The ‘post-COVID’ location independent summer is beginning. We’re seeing more and more posts in the DC forum that begin: ‘Who’s in Medellin this month?’, ‘Anyone in Poland or the Balkans’. Traveling and navigating new cities, and regions is very much the theme of today’s show, which is a discussion for those thinking of visiting Bangkok, and Thailand in general, later in the year. And, of course, we’re hugely excited for our first DCBKK event in three years, coming in October. With that in mind we’ve asked Kyla Gardner and Jesse Schoberg - both of whom have lived in Bangkok, and other places in Thailand, and attended a fair few DCBKKs - to share their thoughts. We’ll cover: where to stay in Bangkok for a great vibe and delicious food, where to consider going after DCBKK, how to manage your time around events like DCBKK, and much more: “I don't know whether to advise people to just accept that you really just have to go really hard, you’re not going to sleep, you're going to be exhausted but it's going to be worth it. Or advise them to try to take some power naps … it is just so stimulating, so much fun.”

The 4-Hour Workweek was, and continues to be, a life changing inspiration to many seeking more freedom in their lives through the path of entreprenuership. But, prompted by listening to a recent podcast featuring a conversation between its author Tim Ferriss and Cal Newport, Dan and Ian reflect on what they see as ‘the elephant in the room’ in the book, in relation to others seeking to emulate the path it lays it: “Tim is talking to people who already have a lot of enterprising know-how and other resources like industry relationships … But the book’s audience extended well beyond the well heeled and gainfully employed. It also appealed to those of us who didn't have businesses, established cash flows, or other traditional advantages”. And this episode also includes responses to a related question posed by a listener, one that often pops up in the TMBA mailbag: how to have an impactful career as a solopreneur.

Today’s guest, Sherry Walling, is a respected clinical psychologist who specialises in entrepreneur mental health. She’s also the host of Zen Founder, a podcast where she is sometimes joined by her husband Rob. Those who have listened to Zen Founder know that Sherry has been sharing movingly about the upheavals and losses she’s gone through over the last few years - in 2018 she lost her father to cancer followed, six months later, by her brother to suicide - and how it's affected her, and their whole family. On today’s show Sherry talks to Dan about how she tried, in some way, to make sense of what happened by penning a book “Touching Two Worlds: A Guide To Finding Hope In The Aftermath of Loss” “The events of the past few years have been so strange to me that I must force myself to study the story, like something I am learning from the outside in, like something that happened to someone else ”. It’s a moving account of what she discovered, including some great practical suggestions for others finding themselves in a similar place and struggling to cope. In Sherry’s case this included joining the circus (evenings and weekends only).

Unless you’ve been living in a cave recently (and if you have, hit us up because we’d love to hear about that), you’ll be aware that crypto has been on a wild (at the time of writing mostly downward) rollercoaster. As we’ve mentioned before, it is a volatile investment, especially when viewed short term. But today’s show isn’t about that. It’s about how crypto can be - *insert an important ‘health warning’ here: this is not advice, it’s just thoughts and views - a practical way to fund other things, like buying a house, and even be set to be a relatively low ‘management threshold’ investment, as today’s guest did when she had a baby. Cathryn Lavery is well known in the entrepreneurial community as the CEO of Best Self which produces stylish and imaginative planning, goal setting and relationship journals. She talks to Dan about how a painful business break up, in part, lead her to create a practical course for those who want to learn more about investing in crypto, called ‘Zero to DeFi’: “It was such an emotional drain for me. The crypto stuff, just learning about it and getting into it, was something exciting for me … I didn't even talk publicly about crypto. Because there's this vibe of scammy. Like how do you go from Best Self to talking about crypto …And then, at the end, I was like: screw it I'm just gonna start talking about this stuff. Because I think, as entrepreneurs, we get interested in different stuff. And so if I'm excited about working on something, then hopefully other people are excited about it as well”.

On today’s show Dan and Ian are reaching into the mailbag to reflect on some topics that listeners have asked about. These include an update on the incredible response to our upcoming DCBKK, things to consider when thinking about business models, and how to manage your net worth without hurting your brain: “I have been guilty in the past of overcomplicating my financial process with too many credit cards, too many bank accounts, too many clever tax manoeuvres, and I would have been much better off to keep it super, super simple’.

Today’s show challenges bootstrapped entrepreneurs to think about lessons they can draw from high-income private equity funded business, especially about structured forward planning and accountancy. But it also covers what lessons PE funded companies could learn from the other side of the tracks. This week’s guest is Jason Long, a valued member of the DC community, well known for being always open to sharing the highs and lows of his long experience of founding agencies, creating Software as a Service businesses and, most recently, from accepting a job as a ‘turnaround CEO’ for a private equity group. He talks to Dan about how the devastating effects on his agency of the 2008 financial crash caused him to diversify his portfolio, and the pros and cons of that decision. Plus why working with a multimillion PE firm has enhanced his experience both as a leader and entrepreneur: “This is a team that had been passed from CEO to CEO, from leader to leader, who just had failed them over and over and over again .. And so when I came in, I said, ‘I’m not gonna I'm not gonna fire anybody’ .. And I brought in a lot of methods to make sure that there was transparency with the top level all the way down to the frontline workers .. so everybody felt like they were knowledgeable about where the company was going. And I felt like that made a huge difference in the trust”.

Lots of entrepreneurs and listeners to this show are inspired to create ‘The 4-Hour Workweek’ type businesses by founding e-commerce stores and agencies, creating money and value entirely online. Today’s guest, Alex Pantich, has chosen a different path with the business he co-founded. Upshift provides hospitality venues with vetted temporary W-2 hourly workers who are able post online the days and hours they are available for work. Alex talks to Dan about how this double-sided marketplace works, the equity share scheme Upshift deploys, and why he thinks so many entrepreneurs are missing out by not considering blue-collar, location dependent opportunities: “When you're getting online and into E-commerce, you're competing with your peers. If you go into the real world, you're competing with baby boomers. Are you telling me the baby boomer who doesn't know email is going to beat you at any sort of innovative business game? They're not. I prefer going into areas where I see tonnes of opportunity and not as much competition”.

This week’s show is kinda a de-brief of our recent in-person event in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico. Dan chats Jeff Pecaro, who has worked with us for nearly a decade, and continues to do an amazing job helping our speakers deliver the kind of presentations that our attendees tell us they want to hear: “It’s not a traditional business conference audience in the sense that they don't want to hear your theories, and they don't want to hear your grand success story, they're looking for the things that they can take, and give to their team on Monday morning to help them grow. So it's really much more of a community of peers than it is a captive audience. And I think that's a big adjustment for a lot of our speakers. Expect to hear: thoughts on PDC as a venue, some common themes that we’re seeing in our community as its revenue aspirations continue to grow, and some takeaways from the awesome on-stage presentations.

Have you ever wanted to get a regular review process going but just never get round to it because it seems so overwhelming? This show is for you. Dr Anthony Gustin, chiropractor, e-commerce entrepreneur and farmer, has been honing his annual review system for over 10 years. It’s available, completely free, online and has greatly influenced people like former AppSumo CEO, and recent TMBA guest Ayman Al-Abdullah. So, why not click on the link and follow along as Dan talks to Anthony about the six steps he suggests for those struggling with identifying and achieving goals in both business and personal lives. “A year is such a long time. It goes by like that. When you look back at what you can get done in your day to day, it seems like you're not making any progress but you look back on the year, it's insane how much you can get done”.

One of the themes of this show has always been ‘learning by doing’, and evolving your businesses based on that. But what about when your circumstances change and, through necessity, that places different pressures on what you need to achieve? Dan first met Dana Lindahl a decade ago when Dana was just starting out as a 21 year old copywriter, creating a decent amount for living in Bali. In today’s episode he shares why feedback from that resulted in him starting Legendary Leadgen, plus how a move back to the US led him into the podcast industry with Legendary Podcasts, which has seen such rapid growth that it quickly showed up some of his personal challenges: “I just had this sort of lifestyle agency, that was a good job for me, and I was happy there. And then all of a sudden, I was thrust into this situation where I needed to employ a level of skills that I hadn't quite developed And that's what I'm spending a lot of my time this year doing”.