Doing It My Way: How Katya Fisher Built a Career on Her Own Terms

It's wonderful to be here. It's great to see both of you, two of my favorite people.

Obviously, I'm I'm a big fan of BDO in general, so it's really, really great to be here. You forgot to mention to everyone that I'm also a Pilates instructor. Oh.

It's amazing.

You know, that's usually... That's how my husband always introduces me.

So it's a good question. So, look, I... I'm very, very fortunate. Obviously, I was raised with all these, like, really amazing, interesting, brilliant people. And so, yeah, my grandmother was one of the first women to go to law school in America.

And Oshiver Hall at University of Pennsylvania, that's named after Samuel Oshiver, who was her brother. He also... He was the architect of the Philadelphian, you know, the huge apartment complex that's, like, next to the Philly Art Museum.

Then in addition to that, my father's brother, Franklin Marvin Fisher, he was, like, on the shortlist for the Nobel Prize. He was chair of the economics department at MIT. So he was an economist. I mean, like, we have a lot of nerds in the family, basically. But that's just on my dad's side.

And then we have my mother's side. And so what was really, really interesting is that, you know, on my father's side, everybody immigrated here, like, a hundred plus years ago, right, coming from some some shtetl and, like, Lithuania or something. And then on my mother's side, my mother emigrated from The Soviet Union in 1978, and she came here with my brother who was four years old. And her family emigrated.

Everybody came thereafter. So I grew up in a really, really interesting environment. I was raised in The United States. I was not raised in any kind of, like, Russian Jewish community.

I was raised in Princeton, New Jersey. You know? Like, we played tennis and had the sweaters and the rackets and stuff.

But I got to see sort of one half of my family that was very, you know, already assimilated in The United States, successful, prominent, and another half of my family that they were building everything from scratch.

It was really, really fascinating to watch, like, as a kid. And, you know, I have many stories there that we can dive into, and we can talk about those things. But just to, you know, start from the beginning, for me, I think the big thing was always that I never had this sense that there's something that I can't do.

It never happened. Like, even my... So my grandparents on my mother's side... I'll I'll tell the story because it's... It'll give you a lot of insight. My grandparents came here when they were in their fifties, and they came from the Soviet Union, and my grandfather had been a doctor in The Soviet Union. And when he came here, everybody sat him down. They were like, guess what? You're gonna be a doctor in America.

And he said, come on.

Are you guys crazy?

I don't even speak English, and I'm over 50.

And this is...

And they said, no. No. No. You're gonna you're gonna do it. So he had to learn English.

He had to learn medical English. He had to go through his residency again. My grandmother spoke French even though she didn't speak English, so she moved to New Rochelle in Upstate New York, and she taught French at a high school and sent cash back to my grandfather who was doing his residency in Camden, New Jersey.

And then after he completed everything, he couldn't get a job. Who wants to hire this, like, old man with this thick accent and thick glasses? You know?

And my grandparents got...

He got one job offer in all of The US, and that was at an oncology practice in Corbin, Kentucky, which is a tiny little one stoplight town. It's a dry town in Kentucky that's known for being the home of colonel Sanders and the original Kentucky Fried Chicken.

So I grew up... Instead of being in some, you know, like, immigrant community world, I spent most of my time in Princeton and then my summers country line dancing, drinking RC Cola, eating moon pies, like reading the biography of Reba McIntyre, listening to Dolly Parton. Right? Like, total...

Just stuff that you probably would never guess about me. Right? My grandmother, she, like, she looked like Dolly Parton. She had, like, the red suede dresses and everything. But what happened was that eventually, my grandfather became a partner in the practice, then he brought the practice, and then he sold the practice.

And they moved back to New Jersey to be closer to the rest of the family in Mercedes and diamonds and fur coats and, like, you know, true success story already in their late sixties.

And they spend the rest of their years, you know, there's them, like, going around Thailand on elephants and at the top of the Eiffel Tower and, you know, just, like, living it up. And so for me, personally, whenever anybody says to me, like, oh, I can't do it because, you know, I'm too old or I don't have this or I don't have that or what... I'm just like, yeah. You can. Because I was witness since childhood to two people who came here in their fifties with nothing, and they did it.

Well so first of I don't think anything was handed to me. I obviously if you believe in genes to some extent, right, like, obviously, there's some level of intellect that that got passed down. I am very fortunate that I was always very loved. Right? I have parents who adore me.

What can I say? Like, it helps in life. You know? It's it's a really, really, really nice thing to have to have a wonderful, loving, supportive family.

That being said, first of all, I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was 12 years old. By the time I was five years old, I was...

My parents were already getting calls saying like, look. Your daughter is really smart, but she has, like, severe organizational issues, and she's a mess. And she, like, doesn't pay attention in class, and she gets lost, and she's, like, you know, like, she's gonna be a problem, basically. Right?

Because by the time I was in second grade, like, I read the biographies of Annie Oakley and Amelia Earhart, and...

But I would get lost in the book, and then I would get called up to class. You know? Like, it's time to do this or say...

And I would just be completely, like, absorbed in the book, And then I would get in trouble in class because I don't pay attention. But at the same time, was like, nobody else in this class can read a book from end to end except for me.

So, like, why do I need to pick this up? But, you know, so, like, there was a lot of those types of challenges with me growing up to the point where by the time I was even in high school, you know, I hated high school.

I had amazing grades, but I hated it. And so one day when I was 16 years old, I walked in. It was gray, and it was, like, dark and just dreary.

And I turned... And I was like, I'm not gonna do this anymore. And I walked right back out, and I walked back into my mom's car. I was like, I'm not going back.

I dropped out. I went to the guidance counselor. I went to my parents. I said, listen. I have straight a's.

I made some kinda, like, honor list for the PSAT, and I was like, just let me take the GED. I'll go to community college. I'll get a few extra credits, and then I'll go I'll go off to university, and I'll be fine. The school told me I was nuts. They were like, you are ruining your life.

You can't do this. This has never been done before. This is, like, not normal. People with good grades, like, they don't take GEDs, blah blah blah.

And I was like, why? Like, I can take these community college credits. It's better than taking high school. I'm gonna get straight a's in them too.

Like...

Right. I explained it, and they told me...

They were like...

They told my parents. They were like, your daughter's gonna ruin her life. And so I dropped out of high school. I took my GED.

I got a perfect score on the GED. I took a few courses at community college, and, you know, I did okay.

I would say that, like, obviously, I didn't go usual path at any point in my life. I've always been, like, a little different, let's say. You know, where does the drive come from? I don't know. I have this, like, insatiable drive inside of me. I always wanna do more. And the thing is, like, it's not even about having anything to prove to anybody.

Because, like, at this point, like, what do have to prove?

Especially for me right now, like, nothing. Right? But I just love it. Like, it's so much fun.

It's so much fun to hear people tell me that I can't do something or that I'm not gonna achieve something and then to... It's like it's the best. It's just... It's like just little games that I set up for myself. So in terms of fearlessness, I'm not fearless in the sense of I don't feel fear.

I feel it all the time. Right? Like, I have panic attacks, not full on ones, but, you know, like, I get, like, anxiety. I get scared.

I get nervous. I get embarrassed. I get all the...

Right? But then there's, like, this little voice in my head that's like, no. Who cares? Keep going.

And that voice is always right, so I just learned to trust it.

So, look, growing up, my family is all academics. They're professors.

Right? Yeah. I had the grandpa who was a doctor. But other than that, like, I grew up with people who are in the arts and who are in academia. So business wasn't something that we really talked about or thought about. It was much more important sort of to be an intellectual.

Right? Like, you should read Dostoevsky, but it wasn't about, you know, business or anything. So even when I went to college and all of that, I didn't major in finance or or something like that, and I wasn't pushed to do any of that. And yet, I think there was a whole dormant side of me that just was never explored because I didn't know that it existed.

And so what occurred was that when I went to law school thinking I'm gonna do entertainment law and media law, I was doing really interesting stuff. Like, I, you know, I did a fellowship overseas working on media law and policy. I did a summer internship at top entertainment law firm. Like, interesting stuff. But what happened was my husband turned to me, and he was like, why don't you, like, go learn, like, tax and corporate and, like, you know, just hard skills. Right?

And I was terrified. I was like, that's like boy stuff. You know?

I don't wanna I don't wanna do any of that.

I don't know how to do math.

Like, that's not for me. And so he pushed me. He's like, just take, like, one class. Jeez. And I said, okay. So I take insured federal income tax, and I took insured corporate law. And for me, it was take the red pill.

That's what it was. It was take the red pill. Right? It was... I suddenly was like, holy... I can't say it on your podcast. Holy smokes.

This is how the world actually works.

Like, this is this is the real world. Like, tax is the underpinning of everything. And here's the funniest part. I got the highest grades in the class in both of those.

So all of a sudden, I was like, my brain is way better suited to...

Like, this I get. This is fun. And I got so into it. So I took every tax class, like corporate tax and partnership tax and real estate tax and corporate classes, and I killed it in those.

Not like, when in a million years did I think that that was gonna be my life? Right? Only to realize, like, it's like imagine your whole life, you've been playing left handed, and you're really, really good. And then one day, you found out that you're actually right handed, And suddenly, like, you switch.

That's what it felt like. It was like, wow. Like, I thought I was pretty good, but, like, oh my gosh. It transformed everything for me.

It just transformed how I saw the world. And so, you know, I think it's, like, really cool to do things that you think are, like, not for you because you never know what's gonna happen next.

I'm charmingly aggressive. Okay. I'll tell you guys another crazy story that sounds unrelated that I've never talked about on any podcast interviews. So this will be like, it's an exclusive for you guys, but it'll give you some insight into who I am.

Okay? So when I dropped out of high school after I got my GED, I was just turning 16. This is a long crazy story, but it's a good one. I promise.

Okay? You're gonna...

Like, this is a story like you've never had on your video.

I go online. I go on Ask Jeeves. Because remember back in the day, there wasn't Google. There was Ask Jeeves.

You guys are puppies. I had AOL dial up. Come on.

I had AOL. I had Prodigy.

I had Prodigy.

Wow. And I got a t shirt that said I'm one in a million, Prodigy J. Moose. So, anyway, I got on the Internet very young. Anyway, so the year is... It's the year...

It's late nineteen ninety nine.

And there I am on the Internet, and I'm like, 16 birthday party in Washington DC.

And as I'm, like, looking stuff up and trying to come up with ideas, somehow it's like party, party scene, DC. Right? Like, raves, techno. Like, I don't know what any of these words are.

I'm a goody two shoes. And somehow I stumble into this website called hyperreal.org, which is, like, a rave website that has mailing lists across the country for ravers in different jurisdictions. And there's one for people in Washington, DC, so I just signed up and added myself.

And I didn't pay any attention to it. I, like, went about my day. At the time, there was no social media. You didn't have, like, Facebook and Myspace and stuff like that.

I opened my email the next day, and I have hundreds of emails because it's like a chatty free form mailing list. Remember those back in the day? And all a sudden, all these people are talking, and they're all friends, and they're all having a good time. And they're talking about, like, waves and parties and this and...

I don't know what any of this stuff is, but I start seeing, like, some people seem, like, really fun, and some people share, like, an image or something, and I see that they're kinda young and they're cool.

Yada yada yada. I became a raver.

I'm gonna tell you how I became a legend. Okay? So what happened was that Yeah. I'm 16.

How am I gonna get into the clubs in DC? Right? Come on. So I had a guy in driver's ed who made me a fake ID out of two playing cards and, like, superimposing my image on top, and they didn't have the hologram, so I put lip gloss on it.

So it looked like a hologram. It worked like a charm, but I realized I learned something even sneakier. Okay? You know who never gets carded to go into the club?

The people who work at the club. The club promoters. The people who support the DJs. So I became a club promoter.

So I would just get stacks of flyers for these parties in Downtown DC and go pass them out and show up early and be like, hey, guys. Yeah. I'm here to, like, you know, deal with my guest list or whatever, and nobody ever asked me anything.

And then what happened was that I started talking to somebody, and we started trying, like, you know, but this isn't a real rave. This is a nightclub. You know? Like, this isn't the real rave. And I was like, I could throw a rave.

And so I don't know how it happened, but on a dare and on a bet when somebody was like, you're 16 years old who, like, doesn't know what she's talking about, you're not gonna throw a rave. I was like, I'm gonna throw a rave. So I found through some friends, there was a warehouse in Prince George's County, Maryland called the Menagerie, and they would rent their warehouse out for events. And on Sundays, it was a church.

But on Saturday nights, it was open, and it was, like, 350 was the deposit.

So I convinced my dad to go with me, and I told him, this is where I'm gonna have my 16 party. So he signed.

And then I used, like, all my savings to go ahead and put down the deposit.

And then I just went around to my friends, and I was like, listen. I'm throwing a wave. All of a sudden, I have a whole DJ set. All the DJs in DC are like, we're in.

We're gonna play for free. Okay? People are like, we're gonna bring sound equipment. We're gonna bring lighting.

We're gonna bring this. We're gonna bring that. So before you know it, I have, like, 18 DJs. I have an entire sound system.

I have an entire lighting crew with, like, strobe lights and everything.

I have a ton of, like, young ravers wearing, you know, like, the big Jinko jeans and the candy bracelets at Kinko's, printing out flyers and going to the local community colleges and universities and handing them out.

And then the night of my party, I was like, nobody's gonna come. Why did I do this? Like, why did I... How did I end up doing this? And I remember the first car rolls up, and these guys get out. And they said, like, is this the party? And I said, yeah. And they said, well, thank goodness because we came here all the way from Massachusetts.

So I had a lot of people that night. K? And I charged $10 at the door, and I made bank.

Have never told this story before publicly, by the way.

Like, I'm sharing with you guys for the first time. Okay?

Well, here's the thing.

When I went off to NYU and those days were, like, behind me, I was really shy about all of that. Because when I decided to become an attorney and go into the corporate world and be very professional, I thought to myself, like, that's not a sign that people... You know, like, people don't need to know about that. Like, you need to tone down the crazy and just be very, very professional and very this, that. It wasn't until many years later that I was just like, that's the most entrepreneurial, like, amazing thing I ever did. And I didn't, like, not only not pursue that route, because I could have been, like, a superstar promoter DJ in Ibiza right now. Right?

Like, hanging out with Paris Hilton or something. But in addition to that, like, look at what I managed to do. Like, I... Yeah. Like, I did a risky business. Right? Like, I made thousands of dollars throwing a [bleep].

I would kill it. I wanna be superstar DJ. But my point is that when we go back to then, now it's years later. Okay?

That whole side of me, like, that whole part of me is kinda, like, dormant. And now I have to start a law practice.

I went to a bunch of, like, bar committee events where young lawyers and solo lawyers come and network with each other, and they were all giving each other their business cards.

And I'm like, you guys are never gonna make any money doing this. You're all networking with each other and trying to go, like, you know, it's just like, why? And then I started thinking about kind of the world that I came from, and I went out and I did networking in terms of, like, it's New York City. There's a lot of interesting people to meet out there.

And you can wine them, and you can dine them, and you can socialize with them, and you can hang out, and you can become their friend. Right? And so I built my career on close personal relationships, and that's how I did it. And so the way that I was able to convince people that I'm a generalist in the very, very beginning In the very beginning, I...

It's just because I had good friends. I made friends, and I was like, listen. Like, I'm gonna do whatever it takes to, you know, help you and make things better for you. And, you know, you don't trust those outsiders, but you know me and you work with me.

And then after a certain point, that turned into real experience.

And then I was able to actually parlay that and leverage it, you know, through referrals and meeting new people into the fact, like, you know, yes, I have done these things. And yes, I do know how to do this and this and growing things more and more. So when I first started my law practice, I mean, it was very minor stuff. Right? Like, I wasn't working with big companies or anything like that. I was taking on whatever whatever I thought that I could competently handle, I took, which was a wide swath of things. And, you know, over time, it just kinda snowballed.

It's my favorite song. I wanna play it at my funeral.

So first of I like to build stuff. Have you ever seen the movie or read the book Where'd You Go, Bernadette? You can look it up. There's a story called Where'd You Go, Bernadette?

If you, like, read it or just Google it or something, you'll see it's like this woman who...

She's never satisfied. She's an architect until she gets a gig designing, like, a scientific station in Antarctica at the South Pole because that's the hardest thing that you can possibly design as an architect on the planet because of the conditions. And then, like, then she's finally in a good mood. Right?

Like, that's me. I like to build stuff. I like challenges. Like, I like to just kinda have, you know, a lot of things to do.

And so a big thing for me was that when I went to go work in construction group, that was a big part of it. I met Serg Bell, and I understood the way he thinks and the way he does business and the way he built his companies and his businesses. And by the way, that whole giver style, I saw it in him. I saw the difference between, like, a successful millionaire and a super successful much more than that with...

You know, who's founded, like, a ton of unicorns is finding other people who are talented and cultivating that talent and allowing them to become superstars as well. And that's what he's always done. And if you take a look at his ecosystem, and people have worked with him for, like, decades, and, you know, people go on to do amazing things. And he supports them, and he cultivates them.

And that's actually rare because most people don't wanna do that for anybody around them. They always wanna, stay on top themselves because they're a little bit unsure of themselves or what have you. And so I was really impressed by that with him.

And when I first met him, I wasn't looking for a job, but we ended up having a long conversation. I was like, listen. Like, I know my career. I know my trajectory.

I know where I'm gonna end up, but, like, I'm supposed to be building stuff. Like, there should be more. And so that's how I ended up over there. And, obviously, at first, I was just building a legal team and those companies and all of that, but then I was like, no.

I was supposed to be building something. So that's how we ended up with Aracor was that, first of all, I saw a need. I think that I can meet that need better than others because I don't think most founders, most lawyers have the bird's eye perspective I have of having been on both sides, working in a major law firm, working for myself, having to be scrappy with technical tool...

You know, with technology and all of that, having to build a global legal team, working in over 20 countries at this point, I've counted, right, on any given day, spending over 10,000,000 annually on external legal costs, having a legal team now of nine people, which is very unusual if you think about it for, like, an in house counsel. Many people in legal are working with me worldwide?

Right? So I just... I see that my pattern matching ability, I think, is unparalleled. Not because I'm so smart or anything, but just because they see the same stuff across the board. Right? So I saw a problem. I think I'm uniquely positioned to fix the problem, and I like to build things and I like big challenges.

You called me a roughneck, Eric, by the way.

I love love it. Love it. I am a roughneck.

Get New Jersey t shirt coming your way. But what's the difference between the problem that you've read about academically? Oh, I'm gonna have to ask... I'm gonna, like, throw two things at you now. Okay. So what's the difference between the problems that you've read about versus those that you've actually lived with and experienced? And because you're a teacher, what did you learn inside the classroom that you didn't learn when you were drilling oil?

These are great questions. Alright. So let's start with the first one. I'm gonna tell you an observation that I have right now.

All the legal tech hype, all the press releases and the fundraising and the this and the that, and everybody like, oh, we're proud to announce this and all this hype. I'm the client, guys. Like, I am the biggest client. Okay?

Like, I work with all these law firms that are posting around the world. Big firms, small firms, all the departments. You know, I oversee immigration, litigation, corporate, M&A, private equity, tax. Right?

All that stuff. Okay? And I'm reading all these, like, news articles and all this hype. And in the meantime, let me tell you something.

Not one, okay, not one around the world law firm, right, or legal services provider has changed how they do the work, how they do the intake, how they provide me services, how they charge me services, or how I ultimately...

Or the speed of the services. Nothing.

Nothing has changed. Okay? Which tells me that, first of all, it's early. Don't get me wrong.

I'm not saying it's gonna be like that forever. That's a. Right? B, some of these things are, you know, maybe being used, like, on the back end behind the scenes, but I'm not the beneficiary.

But I'm just saying it's really interesting to me.

Like, I watch, and I'm seeing all this stuff, and I'm like, oh, I'm like, oh, yeah.

Like, legal tech. Okay? And so I don't see it actually trickling down to me as the true client and beneficiary and consumer of services.

And that's the area that I personally want to change. I'm building a product that is meant to ultimately benefit me. By the way, it's not just about keep...

You know, bringing costs down. I mean, everybody loves to bring costs down and all that. I think some lawyers are worth their weight in gold. Great.

Right? For sure. Like, it's not always that everything has to be cheap.

Don't get me wrong. But some things are a little bloated. Right? But it's also the quality.

And so the big thing for me, like, with Aracor with the product that I build, for example, is imagine I hire a firm to do, like, a massive due diligence. I spend $500,000. There's a bunch of, like, junior associates who are reading pieces of paper, writing giant memorandum that the partner is gonna look at for two seconds that I'm never gonna read. They're gonna send me a zip file at the end, which is probably the most, you know, highest value sort of data thing that I get.

I'm gonna look at it for two seconds. I'm gonna make the real decisions based off of that, and I'm gonna toss it to the side. Right? What if we could do things differently?

What if we could really extract value from that in a way that the client can use that data, can understand that data, can leverage that data? That's what I'm trying to do in Aracor. So a lot of times people are just like, oh, like, it's another legal type tool. And I'm like, no.

Like, I see this very, very differently. So that's to answer your first question. The second one is as a law professor who's taught quite a bit and sort of, you know, what's the disconnect? I think the other thing is this, and I've seen this...

Look. I mean, I've lectured on many things over the years. No. But I have.

Like, I've taught...

You know, I used to do a lot of talking on, like, blockchain and crypto and the regulations around that back when I was in private practice. And now, obviously, people wanna know about AI and everything else. I think what's really interesting when you watch as a teacher, whether it's law students or whether it's executive education, both, you know, even, like, legal...

Continuing legal education, is that there's an assumption when you live...

Like, we live in these little bubbles. We live in, like, a LinkedIn bubble.

Right? Like, our social media circles, we're constantly reading certain things in our industry, and then we just assume everybody else understands. And what happens is that you go out into the world and you understand that, like, people don't understand, and they're also afraid to look stupid, so they pretend that they understand. And I used to find that a lot with blockchain.

Like, I would go on stage at some conference, and everybody in the conference is, like, nodding their heads and talking. And I would always stop and say, guys, be honest. Like, don't be shy. Like, do actually understand what we're talking about up here?

Right? Most of you don't. Like, most of you don't come from, like, you know, some kind of, like, deep finance world. Right?

Right? And so I would try to slow things down, try to explain the technology, the this, the that. So that's one big thing that I would say, like, with students is realizing that what seems obvious to you is not obvious to them, and that translates into other things. I mean, listen, like, when you're trying to get people to adopt your software or where you're trying to work with a client because you're an attorney, there's always this, like, you know, Achilles' heel of forgetting that the rest of the world isn't necessarily sophisticated as you are on a specific topic.

So I tend to speak in parables and see things in a funny way.

So I'm like, I'm gonna do this my odd way.

But think about it like this. Right? Steve Jobs. Okay?

Every day, that guy wore, like, a black mock turtleneck and a pair of jeans and sneakers. You know? Like, think different. And so there became this assumption with every single founder, right, that, like, if you wanna think different and be creative, you need to think different.

You need to also wear black and jeans and wear the same thing every day. Because if you don't do that, then you're not thinking out of the box and you're not creative. Right?

And so what I'm saying about that is that that holds shoe in everything, which is that when you're looking at new developments in software and everything else, everybody wants to be different, but they don't wanna be too different because they kinda wanna be the same as everybody else because they're scared to be ridiculed, and they're scared of failure.

And so the thing is that when you're terrified of failure...

You know how many times people told me even with Aracor, like, question, no. You shouldn't do it this way. You should do it like this and this. Or why don't you just follow this?

Or why don't you follow that? Time will tell, by the way, guys. Like, you know what I mean? Like, one day, we'll look back at this and somebody will tell me, like, was I wrong or was I right?

But remember, like, I did it my way. You know? Like, at least I'm not gonna look back with regrets. You know?

I'm, like, frank. Yeah. The point is that for me, ultimately, it's about doing what I think is the right and the best thing to do and getting over the fear of ridicule, failure, criticism, you know, all of those things. And those are not easy things to get over.

Sure. But that's what you have to get over because, obviously, you know, Steve Jobs isn't Steve Jobs because he imitated everybody else.

What does it take?

I mean, look. At the end of the day, you have to be your own best friend.

It's really it. Like, no one's coming to save you. You know? I've had many struggles and bad things happen to me in life and crazy situations and all of that. And I even... Early in my law career and... You know, I feel myself sometimes, like, even retract back into this. Even, like, you know, you have old habits die hard. I would always think that sort of, you know, I would feel like I'm a girl.

People should just be nice to me because I'm, you know, I'm vulnerable. And then I found out, like, in the real business world, like, they're not. They're not. No one's gonna save you.

No one's gonna help you. You're gonna have to do it for yourself. I mean, obviously, you have wonderful family and you have friends and everything else, but you have to really be there for you. And, you know, one of the things that I talk about a lot if you follow me on social media, if you watch my podcast or or anything like that is that I grew up with not a lot of mentors in the sense of, like, seeing myself.

Right?

Men tend to grow up. Like, I would always grow up with all these guys. You know, they quote, like, American Psycho and Gordon Gekko and, you know, all of this. But as a female, like, you're not represented as this business person, dealmaker, etcetera.

And I still kind of adopted it by watching all of them and by having kind of my, like, make believe heroes. And so if you've read about the whole Madonna thing, like, I would think about this since I was a kid. I'm like, Madonna came to New York with $50 in her pocket, and that was it. Right?

Like, I would tell myself that all the time. I'm like, Madonna came to New York with $50 in her pocket? Like, go. You can do this. 50¢, no father, mother was killed when he was a kid, Drug dealing on the streets by the time he was 13. Shot nine times and supposed to die and dumped by his record label and told that there... No one's ever gonna sign him because he's affiliated with, like, gangsters and, you know, problems on the street.

And after all of that, he came out of the hospital, and he thought, you know what?

Every single bad thing that could ever happen to me, that could ever happen to anyone, already happened.

All the things that I'm afraid of and that any normal person, like losing their parents or being shot, it's like, it already happened. So I have nothing to be afraid of anymore. And it's after that that he made his career. If you read the fiftieth law by Robert Green, you can read all about it and all about that fearlessness. And so I keep that book around all the time and certain books like that so that, like, when I do feel nervous, when I do feel, you know, I can read them. I think about a lot of the time about Abraham Lincoln and Ben Franklin.

Abe Lincoln didn't go to law school, and Ben Franklin didn't go to college.

And look at them. Abe Lincoln is considered, what, like, the greatest lawyer of all time.

Right? He had almost no political experience when he became president of The United States.

Look at what Ben Franklin accomplished. And so the point is, like, if you don't have real people in your life to be your mentors and guide you... And it's not that I didn't have anybody, but if you need that inspiration, like, they're out there. They're out there in books. They're out there in stories. And the thing that all these stories have in common when you look at people who have achieved kind of these outsized success is that they didn't let themselves be confined by who they were supposed to be.

Thank you so much, guys. It's always a pleasure.

I'm sure you weren't expecting to hear me sing Frank Sinatra and talk about being a raver today, but hopefully it was... Oh, and Kentucky Fried Chicken.

But let's do this again, and next time, we can talk about some serious stuff. I'll discuss process and lawyering and, you know, all the...

This was this was exactly what makes I the podcast so know.

I'm a roughneck. I love it.