Entrepreneurship, Social Media Top 100 and Wealth Creation with John Mendez

Today I'm joined by John Mendez, a serial entrepreneur, realtor, investor, and social media expert. John shares his insights on leveraging social media for personal and professional growth, while maintaining a healthy mental diet. He offers tips on wealth creation, including the significance of finding mentors, essential reading for financial education, and the importance of a supportive community. John also discusses the role of intermittent fasting in maintaining health and introduces his mission to help non-tech-savvy individuals enhance their online presence. Tune in to learn how to achieve financial freedom and live your dream life.

Get free access to John's classes at https://www.stopandstare.media/learn
Get John's free guide to getting started as an entrepreneur at bit.ly/walk2wealthgift

Transcript

Magic Barclay: 0:42

Welcome back to A Magical Life. I'm your host, Magic Barclay. And today, John Mendez joins us. He's a serial entrepreneur, a realtor, investor, podcast and social media expert, John is deeply passionate about helping other like minded individuals achieve a life of abundance. Through the power of the mind and social media, John Mendez is empowering others to obtain financial freedom and build the lives they've always dreamed of living. Welcome, John.

John Mendez: 1:18

Hey, thank you so much for the opportunity. I'm super excited to be here and just super excited to, you know, see where our conversation takes us.

Magic Barclay: 1:25

And I'm super excited that you're here also. I guess something I want to just come straight out of the box. And ask you is in a world where social media seems to tell us what's right, what's wrong, what's acceptable in society and what's not. How can we keep it at arm's length, but also benefit from it?

John Mendez: 1:50

Yeah. So one of the things that I did that anyone can easily do. So one of the main that I'm on is Instagram. Instagram has a nice feature that I love called mute. And so I literally muted everyone that's not in my dream 100. And for anyone that doesn't know what that is, it's just my list of like top a hundred people that I would love to eventually collaborate in the future with everyone who's not in that dream 100 list or someone that inspires me locally. I just muted everybody because I don't have time to be seeing negativity. Your mental diet is far more important than whatever you consume physically, because it all starts from the mind, from your head. So for me, I was became very conscious as to what I put in my head and what gets access to my mind. So I made sure to mute literally anyone, even if they were not posting negative stuff, but they were just posting like selfies or something. You're getting muted too. If it's not inspiring me or educating me or impacting me, you're getting muted. So that is the quick and easy way for anyone to start getting more value from their social media without being sucked into. All the negativity and the wokeness and et cetera, et cetera, that tends to go on.

Magic Barclay: 3:07

Oh my gosh. When you were saying that I realized I've done that unintentionally. My Instagram is full of people like Sy Savage and Dr. Joe Dispenza. And then it's completely filled with Siberian cats and bush cabins. Absolutely craziness.

John Mendez: 3:26

That's an interesting mix, but yeah, whatever it is, as long as it's not negative.

Magic Barclay: 3:30

Totally. Okay. And I love that you say getting away from the workness. We don't really discuss politics here, but I think. You know, from a biological standpoint, and I'm probably going to get myself in some trouble saying this, but I think you have to really look at nature, you know, I, I say to people, look at nature for your health, look at nature for your guidance on society as well. This craziness of all being terrified of each other and how to address each other. You know, I just want to, Say this right now, look at the animal kingdom. They don't have these societal flaws that we seem to have developed and certainly don't let your social media fill up with those, you know, go outside, make up your own mind and live your own truth.

John Mendez: 4:23

Yeah, I would say something on the line. I said, so I wouldn't dive too deep just for, you know, out of respect for your show. But it's like one of those things where it's a lot of people who believe that they understand the world and they're very naive and ignorant because this world is so complex. And if you ask people why enough times, most people don't know anything about anything. And so for me, the only thing I know is that I don't know. That's a quote from Socrates, just in case it went over anyone's head. That's the only thing that I'm certain of is that I don't know, but I am in search of more information and knowledge. And it's a journey. So I always. in mind that there's people out there who know more than me in the grand scheme of things. We're all just trying to make sense of this world and this life that we got. So I try not to judge.

Magic Barclay: 5:12

Totally. Okay. So John, I ask all of my guests the same three questions. Everyone gives me really different answers. So your first one is what can your expertise do to accelerate health, not just physical, but also emotional and spiritual health. Thank you.

John Mendez: 5:31

The first one, so my podcast, I talk a lot about wealth building concepts and not just wealth in terms of monetary, I talk about wealth in terms of the holistic approach, like wealth in all your areas of life is what I love to tell people. And for me, I got to see very early on in life. So I grew up in the projects. It was nine of us in a two bedroom. My mother, she suffered from mental health issues. My father was absent most of my life. Grandparents immigrated here from Dominican Republic. So it's like we never had money growing up. We had section eight, which is like government subsidies. And you know, we had food stamps. So it's like money was always very tight in our lives in the, in our neighborhood. Money was always tight. Very tight as well. We live in the projects. We lived in a poor part of their neighborhood. And so for us, We knew poverty, that's all we knew. But going to public schools in the city that I was in, you would see some people that live on the other side of town and they have multi million dollar properties. And one of my friends, I remember the opportunity he gifted me to go to the Hamptons, which is a part of New York where they have like F. U. money, I like to say. Where everyone over there just has tons of money and they're all loaded. And I got an opportunity to see very early on in life the absence of wealth can do to people and what an abundance of wealth can do for people. And so for me, I kept fast forward a little bit further on in my journey. Then I finally read the book for sad, poor dad and shifted my paradigm. It made me realize that these topics about money and finance and wealth, they weren't being taught in my school. They weren't being taught in my environment, but more importantly, they weren't being taught in my house. And so when I started my podcast, it was just like, man, I was very fortunate because I picked this up at what age 20 and age 19 is when I first read Rich Dad Poor Dad. And so for me, I still think that if I've learned that stuff sooner, it would have helped me out so much. And almost, I don't know how it's like over in your parts of the world, but in the States, almost two thirds of Americans can't afford a 500 emergency expense. Eight out of 10 Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. That's like the wealth building, the personal finance, entrepreneurship stuff. It's like that can help you get freedom back in your life, or at least enough freedom for you're not literally struggling to make ends meet and you can actually pay for, you know, 500. It's not much money, but majority of Americans are, would be screwed over if life can, you know, threw him a curve ball. So I think. Money is good for the good that money can do. And it's definitely, if you want to make a massive impact in your life, you're going to need something to help fund it. So learning how to understand money, not to be, you know, Bill Gates or the richest man alive, but just learning the game of money and to understand money so that you don't have to be scrapping ends, you know, at the end of the month, just to make it ends meet.

Magic Barclay: 8:33

It's very similar here in Australia and leading into that. So, you know, have. The skills to make the money so that if there's a health crisis, you can pay for it. What are some top three tips to creating wealth that you have?

John Mendez: 8:51

So the first step is get around people that know way more than you and be a sponge. Like for me, I never should come off as a guy that knows it all. Cause for me and full transparency right now, I'm in the red. I'm starting up my business right and it's like anyone who started up their own business, man, when you're starting off a business from scratch, those first few months or so, man, it is gruesome. It is brutal. And you have to tough it through. So the first step is getting around people that are smarter than you because there's people that already have arrows in their back. Meaning there's people who have already went out to war already and came back alive. Find those people and figure out what they're doing. In whatever industry you're in, get around them, learn from them, and follow their steps because you don't have to be the first one. You don't have to reinvent the wheel. Find the people who already did the work. And learn from them because a smart man learned from his mistakes. A wise man learned some of the stakes of others. So get around people that are smarter than you is step number one, step number two. I'm not sponsored at all by this book, but this book helped me out the most in my journey is a book called, I will teach you to be rich. That book taught me about how to start building my credit again. I don't know how it's like in, um, your parts of the world, but building my credit. You know, how to invest in index funds, how to start budgeting, things like that. That book was so practical. I read, I feel like after every chapter I've read, I could go close the book and then go implement something. I changed the bank accounts that I had. I stopped banking with one institution and moved to my money to another institution. I started using the online bank. Like that book taught me so much about like practical personal finance and money topics. That was never talked about or taught in school or in my home or in my environment. So that was my step number two, I'd recommend for anyone. And it's a brand in a way where it's very, very like friendly to people. A lot of times when you hear people talk about money and finances, they almost make you feel ashamed for not understanding it. And that tends to draw a lot of people away. That book didn't do that at all. It was very easy to read, very practical, very, you know, welcoming. And so. That would be step number two, step number three, I would say for anyone looking to start building wealth is so the first step I said to get around people that are smarter than you, that was like more for like a mentor figure. The second, the final step is I get around people that are going on the journey with you. It's so important to get around a tribe of people for accountability, for support, for love, just for camaraderie, you know, getting around like a mastermind group of people who may probably be a little bit further than you. Some of them might be a little bit behind you, but she's like a group of people that are all kind of somewhere around the same range and you're all headed to the same place. Right. Or similar places, right. And you're all taking a similar journey and get around a mastermind group because that's going to give you these confidence to support, you know, the days that you don't feel like you want to push forward, you can rely on them to start pushing you forward. And when you, you're, you know, gas tank is emptied out, you can tap into their gas tanks to help you keep on going. And there's an old African proverb is go something along the lines of, if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. So that'll be my three steps. Find a mentor, read the book called, I will teach you to be rich or restart reading personal finance books to start understanding money. And then you can find a mastermind group or some type of like group that you can collaborate with other people in your community.

Magic Barclay: 12:36

And our final standard question is around weight loss. Many people battle with their weight and we know that stress is a key factor in that battle. Have you ever battled your weight? If so, how did you win the war? And what can you offer the listeners who might be in the situation?

John Mendez: 12:54

So for me, I've never had an issue where I struggled with weight. And part of it was because I've always been in sports, at least for as long as I can remember, I've been very active. One of the biggest things that helped me, and I know a lot of your listeners are women, and intermittent fasting. Now make sure to consult, this is not health advice at all, but make sure to look into it. I know intermittent fasting has some different effects with women, just because like the menstrual cycle and things like that. So it affects you guys a little bit differently. But intermittent fasting for me, I feel like it's one of the cheat codes to life. There's so many health benefits that come with intermittent fasting, and I think a lot of people, when they think intermittent fasting, some of my common misconceptions that I tell people who are not really informed about it, it's like, Oh, why are you skipping breakfast? It's, you know, why are you starving yourself? And it's like, most people don't understand breakfast is two words, right? It's break fast. Because any prolonged duration of time where you go without eating is technically a fast. So sleeping, It's technically a fast. So when you eat breakfast, you're breaking your fast with the first meal of the day. So the time of the day that you eat. Isn't the most important. It's what you eat to break your, you know, your first meal of the day. That is important. Whether that's that nine in the morning, seven in the morning, whether it may be it's, you don't break your fast till four in the afternoon, whatever it is. I just make sure that I get my calories that I need to eat and consume within a day during my eating window. Now, I used to be very strict with it and I was like, I'm only eating between 12 noon and 8 p. m. dinner, you know, Eastern time. It's like, anything outside of that, I wouldn't even look at food. But now that I, you know, I'm in maintenance mode now, and now I can just like, one day if I don't feel like fasting, I don't fast. And one day if I am, then I'll go push 24 hours. Sometimes I'll push a little bit further than 24 hours. I really go based off how I feel, but I didn't start doing that until after, Well, maybe four years of almost like rock solid discipline of intermittent fasting day in, day out. And what I would recommend to everyone else is find something that you can fit around your lifestyle. I hate dieting. I hate people telling me what I can and cannot do. So, but waiting for something is something that I don't mind. That's just me. That's just my natural personality. So I was like the idea of fasting is like, okay, what you're telling me is I can eat the cookie, but I have to wait till four in the afternoon to eat the cookie. I could do that. But if someone were to tell me I can't eat cookies, I would feel upset because I see a good cookie. I'm going to want to eat it. Right. So it's like knowing yourself and knowing something that you could apply. I argue with nutritionists back when I was in college, I argued this nutritionist major. And it's like, they're telling me how you got to eat six meals and every, you know, hour and a half, you got to eat a small meal and break it up into portions throughout the day and drink wine. It's like, We have jobs, we have businesses we're trying to run, we have families that we're trying to look after, we have hobbies, we have a personal life, we have date nights, we have all these different things. Who on earth has time to eat six meals a day, at certain points in time in the day, every single day? I don't personally don't know anyone whose life is that routine where it's like they every single day can consistently eat. So for me, I was like, what's more realistic? I can't control what life throws at me. So with intermittent fasting, I was able to really start getting a lot of health benefits, but I was also able to still bulk up and build muscle because I made sure to get my calories in. I made sure to eat my protein and get my macros in. And so it became very easy for me to get lean because I wasn't focusing on starving myself, I was focusing on how do I boost my metabolism, which is a whole nother thing because you can go on a caloric deficit but if you're, if your metabolism is slow. It's not going to really do much. So find ways to boost your metabolism. Naturally, of course, exercising is one of them. I would start there. And then from there, I said, I know health from YouTube university. I do not have a degree in any of this. I just know what worked for me. So this is not my advice towards anyone. This is just me sharing what worked for me.

Magic Barclay: 17:16

And thanks for sharing. Okay. We've covered a fair bit, but let's get onto what it is that you do. Tell us about your work and maybe some things that the listeners need to know about working with John Mendes.

John Mendez: 17:33

Yeah, so thank you for the opportunity, Juan. Uh, so the main two things is, I'll share with you guys a little bit about my vision. So, ideally, where I plan on taking all this giant John Mendes brand forward, is I want to get into public speaking. I want to start helping people's lives. Like, walk to wealth. Like, that's where I feel my calling, my vision. Like, I feel like God has placed in my heart, personally, to do something with that and to just take that to the next level. I haven't monetized that yet though. So I have a marketing company that I started and the quick backstory behind that is I was in a real estate group. So like I told you guys earlier, find your group, find your tribe, find your community. I was in that group and. I was always on this like 630 to 7am call. And I'm normally at the gym at those times. And one of the days they were talking about social media. So me, as I said, I'm 21 today to date myself. By the time this comes out next year, I'll be 22. Nevertheless, I'm still relatively extremely young compared to most real estate agents in my area. So for me, I was easily the youngest person in the group. I'm still I think I still might be the youngest person in the group or close to the youngest active person in that group. And. I was, I just knew social media from growing up with it. It's not like I had a master's degree in it. I had, um, I was going to school for marketing before I dropped out my sophomore year, but my second year of university, I left school in the middle of the pandemic, so I didn't even get to my actual marketing classes. So. I didn't know social media aside from the fact that I grew up with it and posted a couple photos, like once a year, um, throughout my years in high school and college. And then I made a quick Facebook post. And then from there, one of the hosts of the group was like, John, would you mind teaching a class on this? And I was like, I never taught a class before. She said, John, tell us when you want it scheduled. I said, Oh, okay. I can't say no to a top agent twice. So, I just figured it out, and from there, I had over 440 Realtors sign up, and I pretty much had to spend more time inviting people manually, because I didn't know how to host a class. And so I had this Excel sheet, and I was copying and pasting emails, and then copying and pasting the links to send it out to everyone. So it was a nightmare, but I ended up getting over 200 people live. And I call, I ended up going amazing. And that's how I cut my marketing thing got started. So now I'm really passionate about helping non tech savvy, real estate agents, booster online presence so that they don't have to pay for media companies, and eventually I'll be branching out to helping, you know, entrepreneurs and small business owners. I not, I'm not the person to do content for people. I'm the person that teaches you how to do it. For yourself or teaches your VA or your admin or your assistant, how to do it so that you can keep your marketing in house because a lot of the stuff that these media companies do, man, they're just posting the same Canva images and I can't speak for every industry. I can only speak for the industry industry just because that's when I want to have the most experience experience in, but like there was this one realtor and she ended up becoming, she's a student of mine now and she was in, she's in my course. Before we hopped on a quick sales call. To see if it'll be a good fit for her or not And she was showing me her facebook page that she's paying 500 bucks a month for a media company Literally, you look on her facebook page. You look like through 20 quick posts. We just scroll through She probably got maybe like six likes across all 20. I'm just like you're paying 500 bucks a month for this And on top of that, there was one post. It was like, here's three easy to bake recipes to cook while you're at home. Like what on earth does that have to do with anything related to her business? And they're probably posting those same exact posts to all their other clients. And there's like, man, we're doing them a great service. You're doing a good job. We're posting for them on their behalf. so many more seasoned people, they don't understand social media as well as the younger generations, because of course, you guys haven't grown up with it. But it's like, nevertheless, you still shouldn't be getting robbed of your hard earned money, just because you don't understand it or just because you don't have the time to understand it. And a lot of these people that are more seasoned to have more established businesses. It's like they hire out because they know they don't understand it. They know they don't have the time to understand it. And so it's like, they'd rather have someone do it for them. So the people that are, have these media companies, they do it for them. But they don't get any returns, but they're still posting every day. So it looks like they're doing something for them on their behalf that actually benefits them. So that's really my main mission really is just, as I said, the walk 12, I, and that's where I really want to scale and take that to the moon. But for the time being, as I mean, I'm doing both simultaneously, the marketing company is what's going to help fund my mission. So I'm using my expertise to monetize. And then my purpose right now, Is not being monetized. So I'm using my expertise to help fund my purpose. So I can continue living at the podcast and to continue pushing that out to more people right now. I'm specifically targeting real estate agents just because I'm getting off the ground now, but as I continue to scale and grow and start getting more social proof, I said, all these things are just battle tested things that I've learned myself from posting tons of videos and getting burnt out and trying to keep up with all the algorithms. It's like, all right, how can I dumb this down to only the stuff that matters? Because a lot of stuff is just gibberish. Like for example, Oh, what's the best time to post? Who cares? Get the content out there. Like so many people are stuck on things that don't matter. So just get it out there, figure out the rest later, figured out how to edit it later, figure out how to make it look nice and fancy later. You're not getting nothing out there. You're not going to get any return. So there's a quote I love that I learned on this. It's. You have to become a disaster in order for you to become a master. And so now I'm pretty much helping people become masters of this content creation and artificial intelligence and how to use AI so that they can keep their marketing in house. Save thousands of dollars per month and save tens of hours, you know, of their own time.

Magic Barclay: 23:49

I love it. You have to become a disaster to become a master. That is terrific. John, how can people get hold of you?

John Mendez: 24:00

So the best way to get a hold of me would be to go to If you need marketing help specifically, go to stopandstare. media. Stopandstare. media forward slash learn. There I have tons of free marketing material. You can catch the replays to my classes that I teach. All the classes and stuff that I do is for free. The only thing I have that's cost money is the course. So all my content is on there for free. So go stop and stare. media forward slash learn and just eat up all the marketing company, start saving your money, stop paying for these terrible media companies and start building your presence so that you can reach more people, impact more lives.

Magic Barclay: 24:44

And before we let you go, John, we love freebies. What can you offer the listeners and where can they find it?

John Mendez: 24:50

Yeah. So right now, for anyone that is looking to start their first business, if you go to bit bit. ly bit. ly forward slash walk number two wealth gift forward slash walk to wealth gift You can get my beginner's guide to entrepreneurship, the four businesses you must start in order to start your dream business. So that is my free gift to you guys. It's a free training that I pretty much collaborated with, with a guy that I know named Drew. He is a business strategist and he really helped break it down. And so that anyone, no matter where you are, can help. Start their entrepreneurship journey and break into the working for yourself instead of working for the

Magic Barclay: 25:46

man. John, thank you so much for your time today.

John Mendez: 25:50

Thank you so much for the opportunity

Magic Barclay: 25:52

and listeners. Thank you for your time. Please go ahead to like review, share, and subscribe to this podcast. We appreciate every time that we see a new listener subscribed and for now go forth and create your magical life.