Mike Handcock | Doing Less, Harnessing the Hour of Power, & Building the Right Network

“The best 4-letter word in entrepreneurship is, “Next” ~ Mike Handcock

Guest Bio: Meet Mike Handcock, a globally recognized Certified Speaking Professional, President of the Global Speakers Federation 2025/26, and accomplished author with 14 books, including 7 International Best Sellers and 6 Amazon #1 titles in business and personal development. As a musician, Mike boasts 13 albums and a No#1 on iTunes in 2013. Distinguished for his philanthropic endeavors, Mike serves on the boards of three charities and has received praise from President Clinton for his work with the SAGE Foundation and Clinton Global Initiative. As the Chairman & Founder of The Circle of Excellence, Mike, along with business partner Landi Jac, has successfully established five companies in Events, Business Intelligence, Licensing, Investments, and an Experts Institute, operating across more than 50 countries. Mike is a sought-after speaker, consistently flying 4.5 times around the world annually sharing the message of playing a bigger game and conscious leadership.

SHOW NOTES: 

• Website: http://www.circleofexcellence.biz
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikehandcock

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Transcript

Mike Handcock | Doing Less, Harnessing the Hour of Power, & Building the Right Network

Welcome to the Remarkable People Podcast!  

The Remarkable People Podcast. Check it out.

The Remarkable People Podcast. Listen, do repeat for life.

The Remarkable People Podcast.

David Pasqualone: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for being here today. We have Mike Hancock with us, and he is going to share his life story, and along with his life story, he's going to not just talk about what he's able to achieve or overcome, but But like we've done for the last five years, he's going to break it down into practical steps of how he did it.

So we can too. So Mike, good morning and welcome. Thanks for being on the Remarkable People Podcast.

Mike Handcock: David, it's so great to be here. Thanks for [00:01:00] having me.

David Pasqualone: Oh, it's an honor. And obviously you and I have pre met and we know a little bit about what's coming, but for our audience deciding, should I listen to this episode or not?

Is it for me? Is it worth my time? What do you guarantee? We're going to go through your life story. You're going to have time for a bunch of gold nuggets, but if there is one gold brick, what do you guarantee our listeners are going to get today if they listen to the entire episode?

Mike Handcock: I think I'm going to guarantee that the listeners are going to find ways and methods to move forward in their life, business, career, more than they've ever believed possible.

And I'm going to give some, some case studies, if you like, of how that's being done by other people. So there's going to be a lot of hope there's going to be, um, some hacks. For people and there's going to be some methodology as well.

David Pasqualone: So would you say this is an episode that's more geared for your professional life or your personal [00:02:00] life or both?

Mike Handcock: I think it crosses over. So it's both. I mean, you can't have a professional life unless you've got a personal life or else, you know, it's sort of like trying to run a race on one leg. You'll be hopping the whole time. So, uh, you know, we live one leg in the spiritual world and one leg in the material world.

So, you know, we've got to take a step with each of them and that's the way life works.

David Pasqualone: Yes, and ladies and gentlemen, I agree with Mike completely when I do consulting and coaching, I'll work with clients all over the world and 80 to 90 percent of the time I spend with most clients is in their personal life and it affects their business.

So I'm tracking with you. So ladies and gentlemen, we're going to take a short. 30 to 60 affiliate commercial that's going to give you a special offer to save you money and have a better life. And then when we get back, Mike Hancock and I are going to share his life story, which is entertaining, and it's also going to be informative.

So it benefits you see in 60 seconds.

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[00:04:00]

David Pasqualone: Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, Mike. Let's do this. You know, everything that happens to us in life, good, bad, ugly, pretty, pretty ugly. It makes us the men and women we are today. Right? So bring us back to your childhood.

Just start from beginning. We'll go chronologically in your life. What are the good, bad and ugly things that happened to make Mike the man he is today?

Mike Handcock: I think the simplest thing for me to start with is that I was an only child born to a solo mother. Um, I had no brothers, no sisters, no aunties, no uncles.

No grandparents. So my father was, um, a wife beater and a drunk, and, uh, he was kicked out of home when I was six years old. So my first six years were really intense with all of that. And then when he left, it was just my mom and me. And then one day when I was 15, I came home from sports practice and found her dead of a heart attack.

So then it was just me. So that's where I think I [00:05:00] learned the first lesson. And it was so weird because At the funeral, all these people who I didn't know came up and said, Oh, your mother was such a wonderful woman. Give us a call when you get back on your feet. I mean, like, seriously, are they kidding you?

Like what's a 15 year old going to do? Ring random people and say, look, I'm getting back on my feet. And you told me to call you. No, not really. So I learned that people are pretty well meaning, but a lot of it's superficial. But I also learned then that my friends are my family and luckily I had really good friends.

Some of them are my best friends even today that I've had my whole life. And whilst we don't see each other a lot, in fact, we all live in different countries these days. I mean, we all know that we're there for one another. One of the things I didn't learn at school, David, was networking, but I sort of created my own network with a strong group of about half a dozen people.

And I think if I had have learned that really early on, if that had got stuck in, I think that would be a key to just [00:06:00] overcoming everything. Is the quality of your network. I mean, Jim Rohn said, you're the quality of the five people you hang around with the most. Tony Robbins used it after him. And I found that to be pretty true.

David Pasqualone: Talk about building that network because so many people come to us in life and sadly, most of them are suckers, not givers, right? They're there to take what they can and leave the scraps. So how do you build a healthy, solid network?

Mike Handcock: Well, I think in our business that we've got now, which is a circle of excellence group, you know, we've been going nearly 20 years and we've never had an upset client.

We've never had a complaint. Um, our clients are awesome. They're in more than 50 countries. And it wasn't something we went out and designed. I can't say that I had a recipe for it, but I think the key is to just reaffirm with people to be of a mindset of a go giver and not a go [00:07:00] getter. So the minute I hear when I'm sort of talking to new potential clients, the minute I hear somebody going, You know, I want to get rich or I need a Ferrari or something like that.

I'm sort of referring them on to somebody else. Cause that's not the type of people that actually end up doing anything much with their lives. And if they do, it's all for the wrong purpose. And a lot of people get destroyed in the way. So I think that network of finding out where really heart centered people are, who, who want to create, uh, a difference as much as creating a profit, um, in their lives and even in your friends.

Um, that's really, really important. You know, my wife and I were talking last night. She had a very different experience growing up and you know, her experience was very much nobody ever asked her how you feeling or anything like that. Whereas all of my friends were, were really considered, considerate to the other friends in the group.

So I think that's the first key [00:08:00] consideration and being a go giver. So when you join a network or when you. Go to your B and I group, or when you move to a new community or a new suburb, don't look at what you can get from people. Look at what you can give to people. And if you're going networking for business tomorrow, consider that and change the way you approach.

That networking because you'll get a much better result.

David Pasqualone: Yeah, I agree. And I think also we need to stay in balance. And I think starting our personal life with that network is more important than business. Because how many people do you see they put all their time and attention on their business, and they grow and 20 years later, they're a multimillionaire.

But they got nobody to share it with. So I'm a big proponent of starting with your inner circle of family and friends. What do you think about that?

Mike Handcock: Yeah, 100 percent couldn't agree more. And I think to not discount the people that are a little weird for you, you know, and that's [00:09:00] sometimes it's, it's, it's going to speak to all ages of your audience, David, in that, like, for me, it was at school that we'd go, like, I was a sporty kid.

Like I was always in sports teams and things like that. So all my buddies were sports guys, but you know, we were sort of like, Oh, they're nerds or whatever. But these days with what I know now, I would go and make friends with them because like, There's a whole range of different layers of just beauty that you see in different people.

So, and the other thing is to be really intentional, I think, I mean, so many people, particularly if they move town or move job or something like that, they're so trying to please and eager to please that if the first person smiles at them and says hello, they want to befriend them and make them their bestie.

I remember when I moved country once. And I, I went and joined up at the sports club, which, uh, which I was, you know, in the sport, I normally play. And when I went to the first practice, I looked around and I thought, I'm going to play a lot of sport [00:10:00] with these guys. I'm going to be really discerning about which of them becomes a friend of mine.

And just on that first practice, There was a guy lying on the grass, actually he was chewing grass, he wasn't even listening to the coach, he was just lying down. And I looked at him and I went, that one, that's going to be my friend. And that was in 1993 and we're still really close friends. So, you know, and we've, we've had such a ball.

We've done so many cool things together over that time. So I think being really intentional about who you bring into your network. And, you know, this guy, I mean, he's not an entrepreneur or anything like me. I mean, he's not traveled any farther than sort of one or two countries overseas. Um, but you know, he's a magnificent friend.

So, and he's a great part of my network. So I think, uh, looking a little differently and not sticking to the norm is also a good bit of advice.

David Pasqualone: Yeah. And the other thing too is, you know, people say, well, take your five closest friends, your 10 closest friends [00:11:00] and add up their income and divide it by that number.

And you'll get your income. Don't only focus on income because there's so much more to life than money. Money's just the tool. And if you're just focused on income again, 20 years from now, you're going to look back and be like, what the hell did I do with my life again? Mike, would you agree or disagree?

Mike Handcock: Absolutely agree. I mean, we don't focus on income at all. I mean, we have targets. But I mean, our targets, uh, we know sort of what we want to do for a year and how much it's going to cost to run our business. And, you know, I haven't had a business plan in probably more than 10 years. Um, we focus on experiences that we want to have.

And if we focus on experiences, then I think our lives are just so much more rich for that. And, you know, so this year we're really focused on, we're going to be in your country quite a bit. We're going to be in the United States quite a bit for at least, I think, two or three months. One of our focuses is to bring all [00:12:00] the really great people that we know together for a two or three day mastermind.

And not to make money out of it. In fact, we're just going to ask everybody, we're going to find out what the bill is and cut it by 13 or 15 people or something, but we do want to bring them together and see what comes out of that. We want to have that experience. So I agree with you. I think, you know, if you're focused on money, you'll be possibly wealthy, probably unpopular, and probably not have too many friends and you may lose your family in the meantime.

But if you focus on doing things right, building something that's undeniably great, Being prepared to give and focused on the journey rather than the end game. I think you'll have an incredible life.

David Pasqualone: So before we go any further, Mike, When you were a child, you lost your mother and that adds [00:13:00] all sorts of complexities. Probably at that time, it was just survival mode, but carrying into your adulthood and your life.

How did that affect you?

Mike Handcock: Well, I think that's a great question because it's something maybe other people are. Uh, having in their life too. I always had that saying, you know, that saying, if it's going to be, it's up to me. If it's going to be, it's up to me. What a load of crap that is. Right. But I mean, that was what I told myself because I was the person who had to look after myself still today.

I have an underlying anxiety because If anybody else runs out of money, they sort of go to their mom, their dad, their brother, their sister, their cousin, their whatever. And there's always somewhere family money in my family. I am the money. So, um, you know, it's just my wife and I, so that's, uh, that's an interesting one that causes me drama and did during the global financial crisis about 15 years ago when things got tight.

But I think to really answer your [00:14:00] question, what it gave me is it gave me, um, The realization that I had to step up that if that I shouldn't be looking for masters in other people. I don't need a guru. I don't need a mentor. I don't need a parent, etc. I had to become that person. And subsequently, I'm not I don't really buy into gurus like I'm not a Tony Robbins fan or anything like that.

I don't Follow anybody in particular. Um, the two mentors have had that I've had in my life have been very ordinary people. Um, you know, one was an ex boss. One was an ex co worker. Um, I call them my two mentors. I probably had somebody else who was maybe a third. Um, and I think the other thing is that I used to start writing in my diary.

Make sure you ask for help because yeah, What that did is it tunneled me into the [00:15:00] fact of never asking for help, which is not a good thing. So I had to remind myself to ask for help. So, you know, whether it be. as simple as getting a referral or trying to work out how to put a cupboard together, you know, luckily for YouTube these days, but, but, um, you know, I'd ask, I'd ask for help, but I had to remind myself to do that.

And I think that was the biggest thing. And, and definitely there's, there was always a feeling, particularly in relationships, I always expected, you know, the person to leave me. I never expect. So I had a series of relationships in my early years. And, you know, I've been with my wife now for 11 years, but it probably took me eight of those years to realize that she wasn't going to leave.

So there was definitely, definitely some of that coming through as well. Yeah.

David Pasqualone: And that's why it's so important. The stuff that happens to us. Any time in life can carry through. We got to deal with it and [00:16:00] reconcile it. So you said it took you about eight years. What did you do for the listeners who know exactly what you're feeling, or what you were feeling, and they're in that position now.

What were some of the practical steps you did, Mike, to get resolution to accept, Huh, this is great. She's here and she's going to be here. It's forever.

Mike Handcock: I can't really take credit for that, David. I think that was her. I mean, she just constantly told me that she was never going to leave me until the point where she kept asking me, do you believe me?

And one day I said, yes. And she said, are you sure? So I think it was, it's, it's reinforcement and it was making sure that even when we had fights and stuff that nobody left, you know, nobody, nobody left, nobody threw anything, nobody, nobody Nobody screamed too much, et cetera, et cetera. So there was a lot of reinforcements there.

And I think also what that enabled me is that [00:17:00] she enabled me to see how strong I was in myself anyway, which I knew about, um, because you know, all of my different life experiences takes a lot to rock my boat. But, um, but I think just having constant reinforcement, that's not something I can take credit for.

However, what I think that I did is that I'm a great believer in your past is not your future. Like if you look at a book, um, and if you're reading a book and you're on page 156 pages. You know, you don't know what's coming next. You definitely know what happened before that. That's a life, right? So then if somebody has ripped you off, if somebody has left you for another person, um, or something like that, it doesn't mean the next person's going to do that.

It doesn't mean the next business deal is going to go that way. It doesn't mean the next person is going to act the same way. I mean, and that's something that I, I just have [00:18:00] a trust and a faith in people. So I really believe that people are good at heart. And as you get older, you get pretty easy, pretty good at picking people who instantly aren't so good at heart.

But, um, but I think that, you know, for anybody who's listening, that's got similar sorts of emotions. Your emotions are lying to you. You, that was what happened and you were 50 percent responsible. Now, if somebody ups and dies, you're probably not responsible for that. Maybe you are, but if somebody has left you or you've been ripped off or a business deal went bad.

You're 50 percent responsible, accept the 50%, move on, learn from it, and get on to the next thing. Don't suffer in anguish. You know, David, there's a great movie, I only rate 6. 5 on IMDB because I checked it, called Elizabeth Town, which was Kirsten Dunst and Orlando Bloom. And in the movie, he plays a, [00:19:00] a guy who loses 2 billion of his boss's money.

And he's in marketing. And then on the same day, loses that money. His father dies and he gets on a plane to go and bury his father and he meets Kirsten Dunst and she's the hostess. And they, they, they hook up afterwards and just as they're falling in love, he says, listen, there's this thing that I have to tell you, I'm going to be over the front page of every marketing magazine in the USA soon, because I lost 2 billion of my boss's money and I'm a total abject failure.

And she says something amazing. It's always stuck with me. I saw the movie when it came out, which is probably over 10 years ago. She said, I'm going to give you five minutes to wallow in delicious pity, and then you're going to kiss me. And I thought, isn't that great? Five minutes to wallow in delicious pity.

Because we want to wallow when, when crap like that happens to us. We want to go, Oh, you know, [00:20:00] that was so stupid or I lost my money or, or whatever, or I, you know, I shouldn't have reversed the car into that guy or whatever it is that goes on, but just let it out and then move on and timeframe it. And I think that's, that's really awesome advice.

And it's not my advice. It comes from a movie.

David Pasqualone: Yeah, but the concept is saying it's like all truth comes from God, Jack Welch, Donald Trump, you know, anybody who's a successful businessman didn't come up with the fundamentals of business. They just applied them. So when we're talking about our everyday life, how do you recommend just letting things go?

Mike Handcock: You know, If it's not going to cause your death, then it's probably not going to be consequential or you're not going to think about it in when you're retired. Right. So why would you give it any energy? So, you know, the best, you know, we work a lot with entrepreneurs and I think the best four letter word in entrepreneurship is next.

Right. [00:21:00] So, you know, if somebody walks in today, one of our staff walks in and resigns, we just go, okay, next. Right. You know, it's just like, right. Let's just get on with it. What's the point of wallowing? I mean, the more you wallow, the more you waste time. And, and the more you wallow, the more likely you're going to end up in some spiral.

And, you know, you mentioned, you know, you mentioned Donald Trump before. I just read JD Vance's book, Hillbilly Elegy. I saw I saw his interview with Joe Rogan and I thought, you know, this guy's had an incredible life. I didn't know anything about him. It's not about his politics. I don't care. I'm not in America.

But, um, but I read his book. And once I read his book, I realized that anybody can do anything. I mean, he became the vice president, the United States, and he was a hillbilly that came from a drug addict family that had and everybody in their community had no hope. I mean, he That's, that's what I mean. If my story was bad, well, he's got a worse story and [00:22:00] plenty of people got worse stories than him that have done, done amazing things with their lives.

So I think you've just got to get on with it. That's the best, best thing you can do.

David Pasqualone: Yeah. And there's so many times where, you know, saying tries to keep us down and keep things obsessing in our brain and have us just hung up or feeling depressed. Are there any practical tips like that you found in your life?

Is it simply just discipline? Like I will wake up at blank. I will do this at blank. I am going to achieve these goals. What do you do to break these cycles?

Mike Handcock: Uh, the first one is probably, I'm going to give you one super practical one and one sort of Mike one and one advice from somebody else that I tried.

So super practical one is just surround yourself with great people. You cannot stay in a funk if you're surrounded with great people because they will lift [00:23:00] you out of it, whatever's happened to you. Whether somebody's died, whether, you know, you lost your business, whatever's happened to you, whether you've got fired, people will lift you out of it.

The second one for me personally, what I found to work for me is travel. You know, um, we owned a travel company for 12 years. Luckily we sold it in 2019. That was a very good move, but, um, yeah, but we, we realized, and we ran a lot of spiritual tours, um, around the world. And we realized that the reason people like to travel.

Is something different than they think people. You always ask me, why do you like to travel? And I go, Oh, I like new cultures. And I like the food and I wanted to see the Eiffel tower or whatever, but none of that's actually true when you get into it and you really dig into it with people is people love to travel because they love who they are when they're traveling, they become the curious [00:24:00] child.

Again, they become the adventurer. They become the person who will talk to strange people because they have to, you know, and then they're proud of themselves and they learn from it. So I find that traveling is something bad happens. We always travel. In fact, it's so weird, David, you know, when, when COVID came, uh, we've got a Chinese doctor.

We don't use a Western doctor. We've got a Chinese doctor. And we went to him about six months in just for a regular checkup. We go every three months for a regular checkup. And, um, he said to me, he said, Oh, he said, I'm going to give you, um, a prescription. And I thought, Oh yeah, he's never given me a prescription before.

You know, we do it with acupuncture. We use some Chinese herbs. And he said, you need to travel. He said, your soul is starting to get, um, despondent. And I went, we're in the middle of COVID. Where am I going to travel to? He said, well, just go [00:25:00] away for the weekends. Said, in fact, I'm going to prescribe to you that every second weekend, you and your wife, Landi, have to go away.

So we went, okay. So that sounded like fun. So every second weekend we went, went away. We learned so much about our own country. Because we couldn't travel overseas, um, we, we went to some amazing places and I really, really felt good. So travel is the second one. And then the third one comes from an ex business partner of mine.

And it was at the time, it was around the, the, the time of the global financial crisis about 2008, 2009, the real estate market had crashed. Um, he's Canadian, my business partner at that time. And, uh, I was based in New Zealand, which is where I'm from. And the New Zealand market was just atrocious. Uh, the property market had had such a significant downturn that I lost 3 million in a week.

So it wasn't good. Right. And I said to him, I said, I don't think I want to get out of bed at the moment. And he said, [00:26:00] you know what? Sometimes getting out of bed is the worst idea you can have. He said, don't get out of bed tomorrow. So when, okay, I'm not going to. Like, normally I was up at six and normally I was at work by seven, but, um, as I am these days, I lasted until quarter to eight.

And then I was so bored, I went, I am so bored, I've just got to get out of bed. And then by that stage, I was over everything. I was just getting on with stuff. It was the weirdest, um, pattern interrupt you've ever seen, but it totally interrupted my pattern of woe is me by saying, I'm just going to stay in bed.

And I thought I'm going to do it again. The next day I lasted less than a minute. And I thought this is just ridiculous. I might as well get up and just do stuff. So there's three ways.

David Pasqualone: Yeah. I think that goes back to that Kirsten Dunst quote to take five minutes to wallow, right? Cause you're, your mind's lying to you.

Oh, you need to stay in bed. You're so depressed. And if you push through the day, You're thinking about, Oh, I should have stayed in bed. I just need to be alone. [00:27:00] And yet you go be alone. You're like, hell no. I need to go get something done. So that's cool. You had that experience and hopefully our listeners can to give yourself permission to stay in bed and then see how fast that lasts.

Mike Handcock: And I can't tell you, David, how many of our clients in the last probably five years, definitely since COVID, but it didn't stop after COVID that I've talked to and they'd say, I've got this problem. What's your advice? And I'd say, take a holiday.

So it's amazing the last five years, how many clients I've had meetings with where I've said to them, where they've asked, what's your advice on this?

And I've said, take a holiday. And, you know, I think people are, people are getting themselves too much in busy ness now. And I have a saying that if all the technology that we use is so good, David, then why do most of us. You know, live exactly the same lives as our parents did, you know, not much has changed, you know, we might have a few extra things around the house, but we're no really no richer.

So people working too hard today, [00:28:00] you know, particularly people in business entrepreneurs, they're on their computers at, you know, 10 o'clock on a Sunday night and things like that. I literally just had my laptop switched off for a month. I switched it on today. I haven't looked at an email in a month. Um, and so I think, you know, people have got to do this stuff and, and they've got to take breaks and they've got to nurture their soul.

And my wife doesn't have an email address. She hasn't had one in 11 years. Um, so she gets up, does 20 minutes of dancing, cause that's her passion. Uh, listens to her YouTubes while she's in the shower and does her makeup and everything like that. Grabs herself a cup of tea, goes and sits on our balcony, which overlooks the ocean and thinks.

Sometimes she journals. That's how she starts the day. Whereas most people get out of bed, grab a coffee and run to their computer. We've got to stop doing that.

David Pasqualone: Yeah, I'd agree. It's like it's so [00:29:00] easy to get wrapped up. In the busy, but I think that's one of the sand's greatest ploys against humanity. It's to get them so busy to make themselves feel so important.

And so the world can't run without you when it's like, no, he's just exhausting you into inefficiency and waste. So people are exhausted.

Mike Handcock: You're right. People are actually exhausted. I mean, go on, please.

David Pasqualone: No, I said yes. Ladies and gentlemen, if you're listening, Mike and I, we're having technical difficulties.

It's a great day and a great interview, but the delays and camera glitches and Mike glitches. Thank Mike and God, especially for getting us through this episode. If you're listening to it now, we made it because we've had some crazy stuff happened today. Haven't we, Mike?

Mike Handcock: It's a fantastic day. And my wife's grandmother died at five o'clock this morning.

She was 95 years old. So, um, so the energy and the veil [00:30:00] is, is thin now. And, and, um, and she kept saying, she said, for five years, I'm too old now. When's God going to take me? Why is he taking all my friends and not me? And it's so fascinating because For the last eight years, she lived with us for four years.

We were, you know, uh, because we have a nice place and it's near the ocean. She was born not far from where we live. Um, so she lived with us for four years and, and it was so wonderful watching somebody who had nothing to do all day. You know, rather than looking at people who are trying to fill every second full of stuff and the fact that, you know, she could appreciate watching the, the waves on the beach out our window or seeing what's going on or reading a book or something like that and or smelling the roses.

And all of those sort of things. And I think, you know, life has got distracting and, [00:31:00] and, and when there's distraction, there's an ulterior motive to distraction. So I'm all about getting people to do less, not more. So I think if you're listening today and you seriously want to improve your life, I think, um, you've got to do less.

You've got to say no more often. No has got to become a very favorable word of yours. You've got to be prepared to put down your laptop. Did you know that, um, I use an app on my laptop that tells me what I'm doing online, but I was reading a report from them last year. They've got 150 million people that use the app and they say the average person picks up their cell phone every six minutes.

Like, are you kidding me? Right. So we are so distracted. I mean, most of us are not productive. That's why we're not achieving more than what our parents and grandparents did in our, you know, eight hours a day. In fact, it's taking us 14 hours today to do the same. So I think you've got to do less. I mean, we work four days a week.

[00:32:00] Um, by the middle of this year, I want to get that down to three days a week that we're working. Um, you know, we take, 10 to 12 weeks off a year, you know, you don't have to do things. I think in this whole 5am club and that sort of stuff, I, I don't, I just don't believe in it. I think it harms you. You know, I think you've got to do what's right for your soul.

If you're an early riser and you love to get up, I'm an early riser, not 5am, but 6am I'm normally up. But, uh, you know, I'm also a person who can shut their laptop for a month and not worry about it.

David Pasqualone: Yeah. And I do. I really believe like, you know, quote unquote, if you're listening, most of our listeners are Podcasts, but if you're watching, I'm using air quotes here.

If you're doing good things, but you're exhausting yourself, you're out of balance and I'm completely with Mike, you gotta make sure you're doing what you're supposed to be doing. What you're called to do and then enjoy as much as you can. I mean, we're, [00:33:00] it's not like a party, everything we do, there's years.

We may go through a difficulty or weeks or months or hours, you know, it varies. There's hills and valleys, right? But there's a huge principle of the exhaustion and Satan will try to get you distracted. And still, like you mentioned earlier, Mike, about the difference between the destination and the journey, he's going to try to get you so focused on the destination that you missed 30 years of journey and you lose everything that matters along the way.

So I would definitely listen to what Mike saying and find that balance because. If somebody is telling you to be a good human, you have to wake up at 4 a. m. And do 37 pushups and run three miles and start clocking in at 6 a. m. Man, that may work for them, but that doesn't work for everybody. And their parties may be far off.

So you got to do as long as it's honoring God, what works for you. And, uh, when you were talking about your mother in law, you said it was a beautiful thing to watch her do nothing. Right. It's like she just enjoyed the life [00:34:00] God gave her. And, you know, I think we should always have purpose and a balance, but I know what you're saying is just, she didn't have that rat race stress on her.

So if someone in their eighties, yeah. So if someone now, you know, you consult, you coach, there's people all over the world, I'd say the bulk of people in. Corporate America are either dead in their soul. They're just going through the motions or they're stressed out trying to go, go, go, go, go to compensate for the 70 percent dead for the people who are just nonstop and exhaust themselves.

What are some tips you have to say? Hey, at least start with this to find your balance. At least start. Maybe you can't take three weeks off. But, and I agree with you too. America is like the only country that I know of where seven days is a week vacation and that's all you get. And most people use it catching up on personal tasks they have to do.

Um, I like to take a lot more time off if not, I burn out. So [00:35:00] what do you recommend? Like, you know, one, two, three, at least try these things to start balancing your day and getting out of this, this nonstop and you will lose rat race.

Mike Handcock: Back when I was in corporate, David, I used this system and I think this is a good system for people.

Um, we still, I think we still sort of use it, but we don't really need to now because we have enough time off. But, uh, I would definitely suggest this. Take three, three day weekends a year for your whole family. Go away somewhere. Three, three day weekends. You know, you, your spouse, the kids. Take three, three day weekends for you and your spouse.

Offload the kids to the in laws or to a friend or something like this and take three three day weekends just for yourself. That will definitely reset your clock. It'll reset your relationship and it will ingratiate you with your family as well because most of these [00:36:00] busy people don't even see their kids.

I remember being with the CEO of the second biggest bank in the world And once I dug through the layers of what was really bothering him, he said to me, Mike, I just want to tuck my kids in at night. If you can find a way for me to do that, that's what I want. And this is a CEO of the second biggest bank in the world.

So, you know, that would be a system just use that system and it's really going to help you. I think the other thing is to, we call it the hour of power and the hour of power is the first that you're awake during the day. So instead of getting up, grabbing a coffee and going to your laptop, cancel that, get up, do something else.

Now, if you don't like going to the gym, I don't like going to the gym. I'm never going to go to the gym. six o'clock in the morning. Do something you like, sit in bed and read for a while, do some meditation. Um, if you've got a nice spot in your garden, sit [00:37:00] out there and listen to the birds or whatever. If it's too cold to sit in the, in the garden, watch somebody you like on YouTube, listen to David's Podcast at seven o'clock in the morning, do that sort of thing.

Do something that's going to lift you up. not something that's going to bring you down. So, you know, jumping straight into work is, is just not a good idea. So that would be a definite thing. And then I think the, the, the third thing is, and we do this, uh, we, not everybody can do this the way we can. I'll tell you what we do.

And I think listeners take what you can out of this in around October each year, we sit down and go, where do we want to go next? Yeah. And what do we want to do? And we block all of that out in our diary. So quite literally I can tell you where I'm going to be of any day this year, because it's already blocked out.

I know. Then we go, okay, um, what are the birthdays and other significant days that we've got to, we've got to have, when do we want to take, you know, real holidays? We don't [00:38:00] like working over the Christmas period. It's our slow time. So we're generally away from mid December till mid January. And then the rest of it is left for work.

And that's how we stack it. Plus we work four days a week. So I think we've got about 130 actual work days that we work in a year by the time all of that stuff's done. And then we don't have time on a work day to muck around and play PlayStation, something like that. We're having meetings and we're doing proactive stuff.

Now if you are running your own business, then the other thing that we do is we don't do anything in our business that we don't want to do. Everything that we don't want to do is outsourced. Now, that doesn't mean just go and outsource it. It means learn how it works yourself first, once you know how it works, then go and outsource it.

So all of our marketing's outsourced, all of our administration's outsourced, a lot of our coaching's outsourced, um, all of our design works outsourced, etc, etc. And this came, [00:39:00] David, um, and then I'll maybe stop talking and give you a chance to comment, but this came from 2015. In 2015, we were in 40 countries that year on business.

Now that meant we're inside a plane for over six weeks. So we just went, how are we even going to run our business? So then I said, we've got to know what we're doing. So that's when I put that app on my computer that was going to tell me what I'm doing every day on my computer. It blew me away. I'll never forget the statistic.

46 percent of my online time in 2015 was in design. I was on Canva. I was in Keynote. I was doing this. I was building Facebook ads and all this sort of stuff. I went, this is like literally crazy. We've got five companies. And I should be doing other things. Why am I a designer? So we just went out and hired a full time designer and I got 46 percent of my online time back instantly.

David Pasqualone: I agree 100 percent I remember stuff. Yeah, it's you start thinking about you're helping the [00:40:00] world. You're giving someone a job You're freeing yourself up. You're actually going to make more money because that you know, 15 an hour graphic design job Now you get it to make your hourly rate. And, um, we have listeners all over the world.

And if you're listening to this, you know, it's Mike runs a business. I run a consulting, uh, consulting company and a marketing company. So it is a little bit easier for us at this point in life. You may be listening and you work in a factory, you're a teacher and your schedule isn't quite the same as ours.

However, you still can take many of these steps. If you're, um, a janitor, You only have so much time and you're probably struggling to feed your family, but even if it's small blocks, like Mike said, a weekend, you know, find a way to get that peace of mind for yourself, for your spouse, for your family. And Mike, what tips do you [00:41:00] have for people who have maybe a little bit less flexibility and control of their schedule?

Mike Handcock: Well, I think the place of work worldwide is changing, David, and like one of my friends worked for the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia, and she wanted to have more time off. So she came up with a plan, and she went to her boss, and it's a government organization, you know, they're not known for their flexibility, um, so she went to her boss and said, I want to work.

10 hours a day for 10 weeks on. And I've worked out if I do that, I can have 10 weeks off the way a contract work. I think that's about right. And she thought a boss is going to kick her out and just laugh at her. And a boss said, so what you're recommending is that you're going to work 10 hours a day.

And then after 10 weeks, you're going to take 10 weeks off because the time is going to be the same. And [00:42:00] she said, yes. And the boss said, let's try that because if it works, I'd like to do it as well.

David Pasqualone: And

Mike Handcock: so for her last five years of her job, that's what she did 10 weeks on 10 weeks off. She traveled around the world, her and her husband, they went to some amazing places and she was working maybe 12 hours a day on the days on, you know, so there are different ways, different ways to cut it.

You know, sometimes you can get people to cover for you and do things, but you've got to plan this. You've got to give it forethought. I mean, most people leave everything till the last minute. And that's why, you know, they get to the end of their life and they haven't done much. Whereas just with a little bit of planning, um, my friend who I mentioned before, who I met in 1993, who was the one I went, that's going to be my friend.

I mean, he has a regular job back then. He was, he was logging. He was a forestry worker. Yeah. Right. Now he works on the wharves. He's one of these guys that drives the big planes that lifts the [00:43:00] logs on the ships that go out somewhere. I mean, you know, but, um, even, even with him, he's worked out how he can work shifts so that he can get blocks of time off.

Now he doesn't travel overseas, but him and his wife like to go and camping and doing all that sort of stuff. He can go and do that. He's experiencing life rather than sitting, waiting for a boss to do it. Now, if it doesn't work the first time, maybe it can work the second time. Maybe if it doesn't work, maybe you have to find a new job.

You know, when I look at it these days and I look at my corporate life, I was always so scared to leave and try and look for another job in corporate. If I had my corporate days all over again, I job hunt, my wife wanted to become an entrepreneur before we met. And so what she did the last three years of her corporate life is she job hunt.

And instead of spending the extra money she got every time, she'd save it. And she was able to save up a year's worth of income, which paid for her first year out as an entrepreneur. So, you know, there are [00:44:00] different ways you can do these things, but it just, you just got to use a little bit of thought and a little bit of planning.

Sometimes it's about moving location as well. I don't understand why people don't move location. Now, I know we all have family everywhere, but you know, I told you earlier, I'm from New Zealand, Auckland, New Zealand. I once said to one of my best friends, I don't think I'll ever move out of Auckland. And what I was actually saying to him is that I like him and my other friends so much that I'm never gonna probably move 'cause I don't want, don't wanna not hang around them.

Two weeks later he comes and goes, oh, my wife and I are thinking of moving to Denver. I'm like, so your friends are gonna , your friends are gonna leave anyway. So all sorts of industries, doesn't matter what it is, have seasons. You know, if you're in real estate, it might be summer in Las Vegas and winter in, I dunno, Detroit, right?

Um, they've all got seasons. So why don't you go where the seasons are good, where there's a lot of work, where you can negotiate better [00:45:00] terms and things like that. There's, you know, Germany at the moment is struggling to find workers. Now, if you can speak German or you want to learn German, you're going to get a pretty good job in Germany these days.

And it's not a bad country to live in. So You know, there's a lot of opportunities around the world at the moment. You've only got to go and look at people who are being nomads at the moment. And, you know, nomad lists, the list of jobs on nomad list for, for nomads is, is phenomenal these days. I mean, countries like Estonia are giving nomad visas.

So you can become a citizen of Estonia, pay next to no tax and live anywhere you want in the world. So there's lots of options these days. I think getting on Google and googling some of the, some of the ways to do things. Um, that you may not have thought of as a good idea.

David Pasqualone: Yeah, it's definitely a time to think, just evaluate what we think is standard.

And what we think is necessary. [00:46:00] Is it even right? You know, is it how it should be? Is it how we want it? I remember thinking about when my kids were in school and young, I'm like, we have a broken educational system. I'm like, we could do this better. And I didn't do it. And now I have a lot of regrets because what I knew then was best that I didn't do is still what I know now is best, which I would do if I could redo it.

You know what I mean? So, yeah, there's so much you could take your kids, train them. And get them a better education. And if you're traveling, like Mike's talking about and you're engaging and you're involved, involved in social groups like churches and other activities, your kids, again, all the socialization they need, and they don't have the kid with the flu picking his nose next to him.

So it's just like, there's such a better way when, you know, at least in America, most of the babysitting is being done in the classroom and the rest is just. Crap they don't need and false doctrine. So, I mean, there's so many, that's just one example to me, [00:47:00] but, um, let's do this, Mike, between your birth and today, is there anything we missed in your story and life that you want to talk about before we transition to where's Mike today and where are you headed next?

And how can we, as a Remarkable community, help you get there?

Mike Handcock: Well, I, I think to say that, you know, it wasn't just the one thing that happened to me, David, right? Um, all those years ago when I was 15, you know, I got, I was the leading manager for a company and I got fired because I had an argument with the CEO and lost a job when I was 27 years old that was paying me a quarter of a million dollars a year.

Right. Which was a lot of money when I was 27 years old. Um, and then I fought them for five years in court and lost more money and eventually won and got most of it back, but still didn't make a profit. You know, I went in and out of relationships and marriages and things like that. I've had, I lost 3 million in, in the, uh, uh, global financial [00:48:00] crisis.

Um, I had business partners that didn't work and fell out that took my money. There are all sorts of things happen, right? But, um, that's just life. That's just parts of life's rich experience. It sucks when it happens, but I think instead of going to blame, what you do is you just get to acceptance. The quicker you can get to acceptance, and move on, then you just learn from all of those experiences.

And now they're, all those little scars that are along the way are as much a part of who I am today as all the successes. You know, we've, I was a professional musician for 12 years. I've got 12 albums. I played on, um, you know, I toured, I toured America with my band and supported bands that were, you know, A listers at that stage.

Um, I was able to produce them and then direct a movie that came out in 2010 and was seen in over 500 million households. So there was there's a lot of good stuff as well, but there's also a lot of bad stuff that goes along with it. I [00:49:00] think the thing, the message there for everybody is to, and this is why I mentioned J.

1. Fentz's book that I read because I really associated with his story because I thought, you know, I thought my story was bad. His story was hopeless, right? And, you know, look at where he is today. It doesn't matter whether you're a Democrat or a Republican. Here's a guy that came from nothing and became the vice president, right?

So if he can do it, anybody can do it. And I think that's the message is that you, your past is not your future. And you can reset it right now. It has to start up here. It has to start by surrounding yourself with the right people. If that's your faith. That's perfect. There's a lot of great churches around that have lifted people up and provided places for people to, to recalibrate themselves.

It has to start by being prepared to try things. Um, you know, and it's not about taking your [00:50:00] last 50 and investing it in something stupid because we've all heard the stories of, you know, a person who took their last 50 invested in something and it became a hundred million dollars. But what we don't hear is the people who took their last 50 and now don't have their last 50.

It's about, it's about making the right decisions for you and for your life. And for me, and you know, I know this is going to be tough for some people to hear, but I'm going to say it anyway. It's not necessarily about just putting another paycheck on the table. You know, when I've talked to people and I've had times myself, I remember going when I was about 27 and after losing that big job, it was about a year and a half later and I had to play guitar at a friend's wedding and I had to borrow money off him to pay for the petrol to go there.

And to get a hotel, right? So I've been there too. So it's, um, it's about being prepared to do what you want to [00:51:00] do because when you get to 70, 80 or like my wife's grandmother today, 95 and when she died, you know, you don't want to be sitting there regretting that you didn't try things. You don't want to be sitting there going, if you're rich, going, Oh, I've got a Mercedes and a beach house, but no friends, right?

Life is about creating memories. And I think the final thing I wanted to say there, David, is one of my two mentors has been a very successful guy in business, and he spent five years sailing around the world. And his brother, who was even more successful in business, berated him and said, you've had more chances.

Then anybody else I've known and you've blown them. And that was at their aunt's 94th birthday. And the 94 year old aunt came up and said to the brother, well, I'm 94 today and I'd rather have Terry's memories than your money. And I think life is about creating great [00:52:00] memories.

David Pasqualone: Wow. That's a great way to end the show.

That is a powerful quote. I'd rather have his memories than your money. And that's so true. Now, if someone wants to get a hold of you, Mike, what's the best way for them to connect with you?

Mike Handcock: There's two ways, David. Uh, they can go to my LinkedIn profile and just search Mike Hancock, H A N D C O C K, or they can go to our website and, um, and they can find me there, which is www.

circleofexcellence. biz, B I Z, circleofexcellence. biz.

David Pasqualone: Awesome, Mike. Well, it's been a great pleasure having you on the show today. And before we sign off, anything we missed in your life or any final thoughts you want to leave our audience with?

Mike Handcock: Um, I think that if you asked some people what they thought they were [00:53:00] going to be doing in their 60s and 70s, you'd be blown away by what they've achieved late in life.

Like, let's face it, in America, the last two presidents of America were well into their seventies, right? Probably neither of them ever thought they'd get there. So my, my message is that, you know, your life is a long time. It's not over when you're 30. It's not over when you're 40. It's not over when you're 50.

It's not over when you're 60. It's not over when you're 70. It's over when it's over. So I think to make the most of every day is the most important thing. And I have fun doing it. If something's not fun, change it.

David Pasqualone: All right. Well, it's been a great honor to have you here today. Ladies and gentlemen, reach out to Mike, continue the conversation, check out his website.

If you have any questions that either he or I can help you with, do not hesitate to ask. Please share this episode with your friends and family because it helps us reach more people. And as [00:54:00] you know, the whole purpose of this show is to glorify God and to help you grow. So. We love you. Have a great day and we'll see you in the next episode.

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