Ron White

I would be sitting at home and, you know, working or whatever and the electricity would go off.

I was like, oh man, I did it again.

um the first time i spoke for free for the for pretty much the whole decade but a whole decade decade wow so i uh i would call real estate companies car dealerships i mean you think about it a car dealership they need to memorize their scripts right their customers names that kind of thing so i would call them and i'd say hey can i speak for free for and i by the way i don't do this anymore but i said hey can i speak for free for your for your company and

teach them how to remember names and that kind of stuff.

And then I'd go speak for free and sell tickets to a workshop or something like that.

It was about five years into that.

There was a rental company, Collar Time.

And they like, you could go rent, I don't know, maybe furniture or something like that there.

But this was 1998.

They said, well, I was living in Seattle, doing my business, and they said, will you speak for our conference in Reno, Nevada?

I said, yeah, I would.

I was trying to do the math, like how would I get there, speak for free?

And they said, we'll pay you $2,500.

Now this was almost 20 years ago, right?

And I'm like, $2,500, oh my gosh, they're gonna pay me $2,500 to speak for what I've been doing for free?

Boy, they don't know I'm giving this speech for free in Seattle.

And they said, okay, just buy your plane ticket and send us the invoice or whatever.

I didn't have money to buy a plane ticket.

I literally did not have money to buy a plane ticket.

I was broke.