The Burn Podcast by Ben Newman
Join Ben Newman, highly regarded Performance Coach, International Keynote Speaker and 2x WSJ Best-Seller, as he takes you into the minds of some of the highest performers in sports and business to tell their full story. The "Burn" is something we all have, but rarely do people uncover and connect to it. Ben helps people from all walks of life reach their true maximum potential.
Ben has worked with coaches and players from the last 6 Super Bowl Champion teams and currently serves as the Performance Coach for the Big 12 Champion Kansas State football team in his 9th season (3 National Championships at North Dakota State) with Head Coach Chris Klieman. Ben served 5 years as the Mental Conditioning Coach for the 18x National Champion Alabama Crimson Tide football team. Lastly, Ben also has served at his alma mater as a Performance Coach for Michigan State University’s football and basketball programs.
For the last two decades, Ben has been serving as the Peak Performance Coach for the top 1% of financial advisors globally and for Fortune 500 business executives.
Ben’s clients have included: Microsoft, United States Army, Anheuser-Busch InBev, Quicken Loans, MARS Snackfoods, AstraZeneca, Northwestern Mutual, AFA Singapore, Mass Financial Group, Frontier Companies, Wells Fargo Advisors, Great West Life Canada, Boston Medical Center, Boys & Girls Club of America, New York Life as well as thousands of executives, entrepreneurs, athletes and sales teams from around the globe.
Millions of people and some of the top performers in the world have been empowered by Ben through his books, educational content, coaching programs, podcast, and live events.
The Burn Podcast by Ben Newman
Discovering Financial Freedom and Impact with Tom Wall
After spending 20 years in the life insurance industry as an advisor, wholesaler, product expert, and home office leader, Tom Wall took a significant leap to champion the whole life insurance industry on his own terms. Misinformation and competing ideologies have stood in the way of people adopting this amazing, centuries-old financial product. Tom Wall has studied and achieved a Ph.D. under many of the most intelligent people in financial services academia, spoken to thousands of advisors in his travels, and worked behind the scenes with the actuaries and engineers of these amazing vehicles. He can tell you with honesty and integrity that participating whole life insurance from the right companies, particularly in 2023 and beyond, is the best kept secret in financial planning.
For advisors, Tom Wall runs an exclusive membership Whole Life Masterminds, where he distills decades of experience and education into an ongoing program that will transfer his confidence and conviction to them. It also connects them with thought leadership and best practices from top 1% advisors and other special guests. If advisors want to be more impactful and effective in this space for their clients, it's a no-brainer to join and level up their practice.
For individuals, Tom Wall has just published his first book, “Permission to Spend”, with approachable concepts that can be used with or without an advisor.
GET $1000 OFF NEW YEARLY MEMBERSHIP TO WHOLE LIFE MASTERMINDS- CLICK HERE
Get Your Copy of Tom’s Book, Permission to Spend, Maximize Your Retirement with the Best-Kept Secret in Personal Finance.- CLICK HERE
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There is a secret in personal finance, and it's not just save, save, save blindly. The secret is actually beginning, with the end in mind, of thinking about how the money's gonna come out of these accounts ["The Burn"].
Speaker 2:Welcome back to another episode of The Burn. I am Ben Newman. You become accustomed to how we do this. Every single week, we're gonna bring you a story of an athlete, a celebrity, an entrepreneur, a coach, an individual in the business world, competing at their highest possible level, recognizing that why and purpose is not enough. It's understanding that underlying burn that actually ignites your why and your purpose, that causes you to be disciplined in your daily action, not only on the days that you don't wanna do it, but especially after you win.
Speaker 2:And I couldn't be any more excited to have my friend Tom Wall with us today. However, it's also nice to be back outside. Weather's beautiful. It's nice to not be on a Zoom screen for an episode. It's great to be in person. Covid got us to the point where so many podcasts everything is just through a Zoom screen, and so I'm excited for you all to meet Tom, but also excited to be able to be in person with Tom for this very special episode. And one of the reasons why it's special is because of the longevity of our relationship and the uniqueness of the story of how we wound up here in my backyard on The Burn.
Speaker 2:So Tom and I had the opportunity. He reached out to me to plan an event which was actually a virtual event with one of the largest life insurance companies in the world, And he reached out. We had a great time planning the event. Event went off without a hitch, it was great, and little did I know after that event. Not only would we have built a friendship and a great connection, we would go on to have opportunities to do things together to impact advisors who are making a difference. So you know my story life insurance put me through college. So the passion when you hear that Tom has for this business will help you understand why he and I have a great connection, but why it's also a great opportunity for us to be able to serve others and to coach and consult in the financial services space.
Speaker 2:So with no further ado, i'm gonna introduce you to Tom Wall. Tom is an author of Permission to Spend, and now here's where I get this is Dr Tom Wall. I wish I had the doctor in front of my name. So when you talk about somebody who's been in an industry, didn't just start speaking and coaching last week and changes over 20 years of experience. Dr Tom Wall, permission to Spend it's an amazing book that dives into an education on what's important when it comes to your financial planning and certain aspects that we will get to with your financial planning. But now one of the most sought after consultants for advisors and consultants in the country, and Tom Wall, welcome to The Burn.
Speaker 1:Thanks for having me. Ben great to be here.
Speaker 2:So help us. Let's start with The Burn, because for you to have had a transition where we met right, you got a great job. You're in a corporate home office, great company, yet you had a vision. You had a vision to write a book. You had a vision for what we'll talk about whole life masterminds, one of the most sought after groups for financial advisors today. What causes you? what was The Burn that says I'm in this great, comfortable job so I'm ready to take some risk?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a great question, Ben. A lot of people called me crazy when I did it. I had been at this firm for maybe 15 years of my 20 year career and I remember being so afraid as a new advisor. I didn't know what to say. I lacked the confidence, i lacked the conviction and, over time, giving the same talk to advisors year after year after year, i got very good at the talk and I got very good at delivering the message, to the point where I was traveling all over the country, kind of giving this talk, and it was years in the making.
Speaker 1:I would be in these home office meetings and I just realized I was working for somebody else. My upside potential was limited And you talk about the burn a lot, and it became very clear to me that my burn was to not have regrets. You know, i really wanted to go out there and make as big of an impact on the world as I could, not just working for somebody else. So that's what. That was what inspired me to start making that move and think about how I could actually, you know, leverage years and years of a very focused niche skill To a wider market.
Speaker 2:So here's what's interesting. There's so many people, they, you do something, whether it's with your regular job, and then all of a sudden it sparks. Sure, there's this burn that creates for a vision. So you go and essentially give a talk for this company that you're working for. What were you thinking about? Is that where the vision started? You're at a hotel room going, wait a second, like I could do this by myself and have a bigger impact. Yeah, is that?
Speaker 1:how it all started. Honestly, it was the pandemic. I remember I was, i was in this role and the pandemic hit and the world shuts down and everyone's figuring out how to operate, zoom on their, on their computers at home And, very sudden, very quickly, the home office folks are saying what are we gonna do? How are we gonna go out and influence the field? It used to be a job where it was, you know, hand-to-hand combat. You're on airplanes and trains and automobiles and and getting in front of people. Now We have to do that virtually and you got to remember this is, you know, may of the pandemic.
Speaker 1:Nobody was set up for this. Nobody had done these with these webinar series. Now Everyone does them. So I was the leader I put, i put together the whole program. So I'm bringing in speakers, i'm bringing in you know, the top names in our business to come on and give their hour-long talks on a weekly basis and Built this whole series and the whole time. I'm just like, why not me? I was actually one of the speakers, but again, why not me? Why am I not doing that independently? Why am I? why am I not speaking to the entire industry Instead of just a subset of that industry and a few different firms, and that was kind of the Genesis of when I started to think about, really, what does it mean to do this? What does it mean to go out on your own? That was the, that was the catalyst for from that change.
Speaker 2:One of the things that I I love about what you've done is the freedom that it's created for your two boys.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:I think so much like when I was an advisor and a lot of people forget that I was an advisor for over 10 years, performing at a very high level. People thought I was crazy when I left being an advisor. Sure, but I love being an advisor because I was working for myself, mm-hmm. Yet then I still take the risk to do what I do now and same for you, like, but you were an employee. I think there's a lot of people they fear, like going out on their own. How much of it was the freedom to be able to build things the way that you wanted to, to be able to do the things you wanted To your two boys, because I love your stories first off, your social media content for those of you that follow time. I mean it's some of the. It's fun, but it's also real and raw about an industry that many people really don't understand because there's so much Information that we'll get into sure but not only is that fun, but I love the fact that you like.
Speaker 2:Your boys are so important to you. So how important was the freedom to be able to have choices and to spend more time with your boys?
Speaker 1:Oh, a hundred percent. You know you talk about again the burn. You know What's getting you there and part of it was the didn't want to have regrets. But you know little eyes are watching.
Speaker 1:I really wanted to be an example for them of what's possible and I also don't believe in work-life balance.
Speaker 1:I think you know if you're doing what you love, then you can work all the time And and and have a schedule that's not the normal nine to five. So there's a lot of times when you know my boys are coming with me on trips And there's and they're seeing dad do cool things or they're seeing some of the great places that I go, and involving them in that. So I think that's the other big motivator for me is setting an example, you know, by the life that I'm designing, versus just working for somebody else. And don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with that. I mean I I would have had a great career otherwise But for me, you know, having ownership in it and putting my stamp on it and saying what I want to say the way I want to say it and influence the way I know I can, that's what became important to me at the end versus just, you know, towing the line and doing exactly what the company wanted me to do.
Speaker 2:So that's a perfect segue for saying being able to educate people the way that you know you can.
Speaker 2:So I think about the book Permission to Spend. So you take Life Insurance which Life Insurance, i believe, is one of the most misunderstood financial vehicles ever created And you wrote a book which really helps people understand, because I think there's a lot of people in the industry and some advisors may be upset for me saying this You know, there's a greed aspect where people are like well, i want to sell something, to make a commission, and one thing I've always done as a speaker I don't hide from it and neither do you do things the right way to educate and the money's going to take care of itself. So let's focus on the client, let's focus on the education, let's focus on an understanding of the products, which is what you're a doctor in. So how important is it and has it been for you to take that messaging of doing it the right way, writing a book on it? Is that part of why you wrote the book? so, beyond all the speaking that you do, to be able to educate people the right way.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So people talk a lot about the art and the science of our business and the misconception is in the financial planning space it's a science. It's not a science. Just because there's numbers involved does not mean it's a science. It's very much a feeling business. A lot of emotion comes into play and there's very much an art of working with clients, as you know, to get them to make the right decisions and make them feel good about what they're doing, because if they don't feel good, none of it, none of it really matters.
Speaker 1:So I wrote the book really as a tool for advisors to give to their clients. To tell the story, i mean it's basically just retirement planning 101, but it finishes with the permission to spend aspect, which talks about how you can actually shift risks to other companies, to other people, put guarantees in place so that you can feel comfortable spending and enjoying that which you've spent decades accumulating. A lot of the traditional financial planning out there is really not financial planning. It's just investment management. It's just accumulating wealth without any thought of what actually happens at the end of the day. So it's really about beginning with the end in mind. But the reason I wrote it was I spent my entire career looking for third-party resources that were that put a positive light on this kind of planning, and there's just not a lot of them For a lot of reasons beyond our talk today, but there's just not a lot of them. So I wanted to be that resource.
Speaker 2:Well, i'm going to plant the seed right now. We're going to have to do a second episode, which is going to dive into the specifics of it, so we can make people wait on that, because I think there's another conversation there. But, as you highlighted that, then there was this spotlight that was really put on you, which is why you're now traveling the country speaking. I mean, you're one of the most sought after speakers in the industry, which is huge. I mean, why you're here in St Louis and why we're able to do this, in the backyard is another Fortune 100 financial firm bringing you into speak and impact again. So there's this spotlight which then created this whole life masterminds group that you have, which is one of the most sought after mastermind groups for financial advisors because it's specifically teaching in a very unique way with different events and coaching. Tell us about why you created Whole Life Masterminds.
Speaker 1:So whole life masterminds was kind of a brainchild of mine once I realized what a mastermind was, which is, you know, just essentially individuals, like-minded individuals coming together to share ideas, and what I built it as was specifically the niche of whole life mastermind. It's not called life insurance masterminds. It's not meant to be, you know, broad based for the industry. It's meant to be for the subset of individuals who are focused on the sale of dividend paying, participating whole life insurance from the biggest carriers out there. And the reason for that is because there's so much misinformation online. I mean, i spent my entire career positioning whole life insurance and competing against its alternatives And also, you know, battling the misinformation that comes from some of the talking heads online.
Speaker 1:So I built this group specifically where I could bring together the top 1% of 1% advisors you know, thought leaders, some of the most prolific authors from the academic world in our space, like yourself mindset and motivation coaches that talk to people about you know what the mental toughest, that you need to show up every day because this is a very hard business And bringing all those together in one program where, on a really a daily basis, people are getting content that they can tap into resources that they can interact with and have that high touch opportunity which just didn't exist before And I think it's unique.
Speaker 2:It's been wonderful And I appreciated the opportunity to be able to partner and to be able to impact the community through our financial advisors academy, and so we're going to make sure that we list in all the notes that people can learn about whole life, masterminds and everything that entails for them to grow.
Speaker 2:But you've really been very intentional, which I've really loved, which creating events at specific periods of time during the year, based upon what you know are the periods of time when an advisor, somebody, will fall short, and I know now we're talking specific to advisors, but I want all the listeners to realize for you, if you're not an advisor, i want you to think how important it is to look at critical periods of time throughout a year where maybe there's gaps.
Speaker 2:You take time off, the summers coming One of the greatest leaders I ever knew I used to talk about the J-months, like June and July, the beginning of summer. Everybody gets lazy, like you got to lock in more, like if you're working, then work. And so I think for anybody, even though we're specifically talking to advisors, this really is messaging when you think of Tom's intentionality for anybody in any industry. But why have you been so intentional with these periods of time during the year? So we have another event coming up at the end of the summer. Talk about the name of that event, because that's a great point. Like that's very intentional. I recognize somebody's going to have a gap here and you want to help people attack that gap, which I think is very unique, rather than just I'll get a bunch of my friends together and just do an online event.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I mean our program is having tremendous success. I mean we're seeing advisors double and triple their production based on the ideas and the language that they're getting out of the program. But it is a closed program. So what I wanted to do, frankly, from just a marketing aspect, is I wanted to have an event that was open to the entire industry. Anybody can come just register for free. So I created this event at the end of the summer last year called the Summers Over Summit, and it was the two of us and we had a few top advisors on with us where we just kind of talked about the best ideas to hit the ground running for a big fall.
Speaker 1:And this business is very seasonal. I think every industry is very seasonal. For us it's kind of the kickoff in January and then it's Summers Over time to get back in business, because now you got to hit your goals for the year and get people motivated. So that was the end of the brainchild for the event And it went off so well, i think. What do we have? Almost 900 people on the line.
Speaker 2:It was a huge, huge number.
Speaker 1:So successful that we did another one called the Fast Start Form. in January We just did the Rise Up Roundtable, which was in May. all about Q2 is actually the time when people start to trail off, but now's the time to get re-engaged, and these big events have brought people into the community. If nothing else, it's gotten them involved in the newsletter and they're getting content along the way, but some have actually become part of the program as a result and they're seeing great success too. So it's kind of a way to just give without needing anything in return. just giving to the industry, sharing ideas and bringing top minds together, which is really all I want to do. It's what I love doing.
Speaker 2:So what's the next big opportunity for you? So, whole life masterminds. You've got the book, you're being invited to speak everywhere. When you think about your legacy and all the amazing work and impact that you're having and you're going super fast, it's been a great trajectory What's really next for you when you think about not only the legacy of your two boys, but what you're also doing in the business world?
Speaker 1:Honestly. The truth is I love what I'm doing right now and I want to continue to focus on that. I mean, i'm laser focused on making sure that these programs are delivering maximum value. I've spent a lot of my time working with my natural network, which is quite large after the amount of time I've been in the business. But there's a whole other section of the business I haven't touched, and other companies, other niches. So the goal now is just scaling it. I want there to be something for everybody. So if you're newer in the business and you don't have a lot of time or money to commit to some of these programs, there's something for you. But if you're a top advisor, if you're a top 1% advisor and you want to be a 1% of 1%, we have offerings for you as well. So I think it's just a matter of doubling down, growing what we have and multiplying myself as much as possible across the country.
Speaker 2:Absolutely love it. Final question When you think of the book and you think about how lost so many people are when it comes to their planning and retirement and spending, what's the most significant lesson that comes from the book that people need to better understand?
Speaker 1:Well, as the title says, it's permission to spend Maximizing your retirement with the best kept secret and personal finance. That's really what it's all about. There is a secret in personal finance and it's not just save, save, save blindly. The secret is actually beginning with the end in mind and thinking about how the money is going to come out of these accounts. So the whole goal of the book is to be just a very approachable advisor, something that advisors could give to their clients. Walks them through the basics of retirement planning. If nothing else, you just get a good education there. But it ends with the choices that you need to make and the goals that you need to outline.
Speaker 1:Do you want to leave a legacy? How much do you want to have available to cover costs of care? potentially, how much liquidity you want? Probability versus predictability, how much security do you want in your retirement plan? A lot of those questions. Just answering those prepares you to then talk to an advisor and really build out the plan, and that was the goal of the book. It was to help people get there. So when they show up with the advisor, they're educated to a degree where they can really make the right choices.
Speaker 2:Love it. Well, the book is incredible. Our work together, i think, is having a great impact, but most specifically, the risk that you took, which I think provides an example for everybody watching the burn, to stay connected to your burn, to take the risk. I always admire and appreciate individuals that are willing to take that risk and live that way. So I appreciate our friendship opportunity to partner together to make an impact. But it's awesome. We've been talking about doing this for a long time, so it's great to finally get you on the burn.
Speaker 1:Likewise, ben. I feel very blessed to be working together and we've got big things ahead of us. So one day, at a time.
Speaker 2:We got plenty to attack. Well, for those of you that might be interested as advisors which you should be signing up, if you paid attention to what Tom said the Summers Over Summit will also drop information on how you can sign up for that event. It's free, and one of the things that you find is when you're driven to impact the way the two of us are, when life insurance puts you through college and it's also become one of the most incredible financial instruments that I've been able to leverage to generate wealth and to be able to leverage the growth of businesses. I think you'll find that our work is something that is significant for a reason because when people understand it, they fight to make a difference with it. So share this episode with somebody that might need that extra push. Maybe they need to learn what it means to have that permission to spend.
Speaker 2:Make sure to grab a copy of the book. We'll leave you that as well, but I want to say thank you for joining us for the burn, and I already planted the seed. We are going to end up doing a double episode, because I had this thought while we were sitting here. In this episode, we're going to end up doing a double episode with Tom that's going to dive further into the importance of this type of planning and how it doesn't just impact advisors but how it'll impact you. This has been the burn and we look forward to seeing you next week.
