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Transcript of Prince McClinton on How To Stay AI-Proof, Transforming Your Creative Self And Protecting Your Energy

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Enjoy this transcript of my episode with Prince McClinton. Prince McClinton is the CEO of Art of Visuals, a media company that produces content and strategy for brands and businesses across the globe. He uses his creativity and experience to transform chaos into content and deliver value to the clients he works with.

Art of Visuals has more than 1.9 million followers on Instagram, and has collaborated with some of the largest brands on the planet.

In this episode, Prince gets into his own hero’s journey, how to position and price your services, his optimistic pessimistic view of AI invading professions, and how to maintain and monitor energy behind a protective moat.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Clever, Google Podcasts, or on your favorite podcast platform.

The transcript of this episode can be found here. Transcripts of all episodes can be found here.

[00:00:00] Pierre: Good morning, podcast. And welcome to a new episode. And I’m super excited for this conversation because we’re going to go deep, deep into transformation, into creativity, into value. How do we bring all those elements into a life to create fulfillment and not be afraid to change and reinvent ourselves?

And that is beautiful because I have the perfect guest for us. And that is something that I’ve been passionate about for years. And in this conversation, I’m going to bring in an awesome guest. His name is Prince McClinton. He is the founder of Art of Visuals, and he’s a creative that helped bridges between brands, creators, and has built communities around the world through social media, but also in real life.

Prince is pretty unique. And everytime we get to talk together, the conversations go very deep very quickly. And it is always a delight and pleasure to dig into it. And I always regret not recording our conversations as podcasts.

So, finally, we made it happen. So, hopefully, this will provoke you and inspire to think differently about certain things in your life, and maybe apply some techniques or tools that we mention. So, if you’re ready, let’s get started. Let’s welcome Prince to the podcast.

So, I was curious. I was like, “Let’s get on the podcast, Prince.” And just before we started recording, we were talking about moving and movement in life and like changing locations. And Prince, can you just, like, give me a little bit of your background again? Where… which city you come from, how you were raised, and your transition to the mountains and how it affected you as a creative, because I am deeply curious about that. And I may want to do that kind of transition one day, but a part of me is, like, the big city energy, you know, is like appealing. But nature is also very soothing. So, tell me more.

[00:01:49] Prince: Yeah. So, I, I grew up in… shouldn’t say I grew up. I was born in San Diego to really young, young parents that divorced at an early age, had a pretty unstable, kind of, chaotic upbringing during that phase in my life, a lot of alcoholism and domestic violence and drugs and things like that. But man, I was a pretty shy kid. I was really shy and sensitive. And so, that was, like, a pretty tough environment for, like, a really shy and emotionally sensitive little person to be in.

But at a young age, I had a gift of being able to see things and just have, like, a understanding of how they work. And so, I started taking apart, like, electronics and remote-control cars and microwaves and anything that had screws. Like, when no one was looking, I would just be taking things apart and… which upset my parents until they realized I was able to put everything back together perfectly and everything to work.

And so, I always, kind of, was a nerd as well. And so, I was just, kind of, this sensitive, quiet, creative, kind of, awkward kid compared to the environment that I came up in. Midlife, we ended up moving to Phoenix, Arizona. And just, I want to say, like, two years before that my parents got back together. So, I grew up in Phoenix. Very hot place.

I was a semi-professional skateboarder. I traveled all over the place, skating in skate competitions. And I was sponsored by multiple shops and lots of flow teams. And so, yeah. And that’s how I got into filmmaking, was because CKY and I was skateboarding, and so I started making these skate films.

And that’s what allowed me to have this other avenue of creativity. I moved around a lot. My parents weren’t in the military, but somehow I ended up going to eight different schools from grade K through 12. And so, I was constantly having to reinvent myself and constantly having to blend in and constantly have to play different roles.

One high school I went to was an agriculture, like, country and, like, technology high schools. Like, everyone had, like, horses and farm animals and wore cowboy boots to school. And then, so I did that for two years. And then, two years after that, the next two years, I transferred to this other high school that was in the, was in the Hispanic projects. So, it was, like, in the hood. You hear, I mean, people were getting stabbed. People would bring knives to school. It was like really just, like, such a polar. And, like, that’s, kind of, like, the story of my early life, is these, like, this polarity showing up in people in my life and schooling in my life and all these different scenarios that I was, kind of, put in.

After high school, I ended up going up to Northern Arizona University, where I went to college. I joined the Kappa Sigma fraternity at the time, which was like the smallest house on campus. But I really liked the few guys that were in the fraternity, and I didn’t want to join, like, a large fraternity because I like to build things and I, kind of, thought it would be a cool path to try to build a community there.

So, I ended up becoming the Rush chairman. And I basically took this fraternity from a no-name fraternity to the largest fraternity on campus during my time there. And, like, we had all the intermural sports. And we had the brand that we wanted at the time, which was, we were the big party fraternity and the sports fraternity. But ended up becoming the president of that. And I think, at that time, there was probably, like, 90-something guys in our chapter, which is a pretty big chapter, especially for that university. And then, after that I, kind of, just went on the hero’s journey, you know. That was the start of the journey.

[00:05:27] Pierre: Wait, can I pause you before we get on the hero’s journey right now? Because how do you think about your switch between different schools? What do you think it taught you? And, and, like, kind of, what do you think it brought you in terms of knowledge that you then apply to actually create that fraternity or, like, join that fraternity and, like, build it up later?

Because I imagine there’s always challenges to try to have other people join that. Like, if there’s more established names around, like, how do you… I don’t know. Do you feel there’s any connection between those?

[00:06:01] Prince: Yeah, a little bit. So, I guess what I learned from moving around so much, at first, I would say it created in my life, it created… it was, I guess it was always a polar aspect to it. It was always beautiful because I learned how to relate with people from all… I could relate with, like, hardcore gang-bangers and I could relate with the most country folk you could ever think of, everyone in between.

I had one of my best friends growing up was Russian. One of my… at another school, my best friend, his name was Elmer and he was from South Korea. And he had, like, a very strict father. And so, like, I’ve been around, like, the Korean family environment.

Then, my best friends in sixth grade were Indian from India. And then, I had some friends that were British. Like, I’ve always… it’s so wild how I’ve had just, like, all these different unique people and different things, but it’s allowed me to be able to relate with people and to understand people and to be able to, kind of, fit in wherever I go.

That’s, like, one of the beautiful things. One of the challenging things that I had to learn later on was that it made it hard to find myself. Like, who is Prince? Prince was always fitting in with the new high school. Prince was always reinventing himself, that I never got a chance to really understand, like, who am I at my core? What motivates me? What am I really about? And so, that took some time until later in life when I finally figured that out.

As far as when I got into college, I think what I realized with building community, I think all communities start around some type of magnetic person or a magnetic idea. Like, there has to be something that pulls people in. So, it has to either be a big grand vision or a big personality, but some type of pool. And so, I was that pool for the fraternity, you know. I was just, like, this big, loving, I mean the same guy that you know today, but just younger and with a lot less wisdom and a lot more arrogance at that time in my life. But it fit the environment.

[00:08:10] Pierre: Yeah, it’s definitely a trait I noticed, because when we’re talking at the events when we met and stuff, I always noticed that you had that ability. And no matter what kind of friends we’re around, you had that ability to be, like, at ease and, like, making people feel at ease also. But, like, being at ease in the conversations, no matter who it was — New York, LA, other side of the world.

I mean, I’m French, you known. It’s like it always felt like fairly natural and welcoming from you. So, that’s definitely something I really appreciated and noticed around. I was like, “Interesting. I wonder what his past is.”

[00:08:43] Prince: Vulnerability is a big one, you know. I, I’ve realized I’m so comfortable with my past and I’ve experienced just, like, an incredible amount of life and an incredible amount of experiences that could be put into a series of 10 complete movies, like, the amount of stories that I have that are just so amazing and scary and all the different things at the same time. And so, when you’ve lived a life like that, I feel like it’s really easy for me to be vulnerable. And that’s the biggest thing, as far as connecting with people. If I’m able to be vulnerable and let down my guard, kind of like when dogs show their belly to another dog, like, “Hey, I’m good. I’m not here to do anything. We’re cool.” And so, I think being a little more vulnerable and even maybe slightly submissive, just to bring people down.

Because a lot of times people have an idea, right? We all… the moment I see you without even thinking our minds are already projecting based on how you look, the way you’re walking, what you’re wearing, how you carry yourself, all these different things. And so, you may come off as a big guy, confident guy, whatever it may be. And so, to make people feel at ease, you know, you just show some vulnerability. And I think people relate with that.

When you’re being… when your heart’s open and you’re not hiding anything, I think it’s really easy for people to be comfortable with you, especially in a world where a lot of times you feel like, “What does this person really want? Why are they talking to me?” And you’re not really sure what’s going on. And so, yeah, I think just which takes courage, I guess, right, to be able to walk around with the blinds open to your internal world and not be worried about it.

[00:10:22] Pierre: As male, I feel like, even just the vulnerability topic is, like, kind of, like, different. Male, female would say just because of how we are being educated, like, and what you see from society. And how do you see it? And how should we think about it as men or as people, just like going forward in terms of vulnerability? What does it mean to you to be vulnerable? Does it mean like I’m going to be exposing all my dark secrets, like, instantly to people or… Because some people have that preconceived ideas. I even heard, like, recently someone tell me, “Well, no, you can’t be vulnerable because people take advantage of you, etc.”

So, like, how do you see that? Because I noticed, I told Erick Hercules who was on the podcast also, we always said, every time I’m with him, all with you, the conversations goes deep in, in two seconds. And, and I think it shows a, a certain quality of openness behind it. Like, yeah, what’s your philosophy?

[00:11:20] Prince: That’s a tough question. I think, I don’t think there’s, like, a formula. I don’t think I could, like, write a blog post and be like, you know, “Prince’s…”

[00:11:28] Pierre: 10 steps.

[00:11:29] Prince: Five steps on how to become vulnerable and get anyone to open up and share all their secrets.

I think a lot of it has to do with resonance. And so, I think without us being aware, we all admit there’s a certain energy about us. And when two like energies are in the same room or in the same conversation and there’s this resonance, I think there’s this certain amount of comfortability and guard that goes down. We can sense each other out.

And humans, like, you got to realize, we’re a highly evolved species. And so, we have, in our lower instincts, our survival instincts are really strong. And so, if someone’s talking to you and they may be saying all the right things, but their facial expressions are off, or their body language is off, or something may be wrong, and you may not consciously be aware of it, but subconsciously your body is in a shutdown mode or is in a defense mode. And so, it puts up its walls.

And so, I think a lot of it has to do with your intentions. And so, having pure intentions for people and not approaching people out of love and, and not with wanting something I think is a big part of getting people to open up. I think for a man, like, for us to be more open has to do with, like, our own, kind of, like… at least for me, I guess in my… I’ll just speak to my experience. I had to do a lot of internal work. So, I had to work through, like, a lot of my early traumas. And I had to let go of a lot of the things that I was regretting and to where I was no longer ashamed of Prince. And then, once I was no longer ashamed of Prince, I wasn’t afraid to show people who I was I didn’t have to hide the guy, or there was nothing left to hide. It’s just like it’s all out in the open and my intentions were pure and I just… I want everyone to win and to succeed and to reach their potentiality. And if I can share my stories and if I can share the things that I’ve been through, and I can… if I can relate to someone, then I’m more than happy to.

And a lot of times I can feel people. Some of us, I think we all have gifts that we’re born with. One of my gifts is being able to… I’m a seer. And so, I can see people’s potential. I can see where people are emotionally, mentally. I can feel them out. And so, a lot of times we’ll be talking and I can feel that they’re going through something that they may not bring up. So, I will… I’ll go out of my way to tell a story in my life that I feel will relate with what I feel they’re going through, that they’re not opening up about. And then I.. and then it gives, it, it basically opens the door to the conversation. And almost immediately all the time, they’ll jump in. And because they’re… they want to relieve that, they want to express that, and they want to share those things. But it’s scary to be vulnerable, right? You want a safe space. And so, by, by sharing a story that’s similar, it creates that environment for people to, kind of, open up.

[00:14:27] Pierre: That’s awesome. It makes me think of, of two things. First of all, is that it’s a great skill to have as a, as an artist or as a documentary storyteller, or as a storyteller in general, because if you’re trying to share anyone’s story, you need them to have them up and fully. And how do you do that? Well, usually you have to open up, too, you know, or come in as if, like, like, feeling open for that person. And that’s a really cool gift.

I was wondering, I was thinking about it. I’m like, I’ve seen it firsthand at an event with someone, like, opening completely out of the plan. I’m like, “Did you know the guy?” You’re like, “No.” And the guy was, like, opening about all his problems. And suddenly, it turned into a therapy session in two seconds. And I was like, “What happened here?”

So, I get it. I understand what you mean by you feel it and then you find stories that relate, because I’ve seen it happen. It’s, it’s pretty funny to observe. Now, it made me think, like, it’s also… it probably a skill that you really honed when you were maybe young, also, just like to be able to move environment, like, how do you connect as fast as possible with new people? It’s like well…

[00:15:37] Prince: You become super observant, too. It’s actually really funny. We look back through everyone’s experienced some type of trauma or pain in their life, and if you haven’t, then, I would say good for you, but I, I mean, maybe not. I really don’t know.

[00:15:51] Pierre: Yeah, there’s just different scale of saying it. It could be my brother took my fries, you know, and then I had to fight. And then I, I got punished instead of him, or whatever, you know.

[00:15:59] Prince: Maybe you had a perfect upbringing and that was really good for you. I think I had the upbringing I was supposed to have because I learned so much and it helped create something special through all those times. And becoming really observant was one of those things. I’m hyper aware of, I call it the field. And so, I can see things. Like, there’s data. I mean, if you talk about it in terms of quantum physics, there’s the quantum field. And so, we’re surrounded by information and data all around us. But it’s like, how large is your antenna? How much information can you perceive and understand within the field? Like, are you aware that there’s actually a confrontation going on in the right corner of the coffee shop and that the people on the back left side are really happy and that the people over here are really creative or whatever it may be? And so —

[00:16:49] Pierre: Sorry, hold your thought. For anyone who thinks this is a little, like, isoteric or doesn’t make sense, think of a camera. Think of a normal camera. Now, change your camera and take an infrared camera. The exact same thing was there before, right? You’re still taking a photo or, like, a video of the same thing. But now you see it, you see a different part of it that you were not available to see before.

So, it doesn’t mean it wasn’t there. It simply means you, you tune into what you see, right? It’s like everything happening all at once around us, but you don’t, like, tune into everything always. Our eyes are looking at a very specific spectrum of light, if we just talk about light, or, like, we tune in to look and interpret light a certain way. And so, yeah, if you think this is a woo-woo, honestly, just think about it in terms of physics and you’ll be like, “Oh, actually, it’s a lot more woo-woo than I thought, but it’s science. It’s beautiful.”

[00:17:43] Prince: Yeah. No, it really is. It is just science. And I mean, it’s like having a lens that goes from eight millimeters to 1,000 millimeters. And so, any moment you can take in the entire picture of the entire scene, and at any moment you can hone in on that specific thing. And so, yeah, I don’t remember exactly where we were going with. What was the question?

[00:18:06] Pierre: I think it, it tied, it ties back to the ability to be vulnerable and to read a little bit around you also, which I love. So, I think it’s a good time to piggyback on your, or, like, to jump back on the hero’s journey that you were starting to talk about.

[00:18:22] Prince: Yeah. So, I mean, I feel like every man and woman, at some point in their life, goes on. I mean, hopefully, embarks their, I mean embarks on their hero’s journey. I feel like that’s like the natural progression of our life story.

And so, for me, mine was right after college and I launched a production company with a buddy of mine in, in Boise, Idaho. And so, I started my first company. We had closed a really big deal, a six-figure deal, with the university. I went to creating videos for residents’ lives. So, already had a deep understanding of, like, hey, they need these freshmen and sophomores to live on campus, because that’s how universities make their money. Like, it’s just like, it’s a system.

[00:19:04] Pierre: Is it?

[00:19:05] Prince: Oh, yeah. And so…

[00:19:06] Pierre: If you don’t live on campus, they’re losing revenue out of not being on… really, I don’t know.

[00:19:10] Prince: Yeah. So, so, yeah, living on campus and meal plans. So, they want, they don’t want you to rent off campus. I mean it’s all a game, right?

[00:19:18] Pierre: Yeah.

[00:19:19] Prince: When you… education is one thing, but the educational system is a system. And every system, there’s always a game, right? And so, for the university system, they want students to live on campus, so that they pay the rent, the high rent, and so that they eat on… if you’re living on campus, most likely you eat on campus because you don’t have a kitchen in your dorm.

[00:19:40] Pierre: Oh, wow. Okay.

[00:19:40] Prince: So, you also have a meal plan, right?

[00:19:43] Pierre: Got it.

[00:19:44] Prince: And so, we understood that. And so, we made these really awesome videos that would inspire incoming freshmen and sophomores to want to live on campus.

[00:19:55] Pierre: I just love that.

[00:19:56] Prince: There’s, there’s perks. There’s perks, obviously, living on campus, too, but… so, we ended up closing this deal. And that, kind of, really kicked us off. We used to just call it SVS, so we didn’t have to explain it to people. But it was actually Super Villain Studios at the time. And we were just like, we were so anti… basically, it was just like the anti-corporate video company. We were just all about making the hip young videos that made sense and, and just more modern production for the times.

And so, yeah, that was the start of the journey. And it, kind of… I mean, the story’s long. I worked all over. I mean, I was… so, before that I was the food and beverage director at Little America Hotel. I worked at Stanley Steemer’s as a carpet cleaner and learned… so, I learned hospitality. I went to school for a hotel, restaurant management. I had a job as a food and beverage director out of college because I was a supervisor. And the manager and director both quit. And so, I ended up finding myself running the whole department at a young age, which was awesome. But I also realized that wasn’t the business that I wanted to go into. Then, I was steaming carpets for Stanley Steemer, the carpet cleaners. And so, I was, like, cleaning carpets and doing that whole deal.

Then, I moved to Boise right after college, launched that production company with SVS, had a blast. I actually started out as being the sales guy. Because at the time I didn’t… my video skills weren’t up to par, so my other two partners were doing the video. But I wasn’t okay with just being the sales guy because I’m a creative guy and I knew that I could also create awesome videos.

And so, I would work all day long, from 8:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., 6:00 p.m. And then, I would work from 6:00 p.m. until 4:00 in the morning doing video stuff. So, I’d be out, like, walking around with the glide cam. I got stopped by the cops one day because I was walking around, like, at 3:00 a.m. with the glide cam, practicing glide cam stuff, as if it was, like, middle of the day, which is middle of the night.

But this is the type of stuff I was doing. So, I was using the camera and then I’d go and watch YouTube and then learn editing and then get in final cut. And before you know it, I was shooting and editing all the videos. So, then I was the sales guy and I was the best videographer and I was the best editor. And I eventually was doing all of the work, which didn’t really sit well with me after a while. And everyone else is like…

[00:22:16] Pierre: “I can do anything. Look at me, I’m so good. Oh, shoot, maybe I don’t want to do everything.”

[00:22:22] Prince: And so, I ended up leaving and moving from… I was in Boise at the time to Los Angeles. And I worked for Northwestern Mutual. I was selling life insurance, which was freaking…

[00:22:34] Pierre: Wait, pause. How does that happen? So, how does that shift ever happen? Like, you have to press a button or sign something at some point. What’s the thought process behind?

[00:22:43] Prince: So, I play really interesting games with myself. I knew that I was sharp at business, but I knew that I didn’t have a lot of self-discipline and structure. And I knew that I needed that. And I knew Northwestern Mutual had one of the best sales programs with really strong discipline and structure on how to operate your life insurance business. And I had a buddy that worked for them. So, I decided I was going to go do that for a summer to get the experience.

[00:23:16] Pierre: Interesting.

[00:23:17] Prince: And so, I moved to Los Angeles and did that. And that was just, like, a whole era. That was, like, a whole saga in itself. Even though I was only there for one summer, it was quite, quite the summer. And that’s a really challenging job.

After that, I actually got into network marketing. What’s really funny, the company’s name was, was it Stepbrothers that had the Limitless Worldwide Limitless Worldwide, Worldwide, Worldwide, I think so. But anyway, it was called Limitless Worldwide. And so, I got suckered into that by some friends.

[00:23:51] Pierre: There’s always a friend who’s like, who has something about that.

[00:23:55] Prince: Dude, life insure… network marketing is awful, but it’s not far, it’s not that different, to be honest, with life insurance sales. Like, they both have you basically go after your friends and family. And whether you’re selling them life insurance 

[00:24:09] Pierre: Wait, life insurance, too?

[00:24:11] Prince: Oh, for sure. That’s, like, the first, that’s the first thing. Like, if I would’ve known you back then, I would’ve called you up and be like, “Hey, Pierre, it’s Prince. Hey, man. So, like, hey, man, I know you’re starting out your career. It’s really important that you have life insurance.”

[00:24:24] Pierre: And an encyclopedia.

[00:24:28] Prince: Oh, man. So, I did network marketing, which was awesome because I got to learn team building. Because they saw so much potential in me, I got to work directly with the founders. And so, I was like their prodigy that they were hoping to bring up. I was living in Salt Lake City at the time, which is like the network marketing capital of the world.

I’m not sure if it’s like a Mormon thing or what, like, most of the people in the company and all those companies are Mormon. But they’re really good salesmen and really good business people, but the businesses themselves are, like, kind of, questionable.

But I learned a lot during that experience, and I learned how to build a team, which was really awesome. Then, I moved into healthcare technology sales and opened up the sales office. I had all the sales experience at this point.

[00:25:11] Pierre: Interesting.

[00:25:12] Prince: And so, I started basically selling doctors, surgeons, and physicians, dentists on practice management software. Did really well at that, and then I quit. And I felt like I had finally got all this experience that I’d been wanting, but I wanted to connect with what I was missing was, like, the MBA, kind of, I was missing the… I wanted to get more business experience from business people, like, entrepreneurs.

So, I launched We Live Limitless, which was, like, my first online community. I built our Instagram up to over 20,000 followers pretty quick. And I launched this podcast, the We Live Limitless podcast, and it was all about living this limitless lifestyle. Like, I want to, I want you guys to get out there and live your best life. And I was interviewing all these, like, awesome entrepreneurs who were living these awesome lives and had built these sweet companies, and was picking their brains, both for myself so that I could learn, gain the wisdom and the knowledge, but also for my community. It was, like, a win-win. I’m like, “This is the greatest thing ever. I get to build my network and expand my wisdom and knowledge and be able to build this community and share this with them. Like, this is like my dream,” because I’m all about win-win-win situations. Like, I want everyone to win. So, this was perfect.

So, this was my first time. doing something like that. Shortly after, I moved to San Francisco and started doing a lot more. And I was, and when I started We Live Limitless, luckily, I was able to bring all of my skills together — so my sales and my production work and all this stuff. So, I used everything I had in my arsenal to build this sweet brand. And then, I moved out to San Francisco. I was still doing that. But then I started doing a lot of these photography meetups. And then that’s, kind of, where Art of Visuals came into the picture.

And I launched Art of Visuals with a buddy in 2015. And so, I… and he was in Boise. And I had been wanting to get back in Boise. So, by this time I had been to Boise the first time. And then, I went to Los Angeles. I was in New York City. I was in Scottsdale. I was in Salt Lake City. I was in San Francisco, and then back.

[00:27:12] Pierre: Moving a lot.

[00:27:13] Prince: So, like, I was… dude, I was like every, like, three, four, every three or four months, my game was like, how fast can I get a good job? How fast can I learn everything I could possibly learn, like, crush it? And I would always get promoted really quickly in these jobs because I was there playing it like a video game. It was like, how fast can I move up the levels, beat the bosses, meet as many people in the city, have a blast, create great friends, and then be off to the next adventure?

And so, now, after being out and about in all these places, I realize Boise is home. I realize, as far as an environment goes where I can thrive that has all the different things that I need as a human being to not just survive but to thrive, Boise was that place. So, I moved back to Boise, launched Art of Visuals. And that’s, kind of, brought me to where I am today, 2023.

[00:27:59] Pierre: Well, we’ll talk a little bit about Art of Visuals. I’m deeply interested in, in, in your sales experience because one of my very good entrepreneur friend, also, we talked a lot about that. I mean, some people in his family did network marketing and actually did really well with that. But he was almost considering that just for the sales experience. Like, even though it may leave a little weird taste in the mouth, we were talking about it because we both agreed that the sales experience is deeply important, you know. And it, it’s not so much about, like, those sales skills can be applied for whatever you are trying to share with people, right? It’s like it could be the best product in the world or the worst product in the world, like, someone with good sales skill will be able to share that and, like, increase the message around it in a way.

And so, as entrepreneurs, we thought about it. Or, when we were talking, I was just a newbie in the, in the, the entrepreneur world, but I was, like, “Oh, yeah, this seems like a great skill, because I had started my photography business and I realized sales is everything, you know.” It’s like sales and marketing, how you talk to people, how you engage them, how you bring them in, how you make them sign.

How do you actually have that win-win situation where you are thriving because you got paid an amount that allows you to live and, like, grow? And second of all, your client is super pumped because they had, not only the best photos, because a lot of people can take the best photos, but the best experience with you, and, like, really have a beautiful time where they will remember, not only about the photos, but they will remember about the experience and always be like, “Oh, my God, yeah, it was such a pleasure to shoot with X, Y, Z.”

And so, my friend was like, “You know what?” I think he went for… I mean, just before he went for his MBA, he was like, “I might want to take a corporate job, just to see how it is inside and, like, and do a sales role, just because I want to learn stuff.” And although he had, like, a seven-figure business that he built with a friend, he still felt like he could learn a lot about around that.

And that was, like, I thought it was interesting. So, anyone in the photography community who’s talking about business, I’m like, “Maybe you need some sales training at some point. Like, just, like, look deeply into that. Forget about the creative side for five, for three months and just dive into, like, any sales books you can find and then you’ll bring it back to your era.”

So, so, on that note, would there be any, like, skills or, like, two, three skills you would… because it’s impossible to distill, like, the knowledge in two seconds, but that you would encourage people to look into when it comes to sales or, like, things that you thought impacted the most your business in the future and, and just, like, the quality of how you handle things?

[00:30:51] Prince: Yeah. First and foremost, you have to be really comfortable with getting turned down, rejected. Rejection. So, being rejected and not taking that personal is an art form. A lot of us take nos as a personal attack on us as if we’re not good enough or our work’s not good enough, and most of the time has nothing to do with us.

And so, I think that’s the big one. I think, putting yourself up there, out there, and almost expecting the no will set you up better. And so, I think that’s a, that would be the first one, first and foremost, is to get comfortable with hearing “no.”

The second one, I would say, would be get comfortable with expressing the value of what you offer and learn how to do a really good job of that. And more importantly, understand who you’re talking to, because it’s not so much about what you have to offer, but how what you have to offer solves this person’s problem or this brand’s problem that they currently have.

[00:31:56] Pierre: True.

[00:31:57] Prince: And then the third one, I would say, would be to… so get used to, get comfortable with rejection. Work on your… how you position your service to solve a person’s actual problem. And the third one, I would say, is value. Like, sell on value, not so much pricing.

I think a lot of people either underprice themselves or overprice themselves and they should be pricing to the client into the value of what they’re doing. If the value of your photos are extremely important, because this guy is a billionaire and this photo’s going to be on the cover of, whatever magazine or is going to be turned into a painting, then you should charge more for that photo than you would a normal portrait. You shouldn’t treat it as a normal portrait because that guy has a much… his perceived value of that photo is much higher to him or that use case than it would be to your neighbor who’s just hiring you to get a portrait for his LinkedIn.

[00:32:59] Pierre: Yeah. Would you, how would you direct that conversation differently? Let’s say a billionaire comes in the same day, well… or maybe it wouldn’t work where you couldn’t have a different pricing. I don’t know. I was just like role-playing in my head, where I’m like, imagine I have a photo studio and I have a normal guy walking and just behind a billionaire that everyone knows. Is there a way to, to have a different pricing? Or, is it like an entire different conversation?

[00:33:28] Prince: Yeah, I mean, I mean, you… obviously, I guess you wouldn’t know it was a billionaire until you sat down. And so, I think before…

[00:33:35] Pierre: But let’s say it’s Leonard DiCaprio. And I think you, you can’t… and deep fake in real world does not exist yet. So, so we know he’s famous.

[00:33:43] Prince: Yeah, yeah. I would just ask. I would… it starts with getting an understanding of the project, right?

[00:33:48] Pierre: Mm-hmm.

[00:33:48] Prince: And so, it’s, like, we have to evaluate before we prescribe something. So, in the evaluation process, we’d start out talking and asking, what exactly are you looking for?

“Oh, we’re looking for a photo.” Why are you looking… “We’re looking for a portrait.” Why are you looking for a portrait? “Oh, because I’m going to… I, I was selected as human of the century, and this is the most important honor of my lifetime.” How important? “Oh, it’s, this is, you know, this is going to bless my family for generations, and so…” Oh, okay. So, I’m guessing that photo’s, this photograph, this portrait of you is really important, then, right? “Oh, yeah. We can’t, like, we cannot… like, it has to be right. It has to show me in all my power and all my might and all the things I am.”

And so, I would keep going through that and, like, making sure that they understand, like, this is a really important service that this service provider is about to provide for me. And then, I would go into a price. Or, I might even ask them. I might even say like, “What is the value of this for you?” Like they said, you know, “How much do you charge? Well, how much…” Typically, I charge, I could even… I could say a range. I could ask him about what he does. I can ask him what it’s for, but I know it’s Leo DiCaprio, I’m going to move up into a higher scale. But I could also just ask him what the value of this photo. I was like, “Some people might think a photo’s only worth five bucks. I know people that know that a portrait could be worth $100,000. What’s the photo worth to you?” And he might say, it’s worth 15 grand. It’s like, “Okay, well, that’s what’s going to cost you.”

[00:35:22] Pierre: That’s… I love it. That’s, that’s very interesting. Yeah. That’s a, that’s an interesting way. I hope everyone took notes here. But it’s a, it’s so true. At the end of the day, instead of sending the value for that person and what exactly are they looking for, it’s like any brand, like, like, you said, the university, their goal was to, they wanted to encourage people to be on the campus. And what is that worth for them? And how much are they ready to invest in, in making that happen, you know?

[00:35:50] Prince: For sure. If it’s tied to value, it’s really easy to sell that or to get signed up on that. If you’re saying, you know, like the university example, if they’re making millions of dollars a year off of residents’ life enrollment and you can help not only with more signups, not only bringing in more signups, but you can help with retention, you can help keep these videos that are going to help keep people on campus, then you’re solving a problem that has a very large value. And it’s not just like one year, like that value. They probably used those videos, I want to say, like, seven years before they created new videos. And so, that’s a lot of value over time.

So, you have to look at the full picture. And also understanding the business. There’s times where I might connect with the business on strategy. And I know the business is doing, let’s say I know the business is doing $10 million in revenue and I understand that their brand strategy and the business strategy and the marketing strategy that’s going to come from this multi-day workshop is extremely important to that company because they’re in a transformation phase. Like, they’ve been, they’ve made it to this $10 million size doing certain things, but now they’re at a point, just like we all get in our life, we get to a point to where it’s time to go into the cocoon, like a caterpillar, and come out as a butterfly into our next form or a higher form. And so, if that’s what they’re trying to do, that’s an extremely valuable service.

And so, I’m going to say, you know, that’s worth 1 to 5% of your total revenue, or 10% of your total revenue should be spent on this extremely important plan in architecture that’s going to get you guys from 10 million to 50 million. And so, even though I may have just charged a company, a much smaller company, $15,000 to do the same thing, this brand is getting charged 150,000.

[00:37:56] Pierre: This is something I always like… I think I always, like, part of me, like, struggled with it for certain parts, where it’s like I understand the not pricing the same for everyone because everyone’s different, I also understand that the retention, especially when you’re doing anything that’s learning or workshop or, like, coaching or strategy or anything that involves someone else’s investment in order to make it their investment successful, right?

So, let’s say you’re taking a photography course, and I charge you $1. The likelihood that you complete it and you transform your life is very low. Because, unless you’re making a dollar a day, that represents nothing to you, in terms of monetary value. So, you don’t feel as incentivized as getting your investment returned.

And that’s something that I learned over time. And it’s the same in a way, where, if my best and most dedicated participants have been people who paid the most, or, like, who never cared about trying to get a discount on anything. They’re like, “No, I’m here. This is what I’m going to invest.” And then, they go fully, and they’re like, “I made this commitment, this investment. It’s not $50, $100 that’s going to change anything if I’m seeing it for the next 10 years.”

And I, I always found that fascinating because, in our mind, we have that… I mean, personally, I have that tendency of being like, okay, this camera is 4,000 and it’s 4,000 for everyone. But how you’re going to use it, it’s, it is going to be completely different, you know, and how it’s going to work for that person.

So, it’s almost like a philosophical debate. It’s almost like… have you ever had those thoughts? How much should you pay an employee? It’s like, but there’s no limit. Just because the market says it’s X per hour, if for you it’s more valuable than X, why not pay him as long as you’re sustainable?

[00:39:48] Prince: Yeah. I operate… that’s, kind of, how I operate my life, is on, on value. So, I’m not so much… like, perfect example, like, you just showed your Sony camera. And you’re like, it’s our camera, no matter where you go to buy it, right? It’s the price is set, it’s $4,000. But to the lawn care guy who wants to just get photos of his lawn, that camera is not worth $4,000. But now you have a product, there’s not a product market fit, right?

[00:40:15] Pierre: Yeah.

[00:40:16] Prince: And so, it’s like it’s the wrong… it’s not that he needs a camera, but he doesn’t. The $4,000 camera is not worth $4,000 to the guy who just wants to take photos of the lawn. A cell phone is a better product for him or a cheap point-and-shoot camera is a better product for him.

And so, oftentimes, we’re trying to sell people $4,000 cameras that don’t need a $4,000 camera. And so, product market fit is a big one. And it’s a big mistake that a lot of newer creators or less business savvy people tend to make.

[00:40:51] Pierre: Yeah. It’s hard to gauge also because we don’t have market data of everything. You’re like usually looking for more at one angle and you don’t really know everything.

I have this, the best story ever for everyone and for you, Prince. So, I went to Iceland. We met this really cool guy, extended family of someone I know, anyway. Happens that he’s been in real estate, right, like, his whole life. And he’s like… I’m like, okay, trying to get some insight. Like, okay, what do you think? How do you think about it? What have you learned? And like, what’s your worst? What’s your best? And then, he’s like, “I don’t know about my worst, because probably it was terrible. It was at the beginning.” But he’s like, “I remember my best.” And he’s like, “I bought a house for 3.5 million one day. And the next week I sold it for 7 million.” I’m like, “Wait, what?” And he is like, “Yeah, I sold it for 7 million the next week.” And I’m like, “Tell me more. How did that happen?”

And he was explaining that he knew the market, first of all. He understood. But he knew the people and he knew the value these places had for them. And that’s where it comes in.

So, the seller, his value for him, the value of selling his place was 3.5 million, whatever he would list it at, right? And he was happy with that. Now, he also knew two people who were likely to buy it on the side for who’s the value was much higher because they’re going to turn that place, that property, into a real estate development project.

So, he took… he bought it himself 3.5, and then he went to the other people. He’s like, “Look.” He went to the two guys, and he’s like, “Hey, look, I have this $7 million property that you were looking for.” And this guy also knows about it. “So, whoever can is interested or wants to have it first will get it.” And within the a day, basically one of, one of the client bought it.

And the funny part is that, at some point, the seller and the client and him in the middle, everyone knew about it. So, the seller is like, “Oh, shoot, I sold it for 3.5. He sold it for seven.” He was, like, slightly upset, but he’s like, “Okay, nice job.” Tthe guy’s like, “I wouldn’t have been able to do that.” And then the buyer was like, “Oh, nice move.” But he was in the same kind of business and he knew his value was much greater. He was going to make 10x on it anyways. And it, so, it didn’t bother him much more than that.

This is a perfect, I thought of, like, perfect example of, like, what is your value? And can you guess the value for people?

[00:43:28] Prince: Yeah, that’s a good story. I think that’s two parts. So, you have what they call price arbitrage, right? Which is buying something that’s undervalued and, and selling it somewhere else at its value. So, that could be, you might come across your Sony camera at a garage sale where the guy has to leave town tomorrow because some emergency happening is selling everything he owns and you just got a $4,000 camera that was used one time for $300. You could instantly turn around and put that camera up for sale for $2,200 and probably sell it within days, right? It’s still half off of what it costs. And so, that would be an example of price arbitrage.

But this sounds like the example with your buddy is a… he’s a visionary. Like, that’s what he, he’s a, he’s an, he’s an, that’s what makes certain people different. Your buddy has the skill of, and this is what I call like, I specialize in transformation. And so, it’s seeing what is and going from and taking what is and creating what could be.

So, your buddy saw this 3.5 million place, and that’s what it was sold to him as. But he knew what it could be. It could be part of this development and this and that. And this is actually what it’s worth, is $7 million. “So, I’m going to purchase this and then go put this in motion.” So, that takes, that takes strategy, right, to be able to do something like that. It’s not, like, he, he didn’t just get lucky.

[00:44:56] Pierre: No, and he had to take a loan. For anyone listening, he didn’t just like cash out 3.5 million. He actually went to the bank on 3.5 million loan, and the next week went back to the bank and was like, “Here’s your money back,” which they were really upset about because they didn’t make any money on the transaction.

[00:45:13] Prince: Exactly. And now… and we’ll, that’s a, once again talking about systems and games. That’s a game in itself, the financial system. It’s, kind of, wild, right? You pay them back early and they’re upset.

[00:45:25] Pierre: Yeah, I know, right? It’s like, “No, you can’t.”

[00:45:26] Prince: [crosstalk 00:47:25] Yeah. They don’t make… “We don’t actually… we’d be happier if you actually didn’t pay the loan back. Like, we have more money. Like, we don’t want the money back. We want…”

[00:45:37] Pierre: Yeah, I heard of penalties if you’re paying back some loans early.

[00:45:40] Prince: Oh, yeah.

[00:45:40] Pierre: I was like, “Wait, what? Are you, are you insane?”

[00:45:44] Prince: I dive deep into that topic. That’s a whole, I mean, all these things, man. But that cool… that’s a really beautiful story about your friend. And hopefully, people can take that and be inspired by that and look at the world that way, because you can do that with anything. You could do that with furniture. You buy a dresser for 100 bucks from a thrift store, and you’re like, “That’s not $100 dresser. This thing is solid maple wood. And if I take this home and sand it and paint it and put some new knobs on it, I know that dresser’s worth $800.” Take it home, put some love into it, and all of a sudden you made some extra cash.

And so, there’s so many ways for entrepreneurs and creatives to make a living being creative and doing fun things, but you got to understand the value of things. And you got to look outside of yourself, not just what you think the value, but what is the value of this to the developer? What is the value of this to…

[00:46:34] Pierre: That’s the hard part. I think that’s the hard part, for most people.

[00:46:38] Prince: Well, that’s why you got to understand the market, right?

[00:46:40] Pierre: Yeah. And that’s where, yeah, the guy had deep knowledge about the market and the people and all the actors, which, which really came through in his example. I was like, okay, not anyone, no one could have pulled that off except you with your connections and your knowledge. But it’s interesting.

It’s true. As creative, also, it’s like, “Well, I want you to…” There is an anti-example, also. It’s like, “Well, I want to take Airbnb photos and you’re going to rent that thing, and it’s going to bring you so much money.” Sure, right. But there’s also a lot of people who can do it, instead of you. So, there’s always that balance of what is your place in the marketplace and what is the value for people? Because, like, a screw could be $1 billion screw if it holds together a power plant from blowing up, but there is many, so you’ll just pay 10 cents for it.

[00:47:33] Prince: Yeah. Positioning is extremely important. And I think that’s where a lot of people in the creative industry struggle, especially people that are, make their living through creative services, freelancing, whether it’s photography, design work, videography. They don’t have a strong positioning.

And so, everyone’s a videographer. Everyone’s a photographer. And it’s like, what makes you different? And some people might say like, “Oh, it’s my color pattern.” And that’s, like, that’s not a position. “It’s my, I’m a… I do portraits.” And it’s like, okay, like, that’s more of a position, but it’s still not a position. There’s a lot of portrait shooters.

And it goes against… Like, art, because once again we’re wired for survival, right?

[00:48:14] Pierre: Yeah.

[00:48:15] Prince: And we think more is better. So, it’s like the more people that we could possibly work with, the better. So, we want to be broad. But in reality, it’s the opposite. It’s like, the more you can split the market and the more focus you can become, the more… it’s like a, it’s like the difference between a flashlight that’s spreading a really wide slow-moving beam and a laser that’s super-fast gets to its destination and its tack-sharp. And so, that’s the difference between, like, soft messaging that’s falling flat and really specific direct messaging, is all in positioning.

So, if you can become the go-to portrait photographer for conservative NASCAR, conservative race car drivers, then you’re going to be that guy. And you’re going to have, like, everything about your brand and everything about your positioning is so specific and so direct that, when any of these guys need a photo work or a photographer, whatever it may be, you’re for sure going to be getting the call because you’ve built, you are the brand in that space.

[00:49:22] Pierre: Yeah, that makes sense.

[00:49:24] Prince: And you can look at cars. It’s like Volvo. Volvo’s about looks, but mostly safety, right?

[00:49:31] Pierre: That’s true, yeah.

[00:49:31] Prince: And you look at Porsche, they’re the opposite. They’re like, “We’re all about performance and sex appeal. And the safety don’t get an erect, it’s a Porsche. But you’re going to be in an, it’s going to be the most incredible drive of your life. But we’re not prioritizing safety over performance.”

And so, they’re speaking to two different people. So, the mom has no desire to want to get a Porsche. Or the family man wants a Porsche, they want to Volvo because it’s a very safe vehicle, where the… in a young single person or an older person that doesn’t have a family in the house or that responsibility anymore and wants to live more freely wants that fast-moving high-performance Porsche.

[00:50:11] Pierre: That makes sense, yeah.

[00:50:11] Prince: And so, every good product, every good brand is positioned in the marketplace, which is why there can be so many people. Do you only lose when you’re not… and that’s where authenticity comes in, especially for creators, right? You only lose when you’re trying to be someone else because there can only be one. So, when you’re trying to do what other people are doing and you’re not being authentic to yourself, then you end up competing on price. And that’s where you go to die.

[00:50:33] Pierre: How have you seen it unfold in your personal creative, or, like, in your creative business, even with Arts of Visual, like, that, that positioning? And I don’t know if you’ve went through that mistake of trying to be too broad. But have, have you…

[00:50:48] Prince: For sure. I’ve made all the mistakes, bro. I made all the mistakes and I’m still making them. Like, that, that’s the beautiful thing about life. Like, there is, if we’re doing, if we’re playing the game correctly, we’re always evolving. We’re always moving into, like, a new form, where we’re… hopefully, we don’t just have one caterpillar-to-a-butterfly moment. We have multiple caterpillar to butterfly, back to caterpillar, back to transforming into a bird, whatever these transformations are.

And so, with those, you’re constantly making mistakes and learning and gaining wisdom and knowledge. And so, for myself with AOV, when we started, when we moved into the creative agency, because the agency came later, that came…

[00:51:25] Pierre: Yeah, you guys started as an inspiration page.

[00:51:28] Prince: Yeah, we were just an inspiration media platform. I had the podcast going, which I’m bringing the podcast back. And so, I’ll have to have you on my podcast, Pierre.

[00:51:34] Pierre: Nice.

[00:51:37] Prince: Which will be a lot of fun. But we had the podcast, we had the online community, we had a magazine. We had the Art of Visuals magazine, which is sick. Have you ever seen that, by the way?

[00:51:46] Pierre: I have never seen the magazine. No.

[00:51:48] Prince: Let me see. I feel like I, I normally have one over here. I might have taken them to the office. Let me see if I have one.

[00:51:53] Pierre: Yeah. For anyone who’s not watching, we also have some of the podcasts on YouTube. You can find them if you type pierretlambert.com/podcast. And so, you’ll be able to see the exchange and what Prince is going to get right now. And that’s actually awesome.

[00:52:07] Prince: So, this is the third issue. This was volume three. I wish I had the Andy Toe one on the cover, but this is actually Jude Allen.

[00:52:15] Pierre: Yeah, I don’t know him, but I, I know his photography. Sweet. Oh, wow. Look at that. That is beautiful. Wait, there is not an ad on every single page? Wow, that is absolutely epic.

[00:52:31] Prince: So, yeah, we, so we had, you know, we had this sweet magazine, which was tough. That was expensive to print.

[00:52:37] Pierre: Okay.

[00:52:38] Prince: And it’s a pain in the butt getting, like, the right resolution images and print-ready photos from everyone, and… but we had a lot of fun. So, anyway, we did all that and then we were doing the presets back in the day. And so, we were doing that all this stuff, like, the first three years and events, and then we pivoted into doing the creative agency.

And so, when I started, and I think everyone, depending on where you’re at, like, we were growing, right? And so, we were taking on anyone and everyone. And so, it didn’t, like, we worked with a butter company, a vegan butter company, but we worked with all types of companies, but we were really broad, and we offered everything. It’s like, oh, we can do video production, we can do photos, we can do social media stuff, we can do giveaways. We can do anything you need. You just let me know what you need, and we can do it. And that makes it really challenging to create systems to execute on the work. And it also, once again, your message is watered down. They come to you and they say, “Okay, well, you guys do everything, and,” which most people assume that means you don’t do anything specifically, like, really well if you just do everything for everyone.

So, then we started to niche down to just the creator space. We’re like, well, we know the creator space better than anyone. And I have built this community. I have a deep understanding through just talking with people and other creators, but also because I had the podcast. And so, I was sitting down with all of these creators for two hours at a time and going deep.

And so, I had all this insight into the mind of creative people. And so, I’m like, okay, well, we can specialize in working with brands like Sony and Adorama and Peak Design and all these industry leaders in the creator space. Sonos and Clips and Roland and all these brands, we can work with these guys because we know the space perfectly.

And so, that was like our first niche down. And then, slowly over time, we kept moving it down and down to where it was just video production. We were doing commercials for Sony’s noise canceling headphones, to brand identity and design and other services. But we’re actually going through a transition right now. And so, the latest iteration of the agency, because we’re always transforming. And so, for us, the latest transformation is moving more into create a strategy in consulting and transformation.

And so, there’s a lot. And once again, it’s getting… and you can see it gets narrower and narrower and narrower. And so, now for creators, so people like yourself, for creator brands like Drum Works, Sony, you name it, and for creative teams, I can come in and help them with their creative strategy, their positioning, help them with their identity, help them with their organization design, help them with their vision, their purpose, all of these things. I’m pretty much their plug-and-play creative partner/mentor and help them transform, whether you’re a creator trying to evolve into the next version, whether you’re someone trying to evolve a product, evolve a brand, grow a brand, grow a product, grow yourself, whatever it may be, that’s now where we’re focusing. So, it’s a creative consultancy in its latest iteration.

And I’m getting, I’m toning back, I’m pairing back doing creative services as far as photo video work and things like that, because in my opinion, the market is becoming so saturated and there’s so many people that can, that do great work and better work than we do. And so, it doesn’t make sense, it doesn’t make sense for us to do it.

What we’re incredible at is strategy. What we can do that no one else on the planet can do is I can come in and make a major impact on a person, a business, or a product. And so, that’s the angle that we’re taking, going forward.

And then, if someone wants to come to us, at least for the… during this transition period, we’re not completely cutting off video yet, but if someone were to come to me and wanted to have a commercial shot, I would take it on. We would run the creative strategy in the front end. We would come up with the concept and the development, which we do very well. But then, I would turn around and I would have one of the production companies that we work with, like, my buddy Daniel Malikyar from MGX or something like that. I would have them produce the commercial because they’re so good at it, and that’s all they do.

[00:57:14] Pierre: That’s awesome. It’s good to see that you shed your skin over time and you just, like, keep changing and, like, iterating and, like, it’s evolving. It’s like, a, it’s a, it’s like the ocean. It’s moving. It’s never static. Even though it looks still, sometimes it’s still moving.

I picked up on something you said about the market that the market changed a lot. And I think it’s a great time to tap into AI. I don’t know if you have any thoughts or opinions or how you… have you been looking at what’s happening? Okay, tell me. There’s so much, like it’s happening so fast. It was very slow, and now it’s, like, ramping up exponentially. So, I’m kind of curious to, like, what do you see and how do you think it’s changing, not only just our industry, but, like, how we going to even, like, approach things or work on things?

[00:58:05] Prince: Yeah, man, I think there’s so many angles and perspectives to lenses we could look at this through. Starting on the positive side, I think AI is an incredible technology and an incredible tool, especially for the solopreneur, and for big teams. I mean, imagine this, you’re a freelance photographer and you don’t have anyone working with you so you’re doing all the work.

You’re writing blog posts for your website, you’re doing all your social media posting and captions, you’re doing all the responses to all your clients, you’re taking notes at all the meetings, you’re doing all the pre-shoot set up. I mean, you’re wearing all the hats.

[00:58:49] Pierre: Been there.

[00:58:51] Prince: All of a sudden, all of the sudden, we all have. And it’s important to have been there at some point, right?

[00:58:57] Pierre: It is.

[00:58:58] Prince: And so, now with these AI tools, you have a, you have a business partner sometimes, you have a business assistant sometimes, you have the potential for the AI to, kind of, be anything you need it to be and operate in any way you need it to operate as far as you can think. If you can dream it, the AI can help you in some way to actualize if you know how to communicate with it, because, like, right prompting.

So, prompting is, like, the new writing code. And so, understanding how to prompt, whether you’re in Midjourney and prompting art or whether you’re in ChatGPT and prompting the AI to give you some type of analysis on a data set or something. It’s all about prompting and how sharp our prompts are. Just code is important to building a website. Prompting is important to getting high-value information back from the AI.

And so, I think AI is incredible, like, we use it in our business. I use Otter.AI, which is like a assistant that’ll pop into Zoom meetings and it’ll be on calls and it records the calls and then it’ll put everything into, like, a call note. So, it shows up as a person in your Zoom meeting. But instead of you writing notes and working and you’re not, kind of, fully being present with the person you’re communicating with because you’re also trying to jot down important things, it’ll basically take care of all that for you, recap everything you could ever need.

And so, there’s all these beautiful tools like that. And that’s just one of an abundance of tools that are available to wear these hats within your business that can help you be more efficient and more effective in what you do. And I think it allows you to focus on your superpower. And I think everyone has a superpower but most of the time, they get bogged down doing all the other stuff, right?

And so, I think AI is a beautiful tool. It’s going to free people from doing busy work and allow people to, kind of, move into more specialist-type work. And so, I think it’s going to liberate, but like everything else, there’s always all truths are half-truths. And so, there’s always the polarity. There’s always going to be, there’s going to be people that win, that are able to leverage this technology. There’s going to be people that have really specialized skill sets that the AI…

Like, the AI is not going to, is not going to be able to create a brand strategy for you, the AI’s not going to be able to solve a problem in a meaningful way. It’s going to give you, like, the duh. It’s going to give you the same information you’ll find Googling your question of whatever challenge you’re going through, but it’s not going to innovate, it’s not going to take you from what is and help you build the path to the castle. So, like…

[01:01:43] Pierre: Yeah. It’s not going to break a box that is existing. Did you know that you can prompt ChatGPT to find better prompts? So, it’s self-learning. It’s, kind of, crazy. So, if your prompt sucks, you don’t know how to ask something, ask the AI you’re prompting how to ask it better, and you may get… It’s like self-learning. It’s pretty incredible.

I also discovered today that if you’re a WordPress user, for example, and you want a new script or a new tool or plugin that you wanted to get, you can actually just literally prompt ChatGPT-4 and be like, « Can you code me something? » Let’s say you want a timer on your WhatsApp, « Can you, can you code me a timer that I can use as a script in WordPress to do this and that? » And it’s 99% solid. And I’m just blown away right now. I’m like, « Wow, wow. »

So, I’m going to be playing more with that because I heard someone explain that they’re, like, they were limited by their computer science skills as, like, as a coder, but their creativity and their understanding of computer science is there. It’s like you can understand, like, the semantics of something without being able to write it yourself, right? And so, he’s like, « Suddenly, it moves me from having to be the script, the one who writes, to just being the guy who thinks and then having… » And I’m like, « Wow. This is getting interesting. »

[01:03:14] Prince: Yeah, it allows… I mean, it’s an incredible creative partner. Like, for me, my mind moves really quickly, especially when I really get into hardcore creative sessions. If I’m sparring with people, it’s like an intellectual sparring on creativity and ideas and trying to solve problems, and I spar really quickly. And sometimes, the pace isn’t moving fast enough. And so, I can get antsy.

Tools like AI is, like, this incredible because the AI is in… You ask it a dumb question, you’ll get a dumb answer. You ask it an intelligent question, you’ll get an intelligent answer. You ask it an even more intelligent question and you really start to train with it, you can give it to give you really intelligent answers and interesting answers.

And so, you can use it as a sparring partner to work through a script or to work through an idea or whatever it may be. And so, although it can do the work for you, you also get, like, if I say, « Hey, write me a tagline for this podcast with Pierre and I, » it’ll write a tagline. It’s going to be something lame. It’s not going to be good.

[01:04:22] Pierre: Prince and Pierre-

[01:04:23] Prince: It’s going to be generic.

[01:04:24] Pierre: …on a podcast.

[01:04:25] Prince: It’s going to be generic, right? But if I understand what makes a good tagline and I understand the business and I understand you and I understand these things, then I can start going back and forth with the AI and feeding at these information to help me brainstorm whatever it is I may be doing. And so, there’s a lot of capabilities and things. But I think it’s super important on, like, the negative side is to make sure that… You know, I think it’s important that we use the AI and we don’t let the AI use us. There’s a big difference. It’s a tool and…

[01:04:54] Pierre: And there’s many AIs.

[01:04:56] Prince: Absolutely.

[01:04:57] Pierre: It’s like…

[01:04:57] Prince: We know the dangers. We’ve seen the dangers of social media. We’ve seen the dangers of these cell phones. And AI is the most seductive of them all. It’s the most potent of them all and has the most potential, I think, to completely take away all imagination. I think it has the potential for people to take away all sovereignty and creative thinking, to where everything that needs to be done, rather than doing it yourself, you’ll just do it through an AI, which, I think, is dangerous because it gives up a lot of personal power.

[01:05:33] Pierre: Interesting. I love where you’re going here. I was literally listening to a conversation earlier, I think it was Tim Ferriss and Kevin Rose. And Kevin Rose was explaining that… Oh, shoot, the name just slipped. It’s not Midjourney. It’s the Stable Diffusion, for video. Right. It creates, like, video that’s so real-looking on prompts, which is just, like, mind-boggling. I would’ve never believed that as a kid.

It was, kind of, like, futuristic sci-fi kind of word where I’d be like, « No, this is too crazy. » I still remember, like, there was this show when I was young, and when you would wake up, they would have recorded your dreams. A machine, a machine would record your dreams and then you would reanalyze them with the machine. And I was like, « Yeah, that’s crazy. » But now I’m like, « Oh, this might be closer than I think. »

But jokes aside, so, I mean, besides that, so Stable Diffusion apparently went open-source and people took it and removed all the guards around Stable Diffusion because there’s a lot of fences to make it ethical or to make it nice or not to be prompted exactly, to make PG-13. And apparently, they removed all the guards and there’s, like, open versions of it running and you can prompt anything you can ever imagine. And it’s apparently freaky because it’s so realistic and it’s… Yeah. So…

[01:06:54] Prince: It’s terrifying on that side. I mean, I feel like it goes back to, like, consciousness, right? To pull it back into that perspective. I feel like wherever you are as a person, it will help, it will help you in that direction. But if you’re a dance-dark person, like, if you got a porn addiction, yeah, I’m sure you’ll be able to hop on Stable Diffusion and prompt it and create some crazy stuff that is only going to suck you in more and more.

And so, that’s what I mean by the AI… It’s a slippery slope. It’s a powerful tool, but it’s also a dangerous vice for many people. And just like everything else, you’re going to have people that use it and do incredible things with it, and then you’re going to have people that are used and abused by it.

[01:07:39] Pierre: That’s so interesting. Yeah, it’s going to be an interesting few next years, I think, in that space or just in all world, because there’s a part of people who are not seeing what’s coming. And the…

[01:07:53] Prince: Oh, photo, video, edit. Like, I mean, you’re talking about a… I mean, the whole creative space is changing, so it’s, like, going to be… I mean, even one of the girls that works for me, she sent me a AI that will scrub through your whole podcast, cut all the video cuts, the clips, cut out certain things, and, like, pretty much chop your podcast together for you.

[01:08:16] Pierre: Oh, I’ve seen that also where it’s built-in with Premiere, and it, like, literally did multi-cam in 45 seconds. I think it’s Full Time Filmmaker, Parker Walbeck who shared one the other day. I was like, « Wait, what happened here? »

[01:08:30] Prince: So, I mean, and these tools are coming and I don’t think people understand the exponential growth at which AI grows at. You can’t really even understand how fast it’s actually moving. But I can promise you by 2025, you will wake up and we will be shocked, utterly shocked. We would’ve never thought how far we could have come in two years with this AI and what it’s capable of doing.

[01:08:59] Pierre: I know. I’m so curious. Part of me is so curious. I’m slightly scared like you. Not that I think it’s the end of the world and we’re all going to die if that happens. I’m not scared of that. I think it’s fine. We’re dead. Why do we care anyway? And we all die anyways. So, it’s like, you know, nature will recycle us into mushrooms and trees and other things and stars, and that’s it. But I’m just curious to see how it’s going to be used, and, like, what shift there will be in people’s usage around it, and how we will think about it. How do you use it personally right now? And what tools… You mentioned one for the podcast notes?

[01:09:39] Prince: Yeah. Otter.AI.

[01:09:42] Pierre: Is there anything else that really, like, jumped or you felt you’re like, « You know what? I’ll never use it. And now I use. » Actually, see how you’re using it.

[01:09:51] Prince: Yeah, I have a list of… I save, like, a bunch of Twitter threads and then when I get time, I check them out. You can get lost in this AI stuff, too. Takes time. Because it takes time to really… Like ChatGPT, you know, you start playing with it. You ask it silly questions and then you get silly answers. You start asking it more serious questions, you start getting serious answers.

And then you start testing it, and then you’re like, « Wow, you can really… Like, it can really do things. » And then you push it and then you’re like, « Oh, my goodness, » like, « I have an employee that does this, but this AI is doing it, not in four hours, it’s doing it in minutes.” And that’s, kind of, scary. The way that I use AI right now, it’s… my AI journey started with Midjourney. And although I don’t…

[01:10:41] Pierre: [crosstalk 01:12:39].

[01:10:43] Prince: Yeah. Although I don’t post any artwork, I started making, like, specifically, I started making… Like, I had two years of Art History. And there’s not, like, necessarily, like, a lot of black art in art history, like, when you’re learning about art history and the French impressionist movement and all these different style periods over time. And I basically was recreating a lot of famous paintings as either black men or black women.

[01:11:12] Pierre: I love it. It’s like the Last Supper. Why are they so white at the Last Supper? They’re all from the Middle East, like, Jesus was from the Middle East, like, something got lost here.

[01:11:21] Prince: Yeah, so, like, I did, like, black Mona Lisa. I did, like, all this. And so, that’s what I was just messing around. And I love history as well. I’m a nerd. And so, I was taking these characters and these people from history and these places that I’ve learned about, and then I was trying to recreate what they might look like using Midjourney. And so, my Midjourney experience started out just really being creative and having fun. It was a fun outlet for me.

And so, it became, like, a daily creative exercise. And then I really started to understand that, wow, it’s all about the prompting. Like, when you can really start feeding it really intelligent prompts, it’ll start giving you really detailed images that are a lot more specific to what you’re wanting. And that’s where, like, general intelligence comes involved as well, like, being able to explain angles, what type of lighting, what type of atmosphere.

It’s like the more creative your mind is and the more detailed, it’s like a mix. It’s, kind of, crazy because we’re moving in this world where I feel like creativity and technology are merging. And so, it’s like you, kind of, have to, you have to be really creative but you also do need to be technical in a sense. And so, it’s a really interesting confluence that’s taking place right now in the space. And from Midjourney, I started working around with ChatGPT.

So, I created, like… Here, I’ll give you an example. I told ChatGPT, I was like, « I want to work on becoming a better leader for my team and I want you to create me a six-month program, split up into six different categories on leadership. » And then I fed it the six, like, pillars that I thought were the most important in leadership. And so, let’s just say that I’m trying to think for, like, an example. One of the, one of the pillars might have been being present. It might start with being present.

The next chapter, the month two might be, like, creating a vision for your team. And so, in month two, if it’s creating a vision for my team, I would ask ChatGPT, I’d be like, « Okay, give me two of the best, most world-renowned books on creating a vision. » And then it would give those books. And then I would ask it to give me the key insights in three paragraphs and summarize the book in key insights, and then it would summarize the book in key insights.

And then I would say, « Take everything you know that’s in this book and create a exercise that I can establish and put into my daily routine so that I can basically take the key insights and takeaways from this book and bring it into my life to create habits. » And then it would create exercises. And so, I kept pushing it and pushing it deeper and deeper until I was like, « Holy shit, this… » It just, like, literally basically created this six-month plan and program on how I could become a better leader down from a macro and a micro down to the daily routine.

[01:14:26] Pierre: Brush your teeth before you speak to employees.

[01:14:29] Prince: And so, it was super interesting. And so, I’ve played with it. I’m constantly playing with it because I’m curious to see what it can do, especially in spaces where I’m already a strong leader. Obviously, always have room for improvement. But I knew a lot of the books so it was great when it was giving me the books back. Out of, like, the eight books, I had read six of the books.

And so, it was really cool to see that the key insights were accurate. It pulled the most important aspects of the book out and the practices that it created were legit. And so, it’s really fun to push the AI and see how we can play with it in these different creative ways. I’ve messed around with kids’ books. I made a kids’ book for my nephew, coming up with a bunch of ideas and then I used Midjourney to make the art, and then I worked with ChatGPT to help me rework what I had written to make it-

[01:15:23] Pierre: No way.

[01:15:23] Prince: … kid-friendly and, kind of, add some humor. Oh, yeah, I mean, the possibilities are endless. It’s really how creative you can be and how, once again, direct you can be with how you want the voice, you know-

[01:15:38] Pierre: Can you type in…

[01:15:39] Prince: …what type of place…

[01:15:41] Pierre: It’s like, « Hey, can you make a story for my kid who is having a hard time with integrating at school? » Boom, here’s your new book for your kid. You’re like, « Whoa. What happened here? »

[01:15:51] Prince: Yeah. Right? And then you could be like, « Hey, that book is a little too serious. Could you make it, could you make it more friendly? It’s for a, it’s for my five-year-old son who loves baseball, whose favorite color is blue, and he really likes these types of shows. » And it’ll, all of a sudden, bring in that personality and those aspects into the book so that it resonates more with your son.

[01:16:18] Pierre: Wow.

[01:16:19] Prince: And so, it’s really… yeah, it’s pretty… I’m bullish on the future of AI, but I’m also… I’m bullish in an optimist way, but I’m also a pessimist at the same time because I’m aware of a harsh reality that it’s also, I mean, it’s also logging so much data and so much information and it’s all a part of moving everything into a digital world. And I think some people are all about the digital world, and there’s some people that I think already live way more in the digital world than they live in the real world.

And I think we’re moving into another more immersive version of that. But that, like anything else that comes with, wins, but there’s also a lot of losses from a society standpoint and the disconnection from humans. And if AI’s answering all of our questions all the time and all of a sudden, people can’t speak in person.

[01:17:14] Pierre: Yeah, there’s really great AI chatbots for doing customer support nowaday. I have not tried it personally because I don’t have the volume. I’m happy to answer. I’d like to know what people ask, or someone on my team so that we know. But it’s interesting. You can be like, « Hey, here’s, like, the hundred… I don’t know, the thousand, like, last interactions with customers, and how I responded, can you respond? »

And that’s what they did with Lightroom also. Like, imagine Dash AI, which allows you to upload 3,000 images of how you edit, or 5,000. It just trains them all on your style, your crops, your selections, and boom, and 20 minutes or so just going to go through all your images for editing, which is amazing for someone like me who has zero interest in editing beyond trying to dial in the style that I want.

It’s like I don’t necessarily… I’m not someone who loves to spend the time on the computer for hours. I just prefer to be shooting and then dialing in a thing I like. I don’t know. It’s an endless discussion. I think it’s an endless bit that will take us very far. So, I, kind of, want to be mindful with your time. We’ll, like, slow back down into some physical real-world stuff or things we can experience for ourselves.

And I’m, kind of, curious how being in this creative industry or working with a lot of companies, how has it been for you being in Idaho versus San Francisco or other places? Like, have you felt a shift? Did you have to adapt in some way that was surprising to you? Or do people not give a damn anymore? And let’s say you can be everywhere. It doesn’t matter.

[01:19:00] Prince: So, I think it’s a few parts. In the beginning, we used to. Because in the beginning, my partner was in Boise. I was in San Francisco. And so, we, kind of, like, used, you know, artificials in the San Francisco-based business. And we ran with that for, I want to say, like, three years even though I’d been back in Boise, like, most of that time.

But eventually, because, like, I was young and I wasn’t as confident, and I thought it made our company seem less valuable, less important, being from a place like Boise, Idaho that most people hadn’t heard of. As I got older, I realized it goes back to that. Knowing what I know now, being a transformation specialist and a strategist, I understand the power in authenticity. And so, I understood that us being from Boise was a superpower. We split the market. We’re different.

It’s like we’re not another agency or consultancy out of San Francisco, or out of Los Angeles, or out of New York City, or out of Austin. And Boise’s a cool place. And so, it lets them know that we value nature, we value the outdoors, we value these certain things more than being in a specific place. And so, it doesn’t affect us at all in a negative way. If anything, it does affect us in a positive way. We’ve had a lot of clients come out here. I pitched Sony Kando.

So, Kando happened in Sun Valley because I pitched it to be in Sun Valley to our client, Sony. And so, we were in New York City and I was talking up, we were chatting about where Kando would be that year, last year, 2022. And there was a lot of places they were looking at and I was like, « No, no, no, no. Like, Sun Valley is where we’re going to do this. » And then I started selling on Sun Valley.

Idaho’s a really great place. And so, we’ve had a lot of clients not only do events here, but a lot of clients come out to visit and we’ll do retreats here and workshops here because it’s just such a beautiful place and it’s nice for them to be able to get away and experience an awesome place. And if anything for the company, it’s created more value for us because we’re getting big city clients.

But we live in Boise, Idaho, which isn’t cheap, but it’s cheaper, especially since all the people from California moving here post-COVID has been crazy with the house values and things like that. You know, I purchased my house in 2020 and it’s doubled almost in value, which is crazy to think about. It doesn’t even make any sense, but that’s what happens when people blow up your housing market.

[01:21:32] Pierre: That’s the value DESI in your place.

[01:21:36] Prince: Yeah. And so, yeah, no, it’s been a, it’s been a huge, it’s been a huge positive, but it’s created an environment for us where we can do our best work and it allows us to be more creative and original. I feel like when you’re in, it’s cool to be in pockets of creativity, but there’s also a lot more mimicry, right? Because there’s a culture. And so, when you…

[01:21:53] Pierre: So, I was going to ask. So…

[01:21:54] Prince: Yeah. When you operate outside the culture, it allows you to be more authentic to yourself and, kind of, create your own vibe.

[01:22:01] Pierre: I was going to ask exactly about that because it’s like you create your own vibe, but, like, it’s cool to have the New York City energy and, like, that creativity, like, that’s very present or, like, the inspiration, but then it’s like if you want your own voice, it’s, like, better to have less noise in a way. It can work either way.

And so, I was like how did it affect you personally and even in your personal life? Like, do you find that there’s a better balance in how you interact and even how you think about things? Because I’m always, like, wondering if once you get to places like that, you’re like, « Okay, I’m retired now. I am a retiree. »

[01:22:41] Prince: Yeah, no. I feel like if you’re living a purpose-driven life, you never get comfortable. I never get comfortable. I’ve never been comfortable. Every time I used to want to be comfortable. I used to, like, work my ass off so that I could be comfortable. But then I realized that I’m not wired. I realized, more recently actually, that I will never be comfortable. Like, I’ll never get to a point in my life where I’m just like, « Oh, I’m so comfortable. »

I’ll be comfortable in the sense that I’m like, like, I’m comfortable now, like, I’m financially comfortable, but I’m not work-wise and creating wise and giving back and creating value and doing things and helping. Like, I have a mission. I’m here to transform people, products, and brands, like, that is my mission, and specifically, people I love the most. Like, I love nothing more than finding an artist that has something special that may not see what I see in them.

They have a gift that they don’t even recognize. Or they’re making 50 grand a year and they’re happy, but they’re not really sure where to go from there. And I chat with them and I’m like, « You’re not a $50,000-a-year freelancer, like, you should be $150,000-a-year freelancer, like, this is your value today and this is how we could get you there. » Or it’s just, it may not even be a money thing. It may be, like, they’re trying to find themselves, they’re trying to figure out what position, how to position themselves, or they’re trying to figure out what their purpose is.

It’s hard to get up in the morning and work hard without purpose, like, burnout, for example. I don’t believe in burnout. I don’t think burnout exists when you’re operating in the divine will and you’re operating in a purpose-filled life. I feel like burnout is a way. It’s a physical indicator. Burnout is a physical indicator that you are not in harmony. That’s all burnout is. Burnout’s letting you know you’re not doing the right things.

Yeah, just because it involves a camera doesn’t mean that’s exactly what you should be doing with the camera. Because if it was, if you were doing the right thing… It’s like a ecosystem. It’s like the forest. Nothing ever runs out. The water doesn’t run out. The food doesn’t. Nothing will ever run out because it’s an ecosystem that’s living in harmony. And so, if we’re living within our purpose, that purpose, and that there’s an ecosystem that’ll come with that.

And normally, whatever we’re waking up, we wake up fired to go to work. Like, podcasting, for example, is something that gets me fired up. It gets me fired up because when I record a podcast and then I get a bunch of people being like, « Oh, my gosh, that was such an inspiring episode, » this and that, « You inspired me to start my own business, » then I get fired up and I’m like, « I’m going to go, I’m going to record six podcasts this week. Always in for the girl, like, for the home, like, for my family out there.

And, like, the more they feed me, the more I want to feed it. And so, when you’re in a purpose-driven thing, it becomes this self-creating ecosystem that… It’s like a battery. You’re constantly giving and exerting energy, but you’re also constantly being charged. And anytime you feel yourself being drained, it’s really important for you to take a step back and pause and say, « What’s not right here? » Because something is not right. That is an indicator of your body physically letting you know, « We are not in harmony. Something is out of balance right now. »

[01:25:53] Pierre: That’s very interesting. I join you a little bit on that because we have this great yoga teacher here and she’s always talking about don’t grasp. Stop grasping, just receive. And it’s almost like if you burn out… And I understand how, like, I have so many friends, they experienced it. I’ve probably been close to it. I don’t know. My radar tells me. I have a radar that tells me very quickly I’m going crazy. I need to get the heck out of this house and go run or do some sport or, like, recharge in nature, but that’s maybe my European six-week minimum of holidays per year wiring that’s, like, oh, anything less is not good for your health.

But it’s interesting because it’s really that concept of, like, if you’re trying to grasp, grasp, like, always reach and, like, catch stuff versus receiving and just, like, being in the position, like, letting yourself be in the position where you can receive, it’s a completely different experience if you practice yoga.

It is, it is a completely different experience to try to grab onto your legs to reach your toes versus slowly receiving and, like, feeling your body move slowly. Yeah, it’s going to be a different pace. But if your goal is not to, like, accumulate the coins in a video game, because it’s a little bit the same, once you’re beyond your, like, survival, you know, you’re just accumulating coins for, like, in a video game in a way. And so, once you’re beyond that, if you’re still, like, grasping, it’s going to run you out because you’re, like, exchanging resources but you’re not being fed in return like you’re saying. It’s pretty interesting. I love how you framed it.

[01:27:36] Prince: Yeah, it’s been a big one for me. And I also realize the energy mode’s, kind of, like, a new philosophy that I’ve been working out, that I’ve realized in my life. And it’s, everything is energy, right? So, you have monetary energy, physical energy, emotional energy, mental energy. And then I feel like when all those four in harmony, you move into creative energy, which is, like, the highest form, that’s when you move into the sphere of creative intelligence.

And those sparks, sometimes people have those sparks. But I feel like, for me, creativity doesn’t work. Like, I have these moments, but creativity, for me, works when I’m in harmony. So, when I have a monetary moat, meaning if my car breaks down tomorrow and I have to go spend $800 on a new gasket for my truck, it doesn’t faze me at all because I have a monetary moat. I have savings. If I don’t have a monetary moat, then I’m going to live my life walking on eggshells.

Because if my car breaks down, I’m going to be so stressed out to pay the $800 and I might not be able to pay rent, and I might not be able to pay my mortgage, I might not be able to do all these different things. Same thing goes with emotional intelligence. If a client, or a friend, or a wife, or a significant other has a bad day and puts the bad day on me, if I don’t have my emotional moat, then I’m going to react.

But if I have my emotional moat, if I have an extra energy in that department because I’ve been cultivating these things, then I can calmly be there and listen to them and understand that it has nothing to do with me, that they’re just having a rough day and they’re just, kind of, going through it and I can just be there and I don’t have to take it personally. Same thing with mental and same thing with physical.

And so, when you have that moat, your being is in harmony. And you’re operating at a, you’re operating at a higher frequency. And I feel like it’s because you’re not worried about money, because you’re not worried about money, your mind isn’t playing false narratives, false movies, those mind movies that aren’t real. Yeah, those ones. Those aren’t playing. And if it is playing, it’s a positive mind movie.

Emotionally, you feel well. Physically, you have energy. When you have those things, all of a sudden, creativity flows in abundance because your being has space to breathe, which is what creates you. You need that, you need that for creativity. Creativity can also obviously be created in high pressure as well but there’s a lot more wear on the body putting yourself in that type of environment. And it’s okay when nature puts you in that environment from time to time, but it’s not the ideal state to live in a state of constant chaos and pressure.

[01:30:22] Pierre: Did you find any practice that you build into your life that helps you expand that buffer or moat as you called it?

[01:30:28] Prince: For sure. So, monetary-wise, like, always paying yourself first. So, you get paid, save money, whatever that looks like for you. And you could put money in certain things. Set budgets. You could put budgets in envelopes. You could freaking make 10 envelopes and be like, « This is my dinner, this is my date night envelope, this is my clothing envelope, and this is my hobby envelope, » in every week and when you get paid.

And it’s nice to have the cash. Like, go take cash out of the bank and go put $100 in my dinner, in my date night envelope, put $100, whatever your breakup is. Put the money into your envelopes, keep your money for your bills and all that stuff separate, and then have your money for your rainy-day savings money. I can tell you what, most of people’s stress comes from financial stress. And so, by saving money, it’ll give you peace of mind. There’s no better feeling than having money in the bank and knowing that no matter what happens, you’re going to be okay. Allows you to operate in a different mindset.

[01:31:27] Pierre: Oh, can I just, like, interject here? For anyone listening who’s like, « Well, I really don’t make a lot of money and that’s why I’m stressed. » I know people who have the exact same thin thread, whether they’re making 15 grand a month or $1,000 a month, because the guy who is at 15 grand a month is living with 15 grand a month, and he is at zero every month if not negative.

« Oh, I’m just going to buy a car. It’s fine, » or whatever. And so, if anything breaks down in that pyramid, it doesn’t matter how high your pyramid is, if it’s three breaks or if it’s a million, everything falls anyway. So, just, like, keep that in mind if you think just more is going to solve. It’s not usually about more.

[01:32:13] Prince: Yeah, it’s debt slavery, right? You’re wearing chains. It’s just some of you wearing iron chains, some people are wearing gold or platinum chains. But don’t get it twisted, they’re all wearing, they’re all wearing chains. Being millionaire-poor looks different than being thousandnaire-poor. But poor is poor and struggling is struggling. And so, there’s that. On the emotional side, I noticed that emotional and mental, kind of, go together.

So, I like to tend to my own garden. So, it’s like focusing on me not getting caught up in social media, getting caught up in other people’s lives, getting caught up in the news and everything that’s going on, taking time out of my day to, whether it’s meditation, whether it’s walking in nature, whether it’s sitting still and just… And you can meditate in many ways. You can close your eyes and focus on something, you can just stare at a tree in nature for 10 minutes, 30 minutes, however long you want to do it, is helpful.

I do qigong in the mornings. It really helps to get my energy and my flow going. I haven’t done it in the last week because I have a puppy, which is, like, just completely wrecked. And that’s life, right? And so, you give yourself grace. Like, my schedule is a shitshow right now. I’m not doing anything because I’m just, like, constantly, I’m, like, working and then, like, working with the puppy, taking the dog out, checking on the cats, my wife’s out of town and, like, trying to do all these things, right?

But I give myself grace. I don’t beat myself up for not doing things. And so, that’s a big one. But I think creating those daily habits is super important to build that moat because it compounds. Just like the AI gets smarter every single day so does the moat. The moat grows every single day. So, every day that you meditate, every single day that you clear your mind, that you replace bad thoughts, you stop bad thoughts, when you start festering.

Because bad thoughts are like weeds in the garden. You got to pull those weeds out of the garden. If you don’t actually actively work on pulling those weeds out to the garden, they’ll take over the garden and they’ll take up all the resources. They’ll drink all the water and they’ll take over everything and they’ll kill. All of a sudden your fruit trees and everything’s dying because there’s no sustenance in the soil because the weeds have taken everything. And those weeds could be people.

There’s a lot of ways, you guys let that one sit and marinate, because there’s a lot of ways you could look at it. It could be people, could be ideas, could be thoughts, could be a lot of different things in your life. But I think being aware of that and removing those types of things and replacing them, planting fresh seeds, whether those fresh seeds are, once again, people, ideas, places, environments, all that stuff will be helpful in creating that energy moat.

And then once you start creating that space, then add the creative practice in there. And you’ll start to notice how much more free-flowing your mind is and how much more you’re strucken by that creativity and how you’re able to cultivate that. You realize it’s not something that just strikes like lightning where a lot of people feel like, « Oh, it hits like lightning. »

I feel like I have, like, creativity all the time because I feel like I have this abundance of that energy and I feel like I’m tapped into it and it’s constantly coming in and it comes in. And in one way, I feel like to be able to tap into more creativity is to be more aware. Because I’m constantly taking in information from the field, my mind is… it’s basically… like, creativity is basically just like a hodgepodge of others, people’s ideas, you know what I mean? That’s all creativity.

[01:35:39] Pierre: Universe of ideas.

[01:35:40] Prince: Yeah. It’s just like, it’s just like taking information and just like, like a Rubik’s cube and just shifting it a bunch of different ways and then being like and presenting it. Here’s a new way to look at it, here’s a new way to look at it. So, the more aware, the more… If you only listen to one type of music and read one genre of literature and watch one type of show and hang out with one type of person and eat one type of food, you’re going to have a small worldview.

And so, your opportunity to come up with really incredible creative ideas is going to be pretty limited to that box. Now, if you listen to tons, if you listen to 20 genres of music and you have friends that are cowboys, friends that are more urban, friends that are adventurous, friends that are super nerdy, and then you read all these different types of books and you do all these different types of things, you’re going to have a massive worldview. You’re going to have a massive library of data as far as things that you’ve perceived, things that you’ve experienced, things that you’ve done.

And when someone comes at you with a question or to solve a problem or you’re thinking for new ideas, you’re going to have such a bank to pull from, that you just have more, you have more assets. Every creator knows, has assets in their library that they use to create things. And so, the more life you live and experience and open yourself up to, the more assets you have available to use.

[01:36:55] Pierre: That’s such a good point. I love that analogy of tapping into that big pool of, like, information and stuff and inspiration and then that channels that twist into your own creativity like you said with the Rubik’s cube you shake. It’s true. Every time is new and you’re like, « Where did this idea come from? »

But it doesn’t matter where it came from. It’s like if you open through to… like, if you’re opening your channels to receiving or, like, just staying open, and that’s cool. And you can’t just believe everything that’s in your thoughts, obviously. But a lot of the creative stuff is pretty cool. You’re like, « Oh, what if I did this like that? You know, what if this? » Yeah. And that’s, like…

[01:36:55] Prince: It’ll move. It’s crazy because ideas… I used to be one of those guys that protected my ideas, like, « This is my idea and no one can know. » And I’d be one of those guys, like, « Oh, like, I got this new thing I’m working on. » « Oh, like, what’s… » « Oh, I can’t talk about it. I can’t tell you. I can’t tell anyone. »

[01:37:47] Pierre: « It’s a secret. »

[01:37:47] Prince: You know, I…

[01:37:48] Pierre: « You’re going to steal it and make billions. »

[01:37:49] Prince: Yeah, it was scarce. It was scarce, right? It was scarce. But as I had gotten older, my perspective has completely changed. I’m like, first of all, ideas are not… like, they don’t come from me. Like, no, I’ve never had an idea in my life. I just have an antenna that’s able to operate at a higher plane to where I have access to these ideas. Because these ideas are everywhere and they’re looking for vessels. They’re looking for people that have the ability to execute them.

So, that’s why it comes to you. It’s like, this idea came to you because you have the potentiality to execute this idea. So, here it is. If you don’t want to use it, we’re going to, we’re going to leave the idea with you for, like, a week or two weeks, and if you don’t execute, we’re going to move the idea elsewhere and you’ll lose it. And I feel like any real creative has probably had that idea that they didn’t execute on and then they see someone else that’ll leave you like, « Oh, my gosh, I had that. »

[01:38:41] Pierre: But that’s business, or…

[01:38:42] Prince: « That was my idea. »

[01:38:43] Pierre: Or… Yeah.

[01:38:44] Prince: « That was my exact… » Or, « That was my… » And it’s, like, no, but that, it wasn’t yours. It was just an idea. You were one of the people that were chosen to execute on it and you didn’t.

[01:38:53] Pierre: I love it.

[01:38:54] Prince: And so, it moved on to elsewhere.

[01:38:56] Pierre: That’s funny.

[01:38:57] Prince: And so, that’s why you got to strike when… They say with creativity, you got to take action. And that’s a big part of making it in the creative world is taking action.

[01:39:08] Pierre: I think this is an awesome, like, way to close this conversation. I think it’s going to let people, like, a little sit down and let creativity come through, see what comes up, and hopefully, they take action based on that conversation. I think it should steer up a few ideas for people, for anyone listening.

Prince, thank you so, so much for your time. Where do you want to send off people to? Do you want them to check out the specific project or something? Tell us where should they find you.

[01:39:37] Prince: First and foremost, I want each and every one of you to realize that there is something inherently special and unique about you. You have a specific gift that is yours and a thing that only you can do, and the world’s waiting for you to present it to them. So, don’t be afraid. Get out there and give the people what they’re looking for.

Give yourself what you’re also wanting to express to the world. And I don’t have any specific place I want to point you guys or anywhere I’m trying to send you guys. If you guys want to connect with me personally, you can find me on Instagram at wonderboyprince, like, wondergirl but wonderboyprince, P-R-I-N-C-E, on Instagram. If any of you guys are looking to… Yeah.

I mean, if you find yourself in a place where you want to transform the current state you’re in, if you’re trying to grow your business, trying to reposition yourself, you’re trying to refresh yourself, reintroduce yourself in a way, holler at me. Would love to help in any way I can. And I guess, that’s all I got for you. Get out there and do it. Live your life, do your thing. And life’s good, man. Surround yourself with beautiful people. I know we’re living through, like, a challenging time. It’s just, I think we had a challenging start to the decade and it seems like this whole decade’s just going to be a challenging decade, period.

And so, I think it’s important that you surround yourself with inspiring people and that you’re feeding yourself with inspiring impressions. And those impressions are those… that’s the stuff you’re swiping through on TikTok, what you’re listening to on Instagram, what you’re watching on YouTube, what you’re watching on Netflix. Make sure you guys are feeding the mind the impressions, like, feed it the world that you want to create because it creates the picture. So, whatever you want to see in your life, consume that stuff.

[01:41:28] Pierre: That’s so beautiful.

[01:41:28] Prince: Watch it actualize real-time, one time. Love you guys.

[01:41:34] Pierre: Thank you so much, Prince. Thank you, everyone. Thank you everyone for listening. Love you all. We’ll have everything in the show notes on ptl.fm/podcast if you want to find anything. And once more, Prince, thank you so much.

[01:41:49] Prince: Always. Thank you.

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