TRP110: Secret Key to Success!
February 22, 2021
Transcription
If you’re looking for honest, real world, no BS advice on how to create income, build wealth, and achieve true freedom with real estate, you’re in the right place. Welcome to another episode of The Real Estate Preacher Podcast Show, where your host, Randy Lawrence, shares with you his experiences and strategies from over decades as a successful real estate investor. This episode is sponsored by Prosperity Capital Partners. Learn more at prosperitycapitalpartners.net. Now, onto the show.
Randy Lawrence:
All right. Hey, I want to welcome you to another episode. Boy, I tell you, today is just a super exciting episode. I’m talking about a key ingredient to success and that ingredient is probably going to surprise you, but it’s humility. You’ve got to be willing to stay humble along the way in your journey of success. And it was striking to me this past week, this last week, my family and I, we were out in Tahoe skiing for a week and just having a fun time, just relaxing and enjoying God’s creation. I take those kinds of times and just one, I’m spending it and having fun with my wife and daughter and we’re just having a great time creating memories, but also two, I’m envisioning the future, I’m looking ahead, I’m strategic planning and thinking about big things related to the business.
Randy Lawrence:
It’s important that you work on your business and not just in your business. And so that’s part of it where I take regular breaks and look about what we’re doing in the quarter or the year ahead, that kind of thing. But that’s not what I’m talking about here today. I’m talking about today is humility. And there was an instance that really brought it to my attention. Maybe a couple of nights before we left. Again in Tahoe, it’s kind of a strange situation because right down the middle of the downtown on the east side is Nevada and the casinos and they’re all open. You can go in and have a steak dinner and restaurants and all like that, breakfast place. On the west side, it’s California side and you can’t get any of that, right?
Randy Lawrence:
Now, most of the restaurants to try to adapt and survive for goodness sake are doing takeout only. And so now we stayed on the California side, we get a house right on the lake. Beautiful. And so, but occasionally, we’d cook at the house or then many nights pick up dinner from a restaurant after skiing and all like that. So, that’s the stage where we’re at. We pull up at one of our favorite Italian places, just has amazing Italian food, right? And we’d ordered ahead and got some nice entrees and dishes and all like that. So we’re going to go back to the house and enjoy a nice dinner.
Randy Lawrence:
And when we pull in, no big deal, my wife and daughter sitting in the car, we pull up right in front of the restaurant, of course, because nobody’s there, it’s takeout only. And there’s a woman standing right by the door. And as I’m walking in, got my mask on, all that mess, and then I’m walking in you can hear her digging through her purse. She’s like, “Oh gosh.” And I just had a little bit of a check in my spirit. Like, “Yeah, something’s maybe not right. Something’s happening not good for her.” But so, “Hello, how are you doing?” Walk into the restaurant.
Randy Lawrence:
And they have it set up where you can only just go into the foyer, 10 feet deep and they have a table where you can then pick up your to-go food. So I tell the guy, I’m like, “Hey, how you doing? Good to see you again, dah, dah, dah.” And so they’re going back to make sure our food’s prepared and then she comes in and she’s just very frazzled, right? And I noticed when I walked in, it looked like she had a little cusp of a ring of a black eye. So again, that’s a little unusual, right? You got a woman that looks about 50 years old or whatnot, and having a little bit of black eye.
Randy Lawrence:
So she comes in and now I’m in the light of the inside of the restaurant, you can see she’s got a full shiner, black eye, I think on her right-hand side of her face. And then on the left-hand side, it was all black round her other eye, like a contusion if you will. And I’m like, “Oh my gosh. Man, this is not good.” And so, she’s looking and the man says, “Can I help you?” So I’m looking and I just look over and I just felt the Lord speaking to me, he’s nudging me in the spirit to just see if this lady is okay. You know what I mean?
Randy Lawrence:
And I think that that’s part of the thing where, it made me think about this, you’ve got to begin to not just think yourself so important that everything’s just about you, right? It’s not just about you. It’s not just about me. Now, yes, I’m there, my wife and daughter are in the car sitting right there watching, and I’m getting dinner for us. But here’s this woman, we’ll call her Mary, that’s not her real name. But I said to her, I said, “Hey, are you okay?” And she just broke down crying. And I said, “Are you all right? Is everything okay? Is there anything I can do to help you?” And she just started break down crying and she’s putting, “No, no, I’m okay.” And she just said, “Oh, you’re so nice.”
Randy Lawrence:
And so I start talking to her. I said, “Do you live around here? Is everything all right?” And she’s like, “Yes,” she does live around here. You could just tell she’s had a hard life. She’s probably had some poor choices that have led to even more difficulty and there’s probably certain things that are outside of her control, clearly look like she’s in an abusive relationship, which is just terribly sad. And I said to her, “I want you to know,” and again, I came from some brokenness in my life and broken home and all like that. And so it’s not like that I had not experienced some of the things that the street has to offer, so to speak. But God changed my life 24 years ago now and he really just came into my life and made a radical difference.
Randy Lawrence:
And so, I recognized in that moment, I’m not there just to get fantastic Italian food for our family. I’m there to help Mary. And that’s where you’ve got to begin to see that, in your daily journey of life, you and I are not so important that every moment, in every situation, in every circumstance is about you, right? It’s not. There’s a bigger arching purpose that exists and we’ve got to begin to not take ourselves so seriously, not put ourselves on the ultimate pedestal, because if I would have in that moment just been like, “Oh yeah, boom.” I could have been in and out of there, grabbed my food, gone back into the warm car or Jeep and then drove onto our house.
Randy Lawrence:
But I stopped. And by stop, we begin to engage in this conversation with Mary. Again, not her real name. And come to talk with her and find out that then her husband had left her, her kid doesn’t talk to her anymore, and clearly she didn’t really want to get into it, but again, you could tell that now she’s in some form of relationship that’s abusive and less than ideal. But also, there’s a high probability based on our conversation that there was some type of lifestyle issue as well, that that led to her divorce and then her kid no longer wanting to talk to her.
Randy Lawrence:
And again, that may have been abusive relationship too. I don’t know. I mean, this was just an encounter there at the restaurant. But so as we talked, I encouraged her to see, “You know what? That God hasn’t abandoned you, that you’re not alone.” She starts crying, “Oh, I’m all alone here.” And I wanted to tell her, I said, “Look, the truth of the matter is, you and I have connected together here at this restaurant. That’s the evidence and the proof that God’s not left you alone because he spoke to me to reach out to you. And so here I am talking to you.”
Randy Lawrence:
She just broke down crying. She looks over at me through tears, “Oh, you’re so nice.” And now truth be told, I’m not that nice. I’m a nice guy, yes. But I’m a pretty hard-driving, hard-charging, accomplishing the vision guy. But yeah, I’m also sensitive to the things of God and humble enough to recognize that, you know what? It’s not just about me. And so that was just an amazing opportunity to talk to Mary, share with her a message of hope that her life could be better, and I told her a little bit about my backstory and some of the rough things I went through in my childhood or teen years, and then how God changed it all and how now, by following him day after day, I’ve got a beautiful wife and family and a great opportunity to help other people and just share those things with her.
Randy Lawrence:
And we talked a bit more and she, “Thank you so much. Thank you so much.” And I said, “Okay,” the guy, he brought my food, “Thank you very much.” And again, you don’t want to be too awkward in a moment there in public with, he’s coming in there and another lady comes in to get her food and she’s crying. I mean, the guy’s like, “Are you okay, ma’am?” It’s a moment there that’s a little challenging, but at the same time, again, I come back to the success component and being able to be humble. You’ve got to recognize that, no matter how high you elevate and the accomplishments or your success, you’ve got to be humble enough to not just think that it’s all about you, that it’s not just that, I’m so important, it’s about me, but there’s other people involved.
Randy Lawrence:
And I mean, we’ve achieved a great deal of success and I thank God for that. We’ve helped a lot of people, both in the ministry side, we’re back in the last market and economic crash in 2008 and 2009, we had started a church and also a food pantry. That food pantry helped 40,000 people over probably about a three-year period from ’09, ’10, and ’11 at the height of the economic collapse. And it’s just an amazing thing to see. And then even now in the apartment arena, we have hundreds of millions of dollars of assets that we manage and people that we help and tenants that we impact. And so all these great things, but I recognize that, look, you know what? It’s not all about me. It’s also about being available to help Mary. And so that was an amazing thing.
Randy Lawrence:
So then I walk out to get in the car and bring the food and my wife, as soon I open she’s, “What was going on with that lady? What’s happening?” And I told her briefly, I just felt like, you know what? I’ve got to go back and just offer to pray for her, right? And now that’s an awkward moment, right? Like, “Oh my God.” It’s like, “Ugh.” But so I knew, it’s like, “You know what? That’s the right thing to do.” And so I said to my wife, she’s like, “Honey, go back.” And so I go back and I’m like, “Hey Mary, I don’t mean to be intrusive or anything like that, but could I offer to pray for you?” And she just breaks down crying again and we step out front of the restaurant for a little bit more of privacy.
Randy Lawrence:
She’s broke down crying. And I just shared with her about God’s love and the fact that she could put her faith in Jesus Christ and begin to change her life and to move to a greater direction of fulfillment. And so we stood there together and prayed and prayed for her and prayed that she would just put her faith in the Lord. And she was just weeping with joy. And then afterwards she looks at me and she asked me how old I was. And I told her, I said, “I’m 51.” She just started crying. She’s like, “Oh my gosh, you’re my age.” She was in her mid-50s. And she looks at me just with tears of joy in her eyes, and she says, “Can I hug you?” And I said, “Sure.” And hugged her and said, “Hey, I want to encourage you to connect together with some good people here in Tahoe. Connect together with some folks here at a local church and really begin to move forward. There’s people who want to help you.”
Randy Lawrence:
And I said, again, “God’s evidenced that by bringing me here to the restaurant, even bringing me back for you and me to talk about this and to pray for you.” And so, the second component I want to talk about in humility is that, not only do you, don’t take your yourself so seriously, and you’re so important that it’s all about you. But the second thing is, you have to look at to recognize that you also have a purpose to accomplish, right? In the things that you’re doing, you have to recognize there’s a purpose. So now in that moment, my purpose was also to help Mary to try to find hope in the midst of a life of despair that she’s going through. My purpose was not to just get great Italian food for me and my family and go to the house on the lake and enjoy our vacation. It was to be there to be able to help this woman who I didn’t know.
Randy Lawrence:
And I want to come back and encourage you in your business endeavor, you’re also there for a purpose, right? It’s not just about you making money. It’s not just about you achieving financial freedom. It’s not just about you becoming wealthy. Now, there’s nothing wrong with those things. That’s the truth, right? There’s nothing wrong with them. We’ve achieved all of those things, but what it is is recognizing there’s a purpose. So for us, like for me, people ask me about that, how I was a pastor leading a church before and now you do this, I’m doing this because it’s part of God’s purpose for my life. I’m impacting the tenants that live in our community. One day we’ll have 25,000 people living in our communities and will be impacting them in a positive way, providing them a better quality of life in a better environment to raise their family.
Randy Lawrence:
And then, not only that, we’re also providing programs to empower and inspire and educate them to a better means of life, financial tools, management, psychological tools, inspiration, and encouragement tools. All these things we’re bringing together to offer and impact these, because we see it as a purpose. And then our investors who invest with us, that’s also part of a purpose, right? Our purpose is to impact other people’s lives so that they would be able to accumulate financial wealth. We’ve got plenty of attorneys and doctors and business owners and they’re happy practicing the law, being an attorney, they love what they do, but they also recognize that through real estate, they can achieve financial freedom. And that’s why they say, “Hey, we want to invest with you so that we can get double digit returns, have tax efficient investments, and the security of cash flow in real estate,” far superior to that what they get in the stock market. And that’s part of our mission.
Randy Lawrence:
And so I want to encourage you that in that pathway of humbleness, of success, recognize that your mission, your journey is not all about you. There’s a purpose that exists to help others. And so we’ve got to be humble enough to open our eyes to see that. I think back, I remember a time, God, probably 10 years ago when I went to Sam’s Club and I remember this, shameful to admit it, but I went into Sam’s… No, not shameful of Sam’s Club. Sam’s Club is great. But what I was thinking is Sam’s Club, right?
Randy Lawrence:
As I’m walking around, I’m driving a Porsche 911 and I’ve got a measure of success. And as I interacted with certain people, I thought, “Boy, I’m better than them.” And it’s like, God showed me like, “No, that’s not the truth. You’re not better than them. You’re not better than anybody.” And again, I had to go through a process of humbling myself to recognize, you know what? That simply isn’t the truth. One, it’s not all about me. I’m not better than anybody else. Two, God has got me here for a purpose to help other people and to impact and inspire them. And then the third thing that you’ve got to see in this pathway of humility as a key to success is that you haven’t done it all on your own. Right? I would tell you this, for me there’s no doubt, God has helped me along the way. Randy is just not so great, so smart, so awesome, so fabulous, so everything that I’ve achieved all of this on my own. No, I’m telling you now without equivocation and without a doubt, God has been the one who’s helped me.
Randy Lawrence:
And not only that, but God has brought significant and special people along the way that have been a part of my journey to help me to succeed. I think back to the very beginning when I was broken, busted, and disgusted and put my faith in Christ and started going to a local mega church here by the beach, God connected me together with two guys. One guy was an elite heart surgeon and the other guy was an African-American guy who was a coach and pastor. And both of those guys befriended me and mentored me and reached out to help me and showed me a pathway of faith and success. And that’s just an inkling. I could tell you, I could spend the next, I don’t know, three, four, five, six, seven, eight hours recording podcasts of telling you about all the people that have helped me along the way.
Randy Lawrence:
There’s been mentors. There’s been peers. There’s been team members. There’s been so many, right? So many. And I think, there’s one of the guys, I can’t remember, he’s a pastor. He’s got in his office this picture of a turtle on the fence and the reason, and he runs a big, whatever, 10,000 member church kind of thing, multi-site campus. But the reason for the turtle on the fence is because it’s a reminder that the turtle didn’t get up there on its own. The turtle had help, right? A turtle can’t get up on a giant fence, six foot high fence, or four foot high fence.
Randy Lawrence:
And so the truth of the matter is, you’ve got to see that you’re not a self-made man or a self-made woman. Yes, you worked hard. Yes, you put in the effort. Yes, you gathered the resources and the tools. Yes, you put in the work. Yes, you did all those things, but also God was your help. And there was other people along the way, employees, team members, partners, investors, spouses. It wasn’t just you. And so that’s part of the thing when you recognize that, it humbles you to see that, you know what? You need to be, and I need to be available to help others so we can be a help to them just like some have been a help to us.
Randy Lawrence:
So, praise God. I appreciate you very much. I want to encourage you too to invite other people to connect together with The Real Estate Preacher. Share it on your social media platform. Our mission and our goal is to provide valuable content to inspire and impact people and help investors achieve financial freedom in their life.
Randy Lawrence:
Thanks for listening to another episode of The Real Estate Preacher Podcast. I hope today that you learned something that you can immediately apply in your life or business. Make sure that you check us out on iTunes or at therealestatepreacher.com for more information. If you want to find out more about partnering together with me personally on real estate deals, including apartment complexes, go to therealestatepreacher.com and click on the Invest With Randy link. I look forward to talking with you personally. Have a blessed and victorious week, for this is the week God has ordained for you.
