The Ryan Hanley Show
Nick Mornard Landed in Miami With Nothing. Now He Runs a Global Business.
Mon, 2 Jun 2025
What would you do if you landed in a foreign country…✔️ Couldn’t speak the language✔️ Had six bags to your name✔️ And zero clue what comes next? That’s exactly where Nick Mornard found himself when he stepped off a plane in Miami. Join our community of fearless leaders in search of unreasonable outcomes... Want to become a FEARLESS entrepreneur and leader? Go here: https://www.findingpeak.com Watch on YouTube: https://link.ryanhanley.com/youtube Nick Mornard Book: https://amzn.to/43J4CR4 Website: https://nmornard.dreamvacations.com/ Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/2jCitCeId7yiNTC508O2ox In this episode, Nick shares the raw, unfiltered story of how he left Belgium, won the green card lottery, struggled through his first years in the U.S.—and ultimately built a global sales organization spanning 8 countries and over 3,000 people. You’ll learn: ✅ The mindset shift that turned setbacks into superpowers✅ How he taught himself English on the fly✅ What most Americans completely misunderstand about opportunity✅ His formula for building high-performance sales teams✅ Why mentorship and proximity changed everything This one’s about more than business.It’s about grit, faith, and chasing freedom—no matter the cost. Recommended Tools for Growth OpusClip: #1 AI video clipping and editing tool: https://link.ryanhanley.com/opus Riverside: HD Podcast & Video Software | Free Recording & Editing: https://link.ryanhanley.com/riverside Shortform - The World's Best Book Summaries: https://link.ryanhanley.com/shortform Taplio • Grow Your Personal Brand On LinkedIn: https://link.ryanhanley.com/taplio Kit: Email-First Operating System for Creators (formerly ConvertKit): https://link.ryanhanley.com/kit
Chapter 1: What challenges did Nick face when moving to the U.S.?
If you do the wrong thing, the wrong thing will come to you. I do believe it. If you do the right thing, the right thing will come to you eventually. Don't give up. Don't expect anything fast. But if you are consistent, because a lot of people have great ideas, they have the great start, but they're not consistent because they want instant success. Instant success, I don't believe it exists.
The move from Europe to the United States, what was the impetus to that? Obviously you were doing very well, you were very successful. Why did you decide to come over to the States and start to build over here?
Wow, you have a couple of hours? Thank you, Ryan, first of all, to have me on your podcast. I really appreciate the offer. I'm looking forward to it. So yeah, that's a loaded question. So I moved to the US June 25th, 2013. So it's been 12 years. I couldn't speak a word of English when I moved. It was my childhood experience.
Chapter 2: How did winning the green card lottery change Nick's life?
dream to move to the united states i was nine years old the first time i thought of it but um but yeah i won the lottery the green card lottery okay so that's very different than most people i was very lucky to want it but i applied since i was 18 years old and i won at 33 after seven years playing the lottery wow so i was consistent with it and you can only play the lottery seven years and so that was the last year that i was eligible to play the lottery that i won it
So it's a long process. It's not like I received a green card in the mail after two weeks. It's a long lengthy process. But I received the card on June 22nd and on 25th I was in the plane to Miami and I figured it out. I literally landed with six luggages and that was the hardest three years of my life.
But I was always thinking, thanks to my mindset, if I can make it in a country like Belgium where we are taxed 53%, I can probably make it in America, which is the land of opportunities. And the first three years, I could have given a million times, but I was confident that I was going to succeed. And I'm not where I want to be now, but I'm further than I thought I would be after 12 years.
But yeah, the journey was fantastic. I learned by speaking to numerous people, making tons of mistakes, and I keep making them. But if you dare, you will succeed. And I believe that in a lot of different areas, definitely in language as well.
I really like to, you know, I think a lot of Americans, you know, we love to bitch about the country and, you know, I think it's part of our culture with the whole free speech thing that people feel like it's an obligation to have some sort of complaint about this place.
But I always think it's a good reminder, especially when I interview people who are either international or now live in the States on the show. At, you know, this is a, this is the place, you know what I mean? Not that you can't be incredibly successful anywhere in the world for sure.
But like, yeah, we have problems here and yeah, there's stuff that broke and doesn't, you know, maybe annoy us and different, but like this, this really is a, a, a unique moment in time that,
and you know, in a unique place in time that you can essentially become what you want and you're gonna get beaten up and you're gonna get tossed against the wall and people are gonna do and the universe is gonna do everything it can to stop you from getting where you want to be.
But, but as you said, you know, if you, if you persevere and you stay committed, man, it just, there's no other place where eventually it's going to work out. Like it just is like, if you keep going, eventually it's going to work out. Maybe not what you planned, but you'll get there. And you know, my next question for you is around that confidence, right?
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Chapter 3: What mindset shifts helped Nick succeed in America?
Like, obviously you are confident in yourself that if you just keep moving forward, you're going to eventually get to where you want to be. Where does that confidence come from? Is that Do you think that's innate in you? Was it taught? Is it just, you know, is it just practice learned?
Like, like how did you instill that confidence in yourself to say, I'm going to get on a plane with six bags and no idea what I'm going to do and show up in Miami and just make it work. I mean, that's, that's ballsy.
Yeah, that's a great question. So the confidence I have, I think, is from a young age. I mean, my dad was an employee all his life. He always provided for me. It was never a problem. But he was not an entrepreneur. My mom was a stay at home mom. They had a very mindset of you go to school, you go to work and then you retire and you enjoy your retirement.
And that's something I never understood since I was super young. I'm like, why don't you build a business? I was always like that. I don't know where it came from because no one in my family were entrepreneurs. At 16 years old, I became a professional basketball player. And I think that's when it changed. I had my mindset set on playing ball for a living. And I achieved that at 16.
And after four years, every pro athlete, you know, scared of his injuries. And that's what happened to me. So I couldn't play professionally after that. And I'm like, oops, what am I going to do? I don't even have, you know, I don't have any degrees.
and so I started door knock sale literally to start making money to pay the bills and then from there I grew and I know you did insurance and that's that was my field health insurance life insurance sorry so I did life and dead insurance and I grew a team of 3200 people in seven years in eight countries and
is just because i believe in listening to people who did who did it and not try to reinvent the wheel because i knew nothing about nothing i just knew that that person was successful so i listened to that person i had a mentor i believe in mentorship wholeheartedly and i'm like just tell me what you did i'm gonna replicate it monkey see monkey do and that's literally what i did and it made me successful then when i was successful
I wanted to improve it by tweaking things because I'm already there. The problem I see a lot of people do is they try to do everything their own way from the start before getting there. And so to answer your question, I think that it's the having a lot of great mentors around me, picking very well the five person I spend the most time with around me because I refuse negativity in my life.
And that's something that was very clear and I was very blunt about it. And i probably hurt some people's feelings when i was in my early 20s but i'm like you don't have the lifestyle of the life that i want to have so i wish you the best but i'm not gonna be hanging around you too much longer and i was literally telling those things and so it helped me when i moved to the us like
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Chapter 4: How did mentorship influence Nick's journey?
And I'm like, thank God I've never lived in a country that was actually fascist, but I've done enough reading and watched enough documentaries and shows. And, you know, I love history. And I'm like, you don't understand what fascism is. Like if you even try to apply that word to anything that's happening in the United States, Like you just simply don't understand what it means.
And it feels very ungrateful to me for the opportunity. Like you hit the birth lottery. Like you were literally born in a country where your last name doesn't matter, where you were born doesn't matter, how much money you had when you were born doesn't matter. Like different starting spots can help, but there's challenges no matter where you're born in whatever hierarchy.
And no matter where you're born, you have this opportunity to work yourself out. So coming out of that process, to me, the thing I see with so many young entrepreneurs and young in entrepreneurship, not just necessarily young in age, is this idea that I think ego plays such a big role
in this process, and I'd love for you to break down how you approach these mentor relationships, because I see a lot of people who want to have a mentor or even are lucky enough to find someone who could be a great mentor, but then they try to put their own, like their ego gets in the way, like they're unwilling to do all the sucking that it takes, even if you have someone showing the way, to get to that place.
So how are you, and maybe what was your mindset, obviously being mindset so key to your success and so much of what you talk about, Like what was that mindset that you had that allowed you to maybe put part of your, I mean, obviously you're an ambitious guy, so you have some ego and you should, right.
That's natural and healthy, but like you were able to push enough of it aside to listen to these people to say, I'm going to not pretend like I have the answer. I'm going to do what they tell me to do. And then I'll, I'll iterate as I have experiences like that is a fairly unique perspective, but also like, In so much as I don't think a lot of people have it.
However, for people who ultimately reach the success they're looking for, it is a fairly common trait. Where do you think that came from for you? And do you think it could be a it's something if someone doesn't have today that they can learn?
Yeah, so again, a great question. Everybody has an ego, like you mentioned, and it's fine as long as the ego doesn't stop you to go where you want to be or you need to be. And I think that's the biggest problem. When you start working with someone that you are willing to learn from, you need to...
excite their ego and put your ego on the side because i do believe i mean i maybe i'm lucky but i doubt i think that if you want to reach out to someone to help you out If you're genuine about the ask and the person feel like you really want it, very rarely someone will tell you, no, I'm not interested. Because you will literally state all the things that they do that you look up to.
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Chapter 5: What practical steps did Nick take to build his business?
Because I love to help and I want to give back as much as I can in whatever experience I've had. Okay. You know... in the way they ask and in the way they approach the conversation, it determines whether or not you're willing to give someone your time, right?
If you feel like someone just wants to talk to you for 30 minutes because they feel like, it doesn't feel like they actually want to hear what you say, they just want to spend time with you, right? You're like, I don't want to just spend time with someone. Like, you know what I mean? Like, I have enough friends. Not that I don't want more friends. Don't get me wrong.
Chapter 6: Why is mindset critical for overcoming obstacles?
But like, you know, I have enough. Like, if I'm going to give you 30 minutes, what am I helping you with? Like, what's the problem? If you can present a problem to me, and I think I can actually guide you in some way, like actually add value, I am often willing to find a time to do that. But I think so many people, they're unwilling to be a beginner.
They start giving you their resume and telling you all the amazing things. And it's like, I honestly don't care about any of that stuff. Like if you're asking me for help with a problem, I'm happy to help you, but I want to know you're going to listen. And I want to know that you're actually going to implement.
And that's the part that's, I think the most frustrating when, you know, from the mentor side and using this as a way, if you are looking for mentors to approach the relationship, it's like that person just wants to know. And I'm interested in your feedback too, because I'm sure you're mentoring people as well.
Now that you're in the place that you're in, but like, like I just want to know personally, that this person's gonna take action. That's all I'm looking for, right? If I believe that you ask me a question, I give you an answer, and you're actually gonna take some action on it, I'm happy to help, right? Like I'm all for it. But if you're just wanna like spend time with me,
I'm not really interested in that as much because I'm like, if that's the case, just listen to the podcast or read the newsletter. Like that's, there's my thoughts. You know what I mean? I'm sharing a lot of this with you anyways. And it's like, just drop that ego, put on your beginner hat, be curious, be interested, you know, be deferential to that person.
Not in like a, like a, you know, they're the boss, you're not kind of way, but you know, hey, you're approaching this person for their insights. And that type of, you know, you find someone who's curious, Oh my gosh, you'll spend tons of time with them. You can tell they're soaking it in and they're analyzing it and they're figuring out how they can apply it to their business.
And I think we get so messed up with this mentorship thing. And it's like, just be honest, upfront and curious. And if you reach out to 20 potential mentors, more than half of them are gonna say yes.
Absolutely.
For sure. And it's like anything else. It's like if you're in sales, it's a numbers game, right? Like some people just don't have the time. Some people might not be interested, whatever. Some people might want you to pay an amount of money that you can't afford. Those are all possibilities. But eventually, you'll find a good fit. And man, as you said, it can take you to the next level.
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Chapter 7: How can young entrepreneurs cultivate resilience?
But like you mentioned, there are things that people don't realize because they're born here. The credit score and the way to build a credit, we don't have that in Europe. So it was new to me. So it was like, it took me two weeks to get an apartment to sign for a lease because I had zero credit history. And that was like a first learning. Of course, learning the language.
know lease a car how it works here things are so many so different like you pay so much more insurance because i need to do a new you know i need to get a driver driver license that the one in belgium didn't come for here so i need to start back but then i'm a new driver at 33 years old so the insurance fee wasn't insane so a lot of things that i needed to understand
I thought I was going to come here, we'll get into the sports business, you know. And I realized that I had offers for 2D1 school basketball to be an assistant coach. Those people do it for $30,000 a year and they have zero life. So people look at Calipari, Coach K and stuff. Those are the exceptions. The people in the bench, like the assistant coach, majority of them don't make money.
They just spend all their day and night at the school, at college. They have one month off a year and the rest is on campus or recruiting. And I love basketball, but that was not the life I wanted to be. And so I decided, OK, what is the first step I should be doing? So, of course, learning the language was one. The second step was like learning how, you know.
It worked with credit because that was a huge thing that I was not expecting. And then Hawk and I started making money because I came with $20,000. So $20,000 was done in six months just with rent, with leasing a car. I mean, that was just the way it is. And so I figured it out. Then I needed to find a mentor. And so I literally was...
walking around in malls and things like that and trying to figure out someone you know someone the way they were talking or dressing or things stupid like that but that's how i started and then i started introducing myself with my broken english and that's how i got invited for Something that was a direct selling, ACN, I think it was at the time. And I went invited to one of those meetings.
And I'm like, oh my God, I know because I built a huge organization in live insurance in Europe doing that. And so let's see. But of course, when you don't know no one, you cannot invite no one in those meetings. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to just find people in the street. And that's literally what I did. I literally went to every single mall and place like this restaurant.
And I was talking to people and knowing people literally and inviting them to a meeting that may change their life. I'm not kidding. After three months, I had 17 people in my team. And so when people say that, I don't know, I don't know what to do in the United States. I don't have like, you know, there is no enough work. There is nothing.
There is work everywhere, but you need to do actually action on them. And so I start doing that and I grew the team to be 230 people in a year and a half.
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Chapter 8: What role does positivity play in success?
Yeah, the rest is history, but continue to grow. But I love the fact that I had those three difficult years because it makes me, you know, put completely my ego on the side and said, if I want to succeed, I just need to listen and do what people are successful are doing. And that's literally my story for the first three years.
You know, to me, I hear this and I'm like, you showed up and you expected it to be hard. You expected it to be hard. And because you expected it to be hard, you were willing to do the things that were necessary to achieve the goals that you had set for yourself. And this is something I see with so many people today who they talk... They talk like they're ambitious.
They talk about having ambitious goals. But I know deep in their mind, they haven't properly set their expectations, right? They're still in their mind thinking, oh, you know, this $27 ebook program that I bought on Instagram is going to hack me into a 20K month or whatever nonsense. And they think it's going to be easy. And it's like, well, hey, maybe you could do that.
But that's going to be hard. Just so you know, like there is no path to success that's easy, even in, you know, and I get this a lot because I live in a very kind of leftist liberal state, which is the antithesis of my personal belief structure. You know, there's this concept that like, that I should, this should just happen for me.
Like I showed up today, like I just wrote this article this week for the newsletter, which guys, if you're not subscribed yet, go to findingpeak.com, subscribe today, around this idea that, so Woody Allen is famous, the actor Woody Allen is famous for saying 90% of success is showing up. And my article is basically like, that's complete and utter bullshit.
Because showing up is, I feel like it completely, it downplays the actual things that lead to success. Like the point of my article is like, yeah, you got to show up, sure. But it's not 90% of success. Showing up is the fucking bar. That's the bar. You showed up in Miami. You grabbed your bags and packed them and got on the airplane and came. You showed up.
But if that was 90% of success, it wouldn't take you three years to break out, right?
you had you set your expectations to be very hard which allowed you to set aside your ego which allowed you to be a beginner which allowed you to randomly walk up to people in malls and on the street pitch opportunities to them you know and look like there's a chance and i'm sure you did at times feel like a fool feel a little nervous feel like oh my god i'm walking up to this random stranger who doesn't know me from adam and you know i'm going to try to pitch them this opportunity
And there's all kinds of fear and doubt and insecurity that comes with that. But you did it anyways, because you knew from the drip that it was supposed to be hard. How do you, how do you, how do we cultivate that mindset? Like if I were coming to you and I wanted you to be my mentor and I said, you know, I, geez, I, I was blessed by being born here, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop.
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