I paid $15,000 for the truth Napoleon Hill never told you...

What this episode is about

The discussion centers on a rare Napoleon Hill booklet titled "Self-Confidence," which emphasizes the profound truth that personal change and success ultimately rely on one's own belief in themselves. Hill illustrates this with a powerful story about encouraging a struggling individual to realize that they are the only one capable of transforming their life, underscoring the importance of self-confidence in achieving personal goals.

Key takeaways

• Self-confidence isn't a gift; it's a craft honed through repetition and resilience—just ask a wrestler.
• The mirror reflects the ultimate truth: real change starts from within—your fiercest competitor is you.
• Decisions are powerful; to 'decide' is to cut off other options—clarity breeds confidence.
• The biggest trust betrayer lies within: broken promises to yourself rob you of self-confidence.
• Self-confidence is a muscle; the more you lift (yourself), the stronger you grow—failure is part of the workout.

Who speaks in this episode?

• Russell Brunson (Guest) · 11 min speaking
• Myron Golden (Guest) · 1 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 3:00: Self-Confidence, Napoleon Hill, Myron Golden
2. 3:00 – 6:00: Self-Confidence
3. 6:00 – 9:00: Self-Confidence, Napoleon Hill, Tony Robbins
4. 9:00 – 11:34: Napoleon Hill, Self-Confidence, Gary Halber

Notable quotes from "I paid $15,000 for the truth Napoleon Hill never told you..."

• $15,000. Almost like $1,000 a page. It's just a rare Napoleon Hill thing I'd never seen before. And it's all about self-confidence. again, it's a short booklet, but he shares a…

  about Self-Confidence · at 0:17

• Okay? He said the word decide means to cut. You have to cut off all other options. And that's how you start having success. How you start having self-confidence. So I thought about this.

  about Myron Golden · at 3:48

• You start building and forging self-confidence. And it comes back to everything Napole Hill talked about here in the very beginning, right? The only person that can change your life is you.

  about Napoleon Hill · at 6:21

• You. This is something I learned early in my marketing career. I was listening to a cassette tape from the late great Gary Halber who's one of the greatest copywriters of our…

  about Gary Halber · at 8:56

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Napoleon Hill — Person · Referenced author/expert · 5 mentions · first at 0:01
  His booklet 'Self-Confidence' is the central text used to frame the episode’s message about self-confidence and personal responsibility.
• Myron Golden — Person · Referenced speaker/teacher (on-stage collaborator) · 2 mentions · first at 1:59
  Presented a key explanation for why people lack self-confidence (breaking one’s word to oneself) and a decision framework (“decide” = cut off options).
• Gary Halber — Person · Referenced expert/authority (copywriting) · 1 mention · first at 9:01
  Cited for a “lead or gold” deadline concept—creating high-stakes urgency to force execution—supporting the episode’s theme of commitment and follow-through.
• Tony Robbins — Person · Referenced expert/authority · 1 mention · first at 8:17
  Used to reinforce the mindset shift from “should” to “must” as a mechanism for behavior change and follow-through.
  Sure I see what those things are. Now, this time it's got to be different. Tony Robbins talks about this. He's if you actually want to do a thing, it has to shift from a should…

Books & papers

• Self-Confidence — Book · Primary recommendation · 12 mentions · first at 0:03
  Central focus of the episode, discussing the importance of self-confidence and how to build it through commitment and action.

Full transcript with timestamps

0:00 Today we're talking about a little booklet from Napoleon Hill called Self-Confidence. And you may look at this, "This thing is tiny, Russell. How much does it cost you?" Well, it happens to be the only copy, I think, on the planet. I didn't know it even existed. And then a little while ago, one of my friends/brokers found it. And after about a month and a half negotiation, I bought it for $15,000. Almost like $1,000 a page. It's just a rare Napoleon Hill thing I'd never seen before. And it's all about self-confidence. You know, again, it's a short booklet, but he shares a story in here that I thought was really cool. He talked about that there was a a guy who came to him and the guy was struggling in life and he was having all sorts of issues and things like that and he wanted to to change his life. He want to be successful. Napoleon Hill was teaching these things and talking about this thing and he told the guy he's like

0:38 I will tell you the secret. There's one person if you meet this one person this is the only person on the planet that can change your life forever. And the guy's like okay I want to meet him. I want to meet him. So Napole Hill took him on a little journey. So felt like he was going somewhere and he walks into this room brings the guy in walks the guy up and he stands him here in front of a mirror and he shows the mirror. And he said, "This is the only person that can change your life. There's nobody else." He's like, "I can't do it. Nobody else can do it. There's not a doctor, not a teacher, not a therapist, not a like it's you. You're the only person that can actually change your life." And that's kind of how he started this book is telling that story. And then he goes on to talk about how like to be able to be successful, you have to start developing self-confidence, getting self-confidence in yourself. You can

1:15 actually do the things you're saying that you can do. And whenever I hear the phrase self-conidence, like I've heard about that my whole life. And it's interesting because when I was younger, I didn't have a lot of self-confidence. But when I for me, the very first time I started getting self-confidence was when I started wrestling. And I'd go to wrestling practice. I practice a lot. I would wrestle and I would win. And I I when I had my first win, I was like, "Oh, I get a little more confident." Right? I go back, I practice, and I would win again. And I kept going back and forth. And like over time, I started building my self-confidence by actually trying to do something, having success or failing, whatever it was, but then doing it over and over again. So when people ask me like, "How are you so confident in what you're doing?" And I didn't know how to answer. I'm like, "I don't know. I just I try a lot of things

1:51 and it builds my confidence. I try some more and it builds my confidence. And I never really understood the secret until one day I was at Funnel Hacking Live, Myron Golden, a lot of you guys know Myron. He was on stage and we were doing this thing going back and forth and he was teaching this principle I wanted him to share with everybody about how to find more confidence, how to decide and how to take action on stuff. And I didn't know where he was going. He just told me he's like, "I've got this thing I can share on stage that'll give people the confidence to actually do the thing we're trying to get them to do." I was like, "Okay." He's like, "Do you trust me?" I'm like, "Sure, I trust you." So I had no idea what what he was going to talk about. So we get up there on stage and I have Myron come out and said, "Hey, the next step in this process, you have to have confidence in yourself."

2:25 And Myron Golden wants to share something with you guys about how to find more confidence. And so Myron comes on stage. He said, "Do you know why most people don't have self-confidence in themselves?" Like, "Yeah." He says, "The reason why is because only one person on this planet knows every single time you've lied." He said, "And it's you." So every single time you told yourself like, "I'm going to lose some weight. I'm going to start a diet. I'm going to start a business. I'm going to do something. He's like, the rest of the world sees you say that and they believe you like, oh, he's going to do he's going to do it. But your own brain knows that you've been lying to yourself over and over and over again. And that's why you don't have self-confidence because you've told yourself a hundred times you're going to do something you didn't do it. And so when you you put out that new affirmation, that new goal, that new

3:05 dream, whatever it is, you don't have confidence in it because you've lied to yourself so many times that you no longer believe your own lies. And so you don't have confidence cuz you're like, I'm probably not going to do it. that you have broken your word to yourself so many times that you don't believe a word you say. And it was so fascinating. And then he went on to talk about, you know, in the olden days when people would make covenants, he walked through the whole covenant formula and how it would work and and this whole thing about like cutting your hands and your blood and this whole myin uh explanation which is really cool. But when all said and done, like the premise of it was like to be able to be confident. Like you have to first off stop lying to yourself and number two, you have to make a decision.

3:48 Okay? He said the word decide means to cut. You have to cut off all other options. And that's how you start having success. How you start having self-confidence. So I thought about this in my life like why was it that my whole life I struggled with self-confidence until I got into wrestling. Right? When I got into wrestling um I made a decision. I was going to do this thing. Right? And when I started I committed I wasn't going to quit. Like I it never once crossed my mind I could quit. Even though I saw people quitting all the time, I was like, "Okay, I've decided to do this. I've cut off all the options.

4:13 This is going to happen." And then I would tell myself like, "I'm going to wrestle this weight class. I got to lose weight. I got to do this thing." And I would tell myself something. I would do it. And by doing the thing, then my brain's like, "Wow, he said he was going to lose the weight and he did it. Wow. He said he was going to wrestle that match and he actually did it." And what happens is over time you start training your brain to believe what you're saying. And the more you believe what you're going to say, the more confident you are. When somebody comes to me now is like, "Hey, Russell, um, I want I want to start a business with you." They have this idea and this plan. If I decide I want to do that, okay, I have full confidence that's going to be successful. Why do I have so much self-confidence? Because I know that if I commit to something, I'm not going to lie to myself. I'm going to do the thing

4:50 that I said. And so self-confidence comes over time by doing the commitments you say you're going to do to yourself. I had a chance to serve a mission for my church back in New Jersey back, man, 20 some odd years ago. And I remember we would go and we would knock on people's doors and we would talk to them about Jesus Christ and some of our beliefs. And then what we would do is we give people commitments, right? And they weren't big commitments like, "Hey, can you read this scripture and then we'll come back tomorrow?" And they're like, "Oh." And almost everyone would make the commitment. It was really easy to make commitment. Like, "Oh, yeah, sure. I'll definitely read that." Okay. But there's a difference between making commitment and keeping a commitment. So they make the commitment. Yes, I'll read this thing. And then we'd come back the next day like, "Hey, did you have a chance to read it?" Like, "Uh, I didn't." And most

5:28 people would make the commitment, but very few kept the commitment. Okay, the few people who would keep the commitment, we say, "Okay." Then we give them a little bit bigger commitment. And then we'd come back to, you know, the next day or a couple days later, see if they kept that commitment. And what we found is the people had success, they were really good at two things, not one. They were good at two things. They were really good at making commitments, really good at keeping commitments. And the people who would make commitments and keep commitments were the people who would progress and eventually have success. Okay? I also see this with my entrepreneurs. I see this in athletes and people in sports. The people who make commitments and keep commitments are the ones who are the most successful because they're building their own self-confidence. The everything that point talks about, they're building that

6:04 self-confidence because people make commitments and break commitments are lying themselves over and over and over again. And so you lose your self-confidence. You don't trust in yourself because you can't believe a word you're going to say, right? That's why you can't be successful. But those who make commitments and keep commitments. When they commit to something, they don't lie to themselves. They keep those commitments. That's how you start building and forging self-confidence. And it comes back to everything Napole Hill talked about here in the very beginning, right? The only person that can change your life is you.

6:30 It's you looking in the mirror saying, "Man, it's not going to be a therapist. It's not going to be a YouTube guru. It's not going to be a podcast. The only person that can change you is you." And then when you change that self-confidence, when you stop lying to yourself, when you learn how to make commitments and keep commitments, right? You make those decisions, you cut off other options, you focus on that, that's when everything will change for you. And when you have that kind of self-confidence, then the world's your oyster. You can accomplish anything you want in life. Okay? So now it comes back to you. You want to have more confidence. You have something you want to do. My first question for you is what's the thing you want to achieve.

7:00 What is that thing? Right? And I want you to write it down like sit down. If you have a pad of paper, write it down like this is the thing I want to do. I want to start a business. I want to lose 20 pounds. Like whatever that thing is. And that's step number one. The next step is for you to start thinking about like okay, am I willing to actually commit to that thing? Am I willing to cut off other options to decide this is something I'm going to pursue? Okay. And if it is, then the next question I ask is in the past when you would say you were going to do that, what were the lies you started telling yourself? How did you justify not going after? How did you rationalize? Like what were the things you were doing? Because for most of us, these things become patterns. They're not conscious. They're subconscious, right? They're happening in the background. And if we're not aware of it, it'll overtake our life every single

7:39 time. So you make the commitment. So for me, it could be something like, hey, I want to finish my book in the next 30 days, right? So that could be the the goal. My next question is I'm am I willing to actually do that? Am I going to decide if I'm gonna decide and cut off other options that's gonna become the focus is going to get the book done? If I'm if I'm going to commit to that, that's number one. So, if it is yes, cool. I made the commitment. I committed to that. Now, I got to stop for a second. In the past, how have I self-sabotaged myself? What were the lies I told myself? How did I rationalize this, right? I start listing them out. Okay, first thing I sleep in the morning or I'm going to procrastinate or I'll finish it tomorrow or like what are all the things I typically do where I'm allowing my brain to lie to itself. I'm gonna become hyper aware of those things. I want to make

8:15 sure I see what those things are. Now, this time it's got to be different. Tony Robbins talks about this. He's like, if you actually want to do a thing, it has to shift from a should to a must. Like, I should do this. I should wake up every morning. I should This is where most people get into that loop of lying to themselves. I should do that. I should do that. It has to shift like I must do that. I must do that. I must wake up in the morning earlier. I must spend the extra time. I must work on the weekends. Whatever it might be to be able to get that thing. And when you're willing to make that commitment, then everything changes for you. What changes people is when your should becomes a must.

8:49 When suddenly the thing you said should happen has to happen. That's when human beings change.

8:55 I got one last story I'll share with you. This is something I learned early in my marketing career. I was listening to a cassette tape from the late great Gary Halber who's one of the greatest copywriters of our time. And in this he was sharing a secret about how he became so successful. The premise came from I think a book or a movie or something. when he wants to achieve something and he wants to accomplish something he says I always set what I call a lead or a gold deadline or gold uh plateau or plommo or silver or the bullet like these are some of the phrases that have been used I know there's movies and stuff where they talk about this but basically says I have to trick my mind like I'm going to hit that goal and if I don't hit that goal one or two things is going to happen either uh gold I get a bag of gold or lead I'm going to get shot I die like I have to trick my brain it's like either I'm going to get rich

9:34 from this or I'm going to die it's like if I can trick my brain to doing that it's like it's amazing what stuff I can get done and the the analogy that he shared and I don't even know if it's politically correct or not or if this is even true, but the analogy he shared on the tape, he said like um if you look at um you know in in some you know other countries when they want to get a law passed and they need to get something finished. He's like they go to the government they're like hey we need to pass this law and and the government's like no you're dumb. We would never do that for you. He says what happens they'll break into the houses the homes of the politicians tonight and they'll break and say look you've got two options lead or gold they either bring you much money and you pass the law or number two lead right you're going to die plot or the the bribe or the bullet you got to pick which one it is in those

10:12 situations it's very easy for the politician to figure out that I'm going to take the money and I'm going to make the law pass right he's like if you can trick your brain to do that exact same things like that's what shifts everything so you look at inside of our company when we have funnel we're going to launch or a project or a webinar or an event or whatever that thing might

10:28 Right? We figure out what it's going to be. I'm going to finish my book. I'm going to do an event. Are we deciding? Are we actually going to do this? Right? And then we set a letter goal deadline. This has to happen. Like no matter what, this is going to happen. We set the deadline and it's letter gold. Like that's the mindset shift we have. And then we start pursuing it from there. And so those are some of the pieces that will help you to be more confident to actually accomplish the things you're going to try to do to quit lying to yourself, to quit letting yourself off the hook. And by doing that, you start strengthening that muscle. on these patterns of that have been holding you back that are making you not have confidence in yourself will eventually be broken and rebuilt with things where your brain will actually be confident in your decisions and your choices and from there everything will start to

11:03 change for you. All right, if you guys want to get a copy of my notes from the self-confident book by Napoleon Hill, uh there's a link down description down below. We will post my notes. In fact, this book is so short we probably just post the entire thing in there and then you have a chance to read it. Like I said, it's only like 15 pages of actual text. But this will help you to be more self-confident in your life. You'll see Napoleon Hill tells the story about the guy in the mirror a lot better than I do. But I think this book is going to help a lot of you guys who've been struggling with self-confidence and give you the cool the tools and the keys that you need to be more successful. So with that said, thank you guys so much. Click the link down description to get my show notes.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "I paid $15,000 for the truth Napoleon Hill never told you..."?

Russell Brunson (Guest), Myron Golden (Guest).

What is "I paid $15,000 for the truth Napoleon Hill never told you..." about?

The discussion centers on a rare Napoleon Hill booklet titled "Self-Confidence," which emphasizes the profound truth that personal change and success ultimately rely on one's own belief in themselves. Hill illustrates this with a powerful story about encouraging a struggling individual to realize that they are the only one capable of transforming their life, underscoring the importance of…

What is mentioned in this Russell Brunson episode?

5 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Self-Confidence, Napoleon Hill, Myron Golden, Gary Halber, Tony Robbins. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "I paid $15,000 for the truth Napoleon Hill never told you..."?

The episode runs 12 min; the transcript is about 3,234 words in 21 timestamped sections.

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