Three-Way Conversation: Gary Sheng, James Morin, and Nait Jones

Date: August 18, 2025
Location: Two Hands, Austin, Texas
Participants: Gary Sheng (@gary-sheng.md), James Morin (new contact), Nait Jones (@nait-jones.md)
Context: Follow-up meeting after James met Gary at Zach Levi's ranch shooting event

Executive Summary

This was a rich three-way conversation between Gary Sheng, tech entrepreneur James Morin (37), and Nait Jones at Two Hands restaurant in Austin. The discussion covered entrepreneurship, faith integration, fundraising challenges, family priorities, and spiritual development. James is actively fundraising for his B2B software company StackWizard while seeking guidance on balancing ambitious business goals with his desire to prioritize future fatherhood. The conversation revealed deep themes about authentic relationship building, spiritual warfare in technology, and the challenge of maintaining faith-centered values in secular business environments.

Key Themes and Topics

Entrepreneurship and Fundraising Challenges

James is currently raising money for StackWizard, his B2B software evaluation platform, but struggling with investor expectations. He expressed frustration with VCs wanting "change the world" narratives when he has a profitable business model:

James: "If I go and tell my friends I have an idea I think it could be cash flow positive, be profitable, make 20 million in revenue in the future... That's uninvestable. No one's going to invest. You have to tell this big story about how you're going to change the world."

Nait's Advice: "Your business is not uninvestable. You're talking to the wrong investors. Funds will not... Don't talk to institutional investors, especially not pre-revs."

Key Strategy: Nait advised James to "raise as little as you possibly can to validate the business" and focus on angels and family offices rather than institutional VCs.

Faith Integration and Personal Values

The conversation revealed James's spiritual journey from Catholic upbringing to seeking authentic Christian community:

James: "I grew up Catholic. I took a break for some personal reasons. But then I was with an ex who was Christian... I quite liked it. I rather liked it... I grew up in a Catholic church and I felt it was a little bit offensive for me, a little bit boring, a little bit too stuffy. And then I went to a Christian church... the guy was up there with cowboy boots... I'm like, OK. This."

Santiago Montoyo had challenged James about his dating strategy, leading to practical advice about church involvement and community service.

Fatherhood and Life Priorities

James expressed his primary life goal with remarkable clarity:

James: "The most important thing to me is to not miss a future T-ball game. Like I want to... Some people talk about calling. Like I want to be a father."

He views having children as asymmetric risk management: "I often view things asymmetric risks. Yes, having children is risky, it changes your life. But the thought of being 85 and having no one come visit me and a nursing home, that's an asymmetric risk that I'm not willing to take."

Gary's Spiritual Transition and Ministry Focus

Gary shared his current spiritual season and delayed move to Tulsa:

Gary: "I've been spending time with God. I've been reading books about God. I've been documenting my thoughts about God... I feel like this is like I've been doing a bit of this over the summer as well, but right now it's kind of like full time."

He revealed a significant spiritual evolution: "As recently as April of this year where I was like, why be a billionaire if you can try to be a billionaire? I literally had that thought. It's embarrassing to say... But I had to like I've been looking at myself... And I realized there are so few people that are even willing to look at themselves in the mirror like that."

Nait's Life Wisdom and Mentorship

Nait shared profound insights about life's pivotal moments:

Nait: "I have a mentor once. He used to tell me this. He goes, the sum total of a man's life comes down to five decisions they will make in their whole life... There will only be five things you ever decide that will decide the entire outcome of your life. And those five decisions will determine the course and outcome of your entire life. You won't know what they are."

He illustrated this with a powerful story from his youth in Kansas City, where refusing a gun in a gang confrontation led to changing schools and meeting a teacher who believed in him, setting his entire life trajectory.

Technology, Spiritual Warfare, and AI Concerns

The conversation touched on spiritual implications of technology:

Gary: "I think what atheistic libertarians they miss when they try to create that libertarian paradise is that it devolves into creating what I call simphastructure... People building technology and changing laws to make it easier and easier to gamble and just have now hyper-personalized AI girlfriend."

Gary referenced a Stanford study showing brain changes in people who interact with AI more than 15 hours weekly: "You see the Stanford study that came out last week about people who interact with... more than 15 hours a week or something. They show their image of their brain. It's a completely different image. It matches the image of a person who has ADHD... So you're literally changing your brain."

Community Building and Authentic Relationships

All three men emphasized quality relationships over networking:

James: "I don't like networking events just for the sake of networking. So I thought this was a nice way of like, we got to meet new people and then figure out from there where we want to go from there. I don't like transaction relationships."

Nait: "The adjustment of coming here was inspiring. It's been a little harder to build community, but the community that I am building, it's smaller, it's more intentional, it's slow growing, but every addition to it has been real. Quality over quantity, yeah. 100% real."

Family Heritage and Generational Patterns

James shared his family's mill town heritage:

James: "I'm only two generations away from my grandparents. My grandparents lived in the mill in the factory. My grandparents lived in mill housing. Didn't even get paid in US dollars. They got paid in mill bucks which they had to use... Think about that for a second. The mill gave them mill bucks."

Gary: "This is literally what they want to do with crypto. Like crypto cities. So it's already been done. It's so interesting."

Nursing Home Reflections and Mortality

Nait shared moving observations about visiting his mother in a nursing home:

Nait: "I go visit my mom in nursing home... So many people are so sweet. You wonder... You're such a sweet nice person. I didn't even come in to see you. No one. No one in the world. You start to reverse engineer how that can happen... How does someone end up 65 years old in a facility with no business. People don't understand. Some of these people were living incredible lives, had a lot of stuff going on. And 20 years... it's a short trip. Short trip. 20 years later there they are in a wheelchair."

This led to profound reflections on preparing for life's final conversations with God and the importance of family legacy.

Business and Investment Insights

Fundraising Strategy

Nait's Framework:

• Don't talk to institutional investors pre-revenue
• Focus on angels and family offices
• "Take your fund cap off. Talk to me like a human right now"
• Raise minimal capital to validate business model first
• Use social proof and scarcity in fundraising language

Austin Startup Ecosystem

The conversation revealed Austin's unique character:

Nait: "The thing that's most beautiful and hard about Austin is it has the most non-obvious possibilities... But you're always... The inventory is... It's hard to stay on top of it... But it's all quiet. It's not like it's loud... It's quiet. If you know, you know."

Crypto and Web3 Skepticism

Gary expressed strong criticism of crypto fundraising practices:

Gary: "The crypto cash out is way crazier than AI... It's like so brazen. It's like the early investors and founders they build out these elaborate theories sell them to the public they of course get a pre-allotment of the tokens then everybody comes in and basically provides retail capital to the tokens they of course have no lock up. Right. They go liquid immediately and then they dump the project."

Personal Development and Spiritual Growth

Gary's Baptism Plans

Gary revealed significant spiritual milestone: "My two closest, like, spiritual mentor peers... that most contributed to my spiritual development... they think I'm ready to be water baptized... So I might be flying out to D.C. to do that."

He reflected on his unconventional spiritual journey: "I feel like I did it, like, reverse for most people. I feel like I've been baptized through fire first."

James's Dating and Faith Strategy

Following Santiago's advice, James is pursuing intentional community involvement:

• Church attendance and volunteering
• Community service work
• Joining Gary's homeless feeding ministry at We Can Now

Nait's Ministry Recognition

The conversation revealed Nait's growing recognition of his ministry calling, particularly to high-achieving men in tech and business.

Future Collaboration and Next Steps

Community Service

Gary invited both James and Nait to join We Can Now's Sunday homeless feeding ministry (10am-1pm, East Austin).

Spiritual Mentorship

Gary positioned himself as a resource for James's spiritual development and business guidance, while Nait offered wisdom on fundraising and life priorities.

Business Connections

Discussion of potential investor introductions for James through Gary's network, focusing on faith-aligned angels rather than institutional VCs.

Notable Quotes and Wisdom

On Life Priorities (Nait): "Someone asked me a question the other day. So, if you could talk to the version of you when you're a 20-year-old and you say you're successful... And my answer to them was like, not according to what the 20-year-old views as success. But my definition, it isn't that the bar has changed. It's that I have changed. What I consider success, that's different."

On Parenting vs. Success (Nait): "The trade-off really actually isn't worth it... I actually believe I would have achieved everything. Maybe even, ironically, maybe even more so... It's kind of a, it's a fake choice... what we think we're missing out on is actually the thing we're running away from."

On Spiritual Warfare in Technology (Gary): "I believe that God has slowed down my worldly plans to reindustrialize America because He knew I needed to like shore up my foundation."

On Authentic Relationships (James): "I don't need to meet someone in the tech space. I don't need to meet someone that's type A like me. In fact, I think you should meet all of the opposite."

On Life's Pivotal Moments (Nait): "Every day you get up you're like, what am I going to do? You are going to do nothing. I'll tell you what to do... Our ego is in a constant battle against our faith."

This conversation represents a deep exploration of how ambitious men can integrate faith, family, and business success while building authentic community in Austin's unique entrepreneurial ecosystem.