Steven Kuhn: Honesty, Integrity, & Transparency

Chris Albert 00:00:00 (link to this point)

This is Chris Albert, and I'm here to remind you of one thing. Someday, you're going to die. Now that's not some morbid statement or scary idea. It's solid fact. Your time here on this earth is limited.

And we need to be reminded of this as much as possible for one simple reason, to live your best life while you can. This is the Warrior Soul Podcast. What's going on, everybody? Welcome to the Warrior Soul Podcast. And, guys, I have an amazing interview for you today.

This is with mister Steven Kuhn. Steven is somebody I've been following for for a while, but the first time I got to hear him speak was at an event a few months ago called Clever Talks over in San Diego. And that was a conference for US military veterans. Got to hear from a lot of people that day. They had Jocko Willink.

They had Donnie O'Malley. They had Evan Hafer. A whole host of really awesome guests, Rudy Reyes. But but Steven Kuhn was the first speaker that day. And his speech absolutely blew me away for a few different reasons.

But but the primary of which was he literally just came out and laid it all out there. He wasn't afraid of, of just trying to make himself look good. He he wanted to talk about the mistakes he'd made. He wanted to talk about the pain he'd felt. He wanted to talk about all of the difficulties he'd had, and he wanted to do that because he was truly looking to serve the audience.

What I've come to learn about Steven is that he truly tries to bring value to whatever he does. He's he's not looking to take. He's looking to give as much as he can. So I wanted to introduce him to you guys because he is somebody that I definitely look up to, and I believe that he's somebody that you guys could learn a whole heck of a lot from. Steven's a decorated US Army veteran, and he is also a business consultant.

And he found a lot of success early on, and then he lost it all. He went from having millions and millions of dollars in business to becoming a doorman. And literally, you know, while he was a doorman, he had people walking up to him saying, hey, are you Steven Kuhn? Like, what's going on, man? What why is this going on?

What you know, are you having some difficulties? And and he was okay with that, and he built himself out of that. He he pulled himself out of that situation, rebuilt his business, and was back on top, in a short period of time. And the reason is because he's developed a certain sense of confidence. He knows that no matter what happens, he's going to be able to change things, and he's gonna be able to rebuild.

So, again, this is a great guy to know, a great guy to listen to. And if you wanna learn more about him, and I highly suggest you do, you should head over to www.steven-kuhn.com. That's steven-kuhn.com. And like I said, he brings value to the table no matter what he does. We'll get you his social media links also later in the show, but you guys are in for a treat here.

Just a couple of things before we get into the interview. This is the Warrior Soul podcast. And if this is your first time here, the reason why this podcast exists is to bring veterans tools, tactics, ideas, and to talk about issues that can help them to live their best lives. And it doesn't matter if you're a veteran or if you're not, anything we talk about here could apply to anybody, but we focus on The US military veteran community, because there's been a whole heck of a lot of difficulties in that community over the past decade and a half. So what we want to do is we want to create a forum that's just giving to that community.

We don't ask for anything in return. But all we do ask is that if you enjoyed the show, if you like the show, please number one, share it out with people who could use it. And number two, please write us a review up on iTunes. It really helps to let people know about the show. Dish in addition to that, I also want to thank the people who make this show possible, the good people over at F Bomb Nutrition.

They make delicious packets of macadamia nut butters. Awesome, delicious nut butters that you can take with you anywhere. They're sending packs of this stuff out to the troops overseas so they can supplement their MREs. And if you want to get 20% off your first order of f bombs, you can do so at www.dropanfbomb.com. Use the code Warrior Soul at checkout.

Like I said, you'll get a 20% discount. Sorry. I know that was a long intro, but I promise you that this interview will be worth it. So with that, I'm gonna stop yapping my trap over here, and let's get into this interview with the awesome Steven Kuhn. Steven Kuhn, how are doing today, man?

Steven Kuhn 00:05:47 (link to this point)

I'm doing fantastic. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me on. Always an honor.

Chris Albert 00:05:50 (link to this point)

Absolutely. You know, I had the pleasure of of hearing you speak at Clever Talks in San Diego a few months ago. And I have to say that, you know, I I went through sat through a lot of speeches that day, but yours was really, really impactful. Just the the the personalization and and the power of your story really, really got me. And and, you know, I know you've been through a whole lot.

I know that that you're a US army veteran, Gulf War, and and you've grown from from doorman up to entrepreneur. In everything that you've done, you know, where you're at today, how are you feeling right now?

Steven Kuhn 00:06:35 (link to this point)

Right now, I feel right now?

Chris Albert 00:06:37 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 00:06:38 (link to this point)

You know, I like to say, well, I hit my limitless, you know, when everyone thinks they're limitless. I hit that back in 2008 when I completely lost everything, crashed and was homeless. So that's not how I feel. Right? How I feel now is at ease, calm, released, receiving.

So I I look so forward to every single day because I'm I'm excited to see what I get to receive. And so it's it's an it's an it's it's more of an attitude of wait and see. Well, actually be active and see what happens. Mhmm. So I feel great.

I feel good. I feel you know, I moved into a new house. We live outside of Budapest in Hungary. Oh, wow. We're putting a putting a swimming pool in right now.

I got a four to five year old kid, nice, beautiful young Hungarian wife, you know, doing well, doing some, know, doing some good business.

Chris Albert 00:07:26 (link to this point)

You know, I went through something similar a few years ago where I had a business, I completely lost everything, ended up living out of my car. One of the things I remember from that is the immense fear up until the point I lost everything. And then when I lost everything, I was like, alright. I lost everything. I'm I'm still alive.

How how how did you get over that fear? How did you get through that?

Steven Kuhn 00:07:52 (link to this point)

Well, it happened when I was, you know, at the top of my games. So and we were doing movies, you know, were producing films in New York and Hollywood and Berlin, Germany. Were doing a co production, and, you know, we were just, you know, rolling in it. We had a we had a mortgage charter charter with my brother. And I was I stayed in Europe.

So I wasn't too into the business. I I did more of the referrals and things like that. But when I crashed and burned, happened overnight, as you know, from from the economic crash. And man, I felt like I felt like someone lifted a stone from my back. It felt like now I can start over and actually be who I'm supposed to be.

Because for some reason, society puts you in this this path when you start working in the corporate world that you're supposed to be this person or do this thing, and there I was a little bit overweight, you know, the big car, making all the money, and I just wasn't happy. And then when I lost everything, after the initial shock, of course, right, the next step after the shock is the fear, I can't pay my bills. Oh my god, can't pay my bills. And then it's like, well, shit, I can't pay my bills. I guess I won't pay them, you know?

So it's like that simple. And next thing you know, you're being locked out of your own apartment. I was lucky enough to be able to rent it out to somebody, I and was allowed to stay and sleep on my sofa one once or twice a week. So that was sort of cool. So I sort of had, like, an attachment to that house, although I didn't really want it.

And then I lived in my car and with with friends, and it felt great. I can't I don't know how else to put it, but I knew it's it could only feel great because I knew that I could get out of it whenever I wanted. Like, I knew in my mind, I'm not staying here. I don't need to stay here. But right now, it's where I am, so enjoy it and and see what that feeling is and, like, sort of let it go inside of me and what does it do to me?

Right.

Chris Albert 00:09:38 (link to this point)

There's also a sense of freedom where when you lose everything because you don't have much of anything else to lose. Right?

Steven Kuhn 00:09:45 (link to this point)

Yeah. And and no responsibilities of trying to take care of it.

Chris Albert 00:09:48 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:09:49 (link to this point)

Paying the bills, keeping it up, washing the car, going there, going to work, punching in, but whatever you do, you know, it's like, it's all gone. And suddenly, you're just with yourself. You're forced to be with yourself. And I I would venture to say that that's where a lot of people lose the curve when they don't look at themselves. When they look to the outside for for like, okay, it's somebody else's fault.

You know, why is this happening only to me? What happened to me? You know, look at society. Why is that guy rich and not me? That kind of stuff.

And see, I I never saw myself not once as a victim. And I would said, I'm here because of me. So and I can only get out because of me. And because I knew me, I knew I could get out.

Chris Albert 00:10:25 (link to this point)

Right. Exactly. I caused this. I put myself into this situation, and then my actions can take me out of it.

Steven Kuhn 00:10:30 (link to this point)

Exactly. And when you think logically like that, everything seems to be okay. Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:10:38 (link to this point)

Now you said was a You just said you knew yourself. Right? And and so when you're sitting there, what were you thinking, okay, my next step is this. I'm gonna do x. What what did you do?

What was your thought process?

Steven Kuhn 00:10:53 (link to this point)

Well, how am gonna do this? So okay. So I I was in a let's okay. We'll go through it. Alright.

So I was in a toxic relationship. Right? Mhmm. So and right after I became homeless, I sort of like hung out with her, and she didn't know and this kind of stuff. And then she found out, and she was really mean and nasty and stuff.

And so I lived with her for a little bit. And we went to this episode, which I spoke about, Clever Talks, the first time in my life ever.

Chris Albert 00:11:22 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 00:11:23 (link to this point)

I told that story for the first time on stage, and that was about the time where I was with her in a car, and we were fighting as usual because she was, you know, she would just treat me like dirt, and I was putting up with it because I guess I needed that. And she was calling me names, and I don't know, called me a loser or something in front of her nine year old daughter. I told to get out of the car. She got out of the car. I I floored it, and I I ran right into a a speed trap from the German police.

And they pulled me out of the car, and here I am, six four two eighty, crying like a baby, snot running out of my nose. And these guys these, like, nine cops are like, what the hell is going on with you? What you know? And, you know, and then lo and behold, my wife or my my ex girlfriend and her daughter walk up, and she's yelling, he's a war criminal. Put him in jail.

He killed people. And just, like, horrible things. And I sort of lost it, and I grabbed the weapon of the police officer standing beside me, which was a small girl, a small woman. And they sort of, like, pushed my hand down onto the weapon and not try to pull it away. I guess they're trained for that or something.

Don't know. And the girlfriend was saying, do it. Do it. I don't know if she thought that I wanted to kill myself or I wanted to shoot her. I don't know what she thought, but she said, do it.

Me, personally, I wanted to, you know, do it to myself. And the little girl, police officer turned to me and said, you don't want to do this. This is not you. Right? I know you.

I was like, woah, what the heck? Sort of shocked me when she said that, so that stopped everything. They took my girlfriend away. And then they they basically long story short, they took my license to my car, and I could walk home, which was only ten, twenty minutes away. So I walked home, got there, and I was like, what the heck am I doing?

I'm an idiot. You know? And I went in my room, pulled out my picture of myself in the army, my eight by 10, put it down nice and neat against the door. And on top of the door, hung my uniform. And I straightened my uniform out, checked the awards to make sure they were all straight and everything.

And then I pulled out the mill the marine KA the knife. And I put it to my put it to my neck, and I was gonna cut my neck. And I saw on the blade, there was an engraved statement about me because it was a gift. It was the first time I'd ever seen that, which made me stop and look at the engraving on the blade. And at that moment, someone knocked on the door.

I was like, fuck. I can't even kill myself, man. This is ridiculous. See, it's crazy. You you have thoughts like that.

You know? That's how indifferent I was. You know? So I went to the door, I opened it, and there was this policewoman in civilian clothes. And I had the knife in my hand.

She came in, held my hand, sort of like pushed it down, put took the knife out of my hand and placed it down in one swoop, and led me with my own hand into my own living room. And sat there and she told me, this is not you. I was at one of your readings because I had written a book in Germany that was a bestseller. And she said, this is not you. Have one of your readings.

You're gonna get married, you're gonna have kids, and you're gonna spread love throughout the world. You're gonna have an amazing life. This is not you. You don't need to do this. And I'm like, what the fuck is she doing here?

You know? And then she got up and left, and she walked out. And to this day, I don't know if it was real or not. I don't. But all I do know is it stopped me.

Right?

Chris Albert 00:14:27 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 00:14:27 (link to this point)

And at that moment, I called my friend Michael. I said, Michael, either you come and get me or I'm not gonna be here tomorrow. I just know it. Wow. Yeah.

So that was the bottom of the bottom for me.

Chris Albert 00:14:38 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 00:14:38 (link to this point)

When Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:14:39 (link to this point)

When when I heard that at Clever Talks, I was like, wow. Wow. That's and you you you were talking about this concept that you have called relational capital. Right. And when you think about it, relational capital in terms of this, I mean, there's two forms of relational capital that that saved you that day.

Number one, the inscription on the knife, because somebody there put something there because you had done something for them. Right. And then this woman, whether she was real or not real, she she she had been impacted by what you said, and that created something that that brought her to your aid.

Steven Kuhn 00:15:19 (link to this point)

Yeah. And that's exactly what why I spoke about relational capital in the beginning is that when we invest just like we invest in in in a financial capital, we when we invest in relational capital, meaning I help you. I'm not looking for a direct return from you, but I I'm expecting return in one way or the other. Right? Because that's the way of the universe.

The good thing about relational capital is there's no risk.

Chris Albert 00:15:41 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:15:41 (link to this point)

Right? You don't you don't lose anything. So it's it's a complete without expectation. When I help you, I help you, because I want to, because I can, because I'm able, because I'm capable. And and I just know in the faith and certainty that I'm gonna get that back, but I'm not worried about it.

Sort of without expectations. And that's where so that goes, we're going backwards now, but that's where HIT sort of begins. Is HIT is my, you know, my core principles. It's honesty, integrity, and transparency. And the way that that came about was when I wrote my book and I was on TV, and I was forced to answer questions that I never asked or asked before, there was 15,000,000 viewers on there watching me talk about the first Gulf War, which is what I wrote about, and my experiences there.

So I I suddenly was faced with questions about, do you support this new war? And I'm sitting there going, okay. I'm a patriot. I'm a I'm a war veteran. If I say no, how am gonna look like in front of these people?

And if I say yes, what the are Germans gonna think of me? And I'm thinking all these things, like, do they expect of me? Mhmm. You know? And I thought, wait a second.

This is about me.

Chris Albert 00:16:39 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:16:39 (link to this point)

Not about anybody else. So I said, I gotta be honest with myself. And I was honest with myself and said, don't support this war. Not at all. I said, a patriot.

I love my country. I respect the office of the the POTUS, President of The United States. But at the time, I don't support what they're doing. So I communicated that transparently. That's where the transparency comes.

So my honesty I had with myself and transparency is the way I communicate that. That that honesty. And the byproduct, which I felt after saying that in front of 15,000,000 people, was a solid, deep rooted integrity in my word. That's where it came from, honesty, integrity, transparency. And I felt it in the moment that I did it, that I said it, that I that I freed myself from any sort of expectation of what I thought they wanted to hear or what I thought I should say.

And that's where this expectation, freeing yourself and expectation comes from, as well as when you invest in relationship with capital with that expectation. It's amazing. Because expectations are there to make you sad, to make you upset, to make you, you know if, you know, if you have an expectation, you either verbalize it or you don't have it. Right. Otherwise, dude, you'd be disappointed.

Right? Right?

Chris Albert 00:17:43 (link to this point)

So yeah. Exactly. I and and this concept of honesty, integrity, transparency, if you look at the world today and and the way people conduct themselves, it seems like there's so many people out there who have a fear of being honest, being truly honest, who have a fear of being really having integrity. And it seems like it's almost naturally ingrained into into a lot of leaders out there, so called leaders, because they're they're they're trying to protect themselves. It's it's it's out of fear.

How did you get over that fear? Did did it happen early on, or did did it happen at at was there a certain point where you said, was it that interview that you went on and spoke about it, or was it you know, did did you say, wait a minute. I have power here. If I'm honest, there's power.

Steven Kuhn 00:18:35 (link to this point)

It's funny you say that because I I you know, my my whole when I was growing up, I wasn't happy with my I didn't like myself. I didn't we we grew up in a typical American nightmare, mobile home, low works. Right? So abusive stepfathers and stuff like that. And I left for the army, not because my entire mil mil my family was in the military, like, back to the 1700, back to the Revolutionary War, but because I wanted to get out.

And I knew and I knew, and I was 19 years old when I left, I knew that I could only ever change if I changed my surroundings. Like, I knew that then. Because I had tried to change and be a better person, be a different person, not be the knucklehead deluge or the the chubby, whatever it was. And every time you try to be different, no one would let you be different. Right?

They don't want to see you change. No one wants to see you be different, because you're gonna make them face themselves, and most people don't want that. So I left for the military. As soon as that razor touched my head, I realized this is my new uniform. Right?

This is my new me. And one day, I was we went through we went through the obstacle course in boot camp in Fort Knox, Kentucky in July or August, maybe. Youngest July 2000 or 1986. And I couldn't make it over that wall. You know, I couldn't get over the wall, you know, that obstacle course wall. Mhmm.

And the drill sergeant threw me in the mud, put his foot in the back of my neck, and was calling me all kinds of names under the sun. And I lost it. I completely freak like like, you know, exploded and just jumped over that wall like a gazelle. Like, it didn't even wasn't even there. And I said to myself, holy shit. This is power, man. Like, it's that was all in my head. That wasn't that was the all this time in my whole kid my whole childhood, you know, flashed through my because I sucked at football. I sucked at baseball.

I sucked at everything I tried. I was really bad at it. And it's because I had zero belief in myself. Right? And suddenly, was super mad.

Right? That was my first step of about honesty with myself. That I was never honest to myself, that I didn't believe in myself, that I didn't care about myself, that I didn't love myself, I didn't I didn't even wasn't even interested in who I was. I was trying to be someone on the outside because that's what society says we're supposed to be. That's where most people are stuck.

So I was forced in a moment where it was either literally do or die to actually face who I was and say, you know what? I'm gonna go past this. And I did it subconsciously, but I was conscious of it after it happened. And that's the key point is I learned that lesson. I literally knew that moment I stopped, the whole world froze, and angels came.

It was like, I know this is history being made right now. Like, I know this has changed my life forever right now. So take it in, brother. You know, it's like it's it was like that. And this is boot camp, you know.

I'm 19 years old. Who thinks like that when they're 19? You know? So it's like, it was really weird to me that to this day, I remember it like it's like I could I could smell the dirt. I could taste the mud.

You know. So most most people that I meet, they're and I and I work with a lot of people because I'm a consultant, but as you probably know as a coach that people say I have a business problem, my sales team isn't working, or I'm not making revenue. That's what they think the problem is. Typically, the problem is the leader of the company. And it's not because they're doing something wrong, it's because they don't know what they don't know.

Right?

Chris Albert 00:21:36 (link to this point)

Exactly.

Steven Kuhn 00:21:36 (link to this point)

So we help them know what they don't know, and we get them where they want go, make them a little bit of money, then they're relaxed, and we we can work with them with with, you know, that knowing getting to know what they don't know. So the fear of not knowing who you are, I think it's because people are scared to face who they are. They're they're scared they're not gonna be who they think they're supposed to. I have relatives like that. Yeah.

Super six super successful, amazing, and they're not being who they are.

Chris Albert 00:21:59 (link to this point)

Well, do you think because because you're somebody who's who's hit rock bottom, and you've come back up, and and and and you've done it a couple of times. When when you don't go through something like that, and the world doesn't show you who you are, because essentially that's what it is. When you hit rock bottom, it's the world showing you who you are. Do do you think somebody has to go through that? And if they don't go through that, are they are they not experiencing what they need to experience in order to to to become who they truly need to be?

Steven Kuhn 00:22:33 (link to this point)

Well, the answer is the easy answer is yes. You know? You know, it's they should go through I mean, if haven't gone through it, if you don't see the dark, how do you see the light? You know? That's that's what most people say.

But it's all relative, isn't it? You know? I was I was after I got back from the Gulf War, I landed in Rhein-Main Airbase, and the sergeant major came up and said, hey, sergeant Kuhn, I got a job for you. I was like, I just got back. You know, I I said it to myself, of course.

And I was like, what does he want from me now? He said, you're gonna be marching in the victory parades in New York City and Washington DC. I was like, what? Woah. So I went to DC, and we're marching down the street.

And that was, you know, typical military parade, six across the front, you know, I don't know, 300 deep or whatever we were. I was calling cadence for the entire division. And that was cool. Then we went to New York, and it was a Charlie Foxtrot, so claustrophobic. Right?

The streets were narrow. People were coming in. Girls were showing us their breasts and stuff, and we ended up being too wide in the front. Right? And there was a Vietnam veteran came, said, you you guys don't know what war is.

You know, you don't have no idea. You guys were there for, you know, a couple, you know, couple months. And I was like, first of all, I said, come on come here, brother. March with us. So I grabbed him, and we were marching with him, you know.

And then later we were talking, I said, look, man, that was my Vietnam. Like, I don't want to know what Vietnam was like. I I can't know, and I don't want to know what it was like. That was bad enough for me. And he's like, yeah.

Yeah. I get it. I get it. So it's all relative, isn't it? So what's bad for you might not might not be bad for me, might not be bad for someone else.

For me, the worst thing that I had was in the war when I lost my friend in my arms. Second personal, you know, sort of crushing moment I had was being homeless. But it wasn't crushing once I realized that was just my ego. It was just what I thought that I couldn't be. That's just what I thought society I I actually got a job as a doorman at the age of 40 after I was homeless.

And I was standing on the door, and I had friends who knew me as this big because at that time, I was I was doing TV in Germany. I was a best selling author. I was a director of a big company. And then I lost it all. And there I was on the door, like, months later, and people say, hey, Steve.

What's going on? I'm like, hey, man. They said you're coming in. I'm like, no. I work here.

And they're like, what? Oh my god. What's with you? What happened? And and they were completely embarrassed.

They're like, Steve, you can't work here. What are doing, man? I was like, well, dude, keep going and have fun and relax. You know, they were more worried about how they look talking to me as the doorman than I was as a doorman who lost everything. Can you imagine?

Yeah. But that's that's society.

Chris Albert 00:24:51 (link to this point)

They're they're projecting their fear onto you. That's exactly what's going on. That's that's insane. Now, we talked a little bit about this, but we're seeing a trend toward plant medicines Oh, yeah. To try to bring yourself to this type of fear.

And I've had experience with with with these quite a bit, and I know you recently went on a journey yourself. Can you tell us a little bit about it?

Steven Kuhn 00:25:18 (link to this point)

Well, I've been working with a plant medicine for fourteen years, Ayahuasca to be specific, and in the last four years now with San Pedro as well.

Chris Albert 00:25:26 (link to this point)

Oh, wow.

Steven Kuhn 00:25:26 (link to this point)

I also worked with I worked with Iboga one time, never again. And, of course, a little bit of rapé here and there doesn't hurt. You know? So what the first time the first time I ever worked with Ayahuasca was in 2007 maybe, six or seven. I was in Berlin.

And the only reason I did this is I was talking to a friend who who was a German and was a McKinsey consultant in London, making 25 k a week month, and just doing really well and collected burden and all kinds of stuff like, you know, the typical societal guy. And he did one session in London, quit his job the next day, took his money, removed to the Amazon, invested in living there, and ended up living with the Shamans and learning their trade and going into the jungle for two years and actually doing that the Shaman trip. So he lived by himself in the jungle for two years, went through the whole journey and stuff. And now he travels the world as a Shaman. He's he's like the western, know, specialist.

And and I said, look, I can't get it out of my head that I'm that I that I'm going broke. I can't, you know, I can't this is before I went broke. I can't get it out of my head. I feel like I'm going broke. I'm I'm always worried about money.

He goes, come let's do a session. Like, what? So in a session, I asked never to worry about money again, to always have enough. Right? Which sounds great.

Right? Well, I said the wrong words. I shoulda had more. I shoulda said more. But I said enough.

So I always ever only ever had enough. But then I went broke, like I told you, and I lost everything. And I think that session was what helped me through being homeless. Because I said, okay, I have enough. Like, I'll always have enough.

Because that the certainty see, with one thing about Ayahuasca is that people forget is it's not a recreational drug.

Chris Albert 00:27:07 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:27:07 (link to this point)

Okay? This is therapy. Anybody who goes on an Ayahuasca trip and they're talking about vomiting and, all this kind of stuff, that means they didn't prepare. There's a two week preparation you have to go through when you do the you when you do the session, and it's about what you eat, what you don't eat, what you put in your body, what you put on your body, and that kind of stuff. And when you're prepared, I've fourteen years, probably 30 times I've I've worked with Ayahuasca.

I vomited one time, and that was last year.

Chris Albert 00:27:30 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 00:27:31 (link to this point)

Because I was so deep in a session for the like, I just went deeper than deep. And we use such small dosages, and it's only to facilitate your own your own powers, your own energies. So we don't go to that, you know, they call it Ayahuasca tourism. We don't we don't we don't do that at all. We actually have our own I have my own journeys now in Peru, going in fifteen days again to Peru.

So Ayahuasca is so powerful because that's that's the feminine. Right? That's the feminine energy. That's the yin so to say, and that's the Aries stuff, that's how you see where you're going, what you're doing, your visions. And then San Pedro is the cactus, which is the masculine, right?

They call Ayahuasca the mother, they call San Pedro the father, right? And Iboga is the grandfather. I'll tell you why in a minute. But San Pedro is the exact opposite, it grounds you. It makes you if you're working with Ayahuasca and you're not working with San Pedro, man, you're missing.

You're missing the entire other you're missing the yang of the ying. Wow. And I didn't know that until about four years ago. And I can tell you what, that changed everything in my life, in my business, in my relationship with my kids, my wife, myself. It changed everything because it's just the certainty.

Now look. When we go there, we talk about mission and certainty. So see, what's up? Oh, beautiful. Nice. Yes.

Sorry. My my daughter's here. Yeah. I see it. Yes.

I see. You wanna pull it out?

Chris Albert 00:28:54 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 00:28:55 (link to this point)

Okay. There you go. Good job. Close the door. Thanks, boo boo.

Yeah. Sorry. That's one thing I never do is tell my kids to go away. So that's just one of those things I I always do. So so the thing we work on is when when when we go on on these retreats, this time we're going with six people, we go with the mission of creating certainty and finding your purpose.

So and I don't mean like, guys, you know, you know, cool, groovy. I'm talking, what's your purpose in life to be abundant and make money and change the world, affect the world, impact the world? What is it? Right? And how do you create certainty? Because you have belief, you have faith, right, and then comes certainty.

And certainty is when you know something's happening, you only have to think about it. It doesn't matter how it's gonna happen. You don't even worry about it because you know it's gonna Like, it's gonna rain, forget about it. I'm not gonna worry about it. It's gonna rain.

That's certainty. And when you have that kind of certainty in your life about business, my man, when you have certainty about that in your relationships, I I you can't even imagine the load off your back.

Chris Albert 00:29:59 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 00:29:59 (link to this point)

And the way you can live and the energy and the power that you have to give others and really invest in that relational capital all the time because you're you're wasting zero energy on the shit that doesn't matter.

Chris Albert 00:30:10 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:30:10 (link to this point)

It's amazing that it's amazing, and that's what we work on.

Chris Albert 00:30:14 (link to this point)

That's awesome. That's awesome. I you you had mentioned a ibogaine, and every person I've ever heard taking ibogaine says never again. Do do you wanna describe that at all?

Steven Kuhn 00:30:29 (link to this point)

Or Yeah. Sure. They they call that the grandfather. It's a truth root. And if you it comes from Africa.

And the Africans say, you only take it twice in life, and that's when you hit puberty Mhmm. And be right before you die. Right? And here we are using it as, you know, a therapy. And what ibogaine is typically used for is for people that are on hard narcotics, trying to get off hard narcotics.

I'm not on hard narcotics. So I took a very small dose of it. And they call it the truther because it's fate makes you face yourself. Right? And man, did it ever make me face myself.

And it was annoying to no end because you had you had this dialogue with yourself for about six hours. You know? So everything I said, I had an answer to myself. Didn't matter what thought I had, I had another answer to myself immediately. Like, I'd thinking, like, man, I wonder if it's gonna rain.

What do you think? It was like back and forth like that. It was driving me mad. But then I had to embrace it. You have the thing about plant medicine, you have to embrace what comes even if you die.

Because what's dying what's dying is not you. That's the bad energy. It's the bad memories. It's the bad you know, whatever it is. The vibrations are are raising or whatever.

So I know it sounds all hokey, but check this out. I've I've I consult some very in some very big people, you know, politicians, party heads in Europe, and Fortune five hundred, London Stock Market, NASDAQ, and they've all done Ayahuasca with me. Wow. And so so you gotta realize, we're not hippies. We're people that have realized we're so you have the you have two two two two types of people that that that typically the world knows.

Those that are full on spiritual, and they have, like they wear, like, gowns and headbands, they have tattoos, and they're like, oh, kumbaya, my lord, you know, that kind stuff. And they're broke as hell. Like, I have no money at all. Right? Or you have the other side.

They're completely corporate or business oriented and have no connection to the spiritual, metaphysical, any kind of world at all. Right? So you have those two people, basically. Right? In between, you have a bunch of people that are a little bit here, a little bit there.

But you rarely have someone who has the far left and the far right as far as full corporate and full spiritual. Not saying I'm that, but that's the gap that I bridge.

Chris Albert 00:32:36 (link to this point)

No. I do.

Steven Kuhn 00:32:36 (link to this point)

I go in I go in, and I use into the knowledge and the certainty that I gained through the Ayahuasca consent to make a lot of money. And to help people make a lot of money. And when I work with my clients, I have I have Immediate Impact Revenue Program, which is a group program, and I have Immediate Impact Consulting, which is my private consulting. I find money in hours, not in months. That's awesome.

I have a client in Texas, just as an example, my client in Texas is a roofer, we found $250,000 in his first hours. He was like, holy shit, man. I I can have like, I just I can pay you in advance. I'm like, well, I hope so. You know, and it's it's these kind of things that I I you know, people talk all the time about masterminds.

Right? I'm sorry, I'm rambling on, but I love People this talk about masterminds all the time, and when you when I say mastermind, people think, oh, it's a meeting of some guy, you pay, you go, you learn. Right? So what a mastermind really is, and this was done this was done by either Napoleon Hill or what Napoleon Hill. Napoleon Hill.

Sorry. Napoleon Hill or Wallace

Chris Albert 00:33:33 (link to this point)

Wattles.

Steven Kuhn 00:33:34 (link to this point)

Well, I forget which one it just said. But the mastermind is this, You have one person that comes, and you have the other person that comes. And when you give yourself freely without expectations to each other, a third entity is formed. That's the mastermind. And you come with you come come away with solutions that either one of you alone would have never have gotten.

And that's how I connect with my clients. So we come up with solutions for their businesses that me alone or them alone can never come up with. And so it's specifically unique to each business owner. So they walk away with a solution going, holy man, this is my personal tailored solution. It sounds spiritual, but it's exactly it's completely not spiritual.

And that's the part of HIT where the no expectations come in again. Being a HIT person is real simple. You show up wholly and fully without expectations, without a preconceived notion, without a pre pre designed solution to the person in front of you. Like when I show up to my consulting, I'm like, hey, what's up? What's what's going on?

What are you feeling like today? That's how I start. Don't go, well, let's go to a checklist here and go to, you know, that kind of stuff. And because I know how to touch my vulnerability, I know I know how to go deep and actually share with you my truths, you share with me your truths. You see, we fill the space that we're given like goldfish.

Right? Just like we're doing now, we're this isn't scripted. We don't know where we're going. This is being created. And these words coming out of my mouth and what's coming out of your mouth, they're not words that I ever would have came up with my own, on my own by myself.

Why would I? Right? So this mastermind that we're creating is something pretty special.

Chris Albert 00:35:01 (link to this point)

It's completely social, and and that's a good metaphor for the plant medicine as far as coming to it open and and ready to hear the truth.

Steven Kuhn 00:35:11 (link to this point)

Yeah. And embracing whatever comes.

Chris Albert 00:35:13 (link to this point)

Absolutely. Absolutely. I wanna talk a little more about that. But but one more thing I wanted to ask you because I did when I went on my own plant medicine journey, I haven't done ayahuasca yet. I did a a DMT, which is more like a a rocket ship component.

The same active ingredient, but more like a rocket ship. Right. Right. The the the thing I really took away from that was that, you know, it put me in a place to where I basically was told to to stop worrying so much about everything. Right?

Yeah. Told me to to to just stop. And then it told me, don't come back until you're ready. Right? It said, don't come back here.

It's a because the first thing it was like, I'm immediately surrounded by these things. And then all of a sudden, they're like, why are you here? And then I kinda communicated that, and I was like and they were like, alright. We're gonna we're gonna show you this, but it's it's one more time, and then don't come back until you're ready. Do you believe that that this is coming from another dimension?

Do you think that that that it's in it's in our minds, or do you think it's it's something else? Because it I mean, when you actually do it, you you literally feel like you're somewhere else and and that you're you're you're you're surrounded by something.

Steven Kuhn 00:36:35 (link to this point)

Well, you know, there's a little literal gland in our body, in our in our head. It's called the pineal gland. Mhmm. That's the third eye, basically. Right?

So the third eye, which is the eye that sees things that are here every day that we don't see with our normal eyes, basically, that's what it is. So it's just awareness, isn't it? So it's it's you, you know, polishing your pineal gland, opening up, that's what that's what ayahuasca does. Also activates that like crazy. Your third eye opens up.

So you see things that are here. I mean, it's not it's not if if you look back in history, this is they've been using Ayahuasca for, god, you know, a thousand years or whatever it's been. If you look at it look at the American American indigenous tribes, they use peyote among other things. This is this is real things. They use Ayahuasca in churches with babies Mhmm.

Still in in South

Chris Albert 00:37:21 (link to this point)

America.

Steven Kuhn 00:37:22 (link to this point)

And that allows you to release. We cannot force ourselves to release because we are, you know, cognitive a cognitive race. We think all the time. And when you're when you're on the plant medicine, it allows you to stop thinking and simply to receive. And when you receive, it's like a radio antenna. You don't know what you're gonna receive until it comes until it comes to you, right? And now, this is where the medicine is important because if you would receive without being prepared with medicine, you would be like, what is this? And you'd probably block it off. So that's that's why for me, it's always important to explain to people, go, and it's funny to see that people go with us because they're business people.

Mhmm. They're business very successful multimillionaire business people that aren't looking for a trip. They're not looking for a gag. They're not looking to go there and why wear white clothes and be all sort of, you know, hokey and stuff. They want to find certainty in what their purpose is in life, because it can't be just about making money.

There's got to be something else. And this is until you get to that point, sometimes people won't won't allow themselves to believe there is something else, because, like you said, it's fear. Right. Like, what if I find out I'm with the wrong woman? What if I find out I'm in the wrong job?

What if I find out that the relationships that I have in the past were complete flukes? You know? People worry about this stuff, you know? And and so they stay away from it. And so there's a lot of facing the truth that you have to do before you even begin with the medicine.

Yeah. Because you gotta be prepared for what happens. You know?

Chris Albert 00:38:46 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 00:38:46 (link to this point)

I mean, I had my buddy did it. He came home and left his girlfriend and went went just left and said, I love you, but we're not supposed to be together. Like, you know, logical. Just cut it talking about? Yeah. Just cut it off. So, look, we we can't be together. Bad for you or, you know, whatever.

Whatever. She was bad for him, whatever it said. I don't remember. You know, that was it. Completely lie.

Like, done. Amazing. Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:39:12 (link to this point)

That's that's definitely something I I I'll never look at drugs in the same way ever again because

Steven Kuhn 00:39:19 (link to this point)

Well, that's the isn't it? You know, people call it drugs, people call it medicine, people call it plant medicine, whatever it is. I don't I don't know. I try not to call it anything. I call it, you know, sacred sacred plants.

Chris Albert 00:39:29 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 00:39:29 (link to this point)

Because in the end you know, the thing that's hard about it, I was I had a call on Saturday with one of my biggest clients. I did 1,000,000,000 in sales last year. And I he said, what are you doing in May? I said, I'm to Peru. He said, what are doing in Peru?

I said, I'm working with Agoge. He's like, what? You? You're a business guy. I'm like, well, yeah.

That's why I'm so damn good. He's like, what? Are you you going in and get high? I'm like, you don't get high. It's not getting high.

It's not tripping. It's not chilling out and being cool. It's work, man. It's ten days of hard work with yourself and crying and being upset and letting go of things that you cherish and love, only to have them come back and love you even more. So these are the kind of things that I go through when we're down there, and we facilitate this with the with the indigenous tribe down there that's actually the the descendants of the Incans.

And the even cooler thing is, where this compound is, it's a compound ran by a South African family called the Maybergs. They've been there for twenty five years. And when they built their compound, it was built at the top of Cusco, which is the oldest city in The Americas. And after that, they found the entire ruins of the Incan Empire. So guess where we do our ceremonies?

Right on top of the Temple Of The Moon, where the thrones are, where the sacrificial stones are. It's all right there. So if spirituality and proximity mean anything to you Mhmm. That's the place you gotta do it. Wow.

Wow. You know? So, yeah, it's incredible.

Chris Albert 00:40:58 (link to this point)

That's gotta be amazing. That's gotta be amazing.

Steven Kuhn 00:41:01 (link to this point)

It is. And then and then we take the train to Machu Picchu. Right? So we go Machu Picchu for a day, we go to Pisac to the market. We do, you we do a little bit of touristy stuff as well, sometimes horseback.

We go to Glacier Mountain, that kind of stuff.

Chris Albert 00:41:12 (link to this point)

That's awesome. That's awesome.

Steven Kuhn 00:41:14 (link to this point)

It is.

Chris Albert 00:41:16 (link to this point)

Another question for you here because, you know, what you do in business, I mean, it takes it takes a lot of skill in in understanding people and understanding not only people people's thoughts and goals, but also their motives, what drives them, where they wanna go, and how in in the bigger picture of of what's holding them back. Right? What is your superpower, if you were to to say what it was, and and and how did you develop it and hone it?

Steven Kuhn 00:41:49 (link to this point)

I you know, I think my superpower is to able to relate and connect with anyone.

Chris Albert 00:41:53 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 00:41:54 (link to this point)

And what that does is puts them at ease and allows them to to to their creative juices to flow together to create that mastermind I was talking about. The way I did that was I realized at a really early stage that I had special talents if I let go. And I was not scared of failing. So that was my biggest thing. So when I walked up to Mick Jagger and said, I'm your new bodyguard because I wanted to, he believed me, and I got the job.

Right? So and then I walked up to Andrea Bocelli, and I said, you need me. He's like, why? And I told him why? And I said, I want a retainer.

He laughed at me, and I walked away with a retainer and 20%. That's because I didn't have any fear. Like, I knew that whoever I'm in front of, if they open up to me, we're gonna create something amazing. And that's because I have faith in, I don't know, whatever it is, the cosmos or universe or the source, whatever you wanna call it, that when you give yourself freely and openly and wholly, then it comes back to you. Period.

So investing in relational capital, the entire thing hit, you know, that whole sort of letting go of no expectations. So I think that the connection that I have with anybody that I work with, when I walk into a room, I'm able to do it in a way where I get noticed very quickly because I'm only giving. I go I go to networking, which I hate, but I go to networking events speaking, for instance, at Clever Talks. Perfect example. I walked in to the whole event.

And the first thing I did is I went to every single vendor, and I shook their hands, said, what do do? How are you doing? Second day, I went back and said, hey, what's your number one problem? Let me let me let me solve it for you. For nothing.

So the new one I was, they saw me again, hey, Steve, welcome back. See, you invest in them. You give them more. You make them feel better than when they when you met them. So when you leave, say bye, they're feeling better than when they met you.

Every single time. I call that your your life enterprise. So, you know, if you look at a CEO in an enterprise, business enterprise, he or she is is has to answer to one person, and that's the stakeholder. Right? Stakeholders, you know.

And in our life, if we're the CEO of our own life enterprise, most of us should be fired. You know, we're the CEO of our life enterprise, We go around. Everyone we meet is a is a stakeholder in our life because they have an influence over us. So we better treat them good. We better elevate them.

We better make them feel better when they leave us is when they see us. And when you do that, everyone wants to be with you. Everyone wants to work with you. Everyone wants to see you. And you do it because it's good for you Mhmm.

As well, not just for them.

Chris Albert 00:44:22 (link to this point)

I'm asking this because we've got a lot of young combat veterans who listen to this show and who are out there. They're trying to figure out their way in this world. When did you know that that that entrepreneurship was your path? But was it always something that you wanted to do? Was it did did it start at a very young age, or or was there a moment?

Steven Kuhn 00:44:48 (link to this point)

Well, back when I was, you know, growing up, the entrepreneurship wasn't even a word. It was it was there, but no one no one used it. You know? You were self employed, or you were a contractor, or you know what mean? Or or you were employed, or you owned a business, or you're a restaurant restaurateur.

All these all these words. But entrepreneurship and the label and all the coolness about it wasn't there. All I knew is when I got out the army, I never wanted to work for anybody again, And I didn't directly. Of course, you do as a contractor, as a consultant, you work for people all the time, but just on your on your own terms. And so when I when I first got out of the army, I got out and did a European out and stayed in Europe.

So I got out in Berlin, and I opened a cocktail bar. Right? Then another one, another one, then a nightclub, and all this kind of stuff. And not the not the nicest business to be in, if you know what I mean, but great cash flow. Know.

And I think I think well, I never saw myself as an entrepreneur or whatever, but this is this is the point. As an entrepreneur doesn't mean you do one thing, you can do it forever and do it do it good. Entrepreneur means you fight your ass off to make sure whatever it is that you're doing is working. And that means that you have to be open to what it develops into. Because your goal may be to be an entrepreneur and make this much money and to open up this, that, and the other.

When you're presented with opportunities that can change your whole business plan for the better, and it could also take you in a direction that's even more advantageous, easier to scale, less work, or whatever, you have to be able to have the belief in yourself, right, and the flexibility to actually move, shoot, and communicate in that direction, if you will. Right. And that's where for me, a true entrepreneur is someone who can let go of what they think that they have to do. Because often, you will never figure out actually, you never will never figure out alone how to get to the end. You will never figure it out alone.

You won't. That's why there's coaches. That's why there's consultants. That's why there's mentors. That's why there's online courses.

That's why there's TV shows. That's why there's all these trainings in there. Because you don't know, like I said in the beginning, what you don't know.

Chris Albert 00:46:46 (link to this point)

Right. Yeah. It seems like there's so many people out there who who just take the solopreneur route, and and they think that the solopreneur route is the way to go. They don't wanna depend on anybody. They don't want help from anybody.

And if you do that, there's there's there's such a big danger of of getting tunnel vision or or or sticking yourself into a place where you're painting yourself into a corner because you're not getting outside perspective.

Steven Kuhn 00:47:10 (link to this point)

Well, let me give you an example. There's there's nothing wrong with being a solopreneur. You're very flexible that way. Right? But you're also very vulnerable, like you said.

So, you know, being an entrepreneur, solopreneur, if you wanna call it, the key thing is how will you grow your business if you're by yourself? It's almost possible. Number two is the the way to grow your business quickest is with collaborations, right, or partnerships. Collaborations are better because you don't have to form a third entity, pay taxes on this certain blah blah blah, all that kind of stuff. You simply say, let's work together and split the profits.

Right? So for instance, you know, I have a new product that I'm releasing called the Immediate Impact Revenue Program. It's a group consulting program. On Tuesdays, we have a special forces veteran who teaches high performance mindset and force optimization in your business. Wednesdays, you have a hot seat with me where I find immediate revenue in your business.

Thursdays, we have business professionals coming in to teach, like Tim Storey coming in to teach. We got Evan Carmichael said he's gonna come in and teach. We've got Roland Frasier's gonna come in and teach. All these big names coming in to teach the students. And then on Fridays, have the business and body mindset with a professional coach, fitness coach from The UK.

Now, all of these things are included in this in this in this in this program. But the biggest thing that everybody gets from this program is the other entrepreneurs, collaboration opportunities. So I can teach whatever I want, and we can have the coolest people in there, but you're gonna get the most value out of the other entrepreneurs for your everyday business. So a solopreneur is great, but you need to belong to a group of of other solopreneurs so you can work with each other. Right.

As an example as an example, Vet TV. Right? Vet Vet TV. That's Donnie O'Malley. Only.

Donnie O'Malley. Right. Yeah. So they're sitting there at Clever Talks, and they're talking about, yeah, we need to get this word out, they were gonna hire me as a consultant, which they didn't do, but they were gonna hire me as a consultant. And I'm sitting there going, well, what's the problem?

Why can't you get more subscribers? Yeah. We need more mails and stuff. I'm like, put Black Rifle Coffee in your movie and ask them to send out an email that they're 1,000,000 subscribers. Do the same thing with Grunt Style, you're good to go.

Done. You know I'm saying? It's like Okay. It's it's a collaboration. It's a collaboration.

It's simple as that. They win, they get spots in his film, you know, they get to join Grunt Style, you see those Grunt Style t shirts in their film anyway now.

Chris Albert 00:49:19 (link to this point)

Right?

Steven Kuhn 00:49:19 (link to this point)

Yep. And then you have Black Rifle Coffee in their films, and then there you go. They send out an email, each let's say they each have maybe 500,000 subscribers for their t shirts and for their coffee. You know, you can probably go from 10%, 50,000 people sign up. We think that's that's good.

Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:49:34 (link to this point)

Yeah. That's awesome. And then and then if you're just split if you're splitting profits, that that's like, you know, you're you're getting advertising without without forking anything out. Right?

Steven Kuhn 00:49:45 (link to this point)

It's You're making money. You're getting advertising and you're making money.

Chris Albert 00:49:48 (link to this point)

So Exactly.

Steven Kuhn 00:49:49 (link to this point)

And this is what people forget. Everybody's so worried. That guy's mine. It's mine. I can't share.

Oh, you know, that kind of And when I'm launching my program now, I have friends all over the place and have massive mailing list of a million people, they're sending it out for me for free because they love what I've done for them. I've helped them. I've done I helped them build their business, I've helped them fix problems, things like that. Relational capital. Right?

Now it's coming back. Like, Steve, we'll send it out. Not a problem. That's You know? So yeah.

So and and this is why I find that anybody who's look. First of all, competition, the thought of competition is scarcity mindset. That means I have to hide something, hold something, beat someone, that's scarcity mindset. There's nothing wrong with healthy competition. But when you stop being fully giving full value to your world around you because you're scared someone's gonna steal your idea, scarcity.

Scared? Scarcity. So and and people forget about that sometimes. They go, I can't well, they're my competition. Yeah, man.

Chris Albert 00:50:39 (link to this point)

Give more.

Steven Kuhn 00:50:41 (link to this point)

Yeah. Give more. You know?

Chris Albert 00:50:42 (link to this point)

That's a that that's the thing. When you when you come into particularly in today's business world, you know, what what the way things are online, if you come into that with a scarcity mindset, you you're holding yourself off from so many revenue revenue streams, potential revenue streams, so many ways to do it that are gonna be so much easier than than just trying to hoard everything and trying to trying to protect everything and and and and going crazy that way.

Steven Kuhn 00:51:08 (link to this point)

Well, that's the competition mind. And then you have the the the other scarcity mindset is which I need this. Need this. I need this.

Chris Albert 00:51:13 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:51:13 (link to this point)

That's also scarcity mindset. Like, you go to a meeting and you have to close the sale, and they're gonna feel it, and you're not gonna close the sale. That's why you go with no expectation. That's why you go and create that mastermind.

Chris Albert 00:51:25 (link to this point)

Exactly. Right?

Steven Kuhn 00:51:26 (link to this point)

Exactly. You don't go in, I gotta close the sale. I got the closing techniques. You want, you know, the alternate close and then the line down the middle. I don't know.

You know, all these different kinds of closes that we learned when we, like, twenty five years ago when I was coming up in sales. They don't work anymore. Mirror and match and, you know, they wanna see you are there for them, maybe a bit vulnerable. And my my superpower, what you were talking about before, my superpower is I can stay vulnerable longer than anybody else. I can stay underwater, naked by myself, in a boardroom, longer than anybody else.

You can go at me all day long, nobody and I will never flare up. Like, will stay in that humble, vulnerable, powerful place that most people call fear. Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:52:05 (link to this point)

Exactly.

Steven Kuhn 00:52:06 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:52:07 (link to this point)

Now you have you have young children.

Steven Kuhn 00:52:11 (link to this point)

Yes.

Chris Albert 00:52:11 (link to this point)

What are you how are you teaching them this stuff? Or are are you introducing this stuff to them now? And if so

Steven Kuhn 00:52:18 (link to this point)

All day.

Chris Albert 00:52:18 (link to this point)

How are you how are you introducing it to them?

Steven Kuhn 00:52:21 (link to this point)

Well, I I I love it. You know, I'm 52 next month. And my my wife's 31, and my kids are turning four and five. So it's a long stretch in between us all. And I I, you know, I started when they were babies. When they get up in the morning or when I go to bed at night, usually both times, I'll give them a a little sermon. Right? And says, you are who you wanna be. You can be anyone you wanna be. You're not better than anybody else, and no one's better than you.

Right? Do you understand? Do you understand this? Yes. I understand, Papi.

They don't understand, but whatever. You know, they're getting to it. Right? And then we talk about how how, you know, how does it feel? What do you feel like right now?

And what are the things that you see when you go to sleep? What are things you see when you wake up? And we just go into this whole metaphysical kind of thing. So I wanted to be aware, and I tell them every day, your mission today is to have as much fun as possible. That's why you're here.

You're a child. That's why you're here. And when you have fun, you include other people in that fun, and you respect those other people. So when they go to school am I kidding? My son walks in the classroom, the entire class stops.

Next. They all run to him. And the teachers are like, what are you teaching these kids? They're so polite and so loving and so nice. You know?

And it's it's and people say, well, yeah, you're be vulnerable. You know? He's he's maybe he's gonna be, you know, a wimp or whatever. And I'm like, no. Do I look like a wimp?

I'm six forty two eighty, and, you know, I I can hold my own. I'm not worried about it. I'm not teaching him to be a softie. I'm teaching him to respect other people. I'm teaching him to invest in that who he is and allow that to develop.

And so, yeah, I'm teaching him that every single day. My daughter, amazing child, is a helper like no one I've ever seen at four years old. You know, she's always helping somebody, always opening doors, trying to open doors anyway. Always saying thank you and please and welcome and just being a real chatterbox. And and of course, everyone's proud of their kids.

But I consciously make an effort to talk to them about the things that matter in life that I learned when I was 40, 45, and 50. And if I can teach them that now, can you imagine Yeah. The power they're gonna have as a human being? The the the clarity they're gonna have, man. I just can't even it gives me goosebumps.

Chris Albert 00:54:35 (link to this point)

That's amazing. At this age you're at now, 52. Right? Yeah. Looking back, and I ask this as kind of a selfish question on myself on my part because I'm turning 40 next month.

So so

Steven Kuhn 00:54:52 (link to this point)

What day? What day? What's your birthday?

Chris Albert 00:54:54 (link to this point)

May 18.

Steven Kuhn 00:54:55 (link to this point)

Okay. I'm thirtieth. May 30.

Chris Albert 00:54:57 (link to this point)

Oh, nice. Nice. So you're a Gemini. Right?

Steven Kuhn 00:54:59 (link to this point)

Yep.

Chris Albert 00:55:00 (link to this point)

Gemini. I'm Taurus.

Steven Kuhn 00:55:01 (link to this point)

So so Oh, you just yeah. You're just Taurus. I'm the land of Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:55:06 (link to this point)

So so, you know, the the reason I asked this is because, you know, when I was a kid, 40 seemed like it was ancient. Right? And I I remember day I got in the Marine Corps, day I got to my unit in the Marine Corps, I was 19 years old. I see this guy. He's a he's a master sergeant.

No. He's a first sergeant. And I'm looking at him, and he looked like he was about to me at the time, 60 years old. Right? And he's like, hunched over.

He's he's smoking smoking a cigarette and everything like that. And I learned later on, he was only about 38. Good. I'm like, you know, and and now I'm about to turn 40, and I still feel like I'm very young.

Steven Kuhn 00:55:51 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Chris Albert 00:55:52 (link to this point)

Looking back, was there a point where you thought, am I or do do you feel older now, or do you feel like you still have the energy you did when you were in your twenties? What's it like?

Steven Kuhn 00:56:04 (link to this point)

Well, when I was 35, 36, 37, that's when I was at my, you know, my peak of my horribleness. I felt really old. Everything hurt. I was chubby. I I felt like I was getting old.

I was missing out. You know? And now, I wake up every single day, and I'm so happy to receive. I'm just I'm excited every day to wake up. Mhmm.

And that's because I'm creating my own reality. Right? And I know, like, there's a scientific study done stating that reality doesn't exist unless someone's watching. Right? So if you know that, you can create your own reality.

So you close your eyes, you know, literally, when I wake up in the morning, my eyes are closed. Before I open my eyes, I create what I wanna have that day. And then I open my eyes. And so that's how I I I literally I I I tease the universe like that. So that and I I had a mentor once, you know, rest in peace.

And doctor Charles was his name, he's a British man who lived in Switzerland. He was the oldest oldest gold medal bodybuilder. Two two hundred meter sprinter, rower, scholar, whatever. So he did all these masters. He started bodybuilding when was 83.

Mhmm.

Chris Albert 00:57:11 (link to this point)

Right?

Steven Kuhn 00:57:12 (link to this point)

He died when he was 93. And I met him when he was, like, 85, eighty eighty six. And this guy told me, I said, man, what do you because he was clear. He was like like, he could talk like this. At 85 years old, 90 years old, 92 years old.

And I said, what is your secret? He goes, it's it's everyone says it's food, but it's not I drink, you know, and it's like, it's having a purpose.

Chris Albert 00:57:31 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 00:57:31 (link to this point)

It's having a purpose, Steven, that will keep you young forever. Always be extending your goals. Always be setting new goals forward. And I don't mean like, I own a car. I own a bigger car.

You know? Like, purpose, purposeful goals. And that's why I had to that's actually why myself and my partner, Lane Ballon, who's a special forces guy who teaches, he's my he's my full partner, we did a course called the last goal setting course you'll ever need. And that's what it's all about. First, find your identity, who you are, what's your purpose in life, then you set goals.

You set five goals for each area of your life, for a total of 100 goals in this course for the next thirty years. What happens is, is when you set goals for thirty years, it isn't like, I want a car in thirty years, it's just like, I'm gonna have a house sometime between now and thirty years. I'm gonna have a family between now and thirty years. So you're setting up the entire structure of your life, but not a timeline.

Chris Albert 00:58:24 (link to this point)

Right.

Steven Kuhn 00:58:24 (link to this point)

That's the cool thing about it, and here's why. Because if I'm focused on one thing like this, like I'm looking down tunnel vision, I'm not seeing what's left and right, and up and down. And if you ask any successful person, Richard Branson or Bill Gates, whoever, they're gonna tell you 30 to 50% of their success was coincidence and luck. So you don't see coincidence and luck if you're tunnel visioned at one goal, number one. Number two, if there's one goal that you have, let's say for instance, you want a Bentley, Right?

And you save money for that Bentley and you buy a Bentley. Well, now now now you can't afford the insurance. You look like a knucklehead because you're wearing, I don't know, the wrong clothes or who knows what. Your goal should be the lifestyle of a person who can afford to drive and enjoy a Bentley. What does that include? And that's where the goals come in. People are like, a 100 goals? Like, that's easy.

What kind of a person would drive a Bentley? They got a lot of money. How much? Okay. How much do they make a month?

What what does their house look like? What color is carpet? How many how many people they have in their family? Where where do they live? You know, what what's the house made out of?

It's all these different things, creating literally in this course, a life of your own that you really, really want, right? And then we learn how to habit, set habits and procedures, and structures in your life to make sure you're always going toward those goals, and the goals cascade. As soon as you reach one goal, it morphs into another goal, morphs into another goal. And so we did this thing called habit stacking as well. So you take an old habit, put the new habit on top of it, for instance, every time you brush your teeth in the morning, have your journal sitting beside your toothbrush because you know, you'll forget it otherwise.

That's called habit stacking. That's from Atomic Habits from Habits from James Clear, great book. And a lot of things we talk about is metaphysics, but we do it in a way like this right here. We don't talk about, you know, metaphysical or quantum physics and things like that, but that's basically what we're talking about. And from the 60 people that signed up with absolutely no marketing whatsoever, I'd say about 80% of them are just blown away at the success they have because of the lifestyle they've built through this identity, goals, procedures, and structures, and and go, cascading goals. It just goes. And so when when when you talk about staying young, my friend, that's how you stay young because you always have something to forward look to. You're building something. You're creating new.

You're helping others. You're giving back. That whole spectrum of what it means to be a human is has little to do with what you get. Because when you give, you automatically get. When you give what you have, your time, your knowledge, whatever it is, you will always get back what you don't have.

Chris Albert 01:00:53 (link to this point)

Wow. That seems like it's the perfect perfect type of course for somebody like who's the guy's listening who's about 25 years old getting out of military, trying to figure out what they're gonna do next.

Steven Kuhn 01:01:07 (link to this point)

It's exactly what it's for. And we actually tailored it to that situation for people who were out and sort of like, okay, what do we do now? And there's a Facebook group to go with if you join the group, and the cool thing about it is the people who have gone through this course already are in that group, so they can help you along the way. And like I said, there's power in numbers. People who know what you know, entrepreneurs who are like you that have been through what you are yet to go through, you don't have to learn that.

I always say, if there's someone where you wanna be in life, go to them and ask them, how did you get here? Why would I go to try to learn Facebook ads if I can find somebody to do it for me who wants to be my partner or be a collaboration partner? I do what I do for him. I help him with his business, and he does my Facebook ads. Why would I try to learn it?

Why would I try to do it myself? It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. If you're strong at something, you need to put everything you have into that strength, and you outsource, delegate, collaborate, partnerships, joint ventures with people who are good at those things that you are bad at. Because you will never be a genius at that one thing if you're concentrating on your weaknesses all the time.

Like, people say, concentrating on your weaknesses, you know, twenty eighty, all that BS. Right? It's not twenty eighty. Not at all. It's like ninety four six.

Chris Albert 01:02:19 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 01:02:20 (link to this point)

You know?

Chris Albert 01:02:20 (link to this point)

Yeah. No.

Steven Kuhn 01:02:21 (link to this point)

So but don't get me wrong, you have to know your entire business, you have to know how it operates, and you have to know how it runs, and how it makes money, and how you all that. You need to know that.

Chris Albert 01:02:32 (link to this point)

Mhmm.

Steven Kuhn 01:02:32 (link to this point)

But not in detail details. I don't need to know how to write and compute an IRR model, internal rate of return model, you know, or ROI model. I I I just need to know how to read it, you know what I'm saying? And say, something's wrong there, that doesn't look right, you know, the variables, you know, the variable costs are whatever, just keep moving to my whatever. And so that you need to know.

I call that being a hitpreneur. So hitpreneur, hit squad, hitpreneur, hit man, hit woman. The hitpreneur is that person who shows up, as I said, to wholly and freely that knows their entire business 360 degrees, but is a genius in that one or two things that they do that just makes them like the baddest ass entrepreneur out there. And that's what we teach in this group. You start off with a with a with a Immediate Impact Revenue Program.

You start off with a thirty day kick start. And literally, it's I think it's like sixty five minute videos or four minute videos or three minute videos that we just go through and we just say, this is what you gotta do, this is how you do your branding, is how you do your sales, these are six sales courses, here's the marketing, da da da da da da, all the way through for thirty days so that you come out on a platform ready to rock and roll and kill it. You know, it's it's so much fun, I tell you. That's awesome.

Chris Albert 01:03:35 (link to this point)

That is awesome.

Steven Kuhn 01:03:36 (link to this point)

Especially especially for especially for for entrepreneurs that are like, man, I started, you know, I don't know what to do yet. And then but I feel like I'm there. Okay, move. Now we get you structured. We're gonna get you moving, get you in a hot seat.

You're gonna grab some mentors out of the group, and off you go.

Chris Albert 01:03:49 (link to this point)

That's awesome.

Steven Kuhn 01:03:50 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Chris Albert 01:03:51 (link to this point)

You know, it's it's it's interesting because we live in such an amazing time right now to where you can literally start a business, you know, with practically nothing. Right? You can start a business with practically nothing with an idea. And when you're looking for help out there, and you're looking for to outsource, you could do it easier now than ever as well, you know, because of virtual assistance and everything. Right?

Steven Kuhn 01:04:16 (link to this point)

Yeah. Well, look, I'm gonna tell you the truth. I started my online business fifteen months ago. Before that, I was an offline consultant traveling the world, Europe mostly, and you know, maybe twice a year to The States, or three times a year to The States, and I was literally gone four days a week, on an airplane two days a week. And it was like cool.

Right? But it sucked because I was away from my family. So I came home one day and I said, I'm done. I'm not going in. Can call my clients and I'm not coming anymore.

And I and I said, you can do with me online. They're like, we're not doing online. Who who the heck are you? Would you come some kind of, you know, ecommerce dude? I'm like, nope.

So they said no. I said, alright. So I didn't know what to do. My wife said, what are doing? I said, I have no idea.

So I went to the veteran group, Vetrepreneur Tribe. Right? There was like 2,000 people there at the time. And I said, hey, I'm doing how are doing? I'm Steven.

I'm a business consultant. I worked all over the world. Worked for Mick Jagger, Andre Bocelli, Olivia Newton-John. I worked for politicians. I worked with NASDAQ, all this, you know, whatever it said whatever it said.

And I said, I'm here to help you. So this is what I teach you today. I wanna teach you how to do marketing. I'm gonna teach you to do this. I'm gonna teach you how to do that.

And after three months, I had so many clients, I made 6 figures. Now, I didn't do any marketing. I didn't do any sales. I didn't do any anything. All I did, and this is where the hitpreneur comes in, was provide 100% free value in that group to the people who were listening.

And those people who were listening took what I taught them, implemented it, or some of them, that's where the money came in, said, Steve, I love what you said. I don't wanna do it myself. It's not my my area of genius. Can you do it for me? And they paid me for it.

Simple as that. I So help people scale their business, grow their business stuff. So there I was, made 6 figures in three months from zero, just from Facebook Lives. That's all I did. Facebook Live.

So you tell me, is it possible to start a business without any money? Yeah. I just did it. Right? So I did it.

And since then, I built it out and I just I still I still do the lives every day. Right? I take weekends off now since since about two months, but I did I do every single day. I have a morning purge. It's morning.

It's like it's like a minute video every morning just to, like, jump up and purge. And then I do my business at at at nighttime, my business video at night.

Chris Albert 01:06:25 (link to this point)

Wow.

Steven Kuhn 01:06:25 (link to this point)

Yeah. Yeah. And and and I still make money from it. It's making that's why I make some of my living.

Chris Albert 01:06:31 (link to this point)

Wow.

Steven Kuhn 01:06:31 (link to this point)

That's hard. So you don't need an investment. Look. Everybody has that thing. Everybody has that you know I'm saying?

It has that boom. Has something that they're amazing at. It could be anything. It could be drawing. It could whatever it is.

But if you are truly giving value from your your place of genius, and you're not expecting anything or turning, you're not trying to sell anything, you're just prove you're providing value, you're gonna win. You're gonna win every time. Promise you.

Chris Albert 01:06:55 (link to this point)

Exactly. And that's that's so important to remember. Everybody has something. Everybody does have something. Yep.

Let me ask you this. You at 52, you look great. What are you doing to take care of yourself?

Steven Kuhn 01:07:10 (link to this point)

Well, remember, I live in Europe now. So I've lived here in Europe since 1980 1993 when I got out, 1986 since I was in the army, and there's no GMO over here. There's no, you know, injections in the meat. There's no bovine. There's no none of that stuff, right?

So first of all, the food's much healthier. Second of all, I train, you know, almost every day since I was 14. And yeah, just that goal setting and a young wife and young kids and the zest for life and conquering more and seeing more and living more and loving it. Like, look, I live in Europe. When I wanna go out on the weekend, we go to Italy. We go to Croatia.

We go to Vienna. We got two hour drive away. Like, just booked this weekend today. Mhmm. So on the weekend, we're gonna be in Vienna or in Austria for two days with the kids.

You know, and this is what you can do, and it's gonna cost me total for two days in Austria with the drive back and forth less than $400. So it isn't like I'm some rich guy going around, you know, throwing money around. And and so, yeah, that's that's how you stay young, and you live life with a vengeance.

Chris Albert 01:08:12 (link to this point)

That's awesome. Steven, let me ask you this. How how can people find you? Where can they get in touch with your your hitpreneur program? Yeah.

And and I know you had it was it was an SMS I signed up for during the during the call if you wanted to put that out there as well.

Steven Kuhn 01:08:29 (link to this point)

Sure. So the SMS, you can actually go on my website, steven dash kuhn dot com, and you scroll down halfway, it says eight ways to create immediate impact revenue in your business. That's one. And at the top, you'll see resources. And you can click on resources, and it'll say the last goal setting course and the immediate impact revenue program.

I think I just I think a pop up just was put on today, so there should be a pop up as well for immediate impact revenue program. I'd highly encourage any entrepreneur who's looking to start or to boost their business, turn it around, to take a look at it. It's ridiculous what you get for for for a program in there. Really ridiculous. And you have access to me on those Wednesdays.

And, of course, I mean, they're chatting the whole time as well because I can't keep my my my my fingers. I love seeing people succeed. Right? Especially because when I know that I know what I know that they don't know, and it's really easy. Because there's only three ways to grow a business.

I think I said that in the speech, you know.

Chris Albert 01:09:25 (link to this point)

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 01:09:25 (link to this point)

That's that's more clients, higher prices than repeat sales. That's the three ways to grow your business. The only three ways there is. Now underneath those three ways are 35 other ways to grow your business, but, you know, there's there's like 15 ways to gain new clients. There's 15, you know what I'm saying?

So and when when you know when you know this, I look in I walk into a business or I talk to someone in their business and I look at what they're not doing. And I go, do this and do that. Done. Alright. Done.

Let's go. You know, it's so gratifying. I love it. I love it.

Chris Albert 01:09:54 (link to this point)

No. That's awesome. That's awesome. And are you on social media? Right?

You're on social media. You're on Facebook. Are you on are you on Instagram?

Steven Kuhn 01:10:04 (link to this point)

Yesterday, my Instagram my whole Instagram with 16,000 followers is deleted. You see, I got I got I have someone copying my my profile at least two or three times a week. So I report them every every time, two or three times a week. And I guess they thought I was fake because they deleted my entire account. So my entire it's yeah.

So my entire Instagram account where I've worked for with 2,000 posts is gone. I'm trying to get it back. But but Facebook is Steven Kuhn official. Facebook's Steven Kuhn official. That's my business page.

My private page is full of I have 5,000 friends, so I can't go over there anymore. But you can go you follow me on the you follow me on the business page, Steven Kuhn official. Twitter is Steven e Kuhn, Steven e Kuhn. Instagram is Steven Eugene Kuhn. I have a small business, one that I never build out, I'm now starting to build out.

So Steven Eugene Kuhn. And I think that's about it. Right? Yeah. That's about it.

Chris Albert 01:10:55 (link to this point)

Yeah. We'll get you we'll get you posted across our channels on there. That's that's it stinks to have something like that deleted.

Steven Kuhn 01:11:02 (link to this point)

Yeah. Meh. You know, it happened for a reason. Like, let's see see this is what I'm talking about. I let go of stuff like that.

If I can't change it, I I got my Instagram guy. I'm like, you Instagram guy. Can you go check it, Isaac? I'll get back with you in a couple days. Alright.

See you, man. I don't worry about it. Right? So it's like, yeah. So what?

It's supposed to happen. Who knows why? Maybe I'm supposed to learn a lesson like, hey, man, next time, take all those names down and put them in an Excel list or something. Know what mean? Like, whatever.

So it doesn't bother me. I I lost a Rolex one time. I'm like, I guess I wasn't supposed to have it. What do you do? You can't change it. It's raining, you're in a bad mood. I'm sorry, man. It's you're not gonna change the rain by being in a bad mood. You might as well be happy.

Chris Albert 01:11:38 (link to this point)

Yeah. Right. No. Absolutely. A lot of people worry too much about things they can't control at all.

Yeah.

Steven Kuhn 01:11:43 (link to this point)

Exactly. Exactly.

Chris Albert 01:11:45 (link to this point)

Well, number one, I I just want to acknowledge you. Like I said, first time I'd heard you was at that talk at Clever Talks. And then, you know, immediately after listening to your speech, I was really, really motivated. And and in the weeks and months after that, I'd started my own new business. And and Wow.

Really changed what I was doing. And I just I loved what you talked about. I loved I loved your presence on stage. And, you know, I love the fact that you're so, I hate using this word because it sounds cliche, but but it's true. You're authentic.

You know, you're you're you're truly putting yourself out there. You're not afraid to be vulnerable, and you're using it to help other people, using your story to help other people. And that's what I really appreciate about you, man.

Steven Kuhn 01:12:31 (link to this point)

Thank you so much. That's probably one of the best compliments I've ever gotten. So thank you. It really means a lot. Thank you so much.

Chris Albert 01:12:36 (link to this point)

Absolutely. Absolutely. And, you know, I'm really looking forward to see what our audience says about this this this episode. I know it's gonna have a huge impact on everybody out there. So Great.

Thank you for coming over and and helping our community. And and, you know, thank you for your service and and being a brother.

Steven Kuhn 01:12:56 (link to this point)

Amen, man. Thank you too, and thank you. I thank all your all your your listeners. You guys hang in there, man. The life life just keeps getting better if you just, you know, follow that attitude that you create your own reality.

And there's one thing I always say at the end of everything that I do, and that's it's all about quality of life in the end. Right? That's what we gotta go for. That's what we gotta get. Quality of life.

Chris Albert 01:13:15 (link to this point)

Exactly. Exactly. Well, again, Steven, thank you so much. And to everybody out there, get after it. You know, go after that quality of life and and get out there and live your best lives while you can.

Talk to you guys next week, and we're out.