The Mindset Shift That Can Change Your Financial Future with Bryan Thompson

Speaker A: 00:00:00

Welcome to make youe Wealth Work, the podcast where wealth becomes your greatest ally in achieving your dreams.

Joe Pantozzi: 00:00:07

Hey, everyone. Joe Pandozzi here with make youe Wealth Work. And I have my good friend Brian Thompson with me this morning.

And I'm so happy to have someone to chat with who shares values and who's. Who's in the same industry with me, if you want to use that word, industry. And Brian's company is Thompson Financial Group. So good morning, Brian.

Good to see you.

Bryan Thompson: 00:00:34

Hey, good morning, Joe. Thanks for having me on here.

Joe Pantozzi: 00:00:37

Yeah, I'm happy to have you. So Brian's wife is Missy.

They've got three kids, and he's sitting in his office in Franklin, Tennessee, today, and he has two other offices in Presque Island, Amain and Bangor. And I know he's been in the business for quite a bit.

We're going to delve into some of the details, the joys, the heartaches, the anxieties and the solutions that we offer to people. And it's just going to be a chat, and I'm excited to be with you.

So I was thinking this morning about our meeting, and I was thinking about our podcast title, which is make your wealth Work.

And the thing that has really been on my heart for a long time, and I mean a really long time, is that there are so many folks out there who don't think that they have the ability to create wealth. So when we say make your wealth work, there's a huge presumption there, and that is that people have any wealth to make work.

And I've come across very many people in my career who have unfortunately kind of a pessimistic view toward their future because they are burdened by the debt that they felt that they had to incur to get to where they are at today.

They don't necessarily see a way out of that debt, and they kind of are resigned in many ways to just pushing forward one step at a time and hoping something good happens. And so my passion is because in order to be in this business, there's like, one requirement. You have to love people, right?

Yeah, I love people, and I love people. My heart goes out to them when I see their anxiety, their angst, their fears.

And some of it either feeds or is fed by kind of a, we use this jargon all the time, a scarcity mentality. But it's a real thing. It's a real thing to have the mindset that I'm not going to have wealth. My family has never had any wealth.

Therefore, I don't expect to have any wealth in the future.

And so, you know, part of my work, my passion, my ministry, my coaching, my counseling, my cheerleading is to encourage people to look at what is possible in their own life.

And I don't think that you really have to have a particular net worth or particular income in order to create some level of wealth in order to start making your family your first, best customer, putting yourself first, paying yourself first, and making sure that your capital grows over time, little by little, but systematically so building that wealth over a long period of time. And I think what happens is people have this burden that I'm never going to have anything.

So I might as well just keep on maxing out the credit cards. And this is not just for W2 wage earners.

I've seen this in the minds and the outlooks of business owners who have seven figure, eight figure grossing businesses, who have employees, who have a long term business that's a stable business. And here I am just ranting and raving. Anyway, my thing is we're interested in helping people.

I don't care where you're at in life financially, I don't need you to have a minimum net worth. We've never established the minimum. Other people do and I totally respect that.

But I'm interested in people working with people who are teachable and who have integrity. So, Brian, I'm gonna let you take it away and just go wherever you want to go.

Bryan Thompson: 00:04:47

Yeah, thanks Joe. I think that's a really good point that you made. I think a lot of people, they don't feel like they deserve wealth.

And I think like you said, some of it can be generational. I think a lot of it is a mind shift that people have got to make and that's very difficult. It's easier said than done.

I know there's a lot of things I struggle with as well. And it's just a decision you have to make.

And then constantly remind yourself it's not a decision like you snap your fingers and you believe a certain way and everything is great. There's going to be attacks from all angles of your belief and how you feel and maybe even of your success.

I think, you know, everyone is entitled to have some success. And to your point earlier, you know, you've got to go after it and feel like you do deserve it.

And when people start having success, man, they really kind of see who the true friends are as well. And when they step out from the crowd, they that's very hard to do, to be different.

And you realize that there's not a lot of people cheering you on anymore at that point. And that's difficult for people to see.

I would say for the folks that are like that and they feel like they're outside of the crowd and they're not with the crowd anymore, you're probably doing something right and to keep pushing forward and keep moving forward, But I think that's swimming in the different direction or swimming upstream many different ways to be able to say that.

But it really is, you know, we're a society where you kind of go to where your grouping is and everyone's doing the same thing and you feel comfortable. And really, I think I need to challenge myself often to get out of that, you know, that group. I feel like a lot of times, too, even just asking.

One of the things I'm working on now is, like, when I have questions about things, whether it's a business or personal, what I'm challenging myself now is, you know, it's okay to ask people that are close to you and friends of yours, but when you really want some advice, you don't. You want to ask people that have been where you want to go?

Joe Pantozzi: 00:06:52

Yes.

Bryan Thompson: 00:06:53

If you ask people that are, you know, that you know well and have never been there, they don't have advice to give you. They just don't know. And. And I would feel that the same for me.

I don't think I would be able to give someone good advice if I haven't been there myself.

So I'm trying to find people in areas where I know I want to go to and where I want to lead, or maybe I want to get deeper into my faith or I want to have a stronger marriage with my wife.

I look at people that have that wisdom and that are older than me and have put the time in and have done the struggle, and I want to ask them the questions and I want to get there, and I need their opinions because I feel like those have a lot of value. So I think I relate that a lot back to what we do for a job and our work. I mean, we meet with all kinds of different clients every day and.

And I'm with you. I'm a believer that everyone deserves advice and assistance. And I feel like one.

If they've taken the step to come and talk to you, that's a big step for someone to share their financial life with you and to get a little more kind of a glimpse behind the curtain on where they're at. They don't let a lot of people know about it.

Sometimes spouses don't even share with each other those level of details and much less their family members, our friends. So when they do that with us as a firm, I guess I take a lot of value in it. I feel there's a lot of.

I need to have a lot of integrity with them now that they've trusted me with this information and be able to provide some advice and hopefully I can.

Hopefully I'm somewhere different than they are, or at least I've been in their shoes, and I can share some of that information of value that can help them maybe step away from the crowd, do things a little bit differently and really feel like, hey, they deserve to be in control of their life and deserve to be in control of their money and really control their destiny. And, you know, hope's not a plan. You've got to be able to have a vision and consistently go after it.

And I would tell you that, man, I've got some visions where I want to go, and they're not easy. It's a consistent reminder to myself to keep going for that vision.

And every day I struggle with the, you know, what's urgent versus what's important, you know, and whatever is important generally isn't urgent.

And making sure I take the time to spend on the important because that's how I'm going to get to where I want to be and not just selfishly for myself. That's where I want to go. I want to bring my team. I have a team that I feel relies on me and looks to me for leadership.

And I want to give them the best life possible that they can give their families. So I want to do that for my family. I want to do it for my employees families and I want to do it for our clients families.

And I think that's what kind of drives me is I've, you know, I want to put that pressure on me that I've got people relying on me and I don't want to ever forget that going forward.

Joe Pantozzi: 00:09:54

So that is so good. Listen, before I forget, this is make youe Wealth Work, the podcast of Alpha Mega Wealth. And you know, there are just.

Just to note, There are over 300 million people in the United States and I didn't ask Brian to come on here to help pump me up, but I also want to give your website. So can you give me that, announce that to folks so they can reach you?

Bryan Thompson: 00:10:21

Yeah, of course. Our website is grow with TFG.com so grow with TFG as in Thompson Financial Group.

Joe Pantozzi: 00:10:31

Awesome. GrowwithTFG.com you know, we. Brian and I are friends. We're men of faith. We belong to a Christian study group together.

And I'm not worried about one person getting on a podcast and saying, hey, I just as soon talked to Brian. That's good.

Because what I believe about our business is that maybe there are a few thousand, maybe there are a few tens of thousands, Maybe there are 50,000 great financial planners in this country.

And if that's true, we probably need 10 times more than that, because there aren't enough people who are actually taking advantage of good advisors who I believe have their heart in the right place. And that's one of the reasons I like hanging out with Brian because it allows me to be myself.

And we can just talk about concepts and we don't have to worry about geography or competition or territories. It just doesn't exist in our business.

Bryan Thompson: 00:11:32

our firm, started it back in: 1962

He passed away a few years ago, and he worked up until the day he died.

He died on a Christmas Eve, and even the week prior to that, he was still reaching out to clients to wish them a merry Christmas and touch base with people. And he felt that he had a responsibility for these individuals.

And, you know, we have generational clients because of him that we're still working with. And I would agree with you that, you know, we should all have an abundance mindset. There's a. There's a lot to go around.

There's a lot of people that need help. He.

I think he instilled that into me, saying that, one, you can't beat yourself up over, you know, having someone say no and not take you as an advisor. Sometimes that's a no, but not right now. They're not ready.

Sometimes that's a no because they have someone that's taking really good care of them, and that's what we wish and hope for everyone. But his. His mentality was move on to the next person and see who can help. There's someone always waiting for some help and advice.

You just need to keep finding those people. And he always made the comment to me, what's easy for us is so difficult for other people.

And that when you're thinking about money and thinking about decisions that need to be made, we have a lot of people and a lot of clients that are really good in other vocations, and thank God they're there doing that type of work, because that's not what I'm called to do. Definitely feel like this is a call for me to do this and a call for me to. To be a business owner and to help clients and to. And to build a team.

And I think, you know, Art really shared with me that, you know, I think the biggest thing is, like, a reputation can be built in a moment, but a legacy was built over a lifetime.

And a lot of that, you know, I see a lot of it after he passes away, and you hear the phone calls coming into the people and the lives he's touched and. And the stories from individuals. We've shared a lot of those with the family.

Fortunate enough that I had a lot of recordings that we took of Art, and I did an interview of him a few years back together, and I have that recorded.

We did a little segment on his life, and in fact, right now we just did another one with Emeritus on a succession plan on how Art passed the business on to his son, how he brought in a partner, Brian Hamill, and how Brian passed the business on to me and just maintaining that continuity within a team and building that.

And now I have a son in the business that would be our fourth generation into the business, and someday I'll pass that business on to him and he'll keep carrying Art's legacy forward. So it's not something we want to forget. We think about it often, we talk about it as a team often. And it's really.

It's built into kind of the fabric of what we do.

Joe Pantozzi: 00:14:38

I love that. I took a lot of notes as you're speaking. What's easy for us is difficult for other people. And just.

I want to touch back on the legacy in just a minute. And I was just speaking with my team in our Monday class, and I was mentioning to them, you know, you don't need.

Our clients don't need to have a PhD in finance. They don't need to have any particular degrees or advanced learning. I mean, we recommend books and books and books.

And, you know, Nelson Nash would say, for example, if you could only read 10 books in your entire life, one of them should be the Law by Frederick Bastiat. And so, because I believed in Nelson so well, and he had. I mean, he had me wrapped around his finger for so long, and he was such an amazing mentor.

And I've had other mentors before him, but not as full time as he was. But the other mentors who are still. Are still in my life. Some of them still preach to me and they're gone from the earth.

But Nelson made us realize that you can build wealth without having to have a complex, chaotic, hard to understand system. What we do, which is primarily getting people to change their thinking, is something that anybody can be coached on.

And some of these things, if you're an outsider, they sound like cliches. Nelson says you need to rethink your thinking. What does that mean? Well, how do I think about money?

Well, the preconceptions that we talked about earlier in this call, a lot of people are out there thinking, I am never going to have any money, therefore this is how my life's going to go.

And then I start to look at some of the data, some of the resources, some of the YouTubes that I get on and watch how credit card companies are just sucking the life out of people, and they're doing it by selling us the idea of having a great life. The more credit cards you're going to have in your pocket and the higher your credit limit is.

So what you're telling me is the more heroin I can get addicted to, the better life I'm going to have. But what's really going on is I have less and less money because you've encouraged me.

myself since I Met Nelson in: 1999

So what, what are you thinking about with regard to your finances? If you're following the crowd. If you're following the crowd, probably you're not doing it because you've thought about it.

You're following a crowd kind of automatically, robotically, and hoping that's going to work out. Which means you really don't have control of your finances. But you're just throwing in with the majority, hoping that they go in the right direction.

Well, what's happening? The majority of Americans don't have this, they don't have that. They don't have savings, they don't have emergency fund.

They don't have anything more than a few bucks in 401k. They don't understand how that works. They're not creating legacy.

And you're talking about, about your firm being heading, heading towards its fourth generation.

Bryan Thompson: 00:18:24

Right?

Joe Pantozzi: 00:18:24

Which is, which is amazing. So you have a firm, which is a legacy firm whose business is is to help people create legacy.

Speaker A: 00:18:34

Hey, guys. Hope you enjoyed part one of this episode. It's just too good to limit to one show. Join us next week to hear the rest.

This is the podcast factory dot com.