Design Your Life, Design Your Leadership: Pastor Dennis Sy on Purpose, Calling, and Building What Matters

And welcome to my podcast, The RJ Ledesma Podcast. In my podcast, I like to speak to visionaries, entrepreneurs, business owners, to learn more about how they think about doing business, what are their success secrets, and can we replicate them in our own lives? Our next guest I have been making him legal for the longest time for us to get comments que just finally appeared here on the podcast. I'm, it's a pleasure to have him over here. He was also a fellow podcast network, Asia podcast over here in his previous podcast called Parented Together with his lovely wife. Please welcome over here, Pastor Dennis C of Victory Makati Pastor. Hello, RJ. Thank you. So excited to be back in the podcast. Yeah. And so happy to have you over here. Just a little note, you know, previously on the show, I've actually had Steve C. a couple of times, which is his younger. That's the nerve. The nerve. The nerve. Yeah, so he's been here on the show to talk about great deals. And you know, I always very inspired by not just his boundless enthusiasm and his support for entrepreneurs, but at the same time, he's really sort of the Christian vocation that he brings to his profession. And Pastor, Pastor Dennis, among other things, no, you lead, you, you shepherd the flock over there at Victory Makati, but at the same time, you've had a very strong entrepreneurial background that is for family, being from a Phil Chai background, right, is very strong. But at the same time, you've ministered to many, many well-known entrepreneurs and advisors on the show. My good friend, Randall Chongson, over there, you've got Carla Opley over there. You also have Chinkitan. You also have over there, Jason Law. Good friends in the speaking circuit and really, you know, motivational speakers. So very happy to have you over here. So today, we're going to talk about, obviously, we can see the book in front over here, not design your life. Maybe you can ask a bit more in an elevator pitch. What's design your life all about? Well, design your life is really a journey for me. It's been a long time manuscript in my laptop. I got sick two years ago, RJ, and I didn't know if I was going to die, have cancer or auto immune disease. And I felt like that was the wake up call, finish the book, because people need to read this book. It came from a framework, a six-p framework, on how to design your life. So I talked about personhood, I talked about purpose, about pain, about the power that you have, the super power that you have, and then the preparation, and of course, the partnership that happens as you design your life, which means you have to really sit down and take time and slow down so that you can design your life and not just live by default. I love that. And we're going to talk about design your life in just a bit. And it's just a lot of people listening on the show are entrepreneurs, right, and business owners. Of course, this applies to, just the things clear. This applies to business owners, and they can apply it in different aspects of their life, including business. Right. Yeah. I think all of us, the six siblings have the same story. We all grew up in Divisoria. We were all required to be in Divisoria from our elementary days, high school, up to college. All of us were working students. We were trained that way. We all have different paths now, some went to e-commerce. I went into the church work. My sister is in a nonprofit organization. But all of us went through the same journey of just the discipline, the hard work, learning how to save up, and having that strategy and how to earn more money, and how to make things grow and cultivate what God has given you. Wow. Fantastic. We're really going into the biblical, not only perspective behind this one, but also the principles that we're going to be gaining from the biblical perspective that you've gained over the years. And I want to go into this one right now, which I find very interesting. First of all, for those who follow Dennis online, which I do know, Dennis, you're really a voracious reader. And you have to give away books because they just don't fit your house anymore, right? Yeah, and the bookshelves anyway. They don't fit your house anymore. For the aspiring entrepreneur or business owner over here, name a couple of books that off the top of your head, you think would be a good starting point for many of them. Right. You know, one book that really changed me was Seth Godin, the purple cow book. His first marketing book about being remarkable. And for me, that was like, because even on a Philippine context, we kind of like, "Oh, wait a minute, oh, wait a minute," reading purple cow blew my mind early on. I was 25 years old when I read that book. That made me say, you know, I need to live a remarkable life, which means I deliver remarkable products, remarkable services, whether I'm a pastor as I preach or whether I do business and do services, it needs to be good. Baseline is excellence. To be remarkable is going beyond what is excellent because everybody's excellent. So how do I differentiate myself from the market? That was like a life changer for me, purple cow, really helped me a lot. And also the four disciplines of execution, right? On how to execute the dreams and the plans that you have, those are really powerful books for me. And of course, the Bible, the Bible has given me so much of the heart of why I do what I do. Excellent. Excellent. Now, I want to move into something else here right now, which people might find interesting. I only came across it, and I was too embarrassed to ask you directly, but I was reading from your posts during that time about what was happening to you. That's a bit more about that journey, if you don't mind, that that health journey which you had, which eventually made you realize, gosh, I got to work on this. And I have to release this book because it's something that's just not, I can't keep inside. Yeah, it was a six month health problem that I had. Nobody, even the doctors could not pinpoint what was the reason behind the sickness. So it was in my back, and I couldn't move your back. Yeah, my back in my spine. So it could have been a sepsis. It could be something else. They had to go and attack on all sides, whether it's a TV of the spine. It might be cancer. It might be all these things, autoimmune. So they had to attack all of it just to see what was really the problem. Till the very end, the doctor was saying, we really don't know what caused the problem. Up to now, they still can, they could it. It was gone after the full dose of antibiotics that was injected in my body. But that was around six months of doing that, you know? And I think there's something there, especially when you're contemplating about death, something it does something to you. And I think for me, being in the hospital, I have five kids, like, Lord, is this it? And I think when death stares at you at the face, you kind of go back and say, all right, how do I really want to live my life? You know, I had so many dreams two, three years ago, like, oh, I need to buy this land, you know, expand this, do more work for the Lord, and just the expansion of our church. So many things. But when you're there, all I could think of was I need to go to the bathroom and need it. I need it 30 minutes to go to the bathroom because I couldn't walk. Wow. That to carry me. So my wife was there the whole time. So I go and appreciate her, my sister, you know, I think the most romantic times we'd ever had was in the hospital, because I couldn't give off anything. I was of no use to her, but she was there for me, right? And she was there every day. And that was like the picture of love for me. And I say, I said, Lord, my manuscript, Patalaga, I needed the right, it's like my 40 plus years of learning and leadership and crafting and designing your life. As I pastor, I counsel a lot of people. I counsel very rich guys who've lost their business. I've counseled people who have everything, but they feel empty. It's like, I need to write this book, it just needs to be published already. That's why I said, let's just do it and launch it this year. Wow. I feel very moved by that experience. And it gives me a new appreciation of your life, which comes to shove. I'm sure that we will, you or I will find that or our wives will find that from in Finland, because I'm sure she was struggling too. Oh, yes. Yeah. Doing this one for you. Yeah, she was praying out loud every day. She was contemplating on, okay, what business should I take? Because she's been a homeschool mom and so it's like, okay, what's the strategy when God takes? Then it's a way, right? So just those options was in her mind, but she wasn't telling me because she didn't want me to worry, but she was just there every day. So it was a way, post, post, post, post, post. You thought I was going to die, but yeah, you know, that's why all the, I had seven MRIs. Wow. They had to really check everything in my body. Wow. Yeah. So let's, let's try to move ahead. And I want to get a bit more into the, I guess, you know, what, what I get an appreciation of for many of my Filipino Chinese guests is really the sort of entrepreneurial background, which, which kind of informs how they look at life. Shave me a bit more because, you know, in the, you know, in a Filipino family, it's the same way, but there's a specific way, you know, that you're trained as a younger. How has it influenced your outlook in life and how, how, how you were raised? Yeah. We were young, well, everybody was on vacation. And when I was young, I was complaining, I was like, couldn't even enjoy Hong Kong. Somebody has to stay. Somebody has to be in the store. So I'm coming, five of us would go to Hong Kong, the other way, it's like, it was crazy. It was like, guys, we can afford to lose two, three days, not having someone in the store, but somebody has to be left behind, you know, and I grew up that way. And then my parents, just the discipline of knocking on our door at around seven o'clock and would say, it's already eight o'clock. Wake up. Because you need to be the first man in, in the last man out. That was a training. That was everyday training for us. Every summer, we would do that. Everybody's doing their voice lesson, music class, theater. We were in Divisoria. All of us went through the same regimen growing up. And now I appreciate it because I realized they were very tough on us. And I think that made us tougher to get leadership roles down. That, you know, Sabi Kongai, the complaint that was in sports, we were never pushing sports. If you see all my siblings, we're not the sporty type. So I'm the thinnest there, right? So it's like, we were never pushed there. That's why we never excelled there. That we were pushed in business and running things. And that's why all of us now run things because that was the training since we were young. So we bring that wherever we are. So I go to church. I work 45 hours a week to 48 hours a week. I make sure I clock in the work so that I could clock out with good conscience and say time for family because I work. And that's how you continue to expand and create value wherever you go. It's having the same in and out, you know, just understanding my private public. It's all the same. How I work here, it's how I'll work in church and I give my best in whatever I do. This is what I find interesting. So you're not a very strong entrepreneurial training for you guys and some of your siblings went on to do entrepreneurship work. And you chose to do entrepreneurship work for the Lord, right? Let me understand that journey for you because I know that your back, like myself, you did commerce in Lasal. But then you chose to go in this direction. Help me understand how I guess the family and your background influence you to move in that direction. I think the word calling is very important. When I was 12, I really felt called by God. In fact, I went to our pastor and said, you know, when I grew up, I just want to be like you. Going to schools, doing leadership training, preaching the gospel, I want to do that. If you're old, I approach him, you know, imagine, you know, when I grow up, I want to be like you. I told my parents at the age of 13, I think I want to be a pastor. All of them were like, oh, no, what will happen to your future, you'll be a pastor. Don't do that. Be in business, earn all the money that you want, then you go and serve the Lord. So when I was in college, we were all working student. Go to Lasal, then go to the Bissoria, right? So we were in the fashion industry, so I was doing that every week, right? But there was this call that's very deep, like I really need to do this. So even in the Bissoria, I would go to the different campuses in Benondo and would do leadership trainings and talks so that we could share the love of Christ to them. He can't take it out there. Then my parents will always get mad, no, you cannot do that. You cannot do that. Until one time I was praying, the Lord, Lord, you know me, I'm ready to serve you. I'm willing to let go of all this business and the money just to serve you. And then my parents went to Korea. They went on a church tour and they found out that a lot of pastors in Korea lived by faith. They don't have salary. So they went back, knocked on my room from Korea. He said, you want to be a pastor, right? I said, yes, of course. He said, okay, we're allowing you to be a pastor. You don't have to do the family business. That one rule, you can never ask money from us, not even a single centavo. You asked the Lord for your provision. I said, I take the challenge, right? So I took the challenge. So I went to Bible school. I did wedding hosting for many years, stand up committee, just to provide for, I'll take the job for the calling. I felt like there was a call of God for me to inspire people to live fully for Christ. And so that's why I did all these odd jobs so that I could pursue my calling. And up until now, you know, I think in whatever I do, I'll do this even for free. To preach Christ, the love of Christ, I'll do it for free. You don't have to pay me. I'll find other ways to provide because it's a calling. There's a deep sense of calling that I think every person needs to have, which I actually explain in the book as well. You were an entrepreneur for the Lord, you know? You paint point out I have to pursue and now we're going to go a bit more into the book. And I think that I think the entry point for many people listening to the program is like you said earlier on, you've passed through many successful and unsuccessful businessmen or who became unsuccessful eventually. And many of the friends who we share like we mentioned earlier, like like Chinkitan, like Carlo Opley, all these people have gone to you and you've passed through them. What often do you see are both the, I guess, the business pain points and the spiritual pain points, which the experience, which I would think directly directly led to creating a way to decide your life. Right. Yeah. You know, a lot of our pain points are J. It's never really business. In fact, even marriage, it's not a marriage problem. There's always a me problem. There's something happening in my soul. There's something there. It could be loss. It could be greed wanting more and discipline growth, expanding when you shouldn't be, right? And a lot of these things we do workaholic. It's really a me problem, not a business problem. Now, of course, there are business problems like system structure problems, but a lot of the soul issues come out in business as well. Yes, Lord Naguane, the love of money is the root of all evil. Once you start loving money, more than you love me, oh, that's where evil comes. That's where corruption comes. And I think a lot of the business people that came to church were actually at a pain or a low moment in their lives where they needed God. I remember one of this guy who was very famous in the Chinese community, lost millions. I said, "Can never repay, like, almost impossible to repay." I was counseling him. He was crying. And I said, "So what did you learn from this lesson of losing all this business?" I said, "I'm pera, pera l'ambalano." And now I know who my true friends are because before he was invited to all this business events, conventions, but now, not even one invitation. Who was there for him? It's actually the church. It's actually people who are saying, "We will be with you even at your lowest time." Now he's a very successful businessman again, but now he has the right perspective already of wealth. It's really, I do business for the purpose of not just of building my own kingdom, but building the kingdom of God. So para ang sarap lang knowing that I'm free to fail because there's somebody who actually loves me, and business would have a lot of failure. That's why our faith. This is chock full of failures, but what we obviously found, the failure leads to you to your success. Right. And globally, they made the study seven out of ten businesses fail, right? So imagine 30% chance for you. If you don't have a lot of money, what do you hold when you're really down? That's going to be a big problem for you. You'll be really depressed because you're not holding on to something far bigger than you. And money cannot do that for us. Money is a moral. It's none life. It's a non-living thing. It doesn't love you. It doesn't hate you. It's just there. Right. So you need to hold on to something that's bigger. And speaking of that one, let's go a bit more now into the book. You start off by talking about the six principles or the six-piece in the Sign Your Life. And I guess that's the foundation of what the Sign Your Life is all about. Tell me. Let's go into the six-piece. Yeah. Yeah. I start with personhood. Because all the business books I read and self-help development book would start with purpose. I don't think it starts with purpose. If I start with purpose, what if I reach my purpose? I started with personhood. It's knowing who you are. Who's your partner who created you? And I think that's very important. Genesis 1 was the very foundation. And I think for Christian entrepreneurs, Genesis 1, 26 to 27 is like the lifeblood of why we do things. It says there, God created man's own image and likeness. We were created in the image of God. It means I have intrinsic value. It means I'm priceless. So my identity is not based on my business. That's why when you go into the business world, you talk about your business. You talk about your business. Okay. Chinese. Oh. It's always the business. But that's how your relationship is based on the business and it's all money. That was our family. Breakfast. It's just dinner, but we don't have lunch or anything. We're so happy discussing all the money that we had. Then we had this room full of gods. We put all the gods there. Lahat, RJ. Okay. That's what I mean. Born again. Roman Catholic Buddhists. All the gods are like there. But if you really think about it, why did we have all those gods? We wanted more money because who is our god? It's actually money. Money defined us. Success defined us. That's why I love how my brother really fell because that was like a shaking. It's like, so are you defined by your success? If you get cast, if you get cast, if you get cast, then if you get cast, then you get cast. Right? But if the world would turn its back on you, your identity should be secure. And that's where we put our identity. And that's why I pastor. I think that's a pain point. That's why pastors will, and priests will never be out of a job because we live in a very broken system where our identities based on success, fame, and power and control, right? But we understand COVID taught us. We don't have all those four. So COVID, what were you asking? I need air. I just need air. Yeah. I just need to survive one more day. It just brings us back to really who we are. Right? Very dependent on God, on the God who created me. And for the Christian perspective, that's the God of the Bible now. We hold on to this God who defines who we are. I'm love, I'm affirmed unconditionally because of the cross. And I hope because of the resurrection, right? And that's who I am. It's like you often describe it in your book as, you be before you do it. Yeah. Can you help elaborate more? Right. You have to be before you do when you understand who you are. It's like a fish. You don't tell a fish. You swim. Well, that's how it works. You know what I mean. You never hear that because they would just swim. If you're created in the image and likeness of God, the blueprint is in Genesis one. If people just read Genesis one, oh, I open her. You were tasked to take dominion, which means you take, you manage the resources given to you. It's called Roda and Hebrew, whatever's given to me, I cultivate Genesis 215. So if I cultivate it, I cultivate it, I try to make it grow. God gives me a small church. Lord, I want to make this healthy so that it would grow. God gave me a body. I want to make it more healthy so that it could, I could accomplish the purposes that God has for my life, right? If you understand even the seed principle in Genesis one, I give you the seed. He didn't give us a sadist or a grocery. He said, the way to grow your business is this. I give you a seed. You plant that. You make that grow. That has been the design of business, of services, of everything in life, Babylonica's original design, Lord, right? And that's why my identity is shaped by my Creator, not the created things, right? Because now I look to God so that you know, humility, even my security would not be based on what people would say. I would always say this, it doesn't matter what other people think. It doesn't even matter what I think. That matters is what God thinks about me. And if you look at Scripture, "Wow, thank you, Lord, I'm love." This is my son with whom I am well pleased, that is him of Jesus. That was the start of his ministry. He did nothing yet, so I've been in love with God. Oh, well, I don't have proof of that. So world, I need to prove, oh, I'm this, I'm that, oh, introduce me, this, that, this, that, right? That's why I don't like it when people introduce, because they ask all your, so what, if I don't have that? You won't listen to me anymore? Right? But look, God was saying, this is my son with whom I'm well pleased, did nothing yet, zero days in ministry. But He says, I'm well pleased with this. That's the identity we have. If you're coming from that position, how will you now do business? Yeah. Ima perspective. Exactly. And perfect. Because very different. And I'm blown away, because the idea right now is you say, okay, I am, I am, I am loved by God. And now I want to share God's love with other people. So what now is the purpose of doing business? Right. Yeah. I think business, if there's, if there's two things in business, it's actually purpose and profit, right? Of course, it has to be profitable, right? And you'll have more guests who can tell you more about how to make the business profitable. I'll go on the second one, which is purpose, because I'm the pastor, right? If you make it profitable, there's a lot of things you can do that would further increase the purposes that God has for your life, right? Because when you do business, it's not just you. You're feeding families, right? If you're, it's, if you look at scripture, it's always for the flourishing of mankind. Until revelation, you'll see it's the renewal of things. Here's something broken. See Jesus is very entrepreneurial and the man in the storm, Jesus comes the storm. When there's chaos, he comes in, he brings order. Pain point. Let's solve it. Right. Oh, yeah. That's the model. That's the design. Everywhere you go. There's a pain. He comes. He brings order. That's why he says, oh, the Holy Spirit is a spirit of order, not of chaos, right? So that's like, now that's where you put the purpose, sovereign, damning pain, Sabundo. Everywhere you go. Every product and services, there's a pain, which means I'm there to solve it. That's why I call it the third piece, wake up and solve problems. Wake up and solve. Yeah. Every day I wake up. The only thing I do is I solve problems. As a pastor, that's all you do also. Yeah. Everybody. My, my, my common example would be you go to Japan home center, you see all the products there. Akala mo in the problem. A problem. A problem. They are trying to solve a problem, which does not even exist. That's why it's a product. Every product in the world is there to solve a problem. We hire an RJ Lee, that's about to host if, why? We need a good one because we have a problem, right? You get, I'm a pastor. I need counseling. I need this. I need that. Oh, you call me. Right? Oh, my multusaba. You call this guy. You're there. Right. There's always a pain that we're trying to solve. So you have to find that niche problem that you're wanting to solve. Yeah. The first one. So the first P is personhood, personhood, second P, purpose, purpose and the third P is the pain. Is the pain. You also talk about briefly in the book. You talk about partnership with God. Is it another P? Yeah. That's the six P. We'll get back to that in just a bit. If you don't mind me asking at this point, especially when it comes to profit, let's say. I think it's a better explanation of what we often understand as being the prosperity gospel. Yeah. God wants you to be, I mean, from the prosper, he wants you to be rich and how, I've heard many interpretations of none one, some favourable, some not so favourable, help me process it. How should we appreciate that? Breathe in and out. You deserve peace and sometimes peace starts with a clean home. With clean works, you don't just get a spotless space. You get mental clarity. Mental cleaners, systematic service, hygienic, safe and stress free. Let clean works handle the mess so you can focus on what truly matters. Rest, family, or just your time. Clean space, calm mind. Book now at CleanWorksPH on Instagram or Facebook, or call 09-66-200-6910 to schedule your cleaning, because self-care starts at home. I think we have defined what wealth is. Defined prosperity, is it just money? Oh, why do I pass a lot of broken business people who have a lot of money? That's not being rich. That's not true rich, is it? True rich goes beyond material possession. So if you look at Scripture, very clearly, Lord, about John 10, my favourite verse. The thief came to steal, kill, destroy. Jesus came that you might have life, an abundant life, life abundantly, or life to the full. The word "life" there is the word "zoe," "zoe" means the source of all life. Because the world will tell you life is found here, here, here, money, power, fame, control. If you get that, you're good, you'll be respected, then you get the life. But we all know more than 70% of what's given to us are out of our hands, out of our control, many things. Humans tend to control it, because when we control, we feel like we're the God, we're the captain of our own ship. Yes, yes, exactly. Until Titanic happens, till the iceberg happens, then you realize, "Oh, I'm not in control. There's so many variables in this world that I'm not in control." I look at all my brothers, sometimes they're so stressed. But they're also stressed. A lot of the things in business, it's not your control. The algorithms would change, it's not your control. How China would do things, it's not in your control, it's going to affect you, right? And so there's so many things there that's like, I cannot control. Zoey is saying, I put my life in this Christ who controls everything, the abundant life. No. So true wealth is really more on contentment. Paul wrote about that, Apostle Paul, Philippians 1 to 4, the whole contentment, your favorite verse, the Steph Curry, is a wrong interpretation of Curry. I can do all things to Christ who gives His strength. That was in the context of contentment. I can do all these contentment thing in Christ who gives His strength, because the world will always tell you, never be content, right? Now, that's very different from being lazy and being, you know, from understanding, I live for flourishing and renewal, but I also know, Christ is enough for me, right? So the world will always tell you, you're not complete. I need this, I need that, I need this. That's why the prosperity gospel is like that, but Christianity, yeah, yeah, man, very wordly thinking, right, I just changed an idol that celebrated globally and changed it to God. Yes. It's the same concept, right? Now, that's why the question is, do you worship God to get your idols like how we were raised? All the gods were in one room. Why? Because ultimately, mammon is a God, money is a God. We worship you to get what we really want, who's in control, then I'm in control, not even the gods. The gods bow down to me, because now they need to give me the money or else I won't pray to you anymore. Seguristakame, madanchaini, seguristayan, yamaramingadiyama. Okay, I'll go to the insurance, yeah, yeah, the concept, very wordly concept, it's not a very biblical concept. Prosperity is understanding, true prosperity is actually saying, I'm with my family, we're enjoying a simple lunch, how this is life, loving wife, kids who love Jesus, successful in their own way, doing what they're called to do, then you smile and say, Sarafneton, I don't know how to make Europe for you to do it for me. You can ask me if you want to do it for me, that's the contented life, Philippians 4 will tell you that, right, the price is actually enough, and it's my challenge for business people. That's why I called it on discipline growth, the soul, you know, the greed, right, there's the number one enemy, and what I see in our family, right, all of us went through that, the greed, the discipline growth, I want more, I just want more, I think I can do more, to the point that it's damaging my soul, what would the man profit if he gains a whole world, but loses his soul, if you're a person who's more, you lose your soul. And so you have to say, God, are you really enough? And I come to a point that I know crisis enough, oh, I could expand everything because that won't destroy me, that enhances me, my theology of, I understand my person, therefore I can do all these things. And that's why it has to always go back to the most foundational piece of the world, the person. The person. Okay, so we've got, let's go to, we have personhood, purpose, purpose, pain, pain, and then power, okay, yeah, God has given you superpowers. There are things that RJ has that Dennis does not have, right? There will be things that you would do better than me, because you have a power that's different from mine. And I love how, you know, I attended this master class from in Brisbane, when I was in Brisbane, it was from this girl who brought the telco to China. Her name is Wendy Simpson. She brought telco to China. She became a two-time businesswoman, a business person of the year in Brisbane, right? And so we had this master class with her, one hour, you know, to talk about it. And she would always talk about strength finder, it's like, oh, strength finder, and then she started talking about how she supplied strength finder to her leadership and in her business. She said, because I'm wired this way, I understand this is my wiring. I would lean on to my strength and serve this way. So I go, okay, I have to go back to my strength finder and start really going back and playing to my strength rather than trying to up my weakness to improve and add value to the team. So your superpowers are very important. You have to understand how God wired you, you know, and be comfortable there. Don't try to be, I'm not trying to be a Steve C or an RJ like this, and I'm not trying to be a Steve C or an RJ like this. I'm not trying to be a Steve C or an RJ like this. There are things that, oh, I'll be good here, I'm not good there. I might hire that, but I'll stick here, because I understand where I'm good at. Here's where I find flourishing, here's where I enjoy. I feel like this is worship when I do this, because I'm playing to my strength, right? So you have to look for that, that strength. Which reminds me right now that I should have a guest from Gallup to talk about strength finder here as well. Oh, just for people who know Gallup, what is your strength, your strength, how did you do for strength finder? My five is futuristic strategic belief learner responsibility. My lowest two is woo and include there. Oh, I'm strong in woo. Yes, I know. So that's my strength over there. So for those who haven't done, if you guys want, we're going to bring some strength finders people over here to get the, appreciate their own strengths over here. So let's move on. After that, when you have super power and what's the next thing, preparation. Preparation. Preparation is actually my wife's framework. Preparation is start of the war. It's not preparing for the war. It's the start of it when you prepare. Two things you need to prepare. Mindset skills help. Mindset is very important. Now some people, because they choose one or two, no, that's what mindset is. That's why manifest is like a buzzword, because it's a mindset, right? But if it's all mindset, manifest is manifest. I like that. It's very thin. It's manifest. That's okay. Like that. You work hard. You know, it's not all manifest. I believe that doesn't happen that way. That's wishful thinking, right? You need mindset. And I love Carol Dweck, the book mindset, where she says, there's no strong envy. It's the learners and the non-learners. That's why I love reading books, because I need to learn. I have to improve on this, because people spend a lot of time to listen to me preach. I need to invest on the superpower that God has given me, right? But it takes a learner mindset to do that. The growth mindset, right? If you fix mindset, you're going to say, okay, I'll just wing it. You don't wing things, right? At a certain level of leadership and greatness, you don't just wing things, right? You still study. You still innovate and recreate yourself, right? And that's part of the preparation process, the mindset. And then the skill set, because I know what problems to solve. Why not research on how I become better at that skill, right? If I'm going to, I speak 52 times a year minimum. I go at around 100 plus, 150 times a year, to thousands of people. So if I know that I'm doing that, imagine you give me three hours of your time to listen. When I waste your time, then I won't create value. You won't come back, right? My craft would be affected. So now that I know that, then I have to have depth, then I need to read up. I need good communication skills and I continue to study up until now. I've been teaching for the past 25 years, almost every week. So I just have to continue doing it because that's a problem that I'm trying to solve. Organizational leadership is something that I really love. I love to turn things around. There's a problem. Let's turn it around. I help my dad in the family business. You know, your problem, it's the Bissoria style to change it. Give me a year to turn it around. One year, turn it around. I don't need to be there overseeing everything. Higher good people create good systems. Things will run. Just oversee things. Creating those systems means I have to study how to do it, which would take months to study so that I could learn and grow in this craft. And then later on, I could do other things and other things and other things because I'm creating systems for that. And that requires a lot of skill set. So imagine you combine mindset and skill set, RG. Super custom. I love that mindset and skill set. And just for people who might not appreciate what you mean by. I mean, same like, you know, if we're the speakers or could you, you should talk about growth mindset, but help people appreciate. I guess, maybe with an larger story, what is growth mindset about? I think the best way to describe growth mindset is you look at your daily life. Successful people have rhythms. Morning, they do this, do this, do this. And it's the mundane. Sometimes because I think that growth mindset is, well, I'll go to this place and then I'll learn from this guru and then I'll be like that already. It doesn't work that way. It's never instant. It takes a long time, very long time, sometimes even decades, right? So I pass through some of the greatest speakers and business people. I know Chinggitan when he had none, nothing. And I've seen him grow. Why? It took decades to be Chinggitan. To be Randall Tiongson took 20 years. I work with him every week. So Chinggit, I work with every week for 10 years in church. I saw the growth. I saw all that. It's because of the patience of the mundane. That's where greatness is developed the every day. We're sorry. We don't have a picture of the story. I look at the picture of the story. It's not Pinterest, Pinterest wordy or Instagram wordy to even be there in bodega. Nobody took a picture of us doing that. It's the mundane, the rhythms that you have. So now, that's why I say clock in, clock out. When I clock in, when I go to work, I work eight hours. Well, I don't know. Jika Jika. After eight hours, then I do, I develop a lot of friendships. So I know where to put my time. I know I clock in now so that when I clock out, I'm free. Most tomorrow is another day to wake up and solve problems and the problems never end. That's right. Because until the day you died, there will be problems, right? So, what's the habit? Yeah. After my sickness, this is what we are talking about. What's the habit? What's the habit? We've created now white spaces in our calendar, RJ. Before? Oh, you should see my calendar. Oh. I love it. For prayer every day is like this. Lord, make us productive today. Why? When I go to my calendar, when I go to my white space, it's like, "I need the white space for my kids to play, to walk, to exercise." That is when I exercise like next time then, there's no white space. It's all. It's work. Yeah, yeah. Lalu napak church work. For God to it. Ah, de vaga nyan. But everything, there's no sacred secular. Your business is worship unto God. So you create those white spaces, right? So you work out the sacred to God to us, right? Yeah, yeah. The state of his head. Yeah. Because you want to prolong your life. Yes, yes, yes. Exactly. And then the final p, which is partnership, right? I think one of the concepts that really change us is Ubuntu by Nelson Mandela. Okay. I am because we are. I am because of you. You are because of me. There are divine connections that God would give us. People who would shape our lives. That's where the friendship happens. In life, it's not just all transactional relationships. You need to have key partnerships in life that would change the trajectory of your life and the life of your kids, right? A good story would be Chingi Tan. My dad and Uncle Peter were best friends. Peter's dad of Chingi. Chingi. Okay. Right? So Chingi, we used to live in a gate. Long time ago, my dad and Uncle Peter never saw each other. We went out together. That's the son of Peter. It's Chingi. Chingi. Never knew that this would be a relationship that would shape us, entire family, right? Thought as business, financial management. The reason I write a book was Chingi Tan. You write a book. If I could write, you could write. That's your calling card to the world. I work with Chingi Tan every week for 10 years. He helped me plant the church when I was 27. I had no credibility in the world. Who are you? You're 27. You're a pastor. You're so young. Oh, but I have a Chingi Tan backing me up. Right? Oh, now I will listen to you. You have the world to me, isn't it? So to have somebody like him that up until now still pushes me to become good and better at what I do. So I go thankful to God that I have a brother like that, right? I've got other people around me. I'm very happy with what I do. What can I do? What can I do? How can I serve you and help you fulfill your dream? Because Ubuntu. I am because we are. You also have somebody called the book "Enter Jail"? "Enter Jail"? Yeah. "Enter Jail" means being, you know, in his Bible, in him, we move and have our being. When I couldn't walk and they told me to, you have to start walking now, so I was walking like this. Wow. Wow. You know, when you're walking like that, it looks like that at that time, Lord, it was that. Because I have a friend who had autoimmune, a guy, which is rare by the way, only 5 to 10% guys have autoimmune. Really, huh? And my cousin had one. I got positive in the first test that I had autoimmune, which means my back would be like, "I'll be bent forever." Walking like this, forever, is like, "Lord, is this my life?" Which means I have to quit pastoring. I couldn't pastor any more. I couldn't do anything that I've been doing. So I was walking like that, then I remember that verse, "Enter Jail". And him, we live and have our being, "Enter Jail". I don't know what you're saying, I don't know what you're saying. In Christ, I move and have my being. You know, Lord, I don't know. No, I have no control of life. I just had to walk 10 minutes, because I had to go to the corridor. That was just the verse that I had. And I called it, "Hadganyan". I couldn't. You couldn't move, right? I said, "Okay. Plus 15 minutes. It's so hard. If you're the MRI, all the things that I would say is "Enter Jail". Sounds 23. The Lord is my shepherd. One, He makes me lay down, He makes me plasters. Tina, tapas, quen. 40 minutes. By verse, "Kakan, Tahu." Lord, "Kasisobra, sakatan, likut, kai, couldn't do anything." The energy, the energy, our being, should come from our personhood, right? Not from our business. Yeah. I'm pretty imagine right now, you know, it must be. Just need to say the least that a pastor's going through that one, because from all the years of preaching and counselling, "Ikai indomada aneyon sa sbapaksosubokhe diva." Right. And, you know, that made me a better pastor. I'm sure. Even hospital visitation, I like now, people are not like hospital visitation, because your whole day is gone. If you go to the hospital, you stay there an hour and then you. But now, like hospital visits, funerals, those are the things that you go to. And attend to, because that's where you show real compassion and love, not because you can get something back, but because you just truly love and you truly care. I am because we are. Right. I love that. And it goes back to your purpose. Yeah. It still goes back to your purpose. Yeah. Yeah. Everything's like connected in life. Yeah. No. I want to go a bit more into entrepreneurship if you don't mind, it's Dr. Christian business leaders diva. Okay. It's a bit of a slippery slope if you think about things, diva. You want to make sure you're successful and you want to make sure you're competitive and you want to make sure you're profitable. But sometimes, when do you say it's okay to be competitive or it's okay to be profitable, but still living out, I guess, your Christian values. You're right. Yeah. I think to be a Christian and a businessman. Don't be because they think, even Catholic businessmen, whatever religion you put in there. What we're thinking, because in my experience, I'm a Christian businessman. Why do you say you're a Christian businessman? I ties. Oh, how do you treat your employees? It's a damn thing to do with my business. Babasha Mang Pasueldo, Lagi Shonsu Misi Gau, Tapos Nak Papamanda Tori Bible Study. Okay. All right. Diva. You're not living it out, right? To live it out means whose kingdom are you ultimately building? It's not yours, right? Because you can't even take that. Chinese has a very interesting practice in funerals. We have Barbie dolls and dollhouses outside. We burned that. Then we put the dolls so that they could have money in the afterlife. That shows a picture of what? There's an afterlife thought that we have of a life that we want, of paradise, of heaven, right? And so, Ka Hitsan Religion Kapo Munda, Ganon Ang Yuma, nobody taught us that. We just do it because we know there's an afterlife, right? But whose kingdom are we building? For the Christian, he understands. God gives. God takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. I'm not building for that. I'm building for something far more ultimate, which is the purpose. My siblings would always say this, "Kompere, pere, lang yan dikatalagatatagal." "Kian daming, one hit wonder, during the pandemic." "Nagging jayan, magpama, star-class," "wala nasi lang yan." Yes, that's right. "And daming, kung katik tok kreators, during the pandemic." "Oh, dishing out." So many advice that was questioned, I was like, "Oh, yeah, really?" They're no longer there, right? What happened? Pera, perae. No, no, no. The purpose is to be an entrepreneur or you start a business, it has to go deeper than just wealth or profit. That's where the purpose comes in. Because at a certain point, how many cars do you need? How many houses do you really need? Right? Humans tend to make life complicated. When something like that, life is very simple. Give you meaningful relationships, give you a calling in life to find fulfillment there. Live out that life. Design your life that way. When you don't design, because you live by default. Default means, "Ko ano saa min ng world sa yo." "Pan na tayo minna marketing." Yeah. "Ga nyan ako eh?" No, early on. Kiela ang mayganito ka miliam bako magisawa. That's right. That's right, that's right. "Dapag nyan ka?" "Dapat e tome ro ka na." By the age of like this, you need to have that. Who said? Who said? Right? "Nalay ko." "Nalay ko." "Nalay ko." "Nalay ko." I don't know where they got it. They got the. The notion of. Yeah. It's a very worldly perspective. But then it falls because the foundation is shaky. You can't control economics of the world. Exactly. Right? Yeah. But a lovely conversation we're having. And I wish it could go on for hours talking with you then. But as we start to wrap things up, I keep in mind, can we share just a couple of things to both entrepreneur and business owners? Some key, I guess, for you insights and principles. From design your life and everything you've learned also, from the previous people that you've pastored for before. What do you want to live in terms of three or four pieces of advice for people doing business over here? Okay. Number one, I think, find the seed that God has given you. We had a good friend who manufactures Malungay Kapsul. Malungay three kami sabaya. Our neighbors would just get it without permission. In short, they're stealing now from us. Anyway. It's the case for it. It grows. Right? If our Malungay has almost zero value for us, we use that for the Malungay soup. Here's a friend of mine who manufactures it and is a multi-millionaire using Malungay. Why? It's a seed that God has given him. The Malungay. I've used everything. Meron Binigay Sayesilard, there's something there that God has given. It might be small now. It could be a vision. It could be a seed dream or it could be a strategy there that God has already given you. The goal is go back to Genesis 2.15, how do I cultivate the seed? Which means you plant it. You don't consume it. You put it down. You let it produce. You know? But I miss adding a say, we consume the seed and that's why we still live in poverty. Right? So that's number one. Find that. Number two, always come from the understanding that we're all created in the image and like this of God. Your business client, the people that get your services, the people that you serve are all created in the image and like this of God. No. Lahati'an. Patinan nin nin ngil sayin ng BIR, Lahati'an created in the image and like this of God. I feel like I had key partnerships in life because we do it in the love way. Because I know you're created in the image and like this of God. I love you and respect you. I treat you like a decent human being, one, regardless of religion. Back it. I know you're created. You have intrinsic value. God loves you so much. And so I shape you out of that spirit. That's how networks grow. It's not just what I can get from you, but how we can have a give and take relationship so that both of us will grow, right? When you understand that, oh, there are so many key relationships that God has given you. You just need to open your eyes to see those key relationships that God has given you. Now, number three for me is really finding your why. So, why do you have to do that? It's funny when you do counseling. When you just ask why, why is it just the reason why God has given you the reason to do that? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? So why? Why? Until the very end you see what's in the heart. The purpose. Why are you doing it? If you don't have your why, there's no reason to do it, right? Because that will fade away. The purposes will remain, right? So that's very important. And lastly, for me, the challenge. And I say this as a pastor, you go back to who you are. You are loved by God. You're anointed by God. You're given by God's skills. So, as Abyssal Bible, Matthew 6.33, but seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all, all is not a mansions or D.P.W.H. project, all is what? Contentment, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, just the virtues of God, all to make me say, "I'm set up number high." All these things will be added unto me. I don't need all the palabos of the world to make me feel like now I've made it. I could be a pastor and I look at my brother who's ultra-successful in the eyes of the world and I would say, "I must fulfill this you are because I know I'm walking in the calling that God has for my life." And that's true prosperity. Yeah, that's true prosperity. Yeah, there's actually a story. I want to end with a story. Yeah, there's this rich guy looking at this guy who was under his tree reading a book. What are you doing? You're lazy. Oh, I'm reading a book. I'm enjoying this book. Under this good weather, you shouldn't be doing that. You should be going out there and working. Look at me. I have all these hectares of land, right? And then the poor guy said, "But I enjoyed reading the book under this tree, under this good weather." And then the rich guy says, "No, that's the practice of a lot of lazy people." And then what seems like the poor guy, this rich guy said, "What's your dream in life?" The rich guy says, "Well, to actually just go and sit down and read the book under this weather." It's perspective, right? Sometimes we complicate ourselves in life. It's a simple thing to do. When I enjoy the blessings around me, I start to say, "Wow, God, you are really good." And therefore, now I can do great meaningful work. Meaningful work is not pastor, host, entrepreneur. It's what we put, the meaning we put in our work, street sweeper, call center agent Pastorca. It's the meaning that you put there. And you can only find that if you design your life. I love that. What a great way to close out this session over here. So Dennis, where can they order the book? It's out in all platform, Sharpie, TikTok. You can get that there. Just type the title of the book. It's gonna come up. Design your life by pastor, Dennis. Dennis, thanks so much for your time. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Thank you. I feel people were inspired and moved by what you said. Again, thanks so much. Yes, for podcast. Breathe in and out. Mental cleaners, systematic service, hygienic, safe, and stress free. Book now at CleanWorksPH on Instagram or Facebook. Or call 0966-200-6910 to schedule your cleaning because self-care starts at home. 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