Be a man who, in his secret thoughts, believes himself to be superior to most men, thus deserving great wealth and power. -Andrew Carnegie

Understand that you are superior to most men. You're deserving of wealth and power and success. But it comes down to you believing that in your secret thoughts, reestablishing your confidence. If you're not confident yet, it's like going back and remembering, replanting those seeds. Think about things that you've done that were successful in the past, replanting that, replanting that, re-cultivating inside your subconscious mind. So that's what will grow. That's what it'll become.

What's up, everybody? This is Russell Brunson. Welcome back to the Marketing Secrets Podcast. This will probably be the last podcast episode of the year, which is crazy. I know my last podcast episode, I was probably a little more down than most of you guys are used to hearing me, so I apologize about that. But anyway, I do appreciate actually a lot of you guys reaching out to me and sending me messages. Anyway, that felt really good and meant a lot to me. So thank you for that.

I'm actually going into next year really excited and hopeful. It's interesting. It's just been a weird season with kids turning 18 and business and all this stuff. Anyway, the other day I came back to the office and I was hanging out with all my old books. And then I was like, "I spend so much time collecting them. I should spend more time reading them."

So I was looking at some of my favorite authors. One of them, a lot of the marketing people, the hardcore marketers would know who this person is. His name's Robert Collier. He wrote The Robert Collier Letter Book, which is one of the best marketing books of all time. But what most people don't know is Robert Collier, he was showing what he was doing in marketing, but he was marketing his own business. His own business was this huge personal development business that he created with tons of books and courses and magazines and newsletters and all sorts of stuff.

In fact, next month, Insider Secrets of Success, we are going to be giving you guys one of my favorite Robert Collier book sets. It's actually seven volumes. The first two volumes are called Secrets of Gold. And then the other five volumes are called Life Magnet. It's Robert Collier taking some biblical principles and some mindset principles and weaving them together into a really cool book set. So if you're a Secrets of Success member, that'll be coming next month to you. If you're not yet, you should go become a member. It's so much fun over there.

As I was collecting all my Robert Collier stuff, all the books and things, I found out that he actually had a magazine for a long time called Mind, Inc. They're small magazines, but they're really thick, almost like little mini booklets. I think I have almost a complete set. I've been trying to collect all of those. So I've been working on getting a complete set, which is kind of fun. But then I recently found out that he started another magazine right prior to Mind, Inc., and that magazine's called House Seven.

he only published, I think, seven or eight issues. I think I've got five or six of them. I'm still trying to find one or two more that have been eluding me so far. But anyway, so the other day when I came into the office, it was sitting on my desk. It was the January 1928 edition of House Seven Magazine. I'm like, "I'm just going to read this thing," and I started reading it. It was interesting because it was kind of the thing that got me out of my funk a little bit.

I don't remember specifically what it said, but I was reading all different articles and everything, specifically the ones written by Robert Collier. There a lot of authors in there, but the ones from Robert. The premise I got was the fact that we have to have self-confidence in ourselves. He talked about how there are people out there who are running businesses and organizations and things like that.

It's not always the smartest person or the person who's the most attractive or whatever. But the person who's got the most confidence is the one who wins. I can remember hearing Setema Gali say, "In any situation, the person with the most confidence will win. They most certainty will win." I started realizing. I'm like, "Oh, my gosh, I've lost my confidence in myself." I think that's really been my struggle.

When I got started in this business back in the day ... Actually, let me step back even further. When I was wrestling growing up, I remember in my head I thought I had a unique advantage over everyone else. I don't know if I did or if I didn't, but in my head I had this advantage. It was the fact that my dad was a college wrestler. I'm like, "My dad's a college wrestler. None of the other guys on my team or other teams have that, so I have this unique advantage that makes me so I can be the best."

I always had that in my back pocket, just like a thing. I remember there was a movie. It was a wrestling movie I used to watch all the time, and it was about Iowa wrestling. The Hawkeyes are one of the best wrestling teams of all time. There were two twin brothers, Tom and Terry Brands, and this video was all about them and their training and their lifestyle and everything.

I remember the video started, and it started with Tom Brands like, "My name is Tom Brands. My goal is simple. I want to be the greatest wrestler in the whole world." The next popup and it was like, "My name's Terry Brands. My goal is simple. I want to be the greatest wrestler in the whole world." And then the rest of the videos was these guys just showing their crazy training routine, what they were doing to try to become the best in the world.

I remember hearing that and, in my head, I was like ... I would never say it out loud because there's ... I don't know. We have this thing where it's not socially acceptable to say these things out loud. But in my head, I was like, "My name's Russell Brunson, and my goal is simple. I want to be the greatest wrestler in the whole world." And then I acted as if I was. In my head, I was like, "I have this unique advantage. I am the greatest." And I wasn't, but I felt like I had what I needed to do.

I was confident in myself, and I started pursuing that. From that, I never became the greatest wrestler in the whole world, but I became a state champ. I took second place in the nation. I got a college scholarship. I was in the top 10 in the NCAA, all these different things that came on the backside of it, of just believing in my own mind that I was the greatest of all time, the GOAT. I like that. I'm going to use that as the acronym for this, the GOAT, G-O-A-T, greatest of all time.

There's a quote from Andrew Carnegie. Dan Kennedy's quoted this a lot. I think he always quotes it a little off. I like Dan Kennedy's version of the quote better, but I found one that's, I think, what Andrew Carnegie actually said. He was one of the richest men. He might be been the richest man in the world back then. But he said, "Be a man who in his secret thoughts believes himself to be superior to most men, thus deserving of great wealth and power."

So in your secret thoughts believing to be superior to most men. What that means is, again, it's not socially acceptable to be like, "I am the GOAT. I am the greatest." Although we have a lot of people in this industry who do that everywhere. But in our secret thoughts, we have to believe that. When I was wrestling, I had to believe I was the best. When I stepped on the mat, I had to believe I was the best. In fact, Dan Gable, who was Tom and Terry Brands' coach, he used to say, "I won't let a wrestler step on the mat unless, in their mind, they know they're going to win before they go out there."

He would pull guys. He was notorious for a guy came out there. He'd look in his eyes. He's like, "This guy's nervous, his self-confidence." He'd pull him like, "You know what? You're not going to wrestle for me." You have to know in your secret thoughts that you are superior to most other men, to all other men, to the people you are competing against. I fast forward now to business. I've been in this business now over 20 years, which is crazy.

I remember I first got started. I was learning, and I was learning from all these people. I don't know. I feel like I became more of a student than anyone else. A lot of people who were talking about it and studying, but I became obsessed with it at a level I don't think most people have. I don't think people knew how obsessed I was until I wrote DotCom Secrets and Expert Secrets. People started seeing like, "Oh, Russell went really deep on this stuff." But I was doing it in the time.

If you were around 15, 20 years ago, there was a handful of people who were look business back then who are still around today. I remember, I don't know, all of them were doing bigger than me and more than me. It was frustrating for me because in my mind I was like ... Again, my secret thoughts. I was like, "You guys aren't better than me." But I don't know. For some reason, I was never the cool guy. I never got into the Cool Kids Club.

In fact, a lot of these guys who were my friends and they started this thing, some of you guys have heard it, called The Syndicate. There's Frank Kern and Ryan Deiss and Mike Filsaime and all these people, and they're all my friends. But they had this syndicate and they would all cross-promote. Each month, they'd pick someone new to promote and everything. I was always on the outside of that. I could never get those guys to let me be part of it.

In fact, I even tried, how do I get in this group? I don't know. For whatever reason, they would never let me in. I don't know if they didn't like me or whatever, which is fine. But in my mind, I'm just like, "It sucks because you guys are doing bigger numbers and more than me." But I couldn't do anything about it because I couldn't get into this good old boys club. It was before we had Facebook and the other ways to buy ads really aggressively and stuff.

But I was studying and learning and trying and testing and doing all these things. And then when ClickFunnels came around, it was the first time I had a vehicle that was different, and I was able to carve my segment of the market out. I was going to be the funnel guy. We had this funnel software, and we had the stuff. From that, it gave us the ability to be the biggest brand. I think the biggest brands of the time, Traffic Conversion of the Big Event. We surpassed them. Infusion Software was the big software. We surpassed them.

We were able to become the biggest voice, the biggest name. What came on the backside, it matched what my secret thoughts were, the secret thoughts of who I believed I actually was and the confidence I had in myself. We had the vehicle. We had the things to be able to do that. We built this business, and it's been amazing. I look back now. The last couple years, it's been a bumpy ride for me. Obviously, the ups and downs of the marketplace, we always had competitors coming in, but it was different.

I had confidence. We were fighting and competing, and it was fun. It was awesome. But then for a lot of reasons, a couple of years ago, between Dave getting sick and other things and people who I had helped grow in this business who started becoming competitors and just, I don't know, a lot of things that just, if I'm honest, it shot my confidence. It was this weird thing where I was just like ... I don't know. My confidence was down.

When you start making decisions and planning and going through things, it was just like Dan Gable. He wouldn't let an athlete step on the mat unless he could tell that in his mind he thought he was going to win. I feel like somewhere in that transition over the last two years or so, my confidence got down where I was stepping in situations I wasn't sure if I was going to win.

We're launching a funnel. We're launching a project, launching this or that. I was like, "I hope this works. I hope this ..." It was entering in with the wrong confidence versus me coming in, Russell, the first 10 years of ClickFunnels being very competent, knowing exactly what I was doing and how I was going to execute and what we're going to do and having that absolute certainty. I feel like I got away from that.

So as I was reading this magazine, the House Seven from Robert Collier and just three or four times, that magazine kept talking about confidence and how we have to have this confidence ourselves, how it was one of the keys to being successful. I realized that I think that's where I've been struggling at. I started thinking back, and I'm like, "Why am I struggling? Why don't I have confidence? Look what we've done over the last few years. Look at what I've accomplished."

I started looking back on that, and I spent some time just really thinking about it and trying to regrow my own confidence. And then I started thinking about, if you've listened to The Strangest Secret by Earl Nightingale, he talks about our subconscious mind and how it's like a garden. He's like, "Whatever you plant in this garden will grow." He's like, "If you plant nightshade, which is a poisonous plant, it'll grow and it'll strangle its surrounding. If we plant something good, it'll grow as well."

I started realizing the seeds I've been planting is the seeds of doubt or seeds of just not in that confidence and certainty and things like that. I started realizing I got to come back. In my secret thoughts, I have to start believing again that I am the greatest. I'm superior to all other men. I'm the GOAT, whatever you want to call it. I got to start planting those seeds and planting those seeds because if I keep planting those seeds in my subconscious mind, my subconscious mind will believe it. It'll grow, and that'll be what happens.

It was just fascinating, and I started thinking about that a lot more. The last week or so, my thoughts is just remembering back, remembering back who I was and why and what I've done and those kind of things and bringing that back out and planting those seeds and reestablishing and regaining my confidence in myself. Anyway, that's been the last few days for me, and it's been fun and exciting again and entering into the new year with a plan.

I've got a plan that is no longer like, "I hope this is going to work." It's like I know the plan, absolute certainty, and it's exciting. It's not just like, "Oh, this is going to increase our sales by 10%." It's like this will destroy the market. Anyway, you guys will see. Watch over the next 12 months. You will see what happens when Russell's back with absolute certainty and confidence in himself. We have a direction and a plan, and we're executing on it. So I'm fired up. I'm excited. A lot of really good things happening.

So for those who were concerned about me from last podcast episode, thank you for your concern. I appreciate it. Those who were wondering how I'm digging out of it because a lot of you guys probably are in that state or been in that state or going to be in that state, this is where I'm starting at. It's coming back to the secret thoughts, like Andrew Carnegie said, "Be a man who in his secret thoughts believes himself to be superior to most men, thus deserving of great wealth and power."

Understand that you are superior to most men. You're deserving of wealth and power and success. But it comes down to you believing that in your secret thoughts, reestablishing your confidence. If you're not confident yet, it's like going back and remembering, replanting those seeds. Think about things that you've done that were successful in the past, replanting that, replanting that, re-cultivating inside your subconscious mind. So that's what will grow. That's what it'll become.

That way when you're entering situations, like stepping on the wrestling mat, stepping on the mat, knowing I'm going to win, stepping on the mat, knowing that I'm going to be the person that's going to succeed, not stepping in-confidently. You know what I mean? That's in wrestling, but same thing in business, stepping into it like this new offer, this new campaign, this new thing we're rolling out, this new whatever it is, coming through with the absolute certainty.

So anyway, that's how I'm feeling today. I'm feeling a lot better. Obviously I'm still under the weather. You can probably hear it in my voice. That's how we're entering the new year, and we have some really fun things planned for next year. I'm excited to show you guys. Hopefully, you'll enjoy the party and the ride. Thank you guys all for listening and supporting us.
I hope you guys have a great holiday and a great new year and cannot wait to see you all next year. We're going to take over the world, and I hope you guys come on the ride with us. It's going to be a lot of fun. Appreciate you all. Thanks for listening, and we'll talk soon.