Simplero and Getting Anything You Want Without Trying Too Hard | Calvin Correli | 295

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October 26, 2020

Calvin Correli is a software engineer, spiritual teacher, and the Founder and CEO of Simplero, an all-in-one marketing software for coaches, course creators, and online marketers. As a self-proclaimed serial entrepreneur, Calvin is also the Founder of several other companies, including Body Meal and Notable Nation. His mission is simple: to help fellow online entrepreneurs and leaders realize their true identities and live a life of purpose and passion.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

What is a LaaS company (and how is it different from a SaaS company)?
How Calvin Correli discovered his true purpose in life and business
Calvin shares the transformative journey that led him to personal and professional happiness
The power of identity and how to stop being a victim to your own thoughts
The vision behind Calvin’s persistence and determination
Calvin’s key advice: say yes to the opportunities that come your way!
Why you should always invest in your personal growth—even when it feels uncomfortable
Calvin talks about his mission to be a special advisor to the President of the United States on conscious nation building

In this episode…

What do you want from your business? Are you simply striving for success or is there something larger driving you forward? It’s important to have an answer to these questions, no matter where you are in your path. For serial entrepreneur Calvin Correli, business is his way of transforming his life and serving others.

Before Calvin started his software company, Simplero, he experienced a transformative journey of personal development and self-reflection. This helped him clarify his true purpose, both in business and in life, and inspired him to build a career that integrated spirituality and entrepreneurship. Now, Calvin describes his business as a LaaS company rather than a SaaS company, providing Love as a Service” and making a deeper impact on its users.

Calvin Correli, the Founder and CEO of Simplero, joins Dan Kuschell in this episode of the Growth to Freedom podcast to talk about his journey toward business enlightenment and personal transformation. Calvin shares the lessons he learned from the lowest points in his career, the power of identity and self-talk, and the importance of always investing in your own personal growth. Stay tuned to discover how to create a more purpose-driven business today!

Resources Mentioned in this episode

Sponsor for this episode

Thanks for listening to this episode of growthtofreedom.com.

Are you struggling to get a steady flow of new clients every day? Or maybe hit a plateau or hit a wall in growing your business? Well, let’s help you solve this problem today. Let’s review your business and have a conversation. You can do that for free today at breakthroughstrategycall.com. That’s breakthroughstrategycall.com.

In addition, if you’re looking for a simple way to implement some of what we’ve been talking about in today’s episode, I want to encourage you to get our free small business toolkit. You can get that at activate.breakthrough3x.com. That’s activate.breakthrough3x.com.

If you’d like access to the special resources and all the show notes for this special episode, make sure to visit growthtofreedom.com.

Episode Transcript

Dan Kuschell 0:02

Welcome to growthtofreedom.com, the show that brings you inspiration, transformation and leadership, we’re helping you connect the dots, see the blind spots and get unstuck. So you go out, create more leads, more sales, more profits, more importantly, so you can have a bigger impact, have a bigger reach and make a bigger contribution. Is that what you want? If that’s not what you want, then go I don’t know, go check out something else. But if it is what you want, you are going to love today’s guest expert. He is someone who emanates the idea of getting anything you want. He’s someone who simplifies the idea of leadership. His name is Calvin Corelli. He’s the founder of a company called Simplero, an integrated software platform for coaches, authors, speakers, and info marketers, maybe like you, right, where you can take your entire business, and get it online in a really easy, simple way. It’s not just a SaaS company that he runs, he loves to call it a LaaS company, LaaS. Now, you want to know what that stands for, you’re going to want to have to, you’re going to have to stick around to learn why he adopted this mindset. From the beginning. His mission is to help you help people like us realize their true identity and live a life of purpose and passion. He’s got a lot of years of experience, and we’re going to talk about his journey of over 17 years in business. As we go today, grab a pen, grab a piece of paper, you’re going to want to jot down some notes if you have ever wanted to learn from someone who’s built a software platform of sass company, entrepreneur, one of the most connected people around, I think you’re going to love what Calvin has to share with you get this though, his most important mission and purpose involves becoming a special adviser to the President of the United States unconscious nation building. So he’s someone who lives and leads by example. That’s certainly going to be evident to you as we go along. Calvin, welcome to the show. How are you?

Calvin Correli 1:57

Thank you so much, Dan. It’s great to be here. I’m phenomenal. How are you doing?

Dan Kuschell 2:01

Ah, yeah, the same. I’ve been looking forward to this interview for some time, and I want to dive right into it. So you know, you have a company called Simpleros. Software as a Service, but you call it a LaaS, what is a LaaS company? And why should we care.

Calvin Correli 2:18

It’s a love as a service, love as a service. So. So you know, I create products that I want to have a deeper impact on people. I’ve actually saw this quote from Steve Jobs some years ago, and it just resonated deeply with me. And I realized that’s what I’ve always done it, it just didn’t realize that he was thinking that way too. He said, certain products can have the spirit of enlightenment about them, that just kind of has this subtle impact you like on you, it transforms you a little bit as you use them. And you might not even notice it. But it just, you know, makes you a little bit happier, a little bit lighter, a little bit like you opens up some possibilities. You’re like, Oh, I didn’t realize you could do it that way. So that’s really what I love to do with my products and services, put some love in into them at the heart.

Dan Kuschell 3:07

And you know, I got a chat, I’ve gotten a chance to work with you, your team over the last few months. So I’m a little bit biased, and I’ve had a chance to look under the hood a little deeper than most, and see the feedback that your clients give you. And it’s evident this idea of LaaS, really, you know, it’s not just a tactic, like it’s a way of culture for for you and your team. You know, overall, and you know, bringing that passion bringing that enlightenment. I’m curious, right? Because we’ve talked about your journey, right? You’re very transparent about like your past and where you’ve been, just to give people context. So they don’t there’s this thing that everything you’ve ever done has been like this Midas touch of success. You know, you’re healthy guy, fit guy, great family, all these different things. Give us some context, like what’s been your biggest failure? You know, or possibly your biggest mistake that you can, you’ll look back on that was like one of your low points. And then what you learn from it that ideally our viewers and our listeners would get some impact from as well.

Calvin Correli 4:07

Yeah, I think so. So when I started out, I when I created my first business, I think in 2002, like that’s not not even like I secured my first business when I was 10. But like as an as an adult person, I create my first business in 2002 and got off to a great start. But a year or so in, I was at this place where I didn’t know where I wanted to go, I just so desperate to be successful. I was like, ah, tell me how I can be successful. I brought some friends and some really smart people and did this advisory board meeting and then after, you know, we were all done. We’re drinking some beer and then one of them looked me in the eye and was like, do we’ve been here for three hours. I still don’t know what you want. And it was like so puzzling to me because I was like what do you mean what I just want to be successful? Just tell me why be successful. But there’s this part of me that was Like, I kind of know what he not means like, and I didn’t realize at that point that you were allowed to want something in business, I thought you were supposed to be like, just like cold and like unemotional and detached and just like all analytical, insistent, you know, or systematic or left brain kind of thing in business. And so it actually got started a little bit, a little bit of a breakdown for me, because I was like, I don’t know what I want, I have no idea what I want. And I realized, I can’t really feel myself. And so it led to this whole journey of therapy and coaching and personal development and eventually becoming a coach before. I had a moment, five years later, where, again, another big crisis moment, you know, been trying to start several companies that were all based on some like clever idea, but there’s no heart in it. For me, it was just, you know, again, a way to be successful. And finally, here in 2008, I sat down, everything is falling apart around me, it’s like, we just bought a house that we really, really couldn’t afford, and just had a kid that wouldn’t baby that wouldn’t sleep. And you knew the house wasn’t done. And it was the winter and the boiler ran out of heater oil. And I’d never had a healer heater that needed oil before as I didn’t know what to do. And it’s like, terrible. And in the midst of all of this, I just sat down was like, Okay, I think the universe is trying to tell me, now’s the time for me to find out what I want. And as I sat down, ask myself a bunch of questions. And what came at me was, I’m here to integrate spirituality and entrepreneurship. So that was, that was in 2008. And that’s been the organizing principle for everything that I’ve done ever since. And it came out of that, like, low point, right? comm feeling like a complete failure, not, you know, years of not being able to feel myself, like the financial disaster at that time. And I was just okay, if, you know, if we’re going down that hole, let’s just go all the way down and dig up the gold, right? Yep. And so glad I did.

I'm here to integrate spirituality and entrepreneurship. - Calvin Correli Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 7:17

Yeah. And I also want to tie in on this because, again, I’ve got a little bit more under the hood of your world than most. And not only did it show up in business, but you you’ve often described it even in personal right, your health habits, you know, speak a little bit of that to, you know, to give people context overweight health habits, etc. And the transformation like when you when you made this decision in 2008, like, Where were you personally in business? And then like, what, like, describe a little bit of what’s happened for you as a result?

Calvin Correli 7:53

Yeah, so I was I was, uh, always, you know, chubby. People would tease me with that. They called me potato. I was like, my, my nickname. I hated that. And like, just a week week, do you know the term soy boy?

Dan Kuschell 8:11

Oh, yeah.

Calvin Correli 8:12

That was me. I was a soy boy. That was me. So, like, just very soft. Such a nice guy that like, didn’t have any anger. No, no, no, not me. Right? Like it was all buried deep inside. And it was a it was a journey. So actually, that awakening of integrating entrepreneurship and spirituality actually led me either even further down that path. So I did a lot of like journaling and visualizing, and like meditating and feeling and all these things. It wasn’t actually until almost 10 years later, that a mentor of mine challenged me to to commit to working out. It was like, what happened was, was I had been we’ve been, I’ve been making some drawings of what I’d like my body to look like. And I made a schedule for my week. And then he looked at me and I had like, plans to do yoga, five or six days a week or something is like, dude, if you want the body that you say you want, then that’s like, this is not going to cut it. I’m like, What do I need to do? He’s like, you got to work out at least eight hours a week. I’m like, Are you kidding me? I get that time. I know, I’d worked with personal trainers, and we would meet like two or three times a week. And like, if I went to the gym two or three times, I felt pretty good about myself. And so it’s just so beyond anything I’d imagine. But I was like, you know, it took me like 10, 15 minutes and I was like, Okay, if that is what you say, I’m just gonna do that. And so from that point on, I started, I made that commitment to myself eight hours a week, I track it in the spreadsheet by the minute. If I get gotten behind by 10 minutes or an hour or whatever, I’d have to catch it up the next week. Right so no wiggle room. No, like I was traveling. I was sick, none of that stuff like eight hours by the minute and I did I ended up doing it for a year and a half. Now I do like 10, 11 hours a week of exercise. But for a year and a half, I was tracking in that spreadsheet. And it changed my life. And like a month, two months, I was a completely different person, when it comes to, to my body, I just started feeling differently, wanting to eat different foods. And it just like that fear that I had of where I’m going to find the time for this completely transform, right, like now I’m like, I wouldn’t have time and I wouldn’t have the capacity to do everything I’m doing. I’ve, I have four companies right now, right? The that I’m managing leading building 35 people, I wouldn’t have time to do that, if it wasn’t for my commitment there. And so that that’s just one piece of it, I get No, I didn’t have that relationship at all with my body. Also just my relationships, you know, I I’m, you know, I ended up divorcing the mother of my kids, which is not something that you ever want to do, right. And my kids actually live in Denmark with their mom while I live in New York City, which is also not a setup that any father wants. But that was how that worked out. And part of it was just, you know, I grew up in a pretty dysfunctional family. And I was very committed to not recreating that, but creating a better family for my kids. And I ended up recreating all of the same dysfunctions and all of them, despite going into it with my eyes open. So that was a journey, I think actually being sort of thousands of miles removed from my family of origin was kind of helpful in going through that because there’s not that like constant pole of getting you back into some of those old roles. Yep. But I’d say that that’s, I mean, just overcoming that family dysfunction that I grew up in and actually being able to help create healthy relationships. I mean, that’s a life accomplishment, right there. I’m, I don’t most people don’t do that. Right. So yes. And

Dan Kuschell 11:55

as you’re listening, or you’re watching right now, like, what are you struggling with? What are you worried about? related to your health? Right, your fitness, your weight, right? Or, like, what are some potential family historical past issues, childhood issues that might just be holding you back more than you think? Right? And what if you can actually have a playbook to transform your life to lead to live to love to do things that matter, right to look at your life as a last love as a service, right, legally, by the way, by the way, and, and the bottom line is, it can happen. And when we come back, we’re going to take a deeper dive with Calvin and he’s gonna reveal some of the strategies that have helped transform not only his life, but literally thousands of his clients. People just like you that might be dealing with some of these things, things or maybe you’re looking looking and maybe everything’s great. Maybe you’re looking to get to that next level to when we come back. We’re going to talk more with Calvin Correli on how to go deeper with simple leadership the simpler way, and how you can apply the last model in your business to We’ll be right back more on growthtofreedom.com, right after this. Thanks for listening to this episode of growthtofreedom.com. Are you struggling to get a steady flow of new clients every day? Or maybe hit a plateau or hit a wall and growing your business? Well, let’s help you solve this problem today. Let’s review your business and have a conversation you can do that for free today at breakthroughstrategycall.com, that’s breakthroughstrategycall.com. In addition, if you’re looking for a simple way to implement some of what we’ve been talking about in today’s episode, I want to encourage you to get our free small business toolkit, you can get that at activate.breakthrough3x.com, that’s activate.breakthrough3x.com. If you’d like access to the special resources and all the show notes for this special episode, make sure to visit growthtofreedom.com. Welcome back to growthtofreedom.com now by the way, if you’re jotting down some notes, if you want to come back to this episode, but you can do that at growthtofreedom.com/295, that’s growthtofreedom.com/295. If you never want to miss an episode, you can go to growthtofreedom.com/subscribe, that’s growthtofreedom.com/subscribe. Now, you know Calvin is you’ve had this, you know transformation, this evolution, if you will. And now you’ve you know, you’ve been able to inspire and impact thousands of clients, you’ve got a team of 35 between your four different companies. I mean, it’s amazing like to think like, where you were to where you’ve come from? What are a couple of the strategies that our viewers our listeners could use or apply today to be better leaders, you know, living their life from this perspective. Have them as a LaaS, if you will.

Calvin Correli 15:03

Mm hmm. Um, well, I think the main thing that I’ve always been willing to do that most people aren’t is just the willingness to do the work. And by that, I mean, the inner work and the outer work, right, I find that there’s there are people that are willing to take a lot of action out there. And but they’re not really willing to go inside and feel those things that hold them back. And I find another other people that are very willing to feel all kinds of things, but usually not really go really deep, they just kind of feel the same things over and over again, but that aren’t willing to take the action. And you really need, you really need both of those. Because, to me, it’s all about becoming a different person. Like, at the end of my life, I hope to meet myself, you know, the person that I could have become in the mirror, and I hope that that person is the person actually did become right, that, that I get to become the person that I’m here to become. So that I can be of service to other people. That’s That, to me, is the goal. You know, I don’t do business to make money. I do business because the business is my way of transforming and becoming and serving other people.

I don't do business to make money. I do business because business is my way of transforming and becoming and serving other people. - Calvin Correl Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 16:18

Yeah, it’s the greatest personal growth platform, I believe in the world outside of sports, right? sports? Yeah. So the two of eight most amazing platforms. Yeah, I’ve heard you say that identity has played a pretty critical role, not only for you, but others you’ve worked with talk about identity, the importance of that,

Calvin Correli 16:36

yeah, there’s a there’s a, when it comes to identity, there’s, you know, how we see ourselves is really, really critical. And we tend to, we tend to attach identity to all kinds of things, right. Like, I’m, I used to think that I was a failure and a loser. And whenever that thought, when came into my head, like, oh, you’re such a failure, I thought that the fact that it was in my head meant that it must be true. And then I identified with it, you know, it took me a while to realize, Oh, it’s just a thought that’s in my head, just because it’s in there doesn’t mean that there’s any truth or any value to it whatsoever. But I’d be such a victim of my own thoughts in that way. And really, like, I’ve, I’ve gotten to, I like to think of it as like, every day I get wake up, I get to choose who I want to be today. And there’s there’s been a couple times in my life where I’ve been, you know, kind of unconsciously using that. There was a time I changed schools between the first and second year in high school. And I was pretty much in the loser category in my first High School, right? It’s just, you know, again, the roles that I’d grown up playing always I was always that like, oddball that nobody wanted to play with and hang out with. And so in the new school, I was very deliberate. I didn’t want that role. I want it to be a clean slate come in, hang with the cool kids, right. And I did, I did. One of the things I did was like, I got to another school where everybody had like, at my old school, it was like, girls and boys that nothing to do with each other pretty much. And then in the new school, everybody had already had sex and like really, like just a completely different culture there. So I felt so so so much of an outsider that actually invented a girlfriend, a fake girlfriend, this like girl from my old high school that had been been, you know, hot on but she would didn’t want me. I just pretended like we were girlfriends. It’s like, yeah, I miss my girlfriend, I got some sympathy on that. So I’m gonna recommend that eventually, I came clean with people but, but it was just like this opportunity to reinvent myself, which is really powerful. I mentioned before, like moving to America, you know, again, an opportunity to reinvent myself, which I’ve done twice. I have also changed my name. So I don’t know if you know this damn, yes, but my my, my given name that my parents gave me was last Algar pin, which is obviously completely different. And so that was actually my, my, my wife Nomi. She had changed her name when we met. And I was really fascinated with that, because I never liked the name that my parents gave me. It always felt odd to me. And so she had worked with numerologist. And so I was like, Okay, that sounds fun. Well, it was that and so I consulted with one and he gave me this like, numbers and stuff and explained to me, he walked me through, like, according to the numbers, this is what your life is like, currently. And I was like, Yes, that sounds exactly like my life. And it’s absolute crap. And like, here’s what I suggest instead. And here’s what your life would be like with with no those numbers. And then you work backwards from the numbers to get he gave me a list of names that I could choose from the moment he gave me that list of names. I was like, wait, so I have to actually change my name. It was like, I haven’t registered for me. But what one of the names on the list, there was Calvin. And I just really liked it because for so many years, I was really struggling. And I was like, kept questioning like, do I have what it takes? Like? Like, is it even worth it for me to keep going? I don’t so in Denmark, we biked bicycle a lot. And for me, the metaphor is a cycling towards a stoplight, right? Do I push hard? hoping that I’ll make it before it turns red? Or do I just go like, I’m not gonna make it anyway. So I’m just gonna coast right? It’s kind of that decision. So I was like, do I keep pushing? What if I don’t have what it takes? Or do I just kind of resign and give up? And my parents at one point were like, why don’t you take a job with Microsoft, just for like, three years to support your family? And I was like, do you guys even have any idea what? Something like the last place in the world that I want to work for? I think such a good brand does alignment, you know, but no, they didn’t know who I was. And they’re just, you know, they’re just worried about means good parents are right. But the one thing that really kept me going for so many years was this quote that I have printed here because it’s so meaningful to me from Calvin Coolidge. Calvin Coolidge was the 30th President of the United States, and the quote goes like this, “Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not. Nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Geniuses will not. Unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not The world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.” And I’d read that quote over and over again. And it kept me going, I was like, if that guy could make it to be the president of the United States, then maybe there’s something to it. And I just was like, I’m just gonna keep going, I’m gonna, I’m gonna like, I don’t know if I’ve talent or genius, or any of those things. I figured I had something going for me, but I did not. I had no idea that have what it took. But I figured, at least I can add resistance that I have control over. So yeah. And it really worked out. really well.

Dan Kuschell 22:24

If you’re listening or watching right now, like, what are you taking from this? Right? If you ever found yourself in a place where you’re asking yourself, you know, am I good enough? Do I have what it takes? Right? Why should I just keep running this hard? I feel like I’m running up against the wall. Or maybe I should just settle back and just take it easy, because what’s the point? Right? If you’ve ever found yourself at that place, I hope you’re inspired by what Calvin is sharing with you. And how just by making an identity shift, or the possibility of an identity shift that you can choose today, this moment, in this moment, be inspired by him to choose what role you want to play, right now? How would it shift the game for you? If you could simply make that shift? Right? What would happen for you? How much more freedom peace of mind? How much more freedom would you have in your life to move away from the things you don’t want and move towards the things you do? If you got clarity on what you want? Right? Think about that. Now, Calvin, you know, I can’t help but wonder, you know, like when you were in this moment of like questioning yourself and then doubt and so on. Can you remember back at that time? And like what was the trigger? I’m curious, like, what was the trigger that actually did kind of keep you moving forward to now I mean, like you’re impacting thousands of people, clients, you’ve got 30 some people working for you in these four different companies. Like because you had that critical moment where you could have just as easily tilted off in my opinion. Yeah, we see this I’m sure we both have known a lot of people and met a lot of people that they chose that path too. So for you What was it that tipped you over to go? What if it does work? What if I could What if I What if I couldn’t be more success? Like what was it for you?

Calvin Correli 24:16

It was a vision It was a vision and a feeling feeling of you know what it could be like what I wanted it to be like right that picture of of good health, good relationship successful business that vision really drove me forward. I mean, I was so I was so out of it that I would look at a balcony and think that looks really delicious. Like something I would jump out of like I was, I wasn’t where I would really do it. But damn, the thought was in my head right a lot. I was not in a good place I felt I had this notion in my head that you have to be like a billionaire by the age of 30. 30 are you might as well just go kill yourself. Hmm. Like that was, I shouldn’t be breathing the air that other more worthy people should be breathing, I shouldn’t be taking up the space. Um, that’s how low my self worth was. And it was, but I had this I had this vision, I have this, something inside of me that that that could feel that it could be differently and I was like, I’m just yeah, I’m gonna, I’m gonna keep trying, there’s, I think there’s a dissatisfaction right, a lack, I wasn’t gonna settle. I think that it’s something that I see a lot with people that they get to a certain level. And then they’re like, yeah, it’s good enough. And then they, they settle and let go, you know, there, I see it even with like, big name, you know, spiritual teachers and other people where you’re like, you’ve overcome a lot and struggle a lot. And then they’re like, okay, here, this is it. I’m done. Right? Right. I don’t maybe I’ll get to that point at one day where I’m like, yeah, this is fine. Like I’ve I’ve, you know, you know, sorted out enough areas of my life. But I’m also I kind of think I like to believe that like, at age 80, I’d be like, how does this thing work? And then, like, a new area, right? I thought, who knows? You know, but that’s kind of how I go. Yeah. Like, you know, even like, a few years ago, I started singing, right, I played piano and jazz piano, but I never really sung before. And then I got into singing and songwriting and music production. And now the whole thing, right, like, so only so many things to explore and learn. It’s super fun. I, I love life. I love the world. And so it’s it’s

Dan Kuschell 26:42

obvious, it’s apparent that you do and you know, what’s neat is you’ve got business, you’ve created a business as a vehicle to help give you the ability to basically be in this, I’ll call it a Play Doh Fun Factory of life to explore, to be curious to learn to grow. Right? And as you’re listening or watching right now, like, what if it could work for you? What if the only main thing was to stay persistent to the idea of growth of being better today than you were yesterday to be better tomorrow than you were today? You not compare yourself to others? Right? And the error that others are breathing that might be doing better than you at this moment, but to you yesterday, like what would that be worth? And how would that start to shift your identity, your self worth and a whole lot more? So Calvin, I’m curious, you know, you not only work really hard on yourself, this inner game of you, right? It’s also shown up in your outer world, you’re, you now coach others on how to get breakthroughs, how to get amazing transformations, how to get results, not only personally but also professionally in their business. Like, what what advice would you give to someone maybe that in the mirror, maybe have a lot of similarities to you? Right? What advice would you give what would be a couple action steps you would guide you, you know, 10, 15 years ago, hey, here are a couple steps that you can take to completely transform you immediately what those be.

Calvin Correli 28:09

The main thing is you have to know what you want. That’s, that’s something most people are just not very clear. They’re much better at what they don’t want. Yeah, get that step of getting clarity around what you actually want, and getting to getting all of you on board because it’s easy to want some things but then, you know, there are other things that come with the territory, right? If you’re going to be very visible or famous, well, then like that has its own crisis. Right? Are you are you okay? with that? Or you know, responsibility? Right? I have 35 people that that’s a lot of mouths to feed, right? And they have families too, right? So that’s a lot of responsibility. Are you okay with that, it’s also just, you know, a lot to manage. And, and so, but really getting clear on what you want. And a key thing for me throughout this has also been that willingness to invest in myself, whether that’s the time that I put into it, or books that I buy or read or courses, I did the math on. Last year, I spent I invested over $300,000 in my own personal growth $300,000 legit over the course of one year, that like really getting in the habit of saying yes to those invitations, those growth choices, you know, whatever they are conferences, coaching programs, books, mentor mentorships it’s that are been game changing for me, right? Like I would tech, and I’ve always been pretty good about this. But then I’d be like, ah, not right now. And I can’t quite afford it and and like holding that link and then like betting I felt drawn, but then let that voice get the better of me right? Yeah, it’s the responsible thing to say no to this thing. Right, right. I’m, like, responsible How? There’s some, there’s some big things there that I regret where I just knew that I should have said yes to that opportunity. And I didn’t. And I, you know, I regret that it’s life, right. But Yep, you miss you learn from it. But I feel like the universe, the life is always showing us the opportunity. And it can be big or small, or whatever it is, but there is always presenting us with that option. And saying, Yes, just saying yes, every time it does that.

Dan Kuschell 30:39

So as you’re watching or listening right now, like, what if you said yes. To the opportunities that came your way, a good friend of mine, Joe Polish says, you know, life gives to the givers and takes from the takers. What if, really, your future success just depended on you, giving to you, meaning giving you the ability to grow, right? If you invest in you, the universe will invest back in you. And it’s amazing that when you meet a lot of the most successful people, you’ll hear this over and over and over again, yet, Kelvin, you and I both see it, and I’ve talked about it, and people go, Well, I’ll invest in me when I can afford it. And yet, you talked to the most successful people and they did it just it was a habit. Just like investing money is a habit. When you don’t have a lot of it, you start small and you start building up this muscle, so to speak, of investing in yourself, what would you say? That might be going up against that mindset right now questioning? Well, okay, well, I can buy into that. But I’ll do it when I have it. Right? where you are.

Calvin Correli 31:44

I think we’re always presented with opportunities and invitations, I like to think of them as invitations to those that are just just beyond our level, right? Because the whole point is expanding our capacity. I think our success or a feeling of love and and well being and and, you know, joy, all the positive feelings of abundance and prosperity, all those things are just a reflection of how much we’re able to contain really, like how happy are we willing to allow ourselves to be I used to have this rule that like unconsciously that sort of like antibodies against happiness that I could sit and be really happy. And then someone was like, Oh, you’re really happy today. And then instantly, I’d go on happy. Like, because I had like, my conscious mind couldn’t have the happiness like no, you’re not allowed to be happy. There’s like, I had, like, ingrained in me that it was it was too happy as a kid my dad would get really upset with me, right? You get angry. And so I was like, Oh, it’s just sitting in my body to not be too happy. And almost I didn’t notice which is okay, right. So, I think is that that like, you know, the stretching is in just like putting down that kind of on last day I put down to 45,000 for for a week on on Necker Island with our common friend Yanik, Yanik Silver, and that was a lot of money right? That was a lot of money for me. But it’s, it’s, you know, part of just saying, Yes, I am the kind of person that is worth putting down $45,000 to go to Necker for a week and have that experience and give myself that experience. And it was a game changing experience for me and not for any of the reasons that you might think it wasn’t because I met Richard Branson or any of that stuff, right? It was all the little things that happen in between such as for example being stuck on an island with like 35 strangers feeling like really uncomfortable and like do I belong here and like all kinds of like, you know, elementary school likes emotional stuff came up for me because like you know, when is the last time that that most of us have been stuck on a desert on an island with 35 strangers right it’s not something that we do on a regular basis so it and sharing a room with someone to write so definitely brought up a lot of emotion and that I grew a lot from that like that really sparked a whole new version of me that was more comfortable with with other people. That wasn’t in Yanik’s sales pitch for him for the trip to Mecca, right. But that’s how like, we try we try to think that we have to figure out how this investment in ourselves how does invitation that we say yes to how it’s going to pay off, but we can’t know because the universe gets his own got his own plan, right? Like, like, at this point for me even trying to figure it out is not is beside the point. It’s just do I feel called to it if I do call to it, boom, do it. We’re doing it and i know i that somehow it’s gonna it’s gonna turn out like it was super valuable. But I don’t know how yet.

How happy are we willing to allow ourselves to be? - Calvin Correli Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 34:58

And speaking of not knowing How can you do coaching for small business owners, coaches, authors, speakers, right? info information publishers, where you can help them get clarity on, you know, what do they want help them, you know, really tune in on their business, to have the outer game of their business reflect them as the inner game culture and in leadership and a whole lot more if people want to go deeper with you, Calvin, where can they connect with you? Where can they learn more about what you’re up to? And also the ability potentially, if it’s a right fit? To have you coach them, you know, in that type of scenario?

Calvin Correli 35:35

Yeah, go to my website, which is Calvincorelli.com. And if you look at the bottom of that, of that page, actually, you can, well go to calvincorreli.com/freedom. And then we’ll have a, there’s a short ebook that I wrote is called, How to Get Anything You Want Without Trying Too Hard. And it’s really about like, I see a lot of people that are, they want this thing, but because they don’t have real clarity about what they want. And because they don’t include this identity, peace and this inner peace, they end up trying really hard, but not actually getting there. And so that’s what this short, short PDF is designed to just help sort all that stuff out for you very, very easily.

Dan Kuschell 36:27

So I want to encourage you, if you’re looking for a way to have your inner game, match your outer game, right and not to be in a place and because maybe you’re already successful, maybe you’re in a place of successful but maybe you feel like something’s missing. Maybe you feel like, Is there more, or maybe you feel a little empty, right unfulfilled at some degree, right? Or your business is struggling and you’re looking to match up. You know, he brought up an interesting framework, Calvin brought up an idea of inner peace. Well, the inner peace and the outer peace, when you get it right creates an inner peace, that creates an outer peace. Right? And we’ll have this in the show notes. So you get the idea of the difference between the pieces, all four pieces I just described. But if you want to get you know, go deeper with Calvin learn more about his leadership style, how he can help you, you know, whether it’s one on one, take the first step by going and get, get this book, How to Get Anything You Want without trying too hard, right? Go to calvincorreli.com/freedom, get the book. And then if you want to go deeper, and you want to learn how Calvin might be able to work with you one on one, right? Obviously, it’s got to be a right fit, all those sorts of things. You can reach out to his team after going through the book to be able to identify that go to calvincorreli.com/freedom. That’s calvincorreli.com/freedom. No, you know, as we wind this down, Calvin, you know, I like to get into some of the personal side of things. Can you remember being a kid, you know, I didn’t know 810 1214 years old, when you recognize that maybe you were a little bit different. And that it was part of the trigger that kind of led you if you can, like, lean back on it, of like, what stimulated you to get into entrepreneurship, or at least the idea of running your own thing? Or do it being your own boss, that sort of thing? Can you remember back to what that was?

Calvin Correli 38:30

Yeah, well, for me, it was both my parents were entrepreneurs, right. So I was kind of in that world. So in that sense, it was naturally for me, my, my mom started a software company in 1980. And grew that to 50 people in Denmark. And, and even before that, we had computers in our house. So this is before the PC was invented. We have like an Osborn one, spectrum z, x and other like other computers like that. And I would always be, I would always be making stuff on it. And one of the programs I made on the Osborn is like this, like it has like little tiny green display in the middle, and then two floppy drives. And it was like a suitcase portable thing. And then write a program that would put a prompt on the screen saying, Tell me what program I should write because I’m out of ideas, and I want to program something. So that was one of the things that I made. So for me, it’s very much about making stuff, I want to make stuff. And if it doesn’t exist, I want to make it and I’m looking at something and I’m like, this is terrible, I can do it better. That’s that’s always been, you know, creating things that I wish would exist in my world has always been my driver,

Creating things that I wish would exist in my world has always been my driver. - Calvin Correli Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 39:46

who’s been your biggest inspiration that you can look back on. Start as a kid, biggest inspiration as a kid

Calvin Correli 39:54

when it comes to entrepreneurship or in general in general in general Well, it might be as a kid, um, wow. That’s good, like the earlier than the two that come to mind are Steve Jobs and Richard Branson. So getting to meet Richard was obviously special in that way. Never got to meet Steve, unfortunately. Yeah. I remember actually, as a kid, it was fun. So when I was 10, or 11, my dad took me and my brother to New York City from Copenhagen from Denmark. And they remember him telling me all about this, this New York real estate mogul named something Donald Donald Trump or something. And he took us to Trump Tower. And I remember that like gold facade where it says Trump and all that stuff. So that was fun. Like, you know, years later, guys president. Yeah, I wasn’t say he was he was not an idol. For me. At that point, I didn’t really know about level.

Dan Kuschell 41:02

Now you have a mission to, you know, be a Special Advisor to the President of the United States, right to, you know, create a conscious nation building model. Speak to this a little bit. Tell us about it.

Calvin Correli 41:16

Yeah, so the whole thing started in 2013. On my birthday, we were living in India, my wife and I, we because we couldn’t get a visa to the US. And she was like, let’s go to India do Ashtanga. I’m like, sure what the hell is that? So we went there to yoga for a year. And one of my birthdays, she asked me these questions. And what came out of my mouth was that sentence, like, I want to be a special adviser to the President on kind of the United States on conscious nation building. And then I was like, what does that mean? I never thought before. And then I had tears in my eyes for 30 minutes, I was like, an all over this idea. And it kind of grew in me. And so I started exploring it. And since I was a kid, this is weird. But since I was a kid, I’ve been thinking about if I had my own country to create, if I got to create my own country from scratch, how would I do it? What would the laws be? What would the institutions be? Like? What would governance be like all these things? Like? I’m a systems thinker, a design thinker, right? And so what it has what it is, is that kind of clean slate thinking like, hey, how would we really like this thing to be? If it wasn’t, we didn’t have to all the institutions that we have now and the things the way things are? What do we want this to be like? What goals do we have? What values do we have? What outcomes do we want to create? And how do we create the perfect system for that? And then how can we work for its from where we are today, to create that? So that’s how I would do it as a software engineer, if I came into like a late, you know, a messy software product, right? And try to fix it. I’m very forget that for a minute, what do we want it to be? Right? What do we want it to be? And then, and then figure out how to get there. So what it is, is kind of taking that engineering thinking and then entrepreneurial thinking, which is about how do we make stuff happen with limited resources, that’s what we entrepreneurs do. And then also the spiritual thinking, what do we know to be the deepest truth about human beings and how we function. And we’ve talked a lot here about the universe and how that functions, right? If we don’t design our society, or with with a correct understanding there in mind, it’s not going to be very good. And so it’s kind of my long term project. And what I what I found after, so I’ve been sort of hanging out both on the left side of the spectrum and the right side of spectrum, I’ve lived in Denmark and India, and now America. So I’ve seen a lot of different things. And what I’ve come to realize is that most normal people, like 98% of people, whether they, you know, are more left or more, right, we want the same things. We want people to be healthy, happy, prosperous, productive, you know, safe, we want the economy to be good. We want the planet earth to be healthy and thriving. Right, left to right, we all want the same things. We just disagree on how to get there. And part of the reason is, we focus on what we don’t want, and we focus on the other, right, they don’t want it right. Like you and I both know, like, how do you get somewhere whether you need to focus on what you want, and then figure out how to get there, right? Big mistake that we make. But it’s also cuz honestly, as people, we’re, we’ve gotten to be very immature, like, despite all the therapy and all the self development, all that stuff. As a society, they’re very broadly. We’re very immature like, you know, instant gratification and like emotional trauma and all these things. So it’s kind of like a long term project of we need to raise and elevate the majority of the population. And that’s where I think like online marketing, right, you know, you and I Both know, big name online marketers and big name like coaches and stuff. So building a coalition of those people to help bring that, that, you know, wareness that can raise the maturity level mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually to the masses. And then once were a little more evolved a little more conscious in that way. Turns out that all of these problems that I mentioned, they’re actually pretty easy to fix. I thought it was very hard, but it’s not like climate change, not hard. No, poverty, not hard, or actually prosperity, if you want, like safety, not that complicated. Honestly, all of these things are actually pretty, pretty easy to solve. We just right now can’t even have a conversation about it.

Dan Kuschell 45:44

And as you’re listening right now, or watching right now, like what would have to happen for you to be operating from a place of peace, of prosperity, of freedom, right? And, you know, what, when we lift awareness, what happens, you know, determines the difference between right and wrong. poverty and wealth, sickness and health. It determines the difference between, like something that’s right, and something that is in it determines so many things, that when we focus on awareness, right, we can get unity from fragmentation, we can get unified instead of being disjointed, right? Or dysfunctional, healthy instead of dysfunctional if that’s what you want. That I want to encourage you. If something here that Calvin has shared with you, resonates with you connects with you. Number one, take the first step and go check out his book you won’t be sorry, you will love what he has to share with you about how to get anything you want without trying or it being so damn hard. So you can go get that right now by going to calvincorreli.com/freedom. That’s calvincorreli.com/freedom. If you want to go deeper, something here where you go, you know, like when’s the last time I met somebody who wanted to become a special advisor for conscious nation building, building companies from this last love as a service perspective, this idea of the four pieces inner peace, outer peace creates inner peace and outer peace, right? Chances are, you’ve never met someone like this. And if that resonates with you a little bit, you may just want to look at working with Calvin in a one on one basis and have him help you transform your inner game to reflect your outer game so you can go out and make a bigger impact. Have a bigger reach, make a bigger difference. If that’s what you want, then go check out what he has for you at calvincorreli.com/freedom, that’s calvincorreli.com/freedom, you know, as we wrap this up, Calvin, I guess what would you hope would be 1 to 3 action steps our viewers or listeners would take from our time today.

Calvin Correli 47:51

Number one, choose to say yes, and invest in yourself, especially when it feels uncomfortable, especially when it feels uncomfortable. Number two, be willing to go to those tender places within yourself where it’s a little bit uncomfortable and hard and painful and you kind of don’t want but that’s where the gold is that willingness that’s the key differentiator and then go take the action go do the things that you know that you have to do build the discipline and the consistency in executing this on the things that you know that you have to do.

Choose to say yes and invest in yourself, especially when it feels uncomfortable. - Calvin Correli Click To Tweet

Dan Kuschell 48:33

And if they’re sitting here right now going man, I would love to choose to say yes more. I would love to get real, to be able to work on my inner game to focus on the outer game and you know, have a safe place where you can go to those tender places, but do it in a strong way where your your your self worth your self esteem are safe. Right? If you want help implementing some of this some of any of what Calvin has shared today then again, I encourage you go check out what he’s put together for you at calvincorreli.com/freedom, that’s calvincorreli.com/freedom also look into the opportunity to work with him where it makes sense on a one on one basis. Calvin it’s been amazing to have you here with us today what’s what’s a parting parting shot in this last 30 seconds or so

Calvin Correli 49:23

persistence keep at it keep going you can do this if I can do it you can do it too. You have what it takes to believe in yourself keep going.

Dan Kuschell 49:33

There you have it take action with what Calvin has shared with you apply I’ve got four and a half pages of notes and oh by the way if you want to come back to this episode you can do that at growthtofreedom.com/295, that’s growthtofreedom.com/295 if you never want to miss an episode go to growthtofreedom.com/subscribe, that’s growthtofreedom.com/subscribe, take action. Take action with what Calvin has shared with you today. Right? So much wisdom here. To apply if you want to go deeper, check out what he’s put together at Calvincorreli.com/freedom. Seize the day. Make it a great week. And we’ll see you next time on growthtofreedom.com. Thanks for being with us. Thanks for listening to this episode of growthtofreedom.com. Are you struggling to get a steady flow of new clients every day, or maybe hit a plateau or hit a wall and growing your business? Let’s help you solve this problem today. Let’s review your business and have a conversation. You do that for free today at breakthroughstrategycall.com, that’s breakthroughstrategycall.com. In addition, if you’re looking for a simple way to implement some of what we’ve been talking about in today’s episode, I want to encourage you to get our free small business toolkit. You can get that at activate.breakthrough3x.com, that’s activate.breakthrough3x.com. If you’d like access to the special resources and all the show notes for this special episode, make sure to visit growthtofreedom.com.