Most people will die without ever discovering the thing they were best at.

Why? Because they never tested enough.

Here's a quick story that changed how I think about business, life, and potential.

I'll throw in a helpful spreadsheet template as well: In 2019, I started running after listening to David Goggins on Joe Rogan. I’m 6'3", 205 lbs.

I'm built like a wrestler, not a runner. And that’s exactly why I did it.

I was trying to avoid gaining weight again.

AI Image Generation just had its iPhone moment.

Many are laughing at it, just like they laughed at the iPhone in 2007.

But 3 days ago, OpenAI launched a new Image Generation API, and it'll change everything.

Here are the biggest opportunities I see: When ChatGPT first added images, it was fun but useless.

Cool demos. Not good enough for real businesses.

That changed 3 days ago. The new API is fast, CHEAP, accurate, and usable.

It just crossed from "toy" to "tool." And the biggest opportunity I see?

You don’t need to code. You need to sell.

My buddy built a custom app for an auto mechanic with AI. It took 30 minutes.

No coding. No templates. Just a prompt. Then he charged $50/month.

He’s doing this over and over. Here’s how: You've heard of vibe coding. Well, this is it.

Talk to an AI tool like Replit, Cursor, or V0…

And it builds the app for you.

You don’t even need to know what a “stack” is. You just need to know what problem you’re solving, and who will pay for it.

How to get an influencer to promote your product… without asking.

1. Use their name.
2. Build the product.
3. Sell it.
4. Venmo them 10%.

No email. No contract. No permission. Playbook below: 1/ Let’s say you create a digital product, a $29 eBook. Build it with ChatGPT and a few Bromozi YouTube video transcripts

“How to Get Shredded in 30 Days”

You slap this on the cover: "Based on the methods of Alex Hormozi"

You never say he wrote it. You’re just giving credit.

Why aren't you doing this yet?

1. Use Zillow's API to scrape all homes that have been listed for 12+ months.

2. Use OpenAI's API to display them with fresh paint.

3. Send the pic to the homeowner or agent with a price.

4. Sell the leads to a painting co, or start one yourself.

5. OR, start an agency that does this for home service businesses in any niche.

Landscaping, pools, roofing, tree trimming etc etc etc.

Why does this work? It removes friction and the need to think. Don't force your prospects to be creative or think.

Show them what THEIR personalized final product looks like. Perfect personalization.

Show an overweight person exactly what they'd look like skinny. Before and after photos are already insanely effective, how effective would this be?

This stuff wasn't easily accessible 1 month ago. The game is changed. Below are some more ideas.

Follow me @mhp_guy for AI biz ideas.
"If you wait until after the storm, you've waited too long. Get your trees trimmed today, resident of 1234 Maple Dr."

People are flipping $5K into $50K by doing something you’ve never even considered.

They’re not building apps, trading stocks or selling courses.

They’re buying liquidated inventory for pennies and reselling it. Here’s the full, specific, 12-step playbook: 1/ A pallet of inventory was listed for $13,000.

Its retail value? $1.8 million.

Let’s be real: Retail prices lie.

So assume it’s worth a quarter of that.

Still: $450K of stuff… for $13K. And this kind of deal happens every week.

We STILL have a 60% chance of a recession and people are panicking. But buried inside that panic?

6 ideas to thrive during the chaos.

Here’s what I’d be doing right now: → Starbucks grew in the ‘80s recession
→ Airbnb launched in ‘08
→ Microsoft was born in stagflation
You want safe? Go to cash.

You want upside? Read on.

Most people are swinging at billion-dollar ideas. Sigh.

Here’s why that’s killing their momentum, and the smarter way to print cash in 2025: You don’t need a VC check, a 10-person team, or a 50-page pitch deck. You need:

$50 in ad spend
A Stripe account
1 simple idea

And 6 months of focus.

Learning Facebook ads changed my life. You can launch a profitable FB ad in 20 minutes.

No agency. No course. No upsell or $2,000 funnel.

Just your phone, a few rules and some common sense.

Here’s the crash course I wish someone gave me years ago: 1. Know the anatomy. Facebook ads have 3 layers:

1. Campaign = the goal
2. Ad Set = the audience, schedule, and budget
3. Ad = the image and copy

Most people only focus on the ad. That’s why they lose.

This guy quietly built a $337k/year business by renting out a single product for $375. Over and over and over.

He now owns 15 of them.

No paid ads. No fancy software. Just grit, repeat customers, and word of mouth.

It all started with a bar fire. Here’s the full story: 1/ In 2013, two brothers launched a bar in Charleston. A few months in, wedding planners started asking if they could bring their bar setup to events.

They said yes. (say yes to everything)

Then caterers started venting about terrible rental equipment.

That gave them an idea.

How to outsource 80% of your emails for $49/month:

The 80/20 rule is alive and well in your inbox. Let's harness it by doing these 2 simple things:

1. Categorize your emails into 5 buckets. For me, this looks like: - Where is the lead magnet you promised? (I use the prompt below for this)
- How can I invest in an RV park?
- Can I pick your brain?
- A direct report needs something.
- Highly custom or personal

Then use a drag & drop AI automation agent to set up 4 flows to handle...

The most simple & genius thing I've heard all month:

I just talked to a business owner that finds millions of dollars worth of customers with 1 simple hack.

Not digital ads, direct mail or door to door sales.

All he does is buy the following: - Plastic bags
- Flyers
- A bag of rocks from Home Depot
- A stapler

He hires high schoolers to assemble them all in his basement.

He drives out to the golf course communities in the suburbs. And then...

I promise I'm not overhyping this:

You are 1,000% going to love this super random niche business I just heard about from a friend. You could copy this!

It all starts outside a ready-mix concrete plant in Utah, in a shack off the side of the road...(continued below) My friend K had a job at this little shack. What did he do? Shake stuff.

He'd shake a concrete form after a cement truck would drop leftover concrete into it.

Companies try to bring more concrete than they think they need to jobs, to be sure they don't run out. But then...

I converted an inbound cold call into a $10m business.

Below is:

1. How I did it
2. What i learned
3. What you can copy from this: 👇 At 23 I was managing an iPhone repair shop.

Sexy, right? Heh.

I started it as a college senior & quickly grew it to 4 stores, but I hated my life. Why?

Retail is tough, and hard to scale, and I'm not great at operations (but I didn't know it yet).

If I lost everything & only kept my knowledge, here’s how I’d make a 6 figure business in 2025.

I've done this exact thing twice.

Here’s a step by step detailed breakdown of exactly how I’d do it again: What are we starting? A tree trimming business.

Assume I only have a credit card w/ a $10k limit

I’d buy this:

- Used truck — $8k
- Laptop & phone — $1k
- Domain — Namecheap- $9
- Site — Carrd — $6

Listen up! This will be one of the biggest opportunities of 2025.

AI will cause the price of software to go close to $0.

Anyone disagree? Cool, moving on.

Here's exactly how to profit from this: Why pay $5k/month for Hubspot when other CRMs are 95% cheaper? Unlimited contacts!

Why pay $2k/month for Zapier when alternatives are $200/month?

People will continue to pay because switching is expensive and annoying. They need your help.

So do this:

WARNING: The 6 tweets below might keep you up all night with excitement.

Go ahead, scroll on past this if you hate new ideas.

If a new business or side hustle is in your 2025 plans,
have a look at my RECS framework: RECS:

Reverse
Engineer
Copy
Shamelessly

Here are the tools you need to do exactly that:

How'd you like a business where you can spend $1,600 once and make $1,600 in profit every month?

Last week I spent the day at one of these businesses and learned all I could from the owner.

Here's what's good: Bounce house rental is an awesome biz:

✔️ Low overhead + high margins
✔️ Built in referral marketing
✔️ Scale fast with low capital risk
✔️ Plenty of cheap labor
✔️ Side hustle that can scale

Start by using a Carrd $9 site w/ these plugins:

If you get the Sunday scaries or want to start a business, read this.

Many of my calls are with people that say,

"I want to quit my job and start a business. How? Should I?"

This is my answer, written from a hotel bathroom at midnight.

Burn the boats.

You’ve heard the phrase, yeah? 

Apparently it’s the title of a book I’ve never read. The synopsis goes as such,

In this gripping rags-to-riches instant classic, Matt Higgins provides the blueprint he used to go from a desperate sixteen-year-old high school dropout caring for his sick mother in Queens, New York, to a shark on Shark Tank and the faculty of Harvard Business School.

I have no idea if this book is any good, but I know that burning the boats is a good thing. 

But what does that phrase mean, exactly?

It means to destroy all possible ways to go back to a situation.

In other words it can mean:

1. Quitting your job to start a business

2. Selling your house to move somewhere entirely new

3. Deleting your dating apps after finding “the one”

4. Throwing away all the sugar in your house

5. Pouring 100% of your savings into something you’re passionate about

If you've never heard of Dude Perfect, they're the most entertaining yet wholesome YouTubers on the planet.

I highly recommend watching their whole documentary, but there's an especially moving part about burning the boats. I've attached it in the first comment below this post.

What a perfect example of "when burning the boats goes right."

But alas, there are still two competing viewpoints in my mind.

1. Burning the boats is good because when there’s no Plan B, Plan A HAS to work.

2. Burning the boats is foolish because it’s wise to always have a backup plan.

Is it okay to believe both of these things at the same time?

How can both be true? And when do we choose one, but not the other?

Story time.

I couple weeks ago I posted about the iPhone parts resale biz I started, after selling my iPhone repair stores.

When I sold those stores, I cut a deal with the acquirers. It was a no good very bad deal, in fact.

It turns out I still had a lot of learning to do in the year my brain officially became fully developed (25 - I’m a late bloomer though, my brain is still forming today.)

The deal was this:

1. I had 4 stores, and my acquirer had 1

2. They pay me $20k upfront and ⅓ of all combined store profits, passively, in perpetuity.

3. They invest $50k into making the branding of all 5 stores match up so it could become franchisable.

4. They do all the work, and I sit on the beach and collect mailbox money.

But here’s the thing, I launched my parts resale biz the day after I sold those stores. I was certainly allowed to do this, as Phone Restore didn’t sell parts, nor had any plans to, and there was no noncompete anyway.

But my two partners soon learned how successful my new venture was becoming. As a dumb 25 year old, I likely told them too much (oops).

I got a profit check in months 1 and 2, but never again, despite the fact that the business kept growing and growing.

Why? Well, I can tell that story another day, but that’s not the point. The point is that my two partners burned my boats for me, without my consent.

I sat on the white sand and watched those catamarans disappear into the Caribbean, bloody Wilson at my side.

My new business HAD to work, or I couldn’t feed my kids. So I willed it to work.

I’ve had a couple other “burn the boats” moments, and guess what, they always just worked.

But I’ve had many Plan B moments, & my success rate on those startups is around 30%.

Why? Because when the going got tough, I shrugged my shoulders & quit. Why keep grinding on thing B when thing A was printing mailbox money?

I had a company called Presto Cars once. It was a concierge car buying service. I didn’t reinvent the wheel, as this is a well-proven business model. But the company failed. 

Why? Because I really don’t like cars, and it was kinda hard, so I quit.

But the real reason I quit is… …because I didn't have to be doing it. You better believe I’d still be slangin’ Toyota Avalons today if I had to.

But let’s talk about having a Plan B for a moment. 

I often have friends tell me about their business idea and ask me if they should quit their 6 figure job. I almost always tell them no. 

They're hoping and expecting I'll say yes! They want me to say yes!

I can’t advise that because the thought of doing such a thing scares me to death. 

I could never dream of encouraging you to risk your family’s livelihood, especially when you might turn out to be a totally crap business owner!

Burning the boats is NOT taking a poorly calculated risk. If burning the boats is done right it will feel like the obvious decision.

And remember, most every time I burned the boats in a big way, it was done for me. I can’t think of a time (in business at least) when I’ve willingly chosen to burn the boats on a scale as grand as quitting my job, hoping that the next thing goes well.

Sometimes that fire arrow comes arching from behind the ridge and lands right on the stern, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

So how can this help you?

Well, because you should know that you can do both. 

You can have a Plan B and burn the boats at the same time. You can both have and eat your cake.

One more quick story time.

As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints I have never tasted

Alcohol
Drugs
Cigarettes/Weed

So when I go to networking events and I’m offered a beer, the temptation to say yes is precisely 0.00%. I made up my mind as a kid and I’ve never faltered.

So at age 31 when I looked in the mirror and saw how fat I’d gotten in my 20s, I knew I had to make a change. I knew I had to lay off the carbs. 

But how?

I simply treated carbs as if they were a drug. Like I had already made up my mind to avoid them decades ago.

Once I flipped this switch in my brain it literally wasn’t even an option, much less a temptation. 

5 months later and I was down 60 pounds and I’ve kept it off ever since (5 years now). 

That’s a “burn the boats” moment. Your BTB moment doesn't have to be quitting your job, it can be smaller things, too. You can do the same with whatever your “burn the boats moment” needs to be.

In a practical sense, let’s say John makes $180k/year and wants to open a mini donut stand. 

He’s all in. He wants to start with 1 and then create a franchisable model that he can scale nationwide.

John doesn’t go and quit his job, no, no, no. John burns the boats by committing to this plan, in this order:

- Day 1 - He sets a revenue goal within a reasonable timeframe. If these goals are hit, he quits his job. If not, he stays.

- Months 1 - 3 - Spend nights and weekends learning everything about the business

- Month 4 - 5  - Finds and buys a mini donut cart on eBay.

- Month 6 - Learns how to operate everything in his spare time

- Month 7 - Spends weekends at fairs, festivals and farmers markets slangin’ donuts and learning the ropes.

- Month 9 - Buys a 2nd cart and hires his first employee, etc.

You get the idea. By the time he really burns the boats and quits his job it feels like a no-brainer.

Many of you reading this either own or want to own a business or real estate

Both categories will always need a burn the boats moment. Maybe it’s to open location #2 or maybe it’s to quit your job.

Side note: I can’t remember ever having a conversation with someone about a major trial they faced and had them not tell me something to the effect of “but man did things get so much better afterwards.”

Many of you reading this are likely going through some serious suck right now. I promise that your greatest days are ahead of you. I don’t know why this post is taking this weird turn, but it feels right. Maybe it's for you?

If you burn the boats and run out of coconuts, you’re about to find a herd of cattle and a spring.

If you burn the boats and you get desperately homesick, you’re about…

Every now and then I have a conversation that blows my mind.

I just hung up with a 23 year old kid that noticed that many apartments near him didn't have washers and dryers, despite having hook ups for them.

Curious, he posted an ad to FB Marketplace that said: "Washer and Dryer Rental. $60 per month."

(He had no business and no washer and dryer to rent out)

He got 80 inquiries! That was a year ago. Today he has 98 washer dryer sets that he rents out for $60 - $85 per month.

There's a gold mine marketing channel that everyone is ignoring.

I just discovered a way to exploit it.

Here's what it is, plus step by step instructions on how to copy me: The channel: Owning your own empire, or in this case, SubReddit.

Why?

You control what goes in and out. All the links you want, none of the links you don't. It works for any niche.

Here's how to do it: