How to Build a Powerful Family and Business with the Ride or Die Mindset [Podcast 187]

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Not many people would believe in mixing professional and personal lives together. Yet, Brandon and Sam Middleton proved that otherwise. As hosts of the RIDE OR DIE podcast, they show how you can make a marriage work while growing a business and family. All it takes is to find that certain balance. They talk about business, relationship connections, strengthening, building your bond, and building up your hustle. They share the key points on how you can effectively do the same by pointing out the biggest mistakes people make in relationships while trying to build something together and at the same time putting their hearts on their sleeves as they talk about theirs together with their learning experiences.

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How to Build a Powerful Family and Business with the Ride or Die Mindset [Podcast 187]

Are you in a place where you’re in a relationship, you’re in a partnership, you’re looking for a way to connect the dots with that relationship, to be a power couple, to strengthen your relationship as well as strengthen your hustle? This episode’s experts are uniquely qualified to be able to share that message with you. They run a successful multimillion-dollar real estate firm. They run a successful marketing agency where they’ve been building experts behind the scene for years and years doing millions, multimillions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars in results. They are certainly qualified to talk to you about business. More importantly, we’re going to talk about relationship, connection, strengthening, building your bond and building up your hustle. Our guests are Brandon and Samantha Middleton. Welcome to the show. How are you?

We’re great, thank you.

There’s going to be a lot of wisdom in this episode. If you never want to miss an episode, you can go to GrowthToFreedom.com/subscribe. We literally have over 150 hours of some of the best insights and wisdom. This episode is no exception. You have built a platform where you’re on a mission bringing power couples together to strengthen the relationship and also strengthen their hustle. I’d love to get your perspective. With all the success you’ve had in business, helping others build successful businesses, why are you guys doing what you’re doing with this new mission called Ride or Die?

Seventeen years ago, we were kids. I was seventeen years old, she was nineteen. We were introduced to the real world. It’s time to go to college. We tried that for a little while. I’ve always been entrepreneurial and start a business. We had many little businesses that started and failed. Shortly after, we had the great recession. We had a lot of immediate adversity as entrepreneurs. As we grew our business and had some success, we’ve got that first $1 million mark in a few years and then had that first $1 million-year. We met a lot of people along the way. We did a lot of business with people who were way more successful, ten, twenty years ahead of us. We noticed that there’s a pattern, there’s a gap. There’s a lot of focus around growing your business, but there was not a lot of focus around balancing that with the rest of your life. If you’re just focused on one area of life, then other things can fall apart.

Both of us coming from broken homes, watching divorce three, four, five times with our parents and knowing how that affected us, we knew that we didn’t want to repeat that. From an early point in our relationship, the relationship was always number one. I would say the first couple of years, money was the only thing I was focused on. We needed to get out of survival mode. Sam’s always been good from the moment I met her. She’s always been more mature than her years. She’s always known her worth, known what she will accept and what she deserves. Quickly, she challenged me to get my priorities in order and I did. I knew that I didn’t want to repeat the cycle. I’d rather make less money but do it with my family than make a ton of money, be the most popular guy in the network, have the vanity stats, but not have the success at home that is important to us. That’s why we did it.

When you approach life with positivity, proactivity, fearlessness, and love, you can get what you want as long as you are willing to put in the work it takes to get there. - @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

We had a lot of colleagues, a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of people we met along the way who would be like, “How can you guys work together? I don’t understand that. How can you spend so much time together? What are you doing?” We thought it was pretty common for us because we figured it out. We built the plane as we’re flying it. The more we kept hearing that over the last seven to ten years, the more we’re like, “We’ve got something that we need to share with the world.”

One of the things you brought up is balance. I have my own view on balance and I talk about it in some other episodes. Samantha, from your perspective, you guys are a young power couple. The maturity you guys have, I view it as way beyond your years. Even what you shared, Brandon, about the idea of vanity stats, even being aware there are vanity stats, I know 40-year-olds I can think of in my head, and I’m sure you can too that I was with. That’s the measuring stick that they have, which I look at as sad. You guys have seemed to figure out how to navigate having a great relationship and being connected. Sam, in your world, in your view of things, you see a lot of people whether they’re working together side-by-side in the business or one partner or spouse is the entrepreneur. Where do you see the biggest mistakes people make in their relationship trying to build something together?

Hands down, whether they work together or not, the biggest mistake that I see couples make is not making decisions together as a team. That’s how the whole Ride Or Die concept came about because when we were together for about the three-year mark, we went through this real crash in our relationship. Brandon was working so hard at building a legacy for us and our future, but in my mind it was so far down the road that I couldn’t see this vision clearly of why he was working so hard. How many years were we going to have to bust our butts that hard and not enjoy the journey along the way? We did break up for this awfully long week of our life where we had to wake up, grow up and figure things out as a team. When we made that transition into what Brandon always says, “We ride or die to the end,” and I’m like, “Ride or die.”

Brandon and I are complete opposites. We are not the same person in any iota. He’s about systems and I’m so free-spirited, we’re so different. There’s something beautiful about when we can come together and make decisions together. We make it as a team, we fail as a team, we win as a team and because of that, our relationship grows stronger.

Brandon, you shared this idea. What popped into my head is the Tony Robbins quote, “You get what you tolerate.” Samantha, it sounds like at some point, you put your foot down and related to this. For you guys, what’s been your biggest struggle? You can go where you want with it. What would you consider your biggest struggle, mistake or failure? What did you learn from it? What would you say to that?

 

I would say our biggest struggle over the years would definitely be this period of time when Brandon and I didn’t understand the value of our time and the value of our skillset and have that confidence behind us that we could achieve whatever we put our mind to and we took action on. There was a while where Brandon was introverted, shy and he was afraid to go out and build that business that we aspire to have. He spent a lot of giving time to other people that weren’t necessarily deserving of as much time as he was giving or appreciative of that time. It did slow us down for a while.

We took some turns in our business and stuff that were obviously learning experiences, but it would build up to a point where we were like, “We don’t want to do this anymore.” We would be quick to switch gears and say, “How do we make this better?” but that time, that buildup to get to that point was stressful and overwhelming. Until we got the confidence in ourselves, trust in each other as a relationship, and know that we had each other’s backs all the time, that was probably our biggest struggle for a while.

For me, there are probably two. One of my biggest challenges has been trusting her intuition. Whereas I may be leading the company, I may be the visionary, I may have a lot of the systems and everything mapped out in my head. A lot of times, I would let tolerate a specific business, decision, client or what have you. Maybe you’re in a job and you’re tolerating that manager. That boss isn’t giving you the promotion or isn’t making the changes necessary. You know you need to leave that job. I would know probably two or three years sooner that should change and Sam would let me know like, “We’re more valuable than this. This has to change. This isn’t the right fit. It’s time for a change,” and I would let it go longer. That would create a more stressful time.

If you’re just focused on one area of life, then other things can fall apart. – @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

We would get to a point where we finally make that decision or that decision will be made for us. It was always, “Sam was right. We should have done those two years sooner because now we can see that the result was better.” Trusting her intuition definitely was a challenge for a while. Thirteen years of us working on this and working on business constantly, we got good at a lot of things. We also created some bad patterns and bad habits, some selfish habits, selfish as a couple. When you add children into the mix, that first couple of years where a lot of your time has to be invested not in business. That was definitely one of our biggest challenges. It has been a huge return on investment.

With our family, it pays dividends. It’s sad but true that a lot of couples in business, entrepreneurs, they give leftovers to their family, their spouse, their partner, their kids. If you’ve ever felt like, “I want to get to that next level in my relationship but I find it hard,” you’re navigating the time and what your client demands, business demands and the relationship, something’s got to give. No, it doesn’t. You can have it both ways. You can have your cake and eat it too. Brandon and Sam are living proof of that.

I’ve heard some people describe entrepreneurship, family and trying to navigate it where you give your family leftovers. It’s sad but true. This topic is personal for me. I’ve been building companies for close to 30 years and had some successes and some failures along the way. I went through a divorce partially because I was an idiot working 100 hours a week. I made business the priority. I didn’t get it right. I like to think I learned a lot from it. What I love about us having gotten a chance to connect is it’s a great reminder that you can have an incredible relationship. I’m learning a lot from you even though you’re over ten years younger than I am and my wife. Samantha, in your view, let’s talk about balance. What’s the biggest myth about balance in business and relationships?

The biggest myth about balance is there’s no such thing as even amount of time.

Eight hours in business, eight hours of family, eight hours in the gym.

The important thing for us to manage our priorities is to realize that things are seasonal. In one season we may be focused on the business. Maybe there’s a big push that we’re doing, a big promotion or we have an event coming up, whatever the case may be, that we have to dive in and put our focus on work. If we’re going to do that in that season, we need to meet and connect to make sure that we’re still giving our kids that time or their understanding of the time that we’re taking away. What is going to be the return on that investment? Let’s say it’s going to be two months or three months where this season’s going to be crazy with business. This summer is a good example. The kids are out of camp all summer and at the end of the summer, we have a nice staycation with the family to reward us all for our hard work.

We have to figure those things out as a couple and then involve the kids on it as well. There are seasons where we’ve worked so much and that we’ve harvested and we have all that stuff. We’re nice, fat and happy for a little while and we can enjoy life more and do more date nights or do more vacations with the kids. The short or the long is that there is no such thing as actual, even balance of time. You can work to create that beauty and that balance for what works for your relationship and understand that those things are in seasons. There’s no black and white to it. You guys get to pave that path for yourselves.

You can have it both ways. You can have your cake and eat it too. – Host Click To Tweet

I’m going to go back to something you said, which is related to the value of time, the confidence. I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but I don’t know if it was doubt or some type of insecurity. What was the shift for you guys? You described building a lot of different companies. I imagine there are a lot of entrepreneurs and business owners who have those voices. At certain times, there’s this amazing confidence and we’re on top of the world and we’re the king, and then other times we feel like pawn scum. We have little confidence, lots of doubt and all these sorts of things. What do you view is the shift that went from not valuing your time to where you got clear on the value of your time? You went from doubt, if there was doubt or lack of confidence, to you’ve got confidence in making the decision. What would you say would be a key turning point where it got clear that you needed to stay in the groove on respect your time and also that confidence in demanding of your time?

Investing in ourselves through education.

We went to a lot of workshops and weekend seminars for personal development. It was one of the first ones early in our relationship. We were probably twenty, 22, something like that. There was a personal development training that we re-attended many times. It stressed on that importance of knowing what you’re worth and how little time there is. Logically, that made sense to me but funny enough, at that seminar, I put it into practice. I had a small little website business at the time and after getting that knowledge, I tested it.

I had a client come up to me and they’re like, “Can you do this?” Normally, I’d say, “Yes, that’s $25 an hour. It’s $1,000 a month.” I immediately put our value five times more than I had been as a new entrepreneur because I had all this, “We’re not worth it. We still need to be the cheapest because we’re new.” What I realized was if I asked for more and we get it, I’m going to over deliver on that value. If we don’t know how to do it, we’ll hire the people that know how to do it or we’ll spend the time to go figure out how to get it done to over deliver for that client. Investing in personal development, training together, going through that experience and those exercises together early on.

 

Sam, I’ve heard you mention a couple times the concept of ROI and meeting together. You guys meet together regularly and then you have some whiteboard discussions or whatever as a couple. What is your groove? What is your rhythm of how you guys navigate a week to stay connected with your goals? Maybe it’s once a month, but what is your process for that?

I want to dovetail this with the last question that we’re talking about building that confidence and stuff. For anybody in our audience, I challenge you to do this next exercise with your spouse and even your business partner if you are not in business with your spouse. Go do this with your spouse on one side and your business partner in your business because whiteboard sessions have been a real pivotal thing for us. That is another way that we’ve built confidence. We ideally like to meet once a week minimum, but there’s one big meeting a week. It’s usually Monday mornings. Sometimes we can’t get it in that week for one reason or another and we’ll do it on date night. We’ll run down a Bonefish and write all over the table or whatever. We’ll take pictures of our stuff and then bring it home.

What we started realizing is when we would sit down and we would go plan together, whether they seemed outrageous or not, we would find out a way to get it done. The more that we sat down and did this and the more that we went and took action on it, the more confidence we built. Literally, we could put down a goal and it would happen. We were almost homeless. We couldn’t pay our rent years ago. I had put a deposit down for our wedding venue. We had a significant change in our finances which left us broke and moving into this ghetto apartment for a little while. I said, “We’re not going to lose this wedding. We need to figure out how to make it happen.” We didn’t have financial support from our families. They weren’t paying for our wedding for us. We had to figure it out.

We started writing down our goals, what we wanted, and how we were going to get it. Within six months we paid for our $25,000 wedding that we had no clue how we were going to pay for at the time. That’s one small example of putting your mind to something and achieving it. We’ve seriously done this with our business, our kids and the way we planned for vacations. We whiteboard it all out. What is our goal? How often do we want to vacation? How often do we want to go out with the kids? How often do we want to go alone? What does that look like? Then we’ll take it to the business. What are our business goals for the next 90 days?

The biggest myth about balance is there’s no such thing as even amount of time. – @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

We can plan out a year, but it’s hard to plan a whole year out. I believe for entrepreneurs, we like to chunk it down in 90-day goals. What do we need to accomplish each month to reach that 90-day goal, knowing that it’s not all black? Not everything is black and white. Everything shifts. You have to be able to change with the times and readjust. Overall, when you have that mark, you have something to measure by. It helps you get to those places and those successes.

Sam, that was amazing how you simplified that process in 90 days, 30 days, the different things you think about. Even the distinction of how often you want to go on vacations, I don’t hear a lot of people talking about that. A lot of people talk about, “Let’s look at our business goals and break it down that way,” but your vacations, your time with family, what you’re going to be doing with the kids. These little distinctions are powerful yet simple. Brandon, I’d love to get your take on this too. You’re doing this together overall. Chances are you’ve got a slightly different three-degree varying view on this. How do you see this unpacking that you guys come together? I can picture you guys walking into Bonefish. They’ve got the white mat sitting there. You guys start in and you’re grabbing your stuff out of the buckets or whatever, enjoying a couple cocktails or drinks. You start power scratching your things. Describe this process because it sounds fascinating.

Bonefish in the last few years, that was a nice little discovery because they do let you write all over the table. You get to multitask a little bit. It’s to have a nice date night but naturally, we’re going to talk about life and the business is the vehicle. It’s a natural conversation. Bonefish is good for those not too serious meetings, the ones that you’ve been putting off or we’ve got to get a date night in and we also haven’t had a meeting in a little while, so we’ll squeeze that in. In the beginning, it was as simple as us sitting down in the living room. We’ve always worked from home. At a certain point, I realized it didn’t matter if I had $100,000 deal on the line for that day. If we were going through something, if we weren’t agreeing on something, I would stop everything and I could miss the meeting, move things around, it didn’t matter. I was always willing to let business be second even when it was expensive.

You want to get your wife for a minute and say, “I don’t care. I’ll stop everything right now. Let’s fix this now.” That definitely stops me in my tracks. He does that and I’m like, “He’s serious.”

Our whiteboard sessions started organically. It was just, “Here’s a big whiteboard. What are your challenges? What are your wants and needs?” We’d write a big long list. We’d get it all out in black and white. We’d start prioritizing things or it would be like, “This is a lot. Can we wait on this until we get this and this done?” We would start literally numbering things and together being, “If you can go close this deal or do that, then that means we can do this,” and we would be on the same page. Those used to be five-hour meetings when we were first getting started.

A lot less responsibility, I don’t know how that happened.

As we’ve grown, we’ve developed a little bit more of a process. A lot of times it’s a weekly check-in, “What deals are on the table? What closings do we have in our real estate? Where are you at with date nights? Where are you at with vacation?” Sometimes it’ll be like, “It’s been a long season. We need to get something on the books basically.” We’ll commit to dates and things. That’s our weekly check-in. It’s not super structured, but I’d say every quarter we do sit down and we have a filter. We write down what needs to get done. As an entrepreneur, we always have a to-do list that probably feels it’s a mile long. If you don’t get it out of your head, it can start to feel overwhelming.

We’ll start off the quarter and be like, “What still has to get done?” It will be this long list of what. Quickly, right next to it is why, “Why are we doing this?” Sam has done a phenomenal job of this over the years, “That doesn’t have to get done right now. That’s not an emergency,” even though for me, I would feel the pressure of a deadline, a client or obligation and then she would challenge me on it. Over the years we got better at being like, “Does this have to get done in order for us to reach these goals?” “No, that would help make sure that we were spending our time on the right things,” and then it would be, “When’s it going to get done?” We worry about how it’s going to get done at very last because that list of things may start off really vague and then it keeps getting trimmed down more and more. We have those dates that we get to commit to and we do it with simple things like health-related things. It will be like, “By this date, we want to be in this type of health. By this date, we want to have this vacation or this financial goal or what have you.” They all have deadlines once we get to the fourth filter of that whiteboard session every quarter.

Understand that things are in seasons. - @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

We’re going back to the filter process. It sounds like there are four things that end with the deadline once you prioritize it. Unpack that. If you were to give the four-step checklist of that filter, what would those handful of things be?

What needs to get done? Why it is that it needs to get done? You’re making sure that it’s connected with your end goal and mission. When is it going to get done? Not everything is going to have a deadline, but projects are going to have a deadline, not necessarily tasks. When is that project getting done by whom? How do we keep them accountable? Finally, it’s how? A lot of times if we worry about the how too soon, then we can talk ourselves out of some things. If we’re like, “We need to pay for this wedding in three months. How?” Let’s make sure these are all the things that get us excited. These are the things that keep us creative. How we’re going to do it? That comes last. We figured that out.

It’s: needs to get done, why to get done, when to get done, who and then the how. You guys are so damn understated frankly. You’ve built this multimillion-dollar real estate business that you invest in, dozens of properties going on through a year. Maybe you have upwards of twenty or 30. You’ve been the backbone of some of the biggest names in the expert industry in helping them drive momentum and build multimillion-dollar businesses, hundreds of millions of dollars in business. You have built your successful business and a successful family. It’s amazing what you guys have done at such a young age. I find it fascinating and I admire what you guys are doing overall.

As you guys think about what you’re doing and with the depth of the clients that you’ve worked with, what would you guys say would be one to three breakthroughs or strategies you’ve stumbled on? It might tie in exactly with this that can allow you to build a power family and a powerful business that has an impact. What would that one to three key things be?

When we’re strong, everything else is strong around us. We’ve learned that a lot through having the kids. When we’re weak, the kids sense it and they’ll go through any crack they can to break us down. We have to be a strong front for them and also for each other. First, I would say it has to be with us. Second, it would be who do we look up to? I don’t think we’re the smartest couple out there and we’re not perfect. We still fight and we still go through struggles. We still have obstacles. We still have to figure things out. There are older people that have gone through this before us. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. We’re always looking for new knowledge, new tips and new ways to grow. Growth is an important part. Third, I’d say the people that were around when we’re either not around each other or even when we’re out with each other. As a family or as a couple, who are the people that we spend our time with? Who are the people that we work with?

 

That was a huge lesson over the years of sometimes along the way working with the wrong person and realizing it. It’s being aware of your surroundings so that you don’t have to necessarily do those struggles for too long and you can bounce back fast. Our friends, we have an incredible circle of friendships, people that are also parents, people that are also committed to their marriages. They know that it’s not going to be perfect every day. They know there are going to be struggles. We’re vulnerable with each other. We can share those things with each other so that we all come out victorious in our lives, our businesses and our marriages. Those three things I would say are the important ones for me.

Brandon, what would you hope would be a handful of action steps that you would challenge our audience to take, to build a power family and a power powerful business making an impact?

When you have that mark, you have something to measure by. @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

I wish it was as simple as a step or one action, but truly it’s more mindset than anything. It’s more of a shift in your attitude, a shift in perspective. A lot of people can think about marriage as it’s 50%, 50%, but the truth is it’s 100%, 100%, sometimes 120%.

Sometimes I’m 80% and he’s 120%.

It is a shift in mindset. If you prioritize your foundation over money and business, even friends, I hate to say it, if you value that then making that change in your mind is going to change saying yes to another function or saying yes to going out with the guys that 15th time on the golf course. You’ll make decisions differently. You’ll be more patient sitting down for a conversation and talking with your spouse. That’s what’s going to open up real change. It’s not just, “Read this one book.” Gary Chapman’s The 5 Love Languages is an easy quiz to take. We reference our love language all the time. When it comes to a relationship, it’s the ride or die attitude. This is a team. If you’re struggling, then the team is in pain and I’ve got to come and help. If we’re not both strong or we’re not both happy with something, then whether one agrees with it or doesn’t, the team needs to make a shift. You’ve got to step up for the team.

That’s such wisdom. I admire what you guys have. I literally wish we could spend hours unpacking some of these little things of genius that you guys have figured out at such a young age. For the sake of time, for both of us and for our audience, we’ve in many ways scratched the surface. Ideally, as you’re reading this, you get a real understanding of the genius that Sam and Brandon have. Not only how they build their family, but how they can help you build a great family and a great business too. They also happen to have a few vehicles to be able to do that which they make available. If somebody wants to go deeper with you guys and understand the Ride Or Die movement, some of the other resources that you make. Where can people do that? How can they reach out to you? How can they get in touch?

We are launching the book. There’s a lot of rebranding going on for Ride or Die, but you can visit RideOrDieLife.com. That will take you to the website where you can see the podcasts that we do. You’ll be able to get the book as soon as it’s live. We’re on Instagram all the time, @BrandonAndSam. You’ll learn more about that as you follow us. Some of the episodes we do are specific to real estate and how we do it.

I invite you to come to share in our lives more. We open up and share a lot of stuff, which has taken a long time. I may not sound shy on the podcast, but it’s taken a lot of vulnerability to open up in front of a lot of people and to share a lot of things which we do all the time on the podcast and all the time on Instagram stories and stuff. We have a fun time doing it. We have a lot of people coming out of the woodwork saying how much this information is ultimately changing their lives for the better. It’s motivating. The more of you that take those actions and have those successes, it’s a motivator for us to keep going. We enjoy it and invite you guys to share on our journey with us.

If you want to go deeper if you want to truly get an understanding of how to build a powerful business and a powerful family that’s having a powerful impact. I encourage you to go deeper with their resources at RideOrDieLife.com. Check them out on Instagram, @BrandonAndSam. You won’t be disappointed. These guys have a wealth of wisdom. They shared a story with me about somebody that had reached out and who’s done twenty deals in the last few months using their strategies. There’s a lot that they can show you to build wealth, to build a great, powerful family and a powerful business and a whole lot more. Join the conversation, follow the journey, and ideally start taking advantage of some of the tools that they make available to you. You brought up Gary Chapman’s The 5 Love Languages. What are your love languages?

Words of affirmation.

What’s my second one?

Quality time.

It used to be, but now it’s acts of service. Yours is physical touch is number one.

What’s his secondary?

His secondary is acts of service. Is it?

I don’t know. It’s been a year since.

Physical touch is his primary one. That’s definitely the one I have to focus on.

What would you guys say to somebody that’s struggling right now where they’re a crazy entrepreneur working 80 to 100 hours a week? They are giving their family and kids leftovers. What’s something you’d recommend to give themselves some taste or a piece of freedom to start making the shift towards better quality?

Start looking at what you’re going to lose if you don’t make these shifts now because there’s a beautiful life in front of you that you are missing out on. Money buys us things. It does buy us freedom and buys us luxuries. We work hard for the money that we’re making. Finding that time, noticing and appreciating your spouse, which is something Brandon’s done well over the years. It’s showing me his appreciation and that he values me as a wife. It’s kept me around for seventeen years, so he’s doing something right.

Not everything is black and white. Everything shifts. @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

When it comes to marriage and family, the means don’t justify the ends. You can look up the research study that was done, people on their deathbed and the regrets that they have, especially as the kids get older. Babies are just one thing, but as they’re toddlers and becoming little people, it breaks my heart. There’s no amount of money that would let me sacrifice that. I hope that by hearing that, someone who might be going through that, that’s justifying. That’s something that I made the mistake of doing in the early years a lot. I was saying, “No, you don’t understand. Everything that you’re saying you want, that’s why I’m sacrificing everything so that we’ll have that down the road sometime.” That extra push from her made it real. It made me make that shift. Embrace your significant other. Embrace their strengths and their weaknesses.

Speaking of appreciating each other, it sounds like Brandon, you’ve gotten this right for seventeen years. I look at you and I go, “Did you get married when you were twelve?” which is what most people would say. These guys are an amazing, powerful, young couple with a lot of spirits, energy, and doing good things in the world. Sam, what would you say you appreciate or admire most about Brandon?

 

He has this quiet strength to him that for me is sexy. He is very motivated and he always puts me and our family first. That’s an incredible quality to have in a man. I trust him with my life. It means a lot to have that from one person. It doesn’t happen overnight, it takes time to build that trust with somebody. When you have that connection and have that trust, you’re truly unstoppable. That would be my favorite thing about Brandon, is there’s this quiet strength behind him and he’s a super smart guy. When people get to know him, they always back me up on it. I love that about him because even though he makes us take a little bit longer to get to things because I wanted everything done yesterday. I learned a lot about myself in the process and it makes me a better person too.

How are you receiving that, Brandon, by the way? Is that comfortable for you?

It makes him shy because I always say he’s the Jim Rohn 2.0. It makes him shy because he loves Jim Rohn so much. He is a lot like him in a lot of ways besides the divorce part.

I receive it well. It gives me a lot of confidence. I don’t worry about a lot of things that I had friends worry about. I don’t worry about infidelity. I don’t worry about jealousy. I don’t worry about a lot of things that could affect my confidence because it’s crystal clear what we have. As more years go on, it’s almost like we’re in a race that no one could take my spot. All I have to focus on is what we have and growing it. Now we get to focus a lot on the next generation of that. Seeing that in our kids, seeing how that love, strength, growth, sacrifice and everything is quickly passed on to our children. We’re seeing them give it back to us, teach it back to us or show. It’s one thing to see something in your mind. It’s another thing to having the mirror right in front of you and go, “This isn’t just words. This is happening. This is growth. This is awesome.”

When we’re strong, everything else is strong around us. @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

What would you tell Sam that you’re most grateful for in how she has shown up in your world all these years to help support you to be? As I’ve listened to her describe you, I don’t think there’s a higher compliment that could be paid in what she shared. If you’re reading this, I don’t know about you, but it’s inspired me to want to even be a better husband and a better dad. That’s the impact you both are having. What would you say to Sam for what you’re grateful for and how she’s shown up to support you to be this person?

I’m super grateful for how much she has challenged me over the years. How much she’s pushed me to see things in myself that I didn’t see early on. She doesn’t let me get away with much. Let’s say you’re into fitness and you are dedicated to getting that six-pack or losing those twenty pounds or whatever. Do you want a trainer, your teammate right next to you? Do you want them to be someone that goes easy on you, let’s you slack and accepts your excuses? Do you want someone that’s going to be truthful to you, who’s going to tell you this stuff that you don’t want to hear but you know it’s probably true and challenges you to push that little extra so that you grow? It’s growth to freedom. It’s all about growth.

Start looking at what you’re going to lose if you don’t make these shifts now. @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

I know we talk about teamwork a lot, but this life is short. I like to look at it like it is a game. This is a game. The business is the biggest game. It’s not as serious as the life game, the marriage game. This is all a game. There’s never going to be like a, “We can just coast,” because that would be boring. It’s a game and I like the challenge. I like growing. The more we fail, it makes the successes that much sweeter. Try not to take too seriously. I appreciate the push. I appreciate the honesty and that she doesn’t compromise. I didn’t appreciate it in the beginning. I will be honest about that. I tried hard to use all of my sales skills to persuade her to think the way that I think about certain things.

A lot of people may, quietly or vocally, could look at that especially in this role. It may be the man on the other side but for me, it’s my wife. I struggled with this for a period. If I’m not right, if I’m not the one who came up with the idea or I’m not the one who made the decision, there’s an area of emasculation or a guy saying like, “He listens to his wife too much. I know who wears the pants,” and all those stupid clichés. That’s the way that, unfortunately, the society views the man’s role and the woman’s role a lot. I certainly see it a lot. I hear it more behind closed doors with the guys than I would in a public environment. There is something to say about it. She’s a strong woman and it takes a strong man to marry a strong woman and to navigate those waters on a regular basis. If there are any guys out there or if there are women who are like, “He knows what he wants.” Instead of seeing that as a negative, see where they’re strong can complement where you’re weak and vice versa.

The more we fail, the sweeter the success. @BrandonAndSam Click To Tweet

You both are an inspiration, you really are. I appreciate our time together. I hope as you’re reading right now, I hope you’re inspired to know that you can have your cake and you can eat it too as an entrepreneur, as a business owner. You don’t have to give your family leftovers, your spouse leftovers and your partner leftovers. You can have a powerful business, a powerful home life, and have a powerful impact. They are living examples. I’m inspired by you. I want to thank you for the time in sharing your wisdom with our audience.

Thank you. Thanks for having us.

Thank you. I want to give a shout-out to our friend, Vinnie Fisher, on how we actually get a chance to connect and meet. Vinnie, thank you. That’s the beauty of the world we’re in with groups and masterminds and communities. Don’t underestimate that. You’ll never know who you’re going to meet. They can have a major influence on you. I encourage you to take action with what Sam and Brandon have been sharing with you. Focus on becoming a power couple, building a powerful business, follow the steps that they’ve shared, put your whiteboard process in place. Look at how you can deconstruct on a quarterly basis every 90 days. What has to happen in 30 days? Go check out what Brandon and Sam up to directly at RideOrDieLife.com. That’s our show for now. Thanks for being with us. We’ll see you next time.

Thank you so much.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Ride or Die
• The 5 Love Languages
• RideOrDieLife.com
• Instagram – @BrandonAndSam
• Vinnie Fisher
• GrowthToFreedom.com/subscribe
• https://iTunes.apple.com/us/podcast/middleton-methods-podcast/id1185297770
• https://Facebook.com/middletonmethods

About Brandon and Sam Middleton

Brandon and Sam Middleton know how to make a marriage work while growing a business and family. The RIDE OR DIE podcast shares what they’ve learned on their journey with you by letting you be a fly on their wall. Listen in and you’ll get practical life hacks, gain insight, and laugh with them as they give you the tools you need to succeed in business, marriage, and parenting. The busy parents of two have been together for 17 years, married for 8, and here’s what they know for sure: there’s a spark that ignites inside when you follow your passion…and when that happens for you, you’re unstoppable. Their mission is to inspire, motivate, and guide you to ignite that spark within yourself by sharing their stories along with interviewing other power couples. This dynamic duo is on fire and they are going to share how you can have a ride or die attitude.