983: We lost a good one. Here's what I learned from AJ...

Transcript

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Hey, what is up?

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Welcome to this episode of the Entrepreneur to Entrepreneur podcast.

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As always, I'm your host, brian Lofermento, and this is a bit of a somber and also a celebratory Solo Sunday episode, because the world lost a good one, one of our past podcast guests, who's a distant friend of mine but someone who has had an impact on me throughout the years.

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I'm gonna tell you, kind of behind the scenes, of someone who I deeply respect and admire.

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I'm so grateful to have crossed paths with and I'm extraordinarily grateful that we had the chance, at least one time in this lifetime, to create something special together with episode 363 of this podcast.

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I want to talk about AJ Mirzad, who passed away this weekend, I believe, in Thailand, although obviously the entrepreneurial world still people are sharing information, so I'm excited to do AJ some justice in this one.

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Let's dive in, all right.

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So to kick this episode off, I kind of just want to give some insights into what AJ Mirzad meant in my life and how we even became tied in the same ecosphere.

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Obviously, the entrepreneurial world is quite small and a lot of entrepreneurs we're all connected on Facebook, we're all connected in social media, just because you all have friends of friends, like, everybody who's in the entrepreneurial world knows somebody, who knows somebody, who knows somebody, and that's how it goes on.

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And so for a long time on Facebook I cannot recall, but I had always been friends with this guy named AJ Mirzad, who was just putting goodness into the world, and that's something that I so respect and admire, because I firmly believe that the world needs more goodness and I think that we all need to use our voices, whether it's our actual voices on a podcast episode or in a video, or even just through written word on social media.

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It's the exact reason why I've stopped using Facebook, for example, is you log in and you see so much toxicity, you see so much negativity, and that's why, over the years, I've gotten so used to the incredible value that AJ has put onto his personal Facebook.

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This is someone that, while he's been growing his own businesses and, by the way, he's been extraordinarily successful, and that's why I was so honored to have him on the show all the way back in July of 2020.

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In episode 363, I invite you to go back and hear his journey and his mindset.

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Similar to me, he comes from an immigrant family and that plays so much into the way that he sees the world and the way that he shows up in the world and the way that he believes that anything is possible, and he, for his entire life, was the example of that.

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It's not just things that he said, it's things that he actually practiced, whether it came to his health and his fitness routines and the way that he helped others with their fitness or within the realm of business.

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This is someone who is so intentional about not only what he was doing and who he became, but also how he showed up in the world, and so that's why, when I sat down to think about today's episode, I know I want to do him justice, and I think that the ultimate justice is how grateful I am that he came on the show.

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But, sharing this backstory of the fact that, just as I saw his posts over the years, I would reply to him and I would send him direct messages and just recognize that because, as a content creator, I know how infrequently we get those types of messages and someone like AJ, who put so much good into the world, I wonder, and I really do hope.

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I hope that all of that goodness came back to him and he felt that love and felt that admiration and that appreciation every single day because he showed up for others.

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And so that's why, not even as an entrepreneur, but just as a person, I think it's so important that we reciprocate and we give that same energy back to people.

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And so that's why, over the years for a long time I mean AJ and I have been friends on Facebook for probably a decade at this point and I always made it a point when something that he shared resonated with me to just reach out and be like bro, that that post was so good.

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I don't know how you thought about that or I don't know how you found that perfect way to articulate it, but it deeply resonated with me.

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I felt myself growing through life experiences that he was going through, that he so generously shared with the world.

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And so it was just those small interactions dating back to close to a decade, where I would then share something partially inspired by him.

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And I think that's the important thing that we all need to realize is that our work has consequences, and I say that in the most positive sense of the word.

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I know that when we talk about consequences so often we have that connotation of solely negative consequences, but our work has positive consequences.

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Our work can amplify and inspire and do so much more good in the world, and that's why I want to honor AJ with today's episode, because he inspired me to start showing up more.

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He inspired me to start sharing my own life experiences of if I went on a trip and I had some realization through talking to a local, I I didn't just want to keep that life lesson and that perspective to myself.

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I wanted to share it with the world, the same way that AJ did.

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And so when COVID started, we're going all the way back to March of 2020.

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I was still living in Los Angeles, aj was still in New York at the time, and that's when we started talking a little bit more over Facebook and I so enjoyed our conversations to the point where I said, aj, dude, we've got to create a podcast episode together.

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You've got to create a podcast episode together, like you've got to come on the show.

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We need to hit record and we need to have one of these conversations out in the public.

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And so much of what we focused on together in that episode 363 had nothing to do with business strategy, had nothing to do with tactics and all the things that so many entrepreneurs want to focus on.

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Because, at the heart of it, every conversation that I ever had with AJ always came back to mindset, always came back to belief, always came back to optimism and hope, and again that immigrant mindset where he said, gosh, my family came to the United States and you can tell how much just scroll through his Facebook and I'm so proud of the person that he is and how he showed up for others that it's forever a testament to how he showed up in the world.

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Go to his Facebook.

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You'll see how important his parents, his family, was to him.

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Giving back to others was so important to him and that's what we focused on in that episode.

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And so this weekend when I heard the news, it was super late on Saturday night.

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I just went back and listened to it and thought, gosh, this is someone who reflects so deeply and is so intentional about his own life and he raises the bar for every single one of us.

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And that's why, when I thought about today's episode, I just I couldn't help but not only go back to that episode, but also go to his Facebook and look for the posts that he's continued to make, because myself, it's a way that I've let myself off the hook, and I want to change that in the new year, and I want to make it a habit to change that from this day forward of I've stopped showing up on my Facebook.

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I've stopped showing up on social media because of all the reasons that I listed at the top of this episode, is that there's too much toxicity and negativity there, and so when I really think about AJ and his legacy and what he's created, aj continued to show up.

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Those things didn't matter to him, it didn't matter what was around him.

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He continued to show up as full as he could and as good as he could, and I think that is such an important lesson for all of us to embrace, and so that's why, in this episode, I want to read to you one of the last posts.

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It's not his last post, but one of the very last posts that he made on his Facebook.

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It was on September 14th, where I'm just going to read it to you.

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Here's a direct quote from AJ Mirzad's Facebook on September 14th you don't need anyone's approval to be good enough.

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When someone rejects you, judges you or treats you badly, you must realize that it's often never even about you.

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It's about them and their own insecurities, limitations and unrealistic expectations of other people.

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Remember that it's easy to see the faults of others, but most people are completely blind to their own.

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Your worth should never be dependent upon other people's acceptance of you.

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Your worth is something inherent.

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You exist and therefore you matter.

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You're allowed to voice your feelings.

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You're allowed to assert your needs and to take up space.

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You're allowed to express your truth and simply be your raw, authentic, unfiltered self, and you're allowed to remove anyone from your life who disrespects you or expects you to be okay with something that they would not be okay with if it was done to them.

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Appreciate those who love you.

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Help those that need you.

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Forgive those who hurt you.

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Forget those who leave you.

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Surround yourself with people who love you for who you are and not for what you can do for them.

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Go where you are appreciated, not tolerated.

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Your time is way too valuable to waste on people who don't value you.

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Finally, and above all else, don't worry if people don't like you.

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Most people struggle to even like themselves.

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So that's the end of the post that AJ made on September 14th, and I think that within there there's going to be lessons that resonate and hit all of us differently, based on where we are and what we're going through and where we are in our own growth journey, and I just think it's such a shining example for all of us, from the beginning to the end, to not only go on our own growth journey but bring others along with us.

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And so in today's episode, I just want to give that shout out to AJ for all the ways that he showed up in the world and left a mark, not just on myself.

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If you search his name on Facebook, you're going to see so many posts and really just expressions of impact and love that people felt for AJ and the work that he did.

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And it goes far beyond work.

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I think that's one of the biggest lessons that I've learned, especially being an entrepreneur for 16 years now is that our work gosh.

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It transcends, it extrapolates into every facet of our life.

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Everything that we do in life shows up not only in our work, but it shows up in our relationships, it shows up in how we touch other people, and so rest in peace to AJ and truly to everyone who's close in his circle, and especially his family, condolences, because it's never easy to lose somebody, but especially difficult to lose those people who so generously have shown up as themselves for so long.

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So I hope that today's episode touches you and inspires you to go find AJ's work.

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He's done a lot of great things and if you want to start with episode 363, I'm going to link to that in the show notes of today's episode.

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But let this be a challenge to all of us to raise that bar in our own lives, raise that bar in our own mindset, raise that bar in our own work and just go out there and be the best version of ourselves that we can be.

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So that's it for me in today's episode.

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I hope that inspires you to show up in your own life, not just for yourself, but for others.

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It's a lesson that I'm going to take to heart as we round out 2024 and head into 2025.

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So pound that subscribe button, because we're going to keep showing up for you, as always every Monday, wednesday, friday, saturday and Sunday here on the Wantrepreneur to Entrepreneur podcast.

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Hey, it's Brian here and thanks for tuning in to yet another episode of the Wantrepreneur to Entrepreneur podcast.

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If you haven't checked us out online, there's so much good stuff there.

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Check out the show's website and all the show notes that we talked about in today's episode at thewantrepreneurshowcom, and I just want to give a shout out to our amazing guests.

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983: We lost a good one. Here's what I learned from AJ...

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