Find Your Zone of Genius to Fuel Your Success

Find Your Zone of Genius to Fuel Your Success—with Berel Solomon

LTB 78 | Zone Of Genius
The Big Leap: Conquer Your Hidden Fear and Take Life to the Next Level
This is going to be everybody’s show. It’s not the Meny Hoffman show, it’s not The Berel Solomon Show. This is for you, the entrepreneur out there, the person looking for the next step in their business. I’m going to go through a bunch of stuff because if you follow Berel for a long time, you know there’s so much to talk to. We could be here all day. Let’s get officially started. We’re going to get right into it. Berel, thank you so much for joining me. How are you?

I’m doing great. I thank the one above on fire.

This is for your audience. They know you, maybe they don’t even, so we’re going to do this as if nobody knows you. I’m going to go back to the beginning. I want to ask you so many years later, so many different ventures, we’ll get into some of them. The question to you at first is, tell me a little bit about your past. Everybody has that fire that comes from somewhere. Tell us a little bit about what that transition was and share some of the transitional periods in your life that will be to our advantage and to our audience.

Specifically, about business or about life in general?

You can disconnect the two to a certain extent. Some people share less than one of the others. What do you feel comfortable sharing that will make a difference for our audience?

I’m going to talk very briefly about my past. As you already know, I was not always observant in my faith. This is something that changed my life completely. I’m coming out with a documentary with God’s help in the fall of 2021. It’s called Orthodox, My Path From King Of The Nightclub And Drug Dealing Kingpin To Lubavitcher Chassid And How We Ventured Into the Orthodox World. I don’t want to go into that too much because we will be touching on that a little bit in the documentary. I don’t want to give away too many secrets. I got funding. I have somebody who’s back to me. He put in over $100,000 into the documentary. This thing is taking off like wildfire. It can’t wait. I’m upset about how the Orthodox Jewish community is always portrayed in not a nice light on Netflix and all these terrible outlets.

I’m going to give the true narrative. That’s on the personal end of it. On the business end of it, I always had entrepreneurship in my blood. When I was a kid, everybody around me smoked weed, so I figured, “Why don’t I sell the people what they want to give them what they need?” It wasn’t that I was a bad person or a criminal, it’s just that it was the business that I was able to get into. I don’t mind saying it because in Quebec, it’s legal. It’s not incriminating. I haven’t smoked weed in several years. It’s been the best thing that ever happened to me. It slowed me down and messed me up.

I was working in my family business. Things were going great. I was working with my father. My two brothers came into the business. We’re all alpha males. We were all fighting over the same role. We’re all doing the same thing in the business. It came to a point where I almost came to blows in the warehouse one day with my brother. We almost got into a fistfight. I said to my father, “If I stay here, I’m not going to have a business and I’m not going to have a family. Forget about a family business.” I said to myself, “I got to get out of here. I’m going to do my own thing.” I enjoyed doing video marketing. It was something that I had done for my father’s business. I was good at it.

I hired companies. I produced. I’m launching a course, teaching people how to start a business. I started a multi-million-dollar business from scratch with no capital and no experience. I believe that it’s something that everybody could do. I codified that. I’m very excited about it. The company’s name is Wealthy Commercials. It’s taken on a life of its own. The Vice President of the company, his name is Elias Makris. He pretty much runs the company at this point. It’s successful and profitable. It allows me to go and build other businesses. One business that I’m building very strongly right now is my executive coaching firm. It’s called Wealthy Executive Coaching. What we do is we take executives in companies, business owners, presidents, CEO, CFOs, the C-Suite people and we coach them on how to reach their potential.

I want to go back to a couple of pointers that you mentioned where on our show, we pride ourselves on bringing no-nonsense advice. It’s great to have great stories about the person reading and giving us their twenty minutes on LinkedIn or on the show, they want to say, “I just read a blog and I immediately took action on it.” There are a couple of points that I want to go back to. If you don’t mind sharing a little bit more and opening up a little bit more about this concept of mixing family and business. We see this now a lot. We see it, family members, next-generation going into business and maybe not being on the same page on how to run the business.

We see it a little bit with spouses even. They go to work together and bring the business back at home with the kids. What can you share from your experience? Even if you made a decision at the end of the day that you want to move on and open up your own shop, even somebody that maybe doesn’t have that leverage doesn’t have those capabilities they want to stick around, what are some of the tips that you could give how to run this or keep it separate yet be able to run it professionally?

One of the things that helped when it was tough in my family business is we had this coach. He was a mentor. He was probably 75 years old, a seasoned veteran. His specialty was working with family businesses. He knew how to make peace in the home when it came to the family business. Unfortunately, people in my company didn’t feel that the expense was worth it. It wasn’t cheap. It was almost $1,000 an hour. I was all for it. I’m all about self-development and self-growth. I believe that if we had gone to him on a stable, steady basis and we had incorporated him as part of our business, in the future, that’s going to be part of the business. Like you have a secretary or an accountant or a bookkeeper, that’s a staple in your business, coaching will be a staple in many businesses going forward. Had we had a hand in that and had we done it in a regimented way, not just when we were in crisis, that would have brought us a lot of success.

I want to elaborate a little bit from my experience. We’ve gone from a place that there was a notion out there. If you hire a coach means I’m not good enough myself. I need to go out and seek help. The answer is the coach is there to accelerate your growth, to get you to levels that you don’t even think you could get on your own. A coach is not there to do miracles and stuff that the company and the business can’t even produce. They’re there to shed a light on the good and accelerate that growth.

Based on what you said before, this is true, companies are seeing more and more the value of it because we are now in a people business. I’ve shared this a gazillion times on the show with different guests. I heard it first from the CEO of 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, a Canadian. He mentioned to me that once upon a time, you were in the service business, you were in the product business, now in the people business. The stronger you build your people, the stronger you are yourself, that’s what’s going to get you to the next level.

I appreciate that. I want to get to the next point which is something that you’re probably passionate to speak about and the notion for our readers, which is you mentioned that you were passionate about video. Therefore, you started decided to go into that space. How much did that passion help your success? How much is that important for every entrepreneur reading to say, “What do you mean I’m passionate? I want to make money. I need to feed my kids. I need to feed my family. Who cares how I’m making it? Give me schmattas, I’ll sell schmattas.” How much is that important?

I’m going to speak from my experience. If this comes off as arrogant, call me arrogant, but I’m going to call like it is. I’ve done so much work on myself in the past several years that I’m so self-aware of who I am and where I’m going. I made a conscientious decision when I started working with my business coach that I’m going to be unapologetic about who I am, what I represent, what it is that I do, and focus on my true zone of genius. I found that when I’m operating in my zone of genius, the whole world rearranges itself for me to pick the fruit off the tree. I’ll give you an example. I’m passionate about God. He’s the best thing that ever happened to the world. The world wouldn’t be here without him. I decided that I was going to spread this message about how important God was to me. I did a live about it on Instagram. The next day, the wealthiest guy that I know pick up the phone and said, “I have $100,000 for you because I want to turn this into a documentary.”

Did I go into it thinking about money and this and that? I didn’t think about it at all. You know how much business I got from that live that I did, how many people reached out to me who want to be next to me? When people see somebody, who is operating in their zone of genius, they smell that and they want to be a part of that because it helps unlock their zone of genius. When you’re operating in your zone of genius, the world will rearrange itself at you. Money will be thrown at you and you will be able to reach your potential.

We live in a world that there’s so much noise and fakeness out there. People are trying to be somebody that they’re not. People are trying to be a business that they can’t even be there. Attainability is so important to know. Is this even a lifestyle that I want to be in? Some people say, “This guy is so rich.” He’s working fifteen hours a day. You’re in your zone to have that lifestyle. Maybe you have different priorities. I’ve written on this on LinkedIn years ago, in the beginning when everybody was sharing their wins. One of the first people that I saw that were sharing both sides of the aisle was you. I think it’s so important why.

LTB 78 | Zone Of Genius
Zone Of Genius: When people see somebody who is operating in their zone of genius, they smell that and they want to be a part of that because it helps unlock their zone of genius.

I lost a major client. When he told me he wanted to leave, I said, “It’s been such a pleasure serving you.” I gave him my parting words, which were advice. I said, “I’m looking forward to working with you in the future.” As it happened to be, he couldn’t afford my service and he was upset about it, but I didn’t get upset, because when you’re operating in your zone, there’s abundance. That’s what it’s about. It’s about abundance, not scarcity. I put a post. I said that when a person is more excited about what he has to gain than he is afraid of what he has to lose, that’s when he’s going to take off.

The thing that I would add on the passion part or world of genius, we live in a world that we only have one life. We have so little time. You’re going to work anyways. Work to the fullest extent, work with something that you love coming to work every single day. Work that when you see the finished product of what you’re servicing or selling that you have a certain pride that I delivered value this way or that way. Why not? What piece of advice would you give someone that’s trying to figure that out?

It’s an art, not a science. Everybody wants to turn life into a science. On LinkedIn, most of my followers are not Jewish. Who wants to listen to a bunch of bearded Orthodox Quakers talking about business? Nobody. Usually, I like to be with somebody who’s clean-shaven and balances me out. It’s art. I say, “Let’s throw it against the wall let’s see if it sticks.” I put out stuff all the time. I did a live coaching where I was being coached by my business coach. I did it live. I put it on every social media live. In my mind, I shut off all the cameras. I was honestly doing a real coaching session with my coach. I was honest and vulnerable. Did I know how it was going to turn out? No. It’s an art. It turns out people loved it. Don’t make so many calculations. Nobody remembers you anyways. After a person dies, nobody talks about them. Think about it. Who talks about anybody after they die?

Nobody remembers what you’re doing. They’re focused on what they’re doing. They just throw as much against the wall and don’t care if you’re going to like mistakes or messing up. I once said to my video editing team where there were six people in a room. I said to all, “I noticed that the corporate videos that the company was making were getting stale. The first client that one of you pisses off because you went in a direction that was too edgy, the first person that pisses off a client gets a $500 bonus.” Meaning I want you to upset the clients because what you created was too edgy.

I get it because that’s pushing yourself out of the comfort zone. This is in every business, the first obstacle that you face, you give yourself a reason to quit. I want to get back to another question that is important based on what you shared before, which is people know you to a certain extent, a little bit myself as well. I’m at a little bit in that zone, not to the scale that you are, which you share a lot of content. You took an approach that I’m going to be an open book, whatever happens, I’m going to share and see what sticks. There is the notion and people say, “What is the end goal?” The end goal is being an influencer, making a business out of it and opportunities because there’s a whole world watching and asking themselves, “Should I also do the same? Should I become the next Berel? Should I become the next Gary Vee?” The different names that will pop up and brands for different people. How would you answer that question?

I’m going to answer it with a story. The Lubavitcher Rebbe was once telling the story about a very rich man named David Chase. He’s the Owner of Chase Bank in New York. David Chase owned a yacht. Every day at 4:00 PM, he would ask the captain of the ship which way is East. After months of doing this, the yacht driver was curious, he said, “I want to know, why are you asking? Are you looking to become a captain? What’s your motivation?” He says, “No, because we pray to the East because that’s the way Jerusalem is. I have to know that because when I do my afternoon prayer, I have to be facing East.” The yacht driver was so inspired. He said, “You’re the most successful man that I know. If you believe in God, maybe I should also believe in God.”

My end game is to light the world on fire about the one above. If that means that money is going to make me powerful, then I’m going to get money. If that means that getting notoriety, fame, and eyeballs on me is going to help me light the world on fire, then that’s what I’m going to do. I’m prepared to do anything to bring the world back to the one above. Whatever religion, whatever person, whatever it is that they are, to connect the world back to the one above, that’s my goal and end game. Gary Vee, he’s a beautiful guy, but his end game is to buy the jets. I could’ve cared less about the jets. They mean nothing to me.

Is that something that you have in front of you every single day? Meaning to say, every person has a motive. It builds with time. Was that exactly your initial thought or this developed over time?

For a long time, Meny, I felt that I had to be at a certain level in order to begin talking about God. Only once I was at that level that people will take me seriously. What my coach has helped me with is to understand that I will never be at that level. Even if I have $10 million, I’m not a hundred millionaire. Even if I have 100,000 followers, I don’t have 10 million followers. What working with a coach has done was to show me that I could start right here, right now, right here I am to light the world on fire and to do what I have to do.

For our readers, think for a moment, what are you doing on a regular basis? How could you advance that cause, that passion is not only delivering value as a service and our product but for a higher calling, for higher meaning? You can make a difference in people’s lives. I hate the term influencer. “I had a badge. I’m already an influencer.” We want to have a level of influence and we want to be able to make a difference in a person. Maybe there’s a person that is confused or looking for the next step in their business. If you could give it to them, on my desk, on my walls in the office, my mission in life is every person should be given the opportunity to succeed in life. If you have the answer for that person, it’s my mission. I need to give it to that person. Therefore, I put out content and a show.

You know what content is. It’s a huge commitment. Not only putting out the content and then commenting and responding. There’s also so much that goes into it. However, if one person’s reading and took out what Berel said before and said, “I’m also going to make a bigger mission in my life, in my business.” It’s worth our time. We are two busy people. For our readers and for you, speak to me about what that effect had to you when you get those comments, you get the feedback from people that made a change in their life and in their business. With the level of influence you have, how much is that accelerating your work you’re putting out there?

I was once at this business conference, there was this little quiet, meek guy. He was in the corner. He comes up to me and I was so surprised. He says, “Could I tell you something?” I’m like, “What is this guy about to tell me?” He says to me, “I want to let you know that I know on all your videos, you get 10,000, 20,000, 30,000, sometimes 40,000 views, 250,000 views. You don’t know who I am because I never liked it, but I want to let you know, every single video that you ever put out in your life, one of those 10,000 views, was me. I want to thank you for that.”

You mentioned it about being in an event. I was at an event right before COVID. I was on the way out and a young guy, similar to the description you gave, came over to me and he says, “I want to ask you a question before you leave.” I said, “Go for it.” He said, “Could you be successful in business even if you’re not successful in your personal life?” I said, “You probably have a reason why you’re asking me.” He literally burst out crying. He told me that he’s a young guy. He just got married and he’s about to get divorced because he can’t take it anymore. He wanted to know is it healthy to have that challenge in the evenings while he’s trying to build his business.

Fast forward, he has a healthy marriage now. He has a kid already. He’s the happiest person ever. He needed some guidance, I was able to listen to him and then at least give him 2 or 3 contexts of who he can reach out to. When people say, “Berel Solomon is all business.” There’s a higher calling and meaning. Sometimes the best approach to it is to help a person, give them what to eat, and show them the right path so they can think clearly. They could have a healthy mindset. So much to resonate with what you’re saying, I hope all our readers are resonating well.

The influencer thing is very important. Meny, there have been times where I’ve called you and I had questions. You were there to help me. I appreciate that. That moments were more important than the biggest influencer that has a billion followers because you were able to influence me in the right direction. It’s an important thing. An influencer is only one person. As it is, I’m inundated. I cannot get to my messages. I’ve got to a point where I have given up. I’m hiring somebody that’s going to start handling all my emails, my phone calls, my WhatsApp, my LinkedIn, my Facebook, my Instagram, my Twitter. It’s too much. I don’t have all the answers. Every person in their rights is an influencer to their circle of people.

For the readers, if you have not taken out anything from this, jot down a note and ask yourself every single evening, “Who did I influence?” Hopefully for the good, coworker, family member, or spouse. Go over to someone that’s not smiling and ask them, “Is there anything in your life that’s not going as well that I could help you out with?” This is something, as a business owner, you have employees, it’s almost your duty. People say, “I can’t ask them personal because then they’ll ask for a day off. I don’t want to mix business and personal.”

You’re a leader. You are there. You need to give them the support and the energy. Sometimes it’s a good word. Sometimes asking them, “How is everything? How was your weekend? How was your Shabbat?” Get a little bit of a feel. I asked someone on the street with a sad face. I asked him, “How was everything?” He says, “Terrible. Thanks for asking. At least you asked. I’m walking down 13th Avenue, nobody asked me.”

This is a great segue into our next segment, which I want to get back to business and some no-nonsense advice, which I know a gazillion people asked you, but I’m going to be the next person asking you. Berel, how do you have time when you’re building a company relatively young to be spread so thin and be involved with so many different ventures? Even asking that question in a different format and the answer to this is when does a business owner know that they’re ready and they could start venturing into other stuff? Is it a shiny object or is it something that they should focus on?

It’s hard for me. I’m only going to answer that question for myself. I’m not going to answer it for anybody else.

That’s what I’m looking for, your answer.

You don’t ask a horse how he runs. You don’t ask a dog how he barks. You don’t ask an Eagle how he soars. It’s who he is at his core. When you are acting in your God-given mission in this world, you have unlimited capacity, resources and potential. How practically am I doing it? When COVID hit, the people that worked for me were so smart. They’re going to work from home. I said to myself, “I remember the day when they were lining up their computers outside of the office.” I said, “One of two things are going to happen. Either they’re going to be back next week and we’re going to realize that this whole thing was all a big joke or I’m never going to see these people ever again.” The second one was true. Most people that worked in my company before COVID are no longer working full-time for me.

I had almost twenty people working for me, full-time on the payroll. I took the best of the best, the people that were in it to win it, the people that were committed and ready to die for the cause. I remember I had a project manager. I’d always ask, “Are you ready to die for the cause?” She would tell me, “No.” She was the first one out. The people that stuck with me and that raised their hands and said, “I am a champion.” Those are the people that are making more money than they’ve ever made before. They have more autonomy than they’ve ever had before. They’re happier than they ever have before. They’re the people who are running my business right now. That’s one. It’s great people. Cut away everybody that sucks. If a person wants to go work from home, a person wants to collect a paycheck from the government, he’s not the type of person that I want working with me.

What is your definition of a great person?

A great person is somebody that through COVID, even though things are tough, is willing to make it work and not resign and say, “I hope that the government takes care of me.” That to me is a great person. A person that will not give up, a person that gets up even when it’s hard, that’s a great person. A person that is positive and has solutions. A person that thinks about a future, a brighter tomorrow, objectively and doesn’t just listen to what everybody else is saying. Those people are the people that are with me now. Those people are making more money with more satisfaction. They’re running my company right now on the Wealthy Video Commercials. On the coaching end of it, I’ve been coaching people for the past several years. I’ve been doing it through a video camera.

Now I’m taking that in. I work with certain people on a one-on-one basis, but I also have coaches that are working under me, these people that are reaching out to me and I matched them with the best coach for them and with what they need. If they’re having problems in their business financially, I have a financial coach. If they’re having problems in their family business, I have a family business coach. If they’re having problems with their wife because their wife or husband doesn’t support them, I have somebody that could coach them through that. That is me. I am a helper. When you are operating in your unique gift to the world, time is not a factor.

One thing I have in my slide when I used to teach this in the Leaders Forum was, what do we have in common with President Donald Trump? Everyone was saying, “Nothing.” The answer to that question when we speak about time is we both have 24 hours in our day.

LTB 78 | Zone Of Genius
Zone Of Genius: You are more important than the biggest influencer who has a billion followers if you are able to influence someone in the right direction.

I have a lot in common with Donald Trump. I love the man. Am I going to ask him about marital advice? No. Am I going to ask them spiritual advice? No. Am I going to ask him how I should talk communication skills? No. Do I think he was the right person to run the country? I thought he did a phenomenal job. I thought he was a great president. He’s not my rabbi. I’m not going to ask him for advice for my wife, but he was the right man for the job. If that offends the reader, I’m sorry that you cannot allow me to exist. If you like Kamala Harris, Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton, I respect you for that. If that person cannot respect me, then that’s their problem, not mine. I’m allowed to live. We’re getting raw here.

This is the beauty of it. The lesson for our readers, the no-nonsense advice is to be yourself. Everybody else is taken. If you cannot be yourself, you’re going to live in your own shadow for the rest of your life, which means you’re going to be living in eggshells, you’re not going to be able to be in your zone.

I’d rather have people love me for who I am than like me for who I’m not.

Back to the practical point, you are now running multiple ventures outside of different projects.

Also, producing a documentary, a father to three children, the board of directors in my high school, and leading a community. People don’t even know the half. I’m helping agunot get their gifts. There’s so much.

How do you physically manage your time, so you know that everything you need to be keeping your finger on the pulse, making the right decisions on each one?

I use Google Calendar. I have a great app called Any.do. It helps me keep track of what I have to do. I use the technology and a great link called Calendly and helps me schedule. What I’ve started to do is all those menial things that I’ve been procrastinating, I hired a personal assistant. She’s handling them for me. I need a window to be fixed in my house. Do you think I have an hour to call people to set that up? I do not have that. I’d much rather pay somebody $15 an hour to figure that out for me. I needed something delivered. Do you think I have time? It comes back to your zone of genius. Here’s a good way to understand what your zone of genius is. Are you doing work that is worth $10,000 an hour or not? If the answer is no, it means that somebody else should be doing that for you.

The only thing in my life that’s worth $10,000 an hour right now is one, creating this documentary called Orthodox. Two is helping agunot get their gifts. For anybody who doesn’t know what that means if you’re not Jewish, it means helping people in their divorces, helping people have an amicable divorce. It’s worth $10 million an hour. One day, with God’s help, I will be paid that to do what I’m doing because it’s my zone of genius. It’s only something a Berel Solomon could do. When you’re doing something that only Joe Smith could do or Jacqueline Fergigi could do, that’s when you’re going to start to be paid big. That’s when you’re not going to care about time. That’s when the world is going to start working for you and not you working for the world.

I speak to so many business leaders that maybe have over 100 employees. All of a sudden, I’m finding them doing tedious tasks that their own people could do for them. They’re paying them. Sometimes it comes from a mindset. I want to ask you one final question about the coaching part of your business, but I want to ask you a question that related to the person getting coached. Many times, we’ve heard from people, “I took a coach. I took a consultant. I spent so much money. I didn’t see the benefit of it. Nothing changed.” What advice would you give the person reading that is maybe thinking about taking a coach and a consultant? First, how to go about picking a coach? Second of all, how could they react so they’re getting the best out of it?

Let’s say I dated four coaches before I selected my coach. You don’t have to go with the first person that you meet, that’s one. Two, it’s not something that will change overnight. It’s a relationship that grows and blossoms. It takes 3 or 4 sessions for a person to understand who you are. The other thing is there’s a certain magic that happens when a person is working on themselves or when two people are working on one person. In Judaism, it says that you should acquire for yourself a friend, and also says, aseh lecha rav, which means assign for yourself a mentor. When a person has somebody above them that they look up to that is able to help them work on themselves, you have two positive qualities, two people’s positivity against that one person’s negativity. Every person has negativity and positivity in them. That battle could often be difficult for one person to fight. When you have a coach, a mentor, you now have two people’s positivity against your one negativity and it helps you. Stick with it. If the person is offending you and you see that it’s not going anywhere, move out of the way. For the most part, it takes time and give yourself that time to grow into the relationship.

Let’s close with the four Rapid-fire questions.

If anybody is interested in coaching, it’s not cheap. It’s expensive. It’s worth every single penny. I have clients that are averaging a 10X ROI, meaning whatever they’re spending with me, they’re getting ten times what it is that they’re putting in. If you are ready to invest in yourself, please reach out to me. Maybe I’m the right person or maybe one of my coaches is the right person. I would love to hear from you.

Number one, what’s a book that changed your life?

It’s called The Big Leap. It helps a person find his own genius and move into the zone of genius. If you’ve been following me, if you’ve been watching what’s going on, you probably see my upward trajectory. It has everything to do with the one above and he put this in my path. That book has changed my life tremendously.

Number two, what’s a piece of advice you got that you’ll never forget?

My rabbi once told me, “Never forget about your bread and butter.” Meaning it’s all nice. Everything is good, but make sure that you have food on your table.

Number three, anything you wish you could go back and do differently?

When I was in college, I was hanging around bad people. I was a big drug dealer, probably one of the biggest in the city. I was hanging around a guy. He’s not a bad guy. He has a good heart. He’s just completely messed up on drugs. He gave me bad advice one day to go beat a guy up in the middle of our cafeteria in college. I went and I punched him in the head. I left him on the floor. I feel so bad about that. I’ve apologized. I’ve written him letters. He’s forgiven me since, but I feel bad for doing what I did. I take full responsibility for it. Hanging around bad people is the worst thing in the world. You are who you hang out with.

Number four and final question, what’s still on your bucket list to achieve?

I want to launch this documentary and bring Mashiach.

We’re going to invite you as soon as this documentary is out. We’re going to invite you again to share some of your experiences and make sure that enough people know about them. Berel, thank you so much for joining us. I know your time is valuable.

Thank you everybody for being here. You mean the world to me. I cannot tell you how much you mean to me. I love you dearly. You should all be successful, wealthy, healthy and in a positive mind frame. Go out and make the world a better place. God bless you