895. Always Open to Opportunities

Jack Gibson

“When I look back on it, college was a great experience, but overall the real world—being in a business and being inside the marketplace—is where I learned the bulk of the lessons. How does the marketplace really work? You don’t really get to learn it and understand it until you actually get into it and take action.”

Jack Gibson knew from an early age that punching time clocks and working for someone else wasn’t enough for him, which is what drove him into building businesses himself and being his own boss. Living a healthy and active lifestyle was always important to him. That’s why at the ripe old age of 21, he built his first company that coached clients on effective nutrition and fitness strategies. He began to grow his team, and recruited and hired an epic sales team to keep things running smoothly. He ran a successful multi-million-dollar company before he was old enough to rent a car. Today, he dedicates his time to mentoring other entrepreneurs, building his real estate investment portfolio, and helping other investors to build a brighter future through the power of passive real estate income.

The Most Impactful Turning Point?

“That caused my stock to drop. I realized if I’m going to do this for the rest of my life and just be all in stocks, then I don’t have control. At any time somebody could do the same thing. Or whatever happens—market forces or whatever—I’m going to lose. And I don’t want to play this roller coaster ride the rest of my life. So that’s moment when I realized I have got to learn the real estate game. I need to study it, I need to immerse myself in it, and I need to understand it so that I can be what Robert Kiyosaki and his books call a ‘sophisticated investor.’ And that’s how I got into real estate.”

The Most Powerful Lessons and Experiences?

1. “I really didn’t like school much. The only thing I liked is when we had some type of competition that I could be a part of. So it was gym. Or in math class when we would see who can do their math facts the fastest. That was what kept me going overall. I needed something that I could really sink my teeth into. I knew that all the energy I have needed to be put into something that’s my own. And that is why I got into business while I was in college and was 19 years old.”

2. “I stumbled across the business opportunity of multilevel marketing While I was in college, I still have that business today, 22 years later; it’s a $10 to $12 million annual sales revenue business. It’s booming. And you know, I found that through happenstance from another college student who was handing out flyers in the dorms.”

3. “It’s just crazy how things happen, where something comes disguised as something that you really didn’t expect at all. An entrepreneur needs to be open to opportunity when it presents itself and not having a closed mind, because so many people have a closed mind and they miss out on opportunities that are incredible, that just pass them by.”

4. “I was not looking to run a real estate operation or make a company out of it. So, what happened? I’m an entrepreneur, right? I think built into any entrepreneur is the ability to see and sense an opportunity, and an entrepreneur wants to capitalize on it if they have the bandwidth and feel like they could make it happen.”

5. “You have to reinvent yourself as you continue to grow a business. Over the course of years, the market changes and things that were working don’t always continue to work. You have to be able to pivot or you’re going to get disrupted by the next company that comes in and has a better marketing strategy and does it better, faster, more effectively than you do.”