Episode 74: Discovering the Power of Purpose with Daniel Mangena – Transcript
Rennie Gabriel 00:09
Hi, folks, and welcome to Episode 74 of the Wealth On Any Income Podcast. This is where we talk about money tips, techniques, attitudes, information and provide inspiration. I'm your host, Rennie Gabriel. In past episodes, we spoke about how to build an Income and Expense Report, how to measure the level of pleasure based on where you spend your money, how to track your money in 5-10 seconds, what to look for on a net worth statement to see how close you are to Complete Financial Choice®. And last week, we had Debbie Allen, who's 'The Expert for Experts', and the best-selling author of nine books. Today we have as our guest, Daniel Mangena. Daniel is an International Speaker, Best-Selling Author, Broadcaster and Coach. He is best known for his highly successful Micro2Millions program and being the author of Stepping Beyond Intention and his Do it With Dan and Beyond Success podcasts While he says he's completely self-made. I'm going to question him on that, because he probably has parents. And he spent decades perfecting his world-class coaching methodology. His mission statement is to spearhead an evolutionary uplift in universal consciousness by awakening people to the importance of their unique role and enabling them to manifest their dream life. Daniel, welcome to the Wealth On Any Income Podcast.
Daniel Mangena 01:49
Thank you for having me on. I've been really looking forward to this conversation.
Rennie Gabriel 01:53
Great. Well, the first thing I've got to question you on, before we get to anything else - is how you made yourself? Without anyone else?
Daniel Mangena 02:03
Okay. Okay. Okay. So there... I was stardust, and the stardust formed and I became a man. No... Even when you look at it, when you look at the alternative meaning of self-made - I don't believe anybody does anything in isolation or by themself. What I mean by that is nobody handed anything to me. Did the pieces that were handed to me get put together by myself without the involvement of other people. No - collaboration is the number one value of mine. Being supported and learning to be supported has been a very big part of my journey. However, nobody handed me anything.
Rennie Gabriel 02:42
Okay, great. I think the easiest thing to avoid misconception is pull that out of your bio. Because I had an interview - or someone talked about - 'Rennie, so you're a self made millionaire?' And I said, No - no one is self-made. And anyone who says that is just full of themselves. So now you know where I'm coming from - okay?
Daniel Mangena 03:08
I know where you are coming from exactly.
Rennie Gabriel 03:09
Alright, great. So now, now we get to some of the real questions. And you know, you're doing coaching, you're doing public speaking, tell me why you're doing this stuff.
Daniel Mangena 03:18
I didn't want to do any of this stuff. You and I have both been through the thing of coming up from nothing, right, you know, everything being lost and rebuilding. My first time losing everything, I was trying to help people. So the prospect of helping people and other people being involved in my life wasn't something that I wanted anything to do with. So when I kept getting the call, to leave the life that I built up, which is very comfortable - making 100,000 pounds a month, living in a lovely place in Highgate in London. Traveling first class, doing all the things, you know, dinners, blah, blah, blah, And nobody to answer to, nobody that could risk any of it. I liked that. But the voice kept getting louder, and louder and louder. And the calling got louder, and louder and louder. And here's the funny thing. So at some point, I was like, 'Okay, I get it. I get it.' And I tried to make a deal with God. I tried to - okay, this is what's going to happen. Hear this - hear me out on this one.
Rennie Gabriel 04:22
Okay.
Daniel Mangena 04:24
I'm going to do a podcast, I'll do some speaking, and I'm going to finish that book that I've been working on - which is Stepping Beyond Intention, which I hadn't finished up at that point. I'd been working on it for about, I don't know, five or six years.
Rennie Gabriel 04:36
Yes. Now say that title again - more slowly.
Daniel Mangena 04:39
Beyond Intention - Stepping Beyond Intention. Okay - and I said, alright, but how does that feel? I'm going to do that, and then we're good, right? You're going to leave me alone? And then I said, okay - it got a bit louder. Okay- Tell you what I'm going to do -let me just get a nice little nest egg together. And then I'm very happy to leave my comfortable life, knowing that I can maintain my standard of living. And then I'll come and do the thing that you're calling me to do. Okay, so it's going to be monastic. And I focused my energy, and I managed to get this nest egg, on the verge, in terms of contracts signed for different things, and everything's good. I went on a trip to a meditation retreat - meditation retreats will feature a few times in this story - I went and whilst I was at this meditation retreat, inexplicably, every single one of those contracts fell apart at the last minute. I had arranged some trade finance for an oil company out of Hong Kong, they lost their foreign exchange license. So they pulled out, this guy that I've done something for in Germany, I can't remember what the story was... But every single one of them just fell on their face. And then the partners I had at the time, one of them decided that he wanted all the money for himself. And so, he set up a second company. Whilst I wasn't looking, went and called out all our suppliers, our service delivery partners, siphoned those off and then went and bad mouthed me to as many of our clients as he could get away with it with and took them. And then our agencies to bring us clients- took those too. And then, by the way, had the audacity a month later to come back and ask me if I had any leads because he was struggling. Anyway, that's another story for another time. But I was literally sitting there like, 'Oh, my God, what am I going to do?' I mean I worked feverishly to negotiate with God that I'm going to come back later, after I've done this thing. I've got it all together, and now it's all falling away. And it was at that moment that I realized when I had that call from Mark, it wasn't even when he took it. It's when he called back and was like, 'Hey, by the way, blah, blah, blah.' I was like, I get it now it's because I didn't trust that I was going to be looked after - that I had to be shown, okay, you can't see that you're going to be looked after. Let me put you in a situation where you have to witness yourself be looked after. And so I said I get it and so I made the commitment there and then, I didn't take on any more clients. I just said I'm just going to serve out the obligations I've got to clients I've got on the table, and I started to put that little bit of money away. Not thinking that I need to thing, but just to... be sensible. Right? 13th of February 2018 - I'm at another meditation retreat - this time in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Now, February in Sante Fe is not warm. Santa Fe, New Mexico in February is bloody cold.
Rennie Gabriel 07:26
I'm glad you warned me about.
Daniel Mangena 07:27
I had a woolly hat, scarf, jacket, body warmer underneath, hot pockets, long johns, two pairs of socks, and my boots. It was six o'clock in the morning doing this walking meditation. Quick bit of backstory. I hadn't had the best retreat. I hadn't really dropped in - I hadn't really got my normal juiciness out of it. This is Monday morning, the retreat finished on Sunday. This is Monday morning. I was like you know what I'm just going to... before I fly home today, and just fly back to England. I'm just going to go and just do another walking meditation this morning. So I just... no expectations - just went off and walked this. Boom - I had this full three dimensional, probably metaverse-credible, full sensory experience of exactly what my life would look like, if I just showed up in service, stopped trying to make everything neat and tidy. Stop trying to plan everything and just trusted that I had a mission that was going to be supported. And that day I closed down the website. I said to every customer that I had open books with - 'I'm sorry, I'll see if I can refer someone for you. But I can't finish this contract.' Anyone that had paid me money that was unfulfilled, I paid back, and I walked away. I walked away from it, and that's why I do what I do now.
Rennie Gabriel 08:38
I get it. I laughed when you first said you were going to make a deal with God. That's when I started to laugh. It just doesn't seem to work that way.
Daniel Mangena 08:47
It doesn't work that way.
Rennie Gabriel 08:48
No, no. Well, and because I donate 100% of the profits from the work I do to the charity that rescues dogs that become service animals for soldiers that might have committed suicide. An important thing is philanthropy. You know, you were guided to do what you do, and so let me ask you, what's the cause that's most important to you? Or what's the charity that you support most? And I love it - it has a familiar name in it, this Foundation.
Daniel Mangena 09:20
So the Mangena Foundation is a nonprofit. We're not organized as a formal charity, as yet. My siblings and I've been running that for... I think we're going into our third year now, second or third year. We do direct investment into projects where people are actually doing something on the ground. So we believe in grassroots projects. So for example, a friend of mine does a lot of powerful work with homeless people around North London. He works with local councils, they put together packages, they do real work with real people in a real way. My sister champions a food kitchen that we do every Christmas for homeless people in East London. I do a lot of grassroots work in West Africa where I've done some contract work before, when I was doing more consulting. I support some local schools, I built a few schools, we've got some local feeding centers that I give money to every single week that we ensure that there's a place for people to come and eat no matter what their life situation is. So we're looking at expanding that over time. A lot of the networks I'm involved in now, like we both are part of JVMM. The point is that I want to inspire people to entrepreneurial philanthropy which isn't just throwing money at problems, it's actually going in and working with people to actually provide credible long-term solutions for them to actually take care of yourself. So for example, the places where I build schools, I do entrepreneurial philanthropy there. I set up enterprises, train people. I don't take any money out, I haven't taken a penny out in six or seven years from these any of these projects. I invested in agricultural land, we get... we lease the land, we put people to work on it, all of the proceeds go into local communities, developing those. Giving the kids a leg up so that they don't need to necessarily work there, they can go and have another opportunity. And that's been going on, like I said for many years, we pay a real wage to people so that it can actually live, not pennies. And we're looking at expanding - now that we've seen that work so well in the two or three countries that we've been working with, we are now looking at other areas. So I'm working with a friend of mine, Cedric, he's from the Democratic Republic of Congo, we're looking at replicating those projects. We wanted to start this year - COVID meant travel has been a bit bonkers. So we're looking at next year, he and I starting with just a few 100,000, looking at local projects that we can get into. Provide local jobs, local education, and opportunities for people to actually be a part of the growth and expansion of their community.
Rennie Gabriel 11:38
Got it - I admire the work that you're doing. And it's not just like you said, throwing money at something, but actually getting involved.
Daniel Mangena 11:45
Yeah, right.
Rennie Gabriel 11:46
Now let's talk about the business that you're in now. And let me know who the people are, who you feel are your ideal clients. And give me a case study of an example of someone who did what you said and what the results were. Okay?
Daniel Mangena 12:05
So there's one thing that has to underpin anyone who wants to kind of play with us. You have to see money as a tool, not something to be scared of, not something to be worshipped, not something to be the be all and end all. It's just an at all - that's all it is. So people that have the best results from us have invested in themselves when it comes to personal development. So they understand that in order to get more and be more, you have to do something different, okay? They have to have some kind of entrepreneurial bug. Doesn't mean they have to be a business owner, they can have a career. It doesn't mean that they have to be an entrepreneur, they can be a worker, but there has to be some entrepreneur inside. And what that means to me is they have to be open to understanding the role that they may play in creating value for others.
Rennie Gabriel 12:51
Mm hmm.
Daniel Mangena 12:52
So that's that. And then, because we go down the rabbit hole a little bit, we don't look at anything one-dimensionally, we don't just look at what the great strategy is, or what the best mindset, we also look at the spirit and the motion of the thing, like the divine aspect of things too. And so people have to be open to having a discussion about something that goes beyond what they can see with their eyes and ears. So anyone who fits that category, we find that we can take them to interesting places in very short periods of time. Ruth, for example, we got her to financial freedom in 60 days, two years ago,
Rennie Gabriel 13:22
Okay,now, go a little slower... So Ruth went from whatever, to a place where she could choose to work or choose not to work within 60 days?
Daniel Mangena 13:35
60 days. Now for that, you'll understand this more than anyone - we leverage credit, we leverage debt. We leverage debt - we've got her into situations where we could earn sufficient interest on that debt so that she could cover her basic needs. After a little bit, we could expand that, reinvest some of that income, look to leveraging other forms of debt. Now, purely fueled by debt, she makes nearly $20,000 a month. She was able to move from Colorado to Tennessee. She's close to her son, she gets to play with her granddaughter. Her partner doesn't have to work either. They run an Airbnb because they like to entertain people, right? That's what they wanted to do. They thought about guesthouses. Like why? Here's why refining your vision is great. Why go and have the overhead of a 20-person guesthouse, when actually you don't need it for business. You just want to be able to host people and serve them. And so they've got a property where they've got some parking spots for people to park RV's and campers. And then I've got a couple of rooms that people can have, and they get to host them. And Robert is a chef, so he gets to make meals for them and stuff like that. And they're just living their best life. They go and do charity stuff. They go and help. There's a property not too far, where the owners do some charity drives and they can donate as much time as they want to for that. And they're making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Like is that wrong? I think that's absolutely yummy. That's just the example of what can happen, when you understand some of the principles that you teach. When you understand that you're going to have to take, you know, some leaps in order to make something happen. But when you do, things that people will tell you are not possible, can be possible.
Rennie Gabriel 15:14
I agree completely. I look at my own life for proof of that. And I do... one of the, I finished a book recently called Attitudes of the Wealthy. And one of them is use debt to create wealth. And I've got millions of dollars of debt. But I'm not the one who's coming up with the money to make the payments. The tenants of the commercial buildings and the apartment buildings, and there's plenty of money left over. So yeah, beautiful, Daniel. So, let me ask you one more question. What is the one question that I should have asked you that I didn't? And what's the answer? Does it have anything to do with the power of purpose? You know, I could tell you were like, 'Oh, I forgot what I was supposed to say'.
Daniel Mangena 16:08
So I've got really interesting relationship to purpose. Which is funny, because I'm actually, we're in the early stages of producing a movie all about purpose that we're going to be releasing next summer. Because a lot of people get caught up on the purpose question. So much so that they actually end up in a place of inaction.
Rennie Gabriel 16:26
Yeah.
Daniel Mangena 16:27
Right? And all the listeners heard my story, like I was divinely called to do what I do right now. I've no doubt of it. But I wasn't sitting around doing nothing waiting for the lightning bolt. And at the same time, when the thing came up, I didn't make an Instagram post about it. I made some moves. Right? I packed up my house. I went into the unknown. I packed everything I could into a suitcase, backpack, and a suit carrier. And I was running on the steam that I had left in the bank account, to go and share this work with people. I wasn't looking for a payoff. I didn't try to negotiate again with God, I learned my lesson the first time. I just put up and shut up and trusted and went on this journey. And now I make more money. I'm more full of joy. My baby son took his first steps today - multiple steps. He's done like the odd one and then fall on his bum, but...
Rennie Gabriel 17:17
Yeah.
Daniel Mangena 17:18
He made the - you know, I'm talking about - he made the steps.
Rennie Gabriel 17:20
Yeah. Now you're going to be running to catch him.
Daniel Mangena 17:22
Yeah. Yeah. Which I'm terrified about because he... But, I didn't strategize this. I didn't hack it. Right? I didn't run game. I didn't look for the hustle it. I trusted. I followed. I showed up. And it's happened.
Rennie Gabriel 17:41
Beautiful. Thank you. Well, that takes us to the end of our episode. And Daniel, thank you for being on the show.
Daniel Mangena 17:50
Thank you for having me. My absolute pleasure.
Rennie Gabriel 17:52
Oh, great. And to my listeners, thank you for tuning in. You can listen to the Wealth On Any Income Podcast on your favorite platform, and please rate, review and subscribe. And if you'd like to know how books, movies and Society programs you to be poor, and what the cure is, then log on to wealthonanyincome.com/tedx. You'll hear my TEDx talk and can request a free 27-page roadmap to Complete Financial Choice® and receive a weekly email with tips, techniques or inspiration around your business or your money. Again, that's wealthonanyincome.com/tedx. Until next week, be prosperous. Bye bye for now.
