Greetings, SuperFriends!

This episode is brought to you by the online course Creating a Meaningful Life. If you're looking to create meaning and purpose in your life and build the life of your dreams, this is the course for you!

In this episode, we discuss:

• Alex's troubling childhood, and the path he discovered to overcome it
• How reading and autodidactic learning changed Alex Charfen's life and made him the success he is today
• How did Alex Charfen go from “special education” to advanced placement courses?
• The story of how Alex Charfen discovered entrepreneurship, and why it was so pivotal for him
• Alex's entrepreneurial war stories, including why he sold his company at the age of 17
• What was Alex Charfen's secret to success? How did he do it?
• What was “The Alex Charfen Rule,” and why did Alex' school have to implement it?
• The other businesses that Alex Charfen started, and how he got into them by chance
• A HILARIOUS story of how Alex became the trusted advisor of a Fortune 500 company
• What does Alex mean by “transparency,” and why is it such a powerful skill to master?
• A deep-dive where Alex coaches me through a personal issue I've been struggling with
• How can you move yourself forward if you're looking for a romantic relationship?
• What is Alex Charfen's superpower?
• How does Alex learn, and what are the strategies he uses to learn faster than other people?
• What differentiates “normal” entrepreneurs from billionaire entrepreneurs?
• A discussion of whether or not entrepreneurship is for everyone – and why?
• How can you determine if you were born to be an entrepreneur?
• What are the “3 awakenings” of the entrepreneurial personal type?
• What are the rituals, habits, and behaviors that Alex advocates for improving performance?
• Why is it so important to drink LOTS of water
• The science behind “hyper hydration” and why it improves your life
• What are the books that have most changed Alex' life?
• What is the most important takeaway from this episode?

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• Alex's website
• The Natural Thirst Challenge on Alex's website
• Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
• How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie
• The Highest Goal by Michael Ray
• The Entrepreneurial Personality Type Facebook Group
• A free download of Alex's book

Favorite Quotes from Alex Charfen:

Transcript:

Introduction: Welcome to the Becoming SuperHuman Podcast. Where we interview extraordinary people to bring you the skills and strategies to overcome the impossible. And now here's your host, Jonathan Levi.

Jonathan Levi: Before we get started today, I want to let you guys know that this episode is brought to you by the online course Creating A Meaningful Life. Now, this course is the culmination of 20 years of work and research by my personal mentor and University Professor Linda Levine, and myself. Now in it, we teach not only the skills and strategies that we've used and taught and which are being used by life coaches all over the world to create a life of fulfillment and balance. But we also go into how you can design your lifestyle, how you can improve in every aspect, all eight of the aspects that make a complete and rich life. And really we share a lot of our wisdom. So if you've been inspired by the show, by some of the guests on here who seem to have these incredibly rich fulfilling lives, I do encourage you to check it out. And of course, it is backed by a 30-day-money back guarantee. So to take advantage of a special coupon for listeners of this podcast,  visit jle.vi/meaning.

All right, here we go with the show.

Greetings, SuperFriends, and welcome to this week's show. You guys today, we are joined by Alex Charfen, who is a serial entrepreneur who spent his entire life seeking to understand how to make businesses grow.

And that question eventually evolved into wondering, well, how do you help people grow now through his research and years as a consultant to billionaires, Fortune 500, Global 100, basically all the top brass you can think of. Alex discovered what he calls the long misunderstood entrepreneurial personality type or EPT.

 Bestselling author Robin Sharp ma recently described Alex as the most progressive entrepreneurial mind on the planet. And I think for good reason, you see, since the age of eight, Alex has been starting, growing, and selling businesses and then teaching tens of thousands of people all over the world, how to do the same.

He's even been a regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal, MSNBC, CNBC, FOX News, USA Today, you name it. Now, as you guys know, we don't often talk about entrepreneurship on the show and we prefer to focus more on health and fitness. Well, Alex has some important things to say about that as well, but more importantly, I think that this episode fits into an important area of reaching one's true SuperHuman potential, which is financial freedom and creating a balanced, healthy, happy life.

So while entrepreneurship may or may not be for you, and we actually talk about whether or not it is and how you can discover whether or not it is, I think, either way, you're going to take away some amazing lessons from Alex and everything that he has to say, which ranges from entrepreneurship advice to inspiration, to motivation, to a huge health tip.

And even some tips on how to improve your romantic life. In fact, on that note, the episode actually got deeply personal and at one point, Alex launches into full-on coaching mode, turning the mic back on me and coaching me through one of my biggest struggles at the moment. So I have to admit guys, this was a huge moment of vulnerability. And I fought the urge to get embarrassed about it.

I think most people probably wouldn't broadcast that piece of the episode to thousands of people all over the world, but you know what? I decided to leave it in. I think there's a ton of value and applicable takeaways there. And if it benefits just one person, I think it will have been worth me blushing a little bit here in the studio.

So let me know via Twitter or via email, what you guys think about that component and about the episode as a whole, by the way, if you guys do decide that you are interested in entrepreneurship and you want to make a killer living inspiring and helping other people, teaching them your knowledge, whatever that knowledge may be.

 I want to tell you about this episode's sponsor, which is the online course, Branding You. Learn how to create a multimedia internet empire. This is a course that was created by myself and Dr. Anthony Metivier. We go into how to create the books, how to create the podcast, how to link it all together, how to do the online courses, how to make a six-figure income, basically doing what you love, teaching other people, and inspiring other wonderful humans out there. The way that myself and Dr. Metivier have been so blessed to do. So, if you want to check that out and get an unbelievable 80, I think it's 80% might even be 90% off that course just visit jle.vi/brandingyou. No dashes, no spaces. Just jle.vi/brandingyou.

 All right, guys, without any further ado, let me present you this fantastic episode with my new super friend, Alex Charfen.

Mr. Alex. Charfen welcome to the show, my friend. How are you doing today?

Alex Charfen: I'm doing well, Jonathan. Thanks for having me, man. I've been looking forward to this.

Jonathan Levi:  As have I. Absolute pleasure. Your my first episode back after vacation. So I'm pretty amplified, pretty ready to get back into the groove of things.

Alex Charfen: Well, then let's make this happen, Jonathan.

Jonathan Levi: Let's do it. So, Alex, I hate to start off on a sad note, but I have to say I was actually completely overwhelmed by your bio. I was like, man, this guy just couldn't get a break. So tell our audience a little bit about your situation and some of the adversities you faced and then we'll get, I promise straight into the happy and the positive and the magical stuff.

Alex Charfen: Yeah. You know, Jonathan, it's funny when people read my bio, they often have that reaction. I don't have that reaction. You know, I, I kind of look at my life as everything that it should have been to God to get me here. You know, I definitely struggled when I was younger and there were things that I don't think should have happened.

And I'm pretty vocal about them because I think there's a lot of kids like me out there who are having those same things happen and we could change things. And I grew up knowing I was fundamentally different than other people. Jonathan, how old were you when you figured out you were different?

Jonathan Levi: Oh, I think I was about 14, 13, 14.

Alex Charfen: So when you were younger than that, you got along in school.

Jonathan Levi: All right. Fair fair. I might've been like seven or eight, but I think it dawned on me. I think I really realized, like, you know what, I'm never going to be one of the cool kids, I think was like 13, 14.

Alex Charfen: But prior to that, you were wondering things like, wow, why am I different?

Why does everybody seem to be doing okay? And I'm not, why am I confused when the rest of the team's not those types of things. Right?

Jonathan Levi:  Right.

Alex Charfen: Yeah. Me too. Me too. And I'm really in touch with it. And then I talk about it openly, because I think that these days, you know, there's this equation in the world that if you don't look like everyone else talk like everyone else read, like everyone else.

And then you're a broken person. We should medicate. You put yourself in a special class, separate you from the tribe. And the fact is that throughout history, the people who didn't talk like everyone else didn't look like anyone else and didn't learn like everyone else were brilliant people who changed the world.

Thomas Edison was kicked out of school. Edison failed algebra twice. There's a pattern here. We are not picking upon. And so when I was younger, I didn't get along with really a lot of people. And so I slated and I read and I obsessively read about success. And I think that the very thing, the isolation that pushed me away from people is why I'm successful today.

Because naturally, I'm a failure at just about everything. I've had to work hard for any success that I've had. And I think that that obsessive reading when I was younger reading about people who had been successful, what happens Jonathan, is if you read. That biography of 10 entrepreneurs, they all look different.

You read the biographies of a hundred, you might even start to see some similarities, but when you read the biographies of hundreds and then transitioned to thousands, you start seeing that the people who change the world, the ones that you remember, the ones who matter to be remembered are just like us.

So I definitely had a hard time growing up, but it pushed me to discover. That even though I thought, you know, that I was isolated different alone and even felt like a party of one, that when you look at everyone who's ever been successful in history, you and I are part of that club.

Jonathan Levi: What are those hardships look like for you? You know, was it social? Was it familial? Was it all of the above?

Alex Charfen: No. I had an incredible family. My family, I think saves me. Social was very difficult for me. I didn't get along well with other kids in school. I also didn't learn like most kids, I didn't learn it in a linear pattern. So I went from special education in California in the 1970s, which was for kids who didn't learn as fast.

To the next year, I was in gifted and talented education, which was for kids who were smarter. And then the year after that, I just went back to regular classes. So it was guardrail to guardrail. I didn't know whether I was coming or going and most, everything was confusing to me.

Jonathan Levi: So I think it's really interesting, Alex. And I tell this kind of story in my TEDx Talk, you and I both found the same path out of our dare. I say insecurities, but also our challenges and these kinds of crises of who am I? What am I? And what am I worth? So, tell us the story of how you discovered entrepreneurship and how that became your thing, your way to understand that you were different in a good way?

Alex Charfen: I was eight years old and, uh, my father had a business and when I was about five, I started going to the business with him and in the rest of the world, I felt pretty isolated and alone. And I, it wasn't good. At being anywhere. I don't know if you can relate to that, Jonathan, but like when I was in class, I wasn't good at being in class.

I wasn't good at being on the baseball field. I wasn't good at being in PE. So, you know, I found places where I didn't really have to be. And when I went to my dad's business for the first time, there was kind of a different structure and an order to it and people were nice and I liked it. I mean, I didn't get in trouble there.

Well, and business was called to me. You know, it wasn't so much, did I find it? I think it found me. And when I was eight, my dad's business failed. And, uh, that was this huge transition for me as a kid, because I really liked going there. I remember being there the day that they auctioned everything off and there was a drill press and a drinking fountain left.

And my dad got the drill press and that lived in our garage for 10 years. And I'd go out and look at it and remember the business. And shortly after that to make a living, my dad started selling stuff in a swap meet, like a flea market. And I went with him. And I think I was eight and a half or nine, and we got up at 4:30 in the morning, which is when I still get up now so that we could get there early enough to get a space.

And we went to the Lama Radha, SWAT, Maine in Southern California. And my dad had bought tiny calculators pens with a clock in them. And I think some three-wheel bicycles or something all in LA. And we went there to basically sell them and see if we could make money. And within the first 10 minutes of being there.

A woman walked up and I remember telling her about the pen and she bought it first time in my life. Like I produced something that was me and I never stopped.

Jonathan Levi: Amazing. Amazing. And what's also amazing is I have such a similar story and I can relate so much to that moment of like, wait a minute, like you needed me here.

I did something to help this and help this person get what they needed. And, you know, turn a profit doing it. So that's incredible. And it basically, as you say, you never stopped. You turned around and sold a company at the age of 16 at the age of 21. And I have to say I'm a little jealous, cause I didn't sell my first till I was 23.

So well done on that. My hats off to you.

Alex Charfen:  Not really, not really, you know what? This story sounds so much cooler when you tell it like that, but. When I was 16 years old, I actually sold it when I was 17. When I was 16, some friends of mine. And I started a company called clear outlook window washing, and we were washing windows in people's homes.

And I basically knocked off this other company and just copied what they were doing. And then I did it way better. So I'd run it for about nine months. I had three crews. I was making about a thousand dollars a week and I went in to go sign all the paperwork for my second year in business with, you know, all the worker's comp and all the stuff that you have to have when you've got like bands and stuff, driving around.

And everyone involved hadn't realized I was 17 or 16. Everyone assumed I was in my twenties. And so I was operating under. All fraudulent stuff.

Jonathan Levi: Oh, wow.

Alex Charfen: It wasn't that I committed fraud. I did commit fraud because I signed something that I was 18 and I wasn't, and I didn't know I was doing that. So I actually had to sell that business.

And so it wasn't, it's not the coolest story ever. I didn't get anywhere near what that business was worth. I was really pissed off.

Jonathan Levi: Well, so let me ask this because you then went back and I mean, most people to build a business, it takes. And I know the stats, right. I invest in startups or I used to invest in startups and it takes like five to seven years to build a business.

But you, you take that business at 17 and by 21, you're selling another business. I mean, by any measure, age, independent, that's pretty quick. That's a pretty quick turnaround to success. So I guess the question I'm trying to get at is like, What was your secret to success?

You go from the student, not confident in school, you know, dare I say, like not succeeding in any kind of avenue you that you found, you find this and suddenly, boom, you figure out I'm hesitant to say a formula to success, but you obviously figured out some habits and behaviors that made you successful in this new arena, which was business.

So tell me a little bit about that.

Alex Charfen: Yeah, sure, Jonathan. May carry over to today. So there's a little more to this story. When I was young, I actually sold candy in school. That was my first business. So I was making about a hundred dollars a week in junior high school. Wow. Yeah. I had two guys working for me and I got shut down by the school district.

So that was the first business that I lost. They actually had a school district. They pass like the first rule was you can't sell candy. So then I started selling earrings and bracelets. Then it was, you couldn't sell anything that, that part of the contribution wasn't to an approved charity. So then I started giving part of the contribution to charity.

Then they said you couldn't do it in less. I can't remember unless it was. I don't remember the next rule, but there was one more. And then they basically held the school board meeting and made it so that no student anywhere in the entire school district could sell anything without the principal's approval.

Jonathan Levi: Wow.

Alex Charfen: It was called the Alex Charfen roll. It sucked. So that was the first business I lost. Then there was a window washing company. So in between that and the business that I ran in college with my friend price, I got into another business that came with its own built-in marketing. If you know what I mean, it was drugs.

Jonathan Levi: I was going to say, are we going to say, or just let the audience okay. So product sold itself.

Alex Charfen: Yeah, exactly. And after a very short period of time, I did not want to continue to be involved in that. I couldn't take the stress. I couldn't take the looking over my shoulder. It was just the hardest thing I'd done.

And so I've met still to this day, my best friend in the world. We talk to be a text almost every day. His name's Price Gibbons. He lives in California. He's the smartest guy I've ever met. We started a billing and collections company called Fraternal Finance Consultants. And between really price, but I helped a little and we figured out how to do automated billing at a time when there was no automated billing.

This was the early '90s. The internet was just barely getting used. The people were just barely getting URLs and email addresses. And here we were with a online, automated scannable billing service, and we applied it to fraternities and sororities. So it sounds like a good story again, but we had like the best, the Ferrari of billing services applied to this tiny little market at colleges.

And so we were doing a lot of the billing and collections for most of the major fraternities and sororities, especially like you go to a campus-like Miami of Ohio and every fraternity that was based there, every sorority that was based there, we were working with them. And at 21, we decided we couldn't scale enough because that market was so small and we've been working together for a while.

And there was a lot of water under the bridge and we needed a little break. So I sold the company to price. He sold a software solution to another guy in Orlando, and I moved out to Orlando to work with the company and make us software transition. And I made it eight months out of a 12-month contract and ended up in Orlando.

My whole network was in California. I was 21. I had dropped out of school. I didn't really know anyone. So I was in a place where I had no experience, no resources, no network, no nothing. And I got lucky. A friend of mine had introduced me to a guy named Richard Thall. Who's still in business.

Richard was a consultant who had an office in New York. He had an interview with Fuji Media, which is that's Global 100, that's big time. They have a blimp. And we went to the meeting and we were supposed to interview for New York and possibly Florida. Like we might be able to consult in Florida. And if, if we got Florida, I was gonna start a company work with Richard, run his Florida office, and grow a business.

And it was a long shot. And what happened was instead of going and getting New York, not Florida, we got Florida, not New York. So, Jonathan, I was 21 years old and for probably the third or fourth time in my life, I was deep into the pool and I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

Jonathan Levi: Hm. Incredible. And yet you persevered.

Alex Charfen: Let me tell you what happened when I was a consultant. And I don't know if this is a skill, but it's something that I train and I talk about constantly with CEOs today. That interview put me into a world where immediately I was dealing with the most intense entrepreneurs on the planet. People who move the world around like puzzle pieces, computer electronics, consumer electronics.

I first I started working with Fuji, then SanDisk, then Fuji digital. Then we worked with companies like Bose, Microsoft, Home Shopping Network, Walmart, Radio Shack. That was a lot. And I remember when I was in my first few meetings. But here I was this new role called consultant. And I knew I worked with my dad for a long time.

I had obsessive, we read about business. I knew the tactics of business and I understood some of what happened in relationships. But man, did people confuse me? Can you relate?

Jonathan Levi: Yup, definitely.

Alex Charfen: So I remember being in this meeting and I was in that place where I'm looking around the table and I'm thinking not one, person's talking to each other in here.

We're all saying stuff. There's no connection. I don't think this shit is going to work. Have you ever been in a situation like that, Jonathan, where everybody else is doing something and you're like what's going on?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: Okay. Well, the time before that I had felt that was in school. And I'm going to see if maybe you have a similar feeling, but I remember in school like sometimes the teacher would say something wrong.

Like they'd be reading, they'd use the wrong word, or they'd ask a question and I know the answer, but I knew that if I gave the answer, the whole class was going to make fun of me. Or there was just something that popped into my head where I was literally in my head saying, do not say this, do not say this. Do not say this. And then almost like I was watching someone else. I said it.

Do you remember having that happen to you?

Jonathan Levi: Definitely.

Alex Charfen: Okay. That happened on that day. And I said, Hey guys, I don't think this is going to work. Everybody really isn't communicating. And I think we need to take a step back address the fact that, that there's some tension in the room and some communication issues.

And then I think we should address this again because we're pretending like something's going to happen. It's really not.

Jonathan Levi: Right. Hot knife through butter.

Alex Charfen:  And I remember that the guy at the head of the table, his face flushed, it got red. And I thought, Oh, you know, like, shit, that's the important person in the room.

And I just pissed them off. And I remember he took this like really aggressive breath in, through his nose, and blew out through his mouth. And I remember thinking that's what guys do. Right. I did martial arts. I was a little older. And I remember thinking like right before the referee says, go, that's what guys are doing.

Like, he's about to take my head off. And he turned to me and he said, it's about time. Somebody says it. We're all sitting here glad-handing and pussyfoot, and it takes the kid in the corner who doesn't look like he shaves to say something. And from that point forward, shading you from that point forward, I was a trusted advisor.

Jonathan Levi: Brilliant.

Alex Charfen: And here's, what's so weird, Jonathan. The same skill. The same attributes, the same abilities that I had when I was in school, they got me made fun of told to sit down, shut up, sent to the principal's office, all of those things because when I corrected a teacher, I didn't get respect. When I said, Hey, I don't think this is going to work.

Nobody understands. I wasn't told, Hey, great job. But when I did that as a consultant, the most important people in the world pulled me close, put me on their jets, put me in the helicopters, and ask me for advice over and over again.

Jonathan Levi: So that's a big, big point, Alex, that I want to pull out, which is divergent thinking is a hugely underrated skill.

And also being the one person in the room who's willing to kind of step over these social boundaries.

Alex Charfen: I call it transparency. The more transparent we are as human beings. The more we are willing to let people know what's really going on for us. The more we say out loud, what we're actually feeling in factual terms, not talking about your feelings.

Cause that's just noise. Nobody wants to hear about your feelings. Totally. You know, if I had said that day, Hey guys, I'm feeling really confused and I'm feeling frustrated with everyone and I'm feeling irritated. They would've said shut the hell up. Yeah, but if we are transparent and we tell people what's going on and we state things transparently.

Factually and constructively, that's how you step into a leadership role in any room.

Jonathan Levi: That's huge. That's a huge takeaway for anyone in the audience listening right now. Write that down because I can speak to what Alex is saying here and also in my own businesses, the difference between success as a leader, success as a manager, even success as an underlaying or as an employee is how openly, how transparently are you willing to communicate?

And I've found that transfers also into personal relationships. I mean, a family is just an organization, like any other organization where people need to have their expectations and needs met and all that kind of stuff.

I think that's a huge, huge point on open communication.

Alex Charfen: Yeah. I mean, the transparency in personal relationships is a place where, you know, guys like you and I, and, and women like you. And I really screw up totally because we're bad at saying what we want. And we're terrible at telling people what we really want to have happen and what we need. And we suck at asking for help. Yeah. Yeah. My clothes

Jonathan Levi: You once were, you once where I had to learn it the hard way, you know, I had to build the bridge.

Alex Charfen:  But you know what I'm talking about?

Jonathan Levi: Oh yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And I like, you had to learn it the hard way as a young 20 something who thought I knew everything in my organization and no one felt that they could communicate openly enough to me that, Hey you little shit, you don't know what's going on on the ground level of the company, you know? So I've been there and I've definitely felt it.

Alex Charfen: You know, Jonathan, I'm at the place now where I would never say I was like that because here's what I've found. And this is maybe cautionary or maybe it's just me sharing my experience, my personal experience.

But each time that I've said, man, I've really got this communication thing wired. I'm really good at asking for help. I've really got my life grows and I suck again.

Jonathan Levi: Yup.

Alex Charfen: Does that make sense?

Jonathan Levi: Exactly. I've realized every time you think you're smart, the universe has a way of correcting you. Yeah.

Alex Charfen: Well, and if you're smart and if you're a contribution-based and you're doing the right things and you're growing a business and you're making a change in the world, the universe will continuously convince you you're not ready because this is a universal law of growth and scale.

Jonathan Levi: Totally.

Alex Charfen: If you want to grow or scale. You can't do so without daily behavioral change, daily.

Jonathan Levi: Totally. I heard a quote recently very recently, which is the most important thing is to be ready to let go of everything you are to become everything you could be. I think that's so profound and exactly that sense.

Alex Charfen: I have a process that I walk entrepreneurs through where I ask them, you know, when we get on the phone and I help them get clarity around their lives. And then one of the questions I asked them and I'll ask you, Jonathan, you know, how important is what you're doing right now to you?

Jonathan Levi: Whew. I would say about eight out of 10.

Alex Charfen: So what would make it a 10 out of 10?

Jonathan Levi: I think if I had my family life will get real open and transparent here and vulnerable. I think if I had my family life dialed in, then I would feel less guilty about working. And, uh, you know, I could focus more on that, but right now, every moment spent on work is a moment not spent on, you know, the things that quote-unquote matter in life. And I think matter at my current stage in life, which is building a family, building a home.

Alex Charfen: Do you have a family right now?

Jonathan Levi: I don't.

Alex Charfen: Do you have a significant other?

Jonathan Levi:  I don't. So if anyone in the audience is listening, you know.

Alex Charfen:  Jonathan is single. Oh, Jonathan is single. Late night, walks on the beach, a little bit of wine. Just kidding. So can I ask you a few more questions? Is that cool, Jonathan?

Jonathan Levi: Yes, sure. We can turn the interview around a little bit.

Alex Charfen: I helped a lot of entrepreneurs through this and I think it might help your audience too. Let's do it because I asked how important is what you're doing to you right now. And you said eight out of 10 because there's other things that are also important to you.

But I'll ask you where you're spending your time.

Jonathan Levi: Oh yeah. Inevitably I end up spending them on the easiest route, which is in work. You put more time into work. It's the path of least resistance.

Alex Charfen: And let's just make something clear. Then we know that this is right now, incredibly important to you. Probably more than an eight out of 10.

Jonathan Levi:  Probably. Yeah.

Alex Charfen: Is the contribution you're making is the difference you're making. When you get an email from someone that says you helped them out, what does that mean to you?

Jonathan Levi: A lot.

Alex Charfen: How much?

Jonathan Levi:  Phew, that's closer to a nine out of 10.

Alex Charfen: How important is it to you to have a family?

Jonathan Levi: That's 10 out of 10.

Alex Charfen: Okay. So here's what I tell entrepreneurs. Every time we get to a 10 out of 10. You can have it. All you have to do is be willing to change everything, you know? And here's why I say that it's not just me being theoretical or philosophical. If you don't have the relationship you want, if you don't have the business you want, if you don't have the family you want, you have not become the person who should have it yet.

And so when we're willing to make the behavioral change like I can hear in you, you're at that place where you're ready to make the change, right?

Jonathan Levi: Yup.

Alex Charfen: Okay. So I have a question for you Jonathan, to this point, how long has this relationship issue been? Something that's been bothering you?

Jonathan Levi:  A couple of years now? A few years.

Alex Charfen: Two years, maybe a little longer, right?

Jonathan Levi: Three.

Alex Charfen: Okay. And prior to that, it didn't bother you?

Jonathan Levi: Prior to that, I didn't have time to think about it.

Alex Charfen: So now it's something you have been thinking about for at least three years.

Jonathan Levi: Yep.

Alex Charfen: How's it going?

Jonathan Levi: Not very well.

Alex Charfen: So tell me what so far, just give me a kind of a description of what's happened so far in the last three years of thinking about this.

Jonathan Levi: I think just frustration, a series of kind of breakthroughs that weren't breakthroughs. And, uh, just a lot of like loss of hope, I think not in a fatalistic way, but in a kind of like, maybe I need to adjust expectations. To improve outcomes kind of way.

Alex Charfen: Yeah. Almost like a, maybe I'm being unrealistic as to what I could have.

Jonathan Levi: Totally.

Alex Charfen: Okay. So, so far, what have you been trying?

Jonathan Levi: Well, I mean, uh, I've tried hoof, all kinds of things, different types of people, different walks of life, different areas, different social circles, different approaches, different dynamics, different levels of intensity.

Alex Charfen: Okay. What are you looking for?

Jonathan Levi: A partner who inspires me, I think.

Alex Charfen: Okay. So here's what I do with entrepreneurs like us, Jonathan. A lot of the reason that we have a hard time pursuing the relationship we want finding the relationship we want. And by the way, you can answer business, whatever business or career or whatever it is is because we don't have a system or structure around what we're looking for.

Cause here's what I've already heard in our conversation. When you have a structure or a system you kick ass, right?

Jonathan Levi: I would say so. Yeah. Thank you.

Alex Charfen: Well, let me ask you a simple question. If a scoreboard is important to you, what position do you end up in?

Jonathan Levi: Uh, usually if I can control most of the factors, I mean, if it doesn't have to do with height or a kind of genetic outcome, then yeah. Usually close to this up.

Alex Charfen: If it's a fair game and the scoreboard is important to you, where are you?

Jonathan Levi:  Usually close to the top.

Alex Charfen:  All right. So we know that with a structure you can create forward momentum. You can find what you want and you can win. Here's the issue for every one of us. We don't have a structure around how to go out and find the relationship we want.

Jonathan Levi: Totally.

Alex Charfen: And when we create that structure and I've helped a lot of entrepreneurs with this, we have an online product called Awaken Your Superpower that goes through this framework, but here's a suggestion for you, Jonathan. It kind of skips towards the end, but this is a shortcut that I've had a lot of people through.

And anyone listening can do the same thing. If you're looking for a relationship, sit down and write the 10 things in the person that you're really looking for. And I want to make something clear, this isn't like, I want blonde hair and somebody who's the right height because that doesn't really matter.

Jonathan Levi: Right.

Alex Charfen: That'll take care of itself. And here's what I mean by that. You're not going to walk up to people you're unattracted to and say, Hey, is this a person for me? But Jonathan, just having listened to you. Don't you think the person who's going to end up with you needs to be somebody who's willing to maybe live a little bit different than the rest of the world?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: Okay. So that's maybe one out of 10, right. You know, if you can write these things out and get clarity around it that provides the basis, the beginning for the structure around how we bring these safeties into our lives.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah. I mean, I have written out a list. I think where I struggle to your point is you don't have a structure of like, okay, X number of new people that I need to meet and X amount of hours that I need to spend getting to know those people, but that is not really an indicator of success. So, you know, I can create KPIs in my business and say, we need to meet this metric.

We need to get this many new students. We need to reach this many downloads of the podcast, but it's a little bit harder to find determined set and actualize KPIs for human relationships, whether that's building out a social circle, whether that's building out a mastermind of other entrepreneurs, improving your family life.

I mean, it's not just a romantic issue. It's you can say, I need to spend 10 hours a week with my family, but that's not actually going to move the needle in terms of family satisfaction. If that's crap time in front of the TV.

Alex Charfen: Makes sense.

Jonathan Levi: I think that's interesting.

Alex Charfen:  For you, tell me, what are you looking for in this person? Give me an idea. Like you have a list, right?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah. Totally, ambition.

Alex Charfen: What does that mean?

Jonathan Levi: It means someone who's willing to interested in and probably already in the process of impacting many people's lives on a global scale.

Alex Charfen: That's different than ambition.

Jonathan Levi: Uh, is it?

Alex Charfen: Well, I mean, I know ambitious lawyers who have a 3% firm.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah. I guess that's true.

Alex Charfen: So you're looking for somebody and I think like maybe if you know, Oh, you're recording this, you can play it back to yourself, but write down someone who is looking at that because Jonathan, you know what happens. So tell me what else. That's a good one. What else?

Jonathan Levi: I would say a worldliness kind of being well-read, well-educated and not in the traditional sense of educated, but autodidactic, interested in expansion of self-knowledge. Wisdom.

Alex Charfen: So you're looking for somebody who's a lifelong learner.

Jonathan Levi: Absolutely. Yeah.

Alex Charfen: Who's passionate about improving themselves.

Jonathan Levi: Absolutely. Physically, mentally, spiritually, not just someone who's like a bookworm or a fitness geek, but like a well-rounded human being.

Alex Charfen: So you're looking for someone who wants to experience life to the fullest and is willing to do the work to get there.

Jonathan Levi: Absolutely.

Alex Charfen: So that's a good thing to write down. That's not everybody. And it's an easy question to ask upfront.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right.

Alex Charfen: So give me one more, one more. Let me help you clarify one more. Cause man, if you get to 10 of these, Jonathan, you start walking into every room with confidence.

Cause you're like, if she's here, I'll find her. And if she's not, I don't have to waste my time.

Jonathan Levi: I love it. I think the other thing is kind of a modern approach to what a family is, what a relationship is a modern and pragmatic approach. Like I have some kind of polarizing views on how families should be and what monogamy looks like, and if it works and things like that.

So open-minded and communicative to like the modern realities of what a relationship is, I think. And I'm not really sure what that means yet, but.

Alex Charfen: So define that a little bit more for me. Does that mean that it's somebody who is willing to work through the struggles in a different way than what you've observed in the past?

Jonathan Levi: Totally. Yeah.

Alex Charfen: How's it different?

Jonathan Levi: It's more communicative and more realistic and pragmatic. Yeah. I kind of, I don't believe that human beings are meant to be emotionally or physically monogamous in the sense, I think it's unrealistic that, you know, people are expected to love only one person and that can mean like a ton of boundaries and caveats, but I think we have to be realistic and pragmatic about it.

Alex Charfen: Are you open to, if you meet the right person and they affect you in a different way, that that could be a reality?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: Okay, cool.

Jonathan Levi: I'd be surprised, but I'd be open to it.

Alex Charfen: Is it fair that maybe you're looking for someone who doesn't have a concrete definition of what a relationship is, but they're willing to build it with you?

Jonathan Levi:  Precisely.

Alex Charfen: That's a good way. It's a good thing to put down because that's one that's really easy. So see what happens is. People like you and I, and I could hear it in your voice at the beginning of, you know, when I started asking you questions, we beat ourselves up a little bit. Cause we don't find success here. And we feel like we've tried everything.

Like, have you ever felt that? Like, what do I do? Yeah. So here's what we've never done. And this is what you just did, Jonathan. I want to congratulate you for doing it because you're doing it on your own podcast, which is,

Jonathan Levi:  It's a lot of vulnerability here, but we'll leave it in.

Alex Charfen: Here's what you just did. You just stated what you want and you know, what people like us suck at doing is stating what we want. Yeah. And when we do it more often than not, that's, what's automatically, almost magnetically attracted into our lives. I think things changed from you where you from this conversation forward.

Jonathan Levi: I'd love to see it. That would be a pretty impressive testimonial to your coaching skills, Alex.

Alex Charfen: Well, I have the confidence of experience that when somebody goes through even the slight thought process, you just did. It starts rattling around a whole new world of possibilities, doesn't it?

Jonathan Levi: For sure. It also doesn't hurt that thousands of people now know what I'm looking for.

Alex Charfen: It's like, we're, we're doing pretty well here for you.

Jonathan Levi: Amazing. So, Alex, I wanted to ask you. I mean what you do today, we didn't even cover that. But I think our audience probably realizes by now that you coach some of the top CEOs in the world. So let me ask a different question, which is what is your superpower and thank you by the way, for that incredible, like a side coaching session.

I really do appreciate it.

Alex Charfen: Oh my pleasure, man. My pleasure. I think you're a unique individual. And what I know about guys like you, Jonathan, is when you resolve the core issue in your life, like relationship, even when you commit to resolving core issue in your life, like relationship and define what you want.

That is the type of thing that makes everything in your life easier.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: And it gives you momentum everywhere because when you can shut off like the, I still not in relationship that meta pattern that is beating you up all the time, and you can say, Oh wait, I define that. I know what I want.

It'll come to me. That changes everything. So I'm sorry, I blocked out the question.

Jonathan Levi: No worries. The question was what's your superpower.

Alex Charfen: So I would have answered this in a bunch of different ways in the past. But I think today, my superpower is that I'm aware of where I have deficit and weakness and voids, and I become more aware every day.

And that in training systems and process around those, I can coach people who are like me and I can help people who are like me to create success in their lives. In the places where I'm good, where I'm good at what I do. And, um, I think that's the first one. And the second one is I think I have a unique ability to put people together in teams and partnerships and in associations that create a one plus one equals 11, not a one plus one equals two.

Jonathan Levi: Right. Incredible. Those are incredible superpowers. So let me ask you this then. Being someone who comes from the background of accelerated learning and also someone who's struggled with kind of quote, unquote learning disabilities and managed to find a way around them, how do you learn? I mean, do you feel that you have some different strategies or habits that have made you more effective than others when it comes to learning? I mean the skills that have made you so successful?

Alex Charfen: No question. I can give you my direct strategies for how I run my life today.

Jonathan Levi: Let's do it.

Alex Charfen: I don't look at forward learning as something that I proactively have to go do because I follow a different equation. I think that the majority of entrepreneurs out there today are walking around trying to fix themselves.

And it sucks. It makes me defensive and sad because I don't know of any entrepreneur in the world who's ever been able to fix themselves. Here's what I know. Every entrepreneur I've ever been around, every friend I've ever had, who has had 10 figure net worth or more is one of those people who leans into their strengths.

And who focuses exclusively on what they're good at, but it's hard to do that when you're going through life trying to survive. So I follow this path. The first thing that I do to work on my strengths as I lower pressure and noise every single day, that's how I learned. That's how I create progress. I make sure that I'm defensive about my schedule.

I don't have noise around me. I have the right people around me, the right, I go to the right places. I don't have things around me that bother me. If something triggers me, I move it out of my life or I resolve to figure out why. The second step is I asked for and I give protection and support to the people around me.

So I have a team and I, as transparently as I can ask for help on a daily basis and tell them what's going on for me. And that creates a state of, of growth and a state of learning and a state of experience that if you do those two things, you lower pressure and noise and you increase protection and support by transparently asking for it.

The third step of this process is that your strengths and abilities will just show. Jonathan, you know, this has happened to you.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: How many times in your life have you had a conversation? Been asked a question, said something, and walked away thinking where did that come from? Right. So this is how we become everything we can become.

This is how we become magical. And if anybody ever questions magical, when I refer to entrepreneurs, if Oprah Winfrey mentions your name, You're a millionaire that's magic. Yeah. If Elon Musk puts out a press release, the stock market moves that's magic. If Warren Buffett's sneezes in the right direction, billions of dollars are exchanged that's magic. Right?

Jonathan Levi: So then is your learning style around kind of, it comes from knowledge of self is what you're saying?

Alex Charfen: Absolutely. And here's the equation, Jonathan. Lower pressure and noise. Increase protection and support because the learning that happens there changes us as entrepreneurs. That is how we actualize.

We actualize by figuring out on a daily basis that we have the value and we should be asking for help. And it is okay for us to say what we want. And then our strengths and abilities will show. And if you lower pressure and noise, increase protection and support your strengths and abilities show, you can make your greatest contribution.

And here's how I define contribution. Cause sometimes when I'm talking about it, people get confused and they think that I run a charity. I've made billions of dollars from my friends. I've made tens of millions for my family and I help entrepreneurs grow and scale businesses beyond what they ever thought was possible.

And I've done that for my whole career. But here's what I know about contribution, capital flows to contribution. So when I talk about making your greatest contribution, I want you to make all the influence, all the affluence, and all the money you can because, in a capitalist system where there's the greatest contribution, you will always see the greatest capital.

Jonathan Levi: Absolutely. Absolutely. I love it. Let me ask you a tougher question, Alex, and I'm going to bite my tongue very intentionally on this one. Do you think entrepreneurship is for everyone?

Alex Charfen: No. No, I don't. Well, let me just tell you about the entrepreneurs I work with, Jonathan. I've had a very unique career and I've been around, um, some of the most unique people in the world.

I've sat down with Sylvester Stallone for a day. I got to hang out with Jack Lalaine. I met Suzanne Somers. I, you know, weird people, and I've gotten to meet and sit down and talk to and advise some of the most intense CEOs on the planet. And I don't think that being an entrepreneur is something you choose. The entire basis of my content, the entire basis of my belief system is that the entrepreneur is an entrepreneurial personality type because I think you and I are different than the rest of the world.

See, psychologists don't understand people like you and I, because they say things like there's extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. That means there's something external or internal that's motivating you, Jonathan. Watch, I can disprove that shit in one question. Can you turn it off?

Jonathan Levi: Nope.

Alex Charfen: Yeah. So psychology. They don't understand us. They call us stuff like hyperactive and obsessive and compulsive and all kinds of other bullshit, which is just a today translation for brilliant human being who changes the world.

Jonathan Levi: I love it. I love it. And yet there's a large percentage of people who you believe don't fit into that mold. And therefore shouldn't mess with entrepreneurship.

Alex Charfen: You want my theory?

Jonathan Levi: I'd love it.

Alex Charfen: Here's the theory. I don't think you and I are like everybody else. I don't think that what I'm saying is different. As in, you know, we need to like all hold our hands and say we're different. I think we need to admit that there is a type of person that is different than the rest and that today society systems don't help us. They break us down. Because the entrepreneurial personality type me, you, everyone that I like having around me is a physiologically sensitive momentum-based being that is highly reactive to constraint.

Is that speak to you, Jonathan?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: So we are compelled to go forward. We must go forward. We, we drive forward. And so when I look at society as a whole, when I look at the human species, I see kind of four different classes. And I think evolutionarily, this all makes sense. Let's go back to tribal times. In tribal times, we needed a big group of the population, especially as poorly designed as human beings are because we really are poorly designed for survival.

Like our young have to be carried around for years. Right. We can't really send for ourselves. We can't really run fast until we're in our teens. Like, let's be honest, with it, Jonathan.  We suck. Compared to any predator out there. We suck terribly. In fact, it's hard to find a predator where the human could win.

If the predator started growing on the same day. Is that fair?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: So how the hell did we do this? How did we make it to now? So there's a big percentage of the population that likes to take care of other people and they like to perform the activities of taking care of other people. You familiar with who I'm talking about?

Jonathan Levi: Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: This is, you know, nurses and the people who clean stuff and gardeners and, and they really do enjoy the satisfaction of helping other people with the tactics of assisting. Are you one of those people

Jonathan Levi: I'm not.

Alex Charfen: I mean, I can't stand that shit.

Jonathan Levi:  But I love to create shit.

Alex Charfen: I'm glad that they exist. Don't you?

Jonathan Levi: Oh, absolutely.

Alex Charfen: So the second type of people, second class is that people who like to talk about things and now evolutionarily, we needed the people to take care of stuff. We also needed the people who liked to talk about things because we didn't have written words. So we needed the person who would go from person to person talking about what was happening today.

You know who I'm talking about, right? Yeah. Like I get told about TV shows. I have no idea what people are talking about. I was just in St. Louis and people kept telling me about the game. I didn't even know what sport they were talking about. But they will tell you about the day, you know what I'm talking about, right?

Yeah. People who are saying, Hey, look at the weather. Like what the, what are you talking about? The weather. Yeah. But we needed them evolutionarily. And today they serve a purpose as well. Are you one of those people?

Jonathan Levi: Uh, I've learned to behave one of them.

Alex Charfen: You like small talk?

Jonathan Levi: No.

Alex Charfen:  You're not one of those people who quit joking around. Nice try Jonathan. I'm not like into that club. The third set and this is a set that if entrepreneurs are going to have conflict, we have conflict with these guys. This is why I say not everyone's a business owner because there's this group of people. I call them the memorizers, the rule-makers, the order takers, the people who want everything to be the same way, the ones who love the status quo, the ones who get on committees and make rules and want to put everybody in the right place.

Please make sure that your callers in the right direction, make sure you do shit the same way today than you did yesterday. And we don't want anything to change. And for Christ's sake, let's put some regulation around it to make it okay. You know who I'm talking about?

Jonathan Levi: Yep.

Alex Charfen: You, one of those people?

Jonathan Levi:  Absolutely not.

Alex Charfen: Often do you want to punch one of those people in the face?

Jonathan Levi: I've learned to appreciate them, but yeah.

Alex Charfen: You're better than me because when I was trying to get a piece of medical equipment onto a plane and the stewardess explained to me the regulation of what I should have done, and the fact that I had flown with it for months and nobody had ever said anything.

And then a half-hour later, she walked over to me with a rule book to show me in 12 point type how she was right. And I was wrong. Yeah, but evolutionarily, those people made sense. We needed people to make rules, to put things in order to organize, to make sure we had food for the winter. Right. So now, if you look at society as a whole, our tribe, our human tribe evolutionarily, we have the people that take care of people, the oral tradition, communication, the people who put things in order and make the rules.

What are we missing for a tribe to survive?

Jonathan Levi: I think people who push society forward.

Alex Charfen: In an evolutionary tribe. Those are the hunters. You, me, every great entrepreneur in history is an evolutionary Hunter. We wake up every day going on the hunt and we both know that every time you've had a kill, every time you've approached the finish line, every time a goal has clarified for you.

And you were finally crossing that line, it loses importance as you go over it because we are evolutionarily programmed to go right back on the hunt again. Yep. And so when I look at society as a whole, I think we are fundamentally different as entrepreneurs. We are the class of people who are meant to positively evolve humanity every single day.

And that's why we get up. And sometimes don't even sleep because we want to move things forward, to create progress, change the status quo and improve things for everyone. We are the hunters.

Jonathan Levi: So do you think people listening in the audience like. You think, you just know if you're an entrepreneur, are there people who are on the fence?

And if there are, how do they determine, you know, because society has made entrepreneurship so sexy. There's so many news articles about so many successful entrepreneurs and all these 17-year-old kids making millions, I've encountered a lot of people in my path who were like, yeah, I'm thinking about doing this entrepreneurship thing.

How do they know? I mean, you've worked with some of the world's most successful entrepreneurs. Like what would you tell to those people? What criteria would you give them that says, Hey, listen, you don't got what it takes? Like, let me save you some effort or I can make it.

Alex Charfen: So there's three awakenings of the entrepreneurial personality type.

And I already tested one with you. And two. So the first one is that you have the same innate motivation that Jonathan talked about, where you cannot turn it off. Cause that's not everyone. You can't be a toll collector and have it innate motivation. It doesn't work. So if you have that, you might be an entrepreneurial personality type.

I think you are. The second qualifier is, did you know you were different from everyone around you? And do you know, you're different because if you know, you're fundamentally different, then to me, that is a reflection to you that you are a part of our tribe, the entrepreneurial personality type, because the people who asked too many questions who want to press forward change the status quo are often isolated because we're so different.

And then the third qualifier, and here's the big one. You're the only one who can answer this. We call it the call of contribution. Are you hearing this voice in the back of your head that says, Jonathan, there's something more important here. There's something more for you, more for you to give more for you to be.

You should grow this bigger. You should do more. You should have more around you. You should make a greater contribution, change it, even bigger, make a greater debt in the universe. And that call of contribution can get so loud. It can be all you hear. Have you been there, Jonathan?

Jonathan Levi: Why do you think I'm single Alex?

Alex Charfen:  No shit. That's why I was single until I was 30.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah. Bingo. Cause it's like, you almost feel like you're betraying your nature.

Alex Charfen: You know what? Yeah. So you tell me if that's not how an evolutionary Hunter talks. Totally. If I'm not out making the kill and be trained who I am. Totally. So when somebody says, is everyone an entrepreneur, my answers no, but if you have those three awakenings, I don't care what you're doing right now.

You can succeed as one of us.

Jonathan Levi: Totally. I love it. Alex, let me ask you another question. I know we're coming up close to time. We've got a little bit more time, but let me ask if there are any other habits or behaviors, originals that you engage in that increase your performance or help you increase the performance of the people you work with.

Alex Charfen: Absolutely. I am a fanatic about rituals and behavior. And if you can't tell already, yeah. One of the most effective is water. Yeah, I know everybody thinks I'm crazy when I say that, but I've been coaching high productivity, high success, Hunter entrepreneurs, my entire career, some of the most successful on the planet.

And by the way, some that didn't even know they could be successful until they finally connected mind and body. And if you look at the last 6,000 years, not the last 150, cause it's all bullshit. But the last 6,000 years of medical research around water, And by the way, in a lot of ways, I consider the older stuff a lot better than the newer stuff, because all they want to do is sell pills now.

Jonathan Levi: Totally.

Alex Charfen: And so if you go backward in time, but water was a cure for just about everything, including things like stomach aches, depression, frustration, irritation, hyperactivity, headache, feeling jittery. Yeah. You know, if you look at the top 20 prescription drugs today, they treat dehydration. Right. They don't do anything else.

Besides dehydration, they have fancy names like ADD and Crohn's and bipolar and depression and all kinds of other crap. That's really a grouping of symptoms caused by the lack of water and the increase of toxicity in the body. So I have a program, it getthirstynow.com. We call it a 10-day natural thirst challenge, and I put it up.

It's free. Anybody can take it, doctors give it out to their patients. We have gyms that, give it out to people who go to the gym, because if you can start the habit. Of hyperhydration and really consuming enough water for you. You will connect mind and body in a way that you never thought possible, and you will see everything changed. To me, water is the gateway drug to long-term success.

Jonathan Levi: It's amazing. I actually really wanted to ask you about this. How does a, an online program get me to actually drink more water? Because I know I'm under-hydrated most of the time.

Alex Charfen: The challenge for most of us, Jonathan is that thirst is a very subtle instinct because evolutionarily survival wise, if you were walking around and you were an evolutionary Hunter and you hadn't seen water in two hours and you walked by a pond, it looked like it was safe.

What do you think you would do?

Jonathan Levi: Probably drink from it.

Alex Charfen: Do you think you'd drink like a couple sips?

Jonathan Levi:  Yeah, probably. I guess.

Alex Charfen: Have you ever seen a dog drink?

Jonathan Levi:  It's like a, a couple of laps, right?

Alex Charfen: Well, have you ever seen a dog drink? Because when a dog drinks, they just go to town, they'll finish a half a water bowl.

And the only species on the planet that sips is human beings. There's not another species that takes like little pecks at water. Every other species goes bananas and drinks, all the water they can until they don't want anymore. And what I think we've done as human beings is we've turned off our natural thirst instinct to hyper hydrate.

So there's three simple steps, and I know where I'm running out of time. But you can watch the program for all the scientific background, because it gives people like us, a lot of leverage, but step number one, when you get up in the morning, first thing, drink 16 ounces or more of water. I call that hyperhydration 16 ounces of water increases your metabolism. 30%.

It allows your body to detoxify. And when you drink more than 16 ounces of water passing through the thoracic cavity, it actually relaxes the upper body. This allows your body to actually release a little bit of dopamine. So you get an, a euphoric feeling off of hyperhydration. You tell me that evolutionarily, there's not some programming there that says drink water more often and drink a lot.

Jonathan Levi: Right.

Alex Charfen: And then the second thing you do, second thing all day, every day, this is a big one. Proximity to water. So rule number one, hyperhydration rule number two, have water with you all the time. My water bottle that's red is sitting right next to me. And if you ever see me speaking at a keynote on a broadcast, even on TV, it's always sitting right next to me because I will not hesitate to drink.

And that's the third rule. If you think, drink. If you so much as glance at a water bottle, go drink, hyper hydrate. Here's what happens, Jonathan? I've taken people who drink as little as no water a day, or maybe a couple of glasses a week and they get up into the two, 300 ounces a day. And yes, you pee a lot.

However, you experience a new level of mental clarity and physiological momentum that you just never have before.

Jonathan Levi: Brilliant. Okay. I like that. And I have to admit, I'm pretty surprised that that is not a tip that has come up. I don't think ever, I mean, the hyperhydration everyone talks about like, make sure you're drinking enough water.

No one talks about like, just go for broke with it. And you know, we've done 80 something episodes. So that's a nice takeaway for the audience. Alex, I want to transition into the kind of closing questions. I feel like we're going to have to have you back on the show because I feel like you have so much wisdom to share but talk to me about books that have impacted you.

Alex Charfen: The biggest impact any book has ever had is Think and Grow Rich. Okay. When I was younger, I read that book and I think that it's the most often purchased, but fewest red book in the world, because I talk to people all the time. Have you read, Think and Grow Rich? They say, yeah. Then I asked two questions.

They happen. Yeah. It is a difficult book to read. I know it's a struggle. I've read it hundreds of times. And I have so much feeling around that book. My wife actually bought me a first edition so I can read it in the original text. Wow. If you commit to that book, it'll change your life. Another one is How To Win Friends And Influence People.

Jonathan Levi: Yeah. I knew it. I knew it. I was going to say you're exhibiting all the Dale Carnegie isms.

Alex Charfen: It's so simple. You know, it's just so easy to follow what Carnegie put down. Cause here's what I think Carnegie was. I think he was like the worst communicator in the history of the world, just like you and I were when we were younger and he said, Oh shit, I've got some strategies that are working.

And he started writing them down. Totally. And if you apply them people like you.

Jonathan Levi: Totally. It's my favorite.

Alex Charfen: I never had people like me before, but it was the first textbook my kids ever got for homeschooling.

Jonathan Levi: That's brilliant. It was spot on like it assessing. I was like this guy's Dale Carnegie ng me.

Alex Charfen: There's no question. There's no question. And you know why it's just the right way to treat people because you can maintain momentum in a conversation with someone.

Jonathan Levi: That's the thing, like, if it's authentic, it's not gimmicky, right? Like people really like when you smile at them, like try it.

Alex Charfen: Yeah. And then I'll give you a third one, and this one's a little obscure, but man, it's such a good one.

It's called The Highest Goal. And it was written by Michael Ray and he's a professor at, it was a professor at Stanford and he taught the Stanford Creativity Project. And I like reading books that have the right reason they were written. And this book was written because so many people who had gone to these creativity classes, like Jeff Bezos from Amazon and Larry, Alison, and all of these incredibly wildly successful CEOs begged Michael Ray to write the book about the Creativity Project so that people could go through the same framework on their own.

And dude, if that is a dense book, the highest school is hard to read, but every chapter is like six months of life lessons. And when I finally read that and really internalized it and did all of the work, it changed everything for me.

Jonathan Levi: All right. That's a huge endorsement. I'm going to need to read that one cause I actually haven't even heard of it.

Okay. Alex. I want to ask our semi closing question, which is you've given us a ton of huge, actionable takeaway information here, but let's assume people are only able 10 years from now to remember one thing that you talked about or they take away one thing, even if it's a new thing, what would you hope that that would be?

Alex Charfen: There is nothing wrong with you and you are not alone. People like you and I for our entire lives have felt judgment. We've felt isolated. We felt different. We felt confused. We've even had our confusion mistaken for anger. We've even raised our hand and ask for help and been told to sit down and be quiet.

For everyone who's ever felt like you were different or isolated or alone. I want you to go through a simple exercise and think back through history, whether it's today, current, or anyone in history that you remember anyone in history that matters to be remembered. And I want you to know that they were just like us and it doesn't matter how different or how alone you felt.

You're a part of that club.

Jonathan Levi: It's brilliant, Alex. Thank you so much. Has been such a pleasure chatting with you today. I'm sure it's not the last time we're talking. And if our audience wants to get in touch with you, learn more about you, where would you like us to send them?

Alex Charfen: They should go to Facebook and they can check out. The Entrepreneurial Personality Type group. And what we have on that group is where I put a bunch of our stuff. I put our newest videos. I put the newest information. There's about 5,000 entrepreneurs in there. It's an incredible group. And then also we set everyone up with a free download of my book, the Entrepreneurial Personality Type.

It will teach you more about yourself. It will help you stop limiting behaviors and create momentum. And you can go to charfen.com. My last name CHARFEN.com/becomingsuperhuman, one word. And, uh, we set that up for you, Jonathan. So the next time I come on, we've already got it.

Jonathan Levi:  Brilliant. I'm looking forward to it already, brother.

Alex Charfen: Thank you so much, man. This has been a true pleasure.

Jonathan Levi: Absolutely. Absolutely. Pleasure was all mine. Alex, you take care.

Alex Charfen:  Talk to you soon, man.

Jonathan Levi: All right, SuperFriends that's it for this week's episode. We hope you really, really enjoyed it and learn a ton of applicable stuff that can help you go out there and overcome the impossible.

If so, please do us a favor and leave us a review on iTunes or Stitcher. Or however, you found this podcast. In addition to that, we are always looking for great guest posts on the blog or awesome guests right here on the podcast. So if you know somebody or you are somebody, or you have thought of somebody who would be a great fit for the show or for our blog, please reach out to us either on Twitter or by email or email is info@becomingasuperhuman.com. Thanks so much.

Closing: Thanks for tuning in to the Becoming SuperHuman Podcast. For more great skills and strategies, or for links to any of the resources mentioned in this episode, visit www.becomingasuperhuman.com/podcast. We'll see you next time.