EP 214 – Cause Driven Goals Bring More Growth

NCS 214 | Cause Driven Goals

NCS 214 | Cause Driven Goals

2017 is about to end and we’ve all hit goals we were shooting for when the year started. Now that your cups have been filled, find your cause driven goals, you charity or organization you want to be part of and fill start filling the cup of others. Don’t think that donating toys is a simple thing, because Scott Carson has filled ten carts full of toys to donate for the Toys For Tots. This year, he is planning to send gifts troops in service. Success can be more meaningful when share your blessings to those who are less fortunate or to people and groups who have big causes but need your help.

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Cause Driven Goals Bring More Growth

What I wanted to talk about on this episode is what’s your cause? We all have a different cause that we like. I know a lot of us, our biggest cause, our biggest charity is us. We have to work towards paying our bills and putting ourselves through what we have to do and making things happen. A lot of us have bigger causes. What I mean by bigger causes are charities or organizations that we’re a part of that really have a heartfelt spot in our heart to really help make things happen. A lot of organizations, especially this time of year, use December through January to really help raise money for their budgets and things for this year. We always have done something around Christmas time and then throughout the year to always help things. Some of the things we’ve done in the past is we’ve done stuff for Toys for Tots where we had a workshop or a mastermind. We went out and bought toys and then donated them to the US Marine Corps Toys for Tots. It’s always fun taking people to Target or Toys “R” Us or someplace and literally going in and buying toys. It’s always really fun when you come to the register with ten big carts full of toys and you’ve got to go back to spend more money because you don’t spend all what you’ve raised. We’ve done that over a couple of years. That’s a lot of fun. It’s fun when we’ve taken some people’s kids along and they’re picking out one toy. I’m like, “No, don’t pick one. Grab the whole rack.” That’s a fun thing. Toys for Tots is a big thing.

Here in Texas, we have Santa’s Cupboard which is an organization up at Fort Hood that donates toys to the single parents that are left behind by either their spouse or spouses or one single parent or both parents being in active duty overseas. That’s a big thing. We filled up a couple of trucks for that. I’ve gone and passed to Walmart and just paid off people’s layaways before. We’ve done that. We’ve donated a lot of money to a San Diego organization that’s helping out kids called Fresh Start, where they’re doing surgeries for kids who have facial deformities or scars or birthmarks and they’re removing them, cleft palates and things like that. We’ve donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to that organization over the last couple of years matching our students dollar for dollar.

This year, we had something that hit a little bit closer to home with one of our students. Maybe you’ve recognized that we’ve had Katie Moton with Colletta Investments who’ve done a tremendous job. We’ve talked about her being, for all intensive purposes, a single mom for the last few months when her husband Chris was called on active duty to go overseas in the Middle East. She’s doing a great job with her marketing and videos and closing on a deal or two here and getting things rocking and rolling. She informed us a while back that a lot of troops aren’t getting anything for the holidays. She said Chris, her husband, said, “Please stop sending me gift packages because not everybody gets one. A lot of guys don’t get gift or care packages throughout the year.” We made it a big thing this year, especially at our most recent mastermind. They throw some money together in a pot. We’ll go out and literally put some stuff together and send some stuff out. If you have a cause that you’re big with, list it below in the comments. We would love to know more about what cause you have. If it’s Toys for Tots, great. If it’s the Susan G. Komen Foundation, great. If it’s the food bank of wherever you’re at, great. Everybody has a very valid cause. We have some people who donate to the Wounded Warrior Project. What I want everybody to realize though is it’s great to do it once a year, but if you could do it something year-round, it goes so much further.

NCS 214 | Cause Driven Goals

Cause Driven Goals: You have to fill your cup first and then feed the world while your cup runneth over.

I am a huge proponent that you have to fill your cup first and then feed the world while your cup runneth over. I know a lot of people like to focus on everybody else and they don’t fill their own cup. They’re constantly struggling to make money. They’re constantly struggling to pay their bills. It should not be the intention of charity. Another thing I’m saying too charity this time of year, if you’re struggling, it’s okay to say something. It’s okay to reach out to fellow investors or fellow people and say, “I could use a little help this year. I could use a little help.” That’s okay. It’s totally okay to do that because this is the time of year of charity. We all, at some point, need a little hand out. I can remember back going through a tough time, I was eating tuna fish sandwiches for Christmas Day at one year. I was here in Austin because I didn’t have the money to drive home to South Texas. When I moved to San Marcos back in the day years ago in between jobs in college, I had some friends that said, “Come on over. Hang out.” This is the biggest thing I want you to know is that the note industry, especially note investors, are a lot friendlier than most organizations. We’re all here to help. Everybody at some point struggles. That is the God honest truth. It is not always peaks. It is not always Lamborghinis and Porsches and Louis Vuitton purses.

What I’m trying to get is we all have a cause. I’ll give you an example. Steph has a very big cause with animals like pet rescue. I encourage her to do that. She’s been good the last couple of months as less hectic her schedule has been transporting cats from one side of the country to another. Using some of our miles from Southwest to jump on a plane and help a cat go from being euthanized and put down to finding a good, loving home. I know a lot of people have pet rescues, dog rescues. If you have a cause, feel free to share it on my page. We’ve got a big following. If we can help unite people together who have likeminded causes, it goes a lot further because you can do a whole lot more as a group than you can as an individual or solo person.

At our most recent mastermind, we took in what Katie Moton talked about and we asked everybody to basically put out a box and we asked people to throw some money in there. We raised some money from it and we decided we were going to match it $1 for $1 and afterwards, we decided to match it $2 for every $1 driven by our mastermind group. We filled the box up with some stuff. We’ve got little Texas sweet pecan pralines. We’ve got one type of beef jerky. We’ve got another type of beef jerky. We’ve got some homemade candy. We’ve got a bunch of other candy and we’re throwing in bubble gum. We’ve got some summer sausages from Hickory Farms. Everybody loves that. We’ve got some Stubb’s BBQ wrapped up to go. We’ve also got a package of D.L. Jardines like Texas sauces and stuff like that. That’s all going in the box here. Nichole and Greg in the office have done a great job of wrapping this all up. We’re going to top it all off with gum and other candies instead of peanuts because we want to maximize it. We’re going to be shipping a bunch of these boxes out.

If you would like to do the same thing, for $13 or $17 you can fill up one of these boxes from the US Postal Service and ship it overseas. Fill it full of love. One of the things you can’t send is you can’t send alcohol. Don’t be sending any Playboys or anything like that. Sports Illustrated Magazines, only stuff like that you can, but nothing racy because the address that we’re putting below is going to the Middle East. If you want to, please do so. We’ll put a generic address down there that go ships to a quartermaster who can delegate stuff out as it comes in. A lot of these guys are loving salty stuff, pickled jerky, anything that can remind them of home. Not the stuff that you just go to the store and buy because they’ve got a PX like a grocery store that they can go buy stuff at on the base and things like that. Jennifer’s kids went out and wrote up thank you cards and thank you letters and wished them well. We’re going to throw that on top there and then a picture of our mastermind group as well, thanking them for their service.

If you could do that, that would be great. One box, two boxes, three boxes. We’ve got a very big heart for our past and present service men and women and we thank them on a daily, weekly basis; the same thing with first responders, police officers, EMS, firefighters. Our military we’re very, very thankful and it’s part of the reason we have the flag in the background all the time. It’s also one of the great reasons why we comp in any past or present military into any of our workshops. We’re always glad to help them on their second career because they’ve given up so much with their tours of duties and their service to our country. It’s the least we can do. They’re interested in any type of real estate to help them along the way by comping them into one of our classes. It’s the least we can do for helping make United States free and giving us the rights and the freedoms that we have here as Americans. No matter what side of the spectrum or political side you fall on, we’re still very blessed to live in the greatest country out there.

NCS 214 | Cause Driven Goals

Cause Driven Goals: If you’re wanting to share, please share. Share your cause. Share your website.

What’s your cause? At some point, if you want to be a philanthropist like our good friend, Gail Greenberg, it’s one of her big things. I know that Adam Adams with AJA Investments donates a portion of their profits from every deal to the Wounded Warrior’s fund or another cause that he’s a big part of, being an ex-military. We can do so much as real estate entrepreneurs. We have so much more options, so many more resources that we have available to us that I don’t think a lot of people have. If you’re wanting to share, please share. Share your cause. Share your website. There are a lot of people out there that are looking for causes and that’s what this episode is all about, “What’s your cause?” You may need the cause of hip national bank of John Doe, I get it. You might be the one who needs the cause. That’s fine. The most important thing I can tell you here is just share your cause.

Our buddy, Scott Dilley, also has a charity in Haiti. He pays for a full orphanage of twenty plus kids, called Children First. We’ve helped raise money for him. I think our mastermind group raised enough capital to help them build a well for fresh water last year. It was last December we’ve talked about it and February this year. We raised more than enough money to help them out with the drilling of the well for fresh water along with helping them build up some stuff as well, so we’re excited about that. Matt Fisher’s pets, animal shelters and rescues, that’s a big cause for a lot of people. Cat’s Meow Transport with Colin Vurek out of San Francisco. Also St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and Dell Children’s Hospital. Anything we could do especially this time of year, I know a lot of people running around crazy, trying to make everything so perfect. I don’t worry about perfection. This is my favorite time of the year, Christmas and this holiday area is my favorite time of the year. A lot of times, I look at a lot of the excess that we do. There are other things we could spend our time with versus running around and making ourselves crazy. I was talking to a lady about how a lot of people have gone to the cash, the gift cards, that kind of celebration of gifts and exchanging of things or alcohol. Alcohol is a good thing for people.

What are the causes there for you? I think we’re all crazy about running around. I went to the mall getting some stuff and gifts for friends and things like that. It’s easy to do, it’s easy to get stressed out, especially if finances are tight. By all means, we’ve had a good year. Anything you can do to give back to your community, give back to your servicemen, give back to a cause, it’s important. A lot of us sometimes run around guilty because we try to do too much and don’t do enough to pay this bottom line. I think that’s one of the great things that you see about some of those that really have a lot of money and have done a lot of donations besides it being a tax write-off or other things. I think the more successful you get in life, the more you want to give back. The more you want to help those that are less fortunate, the more that you want you to reach out and grab somebody who’s dug themselves a hole or is in a hole and just help pull them out to help them get to a place. I think you appreciate the holidays more when you’re in a good position, but I think you appreciate a whole lot more when you haven’t had anything on a Christmas, and you haven’t had the turkey dinners or the gifts or things like that.

I’m a pretty simple guy for the most part. I enjoy the holidays. I enjoy chilling. I enjoy cooking dinner for everybody. It’s one of my big things. I think the biggest thing is it’s always nice to try to give some more. If you can give throughout the year, find something you can do because 10% of a little bit is great, but 10% of a whole lot goes a whole lot further. That’s the thing I like to try to remind people. If you’re struggling and you’re taking time to help with a charity, try to donate money there and you’re not really covering your own base, cover your own base, get your house in order because I’m a firm believer that God helps those that help themselves. Help yourself first. Get over the hump. Get something rock and rolling and make your causes a part of your profits. Make that part of your tithing. For everything you close on, now you’re motivated down to a close thing, but that’s one great way to really give back and make things happen.

Robert has got a great cause. Gifts for your kid’s teachers. There is a job that goes highly, highly un-promoted a lot of times. A lot of teachers are not getting paid a lot and they become, a lot of times, babysitters for a lot of people. Teachers, this time of year, they enjoy a month break. A lot of times, little things for the teachers or something for the teachers is a great thing. Causes are great to have. Try to find something that’s year-round. Try to find something that you could do to help promote things whether it’s adopting a family or turkeys or whatever it can be. Give this year. Give something. Trust me, if you have bought more than one pumpkin spice latte or buying it on a daily basis, you can afford to give something. That’s what I’m trying to get at. What is your cause that you’re big to? Of if you’re looking for a cause and you’re passionate about something, say it too. Say, “I’m looking for a cause. I’m passionate about pets. I’m passionate about military. I’m passionate about animals or vets,” or whatever it is. Share what you’re looking for and you’ll obviously find some great things out there as well. There are a lot of things that you could really help others. There are a lot of people that are part of our mastermind group and our students are doing some big things. This is the opportunity for you to share out to your causes. The Cat’s Meow Group is an all-volunteer leg to leg transport service for the safe relocation of cats and kittens in the continental United States using a network of volunteers.

Once again, if you’re listening on iTunes or Stitcher, if you’ve got a cause, now is a great opportunity for you to share the cause. Go to comment section. Go to review section. Leave a comment and say, “We’re big on this cause.” We’d love that or drop us a private message at Scott@WeCloseNotes.com and we’d be glad to promote your cause across the land. We always are proud of our military, not just on Memorial Day or Veterans Day or stuff like that, but year-round. If you are a past or present military or a first responder, let us know. We’ll be glad to comp you into our upcoming March workshop. No cost, no strings attached, no upsell. Straight up, you get a full ticket to it. Whatever that cause may be, share it. Thank you first and foremost for your service. Thank you for all going out and making something happen today. Even just reaching out to those over message or via phone to let them know you’re sincerely thinking about them to support them this year. Sometimes, it’s not just the things, it’s giving your time and your heart. God knows everyone can use a bit more of that. If you’ve got time and your heart, and just the thoughts are great.

NCS 214 | Cause Driven Goals

Cause Driven Goals: Sometimes pride gets in the way of people asking for help and sometimes it’s good just to surprise them.

Sometimes if you know something’s struggling, sometimes it’s best just to donate, just to make sure that they’re taken care of. Sometimes pride gets in the way of people asking for help and sometimes it’s good just to surprise them by saying, “I know what you need. Let’s go take it and make it happen.” If you’ve got a cause make sure to share it. We’d love to see what your causes are so we can get a total of twenty or more or maybe 100 more causes that we can upload on here and maybe do a special post about the different causes that are available throughout the rest of the year. Remember, just because it’s the 21st, it doesn’t mean you don’t have ten days to make something happen. Because a lot of people between now and the end of the year are going to take it off, but a lot of companies, a lot of charities, a lot of needy individuals are in need of something.

A couple of years ago, I spent the holidays working with the Elf Louise Project down in San Antonio. It’s a very, very big holiday non-profit organization that gets together. It’s put on by the City of San Antonio where they literally have families register for in need. You have literally hundreds and hundreds of people, if not thousands. I ended up volunteering with a group of other people where I ended up being the Santa and I had a team of handlers, four or five people that we drove around. We had basically two big truckloads of toys that we donated. We would show up and I would play Santa Claus to kids that didn’t have a Santa. That was a very touching, a very moving moment seeing kids that didn’t have anything and getting their only toys from the city. It was a touching moment. That always brings me back to making sure that I’m very thankful for what we have and what we do.

I don’t have much more to talk about except what’s your cause. If you could find a cause, share it. Share it in your website. This is an exciting thing as well too, if you are working with a cause and you know somebody else who’s passionate about that cause, join together. Sometimes you’ll find well-known people who have a big cause and sometimes it’s a great way to fly with them for credibility and other things to literally help drive traffic or things like that for whatever cause you’re working for. It’s a great way to help get the word out with what you’re doing.

Once again, go make something happen. Make 2018 more than just about you. This year has been a tremendous year for what we have done. We’re very honored of over 2,000 students that we’ve helped throughout the year, the 3,200 combined students between last year and this year. We look forward to helping 10,000 new students over the next five years and make something happen in the note industry. Will we hit it? I don’t know. I think we will. I know we can. It’s just a matter of us doing the right things on a daily basis to make it happen because that’s where true success lies. It’s not on just the peaks. It’s the daily grind and the daily in and out of doing the same things over and over and over again, and failing forward. Consistency, we know, always, always breeds success. Everybody loves to brag on you when you’re at the top, but they don’t see the number of times that you fell along the way or fell flat on your face.

Go make something happen. If you’re at the peak, not in the valleys, make sure to share. Make sure you give back to any type of cause that you can have and go out and make it happen. Thank you again for being a part of the show. We’ve got some episodes that you’re really going to enjoy listening to some of our students and so many other people out there that are part of our extended note family. I’m really looking forward to those interviews. Stay tuned. If you love the show, make sure to share it with somebody. Share it on Facebook and Twitter by using the #NoteClosersPodcast. Make sure to leave a review on iTunes if you really, really love the show. Thank you so much. Have a great day. Go out, make something happen and be a big cause and be a light in somebody else’s life, who might just need a little bit of pick me up this year. We’ll see you guys all at the top.

 

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