know, Andrew was my coach during that whole timeframe. And he was my rock, and I leaned on him a bunch and, you know, just had to navigate through this, this really traumatizing experience, which was really tough. And then that December, it was actually interesting. I got drunk for the very first time ever, in my whole life in 2019. You know, Lindsay and Lindsay and I, you know, I was like, alright, you know, let's do this together, you know, got us a hotel room in Tampa, and just like, had a staycation and just got got drunk, you know, and just, you know, felt into all the feelings that went with the sadness. And that was not the answer by any means. Um, but by December, I still didn't quite find like, like, a purpose or direction. Like, there was a lot of conflict and a lot of shame that was around, you know, the whole situation. So I, I got a hotel for that night, a night in December, I said, Lindsay, I just needed like, kind of go there, my head a little bit, I got a hotel room, I ordered a bunch of like, unhealthy food, like wings and burgers and just like, sat in the hotel room, you know, soaked away, no TV, no technology, no electronics, just me and my journal, just eating food, and just writing. And during that, that journal activity that I did, um, something that came through for me was, I need to have more more men in my life that I can share these experiences with, like, I need a tribe of men that are on the same wavelength as me right now where I'm at. So that way over the course of the next 10 years, you know, I have a like a, almost like a support group. And what I came up with is my identity of a healthy CEO, Dad, this is who I want to be, this is why I ought to be this is why I'm gonna commit to be I signed up to join another community that I paid several 1000s of dollars to join, got another mentor in the health space. And, you know, they really helped me a ton in 2020. And then I made this list of these men, and I interviewed them. I ever had a comment I called them I called up Doug and I was like, Doug, this is not a normal call. This is a call. Because I want to talk to you about a tribe. I want to join I want to create, I want to create this tribe called the Healthy CEO, dads. And I had these parameters like my needs or your needs and your needs or my needs that we want to grow personally, professionally, financially, we want to, you know, be able to raise our families together, we're, you know, we're in committed relationships with significant others, we want to be dads one day, we want to, you know, own multiple businesses or be involved and contribute to our communities contribute a higher purpose. He said, Is this sound like a tribe and a community you want to be part of? And Doug was my first call, he's like, Sign me up. 100%, you know, and then, you know, I remember, obviously, I had a conversation with Andrew, I had a conversation with Patrick, I had a conversation with Dean. And, you know, that was the first core group. And then I reached out to, I'm not going to name the names, but I reached out to someone else was on the list, I had the same combo, and I got rejected. And he was like, well, I already have a lot of different tribes. I'm in like, different communities, a man, I have a church group, a man, I already am in another group, and like, sounds good, but you know, maybe maybe not right now. And I was like, Ooh, I got rejected. And at first, my ego is like, what you don't want to hang out with me. But it kind of it was no problem, because I knew that if it wasn't aligned at this point in time, it wasn't going to be aligned over the course of the next 10 years. And, you know, now we have our core group of seven or eight men, that, you know, we I started this tribe, we did our first retreat. And it's just so beautiful to see like how this is just kind of evolving, where we have this safe, safe, sacred space, where we can just share openly and authentically and I was kind of the, the heart of this, the nucleus of this. And that came from this deep valley that I was in with so much pain. So why is that relevant for anybody listening is because if you feel some sort of pain, more than likely, there's probably a whole community of people who could benefit from having others in that community of those that not only experienced the pain, but they don't want to stay there, they are going to get on the other end of pain, they want to leverage the pain into turn it into growth and take that growth and turn it into new opportunities and new experiences. And that's why it's so powerful to have this like minded group of people called community around you. I've witnessed my wife do this Lindsay's just been unbelievable with this. She's in all these different Facebook groups, from NICU moms to premium moms to micro premium moms to trach. Moms, to moms with the G tubes, or moms with babies with G tubes, vent vent dependent babies, like she's in all these different communities, all these different Facebook groups. And she has her blog, she keeps her blog, she has these unbelievable women who have each other's back that they all have this pain in common in common. But they also have this desire to help one another in common as well. And through pain is a great place to start. So if you think about what your deepest, darkest insecurities are, your pain points are those desperate moments. Like, there's so many other people that could probably benefit if you're willing to courageously speak about it and open about it and be vulnerable in it and remember what your authentic truth is, and get connected to it. And you might get rejected like I did. And you also might find your tribe of seven or eight awesome people that you can, you know, build a community around.

Andrew Biggs 18:30
Yeah, absolutely. I love that story, man. And thanks for sharing, and anyone who hasn't been following along with my story, definitely check it out online. And you can learn all about it, including the journey of baby James who spent this little miracle baby for you all. So you know, I really love what you were saying. And also, I think that there's a lot of people who, you know, like, man, you know, I'm just gonna go out there, I'm gonna randomly call people up, and I'm going to just open up to them and, and hope that they reciprocate. Yeah, I don't know if that's, if I'm comfortable doing that. And hey, fair enough. The other thing I would say is, you know, and this isn't intentionally kind of a plug for better than rich and what we do. I think there's a lot of places out there like us, I will say, I think we're unique in many ways. But I think like, when someone comes into the better than rich community, for instance, we have certain rules of engagement. We have certain, you know, objectives that we're trying to create at an event or within our community. And, you know, we're also attracting like minded people, generally, there are people who are either, you know, at least have some things in common, right? Whether it's values in common, or they have desires in common and a vision in common. Maybe they're all business owners, or at certain levels in their business, or were in their careers. And so when we attract these people in, there's commonality, right, that can be created. But then there's also rules of engagement, those rules of engagement. Create this space for people To be safe to be vulnerable, right? And how do you find a space that you can be vulnerable in. And if it needs to be facilitated, it needs to be facilitated, right? Come to one of our events, if you want to come to one of our events, go to date with SNA, go to some other and I don't care, but find a space where you can be seen be appreciated, where you could share literally anything. Right. And I mean, I've had people literally share anything and everything with me on coaching calls, at events, different things like that. And when you do that, there's a power in that, I also think there's kind of like a trapped energy when you have a, like, a fear when you have an insecurity when you have, especially if you have like a secret, right? I remember one retreat, we did partner shares, it was like, I think it was like seven minutes, and you had to like sit across from the other person. And one person like, basically, their job was just like hold space, and like embody almost like this as close as they could like this divine safe energy, right? So it's just like, literally, I was supposed to sit there for my partner for seven minutes as they share all their secrets with me. And of course, we all agree they it's all confidential, right? We're not, we're not going to share any of these things. And then the partner did the same for me. And I shared anything that was on, you know, that was my secrets or whatever. It's like that the release of energy from that exercise was really powerful. And of course, you know, having the safety to do that the trust in the other person takes a lot of guts. But when you do it, it's so worth it. So some of these things might sound like they're a little bit on the deep end of community. And hey, they are right, I would love to hit a little bit on like, maybe some of the more, you know, lighter versions of community and networking and those sorts of things here in a bit. But I mean, there is a difference between networking and community though, right? So I would encourage you to try to find a place where you can be completely vulnerable, be completely yourself, Mike, what do you say?

Mike Abramowitz 22:06
Well, if we were going to be doing the light stuff, I mean, this wouldn't be the better than rich show. That's right. And all the deep we go deep diving over here. So I agree. You know, I think it was Brian Lum, at one of our better than rich events said network is where you pass the net and put the people to work. He said cast the net, but the people who work on unity is common unity, where we're have a lot of things in common. And we unify and we create this unity together and literally a clever way of just deciphering between the two, the two and I'm a part of a bunch of different communities. You know, whether it be the Tony Robbins community, the fire walkers, you know, seven times walking across fire, and no one I go to that space, it is it is a it is a very beautiful, amazing community of of all different types of people. And then I'm a part of front row dads, you know, in the front row dads are family, men with businesses, not business men with families, and that's such an awesome, beautiful community. The man talks Alliance is a beautiful community of, of sharing courageously and vulnerably as men. And you know, these are these are beautiful spaces that I'm a part of. And, and I and they're also very intentional. And I think that's a part of it as well, Andrew, is that people want to be intention, people need to be intentional with what, what are their needs, and I think sometimes they people might not even know what their needs are. So how can they meet needs if they don't know what they are? So what would you say, Andrew? If like, someone was curious on what are the needs that I need to meet, in order for me to, you know, start searching for this community? Like how do I know? How do I know this is what I need? Or how do I know this? These

Andrew Biggs 23:51
are the people I want to surround myself with? Or, you know, what are some equites some exploration that someone can kind of like, go through, and curiosities. They can ask themselves on like, Yeah, this is something I really need in my life. Right? You know, and a lot of times people don't even either recognize or want to admit that they have needs whatsoever, right? So let alone try to identify the specific ones they are, you know, who who wants to feel needy, right? Like, I'm sure there's no one listening in their car right now or at the gym right now, or are winding down for the night or starting your morning or whatever you're doing right now on the other end of this thinking, oh, yeah, you know what I want to be I want to be needy, right. And so it's it's painful sometimes to admit that we have deeds but we do. Right? And so looking at pain points or places where you're lacking, whether it's connection right to others, maybe it's health and fitness, maybe it's accountability, maybe its actual business strategy, maybe its purpose, maybe its meaning, and doing some reflection just to see like where are my biggest pain points? Where are the biggest like frustration points Where do they think I'd be further along than I am now? And just be honest with yourself, you know, again, one of the biggest things that I see that stops people in this department is just being honest about where you're at and where you are frustrated, and then humble enough to kind of ask for help and go find help. So many people are kind of just lying to themselves and their lines the world that oh, yeah, I got it all together. It's all perfect. It's all hunky dory. And they're just not willing to be humble. But do you think my,

Mike Abramowitz 25:31
yeah, we too many too often, we want to celebrate, we want to stay in our strengths. It's like this, we're comfortable. This is where we're strong. So we'll stay on the surface level stuff. So a lot of times that surface level community forms around that, like, Well, I'm really good at basketball. So let me just stick with this basketball community, or like I'm really good at, you fill in the blank. So they stay around that safe space, where what you're saying here, I love what you said, like, nobody wants to be needy, but yet, we all have needs. And if we can be honest, and truly open and authentic about what those needs are, well, now you're going to be surrounded around other people who are trying to satisfy those needs. And that brings up the curiosity of well, if everyone's trying to be needy, in this community. How is that how is anything gonna ever get done? Right? It's like well, everyone's Mee Mee, mee, mee, mee, mee, mee, mee, mee need, so that that doesn't seem like a great community either. And that's why we love the philosophy of my needs, or your needs, and your knees are my needs, because when you're in a valley, I might be at a peak, and vice versa. And if if I know that you have the same needs that have valley that I had at my valley, but I've worked through that valley, or on my journey, or I'm a couple steps ahead of you, I'm empathetic, to grab you or extend the hand or to relate to you. And they say you can do this too. And then because life is this ebbs and flows, and ups and downs constantly. So if you can find other people who have those same needs, that's fantastic, because you're not always going to be in the same place that you're at, there are seasons of life. And while you're in a winter, someone else might be in their summer fall. And when you're in your spring, they might be in a winter. And spring always follows winter, it always follows winter. And when you could surround yourself around other people, every one of them aren't going to be in winter at the exact same time.

Andrew Biggs 27:25
Absolutely, absolutely. And I think you know, there's different types of communities, there's communities where there's a leadership, right? So there's no formal leadership, like, the better the rich community, Mike and I lead that. So it's, you know, you're receiving leadership from us. Our job is not to get our needs met through our paying clients, right. You know, I, it doesn't mean that Mike and I don't have needs, but you know, our job isn't to use your coaching calls, to try to get our needs met, I think that'd be kind of weird. And, and I don't think people would like to pay to meet our needs, is my is my take. So those spaces are specifically designed to meet your needs as clients. But there are other communities, right? Where there isn't destratification, you might say, right, and that was actually one of the stipulations in this healthy CEO, Dad tribe is no one's allowed to, like, you know, be in charge, no one's allowed to sell the other person something like it just kind of has to be, you know, a safe place for, for people to feel, you know, like a flat level of hierarchy. You know, but so, so there's advantages to hierarchy, hierarchy, hierarchical, excuse me systems, and there's also an advantage to flat systems. And I love what you said about the the flat systems, though, is, is, you know, it's kind of like in different topics, or in different contexts, or even just different time periods, right? I'm comfortable kind of being a follower, right? And like, following, like falling into a follower position. And then I'm also comfortable kind of, you know, leading from the front at times. It's like, you need to be comfortable being above and below, right. And I think so many people in business, they're only comfortable, like when they're the Alpha when they're in charge when they're, you know, the decisive person. And that's, that's a useful trait. There's many people who aren't comfortable at all in that position. But you also have to be a good follower. I think that the best leaders are also the best follower. So thoughts on that, Mike?

Mike Abramowitz 29:29
Yeah. And being willing to learn that's really what it comes down to, like I was, we were in Colorado, and I was kind of facilitating almost like a conversation over over breakfast during our closing ceremonies of like some business systemization tools and some things that I'm doing and you know, everyone was really interested in the topic because, you know, each of us are business owners in some capacity. And we're just really fascinated by the idea of automation, delegation elimination and how to make processes You know, a little bit more efficient. So we were jamming on it. And and then Cory chimed in with something I really thought was so profound. And he was talking about, like, how you can listen to. He's very into the tech space. And he's like, I was listening to President Biden talk about something with cybersecurity. And he said, When he heard the President talk about this, he immediately went into the tech space and just kind of see what was happening in some of these companies. And boom, he immediately saw there was a trend of an uptick because people were now upping their cybersecurity to protect themselves. And I was like, Wow, what an interesting idea of seeing trends in the marketplace, understanding tech and understanding that you can create massive revenue shifts, in a matter of minutes. And he's like, Yeah, I swung 20 grand. And in a very short period of time, I was like, Damn, that's pretty awesome. That's insightful. And it was a very short, small little conversation segment. But But in that small, short conversation segment, not only did I learn something, but I was open to receiving this new lesson. And I think that's, that's the beautiful part about being around like minded individuals, and the community is being willing to learn. So in the moment, when I was teaching, I was also in the next moment, ready to learn and ready to receive as well. I love it,

Andrew Biggs 31:24
I love it, man. And, and by the way, if you are interested in joining that of the rich, we are going to be you know, putting out more content like this, you'll be getting newsletters in your inbox, and these sorts of things. And eventually, I'm sure that we'll have, you know, kind of like a community forum place. So if you're interested in the updates about that, make sure you go to better the rich.com and sign up for your sign up for our mailing list. So you can get those updates. Yeah,

Mike Abramowitz 31:47
Facebook group, you know, we live into the Facebook group as well. So I know many of you are watching us live right now. So, you know, thanks for the comments and all the support for the show. And in those of you that are catching the recording, of course, you know, you know, join us in the Facebook group, we'd love to hear from you. I'd love to you know, if you feel like you're not getting your needs met, or you have needs and you're curious to explore some of those needs, the Facebook group that we have is a great place for that. So you can post comments in there, you could send us you know, private messages, we'd love to read them, you follow us on Instagram as well. And, you know, we would love to jam with you on on what what are some what are some of your wants or needs that you're not getting from other communities that maybe you would like to get from us and from better than rich, we are continuing to grow right now. I think we're up to two or 300 members in our Facebook group. And I think, you know, by the time you know the next few weeks, next few months, I'm pretty confident we'll be able to hit over 1000 members here. And as this grows, we'd love for you to be some of those. The frontline, frontline and the first wave of of, you know what this community can grow into and what it will continue to evolve into. So join the Facebook group, join the conversation, share, share vulnerably share openly we'd love to hear from you.

Andrew Biggs 33:04
Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you so much, Mike, this was a fascinating discussion. Hope everyone listening really enjoyed it as much as I did. Have a great week ahead and remember to leave today. better than you found it. We'll see you next time on better the rich show. Thanks, everyone.

Mike Abramowitz 33:20
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the show, please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review. To catch all the latest from us. You can follow us on Instagram at better than underscore rich and join our Facebook group at the better than rich show. Thanks again for listening. We look forward to seeing you next time and remember, leave today better than you found it