Chris Lee's Journey Proves Success is a TRAJECTORY Not a Destination

In this episode of The Quest for Success Podcast, we sit down with Chris Lee, an entrepreneur and thought leader who believes that success is a journey, not a destination. Chris reflects on his upbringing in a large family with modest means, sharing how the values of hard work, discipline, and generosity shaped his perspective on life and business.

Chris discusses his motivations for seeking wealth, his early sales experiences, and the tough lessons learned from entrepreneurial failures. He shares his inspiring journey of building a successful business through resilience and strategic growth, emphasizing the importance of partnerships, mentorship, and the role of company culture in achieving long-term success.

This engaging conversation also dives into Chris’s 39 strategies for business success, the connection between energy and clarity, and the art of selling. Chris shares valuable insights from his missionary work and reflects on the key traits that contribute to success, along with his future aspirations.

Tune in for actionable advice and inspiration to fuel your own success journey!

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Resources We Discuss:
Connect with Chris: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-lee-0b02722b/
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Transcript

Dylan Pathirana (00:00.168)
It's morning for us, so it's evening for you, afternoon for you.

Chris Lee (00:05.848)
Yeah, it's 3 p.m. Yep. Yeah, you guys are living in the future.

Dylan Pathirana (00:08.576)
Okay, it's extremely hot in here. was having a swim when you sent me a message. It's so hot. It's going to be 40 degrees Celsius a day here in Sydney. It's...

Chris Lee (00:19.97)
That's crazy. You know, don't know Celsius very well, but I do know that's hot.

Dylan Pathirana (00:24.93)
Yeah. Yeah. It's very hot. yeah. Thanks for joining us, Chris. We'll, we'll, we'll kick into it if you're, if you're ready and then we can. It's just a conversation. We don't really plan anything. We just go with the flow.

Chris Lee (00:41.525)
That's the way I like to roll.

Dylan Pathirana (00:44.981)
All right. Sounds good. It's going to be a lot of energy. That's all we're expecting from you.

Chris Lee (00:49.73)
Let's go!

Dylan Pathirana (00:52.215)
That's it. That's it. Okay. All right. Welcome back to the quest for success podcast. And thanks so much for tuning in once again. Today is going to be full of energy. We've got on Chris Lee. So it's going to be an exciting episode. Yeah. Chris Lee and I studied together last two years at Harvard business school. He's one of the most energetic and positive guy that I know. And great to have you Chris on our podcast.

Chris Lee (01:21.058)
Excited to be here with you guys. Thanks for having me on

Dylan Pathirana (01:24.962)
So Chris, this podcast is all about success, the quest for success. And so we really need to start with a fundamental question. And that is what does success mean to you?

Chris Lee (01:37.486)
For me, success is a trajectory.

Chris Lee (01:46.116)
pacing and what am I pacing towards? It's not a destination. And so for me it's like which direction am I facing? Am I always improving? And so for me success is being the best version of myself physically, economically, with my associations and my spirituality. And yeah, which typically is driven by just creation, right? So I am a...

a big believer that joy and happiness is all that comes from creating and that the reason why we're that way is I'm a believer in God and I believe as God created the earth, He passed on to His sons and daughters

the same desire to create and that our greatest joy comes from creation. so success is constantly being in value creation and consistently working in an up, figuring out how to go to the next level.

Dylan Pathirana (02:53.926)
That's awesome Chris. So people don't know much about Chris Lee. How do you introduce yourself?

Chris Lee (03:00.932)
How do I introduce myself? I'm a father, a believer in Christ. I have five beautiful children, a wife of 19 years. And so those are the most important things to me. On top of that, I am an entrepreneur. I love building. I love creating. I've been in the home service and product space for 20 years. I'm at

at my core a hardcore salesperson. I love sales, I love getting people to see the world the way that I see it. And I think a true salesperson is helping somebody view the world from their vantage point. so, because of that, I've been able to go and build

teams and I love building culture and everything else and you know I've had a lot of what people would term successes in life, little points that I could check marks, a business that I started out of my garage for $180 million, that's cool. Having a successful family, very cool. I've been able to you know

take care of my body and maintain a good relationship with God. Those are all for me the key things that if I were to introduce myself, those are what make me tick and get me excited. I love sports and the competition, the drive, the...

the principles that are taught by sports. I've been a coach. I coached high school football for seven years. I plan on getting back into it. yeah, that's a little bit about me. And you know, there's a lot of layers to this onion. I'm pretty dynamic person, a little bit in your face, sometimes a little too much, but I'm unapologetically me. I understand authentic.

Dylan Pathirana (05:01.081)
Yeah, you're authentic, authentically. Yeah.

Chris Lee (05:05.432)
positive you all the good and the bad i got lots of strengths lots of weaknesses and i accept them all

Dylan Pathirana (05:07.921)
That's it.

Dylan Pathirana (05:11.654)
Yeah, yeah. I mean, we all have our unique goods and bads, right? Like, I mean, we all know you as Chris Lee, that you have that brand that you created, right? So it's all about positive to me. Yeah.

Chris Lee (05:27.876)
Appreciate that.

Dylan Pathirana (05:29.125)
And, you, you also missed off one thing I would say from there is, you're also a podcaster as well. Fellow podcaster. I, I, remember, I think it was jam and I were listening to your podcast in before we even started this. And I think it was a great inspiration for us to kick this off. yeah, really, really, grateful for that.

Chris Lee (05:35.512)
Yes, yeah, I am.

Chris Lee (05:52.964)
Yeah, very cool. So I would say more than a podcaster, I'm a continuous learner. I've sought after education and learning and growing and developing as much as possible. I've spent over a million dollars on my personal education through different programs like masterminds and Harvard Business School where I met your dad and

developed just incredible relationships, I've always paid to be in the right room. And because of that, because of my obsession with learning, I am a podcaster. Because it provides opportunities for me to learn from others, to ask questions, to just network and everything else. And I think at my core, I'm also a networker. I care about people. I love, love, love people.

you know and so yeah that's that that's a lot of who I am

Dylan Pathirana (06:51.752)
So Chris, what we found is through our conversations is people are very much shaped by their early years. So I'd like to kind of go back to your early upbringing. know, where did you grow up? Kind of what was your family situation like? And I suppose how do you think that early part of your life has shaped who you've become now?

Chris Lee (07:10.296)
Yeah, for sure. So I've told this story many times. I love the way that I was raised. I grew up in a small town, 2,500 people. My dad was a school teacher. My mom was a stay-at-home mom. We didn't have much money, but we had everything that we needed. And I had...

there were six of us siblings and then we also raised my cousin. So there was seven of us that were raised in that household. And I just had an incredible childhood. My parents taught me how to work hard. We had rules in our house about having jobs and paying for things. Like by the age of 12, I had to provide for everything but underwear and food on the table.

And so because of that, I learned from a very young age of work ethic. I had my first job when I was nine years old. I started delivering newspapers 365 days a year. I had to wake up at 5.30 every single day, Christmas included.

And later that turned over to waking up at 430 every day as I became the newspaper route manager and I would deliver to my different carriers and stuff later in life. And so just doing things like that, I learned a lot, learned a lot about just discipline, provided for myself, know, self, just.

being driven and everything else. it was a lot about just working hard, not necessarily working smart. I was very involved in sports. My dad was a football and wrestling coach at the local high school. And so that shaped a lot of my life. spent a lot of my childhood on a sports field, learning and absorbing the different lessons that were taught by my dad.

Chris Lee (09:10.796)
just the experiences that people were going through. And so because of it, I participated in a lot of sports. I mean, it was like the only thing that we could afford to do. We didn't have a lot of money. Like I said, we lived very frugally. My examples, I only went out to eat at a sit down restaurant three times growing up. It was on my eighth, 12th, and 16th birthday. And it was only me and my parents.

the other kids didn't get to come because that would cost too much money. But again, we had everything we needed and there was a big focus on family, a big focus on God. My parents just were incredible teachers. The two things I knew from a young age was when I grew up, wanted to be married and I wanted to be wealthy.

And I always knew that I was going to make a lot of money. I was good with numbers. I was pretty smart and I was very driven. I had goals. mean, these are two goals that I had when I was six years old, right? I was just somebody that was always dialed in, had things written up on my wall and as disciplined as possible to be able to go and accomplish those.

And I just had great examples of discipline. My dad invested, even though he was only making $60,000 a year, he was investing half of his paycheck every single month. And so, like I said, we were living off of rice and beans and lentil soup. So I just saw that a lot. But then I also saw how my parents put others first. They made a lot of sacrifices towards...

donating to charitable work and being involved in sponsoring families that were in need. And so growing up, I never thought we were poor. never, I always felt like we were taking care of the poor. When I look back, it was like, man, we didn't have a whole lot, but my parents were always willing to give the shirt off their back. And, you know, that has shaped me tremendously in my life. And, you know, I had a lot of great experiences and terrible experiences with

Chris Lee (11:29.11)
sports like ups and downs that really shaped me and the ability to like bounce back and from expectations and failures and everything else. But yeah just an incredible childhood that was focused like I said on God, on investing, on working hard, you know to the point where

Like I had a lot of things dialed in at the age of 12. I had $2,000 saved up to be able to buy my wife a diamond ring one day. And that was when I was 12 years old. Again, like I said, I had two goals, man. I wanted to be married. I was a ladies man from the beginning. And there was something that...

Dylan Pathirana (12:09.731)
You

Dylan Pathirana (12:21.356)
Looking for that wife, yeah.

Chris Lee (12:23.524)
Yeah, so I had it locked in and met my wife when I was 16 years old and never really looked back. We got married five years later after we met. I finished high school. I went on a mission for my church for two years.

As soon as I got back, we were engaged in three weeks and married two months later. So, like I said, I put goals on the board and I make sure to obtain them whether it's the way that I thought it was gonna work out or not.

Dylan Pathirana (13:02.619)
So how did you meet your wife if that's okay if you're sharing with us?

Chris Lee (13:07.012)
Yeah, so we just met. My sophomore year, so 10th grade, when I was 16 years old and she was 15, she transferred schools. She lived in the same home, but she transferred to our small town. And so, and the interesting thing, in a small town, not a lot of people would move in or out of that place. And so having a new girl come into school, was like, fresh meat. I had to beat the

other guys off with a stick to make sure that she was mine but yeah I knew what I wanted from from a very I mean the very first time I saw her but even even then you know made a lot of mistakes with that that relationship during high school I was young dumb and whatever but eventually things worked out we got married and here we are she was a keeper yeah

Dylan Pathirana (13:55.891)
Well, she was a keeper. Yeah, definitely. And Chris, do you ever like, now that you're in a position where you've achieved your goals, do you ever reflect back to your childhood and kind of look at it in a different light now? Because you know, you mentioned that you didn't feel like you were poor when you were growing up, but now that you've, you've had material success, do you ever look on that, look back on that childhood with like a different lens?

Chris Lee (14:23.726)
I, you know, for whatever reason, God gave me the ability to like regularly reflect. Like that's what I do a lot. I reflect on things, the way I was raised, lessons I've learned and everything. And I've been able to pull a lot. you know, not much has changed, but I mean, definitely the lens for sure. And I look back and like, wow, like.

how did we do that? How were we able to pull that off? Like how did my dad raise a family of seven kids and my mom on essentially 30,000 US dollars a year? that's pretty phenomenal that he was able to pull that off. then, so yeah, I I look back but.

But again, I don't think the lessons have changed much. I've always valued the way I was raised. There's a lot of people that were raised in a completely different way and they look at negative things or whatnot. And I had life good, even though it was hard work and dedication and discipline and everything else. I wouldn't have it.

Dylan Pathirana (15:33.96)
And is that something you're trying to replicate with your children?

Chris Lee (15:38.112)
sure yeah so I've tried to teach them very similar principles it's a little bit more difficult because we have to be very intentional about it but yeah like I mean we we have some some things that my my kids know like one they don't get dad's money when I die everything that that I have is is going to going to my church and charities

So the thing that I always tell them, say, look, don't get dad's money when I die, but what you do get is everything that I can teach you from here on out. so we're very intentional about just teaching our children. My kids have been investors from an early age and learned how to work at an early age. At the age of five, all my kids start selling things.

example July 4th here in the US is really big there's fireworks there's glow sticks and all kinds of stuff every year my kids they go and they I teach them about

money and loans and inventory management. go and they buy, they take out a loan from dad that they have to pay a 10 % interest on. They go and they buy their inventory from the local dollar store. They take that inventory, they mark it up five times and they sell that. I teach them about cost of goods sold. They understand their cost of goods sold is 20%. They go and they sell this product for $5 to people that they go and literally

where they're at fireworks, I make them do all the work. I don't help them at all. They go and they talk to people and they overcome objections and they get them to commit to buying and they sell a product and then at the end of the night, we reconcile against the loan that they owe me. And so that's something I've been doing with all my kids since they were five and it's taught them a lot and because of that,

Chris Lee (17:41.563)
They've seen what I've done with investing and just I've been a very disciplined investor my whole life. like, I mean, got my kids bought Bitcoin when it was $1,200 of Bitcoin and they still have it.

Dylan Pathirana (17:54.709)
Nice.

Chris Lee (17:57.184)
So just different things and they've been able to independently figure out things on their own. And I make them buy their own vehicles and pay for their own stuff. My daughter who's 18, she turns 18 here next week. She's had her own job for the last couple of years. It's a full-time job that she coordinates with school. Yeah.

Chris Lee (18:26.845)
These are many of the same values that I learned growing up. I've tried to incorporate with my children because yeah, think that's one of the biggest mistakes that entrepreneurs make is that they were cultivated in a certain way that made them successful and then they robbed their children of that. And so I've tried replicating that as much as possible. I'm not perfect at it by any means. I mean, there's a lot of things about my kids that I wish they learned a little bit differently, but.

Dylan Pathirana (18:43.138)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee (18:55.557)
I really, really, really try to focus on those things. I live in Washington State specifically for my kids because it was where I grew up. Me and my wife have moved all around the country. In our 19 years of marriage, we moved 14 different times.

Ultimately with the goal to move back to Washington State, which we did eight years ago. And when we moved back, I specifically wanted to buy a small farm so that my kids had a place to be able to learn how to work.

And so we bought that place in 2016. We have 23 acres. And with it, I got 2 and 1 half acres of walnuts and 9 acres of cherries. And my kids, they helped raise those trees, weeding them and mowing them and just everything.

Dylan Pathirana (19:43.833)
Wow.

Dylan Pathirana (19:51.457)
Chris Lee (19:52.834)
So, but yeah, all that has been by design. Again, I plan things real far out in advance, but to make sure that my kids aren't spoiled little brats.

Dylan Pathirana (20:06.778)
Yeah, that's awesome. That's an amazing story. You know, when you're looking back, like when you're a kid, young Chris Lee, you had these two priorities, getting married and getting rich. What motivates to have those two things? Anything that you look at?

Chris Lee (20:24.462)
what motivated me. I I saw what you could do with money. In fact, like,

what my parents did with their money was so amazing, right? Like they gave a lot, they invested in themselves, they gave a lot to their church, they gave a lot to people in need and everything else. like I wanted to exponentially increase that. so because I think one of the biggest life hacks is understanding the feeling that you get when you do charitable work, not just cut a check, but you actually do the work and like you're on the ground floor.

For me, I wanted to spread my influence and impact as much as possible and I knew money would exponentially allow me to do that. And I've always been a leader. I've always been somebody that has been outspoken and desires to be at the front of the pack to show other people the way. And so...

Being wealthy, like I said, has just always been a goal of mine to exponentially increase that. I've been obsessed with personal improvement and development for my whole life. really, I think when it comes down to it,

like entrepreneurship is the closest way that we can be like God in creators as I shared and I strive to emulate him as much as I possibly can.

Dylan Pathirana (21:57.693)
And in terms of that, you know, working towards this financial success, how did you kind of go about doing that? Like when was the first real taste of money?

Chris Lee (22:08.388)
Yeah, so when I was 18 years old, saw a flyer. So up until that point, I just basically traded my time for money. And I saw a little flyer. It said, make at least $13 an hour.

and these little words at least really like stuck out to me and I'm like what is what is this at least stuff right like everything else it's always like no make seven dollars an hour make eight dollars an hour this was at least thirteen dollars an hour and so come to find out it was selling cutco knives and very quickly as an 18 year old boy I was able to

figure out that I could walk into any farm lady's house and walk out with a thousand dollar check making a twenty five percent commission selling these knives and I went from making like six bucks an hour to two hundred and fifty bucks an hour

and I was like, man, this is pretty cool. And so that's when I realized I had the gift to be able to influence and impact and sell. And so that was like my first real taste of like, wow, like this is cool, right? Like I can, it's about the amount of value I bring to the hour, not how much I make per hour. And...

And so from then on, I was involved in sales. I went door to door, was what a lot of my background was selling products. I used to do this program called summer sales. I'd go to college during the year and I would go knock doors for 100 days straight during the summer selling different products. The first year I did that, I made more money than my dad that year.

Chris Lee (24:00.58)
in a three month and one week period, I made 65,000 bucks. And I was like, wow, this is crazy, this cool. And then the next year I went and did it and I made $105,000. I'm like, whoa, like this like this actually works. And at that point I was planning on being a doctor and I was going to school, but I dropped out of college and I started my first business. And...

I started in 08 at the age of 24 and I thought I knew everything. I knew how to sell ice to an Eskimo, so I'm like, man, running a business can't be that hard. Two and a half years later, just massive failure. I had raised money from both my dad and my father-in-law.

took half my dad's life savings and lost it in this business and just made a lot of really poor choices in building the business and eventually had to file bankruptcy. So I lost everything and it was the end of 2010, early 2011. I had less than thousand dollars in my bank account, car was repoed out of my driveway, my third child was on its way, on her way.

Yeah, I was just kind of living the entrepreneurial nightmare of what everyone, why most people don't get into business, right? They fear failure and I had experienced that. But the cool thing was, is during that time, what I realized was it wasn't as bad as I had imagined. because you took all these materialistic things from me,

Dylan Pathirana (25:48.0)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee (25:53.9)
I still had my God, I still had my family, and I had everything that I had learned, right? Everything that I had developed up until that point was still with me. I had the know-how to be able to go and produce. I had the know-how to be able to go and bounce back. And so, a lot of people were begging me to like, hey, just go back to school, finish your degree, get a real job.

And, you know, for me, I just, knew all the mistakes that I had made, because like I said, I'm a good reflector. I can reflect back and be like, that's where I screwed up. My ego was too big. I had bad partners. I made poor decisions here. I priced myself incorrectly. I paid too much, whatever. Did things to impress others rather than actually just build a real credible business.

So luckily I chose to restart and build another business. And that time I got together with my longtime business partner, Darryl, and we launched a business and we built it up. And over the next few years I...

I struggled to scale, but I built good solid businesses, but we did everything, like literally anything and everything that you could think of. Flipped cars, houses.

cattle, beehives, a coupon book, medical pending company, did search engine optimization, owned a home security business, like literally anything and everything to like make a buck I did it. Flipped things online through eBay, I mean whatever. And I realized man there's there is still a lot I need to learn to be able to go and scale and build. So in 2012

Chris Lee (27:42.624)
I decided to go back and work for somebody else and for the next four and half years I call this my paid education time of my life and for over four and a half years I worked for three different businesses and it took a lot of like me swallowing my pride and and just

my ego to be able to say, okay, I'm no longer the CEO, right? Like I'm gonna go work for somebody else. And that was hard for me. But was that humbling fact was like one of the best things that could ever happen to me. And over the next four and a half years, I was there with pen and paper, just studying these CEOs of these high growth businesses and seeing what they do. And over those four and a half years, I experienced two different IPOs.

was a part of just incredible organizations. One of my favorite people to study was Todd Peterson. I didn't get a lot of one-on-one interaction with him, but I was in the room and I just studied the way that he built this incredible organization. Todd, many of guys know, has built multiple billion dollar businesses and done them from scratch. And so just...

just emulating and writing down the principles and how he ran business was where I got a lot of my education. And eventually at the end of 2016, I was the vice president of this company making a half million dollars a year, had what everyone would deem as a dream job, unlimited credit card to go and do whatever.

It was just really cool job that I had. I stepped away and people were just astonished, like, why would you ever step away? What are you gonna do? I'm like, I don't know, I'm gonna figure it out. But I knew that I learned everything that I needed to learn, that I'd come to learn, and I was going to take my next step very strategically and very much on purpose by design. And so...

Chris Lee (29:52.92)
I spent the next eight months figuring out what my next move was, doing studying, paying for courses, learning online marketing, learning a bunch of stuff, and then eventually launched the SolGen out of my garage in November of 2017. October is when we incorporated November, we started marketing.

You know, over the next four and a half years, was an absolute wild roller coaster. We, rocket ship really, and we took everything that we had learned, applied it very much on purpose, made all the right moves. And you know, we went 2018, did.

We did 15 and a half, 16 million bucks, 2020 or 2019, we did 32 million, then 34 million, then 89 million, then $233 million a year in revenue, all with like 23 to 24 % net profits.

It was a wild four and half years and we did, like I said, everything was on purpose. We weren't learning it for the first time. It was now just application stage and go and grow. And eventually we sold off to private equity and you know.

Since then, it's been another wild ride. Along the way, I consulted a company for equity. They sold for nine figures as well. I helped build their whole strategy and got a nice little payday from that. Been investing in bunch of businesses. Now I run the educational side of my business. We invest and have a whole portfolio. But yeah, man, that's the story in a very high level.

Dylan Pathirana (31:46.674)
That's amazing. mean, yeah, we just keep hearing your story and get amazed by what you've done over the years. And, know, when you are young, you had two wishes, right? But even you didn't wish for the third wish, I think you already have that granted. Having a great business partner. Right. And knowing Darrell,

Chris Lee (32:13.23)
Yeah, for sure.

Dylan Pathirana (32:16.754)
very well and you, you know we talked about in our Harvard OPM group quite a lot in conversation because you guys are totally different people, right? The way that we see and in a way that we see it complements really nicely together, you know the energy, what you bring onto the table.

Tell me is that that is that right way to kind of describe it like what what's your relationship like you know you know yes please take us through I just want to yeah

Chris Lee (32:53.972)
Yeah, so I've always referred to Darryl as my work wife. Basically...

Dylan Pathirana (32:58.386)
Yep. I don't know whether he liked that.

Chris Lee (33:02.952)
Yeah, no, he calls me his work wife too, so all good. But yeah, very much a yin and yang, different compliments. We share in some different strengths, but for the most part, we really balance each other out. And I think, for me, I could go do something on my own, but that's never been enjoyable to me. For me, it's so much fun winning.

Dylan Pathirana (33:07.475)
Okay, that's fine then.

Dylan Pathirana (33:26.474)
Salud.

Chris Lee (33:29.386)
in a team atmosphere. And the same thing for Daryl, right? He could go and do something else, but we've always enjoyed and complimented each other. And frankly, I've never seen a billionaire that's done it on their own, right? They have a great team. They have great yin and yang type of relationships.

Dylan Pathirana (33:31.659)
together.

Chris Lee (33:52.862)
One of my principles for success is that there's no such thing as perfect people, only perfect partnerships, perfect teams, and perfect organizations. And the only way that you get there is you have to balance out your weaknesses. so, Darryl and I very much do so, but we're also great friends, right? Like we've built a relationship. Darryl and I have worked together for 20 years on and off. We've had what we call two different divorces over the time where...

There was a point where we didn't speak to each other for a couple years, which was pretty tough. And then eventually we swallowed our pride and came back together. But yeah, like when I came home and got married off my mission, I started working with Darryl almost immediately. And so again, we've said we've gone through a lot.

And but more importantly, we've overcome like our differences. And I think any successful partnership has to do that because there's no just like perfect partnership from the beginning. got to figure out the things that work, the things that don't. But yeah, we've got a strong dedication that we want to do life together.

We want to do life with our wives and we want to do life with our work wives and that's where we're at. We don't ever see a day that we don't stop, that we stop working with each other. So yeah, it's just a lot of fun and I think that's where business becomes the most successful is when you just really enjoy the people that you hang out with every day.

Dylan Pathirana (35:29.228)
Yeah. And having fun together. Yeah. And you mentioned a word there, which I want to touch on, your mission. Tell us like, what was it? Where did you go? And then also like, I imagine being away for so long, there must've been so many learnings like about yourself, but also just like the world around you as well. If you could share some of

Chris Lee (35:52.98)
never been a big huge warrior. I served a mission when I was 19 years old for two years. As part of the mission, what we do is we go and we knock on doors and we share the gospel of Jesus Christ. We do service and we get to know people. When you do something like that where you create value with no compensation,

it really changes the way that you view value creation. where you work out of the desire and love versus like, just stroke me a paycheck, right?

So I did that mission in Oklahoma and part of being a missionary is there's no real communication back with home. get two phone calls a year, once on Christmas and once on Mother's Day. And so I'm only writing like handwritten letters back home and they write me hand letters back. Same thing with my now wife.

you know, we couldn't even talk on the phone ever during my mission. Like as a missionary, you don't go on dates, you don't talk to girls, right? It's just like you're dialed in, there's very strict rules and you're very disciplined and everything else. You have a companion that's stuck with you 24 hours a day that just teaches you a lot about like getting along with somebody that you don't necessarily want to be, that you wouldn't have choose to hang out with.

And so, man, just learned so much, learned a lot about myself and my character and the work ethic that I had. And I had a lot of success as a missionary. One of the things that we desire to do is we bring others unto Christ by baptizing them. And I was able to baptize a lot of people and saw a lot of people's lives changed. And so for me, that was just like so foundational for just young Chris, because naturally,

Chris Lee (37:55.818)
I'm very egotistical. I'm very confident and think that I know a whole lot more than I actually do. so whenever I'm put in a position to be humble and serve others and get outside of myself, it's a good thing for me. so starting at a young age doing that, right, that really set a solid foundation for my life and has made me self-aware of my strengths and weaknesses

throughout and yeah, it's just really served me well.

Dylan Pathirana (38:29.288)
Do you think that doing that mission missionary work help you to kind of get your sales interest like you know because yeah because a lot of rejections right?

Chris Lee (38:38.555)
100%. Yeah, I always tell people, yeah, I always tell people I've only ever sold products that I believe in and I use. that was...

knives, have a big stack of cutco knives at the house. I sold the gospel of Jesus Christ and I am very active and live that to this day. Sold pest control, I get that service on a monthly basis. I sold home security. I have an incredible secure home and I sold solar and I got solar out of my house. like, yes, absolutely.

selling the gospel of Jesus Christ was very important. But I think a lot of people view that word selling as like a negative connotation, but I think it's actually very positive as I started out. natural, like for me sales is just helping the world see...

from your point of view and helping them see how your point of view will actually better their lives and solve their pain. And so everything that I've ever sold, I truly believe has solved the pain for my customers and made their lives better because they've interacted with Chrisley.

Dylan Pathirana (39:54.275)
I mean, I always see selling is like you're becoming an educator, right? So you're educating others. It's their choice to purchase or not, but at least you're telling, hey, what can improve their life, you know, having this, you know, whether it's a product or service.

Chris Lee (40:10.926)
So what I would add to that, would say marketing is the education. Selling is actually closing and getting them to make a decision whether they use it or not. because a lot of people, they present stuff, but then they get a maybe from somebody. And one thing that I've always been incredible at is helping someone get to a decision. like...

Dylan Pathirana (40:14.479)
Yep. Yep.

Chris Lee (40:35.65)
look, I'm not on your doorstep for you to say maybe I'll talk to you later about it or maybe I might do this. I'm like, look, I either want a yes or I want a no and decisiveness is what is going to make both of our lives better, right? And so the world has ran off of people that make decisions and I would say most people struggle with making decisions or helping others make decisions. So...

Yeah, for whatever reason, I've been blessed with the ability to get somebody to decide.

Dylan Pathirana (41:11.966)
Being very reflective, have you ever reflected on why that is? Like how, when you're in the moment, how do you convince someone to make a decision? Yes or no, just how do you convince them?

Chris Lee (41:23.394)
Well, think the reason I'm so good at getting people to decide is because I truly believe in whatever I'm doing. And also, I believe that if someone tells me no, that's fine. I have no fear of loss in a situation. Look, if you don't wanna see the world from my viewpoint, I'm perfectly okay walking away. I don't wanna lie to myself.

when you tell me maybe that person is going to come around and buy my product down the road.

I am a truth centered person and I refuse to lie to myself in any situation and when we accept them maybe we are lying to ourselves that that's actually gonna help their situation or my situation. I believe that decision improves lives, right? And that could be for a no, but most people are scared of decision because they're scared of no.

Dylan Pathirana (42:26.47)
So Chris, do you have any mentors that you look up to? Or people that you look up to?

Chris Lee (42:33.25)
Yeah, yeah, there's a lot. as I shared with you earlier, Todd Peterson has been like one of the greatest influences in my life. He doesn't have a book that I'm aware of or share a lot of stuff. He's got a couple podcasts out there. Casey Barr, our fellow Harvard alum guy, did an interview with Todd Peterson. I'd recommend anybody. So Case Studies is the podcast with Todd Peterson.

Dylan Pathirana (42:58.997)
Yep.

Chris Lee (43:01.796)
absolutely love Todd and then you know I just there's been a lot I I've derived a lot from books so I just I just try to get in the room of many mentors right like Harvard I have a lot of friends that have taught me incredible things just being being in that room you know I'm an avid reader I've read on over a thousand books and

can pull quotes out of all different types of people. One of my top books is Tom McCabbits by James Clear, which I absolutely love. I love some of the basics like Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki. I love David Goggins, Can't Hurt Me. I can give you a list, 1,000 miles long.

Dylan Pathirana (43:49.241)
Now we can add that into our show list. Show notes. There's, there's another point that I want to go to. You, you talk about Todd being such a big influence. And when we're originally discussing him, you said that you learned kind of these key principles to scaling and doing business from Todd super high level. there any like key ones that you can share with us?

Chris Lee (44:15.128)
Yeah, so I operate my businesses by 39 strategies. over the years, I've compiled 39 strategies that I can run any business off of. And I'm actually writing a book on it right now called 39 strategies. I mean, there's so many different key ones. One of the core ones is that,

Most people have their priorities wrong in running a business. They put their customer first, then their employee, then their business. And it's actually the opposite that has to take place. Your business needs to be first, then your employees, then your customers. Because if I can assure that I always run a very profitable business where I have enough cash to be able to invest in the experience of my employees, where I can provide value for them both long and short term, a roadmap,

where they're gonna be able to grow and grow and be successful. In turn, they will take care of my end user, which is the ultimate goal of providing an incredible customer experience. And so like that's one of the core value or one of my core principles. But again, there's like 38 other ones, but that's one of your pieces.

Dylan Pathirana (45:29.432)
Why 39?

Chris Lee (45:31.874)
That is just the number. It wasn't. It's just the number that I've created over the years. Like I keep an ongoing list and notes and any time there's a new core strategy or principle that I run a business off, I put in there and I think through it and I digest him. Like, that the right one? Does this apply across the board? What else? What am I missing here? And so, yeah, I mean, that's 20 years of Chris Lee's experience and reading

Dylan Pathirana (45:33.849)
Okay.

Dylan Pathirana (45:41.795)
Okay.

Chris Lee (46:02.318)
and attending Harvard and studying for mentors and everything else. As I've taught these 39 core strategies, it's drastically impacted other people's lives. They're running more profitable businesses that allow them to be more impactful in society and design their lives better, which really leads to my ultimate mission. The whole mission of my life is designing lives that impact the world.

Dylan Pathirana (46:07.417)
Yeah.

Dylan Pathirana (46:16.954)
Yeah.

Chris Lee (46:30.444)
because I truly believe that as entrepreneurs we can affect the core fabric of society way better than a government, way better than anything else. so that's my mission is to do that by designing the lives that impact the world.

Dylan Pathirana (46:48.964)
Yeah.

Dylan Pathirana (46:52.263)
Can't wait to read your book, Chris, when it's ready. But take us, what's next level pros? We're very keen to know.

Chris Lee (47:00.376)
Yeah, so next level pros. What's that? What was the question?

Dylan Pathirana (47:04.08)
Yeah, we are very keen to know what's about next level pros.

Chris Lee (47:07.394)
Yeah, so next level pros is all about, as I shared earlier, the definition of success. That no matter where you're at, it's all about trajectory. There's always a next level. I don't care where you're at on the path, right? Whether you're 400 pounds or have a billion dollars in your bank account or whatever else. If your trajectory is up and you're striving to level up, plateau up to the next level. And so that's what next level pros is all about.

So that's name of my podcast, it's the name of our community. We do education where we have workshops and we have masterminds and weekly calls and everything else. So business owners that come in and they learn how to scale up their businesses and remove a lot of their own personal lids that are holding them back. And yeah, so that's my passion. I speak on stages all over the world.

And that's all an appendage of next level. But yeah, it's really my life's mission, which shares the same mission of mine, which is designing lives that impact the world.

Dylan Pathirana (48:16.798)
We, we spoke to Darrell a few, a few episodes ago, and one of the big things that came up and you've mentioned it as well is culture. And I asked Darrell, how, how do you view culture and how do you build a strong culture? And I want to, I want to see what, your take on it is.

Chris Lee (48:36.964)
That's a very loaded question that we can spend the next 10 hours on. So culture, culture's my baby. know, Darryl is definitely part of it, but like, like I am a culture driver and do everything, do everything by design. Culture.

Dylan Pathirana (48:42.099)
Sure.

Chris Lee (48:57.922)
Culture is the reason why businesses are successful. Strategy works short term, but long term, it's what culture is what holds everything together. Culture is having a...

mission and a vision for your business that's ran by core values that is based on certain principles. You know I have a full culture guide that a 10-step exactly how you build an incredible culture that I you know most people they talk about it and they say

You know good culture is great or what not know most people know how culture feels right? They've experienced a good culture They've experienced a bad culture and it's just more of a feeling but very few people know how to design it and Again, this is this is part of my 39 core strategies. There's I think 11 of those strategies involve involved culture but yeah, I mean there's no way I can go into every everything here, but

very much, know, an example of it is like a true leader has to be open to being wrong, being willing to be wrong, right? Like that's indicative of a great culture. Indicative of a great culture are when you hire, fire, and promote based off of your core values and where the core values actually mean something, not just something that's up on a...

wall with a poster or whatnot, but you actually run your business based off of it. It's creating a vision that is very clear and identified that promotes action because people know exactly when I take a step in this direction that it's the right way. Yeah, I mean there's just a lot that goes into that, but yes, I freaking love culture.

Dylan Pathirana (50:51.795)
Yeah, yeah.

Dylan Pathirana (50:55.614)
Yeah, culture, strategy for breakfast. That's the same. So, Chris, I need to ask this question, right? Because some people ask me this question. I have an answer, but I want to know your answer to this. How do you get this energy? Where did this energy come from?

Chris Lee (50:59.584)
or breakfast baby

Chris Lee (51:18.376)
Energy is derived from clarity.

What I always tell people is that there's no such thing as lazy people, only unclear people. And laziness or low energy is the opposite of what I have, which is high energy and clarity. Because I've done a lot of work in my life of knowing exactly what I want down to the minute detail. Where most people are like, I wanna be rich, I want a good life, I want a good relationship. What does that freak?

mean? What is the definition of rich to you and why do you even want to be rich? What are you gonna do with that money? I'm very clear on who I am and what I want. I am going to be running a charitable group that I deploy a million dollars a month of my own.

into rebuilding the fabric of society and doing that in a certain ways. So that's like a very specific goal that I have. I very specific goal of seeing God face to face in the flesh. I have very specific goals around my relationship. Like I desire a relationship that my wife is proud of, not just me. I have definitions of what that looks like to make her proud, to get her dialed in.

Again, energy is derived from clarity because when you are clear in exactly what you're working towards, it's impossible not to be excited and just amped up baby, let's go.

Dylan Pathirana (52:56.579)
That's it. That's it. I mean, it's funny, right? My version of energy, like, you know, I've been asked the same question from my living group, for example, because I'm the first one to get up, last one to go to bed, like party like hard. And I mean, I'm not a young guy either. Right. Like, you know, so asking, hey, where do you get the energy? I see I get energy from the environment, people that I associate with, you know.

I get really hyped up when everyone's having fun, having a great time. And I want to be part of it. I want to be in the middle of that. Dylan knows sometimes I can be very flat. Right. And I can I can sleep whole weekend doing nothing. Right. Because it just environment sometimes, you know, get get me into that energy. You know, like, you know, it's funny that you put your energy come from a different different perspective. You know, it's awesome. And

Chris Lee (53:54.98)
I mean, there's absolutely a lot of things that contribute to the energy. believe, like you said, the environment.

putting focus on my physical being when I'm doing all the right things. There's a lot and that's why I say like in the P's which is physical economic association spirituality, I think it's important that we put our physical body first because it's the way that we experience everything else in life. And so I guarantee if I weighed 400 pounds that I wouldn't have the same type of energy that I have right now.

Dylan Pathirana (54:31.013)
100%. And Chris, I suppose what's next for you? What's the next big thing that's going to bring you the energy?

Chris Lee (54:37.848)
Well, again,

Working on next level pros, have several different portfolio businesses that I'm super excited. I'm passionate about sharing my message with two billion people and my very specific message of my 39 core strategies, which essentially change the fabric of society. so like that is what pushes and motivates me every single day. Being a great father, seeing my kids,

first one is going to be leaving the nest this year which is just crazy to me and just making sure that she conquers the world and that I support her in a positive way. The same thing for my other four little nestlings. That's really where my whole life focus is.

I never see a time where I slow down. I don't believe that success is a destination, it's a trajectory. So no finish line will ever define me.

Dylan Pathirana (55:46.755)
And looking back on your journey, do you feel successful?

Chris Lee (55:50.904)
Yeah, I do. think I'm on the right trajectory.

Dylan Pathirana (55:55.491)
I, one, one question, I know, for Dylan, like, I mean, main reason we started this podcast, we want to learn from others. So if you want to give one advice to Dylan, what would that be? I like to hear from you, Chris.

Chris Lee (56:12.64)
One piece of advice that would be, so you just want one piece of advice. I would say, okay, this is the one that first came to me, choose pain now. There's no such thing as no pain. You're either gonna get the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The pain of discipline produces real fruit. The pain of regret, which comes later,

Dylan Pathirana (56:20.136)
One or two, doesn't matter. Yeah.

Chris Lee (56:41.752)
has fake temporary fruit, When the alarm goes off at 5 a.m. and I push the snooze button, I get the fake fruit of 10 minutes of sleep or I sleep in till whatever else and then I don't work out. And so what happens, I have the pain of regret when I am out of shape and whatever it else is. like, I'm.

The best piece of advice I can give to anybody is figure out how you can choose that temporary pain now because pain now in the moment is always temporary and always yields true fruit, which is what life is all about.

Dylan Pathirana (57:18.95)
Amazing advice. Yeah, that's some excellent advice. And look, I mean, we could talk for hours, but I know you're a very busy man and I want to respect that. so throughout our conversation, I've been jotting down a few key traits, which I think have led to your successful life. And I want to share them with you. And I think the first one for me is you mentioned it yourself. You're a continuous learner. You're investing time and money into education courses.

You're having all of these conversations with exceptional people. you're going out and you you spent four, four years just going and learning from other people. I think putting yourself in that kind of mindset of I am a learner and I want to take in as much information as possible. think that's like something that definitely sets you apart and is a core trait that we're seeing amongst a lot of successful people. And then the second one is.

you have very clear priorities. And I think that goes to your point on clarity. You knew what you wanted from a very young age. And even now you're refining those things, but you're very clear on what you want. And that kind of ties into my next one of you're a go-getter as well. You know what you want and you don't just sit on that either. You go and you get after it. You put full energy in and go after and take what

take what's yours. And I think a lot of people can talk the talk, but you walk the walk as well. And I think that's kind of set you apart, whether it's been in business or in life in general. And then the last one is reflection. You've clearly spent a lot of time reflecting on your journey, the steps that you've taken, the decisions that you've made and kind of where it's led you and looked back on that journey.

and spend a lot of time with yourself as well. And I think in today's day and age, it's so easy to get caught up in other things, life, social media, and not actually have that time for yourself to just have a clear mind and reflect on the past. And it's only from reflecting from past mistakes and even just experiences that you can actually grow yourself. And so I think that that's something for me that definitely stands out for me.

Dylan Pathirana (59:42.602)
And also to add to that list, you're kind of unique person. You have that amazing energy, which is confessional. you know, like we all love that, you know, continue to do what you're doing, Chris. And we love your work. can you do a yo, yo, yo for us and get us pumped up?

Chris Lee (59:59.854)
Hey, yo, yo,

Dylan Pathirana (01:00:03.885)
Thank you so much. Love that. It's been an amazing conversation. And for those listening, if you've got anything out of this, please go and subscribe and follow us on whichever platform you're listening to this on. And you can see all of our inspirational conversations over on our website, the quest for success podcast.com. And with that, we'll catch you guys in the next episode. Thank you, Chris. Love your work. Thanks.

Chris Lee (01:00:14.498)
Appreciate it. Thanks,

Dylan Pathirana (01:00:33.869)
That's awesome.