YouSaid · the spoken record

Arnold Van Den Berg

lines on the record: 143
first: 2023-07-23
most recent: 2023-07-23
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Was funny. Yeah. She said to me, you know, Arnold, I was never afraid that I was going to die in Auschwitz because I just knew I wasn't. How do you know? She says, I made a deal with God. I said, what do you mean you made a deal with God? You sit down and sign. And I know that he accepted it, so it was done. I knew I was not going to die in Auschwitz. And nothing made any difference. People, I would walk down and all of a sudden somebody would fall dead in front of me. These people were dying all the time. I knew it wasn't going to be he.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Later, he says, I was almost afraid to die because she was that adamant about it. And that was her. You know, that's just classic for us.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“She said, No, ma'am, you don't. I see you tomorrow. She walked out next day. She shows up again. And she says, Many, you can't do this. She says, how did you get by the guard? She says, you know, he stopped me and I explained to him. And this last time when I saw him, he walked the other way. She says, I think he's afraid of me. That was her numer, you know? And so she said, The last time she said, she says, Lenny, I'm going to tell you so. I risk my life to come and see you to bring you these foods. And she grabbed her and she says, you better not die on me because one of these days we're going to be celebrating getting out of Auschwitz and we're going to be drinking wine and toasting that celebration. And I've got it in my mind. You've got to put it in your mind. And she's still holding it. She says, and whatever you do, don't die on me.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“All of a sudden she comes walking in. She's got a big smile like she owns the place. And he says, and she said, Manya, whatever you do, don't come back because the next time they're going to shoot you. She says, I come back tomorrow.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“How long it would take to get to the gas chamber would be about two weeks. So she says, I'm going to die in the next two weeks in the gas chamber. Or I'm going to die when you shoot me. If I'm going to die anyway, it doesn't matter. I'm going in. And she said, she just took off and started walking and he didn't shoot her. And so Laney was telling me this story, you know, when I visited her, I called her up and I said, Laney, this is Arnold Vandenberg's. I'm, oh, Manya's son, coming. I thought, geez, it was like a celebrity, you know? She made this beautiful meal. She says, you know, you can go your whole life through life and you will never meet anybody like your mother. And I said, what's going on? She says, well, did she tell you when she saved my life? I said, no, she didn't mention it. She just told me to go visit you. She says, that's Larma. She doesn't think it's a big deal. She says, but the amount of courage you took to stand there in front of a gun and say, I'm going in. So she said, I was laying there. I was kind of in delirium. And I thought I heard your mother's voice, but I thought, can't be.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To the guard, and he said, Stoppy, at his gun there, and he says, Where are you going? She says, well, I'm going to go in there because I have a friend of mine that's dying. And he said, my orders are, if you go any further than where you are right now to shoot you. You can't go in because you contaminate the camp. And so she said, let me ask you a question. If you had a relative or a loved one that was dying in there, would you not want to go in there? She says. He said, well, sure. But my orders are to shoot you. So don't go any further than this. I'm going to have to shoot you. He says, you know what? She says, I'm in a cabin where what they do is they put you, they have these cabins before the gas chamber and they'd have you go into the cabin. They gas these people. Then you'd move into the next cabin. And so she figured, where she was from the time where she was in the cabin to”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, Laney Harestart. I was going to Holland one year. It was in the early 70s. And I said, mom, I'm going to Holland. I'm going to be going to England and I'm going to stop buying Holland and visit the people who saved you and so forth. Oh, now it's wonderful. When you get there, please look up Lamy Herchenhauses. That was the lady's name. I said, who is she? She says, well, Lamy and I were in Auschwitz. We're on the same bunk. And she got very sick. We were very close. And she had typhus. So what they do when you have typhus, they take a barrack, they put a guard in front of it so that you can't go in there because you contaminate the whole camp. And they let you die there. You know, you're just in there. And so I wanted to go see her, but I knew there was a guard in front and I had some nightgowns and I had some food for her and some water and so forth. And I figured I would visit her and make her feel better. And so she said, so I went up.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Couldn't afford a location, so we had our little business at the end of a dirt road street. And your mother would go out every night when your dad made the dresses and did all the stuff to create the merchandise. I would go out and sell it. And she said, I never went home until I sold everything. That's it. Put it in your mind, you sell it, you make money. She says, you know what I found out? Your dad called me one night and I came home late and he said Where were you? What's going on? It's late. She said, you know, Hugo, I learned something. I found out that the later it got, the more I sold. And I figured out that people just bought it to get rid of me. That was who she was, you know.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And so I was kind of spent with that. I said, well, so what do you think I should do? She says, you got to be a yucker or a businessman. What do you want to be? I said, well, I don't want to be a yucker. I'll be a businessman. Okay, so find a business. I said, well, mom, what kind of business can I go into? She says, what difference does it make? Business is you find the product that you like, and then you find somebody who would like to buy it. And that's what I do. Find a product, then sell it. And Manya's in the middle make a good living. That's how business works. That's all there is to business. Find a product, sell it, and make money. And you don't need to go to college or anything. That's all you need. She says, you can parachute your mother anywhere in the world. She doesn't even need to know the language and she can make money. She said, when I came to Holland, I couldn't speak Dutch. And, you know, we started our business and we”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Said, How come? And I said, Well, you know, it's very well in high school with the gymnastics and so forth, but I never did well in school. And all the teachers told me, if you want to be successful and make money, you got to go to college. And she goes, what? The teachers are telling you that you can't make money unless you go to college. I said, Dana. She said, the first thing I tell you is ask them how much they make. And when you find out, you'll see they don't know what they're doing. She said, that's the first rule. The second thing is you have to understand the way the world works. There's only two kinds of people. There's the yeka and there's the businessman. I said, what's a yeka? She says, Yekca is a guy like your dad. He's intelligent.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I had zero interest in what they were teaching in school because I remember sitting in an English class and the woman was teaching the dangling participle. And I thought, what is this got to do with life? I want to make some money. You know, how do I do this? And so I just English just became the worst subject. It was boring. I never did well. I didn't want to do it. And this just went on and on. And so I didn't develop academically. And so all the teachers used to tell me, you know, Arnold, you're not getting good grades. And if you want to be successful in life, you got to get good grades and you got to go to college. And if you want to have a good career and make money, you can't do it if you don't go to college. So I was sitting there after I graduated from high school and my mom looked at me and she said, I know you look a little depressed. I said, well, ma I am.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And the conclusion he came to is that because of what happened in the war with the malnutrition, it could have affected my brain, and it might be kind of a permanent thing if there was permanent damage there. He couldn't tell. But he said he just wanted to prepare my mom that this was not just a temporary problem, this may be ongoing. And so that's what I kind of grew up with thinking that, you know, didn't do good in Hebrew school, didn't do good in grammar school. And my mom was concerned about it, high child psychologist. And so I heard this story and that kind of became my image. And so athletically I could do fine. And like working on cars and doing menial jobs and working in blue-collar situation, I was very good. But when it came to the academics, it was almost hopeless. The other thing that I realized looking back, it wasn't only that I had the slow self image.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I think that I had this situation after the war that my mom hired the best child psychologist to figure out what was wrong with me because they enrolled me in a Hebrew class. It was like a kindergarten Hebrew class, and I failed it. I obviously couldn't do the work. I wasn't getting along. And so the rabbi and my dad called me aside and said, you know, you're going to move on, but you're not going with the other kids. We're going to send you to this special course, you know. I said, how come I'm not going with the other kids? And they said, well, you know, it's just a different thing. We think this class will be better for you. And I got the feeling that that wasn't the truth. I got the feeling I fail. And when I got into grammar school, I had trouble reading and all of these kind of things. So my mom hired this child psychologist, who was one of the top.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I enjoyed fixing the machine. I was very good with mechanics. And that's another thing I learned from mechanics. My dad always told me, you know, Arnold, everything you learn in the real world, you will find that you'll be able to use. Sometimes academic things may be important in college and stuff like that, but they don't always stick with you because you don't use them. He said everything you learn in the real world, you'll always be able to use. So I became very good at mechanics and I learned the importance of having the right tool. I remember when I used to work on my car and it would be difficult to get to a place and a certain technique. But if you had the right tool, it made all the difference. So when I was in high school, I always saved my money to buy the right tool.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The gold color, the blue color, and the white color, and the green color. And I passed all of those because I'm red, green colorblind, but a dark green I could easily see. So he says, okay, that's all we need. So I said, well, when can I start? By the time we got there, it was only a couple of days of Christmas. He says, you know what? The day before Christmas, we only work half day. Why don't you come in and we'll start on that day. So I started the day before Christmas. And that was just the happiest time. I went over and saw a friend of mine who was selling Christmas tree and I told him, hey, I got this job. So we were all both pretty excited about it. And that was kind of a turning point in my life because it was a real clean shop. It was a big building. It was a Richfield oil company. They had their internal printing department. And I really took to it.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Said, what about if I go to the doctor and I bring the medical records back? He says, no, it's got to be private. Well, how about if he puts it in Memble Open, he seals it so I can't open it and then I can bring it and be private. He goes, well, that's kind of a new one, but I'll call the doctor. So he called the doctor. Doctor says, sure, send him down. So I came down. I got the exam. I bring it up. I open it up. And he looks at it and he goes, What's the matter? He says, you're colorblind in a print shop, you know, with all kinds of different inks and all that. He says, that's going to be a problem. I said, well, you know, I can see some colors. I could tell he knew I was very upset. He was kind of rooting for me, I think. And so he says, I'll tell you what, I'm going to give you the colored blank test myself. So he picked up three major colors, you know.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Course, I saw it was a print app. So he said, Oh, would you be interested in it? I said, Oh, I would love that. It looked very interesting. So he said, okay, you got to go out. And I said, when can I start? Because I was in trouble, right? I mean, I didn't have much money. So he said, why don't you come back after Christmas? This is like two weeks before, right? Or a few days before. It was right before Christmas. I remember his name, Mr. Mayton. I said, Mr. Maitland, Is there any chance I could start right away? He said, you know, Arnold, I don't have a problem starting you. But the problem is that we need to have a medical examination before I can hire you. So we're going to have to wait a few days anyway. And I said, what do I have to do to get a medical? He says, you go to the doctor, he does a routine medical exam. It's not a big deal. And then we can hire you because it has to do with the group insurance and so forth and so on.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And the gentleman is going out to lunch right now, but if you'd like to come back in an hour, you can talk to him. I said, oh, great. Anytime, then I thought, oh my God, I wish I'd have done that neither, you know. But anyway, I went back in an hour and he called me in and he starts talking about the multilith department. And I didn't know what the multilit, it's a printing department. But I didn't know what the multilith meant. He said, would you be interested in the multilith department? I said, oh, sure. be happy to I figured how can I lose right I run garbage trucks what could I lose so he's talking about the mobile let well let me introduce you to the supervisor the mobilet department so I go to the multilith and he starts talking about the molet department I still didn't know what he was talking about I want to tell him I didn't know so he's going on and on he says would you like to go down and see the multilith apartment I said yeah and I walk in and then of course”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I'm looking for a job. And then my transmission goes out. So I'm really in tough bait. I had to duck when I saw the landlord. I had to duck out of the way. And so I went everywhere to get a job. I didn't have any skills. I didn't have a trade. And I'd walk into these big buildings and they said I'm applying for a job. And they said, what kind of job? I said, I'll take anything, you know. So I went all over town and I was filling out applications. They always tell you, make it real neat. And I made sure that it was neat and everything. After a while, I got really tired of it. So I walked by and I said, you know, I didn't go into this building. I had a feeling that I should go into the building. So I walk into the building. I told her I'm applying for a job. She says, I'm sorry, we don't have any jobs, but if you'd like to fill out an application. So I did it kind of sloppily, and I would just want to get it out. And she looks at it and she says, I just got a call from the personnel.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“My dad comes through. He said, You got pain today? And I said, Yeah, here's the check. I make $29. He says, Well, it's been two weeks. You owe me $30. And I said, how am I going to pay you $30 when I only made $29? He grabs the check and he says, you can pay me the other dollar next week. And that really ticked me off. I was really upset with that. And that's when he gave me the fifth about, hey, I'm the landlord, you know. And then I started telling him, well, pa, I had to pay for this. He said, Arnold, there's one thing you need to learn. The landlord doesn't give a damn about your problems. He only wants your payment. That's it. I'm the landlord. So you pay it and I'll let you go until a couple of weeks. You can pay it back. That's the rules of the game. So I said, okay, so I moved out. And about two weeks after I moved out, the gas station went out of business. Now I got $40 in the bank.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Had an argument, and he said, Look, here's the way it is this is where you live, and these are the rules. And if you can't go by with them, that's okay. I understand. Just find another place to live, you know, that kind of thing. So I thought, you know what? That isn't a bad idea. I think that's what I'm going to do. So I had a friend of mine that wanted to move out. And I said, Duka, are you still anxious moving out? Oh, yeah, anytime. So I said, why don't we find an apartment? So what I didn't like about the fact that my dad is He said, if you want to go to college, you can live here free. If you don't want to go to college, you go to work and you pay me $15 a week. So I said, that was a little high. But anyway, I got this job at the gas station, and the first week I had to buy a uniform, and there were all kinds of deduction shoes and different things. I only made $30 for two weeks. Oh, no, $29 for two weeks.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And it was real cold. And an old man came out at that time, old, was 65, and he came out in a white coverall. And I told him what the problem was. He says, let me go take a look. So he gets on the creeper. He rolls underneath the car. And he comes out and he's got all kinds of oil on his trousers and stuff like that. His face had some things his hand looked at. And it was very cold. And I thought, right, Ben Bear on the spot. I said, no, this is not what I want to do when I'm 65 years old. So I'm going to have to find something else. And right then and there, right on the spot, I decided that's not for me. And I started looking for other things. So while I was working at the gas station, they went bankrupt when the guy went out of business. So I had to get another job and it was two weeks before Christmas. So I had also had a problem with my dad.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Look, they disqualified us not totally, but they made us go back because there were some parts, even though we got the car around the track, they were still misfiring on some spark plugs and so forth and so on. And then by the time we had to drive back, you know, everybody else came in. But that was a great experience because I learned a lot and I got a job at a gas station for $1.15 an hour. And all my buddies would come in at the gas station on Friday night when they go out with their girlfriends. They'd come and wash their cars and fix it up. And whenever there was a problem, they'd always come to the gas station so that I could figure out what was wrong with their car. And I learned to listen to different noises and things. You'd be surprised. There's quite an art to that. So I was really interested and I was going to be that. And then one day I needed a part for my 41 Chevy and we didn't have it. So I had to go to the car dealer. And it was a Saturday morning.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And you start up with the battery and you see if you have electricity here, then you move into you have it here, and then you move in. If it doesn't come here, then the problem is in between here or there. And so there's a whole methodology starting from the battery all the way into the electrical system and from the fuel tank to the carburetor. And then the adjustment. So I really got into it. They had an engine on a stand and you could practice on it and do it. And he would fix the thing up and I'd have to find it. And I love doing it. And even enrolled us into automotive contest where they had 35 cars from different high schools and the mechanics would kind of mess up, you know, so you wouldn't know how to figure it out. And then you had to use your system. And we would have wanted. There were 35 high schools and four junior colleges. And we were the first one around the track. That was the idea.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I didn't have any talent for singing. But my favorite class were two classes, Auto Shop and Gymnastics. I was a rope climber. And so AutoShop was the first two hours of the day. And I really got into it. And as a matter of fact, when I was in high school, my dream was to be an auto mechanic and maybe even have an auto shop type of thing. And so I really wanted to learn everything. And the teacher was really a tremendous guy. The thing that I enjoyed most about auto mechanics was not necessarily fixing the problem. I loved finding the problem. And so”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, and I think that's the value of kindness. When you are kind, and I'll talk about it later, it actually creates chemicals in your body, serotonin, dopamine, and doorphins and things of that nature. So one of the things that we'll talk about later is if people want to be happy, they have to do the things that create those chemicals because the brain is a chemical instrument. And so the more you do the right things that create these endorphins and dopamine and serotonin and so forth, the happier you're going to be. Well, it turns out having good diet, doing exercise, and being in the sun and being kind and being honest, those all are things that create diets. So all you have to do to be happy is to live a good life. It's dedicated by your chemicals and your brain.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That changed my viewpoint and it opened my eyes to the fact that the things I heard about Gentiles were kind of biased. You know, it was through their experience, you know. And so if you have that experience, and that's the only experience you had, then that's what you believe.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yes, and that was very much because my mom was born in Poland in a small ghetto and bad things happened from an anti-Semitic thing and they always had problems. And then they moved to Amsterdam Holland, which was very good compared to where they came from. My dad was from Germany. But the point I've always heard all my life is the Jews are one thing and Gentiles are another. You can't really trust the Gentiles because look what happened to us and so on and so forth. So I never had this viewpoint that Gentile people could be good people and they want to help Jewish people. Of course, you know, people hid my folks during the war. And there's also people who turned them into the Nazis. So I wasn't quite clear about that. But when I saw this couple who was non-Jewish and treated me like, you know, I was their son. I mean, they treated me as good as his son. So I thought them right.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“For all the cookies, and then I say, okay, what's your favorite? What's your favorite? Mom, what's your favorite? And then I divide it up and give them all to them.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You're kidding. He was shocked, you know? I said, Yeah. He says, all right, well, that's great. So anyway, that really was an amazing experience. I've never forgotten it. And it has influenced the way I think because at that time I didn't think there were people that cared about other people and one of the health people and all of that. I mean, that just didn't enter in our neighborhood people didn't do things like that, you know? It was totally out of character. So anyway, I always made a mention of this whenever I see the Girl Scouts selling cookies or something like that. I always buy a big batch of them. And when they look at me and there's kind of surprise, I said, you know, that wasn't my idea. There was a lady and I tell them story that came by and wanted to get me out of the rain and she bought all my flowers. And I know how good that felt. And so I want to make you guys feel good. So thank you.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Believe people doing that, you know? So they drove me, dropped me off, and my boss came by and he said, where's all your flowers? I said, well, I sold them. He said, you sold them in the rain? I said, well, let me tell you what happened. This lady came by, wanted to get me out of the rain, and she bought all my flowers. And he goes.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I hand her flower and she says, Now get in. I said, What do you mean? She says, Young man, I'm buying those flowers to get you out of the ring. So get in. We only live a few blocks from here. You'll get dried out or get you some soup and so forth. So I was just shocked. I mean, I never experienced anything like that. So I said, okay, I got into college. It went 12. She made me some soup. The husband came out with a beautiful shirt. And he said, here, put this on, you know, after I was dried out. I said, boy, that is a beautiful shirt. He said, okay. So we sat there and I watched TV with him for a while and then things went by. And I said, you know, I'm going to have to get back to my corner pretty soon because my boss is going to come and pick me up. So they said, okay, so I went to take off the shirt to give me shirt. He says, no, no, that looks so good on you. You keep it. Not that where am I in heaven or something? That couldn't.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, I'm already went. Yeah, I mean, I was drenched. I'm already wet and people are still buying, so I'll just keep selling. So I kept selling. Finding a lady pulls up and says, young man, what are you doing in the rain? I said, well, I'm selling flowers, 35 cents apiece and three for a dollar. And she just looked at me and shook her head and she whispered to her husband. And she says, how many flowers do you have? I said, oh, I got plenty. How many do you need? She says, no, no. I want you to count exactly how much you get. I want to buy all the flowers. I said, what? She says, I want to buy them all. And I said, what are they for? She says, young man, would you just count those flowers? I said, okay, $16. So I said, $16. You know, that's like $100 today or even more. So she said, okay, she pulled out the money.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To the best corner, which was in Bel Air, near Beverly Hills, right? I even had Tony Curtis buy flowers for me, became up on his Cadillac with his wife and so forth. But anyway, I was really excited because it was hard working the neighborhoods that weren't too good just stood there for hours sometimes and that felt very much and gets kind of discouraged. But anyway, finally worked up to the corner and as I was so excited that, you know, getting up in the morning knowing that I'm going to be in this great corner. So anyway, I was there about an hour showing then it started raining. And I got really bad. I mean, it was a real downpour. And I thought, oh my God, I've worked all this time to get up to this corner. And now I'm not going to be able to do very good when it's raining. And as I was thinking about it and going back and forth, people kept stopping in the rain. And I was selling the flowers.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, there was a job. There was a couple of kids at school that had a flower route. And what they would do is they would recruit kids from the high school and you'd put you on the corner and you'd sell flowers. And what we learned is that some corners really were good because they were in good neighborhoods and people made a lot of money. And there were other parts of town that were kind of tough and people didn't have that much money and you didn't do it. So when you were new, they put you into the worst corner. And that is so you can prove yourself. And if you proved yourself, they kind of knew what was a good job and what was kind of halfway. They had a quota for each quarter. So anyway, the way to move up to the best corner is to continue to outperform the coldest in the bad neighborhoods and then you move up to the next one. Well, I worked for months to work myself up.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“My mom said to me, There's a gentleman in the neighborhood that drives a garbage truck. If you want me to, I can go and ask him if you'd like to work for him. And I have to think about that one. But I said, sure, because, you know, I couldn't get any other job. And so I did that all summer. And the guy was really an inspiration guy because he was a very small guy. And at that time, I was a gymnast. I was pretty strong. And he would take this big box, carbohydrate hole in it, pull it back. put it on his knee and then he'd move it up to the top of the truck. I couldn't do it. I mean, he was amazing. But anyway, it was an interesting job, not one that I'd want to continue with.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, you know, when I became a Bar Mittz for the tradition of becoming a man of the Jewish tradition, my dad came up to me and he congratulated me and he said, what does the Barmitz mean to you? He says, I said, I became a man. He says, good. I believe that. That's a good way. And now that you're a man, you will be responsible for all your financial expenditures except room and board. So anything else that I wanted, it was on me. So I got a paper out. I became very good paper out. I was written up for him time for being a top carrier for getting the most customers. And I did very well on my paper route. And that was my spending money buying presents for my brothers and things like that. And so they got me going and then I did lawn work. I mowed lawns in the neighborhood and I did any kind of part-time job. And I even had it during the summer. I couldn't get a job in my”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He became a doctor. He was very smart. He was a fast president. You know, everybody knew he was going places, but they didn't feel that way about me.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Even some friends, I have a friend for my high school that wrote in my annual, you know, when you sign the annual, he said, Arnold, you're about the coolest guy, no. I hope we'll always be friends. You're kind of dumb, but you're still cool.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I had on the way to seeing Dr. Burke, and so that had to be at least 35 years ago. So the stuff in the file was no less than 25 years, and the sum as long as 40 years. So I estimated to be about at least 25 to 30 years, maybe even longer, could have been longer.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I thought maybe I filed it under a different subject. So I go that are different subjects, never could find it. Finally, I gave up and started a new file. And then one day I decided to clean out my cabinet because it was piling up and papers or hanging out and so forth. I said, you know, I'm going to clean up my cabinet today. And so I started filing it. And what happened is it had fell below another file and kind of went underneath it. And so I never saw it. And then as I was cleaning the cabinet, I thought, wow, there it is. And then I read it and I was really amazed how clearly defined that was in my mind. And I looked through the thing. I couldn't figure out how long it was. But I had material going back to 1980. I had material once I was going to a client's meeting. And this is when I lived in LA. So it had to be 30 years ago. And I wrote a note.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Well, what happened is I have this goal. And then whenever you have a goal, thoughts come to you. You know, the little flashes of inspiration, you're driving down the street and all of a sudden pops in your head. So, when I got in the habit of doing, whenever I had a random thought that applied to a goal I had, when I was driving, I'd pull over and write it down because I knew the subconscious was. Feeding this So I put it all in the front of them. I had a pretty thick file, and I kept it in one place, the gold. One day I went to look for it and I couldn't find it. And I looked everywhere I could.”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The letter, the note to myself is I have a dream, I have a dream that one day I will perfect and innovate a technique that will inspire and motivate people to see the truth. As James Allen Groat so eloquently, that they are the makers of themselves by the thoughts they choose, and that choosing the right thoughts man can become what he wills. By developing the right technique and application, man can achieve his wildest dream. My dream is to teach this to inspire people to believe as I do and to be able to show them how to do it, to be able to offer this to people without hope and confidence in themselves and to give them vision. By giving them a vision, something will stir in them and they will move themselves to realize the vision of their hearts. I want to demonstrate that no matter how hopeless the situation appears,”
2023-07-23 · We Study Billionaires · RWH030: From Poverty To Power w/ Arnold Van Den Berg · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT