Section 1: Episode Teaser (00:00–00:59)

[00:00:00] Michael Oved: You started with really nothing and you built yourself, you built your business and by the age of 32 you were a millionaire. Can you tell us a little bit about that? About how exactly you went from nothing to, to becoming a millionaire by 32?

[00:00:14] David Meltzer: The way that I got there was an insatiable desire that I must be what I can be, and also a thirst to make money.

[00:00:18] Michael Oved: What would you say is the key to happiness? How can people truly be happy?

[00:00:20] David Meltzer: Money doesn't buy you happiness, but it allows you to shop. And if you shop for the right things for the right reasons, it'll buy you plenty of happiness. You see, if you enjoy and learn to enjoy the things you don't like or love or other people don't like or love, and you can be consistent, you will never lack the commitment to get to where you want to be. And life will tell you all its secrets. So what allowed me to expand into a better life, a better position, and a better situation was—

Section 2: Introduction (01:00–01:51) 

[00:00:49] Michael Oved: Welcome back to 30 Years in 30 Minutes. I'm your host, Michael Oved, and we've got a great episode for you today. With that, it is my pleasure to introduce you to today’s guest.

David Meltzer is the Chairman of the Napoleon Hill Institute and formerly served as CEO of the renowned Leigh Steinberg Sports & Entertainment agency, which was the inspiration for the movie Jerry Maguire. He is a globally recognized entrepreneur, investor, and top business coach. Variety Magazine has recognized him as their Sports Humanitarian of the Year and he has been awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.

As Executive Producer of the Apple TV series 2 Minute Drill and Office Hours, as well as Entrepreneur's #1 digital business show, Elevator Pitch, David brings unmatched insights to audiences worldwide. His journey has been featured in books, movies, and TV, including World’s Greatest Motivators, Think and Grow Rich, and Netflix’s Beyond the Secret. His life’s mission is to empower OVER 1 BILLION people to be happy! This simple yet powerful mission has led him on an incredible journey to provide one thing… VALUE. In all his content and communication, that’s exactly what you’ll receive.

​​Section 3: Building Wealth Young (00:01:52–00:04:10)

[00:01:52] Michael Oved: David first, thank you again for coming on the podcast.

[00:01:54] David Meltzer: Thank you for having me. And better yet, thank you for the background on your podcast. I always say my mission is to empower others, to empower others to be happy. And you are a case study for planting seeds in that direction, and it's so nice to see this tree growing. I can't wait to see what you do next.

[00:02:14] Michael Oved: Thank you, David. I appreciate that. So you started with really nothing and you built yourself, you built your business, and by the age of 32 you were a millionaire. Can you tell us a little bit about that? About how exactly you went from nothing to becoming a millionaire by 32?

[00:02:32] David Meltzer: I actually was a millionaire by 24, a multimillionaire by 32. The way that I got there was an insatiable desire that I must be what I can be, and a real thirst to make money. Unfortunately, I was aligned with making money for the wrong reasons.

[00:02:52] I always say that money doesn't buy you happiness, but it allows you to shop. And if you shop for the right things, for the right reasons, it'll buy you plenty of happiness—joy, passion, and purpose. But if you buy things for the wrong reasons, you're going to have to go back to the beginning and start over. Which is what happened to me.

[00:03:03] I grew up with a single mom, six kids in Akron, Ohio. All of them, like you, went to the Ivy Leagues. My mom believed doctor, lawyer, or failure. The fetus wasn't fully developed until after graduate school. She believed that if education was the priority—and if you woke your kids up at 5:00 AM—then everything else would take care of itself.

[00:03:24] I was a little bit resistant to her philosophies. I just wanted to make a lot of money so I could help her with the only thing I saw her struggle with, which was finances. Anytime I saw my mom crying, it was because something broke or we couldn’t afford to do something. So from an early age—five years old, when my dad left and my mom was packing my dinner in a paper bag between her two jobs—I was set on one thing: I'm going to take the opportunities that pay the most.

[00:03:47] At first, that meant being a professional football player. I played college football, but got run over my very first game and realized that wasn’t going to happen. Then I wanted to be a doctor. My older brother asked me what was wrong during a hospital visit, and I told him I hated hospitals.

[00:04:10] He almost fell over. He said, “What do you mean you’re going to be a doctor?” I told him I wouldn’t be a hospital doctor—I’d be a sports doctor, on sidelines and in locker rooms. And he gave me this great piece of advice: “David, you need to be more interested than interesting.”

Section 4: From Law to the Internet (00:04:10–00:05:41)

[00:04:10] David Meltzer: So I quickly changed from pre-med to pre-law. I ended up going to Tulane Law School very intentionally because they had the most maritime law graduates—and oil and gas litigators made the most money out of law school.

[00:04:24] Once again, aligned with my purpose, I went to Tulane to be an oil and gas litigator. Then my professor, who got me a job offer for $150,000 a year in 1992—plus bonus—also told me I should try to get this other job selling legal research on the internet. It paid $250,000 a year.

[00:04:44] I didn’t care what it was. Even though everyone around me—this is another great lesson for your community—my mom told me it would be the biggest mistake of my life to get involved in the internet. She told me I was an idiot for not being a real lawyer. She made me take the bar just in case it didn’t work out. She said the internet was a fad.

[00:05:00] At the same time, Justice Scalia of the Supreme Court told me nobody would ever do legal research on a computer—you needed books.

[00:05:10] So the lesson I learned, and this is so important: appreciate everybody’s advice, especially from those who love you the most. But love doesn’t mean it’s good advice. My mom knew nothing about the internet. Justice Scalia, clearly, knew nothing about the internet.

[00:05:25] Just because someone loves you doesn’t mean they give good advice. I ended up taking the internet job nine months out of law school. Made my first million dollars by 25, and continued to pursue my skills, my knowledge, and my desires—aligning them with what was doing well, what was stable, and what I thought would be doing well.

[00:05:41] Not out of some grand purpose, just because I wanted to make a lot of money.

Section 5: Millions, Misalignment & Loss (00:05:41–00:07:13)

[00:05:41] David Meltzer: I didn’t care what the job was—I would’ve shoveled crap with my hands six days a week if someone paid me a million a year. That was my mindset. I wanted to make as much money as possible.

I did. I bought my mom a house and a car. Then I bought more houses, more cars, until I was running Leigh Steinberg Sports & Entertainment—the most notable sports agency in the world—by my mid-thirties.

[00:06:07] Michael Oved: And so you attained all that success throughout your twenties and early thirties… and then you went bankrupt. What happened?

[00:06:15] David Meltzer: Great question. I lost over $100 million.

And I did have warnings, but what really happened was—I stopped living by the values my mom taught me.

[00:06:25] She taught me to be grateful—to find the light, love, and lessons in everything and everyone. She taught me forgiveness—to give ease to my life. She taught me accountability—to ask what I was supposed to learn from my responsibility, my attraction, and my participation in any situation.

And finally, she taught me to be inspired—to communicate not just with others, but with God, or the universe, or whatever source you believe in: Jesus, Muhammad, Joseph Smith, Buddha, whatever you believe in. 

[00:06:53] Whether you're religious, spiritual, philosophical, or theoretical, I believe there's an all-knowing, all-powerful source—and we’re just a resource of that source. If you’re not aligned with it, it’s because you’re interfering with it.

[00:07:03] That source doesn’t punish you. It protects you, promotes you, loves you, and perfects you. I lost sight of that. I stopped asking for help. And that was the second thing that brought me down.

Section 6: Humility, Expansion & Faith (00:07:13–00:09:02)

[00:07:13] David Meltzer: If I had just asked for help—if I had just been humble—I could’ve avoided so much pain.

One of my favorite quotes is: “You’re either humble, or you’re about to be.” At 57, I still live by that. It’s never stopped being true.

[00:07:27] Michael Oved: How did you bounce back from that very difficult point in your life?

[00:07:31] David Meltzer: I don’t think of it as a bounce back. I think of it as an expansion—of self, of perspective.

It was a paradigm shift. Instead of constantly trying to get more—trading, negotiating, competing, comparing, blaming, justifying—I shifted into asking for help. And I developed faith.

[00:07:55] Not religious or theoretical faith, but pragmatic faith. Nobody can prove to me there's an all-knowing, unified system. But for me, it’s the best option. I don't waste time arguing about definitions. I just operate from the belief that there is something greater—that we’re all one—and that it's my best path forward.

[00:08:16] I believe there's something out there that has all the energy and information I need. Something that protects me, promotes me, loves me, and perfects me—more than even my mom did.

And so I stopped resisting. I realigned. I took inventory of my skills, knowledge, and desires—and matched them to what’s doing well, what’s stable, and what I thought would do well.

[00:08:39] I asked for a ton of help, and I had faith that the detours in my life were divine. Just as divine as the direction I thought I was supposed to be on.

That mindset is how I’ve made more money, helped more people, and had more fun in the 17 years since losing over $100 million.

Section 7: The Key to Happiness (00:09:02–00:11:25)

[00:09:02] Michael Oved: So with that new set of values or that renewed sense of purpose, you've become a tremendously successful businessman, philanthropist, and author. And like we said before, you've dedicated your life to inspiring and empowering over a billion people to be happy.

What would you say is the key to happiness? How can, how can people truly be happy?

[00:09:29] David Meltzer: It involves two things. One, the perspective that you can learn to enjoy. See a lot of people, they don't realize that you can learn to enjoy the things you don't like or love the things other people don't like or love.

You see, if you enjoy and learn to enjoy the things you don't like or love or other people don't like or love, and you can be consistent in that pursuit of your own potential, you will never lack the commitment to get to where you want to be. And life will tell you all its secrets.

You know the old saying, if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life? Bullshit. I love what I do and it's, it's work, bro.

What I teach people is, hey, let's learn to enjoy what you don't like or don't love. Let's learn to enjoy what you would define as work and do it consistently every day, persistently, without quitting the pursuit of your potential—not what other people want, not what you're missing, not what you don't have, but what you want.

[00:10:33] Clearly defined by the divine direction that you choose, knowing that it's the meaning of the past that will limit you and your self-image, and you never will overachieve your own self-image.

And so many people limit themselves because of the mistakes, setbacks, failures, defining moments, historical relevances. They're irrelevant. It doesn't matter. As long as you give the meaning, the lesson to it, and align it with where you want to be or better, you're going to have divine direction.

The detours will become divine, and you'll have the patience and humility to allow divine time to give you the revelation of the lesson of exactly how something as horrible as losing everything—including your mom's house, when you only wanted to be rich to buy her a house—could actually be promotion, protection, love, and perfection, not punishment.

If I didn't lose everything, I would've ended up dead.

Section 8: Actionable Happiness (00:11:25–00:13:37)

[00:11:25] Michael Oved: And so how does that translate to an actionable item that the youth can adopt today? So take me, for example. I'm 21 years old, I'm a senior at Harvard. What can I do today that will make me a happier person next year? Or is that too short a timeline? Or perhaps even in five or ten years?

[00:11:42] David Meltzer: Look, I believe in infinite time and I believe in direction—not equating linear time to any happiness or any outcome that you desire.

And so the first thing is daily practices. And so whether you're 21, 31, 41, 51, or 61, the way the conscious continuum is created is through daily practices.

[00:12:00] The cellular memory leads to the subconscious mind, which is repetitive in nature. Most people—80% of the thoughts you have that you're reinforcing—are negative. And then that's articulated to an epigenetic layer of your inheritance.

I actually can utilize practices—daily practices—what you're willing to do consistently.

And so I divide my practices into non-negotiable practices and negotiable, circumstantial practices.

[00:12:25] And so non-negotiables say that no matter what circumstances arise, every day I'm going to sleep a minimum of seven hours, an hour on my health, an hour with my family—a minimum—minimum of time with my finance, minimum time with my faith, minimum time studying relativity, minimum amount of time studying time.

And so all you need to do is—and I'm happy, by the way, to send to your entire audience my five daily practices that say every day, know your what—

[00:13:00] You're welcome. david@dmeltzer.com—right there—david@dmeltzer.com. I'll send it in with a book if you want. I'll sign it, ship it to you, pay for that too. Don't worry. I love supporting my students.

So anyway: know your what, what you want in your divine direction. Know who you can help. Know how best to get it done by using time—negotiable, non-negotiable, planned, unplanned, paid for, unpaid for—and your sleep.

If you don't have a sleep coach or you're not studying sleep, you are not going to be as effective as for a third of your life.

[00:13:37] I want to be in the Hall of Fame of sleep.

Section 9: Daily Practices & Prioritization (00:13:37–00:15:34)

[00:13:37] David Meltzer: Then the other tool that I teach you in the fourth daily practice is: know your now—which is prioritization.

Prioritization is the antidote which troubles every Harvard student—well, actually every person. Prioritization is the antidote to feeling overwhelmed and procrastinating.

So it's [00:14:00] impossible—if you know what to do now and know what to do next—you’re not going to procrastinate, and you won't feel overwhelmed. You may not get everything done, but that’s okay. That's just illustrating the blessing of being abundant—that you've got more than enough options, opportunities, and touches of favor.

Why are you using that as a negative? Why are you using that as punishment? Why are you using that as resistance, when it should be a blessing that you have more options, opportunities, and touches of favor?

[00:14:31] You just need to prioritize the ones according to circumstances of today, or your non-negotiable prioritization of the past.

And then finally: I am wealthy, I am worthy. What am I doing to interfere with it?

Go back. Read hard. Understand—of course—existentialism. But more importantly, understand math. That if you’re part of an infinite, abundant, unified system full of wisdom and faith, then you must just be interfering with it.

[00:15:00] Especially considering it’s protecting, promoting, loving, and perfecting. We're humans creating a human experience in an infinite time zone.

And so when we realize the gifts that we're given to be here—you’re given a body, you're going to learn lessons, the lessons will keep on coming until you learn them. You're going to forget every lesson you've ever learned, even if you went to Harvard. But you have the power to remember it.

If you utilize these five daily practices and that type of perception, I promise you: you'll make a lot of money, you'll help a lot of people, and have a lot of fun.

Section 10: Ask for Help & Life Lessons (00:15:34–00:17:00)

[00:15:34] Michael Oved: What is one piece of advice that changed your life?

[00:15:37] David Meltzer: Ask for help. I tell myself—I wrote it on my nightstand because I still can't believe I forget to ask for help. And that's the fastest way to get to where I want to be. Plus, it makes the other person, if they're capable of helping me—unbelievably happy.

[00:15:53] Michael Oved: Other than focusing on one's happiness, what are three important things that someone my age should do to best prepare them to succeed in the future?

[00:16:00] David Meltzer: Do your best—number one. Whatever you want to do, just do your best. That doesn't mean give a hundred percent, right? Just do your best at whatever you want to do.

Learn lessons—look for the light, the love, and the lessons. Learn lessons.

And most importantly—have fun. Enjoy it.

So: do your best, learn lessons, and have fun.

[00:16:16] Michael Oved: And I've heard you say somewhere else the importance of having a good spouse and surrounding yourself with the right people.

[00:16:20] David Meltzer: Yeah, my new book—Simon & Schuster is going to launch it in the fall—is called Don't Do Business with Dicks. Not Dick’s Sporting Goods.

It's about surrounding yourself with the right people, the right ideas. So if you want three pieces of advice on just basic life: find the best spouse you can—an intimate partner—that'll be the liaison between you and everyone in your life.

Two: learn to enjoy what you do for economic gain—activity you get paid for.

And three: buy the best bed you can find. You'll spend a third of your life in bed, a third of your life in activity you get paid for, and a third of your life with your family and friends.

So that's another piece of advice I could give.

Section 11: Conclusion (00:17:00–00:17:59)

[00:17:00] Michael Oved: This has been so awesome. Like I told you in the beginning when you first came on, I started the podcast in large part because of you—because I listened to you. And so it truly is a tremendous honor to have you on, to have the opportunity to speak with you.

[00:17:11] David Meltzer: I can't wait to see what you do next, Michael. I am here to be of service and value to you and the Harvard community. I look forward to seeing you in person. We're going to come to Boston, we're going to have a Harvard meetup—so all your friends and everybody can come do a Q&A live session with me. We’ll have a VIP dinner. We’ll invite everyone too.

So please email me if you want the guide or books: david@dmeltzer.com.

[00:17:27] Michael Oved: I really appreciate it. And we’ll share it as well.

[00:17:30] David Meltzer: Congratulations. Keep up the great work.