How Your Upbringing Impacts Success | Richard Friesen

Richard Friesen  00:00

One of my clients, when he made a trade with his son, he would just go into a panic. Turns out it was the same visceral panic is when his father came home drunk late at night, he would hide under the bed for fear of getting screamed at or beaten.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  00:13

Hey, Good morning, and Welcome to another episode of Better Business, Better Life. Today, I’m joined by Richard Friesen, who is the author of a book called A Private Conversation with Money. And I’ve just been talking to Richard who’s based over in the US in Silicon Valley, about his past and his history. And it’s a fascinating stories, I can’t wait for us to share his story as well, things that he’s actually done. Welcome to the show.

Richard Friesen  00:35

It’s so good to be here. I’ve listened to a couple of your podcast and I just love the way you develop conversations and letter flows. So I’m really excited to see what we’re going to discover. And by the way, pushback or disagreement sometimes creates some interesting things. So feel free to get aggressive if you want.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  00:58

Okay, I’m not sure it’s my natural nature to go. Thank you. I like having the permission to do that at least. So you’ve just been sharing a bit of your story with me, I’d love for you to share it with the listeners, because it hasn’t all been highs. Right? We’ve had a little bit of a few challenges along the way, shall we say? And where you are now is not where you started either. So really keen to hear that.

Richard Friesen  01:15

Yeah. So I think that the real awareness that woke me up was in 1995, I had left a trading firm, and with all the capital and everything, and I’ve been on my own, and I started the first year I made $125,000. Second year, I made 150 175 202 100 Again, and it was April of 1990 95. I was awakened in the middle of the night by a voice. And it said, rich, you’re only worth 200,000 a year. I woke up looked around, there was nobody else in the room, my wife was still sleeping peacefully beside me. And I got up dressed and I went to the floor of the Pacific exchange where I was the independent market maker I was on my own. I got there so early, the doors were still locked, I sat on the concrete steps between those huge, you know, massive pillars. And I thought about my life. And I thought about that voice and what it said to me. And I realize now with hindsight, as I work with entrepreneurs, traders, professional money managers, that we all have these voices and these internal conflicts that we have. So when the doors open, I did what I normally do, I stood at the back of the trading pit for those of you not familiar with trading pits, is you don’t own a spot. It’s usually the best spots are held by the toughest, the meanest, the most well capitalized the guy on the social hierarchy. And I always stood at the back has rich reason. You know, he’s philosophy majors, they call these, he’s not really aggressive. But I decided from that voice that I It no longer suit me. So I stood right in the best spot in the front between the two busy brokers and the book staff. So I stood in that spot. The other market makers came in. The guy who always stood there stood beside me watching the clock tapped me on the shoulder before the bell went off. I didn’t move. So there was a pushing match back and forth. And we were warned a $10,000 Fine. If we got into a fight, the rest of pit went, Ooh, what’s going on here. And I stood there and when the bell went off, and I don’t know if you’ve ever seen movies of trading pits, I’m gonna move back from the microphone. I went up by 50 Certainly 100 by 20 soul bio, it was the pit thought I had gone crazy. But what actually happened was a mindset shift. That said, I am done with my own internal limitations. I went on to build a trading firm. And about a third of the traders just took off we had a system a method it worked. Well. A third of them did, okay. But a third of them didn’t seem to make money. And I thought what if just What if these traders had the same internal limitations or different limitations than I had? I brought in a hypnotherapist, and we discovered a whole number of things we can go into them if there’s time. But what we decided they discovered was they had their internal limitations and their own messages and their own internal net worth. So then that has led me to where I am now to write in my book A Private Conversation with Money to invite people to grow rapport with money, meaning and success.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  04:53

Okay, so we’ve gone from running we know successful trading firm, with eight traders you work with them all obviously to change their mindset, I’d love to hear what what are the common things that you found out in terms of what creates this self limiting belief around money for us,

Richard Friesen  05:08

Oh my gosh, right now we have cultural beliefs in the US, you know, we have a very divided culture, that around politics, economics, money, wealth. And if we internalize both sides of that, we end up turn realizing, internalizing this conflict. And as a result, we tie up our energy, and our vision, and our message and our methods. So that we’re constantly criticizing ourselves, we have from growing up, we have beliefs that, you know, money doesn’t grow on trees, or wealthy people are evil, or, oh, when we have it, you spend it or money is energy, we just keep it flowing. So we have all these different beliefs, some of them are helpful, some of them not so much. So by becoming aware of them, you know, for example, with my traders, like one of them grew up dirt poor in West Virginia, which is a poor place in the US, and large families, cousins, uncles, aunts, you know, the whole extended family around this culture of poverty. And when he started to make money, he realized that he would be excommunicated from his family. So how did he solve it just not make money. Another trader had a younger brother, who was severely handicapped physically, and needs a lot of medical care and stuff. And he had always been jealous of his brother, because his younger brother got all the attention, of course. So he knew if he make money, his mom would come for him to get money to take care of his little brother, and his resentment was so deep, how did he solve it, not make money. And there were other examples of that. So by bringing those things into awareness, then we can decide now I had the, the voice in the middle of the night that was accidental. So my mission now has been how do we create a process that takes it from an accidental voice, to a very deliberate process, where people can examine become aware of and make a decision from a higher level, about how they want to relate to money, meaning and success.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  07:24

It’s interesting, I know that over here in New Zealand, we actually have a what we call the tall poppy syndrome. And so even those of us who perhaps have decided we do want to do, you know, take it to our highest power and do whatever the best we can do. There are a lot of people who love to kind of chop you down and pick on you if you have the nice car or the nice house or whatever it might be. So is that exist in the US as well?

Richard Friesen  07:48

We have a division here. And the division is around what we are meaning comes from, and if in fact you say I am an individual, I am going to create value for others. And I am going to make money from that value. This one point of view, another point of view is there’s a one pie model, there’s only so much money to go around. If you have more, somebody else has less. So those are, you know, at the foundation, two very different approaches to how we live our economic life. So one of the concepts in my book and reframe is that we re named money, certificates of appreciation. So Debra, you give me a service that I appreciate, I give you a certificate of appreciation. i You do a service for me. And I give you the certificates, I do a service for you, and you give me certificates of appreciation. Now, here’s the part that a lot of people have blows their brains and the more certificates of appreciation that I collect, the more value I’ve delivered to the world. Now once you reframe it like that, then all of a sudden we can say out, how can I deliver more value to the world? Do I need more knowledge or skills? Do I need to shift beliefs? Do I need new behaviors? Who am I you mentioned I think was the imposter syndrome? You know, who am I rich have reason to be able to deliver value to the world. And once we start looking at it from that and then looking at receiving certificates of appreciation, all of a sudden all this internal conflict, the cultural the stuff from our parents, from our peers, all of a sudden that melts away And we have rapport with money and meaning.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  10:04

Now, I should imagine for some people listening, that all sounds a wee bit scary, right? Because it sounds like going to account so it’s going to kind of unpeel all the layers of an onion and get right to the root cause of who you are. And, and that might scare some people. But what is the process that you go through to actually help people get to that? And is it scary?

Richard Friesen  10:24

Yet, it is viewed as scary. Yeah, I think you’re absolutely right, that when we look at it from the outside, it’s scary. However, my process is to invite them into a mindset that feels better, gets them to their goals, and honors their values. So if we look at as an invitation to step into something that feels better, then we can actually start to make some progress. So if I have a client, and he’s struggling with something, or she is struggling with something, and then they all of a sudden go, oh, wow, that feels better. Bingo, than we know we’re making progress. So at the start of that process, I have what I call the golden keys. The first is awareness. So I’ll do a little example right now. So how am i right now I notice my stomach’s tight. My breathing is a little shallow. My right arm hurts a bit from stressing that the other day. My thighs are a little tight. Okay. The next step of the Golden Keys after awareness is acceptance. Okay, I do I beat myself up for being a little tense and being Oh, excited with Debra being right here with me being on the program, whoa. Or do I say, okay, that’s normal. And that the third then is to say, Okay, now what do I want? from awareness to acceptance, I now can go to agency and the agency says, What would I like? I would like to have a wonderful conversation with Debra while I’m relaxed. I’m breathing easily. So I’ve just made an example of the shift that I make with a golden keys.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  12:12

It’s beautiful. Okay, so it’s about, first of all, being aware of what is actually going on, accepting that it’s perfectly normal, and not to be scared by it. And then the agency, which is thinking about what do you really want, and shifting your energy and your behavior as opposed to to focus on what

Richard Friesen  12:29

You’re exactly right. You just nailed it.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  12:32

Beautiful. Okay. And so, I know that you started this work with the traders on the floor. But this can apply to absolutely anybody can tell I mean, any entrepreneur, they don’t have to be a trader, they don’t have to be in that particular field.

Richard Friesen  12:46

Well, the value of traders is that you get instant feedback. There’s no question, okay. Whereas if you’re practicing to be a dentist or a lawyer, or you’re with clients, I mean, the feedback loop sometimes can be even years. And sometimes it’s so complex, you don’t get it. So the value of starting with traders is I have clear steps. And so as a result, we end the human brain works the same way, you know, whether you’re trading or an entrepreneur dealing with business challenges. And so if we can develop that awareness, that acceptance, and then ask what we want, we can then even move forward in, in actually, I’ve had clients who say, the work that we’ve done on trading or on my entrepreneurship, as translated job, better relationship to my wife, and kids or husband and kids.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  13:44

Okay, so what’s the biggest kind of hurdle you come up against when you’re working with people to help them to change their mindset about money?

Richard Friesen  13:53

The biggest surprise that I had, that I was not anticipating, was being comfortable with success and wealth. Typically, a trader will start to make money, we’re working together, they go up, up, up, and then all of a sudden, they’ll go boom, and they’ll give away, you know, months worth or weeks worth of progress. I’ve had a client who was building a business to be sold, it was a heating, air conditioning business. And he knew who he was a national firm he wanted to sell it to, he needed he knew their criteria. And so he worked for several several years. Building the business for that. They got interested, they were negotiating the sale the business is goal right? And he started nitpicking and he started sabotaging the sale. So we looked at it, and it turned out that in his subconscious messages are you weren’t worth it? You you’re going to be responsible for a lot of money and you’ll probably blow it, you now are going to be in a different social strata, because this amount of worth is going to put you out of your current social strata. And so all those things, so we started to sabotage it. But again, we go back to awareness, acceptance. And then what do you want? And so once we got the issues down, in terms of what his subconscious fears were, and brought them up, then we could deal with them all. And then he could step in, and he successfully sold the business.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  15:35

Wow, that’s great. So there can be a huge element of sabotage. And I suppose actually just thinking about that, it’s really true, right? Because if you’re going to be lifted up into a different, we’ll call it a class system in the UK, we don’t have that quite so much over here in New Zealand, but it still exists. In some respects. That’s really kind of nerve wracking for people, isn’t it? Because that’s a potential change for their entire life. And they’re not sure how to deal with that. So I mean, apart from the fact that they don’t to accept that this is what’s going on how, what else can you do to make yourself feel comfortable?

Richard Friesen  16:06

Well, what you’re pointing out is so important, and I’m so glad you brought it up, is we’re clan animals, when you know, are when we were evolving on the plains of Africa, and you are out kicked out of the clan, or you’re by yourself, you died. And so as a result, we have a very deep neurological need to be part of something. And you, you know, you think of used to be, and you can give me some British flavor for it. But it used to be you’re in a small town, you had all your extended family there, you knew your role in life, and everything was pretty well was just prescribed, because you were part of it. And we look at the, you know, families are no longer what they used to be, there’s less extended families, less kids, we can go to one job or another job, or religion in the US, you know, participation has dropped significantly. So, you know, what do we belong to on I see sports fan, I see these fans, you know, all make up and, and yelling and screaming at the same time, that’s a real bonding experience, you’re part of something, we all need to be part of it. And if on one hand, you have a goal of wealth and success, and on the other hand, you don’t recognize how you can still be part of the human race and part of a particular clan or culture. And you don’t recognize that, then you do the self sabotage. So I’m really delighted you brought that up, because that is something that we can all look at. And once we’re aware of, then we can start to make better decisions.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  17:50

Now, it’s really cool, because we write, we’re losing a lot of those structures, aren’t we that we’ve traditionally had. I mean, I’m originally from the UK. And I grew up in a little village where everybody was very close by my my family, everybody was close by and friends, I actually had friends had never ever left England, you know, that was their entire life, I was quite fortunate to kind of travel a lot. But it meant that I haven’t necessarily had quite so many of those, those formal structures, I think that means that I can adopt or adapt to change a little bit easier than some other people can, but only because I’ve had a lot of experience of it. Okay, so we have to be really clear about you know, what we want. And we have to make sure that we don’t self sabotage, and that we understand why we might do that. And therefore, you know, put in place some measures that can help us not do that. But I’m just curious, because life hasn’t always been sort of a bit of roses for you had them and you built a very successful trading company. And then you started with a software company. If I’m right, then that software was about electronic trading. So based on the experiences you had on the floor, and of course, you then went through what a lot of people went through, which was the.com, bubble burst. And what what happened to you then and how did you deal with that? And what what effect did that have on your beliefs around money as well?

Richard Friesen  18:59

This is a real personal question. And I think that if I go back and look that, you know, I sold my trading firm, I started I saw the end of the floors, I saw everything was going and go to electronic trading, I started trading firm. The one of the biggest mistakes I made, and I look back on it is building something really big. I got VC funding spent $25 million to build this wonderful, generic box for trading almost everything. And I got too far ahead of my customers. I mean, right now electronic trading, I mean, that’s just part of the world. But at that time, I didn’t have a connection to my customers. So now that you know, there’s a process called minimal, viable products. MVPs and I realized that I have the capability of envisioning a future and in fact, I’ve got 10 patents that are now used by almost all trading companies and brokerage firms in the world. And that was because I could envision this future. But the negative of of being able to vision the future is that it’s so easy then to disconnect from current needs current pain, current desires of clients. And I did get ahead and when the.com collapse happened to all my customers evaporated, and the VCs were not interested in funding us anymore.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  20:32

Wow. Okay, well, that was a bit a bit of a bit of a shock. I mean, how did you cope with that one

Richard Friesen  20:36

No, what’s interesting was, I was looking back, especially as a therapist, I was depressed. But it’s such a, you know, go get them, let’s okay, we’re bouncing, we’re gonna go go, Yeah, I was covering it up by trying to have some some artificial energy, and trying to just make it work and whatever. When the inside there was something that was really broken, because my expectation was my wife’s expectation was this was it. Okay, so now we could plan this next stage of our life for wealth, and then look how we can, you know, make our family the world and, and change our approach to the world rather than providing value through commercially, how can we provide value elsewhere. And when that collapses, and you know, going back to near zero, then that meant rebuilding, and I don’t think I fully recognize the impact. And it took a couple of years, before I was willing to come to terms with that. And if I look back, I wished I would have had a mentor who could have helped through that process much sooner,

Debra Chantry-Taylor  21:46

I can say is one of the things if not ask, I know that I know. And I’ve had a couple of you know, business successes and a couple of pretty horrific failures as well. And they do affect you, because it’s gonna knock your confidence, it’s gonna knock a hole, as you said, You’ve planned for this life ahead of you, that then suddenly changes. The biggest thing I had was in the first one, I don’t think I had anybody around me to help me through it or even helped me see what was going on. The second time around, I was fortunate to actually have, you know, somebody who was able to call it a bit wee bit quicker, and actually helped me through it. And I think sometimes, we’re really afraid to ask for help, because we think that will make us look weak. But in actual fact, people love to help. And also, it meant that I got to get through that more easily by having those that supporting help. So yeah, mentors are important.

Richard Friesen  22:32

And because we tend to repeat our survival processes, so you know, so if we grew up, good, Hong Kong, my clients, we can go back to processes that they created when they were 5,6,7. You know, for example, one of my clients, when he made a trade, all of a sudden, he would just go into a panic mode. Well, it turns out it was the same visceral panic is when his father came home drunk late at night, he would hide under the bed, for fear of getting screamed at or beaten. So, so we created a survival process of hiding and his repeat for trading was, I’m just ignoring this trade that’s going against. We’re going to hide from it. So we have under the bed, leave, it’ll be fine. Yeah. So we have survival patterns that we repeat over and over again, and I’ve ferreted out most of these in my life. But still, I find they get triggered. And occasionally I’ll go back to an old survival pattern, even if it doesn’t serve me. But now, I’m aware of it much sooner. So that’s always helpful.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  23:49

So it comes down to sort of being able to have that awareness because we are all going to get triggered, right? As humans, whether we like it or not, I’d love to think that I’m perfect, but I get triggered quite regularly is it but if you can actually recognize it, be aware of it, then you can do something with it is when we’re completely oblivious to it that we actually come to

Richard Friesen  24:05

an awareness without judgment, we can say, okay, oh, I’m aware right now, that you know, I got triggered or I’m really angry or that I made a hasty decision. Oh, that’s interesting. A wonder what’s going on? That’s fascinating. Ah, okay. I can see how that came about. That is so much different. Say, don’t be rich, freeze, and don’t ever do that, again, cotton dirty, what are global? And the other argue, I’ll sit to pretend you be. So you know, that’s awkward. It’s not helpful. But if we go oh, that’s fascinated. I did that again. So that’s the part of acceptance that I think is really important.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  24:54

But that’s going to be difficult for some people, isn’t it in terms of imagine because that inner critic is such a strong voice. We send out by heads, you know, that’s where the imposter syndrome comes from. That’s where, all the time you know, we actually, if we ever spoke to other people, like you spoke to ourselves, I think we’d be ostracized but find it, you know, we really cruel. We’re really cruel to ourselves. So how does one overcome that inner critic? How do you actually tame them all? Or maybe that’s not the right word. But how do you actually have that, that that raw, meaningful conversation with the inner critic rather than having its sheet screaming at you about how stupid yeah,

Richard Friesen  25:29

There’s a number of exercises, one of them is I have my client, take a big jar, I’ve done this myself, go to the bank, get $101 bills. And every time you hear that toys, boom, you put a bucket? I tell you, that $100 can go really fast, sometimes in a day. Another technique I use, I’ll say, may I have a conversation with your inner critic? Huh? What? Okay, you have a name for the inner critic. Oh, no. Critic. Okay, let’s call them critic, may I have a conversation with critic? Okay. Well, hello, critic, this is Rich. Bob has given me permission to talk to you. And I’d like to have a discussion with the understanding that you have a positive intent for Bob, is that right? And amazingly, that voice will come? Yeah, I have a positive intent for him. What’s that positive intent? To keep him moving to make sure he doesn’t make mistakes? He just can’t make mistakes. If he does these, then the world will think less of them. So we then start to have this conversation. So your job is critic is improve his life? Is that right? How is that work so far? far? We’ve learned a real critical thing. Oh, not so good. Okay, how would you like to do a better job. And then we talked about different ways he can talk to Bob, your four ways that he can use his positive intent. So always going back to the positive intent, and then creating better methodology. Love it. Okay. Back to the positive intent. Now, I know that you have got so many things that you can actually share. And I know what you’ve also got an online course as well, if you’ve never looked at, but I guess from a practical point of view, I love to share, you know, three tips or tools that the listeners can actually take away and start putting into play straight away. Would you mind sharing those?

Richard Friesen  27:31

Sure, I have my smartphone, I set an alarm. Work, it can be every hour or every five minutes. And then I just noticed, what is my physiology. So again, right now I notice it, shoulders a little tight. So I just do what we call our Seth’s course sensations, emotions, thoughts, I look at my physical sensations Am I judgmental, and I critical of myself and my feeling bad? Good. And then I look at the quality of my thoughts, you know, what, what are they? Are they supportive? Are they judgmental? And so I can just do that every hour. So that would be one thing. So the next thing then is, can we come to the point of acceptance. And in terms of business, there’s just all sorts of things we just haven’t had time to talk about. But how we’re delivering value, how does that relate to meaning in our lives, because if we’re just working to have a fancier car, trophy spouse, bigger house, you know, social standing, eventually, the energy just takes and we don’t have that inner rapport, that means we’re just fighting ourselves, and we’re going to exhaust ourselves. And that’s why I know there’s so many studies come out that anxiety, stress, and our internal conflicts are increasing with, you know, with this generation. So, and the other thing is to ask yourself, well,

Debra Chantry-Taylor  28:57

So that so you’re talking, you’re talking about sort of connecting to your kind of deeper purpose, because you know, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to have a nice house or a nice car, but that shouldn’t be the motivator as such, it’s like, well, you know, how to add value to the world.

Richard Friesen  29:08

So if I’m trying to fill a hole in my heart, and to prove that I’m somebody that’s very different than I’ve delivered value, and now I can take the money that is a representation of that value and create a wonderful life for myself. So if, you know people are interested, they can check into the free online course. In fact, you can go to conversations dot money, slash Debra D, E, B, R A. And there’s a I’ll give your listeners have a free online course. And they can go along with a book that they can also get online, private conversation with money. And of course, I’m always available for people who want a more extensive conversation.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  29:54

So do you actually work with individuals to actually help them overcome these things? Obviously, what your causes in your book but you Dealing with individuals and helping them know. So

Richard Friesen  30:01

I have private coaching practice. And we work we use different metrics to measure we use. What I call hotseat work where we just didn’t present time was like, right now I can say, you know, what’s my physical sensations? Oh, my stomach still tight. We do that. And we look at their decision process and the mindset that they’re in while they’re making decisions, if they if you can just step back for a minute, and say, Okay, what’s my mindset? Before I’m making this decision? A lot of mistakes can be avoided.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  30:37

Okay, great. So we’ve got a number of things there. So I mean, we’ve talked about the golden keys, which is obviously really key to sort of becoming aware acceptance of the agency. We’ve talked about sort of, you know, connecting with your personal why. So why why do you actually exist? And what are you trying to do? And I think one of the things I like to think about is, you’ve got to put the oxygen mask on yourself, and ensure that you’re able to look after yourself before you can really add value to others. I think sometimes we forget that. But being really clear about the value that you bring, and again, changing that, that thing around, you know, rather than it being money and being driven by money, it’s certificates of appreciation. So you offer value, and I pay you in with a certificate of appreciation. And that’s all good. We’ve talked about setting your smartphone up to actually listen in and see how you’re feeling and certain times in the day. And then what was the third one that we mentioned? Not just him? I wrote that down, but I’ve looked can’t read my handwriting. Right.

Richard Friesen  31:33

That’s terrible. But there’s so much we could go into.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  31:37

There is so much Yeah. So. But anyway, so that

Richard Friesen  31:41

I think the for the foundation is a personal awareness. And that’s where it starts. Yes.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  31:48

Yep, completely agree. And so your book conversation, a private conversation with money, you can find that obviously, through Amazon and all the usual places. And what if people want to get in contact with you, Richard, if they want to get in contact you personally? How are they going

Richard Friesen  32:04

rich@mindmuscles.com. Or r i c h @mindmuscles.com.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  32:10

That’s fantastic. I look, we could probably talk all day, I always love you know, what I love about being a podcast, is I get to meet the most amazing people. And I also get to add an extra book to my collection every single time I talked to somebody. So I’m gonna go ahead and get that book myself, I think it’s gonna be really helpful. And I have a big library here that I share with my clients as well. So thank you very, very much for being so open. And for sharing, you know, not only the good stuff, but the the challenges you’ve been through and how you overcome them. I really appreciate that that level of vulnerability.

Richard Friesen  32:36

Debra, I appreciate the open ended conversation, the invitation to just step into a conversation that is shared, what you’ve shared and what I’ve shared together. ,And I really appreciate your your professionalism.

Debra Chantry-Taylor  32:53

Well, thank you. That’s great. Hey, look, as I said, if you go to conversation, stop money forward slash Debra, which has very kindly given you a free online course that you can actually do which companies by the book, you can reach out to Richard himself. And I think this is just I think this is a really important conversation. I know a lot of people struggle with this. A lot of people struggle with the imposter syndrome, the the tall poppy syndrome, all these things that are sort of thrown at us in our life. And this is a chance to actually explore that into how can I change my the way that I feel about money and what I can do with it. So Richard, thank you for your time.