Chandler Bolt [00:00:02] Hey, Chandler Bolt here. And joining me today is Elena Cardone. Elena is a model and actress and entrepreneur and the author of the best selling book, Empire Builder How to Have It All. She’s also a speaker at The Unbreakable Challenge, which we’ll be talking about here in just a bit as well. This woman has so many talents. I’m like, I got to condense the bio because it’s like, oh, my gosh, so many things. It’s super, super impressive. So, Elena, welcome. Great to have you here.
Elena Cardone [00:00:32] Oh, yeah. It’s so good to be here. Yeah. My team, I think, thinks very highly of myself and of me. And they send this incredible bio. Every time I hear it, I might stop. It’s too long. But at the same time, thank you very much. And it does feel good to hear that. So thank you.
Chandler Bolt [00:00:51] Yeah, well, so, guys, we’re gonna be talking about on this kind of talk a little bit about the unbreakable challenge. We’re also going to talk about Elena’s book today. First things first. If you want to register for the Unbreakable challenge again, we’ll talk about this later and also go to https://selfpublishing.com/unbreakable. It’s a five day challenge happening right now as we speak. Some incredible speakers, including Elena. All you have to do is go to https://selfpublishing.com/unbreakable. You can register at that link or you can just DM us on Instagram the word “unbreakable” and we’ll send you a link right back. All right. So, Elaina, I guess for starters, you know, we talked about this kind of in the intro. You got so many things going on. You know, you got businesses that you’re running, opportunities that you’re chasing like a lot and a mom. So you’re incredibly busy. Why did you decide to write your book, Empire Builder?
Elena Cardone [00:01:50] I decided to write that book because I didn’t realize that people were having issues in the relationship side of a building empire. So so what happened was when I discovered that Grant and I were operating differently and that was actually helping us reach high levels of success together, I said, You know what? I have to put this information out there for all the powerful, strong entrepreneurs, how to include the partner and the partner that has to be strong enough to live with an entrepreneur, whether it’s male or female. Sometimes it doesn’t matter which one’s the leading role, right? But how to actually work together, delegate roles and figure out the purpose and the mission so that so that men and women or partners. However it may be how two people can come together and actually work together to create success, work for and with each other.
Chandler Bolt [00:02:47] Hmm. And that was I mean, we were talking about this before the interview at the mastermind that Grant put together, and you came in speaker. I thought, I feel like that that talk really resonated with me and really resonated with a lot of people. Of that that partnership and and the home and business and kind of juggling those two in tandem. So was this something that you had spoken on previously? And then you said, Hey, I’m going to crystallize this into a book. Was the book kind of the first time that you were really speaking about that? How did that? Yes.
Elena Cardone [00:03:15] Yeah. The book was the really the first time I sort of figured out and laid it out and could see the actual system and process that I use to create this really strong family dynamic, this really strong team partnership. And I realized it doesn’t even matter if you’re married to the person. These types of relationships have to be made with everyone within your empire, the Platonic relationships as well. And then I sort of evolved into another level of thinking, which is I look at it in the family unit is is is is really a powerful thing when when two people can really come together because two is greater than one and four is greater than one, it’s. But I feel like just like it’s going to sound a little conspiracy theory here, but I don’t think quote unquote, the little people like you and me, if I can. I’m not calling you little. I’m not calling me little. But we’ve been made to think that we’re little and somehow that the billionaires are the really kind of corporation type wealth people are is only for them and not us. But they want us to to, to to not think we can succeed in business. We’ve been indoctrinated to be small minded since since inception, pretty much we’ve been indoctrinated to to be thinking that we have to be strong and powerful and never depend on anyone, that we have to do it ourselves and the solopreneur and all these things designed to keep us small and not expand and build, I think comes from a bigger sort of force out there that wants to break us up and wants to keep us small. But it really is strength in numbers. So as as as we grant and I are involving now, we’re a multibillion dollar company. No other company, no other CEO and his wife is on the call with the normal people that small people that whatever you want to call us, saying this is how we did it. They’re behind closed doors. They don’t want you to know. So I feel more obligated to come out and be, you know, defy all the odds, be a woman saying, yes, it’s okay to support a man. Yes. It’s okay for a man to support me and be dependent, you know, all the other labels that want to label codependent and all that. And you need to take a drug for that. I mean, it’s insane the insidiousness of what a society will do to keep men and women apart and not or partners or whatever. I’m just speaking in the traditional broad sense of, you know, heterosexual relationships. But certainly this could apply for anyone that’s in a partnership. It’s no partnerships. Do they want to see fortified?
Chandler Bolt [00:06:04] Hmm. And so how do you how did you decide to share this message in this book? And because I think on one hand, it’s like, I love what you’re saying. It’s like, hey, all right, you can you can support your husband or your wife or your partner or and that can be the primary thing that you do. And then so I would imagine for a while it’s like, hey, I’m not going to really talk about this stuff. But then there’s that, Hey, I am going to talk about this and how do you kind of balance those two things of like, Hey, I want to be very supportive, but also like, I’m going to take my ground, I’m going to write this book and I’m going to own this platform.
Elena Cardone [00:06:37] Right? That’s because of the purpose. You know, my purpose is to restore the family unit on this planet. I think it’s under ruin. I also want to empower women because I believe women are powerful and they have the capacity or the ability to influence not only themselves but others. And so I really want them to step up into power. So I have a very big purpose line. And when that purpose line is there, it’s easy to balance the two because and then yet I also want to support my husband because I feel like his message is very important for people to have this information, because if you have this information, you apply his information, you change your financial situation for yourself, for your family, for your community, and for the world. And so so I support him in getting his message out. So it’s a constant, you know, balance or prioritizing between the two, because I equally believe in both. I think the two go hand in hand. I think you can have all of Grant’s material and do really well in business and still be broken, like you can’t be ten next in business and have a zero in the relationships. Apartment. You can’t be a ten X in relationships and have your finances in ruins, or you can’t be tenants in business and have health failing, etc., etc.. There’s these pillars, right? So I want to just help all people not only thrive in your business, but in your relationships and in your health and in all aspects of life. And it can be done, but you have to get the right information about about this content. You have to invest some time and energy and sometimes money or resources into yourself to actually get the data. If you have the right information, knowledge is power, you can actually apply it and actually change the circumstances of what your future looks like.
Chandler Bolt [00:08:33] Mhm. That’s cool. That’s cool. It’s obviously you’re passionate about this. What was the tipping point for the book to speaking like. Was there a moment. Was there like when did you finally say, All right, I’m doing it and I like, I like to think of a book is kind of like one, two, one, two, one, two, mini. It’s like you’re probably having these some of these conversations with people and then said, All right, hey, I’m gonna start speaking on this and create the book. Was there a tipping point or a moment that kind of where you said having to do this?
Elena Cardone [00:09:01] Yeah, it was really when it was suggested that I write a book and I immediately said no. I thought up, I’m not a school person. I don’t like to sit still. I came up with a million excuses. I wasn’t smart in school. I can’t write a book. I can’t. How can I? I could hardly even write an English paper. Like, this is insane. So I was against it. And then it was great. And hope you know, somebody who’s willing to stomp on your weaknesses to make you stronger. He was like, You need to write this book. And so I started writing the book. Seven months into the book. He asked me how it was going. I started spewing all of my excuses on why I can’t write a book and 3 hours like he can. And and he called me lazy and a coward. And it really upset me. I was like, How could he do this? I support him. But I realized he wasn’t attacking my strengths because that’s what people do when they really want to hold you down. They attack your strengths. He was attacking my weaknesses and it got me so mad that I actually finished the book. Well, the book actually was an incredible victory for me. It restored my my, my losses that I had had in my schooling and also made me proud that I had this product. And it was grand. A man who actually pushed me and was like, No, you’ve got to get this message out. And and if you don’t get this message out, you are in like you are transgressing against your self because you have knowledge that could help somebody else, but you’re keeping it all to yourself because you want to lie and give yourself excuses. So that was really the tipping point that made me go, okay, I it’s not about me or how I feel, or even when I think about myself, it’s I have a content of value that can if it can help one person, I made a difference. So so that’s when I really realized that when your purpose is big enough, then it doesn’t matter your your little feelings or the invalidation of the criticisms you want to do to yourself. You just do it anyway. And I’ve been on that path, and that’s.
Chandler Bolt [00:11:03] When the purpose is big enough that it’s great. And for those who haven’t heard or listened to this episode, we’ve got absolute we talk about how you grant talks about how you wrote his book in a few hours. It’s way back Self-publishing School Podcast Episode number ten seller Be Sober, Drink or Don’t Elena, talk to me about this unbreakable challenge. And I think there’s kind of these two themes. There’s there’s the Empire Builder theme and, you know, the pillars you were talking about finances, relationships in the family unit, amongst other pillars. And then there’s this unbreakable kind of kind of mindset and challenge. What is the unbreakable challenge and who is it a fit for?
Elena Cardone [00:11:46] Oh, it’s not good for anyone on this planet because we live on an economic planet and unfortunately we can’t buy diapers with a hug. So for anybody that needs to have finances, it’s for you. Okay. So the five pillars for the unbreakable business challenge is, number one, you’re going to re learn and reeducate yourself about the money mindset, because I guarantee you, even myself is still stripping away the false information, the false data about money mindset. Right? So it’s everything you need to know about the money. It’s about communication. What level of communication do you need to have in order to believe in your products and and speak about your products to where there’s duplication on the other side and people actually say yes and transact with you. So money, mindset, communication, then you have to have sales, which is such a nasty word for people who don’t understand sales, because when you understand and get good at sales, you love sales because you can, you know, at any time in the world, you can just go recreate money. You can just who’s got my money? It’s not like this big scary sales. So sales, marketing and scaling all the five things necessary to make yourself unbreakable during any economy, during any lawsuit, during any one dying in your family. Normal levels of action, normal levels that you think are survivable are the biggest threat to society because you think everything is okay until it’s not the only thing that can sustain something not devastating is abundance, abundance of mindset, abundance of scaling, abundance of sales, abundance of people, resources, courage. You need to have that. Then you can sustain hits. So this economy that we’re about to go into is going to hurt a lot of people. Unfortunately. Fortunately, however, you look at a glass half full, glass half empty. This will all be a time in history that more millionaires have ever been made in the history of the world before. So it’s about why should anyone come on to this? Because if you are willing to invest in self enhancing yourself, you can have the commitment to come out of this stronger, better and thriving on the other side. Then then the rest of your quote unquote, competition, who could actually severely get destroyed during this next cycle.
Chandler Bolt [00:14:22] Hmm. That’s great. Now, I know that you’re speaking at the challenge. Are you speaking about the Empire Builder philosophy? Are you speaking about something else? What can people have to look forward to when they show up for your talk?
Elena Cardone [00:14:35] Well, I’m going to be speaking about the empire philosophy. Really? How to marry, marry the two. Because, you know, again, it’s these five pillars for an unbreakable business. And and that is extremely important. Everybody needs this also. You know, for anyone that intends to have any relationship which you need nots, you need relationships for an empire. No empire has ever been built alone, ever in the history of the world. You need people. You need lots of people. So I’m going to be speaking about that aspect of things and who to have in your life and and who not to have in your life and how to get everybody on the same page so that they’re working with you, not against you.
Chandler Bolt [00:15:19] Mm hmm. That’s great. So, guys, you can register for the unbreakable challenge. Go to self-publishing icon for Slash Unbreakable, or you can DM us on Instagram. The word unbreakable will send you the link to register. I love those five pillars of an unbreakable business. The money mindset, the communication, the sales, marketing, and scaling. And amongst all of those is the stuff that you were just talking about is the relationship component. Because in all of this money mindset is it’s your relationship with your money, your communication is your relationship with other people. Sales Probably your is your relationship with your people, sales of marketing, of scaling, there’s insecurities that come up when that happens and just leaning into that. Anything else to speak on, on kind of the relational component of those five pillars?
Elena Cardone [00:16:16] Well, you know, look, people, this is a people planet. You know, it’s and Grant says this all the time. It’s it’s not it’s not it’s not your product. It’s people have everything that you want in this life. So understanding the relationships and inner workings of people and your relationship of how you exchange and what your role is with other people, it’s such a necessity in life to really understand even the people in your own life the most. Like, what is the purpose of your friend? I just I defined that one time. I was like, Why do I have all these friends in my life that that have just been there forever? And all we do is this was years ago is drink wine together and kind of natter about the people in our lives, our partners, our spouses. Like is that what is the what is the purpose of that? And then I redefine the purpose of a friend in my life is to help me get to higher height and levels of success. And if they’re not contributing or or challenging me or and vice versa, then then why am I hanging out with them? And I looked at all the roles like that. The purpose of my business relationships is to expand the business so I can share all my exciting wins with them. Right now, relationships with family members. I used to crucify them because they wouldn’t be excited that I would just tell them about this big exciting win that I would have over the Thanksgiving dinner and they would be like, pass, pass the salt. And I was like, What? And so I would get mad at them. They’re not supporting me. But I realize my the purpose of my family is to have life experiences with to have unconditional love to to, to comfort. I don’t seek comfort from my business friends. I seek comfort from my family. It’s a different role and want to. Once I was able to really analyze the relationships and their roles and what we give and receive unconditional love, family experiences, playing cards, cooking together, you know, all those experiences are not what I do with my business people. So I learned how and why I have everybody in my role and their roles in the empire. And and it just it made me have better relationships with all the people in my life. When I finally figure that one little piece out, you know, and the same thing with the business relationships, I need to not cross the line with the business relationships or or staff or whomever, and trying to have family comfort or unconditional love or whatever. Like, I can’t cross those lines because it causes problems. I will get I will I will get hurt if I do that. It’s not the role, but people, when it’s not defined, they blend everything and then wonder why they find themselves in so many disappointing situations in life. They’ll end up holding them back.
Chandler Bolt [00:19:21] Hmm. That’s great. I want to touch on one one thing. I will pull out my notes from your talk at the mastermind in San Diego. And you had this analogies. You said support is like a support beam. It’s strong enough to bear the weight and kind of destigmatizing being in a supportive role. And you talked about how it’s like you even kind of wrestle with that. So can you maybe unpack that, that that philosophy and how that might be helpful for female entrepreneurs or supportive entrepreneurs?
Elena Cardone [00:19:57] Yeah, it’s it’s really for anyone. It’s it’s it’s exactly what you said, de-stigmatizing. I felt that I was I was degraded because I am in the support role. I looked up the word support. It means to show active interest in the success of it. It means to bear the weight. That’s the dictionary definition. There’s others, but those are the two that really stuck out. And so I really thought about it and I said, okay, so I should be embarrassed that I show active interest in the success of my husband. Like, why am I apologizing? You’re feeling bad for that. Isn’t that a good thing? Wouldn’t everyone want that? Like, that elevates me because not everybody does that for their spouse. That’s a that’s a real big super human power that I have to support. Then bearing the weight of. When you really analyze it, it’s a support beam. So the support beam would have to be stronger than the thing. It’s bearing the weight up. So I bear the weight of grant card on motherhood, the rest of the empire, that everything that comes around, I support it. I hold the family together. Grant holds the business together. I hold the family together. Okay, let’s be clear on that role. And so why am I this powerful woman who can really do anything, be made to feel less stand for being stronger than Grant Card? Known in all of that world. And that is the day I realized, you know what, I’m going to own this. And more women need to hear the real definition of support, and then they need to be able to decide whether they want to be proud enough to say, that’s right, I’m strong enough to support. I’m a support and own it. And when you own it, it can no longer make you feel less than or degraded that and then women can go around in society. And when asked, what do you do? Even though they might do any other incredible business, they’ll still say, I’m just a mom or I’m just a wife, you know, as if that’s some somehow less than No, I’m sorry. Womanhood. Motherhood is only the most important role into society because we are responsible for rearing productive, contributing members of society which forwards to civilization. So when you look at it in terms like that, why have we been reduced down to, Oh, we’re just a mother, just a mother, We’re responsible for the entire civilization, but we’re just a mom. So I encourage women to never say just in front of anything that they do ever again, because we are really powerful. And that is not to disclose our men out there because I’m trying to get men and women on the same page and not feeling like they can’t do it without the dependency on a man. I depend on my man every single day and he depends on me. And that’s how we work. And I’m okay with that because I’m going to fulfill my roles in 100% and I depend on him to fulfill his role in 100%. So we’re not 5050 in this relationship. We’re both 101 hundred, which gives us such a far advantage over everybody else who are in these relationships. Still not with a big enough purpose, fighting each other to be important and to have this power role instead of coming together, fighting the real enemies and going towards goals together. Because a win for him is a win for me. A win for me is a win for him.
Chandler Bolt [00:23:20] MM That’s awesome. And I love that. Eliminating the phrase just a that’s great. So we talked about the unbreakable challenge a little bit earlier. It’s happening right now as we speak, a five day challenge for people to become unbreakable and learn the five pillars of an unbreakable business. So whether we’re going into a recession or not, most people think that we are doesn’t matter. We’re going to unbreakable. You will. You will survive, Nancy. Survive, but thrive. No matter what looms ahead in the economy. You can register at self-publishing dot com forward slash unbreakable Eleanor Besides Grant, who is the speaker that you’re most excited to hear speak as part of the challenge?
Elena Cardone [00:24:07] Well, I love T.D. Jakes, of course. And people are I mean, all of them. It’s so hard to say. And Stormy Wellington is such a great friend and a powerful speaker and influencer. So I’ll be glued the entire time because I’m always self enhancing, you know, even if I may have heard something a year ago, it’s I’m a different person than I was. It will affect me in a new unit of time. So I listen, I take notes. I’m constantly trying to become better and and evolve and do more, be more and and and make a difference. So I’ll be on the entire challenge myself as a student as well.
Chandler Bolt [00:24:50] Awesome. And why should people register and not just register, but show up? It’s easy to type in a couple of details and say, All right, I’m registered. It’s another thing to show up, take notes and learn, like you said.
Elena Cardone [00:25:02] You know what? It’s look, if you if you’re not where you want to be, it’s because you haven’t been willing to give up something in order to get where you want to be. So what are you willing to give up? Are you willing to give up excuses why you can’t be there? Are you willing to invest in yourself instead of doing something that isn’t contributing to creating the empire? So so those are the things. And lastly, I’ll say, look, it’s about getting the right information. I’ll just break this down briefly. The definition of information means information like a structure, right? The the origin of the word information means formation of the mind. Okay. Knowledge is power. We’ve all heard and believe and know that to be true. Well, what if you have the wrong information? What if you have missing information? Wouldn’t that equally mean that you have a deformation of your mind? If you have a deformation of your mind, you can’t operate and get productive results because it’s deformed, it’s twisted. You’re going to alter before you get to the end result, Right? You’re going to take a different path. So, you know, when that happens and you have a deformation of your mind, what is likely to happen is you’ll come up with a whole list of reasons why you can’t get it and you’ll tell them all to yourself and they’ll end in invalidation or that never work before. I do this task program and it never work, etc., etc. But when you get the right information and get rid of that and sort out your mind when you actually apply the data to your life going forward, inevitably you actually change the trajectory of your life because you can make the result. You can create the life that you want for yourself. It doesn’t happen by accident. Get the right information and create the life that you want by applying the principles, simple principles that are life altering. And it’s for free. Yeah, it’s for free. You can either join for free or you can pay a VIP price and go VIP, VIP and get the recordings and have backstage interviews with all the speakers, etc., etc.. It’s up to you. But Grant and I have really decided when 2008 we were on the verge of losing everything financially, we said, Look, if the small people, the little people from Louisiana can make it out, we’ll never close the curtains. We’ll let all the quote unquote little people in. And really, we’ve made it. It’s it’s proof that it works, that our systems and processes work. And we want we made a vow. So we give back and we have expensive products that we charge a lot of money for. But we will always put out free content because we believe that everyone who’s willing to invest and self-finance. We believe that we should be able to have this data available for everyone who wants a hand up or wants help or knows they can do more, be more, has a bigger potential, but is stuck. We want to be there for you. We were there our selves and no one was there. There was no CEO of $1,000,000,000 company or a multibillion dollar company. There was no wife of a CEO of a multi-billion dollar company saying, This is what we did. It’s very simple and you can do it too. It does not exist anywhere. So that’s why we offer this program for free for everyone out there, because, you know, we have our success. We had our billion. But that’s not truly how I value success. Success for us is how many people can we help along the way and have be successful not just in finances but in their personal lives as well. And that will really be our contribution to our spiritual legacy is how many people and what big of an impact could we have made on this planet. And I can’t do it alone. So anybody out there who wants their lives to be better and feels that you could help other people’s lives, I’ll see you on the challenge. And we can partner together. We can have wins and results and help more people bring more love to this planet. Because when we’re winning, we’re not hating. And the world needs more winning and loving right now. And and it’s going to be the entrepreneurs that save the planet, not the politicians.
Chandler Bolt [00:29:42] No doubt. Go to self-publishing that conference that’s unbreakable. Register for the challenge the day. Like Elaina said, it’s free and you can dive in and you can choose to if you want to purchase the VIP for an upgraded experience. But yeah, go to self-publishing dot com for words Last Unbreakable. Or you can just if you’re on Instagram, just DM us with the word unbreakable. We’ll send you the link to register. Don’t wait though this live five days happening right now, so you need to register ASAP. Alina, this has been awesome. Anywhere else you’d like to see people before we wrap up to check out your books or anything else that would be helpful.
Elena Cardone [00:30:21] Well, know it all they can. I have a free copy of my book at Card dotcom forward slash empire. You pay the shipping, I pay for the book. But but really, you know, anything I can ever do to help anyone out there? I’m here. I’m available. I’ll be on the unbreakable challenge. I’m looking to expand my empire. I hope you join us. And I just wish everyone tremendous amounts of success and happiness because you deserve it. And and I appreciate you for having the audacity to be an entrepreneur and to go for greatness. Because in this world, a lot of people are against success. But I am not. And I am here to support you to show active interest in the success of you. So I cannot wait to see you at the Unbreakable Business Challenge.
Chandler Bolt [00:31:10] Awesome. Well, guys, once again, you can register at https://selfpublishing.com/unbreakable. We will see you on the challenge.