Daniel Tolson: Using Emotional Intelligence To Unlock New Income Levels
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Growing up, Daniel Tolson was told "you're either depressed when you get into real estate or when you leave it." This idea has always stuck with him, which is why he now is Asia's #1 business coach specializing in Emotional Intelligence. He works with top real estate agents & brokers, celebrities, millionaires, and business to identify mental & emotional blockages and other challenges to help them unlock new income levels in their lives. Listen as we discuss emotional intelligence, fears, limiting beliefs, trauma, hiring, and how addressing these things is just as crucial as focusing on your sales skills.
In this episode, hosted by Mike Swenson, we discussed:
- Daniel's an expert when it comes to hiring people helping people with success. He's regarded as the #1 business coach in Asia, specializing in emotional intelligence and works with celebrities, millionaires, billion-dollar businesses
- Daniel started a program in Australia called Real Estate Agent rescue, helping agents grow their businesses
- He discussed “Emotional Intelligence” - the ability to be street smart, to understand who you are and understanding your strengths and weaknesses.
- To be successful in selling, you have to be able to ask great questions, and then have the ability to listen. What you do is you listen to what's important to them. Then you build your presentations around the client, about what's important to them. That's how you become influential.
- Four fears that all business owners and real estate agents have to face on a daily basis.
- Fear of being taken advantage of.
- Fear of rejection and the fear of criticism.
- Fear of losing stability.
- Fear of trying and failing.
- Success can be broken down into three components, knowledge, skill, and attitude.
Timestamps
00:00 - Intro and overview on Daniel ‘s career
05:20 - How he got into coaching
08:03 - Talking about emotional intelligence
17:21 - Knowing your tool belt of skills
22:56 - Talking about the growth of someone, plateau of achievement.
31:36 - What do you say to that person that says, I'm already successful?
34:04 - How he got into Taiwan
45:46 - Where can folks learn more about Daniel
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Full transcript here:
Mike Swenson
Welcome to The REL freedom podcast where we inspire you to pursue your passion to gain time and financial freedom through opportunities in real estate. I'm your host, Mike Swenson. Let's get some real freedom together.
Mike Swenson
Hey, welcome everybody to another episode of REL freedom stories. And today's gonna be a little bit of a different episode, we are going to talk about some of the soft skills that make building your real estate business and growing your investment portfolio and working with other people so important. And so don't let the accent fool you. We've got Daniel Tolson here from Taiwan. And he's going to share with you about primarily talking a lot about emotional intelligence. He's an expert when it comes to hiring people helping people with success. So he's actually regarded as the number one business coach in Asia, specializing in emotional intelligence works with celebrities, millionaires, billion dollar businesses, really helping them to unlock and go through different ceilings of achievement. So Daniel, we're so excited to have you. You just have a wealth of knowledge. And I really look forward to being able to share with our listeners, how those soft skills, the mental health is so important to building and growing your businesses. So thank you so much for coming on. And we're so excited to have you on the show.
Daniel Tolson
My pleasure, Mike, I was just reflecting on my real estate career not long ago, and somebody said, what's funny memories from real estate. And I thought back and I thought, what was something that really stood out, and then I remembered I was drugged at a listing presentation. And I remember, my vision started to close down, I started to get tunnel vision. And it was like I was looking through the end of a pinhole. And I quickly ran out of the house, I took all my listing presentations, I jumped in my car drove down the street about three mile. And then my buddy went cataleptic. And I couldn't drive any further. So I pulled over and with my last breath, I rang my uncle, who was the business owner, I said, have been drugged at the listing presentation, you got to come and get me. And then I'll just cataleptic in the car couldn't move my body. So lucky, I had that little bit of emotional intelligence to understand that things were going different. Wrong direction. And I got out of there as fast as I could.
Mike Swenson
Yeah, well, so beforehand, when we were talking about your your background in real estate, you know, you had a quote here. You're either depressed when you get into real estate or depressed when you leave it. And, you know, I think that speaks to you know, it's high stress. A lot of times people think in real estate, it's Oh, I just sit back and do nothing and collect commission track checks and all these big checks and build this portfolio. But emotionally, it's exhausting. There's a lot to handle. There's a lot of things that can come up. But yeah, just just want to share, you know, why don't you just share a little bit about your background and kind of how you got to where you're at today, before we dig in further?
Daniel Tolson
Well, I didn't know how to take it. I didn't know if it was a compliment or a dig. Because my uncle said to me at age 19. He said, Danny Boy, you're out of control. He said, you don't have an education. You don't have a career, you're not going anywhere in life. He says you need to get back on the path. And he said, Hey, if you want to get back on the path, come and work with me in real estate. And I said, Why would I get into real estate. He said it's because it's the last place on the planet, that you can write your own check without a education. And now I heard that I thought it's the last place on the planet where I can write my own shake without an education. Now I didn't know if he was taking a dig at me or not, because I wasn't educated. But then he kind of explained to me said, Daniel, in this field, it doesn't matter about your IQ.
Daniel Tolson
It doesn't matter about your school certificate, but college you did or didn't go to what university degree you do or don't have. He said in rewarded. You get in real estate, you get rewarded for your attitude. And he said you don't have a formal skill set. You have learning disabilities, and you didn't finish school, but you're going to get rewarded for your personality. And so at age 19, he gave me a book by Brian Tracy, who has called Maximum achievement. And he's right in the front cover to Danny Boy, this is your blueprint of success. And he said, if you follow all these principles, if you set your goals if you start to manage your emotions, then you can start to succeed in this field. So I applied everything in this book. In my real estate career really took off in the first year I was in the top 10 sales creators in the country. So my job was just a prospect, prospect prospect. But because I could manage that fear of rejection, that fear of judgment, that fear of criticism, I could just go to door to door to door knocking without losing enthusiasm. by 19 and a half have bought my first real estate investment property by 21.
Daniel Tolson
I'm buying my second investment property, but I dropped out of school I had no education and he was right it was the last place on the planet, that you could write your own check with no education, age didn't matter. Sex didn't matter. Color, the skin didn't matter, you got rewarded for your personality. So I loved my time in real estate. And it really gave me the basis of human understanding of what I have today and what I do as a coach.
Mike Swenson
Okay, so then talk about how how did you get into the coaching side of things and kind of focusing on what you're focusing on?
Daniel Tolson
Well, I think a lot of people in as we mentioned before you get into a good real estate because you're depressed, and you get out because you're depressed. I lost a business in 2007, I moved to the Middle East in 2007. And then I was on an aircraft flying from Dubai, to Manchester in 2009. And I was cabin crew, and I was working from in Ceylon, and I met a gentleman on the flight seemed like a really nice guy. And he said he was a life coach. And I didn't know what that was. And he started to talk to me. And he said, you know, all of us get fears, doubts, and limiting beliefs. And these are the things that are really holding us back. So I started to work with him. And I realized that I had a lot of fear, doubts and limiting beliefs. And they'd really held me back, I'd lost a business. Now I'm afraid to start another one. I'm afraid that people are going to take advantage of me. So I'm not taking the action that I need to, I'm starting to doubt myself, did I get lucky, and you start to feel like an imposter? Am I going to be able to do it again? And I was going through all of this, am I am I not educated enough? Am I too old to succeed in my only gonna serve chicken and beef at 40,000 feet for the rest of my life. And so I started to work with him.
Daniel Tolson
And within just a couple of sessions, I started to strip away these fears, these doubts, these limiting beliefs. And I felt so good. I had never felt so good in a decade. And so then I started to course correct and I got back involved in my coaching. Now, this year is my 25th year in coaching, I was actually coaching watersports at age 16. And I said, What do I want to do with my life. And I said, I just want to help people. And so after I finished my career with Emirates airline, we moved back to Australia. And I started a program called Real Estate Agent rescue. And I thought to myself, who could utilize these resources, and I went back to my roots went back to real estate. And I started to help these real estate agents take their income from 50,000 to $100,000 a month without teaching them a sales skill.
Daniel Tolson
And I realized it was all about mindset. So I wrote a book called $100,000 months in real estate. And it was just about the mindset and the emotional intelligence of real estate agents, how they can succeed once they start to eliminate those fears, doubts and limiting beliefs. And so then, since my early days, as a coach doing what I do now, I still have clients who worked with me in 2014, who are still coming back for coaching today. But it's a different style of coaching, when they were dealing with these fees, doubts and limiting beliefs, that's gone. Now they're looking at growing and scaling their business. So I help them build a winning team, and help them identify emotional intelligence before somebody comes into the business.
Mike Swenson
So kind of talking about emotional intelligence. So there might be folks on here that haven't heard of it, just break that down for somebody, I'm kind of explaining what it is, and why it's obviously so important.
Daniel Tolson
So we've got IQ, which is a measure of our academic success. And then we have EQ, which is a measurement of your life success. So we say that about 58% of your success in life is going to come down to your level of emotional intelligence. And because real estate agents are practical people, I think the best way to describe it is with a practical term. Emotional intelligence is the ability to be street smart. It's the ability to understand who you are understanding your strengths and weaknesses. Everybody knows the person in real estate who overcoats the house, they overcoat the house because they have a lack of emotional intelligence, they feel they have to do this to win the business. So they over quoted, everybody knows the person who under quotes it and always loses the listing. They go in there and they feel oh my gosh, well, I'm a little bit uncertain about myself. I'm not too confident I can actually sell this property. So I might just lowball it. And then when I go back to the office, I tell everybody, the vendor wanted too much. And I didn't get to listen. But it's an example of a lack of self awareness.
Daniel Tolson
The second thing in no real estate agent has fees. No real estate agent has limiting beliefs. No agent would ever second guess themselves. That we all do. See, the reason why real estate agents fail to ask for the order at the end of a presentation is because the fear of rejection. And I have worked with real estate agents who go from presentation to presentation, the presentation and they never close. They always say to the vendor. Think about it tonight, and I'll call you back tomorrow. But because of a fear of rejection, they leave the door open and they walk out of the house and they never knock on it again, because they've done this great presentation. But they don't want to hear the word no because it's no that triggers off rejection, they can't handle the No.
Daniel Tolson
So they've got to learn to manage their emotions then the third part is motivation. And what I realized in real estate was you need a lot of resiliency. When I was knocking on doors, you go from door to door to door, and you hear no 99 times before you even get a yes, but most people give up before they get the Yes, but it's all part of the game. So you've got to become resilient, you've got to be able to get kicked in the gut, oh, punched in the guts fall down, get back up without losing enthusiasm. That's the key to success. You've also got social awareness, which is the ability to read the emotional makeup of other people. Now, for a lot of agents, it's very easy to sell to people just like you. I'm aggressive, I'm competitive, I can sell to all the aggressive and competitive people. But it doesn't mean I can sell effectively to the risk averse person. It doesn't mean I can sort of the person who's closed off and non emotional. So agents have to be able to read the emotional makeup of other people and then adapt, adjust and respond there with their personality in their listings down to the homeowner.
Daniel Tolson
The fifth area is what we call social regulation. This is your ability to influence and persuade. And if you can't influence and persuade, if you can't get people to follow your advice, then you can't succeed in this field. But the ones who make a lot of money have that ability to influence and persuade. They just don't do it linguistically. They do it emotionally. Because what the top agents know is that emotions are contagious. So my biggest lesson going into real estate with no experience, my uncle said to me, Daniel, he said, in thues, YaSM, will outsell experience 10 to one, if you're enthusiastic, if you smile, if you're charming, if you're ready to show them that you're ready to work for them, you're going to work long, hard hours, they will feel that emotion, and they'll buy into that. And it worked for me. And so that's social regulation. So they're the five pillars of emotional intelligence, and the the the core of success in our personal and our professional life.
Mike Swenson
Now, a big part of, you know, the emotional intelligence is, knowing what your strengths are, and knowing where it isn't your strengths. So if I'm somebody that's looking to get into real estate, and I look up and I say, Hey, Daniel, you know, I'm not naturally an enthusiastic type person or cash, I really don't feel like an influencer. Maybe I shouldn't do real estate. What would you say to somebody like that? Because we're in we're all self critical to at times, I shouldn't say we all are. But lots of us are self critical at times, and you look at the shortcomings, and you think, well, maybe I shouldn't do this. Because if it takes these things to be successful, and I don't have these things right now, maybe I should just get out.
Daniel Tolson
Well, the interesting thing is Hollywood has portrayed that successful sales, people are bold, and ambitious, and loud, enthusiastic, and then star of the show couldn't be any further away from the truth. The truth is, it's the low keyed person, the person who's more focused on relationships, and a great listener, who is the best influencer. So people don't care about your story. In real estate, they don't care about your car, when you drive it up to the front of house, they don't care about the watch you're wearing, they care about their car, they care about their watch. And to be successful in selling, you have to be able to ask great questions, and then have the ability to listen. People like to talk, people talk themselves into a sale. And everybody's heard of the Freudian slip, if you just listen, people will tell you exactly what you need to know to serve them. And then because a man can't be convinced against his own will, what you do is you listen to what's important to them. And then you build your presentations around the client, about what's important to them. That's how you become influential.
Daniel Tolson
So when I was in real estate, I didn't know a lot about the world. But I was a great listener. And then I'd ask great questions. And then when it comes to enthusiasm, enthusiasm is not like going to a Tony Robbins event, jumping up and down for three days going, Tony, Tony, Tony, what we call enthusiasm. It's a constrained enthusiasm. It's like this. It's like, you've just had sex. And you know it, but nobody else knows it. And you've got this little secret in your status, smirk is to add to smile, you feel a little bit naughty, and all of a sudden your eyes start to twinkle. And people say, what's going on he there's something they can feel something there. And it's a constrained enthusiasm. It's having that enthusiasm, but it's like bottling it up in the side of yourself and you've got a secret that nobody else knows about. And that's enthusiasm. It's called constrained enthusiasm. It's the most important enthusiasm when you're selling.
Daniel Tolson
So even if you're quiet, even if you're located the interest thing is, you're more of a farmer in real estate, you'll start to build these long term relationships, then your relationships, the roots will be so deep that people feel that they know like and trust you. But what actually that translates to, it translates to the Golden Triangle of selling. So today, people are influenced by three things. And that's exactly what you're doing with your podcast. What they want is they want education, you know, when you have a podcast, and then you're constantly educating your marketplace, they don't look at you, as a salesperson, they look at you as a teacher. And we all respect our teachers and mentors. Secondly, when you have a podcast, or when you've got these great relationships, when people have a relationship with you, that eliminates the risk. And so as you build relationships, they don't look at your salesperson, they look at you as their friend. And then thirdly, people need consultation. People don't want to be pitched to they don't want to be sold to people want to make an informed decision, because they're risk averse.
Daniel Tolson
So when they look at you, as a consultant, they say, You're my trusted advisor, I'm going to ask a great question, you're going to give me excellent advice, and you're going to help me make a decision that is right for me, because everybody's made a bad decision. Every time you make a bad decision, you get penalized. So when you become a relationship salesperson, an educational salesperson, in a consultative salesperson, it doesn't matter what your core personality style is, you will succeed.
Mike Swenson
Yeah, that's, that's awesome. Because, you know, I, we've talked in the past about, you know, you you need to have a tool belt of skills here. And you can't just be the sledge hammer, because there's a lot of agents where they're just the sledge hammer, right. And somebody like me, that's extremely introverted. I'm like the anti sledge hammer, or like, you're scared of the sledge hammer. And so, yeah, I think that's key is just understanding. There's so many different personalities out there. And you have to know like, yeah, when is it best to be a screwdriver? When is it best to be a tape measure? When is it best to be a hammer? And knowing when to use what tool is what really would make you successful? And then understanding where you're best? Yeah, you can you can listen to people and have them open up, you know, we always say selling isn't selling, selling is asking great questions. And so that's exactly what you said,
Daniel Tolson
you know, what you're saying here is beautiful, because most real estate agents who start their business, at the start, they've been that hammer, a cable, I've succeeded, because I've just gone bang, bang, bang, I've nailed everything. But then you realize you're only limited to a small portion of the marketplace. So when I'm helping companies, build real estate teams, we want a little bit of all of these styles on the team. Because there's not just one style that works. You've got to be able to have all those styles. There's one agent that I was working with very successful guy making $600,000 a year in commissions. But he wasn't happy with his leadership team. And he said, under this current leadership, I can't get the best out of me. So he walked away from 600,000 a year to go back to zero. And he wanted to work in an office where they appreciated his style, but they could help him adjust his behaviors. Because yes, he was the sledgehammer bang, bang, bang.
Daniel Tolson
But he was also losing so much. He said to me, he said, I think I'm losing at least 600,000 a year, I'm getting 600. But I'm definitely losing 600. So when he came into this new office, the owners looked at his behavioral style. They coached him based on his behavioral style. They taught him how to become more emotionally intelligent, emotionally aware, and how to deal with the broad spectrum of behaviors of all the home sellers. Now, this gentleman went from success to success to success. And it was within about 12 months, he was back up to being in the top 10% of agents in the state. And then within about two years, he's in the top 10% of agents in the country. And instead of being able to sell to one or two different behavioral styles, he can now sell to all three. And it's transformed his career because that agent who's the hammer, bang, bang, bang, they might make the first sale, they never get the second sale. And they very rarely get the referrals because it's been such a traumatic experience for the home seller.
Daniel Tolson
But now because he can adapt, adjust and respond. He just works off referrals. So he didn't have to prospect like he used to. People start coming to him instead of him having to go out to them. But it was the ability of the business owner to see his style to coach him through his job and then show him how to adapt, adjust and respond to all buyers. And so for him if we go back to mental health, he doesn't feel anxious anymore. He doesn't feel angry anymore. He doesn't feel fearful about his future anymore. He doesn't wake up in the morning go oh, where's my next sale coming from? Am I gonna make enough sales to survive? No. He's just got this nice trajectory where he just constantly and steadily grow goes month after month, quarter after quarter, year after year. And what's happening now is it's changed the culture within the business, instead of the team going on the roller coaster, all of them growing steadily. Now I can tell you the growth and what it looks like. In 2017, this company was doing around about $115,000 a month in commissions.
Daniel Tolson
And that was their best month ever. Their smallest month now was $300,000 a month. And that was only back in 2017, the owner of the business, he improved his emotional intelligence. And he saw a personal increase of 250% difference in his sales, he would lose six out of seven listings today, because he's more emotionally aware. He wins six out of seven, but it's transformed the business and it transforms the people inside it. So that emotional intelligence component is the most critical for success.
Mike Swenson
I like you were you'd mentioned about how, you know when building a sales team, you want to have a mix of different things. And I had a former mentor had talked about you know, building a sales team. He said, think about it like a mixed bag of nuts, right? Like when you have the bag of nuts, and there's like what four or five, six different kinds. He's like, That's what makes a great sales team. Because you have the different personalities, you have the different styles, where you can really help each other sharpen each other. But then you have different people that can work best in certain circumstances. So I've always that analogy has stuck with me. So when you had mentioned about having the different personalities that made sense?
Daniel Tolson
Well, for the for the introverts, we want introverts on the team. You want introverted sales people because they go out. And they ask the questions that nobody else would think of. And they ask great questions, because they don't necessarily want to be the star of the show. And the reality is, is these dominant solid real estate agents, these high influence style real estate agents, they want the spotlight on them, they want to be on the signboard. They want to be in the newspaper, they want to be on the Billboard, and they want the spotlight on them. But the introvert says, Don't put the spotlight on me, I don't want to be seen. So the introvert flips around the spotlight and they put the spotlight on the vendor, they put it on the buyer, and they go, you're the star of the show. Let me shine the light on you.
Daniel Tolson
And they're happy to sit in the background. And I'll tell you what, introverts over time, their ability to maintain positive mental and emotional health is incredible. Because they don't go through the rejection, they still they still have to go through the judgment because we're in sales. But they don't constantly feel the rejection, which they don't have to put themselves out there all the time. They're happy just to be a little bit more low-key. So yes, if you're an introvert, you want to be in real estate, I'm introverted. I've just learned to adapt. But I prefer introversion. If I go to a party, I'm the guy standing the corner speaking to the girls who are 60 and 70. Because I like to hear their old stories. Universe do well in this field.
Mike Swenson
Absolutely. So let's talk a little bit about the growth of someone. So, you know, when when people start to have success, and they maybe hit some sort of plateau of achievement? How do you help people work through that?
Daniel Tolson
That income glass ceiling can see the next level of success, they just can't reach it? There's a great case study. And I was called out to a company in Australia. And when they got on a call with me, they said, Daniel, we can't grow this business. And I said, Well, what does that mean to you, they said, what we do is we just work all the time, we get up early, we stay in late, and we've basically run out of hours, there is no more time in the day to succeed. And what we've created is this culture where we just don't stop. But if we stop and take a break, we are afraid that we're going to lose lose traction, we're afraid if we take a day off, we're going to miss a sale and the whole business is going to collapse. I'm afraid if I take a week holiday that I'm gonna lose all of my customers. So there's a lot of fear. And there's four fears that all business business owners and real estate agents have to face on a daily basis.
Daniel Tolson
The first one is the fear of being taken advantage of. So if you're a real estate agent, and you're moving into becoming a business owner, the greatest fear here is now I've got to employ people. What if I employ people, and I pay them a good commission and a base salary, and they don't perform. So out of a fear of being taken advantage of what happens is they tend not to employ or if they employ, they don't employ the best people. If they employ the best people, they say, Well, if I bring this person in and they're really good, they might leave me in start up in opposition and take all of my leads, okay, don't want that person. So they end up going for the low performer and they bring the low performer and then that low performer consumes all of their time. They try to get them up to be a high performer, but the person leaves so then they set themselves. I gave somebody an opportunity and then they left me And then my sales collapsed around me. So it's that first fear.
Daniel Tolson
That fear also prevents a lot of agents and business owners to put the hand up and say, Hey, I need help. So they get the end of that pit of despair. And they say, shit, I can't get out of this by myself. But I don't want to ask for help, because somebody might take advantage of me. So that's the first one. The second fear that we have to face is the fear of rejection and the fear of criticism. So as an agent, what you've got to understand is that before age 18, you've heard the word no 148,000 times. And every time you hear the word no, which comes from the people that you want to try to list their house is when they say no, that triggers off the fear of rejection, the fear of judgment. And so people in the back of their mind, they say, I don't want to hear that. So what happens is they don't prospect.
Daniel Tolson
Thirdly, it's the fear of losing stability. And a lot of people get comfortable in real estate, they say, You know what, I'm doing 50 hours a week, and I'm making 100 grand, but I'm comfortable, I'm happy, they really want to get to that 150. But they've gotten that comfort zone. And as soon as you move out of the comfort zone by 10%, that's when all the fees kick back in. You won't feel your fees in your comfort zone. But as soon as you move out by temps, and as soon as you try to get to 110, the fees kick in, they go, I don't want to feel that. And so there's that income glass ceiling.
Daniel Tolson
And then the fourth one is the fear of trying and failing. People are so embarrassed about trying and failing. They're like, I could go into a new area, I could start to get commissions of two and three and 4%. I could start to sell million dollar homes. But what if it doesn't work out for me? What if I start my own business in a new area? And it doesn't work out for me? What if I go to that new growth corridor, and it doesn't work out for me. So because they're afraid of trying and failing, they don't do anything and they get stuck. And that's what prevents them from breaking through. So to break through, we've got to start with self awareness, but get to understand our strengths and our limitations. But the hardest part because we're salespeople, we don't want to say that we've got a limitation. And that's the worst thing is as soon as you say I don't have a limitation, you then put your blindfold on. You've got all these blind spots, but you can't see it, everybody else sees it. So what we do is we help them improve their emotional awareness.
Daniel Tolson
We did a case study in a company. This is fascinating. This gentleman, he was 50 years old. He'd done all the training, but he couldn't get results. So the company come in and said, This guy's phenomenal. We can see greatness within him. He should be an agent doing $100,000 a month. But he's his own worst enemy. They said, Can you help him? Now, when we started to talk to this gentleman, I said to ask him, What training have you had in real estate? Have you got your license? He had done everything. He studied everything. He read all the latest books, that wasn't the problem. Knowledge wasn't the problem. I said, Do you have the skills? He said, Yes, I've been selling since I was 18. Skill wasn't the problem. It was the attitude. Now, his greatest fear was the fear of rejection. And this is how it worked.
Daniel Tolson
A lot of people are looking for this cause and effect situation but who rejected you? When did they reject you? Why did they reject you and they look for this causal relationship? What caused this? Now when it comes to mental and emotional blockages, you've got to deal with the root cause. And the root cause of our mental and emotional blockages start from birth to about age seven. So this is where the root causes nobody's looking at everybody's looking at bandaid solutions. who rejected you yesterday. Did you use the right tone? Did you follow the listing presentation? It's nothing about this. So I got to know this gentleman. And we started to look at his detailed personal history. And he said, No, I don't like being rejected. He said, because whenever I get rejected, it feels like somebody's leaving me. Now, as we went back through his personal history, we realized that around about age seven, his dog died. Now when your animal dies, it's called a significant emotional event. And at 50, he had never overcome the death of his dog at age 43. Now, this doesn't even make sense. Why would a 50 year old man in real estate who can't get results be talking about his dog that died at age 70? It doesn't make sense.
Daniel Tolson
That's true. It doesn't make sense because it's not cause and effect. It's called synchronicity. It's what likes to occur with what? So think about this. There's an old quote that says, A dog is man's best friend. Now, if your best friend died, would that impact you? So what he developed over the years was he developed a fear of getting into a relationship, because if he got into a relationship, and he started to like and admire and love somebody, and then they left him, he would feel abandoned. So his greatest fear in real estate was a abandonment. And it looked like this 10 years, if I go and prospect and find somebody that I really like, I'm going to create a relationship with them. But I don't want the relationship to end. And if I eventually sell the house, which is the job of the real estate agent, I'm going to get paid. But I'm never going to see that person again. And that fear of abandonment was the fee that held him back.
Daniel Tolson
That was the biggest glass ceiling. It had nothing to do with real estate. It had nothing to do with selling. It was his unresolved fear of abandonment. So I showed him how to overcome that fear of abandonment. On that exact day. He went from making about 20 prospecting calls a day to 80 Call today. Within six months, he rang me said, Daniel, you wouldn't believe it, since I got rid of that fear. He said, I'm so happy to get into relationships. He said, I'm going out there, I'm prospecting, presenting, closing, I'm selling, he and then he sent me a photo, he's in a convertible car, he's taken a selfie. And he said, Daniel, this is the first holiday I've had in 10 years, he said, I've made so much money, that I can finally reward myself and my wife on a nice holiday. And so once he dealt with that one fear, once he let his ego go to the side, and work with that theme, he became successful. So this is what we've got to do. We got to deal with those fees to get through to that next level. Well, we face those fees again, yes, we will. But there'll be at a very different level. And that's what we're gonna do to be ultimately successful. That's why we say emotional intelligence is 58% of your success, you've got to be able to regulate that emotion to get the energy to move forward.
Mike Swenson
Well, and that's, you know, the the stat about the 58%. That's exactly what I was gonna ask next is, you know, what do you say to that person that says, I'm already successful? Or what do I need all that fluffy stuff for? Because I'm so focused on my hard sales skills, not necessarily my Soft Skills, skills, and you had already pre answered it by saying, you know, you can lead with a 50% 50% of your, of your success is all that other stuff that you're not focusing on? That's how you can build and develop and make more money and be more successful?
Daniel Tolson
Yeah. And then I asked them, I say, why don't you have all the listings in the city? Because they often say, our cups full of all good. He goes, I'm the best at what I do. Well, why does that person have they have 50 listings? Why didn't you get caught out? Yeah. And then they start to think, hey, maybe there's something that I don't know. And so what I've learned over the years is it's not what we know, that hurts us. It's what we don't know, that hurts us. And we have so many blind spots. There's, there's a study that they did years ago, and it's called the Carnegie studies, they broke success down into three components, knowledge, skill, and attitude. And we've always heard in real estate, the more you learn, the more you earn. But people go from event to event event, and nothing happens to their income.
Daniel Tolson
No, I was, I had a learning disability at school. And as punishment they used to send me to the library. And I used to look around the library nonsense of myself. If the more you learn, the more you own was true, why isn't this librarian a billionaire? Right? And then you start to realize, it ain't nothing to do with knowledge and skill. It has to do with our attitude. Our attitude is our angle of approach. How am I approaching my customer? How am I approaching my targets? How am I approaching approaching the way I manage my emotions? How am I approaching my mindset, it's the approach that's most important. And if your approach is just one degree off, you'll miss the target. And all you got to do is course correct. In real estate, all you have to have is a 3% competitive advantage. And you will win all the business, it's 3%. You don't have to be 10% better. It's 3%. And you just got to work on those 3% gains, which come predominantly from emotional intelligence, self awareness, self regulation, motivation, social awareness, and social regulation. Work on those you Korea will take off.
Mike Swenson
Can you just share a little bit more about you had mentioned about how you you got to Taiwan? Why don't you just share a little bit because I know people are wondering, how did this guy with an Australian accent end up in Taiwan?
Daniel Tolson
Well, the first thing is my family had been bashing me. They're like Daniel, you gotta learn the language. Now, two nights ago, my wife woke me up and me asleep. She said, You're speaking Chinese in your sleep. So I think I've really mastered this. So I was I was in real estate. I went traveling around the world. I ended up in Dubai and I helped a gentleman launch a business whilst I was in Dubai. I lost my own business. And then I lost the job that I also had. So I had to reinvent myself. So I started to work with Emirates airline, and I was co leading a team of 17,000 people by the time I finished, but in 2010, my wife had an accident on the aircraft. And I got a telephone call at 4am in the morning, and there's no good news at 4am Right so Daniel, this is the duty controller. This There's not a peer support call, there's been an accident on the aircraft. It's your fiancee. And it's that phone call you never want to get. So over two and a half years, my fiancee who became my wife was in and out of surgeries being flown around the world and to get operated on. And then she got to a stage where the emotional build up, the emotional stress was so great that she wanted to in her life.
Daniel Tolson
And I remember coming home one night after a flight. And as she was in the kitchen, sitting down, she had a knife in her hand. And she wanted to end her life. And I really started to think to myself, if what I'm studying today about this behavioral psychology, if what I'm studying and learning about this emotional health really works, I think I might be able to help my wife. Now we should never counsel, we should never coach our family. But there was nobody else for her to turn to. So I believe in a lot of ways through what I know, I was able to get her to look at her situation differently. And she didn't take a lot, which was very close to it. So coming to the end of her operations, she lost her job. She was pregnant, she almost miscarriage three times. And then I had to make the decision. Do I choose my career? Or do I choose my family? If I choose my career, I'm going to be sad on the birth of my daughter. But I've almost come close to losing her three times. I've almost lost my wife in the last couple of years. Am I prepared to take the risk. I'm co leading a team of 17,000 cabin crew, I'm at the top of my game. But I said family's more important. So I moved back to Taiwan.
Daniel Tolson
Within the first six months of being in Taiwan, I launched my coaching business, and I was doing it online back in 2012. But people couldn't understand how can you consult online? How can you coach online, the internet, I'm so skeptical. So six months into our journey. I wasn't focused, and I was grieving the loss of my career. I wasn't present. I wasn't taking action. I'd sold one of my investment properties. I dumped all of my money into building my business, and I lost it all. And in the middle of 2013. I went to the doctor and I said I can't breathe.
Daniel Tolson
And I said to my wife, I think I got a lung infection. So I went to the hospital X rays blood tests. And the doctor said, Mr. Tolson, it's all in your mind. Now here Am I preaching the good news of EQ. But I haven't been managing my own emotions. I've been focused on everybody else. I'm caught up with grieving the loss of Korea. I'm afraid of the future. And I'm not taking action. So I went back to the psychologist and they said, Well, Mr. Tolson, you're depressed you need to take these tablets. Now, it was against everything that I had spoken and preached about. But it was the only resource I had. So I said, Okay, I'll take them. And I took the medication for about two weeks. And I said, this is not me. This, I feel like a zombie. I'm still having the irrational thoughts, but I just can't feel those toxic feelings. Now it got worse. And by the end of the year, I had no money. So I said to my family, I said, Let's go to Australia. I said, I think I can take this information. And I think I can help real estate agents, but I just can't succeed in this area. I'd also applied for 600 jobs, Mike 600 jobs, and all of a sudden, they don't want anybody with no education.
Daniel Tolson
They don't want anybody without a certificate. So I'm thinking the only place that you can make money without an education, his real estate. So I went back to Australia. And it was very shameful time in my life because I'd had so much success, but I had no money. So I had to go on Social Security. I said to my wife, I'm really sorry, you've married a dad, I can't provide. But let's go get Social Security. But the goal was if I could get Social Security, just for maybe three months, it gives me enough time to get back up on my feet. So I went back to Australia, and I knew I'd already mastered prospecting. And I said, I know how to prospect. And I walked around Sydney for 100 days. I went from every real estate in Sydney, and I knocked on the door and said, Hi, I know what it's like to be a real estate agent. You're on this roller coaster. People are depressed coming in, they're depressed when they're leaving. It's about mindset, mindset mindset. And these agents start to listen to me, that's a deal. This is phenomenal. So in my first 100 days of coaching in Australia, I made my first $100,000. And most of it came from real estate agents.
Daniel Tolson
And I started working with these agents. And within 90 days, they were doubling their income. They said this is the most phenomenal software. I've never heard about this in our industry. And I said this is emotional intelligence. And I went from office to office to office and they started to double their income. I had one guy he went from 300,000 to 800,000 other guys going from making no money to $60,000 a month. And they just learned to control their mindset. So I had been on that journey but I had all of those great skills from real estate that I've mastered, prospecting, presenting, closing and following up. And then that's when my business started to explode. Now I did mention at age 19, my uncle gave me that book by Brian Tracy and he wrote in the front to Danny Boy, this is the blueprint of success. And then A friend of mine, he said, Hey, have you heard of Brian Tracy? I said, Yeah, I know that name. He said, Well, he's got a, he's got a franchise. And he said, I think it'd be really good for you. So I ended up buying a Brian Tracy franchise, and then traveling around the world teaching, Eat That Frog, teaching the exact strategies I'd learned at age 19. And then Brian Tracy became my personal mentor.
Daniel Tolson
So we had this business together. And so I'd had this taste for success in real estate. And then I bought these skills back to agents. And today, I help them get the right people on their team. And then once they're on the team, we help them move through those income glass ceilings. So that's how I got into doing what I was doing. It's not a glamorous story, a lot of embarrassment and shame. But we are business people, we are prudent. And we have to do whatever it takes to provide for our family. And if that means you got to get on Social Security for 90 days to provide for your family, you do it, you do whatever it takes to succeed, learn what you have to learn, and do whatever you have to do to become the person you must become to hit your goals, whatever it takes.
Mike Swenson
Well, and I think that comes back to, you know, thinking about why this stuff is so important. And you talked about not only your your own challenges yourself, your challenges that your wife had, you know, this is a stressful business, whether whether you're a real estate salesperson, whether you're investor, whether you're working with other people in real estate, it's a very stressful business. And you don't always realize when your life is getting off course. And sometimes you don't realize till it's gone too far. And so you you come back to self awareness, you have to have that, that check in time where you're trying to understand in my in a good spot, or am I in a bad spot, and how do I get back.
Mike Swenson
And so that's really, you know, the the long term here we talk about on this podcast, building financial wealth to have that time and financial freedom, the whole reason why you do that is so that you can do what you want to do when you want to do it, however you want to do it, that's what we're really going for the money is just the money. But it's to be able to do the things that you want to do with who you want to do it with whenever you want to do it. And so that's why this stuff is so important, because you know, if I had the most monetary success possible, but it came at the course of being just destructive to all of my important relationships with my wife and with my kids, then it's not worth it.
Mike Swenson
And so it's been able to do it well, keeping those relationships intact, while keeping your own mental health intact. And the mental health of those closest to you. That's why this stuff is so important. So that's why I wanted to have you on and talk about it. Because the soft skills are great learning all this stuff is great. But it's so that you can have the life that you want to live that quality of life at the same time.
Daniel Tolson
I've got three values Mike, and they align with what you're doing. First one is to live life on your terms. And this is so important. Secondly, it's to lead yourself your team in your family to victory. And then thirdly, it's to leave a legacy. And what I learned when I got into real estate, my uncle who was my mentor, he said, Daniel, just focus on the people, and the dollars will follow. And if you focus on doing the right things in real estate, then the money is just a reward. And so that's secondary, but it's guaranteed you do the right things in the right order and sequence. The rest will take care of itself. And what I've learned over the years, Mike is the people who are succeeding in real estate, they are the most emotionally aware. They know their strengths. They know their limitations. They know who they are. There was one guy I mentioned before he was earning 600,000.
Daniel Tolson
And he owns beyond that now. And he said to one of his team members, one of his juniors, he said, Look, the scariest thing in your entire life is for when you have to look in the mirror and see who you really are. He said but it's also the most liberating time. So there was a gentleman in the same office. And we were getting we're encouraging him to complete what we call a success insight to have a look at his behaviors, to have a look at his driving forces to have a look at these skills to have a look at his emotional intelligence. But he refused. He was so afraid. For an entire year he put it off, he put it off, he put it off. Everybody else in the business was stepping up. And he consistently stepped down. And he said to me one day I'd flown in from Taiwan. I went down to the office and he said, Daniel, I'm petrified to take this success inside. He said I'm so afraid to learn who I really am. And I said well see everybody else in the office. They're stepping up consistently and you keep stepping down, your results are going down. You're getting left behind. Give it a go. See what happens.
Daniel Tolson
He did his assessment. He looked at it and he went, Daniel, it was everything I thought about So he said, I'm an asshole. And I said, No, you're not an asshole. You just acting like one. And so he laughed, and he realized that his behaviors can be changed. So he started to systematically adjust these behaviors. today. He is the highest performer in the office, he overtook the guy doing 600,000. He's in the top 2% of the country. And he said, Daniel, I wish I'd done it earlier. I wasted so many years of my life putting that off. But he realized that what I thought was a weakness was my strength. He was the quiet guy, the reserved person, he said, Daniel, that is my superpower. Now I know how to use it. And the doubles have followed Trump's a beautiful car, he has the opportunity to live life on his terms. It's a beautiful thing. Once people get it.
Mike Swenson
What a great example that you can give to people of how to help them and really break through and be successful. So yeah, thank you. Thank you, Daniel, for coming on. Appreciate everything that you've shared. where can folks learn more about you that are inspired by this episode?
Daniel Tolson
Come and knock on the front door. Come to danieltolson.com. There's a bunch of resources. There's free trainings there about emotional intelligence. And it'll give you an insight to a different side of real estate. There's a link on my website. It's called jobmathcing.coach. And this is where I show real estate agents and mortgage brokers how to build winning teams in this field jobmathcing.coach
Mike Swenson
Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on and sharing it was a pleasure and best of luck to you in the future. Thank you
