How I Bought Warriors Season Tickets at 17 and Said Yes

Ben BeeriThe best time to start a business is when you decide you want to and you wanna make it happen. Like, we all have dreams and it's never the right time to, like, say yes, I'm going for my dream. We think that it's gonna come at a later time in our life. Sometimes you don't achieve your dreams until you're old. Sometimes you don't achieve your dreams and you fucking die. But to take that first step and to say yes and I'm going to go for it. It's a difficult part. Felt like I owed it to myself as a person to say yes, to take that jump, and to start my business.

I was 20 years old. Nobody really believed I had it in me or was gonna take the next step and make something happen to start my business. And I remember thinking to myself at that time, I don't care if I fail. Like, if I fail, I will be able to live with that. But what I won't be able to live with is not knowing what would have happened if I would have tried. Like, had to try. I had to try and see what would have happened. And the problem for me was there was nobody out there really giving me any level of confidence that I could do it.

And I feel like that's a real problem we have in our society and a shortage of support that we have for entrepreneurs. Like you out there right now that may want to start a business. There's gonna be more people out there telling you that you can't, than telling you that you can. And the belief that you have to have, like, has to come from you. And that belief almost has to be delusional, like, you have to delusionally believe in yourself so much that you're making up for every other person in there who's not believing in you. Every other person you've come across in your life that says, hey, you can't do this.

Because it's not about whether you can or you can't, it's about that you deserve to try. You deserve to give yourself a chance and chase your dreams. And that dream could be starting a business. That dream could be moving to another city in another country. That dream could be anything that you can imagine that you want at a certain part of your life. You hear it from so many people, and it's like, hey, like, oh, one day when I retire, oh, I can't wait to go and move to another place. I'm gonna move to a place with an ocean view.

It'll be nice. I'll be out on the beach every day. It's like, go do it now. It's like one day, I save up enough money. I'm gonna start this business. It's always been a dream of mine. Do it now. It's like one day, one day, one day I'm gonna go to the gym and get some exercise in. One day, I'm gonna go on that trip with my friends. One day. One day. Day one. Like, day one starts today, and it starts when you say yes, and it starts when you give yourself a chance to go after the thing that you want to go after.

You have a goal. You want to go and get it. Like for me, I didn't know how to swim, and I wanted to get in shape. And that ultimately turned into me going and swimming a million yards. And swimming the million yards wasn't about the number, it was about the saying yes to showing up at the pool once. And showing up once, and swimming, and getting some exercise in, and seeing how I felt after that, and then saying yes again. And saying yes is ultimately a series of decisions. Saying yes is ultimately the doorway.

It's like you walk up, you see three doors. You walk up to one, you open it. You don't know what's in that room. Like, have no idea what's in that room. That doorway can be the access point to an even greater doorway, which is where you actually want to be. It could be an even greater place than you want to be, And sometimes that door doesn't open. So you keep walking down the hall, you check the next door, you open that one, you walk in, and that's where you want to be. That's the room you want to be in. And that room that you want to be in, it may not last forever.

Like, different things are temporary in life. Like, we are temporary. Like, I am going to die one day. So are you. And what are we going to do while we're here? Like, how long am I gonna be in this room for? I don't know. But do I even wanna know? Like, do I even wanna know how long this is going to last? How long is your job gonna last? How long are you gonna live in this city for? How long is your relationship gonna last? Maybe the current thing you're doing has to end for the thing that you really want to do to start.

The job you're working right now, that you've always wanted to work, may be coming to an end. But the thing you don't know is in five years, after you've already left this job, you'll be working a job that you love that much more, And something even greater can happen to it. The destination that you thought you were getting to is really just another doorway. Another doorway that you could walk through. And it's like life is like a series of doors. If the door doesn't open, guess what? There's plenty of other doors.

And we really get to choose the doors that we open. We really get to choose the rooms that we stay in, and we get to choose how long we stay there. So what are your doors? What are your rooms? How long are you going to stay? Because that's what matters. What matters is saying yes to a situation you actually want. I remember being a kid, and I wanted to make money. I wanted to make my own money. And I was doing anything I could to figure out how I could make $5, $10, $20. And finally, I hit the jackpot.

I got myself a job working as a referee at the local soccer league. I remember thinking, this is awesome. I'm 12 years old. I get to have a job. I can make, like, $40.50 dollars a day. $40.50 dollars a day when you're 12 years old? Oh, you're rich. You are filthy rich. Like, that's almost the cost of a video game. Like, you work for two consecutive weekends, like, you're buying any video game you want. Saying yes, and going to get that job was really the start for me of realizing it's like, hey, I have value.

I have value not just as a person, but I have value to the marketplace, and I can create value. And I remember being a kid, I was a big basketball fan, I always loved the Golden State Warriors. I wanted to get myself some Warriors season tickets, so I can go to more games. I always loved going to the games. I always had so much fun. And I kept working. I kept saving my money. And I remember when I was 17 years old, I finally saved up enough money to put a down payment on my Warriors season tickets.

I'll never forget this. The tickets were $27 a game. It was a 2013 season. The Warriors had just made the playoffs with Steph Curry the previous season. They got knocked out in the second round by San Antonio. And I'm sitting there thinking, I'm like, they have a chance to be good. Like, they have a chance to be really good. They haven't won anything. I feel like Steph Curry is that guy. And I said, yes. Put the down payment down. I said, yes to my dream of getting the season tickets. I started showing up to the games. It was fun, and meeting people was fun.

Like, wow. So grateful for all these different relationships I was able to build throughout the years of going to these Warriors basketball games. That's what it was really about for me. It wasn't about the money. The basketball games, going to the games, wasn't about the money. It's about the connection. And that's what sports are. Sports are a connection. And I said yes to the connection. The next thing I knew is I had an opportunity to help make other connections. And that was the start of my business.

That was the start of me wanting to say, hey, I want to make autographs available for people, so they can connect to their favorite athletes, so they can connect with other people that are fans of those athletes, fans of those teams. And saying yes to connection really ultimately helped me take the next step in life that I didn't even know was there, because I couldn't have even envisioned it. So for me, in my life, saying yes has led to connection. I feel like connection is very, very, very powerful, powerful, powerful tool for everything in life. It's a very important theme in my life.

And I feel like helping people connect to each other is really something that's meaningful to me, and something that I wanna keep saying yes to, so I can continue to expand on that, continue to expand on how to help other people connect. We get to connect. Like, I may say something that resonates with you, and that connects us. You may share the podcast with somebody that you know, and that connects you and them. And that's a beautiful thing about connection. So how can we say yes more in life? Let me know below in the comments. I'd love to hear from you. Where's somewhere in your life where you could say yes right now and find yourself in a room that you want to be in?