00:06 - Jess White (Host)

Welcome back to The Networking Spark podcast. My name is Jess White and I'm super glad to see you here or maybe you're just listening, but thanks for being here. This is a podcast for entrepreneurs, move makers, shakers, anyone running their own business or anyone interested in being the best versions of themselves. So on this podcast I interview real sort of entrepreneurs, people that have experienced success. We like to dive into failures as well and really just to pull out some tips and tricks to kind of inspire you. So today I'm super excited to have somebody on the podcast who is a real sort of ball of energy, like yeah, just got so much energy. That is wonderful, and I'm really interested to talk to him today. So welcome to the podcast.

01:04 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Thank you, Jess, nice to be here. Thanks for inviting me on.

01:07 - Jess White (Host)

Tell us who you are.

01:08 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Okay.

01:09 - Jess White (Host)

What's your name?

01:10 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Alexander Rhodes Evans.

01:11 - Jess White (Host)

Thank you and your business.

01:14 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

So I'm an entrepreneur, I work with private clients, I teach them how to trade crypto, and I'm also a property investor and beginning my public speaking journey now.

01:22 - Jess White (Host)

Excellent. So, Alex, I can call you Alex? Please do yeah. Yeah, are you the same person today that you were years ago?

01:33 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

No, definitely not Unbelievably. I hate to admit it, but I've recently turned 50. So I think, like a lot of people, when you hit that number you know you have a kind of you look amazing for 50,.

01:47 - Jess White (Host)

By the way, that's the first time you've told me that I didn't know that, so wow, okay.

01:51 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Thank you. So yeah, that's because I've been very disciplined my whole life in my training regime. I cold shower. I have done for years. You see the difference in November, that's for sure, to how it is in the summer. I'm very disciplined. I do intermittent fasting. My background was martial arts but I still train a lot religiously, so that's never, ever, changed. Wherever I've been in the world, even if I'm in a hotel, there's never an excuse. My routine's always like that. So hopefully that's reflecting in what you see In answer to your question. Definitely not the same person I was 20 years ago, at the age of 30. Um, I think, like a lot of people you, you have this concept in your mind of who you think you should be as a young man and then you go on a journey where you try things, it works, some fail and you should keep adjusting along the way. So I'm very different to the person I was 20 years ago.

02:49 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, I can imagine let's go back to your routine for a moment and then we'll go a bit deeper into what makes you who you are. So I mean, this is part of it, right. So not everybody has got a routine. Were you were you, were you like that as a child, or is it something that you have learnt?

03:07 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yeah, great question. So actually, now that you say that, if I think about it, it probably all began when I was a teenager. So when I was a child, I was bullied. I grew up in a single parent family without a father, and my mum's advice at the time was, when I was being bullied, Alex, walk away, turn your back, turn the other cheek, as most men out there, especially if you've been bullied, would know that doesn't work. So what happened is the actual process of learning to fight and teach myself to stand my ground. You watch the Rocky films. You see him doing the pull-ups, the chin-ups and all the rest of it the stuff that us kids in the 80s watched and I began to forge my own routine. We had a loft ladder, we had a loft in our house and the loft hatch had one of those loft ladders on it. So I would un-attach the ladder so that you just had the top two, three rungs left and I would do chin-ups on the loft ladder.

04:06 - Jess White (Host)

So that's where my routine began then, as I got older and I got, is that? Because you wanted to get bigger. Yeah, as a young boy, and yeah, that was the motivation yeah, so I was very skinny as a kid.

04:13 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

My mum's family are all tall and lean. They're like runner beans. So I was always very lean and didn't have any muscle and so I wanted to you know, get more powerful like Rocky. You know you watch Rocky. You want to be like Rocky, yeah. So yeah, that's why I began that and and then, obviously, as I got older, I got into martial arts and then that added into my routine. So there was the training and what have you. And then, obviously, you learn about diet. You look at other people. You look up to boys. I went to college with couple of years older and you see they look good.

04:46 - Jess White (Host)

You want to look like them yeah, you know what inspired you to get into martial arts being bullied yeah, and to be able to then protect yourself and yeah, and did you learn a lot of disciplines from studying martial arts?

04:59 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yeah, definitely, especially my first mentor. I'd like my first martial arts instructor, an incredible man by the name of Alan Hewson, because I think, as a boy or a man, the people that we respect and listen to the most, the people that come across as real, who, you know, have had real stories, and he was someone who, by all accounts, was like a rocker in the 60s and had been in all kinds of crazy fights. So long story, short short. He inspired me quite heavily, and so I listened to a lot of the things that he taught me. He was probably my first mentor and actually was one of the first people. He held me back from getting my black belt because my temper was too bad. So I remember that was one of the first things that I had to learn to master my temper and begin to channel it, because I was so angry. How did you do that?

05:47

Yeah, well, he basically would. It was a combination of him holding back what he knew I wanted, which was my black belt, and then listening to him and he'd tell me to read, like books by Bruce Lee and various other people. So my mum used to make me read a lot as a kid. I've always enjoyed reading and I think again that combination of reading and doing martial arts I just started to. They say success leaves clues, so learn from other people that had done what I wanted to do.

06:16 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, do you still have a temper?

06:18 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Definitely.

06:19 - Jess White (Host)

When does that come out?

06:28 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

out. So it's a that's a really interesting point. So I've had my whole life ever and it got worse after losing my mum like the anger. What I've learned to do is basically focus my anger. I'm actually going to be writing a book, by the way, called focus anger and I've learned that if I didn't harness and channel my anger, I probably would have spent my life in prison, because at some stage I began to realise if I lost my temper, it was almost uncontrollable. So it's been a work in progress, but all I can say is, literally I've found a way to, when I get angry, I turn it inwards and create like this ball of energy and I can draw on it at any time. But I've got to be very careful because it's always there under the surface and even now it my whole life has been a real challenge to keep it under control.

07:14 - Jess White (Host)

I have managed to 90% of the time, but it's still there but super powerful, to be able to channel that energy and use it into something positive, such as public speaking, for instance. You've been doing a lot of that recently, um, and that takes a lot of work, doesn't it? A lot of practice, a lot of energy. Um, somebody once advised me when I lost somebody close to me my little brother actually um, and I felt distraught and I didn't know. I was struggling, to be honest, um, and someone advised me use that energy, use that grief and channel it into something else, and it was probably one of the best pieces of advice I ever had. And do you, would you say, that you channel it into your work, for instance?

08:06 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Well, it's only because you've said that that I'll now share that. The extension of the anger, because I didn't explain why the anger. So the anger began from being bullied, but maybe it's in us anyway, right, that's the other thing. Then it was losing me and unfortunately I've lost a lot of people from a young age. So what happened is each time someone else close to me died, that just increased it, and you know what it was. I realised it was a coping mechanism, because the anger is pain.

08:40

And then the way I have reconciled what I've lost is, and then the way I have reconciled what I've lost is OK so I've now got to go on a mission for them to become the best I can be, or I failed and then I've let them down, so just repeat your question again.

08:58 - Jess White (Host)

Well, I'm just kind of focused on what you're saying at the moment actually, that I was talking about channelling energy just then, what you're saying at the moment actually, that I was talking about channelling energy just then, um, but you know, it's interesting to hear where that's come from, because when we lose people, you can, you can kind of react in various different ways. Some people might just totally collapse because it, you know, and it's it's like, and they might become frozen and not be able to go. Some people might just carry on because that's all they can do, but then sometimes you might not be dealing with what's going on. So it's interesting to hear that your reaction, I suppose because you started losing like how old were you when you first lost somebody?

09:39 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

So the first thing was when I was a teenager and I was in the middle of my BTEC National at college. Our mum died in summer of 92 and I was just I'd just turned 19.

09:51 - Jess White (Host)

You only had your mum.

09:53 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yeah, so. So basically, our mum was a force of nature as a single parent. So my mum, my dad, disappeared. I say dad, biological father, disappeared when I was two and a half. My sister was six months in 1975, he was on the missing persons list, never met him and later on I realised he was never coming back.

10:11

But my mum was we grew up in, so my mum went from being a middle-class housewife to basically being a single mum on benefits overnight. So we went from living in like you know what would have been like a nice mason in Surrey to a council flat in the shadow of heathrow airport. And although I've got many great memories from my childhood, it was rough. So, but my mum what she was driven. So the drive I've got is from her. She was very ambitious and very driven and she did an incredible job of helping us avoid a lot of the pitfalls that my friends as kids got into stealing cars, sniffing glue, whatever they were doing ended up in prison. She kept us away for all of that by her willpower, and what I'm leading to is that we didn't see it coming when she died, because she had bronchitis which turned to emphysema, and then she was on the waiting list for a lung transplant for about eight, nine years.

11:07

By the time she had the lung transplant, at the age of 46, her body was wrecked and unfortunately, we thought that this was what was going to happen. She was going to have the lung transplant, she'd come home and she'd be weak for a year and we just have to do more housework. We had no counselling, we did not see it coming. My sister was 15. So as a girl, that's a really hard age to lose your mum and our mum was our world. So you have to understand. This was like the rug was pulled out from under my feet and I went from one direction to another. I didn't see it coming and that was the first catalyst. But I didn't really have time to process it. I just had to like, right, how am I going to pay the bills now? Like, where are we going from here?

11:47

And I had to look after my sister because you were the man of the house. Yeah there was no dad there and actually the council, the social workers and like a social worker in the council were like I can still remember this, like yesterday. It was a pivotal moment. About two weeks after our mum died, a social worker came to visit us with someone from the council and they were like, basically words, the effect of we've given you a couple of weeks to grieve. Who's paying the rent or is?

12:11

Jesus and then it was like, oh yeah, by the way, if you want to carry on at college, then you've got to pay the bills. You've got to pay the rent, pay the housing council tax if you want to quit college and sign on, we can give you housing benefit was like that's insane, there's no way I'm going to quit college. So I then carried on. I was already working at about three, four part-time jobs, but in effect, that was what began to put me onto a path I went onto for the next 20-odd years, which was basically being involved in heavy activities, crazy things, because it was trying to pay three, four jobs when still not paying the bills and for me, quitting college was not an option. Yeah, so I carried on.

12:50 - Jess White (Host)

But my sister, yeah, quit, she went and started working so life was really tough when you were younger you were, you were on your own by the sounds of things, um, and 19, yes, you're officially an adult, but often at 19 we haven't got a clue what we want to do and we still need that support around us. So being on your own at that age it's hard and it's like for me it was 15. I moved out, but I hadn't lost a parent. So this is totally different and you know, and if you're in a dodgy area and you're surrounded by the wrong sorts of people, you're quite, you're influenced really easily, right, yeah? So therefore, uh, what happened then is that you had some tough experiences or you got in with the wrong people, and what was the journey through that?

13:39 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

yeah. So basically, um, anyone that's known me will tell you I've always been a grafter. When I was a kid I used to sell like fake Rolexes, wash people's cars, knock on doors. So I've always been entrepreneurial, like a lot of people out there who've gone on to become successful. You read about in their books but basically it was just a case of I'm at college, I'm working.

14:02

I was working delivering pizzas at Domino's when it first opened, had like two cleaning jobs but still wasn't making enough money to pay the bills. So, like anything, you know, there's friends you go to college with that, maybe smoke, weed and what have you. And so you end up like, well, hold on a minute, I'm smoking a joint with him once in a while, I'll buy it for us, and then it just kind of migrates from there. Instead of him paying that guy over there, he buys it off you know. But the whole time my eyes were always on college, university. So that was kind of the extent of things. But what happened is, after mum died, because I was so focused on my sister and paying the bills, the next couple of years flew by and then, instead of going on to university, I went straight into work and because I was on the journey of martial arts. It just happens in life that I graduated from the guys I was training with.

14:57

I started working on the door in London. So from the age of 21, I was working in some of the most dangerous clubs in West London and I'm not a big guy by doorman standards. So even at my, my biggest weight was probably like now I'm 85 kg it's about 13 and stone, so maybe my heaviest was 13 and a half stone. So I started working on the door in London and then obviously, as you can imagine, when you're working in nightclubs in London, you're going to be to all kinds of characters. So there's things I've seen and done that I can never talk about because I would be convicted. You know and and you can just imagine that basically I was in an environment where guns and knives were being pulled on you on a regular basis and all of the above. There's nothing. I saw things from the age of 21 to 24 I've never seen again in my life and I've travelled all over the world. You know girls stabbing girls, people being glass acid thrown in their face.

15:53

It changed. So what happened is is losing my mum literally in the space of a year and a half. Now I'm in this crazy world where it's like a learning curves, like that you've got to adapt quick, you know, to survive it. So all of a sudden now I didn't even really have, still didn't have time to grieve I'm just like right, I'm in this world now. And then it just kind of went from there and then eventually, about the age of 24, joined the Royal Marines and then so I'd had this background. Then I've gone into the military. Didn't stay in there too long because it didn't. There was many great things about the military. Super glad I did it, but also super glad I left, because good friends of mine that stayed in a couple of them are not on the planet anymore and a couple of them have got mental health problems. So I've always had a plan. And then you know, on to the next phase.

16:38 - Jess White (Host)

So you went into survival mode after losing your mum and then it was like survival crazy world, where you were just kind of exposed to so much. And then you know, and then started to do some stuff that maybe you wouldn't be doing today, right, sure. And then from that transition into um, the military, into the marines do you think that did you good? Because that did that get you into kind of really stepping up and and looking after yourself a bit more yeah.

17:05 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

So from that point on, without a shadow of a doubt, the things that I'll always say proudly about the marines is I should have brought it today. I forgot my green beret. But to earn the green lid or the green beret of a roaming royal marine commando is not easy. You have to go through hell to get it and you have to really want it. And the process of training was incredible because you are changed forever when you leave training because you get so many, you get used to sleep deprivation on a level you don't experience anywhere else hot, hot, cold, no food, et cetera and you learn what your body can really handle and, without a shadow of a doubt, that was probably one of the single best things I went through, because it served me in good stead for the next 20-odd years, even now, including the routine.

17:51

But not everybody that becomes a Royal Marine goes on to still keep that routine. I've got friends that aren't disciplined like me, so I suspect I was always like that, but I just basically am still in my head. In a way I'm still a Royal Marine. Yeah, I never. I still want to maintain that level of fitness discipline, you know, and I'm not extreme with it, where I know people that I've heard about where they have a go at their kids because everything's not neat and tidy in the bathroom. I'm not like that, but I'm still regimented, I'm still disciplined.

18:22 - Jess White (Host)

I've got a routine, so yeah the marines is a big part of that yeah, that really shows getting to know you recently. It does show us something really, really positive um that I think others around you can learn from, and certainly within kids, I think they've taken a lot from that as well. So let's keep going with your story. So at a certain point in time, you ended up in Dubai, so would you like to just tell us how that happened and why that happened?

18:52 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yep. So after the military, basically I started to get involved with some like security work. So I'd stopped doing door work and was getting more like private security work, so some like close protection and stuff for private clients and a couple of friends of mine working overseas and one of them was working in Dubai and we were basically working in Africa doing some crazy things around Sierra Leone, drc, democratic Republic of Congo. And because I was on this mission to forever, I wanted to be a millionaire. My whole thing was, you know, fixating on that number. So I was just chasing money. But through this journey of security and what skills I had, so I was doing a lot of security work offshore and then basically was reinvesting the money I was making into property and I had a couple of sunbeds shops at the time and most of the property developing I was doing or investing was there wasn't really much intelligence to it. I was just buying a property because my accountant and other friends were, like put your money into property, alex. Every 10 years property doubles. So I'd been investing in property. I actually need to mention I almost forgot.

20:08

Actually, the major positive, if I can say, that that came out of losing our mum was. I inherited the right to buy. Margaret Thatcher created the council right to buy in the 90s, I believe. So when our mum died, I inherited the council right to buy our three-bedroom house. So I swapped that house for a two-bedroom flat and a deposit. So it was perfectly legal, done through the council.

20:33

There was a family that lived in a two-bedroom flat. They wanted a three-bedroom house, so I downsized, they upsized and I had, I think, like a 25 grand payment. So what happened is I eventually used that to buy my two-bedroom flat in Sunbury-on-Thames. My mortgage was like 25 grand because I think the value of it in 94 was 40K with the discount was 25k and then. So I bought the flat and then years later, when I sold it around about 2003, it was worth 150,000 pounds. So that fast-tracked my property journey. So that was what helped me begin to build a portfolio. When we moved to Dubai, my portfolio at the time was about eight properties, including the house I lived in in Chubham, that we bought it for 447 and when I sold it was worth 750. So all of my portfolio. What happened is two 2006. So we moved to dubai in 2005. 2006 I sold all of my property portfolio, expatriated the funds to Dubai and which was a big mistake on reflection. But you don't. You know hindsight's 20, 20.

21:43 - Jess White (Host)

Why was it a mistake?

21:45 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Because if I'd not sold it and just rented them out, I'd be in a very, very, very comfortable position now. Yeah, probably worth about 10 to 20 million gosh okay, so keep going yeah.

21:58

So, um, I basically because I was given, and it wasn't that I did anything wrong, because even along the way, actually when I lived in Dubai, I met a number of famous celebrity footballers and various people that had done the same thing as me. They'd gone non-resident, or non-res, for five years, because if you live out of the UK for five years as non-res, when you come back, any funds you repatriate you're not taxed on. So my game plan was literally actually simple I'm out of the country all the time. I might as well live in Dubai because it's closer to where I'm working, you can have a great standard of living and I'm not going to pay tax. So that was the game plan sent the money over and I began investing in property in Dubai.

22:43

This was beginning of 06. So 06, 07, 08 was crazy. This was the beginning of the bubble before the recession. So I was flipping properties off plan palm, jumeirah, palm jebel ali, all kinds of developments in ras al-khaimah and everywhere, and it was like monopoly, you know. And then culminating with as you've heard me mention in my talks 09, lehman brothers collapse, worldwide recession. I'm over leveraged and then I basically begin to lose everything. But over the 15 months that followed, yeah, gosh, which is like huge.

23:19 - Jess White (Host)

And yeah, so you did a talk for Spark, but the listeners on here might not have heard that talk, so let's remember that was up. But, um, yeah, so wow. So you've had kind of like quite a a huge life, and I know um Alex, that you're now doing some really incredible things. So do you believe that we are forged in the fire and that going through these tough experiences makes us who we are today?

23:45 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yeah, because if, if I think about the people that I've been meeting recently, yourself included, and again, um, one of the owners of the club last night, Danny, when she told me her backstory and I compared it to mine, I'm like everybody. Basically, if you go through what we've gone through, you go one of two ways. You become a psychopath, which I sometimes don't understand why I'm not. I know I've got psychopathic tendencies, but I know I'm not a psychopath, because a psychopath cannot empathise whereas I cry if an animal gets hurt, right. But what I'm saying is you go one of two ways you become a psychopath or you harness that pain and you go and do something with it, or you just become a drug addict right, one of three. One of three ways you go downhill or you do something about it.

24:30 - Jess White (Host)

I'm just going to go back there for a second. What are your psychopathic tendencies?

24:37 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Oh well, um, I would say that the temper element is maybe one, because if it isn't kept in check it wouldn't stop. Um, so that's one. And I would say I don't really think I've got. I'm narcissistical. I think there's elements of that, but not not so it's out of control. But yeah, I guess that's it really. I'd say maybe an element of narcissism and just a temper, really that's so honest.

25:11

Yeah, cause I've got no ego. I want to become the best man I can be. I don't care what anybody thinks, I'm not here for them and in 100 years none of us are going to be here. I just want to be the best man I can be, the best father, the best businessman, and better than I was from 30, from, you know, 20 to 40. I don't want to be that guy. How supportive is your partner?

25:31

She's brilliant. Um, yeah, she's unwittingly rode a roller coaster of extreme highs and lows and it's it's not been easy for either of us, especially to go from the heights that we had in dubai, you know, driving brand new cars every year and having a maid, and you know, and our son's going to unbelievable public private schools. So, yeah, to you know where we were in 2013, 2011, when we came back, and even to you know where we were in 2015 would have broken a lot of people. So actually, yeah, testament to our relationship really, how did you meet?

26:10

so we met in a nightclub in London. Yeah, we were. Um, it's funny, you know, with the world. Sometimes we're humans, are like satellites, right, you could be spinning around in your little circle and there's someone who's been close to you the whole time, but you never meet. But then you have that one event where bang and now you're both spinning in the same orbits, probably like you and me. Similar thing, right? Yeah, esr was our catalyst and now here we are.

26:35 - Jess White (Host)

That is a speaker's training, by the way, um, for anyone listening so, yeah, we met at a speaker's training, didn't we? And, yeah, just happened to realise that you were not too far away from myself and got into a conversation and then, actually, I remember I think that's what struck me about you, alex is that, um, we literally just sat down to have a sandwich and you just opened up and told me your life story and I was like, wow, you're so honest and open. I love that.

27:00 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

I want to think you asked me a question because I wouldn't have just hit you with it, right? I think I probably did, can't remember the details.

27:06 - Jess White (Host)

But yeah, but I was like, oh wow, Okay cool, Need to have you on the podcast because you've got an interesting life right. But then you've come and joined spark, so tell us about your uh experience of networking and how important you think it is for someone wanting to succeed yeah.

27:24 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

So obviously you and I have both heard that saying a thousand times your network is your net worth, but a lot of these sayings are true. So it's one of those things that when you network, it's a bit like kissing 100 frogs. Right, you're going to go around, work a room, what have you? And you have to get out of your comfort zone and speak to people. And, yeah, you are going to meet some time wasters, for sure.

27:47

But I think after a while, especially if you've got a good bullshit radar, you start to politely understand that some people are going to waste your time, and then other people like yourself. I realised straight away you were obviously what I would refer to as a connector. You're a powerful connector, so networking is vital when you're at a certain stage of growth, I think, when you want to open new doors, and then obviously you get to the stage where you don't need to network as much the joy of going to a networking event and if you've got that bullshit radar is that you and I think a lot of people don't get this and understand how to do it.

28:25 - Jess White (Host)

It is common because we're very polite as English human beings. So if you buy, buy buy. The trick is if you're at a networking event and you're talking to someone and you're like, right, really, I need to move on, you can just use the excuse that I'm this is a brilliant networking event. It's been amazing to meet you. I've got to get around the room and that's a great excuse because too many people, I think, just go like we saw it at the last event.

28:48

There was people just getting into groups of three or two and then just staying there, um, and so it's important to get around the room, and speed networking is a great way to do that, because there's somebody telling you move on, move on, move on, move on, and then you get to make sure you see everybody within the room yeah yeah, so um, tell us about your podcast. Zero to millionaire. Why is it called that?

29:11 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Okay, so early one in the year I believe it was February I came back from Mexico. I've been to a cryptocurrency conference which is held by the incredible Jeff Berwick, who's the owner of the dollar vigilante. I talk about him in my book. He was the first person to put crypto on my radar. I came back from Anarcopulco and I went on one of Rob Moore's moneymaker summits and because I've done so much personal development and not only that spent a fortune on my property education with Progressive, which is owned by Rob Moore, I don't really need to hear much more. So I went along. I had never met Rob.

29:49

I went along to the Moneymaker Summit and within the first hour of him talking, there were obviously you know, you've probably been to one, right? So you're sitting down in this room. There's 500 chairs and you've got all different people in the room, some of his super fans, some of you know, so everyone on the ladder on the spectrum and I've got great respect for anybody that's achieved what he has. But I just was like okay, let me go along. I I want to get a couple of nuggets of wisdom and I'm leaving as soon as possible because actually I'd been sitting down for seven days on a conference.

30:18

So in the heat, in the sweltering heat in Acapulco, I really didn't want to sit down all weekend and listen to things that I already know. So after about an hour he basically turned around and stood up and was saying maybe two hours, here's a money making idea for you. I'm going to give you an idea. I bet nobody listens.

30:39

If you want to make a load of money, go and open a podcast, start interviewing self-made millionaires, and what are you all going to have is all their numbers in your telephone. Nobody will listen. There's an idea for you and I tell you what if you go and do it, I'll appear on your hundred 100th episode. So I sat there and it was like an aha moment. It was like an aha moment. I was like holy shit, that is because I was thinking about a podcast. I'm like it just came to me. I was like this is what you've come here for this weekend. I got up and left the room and I went and set up the podcast and I didn't go back so how do you plan to access all these millionaires, Alex?

31:15

So this is my plan. I'm going to call Rob Moore out very soon on Facebook and I will be saying words to the effect of I've paid XYZ for my property education, so I believe I've earned the right for you to come on before episode 100. Secondly, I'm a great networker. Like you, I've actually got no shortage of people to interview, and one of the good things about being 50 years old is that I've got a hell of a lot of life experience and a lot of contacts around the world. So I don't, I think. Luckily, I may not struggle as much as some other people and I'm quite good at finding a way. So I guess I'm just going to fail forward and hope that, as it grows, people will start to make noise and you know, like anything else, you start to build some traction and then hopefully, I'll get to the stage where it just becomes easier.

32:10 - Jess White (Host)

So, Alex, I'd love you to share some of your top tips with the listeners today. I'm sure you've got a lot of insight from things that you've been through, and now I see you, you know, you know you're kind of really you know what you want. You've got a clear mission and we're going to talk about your mission in a moment. But in terms of tips, maybe for people that are kind of struggling a little bit, people that procrastinate or people that are just full with the to-do list, I'm sure you've got loads of tips. Give us your lowdown.

32:44 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Okay. So basically, I think one of the things I've finally learned to do is to. There's an incredible book called the One Thing book called the One Thing, and that book, which I constantly reread, has allowed me to begin to focus on one thing at a time, because I used to be the world's worst for to-do lists. So now what I do is I'll have a to do list, but I call it a now list and everything is numbered number one. But also, literally, I try and focus it down to what's the one most important thing, because the book will refer to the focusing question: what's the one thing? Such that by doing it, everything else is unnecessary. So, yes, you want to set goals, but you actually need to think what is the one most important thing right now that I need to do, because otherwise it's demoralising, because you can't do it all. So that's the first thing.

33:35

Secondly, be strategic with your learning people. You see it all, so that's the first thing. Secondly, be strategic with your learning people. You see it all the time, course junkies. They're chasing shiny pennies. I want to learn to trade crypto. I want to do property investing. I want to start a podcast. You can't do it all at once. You have to do one thing and master that and then take action yeah that I think.

33:55 - Jess White (Host)

I think that's the big problem. There is that people will do course, after course, after course, but not actually take the steps. You can't. You know you can learn. You see it with university as well. People go and do a degree and then a master's degree, and then they're like well, what next? And it's like it's the taking action that counts.

34:13 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yep, yep, so that's it. Absolutely right, that would have been my third point. Like, obviously, what they say knowledge acquired without action is the same as ignorance. So you have to go and get the knowledge, then you've got to take action. The thing that I'm good at is the action taking. So probably what the likes of me and Rob more share in common is we just take action and fail forward.

34:35

I don't give a damn what anyone thinks about me, because I'm not going to be here in 50 years. So get over yourself, right? So take action. Don't care what anyone thinks, because people are going to love you. Like Robert Kiyosaki says, there's three groups of people. Whenever you're in a room talking, there's a third that will love you no matter what you say, a third that will hate you no matter what you say, and a third that are neutral. Our job is to sway the third that are neutral.

35:00

So take action, have a plan. Don't look for friends, don't look for allies. If they come along the way, great. Surround yourself with like-minded individuals. But if you want to achieve anything worthwhile, accept the journey is going to be lonely, it's not going to be easy, and just once you know that it's easy, right, just get. I think some of the worst things is this whole get rich quick schemes. Like I'll never say to anybody you're going to get rich quick with crypto, but I will say I don't know any other way on the planet legal that you can make the money you can in crypto and you've written a whole book on the subject, haven't you, yep, a big book as well?

35:38 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah yeah, how long did that take you?

35:40 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

So I started writing it last year. But then once I found my uh publisher who's incredible, by the way, a lady by the name of Usha D'Mello amazing woman, a brilliant person. If you ever want to self-publish a book, dm me, I'll give you her details she really over-delivered. Once I met her and started working with her, I actually finished the book laser quick in about three months. So the overall process was probably a year, including research, but I sat on it for about six months.

36:11 - Jess White (Host)

Did you wake up early? Did you have like blocks of when you would work on it?

36:15 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yeah, so, again, in the way that I I do, I went on YouTube and watched hundreds of I'm exaggerating, maybe scores of videos on how to self-publish, and then I started to see the pattern set it up on Google Docs blah, blah, blah, blah and then time block your time. But I'd already learned about time blocking anyway. But you're absolutely right. I got up and I'm a morning person, so I wrote from six till eight in the morning every day to finish it and yeah, I just saw that that was a recurrent themes theme sorry, amongst authors time block and write every day yeah, yeah.

36:53 - Jess White (Host)

So this brings us into crypto, would you say you're a crypto expert?

36:58 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

I'm not, so I'm not arrogant, so I would. So someone else would say, yes, I'm an expert, but define expert. I'm definitely an expert in trading as far as teaching people about price action, the trading element, but if you're talking about blockchain, so I'm not a coder, I'm not a programmer and the space moves so quickly it's like a full time job. So you could say a crypto expert, because I can talk with anyone on the planet about crypto and hold my own, but I'm not arrogant. I can't turn around and say that I know everything about elements of it, like algorithmic trading, because I'm not an algo trader.

37:36 - Jess White (Host)

And what do you think is going to be happening with crypto over the next 12 months?

37:41 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Well, again, because I don't. So in crypto, what you'll find is is, whilst I'm passionate about it, I don't I actually don't fall in love with any asset class. So you will find, in crypto, a lot of people are emotional about cryptocurrency. They're married to their investments and they're emotional, very tribal. I'm emotional about cryptocurrency. They're married to their investments and they're emotional, very tribal. I'm not like that. I'm literally the moment. It doesn't work. I'm not interested.

38:05

So the reason why I say that is to give you context that if we're to take Donald Trump on the surface of his words, if he does what he says he wants the US to be the crypto capital of the world. He's talking about the US having a strategic reserve of Bitcoin and he's talking about firing the SEC chairman, Gary Gensler. So all of that is extremely bullish for crypto, because this has been some of the things that has held it back for the last two to five years. But he's got to execute on that. So that's why I'm saying, well, okay, it looks good, the charts are reflecting it, but he has to execute. So I'm keeping an open mind, I'm riding the wave for the moment, but I'm open-minded as to if he doesn't do it. Get out of the market and take profits.

38:53 - Jess White (Host)

But right now it's a good time to be in.

38:55 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Right now is the best time of the last five years that anybody could start to get invested.

39:01 - Jess White (Host)

And do you not think you should like? Is it not too late to get in right now?

39:05 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

No, because if you look at most of other than the new because obviously so a cryptocurrency is a digital asset, so think of it. A good cryptocurrency is a good company with a good team that solves a problem of some kind, right? So I'm not going to start throwing names out there, because I don't want people to think that that's what I'm telling you to buy, because you could buy it at the wrong time and it drops 20%. But a good cryptocurrency is a good company that solves a problem, and so if you invest correctly, basically, a lot of the solid cryptos are 80% down from their all time high. So if you believe, like I do, that they're not only going to go back to that all time high, they're going to surpass that. Why? Larry Fink, the CEO of BlackRock, is talking about putting $10 trillion into real world assets, which is one of the biggest narratives in crypto.

40:00

So once you understand that, you just need to know what to buy, what not to buy, and, honestly, the rest of it should be a no brainer. But people have to understand. You can't. This is the problem with human beings, right? They want to make money. They want all the good stuff without the bad stuff, right? So if you want the good stuff, get educated, or pay someone who knows that to tell you what to do, or don't complain because you can't have big ups. And so I say to guys I work with clients, you don't deserve to make the big money if you can't handle the times when your portfolio is in the reds, right?

40:38 - Jess White (Host)

Yeah, yeah. So if someone's interested and they want their hand held, and to be guided through you know what, you know what type to buy, how to do it, um, then how can they work with you?

40:50 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Okay, so I'm currently in the process of reorganising my website and my offer, but obviously at the moment people can. I don't talk about crypto on my IG right now because I'm changing my business model to a mindset model that covers more than just crypto, but basically you can email me on info at 100xcryptocouk.

41:13 - Jess White (Host)

And that will be in the show notes, by the way, as well. And you can also follow me on Insta, which will also be in the show notes, by the way, as well, and you can also follow me on Insta, which will also be in the show notes. But what does it look like working with you? You're going to be doing a discovery day, aren't you coming up? Or they can be part of your Telegram group. They can do one-to-one or they can join group coaching. Have I got that right?

41:33 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yep. So the way that you can work with me is either A) I'm going to be running a discovery workshop. The next step from there is to either do one of two things. You can either work in a group format so group coaching, in-person workshop and or group Zoom coaching or, if you are an action taker that wants to fast track your results, you can work with me one to one, and obviously each format has a different price tag, in the same way that I've paid my mentors accordingly, that's the next and the last question legacy, what, what?

42:04 - Jess White (Host)

What legacy do you want to leave on the world?

42:07 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

so the reason why I am saying this is also because I want to be held accountable and put it out. I'm still trying to get back to what I believe I was put on the planet for, which is, I think, my unique talent that no one else on the planet has is the ability to help children and young people. So let's say, below 21, overcome adversity. Why? Because that's what I've spent my whole life doing. Couple that with the military, the martial arts and the other things I've experienced. My mission is to empower 100 million people to conquer adversity and realise their dreams. 100 million is roughly 1% of the population of the planet, so I need something big enough to excite me. Of course, it might start with a million people in the UK, but that is my goal. So this is why the Mindset Team wants to be bigger than just crypto.

43:07 - Jess White (Host)

And you're going to do that through your podcast, your book, anything else.

43:13 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yep. So the next book I'm in the process of writing is very different to my first book. So I deliberately chose to write my first book about crypto because of two reasons. Number one crypto has a lifetime. It won't be relevant in 10 years from now. I don't believe it's evergreen. So I wanted to learn how to write a book about something that was relevant now. Second, so my next book will be aimed at helping people growing up without a positive male role model. It will be a smaller book and speaking to people that are probably 10 to 18. So that's what I'm working on at the moment, and then the books that follow and my public speaking are aimed at that avatar to try and help people that are.

43:59

Look at our country now. What's the biggest problems we have? You could put them into two categories, but they come under one, which is we've got a knife crime problem, which is insane. I travel all over the world and London is actually being spoken about as more dangerous than other places I've been to, like Latin America and Asia. Because there was a French family I met. Their daughter went to university in London. They came over to move her stuff because she's moving from digs into her own house. She was on a train in London and she just looked at a girl and a girl went and that was what you effing looking at, head-butted her and she was a middle-class French girl who'd done nothing wrong. So if you couple that with, look how often you hear about someone being stabbed and killed but you don't hear about all the stabbings where someone doesn't die the knife crime in this country is insane.

44:55

I'm not saying I'm equipped with all of the skills to solve it, but I want to try and make a dent. And I do know that if you couple that with something like 90% of the men that end up in prison or boys don't have a father figure, they don't have a positive male role model. So part of my goal is to help turn. I want to prevent 1 million boys from going to prison and instead become leaders in the community, because I need leverage.

45:22

I can't do it all on my own right, I can't be everywhere. So part of my bigger plan and again you're asking me the question, otherwise I don't talk about it, but it's going on in the background I want Mindset Team to become a business franchise model that I mentor a million other young individuals in the country or in Europe, because I can't be everywhere. I want to equip them with the abilities to try and solve this problem, because the government's not going to do it. They're not doing it. Heavier sentences are not working. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that if you stab and kill someone you shouldn't go and serve a long time. You should and sadly, actually that time it's too late. I can't save those people. I want to save the people before they get to that stage amazing.

46:13 - Jess White (Host)

So I can, I can see you, you know, doing some really great work there. I love that you have a mission and a focus and I think you're quite capable of doing what you focus on and what you decide. Thank you, yeah. So anything else you want to touch on before we finish?

46:35 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

I mean, basically all I would say is anybody that's listening, I'm trying to actively speak. I would actually like to focus more of my time public speaking in front of children and anybody that I can inspire, because I'm able to talk from a couple of perspectives. I can talk from the perspective of how you can go on and make money. I've got a great background in financial intelligence, the basics from setting budgets and how you start with a little and turn it into a lot, and then I've got the side of me that can relate to people that are being bullied and need to overcome adversity. So I want to speak more. I've been emailing hundreds of schools every week and like getting a 1% response rate. So if there's anybody listening that can give me any pointers or help me get more speaking gigs or in front of schools, colleges, prisons, I will go anywhere. I'm not intimidated. That would be the biggest thing that anybody could do for me right now.

47:35 - Jess White (Host)

Otherwise I'm good, wonderful. I mean, you're coming in with Spark has given you some speaking opportunities, but you really want to be kind of in front of boys in particular that are having a rough time and to help prevent that. That's the idea. So into schools.

47:54 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Yeah, I mean, I'm hearing that. So one of the people I spoke to, liam last night, who owns Club Quantum, when I spoke to him he said to me that there are people out there governing government bodies and schools with the budget that are crying out for people like you. So how do I get into those places? Because, in a non-arrogant way, I know I've got experience no one else has got. So I'm saying I'm here, how you know, come and utilise me.

48:23 - Jess White (Host)

I want to help people so that that is all about finding the right connection and you never know who's listening or who you know. So doing this and putting that out there is great, um, so hopefully that's going to happen. Looking forward to seeing your journey from here onwards. So, Alex Rhodes-Evans, thank you so much for being on The Networking Spark.

48:44 - Alex Rhodes-Evans (Guest)

Thank you, Jess. I really appreciate you inviting me on.