Leave Nothing To Chance

Can you have MLM success when you have zero networking background? Dr. Barrie White testifies with John Solleder that YES, you can! Dr. Barrie succeeded in many career paths. He thought he was financially secure until he was stabbed. His seven-day experience in the intensive care unit propelled him to look for another source of income. He found it in his tremendous success with MLM. Today he helps others achieve their dreams. This episode will inspire you to pursue MLM success. Dive in! 

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Dr. Barrie White: “Many Careers Lead to MLM Success”

It’s a pleasure to introduce another long-term friend of mine in the industry from beautiful Barrie, Ontario. They even named a town after you, Barrie, which is impressive and that’s Dr. Barrie White. How are you, Doctor?  

I’m doing great here.  

In the book, Leave Nothing to Chance, there are fifteen principles laid out there. I’m wondering which one or maybe several is your favorite?  

The one that particularly gets my attention is the one on love. There’s a whole background to that part of it but the whole area of my being and lifespan had to do with what cost me. Love causes me problems. In terms of my doctoral work, I could have gone on to complete Clinical Psychology but in that particular one because I fell in love with everybody at the council, that’s dangerous. You don’t do that so I knew that was not the field for me. I’m a lousy councilor. I moved from that whole area but that was the reason that I eventually got to network marketing was through that whole thing, caring for other people. I found something that made a difference to, first of all, my wife, who was dying on me. That was the major focus, not for money or nails, just for the sake of my wife. Everything that I’ve done in terms of life vocation has been motivated by that wanting to care for other people. 

You’re in the right industry for that. You have several degrees. Tell me them exactly. I don’t want to mess them up here.  

First of all, I’m an engineer. I graduated in Engineering Science way back when. I did some MBA stuff and then went on to do a Master of Divinity then a doctorate after that. That’s my background. You don’t expect engineers to wind up caring for people. Engineers care for things. They build things. I’m not characteristic of that but in a sense, everything I did, I did to the max. I did school and my music to the max. These were the characteristics. If you use the term, zone, everything I did in a whole bunch of range, I did in zone characteristic. I was focused as best I could, maximizing my time. There lies my intensity. Less intense after I got stabbed and in the hospital but the intensity was the characteristic that I had for all of these things. 

You’re one of those people that has morphed from one interest to another interest then jumped in with both feet, studied it meticulously and spent the time and the effort. That’s something that especially our young readers need to know. There’s time in life to study many things that you’re interested in. Would you agree with that? 

Yes. You focus on what is important to you now. That wasn’t exactly what I was after because it doesn’t satisfy my soul. That was the intense thing I needed at that time but then it leads you like living in parallel universes. You go down this one universe unaware of the rest of the world and then in going down that path, you discover there are other worlds out there. That’s what leads you to, “This is more interesting, as interesting or I need to know more about.” For example, all my life because I’m an engineer, I have focused on everything scientific, science fiction included. It had that keeping up with the world in the scientific areas as part of that but other areas became more important.  

Let’s talk about self-development a little bit. I’m looking at the backdrop here with your books and there are probably multiple other shelves around your office there. You shared with me too that you had given away 4,000 books over the last several years. 

Five thousand books. We moved into a condo and there simply was not room for 5,000 books. Some of them went to Africa and some of them went to a teacher in a college. He looked at my library and said, “I want those.” We had to narrow it down to probably 700. I’m limited now. Even then, I can’t go back to read all those books that I devoured before. Personal development, I came across that. That was part of it but things like Peter Drucker and management and all these other kinds of things that you learn from and see, “That’s interesting. Where does that lead to?” That’s part of the library problem, it leads you to other places. 

In all of your learning, education and self-education, which is probably the best education most of us get. What was that one book maybe that impressed you about self-development? What was the first one?  

This self-development came inadvertently. When my mother retired from teaching at 67, she joined a network marketing company in insurance, probably number one. They gave her a list of books to read, which was Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich. She thought it was interesting so she passed it onto me. That was the first one that I came across of that genre. It was interesting in the sense that opened another door. 

Let’s say that the good folks here in Canada come along and they say, “Barrie, we’ve decided you’ve had this great career, you’ve done so many things and we’re going to move you to a beautiful island but you’re limited on what you can bring. You can bring your Holy Bible but you can also bring three books. Here are only 3 books of the 700 you have remaining in your office there.” What would the other three books be?  

I keep working on my imagination part. I have to see more than my world gives me. One of my favorites is a science fiction book. I gave that one away to somebody else. The whole idea is it isn’t what’s in the book, it’s what leads you into something of that genre. That’s a hard question because I have so many I’d love to play with but what I’m playing with, for example, another Napoleon Hill one which was not published until well after his death. That’s intriguing because it also leads to other areas. It isn’t the information in the book itself, it’s what leads you to something else bigger than. 

We’ll talk about Dr. Hill a little bit, too. I got a story I’ll share with you on him. We’ll come back to that. You’ve been in network marketing now for a long time. You’ve been successful at it like you have everything else you’ve done in your life, which is amazing all the careers that you’ve had, all the hats that you’ve worn and you’ve raised a family on top of it and everything else. You’ve had an amazing life, to say the least. Let’s talk about network marketing from this standpoint, Dr. White. There’s a dad and his son. Where so many people are in this pandemic situation, their careers have been thrown into the garbage can in 2020. 

Let’s say the 25-year-old is well-educated who can take his iPhone and could launch a space shuttle with it. He’s got all this intelligence and knowledge of technology and he’s living on mom and dad’s couch. At the same time, the dad who’s 60 or so, was probably starting to wind things up financially. He can retire in a few years, put some money aside, perhaps had a successful career in sales, marketing, management or whatever it happened to be. All of a sudden, this situation happens and now his career is thrown upside down. He didn’t quite get to the finish line financially. He’s still short with the money to have a comfortable life after stopping working. 

MLM Success: Accidents happen. You have to be prepared with another stream you can count on.

They say, “Let’s stop by and see our friend, Dr. White. He’s a smart guy. He’s got all these degrees. He has been playing with this network marketing stuff and made money at it. Let’s go in and see him.” How do you counsel a 25-year-old and a 60-year-old at this point looking at network marketing perhaps for the first time? Maybe they even have a negative view of it because they don’t understand it at this point. What do you counsel them and how do you direct them? 

In terms of network marketing, I never came across it until I was in my 50s. It may have brushed by me but I didn’t know what it was. For example, when my son was seven years old, he wanted me to join up with Shaklee. We bought two cans of it. We didn’t have a clue what it was. No one talked to us. Here we are. In the old days, we used to think of working for 40 years at the same company, get a gold watch and retire. The current situation has proven that everything is changing rapidly so fast that you better have a different thing. 

Back to the 25-year-old, you may have been trained for something in one area but here’s an area that you need to look at because the industry called network marketing changes rapidly itself. It didn’t in the past but now everything is moving so quickly. Twenty-five-year-old, get going on this, discover how to do it, make sure you’re in top form but start now. That’s the important part. Get as many of your friends in this as well because the future is very uncertain. With the current situations in the world, everything may change. 

Back to the 60-year-old, that’s a different matter. Sixty-year-old guy, let’s say you can go ahead and wind up in a retirement home. You need money to be there. You need about $2.4 million in investments because you don’t want to eat your seed. You need enough money to maintain your lifestyle and provide for inflation as it goes on. Sixty-year-old, get going. You know a lot of your older friends who are probably in the same boat. You need to get out that whole aspect of getting more secure. Besides, 60 years old, you’re probably going to live for 20, 30, 40 years. You probably don’t have enough money for that. With inflation, even your $2.4 million isn’t enough. You need an additional stream of income that you can count on and that’s up to you. Get going on that and get your friends there because they’ll appreciate it in a few years as well when the circumstances make it difficult for them. 

In my network marketing, I thought that I was secure and everything was good. It turns out I was dead wrong. Things changed for me. A whole variety of things like getting stabbed and winding up in the intensive care for seven days, those things come around the corner out of the blue. You can’t count on them. They may happen or not. Accidents happen. You have to be prepared with another stream that you can count on. 

What other advice for anybody reading would you give them? You’ve got so much life experience. I don’t want to forget either. I got to ask about why you’re stabbed because I wasn’t aware of that. We’ll come back to the stab part. There’s a story, I’m sure, with that as well. Let’s get the advice first to the people reading that they’re on the fence. Maybe they’ve even been in network marketing and they’re saying, “I tried that ten years ago and it didn’t work out for whatever reason.” Now, they’ve got to consider their options, to your point. We’re living in unique and unparalleled times with a lot of question marks going forward here in the future. What’s your advice overall to people about looking at this particular industry?  

The past is the past. I came across figures that say large numbers of new companies in network marketing are created every single year. In five years, 95% of them won’t be around anyway so you choose wisely and well. What you know from the past, people are saying, “You can buy things cheaper in the grocery store or whatever it might be,” but to find something that is unique, not duplicatable by everybody else and protected that’s hard to find because it’s a few numbers of companies that have that strength and vitality. You need to have an awareness that the past of bad press for network marketing is maybe still there if you don’t look in the right spot. 

Find the right company and it will prove to be the absolute positive best but you have to choose wisely. Part of the problem is knowing enough. You need to know a person that has the information for you. How do you go and scrounge for that person? They will have that information and you probably won’t pick it up just from the press, they won’t tell you. The thing is you need to have a circle of friends and ask the question, “Where’s the gold mine?” Few people know. That’s the problem.  

That’s good advice, seek and you shall find. The good books say that. I got to hear this stab story. When did this happen? 

In my career, Engineer for 5 years, a college professor in college administration for 19 years, a pastor for 25 years, it was my wife. In the pastoral role, we were looking after a person who was not well. He decided that to gain notoriety and glory, he should kill us. He did his best to accomplish that. I got my wife out of harm’s way and took the stab and then escaped him and got back to where they can call the police and an ambulance. In the ambulance, I was conscious when they put me in. My wife was with the driver and then the conversation that took place I had no knowledge of. The guy that was looking after me in the back said, “No BP. Hit the lights.” The next thing I remember was a doctor putting a catheter into me. I was too far out of it to object but that was an interesting awakening.  

What year was that when that happened? 

It was ’92. Part of the problem was after ‘92, financially we were in terrible shape because my wife had brainstem surgery. She was not doing well at all. I was not recovering. I thought I was recovered but I wasn’t. I was not my normal say sharp self. I found another company or another company found me and I thought it was the solution. It turns out it wasn’t. In that company, I got the third highest in Canada one year and I got a $500 bonus. That was the biggest check I ever got from them. When the company came along, I was broke. My credit card was maxed. I had nothing in the bank but the week before, a check arrived from the government from back taxes that they owed me, income tax return. It was $720. 

Someone took me down to Montreal to have a look at this company, which in terms was for my wife’s needs, not for money. That was not even on my radar. At that point, she was dying on me. The amount I had to pay was $712.80. I had $720 in the bank. I’m risking everything because I was convinced at that point that it was the solution for my wife’s necessity of life. I got back at 3:00 in the morning. If I’m going to be taken down to Montreal to go see, I got to wake her up so I woke her up and gave her the first experiment part. She was bedridden at that point, low energy. By the end of the week, can you imagine this? She was well enough to go to a conference. I knew I had been given the gift of something that was extraordinary.  

Let me make a segue from getting stabbed and multi-level, back to self-development. I had an interview with the last protégé of Dr. Napoleon Hill, a gentleman by the name of Ben Gay III. Ben’s been in the industry forever, for many years. I’d like your reaction to this in closing our interview, Dr. White. I spent two years with them, the company that he ran at that time. He hired Dr. Hill to work for it and he became the mentor. 

They shared office space. Ben at that time was about 20, 25, 30 years old, a young guy and Dr. Hill was in his 80s. I said, “Of all the things you learned in two years rubbing elbows with Napoleon Hill every day and considered to be the very last protégé of his, what three things did he teach you above all else?” He said, “Number one, have integrity in everything that you do. Number two, focus on what it is that you have to do. Finally, take action.” Those three things. The first response to the word integrity. What does that mean to you?  

Integrity is essential. I couldn’t exist in my own psyche if I didn’t have integrity. If I was pulling people’s chains and all the rest, I personally could not psychologically survive. That’s not me. I don’t tell lies and bend the truth. Integrity is who I am. The people I work with understand that if I tell them something, it’s true. If I don’t know, I will tell them. The whole area of integrity, that’s personally who I am. The company that I’m currently in attracted me because that’s the person I am. That’s my core. That’s who I believe myself to be and therefore I will act only in that way. 

What about focus? 

MLM Success: Keep your brain as active as possible. What happens next may demand a sharper brain than what you have now.

I’ve always been focused. I’m a piano player, for example. I would give myself one hour of focused time to practice every day but I wouldn’t give myself an hour and one minute because I have other things to do. For example, when I was doing my Master’s Degree, my first semester, I read 11,000 pages of usually dusty material but that was the intensity I took to everything. When it came to my company, focused, I had been stabbed and I was not quite the same at all. I meandered for a while and then gradually I gained confidence and perhaps more strength so I can get better focused. That was my characteristic is, focus but drifted more since the incident. That was harder to overcome and get back to the focus.  

Finally, action. 

You can’t sit on your integrity.  

Eat it for that matter. 

If you don’t do something, nothing happens. It’s one of these things that people will sit in a chair and look for manna from heaven. It doesn’t work that way. This world rewards those that do something. If you do a little, you get little. If you do as strong as you possibly can, you’ll do your best at any rate. If you know that you’ve given your top in whatever you accomplish then you’ll know that’s my limit probably. You have to try and find your limits. The only way to do that is to push. 

All of that is great advice, Dr. White. I have to ask you this, some of our audience knows you and some of our audience won’t. What’s ahead? 

I’m expecting a good twenty more years is in there. I have to be careful about this changing world. I have to get on my dancing shoes and get moving. To sit with what I’ve got, may around the corner, just not be enough. I have to find some other ways to move with the times. That may not be what I’m expecting so I have to keep a little bit flexible. Part of the thing is to keep my brain as active as possible because what’s next may require a sharper brain than I’ve got now. 

You’re doing great. You’re an inspiration to us younger guys that work with you and know you at a personal level. Thank you so much for spending time with us. I want to thank, Dr. White, first of all. I want to thank our audience. If you haven’t heard the show before, a lot of it is based on the book called Leave Nothing to Chance, which you can get from Amazon, a hard copy, digital. Our prior book, Moving Up: 2020, has Dr. White’s story in it if you want to purchase that as well. There are a lot of the strategies necessary to build a network marketing company. Our show airs every Tuesday on Spotify, Apple iTunes and a number of other podcast networks around the world. That’s every single Tuesday, even at Christmas, New Year’s, Easter, all year. We never miss a Tuesday to be out there. I want to thank you all for your time. Dr. White, thank you, my friend. 

It’s my pleasure. 

Important Links: 

• Dr. Barrie White – LinkedIn 
• Leave Nothing to Chance 
• Napoleon Hill 
• Think and Grow Rich 
• Moving Up: 2020 
• Amazon – Leave Nothing to Chance 
• Spotify – Leave Nothing to Chance 
• Apple iTunes – Leave Nothing to Chance