Okay. So, I'm actually going to need a
beer for this one because this video is
a sad one. This is about the dark side of
entrepreneurship. And this is a tribute
to a friend of mine Danilo Lee who was a
mentor and one of my first clients. A
teacher to me and he helped expose me to
the world of internet marketing and he
recently took his own life. And I'm going
to talk a little bit about Danilo Lee
and my journey with him as well as and
how much of a wonderful man he was and
we'll also be talking a little bit about
signs of depression. And how to deal with it.
You know, what depression is and how to know
if this is something that is having a
serious effect on your life. So, let's get
into the video here's a cheers to Danilo Lee
and I'm going to tell you his story in this
video. This is not for everyone
but it will expose you to something very
different. And I hope just hope you can
learn from it.
So, I first met Danilo Lee back in
around 2011. 2010 or 11. And this is when
I was just getting started in internet
marketing. I was in LA and I was going to
a lot of these different seminars and
what have you about, you know,
SEO and making money and online and real
estate seminars and stock investing. I
went to seminars for anything. I could
you know, most of them were free and they
gave you coffee and doughnuts. You know,
they're just people pitching you all the
time. I would always go there to learn,
right? I just wanted to see what I could
learn. It was free I got coffee and
donuts, right? And through one of these, I
met Danilo. I remember I was in an SEO
seminar. And Danilo, he's this really
larger than life personality. lights up
every room. He's got a lot of energy. Big
Korean guy. And he wasn't presenting but
he was asking the most like cocky like
you know, but very intelligent questions.
You know, he would ask the guy he's like,
"Uh, what... You know, this is
basic stuff. He's like, why don't you do
this? Or like you could make more money
if you do this. Why don't you just do
that? You know, you could put the button
there. You know, why didn't you use this
text?" You know, like... And you know, he was
stumping the presenters, right? Because
the people on the stage is... not all of them,
right? But like, some of these stage guys,
you know, they're just they aren't the
experts themselves, right? They're just
kind of selling stuff. So, I said, "I need
to talk to Danilo. He's one of the smart
guys. He's asking questions that stomp him."
And I was you know just I was like 22
years old at the time. So, I went over and
you know, I talked to him I said, "Oh, I'd
love your contact information and ask
you a question." And he was nice and he
spent some time with me. And he was
running a legal agency. Was an affiliate
marketer and he was running a
performance marketing company. You know,
that's the politically correct term for
affiliate marketing. You're doing your a
performance marketer. He was running in
performance marketing agency for lawyers.
Like those were his clients. He had a
number of employees working for him. And
he had offices in Santa Monica. He was
kind of a big deal. And I remember I
met up with him and I just asked
him for advice. I said, "Hey, could I meet
up. I want to see if there's any ways I
can add value to your company. Or help
you out. And I also just love your advice
on stuff."
We met up and you know, that was one of
his special characteristics, is he took
chances on people. He was very good at
identifying ambition and identifying
talent. And he was just a very generous
guy and the fact that he spent time with
me who was a nobody at the time, was very
meaningful. I think the next year in 2012,
you know, I started doing freelance. I was
freelancing and managing pay-per-click
accounts and I asked him, I said, "Hey, you
are there any clients you'd like to
have me manage their PPC for?" And he said,
"Uh..." And he took a chance on me. He was one
of my first clients. He was one of the
very first people that paid me you know,
not a job paying me. He paid me just to
manage one of his lawyers who wanted to
do pay-per-click advertising. Because
Danilo was doing the search engine
optimization. Organic stuff. And you know,
I was only paying me like 500 bucks or
something like that but I increased the
account. And I remember I increase the
account spend and he paid me more and he
was very good about that. And I learned a
lot from him. And he started because I
was kind of you know, I was helping him
out I was helping him grow as clients. I
was helping him make more money.
He started inviting me to some of his
like you know holiday get-togethers at
his office and other stuff. And through
him, I actually met a great number of the
internet marketers in Los Angeles who
I'm still friends with to this day. And
some of them have left Los Angeles. But
one of the marketers is Ronnie Sandlin.
Ronnie Sandlin is a very good friend of
mine. And Danilo, you know, we all met at
getting margaritas one day in
downtown Santa Monica. You know and
Ronnie and I have been very
good friends since then and we've opened
up lots... Danilo didn't just open up lots of
opportunities for me and he really paved
the way for me not just to you know see
the success in the space but see the
generosity. He was such a generous guy
and as I said... You know, people liked him.
That's why I met so many people through
him because people genuinely liked him
and he just lit up the room in his
energy and he was somebody who was like
a mentor and inspired me. Now, fast
forward to a week ago Danilo, took his
own life. And I won't go into the details
of how he took his own
life or where or what the issues were.
Because it's not everybody hears
business. But he took his life and he was
depressed and stressed. And I mean really
all stems from depression. And his
funeral was attended by people all over,
it was amazing. It was kind of crazy. The
number of marketers that were there, it
was ridiculous. And I mean, I even
remember... I think this was like really
uncouth but like one of his like
eulogies, one of the guys that gave a
eulogy for him and says, "Okay, you know,
Danilo, his work ethic was outstanding. I
remember the all-nighters he'd put in
the office. And he said he was a true
hustler." And he said, "Just a side note,
every time I wrote down hustle on my
piece of paper, I'm reading from, I
spelled it with a money sign." I was like,
"Come on." But like, that was like a
marketers funeral is kind of ridiculous.
Danilo would have laughed, Danilo would
have thought it was funny. But all of his
Korean family I don't think thank got it.
But the point being, he was a person that
brought people together. He was a person
that was really open with his knowledge,
really helpful. He took chances on people
with ambitionally and a good eye for
finding people that would do work just
like me Ronnie and what-have-you. So, it
was really kind of impactful because
we're part of the same like tribe of Los
Angeles marketers. And it impacted me a
lot when he died. But in this, I'm going to
actually go over some of the signs of
depression. And I just want to educate
everyone. Now, one of the biggest
something to be aware of here is the
main characteristic that is really kind
of scary across people in the business
opportunity space. We're seeking to
become entrepreneurs who are trying to
make money online is depression. Not
joking. I have done surveys of people who
buy business opportunity programs or are
trying to be entrepreneurs whether it's
real estate or stock investing or
what-have-you.
But especially the internet. Anybody
trying to make money from the internet
started in e-commerce, agency business,
whatever it is. One of the major
characteristics is depression. Many
people trying to become Internet
entrepreneurs are depressed. Why? Right?
And the reason is is because first off
being an entrepreneur by its nature is a
very solitary journey. You don't have
support groups. Your friends are... You know,
working jobs or broke living at their
parents. You know, people don't understand
you. You're taking risks that society
doesn't approve of. You know the news
tells you to work a job. Your parents
tell you to work a job. Your friends and
family you know generally tell you to
work a job. Everybody's telling you to
work a job. Everything --education system
tells you that's you're going against
the norms. And you don't have that
support group. Second off is you're
working on the internet. So, even if you
have friends or even if you know, let's
say I'm one of those guys in your
network and you're part of my money club,
right? I'm not there. The physical
presence of me is not there. You might be
chatting with me on a live stream but
I'm not there. I'm not there to say, "Hey,
man. You haven't left your bedroom in a
week." I'm not there. You don't have
somebody over your shoulder to say, "Hey
man. You look like shit. You gain 30
pounds since I last met you. What's going
on? Is there something wrong?" And all of
these things that you would get from a
normal friend who is in person who sees
you regularly. And the Internet has
changed a lot of this and depression is
surprisingly happening a lot. Now,
depression. I'm going to go over a couple
signs here. And the first sign I'm going to
go over is overall feelings of
hopelessness, okay?
Prolonged feelings of hopelessness. If
everyday you feel hopeless, if you go
outside and you just think, "Wow, none of
this it's for me." If little things set
you off. If just everything is kind of
tinged with a very negative you know,
helpless or hopeless kind of thing then
you're possibly are probably depressed.
Just the fact that you're actually a
member of my audience makes you at
higher risk for depression. It's kind of
sad but
it's true. It's internet business. Now, the
next thing is loss of appetite.
Sorry. Loss of interest in everyday
activity. So, if you just suddenly lose
interest in... Could be eating food, it
could be having sex, it could be doing
normal things; going to see friends. If
you just have loss of interest in normal
everyday activities. "No, I don't want to
see the concert. No, I don't want to go to
the movies with you. No I don't want to
go to the music festival." You might be
depressed. The third thing is appetite
changes, okay? So, if you have sudden
changes in appetite, you just don't feel
like eating or your your way overeating.
And you're just just like, "Wow, I just
went through another pint of ice cream
and Cheetos and all that stuff." That can
be a sign of depression. You could just
have lost interest in eating or you
could just be fulfilling your need for
whatever with eating a lot of food. The
next thing is sleep changes. And
something to be aware of is this may not
be happening to you but this could be
happening to your friends, right? So, if
you see these characteristics in your
friends, it might be worth a little
heart-to-heart. You just say, "Hey, how's
everything going?" No. "How are you feeling
about life?" Or whatever, right? So... Or just
go deep or go at the level deep. Or you
like feeling good I've noticed some
changes in you, man. You're never sleeping
anymore. You're were you sleeping 12
hours a day. You're never going out.
You've gained 30 pounds. Stuff like that.
You know, it might be worth a
heart-to-heart with a friend. And the
last thing is constant anger or
irritability, okay? Now, these are all
signs of depression. And I'm just going to
end this video with a note that you know
Danilo mean meant a lot to me. And it's
really sad seeing this happen and it's a
lot question a lot of things. You know, it
just made mean like... You know, really
think a lot and it's really sad to see.
You know, this is the first friend of
mine that's been close to me who's died
before their time. So, it's been really
sad. You know, I wish I reached out
earlier. I wish I had these talks. And
what I encourage you to do
is if you see this happening in somebody
else or if you see this happening in
yourself, you know, talk to somebody. You
know, talk to somebody about it. You shed
light on something and the problem. You
know, let somebody know. "I think I might
be depressed and I just like to talk
with you about it. I'm not sure if you
know what you've been seen. But what are
your thoughts?" You know? And just talk to
somebody about it. Let's shed light on it.
But if you know somebody who's depressed,
talk to them. Offer to talk to them and
you know, if you're committed to doing
that and if you were moved by this video
which is very different than my other
videos, right? If you follow my channel.
Just type in "I remember Danilo". Because I
hope his story helps somebody else
because what happened to him and what
took him to the point where he felt so
hopeless about the future that he even
took his own life. When in reality, it
didn't make sense to me, right? I heard
that and I just didn't make sense. I was
like, "This is a guy... He's doing... He's doing
well and all these other things in life.
He has so much stuff. He had a beautiful
wife." He had a beautiful wife. They'd been
married for years. A lot of good friends
and he took his life. I didn't see why. I
didn't understand it but he did. And he
was depressed and hopefully we can
change the world by helping somebody
else in need so they don't feel like
they have to get to that point. So, I
remember Danilo. If you're willing
to have a conversation with somebody or
just if this video moved you. And not all
my videos are going to be like this
hopefully, right? And I'll see you in the
next video. Like this video if this
helped out in some way. We'll be back to
the regular programming tomorrow. Have a
good day.
