From Military Service to Civilian Success: Dr. Steven Crane's Journey to Empower Veterans

Josh St. Laurent: Welcome to the Wealth in Yourself Podcast, a show dedicated to helping you master the complex subject of money by simplifying it through stories and actionable advice. I'm Josh St. Laurent and this is Wealth in Yourself. Welcome to the Wealth in Yourself Podcast where we help people to design their ideal life and take control of their time and money. I'm your host, Josh St. Laurent. Today we're joined by Dr. Stephen Crane. Dr. Crane is a serial entrepreneur and United States Marine Corps veteran known for high performance coaching and helping people break into the next level of their life. He has over 125 professional certifications and licenses, countless executive education programs under his belt and multiple degrees. Dr. Crane, so about your here. Dr. Steven Crane: Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. Josh St. Laurent: Absolutely. For anyone listening who isn't familiar with you, can you tell us about you and your work? Dr. Steven Crane: Absolutely. My story starts back in 2017. Got out of the Marine Corps completely unexpectedly, medical reasons, among many other things. Got out completely unexpectedly, had 72 hours noticed to basically vacate the base and best of luck. No benefits, no retirement, no severance, no nothing. Pretty young at the time had no idea. My rights had no idea what I could do. Wasn't a position to hire an attorney and sue the US government. I was just like, okay, what do I do now? So I scraped and clalled my way back to civilization, got my feet underneath of me after a sten of staining the car for a while. It worked my way through the corporate ladder, worked in nonprofit government, government contracting, corporate, sort of few businesses along the way. Went through multiple university programs as you kind of touched on there. And finally, thankfully in 2020, I got my benefits from the VA. And the Department of Veteran Affairs, I got all my benefits, got 100% disability, and the following year in August of 21, I was luckily and blessed enough to be able to retire from corporate America. So I took my wife out of corporate, I took me out of corporate, and ever since that we've just been focusing on helping veterans and helping small business owners one, not have to go through the same fate I did, but two, also helping them to make sure that their life is a little bit better and a little bit brighter and more. Josh St. Laurent: That's really cool. And I want to touch upon the certifications and the education and all of this stuff that led up to this point, but maybe starting with how are you helping people now? Like how do you partner with people, whether it's a business owner or a veteran? Can you talk to that a little bit? Dr. Steven Crane: Absolutely. My entire journey has been a reflection of my businesses. I always tell people, if you've been following me and you've been following my businesses, they're one in the same. So when I got out and I got my benefits and everything, I was in 2020. So I started 360 veteran. I started a veteran company helping veterans maximize their disability rating, helping them get all their benefits, get a safety net underneath of them, you name it. We still want to operate that company. We've done close to $3 billion in benefits so far. So we've done a lot in the last three years, but that was just phase one because that also led after helping thousands of veterans. It led me down the road of realizing, oh, wait a minute, we're equipping these people with about 50 grand tax-free for the rest of their life. We're equipping them with free medical dental vision, everything. And we're also equipping them with back pay. That's, you know, $10, $20,000 or $30,000 or one month sum. What are they doing with that money? That's so well, got the learning after a while. They were buying trucks. They were taking trips to Vegas. They were blowing it. And trust me, I'm not one to tell you what to do with your money. It's your money, it's your disability. But I also wanted to make sure that they were financially literate enough to understand options and understand how powerful $30,000 can be if you know what to do with it. So I created financial legacy builders. And that's a free educational platform that we created and we go out and we educate communities, families about how money works essentially. So that's one thing that we've been really proud about. But then that also led to, so now we've got the benefits now that they're able to make financial literate decisions. Now a lot of people are still young enough. They're able to retire, but they still want to work. They still want to do something, which leads them to entrepreneurship. So I created my own company, Steven Crane. And that's where I do a lot of my coaching. So I do some deep dive work. I figure out, okay, what's your purpose? What, what's your why? Do some kind of story brain mapping on, okay, where were you in the military? Kind of pull the common thread. What are some options for you? What do you want to look at? So helping them start a business essentially. And then that led to over time creating an ecosystem of businesses that can actually help each other and not just help each other, but also have exclusive partnerships because it's a global company have massive, massive value ad for businesses over $35,000 in software technology, coaching, consulting, you name it that we provide them. And we offer them guaranteed return on investment. So that company is called network in action. And I purchase that. And here we are. So in my entire journey has been always solving the next problem that I see for entrepreneurs and veterans like. Josh St. Laurent: Wow. That's super cool. And I've kind of followed along. And I saw on LinkedIn some of the different companies. And I think that's what initially drew me in. I love that you're helping with not only resources, but also the education and the coaching. Can you talk about maybe your own education and how that played a part in kind of this journey? It's a great question because if you look at my educational path, you're like, okay, the sky obviously likes to learn. Dr. Steven Crane: Where's the direction going? So there is a real direction. And it was actually, no, it wasn't strategic whatsoever. It was just going with the flow. So I started off. I wanted to go in the military because I wanted to work in federal law enforcement. Always my dream growing up. Thought it would be cool to work FBI, TF, do investigations. I like putting puzzles together. So I went into the military, went into the Marine Corps, got the experience on that side. But then also got my bachelor's degree because I wanted to go into law enforcement. And I was in the move of moving to NCIS and CID was in that process. And that's whenever you medical thing sort of coming out of the woodworks. So when I got out, I was like, well, crap. I got this bachelor's degree. That's pretty much worthless now. Pretty much barred from law enforcement. All these things on my record, I really can't do anything. So what do I do now? One of the number one things I was thinking about, I'm like, okay, I need to make myself versatile. I need to do it quick. And I don't know what to do. Let's get an MBA. An MBA is kind of a quasi-everything. It opens some opportunities. So let's see where it leads me. So I got my MBA. And about halfway through, you choose like your concentration. For me, I was really interested in executive leadership management. But I wanted to challenge myself and I had a phenomenal mentor and professor. We're still very good friends now. He challenged me. He's like, listen, whether you like data, whether you like programming or not, that is the way of the future. Even though you may not use it, it will come in handy. Just trust me. I said, listen, I'll put my faith in you. I've got nothing else going on for me. Let's do it. So I got my concentration data science, business analytics. And I understand Excel. I understand our SQL Python, everything like that. So I was like, cool. That's a cool little thing to have. I got out. And I was like, okay, well, I graduated early from my MBA because I had really nothing else to do at the time. So I was double off of classes. But then I came into project management. So I got my PMP while doing my MBA. I got some Agile certifications. I was like, okay, well, I got my MBA now. A good follow on masters would probably be a masters in project management. Make sense. Let's go down that road because everything seemed to be lining up for me to be a project manager. So I went down that road. I got my masters in project management from Penn State. And then after I graduated that one, I was like, okay, I always wanted to be a doctor. You know, like, let's just tack that on, tack on a PhD or whatever. So I started applying to different programs. Guys, except the University of Southern California, then started doing that program. So organizational change in leadership because now that I have a company and now that I have a team of 20 people across the country, I'm wanting to continuously grow. And I'm very interested in how people change and how they adapt to change. So it just kind of made sense. And that's in that play to go down that road. So that's kind of how the education evolved over time. Again, it wasn't strategic, but it fit the need of that time frame. Josh St. Laurent: Right. And it's interesting to me to think about, I mean, all of those things translate into being an entrepreneur, being successful with your finances. Right. Like I think about the project management curriculum. My wife is a PMP. I've looked through some of these books. It's super useful for entrepreneurs. And so whether strategic or not, I think, you know, that education can only help. How does that translate to how you're helping entrepreneurs? Are there comment things that you see a lot of people struggling with as new entrepreneurs? Is there advice you find yourself giving all the time? Maybe something that can help listeners who are entrepreneurs? Dr. Steven Crane: 100% yes. So in addition to like all the other certifications, licenses, everything like that, the actual like university education, the way that that's helped me, the MBA with the data analytics understand the importance of data. Even though you are a startup entrepreneur and you're like, that's kind of a luxury. Again, I've been there. Having data, keeping track, doing analytics, that's a luxury. When you're in startup phase, you're just trying to make a buck. You're just trying to get a sale, try to get a client, trying to do something. But I'm telling you it's important. If you can just find a way to automate the collection of data, you may not be able to analyze it right now. Collect it. Collect it in store. Collect it and store it. Because what you're going to be able to do when you make it is hire someone come in, grab the data, clean it, scrub it, analyze it and say, this is your year over year performance. What did you do in this quarter? Oh, well, yeah, this is when we made this adjustment. This is when we ran this innovative campaign. Go ahead and do that again and see what happens. So it's good to have the data because you can always come back to it. So that's something that was university applicable that I took to entrepreneurship project management, the iron triangle, time cost, resources, everything. It comes down to that as well. You've got to be able to plan things proper, prior planning prevents piss poor performance. There you go. I still remember that from military. It's true though. You've got to plan. You got to understand where you're at and where you're going, just like a financial plan. You got to put it in the GPS. If you don't know where you want to go, how much way you want to have a retirement? I don't know. I can't help you. Do you want to retire with $10,000 a month? Is that sound good? In today's money or that day money? Because interest and all that. You got to know that stuff. So project management was very helpful in being able to kind of systemize it and then create a plan and stick with it. So I do that with financial clients even to today. And then lastly, the doctoral research component and high level strategic thinking that's been very beneficial really as a consultant coming in to companies and being able to analyze, okay, what are the systems? What are the airplanes between the systems? If you're a chief learning officer, how does implementing this LMS system impact finance, impact legal impact HR? How does this impact the organizational change element? How does this impact morale? All these things you contract using data, using linear regression through statistical models and stuff, you can do that because I've done it. I know it. So I'm able to consult on, I'm able to help businesses understand it and the importance behind it. Not just make a buck. Dr. Steven Crane: Because make a buck is important. You got to pay bills. But if you're looking to grow or retire, if you're looking to do anything big in the world, you've got to use data. Hands down. Josh St. Laurent: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense to me. So for an entrepreneur who's listening, who's saying, okay, crap, I'm not tracking any data. I know it's going to be industry specific, but is there a certain data said that everybody should be tracking as an entrepreneur? Is there a base level of, hey, these are the things at the very least that you want to be keeping track of that we can revisit down the road? Dr. Steven Crane: It's a good question because there's not really a right or wrong answer with this. I always encourage people start small. Start small, start with something simple, just like in financial traffic, just create a budget. If you get a budget down, hell, you're better off than 50% of Americans, you know, good for you. I tell them start small track. How many appointments you have on a weekly basis? How many you have then track? How many show up then track? How many led to a second appointment or how many closed from that? From there, once you get about a month's worth of data, kind of understand your close rate. You kind of understand your no show rate. You understand these things and then you're able to tweak it and say, okay, if I know my no show rates 50%, I probably just like a hotel, I probably need to double book because I know 50% of them won't show and God forbid worst case I need to do is say, hey, I'm so sorry, I don't know what happened. It looks like we were overbooked. What I can do is I can slide you into next appointment and that way you kind of use it as a screening method, honestly, because now you know their legit, they showed up and now you know for the next appointment, they're actually going to show so you don't double book that appointment. The similar things with hotels and all businesses do it, but when you do that, you're able to know your numbers. So start small with something like that and then after that, the number one thing that I would say hands down, start collecting even though you may not use it, even though you may not know what to do with it, collect people's data. I know it's on super predatory. Collect people's data. Collect names, emails, phone numbers, names, emails, phone numbers. Dr. Steven Crane: You never know when you're going to need them again. It's better that you have that information ready to go than trying to grab it because data is super expensive. I mean, I had a valuation done on my CRM. It's worth a pretty penny because I've got over 50,000 verified phone numbers, emails, names, addresses, you name it. So I just start collecting data. Do I sell it? No, of course I'm not going to sell it. That's predatory, but do I collect it for later analysis and you know, being able to upsell people, reach back out to people, build communities, everything like that. Absolutely. And that's one of the biggest things that I'm super happy and proud that I did early on was even though I never did anything with it for years, I collected it, kept it in a data repository, and now it's in the bank. It's like a savings account. It's in the bank for that rainy day. If I ever need it, I can tap into it, but I'm glad that I have it instead of having to try to rebuild it. Josh St. Laurent: That makes a lot of sense to me. I've talked to a lot of new entrepreneurs who are sort of learning this lesson and kind of feel this imposter syndrome in a way of, you know, I don't want to be gathering emails as an example. I'm just going to wait for people to come to me. And so I've heard that a lot and I kind of seen both sides, but I agree with what you're saying. I mean, collecting that data is important. You can revisit it. There's so much you can do down the line, even just keeping in touch. If you decide to start a newsletter, for example, I've kind of seen people go that route. Is there something you commonly see with the clients that you work with? Maybe a major issue that they struggle with that has a simple answer, but it's something that a lot of people kind of see as a roadblock. Dr. Steven Crane: You know, I think a lot of people struggle with the same things. And a lot of times it's, you know, maybe over complicating or getting in our own way. It pulls time to one word discipline. 99% of problems. And yes, I'll go on record and just say 99% of problems is right here. It really is. There's very few external obstacles that actually exist. And if it's a real obstacle, it's a real obstacle. But thankfully, those are the quickest and easiest things to deal with. You need some money. There's tons of people giving away money. You need a place to stay. Dr. Steven Crane: It was homeless. I figured it out. You can figure that out. Right. People don't know resources, but that's easy because you have people like me that know the resources. So it's like, okay, that's an external blocker. No problem. Here's the resource. Done. All right. What's your excuse now? And then it always comes back to this. And the key of it and talk about it in my book, a flush to BS was gales, gremlins, assumptions, interpretations and limiting beliefs. If you know the gales and you know how to identify them and you're working with a coach, but properly trained, certified credential ICF accredited coach, if you're working with a true coach, they can help you identify these gales and they can help you in coming up with strategies to either mitigate it or completely eradicate and overcome it. So gremlins, big one, you know, that little voice on your shoulder that whispers in your ear, you're not good enough. You'll never be good enough. Bobby did it better than you. Don't you see the other veteran down the road? He got a job at Lockheed, making 70 grand. Why are you in your car or your hopeless? That's on your shoulder and we all have that. We also have assumptions that we make. Oh, just because this happened, this means this isn't going to happen or interpretations. The reason I got in the car wreck on the way to the interview, that must be God telling me that I shouldn't be going to that job. Is that your interpretation or is that God actually speaking to you? So is that your interpretation of the world and realizing that you can change that interpretation literally to mean anything that you want? A book called Psycho Cybernetics, phenomenal book talks about how your brain can't distinguish fact from fiction. It can't. Whatever you input, that's what you get. It's a computer programming. So you got to flush the BS. You got to reprogram your mind to actually think the way that you need to think to accomplish your goals and lastly, limiting beliefs. Everyone has limiting beliefs. Well, how many people in the world are millionaires? You really think I can become a millionaire? Another one in my family was a millionaires. So I'm never going to be one or whatever the case is. That's a limiting belief. Dr. Steven Crane: You're capable and possible just like anyone else in this world. We all have our own sets of talents and gifts that God gives us, but it's up to us to use them. The problem is this thing. So working with a coach can help overcome that. And for myself, I've hired so many coaches. I mean, I talked about in the book as well. I spent over $400,000 cumulatively over the last couple of years on coaches, seminars, university program certifications, you name it. Just trying to flush everything in my mind, reprogram it properly and then get on the right track. Hopefully, answers your question. Josh St. Laurent: It does. No, I think it's a great answer. The self-talk, the limiting beliefs, it's so, so powerful. And I think we all kind of struggle with it, but we all have that person on our shoulder that were like, shut up. That little person there who's kind of talking us out of it. So I wanted to ask you as well. I mean, I got to imagine there's a lot of commonality with yourself and the people that you work with. I like to ask folks about, is there a mistake that you made that maybe it was a major learning lesson for you or turning point, something that maybe you share with clients so that they don't have to go through the same thing? Dr. Steven Crane: That's a really good question. Mentors, mentors, mentors, mentors. Now, again, I talk about it in my book. Mentors are great. Do not get me wrong, but understanding there's different types and different levels of mentors. That's the part that most people miss out on. Dr. Steven Crane: When you have a mentor, first off, you always have to be skeptical and you always have to keep in the back of your mind, why are they telling me this? Why are they telling me this? Is this for their benefit, their gratification? Is this because they're strategically not wanting me to do something because it's going to ultimately benefit them or maybe benefit someone else that they're working with? So you got to keep every piece of advice somewhat skeptical. The second part is knowing how far in advance are they from you? A lot of times you'll find new entrepreneurs want to seek out a billionaire. It's a mentor. It's like, okay, if you did seek them out and they did agree to be your mentor, what kind of advice are they giving? Are they talking about selling the drain basically? Are they talking about commenting the entrepreneurs like to ask is what's your morning routine? Well, if you ask Radalia, what his morning routine is, it's very different from the 70 year old Radalia versus the 20 year old Radalia. Very different people, different mindsets, different everything. If you ask him today, he wakes up, he has breakfast, maybe he goes for a walk, he reads a couple books, he sits down after having a cup of coffee and then he reads his emails and whatever, right? 20 year old, he got out of bed, he hopped in the shower, put on a suit and went and started grinding. That's a difference. So if they're telling you, this is their morning routine, understand you're not at that level. That should not be your morning routine. So that's another thing. The last thing that I that I cautioned people on with mentors is finding a mentor kind of three steps. You want to find a mentor that's about on your level. That way it's somewhat kind of competition to boost you, but you're also hearing some things actually in practice. Maybe they're only like a year ahead of you in business. That's good because you're going to learn some things tactically on the ground that are working and that are applicable. You also want to find mentors that are around five years above you because they're going to be able to give you some kind of four warning. Be like, hey, it wasn't too long ago. I was actually in your shoes and this is what happened to me. I'd be cautious about this. Dr. Steven Crane: That's good. Then you want to have mentors like 10 plus years above you and those are kind of like the old wisdom stoic people, right? They're going to give you granddaddy wisdom of a penny saved is a penny earned. What the hell does that mean? But when you break it down, you're like, ah, hindsight 2020, that's actually really good advice. Knowing what mentors are and worth a rat, that's really important. I know I said that's the last thing. One more thing on that, asking questions to these mentors. This is a kind of a revelation I had over the last couple years was, are you asking a thousand dollar question or are you asking a 10,000 more question? If you're getting mentorship advice from someone that's five, 10 years above you and they're super successful, are you asking them a petty one thousand dollar question? Are you asking them something at a 10,000 dollar level? Because not only are you kind of wasting their time, if you're asking petty questions, which doesn't really keep that person interested in wanting to continue to mentor you. Number two, most importantly, you're not squeezing it for all its worth, right? There's certain things. This is where kind of leveling up, you're leveling up in life. As you learn more, as you gain more experience, you'll be able to ask deeper questions. And those deeper questions will help you make exponentially more money because now you're asking a 10,000 dollar question. A lot of entrepreneurs, when they first start off, they're asking tactical on the ground questions. You don't need to go spend 10,000 dollars for a freaking coach when you're first starting off. Go find a coach that's charging a hundred bucks an hour because those are the questions that you're asking. Don't waste your money up here. Dr. Steven Crane: Use your money here. And then once you start gaining that experience, start leveling up. If you go straight to the top, it's not going to benefit you and it's not going to benefit them. It's a lose, lose for everyone. So that's actually one of the main things that I tell people kind of hindsight for myself. Josh St. Laurent: Yeah, I think that's so important. I mean, I would credit a lot of my success to mentors, honestly. I wanted to ask, what advice would you give for someone who's seeking a mentor? How do you find this good mentor? And how do you formulate the 10,000 dollar question? Dr. Steven Crane: You asked really good questions. And finding a mentor, there's tons of different ways to go about. There's tons of free platforms. There's tons of paid platforms. There's tons of ways to reach out to people. The question you really have to ask yourself first is, why do I want the mentor? What is the goal of it? Is it to unlock doors and opportunities? Is it to gain insight and wisdom? Is it to teach you something? Dr. Steven Crane: No right or wrong answer, but you need to be clear about that because it's going to help kind of define where you go to find that mentor. If you're looking for someone to open up doors for you, obviously going to networking events, putting yourself in maybe like a vistas group is going to be very helpful. It's going to be very high mastermind level executive C suite type mentality. And they also have a network of their own that they're able to introduce you to. If you're looking for more information, wisdom, science data type stuff, you probably want to look for someone with a PhD or an EDD or someone that's very academia focused. They have their own resources. They have their own skill sets, but they would be very good because they're going to be able to give you a lot of knowledge, maybe not applicable knowledge all the time, but they're able to feed you that knowledge because they have they know everything. There's very few things that I haven't heard of because I've spent the last 10 years in my life in university. I've seen it and I've I know it all for good and for bad. And a lot of times is bad because I wish I wish I could go back to that innocent not knowing anything that childish mindset. We always try to stick like that, but people with higher degrees sometimes they get too full of themselves. And then they lose touch with reality. And that's where some of that theological mentorship comes in. So you want to try to find like a good PhD person that's actually been there and done that because they can help you out with that. But I mean, there's tons of platforms. Veterati is a phenomenal platform for veterans seeking mentorship from all walks of life. ACP American corporate partners is another awesome mentorship project where veterans can get plugged into other business owners and also people in that field or in the industry. Dr. Steven Crane: There's also tons of different ones for business owners. There's bunker labs is a great one. There's tons of incubators. So it really just depends on what you're looking for. Well, I'm glad that you brought up like the fact that you want to look for someone who has experience in addition to the education. How do you formulate the $10,000 question for them instead of the $1000 question? How do you formulate the $10,000 question? Josh St. Laurent: One, it comes from experience. It comes from asking great questions over and over and over again. It's just like a skill set. Coaching is nothing but asking questions. I encourage everyone. And actually there's tons of articles coming from Harvard Business Review, coming from Princeton, coming from Forbes. They're saying that coaching programs are replacing MBA programs because of the practicality. I fully endorse that 100% because if you know how to ask good questions, it's game over. You will unlock anything. Your knowledge, your ability to learn is limited based on the quality of questions that you ask hands down. Dr. Steven Crane: So if you don't know how to ask good questions, go get training in that. Go to a coaching program that allows you to understand how to ask and formulate good questions. There's tons of books. Questions are the answers. Tons of books on how to formulate good questions. I would encourage you to go out there and learn how to formulate a good solid question. And then also make sure as you continue to ask questions and grow and gain experience that you're building off of the previous questions. There's kind of two sides with this as a data person. Yes, I would ask the same question to a thousand people and find out common themes and do some qualitative analysis on that. But I would also want to build upon that. I would want to ask you ask a thousand people a question and then take that information, formulate the next question, say, okay, based on a thousand people 700 answered this way, I'm curious. Why do these 700 think that way, right? And then build off that and then continue to build until you finally get to that final question and that final question may be some pie in the sky question, but nonetheless, it will be a ten thousand dollar question because you've worked your way up to it. So it's kind of hard. And it's kind of like a cop out answer, but it's kind of hard to just sit down and formulate a ten thousand dollar question. If you don't have the experience, if you don't have the the prior understanding to get to that question, 100% and if someone's listening to this saying, you know, either, hey, I want to go get a coaching certification or maybe I just want to hire a coach. I think you touched upon this earlier, but you said make sure other ICF certified, right? Josh St. Laurent: Yes. There's tons of programs out there, tons of business coaching, tons of life coaching, tons of spiritual code, tons of certifications out there. And trust me, I'm not trying to say one's better than the other. What I would say though is there's one governing body. It's called ICF, International Coaching Federation, just like there's one for facilitators in a fact, just like there's one for project management, PMI project management institute, you typically that governing body that's following an ISO standard, they are the governing body for a reason. Dr. Steven Crane: If the program that you're going to isn't accredited by it, you kind of have to ask yourself why, right? And that can lead to a 10,000-large question and actually save you a lot of money. For me, I've done both ICF accredited courses, I've done non-ICF accredited courses, and again, they both have tremendous value in them. You got to find the nuggets in both, but the reason I would say go with the accredited portion is because one, yes, you're gaining the skill sets. Two, you're gaining the credential, which helps kind of build some rapport and some trust factors, right? You got your CFP. You got your CFP because it has some weight, it has some value. People know if I'm working with a CFP, this dude knows what he's talking about. Even if me and you were both financial people, even if we both are seeing the exact same thing, people are going to come to you first because you've got that designation. So it's the same thing with an ICF credential. Dr. Steven Crane: Then the last part is you have something that's actually transferable. So if you wanted to work in corporate America as a coach, you have to have an ICF credential. If you work in project management, you want to get on a government contract and you don't have a PMP. I don't care if you started, if you're Elon Musk, if you don't have the PMP, you're not getting it. That's how square box some companies and contracts are. So check the box, go through it, worst case, you do that, and then you go through a non-credential one for some ad-hon training. Josh St. Laurent: I'm in the early journeys of myself of this. I think when I finish my masters, I want to say we maybe talked about this previously before we were recording, but I've been looking at the ICF training. He's got to finish the master's first one at a time, but I've noticed how many different types of coaching certifications there are. Josh St. Laurent: So that's something that I need to kind of dig through myself. I can't help myself ask you, you know, what was it over 125 different certifications? Do you feel like there's one that sticks out to you as like, hey, this one had the most impact maybe in your businesses or in your life? Like was there one that jumps out to you that's like, man, this one was really impactful. So glad I did that. Dr. Steven Crane: That is hard because they have all similar to the degrees. They've all served a vital purpose in my life. What I would say, and again, this is because of my story, my journey, the way my stars and moons align, the number one thing that transformed my life was the PMP sort of certification. Here's the funny thing. Yes, I've worked with the space force DARPA. I've worked with, you know, Fortune 100. I've worked with some companies after the reason why the PMP I'm not the door is the person that introduced me to the PMP. So I'll give a shout out right now, Dr. Eric Greig from vest P.M. without that man without his team without that. I would not be here. Plain and simple. That dude completely changed the trajectory of my life. And it wasn't because he gave me some amazing opportunity. It wasn't because he took me under his wing or anything like that. It was because he just simply gave me a little nugget that I needed in that moment, changes the trajectory of my entire life. So for me, the most profound and the one that really stands out is the project management professional designation, the PMP just because of that moment in my life. But I will say it did help me secure my spot on government contracts. I walked in two different organizations and the number one question they asked when I was going for project management positions was do you have your PMP? That's like the qualifying question. If it's a no, I want to waste your time. Dr. Steven Crane: Thank you for coming in. You have your PMP? Awesome. Because not too many people actually have it. It's actually a really hard certification. So if you have it, it's a freaking massive check in the box. And then it's like, okay, what else you got? Oh, you got this too. All right. Cool. Brownie point. Okay. Tell me about your experience. I mean, you're definitely going to get the job. But go ahead, tell me about your experience. So that that one definitely stands out to me. Outside of that, financial literacy, you know, financial certifications, destinations, those were just kind of cherries on tops just because of the information that you get. Josh St. Laurent: Cool. PMP. I wasn't expecting it, but I believe it. I've looked at the curriculum. I think it's fascinating. I'd love to dive into it one of these days. I'm going to transition a little bit and ask you what does living a wealthy life look like for you? Dr. Steven Crane: Living a wealthy life to me means more than anything doing what you want. And I say that because freedom is what we all kind of chase. I often use the analogy that when we're young, our dreams are massive. We want to be an astronaut. We want to be present. We want to go here. We want to do this. And then we become an adult. And then we realize that the median household income is 52,000. And then our dreams start doing this. And then we're like, okay, well, I'll be happy if I get one vacation a year. There we go. Now, now I'm living, right? I get two weeks vacation. And I got a 401k and I got health insurance. What more could I ask for? You could ask for the world. That's it. That's all you're getting when you were young, your dreams were like this. And so what happens is we minimize our goals to fit inside of our income instead of trying to maximize our income to fit our goals. And that's something that's a mindset shift. Again, things inside here that limit us. That's a mindset shift that to me equates to being wealthy. Because if you have freedom to do what you want, to travel when you want to buy your family, you know, you go out, go to Disney. Let's say, you take a vacation to Disney. A lot of families are lucky enough just to get to Disney. And then when the kids walk into the shop, they're like, Mommy, can I get this? Daddy, can I get this? Can I get this? And the parents are like, you can pick one. And how soul-crushing is that to know that you're not able to give your family everything that they deserve? Right? That hurts. That hurts as a man, that hurts as a spouse as a wife. It doesn't matter. It hurts. Because it's kind of that punch in the gut of, yeah, I'm able to do this. But am I really living my fullest life? Am I really being, am I really wealthy in that sense? Or even in the sense of giving? Some people love tiling to their church and doing, you know, different trips and doing different things. And that's awesome. And not to say like it's a competition of tiling and giving money, but you enjoy giving. Maybe that's one of your things. Dr. Steven Crane: You want to be a philanthropist. You want to actually be the highest donor in your church or in your community and have the biggest impact. But you're limited to only being able to, you know, give 500 bucks a week or whatever. That hurts. That stings a little. So again, living a life that's wealthy means having that freedom and flexibility to be able to do the things that you want when you want to without having to go to bed saying like, oh crap, what did I do? Is that, is that checking amounts? I'm scared. To me, that's what it means. Josh St. Laurent: I love that answer. I'm going to try not to let it derail me here and talk about it for an hour. But that's perfect. When I work with clients, we don't even talk about the numbers typically for the first two meetings. We're kind of doing dream setting, goal setting, talking about aspirations, right? Bigger than goals. Who do you want to be? Josh St. Laurent: What do you want to spend your time doing? And people at first are confused, hey, this isn't what my traditional financial planner kind of talked me about. But it's like, well, you know, if I'm going to help you with your money, I need to know what the money is being used for. What is this ideal life for trying to create? So I love that answer to kind of segue. If you could give one message to someone working to gain financial freedom, who isn't there yet, what would that be? Dr. Steven Crane: This is going to probably confuse people, piss people off, inspire people, motivate people. What's going to do everything? So prepare yourself, become an entrepreneur, become an entrepreneur. This country favors entrepreneurs with by 360 veteran business and helping, you know, disabilities. A lot of people are mad at this system because the system isn't giving veterans, you know, all these benefits and stuff. And it's like, well, are they not giving it to you? Or you just not understand the playbook. Dr. Steven Crane: If you understood the playbook, it's actually very favorable for veterans. I mean, I'm sitting to you and I'm 100% disabled veteran that's making 50 grand tax free for the rest of my life. That's a huge blessing. That's massive. That's more than I could even ever ask for. That's awesome. And that's because I know the playbook. If people understood the IRS playbook, if people understood how laws are made and how money works and things are created, they would understand that the real, and I want to say the only way to wealth and freedom is entrepreneurship. But the number one quickest fastest, best way, the most effective way to get there is entrepreneurship. If you understand taxes, it favors business owners, not employees. If you understand how money is created and how money works, you understand that 401Ks are not typically the best option, but that's only offered to employees. What's offered to executives? Dr. Steven Crane: What's offered to the board? Oh, life insurance products. Interesting. I was told in middle class America, life insurance is bad. Well, then why 97% of Fortune 500 CEOs don't have a 401K. They have life insurance bonus programs. Interesting. They have lurps, life insurance retirement plans. Why is that? So once you start educating yourself and once you start realizing all these things, you're like, man, the system is kind of rigged against me, but it's not a raid. It's set up this way and you have access to the same information I do and you do. It's just most of us aren't taught this. And that's why we need people like a Josh to sit down with us and to walk us through that financial journey and have people like me to sit down and educate them on the benefits of being an entrepreneur. Because once you understand it and once you see it, you never want to go do anything else. Dr. Steven Crane: You're going to want to invest and try everything you can to be successful as a business other. And there's so many resources to make that happen. It's so true. I think back to my time studying for the CFP and it was so eye-opening, the tax code you mentioned, just out alone for real estate investors, for business owners. It's like, man, we're all playing the same game, but I'm playing it wrong. What am I doing as an employee? So I can relate to that. And I want to kind of piggyback off of that actually and think back to your time. When you first started, I think you said 2017, you're in your car. I always asked this question right at the end, like if you had to start over with $1,000, where would that money go today knowing what you know now? Josh St. Laurent: Cheese. I had a $1,000. It's hard because it's almost like a parent. It's almost like a coach business owner. I don't wish ill. I don't wish harm on anyone. But I also understand that I am where I am because I overcame what I overcame. So it's almost like, do I want you to suffer and become homeless? No. Do I know statistically for the vast majority of people that go through that? Do they have a killer ride up? Right? Even when they're able to pull themselves out? Do they have a killer ride up to the top? Almost always. Almost always. So knowing that and knowing that just like kids, you want to protect them and you don't want them to run off into the street and get hit by a car. Josh St. Laurent: But you also know if I protect them, they'll never really understand why not to go into the road and get hit by a car. So you're kind of teaching them and you kind of want to create a bubble where they're safe to explore, but they're also safe to get hurt. I think that's the key word. I want you to safely get hurt. I want you to safely become homeless. I want you to safely feel the pain so that you understand how much good is in life. Because until you've been to that point, you'll never understand how good life can be. So to kind of answer that question, a thousand bucks, I really wouldn't do anything different. I would invest it in myself. And that's exactly what I did. The number one people, I'm sure people ask you, what's the number one ROI? What's the number you know, return that I can get in the stocks or crypto or realist, whatever. The number one investment for myself has always been in myself. The number one investment has always been in my education. That's why if you look at my portfolio, I'm very poor in my portfolio. And then you look and you said, but Steven, you spent $400,000 on yourself. I said, yeah, I created the biggest wall building assets, which is this and this. I can do anything with it. Now that I know everything and now that I'm able and I've established a network and I have so many people come to me with opportunities. Now that I've made myself so valuable as an asset, the only way I can go as an asset is up. So I'm not worried about my financial future. Everyone should be, but I'm not worried about that because I've already built my asset. It's just, are you going to place that $1,000 in the S&P? Josh St. Laurent: Are you going to place that $1,000 on you? If you bet in the S&P, which every trade, every stock, every buy, every bull, everything is a gamble. You're putting it in and it may or may not do well. Same thing with yourself. I can't control this though and I don't like that. If I can't control it, I don't like it. I can't control the market, but can I control my destiny and can I control what I do in my 24 hours? 100%. So I will continue to make that investment time and time again, just because I can control this outcome. I can't control this outcome. So that's what I would say. Invest in myself. That's a great answer. Before we wrap, I wanted to ask you, where can people find you online? How can people connect with you? The best way to connect with me, LinkedIn. Dr. Steven Crane: Unfortunately, fortunately, however you want to describe it, I have reached the 30,000 connection level. So technically, I can't accept any more invitations, any more connection requests, but you can follow me. I've got even more followers than that on LinkedIn. You can follow me, you can message me, but you can also email me directly, Steven at Stephencrain.com. Super simple to remember. Email me that way. Reach out to me. Love to connect with you. Hop on a Zoom. See what we can do to help and honestly, see who I can connect you with and see what resources I can plug into your life. That's amazing. I'll put all the links in the show notes too. So people can track you down easily and get back to that. If they can't remember Stephen at Stephencrain.com for some reason. That's a wrap. Anything that I haven't asked you that you wanted to make sure to talk about. Dr. Steven Crane: The number one thing that would say trust in yourself. Trust in yourself. And that's super cliche, but trust in yourself through the entire process. Again, you control yourself. You control your thoughts, actions, behaviors, feelings, emotions. You control that. You can't control anything else that happens. You can't control outcomes, but you can control actions. And I promise you, if you do the right action consistently over time, if you had the discipline to put in the work consistently every single day without stopping, you have to see results. It's like a universal law. You will and you have to see results. If you concentrate your effort on something for a prolonged period of time, magic will happen. So that's what I always try to let people remember and kind of dwell on is find something. Do it consistently. Have the discipline put in the work. Focus on you and the rest will take care of itself. Josh St. Laurent: That was perfect. I'm not going to add anything to that. This has been the Wealth in Yourself podcast where we help people to design their ideal life and take control of their time and money. Our guest today was Dr. Stephen Krain, whose mission is conquering limiting beliefs, introducing a world of possibilities and ensuring no warrior is left behind. We'll see you next week. And thanks for listening. Josh St. Laurent: The Wealth in Yourself podcast is hosted by me, Josh St. Loren, an edited and produced by Ray Haycraft. To learn more about how to make your money work for you, visit us at www.WealthInYourself.com and connect with us on all social media at Wealth in Yourself. This podcast is educational in nature and is not meant to be investment advice. Please do not construe anything said to be advice and the opinions of the guests may or may not represent the opinions of Wealth in yourself. This podcast and the information presented are separate for my employment at Golden Gate University. Still, they are part of my mission to make no cost, financial knowledge more accessible. If you like the show, please take a moment to leave us a review. We read all of your feedback and we want to make sure we cover the topics that matter most. If you have a specific subject you'd like us to explore or a guest you'd love to hear interviewed, don't hesitate to shoot us a direct message. And as always, thanks for listening.