The Power Transformation Podcast

88. From Observer to Creator: Crafting Your Path to Entrepreneurial Success with Jermane Cheathem

• Alethea Felton • Season 2 • Episode 88

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Top-level entrepreneur and sales strategist Jermane Cheathem shares his journey from his early days of being abandoned by his father and stepfather to ultimately becoming a trusted coach and expert with freedom to work and travel from anywhere in the world. Hear Jermane offer insights and lessons on authenticity, resilience, and consistency for achieving success, and discover how strategic partnerships and leveraging platforms like podcasts and LinkedIn can catapult your business while embracing a holistic approach to life for fulfillment and transformation.

Connect with Jermane:


Episode 88's Affirmation:
I use my abilities as a creator to bring my unique visions to life with passion and purpose.

Click here to connect with Alethea Felton

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Alethea Felton:

Jermaine Cheatham is a guest who definitely never let anything stop him. This man has an extraordinary story of how he overcame so many obstacles and is now a top-level entrepreneur. Not only is he a top-level entrepreneur, but he shows other people how to do the same. This is an episode that is definitely going to capture your attention, and you are going to learn that you can choose to either be a creator or a victim, but it is up to you to decide what type of freedom you want. Join me as I interview Jermaine Sheetham on the Power Transformation Podcast.

Alethea Felton:

Hey y'all, welcome back to yet another episode of the Power Transformation Podcast. I am Alethea Felton and I am so overjoyed that you have joined me today. We're gonna get right into this episode, but I want to tell you that I am so thankful for all of my guests and, more importantly, I am grateful for all of you who are tuning in to the Power Transformation Podcast, you who have been with me since the beginning, as well as those of you who are new and are checking this podcast out to see what is it all about. There are thousands upon thousands of podcasts out there, but this podcast ranks in the top 5% of podcasts globally, and we are continuing to grow, and that could only be done because of you. So I thank you. If you haven't done so already, go ahead and subscribe and follow the Power Transformation podcast on all platforms, and go ahead and give it that five-star rating on Apple Podcasts, as well as share it with as many people as you know.

Alethea Felton:

I like to start this podcast out with an affirmation, because an affirmation it tells us and it shows us that we can become what we think and what we believe, and so, therefore, we're going to start off this podcast with the following affirmation I say it once and then you repeat it I use my abilities as a creator to bring my unique visions to life with passion and purpose. I am super excited today to have my guest with us on the Power Transformation podcast. Us on the Power Transformation podcast, I have Jermaine Cheatham, and he is so much. But just briefly, he is a sales strategist for expert solopreneurs. I'm going to get him to talk more about that. However, one of the most incredible things about it and why he is a guest on this podcast is he has such an amazing story of transformation as to what even got him to this place. So welcome, jermaine, to the Power Transformation Podcast.

Jermane Cheathem:

Thanks for having me, glad to be here.

Alethea Felton:

You are so welcome. The honor is all mine and y'all. I met Jermane through LinkedIn, where he actually connected with me, and what I valued about him is he left a quality connection. It just wasn't some randomness, it wasn't BS, it wasn't jive. I just liked his vibe and I liked the way that he came directly to me, because on LinkedIn you meet so many people and I'm very strategic about who I let in my network and most of the people I know personally. But I did like how he approached me and what he has to offer entrepreneurs I think is absolutely amazing and we're going to get into that. But first, Jermane, I always like to ask just a random question, icebreaker question, and it's so that we can get to know you more. And it's fun, lighthearted, nothing deep, but this is your question.

Alethea Felton:

Question, Jermane would you rather be able to sail all around?

Alethea Felton:

the world or backpack all around the world?

Alethea Felton:

and why Now are you saying sell?

Alethea Felton:

or sail Sail S-A-I-L.

Jermane Cheathem:

sail Okay got it Uh-huh, yeah, yeah, 100%, without question sail. And the reason is the ocean is a miracle to me and when I'm on the water, near the water, at the beach, I feel very connected to life. I feel very a sense of oneness, and so I don't get that same feeling, to be honest with you, when I'm walking or hiking or doing the mountain stuff. I'm not saying I don't feel connected, but it's just a different level of. To me, the ocean is a perfect symbol for life because it has these ebbs and flows and it has this constant movement. Sometimes it's rough, sometimes it's calm, and it's just like life and our emotions and sometimes in our business. So I think it's like a perfect metaphor for life.

Alethea Felton:

I love that response and I can actually resonate with that. I like to hike and do trails, but I grew up by the ocean and by the water, and so I agree wholeheartedly is that water is life-giving, and so the way that you summed that up is absolutely perfect, and you are a global traveler and so you would definitely know what that means. But I think that there's a certain amount of freedom that comes with the oceans and waters, so thank you for that. That's a wonderful way for us to start, because now it leads to the transition in terms of how you give life, in a sense, to entrepreneurs. But if a person were to ask you who is Jermaine Cheatham, how would you respond to that?

Jermane Cheathem:

I'm a ball of energy, literally and figuratively, and other people can put labels on it and I'll let them do that because that's their prerogative. But I'm nothing more than energy and cause. I know the truth and we're that's all we are. And when you realize your energy, you can decide where you want to channel that. When you realize your energy, you can decide where you want to channel that, and so I channel it into right here, right now, and cause, that's all we have. And when you focus on right here, right now, then I can focus on you know how can you express yourself? And I think one of the biggest and best ways to express yourself is in business, and I don't care what it is, because the ultimate expression is having an idea and then bringing that idea to other people to enrich their lives. And that's a long winded way for me to say that's who I am.

Alethea Felton:

Well, I respect that, and it leads me to ask this next question. That kind of gets us more into the heart of who you are and this journey with business. But it's not like you just woke up one day as a toddler and said I'm going to be a businessman. There's always a journey behind it all. So take us back in a sense. So, Jermaine, tell us a little bit about your upbringing, where you're from, key parts of your childhood and what led you down this road towards entrepreneurship and business.

Jermane Cheathem:

So I'm from Phoenix, arizona, and my childhood was full of confusion and fear. I never knew my father. And then I was adopted, but then abandoned by my adopted father. All this before the age of seven, seven or six. All this before the age of seven, seven or six. And so I grew up in rough neighborhoods where they would be shootings all the time, friends were killed, and from kind of this place of I guess it was kind of a place of desperation, I had two ways to go. I could grow or I could hide. You know, I could become a creator of my future or a victim of my past.

Jermane Cheathem:

And the first opportunity that I found was in sports to choose this creator ship, this authorship, this opportunity to see what life was really about and what I was about. And so sports gave me a glimpse into discipline, teamwork, excellence and the mind-body connection. And so I realized, like if it's going to be, it has to be up to me, and no one's coming to save me. I have to figure this thing out. And so sports gave me my first lens to see that through. And then, after you know, after I got through with sports, I realized that, okay, all these things I was told about life, about people, about the, even the things I believed, because every story you have to believe. If you believe that story, then now you adopted that story. So don't blame the person that told you the story, blame yourself. And so I had to question everything and I realized that I have to test these stories out to see if they're really true. And so I thought people were losers. I thought people were fearful. I thought people were running. I thought people were fearful. I thought people were running. I thought people made bad decisions. I thought all these negative things about people. And I said let me just test this and see if it's true. And so the best way for me to test it was in sales, because you talk to people every day and you see am I good enough to do this and are they really who I think they are? Am I good enough to do this and are they really who I think they are?

Jermane Cheathem:

And I went into sales thinking that people wouldn't like me, wouldn't trust me, wouldn't want to resonate with me. And I was completely wrong. 99.9% of people are kind, friendly and loving and actually want to help those that want to help themselves. And so I started having all these epiphanies, but first started with sports, then it started with sales, sales. This gives you so much freedom because you really write your own ticket, and I realized that all these things I believed about the world and myself were wrong, and that was really the beginning of my journey of self-discovery, of the real self. The real self is not your identity. You're black, you're white, you're male, you're female, you're Democrat, republican. That's not who you are. You're none of that. You're basically the essence behind your thoughts, and when you just get caught up in your thoughts, instead of really letting life take over you and inspire you and show you the way, you're just going to be a victim. And I believe in creators.

Alethea Felton:

I like that and it's loaded and you said so much in that that I want to extract because of who you are now and those experiences and so in thinking about how you were abandoned but yet you then found this passion and this love for sports. Your perspectives on people changed once you got into sales. How in the world Jermaine, how in the world Jermaine did those early?

Jermane Cheathem:

experiences of abandonment, not wanting to be an entrepreneur, but the actual drive to succeed.

Jermane Cheathem:

How did those experience help to shape that? I think at its core, it was the realization, at three, four or five years old, that no one's going to save me but me, and so that sparked something inside of me that said, okay, it's up to me, and so when your back's against the wall, you're going to find a way out. And there's really only two ways to go, like when your back's up against the wall either you fight your way out or you get killed literally. So that was my options, and so growth is my only option. I don't have, you know, I don't step back into safety. That's not, that's not my path. And so and that's what everyone's option is really you have two options in every moment to grow or to retreat into safety. And so me, kind of being on my own on an island forced me to make that decision, and I think we make those decisions every day, even as adults. We don't maybe realize it, but in every moment we have an opportunity to move forward or move backwards.

Alethea Felton:

Mm-hmm, and something about your experience that I found quite interesting and I learned this from LinkedIn, but we also talked more about it is that your experience in sales didn't necessarily happen when you were grown. You learned as a child how to kind of start the whole sales aspect. About that Tell us about your earliest experiences with sales and how that led to your ability to be able to connect with your clients and really understand their challenges.

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah, everything in life, and also everything in a great movie or a great story, has to do with a goal and an obstacle to the goal. That's it, very simple. And so when I was little, my goal was to buy candy and to buy sports cards. The obstacle to the goal is I had no money. So I looked at my neighbor and she had kind of a garden in her front yard and my mom suggested to go over there and talk to your neighbor, hazel, and see if you could do some yard work and she'll pay you. So I knocked on her door and next thing you know, I I started working and pulling weeds and I was making like five dollars an hour.

Jermane Cheathem:

But I remember feeling so happy and so such a feeling of power, control, autonomy, mastery, even of pulling weeds. And it taught me this little lesson that there's always an opportunity for people to pay you for something they don't want to do, you for something they don't want to do, and they are always. There's always an opportunity for people to see a value in something you offer that you may not even know you had. So it kind of leads to these dominoes, and the funny thing about you know her experience is I took that money and bought, you know, basketball cards.

Jermane Cheathem:

But then when I bought the basketball cards, I realized well, these are valuable, there's leverage in these, so then I would sell them to my friends and I'd make even more profit. So I started stacking these dominoes. And so business and life is just where is the lead domino? And when you push over that lead domino it knocks over the other dominoes. And that was my first experience in sales and business and it opened my eyes that people will trust you, they'll give you a shot and especially if you want to help yourself, yeah.

Alethea Felton:

So I'm curious now kind of fun, lighthearted question, but I'm curious if you started this in childhood. You were straight up hustling at a young age like, hey, I'm going to do this because this can make this happen or that happen. When you were selling things to your friends group, did you have any say any of your close buddies or friends who saw what you were doing and wanted to get help themselves as to how you were doing it? So did you also start to mentor and teach people then how to do what you were doing, or did it seem as if you were the only one interested in this aspect as a child?

Jermane Cheathem:

No, I think birds of a feather flock together. Okay, so the people I was selling my cards to and just kind of associating with were hustlers too, where you know they were selling cards, they were doing other side stuff. You know, I think people do stick together and so we were all kind of in the same vein, if you will.

Alethea Felton:

Yeah, ok, I like that. Yeah, because you know that is so true in that we we often become most like the people that we hang around. Or it could be the other way around, is that people were watching you? But either way, you all were kind of gleaning information from each other and really starting to see how this all works. And so how have you tended to navigate the transition from, almost, in a way, building resilience and perseverance in both your personal life and your professional life? How do they go hand in hand? And then we'll get more in terms of your sales strategy techniques.

Jermane Cheathem:

I don't believe there's such thing as like professional and personal life. Okay, I don't believe there's any separation. I don't believe there's any separation.

Alethea Felton:

Explain that.

Jermane Cheathem:

So if you have a separation, like work-life balance or this is professional and this is not, if you think there's a separation, then we have a mask problem. You're wearing one mask at home and a different mask at work. Interesting You're wearing one mask on LinkedIn and a different mask at work. You're wearing one mask on LinkedIn and a different mask on Instagram.

Jermane Cheathem:

And I fundamentally believe wearing masks keeps you stuck, keeps you small, keeps you not living fully, because you become this persona who you really aren't, and you decide to put this one on and put this one off. And take this one on and take this one off versus just be you, whatever that might look like. Who cares? Because if they weren't for you in the professional life, do you really want them to hang out with you personally, like I want to hang out with people personally, professionally, in any time of day, anywhere in the world. What you see is what you get like it or leave it. So, um, to answer your question about the, the resiliency in the professional versus personal life, they're the same thing, it's just move forward.

Alethea Felton:

They're the same thing. It's just move forward. Interesting, I hear you, I hear you. I don't necessarily agree with it, but I respect your opinion.

Alethea Felton:

Other professions outside of that business world. Sadly, sometimes people are forced into these boxes of personal versus professional, like with all of my years spent as a public school educator. It wasn't until I broke outside of that mold after 20 years that I saw that you can be more authentic in other aspects of your life. Is that? Sadly, a lot of educators, especially here in the States, have to make a very strict distinction between professional and personal.

Alethea Felton:

But what I like about what you're saying is that I do see how we, being a whole person, is that we should be our authentic selves, which is true, but I think in some professions they have to walk a thin line as to how much of their true selves they can be without risk or fear of losing their job, and I think that's what the beauty is in entrepreneurship is that you're working for yourself, navigating things within yourself, and so I think that your personal story can definitely help to inspire others. But how in the world, what lessons, in a sense, have you learned from your various changes in life and how do they apply to your entrepreneurial journey. So this leads to this question. You're a sales strategist. Let's start to shift there. What exactly is that and what does that look like? What do you do and who do you help?

Jermane Cheathem:

So you know, most people want to confuse business and entrepreneurship and make it very complex.

Alethea Felton:

But it's not.

Jermane Cheathem:

All it is is what do you sell and how do you sell it?

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah that's it. So the the thing that is unique about my approach is I am all about minimalism and all about simplicity, and so when you can line up what you sell with who you sell it to in the most streamlined way, that taps into human psychology, because business is not widgets, it's not software, it's not corporations, it's people. It's not software, it's not corporations, it's people. And once you understand that business is done with other people and the only way to sell anything is through other people, then once you understand this concept, you can set up relationships where what you sell psychologically is a no brainer to the person you want to sell it to. And so, strategically, all you have to do is step back, and usually it helps a lot to have someone else look at this, because we're just too close to the product in our own businesses to see it clearly.

Jermane Cheathem:

And so when you step back and you look at actually what you sell, who you sell it to, you step back and you look at actually what you sell, who you sell it to, I can see clearly the through line that gets you exactly what you want and how to get it done without driving yourself crazy, because most people are saying you need to be on all these platforms and post all this content and do this and do that and work eight hourhour days. I've never worked more than four-hour days because I find leverage it's the eighth wonder of the world and people don't use leverage when it comes from psychological leverage and also relational leverage. So this is all about strategic partnerships that have your ideal customer in their network and have their trust. So literally, this is how I did over 50 million in ready to sign clients in my financial services business. Without me lifting a finger, they did all the selling for me. So that is kind of the philosophy, the strategy, in a nutshell.

Alethea Felton:

And I know that we spoke more offline about this concept of especially entrepreneurs or solopreneurs. Identifying their one thing is that sometimes people have their hands in so many pots that the message or the branding can get diluted. So tell us more about the importance of this identifying your one thing and how it's contributed to your success.

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah, because you can't have five income streams. I mean you can, but you would literally be able to make 10 times as much with one income stream in a quarter of the time. So the fear is, people want to place their chips on all the table. So that's what, that's what keeps them in this hamster wheel. And they look up and they're 80 years old and they just spun their wheels for their whole life but never actually lived their life, because they were working eight, 12 hour days.

Jermane Cheathem:

So when you're focused on one thing one service, one avatar, one client and servicing them in one way, that's how you leverage things. So, for example, financial services is a very broad topic. If I wanted to, I could sell 10, 15 different financial services products, right, but I didn't. I chose to narrow down, and so in my particular situation, I narrowed down into one sub-niche which was only doing financing on commercial equipment, and even within that, I niched down even further into only medical equipment, and even within that, I niched down even further. Instead of me chasing the doctors that needed to get financing to buy medical equipment, I only focused on becoming friends and creating partnerships with medical device salespeople, and so when I did this, I literally worked a fraction of the time but multiplied my outcomes, and that is the only product I sold. And so I did the same thing when I started teaching people these philosophies. As I niche down, niche down, niche down, and I find the person that has the audience that I want and become friends and create partnerships with them.

Alethea Felton:

How did you get to that point of niching down, niching down, niching down Like what was your aha moment to say this is what I need to do. Were there moments of trial and error? Were there moments in this journey where you made mistakes and learned that? Tell us about that.

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah. So in the financial services business, I was just spinning my wheels. And I was just spinning my wheels cold calling medical doctors all day long, 300 cold calls a day, 12 hours a day, and I knew there had to be a better way. And it didn't hit me until I had a conversation, when I was working on a deal, with one of the device guys and he says, yeah, I'll have some more deals for you. And I realized, oh, he's going to send me deals. And so then I flipped and said, oh, this is crazy that I've been chasing people, I'm just going to start going after the device people. And so, ever since that moment, that's what I did. And then the same thing when I had my course and my coaching program, had my course and my coaching program, I was doing ads. I was doing Facebook ads, I was doing YouTube ads. I was trying to do all these cold DMs to people that I thought might be interested in my coaching or my courses.

Jermane Cheathem:

And the moment I went on podcasts that had my ideal audience, they were just buying while I slept, buying the courses, buying the coaching, because again, I got in front of my ideal audience. The host of the podcast had the audience's trust. So inherently psychologically, when I came on they trusted me. Same thing with the medical device guys they bring me into the deal. The doctors inherently trust me because they're buying a device from Todd. The Dr Smith is going to trust Todd. So if he trusts Todd then he's going to trust me. It's just human psychology. Same thing with your audience If they trust you, they're going to trust me. It just makes life seamless and business seamless. So that's really how the aha came.

Alethea Felton:

And I do appreciate that, because I think sometimes people will see a successful business person and just see the success and the glory of it all without realizing that you had to learn certain lessons. You're still learning them, but also you pay it forward so that you can help others. And so how do you approach in thinking about transformation, empowerment, how do you approach your own personal growth and development, and what effect has this had on your business success?

Jermane Cheathem:

And what effect has this had on your business success? So without personal growth, you can't have business growth, and it's also there's levels to it. Yeah, so what I mean is you don't know what you don't know, and you have to go through the beginner stages before you can get to the advanced stages. And so what I realized is it's actually easier than you think, but you have to try all the other shit to realize it doesn't work.

Jermane Cheathem:

And so, like a lot of personal growth comes down to simplicity, and it's not necessarily doing cold baths or doing, you know, journaling every day, or meditating for an hour or all the things that you hear you should be doing. It really comes down to just paying attention to what you're thinking about and deciphering thinking versus thoughts, because when you're thinking, it's usually either about the future that you either want or don't want, or the past that you didn't want, or you're holding on to because you liked it. Thoughts are just inspiration. Something hits you, strikes you, all of a sudden, an idea. I now only act on thoughts. I ignore all my thinking. It's a waste of my time because it takes me away from right here, right now, and that's all we have. So, but I didn't know that until I did the meditation and the cold baths and all the stuff, right Um. So it's just a journey and it's just um practice, and you got to practice going through whatever you need to go through to see the truth. And it's simpler than we think.

Alethea Felton:

And so how does that then translate into how you are very strategic now, even on LinkedIn. So how have you leveraged LinkedIn, as well as podcast networking, to grow your business and establish these strategic partnerships? Because when you mentioned earlier about trust, that is so important in building trust with your clients or just people in general. So how do you leverage those?

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah, so LinkedIn is like taking candy from a baby, because it's very easy as long as you know how to message people like you were talking to earlier, so there's a couple of different approaches. Podcast guesting is probably one of the most underrated, underutilized leverage points that entrepreneurs don't use.

Alethea Felton:

I agree, uh-huh.

Jermane Cheathem:

If you know what you're doing, you know how to get on podcasts and if you enjoy conversation. It's simple, easy and it's fun. Yeah, so that's one aspect of LinkedIn messaging podcast hosts right, because podcast hosts are always looking for great guests too, so it's a win-win-win the audience wins, the host wins and the person talking wins because they enjoy it. The other part of it is the great thing about LinkedIn also is you can see people's history. You see, basically, their resume. They're real people. It's not Twitter, it's not Instagram, where you're not quite sure if they're real. Like LinkedIn, you know these people exist and what they've done, where they went to school, where they live all this information. So when you go into a conversation in the DMs, you actually have relevant things to talk about, so they know it's not a bot, it's a real person. Relevant things to talk about, so they know it's not a bot, it's a real person.

Jermane Cheathem:

And then from there there's also so much context, especially from a business coach's lens, of things they're doing wrong their headline, their banner, their about section, any, their, their content. There's so many things I can see like oh, this, this, this, this. Let me start a conversation with this person and see if they need help, so then, and you want to get them. You want to make your offers a no-brainer. You want them to say yes to whatever you're offering, because what you do is again with strategic partnerships. They now become a strategic partner where you can offer them discounts, freebies on referrals, profit sharing on referrals. They become now an evangelist for your product or service and they tell other people, so it's kind of a two-pronged approach. What I teach people is strategic DMs, either for podcast hosts or for actually people that need your service, and it's something that most solopreneurs coaches, consultants, speakers, authors sleep on.

Alethea Felton:

And so, when these people are sleeping on this, and yet you're actually winning in these areas this, and yet you're actually winning in these areas. Tell us about your approach to your coaching and supporting your entrepreneurs, without giving away all of your trade secrets. But what's your approach? What's your style?

Jermane Cheathem:

So my style is very tailored and conversational. So my style is very tailored and conversational, so I have a. My entire life is really based on liquid frameworks, and what I mean by that is I have frameworks, but they're fluid, they move a little bit because you don't want to be rigid but you don't want to not have a framework at all. So, for example, I always go through what do you want? This is about vision. And then, once I understand what you actually want, then I find out why do you want this? Because many times I find that my clients want something that's not theirs, it's their parents, it's their cultures, it's their friends' wants. It's their parents, it's their cultures, it's their friends' wants, it's their church's wants. And so once we skin that away to the true core of what you want, then we get into strategy, and this is where I put together the strategy.

Jermane Cheathem:

As far as what you sell, I get very clear on the one thing you sell, who you sell it to, the one person you sell it to a clear avatar. And then the how how do you sell it? And this is the strategy that we're talking about here is I figure out who are going to be the strategic partners, and podcasting is a huge part of it, and that gets very nuanced because it depends on what you're selling, who we're going to go after, how we're going to go after them, but it's pretty simple. And then how you can actually target people on LinkedIn to create a relationship with them, and then now they become a referral partner as well to bring you more and more clients. That's it.

Alethea Felton:

Hmm, and what types of transformations in general or changes have you seen in the clients that you work with? Now, this is a broad question. You can make it general or you can share a success story, but if you approach a person and they say, yes, I want to work with you, what is their success story, what is the outcome of their partnering with you?

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah, so really, what it comes down to I'll start broadening, I'll narrow it down for you is it really changes their entire perspective on life? Interesting?

Alethea Felton:

entire perspective on life Interesting.

Jermane Cheathem:

Because they've been told since they were five years old work is hard, you have to grind. To be successful, you must work hard. And my philosophy is actually don't work hard, just work smart. Don't work eight hour days, work four hour days, just make sure it's focused. And so, so, like I, literally turn it on its head, and so they look at life from a different lens when they not only have financial security, but they also have time security. Now they have location security. Now they can go work from mexico for two months if they want like, and then they also work Like you were all around the globe yeah.

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah, and then the biggest thing is they understand this mental freedom. They get that. They not only learn the skill of less is more, strategy over grinding, but also, I think, they see clear their contribution to the world and how and a clear path to it that is not convoluted, not complex, it's just very simple and it works. And they don't have to continue to spin their wheels. And it's just, it's frustrating when you don't know what you're doing and you don't even know how to get out of it.

Alethea Felton:

Yeah, yeah, jermaine, this life that you have currently, and thinking about the challenges that you had to navigate growing up and how you overcame them and just stay focused, is this the life that you've always envisioned for yourself, and how did you keep that mindset, strong enough to pursue it despite adversity?

Jermane Cheathem:

No, it wasn't the life I always envisioned for myself. Wow, I believe. When I was little, I just wanted freedom. I wasn't sure what that looked like, I just knew it was something to do with like mental freedom. I wanted to escape not only my own thoughts about what I thought was true, what I thought about myself, what I thought about other people. I wanted to get clear about the truth about all of that, and that was, to me, my ultimate freedom. Everything else is downstream from there. Everything I created was downstream from there. Businesses happen to be a great vehicle to do that. Sales happen to be a great vehicle to do that vehicle to do that. It wasn't until later in my life, until my twenties, that I started to get clear on like what I wanted as far as my business what I wanted as far as my future, and I did start to envision and create crystal clear things like I see now in my life.

Jermane Cheathem:

I created those things from my mind, from my imagination. So you know, it's stages Like I don't think you can really. I mean everyone's different. I never was someone that could prophesize 30 years in advance and say, oh, I'll be here, but I knew the overall direction I wanted to go. And then, as I got to that next stage, then I would say, okay, maybe I'll be the quarterback of the football team. And then I became the quarterback of the football team. And you just start, okay, and you keep building onto this thing. And so I do remember thinking to myself I want to make the office, I'm sorry, I want to make the world my office, and this was probably in 2015. And so then I did, and so it's just, um, you are the creator of your life experience and you just have to create it in your mind first, and then you execute on that and it happens.

Alethea Felton:

And so the execution part is so important, because a person can have a dream, but if they sit on it and just imagine it without taking the actions toward it, then they're not going to end up anywhere. And so, with the clients that you work with in these aspects, maybe there's someone who could be experiencing a challenge, or they're stuck and don't quite know how to niche down, like how you do, what is just one step that you would give them to start to create that vision for their life so that they have a successful entrepreneurial career.

Jermane Cheathem:

Well, the first thing I would always suggest is something practical. Beyond the vision and all that stuff. I would tell somebody to, before you go to bed, write down the one thing you can do tomorrow. That is the smallest possible step you can take to get you towards wherever you want to go. And as soon as you wake up, get out of and, within three minutes, start your timer for 90 minutes. If that means you have to wake up early before the kids, so be it.

Jermane Cheathem:

And you start on that one thing for 90 minutes and you do that for the entire 90 minutes and then you start to develop this habit. It's just habits shape your life, they shape your business, and I don't even consider it discipline because it becomes automatic. And you'll notice that snowball will start to get bigger every day as you continue to do this process of working on the single highest leverage activity first thing in the morning. It's only one activity, it has to be high leverage. If you do that over and over again, you will be successful, guaranteed, with a caveat, that is desire, you know a lot of people talk about things and they have hopes and dreams.

Jermane Cheathem:

But if there is no desire burning desire like you'll, do it, no matter what. It's a must, you will die trying to do this Then it ain't going to work. And whenever the desire shows up, then it shows up. If it doesn't show up, it doesn't show up. You're not in control of that desire, it's the muse. But you have to pay attention to what gets you excited and whatever gets you excited, follow that.

Alethea Felton:

What excites?

Jermane Cheathem:

you, jermaine, the thing that excites me the most is this moment right now. Oh, me the most is this moment right now, because everything else is fake, it's made up, it's false.

Alethea Felton:

There's nothing else in the world but right here, right now so, in terms of the excitement, do you mean more by living in the present and just taking everything as it comes, taking everything in stride?

Jermane Cheathem:

What I mean is all the joy, all the money, all the freedom, all the everything you ever wanted in your life is found right now. And so when you realize that and you can hear the silence, or you can hear the wind, or you can hear your own voice and realize number one this was a gift. I don't know how I got here. I know it's going to go away because we all die, whatever I'm working on becomes minuscule. As far as how important it is, it doesn't matter. And so when that reframe happens in my mind because I'm here in the moment appreciating this opportunity that life gave me, that makes me excited about the joys, the pains, the wins, the losses, the struggles, the headaches, the sickness, the health, it all because I am just a witness to it.

Alethea Felton:

I am not it what is the greatest thing or the largest thing that you've learned about yourself over the years on this entrepreneurial road?

Jermane Cheathem:

that's a. That's a big question. Um, the biggest thing I've learned about myself in this whole journey, um, I think it's bigger than entrepreneurship, it's just life. But what it is is the point of life. This is, this is my philosophy is just to experience everything, okay. And so when you're sad, when you're happy, when you're so frustrated, when you feel so lost and it's so dark, or you're just so happy and you feel so alive. So happy and you feel so alive is I learned that the point of life is to accept and experience all human emotions and if you're not feeling them all, you're missing out on the whole experience, the whole fun. That's the fun part of it, and I don't get too high or too low and I never feel like it's hopeless or it's never going to work, because it's going to work. It's just not happening right now and that's okay. So I guess really, the the to break it down is everything's fine.

Alethea Felton:

The biggest lesson you've learned is that everything's fine. That's a unique way of viewing it, but I think that can be so encouraging and uplifting for a lot of people listening, because there's a certain level of self-awareness and self-acceptance that it takes to even get to that level of saying everything's fine, even if it seems like situations around might not be what others could consider favorable. Everything's fine.

Alethea Felton:

I have a similar viewpoint and it's not ignoring the reality of things that happen. Have a similar viewpoint and it's not ignoring the reality of things that happen. But I do think that when you view it like that, so many more powerful occurrences can happen in your life where you can live such a rich, fulfilling life in more ways than one. And although you said you're not the kind to say X, y and Z is going to happen within 30 years, I'm the exact same way, but thinking about the here and now, how do you envision your journey continuing to evolve and what are a couple of aspirations for your future? And this is a general question, doesn't have to be about business, doesn't have to be about business, it doesn't have to be about anything else but how do you envision your journey evolving?

Jermane Cheathem:

I don't know. So I've kind of let go of this need to control, of this need to control, of this need to I mean even like force myself to do things. When the desire is there, I do it. If the desire is not there, I don't do it. I don't. I don't resist life, I don't fight life. I don't fight things. I don't fight my emotions, I don't fight my how my physical body feels, I just accept it and the future is going to be dictated by life and the way it's going to go.

Jermane Cheathem:

The world, like things like this, continue to work on social media platforms and continue to grow and express my unique uh ideas, and then from that action, things will come. And then, whatever I get excited about, I'll do those things and then from those actions, things will build, things will grow, and my premonition is that it will revolve around helping entrepreneurs live a more fulfilled life in their business and in the personal life and tying the globe together more tightly and eliminating Labels, identities and false narratives that we all have and we think we are, and it just divides not only each other but yourself we are, and it just divides not only each other but yourself.

Alethea Felton:

Yeah, that's well stated, Jermaine. And although you reach out to entrepreneurs, how might somebody connect with you? How can somebody get in touch with you if they'd like to learn more or inquire about your work or coaching? How can people contact you, Jermaine?

Jermane Cheathem:

Yeah, best place is going to be LinkedIn. Yeah reach out to me there.

Alethea Felton:

Yes, and I will also put the link to your page directly in the show notes. This has been absolutely wonderful, and I have one closing question that I'd like to kind of end with In the fact that a lot of who you are now, of course, was shaped by your own personal story, in what way do you sometimes, or often, encourage your own clients to embrace their personal stories and use them as fuel for growth and success in their businesses?

Jermane Cheathem:

growth and success in their businesses. I think your own personal story is one of the most underutilized things that entrepreneurs are scared to expose, and I actually leverage that as one of their key things that they can use to attract clients, to have people resonate with them and to understand them, because it's just what happened. It's just your take on neutral events. It's the story you made up about a neutral event, and so share it and don't feel like, oh well, my friends won't like it, my parents won't like it, whatever, that's not their story, that's your story.

Jermane Cheathem:

That's how you perceive the neutral events, and so when you frame that for my clients is when I frame that I create these powerful narratives that people instantly resonate with, especially when they're on podcasts. And this is how you make money while you sleep, because people are like, oh, I trust them, they're a real human, they're not just trying to sell me something and they know their shit, because the story is going to tell your whole life, basically, of how you began and how you got good at this thing and how you help other people get good at this thing. Oh, this is awesome. I'm going to call Becky tomorrow or whatever it is. So stories are powerful. That's how humans have communicated for eons. So if you're not using stories, you're shooting yourself in the foot.

Alethea Felton:

I am so thankful to Jermaine for gracing us with his presence here on the podcast, and I do encourage all of you to please follow Jermaine, see what he's up to, contact and connect with him if what his message says resonates with you. He is definitely someone that is worth knowing and I am so grateful to have had him as a guest. So every Wednesday, a new episode of the Power Transformation Podcast is released. So join me here again, and if you have episodes that I've already done and you want to catch up on them, go ahead and do that too. There is something in these episodes that will definitely speak to you, and I encourage you to please let as many people as you know know about this show as well.

Alethea Felton:

We are here to help transform and change lives. In a world where there's so much news that can be sad or bad or tragic, why not give people light, hope and joy? It's still out there. Let's go ahead and end with our affirmation. I will say it once and then you repeat it I use my abilities as a creator to bring my unique visions to life with passion and purpose. If you enjoyed today's show, then you don't want to miss an episode. So follow the Power Transformation podcast on Apple Podcasts, spotify or wherever you usually listen, and remember to rate and review. I also invite you to connect with me on social media at Alethea Felton. That's at A-L-E-T-H-E-A-F-E-L-T-O-N. Until next time, remember to be good to yourself and to others.