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Dream Home Movement: Renovation, Property Investment, Interior Design, DIY, Gardening

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 6, 2020 49:33

- Jason Seiden That meant that I would gladly, if I could be the last person ever lose a child. I would I would take that on, if I could, to say it like that's how horrible it is that I don't ever want anybody else to feel it. And so other folks actually telling me that they're happy and that they're like, I think they would feel like I would feel worse, like rubbing it in. - Jason Seiden But actually, no, you know, that's it's the opposite. Like live your life. And tell me you've opened up your eyes and you're stepping into it and you're aware of the discomfort and you're aware about the hard choices you're making and you're doing it and you're celebrating those wins because they're so few and far between. Those were, the those were the best things. INTRO Jason Seiden is joining me today to talk about his daughter Elle. Elle was passionate about social justice causes, possessed of a sardonic humor. She was insightful and creative…and she is dead. She committed suicide after suffering from debilitating pain due to CRPS (complex regional pain syndrome) diagnosis and committed suicide at fifteen years old. What does it mean to honor her legacy, to remember her in all her fullness? What does it mean as a father to live a life that encompasses such a profound loss but is not ultimately defined by that pain? Jason is articulate, reflective, and honest in this powerful conversation. Before we begin, I’d like to thank our sponsors. First, we are sponsored by FullStack PEO. Providing full-service solutions for entrepreneurs and small business, FullStack manages the details so you can get back to doing what you do best, running your business. We are also sponsored by Handle with Care HR Solutions, with engaging, interactive training ans coaching sessions, we empower you to give meaningful support to your people as they go through disruptive life events. Back to our conversation. First, as a sidenote, Jason was sitting outside during the first part of our conversation due to water damage and clean up crews in his house…and you might hear the birds singing under some of his thoughts. In the months after my daughter, Mercy, died, someone reflected that there wasn’t a word in the English language for a parent who has a child die. If your spouse dies, you are a widow. If your parent dies, you are an orphan. It is almost like the death of a child feels so against the nature of things that language itself can’t encompass the loss. Jason and I began our conversation talking about the difficulty of talking about the death of a child. Jason has founded and sold businesses, he is a gifted teacher, trainer and communicator. He recalled putting together a presentation on the fly. So. Yeah. So I a 19 and a half minute clip. And I lost the teleprompter halfway through. And still in one take was done in less than 20 minutes. - Jason Seiden And then my partner at the time spent three hours trying to record the same 20 minute clip. Yep. This is hard. They said this is this is you know, I'm speaking from a much different place and I'm surprised at how difficult it is. - Liesel Mertes One person's journey is not anyone else's. But I remember specifically in that the aftermath of my daughter Mercy dying. It felt so in. I mean, there's so many things that make it feel de-centered. And but for me, like if there's anything that I traffic in and feel comfortable in the world, it's words like it's it's been able to communicate. Similarly, you know, I have my own stories of like know what? Like I feel adept in that realm. - Liesel Mertes And to come to a place where it's like I. I feel. It just feels different. And it felt it felt like it it have done a skill set, that it was like I'm normally so comfortable doing this. - Liesel Mertes How could even this feel altered? Well, you're aspects of that. - Jason Seiden And I know you well, I want to talk about the journey since losing Elle. But I think this is this is actually a great opener because it's it's true. I've journaled my entire life. I've written my entire life. I've written books. I have novel length stories that you'll never see the light of day written. And when when I wrote after her passing, I went back to read some of those journals. And some of them are very clear, like, this is a man who's in pain and who's articulate about it. - Jason Seiden And then there's other journal entries that are just noise. It's you read those you like. Oh, that's what it looks like. It's unintelligible. It's it's it's complete. It's just you. These are not sentences. These are not phrases. That makes sense. These are, this is raw stuff. And it's remarkable. And you kind of say to yourself, I'm good with words. I lived with a thesaurus, I'm specific with them. And if I'm struggling to find just even the basics, how is everybody else going to do? - Jason Seiden Right. You know, we don't we don't step into things that are hard. We tend to avoid things that are hard. And this is this is the hardest. So I think most people avoid grief when possible. Certainly the kind of grief that we've had. And that just means, they're completely unprepared. I was entirely unprepared for what happened. And trust me, if I could have avoided it, I would have. It's a hell of a journey to be to find yourself in particular for the first time. - Jason Seiden And then also you are surrounded by people who are equally as inarticulate to help. - Liesel Mertes And that's you know, that gets to also the profoundly isolating nature of grief because to to communicate where you are, like it's hard enough to just know, like, you feel like you're throwing words against a wall. But to be able to be understood by another person and that can just feel so daunting. Like, I don't even know how I'm feeling. And now I've got to find some words to have, you know, what I'm feeling. - Liesel Mertes And maybe it's just better to be alone. You know, it can be that retreat. And to just I don't even know. - Jason Seiden Yeah, well, I think there's a, I think there's a lot of truth to that. If I go back, I still default. I bridge that problem with something that I started defaulting to the week Elle passed. So I lost my daughter a year and a half ago. Coming up on two years, actually. And she, she died of suicide. She had been very sick prior to that. And she was in intense pain. She had a condition called CRPS. complex regional pain syndrome. - Jason Seiden And it's it's just it's nerve pain. And it's always on. It never stops. Nerve pain, like when the dentist hits the nerve in your tooth and you hit the ceiling. And she had it in both her legs treatments for years. Nothing was was helping. It was getting worse in certain circles. It's actually known as the suicide disease because it doesn't have the decency to kill you. But, yeah, it's it's close. You know, it's terminal. - Jason Seiden Who can live with that pain or that amount of time? So there's others, too. It sounds awful, but there's this one benefit that I got, which was despite having lost her to suicide. I don't I don't wonder. Could I have done more? Was there you write like that. Mental health is invisible. And it's real, but it's invisible and it's it's difficult as a human to accept things you don't see without wondering, could I have had some sort of control over that? - Jason Seiden And when it's physical and you can see it, it's a little bit easier to go. I couldn't control that. That was a thing. And it was a whole conversation we could have around mental health and how it needs to be in the same category. But for, for this, what I wanted to say was in those early days, the words that it was that were most easy for people to find were were those around how Elle died, what she died of, what her condition was prior. - Jason Seiden And I very quickly found myself initially trapped by that. It put me in the past. It put me you know, I had, had this journey of trying to help her and in all kinds of stuff was going on. You can imagine the complexity of the dynamics of dealing with, by the way, not only a crippling disease, but the most misdiagnosed disease out there. Right. It just was so I didn't want to be in that space. And it kind of struck me one day to a lot of thinking and metaphors. - Jason Seiden And I couldn't find the words myself, but I had this metaphor that sort of hit me. I'm talking about Elle in terms of CRPS would be like talking about MLK, Martin Luther King, in terms of gun rights, you know, or Anwar Sadat in terms of gun rights. It's like, yeah, these guys were assassinated. That's true. But they stood for something else. They lived for something else. What they lived for what they died of were totally different. - Jason Seiden To make MLK the poster child of gun rights would be to lose his legacy as a civil rights leader. What a shame. You know, you kind of you know, you'd have to kind of look at him and go, OK, technically true, but we're not going to use him for that. Like, we're not gonna make him. And I don't mean to use him. Right. But we're not going to. That's just not going to be his legacy. - Jason Seiden And with Elle, sorry, it was just it was the same thing. You know, she was a social warrior. She lived for stuff that she didn't die of. And so I found those words and I found it. Redirecting people really helped me control my narrative. And I still do that. I still use that today. - Liesel Mertes And tell me a little bit more about her, about some of the things that made her distinctly her and those causes. And particularly if, you know, she's she's a she's a fully fledged person behind the memory I'd love to hear more. - Jason Seiden Yeah, absolutely. And so very early on before she was born, I just had a feeling about Elle. And I've got I've got two daughters there and I've learned first on Elle. And it's just proven true with my other daughter as well, that as a parent, my job was just to get the stuff off the high shelf. - Jason Seiden You know, these kids coming up, they're fully formed. They're they're, a bit like flowers. Right? Do they have to for all. They have to blossom. But the flowers in there. - Jason Seiden Nothing I could do to change the raw material. And and, you know, so Elle was very special. She, she had a wicked sense of humor. Like, just even from a very, very like an impossibly young age. Understood sarcasm. I don't know if your grandparents on your side. I mean, she couldn't because she couldn't have been like more than a year old. And my grandparents would come and babysit her for more than once. She's understanding sarcasm. Yeah. - Jason Seiden I changed the tone of my voice. And she doesn't laugh. I flip the words around. She looked like she only laughs when it's a deadpan opposite, you know? The description is deadpan and opposite of what's true. She is following sarcasm. And it just, it was why she was always very tapped in. She she just you know, she came to this world with knowledge that you look at her and. There's no way that that knowledge came from five years of existence on this planet. - Jason Seiden It's just kind be living proof of something bigger. - Jason Seiden And she had a way of getting noticed. I'll tell you one story, which is just one of our segments. When the girls were maybe 7 years old, I took to sort of overnight count drops kids leave families rent cabins, and then have a dozen families in those camps all up in Sweetwater, skier No.12 things. They did a talent show and one girl after another is getting up and doing cartwheels and walkovers. - Jason Seiden And they're up there for ten seconds. Let me run off the stage, get going. Elle gets up there and start a cappella singing. Don't stop believing. That's awesome. - Jason Seiden And the camp director stops her, runs up to the stage. Wait, wait, wait, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. And I'll think something's. She turns on all the equipment plugs in her iPod, iPod, and let's Elle do the full five, five and a half minute song scene over Steve Perry. We're all downloading on our phones. The lighter apps are holding them up like a concert. - Jason Seiden And that was Elle, you know, just just being able to put your finger on the gestalt start of the moment and own it. And it is remarkable. And so you're kind of one of the reasons why I don't like thinking of her when she was sick was all of that power. It's not just that it went away. It never went away. So, you know, somebody with that much kind of cosmic ability gets sick, real sick. It's just it's so wrong and so far away from what she works for, what she stood for. - Jason Seiden She was always so zoned in. So you wanted this story. This is actually relevant to her legacy. So I do a lot of communications work at my house up with certain companies and also internal internal comms. Well, politics has a role in that. And there's an immediate negative connotation to politics that people have. And so to break it out, I would give people this moral dilemma. And, you know, I just let them sit with it where they realize, OK, I may not like politics, but they're real. - Jason Seiden I can't escape this question. Damned if I do or damned if I don't. It's one of those kinds of things. And I posed it to Elle. She's 10 years old. And Liesel, I'm telling you. Maybe two adults out of hundreds. I posed this question to and Elle heard the question and she said, well, you know, the only way to win is to not play you both these actions. Horrible. It's just a you're just choosing which value you want to violate and which value you want to maintain. - Jason Seiden That can't be true to yourself with either. You know, I think the outcomes once you're in that position. Like, oh, my God, she's 10. And she understood that. And here so, you know, so it's, it just it felt. It has always felt important to honor, you said, who she was. Things that made her unique. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. Those are some remarkable memories of who she was and, yeah, what she brought the color and dynamics. - Liesel Mertes I want to talk about, yeah, the journey after her death. - Liesel Mertes I'm, I'm struck that even as you are carrying her legacy, you, you are also shaped by who you needed to become in the midst of watching her be sick. - Liesel Mertes What were some of the things that you noted in yourself as a parent, at that time, that shaped you? - Jason Seiden The things that I noted as a person and same things and as a person of. Life has to be lived and risks have to be taken. The only way to not make a mistake is to not play the game. And that's so you're just not safe as a as a parent. I'd always cited my job as kind of two parts, one part keeping my kids safe and two parts helping them unlock who they are and, you know, make the most of this world. And, you know, my daughter's gone. So a very, very fundamental way, I did not keep her safe. - Jason Seiden We can have a very intellectual conversation, Did I control her getting ill. And, of course, like, you know what? No, of course not. But it's like you're never going to tell me. I will never be able to feel that as a parent because she's gone. I. So this the game, whatever, whatever that's I was making whatever balance I was trying to strike between keeping you safe in the world or the game with her. It was frozen. - Jason Seiden Right. It's it's lockdown. There is no no more time on the clock. There's no hope. There's no tomorrow. There's nothing's going to change. And so they're validating that recognition that there is no safe there. There is no harm. - Jason Seiden By the way, not only do you have to play the game and not only your mistakes be made, but there's consequences for those mistakes. People will be hurt when you make a mistake. I've had to I've had to come to grips with that both as a parent and as a human. - Jason Seiden And it's, it's, you start to see the world a different way. - Liesel Mertes What, what does, I'm struck by how profound and. Yeah. Awful. That feeling is because so much of what we get to do living in like a wealthy, affluent, you know, society is we don't have to feel unsafe in so many areas of life. And and to feel it at such a visceral level is horrible. When you say, you know, I've had to come to grips with that. What has that looked like for you? - Jason Seiden I don't know. That's a powerful question. I'm not sure what it looks like, but I'll tell you, it feels like things. It feels like my life before was it's just been pulled to the extremes. And I'm not dealing with any emotions that were foreign to me. I'm just dealing with a lot more of them. So it's funny, I actually said, you know, here's this girl who introduced me to stretch my capacity for joy in one direction. And then the passion stretched my capacity for sorrowing another. - Jason Seiden On some level, like how do you just not feel gratitude for somebody who gives you more life to live? And. It shows like that. MUSICAL TRANSITION - Jason Seiden You're constantly playing other people's emotions at life events and realities. You have to live your life. If you live boldly, you will. Other people will be hurt. And you have to be OK with that. I'm not saying you should be indiscriminate or not care. I'm just saying to be simultaneously OK, moving in the light, doing your best, try and take care of people and understanding you can't save everybody. In fact, the act of saving one person might cause somebody else to be hurt. - Jason Seiden Yeah. And you feel it if it goes through an intellectual concept to something, you feel very deeply and constantly. - Liesel Mertes Elle died. And you said it's been a year and a half. - Jason Seiden Yeah. A little more coming up on two years. - Liesel Mertes Okay. Still, when something horrible happens like that and even, you know, the. The journey of walking with an often misdiagnosed disease. All of those things. What were you finding that you, what were people offering you in the way of, like comfort or presence in that, you know, messy aftermath? That was really meaningful to you? Or even now, just things that you'd say, "Man like these people did it really well. They came alongside me and it mattered?" - Jason Seiden It's for windchimes. So that's, that's Elle. They went off the top of our call and I just heard them. - Jason Seiden Yeah. So. For so long, surprised at how much. I'm not somebody who asks for a lot of emotional support. Probably not dissimilar from a lot of men that way. But I was surprised at how much I actually needed it. They were largely, I was really struck in the immediate aftermath at how supportive people were. It was absolutely incredible. - Jason Seiden My professional colleagues are scattered all over the country, all over the world. And without my without my engagement, a few of them, Mark Stelzner, Lori Rudiment. Susan Strier. - Jason Seiden I had friends who, you know, without without my help. I put up a page and tribute to Elle. She she died a couple of weeks before my birthday day. They promoted it for my birthday, a tribute to Elle and I just watched, I watched for for twenty five thousand dollars get raised in a day in honor of my daughter for a small handful of charities. The Human Rights Campaign, chief amongst them. The United Colors Foundation, which helps LGBTQ homeless youth and Burning Land, which is a CRPS foundation. And it was it was absolutely incredible. - Jason Seiden The next thing I know, the CRPS Foundation has a grant in its name that had been funded. HRC flew a flag in my daughter's honor, which I now have. It's it was astounding. So, in the immediate aftermath, how important, it was incredible, - Jason Seiden As you can imagine. You know, as time goes on, everyone goes back to their lives. I've had a handful of people have continued to reach out. And it's so helpful. On the homefront. Everybody here has been incredibly helpful. - Liesel Mertes What has that continuing to reach out looked like? - Jason Seiden Literally just a check in and a thinking of you. That is all it takes. - Liesel Mertes I think sometimes people fear that because they think out of the person doesn't want to talk. Or what if it brings up bad memories? Maybe I just won't do that. From your experience, how would you speak into like that, that cycle of second guessing that people can have as they should. I reach out and I'm out. What if they don't want to talk - Jason Seiden I'd go back to what I was saying before? You have to live your life. You might make mistakes. Go make the damn mistake. Engage and you know. OK. So I'll tell you, the waffling shows up. And from my perspective, as the one going through this, It shows up and I can see it a mile away and I end up in a position then of having to take care of the people who are reaching out to me. Sure. I know it's fairly common. And, you know, and you do a great sweat. - Jason Seiden I mean, like, this is such a horrible thing. I get it. We don't spend time with this if we don't have to. I'll assume it happens to you or something you're close to. You don't have to. Yes. So the, the, the fact that people are unprepared for it, I'm not surprised. The most helpful thing, we just when people reach out. - Jason Seiden Actually, the most helpful thing is when people would reach out and say, I'm thinking of you. I just had a lovely time with my family. Oh, great day. And I was thinking of you and I was thinking about. And I gave my kids an extra hug and I made sure I didn't take it for granted. That made me happy. - Jason Seiden And it's, it's so funny with these people would reach out and, I can't imagine what you're going through. And I always look at them and be like, why would you take one moment of your life and try to imagine what I'm going through? But yet we all know it's horrible. Don't waste your time. Just write like it's horrible. Check the box pass, you know. You know, it's a kids with, you know. This is gross. Taste it. No, no, no. Not to me. - Jason Seiden Yeah. It's like that. Except with consequence, you know. No. Right. - Jason Seiden I actually loved when people would tell me that, you know, they were thinking of me and they weren't taking the life for granted as a result because that meant that Elle counted. - Jason Seiden That meant that I would gladly, if I could be the last person ever lose a child. I would I would take that on, if I could, to say it like that's how horrible it is that I don't ever want anybody else to feel it. And so other folks actually telling me that they're happy and that they're like, I think they would feel like I would feel worse, like rubbing it in. - Jason Seiden But actually, no, you know, that's it's the opposite. Like live your life. And tell me you've opened up your eyes and you're stepping into it and you're aware of the discomfort and you're aware about the hard choices you're making and you're doing it and you're celebrating those wins because they're so few and far between. Those were, the those were the best things. Yeah. - Jason Seiden I mean, I will say because it's relevant. I mean, we we. We tend to think of our personal life happening in one area, in our professional life happening in another. And they don't. A decade ago, I actually coined a term, "profersonal" for, you know, this notion of the bleed over. You know, we spend a lot of time working. And so what was really surprising was how difficult that transition was without the folks on the work front doing some of that, acknowledging as well. - Jason Seiden Not just my friends. But, you know, this is where I'm spending my time. It really helps when, when professional colleagues check in as well. Otherwise, your your work starts to feel like just this void where it's like I have to go put on a, you know, put on a mask for the majority of my day. - Jason Seiden You know, I I think this notion of. The notion of grief at work is not trivial. It's a huge part of people's days. And, you know, I'll say I worked at it at an organization when this went down. You know, the organization I was with great culture, phenomenal culture. But this was a this was a blindspot. And it showed, and it it had an impact, like the journey could have been different. - Jason Seiden And. What I, what I could have done quicker or more of, I think would have been. It would have been. I could've done more. Yeah, I couldn't move through some of this faster. And. And at the end of the day, I think there's a real. You know, I I'm getting through it. I will get through it. But I think the organization lost something. And when you kind of look at large organizations with hundreds or thousands of people, here we are in COVID, and the loss is real. People are losing people. - Jason Seiden And there there's complicated grief happening out because they're they're unable to be with the ones they love. Now is the time to actually step into this and to have that compassion. The benefits are are substantial. They're. And they're there at multiple levels. The economic benefit, the just, the benefit to us as humans. I think it's important that our organizations step into this breach and start recognizing grief is something that we all have a responsibility for helping people through. MUSICAL TRANSITION - Jason Seiden You know what it is? I'll preface this by saying I don't blame anybody. It's not an area. We haven't quite evolved to this yet. I think we're on the front edge. I think people such as yourself are on the cutting edge of bringing awareness to the business environment, of the importance of dealing with grief effectively. So, you know, we're we're getting out. - Jason Seiden We're getting a handle on DNI. And I think in that same bucket. This is this is their belonging. When you start thinking about belonging as a as a goal for DNI. Well, belonging. If you're dealing with something that nobody else is dealing with, whatever that thing is, that's your your barrier to belonging. So hopefully as we kind of move in this area, the will all get better. But, you know, it's little things. It's. - Jason Seiden First of all, texts and messages from people are super helpful. Doesn't take much. It's just like, hey, just checking in. How you doing? The gap is experienced when you don't get those more, when the only time you do get them is on the front end of a call where you're talking about other stuff. Because, you know, I would get that from my manager. Looking back, I think the only times there were check-ins were back at the top of a call. - Jason Seiden I'd be like, hey, how you doing? OK, great. So here's like the five things that we've got to go through today, right? - Liesel Mertes It feels like. Yeah. Just like, hey, are you are you ready? I'm with tasks because I certainly am. - Jason Seiden And so in, you know, like, OK, great. And so it's it doesn't count, you know. And it creates this problem with the other person thinks, I'm checking in. And you're like, no, no. You're just making sure that I'm ready to go through your agenda. That's not a check-in. - Jason Seiden That's like. - Jason Seiden It's like, you know, is your you know. Can you can you mute the background noise? It's it's administrative at that point. - Liesel Mertes Different than having, a specific time that is not encumbered by any other aspects of an agenda that would, you know, crowd it out. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes Sometimes people say ill conceived, offensive, stupid things to people who are grieving. What were some of the least helpful things that you heard? That you say, you'd say, you know, you can do all kinds of things, there's a margin of error, but don't do this. Let me do you a favor. Don't do this. So I'll give you so I'll give you three answers. Number one, there's always some people who are close to you who are surprising in their lack of support And so I had two of those two people who just AWOL, like shockingly AWOL. Oh, my gosh. Right. So that's. The lack of saying something is saying something. There are, then there are people who make it about themselves. - Jason Seiden So when I was getting married, I remember the people who were in the inner circle. Right. You're a close friend. We'll get married and you find that the venue was small and you'd call and be like, dude, totally get it wherever you need to see this, totally fine as long as I'm in the venue. You do what you gotta do because you're going to have some issues here with your seating chart so you can see it coming. - Jason Seiden I mean, it was the bubble. People like the people who were barely they barely made the cut. They're the ones who would be pissed that they weren't in the bridal party, too. They're like, dude, this is so backwards. Same thing in reverse. You know, my best friend like that. You know, Lori and Mark and Susan putting that thing together. That is so incredible. The people who showed up and who were part of it. - Jason Seiden Amazing. And then, you know, there are the like the one or two people who who are like I was just I was appreciative that they showed up. And then I find out later they were angry that I didn't include them in the planning. And I'm like, they are so far out. They had no idea; I had nothing to do with the planning. But this was all you have a group coming together for me, like this wasn't me orchestrating. - Jason Seiden I wasn't using Elle to. This is happening in support of her. - Jason Seiden Right. And so that that's been that's been disappointing. You know, again, there's nothing that gets said. You just hear about that stuff sort of second hand. Right. - Jason Seiden Then then the third part is just people who don't know what to say and you know, and they try. And I actually appreciate these people. It's it's hard for everybody. I can't tell you how many people asked me, how are you feeling today? And I'm like, you know what? - Jason Seiden Good. Right. OK. Awesome. Like you went digging. You found the Sheryl Sandberg Plan B. Quote. And Granny read the headline and you're giving that to me. When you start getting the same question over and over again, it's it's hard. You know, I like you. You wish people would kind of real deeper or maybe find another avenue or, you know, kind of go, OK. But everybody else is saying this. So can I find the next thing? - Jason Seiden Can I can I have the conversation to the second sentence? And so I don't want to. I want to discourage people cause it's so important to get started. I think it's just also really important to be thoughtful and to not stop at the first perceived solution. So it's not that those people said anything bad, it's that the ones who go beyond stand out that much more. - Liesel Mertes Yeah, I hear that I'm struck. So I am reading there has been a book that that has just been published. I think it's it's called Meaning, The Sixth Stage of Grief. I'm going to check that for sure. But it's, it's a researcher who had worked with the Elizabeth Kubler Ross Foundation and after the death of his son said, you know, I feel like although these five stages that were described, they're not linear. They were never meant to be that way. - Liesel Mertes But that the fact that an important stage for a number of people is actually the meaning that they are able to make in the aftermath of loss. Not that we. And he says there's a diversity of ways that can be another. The death in and of itself is meaningful. But there are different ways of making meaning from this and how the people who live beyond that integrate a loss or grief into their lives - Jason Seiden Kessler. - Liesel Mertes Yes. Yes. Have you read his book? - Jason Seiden I have not read it yet. It's on the list. - Liesel Mertes Yeah, I've heard him on an interview. - Liesel Mertes It's I've appreciated it so far. It strikes me that making meaning has been an important aspect for you. Tell me what making meaning has looked like for you. - Jason Seiden Yeah, it's some. I hadn't really thought about it until I kind of heard the concept and realized, yes. This is true. Life is really random. Right. So here's, here's something that that death does. It brings a finality to a relationship that cannot be undone. And it leaves you, you know, it's like the other side of the game. A tug of war drops the rope and you're just and you're left in this you're flying backwards stage. - Jason Seiden Except there's no there's no hard ground to land on. There is no other person to laugh that they let go of the rope like you are now potentially flying forever in the wrong direction. And finding meaning is really for me. It's been around, you know planting my feet under me and just bringing that momentum to a stop and recognizing I can't honor Elle if I'm crumpled in a ball on the floor. I can't honor Elle if I'm in the past, you know, grieving her illness or thinking of her sick. - Jason Seiden I can't honor Elle if I'm in the future, if I'm anxious about will this happen again and like this happen to somebody else and what if and what if I hurt somebody? And what if I'm responsible? - Jason Seiden What if I did? None of that helps. And so for me, finding meaning has been around what Elle stand for. How can I honor her? What should I do? What can I do today that she would be proud of? And really, that's about grounding myself in the present and finding a way to conduct myself. That starts just getting through my day. Right. It's like, OK, I can't honor her if I'm crumpled on the floor. - Jason Seiden So what does that mean? It means I have to choose to be happy. I have to choose to live like I have to choose to get up. I have to have to choose to try. So that looks like putting my feet on the floor. Getting out of bed, making the bed, making coffee, certain, basic stuff. And as and as I kind of got that underway, then it was like, OK, well, what am I doing? - Jason Seiden What should I go do today? Well, I should be healthy. I should go for a run. You know, the CRPS attacked your legs. I'm going to go run. And I'm I'm I'm go use that part of my body that she couldn't. Because if I were you know, it's like if I want people to tell me that they're happy and they're not taking their families for granted, I have to assume she'd want the same. And so I'm going to do that. - Jason Seiden And, and right then it cascades up from kind of the basic stuff to what am I doing, like, on a higher level and my leaving the world a better place. Am I taking care of the people around me? But at the end of the day, finding meaning has been around grounding myself in the present so that I can honor her in a way that also allows me to move forward. - Liesel Mertes I think that there are some people who would hear something like that, you know, they would this, Elle want me to live fully and be happy and I'm purposing to do that, that for some people that can morph into, I'm, I'm just not going to think about these unpleasant feelings anymore. When they come up, it could be its own form of avoidance and pushing those things away. How do you, how do you live into that meaning without just ignoring the painful feelings that can crop up unexpectedly? - Liesel Mertes How do you still acknowledge and honor some of that sadness and emotion? - Jason Seiden Easier said than done. I can't say that I do that perfectly. This is, this is not a topic that I speak easily about and I actually don't speak a lot about because it is hard to step into those feelings without kind of getting lost. But. - Jason Seiden I think. For me. If I'm totally candid there are parts of it that could feel sacrilegious. There are times where moving forward actually feels like it's gonna be disrespectful like that, the respectful thing to do would be to sit and cry and grieve and be a mess and that the way to honor her would be show her how important she was by showing her how incapable I am of moving forward without her. - Jason Seiden And at those moments, it's a hard choice and the hard choice is to remember, we are all individual people on this planet and me doing that, me, quote unquote, honoring her in that way would be to lose two lives. So that doesn't work. - Jason Seiden And then you get. Right. So that's, that's sort of one path. And so I just I allowed the emotions and the thoughts to kind of carry me to get to that point. And I'm like, OK, I can't do this. - Jason Seiden It doesn't work. So even though the other side, even though moving forward doesn't feel right, I just proved to myself that sitting here in a bar wallowing doesn't work. So I'm going to go make that choice. That doesn't feel right, not because I'm drawn to it, but because I am repelled by this other thing. - Jason Seiden And then, and then there's another part too, which is there's a piece of it that's like, well, to honor her feels like picking up her torch. And carrying that and becoming the social worker, becoming her, doing the things that. And I run into the same problem. We're different people. He, you know, I can support her causes and I am. But I'm I'm taking my time because, this happened to me. It could very easily be the thing that defines me. - Jason Seiden And I've spent my entire life to defining myself to be something else. I'm not ready to just let this become the thing. You know, there's the guy lost. That's not who I am. What I want to be is the guy who shows people how to continue to be themselves. Even when something like this happens. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. - Jason Seiden And so, you know, so there's a it's it's hard, you know. What does it look like and how does it feel? Sometimes it feels sacrilegious. Other times it feels like I get selfish. - Liesel Mertes We are drawing near the close of our time. But I'm struck in that last thing you said, you know, you are you are not just a man who has had his daughter die. - Liesel Mertes What are some interesting things that you like about yourself that make you you? - Jason Seiden You know, it's a surprisingly hard question. - Liesel Mertes Sometimes it can be. I have a friend who would do that to people on their birthdays. He would be like, you need to tell all of us three things you like about yourself. I felt kind of awkward. - Jason Seiden I live out loud. I, I, I make my mistakes. My my dad used to say, my dad says, own your mistakes. They're the only things other than your name that other people won't try and take credit for. - Liesel Mertes And it's a great line. - Jason Seiden It is. And in this day and age of of digital piracy, your name's not even safe. So, like, literally, my mistakes are the only things I can. So I make them and I do my best to make new ones all the time. I try not to repeat. So I live my life. I learn. I still am learning. I am still open to learn. I don't. - Jason Seiden I know what I know. And I. I've earned my gray hair once, I don't have to earn it twice like I know when I'm in a situation where I actually have an expertise, but I am well aware that it's a great big world. And, you know, I have like, this tiny speck of knowledge within it. - Jason Seiden So, I appreciate the fact that at my age I can still look at the world with a certain amount of wonder and to sort of get lost in it and want to know how things work. - Jason Seiden And. I. You know, I and I'm stronger than I realized. I have a certain amount of resiliency that I'm. This has not been an easy journey, but I'm I'm surrounded by people in this club that I don't want to be in. But, those of us who are able to persevere and make something positive of it. I, I see the people who aren't able to do that. And I can I can recognize that I'm I mean, about I have something to offer because the boat I mean, it's the boat of people who are able to move forward. And I'm proud of that. MUSICAL TRANSITION Here are three reflections from my conversation with Jason. Even if you aren’t sure of what to do or say, move towards people in their grief.In his words, “Live your life, make the damn mistake,”. You won’t be perfect and you don’t have to be but your support matters. If you are in a workplace setting with a parent that has lost a child, especially as a manager, make time to actually check-in with them, not just as an entrée to a meeting, ticking a box so you can get on with an agenda item.This might mean scheduling a call or a meeting that isn’t about a to-do list but only about hearing from them about their how they are doing. Navigating life after the loss of a child is hard.Jason expresses the complex, internal challenge of moving forward, of not letting himself be singularly defined by Elle’s death. Sometimes it can feel sacrilegious or selfish as he leans into life beyond his daughter, struggling to be and become himself even after tragedy. If you are struggling in this journey, perhaps you find camaraderie in Jason’s reflections. And if you know someone who has lost a child, perhaps this gives you additional insight. OUTRO

How to choose an property (for investment purposes) with Claudia Brdar

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 19, 2020 14:48

Claudia Brdar Claudia from The Renovate Avenue shares practical advice on how to choose an property (for investment purposes)We cover:Choosing a suburb to invest inWhat to look for in the propertyChecking quality and structure of the propertyThis episode is part of a very special DIY renovation series.⠀Claudia from @therenovateavenue and Founder of the DIY Renovation Academy will join us once a month on the show to take you through EVERYTHING you need to know to DIY your reno.⠀⠀This is like a little sneak peek into her super popular DIY Renovation Academy course.⠀⠀This series is exclusively for Dream Home Movement listeners.**This episode of the Dream Home Movement was recorded live at the RPPFM**Follow the Claudia and The Renovate AvenueFacebookInstagramWebsiteFollow the Dream Home MovementFacebookInstagramWebFollow Carl and Jo VioletaFacebookInstagramWebGuest bioClaudia and her husband Pete have renovated small properties right through to large scale projects. Several years ago they bought a run-down 1960's weatherboard house (purchased for $460K) and ended up completing a major renovation ($75K), creating a beautiful sought after home ... on a tight budget! They set the suburb record for a property price of $1.035 million (2017)!They're currently renovating a 1960's brick house to sell.Both Pete and Claudia have a real hands-on DIY approach when it comes to renovating, focusing on achieving that ‘WOW’ factor ... thinking bigger, outside-the-box, and never afraid to take a risk.Claudia created The Renovate Avenue to share her knowledge, and inspire others to climb the property market via the renovation avenue, building a financially stable future to retire earlier (and do what you love).Transcript*This transcript is automated, so may not be 100% accurate*(00:00):Welcome to the dream home movement. This is your weekly dose of home and property inspiration, bringing you clever tips and advice from the very best experts and real-life Reno stories with your host, Jo.(00:16):Yeah.(00:23):On this episode, we are looking at how to choose a property to renovate. So we're going to unpack how to read, how to actually research suburbs and also what you're looking for in that, in the property that you're purchasing, what to look out for and to help us with that. We have friend of the show, show regular Claudia Brdar from The Renovate Avenue. Now, if you haven't met Claudia before, or if you're a new listener to the show, Claudia is a renovation and home-style specialist on any budget. And she's the founder of The DIY Renovation Academy. I am a student of The DIY Renovation Academy. I'm learning so much. It's excellent. And basically what the course does is that it helps you to learn to succeed with your renovation. And it just covers everything like all the way from the planning to the styling, to choosing trades everything.(01:27):So welcome to the studio. Claudia. It's lovely to have you here. Thank you so much, Jo. I'm really happy that you've invited me to the show again. I'm I'm excited. Thank you. I'm enjoying this monthly series that we're doing. I think our listeners are going to get a lot of value from it and this topic I'm particularly interested in because it's just so important and buying a property is such a huge, huge investment. But talking about a lot of money here. Yes. Yeah. We're not choosing which margarine and we're going to, or if you don't use much, we're going to buy, like this is a big deal. Yeah, that's right. Alrighty. Let's start with not the property, but the actual area because where you buy your property is so important. So do you have sort of like a method or a process for researching neighbourhoods and suburbs to buy in?(02:21):Yep. So look, firstly, don't ever buy a property on impulse. Do your research. It takes time to do research you know, you really need to know the area that you're looking at buying into what's around. Is there a school around, is there childcare what facilities are there close by? What's the transport like? Are there buses around, is there a train station close by what other facilities are around in regards to shopping medical centres, things like that are really important when researching and finding the right property the sort of neighbourhoods tend to be popular more so with, so definitely(03:00):Do your research there and know what area you're looking into for sure. And also talking to real estate agents too. And I think real estate agents get a bad rep, Joe, but there's some really good honest and knowledgeable real estate agents that you can talk to and get some information from in regards to the property in the area properties there in the area. And I guess you would also, depending on what you want to do with the property. So if you wanted to resell it that's right. You would be looking at capital growth in that that's right. That area. I mean, I know we've gone through a bit of a market downturn lately, but be looking sort of at very long term trends or yes. I mean, it depends on when you're wanting to sell and rental yields as well, if that's right.(03:44):That's right until yields too. So yeah, your numbers and, and also, yeah, those are manatees are so important. Aren't they people that are looking for properties, people with families more so want a property where there's school nearby there's facilities, there's transport. That's really important. There's also another tip that I wanted to share as well. So do you know what a sister suburb is? Joe? No. Tell me, so sister suburb is a suburb where it's the same distance from the city to a popular suburb. So, okay. So there's, there's areas out there that are quite significant in property growth and in price as well. And there's also the sister suburbs, which are on the opposite side, but at the same distance from the city that may not cost as much as buying in a more popular suburb. So I've done that in the past with a property.(04:45):It was a sister Saba was about 15 Ks from the city and we renovated a property property there. It was right next to the train station and it was also next to schools and other facilities too. And we did extremely well in that area. It was a sister suburb. Like it feels about 15 Ks from the city, but it was in the Northern direction. So really do your research. There's suburbs out there that are untouched. When I say untouched, there's a lot of properties out there that are un-renovated and they're there they're goldmines ready to go to be renovated. So that sister suburbs that's really clever. So check that out, have a look at the areas and know exactly how far particular areas are from the city and then look in other directions as well. So don't just look in the one area really try to see what else is out there in the opposite directions. Like I said, so they're the sister suburbs. Wow. That is, I like that. That's a new phrase for me to add a little bit of a tip for you. So once you've decided on the area that you'd like to buy in, or the areas(05:58):That you're going to look at, house hunting, what are your tips?(06:03):So what are you looking for when you're choosing an investment property to renovate? Yeah, sure. Is the building and roof structurally sound? You need to really know, don't just take the agent's word for it. Really have a look, get an independent building inspector in if that's what you need to do, just remember this is the biggest purchase of your life. So get in an expert to have a look. If a house has a need re stumping, does, does the plumbing need to be redone? Really have a look at the overall structure of the property to an, a building inspector can check out the overall quality of the house and you know exactly what you're getting into before you sign on the dotted line and hand over your money. Also does the house have the right number of rooms to suit your needs?(06:44):So how many rooms does it have? And how much work does does need to be done? How much will you need to spend to get that property up to a level where you want to get it to? So knowing exactly what you're getting yourself into, I've got a due diligence sheet that I give my students and they can run through everything. There's a list they can tick off once they've checked it out and they know exactly where, what needs to be done and what work, what work will need to be completed. Check your plumbing to avoid plumbing issues. What are the neighborhood know noise levels like? So is there a freeway nearby? What are the sound levels like? These are an airport nearby. It's like on that movie the castle castle, well, there'd be an airplane flying over, you know, every hour. So does the house have good natural light as well? Is it dark and dingy in there? Do you need to, will you need to open it up with more windows and or doors and if you need to get a building report as well for termites and pest inspection, if, if that's what you want to do to, that's a good idea to do as well.(08:04):Oh, that's a really good tip. Can I share a wacky tip? Yeah. Okay. So this might sound really weird, but trust me, if you don't check this, you're gonna regret it. Yup. Go into the toilet. Yes. Right. Close the door and turn around in a 360 degree circle and just make sure that there isn't make sure there's enough room in there. Because the reason I say that is we lived in a house a while back and the toilet, when you just looked at it, it was like a separate toilet to the bathroom and you just looked at it. It looked like it was a good, decent size, but then you'd go in. And like every time I would go in, I would close the door and then turn around and I would knock the toilet paper off the toilet paper holder because it just was, it was just a bit too. Yeah.(08:56):In there. I said, that's very random tip something. I wish. Yeah. That's a good one. I like that. Thank you very gracious to say that you like that too like that, but I'll also things such as when people, when you see people going to house inspections and they're knocking on walls, cause they're trying to act like they know what they're looking at. Which my father in law does, and he's a carpenter slash builder for the last 40 years. And he does know when he's not here at stuff and he listens to the sand. He knows what's going on. But also things like checking the windows, opening and closing the windows and seeing if they get stuck on the hinge that I easy to open and close looking for signs of deafness or mold as well. The last house we renovated there was mold everywhere.(09:45):There was no ventilation. So just, just really looking at stuff like that. Also checking to see if the taps are running, listening for sounds. So, you know, when sometimes you turn taps on and you can hear a banging sound in the pipes yet listening for that. Cause that will be a telltale sign of plumbing issues. Things such as that are really important. Looking at defects, looking at squeaking in the floor looking up at the ceiling, just looking up and down and yeah, when you're going to toilet do a three 60 being really aware of cracks and spots and creaking, just so you know exactly where you're at with the house and what will need to be done. We'll give you more insight, give you much more insight into what work will need to be undertaken. Yeah, definitely. And if you're, yeah, if you're renting, gonna buy that house and you're renovating for profit in whatever form that takes, then you would run last episode.(10:41):Claudia ran us through her calculation to figure out whether a property is going to be profitable. And so, yeah, checking what you're actually going to be working with, checking for those creeks and cracks. And that sort of thing is something that you would need to factor in to make sure that it is actually going to be profitable. That's a, that's a really good point. And with the cracks, you've got to look carefully, haven't you? Because a lot of really clever painters will paint in a way that kind of covers up those cracks quite nicely. Then you're in the house for three months and you're like, Oh yeah, exactly. Giant crack. Yeah. That's right. Come from that's right. Yeah. So have a look and you know, what, if there's carpet have a look with under the carpet, if there's floorboards on there, I sweat when I go into an old house and there's carpet, if there's floorboards underneath, I swear I do a happy dance because I know that, Oh, this is fantastic. All I've got to do is now sand, hopefully sand and Polish, those floorboards. So it's like an added bonus and most of the older house has got the floorboards underneath the carpet. So yeah, do that as well. Lift up the carpet when no one's looking in the corner, you'll have that, those amazingly beautiful high quality floorboards underneath, underneath that's right. Okay. So we all now NAR what to(11:54):Look for when we're going to buy a property to renovate. Thank you so much. I feel like I've got a really good like action plan to look for again, Claudia, thank you so much for coming in tonight. I really appreciate it. And this wraps up our little mini series that we've done as part of season three, with Claudia, where we were looking at planning your renovation. So this has been a lot of fun. Thank you so much. You're welcome. I'm so happy to be speaking about this and sharing my information and my experiences. So you're welcome, Joe. Well, I'm going to put you on the spot here now and say, will you come back? And I think we'll move on to styling and design now. Oh, I love it. That's like dressing the cake. That's the fun stuff. Everything. It's all fun when it comes to renovation for me, but sounds good. I'll be there. Awesome. I can, I'm looking forward to it. So Claudia is back doing a monthly special guest appearance, little miniseries and we're covering styling and design.(13:01):Hey, thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the dream home movement. Now, just to let you know, this episode was actually recorded to Claudia and I recorded it back in October. I think it was 2019 and it's now I'm editing it now in May, 2020. I think it will be released in June, 2020. So as you know, if you're a regular listener to the show, I do have a bit of a, a library, a backlog of episodes that I'm working my way through. But we will, we will get there. And as Gloria and I mentioned, she will be back for another little mini series of episodes coming out once a month. Hopefully I can keep my skin, my editing and publishing schedule on track. Yeah, she would be, there'll be another monthly mini series with Claudia, with styling and design tips. I want to thank you again so much for tuning in.(14:02):And if you enjoyed this episode, which hopefully you did, if you got to the end of it, I would love it. If you could leave me a beautiful five star review and do a subscribe, couldn't think of what I wanted to say. Please review and subscribe. I'm going to go now. I can't talk anymore. I hope you have a lovely day and I will see you again. Or I will speak to you again soon. Bye. Thanks for joining us on the dream home movement. Be sure to come over and say hi on Facebook and Instagram. I hope that your dream home projects are going well. And I look forward to chatting with you again next week.

diy home house renovation founder polish real estate reno giant property northern yup home renovation so i've lift ks bye 460k alrighty i'm i'm nar property investment 75k all i've both pete

The Impact of Technology on Engineering - an ACEC Research Institute Roundtable

Engineering Influence from ACEC

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 19, 2020 58:54

On June 18, 2020, the ACEC Research Institute held the first of a series of panel discussions on the future of engineering. The topic covered by the panelists was the "Impact of Technology on Engineering." Panelists included:• Jose Luis Blanco, Partner, McKinsey & Company• Mike Haley, Vice President of Research, Autodesk, Inc.• Chris Luebkeman, Director for Strategic Foresight, Office of the President, ETH Zurich• Heather Wishart-Smith, SVP Technology and Innovation, Jacobs• Moderator: Joseph Bates, ACEC Research InstituteA full video of the roundtable can be viewed here. Transcript:Daphne Bryant :Behalf of the ACEC Research Institute's, board of directors. Welcome to our first round table and the series, the future of engineering, a big thank you to our donors who have made this session possible. We have a great group of thought leaders, as you can see here today that will share their insights and expertise with us on the impact of technology on engineering without further ado. It's my pleasure to introduce two of my colleagues from the ACEC research Institute, Joe Bates, who will serve as our moderator today and Kevin McMahon, who will be monitoring the chat box and fielding your questions during the session, Joe, it's all yours.Joseph Bates:Thanks very much Daphne, and thank you everybody for joining today's round table. Before we get started with our questions, I'd like to introduce each of our panelists for the webinar. Today. First we have Jose Luis Blanco. He's a partner at McKinsey & Company Jose leads, McKinsey's engineering, construction, building materials and construction technology work in North America. And as a leader of its retail real estate practice, he brings deep expertise in optimizing performance and unlocking value through embedding digital capabilities and deploying and scaling up new technologies. We also have Mike Haley, vice president of research at Autodesk. Mike leads a team of researchers, engineers, and specialists to explore the future of how people design and make things. A primary focus of his team, is automation and leveraging technologies and disciplines that include machine learning, robotics, human, computer interaction, geometry, and visible visualization. Next, we have Chris Luebkeman. He's the director of strategic foresight at office of the president with ETH Zurich.Joseph Bates:Chris has a multidisciplinary education, including geology, civil engineering, structural engineering, entrepreneurship, and a doctorate in architecture. And he is deeply passionate about curating, constructive dialogue, insatiably curious. He relishes the opportunity to discover the opportunities which will be created by change, and perhaps most importantly, to evolve position solutions to the profound positive solutions to the profound challenges we face today. And last but not least, we have Heather Wishart-Smith. She's SVP of technology and innovation at Jacobs. Heather is a registered professional engineer and certified project management professional with proven, experience managing large design programs and developing, managing, and turning around troubled offices and the architectural engineering professional services market. And also Heather is a fellow of S A M E and she is currently the president elect for the 2020, 2021 Centennial year. Thank you all of our panelists for joining us today. I'd first like to start out with a question fairly broad one for each of you to start out with, and I'm going to ask Mike to start us with this based on your individual perspectives, as you look at the engineering industry, what are the one or two biggest impacts that technology will have on the industry in the future, say in the next five to seven years, for instance, will, will things be going faster? We'll be doing things in a different place,uwhat what's going to happen, Mike?Mike Haley:Thanks, Joe. Yeah, it's a, it's a, it is a broad question. There's two things, main things that come to mind for me. So the first one relates to systems and, you know, I think as we all know engineering anything in the world today and especially buildings is all about resolving the various forces that are acting between the systems and systems might be the relationship between the architecture of the building, the structure of the building NDP systems. It could be the relationship between the materials and the methods of production of the building and the sustainability of the environment. It could be the relationship between the people that are ultimately going to be in the building. And today in most practices, we don't have a way of resolving all of those tensions all the time because systems are inherently very complex and they're always changing. So the industries rely on rules of thumb, established practices, standards, these kinds of things.Mike Haley:And I can see that changing in the future. We're beginning to have the ability to automate the understanding of systems and be able to bring those insights and that guidance to engineers and designers in that process. So that's my one aspect that then leads to the second one, Joe, which is that with all of this automation and your question about, you know, you know, do, do we, are we going to need more engineers or are we going to need less engineers? What's the nature of the job market? I actually believe we're going to need more. And the reason I believe you're going to need more is I actually think we're opening up the world to greater possibilities right now with these tools. And that is going to lead to the next, my second point, which relates to knowledge and education. And I think as we build automation systems that understand and learn the patterns, we don't just use that knowledge to automate and make the machine do things, but we can use that knowledge to upskill people. We can train people more easily in using tools and using techniques. We can raise the sea level for lots of people at the same time with technology. So I see that as a sort of a commencement great trend that we're going to see in the coming years.Joseph Bates:Great. let's, let's go over to Chris. Chris, what do you think?Chris Luebkeman:So I, I totally agree with everything Mike just said, and I want to amplify a couple of points. I think there's three things. We're going to see expansion, acceleration and consolidation. As Mike said, an expansion of what we can do and expansion of toolsets and expansion of knowhow and expansion of what we're going to be asked to do. I think there's the acceleration, there's going to be, we're, we're suffering from this already when we like to complain about not enough time to even think anymore, we just have to do do do, and frankly, that's not going to stop. And so therefore these tools are going to help us. I hope and these techniques and our, and our teaming will help us deal with that acceleration. And the last is consolidation. I think we've seen over the past 10, 20 years, an industry wide consolidation, especially in the built environment.Chris Luebkeman:And I believe frankly, that will continue, but I also believe we come back to the first one, it's going to lead to an expansion because as we have the consolidation and either, so this core, core, core core, all of a sudden, there's going to be the realization. We need these new typepology, these specialists who can really focus on, for example, getting our, our third world infrastructure back up to what it needs to be in order to to regain our, our, you know, a position of pride and the other parts of this sort of this other is a consolidation of knowledge. I really think that we're going to be able to acquire and that it's not consolidation by what's there, but how we get it. Right. So we're going to be able to in a much easier way, consolidate know how consolidate knowledge in a much more rapid way. So those are my three words. Great. Jose, what about you?Jose Luis Blanco:Like how Chris frame it in three specific like you know, sentences or, or, or, or things? Let me try to do the same. I think that for me, the three things that I believe what I would love to see going forward, given what we see in technology is more transparency first. Second, being more output outcome driven. And the third one is actually much more collaborative environment. Let me try to just give you 15 seconds for me to one the transparency of think it's clear, but I think it's, I think right now we're capturing data. Not only we capturing data, we're storing data in a much more way that is going to be, we're going to be able to actually analyze that data and provide like, you know, transparencies and some traditional issues we always have a, in the construction industry and Jane construction English, okay.Jose Luis Blanco:Who made that change? What happened? What was the implication? So I think that that's going to be a huge unlock for us, and we wouldn't have a lot of noise that is always around our industry and to move forward. The second one is outcome driven. It's also tied to the first one. I think if we have more data, we have more transparency and then we're going to be able to actually you know, our designs are going to be much more outcome driven is going to be able to provide better service to our owners. I mean, I'm sure Mike and his team are working on Gera design, like crazy these days. And that for me is critical because it's going to be able to fully actually capture what the client needs and actually tell them, like, here are the choices for you, depending on the outcomes you're trying to achieve.Jose Luis Blanco:And the third one, which is the collaborative point, I think is much more than just breaking silos because we're going to have much more transparency. It's like for me, going back to Chris' point about knowledge, is really unleashing like the potential talent of fully the potential of like a group of engineers working together, right. Removing all the constraints that we need to do right now being tying like the King of silos and many other things. So these three things : transparency, outcome driven and collaborations is the things I expect and hope to see in the future there.Joseph Bates:Heather why don't you round us out here with your thoughts on this subject.Heather Wishart-Smith:Sure, so I think that my thoughts on this are really quite frankly, complimentary to what the gentlemen have mentioned. The first really that I would focus on is the interconnectivity of systems. So I've mentioned since, but that interconnectivity and disciplines, and then also the technical workforce. With regard to the interconnectivity of systems, you look at the interconnectivity of society we're coming out of the pandemic, the future of cities the urbanization, everything is going to need to rely on techno technology to really meet that exponential growth and the exponential growth of mega cities. So as was mentioned earlier, this will provide more opportunities for engineers to get involved, to leverage that kind of technology. And, you know, Jose mentioned silos. With that, I mean, I really think that those who are most successful in the technology enabled world will be those who are able to break down those silos and cut across disciplines.Heather Wishart-Smith:So much of what we do in innovation is rather than just say creating something in one discipline and then kind of throwing it over the transom for the next discipline and the next discipline; cutting across, and co-creating across disciplines in order to increase that speed to market. But then the workforce is that second aspect. You know, of course there's so many statistics out there about the U.S. In particular, not graduating enough STEM graduates, and of course it's about more than just graduating them. We need to retain them once they come into the workforce in order to remain competitive. But we also need to recognize the value of the trades, particularly as the trades become increasingly complex, as we bring IOT into operations and maintenance and all of that. So I think sometimes it's tempting to view technology as kind of a way out of not graduating enough STEM graduates, but it's, it's, it's really going to cause the need for even more of those graduates.Heather Wishart-Smith:They need to, you know, they need to have the skillset to design a program that operates and maintain all the technologies that we think will help, you know, get us out of, out of the, the brain drain if you will. But that, that workforce, it needs to be nimble, adaptable needs to be committed to lifelong learning. And finally, I think it's critically important that that workforce be inclusive and diverse. It's not just the right thing to do. It's been proven by study after study that inclusive and diverse companies and organizations perform better. It allows us as an industry to just really cast the widest net to draw the widest possible pool of candidates, to get as many STEM professionals as we can. And it's really once you that critical mass of diversity, that's when you can get the most benefit from diversity of thought.Joseph Bates:So, Heather, I think you've provided a great segue into the next section of questions here that I wanted to ask about. And that's about the increasing speed of design and how that impacts projects and delivery. And in particular, are there generational issues that we need to consider here are our younger people that are graduating more adept with the technology that is out there, or, you know, what, what are your thoughts on this?Heather Wishart-Smith:So because the people who are graduating today are digital natives. I think it's, you know, very often tempting to fall into that unconscious bias that people who are have more time in their career might not be as willing or able to change. But I have found and worked with so many people who were at the latter end of their career, who really do fully embrace that technology and innovation. So I mentioned earlier being nimble, being adaptable, having that commitment to lifelong learning, it's really about that mindset. And I think it's also important to be open, to taking on say a reverse mentor. Yes, we absolutely need to be learning from, from younger people. We need to provide better pathways to promotion and success. We, we shouldn't in any way be writing off due to our unconscious bias, any kind of you know, whole groups of people, right.Heather Wishart-Smith:I, I'd also add that, you know, not all technologies innovation, not all innovation involves technology. Some of the best innovations we have are those that have nothing to do with technology. It's really innovation in my mind is about how you approach problem solving, constantly asking what is the problem that we're trying to solve. So automation, of course, you know, we all know it should be harnessed to reduce repetitive tasks. And oftentimes also more higher risk operations to get people out of harm's way we should be using it for rapid auctioneering. We all know about, you know, generating just infinite possibilities, filtering them down to make sure that we're presenting to our clients what's best for them. Gone are the days where we show up at the [inaudible] with just, you know, possibilities. So we have a lot more to offer it's design attitude approach rather than the decision attitude approach, because you know, of course, decision attitude is assuming that all the, you know, the good options are out there. It's just a matter of deciding which one is best, but as we move into more automation, I really think it's important to take the design attitude approach to come up with the best alternatives. And then after that, the decision will be much easier.Mike Haley:Yeah. I'll answer that a little bit. What had I say that, you know, what, what we've found with the, with the newer generations, the digital natives, as you put it, Heather, is that there's a different expectation about the time to productivity you know, the traditional tools, certainly that we've been building were things that required a long time to become proficient. You had to study them, you had to learn them, you to learn the features you had to, there was a period of learning that was required. And there's, there's a level of expectation now about digital natives that they can pick up a tool and be productive immediately. So there's this relationship between learning and being productive, I think, is going to change. It is we're not ever going to have a world where you learn first and after I think, period, the time you become productive, the two are going to be much more intertwined.Kevin McMahon:I've got a question from the audience, one of the audience members wants to know in the future because of the varied nature and multidisciplinary skills that are going to be needed, that all the panels have mentioned, will, graduates be coming out of school with a more varied skillset - majors in civil, but perhaps minors in mechanical and electrical, for instance.Heather Wishart-Smith:Yeah. So I'll address that. I would even great question and I would even take it one step further, not just minors in mechanical and electrical, but in programming, in robotics, in all kinds of different disciplines that might not have been considered as related say to civil engineering as in the past. But the challenge for us in the industry is to make use of them. I think the risk is really there where you get the bright eyed, bushy tail, new graduates, and they come in and you're really attracted to them because they have the programming skills, they have the robotics background, they've done all kinds of three D printing. And then we sit them behind a computer and tell them to design things the same way that we've been doing it for decades. And we run the risk of burning them out of just really disenfranchising them. So we can't just be attracted to them. We need to recognize that we need to continue to foster that and cycle them through different opportunities and then listen to them when they come up with a way to challenge the status quo.Jose Luis Blanco:I think what Heather just said is super important. And I think that there's, if I may add one, another point is I think there's a very thin balance between and technology needs to help us with that between actually ensuring the that we maintain the knowhow that has been billed by the, I will call the older generation so to speak. I mean, we know that 30 or 40% of the workforce is going to retire over the next 10 to 15 years. So I think technology needs to allows us to capture that kind of knowhow making institutional and at the same time, without the same time, you know, and now we're allowing or empowering the new generation to do new things and doing them right. Right. So for me, that's a little bit of like [inaudible] out the new generation to do things differently, not the same way I've been down before that, for me, it's like what you actually make magic happen.Chris Luebkeman:So excuse me, I'd like to build on that as well. Yes. And first to the graduates, and then to what Jose was just saying, I think the question Kevin was a little bit in my mind too limited. Saying gonna major in civil and mechanical, I would much rather say, well, how about civil and philosophy or civil and biomedical or bio or, or, or some earth sciences or something that's actually, I think what we're hoping to see is actually a mix of the hard - the decision sciences with the natural sciences, because the challenges which we require, I think as a society are not just those who are trained how to make a decision, but as Heather was saying, the profound impact of a systems understanding and the need for us to understand more and more about how the elements within their systems sometimes need to be sub-optimized so that the system is optimized. And I think this is one thing. And the second point to build on what Jose was saying is I, totally agree with that. And we have to figure out how to make real lifelong learning, not just continuing education credits, which you go to some lunchtime lecture, which we all do and get a stamp and say, Oh boy, that was good. Thank you very much. But actually to real meaningful, lifelong learning and how I, and I, frankly, I don't know exactly what that means at this point, but I do know we're all recognizing that due to the, due to the rate of change, both professional, informational knowledge, that we need to find better ways to foster, to empower and encourage real lifelong learning and lifelong curiosity to learn. And I think that those are the two aspects there, which are not hand in hand, but in North self evident, but very, very critical for us.Kevin McMahon:Joe, we have one very interesting question then I'll let you ask the next question to the panelists. The question is with the super evolvement of technology to the panel is see that where most of the work is still procured locally and performed locally. Do they see a future where the local office, where the client is maybe just a small nub or collaboration, and then the bulk overwhelming bulk of the work is done around the globe or, or outside that core local office. Do they see that future happening in the next five to seven years?Mike Haley:I will. I'll say we're, we're beginning to see that happening already. I don't think it's a, I think it's, it's a growing trend. You know, technology is enabled and enabler of it. So as the economy, so it's society, right? All at the same time, we're seeing the shift of cloud adoption. People storing the data in centralized locations that can access it from everywhere. The days of having it on the server, inside your company, and only being able to use it. They're pretty long gone for a lot of companies. I think the gig economy, the notion of being able to hold down multiple contract jobs at the same time, switch between things, manage your workload, manage your life is a reality for a larger, larger number of people year over year. And then I, I just think that the borders are breaking down in terms of how we think about the world. And I think just because you live in another side of the world, you can think about problems elsewhere in the world, quite easily. You have access to that information.Heather Wishart-Smith:And I'll add to that. We've actually been doing this for years. It started out, I looked back in my career when I was, you know, managing programs. It started to become of course necessary when you needed to bring in a specialist who you wouldn't expect to have in the local office, but it really has evolved to the point where it's just a normal part of how we do things these days. And I think it will just continue to evolve. And that's a little bit different. I come from a very large firm,uand the smaller firms probably it's not as necessary, but it it's absolutely being done. And in addition to the technology and adoption of cloud, as Mike said, also,uvirtual and augmented reality has helped to facilitate that as well. And it also means,uless travel for some of our staff. So that's better from a work life balance perspective.Chris Luebkeman:To me, I agree with both, both of those, again, strange, but to me it's all about access. Now, at the end of the day, you used to not have access to first-class knowledge unless you were in a center. Now we right now are in two different continents at seven different time zones, and yet we're all accessing each other at this moment and the other, almost 300 people. And so it's it's access. And so it's access to knowledge, but it's also access to the marketplace. So I've been for the past five, 10 years, really, really encouraging the integration of small local offices, because at the end of the day, we know with the global move towards segregation. So national segregation and regional segregation, this is, this is going to continue. And so the local offices are going to become key to be networked and to create a new kind of network, which is trans-regional as, as the, you know, globalization screeches to a halt. I think this is, this is going to be a new reality, which we have to really look at. How can we make sure that the small local office can really provide the most excellent world-class delivery. And I, and I think that at the same time, we will still be, the big firms will still work globally and the Jacobs, the ARUPS, and all these they'll be able to flip work around the, around the world and continue doing that.Joseph Bates:Great. So I want to move on to the next section and I'm going to have Jose - I'd like to direct you then to start out with you on this one. There's a lot of buzzwords today in technology such as digital twins, data analytics, machine learning, and artificial intelligence. I'd like to talk about, first of all, what are the terms actually mean? And secondly, how will they actually affect the industry in the future? So maybe Jose, if you want to start out with one of these areas and kick us off.Jose Luis Blanco:Yeah. So a couple of reactions here. I think there's definitely a lot of buzzwords going on. And I think that I would like to separate the reason for that is because I think people sometimes actually confuse you know, technologies that aren't available or venture capitalists sounding, right, or that money is flowing to actually develop reinvestigate versus technologies that are really being adopted, whereas having mass adoption. So we'll make that distinction in the beginning of it. Right. So it's just been, you know, two or three or four, what you say is like, really, if I think about technologists, for instance, that are already impacting the way we work, obviously there's analytics that actually are being applied or advanced analytics are being applied on the field for early flags for projects. How do you explain, or the main factors that explain what a project can turn profitable non-profitable so you can, you can do a reduction analysis to actually do that, and even just forecast that you can definitely do it, you know, analysis of bidding and bidding factors, or even you can apply it to other electronic design for instance, right.Jose Luis Blanco:Which is starting to be widely used. Right. So there's things that are already happened, right. When you think about some of the things that may happen in the future, or maybe starting to happen, but not fully implemented, that's when you start entering like a world of lack of potential digital twinning, construction, or potential, like, you know, artificial intelligence where we actually fully explain, I don't think we're doing artificial intelligence in construction, per se right now, I think we're starting to do machine learning. And actually my, my actually disagree with that. I'm not, but actually that is a little bit like how we see. So I think the big, important thing for me is like all these technologies we're exploring and what should we be talking about all of that. Right. And, you know, venture capital is funding as soon as you get amount of them. And we're seeing a lot of them, the ones that actually read being adopted, I wouldn't say that at scale, they started to be adopted as a sizable pattern actually are much limited. I mean, they made it to analytics and we made it too, obviously maybe generated the design, some machine learning applications from project planning in advance.Jose Luis Blanco:[Inaudible] ....some Of that is implemented. I just want to hold on. When you say digital twin, the sec for various specific kind of use cases or a specific like areas who still are like ha a little bit like far away from a fully functioning digital twin, we understand in aeronautics to where we understand, you know, their industrial processes. Anyway, that's my perspective.Mike Haley:Yeah. I, I think Jose I makes a great point about, you know, I think of it as the hype cycle, right? And the reality is all technology goes through a hype cycle and terms like artificial intelligence, machine learning are, are hype terms. Now we deeply believe in artificial intelligence and machine learning and digital twins, but they have to be ready to Joe's point. One of the things I would add is I, you know, I think the things that are real today, like you said, are our analytics computational methods. You mentioned that Heather as well, the ability to explore alternatives, I think that's becoming a fairly robust capability today. When we start coming back to that systems aspect of things that we were talking about earlier, that's where it starts becoming complicated. And I think this is a big role where machine learning can actually play.Mike Haley:If we are to build - digital twins, I've also been around for actually quite a long time. And as you said in other industries too, but the difference is the future to have to understand the system. If they don't understand the systems, they're not correctly reflecting the situation and you're not going to be able to optimize your solutions correctly. The only way I believe you're going to be able to make correctly representative digital twins in the future is through sampling. The world is through measuring the data, learning from that data, generalizing those patterns, and then placing them within that digital twin. And then you, then you leverage that digital twin to optimize your designs and look for alternatives. But that's a pot. That's a path we're on. We're not there yet today.Chris Luebkeman:I think one of the interesting things with all of those is, as you said, Joe there's, there are buzzwords and there are many different interpretations. We can look at them with starry eyes and say, you know, I can't wait to do a digital twin and others get terrified of the thinking of the matrix coming down upon us. But as you've asked, I think it's, as we're talking. It's really critical that every firm, it makes the effort to learn about them. Both the potential as is implied by the technology tool makers, but also from those like Jose or Heather, or my other colleagues about what we're seeing is little small implementations that are showing success. So some of the data analytics for mobility and how that's able to really begin through the digital twinning of mobile networks and, and train systems of our airline systems actually to say, ah, okay, well maybe that works there.Chris Luebkeman:Maybe I could work on our proposals for this project, if we could try something. You know, I think so for me, the key with the buzzword is that our firms are prototyping a little bit and they're having a person or two who they give a freedom. What say one degree of one degree of freedom to try this. So that when the, when the client, the project, the tools are all right, that we're ready and it doesn't take yet another three years of ramping up to figure out what the heck it is. And I think that's, that's my 2 cents on that.Heather Wishart-Smith:Yeah. Joe, I can give a couple of very specific applications if you're interested. Yeah, yeah, sure. So starting with digital twins on water treatment and industrial water plants. So we've got a tool called replica that allows us to optimize those systems to prevent overflows in the event of emergency response, do a lot of scenario and what if training? And it also allows us to optimize the design and optimist and operations and maintenance. Another example for data analytics is for NASA at their Langley site in Virginia, we have about 120,000 sensors that are all around that campus. That measure things like vibration temperature, humidity, and we use predictive analytics and machine learning to be able to anticipate when something might break, which then leads to benefits like improved safety. You don't have to send somebody out to just regularly change a fan belt or whatnot improve reliability.Heather Wishart-Smith:That is a huge aspect of it. A site like NASA, they really do need to keep their site going and not have these unexpected outages also financial benefits, money money that saved and energy efficiency. And that we've had - we didn't start with 120. We started with, you know, you know, I think it was a few thousand or something like that, but it's been going on for about four years. And it just goes to show that there are a lot of opportunities in the built environment to be able to harness these technologies. I think we probably, you know, as far as specific discussion about artificial intelligence, but when, you know, when you marry that with automated design, we've been able to automate the design of you know, replicate some some very re repetitive sorts of components, say of rail or other things that, that are used quite frequently. But then bringing that and taking the learning again, starting small. So I mentioned starting smaller with Langley, starting smaller with some other things, learn from that and then be able to use it to scale even larger.Kevin McMahon:Joe, we have a pretty interesting question following up with what the panel just talked about from the audience. And it's with the ongoing industry evolution of technology is all for the panels of describe and the new graduate backgrounds that are not necessarily all engineering, traditionally related vertical integration of team, perhaps some of those team members being around the world. What impact does the panel see relative to professional engineering licensor requirements? Also coupled with the political issue today of making sure that America stays strong in engineering and doesn't outsource all the talent, like the manufacturing issue that we're well aware of.Joseph Bates:Good question. Anybody want to bite that one?Chris Luebkeman:So I I'm perhaps not the right person to answer this one. And I put that up front because I'm no longer licensed. So I really probably don't have the right to answer that question. I think what is critical is there, look at what the responsibilities are and who carries the responsibility because to me, a professional engineer in Switzerland, you don't need to have us go through a special, another licensing exam because the education is supposed to prepare you for that. But at the end of the day, it's who carries the responsibility. And what do you want to trust? Do you want to just, you want to trust a degree or do you want to trust actually that someone has proven their capability to make the right decisions. So I think it's that trust and I hope I've given Heather enough time.Heather Wishart-Smith:True friend, Chris, thank you. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a, that is a great point. I am still licensed. But I think it's, yes, it is trust. I think it's important to recognize despite the fact that there are many forces out there in various States trying to diminish the value of the license and great organizations like ACEC, like NSPE had been working hard to show that value. So despite those forces of trying to diminish the value of it at the end of the day, I think we need to remember that technology is a tool. So the tools have evolved. It used to be that professional engineers just worked at the drafting table. Then we shifted to computer aided design, you know, and then we've, we've evolved. We've got, you know, all kinds of different tools, but the technology is just a tool we still need to, as Chris said, trust the people who are applying the tool and that's for the professional engineering, licensure comes in.Chris Luebkeman:Good job Heather, thank you.Joseph Bates:So in the interest of time, I'm going to go ahead and move on to the next question that we have here. Okay. We could, we could probably have a round table on each one of these questions. This next one. I'd like to direct it at Heather and, and Chris as well, actually. How is, and you all have talked a little bit about this already, so maybe dive a bit more into this, but how will the technology affect the culture and the collaboration environment of engineering firms? You know, we talked a little bit about will, and there was a question about, will it work different places around the world, but in terms of the culture, how is that going to be impacted by technology?Heather Wishart-Smith:Yes. Would you like to start, or should I start and give you some time to think...Chris Luebkeman:You're on the edge of your seat and ready? So go for it.Heather Wishart-Smith:Okay. so we've already talked about that. I think there's going to be - several of us have said that we think that there will be a greater focus on cross disciplinary work. Innovation, pretty much demands it. And we, we can't just complete our work in silos. We need to have these multi-disciplined teams and these multi-disciplined teams, can't just be the disciplines they need to include the business model. So the HR piece, the finance and all the rest, that should be part of the development of new solutions. I think a key way of doing this is, you know, at least in my role is by embracing innovation within the workforce that we have and that's by promoting collaboration.Heather Wishart-Smith:So we need to teach people across the business to be able to collaborate, to be able to network so that when that real work does happen, they have that muscle memory of the collaboration of the innovation. And I mean, you know, in our industry, it's so difficult because we're built on a billable hours culture, it's been this way, you know, for eternity. And there's also a performance unit kind of mentality to the engineering industry where you know, it's, whether it doesn't matter how your company is structured, whether you're structured in it by geography or by discipline or by market, there's still silos. And so we need to find ways to promote and, and sustain the breaking down of the silos. Many firms are, are, are structured to promote and sustain them, but we need to find ways to break them down. They're hard to break down. But I really do think that the firms that endure and those that will be successful are the ones that are successful in doing that on breaking down those silos.Chris Luebkeman:So I agree with fully Heather and I want to bring up two more aspects. One is cooperation, we are going to be in an increasingly cooperative and competitive environment. And I think many firms already, and many of us already understand how you can compete and still be friends. And this is one of the things I always enjoyed. When I was got to travel, go down to Australia and watch a sort of Australian rugby game or rugby, you know, and people would literally like without pads, try to beat the blank out of each other, but nobody really did anything where they couldn't go have a beer afterwards and they would respect each other from, you know, the grit and their cleverness and how they played the game. But you never played dirty. Cause if you played dirty, you know, you couldn't have that had that beer.Chris Luebkeman:And this is something which I would like to hope that we can also aspires - not necessarily Australian rules, rugby. It's a crazy game, all due respect, Mike, it's crazy. But this idea that just because we're competitors does not mean we can't always be good friends and I truly believe we need to work more on the second part. I think we're very good at the first part. So I think so culture is actually a manifestation of both the written and unwritten rules and how one treats each other. And it's the written and the unwritten rules. And part of your question there, Joe is about culture change. So part of the question that has to be, as we look at ourselves and our firms, what is our culture? And do we actually understand what the written and unwritten rules are of our firm? And if you haven't asked yourself that, and not just what you think as a principal, what the culture is and you say, well, our culture is openness and you walk into the office.Chris Luebkeman:And as soon as you walk in, everybody puts their head down and they're afraid of you, but you can say it's open, but the reality might be a very different thing. So to actually have a real conversation about the culture that we need in order to be successful in the new economy, in the digital transformation and one and one more thing, Jose, and it's all you said. So for me, the most important thing that we could say with this is, and I support Heather is it's not just a technology, but it's actually having a real conversation about our firm's culture and what we wanted to be slash needed to be.Jose Luis Blanco:Yes, just 10 seconds of this. I think that there's clear, there's a very clear link between performance and health, right? Health critical part of that is culture. And I think that over the past three months with COVID, I think we shift towards a working remote environment and we all will be surprised how fast we've been able to adapt to that. Right. but I think that some of the challenges of the issues will culture are going to start to appear in the coming months. And it's my belief that you can sustain. You can potentially sustain our existing, strong cultural, remotely. I don't think you can build the cultural remotely, or you can rebuild a culture remotely. So that's something that firms will need to, you know, when we're talking about what we're hearing about are they working from home, you know, half of my staff working from home and things like that. I think the implications of cultural implications of that I get to be seen, and we just need to pay attention to that.Kevin McMahon:With lifelong learning, that a lot of the parents have mentioned, and the ability for more experienced engineers to learn new tools and skills, maybe it's more from Mike's first answer, or are the tools keeping pace with the expectation of learning curve of designers to shorten or eliminate the learning curve to use these tools?Mike Haley:No, I wouldn't say they are. I think there's a it's, it's, it's a very, it's a, it's a difficult problem because I don't think it's well understood today. I mean, we, we still live in a world with traditional educational cycles, traditional university college, whatever it may be, get your, get your certification, do that. But those are the cycles we live in. So those are the models we have today. There isn't many models that, that, that, that have this sort of rapid learning world that I referred to for. I mean, some of the only models today are actually newer technology applications. Things you might get on an iPad that people are learning supervised there's there's ideas. There's these hints. I think all over the place as to what these are, I would hesitate to think of a single really, really good example that exists in the world of technology today.Mike Haley:I can tell you, in our research group, this is a very large part of our research objective. And it's precisely for this reason is that we don't actually know the right ways to do this. We are doing experiments in our software. We were introducing features that help people understand how they're learning the software, how they compare to others who are learning it, what are their patterns of progression through the software? And as we do this, we are gradually introducing more tools, but we're also learning at the same time. So I'm not quite sure what that looks like yet, but we don't have an option. That's the point though, we have to do this. We have to make this, the nature - tools cannot just be about taking what you do today and automating it away. Tools have to be about making you more effective and making the combination of human and machine better at the end of the day.Chris Luebkeman:No, I think that's great. The other thing I think so fascinating, it was Kevin with that question is the micro-learning. And I have two 20 something year olds one's graduated. One's just about to, and you know, they, they do micro-learning if they need to learn how to do something, they take and look on YouTube and they find a little burst on how to do it. And then all of a sudden they know how to do it. And I just, it's hard for me of a different generation to think that way. I'd rather call up Mike and have Mike explain it to me and say, hey, you know, and talk to him. And my son, George would just rather just look at YouTube, look it up. And he actually doesn't care what language it's in, because if it's a tool, he can just watch the strokes. And sometimes he'll look at something in different languages, because it's just interesting to see how someone's designed something slightly differently. It just kind of blows my mind, you know?Joseph Bates:So I, again, I just want to keep us moving here. I apologize for cutting off these great conversations. I want to this one's just for Mike, and then we're going to, we're gonna move to the last questions here, but Mike, how, how are people going to pay for this? You know, are certain firms going to have an advantage, the big firms, because they can afford to pay for the technology and the education and the taking the non billable hours to learn it, what's going to happen there and how will the small firms catch up?Mike Haley:Right. So, I mean, you know we're seeing a lot of new business models around how people pay for software, right? So, I mean, we've, we've moved to subscription models which make billing more consistent. And over time, we're also seeing the emergence of capacity based models. And, you know, there was a time not too long in the past where there were, there were products and tools that we make at Autodesk that very few firms, unless you are a massive firm could actually afford, you know, you would, you would only use those tools if you're a certain size that doesn't actually make sense in a capacity based world. So if you're paying for capacity, if I'm a small, if I'm a small firm and I need to run say three structural simulations a week, if I pay per structural simulation and don't have to pay an enormous amount of money for the software upfront, then it doesn't matter that I'm a small firm versus a big firms.Mike Haley:So I think we were seeing these more flexible models that, of course they relate to the cloud, they relate to those sorts of things. And I think, I think there's an interesting difference between large firms and small firms. I think large firms have an inertia that, that, that they have to overcome, but they also have, they have the capital, they have the assets, they have the money, they have the ability to do some of these things only. So the firms lack what Heather were saying. Firms that have been doing this for awhile, actually have a massive advantage because they are there. They are able to act on it. On the flip side, the small firms are nimble, right? They are flexible. They starting up. In fact, their secret sauce will be adopting these very kinds of technologies that we're talking about right now, data in the cloud work from anywhere, flexible learning, bring the data together. Use, use generative design, use, use digital twins, use insights, use these things. And those will be the folks that will win better. But I do believe in the sort of flexible business models that allow everybody to leverage all of the technology.Joseph Bates:Okay, great. So I'm going to ask the final question for each of you, and then we may have time for a couple of questions. Kevin Jose, I want to start out with you. I know you have to log off just a couple of minutes before the rest of us. So the big final question is what is, what is the firm of 2040 look like? You know, put you put on your thinking, cap, your wizardry, whatever you want to call it, your crystal ball. What is the firm of 2040 look like Jose? He might be gone. Oh. Did we already lose them? Okay, well sorry about that. I thought we were going to have him for another five minutes, but so let's just go ahead and throw that one over to Heather.Heather Wishart-Smith:Sure. So I think that we're going to see very few of the traditional A & E's in place. I think that line between technology and design it's, it's already been blurred. I think it will become increasingly blurred. Some examples. We all know about Sidewalk Labs and their smart city project in Toronto. And, you know, yes, I know it's, you know, that project has been terminated, but it they're going to come back in a different city with a different model, with more privacy controls and all the we've seen it with Elon Musk, the Boring Company, and Hyperloop pretty much with no past performance, they've won large scale tunneling projects. You see it with tech companies with autonomous vehicles. Just what was it two weeks ago with space spaceX just launched America's first private company to do so here in America. So that line is really becoming increasingly blurred.Heather Wishart-Smith:So it's really going to result in the increase in the skill set of firms. So tech companies, I think, are going to start acquiring more traditional skill sets, maybe by buying some of these more traditional A & E companies, especially as the owners age out and traditional companies are going to be acquiring the tech skills. That's maybe not as much through acquisition, but through training, by hiring different people. It's funny at Chris, I love your term of coopertition in, I have a colleague at Jacobs who refers to it as competitive-ates. These are where sometimes you compete and sometimes you collaborate together. Taking what Chris said earlier a little bit further. I always try to remember that today's competitor could be tomorrow's client because this is such a small industry. We all have competitors who have since become a clients but, you know, with these competitive-ates, cooper-ates competition, it's really about collaborating together to address these new market opportunities because alone, we're probably not going to be able to get there. So it comes back to your behavior, your home, we talked about earlier, your mindset, not being risk averse, being open to new ideas. And if you want to endure, do not get too comfortable in your silo.Joseph Bates:Great. It looks like we have Jose back Jose. I wanted to ask you before you have to jump off, what does the firm of 2040 look like?Jose Luis Blanco:Well just kinda like very, very interesting question. I mean, I wish I had a crystal ball to actually explain all that, but I think that, I think in my mind, if I just summarize what I see the firm of 2044 as like having a very different demographics in terms of like the roles that we have and have been there for 34 years I'm very doubtful that we're going to be there. Right? [inaudible] The projects that we have right now, many different type type of led professions in there and professions that don't even exist as of today. Right. I expect us probably hopefully it'd be again, probably much more remote, but also with some sort of physical presence because in the end physical presence, local presence, because in the end, I think that the work that we do is not only even the built environment is an enabler for many of the things and we need to listen locally to be able to deliver globally.Jose Luis Blanco:Right. So that's something that also, I think the firm needs to have. And I hopefully I hopefully like you by 2040 as is like in a few years time, which is time you know, infrastructure and the brother engineering space is being seen as a critical part of how people, you know, how will you enable how people live, work and play. So hopefully we will see engineering to be playing even a more integral part in people's lives than it even paying today. So maybe I'm being too optimistic, but those are the things that I would personally see. I see all these revolutions that are happening is also like almost like an opportunity to put the engineers back at the center of so many different things that we can do to improve our society going forward. So again, maybe I'm a little bit of like an optimistic, maybe I'm just like a little bit optimistic, but those are some of the things that I would expect to see in digging the farmer to 40, like diversity from backgrounds, diversity in terms of likely for him elements being much more at the core of how we work, play and live. And and those are some of the traits that I expect.Joseph Bates:Great. Thanks Jose. Mike, what about you? And then we're going to add, go to Chris.Mike Haley:So I, since we're a group of optimists here, so I'm, I'm I'm an optimist as well. When for me, a lot of it comes back to the competition thing that Heather and Chris have both talked about, but looking at it at a knowledge level I think there's an enormous amount of knowledge that exists across the engineering architect of the entire building industry that is mostly common, but it's not always shared or is really shared. And I think by 2040, I see there being a strata of, of knowledge be a digitally represented, hopefully that is then is available to everyone. It, again, I used the term, you know, raising the sea, raising all boats, right? All boats are naturally floating at a higher level, which allows the competition then to actually happen at a higher level. The difference between firms is no longer at this lower level that everybody is benefiting from the shared observations, perhaps it's the performance of certain buildings or performance of certain decisions or materials or processes or whatever it is. So I really do see a more collaborative world centered around knowledge sharing.Chris Luebkeman:So for me, well, the first thing that I do whenever I asked a question like that, Joe, is I think of, I go 20 years back. So if we go back to two year, 2000 and think, where are we as a practice, as a world, they're all freaking out because we thought our computers were going to blow up, right? And the world was a, I would argue a very, very different place 20 years ago. So I'll then go forward and think 20 years, what's the context going to be of the firm 20 years from now. And so we will have massive water stress globally. We're already seeing that in the United States, North America. So we will see mass migration. We're going to have a political stress due to migration, which we have not in our lifetimes yet even begun to experience.Chris Luebkeman:And so therefore we're going to be called upon to solve problems, which are not just technical, but have a social dimension in a way which is quite profound. And I'm not quite sure if we're going to be up for the, up for that yet right now, the firms aren't. But I think by then we will be, I think there by 2040, we are always going to be designing and full artificial reality. And we'll be using virtual reality in construction sites as an absolute norm. It's gonna be like, duh, can you believe that we actually did this once without it just in the same way. Now we can hardly imagine using a slide rule, which I think I was the last class at Cornell to actually use, you know, and I think, and so this is going to be a new, so let's means then if you're doing in VR/AR or that means you don't have to be co located in any way, shape or form.Chris Luebkeman:So all of us can be in a design meeting right now and actually really interacting with haptics so we can push and pull and really feel that I think by 2040, we will have climate legislation, which has been a long time coming, which will then have a different paradigm shift on how we, and what we designed to. So the makeup of our firms will also be very different and what's going to be needed in order to, for us to design for things which will be fit for purpose because the purpose will be not just engineering specification. And I think that's so, and then if I think about economically, we will have gone through two recessions. We're about to hit one and we will at least go through another two within 20 years. And I think we'll go through to identity crises as a profession. We're kind of in one right now, we're doing, what's our role.Chris Luebkeman:I think we'll go through a couple more as these new tools and these new challenges come. And so, and the last one, I'll say, no, politically there will be a new ballgame. There'll be a new empire, not quite sure which one will rise stronger, but you know, our rocket is kind of kicking over. We've seen peak Americas. And so, and then the question becomes, what will it look like in this new environment for consultants that we already have a lack of sand. We have a lack of, you know, so it's gonna be very interesting in how we design in a constrained physically constrained world. So these are gonna be new challenges, which I think is super exciting for us. And we have to be walk into this with our head up, right? Not looking backwards, but to walk with that with our head up and shoulders back saying, okay, it's, it's a new, it's a new game. It's a new quarter. Let's get the team out there and let's play ball.Joseph Bates:Great. Great, Chris, thanks for closing this out there. Daphne, I'm going to throw it back to you for a few final comments.Daphne Bryant :Thank you everyone for joining us. Thank you to our panelists for all your wonderful insights to our donors for making this session possible. We do have a short evaluation that we will send you this afternoon. So please share your experience with us and be sure to join us next week for our second session, the buildings we live and work in, that'll be on June 25th at 3:00 PM. Eastern. Thank you. Have a great afternoon and please stay safe.

Episode 195: How Course Creators Break Through The Noise And Fill Their Programs

Fuel Your Legacy

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 12, 2020 48:20

Welcome back to the fuel your legacy podcast each week we expose the faulty foundational mindsets of the past and rebuild the newer, stronger foundation essential in creating your meaningful legacy. We've got a lot of work to do. So let's get started. As much as you like this podcast, I'm certain that you're going to love the book that I just released on Amazon, fuel your legacy, the nine pillars to build a meaningful legacy. I wrote this to share with you the experiences that I had while I was identifying my identity, how I began to create my meaningful legacy and how you can create yours. You're gonna find this book on Kindle, Amazon and as always on my website, samknickerbocker.comWelcome back to fuel your legacy. And today we have another incredible guest I love bringing on people from all different walks of life, people who have accomplished different things and are really focused On, on different aspects, they're bringing their light their love to the world in different ways fulfilling and sharing with other people. Billy Bross is someone you're gonna want to go follow him on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, these places, but he, he loves just helping online education companies and course creators break through the noise and fill their programs with committed high quality content and students students, right so part of its getting the students in part it's making sure their contents ready for that. He left a really great career honestly in renewable energy industry to go full time into his side hustle, his heart, his hobbies and ultimately his passion. So that's what I love about the people that I'm bringing on is that they've made that transition, and they're able to give us a light and knowledge as far as how we can make that transition in our own mind. He also runs a home and online home beer brewing school, so if you've ever wondered how to make Your own bruise and go check him out, he's awesome. Okay, so with that, I'm going to turn the time over to him, but I want him to be able to share his story and why he made the transition, how he made it, and how did he know when it was the right time to take that leap, quit his promising career and jump in full time to what he loves doing. So. Billy, thank you for being on here. I'm excited to hear your thoughts and and what we can do to become are following your footsteps. Awesome. Hey, thanks for having me, Samuel. And yeah, if anyone needs a good beer brewing recipe, then I'm your guy hit me up. Are you a craft beer fan?I actually don't drink alcohol at all. But I have family members who do and I know a lot of people who do.It wasn't a we'll talk about the business. It was a lot of fun, although it wasn't the healthiest business to run.Yeah, so thanks for having me again. And yeah, so you know, I I'm not the typical entrepreneur Am I very much like school, and a lot of entrepreneurs you hear dropped out of high school, or they kind of bash college and say, just get out there and start selling stuff and growing businesses. I actually liked learning and that's a theme that you're gonna hear from me. I love education. I'm very curious. I've always loved learning new topics. I remember in fifth grade, I was really into reading Popular Science Magazine. I would only read two parts, I would read the very front and the very back. And the front, they always had the section called what's new, and it's about all the cool new typical technology fields. And then in the back, it was always a classified section. And they're always like these really like kind of interesting, quirky ads. And I was I was like, wow, that's, that's kind of cool. You can build a helicopter, and then you can fly around. You can like buy a DIY kit on how to do that. That's really interesting. So I've always been interested in both science and art. So in business and creating new ventures, so I went through, went through all of high school, went through college, and then I went to grad school and got my MBA. So I took the very traditional path. But when I got that first job, which was a great career, I'll go into that. When I sat down the very first day at that desk after that, my boss remember, he gave me a tour of the office and everything and then finally sat me down and I was like, Okay, now this is assuming I don't do anything. And I just say the past, this is my life. I'm gonna be at this desk an awful lot. And I was excited to be there. But at the same time, I said to myself, this ain't gonna last too long. And so it wasn't too long after that, that I started on the side because I had this free time during nights and weekends, I started a beer brewing blog. So got really into brewing craft beer in college, really geeked out on like I do with a lot of things and decided to start writing about it and posting homebrewing tips and videos and things like that. So eventually, that was what allowed me to this was six years later jumpship when I was finally ready to leave that job and that career, I had this side hustle going, as you mentioned, and that was what enabled me to really forge my own path.That's awesome. So I'm curious. Because I mean, I know you say you're a proponent of education, and, and schooling, where would you I mean, do you feel like there's a line between schooling and education?Is there well, you can certainly have education without depends on what type of schooling you're talking about. And I think there certainly is a place for traditional education. But I think the whole I know the whole industry is getting disrupted right now. And I and I work with because I I work with online educators now online experts, teachers, teacher entrepreneurs, who are working in these areas. Well, for example, I have one on my school I'm working with and they teach artists. So digital artists, mainly people who do concept art for movies and video games. And traditionally, they would have to go to a university to get these skills and pay $100,000. And then they're not guaranteed anything afterwards, not guaranteed income or jobs. And now you have this online school, who I'm helping, and they help these artists they do it through $500,000. Sometimes a little bit higher price courses are still premium price for online but much cheaper than $100,000 for a traditional University. And the best part is these course creators are practitioners in their field. So they're in the trenches, they're, they're working in this area, and so they can tell their students how to succeed not just in their craft, but in the business side of their craft, which is so important. And now they're even starting to pass on jobs to their students as well. So, you know, there's certain there's certainly, there are places for traditional education. I mean, you wanna become a lawyer, you want to become a doctor certain fields like that engineering, but for, for some of these other fields, that's not necessarily the best path.And I think I think, for my cuz of how you caviar, like oh, I'm not one of those entrepreneurs that bags on it. I think that most for my experience, I all I do pretty much is an interview entrepreneurs of some sort CEOs, people who are successful in business or on the other side, mother's father, and just like, I guess I do interview a wide range of people. But I think most of the entrepreneurs that I interview there, although I would consider myself in this category, I bagged on traditional education, to a degree, but only to the extent of, I think that you could go get the same or better education from an online course. With somebody who is still practicing in the industry, and has some real life experience over going to a college, where that may or may not be the case, as far as crack practicing, and as you said, you pay now you walk away with $100,000 either spent money or debt with no guarantee of a job. And so, I think that's where, at least from my experience of talking to people, that's where most of the if you want to call it animosity comes from in that conversation. It's not that they think that to become a doctor, you shouldn't go have somebody practice and teach you that. But even even with that, being a doctor, being a lawyer, I hope not true, but I would say even with that, there's a lot of people who have gone through all of that education, formal education to get their degrees and in the process, they found that they actually are better able to serve clients or patients by you. Using methods that aren't necessarily taught in school, but to be able to use those methods, they have to have the credentials. And then they end up going off and doing functional medicine, which they could have done. They just want to have the licenses to do so without the formal education. So it's an interesting balance. I think education is everywhere. I don't think you should go fail.I shouldn't. How do I say that?I think failure is essential. Okay. I think we should be willing to fail, but fail different than the people in the past. Like if you're going through and you're making all the same mistakes that everybody else made. You didn't learn anything. Yeah, you know, guys like my point you need to go and create your own.Like, take and this is what this is one good thing that I think I gained from public like from my college years that I don't, I don't Where I would have got this otherwise, sure there's places, but how to conduct effective research is a very, like, if there's nothing else you learn. That's a pretty dang good thing to learn. So you can actually read medical journals and say, Okay, what exactly like how are these samples done? What's it? How are they using statistics? How are they doctoring statistics, not just medically, but business wise, if you're walking into a business and they lie, whereas $4 million company and you're like, Okay, and you have $10,000 extra every month, because your operating costs are like you're barely surviving doesn't matter that you're making $4 million of revenue, if 3,000,900 you know, whatever, if it's all going out in expenses. You're, you're struggling, right, one bad month and you guys full, that's different than somebody who's netting $4 million every year, you know, so, being able to read, statistics read and be able to research stuff i think is important. In in that so something I feel like I'd be Effective from there when you're helping somebody build effective content. What does that look like?Well, the important thing is to always start with the audience. So a lot of this is a trap that a lot of and I fell into this trap, too, that a lot of experts and people are just subject matter experts, people who know a lot about their topic. They become obsessed with the topic, and obsessed with the content. But it's that whole set hole, if you build it, they will come thing not being true. When it comes to selling education online. A lot of people think it is though. So you want to start you want to find products and content for your audience, not customers or an audience for your content. And there's a big difference there. So the most important thing is to focus on what is the problem to be solved, or what is the thing that they want, and then try to in as few steps as possible. That's a big mistake, too. You don't want to over people are overwhelmed with information. You don't want to just dump a bunch of insight PDFs on their lap. So you want to get them from really our noun to that endpoint and as a efficient manner as possible.I agree. And so with that, just because you're you have helped over 500 companies accomplish this. How do you address it? I guess if it's online, when you're doing online courses, how what percentage of these online courses have an active teacher, somebody who's involves teaching in it, and how much what percentage is just recorded content, like an online course is recorded, and they're gonna buy it and pay whatever and it was made once intellectual property and they resell it multiple times without updating? Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah. So so it's shifted over the years. So it's very different than how it was when I first got started in 2009 2010, where it was a lot more self paced, more on demand more of a separation between the teacher and the students. And now what we're seeing is The model that we like that we see working in that we teach is more so that other end of the spectrum, or more closely resembles a true college class or college semester, where you're taking people in, you're taking them through as a group, we often call it call it a cohort, kind of nerdy term, as we call it. And, and it can be 100% live teaching, it can be pre recorded, plus maybe some office hours or some support calls. But usually, there is some, I think, going forward, the way of the future is there's got to be some kind of support some kind of live interaction, because if not, I mean, the, the, the numbers right there. I mean, the lesson is right there in the data, and that only one to 3% of people actually complete online courses as just as terrible. It's terrible all the way around. It's terrible for the students. It's terrible for the teachers as well, any entrepreneurs because, you know, most of a business's revenue should be coming from repeat customers. Because the most expensive thing you can do Doing a business's get a new customer. So if they're not if they're failing at that initial product, initial product is not working for them. What are the chances that they come back for more?I agree. Have you add sure you have in this space heard of lightspeed, VT said again? Have you heard of lightspeed vt it rings a bell I'm not too familiar with it though. Brad Lea is the creator CEO of the of the service, I would highly recommend looking it up his his service what I like about his service, and this is not necessarily a plug for him, but why not? You're listening. You want to create an online course, why not plug for guy he's awesome. Um, but it's a very interactive so unlike a typical video course where it's like, you use watch it hope they watch the help they got out of it inside of the video. There's a lot of interactive things, you can click on. And it's like building a sales funnel. But in video course form, so like, I could be having this conversation and then say and what's what level was your income? I'm, I'm fine. And so that makes sense, right? What level is your income 50,000, whatever. So they're gonna have three options they pop up after me and based on which button they push, then they're going to hear different content from me based on where their level of knowledge is at, or it's going to relocate them back to where they need to hear, hear what I just said. So they can so we can contest comprehension contest, make sure that the people are getting what they need because you may have somebody who's taking an elective class or taking a course just because like they need the basics but they already understand half of the what the content and most courses and make you go through the same like the same path. And so they're they're only getting, like everybody's getting the same cookie cutter information rather than saying okay, I want to buy this course on so Media, for lack of a better word, right? There's people who don't even know that on social media, you should have all of your profile pictures be the same across social media, you should have all of your banner pictures be basically identical, you should have all of your your descriptions about who you are like there's, that's like step one, before you get started on marketing before we get started I that have uniformity, like that's important. So that person, maybe that's where they're at? Well, the other person may already have all that done already have been paying for ads for a while, but just needs to know how to write more effective copy, right. And so for that person, they can go through and get the first half of the course done, still get credit for whatever, but they get the first half of the course done super fast, because they have advanced through that they already know it. And then they can move on to the part that they actually want to do faster versus having a course where they're bored for the first half of the semester lose interest before they actually get the content that they wanted and then they don't complete it. So anyways, it's a personalized learning paths. No, those are excellent. Yeah, and it's a, it's one of the cool things you can do with online education technology. And it's a great way to increase results. So I love that. I'll check that out.Yeah, he's said he would be actually a good. He's super, super cool. If you reach out to him on Instagram. He's in. He's in Vegas. And he doesn't do interviews unless you come to his office. So that's a thing there, but he would be a great person, I think, for you to be on his podcast.Cool. Yeah. That was my mom go to Vegas. Yeah.Yeah, no, it's uh, and he's super chill. And he also I shouldn't say loves beer, but he drinks beer. So you'd have to be able to contact or like, my kind of guy.Yeah. Um, anyways, so So let's talk about this. When did you I mean, you got out of your working your corporate gig. You've got out of beer, I mean, creation, I guess craft beer education. So was that really That the transition from like, how did you transition from your corporate job to teaching people how to create educational, like content?Yeah, good question. Yeah. So so I left the full time job in the, in the renewable energy industry to run this beer website. And so fortunately, you know, again, I'm not the traditional entrepreneur, a lot of entrepreneurs were just like, jumped ship, I wanted to have money in my savings account, I want to have a decent amount of consistent income coming from that website. So I got to that point where I felt really confident that I could cut the cord with a full time job and have a viable business. And unfortunately, that happened, but it was really more of a springboard that website into where I am now. My intention really wasn't to be the beer guy my whole life. That was just a cool project that I was working on and I want to be experienced doing it and of course, wanting to use it to leave my job. But I really missed working with with other things. People on teams and collaborators, really smart people like I was doing. I didn't, I didn't have that anymore when I was running the beer website. So So I started joining these online forums and communities and meeting other people like myself in all different niches. And even though a lot of them were beyond me, they still I can still notice things in their business gaps, especially in their marketing, where I would say, hey, if you just move this thing over here, or just do this or get this page up, it could really explode your growth. And so more and more of them start to reach out and I started doing some consulting on the side. And that eventually became my main passion, helping people like myself who had the subject matter expertise, but didn't have the the business expertise or the marketing expertise to get it out there. And because I had learned that and I had this traditional business background, that combination of skills, put me in a good position to help them grow their business, and that's what led me to where I am today. So I sold the the beer website actually a few years ago. So that's now in someone else's hands. But but he's doing a good job with it. We're still in communication.Good hopefully hopefully turned to pretty penny that Scott. That's awesome building websites, I didn't know how like that I don't have anything that gets a ton of traffic. But you can just like go by URLs and or domain names. And if you put something on there and get a little bit of traffic and like build up the name on Google like you can that's a way that's a form of investing right there it's kind of interesting business model but it's it's cool to see like how much what I paid for my my domains and then how much they've increased in value since I've put content on their websites and add things pushed to them create a connection. So it's a cool it's a cool thing to see. So I'm curious. I liked the way you said this, I guess is you had a bigger goal and so many people they think, Oh, I'm I'm in this business. For me. I work in finance, right? My objective is not it is my objective. is financial but I'm in finance because of the the bigger goal, right? The bigger goal for me being in finance is to help people with well, as they understand how money works, then they it decreases statistically decreases causes of depression, anxiety, suicide, domestic violence, malnutrition. And those instances decrease when there's higher income, or at least understanding how money works in a home. And so although I work in finance, that's not my main gig, my main gig is what it produces. At the end. I think that's important for people to understand, especially when they're trying to identify well, do I jump ship? Do I go do my own thing? Or what is it exactly that you're jumping ship from and to? I think that's a huge, huge, huge question to be answered. Before you quit your day job before you go anywhere. What exactly are you jumping to? And as Billy said he wasn't jumping to the beer company to become the beer guy. That wasn't as objective. He saw that as a project as a current way of expressing himself in, in other forms of creation. And I think that's important because so many people will get fixated on a certain thing. And they'll say, Well, I don't know anything. I only know how to be a mom, I only know how to garden. I only know how to create videos, I only know how to make beer, right? And so they don't see their value outside of the task that they're doing. And this holds people back. So many people back even in their corporate jobs, because they think I'm only good for what I'm being paid for. Instead of recognizing that the value that they're adding to that company is so much more than the tasks that they're fulfilling. And if they were just to go market, just the value that they're adding, personally, they could probably increase your income, even if they didn't want to change what they're doing. They could take that out of a corporate And go perform those tasks by themselves and be able to create the same or more income more regularly and be in more control of their income. So that's a huge thing. And then understanding that this happens. I would say this happened to me as well, especially with this podcast. Like just kind of the the germination of this podcast is I was doing Facebook videos about different topics. Facebook Lives, I did them every day for I think a month did a month of Facebook lies every day. And what I found was people were reaching out to me and saying, Man, I would love to listen to all of your content, but I can't leave Facebook on all the time. You should turn it into a podcast. I was like, Oh, I never think about that. But I'll turn into a podcast then. And so so so many times, think about what are you complimented on the most? What What do people compliment you on? What do you think? What do people say? And if I Just think like that. Or if I could just do that, what is the most common thing that people say about you in that context? And then reach out to Billy and say, Hey, Billy, how do I turn this into a course? Yeah, I turn this into an online course. Because clearly if there's enough people who recognize my gift, even though I don't recognize my guests, how do I make this gift? able to reach more people? And how do I monetize it? Right? How many times does that happen to you, where you have somebody who comes to you who wants to create a course isn't quite sure exactly how to do it. They know their audience, they know what they what they're trying to teach, but they just have no idea how to monetize it, how to make it effective for their end consumer.Oh, it happens all the time. Yeah, it happens all the time. And and I'll tell you what I tell them because the wrong way to go about it is to go disappear into your basement for nine months and go record some amazing video course. It's been a ton of fun. On software and lighting and microphones and all that stuff, editing, distribution, and just to find out that no one really wants the topic, no one really wants what's being offered. So, this is good news. This is good news because you don't need to put so much pressure on yourself to have something completely polished and dialed in. The way to do it, especially now going going forward is to take that audience first approach, like I talked about, start to build a following get in the trenches with your audience, hop on the phone with them even I've talked to dozens of my customers and email subscribers when I was running that beer brewing website, not selling anything, just hopping on the phone and just asking questions. And look, I was part of my market. I was brewing up a storm. So I but I still my mind was blown all the time. And I was surprised by the things that people would say and what their problems were. So don't fall into that curse of knowledge. You know, where you think that you know it all. The market will tell you and you'll often be surprised. And then just get something out there. Just get something out there. Take an iterative approach. And this is really my approach to to life, you know, and the value that I provide. And like what you were asking earlier. I mean, I see myself in a really strong point of leverage for two reasons. One is I think personal growth is the most important thing in the world. And one of the ways that we can solve a lot of the problems that we have in the world, yes, there are a lot of problems with society and the economy and all that. But if everyone really focused on themselves, and focused on if I focused on making myself better tomorrow than I am today, and I did that consistently, every single day, if everyone did that, we'd be in a really, really good position. And one of the ways to do that is through education, through online learning online courses, and it doesn't matter what niche you're in. What tends to happen if a person is improving in one area, even if it's something sort of like insignificant by most standards, like brewing beer, people don't think that's entirely a life changing thing. But it is and I would see how my students would come in and they would fall in love with this hobby. And that passion would exist. from them, and it would spread to their family, their wife, their kids, they would all see it. And next thing you know, everything in the household is uplifted. Right. So that's one leverage point working directly with them. But I took a step back and said, Okay, let me work with the entrepreneurs and the teachers, the teacher entrepreneurs who serve them. And now we get into, so now I'm able to help them reach more people. So improve this collective personal growth going on throughout the world. And also, I'm a big believer in small businesses, they really are the engine of the economy. So that's I love working with entrepreneurs. Now, they're the innovators, they're the job providers are the ones paying a whole lot of our tax dollars. So that's what gives me a lot of fulfillment. I see myself really in a great place of leverage and aligns with my values. The main one being personal growth.Yeah. And I think that that's the key is identifying what isyour personal value and how are you aligning yourself with your personal value, I think once so I have a I have a my journal, a journal that I created. But it's called the nine pillars to build a meaningful legacy. And the focus is identifying who why why would it be important for you to actually exceed or succeed in life in general. And it's part of a grander process of identifying your identity. And as you said, your your values for me my core values are candor, integrity, and gratitude. Those are like more important than just about anything else. And when I really analyze who I am, without any fear of judgment for not saying God or saying family or whatever, without any fear of judgment of anybody else, what am I personally internally committed to more than anything else in my life, and it's those three those three values and so I built my business I built everything I do in my life down to my marriage, my children, my everything, based on those three values and all of these need to be present in everything I do. I'm not interested. And when you're looking at jumping ship or going something new again, Be aware of what you're leaving and what and where you're going. Because I'm sure I want you to tell me some failure stories of people who have done this what I'm about to describe, hopefully, some, if you don't, that's amazing, but I think you probably will, but people who they, they were doing this, I decided to create this course or education, out of desperation, because rather than running towards what they were passionate about, and running towards what they love doing, they were running away from what they didn't like doing. And that distinction is huge. just choosing to try it, try and create as, as you would say, try and create a product that you can sell just because you don't like what you're doing right now. Your current, your current work. That is not the way to move forward. It's not I think it has a short lifespan. You're not going to be a long lasting educator or innovator anything but if you are passionate about something and you're running towards what you like, you're gonna have different results. So tell me a story of where you've had Somebody who is running from something rather than towards something.Yeah,well, I can give you my own example. Sure, sure.Yeah. So when I, when I made that transition from running the beer site to doing consulting full time, I was doing some service provider work. So I wasn't just consulting, I was also helping people build and maintain their Facebook ad campaigns and the natural path. And so I eventually pulled back from that because the natural path if you start doing that is to grow an agency. You know, so you start to look at Okay, how can I get more clients? How can I do a better job with this and you're just gonna wind up in that agency playground. Turns out I didn't really didn't want to run an agency. It just, it doesn't align with what I enjoy doing. It's not me, much more of a strategist, much more of an architect. I don't want a big team or anything like that. It just didn't match up with the lifestyle that I wanted. And I always start with the lifestyle and reverse engineer that So I started to go down that path, but then quickly pulled back because I had that feeling like and yeah, I can deliver value here. But this isn't, this isn't my zone of genius. So a lot of my life has been like that testing different things, seeing how it feels. Sometimes you just have to write like, I didn't know what that that day to day was like, it looked good on paper, running an agency getting a lot of clients. But when I was actually in the trenches of it, I said, No, I don't feel so hot. Let me go back this other direction.Yeah, I think that's that's huge. Being able to dig, like to determine and decipher between that What are you running from something you write to something and making sure you're running to something that you love and that you're going to bring the light and Joy to the world not just from what you don't like because it's just barely I haven't seen it pan out very well for many people. And it's good that you were able to recognize that before you got too deep into something you hated and decided to. You never know happens honestly. So I'm curious when you did make the jump though. What was your? Did you Who are your biggest naysayers saying no, don't do that. Why give? Why are you giving up this great job? Tell us the story of your biggest naysayers and how you overcame them.I have been really fortunate in that I've always had a tremendous support system. I really can't think of one person I'm close to. I can't even think of one person who said, You're dumb. Don't do that. Don't leave that full time job. It's great. Everyone was just like a really great cheerleader. Just Hell yeah. Billy, go for it. So I've never had anyone say that, fortunately. But I have had haters, you know, running. You wouldn't believe that running a beer website. You get haters, like, I remember I was. I was, uh, I did some videos about a beer cocktail and some British one. And I guess they're very strict about how they make these beer, beer cocktails where you mix two beers together a beer and some other kind of a silly thing. But people will get on YouTube get really upset and passionate about pretty trivial things. So I'll get flamed in the comments if I made the recipe wrong or something And then and then I would have people just generally upset that I would sell information. A lot of people just see that as a big No, no. How could you possibly sell this, especially in a niche, like an enthusiast niche? You know, the beer market? People are a little bit touchy about that. So, so yeah, I certainly had my fair share of haters, but but no one no one saying, hey, you shouldn't be doing that as a career or a business fortunately.Right? So how so? How did you overcome that? Because there's people who, maybe they have support in their career, but when they see those comments online, when they see that the haters, they're like, Oh, no, am I doing something wrong? Maybe I should adjust my my approach my market like maybe, maybe I should change maybe I get doing whatever I'm doing. So how did you learn to just let that roll off of you or not give it any credence? Like how did you move past that and say, Look, I'm doing me you do you and you don't want to do it, whatever. If you want to post crappy things, that's fine, too. Whatever.Yeah. So a big Part of it was looking to mentors. So looking to people who either mentors I knew personally or mentors from a distance I just followed online, who were a few steps ahead of me, or many steps ahead of me and had way more haters than me and seeing them talk about it. I remember I think it was a roommate safety, if you know who he is heard of him? Yeah. And he had his own version of Have you seen mean tweets against what he's called Jimmy Fallon, one of those late nights? Yeah. President Obama will be on there reading all the mean tweets about him and he makes it funny. So Remi did something like that, I think was him and maybe James altucher. And they're reading all the tweets. It was like this funny, they're sitting around the fireplace drinking whiskey or something, and reading some of the hit the April comments on their YouTube videos. So I've Oh, I'm a big fan of humor. So I used humor to approach it and just kind of have to laugh at them. You know, it's silly, right? And I don't take it personally. And I realized that they only see they only see a sliver of me and my personality. Right, like they saw maybe just the first three minutes of that YouTube video and that's all they know about me. Right? So I have a lot of empathy.I think I love that. I think that and that's really the whole purpose of my book or one of the major purposes of my book is exactly that. How do you like gain perspective of what's really happening? So often in our world today, we get sucked into like, Oh, this is such a big deal on Facebook. It's like no, like, literally in two days, nobody's gonna remember this thread even happened. We've got it got to keep in perspective there, how much they know about you. It's not an attack on you. It's an attack on their perception of, of what's happening, which is entirely different than on you. So I love that what would you say your your secret? If you have like a specific habit, mindset or behavior that you have participated in regularly to build your legacy? What would you say that is and how could we adopt that into our lives?Yeah, so it's really I'm a big fan of positive habits. So having a strict morning routine. Having a strict nighttime routine? And then and then self reflection. Am I improving? Going back to what I said earlier? Am I a better person than I was yesterday? Am I smarter than I was yesterday? Am I more skilled in this area than I was yesterday? And if you just do that day in and day out, I forgot the exact numbers are. But I think if you if you improve 1% each day after 70 days, then you're twice as good as you were before. That's been the biggest thing for me again, personal growth.Yeah, no, I love that. It's awesome. So how could we support you if we wanted to get in touch with you? Let's say we have a course that we want to create. Or we'd like to maybe take part and see what see what courses you helped to create and just take part in some of those that you've already helped create for other people. Do you have a list of all the companies you've worked with? And so we'd go cruising back. Oh, yeah, he's helped dessert. I'd like that type, of course. And where do we get in touch with that and how do we get more involved with what you're doing?Yeah. So nice and simple, best ways to get around. My website Billy bras calm b i ll y VR OSS calm. And yeah, there's a bunch of case studies on there. And you can see a lot of the courses that I've worked with and a lot of the niches that I've worked in, you can hop on my email newsletter, I send out a almost daily email newsletter. I'm a huge fan of email marketing as a channel. I just think it's the most intimate, personal way to communicate but I do it very differently than how most people do it. So So yeah, that's that's a very popular.Okay, cool. So here's the here's the last two sections on my podcast are some of my favorite. So this this second last section is called legacy on rapid fire kind of like a game show. But there's, there's no right or wrong answers. But there's five questions. And we're looking for one word, one sentence answers. I may ask you to clarify any one answer at any given time.Fair enough. Let's do it.Awesome. So legacy on rapidfire number one, what do you believe is holding you back from reaching the new Next level of your legacy.Hmm.sorting the great opportunities from the good opportunities. That's the constant challenge.That is and what have you found to help you in that endeavor?There's actually I actually have a really tactical thing that I use. It's a formula that I've discovered by Brendon Burchard. And I can't remember the little complicated, but you essentially look at everything that goes into an opportunity, the resources, the time, the money, the sanity, that you need to invest into it, and see if the payoff. So the financial payoff, the doors that it opens and how it fits into your lifestyle, how those balance out, it's kind of like a scale. So it's not perfect, but it's a good framework to use to evaluate opportunities highly recommended. No, that's awesome. I agree that you have tohave some formula of determining how You spend your time and where you spend your time. And I talked about it from a perspective of, you've got to become the CEO of your own life. And that's the CEOs job to determine like, hey, which contracts we're getting in? How are we increasing the value to our shareholders, if it doesn't weigh in the favor of increasing the value to our shareholders, now worth my time, and, and being able to hold that standard to yourself and for others, it's a nice school concept. I love it. It'll be a book one day, but like that might be a course before it becomes a book. I'll see. So what do you think the hardest thing you've ever accomplished has been to this point,running a marathon?I haven't done that. So I will, that I would tend toseegoes to the head and then like 10 or 11 years old, and had no not no intention of running this half marathon. On, but my, we were all showing up. We all showed up to support my family and my older sister who had been training while she was warming up that day, she pulled a muscle or something so she couldn't run. And so she's like, Well, does anybody else want to and I was like, I have two or three other brothers who are running. So I, you know, like sketcher Skechers. The shoes had like a leather, almost like nice, classy leather. Skechers shoes. That's what I had on. And I was like, y'all run? Why not? So I ended up running this half marathon in Skechers shoes. I was like 10 or 11. I was like, That will never happen again. So I haven't ever thought to brave another half marathon and

Digital Marketing Done Right

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 11, 2020 50:01

TO READ THE TRANSCRIPT SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE.In episode 17 of the new Awaken The Possibilities Podcast, Host Terry Wildemann interviews David Somerfleck on "Digital Marketing Done Right”. Awaken the Possibilities Podcast features successful entrepreneurs and intuitive leaders who offer insights on how to attract success in business and life.ABOUT David SomerfleckDavid Somerfleck is a digital marketing and business growth expert with over 20 years' experience working for multiple marketing agencies and 10 years' experience as a nonprofit small business mentor. He is also the author of "The Road to Digital Marketing Profits.Website URL:: https://dms.blueFacebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/dmsblueLinkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/somerfleck/Twitter: https://twitter.com/dmsblue01Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/dmsbluedigital/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCypF0s-KPKzF_UFm92mGdaA__________________________________________________________________________________________________About Terry Wildemann:Terry Wildemann is the owner of Intuitive Leadership® and a Business and Resilience Accelerator, Speaker and Certified Executive Coach.Terry's specialty is working with tired, unhealthy, close-to-burned-out entrepreneurs and professionals and helps them leap off the stress hamster wheel. They evolve into unstoppable stress resilient intuitive leaders and practical business mystics. Terry’s timely message guides clients and students to integrate intuition, stress resilience, positive communications and leadership with grounded business systems to achieve success by positively serving and influencing others. Her leadership experience includes owning a manufacturing company, image consulting company, leadership and holistic education center.Terry is a best selling author of The Enchanted Boardroom: Evolve Into An Unstoppable Intuitive Leader.Website URL:: www.IntuitiveLeadership.comFacebook Page: www.Facebook.com/intuitiveleaderFacebook Group: www.Facebook.com/groups/AwakenThePossibilitiesLinkedin: www.LInkedin.com/in/TerryWildemannTwitter: www.twitter.com/terrywildemann www.twitter.com/leaderintuition_________________________________________________________________________________________________TRANSCRIPTwelcome everyone to awaken the possibilities I'm your host Terry willdemann. we have an episode I think you're going to find quite fascinating I've never had anyone like this often behind shell and all my guests are unique in their own right and David Sommerfleck is definitely unique which I spent sometime talking before the show and as you can see he's all dressed in blue from the water bottle to the students in the classes so that your bones are going to be talking about that because it's really in the libel or David came to me through he reached out to me to be honest as I thought okay let's check it out and you know what is really really cool so I hope you find what he has to offer the meeting as I do so let's talk a little bit about David David in MA where are you he is a digital marketing and business growth expert with over twenty years of experience working for mobile marketing agency years experience as a nonprofit small business mentor he is also the author of the road to digital marketing one of the banks it's not in his bio which I can share with you it back he also work for RT to sort certified small business for score mentor and he worked with hundreds of business owners of every color line so because of that loves working with entrepreneurs and business owners with it which is what you are my waking the possibilities audience your entrepreneurs you are business owners and we are going through right now like we've never seen before Mr so it is time to get someone inside was welcome to the show David stark black thank you for having me I really appreciate it well now that I check not now that I I have mentioned about the blue talk to me about the blue I love it well basically blue's my favorite colour but basically %HESITATION a couple years ago I kind of I'm semi retired I don't want to say I'm retired because I still enjoy working with people but you need more scaled back approach but I decided to kind of take a step back from my last business and change things and so I wanted a new way of marketing and branding myself and I thought well you know what I'm gonna be really back to basics yeah I used my initials in my favorite color so my business is G. M. S. dot blue by website is T. M. S. dot blue when I meet people in marketing or ugh skews me networking groups about how can I reach you what's what's really easy you see the little white bar at the top of your browser type in DMS dot blue in they they can't believe it because it's a very on nontraditional %HESITATION website address or domain name %HESITATION but also I was never the best dresser yeah my wife was much smarter than me one day just said well look you know I lost some weight I need to get some new clothes %HESITATION and she's like look just get get get new clothes in your favorite color and I thought that's genius my favorite color is blue %HESITATION just where everything blue all the time yeah it makes it easy to market because people know me there is a tall skinny bald headed guy use glue what's my business Lou DMS dot blue what are my initials so it kind of goes in to get out there in syncs up together it makes things much more simple in in a way it's also very very authentic and the other piece about blue is from a spiritual perspective working with the truck rests yes the energy centers in the body the rent is due yes are you telling me that and %HESITATION I think that's very very interesting and really very appropriate because that's what I'm about is speaking truth to power to business owners entrepreneurs nonprofit founders speaking truth to power to them and then letting them decide you know now it's time for you to speak your truth I love it absolutely love it so David one of the things about branding is you're talking about symmetry and being authentic right okay so for me that is a huge thing is being authentic and being you know as a business owner as an entrepreneur we need to really be true to ourselves however I find that a lot of us have a challenge with that ma'am I'm gonna ask you I'm going to share this story with your personal story just to get your perspective because I think we need to hear that using the angels on the back these are my angels you just have been a part of my life forever and I love having them back there and they have my back so I can have it back to you with my clients on the internet or whoever it is that I'm interacting with on my computer monitor and and people that I have worked with the person however there are folks that's who I am that's part of my brand to weaken the possibilities sure awaken the possibilities is all about they help me do that they help me work with everybody but there are people who are really uncomfortable with my having my angels on the back end I need to have a green screen and I should have something else on the back blah blah blah blah blah and I'm like you know it doesn't Florida doesn't feel authentic to me destroying them right I'm curious I am not the only entrepreneur has those challenges so can you speak about as a branding and digital marketing experts sure absolutely %HESITATION you know if you're looking for and I don't know if this is good video or audio but if this video you can look behind me and you can see that I have a picture of Buddha how do I. video and audio yeah so I have %HESITATION poster Buddha on the wall of my office now I probably need to put more holes in the wall because on the other side of a signed letter from which an autographed photo rather in the letter from the Dalai Lama %HESITATION in a lot of other things are autographed photo judge Judy and some other stuff I could put up there but I also have a little statue Shakespeare in the behind me is basically things that make me feel good yeah reinforced who I am as a person and and just the things I like that I gravitate toward so %HESITATION you know if you watch a lot of webinars a lot of podcasts today especially now %HESITATION you see a lot of people speaking behind book shelves or even having obviously %HESITATION forty backgrounds is a better term I know I personally just leave the yourself no more in touch you are with yourself the better off you'll be but it's not easy it's it's difficult %HESITATION and the thing is the irony is if you are a business professional with any length of time or service provider like a psychologist or psychiatrist or therapist because it's it's very easy to look at other people and diagnose issues and solutions it's very easy but to do it for yourselves it's it's very difficult so I've always struggled with branding for myself yeah what should I. S. C. O. B. for me in terms of who I can help who I want to work with that's very difficult but I can very easily look at someone else and say this is what your SCO should be just what your marketing should be and everything else because of course I can look at them just totally right yes exactly I can't really do look at myself objectively without a lot of preconditioning but I think it's very important to be as authentic as you can good looking in the mirror that's it I call that the inward journey right looking in the mirror yeah it is very difficult it's very challenging you know I read that right now %HESITATION what is it April seventh twenty twenty as of right now we have the code nineteen virus it's running roughshod through global economies and really making a lot of people either very very very ill or or causing many people to pass we prematurely and it's it's very difficult for a lot of people to stay home to be reflective you know I read about many people are having great issues staying home yes %HESITATION I've seen some really really you know horrible stories of people just can't handle being at home yeah they have a really hard time with that yeah and I thought I read that to the divorce rate is skyrocketing people living together fighting more %HESITATION and it's you know what can you do it's really important to be in touch with who you are if you can do it you know there's an old eagles song if you're you know the older guy like me called learn to be still and so you know I've learned a lot from Buddhism and Buddhism hoping to learn to be still at times I'm not perfect yeah it it all I get up every morning and make a list of things to do and I put things in structuring go from monthly weekly and then daily lists and I work from a very organized deliberate perspective but there are times when I also say it's time to just sit and be still for an hour one of the things I look at this it does make is an opportunity to refocus in a way I thought you know what Sunday's surely bad because as long as we have food were fine %HESITATION what was I really going to all these networking events four what did I accomplish if he's someone R. as in boot camps and workshops and I might have felt good speaking to a hundred people or something what all those one hundred people how many people really listen to you and act on what you suggest they might have paid X. amount of money to attend a digital marketing okay right for the sake of example I can't tell you how many boot camps and workshops are taught over twenty years in marketing how many people kept in touch with me afterwards how many people actually went out and did what I suggested in the said they were going to do and I would go and look a week later look him up online most %HESITATION we're going so you know in a way I look at this as an opportunity to refocus him re solidify the foundation get back to basics you know if I could show you the bookshelf right here you know %HESITATION I have a stack of books that you know these this is what I need to get through this long and then this month after that so I'm like a pig in mud is a city in the south it's a good opportunity to get back to studying the classics yeah I work on another book how cool is that yeah instead of just refocus yeah absolutely and I'm buying a break in the possibilities people have heard me say this over and over again I look at it as the manager was asking for and Matt and nat stands for nurture reshaped and posh so when you think about it if we pause and stop and take a real good look around we have an opportunity to really see what's working and what's not working the kids an opportunity it's where it's really up to us whether we're going to take that opportunity and how many of us going to go back to the old ways because my in business business has changed so much that I don't think there's going back to the old ways and if you don't ship your business you know the needs of the clients as they where they are moving towards now you will become obsolete many of them are becoming obsolete very very quickly very quickly if you look at %HESITATION what is it C. N. B. C. or the financial channels they tell you how many people are filing for unemployment across America business owners are going bankrupt right now %HESITATION my wife is telling me just this morning that %HESITATION the the very large bank Wells Fargo said we're no longer offering small business loans too bad really wow so it's it's it's extremely challenging time where I live in southwest Florida there are a lot of local mom and pop shops and small business owners I wish all of the war offering home delivery but I can honestly tell you I know most of them aren't I wish most of the more online in that they could take orders online for home delivery but I know most of them are in the world and they don't have much more time to give it not a lot of time today you can keep paying debt %HESITATION mortgage or rent it just not having customers coming in where you drop off so it's really important to be able to have it now is the time that pivoting peace can be very painful for people %HESITATION and give you an example of somebody who committed and was incredibly successful and I would love for you to comment on it afterwards because I I know that there or something and I need to give an example of a phenomenal I'm just and on a three day conference the conference was supposed to be in Montreal Canada yes and it got canceled the person who gave this conference I saw live in San Diego three years ago this person was on not doing it online and so many people that two hundred fifty people registered for Montreal I was not one of them because I had a I had other commitments here that I could not change that were very important to me and when the opportunity came they they had so many requests from around the world this two hundred and fifty people to check in online check in online check in online and he finally said okay I guess I'm going to do this within three weeks something he said he would never do never ever ever do in three weeks this team transformed I am put on okay online the bench for four hundred and fifty people okay and it was a nominal it didn't skip a beat I live in the great food but he always offered to me but it was phenomenal it it it and there was one word that I have to use to describe it the step that he took and the word was courage yeah can you talk about that sure absolutely there's so many different angles to discuss it from you know I %HESITATION there's %HESITATION website or business basically called meetup dot com which was a division of we work yes %HESITATION what's happening to we work right now I have no idea they're probably not doing very well because he rented out office space including working facilities so guess what you don't want to go to a physical office you want to work from home if you're poor will let you yeah most employers in the US are not skilled in that way and even if they could they want to be able to physically see you to know that you're working but recently meetup dot com which encourages people to literally meet up and go to networking groups and %HESITATION workshops boot camps things like that over the years I've had many many many digital marketing boot camps in marketing workshops through meetup %HESITATION I remember when I had my own a small agency I remember once we didn't have enough clients in the pipeline so I went to meetup dot com created a couple of daylong boot camps and I literally you don't pay the mortgage one in one month you know in one day you know so it's great but now you can't do that so I give them credit for being able to change direction very quickly and now if you go to well I think maybe it took them two or three weeks after the virus began to spread that they said look everything should be done online right now everything should be done online and you see more more people are going crazy using zoom while working from home read recently that the White House task force on supply chain someone had the corona virus so they said okay well we need to do everything remotely now so that's another great example being able to change direction very quickly are the small business owner I'm not sure does that mean for them that means if you own a yoga studio for example you should be able to use the video like we are right now yeah do you video classes offer podcasts is well Joe Biden the presidential candidate I read just started a podcast to try to reach more people because he's an older guy and doesn't want to install it so they're all doing it now you're all doing more more video more audio I don't reach and that's what everybody needs to do so whatever business you have and you can still be a million examples %HESITATION but I'd be happy to field them they all need to be changing how they approach doing business in how they market in marketing is to mean marketing is not a dirty word obviously marketing means reaching out to the other person and saying look here's what I do I could help you if you're interested are you interested do you need help or you know the things you don't understand that I can shed light on now then if you decide that you want help if you're ready for that we can move forward but if not that's okay god bless you have a nice day but to me that's what marketing needs and I'm I'm very very passionate about that because I've seen it used and misused so many times well I have to ask you this %HESITATION based on how you presented it one of the things that drives me absolutely ballistic David and I'm gonna get into the sales process because I I do what I just did a %HESITATION weapon are branding that were that were we talk about this scenario I'm gonna present you I go on to a platform it's a biz at B. two B. platform and somebody connects with me and I read their profile yes no yes no okay yes I accept them and out of the gate they're selling me yes on their product I do every day oh my gosh it drives me absolutely out of my mind it would be something that happens what do I do yeah well just last night I wrote back to somebody who did that and I said no thank you I only buy from those I know like and trust right now if you would like to have a networking conversation with me and having no page fifteen minute virtual convoy yeah well this is my link WWW dot copy with Jerry dot com and we can chat for fifteen minutes and I can get you know you know when you can get your name and then we'll see where it goes from there right out last night me I get that every day yeah I got all the time to drive me crazy yeah so you how would I handle that I can't tell you what I do when I got it depending on what mood I'm in usually what I do is I shake my head I just delete the message I did a lot I just can't believe it I it's spam I don't know the person they're not making any attempt to get to know me as a person exactly they don't know what my interests are or not yes you don't know what my needs are maybe I don't need financial planning for example maybe I just wanted to connect on linked in with a financial planner because I like some of your posts and I thought it would be good to grow that online and I've gotten like I said I get up every day usually I delete them %HESITATION there's a profound difference between posting content online yeah tempting to generate substantive conversation yeah and it's the same as going to a networking event only online how many networking events have we been to jail I'm sure this has happened to you too where you go to the personnel tell you one recent example I went to a chamber of commerce you judge maybe a month or two ago and so I went to the event and I look at what there is to eat to know what's going on and I'm probably in less than standing at a podium a pretty shy reserved person I and %HESITATION so I go there looking around for what there is to eat up standing behind all the ladies because I do not like protect me you know anyway I talked to people in this will what do you do and I say well I'm a digital marketing experts in you know business growth expert because that's basically what I do and %HESITATION that well I don't need any help by all right and then I go home I look at their business card or look at their website it might look first of all there's no way you're number one in Google there is no way he did you're maximizing your potential financially because you could be taking payments online you're not if I look you up and you look up your type of business in Google you're not number one so Avenue for employment for improvement yeah that's my point what is what is the reason and I and I do believe that this is actually very true because of experience that messed up people they say oh I don't need it only because it's a financial thing they put money person they think you're gonna cost a lot of money before even having a conversation with well let's talk about it %HESITATION part of it I think in in again this is what I did several months ago and now if I were to go to a beauty business networking event %HESITATION chamber luncheon or what have you and I really should be going to them anymore it's not a good use of time for that matter but if if I do go I wouldn't say I'm a digital marketing expert and the reason for that is I think it many many times people focusing on tools and not objectives yes yes yes they obsess over the type of phone now what are you going to say to the other person and how would you say it what we you talk about so that's one the other point is %HESITATION I'm having a senior moment the other point was from can you help me I'm having well well here's what's happening to me here's what I'm saying and by may jump and you had your phone up your phone is below can you pick up your water bottle water bottles blow so I could see if I were to connect you with you let let's let's do a networking piece together sure we're connecting with you at a networking event and I would see you and I see that you are all blue and I see that your phone is glue and I see that you're you know get you pull this water bottle out of this bag hello I will come back to you and say okay I'm curious what's visible loop bank and what all of your with me right you're tempting to build rapport to stimulate conversation because yeah everybody has a connection by doing asking that question you brought it back %HESITATION back on track again yeah basically we all have potential connections but because people have a tendency to look at what's in it for me or they look at the tools rather than the objectives we lose focus we look for things to compartmentalize it so how would I handle that I would say %HESITATION thank you for asking and you know here's my background like we did at the beginning of right and %HESITATION that's still a little room play here because I sure but I understand that if that's okay with you sure sure %HESITATION I come up to you right right I love this blue thing that's going on with you know what is all about it seems like it's almost part of a part of the brand's right and I would say %HESITATION yes thank you so much here's what I do here's why I do it you know the blue is just a visual representation %HESITATION it's my favorite color body so I have to wear clothes when I go talk to people how I choose to guard myself the emotionally mentally and also helps people feel at ease which is very important yeah because I know the color blue is about confidence competence and credibility so you got it all over you is very important you know so I'm curious obviously this is part of it so again this is me a role playing David so I'm curious this is part of your brand yes okay so how is a part of your brand tell me more yeah it's part of my brand in so far as to color for all the marketing collateral it gives it a visual uniformity and also ease sinking up if you will with me basically you know the central focus or driver of the business also how I want people to feel at ease and relaxed okay in a to help them so but how do you help people what is it that you do right exactly and how I help people is by helping them ignite growth in their businesses but how do you do that well what is it you right we use a broad spectrum of tools digital marketing what I like to call boots on the ground marketing or old school marketing is well as current consulting I was really bored yeah if you Google the term digital transformation that's really the best representation of what I do where digital transformation is basically taking the business in saying how can we use modern technology to help you operate more efficiently to reduce overhead to increase revenue %HESITATION they just operate on a higher level across the board so that a local mom and pop business can work in a very very very streamlined organized way like an enterprise level business wide which enterprise business would prob I think they are wrong fifty employees or more okay so hearing you say is if I work with you to help me brand my business and being a digital marketer ran my business online you're going to save me time and money by getting me out there in the streamlined way why would be a part of it in another part another part of it is also helping you get to the top of Google and also be more heavily advertised in the appropriate channels for you well I would love to meet up for a Cup of coffee with you to see where we can take that so can you can we can I can I have your business card sure here you go thank you so much right here in obviously you don't yeah and if I don't have a business card I would just say look me up online D. M. S. dot blue in it also helps people remember that and retain it more because those are my initials it's what I do all I remember the color right so what else multiple avenues so I hope people %HESITATION and audience I hope you learned a little bit about that you know from a networking perspective and ask what was the one thing I did I kept asking open ended questions that's right I can ask open ended questions what credit which camp and getting you to answer me back yeah you know tell you when I meet people at networking events and they do come to me with that energy I always find it very very endearing I always find it very engaging I also say to the %HESITATION thank you so much let's sit down let me get a Cup of tea or something and really talk to you %HESITATION you know like an adult like a caring human being whereas if you get something from linked in or meet up or whatever %HESITATION lined a ball there's a million of them now if people try to shove their business down your throat it is very obvious that there you know when they come across like a huckster game show host or something and you just feel like you know I don't have time for this so you're not an individual level when I talk to people I just say tell me what it is you're trying to achieve and why you know do we have you know a half hour of your time to really talk about this yes all and so important yeah I've gotten so many phone calls were people I am not kidding I've had people call me to see how much how much is a website how much is SCO how much is he commerce service was Sir ma'am how much is a car I don't know what your destination is I don't know what you're trying to achieve I don't know if you want your road to be rocky or if you wanted to be comfortable I don't know if you want to give people the appearance of being classy and refined in X. for Taylor what you don't care what your appearance is and you don't care for example if your website works on modern phones are not so I can't tell you how much anything is into %HESITATION a we can talk about this being a service and you having objectives is that makes sense and if they say no %HESITATION or they get angry I said well god bless you have a nice day you're probably not a good fit I wish you all the best there are probably other people could help you probably won't be me have a nice day don don't have time for that I'm not twenty one but if they say yeah all you know I really want to talk about that like what you did then I see that's great we could probably make some headway with us let's talk about what really is the matches in the in the relationship yeah and that's what it is it's real it's really is about the match and your name yeah so what I'm going to share with your audience is please if it's about money when you're interacting with somebody that's not gonna work yeah it's about sharing and it's just about being really interested in helping the other person sixteen there's an energy there so sharing and authenticity comer for prosperity so in order to get prosperity it's about sharing first being opened checking your sharing in the prosperity will low afterwards to put it ahead of the other two it does not work and you know that David absolutely I could agree with you more Anders also synergy home you know before we began talking online and in two audio we were talking about your angels in the boot on the background and everything %HESITATION then you did exactly what you just demonstrated right it's so important to establish tech communication first report reporter exactly before you try to do things on a business level because if you don't have that report you really can't get people on the same page with you in if you're a business owner or entrepreneur or nonprofit founder whatever you need experienced professionals to work with you who can understand what you're trying to do and why you know why it's so important you can outsource everything you can do everything for the cheapest price will you be costing yourself much more in the long run you know for sound difference there what are the challenges that a lot of entrepreneurs have is they feel they need to do everything on their own yes yes they don't have the cash to be able to pass a decree ended June what are your thoughts about that David because I know %HESITATION that's something that I talk a lot about with my own clients that the gene is so important so that you can focus on working on your genius well there's some really good points to touch on there %HESITATION so you talked about team and you talked about D. I. Y. which is huge in in marketing so you know every day I always see this on forms as you would imagine there is wicks and we believe in squarespace in just to print ten wordpress dot com wordpress dot org what's the difference what do I do and people are overwhelmed by tools meanwhile the objective remains completely blurred yeah that's one of the reasons why I wrote my book the road to digital marketing profits because I found so many people obsessing over tools in prices but not looking at objectives and goals I want to be a better husband I want to be able to provide for my wife my family more effectively but my business I have a website that looks awful nobody looks at I don't get any phone calls how do you measure success in digital marketing are you getting more phone calls and emails every day if the answer is no then you're not really really really bare bones simple and that's where you need the team part and so how do you find the people to work with you build a report like what you were doing you build the communication but you also look for experienced professionals who know what they're doing and have expertise in care about you and say look you know I really want to do well for you let's talk about rules of engagement or just terms or you know before a little let's really make sure that we have everything together before we jump into this because I really want to hit a home run you know %HESITATION so you really want to people to go over that with you whatever it is that you're doing whether it's marketing or looking for however I know and that's really really important %HESITATION I C. D. I. Y. every single day and it's always we're not getting enough phone calls we're not getting any emails what we do I'll give you a great example if I can place my wife was going in for cancer treatment and I had scheduled in a consulting appointment with a lawyer I schedule this like weeks before I found out right so to say I was stressed out was an understatement yeah I'm sure and I was waiting for her in the car because I did want to go in I knew what was gonna happen and I thought if I go in I'm gonna be really really nervous I'm just gonna get in the way of things and there's really nothing for me to do because you're going to go in the waiting room then you're gonna go inside where I can't go anywhere what a radiation can go underneath right so I waited in the car that particular time and I'm like let's call this lawyer you know what we can call our house stole stressed out from this you can imagine I called Robert Joseph hi this is David I know we schedule the point just ask whatever you want you know answer all of your questions with total honesty sincerity because the truth is I did tell you this but you just look I don't need the money I do it because I love the work and I can you know I do can I help you of course I can I know I can I'm no doubt I know I could help her like I knew on ball okay and some sitting in the car and then like even even going through what I was going to I know I could help because I've already looked at our website amid this is a troll shoes there's no way for people to contact you or four doesn't work it doesn't look professional at all yeah ads for your competitors on the bottom it looks awful course I can help you plus you can put all your bookkeeping online yet as there's many things you can do and so I just thought I'll answer your questions so I'm waiting in the car an hour later she's done asking me questions we're both exhausted she told me you know what I was stressed out in anxious before I talk to you more stressed out now I was getting ready to just go get a job at Starbucks give up practicing law because no one's calling me and I said I'm really sorry you feel that way I'm going to a lot of stress right now with my wife going to cancer treatment I just want to answer all your questions it is honest as I could if by doing so I did you a disservice because I gave you all this information you asked me about all these tools and expose it makes no sense it it in context yeah she doesn't know what SCO is she doesn't know how to program the SCO she doesn't run into her Rick's or we believe are squarespace or whatever and they're not made for that right they're made for hobbyists and so %HESITATION I just said well I'm sorry you know we just couldn't connect if you want to get back in touch with me in a month or two I'd love to talk to you again if you don't want to I understand I wish you a Lotta luck and if you decide to go work at Starbucks good luck do you know with with that learning how to be a very stuck yeah and it's a shame I'm barrister to restart yeah it's it's it's yeah exactly it's a shame because all that specialized knowledge it is just going to waste so that was a prime example of D. I. Y. not working and I've had probably a dozen interactions with lawyers in particular just like that it's a quiet back no I don't expect you to she's overwhelmed she's completely lost in a sea of tools and bright shiny objects where is the objective getting more of the right types of clients we never talk about that she should have asked me that instead she's asking me how can I do it all by myself yeah free website which is not going to do it right now it's like throwing a computer it's someone in signal beat a web developer so the bottom line we've gone way over but this is been such an interesting conversation the bottom line is as entrepreneurs it truly is important for us to create a team around us that supports us yet the accountant general ledger accountant get what you forget the accountant to do that side of the house get a webmaster somebody who really knows what they're doing yeah this issue media directors that they really know what they're doing and you go and you do what you need to do to step into your zone of genius and username geniuses are challengers under genius is where people are waiting out there for and I'm gonna share with you what I share with my clients who are you as an entrepreneur to not own who you are number one and have the courage to be who you are hold me in completely with the team behind you with the courage to step forward because your tribe is waiting for you so if you're not doing everything possible to help get you out there the way you need to pay you're letting your tribe down you're letting the people down or waiting for your brilliant yes I I couldn't agree with you more %HESITATION and I would only add to that %HESITATION you know how can you tell an experienced professional from the neighborhood hobbyist is look for testimonials and references from yeah fiable sources it's huge a big big big deal that is a big I I take a lot of pride in their own right people's names and their phone numbers even or references for me the people ask for references I asked why aren't you don't you care about that you know if you go to a doctor you see certificates U. C. degree you you look them up online is the reviews if you go to a mechanic you look for the certificate or degree your casual college they attended you look at the reviews online you see a lot of other cars in the parking lot well when they work with an accountant or digital marketing expert a lot of cases we don't how much okay we'll work with that person they offered to help me for fifty dollars good luck the way to do it I got it I got it I hope my audience gets it I do David I would love can you reach back and grab your Buck you may have to take your headset off I would let you share your book online sure give me one minute I'm gonna go ahead and get all those listening I'm gonna get up and show it to the camera yes please the headphone back on here so I can hear you we hear you great just finally and now here is a closer closer closer closer closer closer closer closer you know to follow the road to gyms in digital marketing profits you are and where can we get a hold of apple here's the ISBN you can purchase on Amazon dot com by taking up the TV title you can also go to my website and click on Amazon logo and it is basically a work book it's a very non conventional book about digital marketing that takes the perspective of let's see that you're a total beginner your small business owner nonprofit founder whatever you're completely new to digital marketing in you're overwhelmed by all the extra SCO content marketing methods you're overwhelmed by how do I get from point a to point B. they're calling me they're emailing me every day I have people who I would want to work with and they want to work with me or you want to walk into a credit union or bank and take out a loan and you want to have a plan to show them how you will make money with your business he had used digital marketing because they won last night at a business plan so that's all in that workbook when I when I start on page one they go all the way through it at the beginning you're getting in the car it literally says getting in the car and then at the end of your thirty do your destination very very nice sounds really exciting and incredibly helpful tool for anybody still kept in growing a business so David what parting words do you have what what is your favorite piece of advice to get involved because that are I think it's really to stand up for what you believe in and your own true voice be true to yourself and don't act from a place of fear one of my favorite quotes is from the late great activist Malcolm X. who said if we do not stand for something we may fall for anything yeah he certainly %HESITATION represented that concept in his life and so I believe in representing that idea in what I do you know as a consultant and so I would give that message to people listening or watching thanks to B. B. really heartfelt don't give up on what you believe just take a very deliberate structured organized perspective build the foundation first another great quote from Henry David Thoreau wrote Walden said build your castles and therefore that is where they belong now leave your foundation did we set so that's my advice for business owners in general thank you so very much speak our but don't give up I appreciate your time with us today we can we can the possibilities finance you can find out more about how David add DMS dark blue and we will have all of his social media links underneath the the websites are not the website his name on the awaken the possibilities dot com website so thank you so much David for being here to my waking the possibilities audience you know that intuitive leadership university is going to be launching soon we have the leadership within the business %HESITATION and a life prison school we're starting with the leadership with all also I would like you to join my Facebook group Facebook dot com forward slash route over splash all weekend the possibilities so on behalf of David and angel behind me hi your best week ever and we will see you in the next episode to your success everybody See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Everything Fell Apart: Cancer, Miscarriage, Divorce, and Infant Loss. An Interview with Molly Huffman

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 7, 2020 50:37

- Molly Huffman A year after Tage died, I had processed so much that by the time my husband left, I, I was I was definitely anxious and really struggling at that point. But then there was this little bit of just, a I had to laugh and maybe that was all I could do to keep from drowning, but it was just like, are you kidding me? Like this, too. This is unreal. You like this. This can't happen to people this much loss. INTRO Sometimes in life, it seems like one loss piles on top of the next. And that is certainly the story of my guest today, Molly Huffman. Cancer, miscarriage, infant loss, divorce. Molly’s story has been marked by grief. And yet, her story holds more than grief. She shares about the heavy, tumultuous emotions and how she has embraced life on the other side of loss…and about her new book, which chronicles this journey: The Moon is Round. Before we begin, I want to take a moment to note that, at the time of this recording, our country is reeling from the tragic footage of George Floyd’s death, which is convulsing the nation. And this systemic, historic, abuse of black and brown bodies is not new news, it is just the most recent in a tragic continuum that spans centuries. And this is definitely a workplace issue. We will be talking about this in the weeks to come, because it is not a new issue and it is one that this podcast has not given enough voice to in the past. As we start, I want to thank our podcast sponsor, FullStack PEO. If you are a small business or an entrepreneur, let FullStack take care of your benefits and your payroll so you can focus on what matters most: growing your business. We are also sponsored by my company, Handle with Care consulting. We offer interactive training sessions that build cultures of empathy and care…and don’t we all need a little more of that these days? Now, back to Molly. Molly is a Hoosier by birth but she lives now in Moorehead, Kentucky, in a little neighborhood tucked up in the hills. - Liesel Mertes And who are the people and animals that fill your house? - Molly Huffman My husband. Guy. And then I have two stepdaughters, Ali, who is 14, and Aaron, who is eleven. And then our son, Mack, who is one and a half. We have a chocolate Lab, Marty, who's twelve and a black and white kitty Bella, who's also twelve. - Liesel Mertes And do the dog and the cat get along well? - Molly Huffman They became siblings as puppy and kitten. So they've been together their whole lives. However, I don't know what they say in their pet language, but he gets so annoyed with her. Molly loves to run, even in the sweltering heat of Kentucky summer. And, as I mentioned at the top of the episode, Molly is also a published author. - Molly Huffman So the book is hopefully coming in June, and it's titled The Moon is Round. And the subtitle is an extraordinary, true story of Grief, Loss and the Fight for Faith. And I tried to vulnerably share a season of life where everything fell apart. But then what I learned and the good that came from it and with the hopes that it can encourage people, you know, in whatever seasons of loss and grief and questions that they are in. - Liesel Mertes Well, and that is a great jumping off point. I want to circle back to the book. - Liesel Mertes But tell me what it was like to begin this season of one loss cascading onto the next. Where were you living? What were you doing? What did life look like for you? - Molly Huffman I was living in central Indiana at the time and I was newly married, had an elementary teaching job, which is what I'd wanted to do. - Molly Huffman I lived near my parents and my younger sisters were all nearby and it just seemed like life was suddenly falling into place. I had everything I wanted. Things were great. - Molly Huffman And then all of a sudden, my mom got a cancer diagnosis and and suddenly everything changed. You know? And I had to really just kind of wrestle with all of that, - Liesel Mertes And what was your relationship like with your mom? Tell me a little bit about her. - Molly Huffman She I'm the oldest of four daughters, and so she and I had come to a point where we were friends. And I, for the most part, was never much of a rebellious kid. So we really had a great relationship. For the majority of my growing up years, with the exception of like a six month time period in high school. But she really was my best friend. She was funny and generous and kind and my favorite person to hang out with and dream and talk about life with and. - Molly Huffman And so it was just really devastating to to lose her. - Liesel Mertes And was it a long journey with cancer? - Molly Huffman She there it was a spot on her shin was melanoma. And it was removed and we thought we were in the clear. And then a year later, it reappeared in some of her lymph nodes and from there just sort of spread. So it was less than a year between the time we discovered it and her lymph nodes until she was gone. Molly Huffman But, you know, the the plus was that we had time to say what we wanted to say. The difficult part of that is. That you might be doing a lot of your grieving while the person is still alive. And, you know, so for me it was it was hard to find the balance between enjoying her and also knowing that she's dying, you know? - Liesel Mertes Yeah. Tell me tell me a little bit more about that, because that stroke is. Is its own, like daily figuring with that? What would that tension look like one day for you? - Molly Huffman So, you know, I no longer lived under her roof because I was married. But I would teach all day and then either go to her house in the evenings or in periods of time when she was hospitalized. I would drive straight to the hospital, you know, just to be with her and to be with my dad and. Then sisters and. So it was exhausting in its own right, you know, because I'm working all day and then going and caring and grieving, which takes so much energy. - Molly Huffman But that's just what you do. You know, so we I just. For months. That was. Just how how my days looked. And so trying to have normal conversation, you know, particularly when she was home, talking about the day and what's going on. While watching her decline and, you know, needing to talk about her pain. And what was really interesting was seeing the shift from her being a mother to me and taking care of me. Molly Huffman And I was 24 when all this happened. So I hope I would deal with it differently now. However, at the time, I don't think I was done yet being mothered by her. And so it was hard for me to to not feel the care and nurture from her that I was used to feeling as she got sicker and sicker because she just didn't have the energy herself to give in. - Molly Huffman So, you know, that was part of a grief as well here that that led that the tons of. Being more alone than when she had been healthy and able to give fully out of more of an overflow. Right. - Liesel Mertes So and what was your mother's name? - Molly Huffman Susie McCracken. Susie. - Liesel Mertes Sometimes I find, you know, people, people who have died. We don't even get to a chance to say their names in the same kind of way. And they had loomed so large, you know, in our life sphere of irony. - Liesel Mertes And so this is a devastating thing for you in your early 20s. - Liesel Mertes But as you write in your book, this is not the only disruption that was going to come and talk with me a little bit about what that timeline looks like with your first pregnancy and your mother's death. - Molly Huffman So a year after. No, I'm sorry. Three years after she died. I had come out of the fog of grief. And my husband and I tried to start our family. And seven weeks into that pregnancy, on her birthday of all days. I had a miscarriage. And, you know, I wasn't yet done grieving the loss of my mom as really I suppose we never are. You know, it just morphs. But it was still pretty fresh to me at that time. - Molly Huffman And so. It was devastating because I was so looking forward to this child and new life. And so my husband, I waited another year and then we were pregnant again. And this time our son Tage was born in March of 2014. - Liesel Mertes And tell me a little bit about Tage. - Molly Huffman He. Well, it's I guess I have to say, a past tense. He ended up passing away, but he was just a beautiful boy and so healthy. - Molly Huffman When he was born and just I I felt my joy coming back. And. He was big and strong and had these bright blue eyes that just sparkled. - Molly Huffman But around the time that he was five or six months old, we started just noticing that. Something seemed off. He wasn't making eye contact or cooing sounds that babies make. He wasn't smiling. And so we went to a couple doctors and the first one, you know, just maybe thought that I was a new mom and nervous, you know, and sort of dismissed my concern. - Molly Huffman And so I rallied. I thought, OK, maybe that's the truth, you know, but things just weren't getting better. - Molly Huffman So we went to a different doctor and he immediately diagnosed Tage as failure to thrive because of his weight. And so we were sent for blood work immediately that day and a follow up appointment at the Children's Hospital the next week where they admitted us for muscle impairment problems. And. And so eventually we. Discovered that he had this rare genetic disease called Lei's disease. - Molly Huffman And it was affecting the mitochondria of all of his cells. - Molly Huffman And so the doctors told us that it was terminal and and that he would not make it to his first birthday. - Liesel Mertes So you go from this this big, beautiful, blue eyed baby who's already, you know, a child who has followed a loss and the sadness and the loss of this first baby you were pregnant with and the death of your mom to receiving this news. Was it was it over the span of a couple of weeks or did it did it come to you all in one day? You know, all of the the reality of his condition, I imagine that that is just a 180. - Molly Huffman And yes, how we showed centering it was it absolute was we were you know, we went to this follow up appointment at the Children's Hospital, and I legitimately thought that they would. You know, tell us what we needed to do and send us home. - Molly Huffman You know, I was not thinking terminal at all. And so when they wanted to admit us in that appointment, I was so confused and so. It took a couple days for. Of us being in the hospital with him, for the doctors to be able to, you know, decide what the what they're working diagnosis would be. - Molly Huffman And so two days later, when they told us, you know, I people use that phrase, you know, the room was spinning. But it really it did. I my my body just froze. I could not believe what they were saying. And, you know, how in the world am I going to deal with this after losing my mom and our first pregnancy? And it just didn't feel like I could handle something else. - Molly Huffman But as a parent, you figure it out. You know, you you realize, OK, well, once the shock wore off, the next day, it was go time. And we spent a week in the hospital just running different tests and Tage got a G tube so that he could eat successfully. - Molly Huffman And so, you know, going home from the hospital a week later, life looked totally different than when we had entered the hospital. - Liesel Mertes Well, and I'm struck, as you say, that about a distinct parallel between what you said about your mom, that you were walking this tension of how am I with her and enjoying her, but also grieving her while she's still alive. Did you feel like did that feel akin at all to what you were doing with Tage? Like, I'm I'm with him and I'm wanting to delight in him and be with this child, but I'm grieving him because I have this, I don't know this limited amount of time. - Molly Huffman Yes. Oh, it was. It was so difficult. My husband, you know, still had to work. So he would go to work Monday through Friday. And I was home with Tage by myself at first and needing to feed him with a G tube, which was new. And, you know, looking at him was the reminder that he was also dying. And it was just so intense. - Molly Huffman It was so emotionally intense during that time, trying to balance. I love him. I want to care for him and enjoy him while also knowing that our time is limited. And. And I didn't know how much time at that point we would have. - Molly Huffman But I can say, thankfully, that once I figured out that I could not do that by myself. Friends stepped in and would come over during the day and be with me and just help help me not feel as alone. - Molly Huffman Which was so such a gift. - Liesel Mertes I'd like to hear more about that because. One, you know, distinct aspect of what this podcast is about is enabling people to be able to show up in ways that are helpful and that matter as these friends came to your house. Did you did you ask them to come? Did they offer to come? How did that start? Like, what was the tipping point? For that to change for you. Sure. - Molly Huffman I, I had told a trusted friend or two that. You know that at the time, I, I just could not stop crying because I'm trying to take care of stage, but he's dying, you know. And just seeing him was the reminder. And, and so when I finally admitted that to someone, she said that was actually this is really neat. It was one of my mom's friends. And I think there was this part of me, you know, that when I needed care, you know. - Molly Huffman And so she's she saw that and said, what if we make a schedule? And she looks at all these people that were my mom's friends that, you know, were in their friend group, - Molly Huffman She said, what if we make a schedule and, you know, just for whatever you want, two hours in the morning, someone can come and then two hours that afternoon, someone can come and, you know, and it can be fluid. You know, maybe we start with somebody in the morning and some in the afternoon every day. - Molly Huffman And if that's too much and you can always text us and say, don't come. And so it was really neat. - Molly Huffman We ended up making this schedule and so hurt my mom's friends would come and sometimes my friends would come as well, and sometimes we cried. Sometimes they just sat in the other room while, you know, I did the things that I needed to get done. Or they might help with laundry or dishes and. And eventually I realized that actually having someone in the morning, in the afternoon was actually too much because I knew that I needed to process the grief. - Molly Huffman But when people were there, it was hard for me to be real about the grief. And so we then tapered it back and, you know, maybe someone would only come in the afternoon. And, you know, sometimes people would. - Liesel Mertes I paused for a second just because I'm, I'm struck. You said something interesting that I want to hear more about, the importance of processing your grief and that when someone else was there, I think you said it kept you from being. And being real about the grief that. Tell me more about that. How did the presence of another person in, in so many ways in which it was helpful, but how did that affect how you were processing your grief? - Molly Huffman My personality is a helper and a caretaker. It's just what I do. And so when other people are at my house, I can't help but want to take care of them. And so. I got better at letting that go during this time, but. But there was still an underlying sense of like I need to have conversation with this person, I need to entertain them. I need to offer them a drink, you know? And so I I couldn't care for myself emotionally when I'm trying to care for some of the people now, you know, a couple of my very closest friends. - Molly Huffman You know, I wouldn't necessarily feel that pressure, but some of my mom's friends who, you know, I didn't necessarily spend a lot of time with before then. I felt like I needed to care for them. - Molly Huffman And so it was helpful to have them, but then also helpful to have time without them so that I could just let the tears fall. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. And as you were aware of this need to process your grief, what were some of the things that were especially helpful for you in that journey of, you know, just walking with this hard reality being like internally to to make space for that sadness? - Molly Huffman I think. Being honest about my anger and my questions about it. I grew up in a very faith filled family and, you know, as often under, under the thought of, you know, be joyful, always give thanks in all circumstances. And I think that we can be joyful and give thanks in all circumstances once we've been honest about our pain. And so this time gave me. - Molly Huffman I was able to. I learned to pray honestly: the doubt and the questions and the anger and believing that that this God that I had believed in, you know, that he could handle all of that, too, gave me such a space to to be able to process the grief. Honestly. - Liesel Mertes Was that something that you had someone invite you into or you read a book or it was just the overflow of where you were at? Because sometimes there's this element of finding permission out of out of a context that didn't really have space for that. How did you how were you able to accept that that was OK for you to do? - Molly Huffman Two things. I had a couple friends who would say things like, like Molly, I would be angry, too, you know, and just validated the feeling or some other friends would say it's okay for you to be angry about this to God. You know, like to give the permission. - Molly Huffman The other thing that was really helpful to me was. Again, going up in church, I know there were these ways that we prayed as children. Like confession or praising God. But what I hadn't learned how to do was lament. And so during that time I started coming across passages in the Bible where these. Men and women of faith and even Jesus himself would lament, know, God, why have you forsaken me? - Molly Huffman And so seeing that and, and seeing this pattern and this permission to lament allowed me to process the grief. I also found different counselors over that time who were great at helping me process and allowing me to grieve as well. So there were there were so many parts. They were helpful. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes Well, then. That's face of a community of people, whether it was friends or counselors, to be able to, yes, allow you to feel your feelings and not have to suppress them. - Liesel Mertes I I have found in the work that I do in my own experience that grief can feel so profoundly isolating because there's no one who who knows the exact dimensionality of your grief and and how even it changes throughout a day. And that particularly with the loss of children or their sickness, that that that can be something that can be hard in in partners or a couple those moments where you are grieving differently than your partner. Did you run into that as Tage was sickening and declining? - Molly Huffman Yes. My husband tended to run toward work and and busyness and and so he was away from the house a lot. So being stuck at the house, I tended to run toward my girlfriends and family members who could come by. And so we definitely grieved differently. - Molly Huffman We we did go on a grief retreat. Together. And this was after staged a yes after Tage died. And, you know, worked on processing it together and. And. Really there I felt a lot of of hope leaving that weekend. But. - Molly Huffman Ultimately, we were not able to turn toward each other. And, and he ended up filing for divorce a year after Tage died. - Liesel Mertes So. These are. A number of losses from the life that you were moving into two years previous as you were pregnant and expecting stage. What was going on was that. How did that feel? It seems like just so many losses. One on top of the other. - Molly Huffman It was I. I think by the you know, after a year after Tage died, I had processed so much that by the time my husband left, I, I was I was definitely anxious and really struggling at that point. But then there was this little bit of just, a I had to laugh and maybe that was all I could do to keep from drowning, but it was just like, are you kidding me? Like this, too. - Molly Huffman This is unreal. You like this. This can't happen to people this much loss. But one day at a time, one counseling appointment at a time, one walk with a friend at a time. You know, I here I am and. And life is good now. So it was so, so much loss. And I still I miss my mom, like, all the time. And I miss Tage. - Molly Huffman And, you know, so those losses have not gone away but I have. Learned to live with them. I just picture the wound is not open anymore. There's a scar. And I'll never forget. - Molly Huffman But I also and as I explain in in the book, I like this version of me better. All the things that loss and grief taught me. - Liesel Mertes Tell me more. Tell me more about that. What? How is this version of you different than 23 year old Molly? - Molly Huffman I would say and I don't want any of this to sound like I'm puffing myself up, you know. But I can see when I look at 23 year old version of Molly versus now just that, I I have more compassion for people, you know. Twenty three year old Molly was all about herself and what she could get and what she wanted. I - Molly Huffman My values are different. As far as what used to be important is no longer important. The things that I, that I think I need to make me happy. I don't need those things anymore. You know, as far as material things or. Per. I don't know. I'm trying think what else it could be, but. And - Molly Huffman I think this version of me is just more authentic. I, I am I feel more that I am who I was created to be. Now I know who I am. And I'm just much more grateful. - Liesel Mertes Thank you for sharing that. Do you do you find so with with a number of losses, you know, and to specifically related to bringing children into the world? Did your experience can also tip into feeling yourself as more fearful or anxious? You know, even starting a new marriage with your husband stepping into has. Has there been a shadow of what if everything falls apart again for you? Yes. - Liesel Mertes Amen. So I am how have you lived within that? - Molly Huffman Well, so the good news is I'm now remarried to my husband guy and we have two stepdaughters. - Molly Huffman Well, I have to say, barters his daughters and we have our son, Mac, who's one and a half. And - Molly Huffman so two major moments in my life where they there was a crossroads. I remember getting married to Guy and and thinking, how do I do this again when my first marriage failed. But I think this time with marriage, I hold it loosely. I don't need the marriage to complete me or to fulfill me. Instead, I get to just enjoy guy as a gift that I've been given. - Molly Huffman And it's so interesting because, you know, my first husband wanted out and and that was a huge fear of mine for so long that that, you know, someone would leave. But I saw OK. So the worst thing happened. He left and I'm OK. I was held it and so I know. You know, I've joked with go out with guy like if you want to leave, you can't. Like, I. I'm not going to, too. - Molly Huffman I'm not. I keep you here if you don't want to be here, you know, and honestly, that that opens up such a freedom. And I think for me, a more genuine love for this person knowing that I don't need to control them. And I can just enjoy it for what it is. - Molly Huffman And then when our son Mac was born in the hospital, I actually had him like a PTSD moment hearing him cry for the first time because I hadn't heard my baby cry since stage right before Tage died. - Molly Huffman And so there have been some moments like that where all of a sudden, you know, the fear and the anxiety can come rushing back in or, you know, in quiet moments by myself. There are these questions in my mind of, well, what if what if he dies, too? And I think it's important for us to to take that question and say, OK, what if what if. And you know, what I've learned through all of this is that I will be OK if if Mac dies, it will be treacherous and grievous and it will take some time and it will be hard and I will be OK. - Molly Huffman And. And, you know, having those realizations for both of those relationships has allowed me to live in such freedom. And I think sometimes, you know, we fear, well, what if this worst thing could happen? And literally, my three biggest fears happened to me within a matter of seven years. And. The thing is, if we lean into it and. Get help and admit that we can't do it in seek our friends and seek counselors and. - Molly Huffman And, you know, in my belief, see, God like you, he will not let you fall in. And so so that's what I live with now. - Liesel Mertes Can you tell me a little bit more? You know, if someone is listening to this and to hear you able to say, I will be OK, they might think, well, what does OK mean? Does that mean just that you're still alive? Like, is that OK? What does being OK, tell me more about that and what that has meant for you being okay? - Molly Huffman Now, being in a place where I can say I will be OK is for me. Being able to acknowledge the loss and that there is still pain there. I still miss the people that I've lost, I miss parts of my former life where I lived and who I lived near. But, I also. I've seen that. We can we can still live with that pain, but it doesn't consume us. And there is still. Hope and joy and beauty after loss. And I think sometimes we do. We have a choice. - Molly Huffman I remember a specific moment that I write about in the book where I had to decide what path I was going to take. And one path would lead me to bitterness. And I have seen people who took that path after loss. - Molly Huffman And and I believe the other path leads to life. When, if we, if we can choose to do the work and the wrestling in the midst of our pain and and just cling. Then. I really I really have experienced that. You know, our our biggest fears coming true do not have to they knock us down. They knock us down profoundly, but they don't have to destroy us. - Liesel Mertes Thank you for sharing that. I think that's that's helpful. Sometimes you've had a diversity of types of losses. Sometimes when people are trying to be helpful in the midst of that, they say or do things that are not that helpful. What are some of the least helpful things that people offered to you? - Liesel Mertes You just say, oh, my gosh, like you might want to be helpful, but please don't do this. Yes. - Molly Huffman Well. So after Tage died, I had thought that I was going to be staying home, you know, for a long time, raising stage in whatever siblings might come after him. - Molly Huffman And so instead, my counselor at the time told me, Molly need to go back to work. You can't just sit around your house all day and. I was so mad that he said that, but it turned out to be so true, and so I went back in to the elementary school as a teacher and. I found there that that. - Molly Huffman Some people were so helpful in that they would leave little notes on my desk for me to see when I got there in the morning or, you know, if I'd stepped out. - Molly Huffman Or they would just offer a hug. Or little gifts, you know, just things to let you know. Even if we weren't, they weren't my closest co-workers. But but just offering acknowledgement in whatever way they felt comfortable. The thing I would say most of the teachers were amazing. They really, really were. - Molly Huffman But I know sometimes, you know, we get wrapped up, sometimes caught up in what do I say? And I think what's important for us to know is that nothing that we could say to someone who's grieving in our workplace or anywhere is going to fix it so we can take the pressure off ourselves that we don't have to find the perfect words. Sometimes less is better. You know, just. I'm glad you're back, Molly. I am so sorry. May I give you a hug? You know, simple. - Molly Huffman Keep it simple. But what's not helpful? What were phrases like? Well, at least, you know, you can be here now. Dot, dot, dot. You know, putting that phrase at least, you know, whatever follows that is not helpful. And, you know, it minimizes the pain. And I know that sometimes we all do that from. A feeling of feeling awkward or not knowing what to say. But. But it's still not good. - Molly Huffman That was not helpful. - Liesel Mertes Yeah, exactly. I'd do it. Yes. When we when we. Because I know that even though I really care about it, I can still, like you can spin into these just ingrained behaviors or you feel like you're just grasping at words. But that's the purpose. Now, don't do that. Yeah, helpful. - Liesel Mertes Well, your book your book is exciting. Does it? This is this is a question from someone else who, you know, right in some ways, you know, I I write my own journey with Mercy. I don't know to what end or what I'll do with it, but there could be a sense of like, man like this journey is still unfolding. I'm still changing within it. - Liesel Mertes Does it feel like a like an important like flag in the sand to have put out a book on it? Did that feel like. Yes, I have something to say. And this is it. Is there a sense of like, oh, but my story is still unfolding with this. Tell me, just as a writer, what that has been like to get something out there. - Molly Huffman Well, I started writing after my mom died. And so this whole journey of loss is is reflective. Of writing for me in in my. You know, I didn't write really before my mom died, and I thought I was going to write a book about losing a parent. And then all of a sudden, you know, there was more loss and more lesson. And so I never felt like it was time to put it. On paper. But I had a blog while Tage was sick, it started as a Caring Bridge when we were in the hospital, but I couldn't help but kind of write. - Molly Huffman In story form, because that's just what I like to do and. And so after we were out of the hospital, some people were like, well, will you keep writing about all of this? And so we started a blog. - Molly Huffman And. So I always thought that it might be neat to write a book someday. And then when I met my husband Guy, I just sense that that particular chapter of life and those losses. I wanted that, too, to not be behind me as in to never think of it again. But I wanted a marker that, OK, here was that incredible season of life and what happened and what I learned. - Molly Huffman And now I'm going to turn the corner here and see what's next, because I'm sure I'm not done writing and I'm sure I know my story and the listener story. No one story is over, you know. But but it it does feel really nice to just. Like you said, plant a flag. Like, let there be a marker from that season of loss and pain. And now moving into this new season, which I'm sure we'll have loss and pain because that just seems to be life. - Molly Huffman But but I am excited to get to share this book with the world may hopefully be with a little more space in between the losses. - Liesel Mertes Right. I can feel for myself when I hit 30. I had friends around me who were like thirties, so old. So I was like 30. Feels just right. I lived a heck of a lot of life in my 20s, 30s. Slow down a little bit. Yes. My hope. Yes. Grief. - Liesel Mertes If someone is listening and they say, I absolutely want to get this book, where is it available and where should they go? - Molly Huffman It is currently available on Amazon. I believe that the distribution will be wider soon. But for now, I would just say go to Amazon. - Molly Huffman And I know that there is a little bit of a backup with ordering, you know, because of COVID. - Liesel Mertes But and I will include a link in the show note. You can also go there. And it's great because you're already getting a ton of your stuff from Amazon. So you just add it on with your toilet paper. - Molly Huffman Exactly. Easy peasy. One click. Liesel Mertes You're also a speaker. Tell us a little bit about people who would maybe want to know more or have you for an event. Sure. What kinds of speaking do you do? - Molly Huffman I love speaking to groups. I have spoken to women's events, college events, youth group events. I've spoken at churches and done even just a writing talk one time. So I would love to to be invited to speak to any group. I love to encourage. - Liesel Mertes So what is the best way for people to be in touch with you? [00:46:36.590] - Molly Huffman My Web site. MollyHuffman.com. And there is a contact button. - Liesel Mertes Perfect. Molly, thank you. MUSICAL TRANSITION Here are three take-aways from my conversation with Molly If you know someone that is in an overwhelming, isolating season (particularly with a small child) it can be really helpful to make a schedule of support.Molly’s friends made sure that she had someone with her….IF she wanted to and they gave her space to cancel at any time. This sort of consistent, responsive, flexible support can be deeply meaningful. Molly noted, “Nothing you do or say will ultimately fix the person that is grieving” so release yourself from the pressure of getting it perfect.Molly appreciated gifts, a hug, and the small gestures of people moving towards her. Grief can and often will cause you to question what seemed like unshakeable beliefs.As Molly grew in her practice of faith and her ways of prayer, she benefitted from friends that encouraged her to be open and honest in her questions. And this open, honest engagement is so important for faith and for life. Avoiding or stuffing unwieldy emotions is toxic, what we resist persists. OUTRO Link to The Moon is Round: https://www.amazon.com/Moon-Round-Story-Extraordinary-Grief/dp/B089D34VT6/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=the+moon+Is+round&qid=1591579462&sr=8-1 Molly’s Website: mollyhuffman.com

Part 1 - Mark Charles - Native American 2020 candidate Asks does 'We The People' includes everybody?

Back in America

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 4, 2020 28:23

Stanislas Berteloot 0:01 I have recorded my first interview with Mark Charles on May 22 three days before the murder of George Floyd. Since then, protests across the nation have forced white Americans to confront the darker, racist history of this nation. I called back mark to ask him how he felt when he first saw the video of the arrest and of the death of the Black man. Mark Charles 0:28 Wednesday morning, I forced myself to watch the entire video of the murder of George Floyd. And it was painful. It was gut-wrenching. Not only did you have a white police officer over this black man holding his knee on his neck as a black man was crying out, just to be able to breathe. But there are other people black people women watching this pleading with the officer to take his knee off to let them intervene to check his pulse to come in. He was keeping them at bay with mace, threatening to mace them. And there was another officer standing guard keeping them on the sidewalk. And in the midst of this one of the women who were there, she wasn't on camera, but you could hear her voice and she said something to the effect of how do you call the cops on the cops. And that's the challenge people of color face in this nation is our country believes that it has these institutions white America remembers that there are institutions that have been established to protect them. The police forces, the government, even the military, and people of color, have the lived experiences that throughout history these institutions have been used to oppress them, enslave them and even kill them. And once you realize that once you see that and you see the injustice happening right in front of you, it's what do you do? Where do you turn? Who do you cry out to? How do you call the cops on the cop? And so, what hit me very strong. I saw that video. I lamented it for 24 hours. I couldn't even speak publicly about it. And what it reminded me of emotionally was the 11 years I spent living on the Navajo Nation where I watched these types of things happen to my own people. In his last state of the union, President Obama was acknowledging the deep divisiveness that existed throughout his presidency, the opposition he faced at every turn. And he was lamenting that and talking about the need for our nation to build a new politics. And he quoted the constitution he said We the People. Our constitution begins with these three simple words. Words we've come to recognize me and all the people. That sounds beautiful, even inspiring. He got a lot of applause for that line. But as I sat in my house listening to him, I asked myself I said, when when did we decide we the people means all the people the founding fathers absolutely did not believe we the people met all the people. Abraham Lincoln did not believe were the people meant all the people. As good as the civil rights movement was it did not get us to be the people meaning all the people present Trump does not believe we the people means all the people. This is the problem. We've never decided collectively as a nation. That we want to be a place where We The People, includes everybody. Barak Obama 4:06 If you're tired of arguing with strangers on the internet, try talking with one of them in real life.Jon 4:20 Welcome to back in America, the podcast.Stanislas Berteloot 4:32 I am Stan Berteloot and this is back in America, the podcast where I explore Americans' identity, culture, and values. My guest today is a candidate running as an independent for President of the United States. A man who's not white, not black, but a dual citizen of the United State and the Navajo Nation. For three years. He lived with his family in a one-room hogan with no running water or electricity out in a Navajo reservation. He dreams of a nation where We The People truly means all the people. Yet as we prepare to celebrate Memorial Day, he reminds us of the ethnic cleansing and genocide the United State carried against the indigenous people of this land. Mark Charles 5:26 Thank you, Stan, it's very good to be with you please let me introduce (...) When we introduce ourselves, we always give our four clans we're matrilineal as a people with our identities coming from our mother's mother. Now my mother's mother's American of Dutch heritage and that's why I say Simba kid dinner. Loosely translated that means I'm from the wooden shoe people. My second clan, my father's mother is told him blini which is the waters that float together. My third clan, my mother's father is also syndicate. And then my fourth time my father's father's to the cine, which is the bitter water clan. It's one of the original clans were Navajo people. I just want to acknowledge as well that I'm speaking to you today from the traditional lands of the discard away. I live in what's now known as Washington DC, but it was the Piscataway who lived in these lands, they hunted here, they fished here, they farmed here, they raised their families here, they bury their dead here. These were their lands long before Columbus got lost at sea. And I want to acknowledge the people whose land them out of where I go around the country. And so I honored today that Piscataway. I also want to honor that you're speaking to me from Princeton, New Jersey, which is the traditional end of the Lenape. And I also honor though the not pay as the indigenous hosts of the land where you are conducting this interview from, but it's great to be on the on the show with you. So thank you for having me. Stanislas Berteloot 6:57 Thank you for making time for me today, Mark. So, let me start with a burning question I have got. Is this country ready for Native American president? Mark Charles 7:12 I understand why you would ask that question. I would actually say that that question is coming from the wrong perspective. What that question does is it it centers white land-owning men. And the challenge we face in this nation is the entire nation was founded on founded for even founded by white landowning men. So our Declaration of Independence, which says all men are created equal, refers to natives as savages. Our constitution which starts with We the People, first of all, never mentioned to women, it specifically excludes natives when it comes to African, just three-fifths of a person which in 1787, that literally left white men and it was white men who could vote. And so the nation which claims to be about equality, freedom and liberty and justice, was actually defined very narrowly. For white landowning men, and that demographic has controlled the narrative and placed themselves at the center of both politics, economics, social life, everything in this country. And so when you ask, is America ready for a native president? The question that is really being asked, Is, are white landowning men ready to have a Native American president? I don't know the answer to that question. That's one reason why I'm running. It's also one of the reasons why my campaign is trying to decenter whiteness. Now, I firmly believe that the marginalized groups within our country, women, African Americans, Native Americans, LGBTQ, other people who are not part of that center demographic.I think there is a very big openness to having knowledge as someone who's native, but also someone who's African American, someone who's a woman, someone who's a member of the LGBTQ community, outside of the center, which is the white landowning male, the rest of the country, I think is definitely ready for a much more diverse knowledge pool of candidates, but even actual presidents. The question is, are white men ready? And technically, I'm not convinced they are. But that does not prevent me from running. And it actually helps me frame my campaign, which is literally about decentering whiteness. Stanislas Berteloot 9:34 Thank you. Thank you. And we'll definitely come back to that. Before we do, however, in order to better understand who you are and what where you come from. I would love you to take me back to your early days. Where did you grow up? Talk to me about your parents, your siblings. Mark Charles 9:53 Yeah, so I grew up in the southwest of the United States, right near a border town. To the Navajo Nation, a small town known as Gallup, New Mexico. This is the area in the United States that in 1862, was ethnically cleansed by Abraham Lincoln. So, after signing the Pacific Railway act in 1862, he literally began very systematically ethnically cleansing native tribes from the states of Minnesota, Colorado and the territory of New Mexico to make way for some of the early routes of the transcontinental railway. And one of those routes went through the Southwest, which was right where are Navajo, the Mescalero, Apache and other problems were. And so in 1863 1864, they began the ethnic cleansing and genocidal policy known as The Long Walk, where they literally burned our villages, burned our homes, destroyed our crops, killed our livestock, and hunted our people rounded us out and moved us down to a reservation established by Abraham Lincoln Near busca donde. it, they called it a reservation technically was a death camp. Over 10th of almost 10,000 people were marched down there. nearly a quarter of our people died while in prison there. And then after we came back after Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. We were moved to a much smaller plot of land north of what was to become Gallup. So I grew up in that area, off of the reservation right near the sporter town in a mission compound that was started by the Christian Reformed Church in the early 1900s. They actually came to the southwest to establish a mission, and they very early on after they arrived, started a boarding school. Again, the role of the boarding schools was to commit cultural genocide to forcibly assimilate natives the status goal of the boarding schools used by the government and the churches was to kill the Indian save the man. And so young children, Native children were taken from their homes put in these military-style boarding schools, punished for speaking their languages punished for practicing their culture. On the stories of abuse that I've heard, mental, physical, emotional, sexual, that happened in these boarding schools is gut-wrenching. And so I my grandparents on my father's side, my Navajo grandparents were both boarding school survivors. And they became Christians, again, a very colonized version of Christianity that rejected their culture, and their language and their understanding of the sacred. And so they emphasized Western education and the English language with my father and my aunt, and they worked as translators for some of the early missionaries. My mother then came down as a missionary nurse and she was actually on her way to Africa when she met my father. And they began dating and fell in love and got married. And this was in the late 60s, which is literally right after biracial marriage even became legal in the United States. For much of this nation's history, biracial marriage was not even legal Stanislas Berteloot 13:18 Between the United States, Native Americans, and white people or for all races. Mark Charles 13:24 Yeah, white people are not allowed to marry black people, native peoples biracial marriage was not legal in the United States until the late 60s. Yeah, and so and so they were married soon after that, and I, my siblings and I attended this Mission School, which was in the process of transitioning from a boarding school into a day school. And so we attended there I attended there as a boarding as a day school student. I had other friends and people who were Attending. There's a boarding school student and many times our experiences were vastly different. So that's the environment I grew up in, which was highly assimilated. Even though my Navajo grandparents lived on campus with us and I saw them every day, we did not speak Navajo in the home. The school I went to did not affirm Navajo culture. And it was it was a I so I was raised very much in in a white evangelical setting. Stanislas Berteloot 14:34 I saw that you were widely mentioned in the Guardian. In the UK that's quite prestigious. Mark Charles 14:42 Yeah, they actually, they did a longer interview of me probably nine months ago. And then they quoted me on it on a story they did on the Navajo Nation. A week or two ago. Stanislas Berteloot 14:56 Do you have a lot of coverage? at the moment Mark Charles 15:00 No, I've had a few national stories of very few. The press has largely ignored me, including literally writing me out of events that I've attended. The national press in the US does not want to cover my campaign. Stanislas Berteloot 15:19 And why is that? Mark Charles 15:21 Well, there's two challenges. The first is the history I'm discussing. Our nation doesn't know what to do with it. Again, there's a deep mythology in the United States of America that we have these foundations that are fantastic and great. And the press doesn't know what to do with someone who clearly articulates a counter to that narrative. I'm second, I'm running as an independent and the press is deeply invested in our two party system and maintaining the status quo of that two party system. And so they largely ignore third party and independent candidates. Stanislas Berteloot 16:00 Were you when you realize that Native Americans were treated as white Americans? And how did it make you feel? Mark Charles 16:07 So, again how growing up I knew I was native, I knew that my father was Navajo I knew I mean, the reservation and my all our my native relatives were literally just across the street are where the reservation began in some instances. And we would go on to the reservation frequently I, I was, you know, Gallop is a center for both native and kind of the settler culture out there. But had you asked me when I was in high school, or when I was even early college about what was the daily experience of native peoples, I probably would have told you that, well, the history was bad. But today, things are much better. And things have improved a lot. It really wasn't until I moved I, I went to college, attended and graduated from UCLA in Los Angeles, moved to Albuquerque, moved back to California, got married, eventually moved back again to the southwest. And then, after a few years was called to pastor a church in Denver, Colorado known as a church was called the Christian Indian center. And the congregation which was primarily Navajo was really wrestling with the question of what did it mean to be native and be Christian? Because the gospel was brought in a very colonial way, which said to be a Christian, you have to be a white, cultured person, speaking English and celebrating Christmas and the Easter Bunny and everything else and giving up your pagan heathen ways of your native culture. There was a renaissance if you will, going on not In the US, but globally, of indigenous Christians who are asking this question, what does it mean to follow the teachings of Jesus, but yet still be from the tribe and the cultures that we are from. And so, I began almost a 10 year process of building relationships with indigenous Christian leaders from all over the world. It was called the world Christian gathering on indigenous peoples. And we would meet every year every other year in a different nation around the world and would talk and challenge and learn about ways we would begin to deconstruct this colonial worldview. And this is where I really began to understanding how deeply embedded the colonial history of our nation was so closely tied to the history of the church. After a few years, our family, my wife, and I decided that if I was going to really be leading in this type of movement, our capacity that I needed to live on the Navajo Nation, we needed to live there. So we moved from Denver back to the Navajo Nation and we wanted to go because I grew up in a border town and on a mission compound and I, attended what essentially was a private school that was also operating as a boarding school.Um, I, wanted to actually live as traditionally as we could. And so we moved into a very remote section of our reservation. Six miles off the nearest paved road on a dirt road. no running water, no electricity. Our neighbors were rug Weaver's and shepherds, and we move they're prepared to live off the grid. We move they're ready to haul our water and cook by camp stove or are over an open fire to live by candlelight using an outhouse, all the things that life has like hurt sheep and everything else of life, what life is like out there and we prepared ourselves with that. What we what caught us by surprise. Literally slapped us in the face was how deeply marginalized we realized the reservation community was it literally like we felt like we dropped off the face of the earth. I learned very quickly that living on the reservation primarily the only nonnatives you ever see or interact with are those who come to give you charity or those who come to take your picture. Almost nobody comes to get to know you as a person or treats you as appear. At the same time I'm experiencing and witnessing and observing the historical trauma of our people from the boarding schools from the long walk from the oppressive history. I'm learning more about the history I'm I'm seeing things from a whole different angle. I'm seeing the oppressive economic policies of our nation and how they've, they've caused this unemployment and the challenges of the reservation tribes not owning their lands, but there being trust land held by the federal government, and I'm seeing all these problems experiencing them firsthand. Stanislas Berteloot 21:00 How do you feel? Mark Charles 21:00 and Stanislas Berteloot 21:00 How do you feel? Mark Charles 21:01 I'm becoming more and more law I'm becoming angrier and angrier, I'm becoming very angry. And I'm trying to process through all this because again, I feel in some ways like a fish out of water because I'd never grown up experiencing this and thinking things used to be bad, but now they're okay. And now I'm sitting in this environment and I find myself just doing and I'm trying to process through it even with some of my non native friends. Again, we're doing this over the phone or email or, or even by letter because they're not coming to the reservation. And every time the topic comes up, I can feel the anger kind of welling up inside of me, and soon I have to hang up the phone so I don't yell at my friends. So I began to kind of disconnect emotionally so I can talk about it more. Almost like this is something I read the newspaper, then I can stay on the on the discussion longer, but it's not soon after that, that my friends defensive start rising. I didn't do that to your people. I wasn't the cause of that. And soon they would hang up the phone. So I was searching for a way to engage the dialogue that led me honestly articulate what I was feeling, but didn't drive myself or others from the conversation. And I was writing a letter to my friends this is after multiple attempts to get understand what I was feeling. And in my letter, I said to them being Native American and living on our reservation in the middle of this country, it feels like our native peoples are this old grandmother who has a very large and very beautiful house. And years ago, some people came into our house, and they violently locked us upstairs in the bedroom. Today, our house is full of people. They're sitting on our furniture, they're eating our food. They're having a party inside our house. Now they've since come upstairs and they've unlocked the door to the bedroom, but it's much later and we're tired. We're old, we're weak, we're sick, so we can't or we don't come out. But the thing that hurts us the most causes us the most pain is that virtually nobody from this party ever comes upstairs, seeks out the grandmother in the bedroom, sits down next to her on the bed, takes her hand and simply says thank you.Thank you for letting us be in your house in why I wrote that. I mean, that's it. That's when I'm feeling it. Stanislas Berteloot 23:22 I love that. I love the metaphor. I mean, I think this is right on. Why do you think nobody comes to you? Why do you think nobody asked? Mark Charles 23:29 Well, I think the challenge is, is because of the history because of the implicit racial bias of white supremacy. Because of the dehumanization of native peoples, African Americans and women, our nation. Our nation doesn't know how to deal with its history. It doesn't know what to do with it, and so and so our country There's this reversal of roles. One of the things our country, part of the national narrative that our country says about itself is that we're a nation of immigrants. Now, that's true for a majority of people. But when you call the United States of America, a nation of immigrants, you're excluding two groups of people. You're excluding Native Americans who were indigenous to these lands and did not immigrate to become a part of this country. And you're excluding descendants of enslaved people from Africa, who were brought here against their will, and then enslaved and forced to build this nation. So calling our nation a nation of immigrants excludes some of the most unjust and oppressive actions our nation has ever done. And so, there because we we have this narrative, not only of we're an immigrants, but we're a nation of exceptional immigrants, American exceptionalism. There's this reversal of roles where you literally have 300 plus million technically undocumented immigrants, people who've never asked for permission, nor have they been given permission to be here. And they act like they own the place. And then you have 6 million approximately indigenous peoples native peoples who have been pushed to the side and are treated like unwanted guests in someone else's house. And so we have this reversal of roles. Again, this goes back to the whole myth of America. One of the myths we have is that these lands were discovered. I have a book titled Unsettling Truths, the ongoing dehumanizing legacy of the Doctrine of Discovery. The first sentence of the first chapter says you cannot Discover lands already inhabited. You can steal lands that aren't habitation, you can colonize lands that are inhabited. You can ethically cleanse lands are inhabited. You cannot discover them. There's already somebody there. So the fact that we have this national narrative that says, Columbus discovered America, it reveals the implicit racial bias, which is that Native Americans who lived here, and Africans who were brought here and enslaved, were not fully human. And so this is why our nation doesn't even think to say thank you. Because then the belief is, and even if you go back to the boarding school, the goal the boarding school was to what to kill the Indian to save the man. The notion is that by the presence of white Europeans in this country, even by The bringing over of African people from Africa and then slaving them here, we civilize them and even humanized them.And wasn't that very generous of these white Europeans. Stanislas Berteloot 27:26 The interviews continue with part two. In part two of this interview, I asked Mark whether Native Americans should work within the system, or should they focus on dealing with the foundation of the problem. Mark also talks at length about the relationship, or lack of, between African American and Native American. He discussed the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls crisis in the US. We go on to talk about the impact of the Coronavirus on Native American community, President Trump is mentioned and Mark shares some of the immediate actions that he would take. If elected. Make sure you’re listening to part two of the interview of Mark Charles, an independent candidate to the presidential elections of the United States.

Intuition and Spirituality in Selling

Get Sellers Calling You: real estate marketing agent coaching seller leads generation Realtor Tom Ferry Brian Buffini Gary Va

Play Episode Listen Later May 7, 2020 34:59

TO READ THE TRANSCRIPT SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE. In episode 12 of the new Awaken The Possibilities Podcast, Host Terry Wildemann interviews Joe Nunziata on "Intuition and Spirituality in Selling”. Awaken the Possibilities Podcast features successful entrepreneurs and intuitive leaders who offer insights on how to attract success in business and life. ABOUT Joe NunziataJoe Nunziata is a best-selling author, business consultant, professional speaker and life coach. He has been delivering his life-changing message at events and seminars since 1992. His enlightening programs are a unique blend of spirituality, psychology, philosophy and the power of internal energy.Joe teaches that to make permanent changes you must clear your negative energy and break destructive patterns of behavior at the core level. This transformational process creates new energy and beliefs designed to help you achieve sustained, positive growth in all areas of your life.He has appeared on many television and radio programs including Good Day New York and Street Talk on Fox TV, Gaiam TV, Cablevision News 12, Better TV, The Braveheart Network and various radio stations across the country.Books include: soon to be released, Heal the Deal, Chasing Your Life, Karma Buster, Spiritual Selling, Finding Your Purpose and No More 9 to 5Website URL:: http://joenunz.comFacebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/JoeyNunziata/ Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joenunziata/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/JoeNunziata YouTube: http://ashotofjoe.com ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________About Terry Wildemann:Terry Wildemann is the owner of Intuitive Leadership® and a Business and Resilience Accelerator, Speaker and Certified Executive Coach.Terry's specialty is working with tired, unhealthy, close-to-burned-out entrepreneurs and professionals and helps them leap off the stress hamster wheel. They evolve into unstoppable stress resilient intuitive leaders and practical business mystics. Terry’s timely message guides clients and students to integrate intuition, stress resilience, positive communications and leadership with grounded business systems to achieve success by positively serving and influencing others. Her leadership experience includes owning a manufacturing company, image consulting company, leadership and holistic education center.Terry is a best selling author of The Enchanted Boardroom: Evolve Into An Unstoppable Intuitive Leader. Website URL:: www.IntuitiveLeadership.comFacebook Page: www.Facebook.com/intuitiveleaderFacebook Group: www.Facebook.com/groups/AwakenThePossibilitiesLinkedin: www.LInkedin.com/in/TerryWildemannTwitter: www.twitter.com/terrywildemann www.twitter.com/leaderintuition_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________TRANSCRIPTwelcome everyone to this episode of awaken the possibilities I'm your host Terry will demand the owner and founder of intuitive leadership and the host of this specific podcast this is my third podcast tonight my third podcast that I've created not the third episode that they're not read it and I love bringing so many wonderful people to share their wisdom with you today I have an old to a special person John and Jana and John I have been friends since two thousand seven two thousand eight when he wrote his first book spiritual selling Joe has a magnificent way of seeing business and helping you grow your business and that's what we're going to be talking about today today's topic is elevate your energy and elevate your business so a little bit about your out Joe is a best selling author business consultant professional speaker and life coach is been delivering his life changing message at events and seminars since nineteen ninety two is enlightening programs are unique blend of spirituality spirituality psychology philosophy and the power of internal energy you are speaking my language channel your teachers that to make permanent changes you must clear negative energy and break destructive patterns of behaviour at the core level this transformational process creates new energy and believes designed to help you with changes sustained how's it have growth in all areas of your life he has appeared on many television and radio programs including good day New York and straight talk on fox TV Gaiam TV Cablevision is twelve better to be the Braveheart networking various radio stations across the country books include soon to be released you know the deal chasing your life karma busters %HESITATION just calling finding your purpose and no more in nine to five N. he is also a faculty member for the soon to launch intuitive leadership university and the business school welcome to awaken the possibilities Mister Joe hi how are you Terry I'm doing really really well considering a lot of the insanity that is going on in the world right now yes yes you know it's for those of us who have worked from home for a long time I'm not so sure that the access is deeply as those who are just learning how to work from home which can bring up all kinds of new challenges new opportunities and new feelings and emotions that you haven't felt before and that for entrepreneurs who are doing this for the first time can be really challenging can we talk such a match I love to hear your thoughts on it yeah I mean I you know you and I've been doing this for a long time working from home so with that you know I mean I'm a little home a little more because I do a lot of speaking and stuff like that but I do work a lot from home so for many many years so %HESITATION for for me you know and like you alright maybe were a little more but we're still not drop it in the in a way that many people have been where they are used to not being all at all so you know this is this becomes a very emotional experience for people because all of a sudden you're home with your your spouse may be a lot more horse usually were before or your kids or your dog or whatever it is that you're doing and you you can't really get out and do things so yeah yeah I think it's going to it's doing a lot of different things for people one of them obviously that's forcing people to be quiet because you have more yeah we have a whole day so the other day I think it was a couple days ago I got up relatively early I you know got up had my shake which I was to have my coffee watch all TV worked out went for a run came home took a shower and I come out they say it's one o'clock I have no idea today is to go here so and as I already did all this stuff so it was kind of like you know one of those those moments right by that but I think for a lot of people it's going to be a very emotional experience of them looking at themselves understanding themselves at a deeper level spending some more quiet time and also the dynamics of relationships that they have with their family with their kids you know it's funny I'm here a lot of people stayed up there whatever all soldiers that there all day with their kids they never got to spend time do you and I say to people you have to be honest you like it maybe you don't like it may be a finding it's stressful maybe funny the only be if you find your partner like you see what they do have different habits so there's a lot of things that are going to flush up here for individuals under emotional bases and it's important for us to process that emotion and not lash out act out we're going to be eight years old so that would be the main thing I think for people is this is an experience that you need to have but you need to have a deeper level not just the surface book and that's can be really really hard because it forces us to look in the mirror and looking in the mirror you know it can be a little traumatizing sometimes because if you really take a good look deeply some of the stuff that you don't like about yourself may come to the surface and this is an opportunity to have real good dialogue with the people who live in your house I mean it's happening here in my own home %HESITATION my husband is working from home and he's learning new skills sets and he's actually is my office a couple times that the the piece that my computer is on right now I have a an elevated desk well he uses an elevated desk at home so for him to talk with other people this was a natural for him except I was downstairs and working objects which I do all the time also I only come up to my office pretty much what I'm doing the podcast in this country and not interacting with folks and I couldn't get over the noise from up here what %HESITATION I'm here with somebody upstairs so that takes the floor boards up there you know let little things that come to the surface that can either bring you down or make you laugh and we have been laughing all day it's very interesting good thing yes it is laughter helps to heal the soul record so what one of the things about business and elevating our energy is I truly believe that what we focus on expands so if we look at our business as this being catastrophic it can get bigger and bigger and bigger for some folks it really is catastrophic some of the stories that I have just yeah it's awful however there are others who have taken these catastrophic experiences and have shifted the way they do business to serve humanity in ways that they had not thought of before what are your thoughts on that channel yeah reminded me when it first happened a little bit of a nine eleven this of course and and being a New Yorker even though now in California would be growing growing up in New York and living in New York at that time it has it had the feeling of that this is of course much bigger because of the whole world but what we did see at the end of nine eleven were a lot of people reassessing their lives and saying wow I've been working all these hours going to Wall Street whatever I'm doing a bill that would be successful and kind of looking at their lives and saying this is not this is not where I want to go for the next twenty years ago our role they work as a lot of people that everybody but the you know a lot of people do that I think we'll see the same here I think a lot of people will do so some people are going to be forced out of what they do because what they do well not exist so this also happened you know we had to crash in two thousand eight right where a lot of people who I knew who work in financial sectors all the sudden those jobs did not exist anymore they were forced into re invention so we're going to see a couple different things some people will choose and say you know what after this experience my soul is speaking to me people who are a little more aware and they will say I I I I need to go a different direction my life it's real I'm ready for that I think other people are gonna be forced because they have no option so it's always good to see that this you can't do this job does not exist when I speak a lot of people in different businesses of people I'm in manufacturing %HESITATION I know who could you know make you know clothing handbags my sisters in that industry destroy absolutely decimated so there are a lot of companies that are going to close those businesses that are going to exist we don't know where what will evolve out of this and there will be other opportunities that we don't even know back so the bottom line is this is going you know you mean beings unfortunately for the most part we have certain people who are seekers which is a small group who are looking to change it again bro but we know that you Maddie on a whole only changes through dramatic shift that is forced upon them so that is what we're seeing now this is a divine event it's happening for a reason and it's going to take us to a different place that does not mean it will not be bumps in the road that has not been there will not be difficulties that does not mean it will not be a lot of emotional trauma for some people the people who are prepared for this the people of the I cannot be personally I've been waiting for this forever and knowing it was coming and just was saying when when will it happen and I wasn't sure exactly how I knew after the two thousand sixteen because we had a big shift of energy in September we have the election yeah we had the shift so I was like okay this is coming it's just a matter of when and how and so again I was very positive support combos like okay %HESITATION it's finally happening took a long time other people are being forced into situations that they did not want to go and so what we have seen in our society is people created super busy lives to avoid dealing with themselves are now being forced to say I have I have it's not like say I want to work but I'm choosing to stay home you can't work you have no out so you're full it's almost like there's no way for you to hide from yourself right now and this is what's happening for people who have spent their lives keeping busy and driving themselves crazy running all around and doing all these things to avoid their feelings and now they're being pushed into a corner where that is something that well they don't have to do it other people will self medicate you will see a lot of people I think you'll see suicides I think you'll see people who are going to %HESITATION do you have to use the people get it use substances I think it's the whole gamut of things as this flushes out and again it's all going to be how you deal with it emotionally will be the key and I agree with you a hundred percent we've talked about this quite a bit in other podcast that we've done you and I together and yeah we I've been waiting for this to it's like okay when I just didn't expect well you never know when it will happen but who knows exactly right is like okay here we go %HESITATION now as business people and you and I are both business people one of the areas that we have that we focus on is our branch yeah and the thing with our brand is a lot of our brands today they are what and this is what I'm seeing they're caught up in what they were now I'm seeing brands changing taking advantage and I don't not taking advantage from a negative way but taking advantage in a positive way things that they could be doing differently and I mean let's look at what's happening with the liquor industry and how they have shifted gears and are creating %HESITATION and bacterial okay there's hundreds of companies that are doing that so from a branding perspective for business owners what do you see from before and what do you see after this event in people how do they shift their brands how do they shift their sales how do they shift their marketing how did they shift their insights on their business what aid is always opportunists in the situation so certain people will take an opportunity to try to say how do I manipulate the situation which we always always happens because that's part of life and you know big corporations and %HESITATION Tory is for that trying to use the the situation to manipulate people into something else I think for us who are doing for our own business is the market price selves I think it's important for us to kind of say okay what is I or am I on the right path and does this situation kind of give me a little wake up call to say you know I've been holding back well I haven't been going in the direction that I really wanted to all right been afraid to kind of put this out there now is the time for you to be courageous and say you know I mean I've been who I am for a long time I never hide it I'm just like Hey this is what I do but I've involved as you have right we believe I'll be different but I think it's a point out for people to say Hey you know what is what I do and the the key right now is to shift yourself to a place of service how do I serve based on my skill set of what I do what my company does whether it's a company or whatever it is and say how do I start because that's your first line of higher vibration hi Sir I share I prospered that's what I thought about deal the deal that's what we hear that we had a survey to share way to prosper show down yes those are my three things it's in the book outside that you as soon as I get it won't be out till may but so what I'm saying is those are the things I think we need to shift you and I think the companies that we have been part of here in this country I've been focused on profit first I think you know basically how do we squeeze the most profit this is been this is systems that have been in place for thousands and thousands of years which have been focused on how do I squeeze profit and pay the people this is the lowest possible amount then squeeze profit up to the top so the thing that I'm hoping will come out of this and I don't know that it will hundred percent combat but but what I'd like to see in what I hope we we start to evolve into is more of a the company is only successful when everybody contributes and it is it is appropriately rewarded yeah so it doesn't make sense that the CEO is getting five hundred times per dollar based on average salary more five hundred times you know and this is escalated since really the late seventies early eighties it started it went from about thirty five to one which was the average salary versus PTO dollar for dollar to about five hundred to one over between I'm gonna say nineteen eighty going forward are give you exact dates but I study all these these numbers so that's what all this really started to chill way out of whack and we need to go but we need to go to a different space so I think for us personally as brands it's about be true to who you are and here's the deal trust your feelings this is what I'm feeling I'm supposed to do to start so if you don't know what that is meditate right stick with it and say I want to say how do I search this is what you've got to live now how do I serve what is it that I can do to make the world a better place and then you will share and then you will prosper because you are in alignment with your vibration with your energy doing everything at the highest level you have there's no way you cannot prosper in that energy field so but again I have to be I'm putting prosper at the end of the list where corporations but it at the beginning of the list so I have to have faith and trust that if I do the right thing and if I saw her and if I do something with a higher and that everything will work out the highest and greatest good that's what we have to live now if you live in that space you will see great acceleration if you try to go back to the old green based you know kind of structure you are going to be just blown up and that's what we're going to see that and that's going to happen that that's really musically but it will definitely start happening as we go it's a it's a different value system the new you know the world is offering an opportunity for new value system to be birth and if we follow a positive value system where we honor our workers and we honor those who how I search we put everybody in a really good space and that's one of the things that I I again I agree with you a hundred percent with everything that you're talking about I really do see that a lot of these companies people at the helm and people are even in middle management they haven't trusted their intuition or they're not allowed to trust their intuition because of the culture of the organization you know the culture of the organization may dismiss intuition you know me into a leadership and intuitively we have our intuition and we have our feelings so when our intuition and our feelings match that's where the magic happens but when our intuition and our feelings and what is expected of them had a third piece in there conflicts with our values dealings intuition that's what we get into trouble and that's a leadership issue do you what our thoughts on that well I think the bottom line is people have been conditioned people people are hypnotized okay they're they're hypnotized into a system that it doesn't work right and it's people say you know I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna re frame this for people so you understand it the system is not broken the system was designed this way yeah okay so people say all the system is broken no no no it's not built this way so basically it's built to keep people hypnotized plugged into a system of slavery on a different level whereas those slaves the only difference is we now have carpeting in a car but we're basically still in Avery energy right so the idea is all one of my sub you so here's what happened how do I get hypnotized because collective energy became this is what you're supposed to do you're supposed to go to school you're supposed to get an education so what happened in education well the schools became the mafia because what they did was they jacked up all of the tuitions and put people into debt which feeds the system to continue to keep people weak and fear based and unable to go forward why I'm coming out of school people I meet people when I'm speaking for forty fifty years all telling me I'm still playing college that the fifty years old how is this possible is does it make sense and it was it was I was speaking about recently before all this happened and I said to somebody it was a bunch of executives whose executive leadership group or executive whatever they were and I said let me ask you question your own business guys people assume they got but I have to be politically correct but the business people I think doesn't make sense if I was if you were eighteen years old I think about yourself or someone is I'm gonna give you two hundred fifty thousand dollars and help you start a business or you're gonna go two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in debt come out of school and hope to get a job what are you gonna do me I'm gonna take the money and start my business but think about that is that what happened was the hypnotized people world said you need to go to school you need to spend this money and when you come out you will then that's the way to advance yourself in a system that doesn't work so basically what happened was that person is now being conditioned from an early age or what are they doing on college campuses and my son was on one recently what are the first thing they're doing to try to give kids credit cards it's trying to get kids into right away the trying to get people into the system of being indebted what and I'm indebted I have all these loans I have to do this so now I'm hypnotized into a system that it's almost like it's exactly the matrix if you saw the movie everybody's plugged into the system so tell people and I said I remember when this was happening I said to myself under no condition is that happening for you I'm telling you right now I said I'm not doing this by Barack and I agreed we pay for his school he went to work he went to a state school which is a fantastic local school it cost us virtually nothing compared to all that money he walked out he said you know what now that he's out he said I see my friends in debt under duress because they have to now go look for the get these jobs that they hate to start helping the parents pay back these loans are some of the most paying it back themselves and now you're under the foot of the system so this is what we need we were coming out of this hypnotized state we're coming out of this false idea that this really work that people think you have a look at someone so they became a millionaire yeah that's the one and how many right we have a feeling and I would say we have a trillion and a half dollars in college back in this think about that over a trillion dollars in people who are still can't pay that yeah and %HESITATION trying to pay this off they'll never paid off a lot of people they still will not paid off in their lifetime this is part of being hypnotized to believe something that is not true so part of it so what what I one thing I really wanna make their difference here is an eight again I agree with what you're talking about there is a difference between being an entrepreneur and being a business owner and I know if I were given two hundred fifty thousand to start a business to be an entrepreneur I would do it in a heartbeat look at the people who are at the helm of the major companies did they finish college Facebook Microsoft look at the folks who did not finish their education their formal Alton education and stepped away to begin a business so there are lots of ways that you can be a success and I think that's something that we as parents would be wise to consider that yes we want our children to be successful it doesn't have to be the way we did it it doesn't have to be going into having our children going into debt there are other ways to do things and that's one of the things that I shared with the when I did the transition assistance program for the military over twenty years and I changes team thousand transitioning many women that were going into Japan world and a lot of them were going into entrepreneurship and then when they kept asking me do I need to go to school during a disaster new developing a sentiment look at your talents look at what you have look at what you've learned and can you do it on your own or do you really need another piece of paper only you can answer that for yourself I can answer that for you what is it that you need for yourself and a lot of folks to go back to school because they they thought they needed it and others just went right into entrepreneurship and have successful business so I want you know there are some people who need to the safety of being in you know I'm having a structure and there are others that like the safety of freedom so knowing that Joe and knowing you know I I call what you're talking about she pulls knowing that there's the seven side folks or she pulls what do you want to save them in terms of following their hearts and elevating their energy and elevating their businesses elevating their careers I think you have to know yourself and I think you know the bottom line is that everybody is an entrepreneur not everybody sees a creator not everybody is going to want to take that on that everybody wants to deal with the stress and the uncertainty although now the whole world that uncertainty which is ironic right but it is getting a lot of people don't want to take that up so I think a lot of it is knowing yourself and say you know there's certain people who are you know they can only be so many chiefs that so many Indians right so certain people are better suited to be maybe underneath or at a different level or the bad maybe they're not meant to be that person who is the creator does that either that everybody is that person so the first thing is I understand what you like understand your skills I understand what you feel good about so just so you know I I don't you know there are people I talked to my first book was called no more nine to five is to teach people how to start a business at home while they were still working this is going back think about this over twenty years ago yeah I was already teaching that twenty years ago and I was doing a class one day a guy came up to me at the end is that I want to thank you because after being in this class I realize this is not for me and I said you know I persisted %HESITATION I feel bad it's an old I I didn't fire him and he said no no I realize what's involved and that's not my thing so that was okay and it was okay for him to have that realization this I I'm not that's not my kind of thing I'm not that kind of person who wants to do that so there's nothing wrong with that so that's the first thing is just a news this is who I am if I want to be an artist if I want to be a maybe there's a lot of people who are very very skilled with you know electricity electricians and carpenters and plumbers these people are tremendously skilled and their path was not to go to college and get a degree their path was to learn yoga really get great at that trade because that's a great skill so I think we have to do is say no yourself say is this something I want to do what's my role maybe my role is a support person maybe my role is not going to be the same person that's fine so it's really does no good or bad it's just whatever feels best for you yeah it is what you is what you're best suited to do and that's what you're gonna be most successful and if you're not a person who wants to be in the front who's got it because listen if you're going to go out there you know if you're gonna go in the arena you're going to get hurt you're gonna get you're gonna get beat up because that's part of being in the being in the arena being the person who steps into the arena not everybody wants to do that it doesn't make you a bad person read it doesn't make you a failure it makes you have to just say no that's not my thing I'd rather support a person who puts in the arena and that makes me feel better and we need those four people of course you know and and the people go into the trades they aren't talents it's not just about that you know they're honoring their talents their innate talents that they're born with many of these folks are artists that and I'm talking and I'm not talking about artists just painting now absolutely I look at some of these traits folks and I see what they do and it's like oh my gosh this is this is a blessing from birth that these people have and if they can develop it if they can grow with that and right now there is an opportunity to be all you that tremendous the tremendous opportunity dependent to shift and to live their lives in the direction that you are meant to in this lifetime you know one of the things that kept coming up for me in this crisis with the virus and on and on and seen so many people around the world making masks and seamstresses and I used to make all my own clothes I used to make everything and I have ever downstairs I kept thinking maybe I should start doing that maybe I should contribute to that and then I got a very clear message to Maine just behind me they always have my back so that I can help everybody else is on the screen and I get and I meditated on and I got a very very clear message your gift is what you are currently doing with your podcast with your Facebook lives with your group with being out there being a beacon of hope love values on and on that's what I am meant to be doing right now and that's something I had to under but I kept thinking that I could be making something I'm going to be doing something no I don't think we need to bring something this this is work but it's work I love it doesn't feel like work and that I think is a key when you're doing something that you love and it doesn't feel like work and you're serving humanity well I wonderful thank and what you can do work you love where you're serving humanity and do that third piece you're sharing it the third piece band is prosper because you were focusing on serving using your talents and then sharing and then you become prosperous I feel good yeah it is it was really really good you're doing the same thing Joe I think also what I want to explain talk about something I think that's that's very relevant for people like us and whoever whoever's been working on something for a long period of time and maybe has felt like I have not reach where I wanted to be you know a lot of there's a bug that yes and it's a lot of us have been how are you I'm doing this a long time and I've stayed with it and I've kind of held the line and I've been in integrity and I haven't really reached that place what we do and again we always want to be harder than we did just that for those people but you know what I'm saying so one of the things that we have to understand for your souls from assault perspective is your soul is always preparing you for the moment that's right for you and one of the things in in karma is basically saying is a couple different ways that this works I put in effort to accomplish something if I don't create the result I wanted even though you got the lesson you needed which is a different issue what happens is all that good energy keeps building your bank and one of the things that karma does is it gives you the deferred results so it's almost like you didn't get it yet but the good the good news is I'm taking that positive energy and I'm deferring those results for the future because you're not maybe you're not ready for whatever it is that you were called to do because you have to be at a certain level of energy maturity vibration com this whatever that may be to really do what you had to do so for those of us in a lot of people in all different fields could be in your business could be something of a working on whatever the case may be writing your book whatever it is that's why you have a working on this for a long time I haven't really gotten where I needed to go now could be a time we were all that differed result is waiting for you it's kind of like a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow but only because you stayed the course you kept moving forward you kept doing the work on yourself you had faith you believe in what was happening so this is kind of like you know I always use it out you know I have the Moses connection so I always talk about the forty year to Moses forty years I do that it's like he wanted he was out he was wandering around that god called them and they do twenty years so it's like you know you've got to be yeah he's yeah he's staying with paint the say yes we're going to we're going to get where we need to go and it's not about race it's about understanding that whatever you've done at this point has tremendous value even if you haven't seen it the way you would like to don't underestimate what you have already done and that is something that all of a sudden all of this with the mall this work whatever it is in any field you're in you are now going to be called as we come out of this and we know Saturday we have the big four call for portal so this is all starting to really ramp up for for a lot of people who have been in this world of you're in the minority are gonna call it a people who have been saying well I wish this world would get better and I'm waiting for this to happen in whatever you've done to build that foundation is very very important so don't underestimate and also on yourself with the work you have done it and appreciate everything and that is a brilliant brilliant place to end our podcast on today sure that message just so very very powerful thank you so much for helping us build and create practical business actor call business mystics because I read that's what I believe a lot of us are actual business districts and allowing us to share your time today I thank you for that so much range and for our awaken the possibility audience thank you for being here today I appreciate you very very much I hope that you are walking away from this discussion with Joe having learned one new thing to new things maybe three minutes thanks so I wish you tremendous success and I look forward to seeing you at the next accent take care See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

P063 Driving continual sales through Client Events ... a step by step process with Tom and Nancy Cleppe

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 30, 2020 51:40

[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent="no" equal_height_columns="no" menu_anchor="" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" id="" background_color="" background_image="" background_position="center center" background_repeat="no-repeat" fade="no" background_parallax="none" parallax_speed="0.3" video_mp4="" video_webm="" video_ogv="" video_url="" video_aspect_ratio="16:9" video_loop="yes" video_mute="yes" overlay_color="" video_preview_image="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" padding_top="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" padding_right=""][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type="1_1" layout="1_1" background_position="left top" background_color="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" border_position="all" spacing="yes" background_image="" background_repeat="no-repeat" padding_top="" padding_right="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" margin_top="0px" margin_bottom="0px" class="" id="" animation_type="" animation_speed="0.3" animation_direction="left" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" center_content="no" last="no" min_height="" hover_type="none" link=""][fusion_text] Watch the live interview below [/fusion_text][fusion_youtube id="https://youtu.be/kTE7MhFGjWI " alignment="center" width="" height="" autoplay="false" api_params="&rel=0" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" /][/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container] Transcription (was completed by automated process. Please ignore any speech-to-text errors) Hi, I'm Beatty Carmichael, and welcome back to the Get Sellers Calling You Real Estate podcast. And I'm just really excited about today's call because I get to interview another wonderful set of agents with an amazing story, and who are actually clients of ours. Tom and Nancy Cleppe from Franklin, Tennessee. And I'm just really excited about today's call because I was able to speak with Tom and Nancy earlier. They have a really neat business and story. And I really wanted you guys to hear it. So, Tom and Nancy, how are you guys doing? [00:00:39] Hi, Beatty, how are you? I am very blessed. We're lucky. Blessed as well. [00:00:46] Well, very good. Very good. And I want to talk about those blessings in a moment. So they'll be great. Just also, a quick reminder for those who are listening and watching, watching, this is an Internet call. So if there are any type of Internet interruptions, just please part in this part in those four for that. So tell me, Nancy, I'd love just real quickly, just a little story about your real estate career. I know you're in the Franklin area, but maybe how long have you been selling just anything about you guys? Just the introduction of who you guys are. [00:01:23] Nancy looks at me like I should start right away then. So so Nancy had been in business, in real estate business before I was eight years before I got involved in it. And she said to me, one day, you should get into real estate. This is before we were married, actually. And I said, no, I don't want to work weekends. We can build our business. We don't have to work weekends. So three weeks later, I was enrolled in a class and what, six months or less later, I had my license and we started a team. And so that's eight years ago. 70 years ago, no. [00:01:57] Ok. So I got to ask your question. Do you work weekends? [00:02:00] No. Rarely, I should say no. Obviously we if if necessary, we do. [00:02:07] Ok, cool. Well, it's out now. Let me ask you just Horton comes quantifying purposes like how many transactions a year do you guys do? [00:02:17] This is consistency we like. We do. I want to say that we do 50 units a year, but it's anywhere from 30 to 60 units. [00:02:25] Ok. So 30 to 50, maybe 60 on a good year. And rarely work weekends. So I'm out. So the typical client that I talk to works 50, 60 hours a week, works week as you ask them. Hey, what's that? How is your weekend? They kind of with this blank stare or astonished voice pause in the voices, they say. What's a weekend? Right. So how did you how do you guys build your business where it's rarely on the weekends? I mean, how do you make that happen? [00:02:57] Why you've got to be purposeful. You know, the first thing is you've got a time block and you've got to use your week well so that your week will fall together and follow. It's in the, you know, Monday to Friday business hours. And one of the ways we do that, we put God first, we put family second, and then our real estate business is third. And it seems like doing that, things just kind of fall into place. You know, we work hard during the week. We try to get it all done and we schedule as much as we can during the office hours. And obviously, we have clients that can always meet during office hours, and that's when we fall back to, you know, weekends or evenings to accommodate them. And it's pretty rare. [00:03:36] You know, I love to explore that just a little bit, because as you're talking, Nancy, my mind went back to two or three other agents I've interviewed, and they all had the same pattern. And I think this is a pattern that's really worked to pull out in terms of setting the parameters. Okay. I'd like one of my clients, he or he does two to three times the volume. You guys do personal production. He does it differently side. I don't want to make that comparison, but what he does is he works. At the time I was asking him this question about thirty five hours a week. Yeah. No, seriously. And and I asked him how in the world did you do that? He said, well I structure. He said, I choose not to work Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and I choose not to work on the evenings unless I just have to. And I'm willing to give up business by me too. But he says when you put those parameters in place, you just fit your business around it. And I think a lot of agents never put those parameters in place. Yeah, sounds like you got some monster over there. [00:04:51] Well, we have construction going on as well. [00:04:55] Oh, okay. I love it going on. I thought that was maybe the door. We we're having a fun discussion about the dogs before their call, so. Great. So tell me a little bit. So 30 to 50 transactions a year. You don't work weekends. You set parameters. Tell me a little bit more about your business practice. And most importantly, how do you keep the business going? I don't have I want to kind of go and go towards what is it that you're doing that keeps your business? Because I know a lot of folks who would love to have 30 transactions a year and they're working 50, 60 hours a week just trying to get there. But what have you guys found to be the pattern that works for you that keeps you guys going? Does that is that a fair question to ask? [00:05:42] Yeah. You know, when Nancy and I got into business or when I got into Nancy's business, she was kind of coasting for the lack of a better term and how she was doing your business. It was kind of coming to her by your relationships. And then I come in and it's like I have a sales and marketing background. It's like, wait a minute, we can be doing this, this and this to bring customers into us. We can do this business to set ourselves up so that there's stuff out there that's working without us kind of dealing in. I have it. I keep saying I'm the luckiest guy in the world because when it comes to contracts and negotiations and closings in one, Nancy's the structured one. She keeps all of that in line. I refer to myself as the guy out front bringing people in and the guy after the close of the sale then keeps in touch with them so that we give referrals and repeat business from that. So Nancy takes care of all the middle. And I take you to the beginning in the end. [00:06:31] If you're a single agent, that would be a single agent with my capacity. That would be difficult. [00:06:38] I totally get it. So. So you're more behind the scenes, Nancy and Tom, you're more in front of the scenes, is that right? [00:06:46] Until it's time to switch. I'm in front of the scenes up front and then, like, we'll go to a listing appointment, get a listing and they never see me again. It's up close. [00:06:54] Ever from there. I handle the listing and getting up and running and handle all the contract negotiations to get it to close. Okay, cool. Yeah. We don't need assistance to help us with those things, but I think the core of our business has always been it comes from our relationships with people. [00:07:12] Talk to me about that. Yeah. [00:07:14] Well, you know, I had a business before Tom joined me and we do a lot of referral business. I think our first several years together, our business was solely on referral business and then friends and family, you know, they trusted some of us and they want their friends to, you know, experience the same trust that they have with us. So whether they use us for a transaction or not, they feel comfortable referring their friends to us. [00:07:40] So how big of a group are we talking about with this? Your relationships? [00:07:46] Wow. There's fourteen hundred people in our in our database and we consider two hundred of them close. You haven't referred broken down and advocate a being. See, depending on if their client if they're just friends with referrals and if they're local. [00:08:04] Ok. And then what? What do you guys take to nurture that? I'm assuming you do something. Is that correct? [00:08:10] Yeah, we do. We don't do enough. It seems like sometimes. And there's other people that say we do too much. So like events, we're always doing client events to keep people safe. To get as many touches at once makes a lot of sense to us. And of course, everybody appreciates a good party kind of deal. We also do community outreach stuff where we're giving away. We have like an ice cream sundae. We're well into. This is a Sunday where we'll we'll give away ice cream at the local custard store and everybody we publicize it than anybody who comes in, gets to sample the ice cream, obviously, and then we get to shake hands with people that are not necessarily in our database or weren't at that point. And, you know, we're making fundraisers, fundraisers and the local fire department. [00:08:58] And we've also raised money for a couple other organizations by giving away things and asking just asking people to donate when they can't. Like, we gave out pumpkins last year and pumpkin patch, we gave a pumpkin to everybody that they donated or not. But then we had a little jar set up for donations and those people died. [00:09:17] So tell me how. Because one of the things that we talk about, especially like with a geographic area to do fundraising events or some sort of civic community event where you get the people into the same a common spot, you're the the civic champion, so to speak, of that cause, and then you get a chance to meet them. Help me guide me through, if you would. Let's take one of these fundraisers that you do. What's the process? How do you if you just come and give me a short synopsis of the process and most importantly, how it's structured so that you interact with the people if you're interacting at all. Does that make sense? [00:09:58] It was probably our biggest. [00:09:59] So I guess, you know, maybe when I was a kid, a delinquent and I might have had I had a lot of parties. Right. And it was just a matter of putting ourselves out there. You just create the event and invite people to come in. Those people that came had a good time and those people that didn't come heard about it kind of deal. And so the next time they had one, they wanted to come. And we just kind of promote it that way. The idea is, is we put the event out there and make sure that everybody knows about it, at least four different touches. And if they show great, if they don't, they kind of miss the event when they come, then we try to have as much set up prior to the event so that the day of the event, we're not running around cutting watermelons for everybody. There's somebody either the watermelon is cut or somebody else is doing it. And the more that we have in place for that than we heard the term wants to Elm's buds. That's exactly what it means. But we're just shaking hands. We're walking around laughing with everybody and be who we are socially. And that's really where people then kind of engage in that in in some events, depending on the person and depending on on the drive, we'll say something like, you know why you're here. Can you tell us a little bit, you know, who do you know that might be interested in? [00:11:11] Might you rarely ever say, who do you know, say something about who might have had the good fortune of having a Beatty that might be interested in in getting a bigger house or what? You know, just got a promotion that's looking into getting a bigger house or something along those lines to start that conversation with Nancy. And I don't have trouble starting conversation. It's a matter of is the event just a celebration or is the event a lead generation event? [00:11:40] Interesting. Do you all do any follow up after an event like a thank you know for coming or anything like that? [00:11:46] Yeah, absolutely. Everybody gets a handwritten thank you card. I think last year we made sure handwritten thank you cards went out. They get at least an email. Thank you. And then we got a lot of follow up calls as well. Well, a cool thank you for coming or sorry we missed you. [00:12:02] I'm sorry we missed you guys are just as important. So we send all of those emails out as well. Man, you missed a good party. Here's what you missed. Kind of deal. And we'll send pictures and that kind of stuff so that they're interested in coming either the next time or or at least keeping involved in what's happening next. [00:12:18] So these are these are just these are big, maybe not big, but they're fun party happy atmospheric events. And then a lot of follow up to continue touching afterwards. Right. I like that. Have you found anything that's kind of anything that you can share besides what you just shared, that if you go back and say these are really, you know, like the top two or three most important things you've learned and doing these things that make it successful. [00:12:49] I think advertising at a time or getting the word out ahead of time, it seems, when we get lazy, not lazy, but get busy and we don't get the word out as early as we need to. And and those extra follow up touches prior to the event is what seems to make the most successful. We're doing it and having it catered and, you know, doing all the things we need to do. But if we don't get the word out early, we don't have a good attendance. [00:13:13] So what? So what's the timeline? How far out do you start contacting in invitations and then talk to me about when you start to actually make the personal contacts to make that personally. [00:13:25] So the save the date goes out about six weeks in advance. And then I think just as the Sarah question, she's not with us. She's our assistant. But they get text about once a week after that, OK? They get an email that tells what the event's actually about and kind of what they can expect. And then just some reminders for hours, BP. [00:13:46] And there's a handful. The truth is, is that you're not going to get everybody. You can't call everybody then obviously on the list kind of deal. So you call a couple of key people and make sure that they're coming. Check the RSVP fees, try to get as much RSVP so that you can plan accordingly. Obviously, the earlier the better. And then just create from there, know create the list that you're going to call it is. And then when you make those phone calls to them, you know, are you making sure that you're going to make it? And do me a favor, bring somebody along with you. It's like I can bring somebody in your life. I got you on the phone, of course. You know, so and so. It tends to be good in that sense with our neighbors to come as well. [00:14:23] We are fortunate enough to live on a farm. And so we don't have next door neighbors what we do, but they're pretty far away. So we like the community to know that we're that we would like to do a lot of fundraising for community community, that we support the churches here. All of the churches have ice cream socials in the summer. And we try to get as many of those as we can, but we get to know the neighbors that way. And then when we have an advance, we'll even put a sign up, a big sign in the yard that says everyone's welcome. So it's not just our client and it's client people that, you know, we love and want to do business with. Right. [00:14:59] So there are key key for that question. I mean, I'm on the phone every day. I get in the office about seven o'clock. I do a script practicing beforehand. I prepare for my day. And at eight o'clock I'm on the phone and I'm on the phone until noon every day. Whether I'm doing a follow up was how it ended or I'm doing lead generation, calling the people in our database. And there's the it's it's the relationship building. I wish I could say I was better at it. [00:15:24] Some of the times I get we just switched over a new system in in I'm not making as many context as I'd like to be making because I'm trying to like fill the system in as I go kind of deal and make it good that sense. But for the most part, it's just keeping in touch with them, whether you're sending them a thank you card or thinking of your card or inviting them to an event or sending them birthday cards, we've got to force the birthday process. I mean, you get into an email, you you get a phone call, you get a text messages, and often you'll just get a card as well. So, well, I say often cards take a lot of time and so do the phone calls. So you got to kind of balance your mind on what you're doing with. [00:16:03] Well, if you were to put an end, I must say, I mean, like these 30 to 50 selves a year that you guys do, are most of those coming from your personal contacts referred to or directs? Is there a way? I don't know if this is a fair question, because I know when you're just doing all these relationship things, it's hard to measure and quantify. One is more important than another. But is there a way that you guys have mentally quantified in your mind, which are the most important things that you're doing in terms of these ReachOut events and which are just kind of supporting things? [00:16:41] Is that a fair question? It's a great question. And, you know, I'm I would say that we're just not measuring enough to know it. [00:16:49] I think that. I think the phone calling is actually the most important, because that's something that we can do consistently every day. [00:16:58] Now, of course, you can't you don't talk to everybody every day, but the events are kind of a couple of times a year event. And so we're touching them. We're trying to do them four times a year. So we're touching them during that time. And I think a personal one on one phone call probably goes the furthest in getting us, you know, repeat business and referrals business. [00:17:17] I can up my game a little bit here recently in regards to the phone calls, it's like I'm setting up appointments nowadays, which I didn't do in the past because I was so focused on business kind of deal. I'm setting appointments just to have coffee with people in in trying to set up so my afternoons are filled with going and have coffee. No, no, remember. I don't drink coffee. So it's just a matter, it's just a matter of getting in front of these people. In the conversation they bring up real estate, which is really, really enlightening, kind of really cool that they bring it up, you know. So how's business with the man making it into it? You know, by the way, you know you know anybody that just recently had a kid or maybe a job promotion or those kind of questions come up then. And then the other thing is, is that we're tapping back into. So it's Nancy and I have been involved in motorcycle's in fact, that's where we met, was at a motorcycle store alone. And and so Harley Davidson, that's my that's my life for 30 years was motorcycle. So we're going back to those people and creating events around specifically around motorcycle enthusiasts and then doing stuff that is, you know, I guess dovetailing if there's another event going in, we're definitely going to be there and we're definitely going to be a figure in the event. And then we're definitely going to be promoting. It doesn't I don't ever want to make it sound like we're promoting real estate business. We're simply promoting Tom and Nancy and and then talking about business. And it's a different, different mindset than what I've always said or then what I have had. It became a grind in the past. It was how much business can you do, how much business, which business can you do and not doing not even been greatly successful. And then going back to just how what kind of person do I want to be? [00:18:59] We know that's the basics and real estate. I was interviewing a another friend of mine who's actually here in town and he's been selling real estate twenty five years broker. And the cool thing about him is I was asking him, I said, now, what type of marketing do you do? I've never done any marketing. I said, never done any advertising. Now he's I've never spent any money and marketing for business and said, so what do you do? He says, I'm I'm just cause I I'll call people and say, hey, how's it going? Let's get together. And that's it. I said, that's it. You know, is this what you guys are doing? And what's interesting is, is he has never had a time when he never hit his goals financially because he you know, his just like you guys. God, first family second, business third. And he grows his business to the point that he accomplishes his business goals. So he has time with his family. But it's it's always it's only about Tony furious about a relationship. And that's what you guys are doing. That's what's so beautiful. [00:20:10] There's lots of room for improvement. [00:20:12] Yes. Now I get that. I want to shift just a little bit. Have you done. Have you tried things in the past that were an absolute failure? Let me see if I can phrase this the right way. I don't want to say that was an absolute failure in turn someone off from doing that, but maybe it was a failure for you. And you know why. In other words, most things out there work for somebody if they're in business. Hopefully they work for somebody. And the question is, have you tried some things that didn't work that you learned from? And is there something you can share with our listeners as to why it didn't work for you, that maybe if someone has similar, similar or a similar situation as you guys, that maybe you can help them understand what works, what doesn't? I don't know if that's a fair question. [00:21:03] Now that we have had anything that has just totally failed, we have some things that have been more successful than others. And one thing that happens with us and our agents are like this, but we don't consistently use everything that we have available to use, either from lack of time or lack of money. But there was a couple of years when we farm to market, farm to neighborhood, and we were successful with that. Well, that kind of went away because we got involved in other types of marketing things. And it wasn't that it wasn't successful. We just haven't done it in the last couple years. So we could go back to that. But then we probably have to give someone else, because just the lack of time probably makes sense. [00:21:45] The other aspect, it would be like open houses. I mean, you can farm the market indefinitely, build the relationships that are indefinitely build. Unfortunately, we don't live in a neighborhood, so we can't farm our own neighborhood, which to me lends credibility a little bit a little bit different way. And then you can grow out from there. If you're moving into a neat or you're working a neighborhood, you're gonna do you gotta find out about the neighborhood. You got to get in a frenzy to make events that happened in there. And it's always kind of out there. [00:22:12] So that would be reason for a decision not to put that much effort into it. And yet there's lots of reasons to put it into it. Another thing would be something that we have been unsuccessful at following through with the same with the farming is on open houses. You have an open house and you've got people that are coming in. And all you have to do is set up one appointment at every open house to get a buyer or seller. It's like done. We should be doing that. And at the same sense, you know, it's a weekend job. Right. [00:22:46] And then you have to follow the system not wanting to work weekends. [00:22:50] Look, system, I think that ideally, you know, if I was to lay out my open house on Tuesday, had put arrows out and start the marketing on it on Friday, I'd put Gob's to somewhere around 20 different signs out. [00:23:03] And then on Saturday or Sunday, I have open houses. [00:23:06] There would be two hours long. And, you know, make an event out of that and making sure that we've got up systems to that. And we just don't do that. [00:23:15] And that's why open houses are such a great way for new agents to start their business because they have time. [00:23:22] You know, I've always said, what do we have more time or more money to invest in into a certain marketing thing that we're gonna do for that time period in our business. [00:23:33] And if you don't have any money and you knew you don't have a clients, open houses are definitely the best way to go. We actually have more money than we have time. Right. That's the place to be either right now. Well, I always feel like we have more money and we have we definitely have more money than we have time. [00:23:52] I totally get it. Well, you know, I think it goes back to the parameters that you guys mentioned in terms of, you know, you set the parameters and you operate within it and open houses violates the parameter if we don't work on weekends. Right. So now, hey, speaking of those parameters, I want to go back if I if we can. So you have a hierarchy, God, family business. Talk a little bit more about that. I want to talk a little bit about just that whole balance and those parameters. I don't have a specific question yet, but can you maybe maybe give me some your thoughts and what you do and how firm those parameters are? Just gonna craft what's going on with you on that. [00:24:41] Well, this business. [00:24:44] Can lead you astray easily if you let it. You know, you can get so wrapped up in in making money or pleasing the clients and you can take your eyes off what's really important, which is pleasing God and saying yes to a client isn't always the best thing for them or you. And so I think if you go back to kind of the old bracelets we used to wear, what would Jesus do? [00:25:10] You know, sometimes you have to say no. [00:25:12] For whatever reason in kinds don't like to be told no and usually all is business. In that situation. But that's something that, you know, is important to us. We go to a listening appointment. We we talk before we go. And, you know, is this a house that we want to live? And, you know, what are the criterion which we're willing to take this? You know, we're not ruling to compromise our values. We're not willing to be dishonest. We're not willing to just be at the beck and call of our clients knowing that that's not best for them or us. We're not going to serve them well if. [00:25:51] You know, we're at their beck and call 24/7. That makes sense. We're not here. [00:25:57] I mean, that's it. So Nancy and I just come from a place of of knowing faith and hope is clearly there for us. So. So we know that there's a that there's a higher power, that what happens to be Jesus Christ as we know and love them. And if she shows up for us, you showed up for us in the past and he's shown up for Stanely. [00:26:15] And whether we're whether we're saying a prayer before we go into a listening appointment or we're saying a prayer at the listening appointment or or we're just making sure that when we start our day, they were grounded in in in in the word or in, you know, meditative state where we know that, you know, we're covered. [00:26:35] All right. Hey, let's talk and let me talk on that, because different people bring their relationship with Christ into their business in different ways. When you do your real estate business and you're in interacting with clients, do you do anything that I'll call it just overtly Christian? Let me say this makes sense. When we were looking to buy our house and we were putting the offer, writing out the offer on it, you know, my realtor who's a Christian, said, well, let's pray over this. And we prayed. OK. Do you guys do anything like that with your clients at all? [00:27:11] Absolutely. We don't want to go in talking about, you know, being Christian, because sometimes people can oversell and under deliver. And I think we'd rather over deliver and undersell. So we try to let that show up in who we are and not what we say. After most listing appointments, Tom just very casually says, is it OK if we say a prayer? He says it just like that. And have we heard anybody say no? No, I don't think we have. [00:27:40] We've picked up cues along the way. I mean, you know, they've got a cross hanging above their bed or something. I mean, it's it's you pick up cues along the way. But I don't know about you, but I have been turned off by plenty of people that profess to be Christians. And they're the first ones to start like pushing and shoving and lying and cheating, you know, like man men. So so we don't go in there with, you know, a Christian tone. We go in there with a humble tone and then go from there. Like I said, like Nancy just said, the opportunity presents itself to say prayer. Is it OK? It's always a question. [00:28:15] And how did how did the clients respond to that? [00:28:18] I mean, I think the majority I can't remember anybody that's actually said no. Most people are very excited. You know, they realized then that these are probably some pretty sincere people that want to pray for us and really are concerned about what goes on with this transaction, whether we lost our house or not, and whether we sell our house or not. You know, it's they're getting a feeling for us through prayer and our actions that we're the type of people that are going to have their back. Even if it doesn't turn out to be a sale. [00:28:51] I love it. And what other ways? I'd love to find out if you don't mind sharing just a little bit more, maybe your relationship with Christ and how you feel. It's kind of impacted what you do in real estate. Can you share something on that? [00:29:07] I'm a I'm a recovering Catholic, and what I mean by that is, you know, we went to church as a as a family firm because all the least you could do. [00:29:20] I just remember Mom saying something felt the least you could do is give God an hour or a week in there. And I went through catechism, confirmation and communion and all of the sacraments. Catholic. And and when I and when I separated from that and I and I needed some stability, I knew that I could go back to the Catholic Church and get that. And yet when I needed a personal relationship, I didn't have that. And I'm also a recovering alcoholic and still in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. I found Jesus. He showed up differently for me than he did for many other people. But I just developed a personal relationship at that point. So that's just kind of my baseline. So if I've got that personal relationship as a result of my connection, the things that I do, and I don't mean the overt things that I do for other people in regards to my communication, my prayers in the morning, my meditation, my gratitude throughout the day. I've got reminders that proper by my full and that's as a sign for gratitude. And. And those are the things that keep me connected to the spirit, keep me connected to Jesus and go from there. Nancy, similar know, we write we read the Bible and we go to Bible study and we help out at church and we do mission work and we do this. But we don't do that to earn glory or to earn favor. We do that because that's servant. [00:30:41] Right. Talk to me. This is really interesting. You mention relationship. A lot of times, you know, people think about Christian as a religion. What religion are you? I'm Christian. Things that sort in your life. You use the word relationship a couple of times. What does that mean to you? And why are you using that in this context? [00:31:04] Help me understand that. [00:31:07] Wow. Guess because he saved me. Tell me more. I mean, so, you know, my life is is not been a smooth sailing. They say the road to paradise is not it's not smooth. And in mine has been hellish. I mean, I've had a. [00:31:27] Whether it was. [00:31:31] Childhood diseases that I was able to to work through or that Jesus pulled me through or whether it was an illness that removed me. [00:31:39] I was a I had a corporate profile job and I'm moving up in it and I get disabled and I'm not able to go there. And I think it's what what I what I do. That's going to make it better and then make it to the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and in and pulled from the need to satisfy others so that I can get that paycheck or that notoriety or whatnot. And then I'd like to say that, you know, that recovery at that point was perfect for me, no drugs and alcohol. But the truth is, is that I found Internet addiction, Internet pornography addiction, and I needed to work the steps on that. And as a result of that, unfortunately, I lost my first marriage. And in the way that that was kind of hammered on me, it can have a real negative connotation in society. And with my former wife and and in you know, I had my faith at that point. And so I look back. [00:32:44] And I know he is with me, and that's in a can't, whether it's Nancy and I or whether it's another close friend or somebody that I work with. I know what teamwork is. And it's not because of what I do. It's because of what we do. And I can't. And I have a relationship with Christ the same way. It's not because of what I do and that just because of what he does, it's what we do together. Next, the relationship. [00:33:07] That's really neat. In terms of that relationship and trying to I've got kind of pictured in my mind's eye what I want to ask and then trying to formulate it into a question. So someone's listening to this call. They're going through challenges and they pray. They've gone to church. None of that really is not clicking. It just doesn't seem to be, quote unquote, working. They they check off the little list. What is different between what you did and going to church and doing catechism and those things? And this thing you call a relationship. Help me. Help me understand. All right. That person that may be listening. What's the difference between relationship and these things that we call, you know, doing the Christian thing? Is that. [00:34:10] Yeah. Well, first of all, it's not a checklist. You can't check the list and say, I went to church and I read my Bible and I prayed. So why isn't my life happier or better, whatever it is they're looking for? I mean, that's not how you have a relationship with another person. You don't check off the boxes while I called so-and-so today and I met them for lunch. [00:34:31] So, you know, we should be really tight now. You know, you have to think of it that way. A relationship is a one on one ongoing experience with another person. And that person has Jesus and he. Is better than to your friends, because he he's always there and he forgives so quickly and so easily. I think a lot of people come to faith when they're that they've hit bottom. And he's standing there waiting. You know, he wants to help you up and pull you up and. I don't know really how to tell people to. [00:35:10] You get to that place where they're surrendering everything to him. But that really is the only answer. You know, you're probably going to do it. Meaning surrender everything to him. You can do it now or you can do it later. Most people like to go through a lot of pain before they do it. [00:35:28] Like, do they just. [00:35:29] Well, they don't like it, but they do it. So if you can do that, you know, sometime in your life. If you're tired of going through the pain or maybe you're not in a lot of pain now, you will be, you know, it's coming. That is something that being a believer or being Christian doesn't mean that you're not going to have troubles. It means that God's going to get you through those. And the sooner you learn that, I think the happier that you'll be just having that solid foundation to turn back to as opposed to what do I do now? And that trying to help yourself. [00:36:05] It just doesn't work. [00:36:08] I think the relationship with Christ for me is developed in in two primary ways. And the first one is in nature. I can't look around me and think that there isn't something greater creating this. I mean, we're in the change of seasons right now. The colors of the leaves will be changing colors and then we'll go into winter and then. Oh, my heavens. Spring comes and you're like, well, of course, he's going to put spring after after winter because it's just and, you know, I say he put it there because I believe it was created by him. And so I can just watch around me. It doesn't mean I like all of the seasons. Frankly, I don't even like spring. But it sure does bring out beauty, you know. And and I appreciate that. And the other thing. So in nature, I see that what I've seen in people as well to the relationship I have, you know, this. This is been a twenty five year road for me to get to this point. And that's not twenty five years old, that's twenty five years. When I met Christ in that in that relationship way in like my sister turned me on to a book, The Time for Joy, which is in scrap pages nowadays. But I still read it. Not every day as much as I used to, but I read it. I read it this morning again. And it's just that meditation. And then, you know, eight or ten years ago, another friend gave me a book by Derek. [00:37:27] It's kind of my Bible leader book. Think of the rings. Dear friends. Thank you. And then, of course, I got a recovery Bible from somebody else. And I got I got in business. I was handed a journal, you know, and said how you can put God first. That's for writing about it when you go to bed and be grateful and in in recovery in the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, they they encouraged prayer and meditation. They encourage a relationship with God. And, you know, so and so all of the friends that I met in that sense and every Thursday night for the past eight years have been in a men's men's meeting which started out at a church. Now we've been through several different churches and it's clearly Christian driven. We just call ourselves the protocols at this point. And there's just a topic where men from thirty six years old at 84 years old are getting together and talking and in that crisis shows up. And in that the relationships built I mean, we cry together, we laugh together. We in in there's not a meeting that goes by that you don't know that there's a presence of God. [00:38:35] So. That's really neat. I love what you're saying, Nancy. You know, someday you're going go through tough times. And I was thinking I just had one of our podcasts, actually, Elk LP coming out before this one, but I've already recorded it. By the time we're doing this interview and is talking about the Israelites going through the wilderness, you know, coming out of Egypt. And it seems like they always put themselves into a position. God takes them to a position of dry point. OK. Where there is no water and and they always wait till they're about dying of thirst. They start complaining to God and God shows up with their answer vote. [00:39:19] What hit me reading it is God would have given them the answer. They just ask God to light early before they got to that point for inspiration. [00:39:26] Does that make sense? Yeah. [00:39:29] I think sometimes we we wait until it's unbearable and that's when we we, you know, seek the Lord and crown the Lord. And yet Jesus said I came that you might have life abundantly right now and always have to do is this kind of saken right now. [00:39:47] Let me ask you a question on that, because you guys have gone through a lot of struggles. I know. And if you were look at your life now. I know there still probably struggles. And if you look at your life 10 or 15 years ago or 20 years ago or maybe a little bit further back when your relationship wasn't with the Lord, wasn't his strong. And I'm I'm just looking at the life with a relationship with the Lord now versus where the relationship was a lot less. Are the struggles significantly different? In other words, now that you have a great relationship with the Lord, is the struggle or a stronger relation is a struggle a lot less in terms of things hitting you than it was earlier? Or is the struggle level about the same? Does that make sense? [00:40:38] Yeah. It's about the same struggles. [00:40:40] Both the same. What is the response to the struggle? OK. The joy in the struggle helped me. Now the struggles are about the same now with a relationship being more mature vs. not really pursuing it. What's the difference? [00:40:56] You know, sometimes when something disaster is happens, your first responders response is to panic and, you know, despair and, you know, having this guy here that just says to me, you know, we need to start Perrow right now. And God's not going to leave us now. He hasn't so far. And it's just really a matter of a couple of minutes. You can take a few deep breaths. You can say a prayer and come back to he's going to get us through this. Whereas I think years ago, you know, you rely on your own, like, what can I do to get through this? And sometimes you can. I mean, sometimes it's up to you to do the next right thing, but often it's not in our hands. The things that are really hurting us and bothering us are totally out of our control. And that's what you come to realize in a close relationship with God is that he's in control. And hearing our prayers is the most important thing we can do now. We don't need to try to fix it. You know, either we can't or it's completely out of our hands. [00:42:01] There's. So you've got to think so. [00:42:06] There has to be a physiology shift and that can be like breath work, breath work to me has always been extremely important because like breathing happens without me thinking about it. And yet, when I think about breath work, to me it's a connection with with everything else. I mean, I exhale carbon dioxide and the trees inhale it through the trees. Exhale oxygen. And I inhale that. And so there's there's a definite connection there with that stuff. So it's in it's a conscious I'm breathing and I'm kind of counting or I'm doing feeling the chest rising and lower. So there's a physiology that happens with it. And then there's also an anchoring opportunity. [00:42:41] So for me, I have an inker that when things don't get to it, I can I can just anchor and it'll pull me back into those thoughts of when I was blessed with feelings of blessings or feelings of abundance or whatnot. And just anchoring it added recognize that. That's good. So there's a physiology that starts and then there's that the you know, it's all about mindset, 99 nine mindset. It's got to be 90 percent of it all. And if we're talking about God and we're talking about gratitude and we're talking about abundance in in the proverbial fan gets hit with life, you know, we can go with talking about the proverbial fan and the stuff that's flying or we can talk about the good things. They're in the office. There's a saying that your thoughts eavesdrop, get your thoughts, eavesdrop on your words. And so if you're gonna be talking about the things that are not favorable, then you're that's where you're gonna be hanging on. And that's what you're going to find support in. If you're thinking about things that are, you know what I want I want to use the word good. But that's way too general. Things that are of abundant, things that are of joy, things that are of Christ, things that are of life, things that are of relationship. Then it's soon certain to go in that way in Christians. [00:44:01] You know, I love the mindset. When you mentioned that my mind went back to Roman, say, with Paul, has the mind set on the flash is death. But the mind set on the spirit is life and peace. And where we set our mind is the outcome we get. Right. And. And I not long ago, we were going through some challenges. And my son is very wise in the spirit and we're talking about these different things. And he said, Dad, the battle is won in the spirit before it's won in the natural. And you know, that's so true. And, you know, God is a god of patterns. And he has a pattern. And he keeps repeating that pattern in one pattern that you guys have seen in your life. I've seen in mine. And that is that. God takes care of you. God takes care of you, as you say, can follow him, in fact. I would probably suggest without knowing the inner workings of your business, that if you were to look back over the life of your business. That all the big wins and and transactions and revenues that covered all your expenses probably were things that God brought to you, that you didn't really work. [00:45:22] Yeah. Yeah, I would almost guarantee it. Yeah. [00:45:25] It's a it's a pattern. And because of that pattern, we can live in joy in the midst of the struggles that come our way because we always are in struggles. The question is, do we try to reline ourselves to solve them or rely on the Lord? And the pattern with the Lord is he always handles it for those who love him and who follow him. So that's kind of the big takeaway I'm getting with you guys. Yes. Well, this has been really neat. I've enjoyed this. Is there anything else? As we start to wrap up, is there anything else you'd like to share business spiritually? A combination or anything else that. Before we wrap up the call. [00:46:20] Thomas reading his notes. No, I'm not. There a tax in place? There's two things that come to mind. [00:46:28] First of all. In watching videos and in watching and reading other people's real estate businesses and do this, do that, do this, that I've put other people on pedestals and in like that envy, maybe envy is is a word that might fit it as well. But I want to be like them or how come I can't do that or what's happening. And when Nancy and I sit here like this, I don't ever want to be thought of as the guy that has the answers because we struggle day in and day out. But we've got the answer of relying on our greater than ourselves. And we know that if we just get up in the morning and put our best foot forward, that the answers come in as long as our house is in order as we stand in the rooms. And so it's it's their struggle and there's pain and there's loss and there's reward in. Life is clearly way more abundant now than it was before. So. So don't do what I did and yet do what I did. But don't think of Nancy NYes any better or worse than we're just on the same path in the same. Going in the same direction and doing things have a little different speed than you are because everybody is is on the path. [00:47:52] The other thought is, is. [00:47:54] Some of the things just kind of along those same lines. Some of the things that were said here by what you've read and what Nancy and I have come up with in the moment, and as we said a prayer before we started this, I think this is a good podcast. And I'm looking forward to listening to those two people because they get some good stuff to say. [00:48:14] Well, y'all are definitely just an amazing couple. Anything from you announcing that, trying to put you on the spot or anything, that song line before we wrap it up? [00:48:23] Now, I just you know, for me, the most important thing is to have Tom as the leader of our family. And he continues to do that. He leads our company and he leads our family. And that's important to me. I hope to retire someday sooner than he does. [00:48:38] And it's just nice to know that the person leading our company and leading our lives is a man of God. [00:48:46] Absolutely. There is another passage that says no. Why be submissive to your husbands as crisis, as the churches, to the Christ husbands love your wives as Christ loves the church. And the picture that I got was this. You know, in the in the Christ center form of marriage, the husband is the covering of the family. And it's the husband's responsibility to take care of the family. Right. Ultimately, and as the bride of Christ, all of us make up the bride of Christ. He is our husband. And we can trust him to cover us. And trust him to provide for us. And it hit me as I as I was reading through this in the spirit, just kind of spoke this to me. At least I believe it was the spirit that said, you can trust me to Beatty, I'm your husband. And you don't have to worry about all of these decisions just to, you know, follow the leading I give you and leave it all up to me. And it's just really freeing. So it's wonderful to have a man of God is your husband to to just follow and lead your family. So. I really appreciate that. [00:50:00] Thank you. Thanks. All right. Well, as we wrap this up, if you do like this podcast, be sure to subscribe to it and you'll get a lot more. Be sure to like us on iTunes and YouTube and learn more about us and how to grow your business and how to grow spiritually if you want. At our Web site, get cellar's calling you Acom. Thanks, everyone. You'll have a great day. [00:50:23] Thank you. Thanks. P063

249 - Will COVID-19 Change Bourbon Commerce Laws Forever? Bourbon Community Roundtable #43

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 16, 2020 62:44

Today’s podcast, as you guessed it, is a reflection on what’s been happening with COVID-19. The whiskey industry is going to see some big changes. We’ve seen legislation pass as it relates to shipping and delivery of alcohol because it’s deemed an essential part of living and our culture. How long will this trend stick around and will we see this continue when the pandemic is over? Do you want to see more relaxed liquor laws? Lets hear it in the comments. Show Partners: The University of Louisville has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at uofl.me/bourbonpursuit. Barrell Craft Spirits has won a few medals at some of the most prestigious spirits competitions out there, but don’t take their word for it and find out for yourself. Learn more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about grains. Lots has changed since our last roundtable with COVID-19. Are people actually drinking more? Or are they just hoarding? Is distribution down with distilleries producing hand sanitizer? Will COVID-19 change consumer demand indefinitely with services for shipping and delivery? KY HB415 has passed. What could this mean for the greater United States? Should these large corporations that have donated 50k, 500k, or 1M be donating more? Billions in revenue vs a small donation amount in comparison. When this is all over, what’s the best thing that will come out of COVID-19? 0:00 Are you interested in preparing your expertise on the distilling process with key business knowledge such as finance, marketing and operations, then you need to check out the distilled spirits business certificate from the University of Louisville. It's an online program that can be completed in as little as six courses. The program is taught by both UVL business faculty and corporate fellows. So you are getting real experience from experts at the most renowned distilleries, companies and startups in the distilling industry. We're talking leaders from Brown Forman beam Suntory, jack daniels and more. get enrolled to this online program at U of l.me. Slash bourbon pursuit. So your meetings of the day are Andy, Donald Trump. 0:46 No wonder you drink Jesus. 1:01 This is Episode 249 of bourbon pursuit. And it's another week stuck at home. I don't know about you, but we're party hopping. We're going from the living room to the dining room, the kitchen, all just looking for some entertainment. And as you can guess the industry news has also been pretty slow. So you're in luck. We've got a short intro this week. We all know that restaurants and bars are feeling the pain right now. So one man in Tampa, Florida stepped up with a $40,000 cashier's check to purchase a bottle of the old Rip Van Winkle 25 year decanter that was listed for $20,000 to help save debts one of his favorite restaurants in the area. This bottle was only one of 710 that was released back in 2017. That had an MSRP of around 1800 dollars. In bourbon pursuit news. Our jack daniels barrel proof single barrel went on sale this week. And then it's sold out. Because of COVID-19. We've had to delete three of our barrel selections this year, and we're hoping we will have to reschedule anymore but I hope everyone can 2:00 Be grateful that we've got ourselves a few good bottles that get us through this process. And if you want to see all the barrel selections that we have scheduled, and the ones that we have for the rest of the year, go to patreon.com. Slash bourbon pursuit. During this time when you're hanging out with family or friends on zoom, they might be seeing you there sipping a bourbon neat. While they've got a cold, refreshing beer in their hands. Ask if they want to try some of your bourbon, fill up a sample bottle or to walk it over, drop it in their driveway, put it in their mailbox, take this opportunity to spread the good word of bourbon. And since they're stuck at home, tell them to check out your favorite bourbon podcast so they can binge and catch up as well. You'd be doing both of us a favor, and we'd really appreciate it. As you know, we're pushing out more content on live streams. So make sure that you're following our social media handles. And you may have even seen some bonus episodes this past week as well. Remember to subscribe to the podcast and make sure that you never miss those bonus episodes. today's podcast as you guessed it is a reflection on what's been happening with the Coronavirus 3:00 The whiskey industry is going to see some big changes. Because of this. We've seen an insurmountable push for legislation. And that's been passed because reflects the shipping and delivery of alcohol because it's now deemed an essential part of living in our culture. But how long will this trend stick around? Can we continue to see this as the pandemic is over? Hopefully, we get to see more relaxed laws continue to happen. And if you want to see more relax laws and what you'd like to see changed, let's hear it in the comments. Once again, enjoy this time inside with your family. Have a nice pour bourbon, and now you get to hear Joe from barrel bourbon. And then you've got Fred minich, with above the char. 3:39 I'm Joe Beatrice, founder of barrel craft spirits. Our Bourbons have won a few medals, some of the most prestigious spirits competitions out there, but don't take their word for it. Find out for yourself. Use the store locator at barrel bourbon calm. 3:53 I'm Fred MiniK, and this is above the charm. This week's idea comes from an old email 4:00 Keith Norton wrote on March 3, sorry for the delay Keith wanted to know, what's the difference between bourbon rye bourbon, and a weighted bourbon from a taste perspective? is one sweeter than another? does one have a multi flavor? And, yeah, happy to approach that. It's actually a good good chunk of that information in my book bourbon curious that you can go to and it's a pretty good guide. Look, when it comes to breaking down the flavors of all whiskies, not just bourbon, but scotches. There's so much that goes into it. The mash bill is something that we tend to get 4:42 connected to because we understand it, we really start formulating thoughts about how one profile is different when in fact, a weeded bourbon has is historically going in at lower barrel entry proofs and I would argue that hey, maybe it's 5:00 Not the wheat that's causing it to have that real velvety structure and the deep caramel notes. Maybe it's the barrel entry proof. And then you have 5:10 the high rye Bourbons that tend to be extraordinarily spicy. I've had some of late that tend to be more floral than spicy. And where does that come from? Why it's a matter of fact, the yeast, but talking about the yeast is not necessarily as sexy as as the grain. Now there are definitely those that are more malt forward and heaven Hill is a kind of a like a classic example for me that they tend to a lot of their whiskies will have like a caramel malt flavor to it. Now where's that coming from? ag could very well be their distillation technique or the the way the barrels raging. But when it comes down to it, you do have some generalizations to how these whiskies will taste in nine times out of 10 the higher the right content, the more spicy 6:00 You will find okay so I'm talking about like pepper, cinnamon, cardamom all these like baking spices that you would like have in your your baking spice rack, you know you'll find a lot more of those and the higher right Bourbons, you'll also tend to find like a nugget of herbs from time to time. Now the weeded Bourbons will they tend to be a just a touch sweeter, just a touch softer and they don't have that same kind of vibrant finish on kind of a generalization. Now you give me a William LaRue Weller from the Buffalo Trace antique collection and you're gonna get your socks knocked off, you know, so I mean, it varies but Maker's Mark which is kind of like the everyday standard, you know, we did bourbon, you know, four or five years old we did. recipe, you know, a lot of people will taste that and says it's very wood forward has nothing to do with a wheat 7:00 So more more of the things that we taste in a nose out of whiskies, you know, grains only probably make up 20 to 30% of, of the, of the flavor. Most of it's coming from the barrel and the techniques, if you were really you need to lump the grains into like the fermentation techniques. So if you put that if you put the grains in the same kind of like soup as the fermentation and the yeast, you know, then I think that that 20 to 30% goes up to about 40% it's all about who you talk to, and you know what distillery prioritizes? How, you know how they make it. So is the grain important? Oh, God, absolutely. It all starts with the grain. But is it the end all be all for the taste and flavor that you get? No. But it sure is fun to talk about and it's easy to understand. So that's the 8:00 This week's above the char Hey, if you have an idea for above the char like Keith, why don't you write me an email you can go to my website Fred minik.com that's Fred minich comm click that contact button, and at the very least, maybe we can start a conversation about good bourbon. Until next week. Cheers 8:21 Welcome back to another episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon. This is the 43rd recording of the I know that sounds like a question. It is the 43rd recording of the bourbon Community Roundtable actually to have the second guess myself because it's so many times but Fred Ryan, good to see you all again on this glorious quarantine evening. How are you all? Great. I feel like I see you all more on quarantine virtually in real life. 8:51 No, it's Oh, it's always just good to hang out with my with my fellows. It's good to see you guys. Well, I would say that I'm I'm getting 9:00 Getting a little stir crazy, like I'm ready for this stuff to end. It's that or I'm also getting to the point now where I have to get on like zoom meetings for my daughter, because she has like virtual soccer practice or like classrooms and stuff. And it's killing me because I've been using zoom for three years now. And I know how to press the damn mute button, and you log on and it's just chaos. There's just sound coming from everywhere. 9:26 Well imagine what it's like to be a teacher. You know, I mean, this whole thing has made me realize that we don't pay our teachers enough in and whatever we can do to increase their salaries. Let's do it. Yeah. Yeah, we can pay their salaries. 9:43 Exactly. I'm all about it. I'm all about it. So we've got it. We've got a good lineup of stuff to talk about tonight. But let's go ahead, we'll go around the horn. And you know, because a lot actually changed since we're here at the Ross roundtable with COVID-19 but I was able to just do the regular introductions. 10:00 So we'll start off with Blake Blake, just kind of tell people where you blog at. And, you know, if if you know, where do you think or how do you think Carol Baskins actually killed her husband? 10:11 Yeah. So I'm Blake from bourbon er. You probably know me as the Cal Ripken roundtable still undefeated on the roundtable that you know, if you're undefeated by just showing up that's how that's what I kind of W in this in this world. But no, always fun to be here. So thanks again. Yeah, everyone who watched Tiger King, go back and listen to the podcast. I feel like that's the new debate. It's like, well, was the movie better? Was the book better? You know, our generations debate was was the podcast better? Or was the documentary better on Netflix? So check that out. Definitely more entertaining. So I'll go out and check the podcasts. We actually ended up watching last night the the kind of like after, whatever it is with Joel McHale. And so it kind of talked about, it was just like a one hour series of just you know, interviewing pretty much everybody 11:00 Except the tiger king himself, so it was, it was pretty good. Yeah, check that on Netflix if you haven't yet. Officially on Netflix, I saw everybody complaining on Twitter that Joel was basically just making fun of everyone. 11:14 He made fun of himself too. So, okay, that's what makes a good host. Yeah, he was also tied in so we me and Joel McHale something in common. 11:26 Yeah, just go ahead and just dm each other on Twitter. Yeah, yeah, but the glory days. 11:33 All right, Jordan, what do you think was did she feed into the Tigers are buried in a septic tank? Oh 100% the Tigers quick, easy. They were hungry. Why not? So this is Jordan from breaking bourbon calm and catch us on the socials at breaking bourbon. Make sure to visit this site for our near daily Release Calendar updates. Awesome. And Brian, what are your thoughts? Do you think Carol did it or you think you think you think maybe she's she's clean on this one. 12:00 I mean, you are the wall here. Well, I'm gonna throw you for a loop on this. I haven't seen it. I don't have Netflix. I'm also the person who avoided seeing Titanic and Avatar, so I try not to do those things. Yeah, I'm really exciting like that. Yeah. 12:17 Titanic was it because you like you already knew what the end was gonna have. It was well is knew what was gonna happen and it was it people were too far into it. Well, it was too big. I guess I was contrarians on that. 12:29 But I can't so I can't. I mean, I know from Twitter what's going on, but I'm clueless when it comes to it. 12:36 But if so, if you want boring stuff that's not up to date. Come see Brian here, right. sipping corn mostly on Twitter, sipping corn calm and bourbon justice, calm. Thanks for having me on again, guys. As always, man, always happy to have you here. So I guess the one thing we want to start talking about is because a lot has happened since the last time we talked, I remember it was what three weeks ago 13:00 Go. And it was maybe actually it's probably four weeks ago things were like just starting to snowball, right? Just a little bit. I know Jordan in Pennsylvania like there was talk of like some things happening but they hadn't closed down all the liquor stores yet. And now they now they like reopen them up somewhat like online like a hot mess. Yeah. So yeah, so for those at home that don't know about PA, it's a state run system. And it's beyond sloppily managed on a good day, right? Oh, 13:33 they shut down the liquor stores. But before they did that, they announced that they're gonna shut it down. There is of course, a mad rush and ever ignored social distancing. And they also shut down online delivery. And then they've opened up online delivery maybe like a week or two ago, but I have yet to talk to one person who has figured out a way to get in. And it was really funny. So they did an article, like basically saying the came out touting the success of the online liquor. 14:00 Store and how well it's going right? They basically measured it by saying, Well, on a normal day we get, we processed four orders an hour, but now we're up to like 50 orders an hour. Right? And you think about that, and that's an entire state, right. So like any other private business would go out of business long time ago. And somehow pa spins out for a wind. So it's been a hot mess, the good news, local distilleries around pa or shipping. You know, we've seen a lot of uptick in supporting local, which is great. And I'm a huge advocate, especially during this time supporting local for all businesses. So we've seen a huge influx of people around the state buying from their local distilleries or trying out new distilleries around the state, which is really nice, but point at the state just dropped the ball on this one. And I guess that kind of goes into really like the first subjects when we look at the way that consumer demand has really changed from COVID-19. I mean, let's let's not beat around the bush like we've been touting this for a long time. And you know, Blake's been on the forefront with opening sealed box and trying to get shipping happening in and making that happen. 15:00 And then all of a sudden you see drizzly and instacart and Bart and all these different kind of services like they're gonna meet like five or six x three annual projections now, and you now are also seeing every single liquor store every single restaurant scrambling to get their, their, their online or basically get their store online. And not only that, I mean, we'll talk about how 15 Hospital for 15 and a little bit, but I mean, do we see that after this thing starts ending like after it's over? Are we going to see some of these services start going like back to normal? Or do you think this is this is gonna be the new normal? thing, Pandora's Box been open when it comes to liquor delivery, that's for sure. So, you know, other businesses aside, I think consumers now are realizing Well, we should be able to everything else. When we get to our doorstep, we should, you know, be able to get liquor to our doorstep to and the convenience is just there, right. I mean, if you can avoid a trip to the store, they don't have it in stock, all that stuff. Sure. And I think people are once they once they get used to it. They're going to continue to 16:00 expect that afterwards and I don't blame them. And it's not going to take along the east to this. I mean, if we can get drive up cocktails made ahead of us for the from the restaurant and get that and if we can get curbside service or delivery service from the liquor store. I mean, it's the trains leaving the station already. I hope that's I hope this lasts. One thing that I noticed that after after I wrote that Forbes story, and 16:26 I can't remember what the title was, was something to do with like a pandemic, you know, bring a war between the distillers and wholesalers. I got a lot of feedback from distillers thanking me for this the one thing that I have realized in this in this current state is that the distilleries really really want shipping. I mean, they want they want shipping, probably more than anything that's out there. And 16:55 you know, they don't all come out talking about it, but they all really want it 17:00 Because it's another revenue driver for them. And this has shown that this is where the consumer populace wants to live moving forward because we're not. I don't know where when you know, when we're going to go back to normal. I mean, everyone wants to talk about, you know, when that's going to be a nobody got a crystal ball, but everybody needs a drink. And that drive thru is nice. That delivery is really freakin nice. And so let's I want to talk to the guy a little bit that that actually could show us a graph of sales like Blake, what have you seen in regards of like, just your online sales? I mean, have they increased at all? Or is it kind of status quo? It definitely has, um, it's a little hard because it is a newer company. So like saying that it's up, you know, 90% over last year's is a little bit of a, you know, a false sense of what's actually happening because I don't have a ton of historical data but in general, you know, you have what they call OMD. So October 18:00 November, December, then it slumps. And we still haven't seen that slump yet. You know, it's it's been jumping right up. And, you know, it's funny, you can kind of see as some of these states, certain states in particular will, they'll call for a lockdown, and we'll see an increase in traffic from those states. So it is a really interesting thing because I think a lot of these government officials are having to think about this for the first time whereas before they just had a lobbyist or whoever was saying, nope, we can't do that. It's not safe. And it's like hold on with all this. It's like, what Why is this not safe again, like it's not safe for people to go to a liquor store. So explain to me why it's not safe for them to have it delivered to their home. So you know, you don't want to say like something good comes out of this where we get this push through because it is so minor compared to what we're facing, but it it has a lot of people rethinking it and, you know, just on the steelbook side, we've seen a giant increase in in sales and people interested 19:00 from other states that we can't ship to, and it's like, hey, why can't you ship to me in New York? We're, you know, we're locked down and I'm like, I'd love to, but your state says we can't. So. 19:11 Yeah, a fear I have 19:14 is then that they're going to be so busy trying to rebuild their states and do deal with so much more important issues that's gonna get put on the back burner even more. And so like, I don't know, it's every day It seems like Andy gets at contended our governor gets asked like, so why are liquor stores essential? You know, and like, it's so you know, there's still people trying to like prod that there. You know, because we have some inch, we have an interesting demographic in our state. Well, I think I think we might have talked about that last time picking back on that though, Ryan, so I know. Right? And that's what was surprising for a lot of people in Pennsylvania because there is you know, I've read a lot of articles from just doctors and nurses have the same thing as much as we don't want admit it right like alcohol. 20:00 abuse is a large issue for a large amount of the population and if you don't give them access to alcohol then they're the ones clogging up the hospitals oh yeah right no doubt so and but I think that also should show you like it should be eye opening for a lot of people yeah for sure no doubt i mean i i totally agree and this is kind of broke down that barrier like that distributors could say Oh, it's not safe but now they're like we need this to keep sales going. So it's like you know it's a it's pretty funny but yeah, I hope it all continues on because I mean, it's it's fantastic. We tried the drizzly app and got stuff shipped to our house and now I got all my neighbors doing it for party mark here and like they're like loving it. It's it's pretty sweet. 20:42 You know, there's a there's been another wrinkle that's come up from this and you know, while the the shipping stuff and everything is Come on, I you You always hear me talk about this. But the anti alcohol people have started coming on saying that this is 20:59 they're looking 21:00 To try and ban alcohol and every single state right now. So they're they're taking advantage of this pandemic in a very different way. They're saying that this is going to lead to more abuse in the homes there's going to be more domestic abuse, there's going to be more alcohol related problems, there's going to be more liver failures and stuff. So they're taking this as an opportunity to say, hey, look at all these sales, you know, our country we're going to be hurting from this we need to ban all liquor sales. I mean, that that's some of the stuff that that's also going going on right now back door, and I just with legislators, I feel like we should make an amendment to the Constitution then if that's what it's gonna be to 21:36 try that. 21:40 Yeah, Brian, you're not busy, right? 21:43 Let's do that. Round two. I know there's a surge in sales, but it's more of like a stocking up thing. Like I just don't see it continuing down this path. Like if things kind of slow. Well, I go back open and so like, is this stocking up or have you guys seen those videos of people going on and 22:00 Dog filming their neighbors recycle bins 17 bottles of wine Yeah. And and bourbon bottles all over the place. Yes. I don't know if it's stocking up, you know, in full transparency my my consumption is definitely up because I don't know everyday feels like a Friday and a Saturday kind of so it's like Alright, well it is five o'clock I can go ahead and have a drink and then some days like alright, it's three o'clock I'm not doing anything the rest of the day. You know, I'm not getting drunk or hammered any of the times, but it's definitely more than I normally would during the week. 22:37 So you know that that adds up over time. Yeah. Oh, yeah. My consumptions way up it actually yesterday. I was like, I'm taking a day off yesterday. Yeah, fires me. And I still haven't had a drink yet. And I'm like, I was like, I haven't not drank ever since since it started it. You know, I would usually drink take like three or four days off a week. But now it's like you 23:00 You just do 234 every night because you get off at five o'clock with Andy. And then he cut in President Trump's lawn and then you have dinner. 23:08 And then you put your you have dinner with your kids and you turn on a movie, then you have more drinks. And then next thing you know you're in bed and you wake up, repeat. So so your meetings of the day are Andy, Donald Trump. 23:24 No wonder you, Dre. Jeez. 23:28 I might be the only one like, I feel like I'm still like my, like normal scale like myself. I'm right there with you, Kenny. Yeah, I was like, I don't really think anything's really changed in that regard. However, there were a lot of stats that came out. I mentioned them. I believe last week on the opening of the podcast, talking about really like there has been a spike in alcohol sales like it's there's, there's no you know, there's no hiding it like there has been a surge. But then there was another great article that came out an opinion article by Steve Coombs last week that kind of talks about like are people actually doing 24:00 making more or are they just hoarding? Because if you look at the actual sales of things that are happening, it's a lot of like 1.75 and one liters of stuff. And so that equates to a lot of unfortunately Tito's, but there's also a lot of 1.7 fives of Maker's Mark and other types of, you know, basically bulk whiskey that people are actually purchasing rather than going out and you know, getting this little 750 here or anything like that people actually making these big bulk purchases. However, I think most of us here have enough bourbon in their library or their 24:36 choose any random choose any random closet in your house that could defeat the most general populace out there. So I tell you, I've been doing these nightly tastings and I've been trying to be creative with the stuff I taste and, and 24:52 and that's when you I found that that's, that's the one the one way to like determine how much I really care about a bottle because I'm finding myself 25:00 been very reluctant to go into my stash of like 1930s the 1950s stuff. And 25:09 and I'm like, I, I know it's I know people want to see me drink that, but I can't do it. I can't open it up yet. I don't want to open it up for that I want to open up for something else. So maybe it'll we'll get there. But what I have noticed is that yes, well we have a lot of stuff. It's very interesting to see what I am drinking. Because, you know, when I'm that, you know, live streaming or something, I'm drinking something very different. And it's not stuff that I would know that I wouldn't think I would be drinking. So just Evan Williams bottled and bond 25:41 it's nothing like that. It's mainlining it it's funny you say that phrase because I think you know, mean economic have talked about this a few times. We've almost taken like the opposite approach. In fact, Eric did an opinion piece on the site not too long ago where, you know, the more we The more we know, people are getting impacted especially from economic and being in New York. I think 26:00 Almost switched our mindset to be like you have a special bottles we're holding on to maybe we'll start cracking one or two more of those more often just because you never know. Right? So I think it's interesting you say that and it'll be even more interesting to see how your mentality changes the longer the actual lockdown goes down. Right? Yeah, that'll be truly interesting. Yeah, it's definitely a psychological thing and it's not really it's, it's I'm definitely still drinking the good stuff Don't get me wrong, but I mean, I've got some of those really, really rare bottles that I hunted for worked hard to get and, and, you know, I was looking forward to like cracking them open with friends and like, our night or something nothing and it's like when the hell am I ever going to be around people? Yeah. You know? Yeah. I mean, I'd like to look at the see that that hopefully the lies at the end of the tunnel, but man, I just something tells me it's not though. I really want this to be over soon. But today was pretty. It's pretty grim. So yeah, yeah. How do we how do how do we get to it? 27:00 point where we're not. We talk about it, but not like in the depressing sense. It's like, Oh, yeah, so make sure you wear your new mask out there, by the way, the weather is going to be 55 and sunny today. You know, it's only when you become used to it, and no one no one's bracing for that. Yep. It's a maybe a poor analogy, right. But in terms of so think when the smog index came out, and you know, you go to a polluted city or pluta country stuff like that, and used to be home in the smog, like off the chart now. It's just like, you know, la or, you know, if I go to India or anything like that, it's like, here's a smog for the day. Gonna be bad for your health. Moving on. That's it, and you're like, Oh, okay. normal part of life now. All right. It's just gonna be kind of like that, like, viruses are breaking out. Just be extra productive today. All right. Great. Thanks. So the trash cans, employees, please don't. But it's a good question that came in from Brian here. And he's wondering if, if the distribution from distilleries distributors is way down right now, especially with hand sanitizer production going on. Along with folks being quarantine. I mean, what 28:00 What do you think is the the short term and the long term outcome of what we're going to see here? So I actually talked with a couple people about this from the distributor aspect. And they were saying that basically, their sales numbers were about pretty close to dead on what they were in prior months. And that's 100% because of off premise. So they lost all of the on premise. And we're able to make up the majority of it with off premise sales. 28:29 Now for other distilleries who rely heavily on their tasting room or that's even you know, they lost that part which really hurts but as far as like the big guys go, I don't know that they're that affected because the demand through distribution has been so strong because retail has been so strong. 28:48 So I don't know it'll be interesting to see how that all I think the hand sanitizer thing is great for their, for them just kind of giving back, but it's not really making up 29:00 A huge part of their revenue. And ultimately, I think it's the smaller guys who are going to be affected who, who have a bigger, you know, tasting room and all that kind of all those kind of sales going on. Yeah, I mean, anybody who geared up for tourism is just looking at this scared and glammed up scared, kind of want to get, you know, Brian or Jordans kind of thoughts if we see any kind of short or long term effects of these distilleries haven't been shut down or producing sanitizer. Yeah. So, sanitizer. I think it's great. I'll address that first. I think it's awesome. I think it's great. I have yet to see some hit areas or at least even be available online. I think it's going to first responders, which is the right thing, so that's even better. But I was thinking about this the other day as I was going for a run on the treadmill, right? So all these distilleries the last two years have just dumped money and expanding their visitor centers right Woodford just opened up their new one right buffalo trail. 30:00 was doing a huge expansion. Everyone's that was the whole the whole shtick, right? let's dump more money, let's think big thing, right? But those who have put all this money in there, it's almost a shame because I don't know if it's ever going to go back to the way of having just a crush of people line up at a bar right thing of going to a Woodford for a Buffalo Trace on a Saturday, right, with all the tourists. Everyone's just lined up getting shots and tasting your samples and stuff like that. And that may never go back to the way it was. And, you know, they might be regretting that that influx of cash, they just put in that this your experience now. I mean, I think it'll come back to at least some extent, but that's never where they're making their money. I mean, they have to get the people there in the first place. And there are a lot more people who are drinking Woodford than ever that ever make it to that tour or to any other distilleries. So they've they've got plenty of bourbon that they've distilled in the last few years socked away, that'll still come to the market. 31:00 They just need to find a new way to market it. And instead of trying to bring people to the distillery, which I think is a small percent, I mean, it's a growing percentage, but it's a smaller percentage. So we're taking a hit on the old bourbon trail, as far as that marketing goes, but there's, I think there's plenty more to do and they can recover from that. Yeah, and humans forget things. I mean, it's, yeah, we're I mean, it's easy now to say all we can but it's like even like after the last recession, you know, like and people got in trouble with you know, loans and mortgages or whatever and like a year later, they're doing the exact same damn thing. Yeah, we're still giving like no proof mortgages in like, you know, I AR, whatever you call it, but just alarms and all that. Yeah, arms. Yeah. We just need like two more tweets that says whiskey kills the virus and it'll open. 31:56 Start just spreading the rumors now might as well 32:00 So I guess that kind of makes me want to go into sort of like the next segment here. And that's looking at House Bill 415. So I know that a lot of us have been kind of following this for for quite some time in regards of what this means. And there's this, this great PDF that got sent out by some of the people that were for the bill and making it happen. So just to kind of like digest this down. What this really means is that, and hopefully what this means is a potential domino effect of what we could see for the rest of the United States to hopefully latch on to. And this is the giving the ability for distilleries to now ship direct to consumers, completely bypassing a distributor and bypassing and actually, I guess they function as the retailer in this point, right. And that's what I know that there was a lot of 32:52 commotion, I guess, you could say from distributors and everything like that and retailers that didn't want this. I mean, of course, you don't want this right. I mean, 33:00 Kinda like it pokes a hole in your whole business model. But the the other side of this is that this is now putting spirits and putting Kentucky as one of the first states to now have the same exact law as around what is it like 40 or 42 other states that allows shipping of wine, right i mean shipping and wine from California or anywhere else like that's pretty, pretty standard. 33:25 However, this is now starting to allow this to happen for for greedy spirits. So looking at this now, I'm all for it. I think this is something that we've been offered for a while Blake, I know is he's over the moon for it. But I kind of want to think is there because I know Fred, we had brought this up before and this that you know you you had talked about the warning signs of saying like, well, all it's gonna take is for like, you know, one kid intercept something and then this could all all go under. Has this bill passed like sort of change your mind and regarding 34:00 of of potentially like the shift we're starting to see in in the legal side of things 34:10 What do you get if you mix Seattle craft, Texas heritage and Scottish know how that's to bar spirits to our spirits traces its roots to a ranch in rural Texas run by the founder, Nathan Kaiser his family for six generations. Nathan grew up on the ranch with stories of relatives bootlegging moonshine, and after moving into Seattle, he wanted to keep the family tradition alive and he opened to bar spirits in 2012. They're very traditional distillery making everything from scratch and each day starts by milling 1000 pounds of grain. Their entire product lineup consists of only two whiskies, their moonshine, and the only bourbon made in Seattle. Both bottles are being featured in rack house whiskey clubs next box. rack house whiskey club is a whiskey the Month Club, and they're on a mission to uncover the best flavors and stories that craft distilleries across the US have to offer racquel 35:00 out to have the feature distilleries finest bottles, along with some cool merchandise in a box delivered to your door every two months, go to a rack house whisky club.com to check it out and try some to bar for yourself. Use code pursuit for $25 off your first box 35:19 you had talked about the warning signs of saying like, well, all it's gonna take is for like, you know, one kid intercept something and then this could all all go under. Has this bill passed, like sort of change your mind in regards of of potentially like the, the shift we're starting to see in in the legal side of things. Well, first of all, I've always been for you know, some type of shipping. I've always thought that you know if wine can do it, you know, whiskey should have that same, right. I've always just taken the side of like, taking the kind of devil's advocate side of like, I know like how the wholesalers think and as soon as this bill was passed, they came out against it. 36:00 very heavily. And basically said it was a shame that Kentucky took advantage of a, of a pandemic to get this thing passed. And they called the they called the KDA. And a bunch of people who push for quote bad actors. I they use that a lot in their press releases. I still don't understand what that means. Well, still hasn't like approved or vetoed it right. He's hasn't even like, right. Didn't auto into Milan? Yeah, but not until like June or July, I believe. So there's a 90 day period before it become goes into law. But it's like it was but by him not signing it or vetoing it, it basically passed and that was just the weird provision to it. So it's, it's good. But yeah, I think from a from, 36:50 from an overall perspective of like, people have kind of swung to this pendulum of like, as long as someone is checking the ID 37:00 And oh, by the way, the wholesalers, they own a little piece of a company called drizzly. So they're okay with delivery as long as they are getting, you know, it's as it seems as long as they are, have like a guaranteed structure of someone, you know, being 21. And someone texted me today and said, The wholesalers are okay, as long as they're getting their cut. That's what I was gonna say. I was like, making sure that we're getting there. 25% that's what I was making sure that that's what they're gonna say. And and that's a, I get that. But, look, if wineries can do it distillers should be able to that's it. You just sound like a bad actor. That's all it is. 37:41 But I mean, I mean with this, it's still only two like six reciprocating states, right. So it's, it's more than that. It's like 12, I believe. Yeah, it's a handful. But yeah, it's a handful and it's in that it's in that release. 37:56 But the some of the big wind states are on there. So 38:00 California is not on there. But you know, Rhode Island. What are we going to get from Rhode Island or Hawaii? I mean, hold on the islands get some decent distilleries. How do they do it? 38:11 Alright, so here are the states. Alaska. 38:15 Arizona. I you know what? No, Connecticut, Hawaii, Kentucky, Nebraska, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island and Washington DC giddy up. I mean, when I look at this, though, I try to think picture it from. And I think this is one of the things that Chris, one of the people that helped draft this and lobby for it kind of looked at this as really the first domino to fall, right. I mean, this is this is a radical change in consumer demand and the way that laws have to now adapt to what we're going through. I mean, I think john Henderson said it in the YouTube channel, but earlier, like, it only took a global pandemic, for us to finally move the industry forward. Right and 39:00 And if you look at that, I think we are moving in the right direction. Now it's a move in the right direction, but you need you need a legit state to jump on board with this to make it matter. And I think we're the first logistic unit. Well, the thing is the the list of states you just listed off there nothing in the record, you mean like a large long Nabila? gorgeou, Florida, you're nice. No, I like that. And that's when it's gonna make the most difference, like because the no offense the other states, but they're, they're peanuts compared to those and like, I just have a feeling to those states are gonna iron fisted, you know, to keep it in their states as well. So is that right move in the right direction, but it's not there yet. Well, I mean, do you look at this as a move for that? Or is it a move to actually help distilleries? Right, this is this is another another way that we can look at putting more money back into the pocket of the distillers. We've, I don't know how many times we've talked about this on the show that the three tier system has been a problem. 40:00 That's why the secondary market exists because, you know, they it goes off to the distributor and distributor goes, Well, I don't know, like it goes to whatever kind of algorithm that they want to however they want to do it. This now puts a little more power to the distilleries, if they want to do it. Yeah, they are. But they still have to have the distributor to process the tax payments and stuff. So the distributor is going to charge something and get a little bit but it does, it's definitely great for the distiller because they're gonna keep more revenue, but the distributors have, because I doubt each distillery is gonna have their own, you know, maybe they will, but I don't see enough. I just don't see enough shipping demand with those states to justify having a dedicated team to deal with the tax implications of you know, shipping and cutting out the distributor as the current level, not just attacks the right building out three commerce capabilities, building out the team, that shipping everything dealing with the customer experience online and all that stuff. It's it's harder than people realize to just snap your fingers and do those things. I think Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Episode 29 Financial Independence Retire Early Explained.

Real Estate Marathon

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 9, 2020 58:39

After 49 Episodes, Mike and Larry get the chance to describe the F.I.R.E. movement and what it means to be financially independent. They help you figure out your why of F.I. This is a must listen episode. Show transcription: Episode 29 Financial Independence, Retire Early.mp3 [00:00:00] Welcome to the Real Estate Marathon podcast. Your Guide in the Race to Financial Freedom. The Real Estate Investing and Sound Financial Practices. This podcast is for anyone interested in learning more about real estate, investing, personal finances and a new take on traditional retirement. Now here are your host, Larry B0 and Mike Moe. [00:00:24] What's going on, everybody? Welcome to the Real Estate Marathon podcast. Your guide on the race to financial freedom through real estate investing in sound financial practices. My name is Mike Bell, one of the hosts of the show joined today, as always, Mr. Fisher. [00:00:39] I'm doing well, Mike. I'm doing very well tonight. [00:00:41] I know that you're extremely excited because this is an episode that you've been looking forward to for about forty nine episodes, I would think. [00:00:50] Yes, I am super pumped for this episode. So what are we going to be talking about today, Mike? Well, man, after 50 plus episodes or so, we are finally going to dove deep into the financial independence. What is it? What does it mean? How do you get there? You know, when we started this, you know, we talked about, you know, obviously the name is a real estate marathon podcast for a reason. But when we started this, we talked a lot about, you know, having this be a really good blend of real estate investing and personal finance topics. You know, I think we've we've done a decent job, you know, going over the credit scores, going over a lot of that, you know, setting that strong financials, you know, foundation that we talk about and we delve deep into, you know, a handful of topics around real estate. And now after like I said, after almost 50 plus episodes, we're going to dove deep into financial independence. [00:01:43] What it means, you know, we're doing five, one on one. So finding independence is one of the posts you put earlier in the podcast on social media was your Wi-Fi. Larry [00:01:54] Yeah, I like that. And everybody has to have a reason for why they want financial independence. And once you discover that reason, it gives you the motivation to pursue it actively. Larry [00:02:04] And that's what we're here to do. We're going to define it. And really deep dove into it. So I am surprised you can even sleep last night. We absolutely did. [00:02:14] I'm omgpop man, and I'm glad we're finally getting around to this. You know, and it's it's a subject that we've we've touched on or it's a term, I should say, that we've used in a ton of episodes. [00:02:23] So I'm glad we're finally getting to it being given it's a given it the justice it deserves. You really kind of dove deep. So we're going to you know, we're we're going to cover the definition. Obviously, we're in a covered the history of, you know, fights. The basic principle is how did she do it and resources to us to explore more and dove deeper on your own. So it's it's going to be a good episode. And I'm fun. And it's the first time that you and I have gotten to a riff. You're on our own. You know, we've had a ton of interviews, last handful of episodes. [00:02:50] We haven't that. We've had a solo Soad an hour. It's just us on a topic. So be good to get back to that as well. [00:02:56] Yeah. Yeah, I enjoy that a lot because I think we we offer a lot of good information, a lot of good material to the listeners and it's great to have the interviewers. [00:03:06] But one of the things I enjoy hearing the most is my own voice and they have not heard enough of it lately. [00:03:14] I like hear my own joke. So we'll see if I can throw a few of those in here. [00:03:17] Oh, yeah, yeah. I loved some bad jokes myself. So. Yes, well, you want to start with the warm up so we can get Guiteau limber and loose ready to run this marathon. [00:03:27] Let's do it, man. And this is going to be a marathon. It's going to be a get up. So here it is. [00:03:31] It is. We're talking about the fire movement and fire stands for financial independence. [00:03:36] Retire early. And the fight the fire movement is essentially the goal of planning for financial independence. So you have the option to retire early or at any time you would like to. [00:03:48] Yeah. Yeah. It sits exactly what we're talking about today. And, you know, some people get to it kind of thrown off by the R E on that term, you know. [00:03:58] So people some people like just the they don't like to retire early. Sometimes they retire term gives kind of a negative connotation or you're just gonna be, you know, sitting on the beach and sipping mai tais, which isn't necessarily the case for most people who reach financial independence. But either way, it's exactly, exactly what we're talking about today. [00:04:18] And I've been known to take some liberties with the army of fire. You know, it could be a financial independence. Retiring is excellent. You know, any any of that kind of thing. Real estate. You know, I take liberties. What it actually does mean the retire early. [00:04:33] So you know what? Where do you want to start? You know, we're we get really deep dove into it. You want to cover some of the history. Maybe the basic principles of it. [00:04:43] Well, you know, so let's just expand a little bit more on on fire. So there's a couple of different terms that it can be referred to on a pretty regular basis. [00:04:51] So fire is probably one of the most common ones which you already defined as that financial independence. Retire early fi or F5, financial independence, financial freedom, the hundred percenters, which is basically means 100 percent of your expenses is covered by passive income. But essentially all these things mean that saying that all mean that you can hundred ten, 11 percent cover your living expenses is with the income that is coming in off your passive portfolio, a passive investments, whatever. Maybe whether it's real estate, whether it's stocks, bonds, whatever your investments is. They all mean the same thing that you made such a cover, your living expenses and your main expenses for life. [00:05:33] And I'm actually in this position right now with my passive income portfolio, with being able to cover all my expenses. [00:05:41] I could retire right now and and not lose any ground in my financial livelihood. I guess you could say and this is very freeing. It gives you options. And that's one of the things that people seek is freedom, freedom, freedom. And the FI gives you that freedom. And when we actually in the last few episodes, we've been talking a lot about the financial retirement number, and the number is in an age which we defined in one of the last episodes. It's just a number of how much how many dollars you need to have monthly coming in. So you don't have to work that eight to five or nine to five full time grind the rat race, if you will. [00:06:24] Yeah. And there you're probably the prime example of why that already doesn't necessarily always apply. So you got that fi- and it's almost like financial independence work optional. [00:06:33] You're still working. But tomorrow you don't have to. Like that's kind of the options that this gives you. You know, it's kind of like I said, I think a handful of times on this, you know, this this show, I got a you know, a nine-to-five today that they currently enjoy. And I get to do some on energy. And, you know, I'm not one of those people that hates their job day in and day out. Right. But, you know, in five years, I don't know what's going to happen in five years. I think I use this exact term before, you know, my boss could come to me tomorrow and say, you're scrubbing toilets for the next week. You know, obviously in I.T. this could happen, but they could. And I you know, not being at financial independence, what do I do? I guess Guptill is right because I'm dependent on that paycheck right now. So financial independence work optional. You don't have to retire. You don't have to stop working. You don't have to go sit on the beach. But it gives you options. You know, I'm talking to one of these young guys at one of these investment events. The handful of months ago. And he kind of said the same thing is like, I love my job. So why do I care about financial independence? [00:07:34] Don't care about, you know, that whole movement. It's like, man, things change real quick. And, you know, I think we're in a position right now currently in our current situation that we got going on here, mid 20s, Tony, where a lot of people would be better off. Have they had some, you know, passive income coming in? [00:07:51] Yeah. Yeah. And you bring up a good point where we are with my my financial independence is it is work optional. And part of the reason, you know, people are saying, why? [00:08:02] Why should I care about financial independence? I enjoy my 9 to 5. Well, financial independence. What that allows you to do it. It allows you to build wealth twice as fast, because if you've got dual income, you've got the the portfolio income, which is equal to or higher than what your regular paycheck is. And then you got that weekly paycheck coming in. You can actually get to, well, wealthy. You're rich even faster if you take that money and use it is as in investments or however you choose to use it. We choose real estate. But if you have that financial independence. No. On top of your regular income, that's just it's brings a lot of a lot of wealth to bear at your situation. [00:08:49] So, yeah, it it's it's just a numbers game and it's just taken the numbers and extrapolating. I know, you know, I used to always hear, you know, one of the best things to do was, you know, you know, if you're married, you get two incomes. You should save 100 percent of one person's income and just live off the other one. [00:09:04] Well, in essence, if you are five or if you build up a portfolio of, you know, whether it be rentals or whether it be stocks or bonds, that provides you enough pass, it could provide, you know, passive income to live on. Well, essentially, you have two incomes. You're just one hundred cent investing one and then you're living off the other. So it's almost doing the same thing, but better because you're building this investment portfolio. [00:09:26] Yeah. Yeah. And like you said, if if my boss came to me today and said you've got a you've got to clean those toilets, I have the option of saying I really decided I didn't want to do that today. [00:09:37] Yeah, that's. We'll get to that in the basic principles of fi. That's what we like to lovingly referred to as F-U money. [00:09:44] F-U money, the toilet principle. And I'm still reeling over you quoting your own term, that thewall Wauchula theWall Financial. Linda Pence's financial independence work optional. [00:09:56] I like Eminem. Yeah. His trademark that themwho coined to fuel this is a new thewall movement. There's some other other variations of FYE that I want to touch on real quick. [00:10:08] And that's fact fire and lehne fire. And essentially these are just the, you know, lean fire is you have enough passive income coming in to cover your basic basic basic living expenses. So you can eat. You can. You could. Your mortgage, but you're not living the life you want to. It's not like you're going oh, it's not like you're traveling. You're not living the life even that you're living. Right now, you would have to make some significant cutbacks. But you wouldn't make it right. So that's lean fire. That fire is kind of the opposite. That where it's, you know, you have more than enough to do it. You know, I wouldn't say extravagantly, but you can travel. You can, you know, live above your means that you're even doing now. I'm completely on your passive income. So I moved in last year living large. Right. So I thought fire. [00:10:53] Fire. I like it. That's that's the way to be. Get enough of that passive income. And there's not really much you you don't necessarily have to live large way. You could if the if the mood struck you. [00:11:05] Yeah. Exactly. There's a kid. You can take trips or travel or you know, do whatever you wherever you may be. But you're not you're not living like pinching pennies. [00:11:14] Right. [00:11:14] So these are as you see with the pictures of the Lamborghinis and the private jets out there, they're definitely fat firing that straight away. [00:11:21] And it's straight wealth, man. That's that's wealthy for sure. But yeah. [00:11:26] So we actually move on or you want to dove in and anything else on those, you know, the FatFighters, when I think I think a lot of people are trying to get to the lean fire is when you first achieve financial independence, you have lean fire. [00:11:40] You don't necessarily have to retire. But you can. And just get by. But like you said, that fat fires, what dual income that I'm working towards right now is. [00:11:50] Yeah. Yes. But I'll give you a I guess I'll give you an example right now. So, you know, if you're somebody who on a regular day to day basis is living off about, say, let's say six grand a month and you take a look at all your expenses and you realize you can cut out, you know, you can cut your grocery bill, you cut gas down if you know, if you had to. [00:12:08] And then you could you could live at, say, forty two hundred bucks a month. Your lean fire would be forty two hundred bucks a month. I mean, you could live. You could pay your bills. You wouldn't be you know, you wouldn't be going hungry, yoga, losing your house or going bankrupt. [00:12:20] So it's very nice in that same example. You know, let's say 10 grand a month. Is that advice? You know, it's well, but beyond that, you know, that six grand that you're accustomed to, you can splurge a little bit on travel alert. You know, what have you per month and you're good to go there. [00:12:37] And the fat fire, my goal, just so everybody knows, is that taken that month or two off and just just traveling for an entire couple months, you know, that's serious. [00:12:47] Well, my hope is that fires. [00:12:50] But we got to go. We've got to get a handful of these people. Oh, there's so many people that take these many retirements that I've listened to where, you know, that worked for three or five years. [00:12:59] And they'll take six months out because they can because it built this this this machine. And that is their portfolio that can that can, you know, sustain them for more than six months. [00:13:11] But they'll just do that as a mini retirement so they don't wait until they're, you know, fifty or fifty five years old. And you only need to wait till you're fully, you know, that fire. You can just do it. If you have a if you union fire and you have a little bit of an essay that you're comfortable with it, you take them in your retirement and MBNA. [00:13:27] Yeah. And one of the terms and I think it was Jack Bosch on his episode said, was that forever cash? You know, it's an excellent concept. I love that forever cash flow out, you know. So you want to jump into the history and file. But where did the word that term get coined? [00:13:45] Yeah. And we weren't willing to spend too much time here, man. But it did start better. It is known to have started right around in the mid 80s by a couple, Vicki, Robin and Joe Domínguez. They wrote a book. [00:13:57] They wrote a book, not a bike, pirates' and bikes, but they wrote a book called Your Money Your Life. And the core concepts of this book is that most people go through life unknowingly trading their time for money. So essentially, you guys, everybody, most of the people here, they show up at a job every day and you spend eight, nine, 10 hours at that job and you're essentially trading now or you realize for certain things in your life. Basically, it's a trade off, right? [00:14:24] Yeah. Yeah. And that's I mean, a lot of people when they and this is how I run my finances, you actually think to yourself when when you're looking to splurge on something or you're trying to decide whether something is in need or want. [00:14:38] I generally calculate how much time I would have to spend to make the money to pay for that. [00:14:45] So which is it? That's a great thing to do, man, because when you look at it like that, when you kind of put that that on its head as far as well that 400 at our and that's easy. [00:14:54] I can I can handle that. I can make those payments. But when you kind of put that on its head and say, well, how many hours your life are you trading for that hour payment, well, then it kind of becomes real. There's a little bit more personal. And I wrote an example here and see if I can get it straight. This is a week or so ago. But so if you think about that 400 car payment, which is not I mean, that's pretty average for people these days, I'd say maybe that's even a little bit on the low end. But 400 bucks a month is your car. If been making bread around the national average of $50000 a year, you know, after taxes, you always gotta come. You know, factory taxes, because when you think about it, you make 50 grand a year. Sure. But you are paying in taxes and all that money. And then when you are buying something like this car, you're also paying taxes on it. So how much you truly walking away with? So let's say after taxes, you are going to forty three hundred bucks a year. So a 40 hour work week say that you work out of 40 hour work week, you're averaging 20 bucks an hour or twenty dollars and 70 cents an hour you're walking away with. It would take you 19 hours. Nineteen point three hours a month to trade for that car. So essentially, you think you work Monday, Tuesday and half of Wednesday and the first week of every month. That is your time that you traded for that car. And when you think about it like that, especially when you start thinking about, you know, this mortgage payment of two, three, four, five thousand dollars a month, you're trading how many hours or weeks or days year your life for that essentially every month. And when it adds up, you want to make sure that you're trading your time for things that actually mattered and helps put things in perspective a little bit. [00:16:29] It does. It does. In one of the things I kind of throw a little bit of a subjective part of that as well. You know, I look at it like, do I buy a car that gives me nineteen point three, two hours worth of enjoyment for that? [00:16:43] Because it's it's a input output kind of thing. So I'm putting my nineteen point three, two hours. But if I get 50 hours worth of enjoyment on my will, say like a Corbat or whatever I decided to buy, it becomes worth it. But if if you're buying, you know, I don't know what kind of little tiny, you know, card doesn't go very fast and you get maybe an hour and a half of enjoyment. And it's just for getting you back and forth to work. Then, you know, it might not be a tradeoff, but you definitely do need a car. [00:17:16] So, yeah. But so you bring up a good point that in the whole I think the whole reasoning behind looking at it like this is it's looking at what am I spending money on? And does it truly bring value to be it like I am not a frugal person. So that's why I went at a time when we talk about budgeting, when we talk about debt. Like I see those cars. I'm like, yeah, I want that. So, like, I have to look at that and say, does that. Is that worth trading my time for it? And some of it does splurging on those nice things. It's worth it to me. And some of it isn't. And that's that's why looking at it and taking a true look at your expenses and you're spending. I was able to cut a bunch of expenses just by, you know, in hindsight thinking of how much value I got out of those expenses and shift those into the things that I actually got value. I think that's the power I find that really makes you look at where's your money going and does it align with your values and what you find beneficial and you like you enjoy, you know, getting time and spending time on those things that you spend your money on. [00:18:17] And I think this is a good time for the credit score. KING To jump on a different side note, you know that that example you had would cost you nineteen point three, two hours a month. [00:18:28] Imagine if you had like a four hundred credit score that could number could easily jump to 30 hours or 30 hours a month and you're paying more for your credit. So, you know, the higher your credit score, the lower the amount of hours that you have to cover purchases. So, yeah. [00:18:46] And you know what I like about the credit score. And you know that I don't like the credit score very much. But I do like the credit score. [00:18:52] The fact that you can you can maintain and you can you can get a good credit score without spending a lot of money. Like I always feel people and you know, you've heard my complaints about the credit score that I don't think it's a very good indication of how financial savvy you charge because you're able to borrow a bunch of money and pay it back. And that doesn't mean you're good with your money, but you can do it without spending money. And you can you can build that up without going and racking it into debt. Like like we talked about, you can get a credit card and you can put your you know, if you're smart about it, you can just put your next year and your money that you would have spent anyways on that card to get those points into build up that credit and not go into more debt than you weren't expecting to. Yeah. [00:19:35] And that's definitely another benefit. So but it looks like you have listed a few few different resources to help people deal with FI. I mean, the first one you've got listed here is the Mr. Money Mustache Blog 2011 net. Yeah. Yeah. [00:19:51] So we went we went a little off track of the history. You know, it started with Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez with that book, Your Money, Your Life. And then it really exploded. 2011/2012 with with the blog that you you mentioned, Mr. Money Mustache. It's a lot of people's kind of first foray into, you know, financial independence or what it might actually mean to, you know, go this unconventional route and be able to retire early. So there's an article that was one of his most famous one that's called The Shockingly Simple Math Behind Early Retirement, which we linked to here and we can link to in the show notes. It breaks down in a unbelievably easy way to understand how you can retire at 30, at 35, at 40 if you truly want to. It kind of breaks down that it is just a numbers game and makes it super easy for people to comprehend. [00:20:45] Retirement just. Well, math problem. And yeah, you know, math and realize it tells you exactly what you need how to get there. [00:20:53] And once you get there, the numbers work out. It's it's glorious. People lie. [00:20:58] Numbers don't lie. [00:21:01] That's how it goes. So, yeah. [00:21:03] If you guys haven't heard Mr. Money Mustache, you know, he bragged he was one of the really the pioneers of bringing, you know, the financial independence, financial freedom fighter or whatever the heck you want to call it to a little bit more of a mainstream with his blog. And then there's a handful of other ones that choose F choose F, I guess, which is phenomenal podcasts. They also got a book I A Blueprint to Financial Independence. Remember correctly. And then the bigger pockets, money, podcasts. All of these are really the core players in the financial independence education sector. I would say, you know, out there and have done a ton of bringing all these principles and these concepts to the mainstream. [00:21:44] Yeah. And the nice thing about all these blogs and podcasts is they basically put a put a term and a face on what I was already doing. [00:21:54] It took me 15 years to get to the point where I was financially secure and and had my credit score and everything fixed. And I started listening to these guys. I'm like, you know, why are you do that? And I didn't realize there was a rule to cover it. [00:22:08] This is what, you know, you'll be even before where obviously this guy really popular in 2011, 2012 started to take off. You know, obviously there are people doing it and practicing this. But I think what you know, what that goes to say is there are still ways that you can even improve even further. There's not a lot of these are just minor, minor tweaks that over the long run really, really, really make a difference to these different like tax strategies that these different savings tactics and things like air investment strategies that really they seem I knew in the in the in the real time here, but, you know, expand that over a five or seven or eight year investing term. And the numbers show how much of a difference this can make. And it is really tactical ways about going about your finances. [00:22:59] And once you start getting getting a handle on everything, it generally falls into place. You have to you have to get this stuff set the the basics before you can run, you know, when and where you can run. [00:23:12] Yeah, 100 percent. [00:23:13] And there is there's almost these different levels of as you kind of dove down into the financial independence rabbit hole, there's these different levels of, I guess, educate educators and a levels of education. So if you think about, you know, Dave Ramsey is one that I know a lot of people mention in is a is one that I started out with. You know, I started out listening to it. You know, it kind of led me to the next one, the next one to the next one. And Dave Ramsey, you'll see a lot of people in the financial independence community, starting with Dave Ramsey. He's got super good principles. He teaches a lot of the basic money concepts. But when you look at it, some of it is just too black-And-White. Like he's got this like, you know, you hate debt. Right. Like, he just absolutely can can't stand debt and says you shouldn't buy real estate unless unless you can buy a cash, which I mean, and leverage is one of the amazing tools of real estate and amazing tools and investments if done right. So I think you'll find people start with like the Dave Ramsey or some of the other basics and then graduate once they learn those. They kind of. They graduate to some other concepts of different educators and the financial independence world. [00:24:25] Now, I see Dave Ramsey as being the person that gives you a healthy respect for the power that the negative aspects of debt. And then once you learn to have a healthy respect for debt and you use it wisely, then a debt can be a huge tool in your tool belt. [00:24:41] Yeah. And let's be honest, like you think about like you listen to the Dave Ramsey podcast and you listen to the people that call in. You know, he's got these millionaires that call in and it'll work. [00:24:51] If you want to. And believe me, I was on this train at first. You know, when I when I started listening to this and when I started getting into this movement, you know, worked twenty five years and spend your super frugal and don't spend a lot of money and save as much as you can into mutual funds. And in twenty five years, you'll be a millionaire. [00:25:09] That will work. One hundred percent that will work. The problem is, I don't want to do it in twenty five years. I don't want to do it in like five years. So there are others tactics and other strategies for it. You know, those goals. So it all comes back to that. So it's a it's a good start. But then I think people kind of graduate from there. [00:25:27] Yeah. Twenty five years is a very long time to get to be a millionaire. Bye bye. Yeah. Scrimping and saving pennies and things. [00:25:35] Yeah. And it's like I don't want to pinch pennies or twenty five years. [00:25:38] I just want to do the same page with that, Mike. You know, it's a lot of things I don't want to work for sixty five years. For ten years of fun before. That it has a way. [00:25:48] So that's why we're here trying to help as many people as we can to get that. Get the heck. Yeah. 25 year millionaire do it. [00:25:56] I mean, there's studies. I mean, obviously. So a lot of the financial independence blogs, podcasts, things like that. It all depends on your savings rate, which we'll talk about in a little bit here. But there are case studies, people doing it in two or three years as case studies of people doing it in nine or 10 years. I think on average, people can get to this five point anywhere from five to 10 years, depending on how much you make, depending on your savings rate and really depending on how crazy are about it. You know, some people don't mind being super, super frugal and cutting back down to the bare bone and saving, you know, 60 percent, 70 percent or 80 percent of income. Other people, you know, totally cool will do 20, 30 percent and just add a couple years under, you know, the time it take you to get there. And either approach is fine. It's just kind of what fits you type thing. [00:26:43] I tell everybody, you took me forty nine years to get to financial independence. It was forty seven years of trial and error. And I wasn't doing that correctly. [00:26:53] Yeah. [00:26:53] And so if you can take that and if you can use some of that education that's out there, you know, just so much education out there, you might go to cut down that learning curve more. [00:27:04] Yeah. I'm hoping to condense my forty seven years of trial and error and help these folks in in listening to the podcast do it in a couple years, so. [00:27:12] Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Man, you. Yeah. I can't even tell you how many resources are out there, podcasts and books. And, you know, obviously that's that can be an issue, too, because it's almost overwhelming how much stuff is out there. [00:27:25] And it's just it's like it's just like the health industry and some of the stuff contradict each other. Some of the you know, this this guru says X and Scooter says Y. And there's really no easy way to navigate that other than you've got a headache. Go out there and explore and take what works for you and discard the rest and keep keep going and figure out what works for you. [00:27:45] So, you know, and you guys are all listening to my favorite podcast resource. So keep that up with that. [00:27:54] The real estate marathon is my favorite resource. That's right. It's a dad joke. So a lot of people miss him. [00:28:05] So you can jump into the basic five principles and rules of thumb. [00:28:09] Yeah. Let's do it. [00:28:10] So the 4 percent rule, the 4 percent rule is essentially you need a hammer. So essentially you 4 percent of your nest egg you can live on essentially forever. So if you have a million dollars, you take out 4 percent of that. That's what, $40000. Right. So you could essentially take out four percent of that million dollars. And there is a 97 percent chance, likelihood that that principle will last or that that nest egg will last forever. It's based on what the called the Trinity studies, which is this massive study of basically of what you can take out and with based on the returns in the whole other factors, the likelihood of it lasting forever, essentially. You never having it touch that principle. So based on that, the four percent rule, it's kind of been this rule of thumb being, you know, once you reach that's that 4 percent rule, you're essentially for. So my expenses are $40000 a year or, you know, adjusted for taxes. Then you're a little over a million dollars nest egg. If I'm doing stocks or bonds or whatever that it's that stock portfolio, then that would be your number. [00:29:22] Yeah. And as everybody knows, it's one of the one of the fears of people that they're they're going to outlive their money. And that's not a good retirement. If you end up having enough money to cover five years and you live, you know, twenty five years of retirement, you're you're broke in five years. Then what do you do? [00:29:40] Yeah. Right. Yep. The other way to do it is just take your expenses that you need. So if you need $40000 a year to live. Times it by twenty five. It's the same thing, but it's just like anything. It's a rule of thumb. So it does not. You know, there are there are more conservative folks out there who might who would say it's probably more like three and a half percent and would also say that it largely depends on what happens in the market. The first handful of years, if you were Tirina, because you you know, if you're a tired day one and you start drying on your portfolio in the market immediately takes a dove, say 20 percent, I don't know. Like it just didn't stop 25 percent, then that way you can't take that 4 percent off that original balance. You have to then adjust for what the principle is. Sorry. What's your your total portfolio is and take 4 percent off that new. Right. Right. So in sequence return risk essentially is what they refer to. That is what it is a good rule of thumb, at least while you're traveling on the road to fi and as you're trying to. The goal to shoot for is that 4 percent rule. [00:30:49] Yep, yep. And then the next thing you've got there is the savings rate. Now, that's the amount of savings that you need to retire. Financial independence, is that what that means? [00:31:00] No, it's it's essentially. What percentage of your income are you saving today? So if you're making said one hundred thousand dollars a year and you're saving ten thousand dollars a year, whether it be to invest in stocks or to invest in real estate, you know, your savings rate is 10 percent. [00:31:17] We've talked on the show a few times where we think, you know, in normal in a society, you hear about somebody saving 10 percent of their income and they get that boy. [00:31:26] And everybody is super pumped in the firewall world. You know, it's more like 40 or 50 percent. It is usually the average. People are saving upwards of 40, 50, 60, sometimes 70, 80 percent of their income just in investing that tire on it that they're saving and then just living on that 10 or 20 or 30 percent of their income. You know, that's a little bit extreme depending on how much money you make. But I think 50 percent is kind of that that nice balance, at least in my my perspective. [00:31:55] To get to from a savings rate on the savings rate, like you said, if you can save 50 percent. [00:32:00] That's where for me personally with the portfolio, that's where my portfolio comes in because I make as much in my portfolios as my wife and I do working full time. So we we live off of our full time income and then basically save 50 percent of our income, which is the portfolio income. We put that right in the savings. So that's going to help effectively get us to being millionaire status a lot sooner. [00:32:25] So you're essentially saving a 100 percent and you're able to 100 percent of your working income. You were able to save because of that, because of that rental income that you had coming in. [00:32:36] Yeah. And then once we get to a level where we can invest even more into another expanding their portfolio, another duplex or try to flekser multifamily, then that just keeps increasing the amount. So at some point we're going to be saving 200 percent of our of our income. [00:32:54] Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And definitely powerful, powerful, powerful thing. [00:32:59] Now, what's this next item on their mind? Inefficiencies in taxes, spending and investments wasn't necessarily like a rule of thumb. [00:33:07] This is more of a kind of a general guiding principle. [00:33:10] You know, when you get into it, like I said with earlier, with the Dave Ramsey is the world has got really super good basic basic financial literacy. Right. That's the foundation. And then financial the five principles, the fire principles typically are a level up from that. [00:33:29] And they they a lot of times all kinds of shit like that on those minor, minor efficiency's that really make a big difference in the end. A lot of my around taxes. [00:33:39] So how can you max out your tax tax deferred savings, things like your phone fallen case, things like HSA or MAX, maximize tax benefits, do things like real estate. [00:33:51] And then on the I guess on the withdrawal, you know, maximizing your tax burden by doing things like Rothenberg's and Ladders. You make it backdoor Roth contributions and things like that. [00:34:03] Now, these are kind of more advanced financial principles that you can look into and get details on, but it really comes down to expanding or making those those improvements on the margins. So, you know, you got your basics and then fight typically goes above and beyond. And it makes those minor adjustments, like you said, seem minor, but make a huge difference in the this category. [00:34:28] Here is it reminds me of the saying that somebody I heard a long time ago and I don't remember where I heard it's from. [00:34:34] Are we going to I'm probably gonna busher. It might have been Robert Kiyosaki and rich dad. Poor dad. But he said it's not about how much money you make, it's about how much money you keep. Yeah, and that actually plays right into the efficiency's in tax. And his taxes and spending because you you actually if you can reduce your spending and reduce your tax burden, you're going to be able to keep more of your money regardless of how much money you make. You can use that to get to be millionaire status or even, you know, even if you're just shooting for fi doesn't necessarily have to be millionaire status. But you know that personally is what I'm shooting for. [00:35:08] Yeah. I mean, when you eat it makes it so, so worth it to dove into this and figure out how you can how you can truly make get the most bang for your buck. You know, somebody wants that. And again, it's kind of the same thing you just said as a quote there somewhere. I can't remember who said as I apologize, I'm not giving credit. [00:35:25] But there's one line in the tax code that says you have to pay taxes on all your income. And then there's like thirty thousand lines in the tax code that gives you loopholes to not pay taxes on your income. So, you know, you say what you will about the wealth, the avoiding taxes, but they use the tax code to their benefit. [00:35:43] You know, if you could do the same. Should so figure out where you can save or where you can reduce your tax burden. Get yourself educated so you can you can get your goals a lot faster and keep more of your money that you make. [00:35:57] Yeah. Yeah, that's and that's actually a very powerful thing. Thirty thousand versus 1. So. Yeah, and how but when. [00:36:03] And that's only one thing that says you got to pay out pay taxes. [00:36:07] Every other line in the tax code is loopholes on how to not pay taxes. So why the heck once you take advantage of that as a real estate man, as you and I know the tax the tax benefits from owning real estate. Q Huge, huge. You know, there's there's doctors and lawyers who dumped some money into real estate, you know, not even caring about the performance just because it can completely simply wipe out a lot of their tax liability and all the income limit. [00:36:33] So, yeah. And if you it's hard to tax season, you're now investing in real estate, right? [00:36:40] Yeah. I don't look forward to tax season because of the paperwork, but I do. I'm with you. [00:36:44] I'm a numbers guy. I'll sit there all day and add my wealth. [00:36:48] That's probably a whole another whole topic around. Don't wait until last minute to do your tax paperwork, your expenses for your business and stuff like like I sometimes might have said that 48 hour I called the 48 hour tax marathon that you don't really know of. [00:37:05] All right. Now, I'm curious, this one I I've heard the term before, but I've never really delved too far into it. What exactly are you meaning by stealth wealth, stealth wealth, mail. [00:37:16] This is a millionaire next door and this is it. This is those people who can essentially buy your Tesla with cash if they wanted to. But don't they choose? Not that they choose to drive a five or six year old Camry or Kearl or whatever, you know, whatever your car choices. But the point is, is that they could spend a ton of money. And they're very, very wealthy, but they don't because they spend money on what they value and because they they've been able to get their wealth by not spending things on flashy things that don't make sense. So the stealth wealth community is one that that is they're they're interesting bunch, but essentially they're bunch of millionaires. You don't look like millionaires. They look like your average person who looks like your average working class person. [00:38:00] So these are the folks that you see every now and then. [00:38:03] You read an article about it where people say they were surprised that they were able to leave a 10 million dollar endowment fund to their college. Right. You know, they passed away. They left all this money and everybody's like they were just normal people. They cut coupons and they did, you know, they did whatever they had to do. And nobody knew that they were millionaires. [00:38:22] Yeah. Yep, exactly. And I got to I mean, I got a I won't say I'm might with this camp, like I completely understand and respect the selfless community in a. Who's the guy who is a millionaire next door. Can't remember the name of that book. Yeah. Cameron. It's because I'm. I know I like my Teslas. I like my flashy stuff. But no, it's it's totally it's definitely a movement out there in a community out there that is very proud of what they do and the more power to them. [00:38:53] And I clearly like my camper and my Corvette that I'm looking to try and have fun. Let me buy. [00:39:00] Yeah, but it's the spending money on what makes it what makes you happy. It will make sense for you. [00:39:05] Yeah. Well, and I was telling somebody that I'm trying to talk my way for. [00:39:09] No, let me get a Corvette. Nice. We were playing a chess game of this, trying to get this Corvette out of the dealership and you'd be surprised if you start beating your wife in a chess game of getting the Corvette dealership, how quickly it turns into hardball playing hardball. [00:39:25] So it was a firm. No, after that. So what you got to do, man, you just need to buy a pickup, one more property and half your tenants pay for your Corvette. One of the that thing and like five, six, seven hundred bucks a month, all you gotta do is find a couple of properties, a cash flow that ammo and go right there. [00:39:42] I actually already I already started with that argument, had the properties all picked out and everything so nice to the network. But that's that my friend is is that is a principle. [00:39:55] It wasn't a key Sakhi thing was that we're okay. So essentially have your your assets paid for your liabilities. Huge. Huge. Basic principle of investing. Right. So if you base if you want that Corvette, don't go work your 9 to 5 and use your your after tax dollars to buy that Corvette. And B car poor essentially. Right. Go buy an asset that pays you that amount of money and then that funds your fund, that buys your Corvette. You know what happens when that Corvette is paid off in five years? Your assets still paying you money and you still have that. [00:40:33] So you go from having a Corvette bought for you to get in the race. Exactly. Or something else. Gomez, I got something else in mind. Let's say your assets paid for your liabilities when I had never. Have a lack of imagination. So I think of it. You. And the next term, they're the next principal, the F-U money. It's my fast favorite f you money, financial university money. [00:41:00] That's why they say using your son. No, we won't. Because we we check that little box that says we're, you know, a clean, family friendly episode for our right as listeners. We want one explain this one too much and do so. But this is kind of the point before Lehne Fi that you have if enough money where if that boss comes in and says, look, you scrubbing toilets for the next six months because a sorry, that doesn't work for me. What a it changes the game. It changes the perspective that you can. [00:41:28] You're in a position of power. [00:41:29] You know, there's so many people who have written about this and about how they've enabled to, you know, after they got into this step, may have had the courage to go negotiate with their employer for a better work life balance or for more money for a better position, because just worried about where the employer says yesterday. Because you have that money that you can say, well, you know, that doesn't work for me. I respectfully decline and see you later because you have that money, whether it's six to eight to nine months expenses or, you know, the exact dollar amount is all personal. But it's whatever that that amount of money that you feel comfortable living off of for space with, you don't have a job. [00:42:07] Yeah. I call this the forget your money because you get you and your money. Because when I leave work, I'm going to forget all about you because I can afford to live a mile. [00:42:18] This is the type of money in the situations that we are in right now. [00:42:22] Like I said, we're recording this March, April 20, when you get this little thing called COBRA 19 going on right now. And it's causing a lot of anxiety with people like we've talked about before, a lot of people don't have that for on their books that that stat that they say, you know, most Americans can't take a $400 expense without diving into credit or, you know, dip in it, you know, borrowing the money. What happens right now when hundreds and hundreds of millions of people are getting laid off from their job are now uncertain? You know, this isn't necessarily the F you money, but that same type of money that concept comes in where, you know, if you lose your job, can you survive for six, eight months with expenses? You have that rainy day fund built up. And I think, you know, I hope, you know, people who don't use this as an opportunity to realize how important it is and how much much stress that could take off. Yeah. [00:43:16] Yeah. And it's times like this when I'm I'm glad we're able to save one hundred percent of our income through the portfolio, because that's just. Money will fall back on. So I can sit here and talk to you with the podcast without worrying. Yeah. [00:43:32] Yeah. It's. That's that's a rare situation to be in. [00:43:36] And I found I think it's a it's it's a good one man and I think this hopefully will well implore people to start looking at their finances and start looking at some alternative options, you know, saving the 10 percent. We'll get you there in 30 years, probably. [00:43:52] But, you know, you really got to make some more aggressive moves in order to to get there any sooner. Really? To to put yourself in a better spot. [00:44:01] Yeah. Well, next is the burning question that I have for you, Mike. How do you cheat, achieve my financial independence? How do you go about doing that? [00:44:10] Well, this is kind of a loaded question, because it's it's it's a little tongue in cheek because it's kind of like, how do you be successful? There's a, I don't know, a million different ways that you could you could chuck an answer out for that. There's probably gonna be new ways invented every day and height, yet there is kind of the same thing as five, but the basics of fi are the same, which I think we've covered a couple times on this on this show in various episodes. Here's what you spend, you know, whatever you spend, and then here's what you make, whatever you makes it take, whatever you make, minus what you spend. And the point is, Tate, that needs to be as big as a number as possible and wisely invest the difference. So if I make $5000 a month and I spend $3000 a month, I get two thousand dollars surplus that I can invest in wisely with over a long period of time. The point is, the fastest way to achieve high is widening that gap, lowering those expenses, increasing that income, whichever you want to focus on, both want to focus on one either way, widening that gap and then wisely investing that difference over time consistently. So maybe you get A's and you go up to seven grand a month and maybe cut your expenses back a little bit more. But on twenty five months, it's just widening that gap and being smart with the difference. [00:45:31] Yeah. And it's it's not rocket science. It's just a math problem. Yeah. You want to get there? The solution would be the biggest number you can and it's a subtraction problem. [00:45:41] So you want the left side of it to be as big as possible. And the. Right side of it to be as little as possible. [00:45:47] Yeah. And you know, it's comes down to it's not not sexy. There's a thousand different ways to do it. I mean, you could literally do that and just throw it in stocks that, you know, index funds, whatever you may. [00:45:57] And you'll get there, you know, in the past. And the more you save the bad, you'll get there. You could put it in real estate and you can, in some people's opinion, get there faster. Like like what we think. But it's just making that that gap as big as possible and then investing in that that the difference. Wisely and then taking advantage of the margins or taking advantage of your tax. [00:46:18] You're you're more strategic tax. Either ways to go about reducing your tax burden in reducing your fees on your at your best friend strategy and things like that. It's a bunch of different ways that you can you can kind of optimize at the margins, as I say, with with some of those more those higher rate, not higher those more advanced strategies. [00:46:43] Yeah. Your your tax strategy planning is something that you really need to look at probably before you need it. [00:46:53] I mean, you should start planning way early because if you get to tax season and you think to yourself, I could've used another three or four, ten thousand dollars and deductions all, it's too late at that point because every first or last years when you should have been planning that unless you're a corporation, then you may have may go a different calendar year. [00:47:14] But for the most part, for you privately, the thirty first of December is the last time we get a chance to do it short of maybe investing in an I.R.A. and that's a.. [00:47:24] And even if you do it, it you know, even if you do it at the very end of the year, there's so much there's not as much as you can do. [00:47:30] You want it like going to you with a really good tax strategists who will say, you know, throughout the year hear the different things, they should do it. Here's the investments you should do to reduce your tax burden. I guess taxes, I think there's a really daunting, early, intimidated people. And I know that I felt that same way when I started looking into it. But really, it's really amazing how you can use some of these strategies to reduce the taxes that you pay to you in the end. [00:47:56] In the end of this, you know, especially some of these tax advantaged accounts that you can invest through. It's just it's really remarkable once you start diving into it. [00:48:05] So as it is and I know investors that use their their portfolios to pay for every aspect of their life and a lot of it legally can be written off. You know, it's just the tax the tax advantages, real estate are just limitless. [00:48:24] Yeah. [00:48:24] And even if, you know, in real estate, you still want to be smart about your taxes and you still want to figure out, you know, what can you invest in that reduces your taxable income? What are different ways that you reduce your taxable income? So you're you're keeping most your money now. [00:48:39] Now, if I want to learn more than then, just as a podcast, what do you think we should do? I notice you got a list of some books here. [00:48:48] Do it. Yeah. And there is no shortage of them. And I I didn't even know. [00:48:52] I almost didn't want to make the list because I mean, you're inevitably going to leave some of the big hitters and the key ones off. But I think it give us it makes sense to to the people at least some place to start if they want to dig in more. So, I mean, we've got a bunch on the list now. We've got Rich Dad poured out of it by Robert Kiyosaki, which I think is I mean, bar none. It is one of the biggest ones that always gets brought up. When you talk to people about, you know, what changed your mind would change your life, your financial trajectory. [00:49:21] And a lot of people refer back to the rich dad for that book from Robert Kiyosaki. [00:49:25] And that changed my life when I read it, because it makes you look at a different way, your finances. What exactly an asset is. [00:49:34] He's defines assets a lot differently than we've been taught through school and through our parents. And it's definitely worth a read. And I've noticed like I bought twenty five thirty copies of Rich and Poor that they were they were on sale going on and I'll hand it out to people one. And the funny thing is I say it either resonates with you and you go and buy every one of his books and read read voraciously or you just don't get. You just don't like it or doesn't. Does that strike a chord with you? So, I mean, it's it's 50 50. You know, you can either be something that's going to change your life or you just go, what's the what's the all the hype about? [00:50:13] And I think more often than not, people are all right. It's definitely on the former of those two because it's time and, you know, it's time tested. It's one of the most popular personal finance books ever written. When was it written? Early 90s. Maybe it's been off for lying is a long time and it's always been at the top of the list for personal finance. So it's definitely a time tested bestseller for sure. And then, you know, I'm going to skip around a little bit. Maybe a little maybe a little bit of a out there statement, but I think the rich and poor that of our generation is the book by Scott Trenchcoats set for your set for life. [00:50:55] And this is one tenth of what you mentioned on buying 30 copies and given it out. I think this people need to buy these for any graduating senior from high school. Anybody graduate college? Any any young adult could benefit massively by the principles that are taught in this book. Set for life by a trash. [00:51:17] Yeah, yeah, definitely. You know, your money or your life. Vicki, Robin and Joe, you you basically touched on that and started the fire more. [00:51:26] My back in the 90s are back in the 80s, actually. So that was that was pre, you know, the kind of computer stuff we got going on now. Pre technology, man. No, everybody checks and everything back then. [00:51:41] Yeah. Back in the ghetto there's the good old days. [00:51:43] The good old days. You know we were riding around in horse and buggy easier, you know, the wagon trains. [00:51:51] But you know and J.L. Collins with the simple path to wealth. And one of my personal favorites is The Honeybee by Jake Stand's Piano and Geno Barbaro. We yeah. Podcast episode with those guys on that. And it just touched on basically how to create the multiple streams of income, which is so powerful in the world today. [00:52:13] Yeah. You know, I love this one because it breaks down these principles in such the easy way, easy to understand way. So it's that's the honeybee. Baiji extends the unknown. You know, Barbara, we didn't like you said, we didn't interview with a handful of episodes back. Memorable what episode number that was. Twenty, twenty, episode 20. About creating multiple streams of income. Yeah. Easy, easy. Read another one that should definitely be handed out set to anybody who is interested in learning more about this. Definitely be a life changer. So yeah. [00:52:45] And then we've got some some blogs and some podcasts. [00:52:49] Yeah. Yeah. We'll just run down the list is what is we're getting kind along here. But from a podcast perspective, you know, choose f I mean those guys do a phenomenal job of going over. [00:53:00] I mean they're on a couple hundred episodes now, but you can go back all the way to the beginnings and listen to a lot of the basics around financial independence and kind of follow along with their journey. Mad faintest. This guy is, if you like, numbers. This is the dude to talk to. Here he writes some of these articles. It's a little bit harder to follow. I would say. But it is numbers, numbers, numbers. He is a guy who's reading these thirty thousand lines, the tax code, figuring out how to best take advantage of it. And it gives these case studies of how he's done a lot of the things he's talked about. So Mad Scientist is a good podcast and blog to talk about as well. Bigger pockets, money, I guess, is another good one. And then Dave Ramsey, MINIFY podcast. It's got a lot of really, really good basic financial literacy. [00:53:47] Yeah. You know, I started reading the tax code, too. I think I'm on line five or seven, something like that. You get a little bit of it. Yeah. Well we take it in fits and spurts. So they go on the blogs. Mr. Money Mustache. [00:54:05] I follow his blog, The Financial Samurai. Those. Yeah. Yeah. That's a great one. I love that one. And the physician on fire. That's. Yup. You know, they're all great blogs. They give you a ton of information. So you should check those out. [00:54:20] And this is just a starting point. Like I said, it was I was debating on whether or not we'd make a list here because, you know, this so many people in the space right now. [00:54:27] So many people in this area that inevitably leave some of the really, really good ones out. But, you know, you're linked to you jump from one to the other to the other to the other other end by timing. I mean, we are one that you've never heard of before. But Scott, you know, they all got good information out there now. [00:54:45] Yeah. And the last thing we got there is our Wi-Fi. Mike, that's what motivates you and I. [00:54:53] Yeah. I think this is important. [00:54:55] Not necessarily that anybody cares about our Wi-Fi, but it's important to have Wi-Fi in it. It's kind of fun to say, but like, why do you want financial independence? Why do you want freedom? What do you do in it for a nine? If you if you have that, then these some of these concepts, these things that you had to sacrifice, because let's be honest, it be a lot easier. Just go rack up credit card debt and go, you know, go, you know, live the life you want. Go travel and go party and buy the fancy cars when you can't afford it versus waiting, you know, a handful years till you can. But see, if you're making similar sacrifices now, it's it's easier to do so if you have a Y. [00:55:38] Yeah. Yeah. And like you said, there are options and freedom. That's one of the big ones. [00:55:44] Seems to be a running theme options, man. It's literally all about options, like when his options ever been a bad thing. [00:55:52] Never. Never. [00:55:53] You know, it's, you know, no idea what's what's going to happen in five to seven or eight years or even two years. So like you options and you can kind of control more of it. [00:56:04] I do know one instance where option too many options are a bad thing. Let's hear it. Starbucks. I mean, I love Starbucks, but come on. You know that. Let's go back to decaf and regular. [00:56:17] No, man, I like my fancy coffee mcare. But coffee, though, you know, being from Minnesota. That's kind of my my my thing there. But you know, Amanda. Yeah. We posted a while back on Instagram. [00:56:30] And we're like, what's your Wi-Fi? And, you know, I originally because it was what I was doing at the time, as you know, because books and a/c and the deck was, you know, shouldn't just be for Saturday ability to do that. You know, any day that week. Right. Is we want to spend more time with you. You know, the people in you know, the things that you love to do. So, yeah, you know, I never was. [00:56:52] Well, I mean, that's that short of doing the call to action. You know, I got the cool down. [00:56:58] You want to do kind of a quick recap and I do. [00:57:03] Let's see if we can if we can recap this. We covered a lot. I think we're we're a little over an hour, you know, some outlets yourself. [00:57:09] Arsalan, final good byes today. I literally cannot wrap it up with my options. Options are good. [00:57:21] Let's call that action that way. Issue we get the Wi-Fi like figure out what's your Wi-Fi has made sure that. [00:57:26] Yeah, it's well understood and well documented. Why you're traveling down this path. That is a little bit unconventional. It might might be a little bit more difficult in your in your daily life than your average life. [00:57:41] And I think you should write it down and put it like on your bathroom mirror or some place you're gonna see it every single day. And remind yourself what you're working so hard. [00:57:48] George, techie Asian apps to keep that front center. Now, so while that's everything I got, all I got in my moments, I wrap her up. Thank you, guys. We've seen another episode of the Real Estate Marathon podcast and we'll see you next time. Take care, guys. [00:58:07] Thanks for listening to the Real Estate Marathon podcast. If you found value in any of the content from this show, consider supporting us in the following ways. Subscribe to the Real Estate Marathon podcast. Leave a rating and review. Continue the conversation with like minded individuals on social media by heading over to the real estate marathon podcast Facebook Group or follow us on Instagram and Twitter at Real Estate Marathon podcast.

COVID-19 & Catering: Insights from the Pirate Ship

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 29, 2020 20:00

- Matt Mills You care about their family; you care about each other's success and what you're doing. And you never want to. You never want to see anyone suffer, especially from things out of their control. As far as our, personally, with my business, I was telling them the first person and not get paid, it's gonna be me or will be me or is me. So as far as the restaurants go, it's just such a tenuous thing. - Liesel Mertes Hi, this is Liesel with the Handle with Care podcast. Perhaps you are sitting at home listening…because so many of us are sitting at home in this time of COVID-19. Or maybe you are an essential worker, going out into a world of exposure because you still have a job to do. Coronavirus is top of mind for everyone, so we are doing a special miniseries here on Handle with Care. Workplace empathy, truly seeing the whole person and not just the job, has never been more important to as many people as it is now. We are going to be talking to all kinds of people affected by the shutdown, giving you valuable insights and guidance within their stories so you can help those around you. Today, we are talking with Matt Mills of Mills Catering, headquartered in Indianapolis. Matt is a hard worker, a straight shooter, and, as someone who has been fortunate enough to sample his cooking, he is a bang-up chef. And COVID-19 has hit his business, hard. Before we begin, I’d like to thank our sponsors, FullStack PEO, providing benefits and HR support to small businesses and entrepreneurs, and Motivosity, a software solution to brings fun and engagement to your employees. Now, back to Matt and his story… - Liesel Mertes Would you tell me just a little bit about Mills catering? How long you been around? Why you started doing this catering thing? - Matt Mills Sure. While I was an English major. That's why I became a caterer. Absolutely. As what? The creative writing major. So, my father is in the food business, the wholesale Sysco for all my life. I worked at Cisco for a while. I started working there when I was 13 in the maintenance department. When I went to college, dabbled with restaurant stuff a little bit after that, but my first real job cooking, I ran the cafeteria, Sysco in Indianapolis Fed three shifts, didn't go my head from my butt and I loved it, loved the oh, let's see what we can do with this. - Matt Mills It actually prepared me quite well for what I do now because they are basically, they'd give me things. I'd plan a menu on the fly. We'd figured out and realize I know what I was doing, went to culinary school in Rhode Island, came back, worked in some restaurants, was working for a local restaurant in town and did a catering job for them and spent about 20 hours on it and used some of my own stuff and realized that I didn't need a middleman for this. - Matt Mills And it picked up one or two people that were interested in events. And I was like, you know what? Let's give this a shot. Quit my job, started buying equipment and slowly started a business and went from a couple different locations and worked out to cast the old cast across from. - Matt Mills I guess it was we're be-bop pizza was a forty fifty fourth and college worked out of there for a while. Shepherd community who will give a kidney to at any time if they need one has very good to me. And Jay Height is probably one of the best people I know. He. They've been in there instrumental in me staying in business for a while. Had a baby about 15 years ago, so I ran a business 18 years. He's paying taxes legally. - Matt Mills And when Silas was born, I remember having a conversation with my father. Lon is like, we going to get serious about this or what? So, I bought a building right after that. And then. Just started quietly building business in spite of myself. I'm not very good at. social-networking I don't really. We finally got our Facebook page up and running after 10 years. But Zo, in spite of myself, we've just been quietly under under promising and overdelivering and trying to do our best. - Matt Mills And if we don't do our best, we fix it. So. That's good. - Liesel Mertes And just for the human dynamic. Will you tell me a little bit about your wife and son? - Matt Mills My wife is my better three quarters Anastasia. Catherine Anastasia Mills. She is much smarter than I am. She is very talented in law, gardening, music. Just about everything she does, my son is 15 sales smells. He goes to cathedral. He is such a good friend and a good teammate and a great kid. And I couldn't be more blessed like that. And yes, a rousing endorsement on my part about your wife, especially. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. I had, um. I had a friend who well, Sam, we had dinner. He dropped our food for our family. And as I looked at it, they said, oh, that's actually from Matt Mills catering until my dad's. I mean, I know I've been the beneficiary of some of your cooking effect of some of the food that you gave him. So, thank you from my family to yours. That's funny. - Matt Mills Well, as far as my business goes, we. It pretty much has wiped me out for about the next two months. And once we get into wedding season, that's definitely going to get a lot more interesting as people try to life events tend to take a lot of time to plan and tend to be expensive for some of them. So, we got some figuring to do on that. As far as restaurants go in food service in general, pretty much if you got any place right now you you have the owner, all salaried people doing what they can to keep the doors open. - Matt Mills And then I know many places like this where they'll pull temps and try to help offset expenses and help pay any staff, because pretty much servers went away about, what, a week ago. Yeah. And that's a that's a real thing. I don't know why I don't know the end plan on this, but if we can't if we can't adapt, I don't I don't know. I think that's what everyone is doing right now. - Matt Mills Everyone's just kind of seeing what they can do. Changing what they do. Compromising any way they can. We were all families, basically, when you when you look at a restaurant or any kind of business and you want to make sure you take care of your family and it puts an especially owner is in a tough situation and there's really not right answers. But I don't know. Do what you can, I guess. - Liesel Mertes Tell me a little bit more about that. When in the midst of normal times, what is that kind of family or collegial interaction like? - Matt Mills Well, for us, it's kind of like a crew on a pirate ship. We're all there. We're all there because we want to be there. And I would love to say it was a military example, but it's not. We just, you know, we we kind of you work with someone, you form a relationship, you start, you care about them as a person. - Matt Mills You care about their family; you care about each other's success and what you're doing. And you never want to. You never want to see anyone suffer, especially from things out of their control. As far as our, personally, with my business, I was telling them the first person and not get paid, it's gonna be me or will be me or is me. So as far as the restaurants go, it's just such a tenuous thing. - Matt Mills And now I'm losing in the middle May. I've had June stuff either move in some of these things or reschedule and we'll figure that out. But its kind of is what it is. I like I said, I'm trying to figure out the best way to be a steward of the funds we have. Make sure everyone can get paid. Make sure we can kind of be in control of the situation as long as we can. We've even switched what we're doing now, we're doing catering. - Matt Mills So, we run deliveries. We have free delivery. That's what a lot of restaurants have done. They've gone to to carry out pickup or they've changed what they've done all together. They've become commissaries. - Matt Mills I've taken steps to help fortify things. But it's I'm not really concerned about the business. It's not going anywhere. I'll need to die, or the building needs to burn down for me to quit. But I keep my guys and I want to keep their I want to help them help feed their family. So, we're trying to stay busy. That's kind of where we are. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. Tell me about that. Because as I have been talking with and doing communication coaching for executive teams, you know, I realize there's a particular burden of someone at the top who realizes that the decisions that they make have trickle down to all the peoples families who are present in there. - Liesel Mertes How has that felt to you as you're facing the realities of the market and the people who make up your pirate crew? - Matt Mills Pirate crew? Thank you very much. Well. I like the fact that we're still working. It's kind of in our bones and it's what we do. So, it gives us normalcy in that. And if we can feed some people and help some people and feel like we're actually doing something towards it, I think that's a win. So that's kind of. We always run by the. The theory, it's not the philosophy, it's not what happens, it's what happens next. - Matt Mills Like things happen. Now what? So, this was a now what moment where. Now what are we gonna do? Well, we're gonna do this meal kid thing if that doesn't work. I've talked to the guys. I'm like, if they shut it down, maybe we can be at someone's hungry somewhere. I'd rather be cooking even if I don't make a damn dime on it. Cause that's what we do and kind of go crazy if I don't do it for a while. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. You mentioned is keeping you up at night. Tell me a little bit more about the stuff that's keeping you up at night. - Matt Mills I've had a lot of peace about it. My my fears are the unknown. I think that pretty much sits with everyone because there's so many things we don't know right now. I think that. Needs are gonna go. The needs that everyone has now will change as this progresses and as things get more and more restrained. I mean, I'm I'm fortunate or we're fortunate in that as being part of food service. I don't think that we are going to physically close down, but I don't know what happens with grocery stores. - Matt Mills People go into the store. There's just a lot of unknown as far as. It's just interesting because like food banks, I think food banks are struggling to find product right now, even if they have funds because everyone's in the same boat. Everyone wants the shelf stable. They want the the past policies and they want the something you can pull out and feed your kids. So that that keeps me up the business stuff. It's all things. It doesn't matter just the personal cost on this for us as a as a city and everything else. - Matt Mills That's what that's what worries me. It's all right. - Liesel Mertes I mean, I've I've had a growing sense of just the long tail on this. And they're the relational cost then as people are just dealing with all of that, the stress of work, insecurity or people being laid off, you know, how that how that comes out and different behaviors and. Yeah. Like, you know, our alcohol sales are through the roof right now and not that that's inherently bad thing. But, you know, I'm going to be having an interview later this week with a guy who, you know, is fighting for his sobriety. - Liesel Mertes And what does it mean to have all the AA meetings closed down? Right. Have everybody drinking. And, you know, it's just all these human dramas that are compounding as time goes on. - Matt Mills Sure. But it's not. I will say this. I really value the time we've been able to spend at home because we were always in orbit of each other and we're always at the same place, you know. So, it's it's been very nice just to be. The circumstances are shit. And I would love the circumstances, but it's just kind of nice to. Be together. And this also brings out the resilience and people, because you see people that like, oh, now we're gonna do this and we're gonna look out for each other this way or we're gonna. - Matt Mills I'm sure that you can find countless stories of people helping people and where we live. We have a bunch of bikes we're going to put on the porch because there's a swap. So now you don't have to go the storm by stuff. We all have stuff we can kind of trade. And we hopefully this will bring us a little closer as people that we're not supposed to talk to one another face to face. - Liesel Mertes You know what? Then I like the turn of phrase is not what happens. It's what happens next. And tell me a little bit about some of your most fun at home times as you've been enjoying being with stations. I was. - Matt Mills Well, we've we've been watching movies, which we don't usually do, but it's just fun to sit together and be together. We play anagrams or we try to pick out a board game and make it work. Dinner is more of a source of entertainment. - Matt Mills I love trying to figure out what we're gonna eat and station would always I drive her nuts in that I would try to run out of food before I'd get more. I'm really good at survival cooking. I guess that can of beans last for me. But I like the challenge of that. Our drawers have never been more organized. Hopefully the sun will come out eventually and we have this side. But I don't know. It's just going to be stuck with people. I'd rather be stuck with them. - Liesel Mertes Yeah, you wouldn't want people to know about it. I don't know. People who are in the restaurant business or catering. You would want them to have an awareness of or do you have any word like that? - Matt Mills In what way? I don't know. Like, I actually write things like, hey, still, you know, be buying gifts, certificates or. - Liesel Mertes Absolutely. Is there a call to action like that? - Matt Mills I do. I'm not as connected as I should be. I mean, be aware that it's not for people in the industry, but for people out of the industry. There's a lot of people off work and suddenly off work because of this. And yeah. Gift cards, I think are a great idea. If you're I mean, these people are still good at doing carry out and stuff as long as we can do that. Any tips you usually do, they'll pull and give the servers. - Matt Mills I mean it's it's not critical yet, but it's gonna get interesting I think for sure. I don't I don't think this is going to end us. I think we're gonna be OK. Just going to suck for a while. - Matt Mills Yeah. Yeah, I hear that. Well, thank you, Matt. I hope that the rest of your day, whether it's movies or Bananagrams, goes, well, I am surprised. I'm sitting in my closet with the door locked and I told my husband before I went and I was like, Luke, can you please keep the children from screaming at each other just as long as I'm in there? And it's been remarkable because this is the longest stretch to day that we haven't had either war cries or loud games of tag. - Matt Mills So, I've got some fun, actually. And they they are kind of fun. - Liesel Mertes There's there's an element there, all kinds of things that are chaotic about having four children. There's also things that like they still have like a kind of cohort like to play with and fight with. And so, everybody's at a pretty high emotional pitch, which can be glorious or devastating. But they do have other options all the time. - Matt Mills So, there you go. - Liesel Mertes Thank you for making the time. I appreciate it. If you need smarter answers, I could probably think on things until you give them all. Those are good answers. And yeah, I think more than anything, you know, talking about owning your words in your heart. Your your heart for your people, but also the power of, you know, ducking your head and doing the work and being willing to pivot. Is is a good word. I especially liked. Yes. It's not what happened, but it's what happens next. So, I think it's a good word for people. And thank you. All right. Have a good afternoon, Matt. All righty. See you. I like. MUSICAL TRANSITION As always, here are three key takeaways from my conversation with Matt Mills I hope this conversation opened you up to one of the stories behind the numbers.The men and women being affected are not just data points, they are people with families and passion, scrappy entrepreneurs and workers that are feeling this deeply Buy gift cards or order carry-out.People in the restaurant and food service are doing everything they can to keep their pirate ships afloat…I have linked the Mills Catering Facebook page to the show notes. This is the best place to keep up with daily menu items and delivery options. Try the coleslaw I loved Matt’s turn of phrase: it’s not about what happened, it’s about what happens next. This is, in a time of great uncertainty, perhaps a good word for everyone. What happens NEXT for you? OUTRO Mills Catering: https://www.facebook.com/Mills-Catering-122716954412270/?eid=ARAsePo1FH2OYPk9_Q_UhyxBJAYJQ8cgc1xiN3nH-Y7UWGKaTFmwWAPxQm4dLo5y6xAnUXokFIzXjIvS

PHP Internals News: Episode 46: str_contains()

PHP Internals News

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 26, 2020

PHP Internals News: Episode 46: str_contains() London, UK Thursday, March 26th 2020, 09:09 GMT In this episode of "PHP Internals News" I chat with Philipp Tanlak (GitHub, Xing) about his str_contains() RFC. The RSS feed for this podcast is https://derickrethans.nl/feed-phpinternalsnews.xml, you can download this episode's MP3 file, and it's available on Spotify and iTunes. There is a dedicated website: https://phpinternals.news Transcript Derick Rethans 0:16 Hi, I'm Derick. And this is PHP internals news, a weekly podcast dedicated to demystifying the development of the PHP language. This is Episode 46. Today I'm talking with Phillipp Tanlak, about an RFC that he's made titled str_contains. Phillipp, would you please introduce yourself. Philipp Tanlak 0:35 Hey, Derick. My name is Philipp. I'm 25 years old and I live in Germany. I work for an IT service company, which does mainly development and maintenance of IT projects. We specialise in the maintenance of e-commerce website and create enterprise applications. Derick Rethans 0:52 How long have you been using PHP for? Philipp Tanlak 0:54 I've been using PHP for quite a long time now that might be six years I guess. Derick Rethans 0:58 What brought to you creating an RFC? Philipp Tanlak 1:02 The main reason I've created this RFC was out of necessity and interest, mainly to scratch my own itch. Derick Rethans 1:08 That is how most things make it into PHP in the end isn't it? Philipp Tanlak 1:11 Yeah, I guess. Derick Rethans 1:12 The RFC is titled str_contains, that tells me something that is about strings and containing things. How do we currently find a string in a string? Philipp Tanlak 1:22 The current approach to find the string in a string is to use the strpos() function or the strstr() function. But on Reddit, I found someone also use preg_match which I find kind of interesting. Derick Rethans 1:35 There are multiple amount of different methods in use, what are the general problems with these approaches that people have made? Philipp Tanlak 1:41 So the current approach which I find is not very intuitive, and mainly because of the return values of these functions. For example, the strpos() returns either the position where the string is found, or a false value if the string is not found, but there has to be a check with a !== operation, and the strstr() function just returns a string. So you have to convert that to a boolean to check if the string is found or not. Derick Rethans 2:11 Because with strpos(), if you wouldn't use the === or !== operator. Of course, if it would find it at the first position of the string, it'd be zero position, and it would return false, even though it's sfound it. Philipp Tanlak 2:26 Yeah. Derick Rethans 2:27 So there's a few different problems with these things. Also, I don't think it's particularly vary intuitive to do because you sort of need to come up with like a whole construct to see whether it's part of a string. Philipp Tanlak 2:37 Correct. I don't think it's intuitive for a beginner. So if someone is learning PHP for the first time, then he has to search through the documentation, what are the exact return values for these functions, and has to remember that so I thought, string or str_contains() might be a better fit for that to just return a true or false value. Derick Rethans 2:58 We've mentioned str_contains() a few times now, I guess the RFC is producing to add this function. How would this function differ from what PHP already has? Philipp Tanlak 3:07 So this function does not differ in a lot of ways. It's basically the same implementation of the strpos() function. But instead of returning the position of the found string, it just simply returns it as a boolean value. So either true or false. Derick Rethans 3:23 I can imagine some people will say, well, you can just do this in your own wrapper function, right? Because pretty much what it deos is converting the results from strpos() to a boolean. But you must have a good reason of why to want to add an extra function here. Philipp Tanlak 3:38 The reason for this function, and maybe someone might disagree is, mainly a user experience for the developer. So this is just out of necessity which I found, and I've been using this function quite a lot. So I thought this might be a valid add to the PHP language. So I tried to implement it and it got some great reviews. So I thought that wasn't a very bad idea I had. Derick Rethans 4:04 Is the RFC suggesting just out a single function: str_contains(). Philipp Tanlak 4:09 Yes, the RFC is currently adding just a single function, which is the str_contains(). When I first submitted the discussion about this RFC, there were quite a few people asking why is there no case insensitivity or multibyte versions for these, and I did not think of those at first. But in the discussion, it became clear that the multibyte version did not seem to be very necessary because the comparison is going to be byte by byte. Unlike strpos(), the position of the found string is not relevant. So it doesn't matter if there is any difference in encoding. Derick Rethans 4:47 I remember in last year, there was another RFC related to strings functions they were the string_starts_with() and a string_ends_with(). Those are two functions and there were also variants for both case insensitivity, ss well as multibyte. Which made eight different functions to be added to pretty much do a single thing. That RFC failed, potentially because there are so many things being added. Philipp Tanlak 5:11 Yeah, that was also the main reason, I think the case insensitivity of this function, or the variant of it was not so relevant. So I did not include it into the RFC just because of this case you mentioned. So instead of polluting the global space with more functions, someone suggested to just advance PHP incrementally and add in case sensitivity for this function just if it is necessary. Derick Rethans 5:37 This is a common recurring subject. Most of the people I spoke with in the last few episodes are all adding things to PHP bit by bit instead of coming up with big RFCs which I think is a good way of going forwards. When reading the RFC, I had a quick look at which argument the function would accept. PHP of course this weakly typed strings in most of time. Is this str_contains() function handling distinct different from what strpos() does for function arguments. Philipp Tanlak 6:10 So the str_contains() function uses the same internal function, which is php_memnstr(), if I recall correctly. It tries to interpret it as a string. And if it's not a string, it either throws a warning or notice, but I've just run some checks and it seems like in the next PHP version, non string values which are passed into the string functions will be interpreted as a string, and if that is not the case, it will throw an error or usually return false. Derick Rethans 6:43 So it doesn't do any special magic, and just relies on the PHP tends to do for parsing arguments and weak and strict typing. Philipp Tanlak 6:51 Yes, that's correct. Derick Rethans 6:53 Most RFCs they come with a patch, as does yours. How did you find it getting started with writing things for PHP instead of using PHP. Philipp Tanlak 7:02 So basically, I've looked at the PHP source code in the past, just to see how things are implemented. And I had some basic background in C. So I thought that this was not very hard for me. Most of the functions or things I had to do to include this patch, were already there. So basically, I just copied the strpos() function and remove the, when the string is found, use the position to calculate a new string and just remove that code and return the boolean value from the found position. Derick Rethans 7:35 Because it is not a very different function from strpos(), it's just pretty much a different return type. It's a lot easier to do. Philipp Tanlak 7:44 Yeah. Derick Rethans 7:45 When looking at feedback, what were the main criticisms of this? Philipp Tanlak 7:48 The main criticism of this was basically just the variants of these functions. So mainly the multibyte variant or the in case sensitivity. Other than that, the response was very, very nice and, and also very rewarding for me. So I thought I did a good job on this. And many people wanted to have this function in PHP, but either did not have the time to implement it or it was too easy. I'm not sure how that went. But I think the response from the devs and the overall PHP community was very nice. Derick Rethans 8:23 The RFC is already in voting, so I'm I'm a bit late to talk about them. Usually I'm and things are still in discussion. And at the moment, it looks like it is passing because the votes are 43 to 6 with another weeks ago, then. Philipp Tanlak 8:37 Yeah. Derick Rethans 8:37 Do you think this will be your last RFC? Or do you have something else in mind? Philipp Tanlak 8:41 At the time of this recording I don't have anything else in mind, but maybe if I find something. Since I'm working with PHP on a daily basis, which I think is worth adding to PHP I might create a new RFC. Derick Rethans 8:54 That's how I started and see what happens now. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me today Phillipp, I hope you enjoyed this. Philipp Tanlak 9:01 Yeah, thanks for having me Derick. Derick Rethans 9:05 Thanks for listening to this instalment of PHP internals news, the weekly podcast dedicated to demystifying the development of the PHP language. I maintain a Patreon account for supporters of this podcast, as well as the Xdebug debugging tool. You can sign up for Patreon at https://drck.me/patreon. If you have comments or suggestions, feel free to email them to derick@phpinternals.news. Thank you for listening, and I'll see you next week. Show Notes RFC: str_contains() Credits Music: Chipper Doodle v2 — Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) — Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

spotify kevin macleod germany mp3 reddit credits united kingdom philipp correct bepatron php transcript github since i'm i'm i'm derick phillipp xing rfc rfcs usually i'm xdebug

Episode 27 Financial Control and Self Directed Accounts with Dan Kryzanowski

Real Estate Marathon

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 26, 2020 26:03

Dan Kryzanowski discusses checkbook control and self-directed accounts. Use your retirement funds with Rocket Dollar to invest in real estate, startups, funds, & more. You will maintain all the benefits of a typical retirement account. Visit Rocket Dollar's Knowledge Base to learn more or signup online using code DKRYZANOWSKI for up to $100 off today! Show transcription: [00:00:08] Wonderful, Larry. Great to be here. [00:00:27] Sure sounds good. [00:00:37] Yes. So, you know, my guess is just with the context, my background, I originally from the Northeast grew up in Scranton, P.A.. [00:00:43] So, you know, politics aside, but I played on Little Biden's Little League field and then I wrote up Penn with Trump Junior my freshman year. So, you know, I'm an equal opportunity investor. Let's call it from that standpoint. And, you know, my very probably a lot of folks 'specially in the northeast, you know, we're big companies, Merrill, G.E. went to war and etc. and then the financial crisis came through. And I think for me, you know, to kind of knock out a 9 to 5 at the same place for the next 30, 40 years wasn't in my blood. It's not how I'm wired. So my wife's from Mexico. We made the conscious move to move back to Austin, Texas. So we've been here for the last decade. So you could say we were smart to predict the boom down here in Austin. And it's been good for me because, you know, besides being able to keep it weird and all that, I professionally have been in a variety of fintech and real estate in my nine to five. And I think that's really sculpt it. You know, where I am and where my passion and where I feel I can help people, you know, particularly these days. [00:01:57] It's primarily it's towards real estate. There's some stock, so I'll preface to say, yeah, I think it's always healthy to be diversified. And my big light bulb moment was I was fortunate to speak at a family office high net worth, Joe, where, you know, even in front of open doors, they say, you know, I'm just not 60 40 stocks, bonds. I'm kind of the opposite. You know, I've a majority my stuff in real estate, private tax advantage. And that's kind of been my mindset. [00:02:24] You know, recently, I you know, I learned these self-directed accounts and being able to use your retirement dollars. Almost a decade ago, I was Codesa man in the wedding. [00:02:36] And he said I said, what are you doing? All I heard him say was fifteen percent men of any sense. And then for me, you know, he said, you know, you can use your retirement dollars. And I was just mind blown like what I said, I'm stuck at like fidelity is like, no, no. So that's been a lot of my journey. And I think what I'm trying to assist folks, you know, at the very least just make people aware that they have this huge lot of money. You know, collectively we as Americans, I'll call it 10 trillion sitting on the sidelines. [00:03:06] That is not active interest that you know or your community that can be moved to. I think, you know, at least the way I do my portfolio, often of lower ish risk, higher return sort of assets. [00:03:46] We're. [00:04:01] Absolutely. Yeah. [00:04:02] Sunny with check-ins, I'm glad you brought up checkbook control because, you know, we feel folks should have access to their money at all times and it should easy to contribute. And frankly, there should be no fine print. I think, you know, people say what is true this is of the millennial mindset is I think generation. It should be easy, even folks. You said you are working hourly and there's a limited job situation, a divorce. A whole lot of things can happen where you're just not sitting on this huge pension, maybe as parents were way back when. So with that. With the checkbook control account, you know what it does, it makes it very easy to open to contribute or rollover. I mean, to use that money just like you would with your piggy bank checking account. And I preface that because the other self-directed other retirement accounts of the space are very different, that it's almost like going to mom and dad for an allowance that you're ultimately going to get. They've got, you know, full on fraud and all this other stuff for a few hours, which it's just frankly not worth anybody's time. [00:05:26] Yeah, sure. [00:05:49] Sure. Yes. [00:06:01] Yes, I mean, first, yes. Likewise with my son, we're at the same financial institution. And that's great. I'm able to transfer money in and out. And lo and behold, you know, I see as in even now, if he ever does look back, I say, you know, print X thousand principle or, you know, a twenty dollar dividend in coming in to really show, hey, this is what was going on with your money, particularly as an investor, not just sitting. [00:06:22] And, you know, point zero zero one percent savings account. So I'm a proponent. I'm a little old school like you. I still write old school checks, particularly for the first investment with a certain person. [00:06:35] I feel I on to something about it that I like with that. [00:06:40] It is. It isn't away, are you? It's like you at least know that, you know, you're signing your money away as opposed to, you know, it kind of gives you a second thought. And I got a feel that. That gives you that sort of just clicking and button. [00:06:52] So in all seriousness, I do think that's good for, you know, initial investors to literally sign your name instead of just kind of wiring like you swipe and buy a hundred Starbucks. From that standpoint. But yeah, I mean, check control in general. You know, I think of the term more in for retirement accounts. And if I could, I mean, a brief history, so self-directed accounts have been around since the 1970s. The ladies have been custodial. So far it's been a very high priced, expensive lawyer that sets this up. In short, you do not have checkbook control. You're going to a third party that really has no insights into what you want to do with your money, etc. And you have to fill out their forms and be on their timeline. [00:07:34] It can be a little bit frustrating. And so, you know, a checkbook control. It's more about the access, I think, to it. Yes. [00:07:43] And also the transparency and also it's linked up to a bank. [00:07:47] You bring up a great point is that, you know, by default, checkbook is part of a bank. You have a checkbook. You can look back, you can see transactions. Whereas, you know, and I've had different custodial accounts earlier in my career. And I look now I can even look back over a year, but I'm like, you know, the way I invest is longer term real estate investments and I can't even seno my dividends from over a year ago. Very frustrating. [00:08:12] And this is somebody that's charging me for a setup fee, an annual fee. You know, God forbid I made some good investments, higher fees on top of that, as opposed to, you know, kind of a flat monthly fee that, you know, is common and different sort of checkbook control intensities. [00:08:44] Yes, sir. The nice I'd say it depends on. [00:08:48] The type of profession either way, though, it's gonna be the same. Excuse me, the same that effect. So as you said, person just opening an account. So, for example, with the dollar and associated with, let's say somebody is W2. Meaning you do not have self-employed income, especially with the tax season being pushed down another few months, assuming your fortune is off. You're feeling comfortable. I would. You know, when I look back, the best thing my parents and Bizos maxed out your stuff, which I did lie. When I finally picked up my head, I was sitting on a six figure self-directed account or IRH and set up to reconcile for millennials out there. I'd say open an account. Either if you have money to put in now, so you're getting a tax return, throw a few thousand and even do it for twenty nineteen or twenty twenty for fortunate. And then look to see what you want to invest and what I think is great. There's so many great crowdfunding campaigns. I know we have to be a little bit cautious with the profitability of a restaurant in modern times. But I would say vs., you know, five, 10 years ago, when it was kind of Wild West as an equity investor supporting somebody in your community, a lot of these crowdfunding say it's going to come off the first year revenue right off the top of tippy, tippy top. It's the most preferred that you can have to be paid back. [00:10:05] There's something called a. trader. That's what land's not going anywhere. And what is it Mark Twain said by land? Is that more of it? And you know, these different platforms out there that you can get into, some might say a very solid, more conservative, higher return assets to kind of test the waters and doing it with the checkbook. So that's one. And the second thing I'd say, let's say our realtor friends out here, if you're ten ninety nine realize right off the bat you're not limited to say the six thousand like your W-2 friends say you have a true rock star a year you could salary for nineteen thousand three W2 friends within 20 percent of your net earnings. So you know, even if it's not this year and next year, the benefit of having this account open is, you know, down the road you may have one of these sort of rock star years. [00:10:56] That's really cool having this account set up, because let's say you're in real estate, you like a niche, something like self-storage. And once you get to that 50k or 100k, you might say, great idea, great you're acting contribute 40 pay this year and then you can invest in something like a storage facility. So to sum up, I would say the benefit of the checkbook and. It's just to do something, have something on the side. And I think there's a lot of things where you don't have to worry about the volatility of the stock market. It's still a pretty decent return. [00:11:33] Yes, we do. [00:12:00] Yeah, it's it's a good one because it's making me think that I did the right thing. [00:12:05] So I would say yes. I mean, stay the course. There's two ways about it. [00:12:11] You know, if you do, let's just say you put in a thousand dollars every month on your paycheck for a hundred dollars, if you're doing dollar cost averaging and you're going to do for the next 30 years, you're going to work w to continue to do it. You know, I read a book, Forget the author, but they pretty much said at any time in history is a good time to enter the stock market. And it's really pretty. Statistically, it's a pretty correct statement. So even if you put, you know, a boatload of money in a month or two ago, I would say definitely not. So. I mean, could we be back up to 30K at the end of the year? Possible, maybe. Maybe not. [00:12:49] So that's one second nature, folks, that kind of had a lot of money, and I know myself, I mean, I put in a fair amount and right when I left Wall Street in 0 4 0 5, my original boss, Scott Roth, sort of like the U.S. Metals Management was actually running it. [00:13:04] And the. [00:13:07] I haven't you know, I've been along for the ups and downs. It's OK. You know, I think you need to be a little cautious is once you're starting to depend on it for your cash flow for folks. Fifty five, sixty sixty five that are retiring. Yeah. You have to be maybe a little more measured of what you're in addition to be decision you're making. This should have been something thought about, talked with the plan or at least talked with your family over the last few years was like what am I going to be in. So with that I'm I'm not sweating it. I mean, I think it's a share in the short term. It sucks, you know? [00:13:46] No doubt. But, you know, the world's going to go on. [00:13:50] People are going to do stuff. And companies are going to go. The one point I would say it's funny. I mean, for those that read Barron's or even if you just pick a few articles out there, things were so overvalued. [00:14:02] You know, certain sectors like even price equity was at the highest 99 percentile it's been unless, you know, 10 or so years or I just kept on reading all these stats that say eat. Now, you know, like we're bound to have a correction. So, you know, I'll put it this way. When I joined G.E., Archer said, I'll think back when Jeffrey Immelt joined G.E. the week after 9/11. You know, as great as Jack Welch was, I think, you know, he kind of left on a, you know, partial, you know, when he fell apart. False, negative. You know, upswing that. And I think the stock market was that I think it was just trading too high for a complete lack of fundamentals. I don't have an exact number to four out there, but yeah, I know round numbers up from twenty five to almost twenty nine. I think that was just people. Following the media, that was definitely not based on any sort of fundamentals. [00:15:08] Yeah. [00:15:38] Yes. [00:15:49] Yeah. [00:16:05] Yeah, I would say don't chase. Be cautious of chasing yield, as you said, some stocks have gone a lot for folks. [00:16:12] So their yield is just basically, you know, the dividend divided by the price of, say, stocks trading at a hundred. The stock pays a dollar a quarter to four percent yield. So, hey, that's great. But, you know, let's assume that that stock was at two hundred dollars last week. Well, like I was, you know, realize. Yeah. Great. You're probably not getting the dividend. It's going to go a bit. Even if you still got that $4 dividend, your stock went down 50 percent. So I. [00:16:38] And I say this also, maybe for some of the older folks that aren't as sophisticated. Yeah. It's like, OK, well, you know, the Fed cut rates again, which means your at your community bank or credit union is, you know, one point two percent while the five, whatever it may be. Don't be chasing yield if you're only looking to compare the dividend yield vs. the c.d rate because a particular stock may still go down. They're using an extreme example. Would you buy a Carnival cruise or one of the cruise lines from a dividend? No, probably not. They're probably going to shut them down. But that's what would be the other thing of mindset. I'm sure there's going to be some media about and of will be very positive, as you mentioned, stock some stock selling price, maybe some great yields. [00:17:25] But for the average judge, an investor out there, it doesn't look at this every day. I'd just say be very cautious on chasing yield because the price could still go down for certain stocks. [00:17:53] Sure. [00:17:53] So, Dan, the at Rocket Dolla dot com to learn more about the self-directed account checkbook control just Rockerfeller dot com slash learn and as a courtesy hopefully says in the call notes. [00:18:08] But for those that can spell my name, you got $100 off. So. D crisan Wolski d k or y 0n o w S.K. I. That will ultimately get you up to a hundred dollars off your record dollar account. [00:18:20] So if it makes sense to go down the self-directed route, reach out to me directly. But of course want to send a thank you all very close here and I'm happy to take on any questions. [00:18:33] We do it's called rocket. Your dollar. So a little play on rocket dollar. And this will give you a feel of both. [00:18:42] Other investors, other sponsors, many people that are raising money for deals. As we talked about kind of in this 21st century diversified portfolio, whether it's from real estate, real estate, niches like self-storage, some bitcoin, some female entreprenuer, you name it. This is what I think folks are really trying to pretty up their pie charts and just follow this 60 40 stock bonds that are going into. So we bring in real people raising real money with real companies and real investors. And that gives you some really good color kind of what else is out there. [00:19:26] I'll get. [00:19:36] Well, I'm I'm happy to be back on. So I'm like, it's a rain check this time. [00:19:43] Yes, sir.

Awaken The Possibilities: Building Deeper Connections in Business

business billboard pacific cnn newport sir speaker awaken inigo mattis hesitation i'm i'm shamil intuitive leadership textron certified executive coach ron ross

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 19, 2020 30:34

TO READ TRANSCRIPT SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGEIn episode 5 of the new Awaken The Possibilities Podcast, Host Terry Wildemann interviews Sara Towe on " Building Deeper Connections For Business”. Awaken the Possibilities Podcast features successful entrepreneurs and intuitive leaders who offer insights on how to attract success in business and life. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ABOUT Sara Towe Sara Towe is a knowledge broker who shares the wisdom given by those who have go through the process of life and who now share their knowledge with Sara on her Self Discovery Media network. With an accumulated 2500 shows and expansion in place, Sara Loves the inspiration that begets invitation in embracing our awesomeness. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________About Terry Wildemann:Terry Wildemann is the owner of Intuitive Leadership® and a Business and Resilience Accelerator, Speaker and Certified Executive Coach.Terry's specialty is working with tired, unhealthy, close-to-burned-out entrepreneurs and professionals and helps them leap off the stress hamster wheel. They evolve into unstoppable stress resilient intuitive leaders and practical business mystics. Terry’s timely message guides clients and students to integrate intuition, stress resilience, positive communications and leadership with grounded business systems to achieve success by positively serving and influencing others. Her leadership experience includes owning a manufacturing company, image consulting company, leadership and holistic education center.Terry is a best selling author of The Enchanted Boardroom: Evolve Into An Unstoppable Intuitive Leader. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________TRANSCRIPTwhat we want to this episode of the week in the possibilities podcast I'm your host will demand and as you know I love bringing amazing guests of the show to help you become unstoppable intuitive leaders and practical business mistakes I I have an extraordinary yes her name is Sarah Troy and Sara is a knowledge broker who shares the wisdom given by those who have gone through the process of light and who now share their knowledge with Sarah on herself discovering media network and this one is like the network she has accumulated twenty five hundred shows I can imagine %HESITATION twenty five hundred shows and she has expansion in place Sarah loves the inspiration that begets invitation and embracing our last semester come to the shows Sarah I thank thank you he well you know one thing that I know about you is you are a rock star in terms of energy and energy and energy and energy I mean it just flows out of you so one of the things that I know your love is business and our topic today is the knowing this business and you tell me a little bit more back than knowing this in business a lot of people like to stay in the head you know everything is I've done this business course and you've got to do things this way and that way and and it must be that and they forget the off their business people are going to buy them before they're going to buy anything from them and if it doesn't come from the heart the soul and the spirit the conviction it doesn't matter what you're promoting a yes selling people just aren't going to be that interested in it I'm not not in alignment it'll west the connection there are trillions of other people out there doing what you're doing how do you stand out right it's not the better graphic it's not this it's not that it how do you connect how do you build relationships what do you of yourself do you bring to the table because that's really who people want to dine with right and if I'm going to do business with you I want to know we have a connection that connection please my gosh it is it just seems like it's coming at me from all directions it's a bad connection people are tired of being sold to us they are I just the products and the services maintain ma'am and they have no idea who you are as a person now I mean have you noticed that your member flash this flash that you have you noticed we don't see them on sites anymore because people would like it's intrusive it's intrusive you know it's stopped pitching me stop frame things at me you know and it's just like you have no idea whether you're actually offering me a service that I need and you won't know that unless you're willing to interact with me you know I find that to be searched you're on certain platforms I'm not going to name the platforms H. as there are a couple that are pretty active on that then I'm quite active on that %HESITATION friendship and immediately I'm doing this this this this and I want to buy into this this this this and I'm like wait a minute you have no idea about who I am what I am what I do anytime you get interested in what it is that you're offering right you have to say about that Sir it's rather like buying likes on Facebook and linkedin does get the numbers what do the numbers mean nothing there's no connection give me you know three of four or five people I can truly be interactive with that we can build a community because support one another I don't need to millions of sheep will coming along it's all about the connection the interaction the participation and you know I reach out to people and say hello hi great to meet you you know and if they come back to me now we will not we can have a call to say would you like to have a chat let's get to know one another but as he said in a concert a serving did you read my bio did you go to my site did you know that when you're setting your yoga thing absolutely means nothing to me because if I get down into a pretzel like I'll get back up again six you and I can make them a baseball yes and you sent me a link I am I request and what did I do when I answered your request yeah that's %HESITATION I can't remember exactly but it was it an invitation to know one another I'm at work %HESITATION let's get to know one another yes and we did and we set up a time I sent my coffee with Terry link yes hi and after two minutes turned into it's very easily very into it is not wonderful we do not sell each other at all no each other as I said Hey come on my show you said I want you on your own you're shaking and here we are in here we connection again you know you know I have a saying is that you discover your beautiful instrument to like learn how to play it and then find your orchestra that you belong to and you know I'm about finding this communities that you know could be an orchestra business orchestra health focused %HESITATION what every day is and when you step into your goal just instrument you know playing that in an orchestra in creating harmony and symphony is absolutely wonderful that's the best invitation that you can send out to people by inspiring them it invites them stop pitching to them that's old fashioned but just not interested in that anymore right absolutely and you know it's interesting I'm giving a talk your locally at the Newport in March and they wanted me to do a talk on the pitch no no no no no no and she sent me all this information and and my people don't do pitches yeah so you're doing a pitch let's talk well let's see can people all about the pitch and you can't change if you don't connect right the goal is to be so connected with the individual that they pull out their credit card in Chennai I wanna work with you that doesn't happen if you're pitching mostly I just lied lied lied lied lied lied lied to somebody else's pitching me I'm not interested but if you build up a connection you know relatability isn't it I relate to you I relate everything is storytelling since the beginning of time around the campfire when you share a story and it relates with someone they want to know more they want to know you what can they learn from you that they can apply to their own life so beat the inspiration because that is the invitation and you're not going to get that in the thirty second pitch I was never any good at that anyway you know you're talking about the campfire and the storytelling is so important and yet the accessorizing of the storytelling is just as important because you have to have more is there do you have the more it's what does Graham crackers and marshmallows yes exactly yes No yes those components the Graham crackers marshmallows and a chocolate the embellishment Aleshin rocks are all part of this story telling and it's not necessarily about your product best known no yet why is the movie industry so big why are the seven hundred and fifty thousand pot concept that why attend talks in order these things listen to because they have become more personal in the way that they speak to you in the beauty of a pot costs is that we really can pull back hello yes we have we got some producers say you cannot say that you can't do that you got ten seconds for this you know you can really rattle the story and allow it to to take foreman go where it needs to go into some beautiful fluidity we love storytelling we love it because we're always looking at how do we fit into that story is that story about me did that person trying in that story can I transfer my story it's always about that relatability in that relatability it speaks to the heart it it's the heart it's not up here hello the heart yes the soul and the spirit yes use a four letter word I love %HESITATION what a wonderful vibration isn't it beautiful it is and when you walk into a networking event and you have the mantle on your head of I am love I love what I do at I want to be able I I don't want to I am serving yes the person who crosses my path to the best of my ability do you remember that please leave out of your head the numbers game yes it's that connection game and to realize as I'm always saying I'm not everybody's Cup of tea but I'm somebody strong cuppa could black coffee right you're only going to speak to people that can feel your vibration this because they're ready they're ready to connect today ready to hear what it is that you have stop trying to pitch to everyone it's not about that personalize I am and that's where that invitation is isn't that that connection is you are your business go in there on that beautiful vibration if you don't love what you're doing how the hell can you sell it to anyone else here's the thing if you're going to networking events a pension to sal mother will turn around and walk away right because quite frankly that's not the place to pitch in to help that is the place to make connections yes we don't want the rah rah rah the sugar high you know we just not interested in that that's the old paradigm and it was T. shattering it wasn't you know what are we looking for in the end M. love is a beautiful energy it's high vibration but in order to get to know if you've got a cat you go to show kindness you gotta have empathy and that stops with you and if you want it how can you share it how can you ignited enough that's and that's the word igniting it in other you are authentic and in integrity yes you are with no apology she's sweet yes sure you know if somebody says she will what is it that you do it is important to be clear on what you do you know I don't mean but it's not it's it's about avoiding becoming a recall a Billboard yeah yeah yes when you sure what you do in those sixty seconds to thirty you know thirty to sixty seconds that you're sharing about yourself and it's about clarity do you think it's clarity on what you do when you come back clear everything falls into place maybe we should be talking about who we are run in the what we do you know I'm I'm so inspired by the people who shared the stories that I couldn't help but you know Shamil it's I think our connection you know we very often have a selling something when we forget about that connection that you are what you're selling you are what your businesses and you know it is it what we do or is it what we represent yes so you tell me you're going into a networking event I got that out don't let me %HESITATION let's not like that well I would love to hear about the connections that are rolled you and the ones that pushed you away Ron Ross pushed me away immediately can I want somebody pounces on your like a puppy you know and and debt we meeting wanted to know if they could school from you yeah and that really kind of repels me immediately but what I am I'm a bit of an observer when I get when I go in I observe what's around then I choose who I wish to speak to an act choosing it based on the energy that I'm feeling or even seen somebody who feels a little out of place I lost because nobody seems to be community Kate in with them everybody's different networking events in everybody caught this time this time that you called me next you know that's the way they are so I like to look for that person that may be a little out of place I'm but I like to observe and see where the energy is going it's very much about me tapping into the energy first because I have to see where that energy zone is and then it's striking up a conversation and you may only took two to three people the entire evening for the entire event but those relationships is something you're going to take with you what it costs the event it's not about how many cards you can get a how many people you can get on your list that I could go home and email them a bitch bitch bitch it's what relationships have you started that now can continue one so I'm very much meat and speeding their way and if I see people running around like chasing their tail handing the contact page bitch bitch I know that I'm not gonna make any connection with them they're looking for the quick six I'm looking for the people who are willing to take the journey yes I believe that when we do these networking events that we really start to connect the moment we register yeah well and it's about asking yourself intuitively yes I really want to go to does this event actually sound like it will have the kind of people that I want to and I am I'd love to share a story about that because %HESITATION a couple years ago I drove up to an event in Boston so I'm an hour fifteen minutes away he I drove up and I was really excited to go when I walked into the doors of the restaurant and it was like oh it was this isn't gonna work this is a global network and I ask my higher self and my to stay you are to stay so I state it was such a good old boys network and that energy was so sick of it it was challenging to talk with folks either I mean it it read and there were a couple of them in there and we talked about things and you know I I you know I left that place it took me two hours to get home and I was on the couch the entire day the next day I'm drained yes I would and it was like oh my gosh what happened here and I'm glad I did what I did because if I didn't I wouldn't be able to share the story but that's you know I'm a business woman I didn't business since I was eighteen years old I'm a no nonsense don't mess with me person when it comes to business and but I do a compassionately yeah that there was no it L. well you know before I started this %HESITATION I'd met somebody who had an ingenious idea for new electric motor I don't think about electric motors forget about the technology I didn't know need to know how it works he knew how it works I just knew I had to get it out there I had to get this exposed and so if it was for me to setup goals and things like this and I'll give you fifteen minutes to hours later but still that because he truly was a brilliant person and quite fascinating and no we didn't go anywhere we will close up and other things that went on but for me it was a really big lesson Inigo and you know you've got people who are going to be invested as and they're looking at what they can get out of it with his least that they can put into it and I'm one of those people that unfortunate after a while they realize I'd really see them and they they kind of stop the pitch this stop the whole ego took on this like she really sees me I'm pulling the wheel I'm trying to pull the wool over her eyes hit this facade of me being the big business person but she really sees me and in that so you know that didn't rewards work in my favor but I just found it really quite fascinating all of this very M. G. ego talk of a testament to Textron and and just how unproductive it really was you know I couldn't help but thinking if a man ran home the way he runs his business a lot of people would go hungry and dishes would never be done with the laundry all the children A. M. best it just a not really it put me off a lot you know and in dealing with business and that way and was then I fell into this wonderful field but it really was quite fascinating because it just seemed to be the puff puff puff in each other up I didn't see where is the connection which is the interest was that the real commitment to anything I just didn't see it and that part there was you know so we're we're sharing stories that have the underlying theme where's the connection yes yes the one thing that I find now I could see the one thing there's a lot of things anything that I really have noticed over the years of the decades is when you're so focused on money yes you lose sight of what is important and when you focus on what's important and creating the connections the money is going to automatically flow yeah know which comes first the money or the people yes hold people always creation not being so practice if you're so practical practical logical that you put the people second it will always be a struggle to attract the success that you seek because they're not going to work as well for you yeah and and I've just read several blocks because about this when you have a company that the secret ingredient in success for a company is well yeah because when you love your people care for your people our compassion for your people and have a connection with your people they are going to work twice as hard for you their loyalty their respect I mean it's the same but if it's a treat the janitor the same as you would treat you know seo part because if you walk into a business and it's dirty that is actually selling to people that you really don't care the presentation is not that suit your janitors just as important as the person that's cutting the deal and I think that the company's success I did a wonderful series on this of let's get sync and it was about the emotional climate around climate change but interviewing change the emotional practices you're not going to be able to change the climate practices and it was so interesting how many companies are working with companies with government on putting people planet before profit and the profit will come and they if you've got employees as I love my job I love the fact that I can really speak out be creative my input is heard if I go to work and I'm not just another number okay click you know I'm a person that that's valued and don't we all want that for ourselves with the reserves an entrepreneur %HESITATION we work for someone we want to know that we count it that our contribution is counted and when that's counted aren't you what is it that you're activating people if you're a leader or manager what are you asked to beating people when people feel that they make that they are counting that they make a difference what do you activating creativity first thought right wonderment exploration you know the possibilities that nothing is limitless you know and that's the thing is we want the possibilities because those create the opportunities and if you invite people that their creativity Mattis you know we look at something can go again that this is the issue that we have right now and you can only see it from your perspective but when you invite everyone else to look at it from a different angle somebody sees it in a different way and next thing you know you have a solution absolutely that is so cool and we we drive where that's concerned because that's the stuff that I talk about my workshops in and seminars and the one question I ask is who's the most important person in the organization and it's interesting to get this you know this year how I manage I get that a lot and I'm like man and then and then and now and they're looking at me like I had three heads of my shoulders your maintenance staff yes because you can't work effectively and efficiently in a dirty office right and they look at me like I've got three heads in my shoulder exactly it's that simple it really is and it really %HESITATION someone very close to me came home and shared a story about how eight person who I believe they had down syndrome as part of the maintenance staff their office mate what shocked at how this person why so kind and generous and happy and genuinely having a relationship with the maintenance crew and after they walked out you're the person was like what is it with you what what are you talking with that person and it made me so sad yeah that this other individual who was quote unquote a leader okay I'm didn't understand the value and the importance of what the maintenance staff was during was really sad that is that person's ego right I'm in a my old company speckled the importance of you this is very very important to place importance upon yourself your health your well being everything about you it's very different from self importance which is ego driven which very often is in security because you feel secure I love who you are you not going to be driven by the ego the ego comes from that in security and you can see it in the people well I'm more important you know I've got a promotion to not get a hold of everyone else and that is that insecure ego drive at the best leaders of those that create lead us yes absolutely so I'm curious do you think that there's a positive you go into negative ego I would stay cold maybe it pride you know taking pride in your accomplishment and what you've been able to do you know pride that I I never thought I could do this but look what I'm doing now I'm and I think that kind of pride ego you know a self congratulation is perfect all right but I think when it becomes the ego that has to bash someone to make them feel bigger that is the eagle I'm talking about that is very negative because they've got to pull someone down in order to put themselves up and that's just not acceptable you're absolutely right you are a rock star so this kind of stuff I'm I would love for you we only have a few minutes left I would love for you to share with the audience about your twenty five hundred pop apps plus the moment pretty bad done about two thousand of them because I have hosts that come and go you know they come in for a while some of state for a while some of them got my god this is so much work as you know a lot of people don't think it is even though I'm doing all the editing I love you know my goodness I am it's a gift in it it it's it it's a gift to me to be able to show someone story and the things that I've learned about people and about humanity because I was reading at the crossroads of my god you know I've really I'm about to give up on humanity yeah I just you know it's not it's I do I want to be here anymore and then I started interviewing people that have really had some incredible struggles and strife and challenges the night yet they've gone through the process and they've taken whatever it is they've learned to and now that calling is to help others on that Pacific journey and it inspired me so much that I learned a great deal about myself my own strength my own carriage ride own abilities which I'm actually being learnt one step at a time one show at a time but it shows as we don't focus enough on how wonderful human beings can be because the CNN effect is the pimple into a volcanic corruption and it's always about what misery we can sell what hysteria can we sell what fear can we sell on my purpose is to actually bring you the people that are all some that are extraordinary human beings ordinary human beings doing extraordinary things because they found the courage they found the strength they found the abilities and they're willing to share anxious to share with you so that you've got the tools of the school skills to be able to walk your own life so it is it is a gift to me I love it I love getting to meet people like you it inspires me it gives me hope for us as a humanity and I know that with with each show with each vibration that we rise up we're beginning to tilt the scales and the more mall we focus on the good and feed and water dot good the more we could start seeing the changes that we desperately need to see on this planet yes we do yes we do %HESITATION well Sarah Kenyon share with the audience where can I find your they can find me at self discovery media dot com in the next month I will be launching a new site called discovering communities dot org I will be having mentorship said we'll be doing podcasts books all of the shows will be there as well but it's expanding on the work that I'm doing and just taking it even further but some discovery media units or about our own self discovery not being afraid to take the journey you know it's not about you listing around the campfire driven one else's journey you're just as important you have a story to share as well participate in your own life and you just see how awesome you really are and then get a hold of me at info at self discovery media dot com thank you so much for sharing yourself with us today it was the number one if the audience can't tell the connection that we have and we've only met once folks yes I at that fifteen minutes off the coffee it's good to get lastly I would remind you're coming on my shows which I can't wait for that as well and that probably will go an hour and a half on that show so that definitely is one grab the wind brought the coffee put your feet up and have a broad in the rock and roll thank you so much for being here Sarah is such a joy to always be in your presence I was like I don't we awaken the possibilities audience who are listening to this wonderful information that you share with you to help you become unstoppable so until next time I'm Terry will demean your host for waking the possibilities podcast see you next time take care See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Living with Depression: an Interview with Paul Ashley

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 15, 2020 38:49

- Paul Ashley Because it dismisses it dismisses who who I am or whoever that person is. You're saying it, too. It dismisses who their whole self is. Yes. Right. Again, the dichotomy of the fact that I have depression, yet I'm a hoot to be at be at a party with or are both true and at the same time. And if you dismiss either part of that, like all, if you're depressed, you can have fun. If you're fine, you can be depressed. Right. You're basically saying I'm not me, and that's offensive. INTRO Paul Ashley is a Vice President and Managing Director at First Person Advisors. He has also lived most of his life with depression and, at the time of this podcast recording, has just published an article taking on the stigma associated with depression. Liesel Mertes What is the American 24th twenty first century associations and stigma that go with depression and particularly for you as a white male? Yeah. How do you feel it? - Paul Ashley Well, I think I've blown through some of that. I think I've realized the stigma that I believed existed. Maybe isn't true. But let's say let's say I didn't yet. So what is the low level stigma? I think that as a man, we're maybe called to be brave and strong. - Paul Ashley Maybe it's different than feminine, right? Female. - Paul Ashley As a successful business person, what do you have to complain about as a person and business? You can't show people you're weak because weakness will get preyed upon. I think those some mixture of all that is a stigma. But Paul is more than just his depression. He is married to Amy and the father of five children, including twins. And he has three dogs. And a fish. - Paul Ashley Technically the fish's name is Mr. Unicorn Pants. Because it spent some time in Amy's classroom at school and sometimes at home. But at home I call Mr. Bubbles. He is also a wine expert, which has a proper French name that I have been struggling to pronounce. - Liesel Mertes Tell me a little bit more about. I'm not even going to pronounce this word correctly. I only see it written being at O somewhere. Yay! Oh, say it again. Some of yeah. Some it s a French word. Just super friendly French words. Tell me more. - Paul Ashley Yeah. So that's part of what's helped in my journey is having things that I enjoy in life. And one of them is I I enjoy wine, education and wine knowledge. And officially a few years ago I earned what's through the courts of master sommeliers is my level one designation. - Paul Ashley Sharing wine and food like is there a better way to have community, you know, good people, good wine, good food and that wonderful banquet table, by the way. And in that order, people, food and wine like you put those three together. You're going to have a great time. Paul takes trips down to Haiti with Filter of Hope, to address Water Insecurity. In addition to his international travels, Paul is raising money for Cancer Research this month as a Man of the Year candidate, more on that later. And as we begin this important conversation, I want to thank our sponsors. FullStack PEO is a full-service benefits firm that provides great services and packages for small companies and entrepreneurs. This month, we are also welcoming Motivosity as a friend and sponsor of the podcast. Motivosity is a peer recognition and employee feedback software that will have your employees more motivated than ever. Finally, we are sponsored by Handle with Care Consulting. Contact Handle with Care for interactive, powerful sessions that equip your people to competently offer care when it matters most. As I mentioned, Paul also become more vocal about his journey with depression. As we began to talk, Paul memorably described depression like a dog. - Paul Ashley It's. It sort of has. You've ever seen the World Health Organization video they put out on depression, though? With the metaphor that it's a black dog. Mm hmm. - Liesel Mertes No, tell me more. - Paul Ashley Well, so this idea is that this black dog follows you everywhere in life when you have depression. - Paul Ashley And sometimes the black dog is this massive creature that stands over. You like foreboding. Other times, it's this little puppy that's in your lap that you can control. And it's he's always with you, right? Well, I sort of feel like it's helped make the black dog be like, yeah. - Paul Ashley T-Mobile doesn't cure it. The black dog is never gonna go away. Not cuddly. But yeah. Just survivable. Yeah. Yeah. Like president that present but not out of control. Right. Not a slobbery, you know, vicious dog. - Liesel Mertes Well you said was it your teenage years that you. - Paul Ashley Yeah. It started when I was 17 to 17. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes Tell me more about that. - Paul Ashley So growing up in a in a you know, in a house that was imperfect as most homes are, even the home I have with my wife and it's we we aren't perfect. You are still. Yeah, right. - Liesel Mertes You do? - Paul Ashley Yes. What a coincidence. Especially the greater number of children you have, the greater chances for imperfection. You think? Yeah. Because you have more human fallibility mixing together. [00:01:42.420] - Paul Ashley You know, I in really quite frankly, family history is is very present on both maternal and paternal side of the family with mental health issues, depression, anxiety, other stuff. - Paul Ashley And I, you know, was dealing with teen angst as one deals with and I can I can see it as plain as day. We were I was I was driving somewhere in the evening in my hometown of Columbia, Missouri. And there was an intersection. That's actually not too far from University, Missouri, where this one road comes to a T. And on the other side of that, T is a limestone, you know, cut out from where they blasted to have to have the road built. - Paul Ashley Right. And I remember turning onto the one road that tease out there and thinking, I'm just going to gun it and just like hit the wall and make it all go away. - Paul Ashley And I realized, whoa, that is that's a suicidal thought, that self-harm like that's not that's not good. That's real bad. I was like, what is causing that? - Paul Ashley And I reached. Luckily for me, thank God, my best friend growing up, best man at my wedding. - Paul Ashley His father is one of the most world renowned child psychiatrist. - Paul Ashley And he his actual specialty is working with children in war and where they've gone through massive events, things like Syria. And remember, in the 90s, Bosnia and Herzegovina and all that they dealt with, he did a ton of work with the U.N. and he's just unbelievably gifted. Well, you know, fearful as a 17 year old who just didn't like didn't know what all this is about. I called I called him and said, I need help. And he said, listen, I normally don't treat people that close to me, but I'll take care of you. - Paul Ashley And he did and sort of started me back to stability pretty quickly. Once a cult classic story. - Liesel Mertes So a childhood context of, you know, your parents having their own mental health issues. Did you feel like you had? Because it strikes me as particularly self-aware in some ways that you at 17 were able to recognize that thought is damaging, feel like you had agency to reach out to someone. Was that formed? Did you have an awareness with your parents like, oh, they are going through a mental health episode or because I'm struck for some children, like they just internalize that as I deserve what's going on or I'm the cause of that. - Liesel Mertes Like what sort of a formation did your perception as a child have allowed you to reach out the way you did? - Paul Ashley What a brilliant question, because I don't know that I ever have ever thought about that. You know, it's something I was able to do. And so at the same time, I think what what your question helps me think about and realize is that as imperfect as some of the upbringing was and as as much pain as can get caused in the household, my parents, my dad has passed away. My mom still living. Did a lot, you know. - Paul Ashley They gave me enough there was enough love in that house. There's, you know, everybody's doing their best that they probably not only do they give me the genetic disposition to have the problem and some of the triggers that would exist to create it. I'm not blaming them, don't get me wrong. But they also gifted me with the bravery to self-identify and be self-aware at the same time. Isn't that interesting that you both would coexist? - Liesel Mertes Did you see some of that bravery for them in your upcoming light at the time? - Paul Ashley No. As I now, as an adult, as a as a parent of five kids, I I see it. I see the bravery in hindsight, but not the. - Paul Ashley That's certainly not in the moment. Yeah. You know, there's more blame and payment pain and blame than there was. Looking back and saying, you know, bless them for. Yeah. But they were able to do well. - Liesel Mertes I mean, that's such an age where you're just beginning to make sense of who you are. Is there an emerging in the washer and what you take from your parents, what you choose to leave behind? Do you remember that as you're beginning to work with this friend's father of just I imagine I could feel really tumultuous, like my parents have given this to me or they've wounded me in this way. Do feel free. - Paul Ashley Yeah, I think there's a definite wounding, you know, the wounds, wounds as you have as a child. And, you know, even today it almost 43. I'll be 43. And in April this year, happy. Almost. Thank you for almost having a birthday. - Paul Ashley Yes. I think there's still that childhood wound that doesn't fully go away. Not at all. Does it fully go away? Yeah. It's just it's hard. You know, even though I I'm blessed that I've been connected with Cindy Rep. Ragsdale. Yeah. You know, Cindy. I do. And and her husband. Unbelievable artist Kyle, her husband. - Liesel Mertes My husband and I have gone to marital counseling with Cindy. Well, let's just say I have sat in her office. - Paul Ashley So this is the Cindy Ragsdale fan club right here. - Paul Ashley So Cindy and I have been working together for probably a year and a half now, 18 months, pretty consistently. You know, every three weeks, give or take. And, you know, we're, we're, we're going back and dealing with some of those childhood wounds. - Paul Ashley But the big realization I have from all that is that that the things you did as a child to cope, survive and thrive were were the right things and they were effective. It's as you get later in life and continue to work on yourself and become try to become the whole you that you're supposed to become. You begin to realize that those same skills that were really effective as a child becomes super and potentially super ineffective and damaging as an adult. Right. - Paul Ashley Right. But there's grace in that. Yeah. Like, that's okay. And you you don't you don't trash the old behavior because it was what you needed at the time. And you just you sort of learned to evolve throughout that process. That's kind of where I'm at right now in terms of that counseling. And, you know, there's bad behaviors that again, sins of the fathers. Right. Like, right. If I don't if I don't do my thing to get healthier, I'm I'm just kicking the can down the genetic stream to my kids and their kids and their kid's kids. - Liesel Mertes Well, it's it's a brave and painful journey and not be able to do that work. And like you said, to to work is not to evade, but to sidestep some of this weirdly inside eddies that are all about like, oh, man, I'm so messed up and I've been messed up since I was six. And I started doing, you know, this thing to survive and to be able say, you know what, I'm recognizing that that exactly what you said was what I needed to survive at that time. - Liesel Mertes But that doesn't mean that I, as a choosing an aware person, have to keep being hijacked. Right. That pattern. - Liesel Mertes Exactly. And breaking. It's not easy because it served you well, right? It's certainly not your neural pathways. - Paul Ashley Ray, there's some neural pathways that are pretty solid. Yeah. Based on survival. MUSICAL TRANSITION - Paul Ashley And so it was like I thought of this thing. It was crazy. Help me. That's all I had, which was all I needed at the time. And I think that was what I've taken from that is I've as time has gone on, I've been more willing to be more public about my journey. I think to realizations. Number one, being able to say this is this this journey with depression has existed in my life continuously since I was 17 and now at 43, realizing it's probably never going to be cured. - Paul Ashley Air quotes inserted here, right. Like it's not going to go away. It's probably always going to be present. OK, so relax. Except that doesn't mean you're broken. Doesn't mean you're messed up. It just means that's true. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes If someone were to say, well, I'll feel sad sometimes. Yeah. How does depression feel or look different? Like what are the undertones? Does depression for you? Come on, quickly. Is it cyclical? How is that looking for someone who would say it hasn't been a part of my story? - Paul Ashley Yeah, I mean, sadness exists in this world no matter what your clinical background is, you know? But there are sad things that happen all the time. Life events and and sad, you know, occurrences, I would say. For me, depression is more like the consistent who who I am. And I don't know that it's cyclical. It's it's always present. But it does have general peaks and valleys. And a lot of those peaks and valleys depend on sort of what I'm doing to either take care or not take care of myself. - Liesel Mertes Right. So when you're not taking care of yourself, what does that look like and where do you find yourself going? - Paul Ashley Problem biggest indicator for me of how I feel when those, you know, sort of the values are more present is our mornings where it feels like it is every fiber in my being to get out of bed, you know, to simply put the feet on the floor and get out of bed and face the day like, I don't even want to go to bed. I just want to close my eyes and never get out of that. Get out of bed. - Paul Ashley And there's been some seasons where I have had I don't have suicidal thoughts. Is there nothing like ideation with a start of a plan like I had when I was 17? But I've have had thoughts at times when those valleys are true. - Paul Ashley In addition to get out of bed where it is, where I've had some sort of like like man officious was if this life was just over, there would just be this all would be solved. Like the pain would be gone. I'd be fine. - Liesel Mertes And how does the day progress from there? Where is that reckoning of like, oh, I only want to get out of bed. - Paul Ashley And there's some days we're all cancel meeting or all. And this doesn't happen anytime recently, but I'll cancel a meeting or, you know, get up at the last possible second. - Paul Ashley You know, like, can I get 30 more seconds but not facing the world and think the other thing that I see to do is withdraw from mostly with the family, for my wife and my five kids, you know, getting sucked into social media as a escapism. I think that you see a lot of that too little. That's adult a._d._d as well. But the addiction of social media made to be addictive. Right. Like, they literally have designs. - Liesel Mertes They're not doing this by mistake. So I think those are probably some indicators that I see. Right. - Paul Ashley What's interesting about, you know, my role professionally is I'm in an advisory role and I'm also in a business development role. And so this idea of being onstage and performing those two can sometimes not mix so well. Luckily, I've been able to, you know, particularly the last 10 years, been pretty successful despite this ever present friend that I call depression. - Paul Ashley And then in the writing and in in conversation with you and other people, I I phrased it a little differently every time. But I essentially say when I tell people about my journey with depression and oftentimes the reaction I will get, which is not they don't mean harm and it doesn't hurt me, is really. Yeah, you you're depressed or you, you have depression or really this is a journey you've been on. But Paul, you're literally one of the most fun guys to be around in your. - Paul Ashley So you're the life of the party and you're engaging. And my response to them is, yes, both are true and literally at the same time, which surges like day. Right. - Paul Ashley And that's a that is that dichotomy is really weird. And it's sort of in some ways beautiful and painful. I’ve been at events that Paul has hosted. He is high-energy, with a warm smile and a quick retort: a talented connector and facilitator. But this sense of being on came with a cost. - Paul Ashley I hold it together at work. When those those episodes are seasons are there. And then at home, I'm just darn near worthless. - Paul Ashley You know, I I see the damage. I see the damage that is done at home. And Amy and I have a really solid marriage and a great relationship. And it's almost 19 years now. But there are you know, there are seasons and days I can't get back. And I think she's as an adult, she's more aware and gracious. I think it's really it's been really hard at times on the kids. - Paul Ashley Yeah. So. So the kid, the kids of, you know, they're they're resilient. Right. So they'll bounce like the seasons that I've where I've done damage by not being present, you know, much like I'm I'm resilient from my childhood. They're gonna eventually be fine. But it it hurts. - Liesel Mertes Is there a conversation? Because there is a complex web of modeling, genetics, stress points. That is not something that's easily clinically or relationally passed out. Yeah, but there is an element of, like you said, aspects that run through families that make children predisposed towards certain behaviors and your own journey. How do you find yourself talking and framing life experience around depression or anxiety to your children to equip them in ways that perhaps you were underequipped? - Paul Ashley I think that's the next horizon for me and my journey. I think where I've been able to be a little more clearer for what I need a little more clear about sharing. Publicly out in the world where I don't have relations, like I think the next horizon is figuring out how to be public with my kids in a way that's productive for them and for me, but also realizing there are five different humans at four different ages. Right. Right. - Paul Ashley And you know what? I know I've hurt them because I'm a human. And that's what we heard our kids, even though we don't want to. And so what can I do to equip them, to help them understand why that is, how these reasons and things have happened? - Liesel Mertes Well, I'm struck that as you're living those questions towards their answers. That's his own gift that you give not only to your children to equip them more, but hopefully, you know, it's not just this aspirational like American dream, but to equip our children, to not have to make the same sorts of mistakes in the same kind of way. And then should they have children to equip them to give even more and to be able to pass wisdom down? - Paul Ashley Yeah. Yeah. And it's a I mean, they're dealing with things as adolescence that I never had to because they're they have a supercomputer in their pocket. Right. I didn't have that. - Liesel Mertes Well, they have so many feedback mechanisms to when we talk about some of the things that can spark whether anxious episodes are depressing. You know, so often it is based off of perceived social cues. And you're so inundated with so many people's thoughts and likes and dislikes of you all the time. It's just a different psychological reckoning. - Paul Ashley It's really is. And being a kid isn't easy. Right. Never has been. And I think it's not going to be easier. - Liesel Mertes Well, and it's always good to remember, I think as a child, you actually as you encounter the escalation of life stresses, you don't actually know if you're going to survive them or not. Like it's only through surviving the chaos of that first time that you can have any sort of sense of building resiliency. And so the the pitch sometimes of of children's emotion to be like, well, they're not sure if they're going to die from this pain or not, you know, and it's it's survivors slowly like and living through it when you are in the midst of. - Paul Ashley A depressive season. That's the word I use. Season, season. What are some of the things that have proven helpful for you not to, like, suddenly snap out of it, but that are helpful? - Paul Ashley So I think talking about it is probably the most helpful because that that whole if it's if it's hidden away in its secret, that's where it festers. And, you know, as a person of faith, I think there's a spirituality that there's a kind of spiritual warfare going on there. But if you don't talk about it. You know this. The you know, the devil can steel industry. Right. You know, that's how I would describe it for somebody who's not a spiritual person. - Paul Ashley I just think things in secret versus things that are brought out in truth are damaging. Yeah, I mean, the secret is damaging. Truth is his life-giving. So talking about it, whether that's a counselor or a confidant and a friend, whatever. - Paul Ashley It just any conversation, most any conversation should be helpful with somebody you trust. Sleep healthy sleep, which I know is kind of ironic when I say I can't get out of bed. But having a healthy sleep pattern has been helpful. - Paul Ashley Exercise is, you know, clinically been proven. That is one of the best ways to fight depression, even without medication. You know, the way your body doesn't have to be, you have to be a marathon runner. You know, do. - Paul Ashley What does that crazy gym thing called - Liesel Mertes CrossFit. - Paul Ashley CrossFit, you know, to be a CrossFit expert. Right. You just have to get out and get your heart rate up a little for 20 or 30 minutes every day. And that's the science on that. Is that what it does from an endorphin perspective and sort of a natural defense mechanism to depression? - Paul Ashley So a little bit of exercise or lot, if that's your thing. Diet certainly plays. You know, if I if I eat foods that are way too regain, you know, eat too late at night. And, you know, if I if I alcohol's at the presence of I, you know, entertaining and I have too much alcohol. That doesn't help. And then, you know, for me, medication and medication is not for everybody. And it's not exact science either. - Paul Ashley It's a search for what works best. - Paul Ashley And I think kind of any combination of those have really been helpful. These are all personal things that Paul does to manage his depression. However, as a benefits specialist, he also has a lot to add about how employers can help their people as they live with depression. - Paul Ashley And you know, in the workplace there's all sorts of stuff like, you know, most employers have what's called an EAP - Liesel Mertes An Employee Assistance Program. - Paul Ashley Those EAPs can be super helpful. Yeah. It's like if you're a leader and you have somebody in your team who you think is struggling, you as the leader call that the EAP and say, here's what's happening. And they they these are professionals. They can help you. - Liesel Mertes So for people who don't know EAP are license agreements with clinical providers to be able to have as a resource for your people to call to get help to hook appointments? - Paul Ashley All sorts of stuff. Right. Yeah. And they're highly underutilized. Yes, they are. So employers pay for this or it's it's included as a value add in certain products they buy. Paul also notes how the Canadian system is structured in a way that invites employers to be a part of solutions. - Paul Ashley They have an opportunity to to create perks that because they're not paying for while they're paying for it, but because they're not providing basic health care. - Paul Ashley The government takes care of that. They then to attract and retain employees have to be thoughtful about what their different perks are. And one of the things the Canadians have done is and the workforce that the employers believe they have a role to play in helping people with mental health and that it's something that's talked about in the workplace. And it's a benefit that is well thought of. And there's different models that employers provide above and beyond what the health care system does. - Paul Ashley And so as I go to industry conferences, the Certified Employee Benefits Specialists, which is a designation I have. We do our national symposium or the international symposium every year because our Canadian friends are there. And it's I always stop in and listen to what they're doing on the Canadian track, because what they're talking about in terms of mental health in the workplace is so far ahead of where we are. I mean, they're probably a good 20 years. - Paul Ashley It's like awareness, specific support systems, counselors on site, incentives to seeking out care, whether it's the stigma is different. - Paul Ashley I mean, there is probably still a stigma not being in it. It's hard to say, but it feels like the stigma is less if nonexistent. - Paul Ashley It feels like they invest from an employer perspective in programs, telephonic support apps, you know, various different modules and modes to support people, investment of time and dollars and just a cultural difference as seen as a lot more of a buy in. MUSICAL TRANSITION - Liesel Mertes When you're in a depressive season, what are things that people either purposefully or inadvertently say or do like is not helpful? - Paul Ashley I think I used to be bugged by the the thing of, well, you can't be depressed. You're super happy. Right, like that. That can be hurtful. How? - Liesel Mertes Tell me more about that. What level does that hit for you? - Paul Ashley Because it dismisses it dismisses who who I am or whoever that person is. You're saying it, too. It dismisses who their whole self is. Yes. Right. Again, the dichotomy of the fact that I have depression, yet I'm a hoot to be at be at a party with or are both true and at the same time. And if you dismiss either part of that, like all, if you're depressed, you can have fun. - Paul Ashley If you're fine, you can be depressed. Right. You're basically saying I'm not me, and that's offensive. - Liesel Mertes What does it feel? Also, I can imagine I could feel like you're invalidating what I'm saying. Yeah. And that what I'm saying could be true. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. - Paul Ashley But. There's no way you're depressed. You're too much fun to be around. Really? You really want to see that? - Paul Ashley You really come on over it. Yeah. Come on. Come on over all. You live in me for a while and you'll get me a real back. But that's over. I'll show you. I'll show you. Depressed. So that can be hurtful. - Paul Ashley And, you know, ninety nine point nine percent the time people are not trying to trying to be hurtful. I think the other one this just popped in my mind. - Liesel Mertes Bless these people. - Paul Ashley So the other one is in Communities of Faith Church and my you know, Christian Church. - Paul Ashley I've had people say, well, you know, you just pray harder and have a little more faith. God will take away your depression. - Paul Ashley Do you not think that I haven't already brought this to God and said, if you know, if you 're willing take this away, make this not be part of who I am. Do you not think I haven't tried that? Yeah. Do you not think that hasn't been part of my faith journey? Right. That hurts a lot. - Paul Ashley Like that is unbelievably right. Because that's not you know, that that's just it's just not it's just not true. I mean, that's just not how God works. - Liesel Mertes I think you touched on this, but I don't know if you say it differently. If you could give a greater awareness to people who have not experienced depression. What would you want them to know? What would you feel is really important? - Paul Ashley That people who are suffering from depression all don't look the same. And. It can be as debilitating as any other chronic illness that you've ever heard of, like diabetes or cancer or things of that nature and that, but it is because it has been stigmatized and it's harder to see. - Paul Ashley That you sometimes don't even know who's walking around with it. Yeah. And that's just another proof point that we need to just be a little nicer to each other, right? Because you don't know what somebody's carrying around with them. - Paul Ashley I thought about that thought about any disease, just that, you know, everything you everything you need to know, like you learned in kindergarten. Yeah. Right. It's just be nice. - Paul Ashley Try to be what good does it quantify a little bit and then come back and then come back and try again. - Liesel Mertes I'm struck with in your story, as I said, you had a noteworthy ability early on to be seeking community. As a 17 year old, to be not just internalizing it and keeping it private. If someone is listening and they say I know someone who man, they're definitely depressed, but they're, they're not doing some of those things like they're not they're not exercising, making healthy choices. They're not utilizing a counselor. They're depressed. And it's very much something that's tightly held for them. - Liesel Mertes Yeah, for support people. They can often feel at their wits end of wanting to make a difference, but being unable to. What would you say for those people that are listening and they say, I don't know how to help someone like that? - Paul Ashley Well, they're not an actual clinician. Don't try to be one because you can do more damage than good. - Paul Ashley And sometimes pursuing them and asking them to do things, you know, that they historically have found to be fond or enjoyable and asking them to do them with you, even if they reject you multiple times, continue to ask, because sometimes all you really need to do when you're in those depressive seasons is simply get out and start living. Go for what if if going for a walk was your thing. And bottom for a walk if you are going to see a movie is their thing environment. - Paul Ashley But you may have to ask again and again and again and again. Right. And that's something that anybody can do, is join them in something, you know, they enjoy and get them. Just get them moving. Get them living. Be willing to be persistent. Yes. Yes. Yeah. - Paul Ashley And sometimes if somebody is really suffering, sometimes it's just simply out your relationship simply go into their house and just being present. Mm hmm. Yeah. - Paul Ashley Just physically present and not. I've never been in that stage where I've that's I've never gotten that bad. But I can see why that would be a spot where if somebody that truly cared about you just showed up and just sat there and didn't necessarily want you to talk, you just weren't alone and you knew somebody cared. Right. - Paul Ashley That can go a long way. And that can be its own practice of self-discipline and restraint for the person who arrives for the caregiver. - Paul Ashley Yeah. Oh, yeah. Do not say all the things that are perhaps at the tip of their tongue. Be that advice or you just need to hear this or. - Paul Ashley Yeah. I don't know that they need to just show up and be silent the whole time. But if the person doesn't wanna engage and talk, I mean you ask a few open to the questions. Right. How are you today. Would you want to do it? Still try to engage them. But if if all you get is silence just being followed, you'd be amazed at how much presence can you help We are going to move, in a moment, to the three key take-aways from this episode. But I want to remind you that Paul is currently engaged in a great advocacy campaign to raise money and awareness from now until May 9 of 2020 for the leukemia, lymphoma society man and woman of the year. - Paul Ashley I t's about raising money for L.A. less. And L.A. Less is an amazing organization that does work in research, huge research, patient advocacy and resource connection for families. Paul is inspired by the cause and by Finn Stallings, who was diagnosed with leukemia at the age of five and, three and a half years later, Finn just rang the bell to signal that his treatments were over. I’ve donated to support Paul and Finn and this meaningful research and I am including a link in the show notes so you can too. MUSICAL TRANSITION Here are three take-aways from my conversation with Paul If someone confides in you about their depression, listen and resist the urge to say something that minimizes their disclosure. Paul was especially triggered by statements like “But you are always so happy!” Which leads to my second point Depression can take all different forms.A person that is often “on” in their job function can be absolutely exhausted at home. Widening our perception of what depression looks like (and how debilitating it can be) will go a long way to breaking down the stigmas that promote a culture of silence. If you know someone that is struggling with depression, regularly checking in with them can be really important.Remember, as you make contact with them, they might not respond initially, you might need to continue checking in. As Paul said, coming alongside them and doing something that they have enjoyed in the past or just showing up to be with them, even if that means not talking for awhile, can powerfully show support. As we close, I want to thank our sponsors. FullStack PEO is the premier benefits provider for small businesses and entrepreneurs. They give you great options, their staff is top-notch. Let FullStack handle your benefits so you can get back to work. We are also welcoming Motivosity as a sponsor. Motivosity is a software solution that creates motivated employees and helps to spread fun and gratitude. Finally, we are sponsored by Handle with Care Consulting. Through interactive workshops and keynotes, we help you offer support when it matters most. OUTRO https://pages.lls.org/mwoy/in/indy20/pashley - Man of the Year Campaign https://firstpersonadvisors.com/paul-ashley/ - FirstPerson/Paul Ashley bio page https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiCrniLQGYc – WHO Black Dog video https://www.bizvoicemagazine.com/interactive/2020/03/index.html#p=16 – Reducing the Stigma, BizVoice Magazine Article

Awaken The Possibilities: Women and Menopause in the Workplace

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 12, 2020 34:38

TO READ TRANSCRIPT SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGEIn episode 4 of the new Awaken The Possibilities Podcast, Host Terry Wildemann interviews Pat Duckworth Host on "Women and Menopause in the Workplace.'' Awaken the Possibilities Podcast features successful entrepreneurs and intuitive leaders who offer insights on how to attract success in business and life._____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ABOUT Pat Duckworth Pat Duckworth is a Women's Health Strategist who specializes in advising businesses and organisations who are committed to supporting women colleagues at menopause in the workplace. She brings to this role over 30 years experience working in the Public Sector at Senior Management level and 10 years as a therapist and coach. She has written 4 books including the Award-winning 'Hot Women, Cool Solutions'._____________________________________________________________________________________________________________About Terry Wildemann:Terry Wildemann is the owner of Intuitive Leadership® and a Business and Resilience Accelerator, Speaker and Certified Executive Coach.Terry's specialty is working with tired, unhealthy, close-to-burned-out entrepreneurs and professionals and helps them leap off the stress hamster wheel. They evolve into unstoppable stress resilient intuitive leaders and practical business mystics. Terry’s timely message guides clients and students to integrate intuition, stress resilience, positive communications and leadership with grounded business systems to achieve success by positively serving and influencing others. Her leadership experience includes owning a manufacturing company, image consulting company, leadership and holistic education center.Terry is a best selling author of The Enchanted Boardroom: Evolve Into An Unstoppable Intuitive Leader. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________TRANSCRIPT welcome everyone to awaken the possibilities I'm your host Terry will the men and today we have an exciting juicy show I have a really good friend who's here someone who I admire greatly and has spoken around the world specifically our causes related to women so I'd like to introduce my amazing gas packed Duckworth and read her wonderful little bio and if you were to read her bio which will tell you a lot about where we're going to be going today so worth is a woman's health women's women's health strategist who specializes in advising businesses and organizations who are committed to supporting women colleagues at menopause in the workplace she brings to this role over thirty years experience working in the public sector at senior management levels and ten years as a therapist and a coach she has written four books including the award winning hot women cool solutions I can already feel the the the the ice pack on my head and I've had a lot of fun in the blast especially the first time I met her in person we were on our way to a conference fort Lauderdale and she asked me to pick her up okay where is the conference fort Lauderdale where was I in coral gables Florida literally ten minutes from the Miami airport but for some reason and we still haven't figured it out yet when thinking she's going into the fort Lauderdale fort according most calling a calling is just tell me what she's wearing and I'm driving around the parking lot on where is she all of a sudden this light bulb went off I'm like when you're putting you in one male okay are you in the mine that's what it was the one by fort Lauderdale and how many are you at the Miami International Airport and you walked around and you saw a sign or something he said so back to Miami would likely wouldn't have a lot of traveling because sometimes I can take forty five minutes and I picked up this beautiful woman wearing exactly would you describe them right away we went to a great conference %HESITATION that was funny and that was how we met Amy no there is not one airport in that area folks there is an airport and fort Lauderdale very grateful to be picked up it was funny it was fun and we had such a great time we really did it was an auspicious start I will say that to what has become a wonderful relationship Sir Pat one of the things that I know about you is you care so much for people you are the scum national it caring soul really right up there with some folks that I've met who are incorrect you know you're a rock star that that's only say you are a flaming rockstar and when I I remember the first time I heard you talk about menopause in women in business on my what can you share with us why it's important for business owners corporate and leaders to understand what happens with women in menopause and how it affects them in the workplace N. or in business who %HESITATION that such a big question where do I begin I think it begins with the number of because business is a lot of the numbers and there are more women over fifty in the workplace than ever before I mean is the growing demographic in the workplace so just for white numbers it's important the thing always looking after these women and if we go back to well probably twenty years ago when there was a whole thing about actually looking after women in the workplace we have to think about maternity leave and looking after them during pregnancy because we don't wanna we lose women that we spent a lot of time training and you know getting getting experience and knowledge we don't want to lose them when they have their children so business is one stop to it instead of thinking that would be more liability if I'm going to have children like stuff we need to get back into the workplace of the children so the maternity leave things stealthy but that's a whole different politics lifecycle with women business stage that we get to when wearing now meet full teams ample do you start to grow hello you know something is beginning to change you start to get symptoms and not all women get symptoms but seventy five percent to about seventy five percent a good twenty five percent experience frequent and intense and since then okay number R. and that and if you'll not sleeping well feeling anxious losing confidence if you're starting to get hot flushes in many things you're not going to perform as well as you do so I'm going to I'm I'm going to pose a challenging question here I'm a man a single man because of its a married man and he's married to somebody in our age group here already knows it's going on a single man who doesn't get it or a single one or woman the young man I mean it doesn't have to be a man can be women who don't get it either and why is it important for them to really listen to this I heard what you said about the meeting in and get in the hot flashes in and I myself %HESITATION I went to menopause very very early because I had a phone I mean all those parts were taken out eight thirty all right so I I went through what we call surgical menopause yeah what you're looking women go through I'm sitting in meetings and and and I would just be sitting there and all of a sudden my kids call it into the deer in the headlights look he could always tell because my eyes would get real busy right well what was it they called it %HESITATION marmoset was hysterical now I can't remember another on the show %HESITATION it wasn't just a hot flash my mom's having any I'm back to make it right whoa thanks something %HESITATION what a power surge or our research that's what it was I don't know if I would always say to them and get out of my way because this power is going to explode %HESITATION that's what it was it was a power research thank you for that so why do these people who just don't get it why do they need to get it it worked some some many reasons firstly is the whole question of well being in the in the workplace yeah and it's recognizing that people at different stages of birdlife need different support so it might be if your young man you might have a bit of anxiety or you might going to loan money don't depression and you need help through it it's not gonna last forever and if you get supposed to be a really good support server business absolutely yeah and %HESITATION so it's recognizing that different stages of our lives if we want to have a diverse workplace if we were to have women and men of all ages contribution in putting in the knowledge of my wisdom we have to create the right atmosphere for and if we create a culture where people can be listened to that is open to listening to people die is of very good culture for businesses the way ideas come forward it's where innovation takes place because people feel comfortable with expressing themselves and if you're looking off to people looking up to their well being thank god we give a lot more about business this is going to thrive with it so say I'm a woman and that doesn't really look at a challenging question I'm a woman sitting in a meeting with five men okay and almost in the deer in the headlight switch comes on and I'm tripping yeah the guys don't know what to do yeah what would you what advice do you give them and the woman who's going through menopause so it really depends on the culture in the organization or you know it could happen if they're amazing somebody else's organization the woman it's about making sure you got a pencil supplier of coal will serve so you can have a drink a cold Wilson cool yourself down it's not not thinking that everybody's looking at you and judging you it's being ready to reply to people if they do make a comment but for most people they want you to be okay because they want to hear what you've got to say in that meeting so for the man it's just about no and balancing woman but they might pull her drink rules or policy or they might face or anything I can do for you it it's no embarrassing her it's not putting the spotlight on how it's just being there and being supportive if your own organization acknowledges a love this it's so much easier to find just excuse me for a moment I just need to have a drink or just makes out side for a moment the culture of the organization is fine and let's not forget that some men get hot flashes yes they do so yes they do because they can get hot flashes from all kinds of physical challenges yeah so they can get them to something called Andrew pools which is the male version of metal poles and it's just a reflection of what's going on with the whole mind cement Bowie's for Franco intellectual interests but say the men going into decline you know I made the whole month of reducing I'm sorry thank you can get a whole functions from an older might just be you know they might have some medical condition that gives rise to it so we're human we're not perfect we spent like Norwegian each other as human beings so what we can do to school teacher over so we can talk about best absolutely bring an answer and of course it only takes a few minutes for the hot flash to hit you know hitting the side of the head and you go through it and then you freeze some who really cool well I think at night when it's prevailed through mail to her home hi friends from all okay you know I I I often say you know I travel to Florida a lot as you know and I'll be walking through the streets when it gets you know when it's really hot men hot flashes then it's like you gotta be kidding me god really but then when you're up north and it's freezing cold well the house flashes for crying out so I mean one thing I would say if you're a woman who experiences hot flushes and you're going to amazing don't have a Cup of coffee before you go in there and don't know won't drink don't cookie you know the Kathleen the sugar thank you your system well that's awesome the smart health care you know and that's the word soft care yeah extreme self care is critical because when we take care of her certain we take care of ourselves first it's not just about us we are demonstrating especially as leaders as business owners as business women we are demonstrating to those around us the importance of caring for ourselves and that's what leaders do they absolutely sure themselves first because when they take care of themselves do there for everybody else I think a good example of a good role models the fees will taking care of yourself looks like so the people that they leading can learn from the example if you're not taking care of you so how can you expect other people to do something good when they're looking at you and thinking well she don't look down only because I'm I'm taking care of myself because she stopped at although that is challenging when you have a a manager or senior person who doesn't take care of themselves can you do what you just spoke about can be a challenge can you talk about that a little bit more Pat here looking to rent it from personal excel yes No example because I used to work in a big government department %HESITATION it was open plan hot desking has kicked her in the morning and right before you know it was it was great musical chose somebody thinks right now and I had a boss who was a very difficult person's work flow and %HESITATION the organization itself was supportive of self care there was a a gym down in the basement and so I used to bring my gym came in a couple of times a week we go to the gym also read full policy steps were my gym kit in my lunch break I would get the look I think I don't care about the look this is about me keeping myself well and my team knowing that I do this because I was a buffer between him and his style and the team will I want to do how I wanted them to stay so this complete the German the firm which really you know that you've got somebody above you is not suffering a good example that doesn't mean that that's what you have to Paulson's you'll train you can be the one who says no this is how we behave you know we take a lunch break you go to the gym you take care of me so a once a month from used to come in and do massage sessions your muscles session of mass destruction because that way they're gonna be they're going to be more responsive to many they're going to give me the support I need and if I'm not getting it from above I need to have a nice atmosphere around me so yeah I don't think just because somebody above you isn't that pleasant that tax what you need to call stands people below you know acts as a buffer and be that leader who can say no DC's helping behind what happens though when that manager uses your self care as a weapon against you and it can happen %HESITATION in the same person when I asked for feedback %HESITATION sets me what you will feed back I said well because I like to know how you feel I'm doing in the role the next sentences will be import once he said okay you'll also see good with people but from what what was your job description sorry yeah it did make it very uncomfortable because I knew I was doing a good job and I was turning the results that were required I just have to be able to absorb negativity coming from above me so the people who worked for me could do the job that they need to start so I'm not saying it's comfortable I couldn't not being me because that would have been a pretty horrible place for me to say and it would be horrible for everybody been anything wow intense so you know from personal experience what it's like absolutely I know what it's like to be in that place where you're really not getting the example that you need to say hello isn't one of the things that I find in the workplace where bridge Rainer's D. behavior that you just spoke about %HESITATION I find that when managers or leaders are very task focused people they're so focused on the task task task task task do do do do do you forget that it's people who are actually creating those tasks and if the manager kickers for people those tasks are going to be done do you play however if the manager doesn't give a damn about the people only about productivity and perfection which doesn't exist in you and I both know that do you find that the quality of work in those situations %HESITATION is as good as the quality of work with a manager cares for their people it just comping because if somebody's not being cared for they care less about their work the consortium works it is sub standard because it's good enough I'll do the job is good enough but if you're working for somebody you respect and %HESITATION who you admire do you want to show them the best of you you have to get the best out of people as a leader you have to show them your best so I can give you that passed its wall art foundries you know the people that I've worked with I'm not sure I deserve to be more open if you were in that critical environment of some you just toss toss toss you have really good ideas about how how it could be done back so or you know just little improvements in the office of be ready because but you might not be willing to share a room firstly because you're not sure how they're going to be received because you think it's possible deserving of my good ideas thank you serve to hear well I've got to say when the person applying all where is if I respect somebody in the mind of somebody and I feel comfortable with them then I'm more likely to make myself vulnerable but putting my ideas out there I think you start phone repair is he in the workplace so well you know you got this idea but I don't wanna be laughed at I don't want some discover that St Pete Owen you know that's not how we do things here you want people to feel well if I've had a good idea if this is something I've seen that could be improvements that's something I've seen in the system what's going wrong I don't know what my books look stupid but if the boss is open you can say what you know the system doesn't work the way you think it does and then it's okay so it's creating that atmosphere it can be done for us that could be open with people could make themselves a bit vulnerable in order to share all the wisdom that I have and I can remember ability can truly only happen when there is a culture of what I call real leadership which is trust honor respect integrity loyalty and love a fellow man yeah absolutely and hi I would like to in fact a little bit and %HESITATION ask one is the leader it is a menopausal woman we're talking about men you know but what happens when the leader is a menopausal woman and there's a true fear I'm resistance in it limits the resistance of being vulnerable and honoring where she is at at the moment can you address that so this is a situation who's quite a bit in which that woman with all her wisdom and knowledge goes from my organization because she doesn't feel supported she doesn't feel able to talk around here she called sure about vulnerability and a really high percentage of women in that situation consider leaving their job only federal so they might feel that it's time to leave a call pro %HESITATION position and go work for themselves or to do something real flexible strain because I just don't feel well enough to do the job that they were doing also I think I'm going a little bit off topic here but some of those women they get to that point when they reach a tipping point and think well I always wanted to do where are mine now you might face and the people around me all respectful you don't really want to do something else I'm so lost women make that decision to jump ship and go and do something completely different and it might be you know a new career the site might be setting up themselves become the mantra it might be something community based off charity based because like that she will to fulfill a purpose and I haven't been able to fulfill through that job someone is shifted and that was very much in mind that that comment was perfect western society looks at men upon looks looks at older women who are going through menopause they tend to look down on your eyes are indigenous cultures look at women who've gone through menopause a revere them and they call them wise women on thus the the crown ceremonies into the word chrome comes from the word crown and you really think about it our those women who have gone through menopause when they go through a cloning what I'm quote ceremony %HESITATION they're being crowned for their wisdom what do you think it's going to take for us as wise women when we reach that point to be able to own it and understand that these career shifts you're talking about the possibility of a career shift going into business for yourself going into a different career and some people so I'm just going to retire I don't like to use the word retire I like %HESITATION we inspire own you know you're using you're doing something that really inspires you where you take all of that wisdom with you to elevate your sell your customers your family and the people around you so I I'm curious Pat about your perspective on the different cultures and addressing the wise women %HESITATION that walk among us yeah I think this is something that's been neglected to think about mana pools as of just a very short period of time you know you go through menopause yeah its stock %HESITATION but actually I I heard the phrase I heard the words liminal space %HESITATION a couple years ago and I thought man the polls this liminal space it's the time between two parts of your life the five minute Wanda this is a period of time where you can start to acknowledge but time has pulse you've reached a new stage of your life when you were a teenager you were going through a massive change but you know whatever your teenager but now you've probably heard forty five fifty years of your life and you know if you're lucky you might get another forty five fifty but you know that's part of the broad side of it and now you've got the strongest as your boarding stranger initial hormones are changing ask your actual again to see if you'll self so you've gone from being this fertility goddess into the wise woman and there is some loss of so if you if you do not spice the most support role but there's a lot to be gained from the other side of it so accepting that this is a time of change but it's not just five minutes it might be five or ten years that you're going through this time I'm reassessing who you all what you'll identities on the other side of things that's a really crucial point if I was you know if I had children and they don't need me as much anymore welcome back sorry about that yours truly had this little coughing spell come over me because that set a few things in mind body reacted and missed by the way if any if anything like this ever happens to you please note that the body knows before the grain diets the body knows before the brain to us and we but after I couldn't keep going because I had it first of all cleared out I could keep talking and she was never has some powerful words are powerful questions that allowed me to figure out why I was responding so intensely to the questions that she was asking and it's really important because we as women who are going through menopause this is a powerful time for us to make certain decisions that are going to affect a lot of people in their lives so Pat yes %HESITATION did an amazing job talking me through that because that's it I don't know where and you had mentioned something about you were feeling the chef can you talk more about that yes I was talking about it I could feel the power of what I was saying about the stage of life being so transformational but it's not just any of the period of your life this liminal space with something is changing and thought I could feel the power of this I was talking about and then you start to its response rate started to cough and something needed to come out there will be words that needed to come out and that's what we were able to explore so it really started with me talking about this change of identity the identity that you had before you went into the polls all being infertility go there from you know having all of our younger stuff going on and being a carrot your children and then the other side of it who are you what is your identity that side what does it mean to be the blinds woman and there is so many negative words associated with it but it's finding the power in it because we're we're one of only two species have Amanda pulls this off and two species of wireless let free I'm sorry what else yeah we're yeah because it's a survival premium around having females who all reproductive who all the grandmothers and grandmothers have the experience the wisdom of their lives to be able to support the next generation coming through and if you look at the whitewater whose lives but lives they live in those faults with grandmother wireless being with the mothers of the baby whales so it felt that you know who the real premium around having once we meaning you'll climb who can then help the younger ones and actually help everybody to thrive is one of the following it is so cool but the Wales that is really really cool the thing is though Pat do you not think that it has to do with our culture and as we look at aging women I mean so many companies and an aging men also so many companies I have just tossed people side because of the fear of them getting sick or this and that you know it breaks my heart to see that because these people have such wisdom to offer what are your thoughts on that so I think we have a responsibility ourselves as we've talked about to do the self care to keep ourselves well people can get ill at any stage in their lives it's not check your fault but we need to take our own personal responsibility for keeping ourselves well for keeping also in that space gross growth of the Shia you know as you get older if you go into fear and contraction you'll not going to be attractive to employers if you studying gross so you're always looking to develop and develop your ideas and I'm gonna keep sharing your wisdom and your knowledge your really valuable resource and if an employer ignores that well you know but it's kind of a problem because you can type or outside of that business and develop your your own business so I think it's partly the responsibility of the organizations to recognize to look at the research room Barbosa team want phone poll and there's a responsibility on themselves to keep hospitals moral to keep also seeing growth and development so that we all such a valuable resource to ourselves and our proves that we don't get a vote well this is been a phenomenal interview I always a door interviewing you you think that this is my third podcast you've been a guest on on all three of them and you are just a delight and a wealth of information I just want to thank you so much for being here and sharing your wisdom with you awaken the possibilities audience can you tell us did did you bring a free gift for the inconvenience well %HESITATION if you go to so my first book about menopausal school hall women cool solutions and there's a whole women cool solutions dot com website and there's a whole bunch of free gifts where there is a sign up on the right hand side of the screen those are things to do with becoming an entrepreneur there's lots of recordings to help you deal with the hot flushes and the white guy and you know as a hypnotherapist is one of my double cheese I used less and less lofty visualisations it just kind of grab brilliant thank you so much you're so caring and loving and and so why is I didn't pricing wise movement and what would you say what is the last thing you like to leave with your audience that you wish to say to your younger self %HESITATION firstly I would thank her so much because she's full for me to be able to do what I'm doing now so I would just like to say a really big thank you to her for the work that she did for the for the education of the development that she did the celeb me to be the woman I am to die so my make it think its message by terrorists thank you so much thank you Pat I went to the wrecking the possibilities audience thank you so much for being here it is my drawing my pleasure to be able to bring you amazing people like Pat Duckworth to be able to share their knowledge and their wisdom to help you awaken the possibilities in your life and your business I'm your host Terry will demand and I look forward to seeing you next time to your success See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Awaken The Possibilities: Integrating The Cosmos and Business

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 5, 2020 31:57

TO READ TRANSCRIPT SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGEIn episode 3 of the new Awaken The Possibilities Podcast, Host Terry Wildemann interviews Brian Kelly Host on " From Fitness Training to Business Automation Doing Work That You Love”. Awaken the Possibilities Podcast features successful entrepreneurs and intuitive leaders who offer insights on how to attract success in business and life._____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ABOUT Chris ThompsonChris Thompson has worked as a lawyer, economist, Oriental scholar, national campaigner, director of think-tanks in Scotland and the USA, and as an advisor to companies. He is an international speaker, and has published many articles. Today Chris focuses on helping people and organizations understand and address the deeper root causes of their problems, with a view to building a world that reflects our potential to be, one day, the most intelligent species on this small planet. He is also psychotherapist, mentor, writer, and course leader. He lives in Catalunya, and spends as much time as possible in the mountains._____________________________________________________________________________________________________________About Terry Wildemann:Terry Wildemann is the owner of Intuitive Leadership® and a Business and Resilience Accelerator, Speaker and Certified Executive Coach.Terry's specialty is working with tired, unhealthy, close-to-burned-out entrepreneurs and professionals and helps them leap off the stress hamster wheel. They evolve into unstoppable stress resilient intuitive leaders and practical business mystics. Terry’s timely message guides clients and students to integrate intuition, stress resilience, positive communications and leadership with grounded business systems to achieve success by positively serving and influencing others. Her leadership experience includes owning a manufacturing company, image consulting company, leadership and holistic education center.Terry is a best selling author of The Enchanted Boardroom: Evolve Into An Unstoppable Intuitive Leader. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________TRANSCRIPTwelcome everyone to wake in the possibilities podcast I'm your host Jerry will demand and I'm thrilled to be here today with that fabulous fabulous gas Chris Thompson and before we get in there I want to wish all of you a phenomenal twenty twenty this is our first podcast for the year and it's exciting to have someone like Chris with us because he's going to be sharing some very different but very clear and wonderful insight to help us get our twenty twenty two where we wanted to be here a little bit about Chris Chris has worked as a lawyer and economist a Synology S. which I'm gonna ask you to explain a little bit because I don't think a lot of people really know what that is and more recently as a psychotherapist course leader writer and director of think tanks in Scotland and New Mexico welcome to the show Chris I'm so glad that you're next Duterte spice to the show what are the challenges hello this is someone who studies tried background news in the sixties degree in Chinese and economics and after a short spell working in a bank bank of England I decided to go back overall I was persuaded to go back to the university and I did it in the development of scientific Chinese you don't know what that means it means the vocabulary in Chinese for the science chemistry cemex so that's what I did so in that sense I must've excellent eventually cool as I have an admin I wouldn't have anybody on any of my shows this is my third the cashier who it had anything to do with China or the study of China and here we are I'm really glad to hear that because it makes it very clear thank you so much so when things are gonna be talking about today is the customer so when you say the cosmos Chris can you tell us what you mean about that well it's just another word is you know all of the universe %HESITATION it is the Greek word for the universe because most of the exploding K. %HESITATION and it's used interchangeably quite often many scientists using your member call center or if you years ago did it be TV series on the coast so scientists are quite accustomed to using but when I use the term all right tends to mean something more than the physical okay so I tend to be more than the same sorry so if the universe has a spiritual dimension mentions that sort of thing being by the coast lawsuits both physical and non physical it's both material and spiritual that's my understanding knowing that this is a show about business and about life how do you connect your work with the customer and business well it's an interesting question I'm going to have to think on my feet as I am so stupid with this is not a solution for okay so business is business the business has to make money make a profit and all that okay apart from that business is like everything else it's it's it's it's choose your own lives in the world talk to %HESITATION and in a way it has to recognize the rules what do I mean %HESITATION when I go back to what I just said about the cost most this material and spiritual aspects I do believe very strongly that recalls most influences all over in more ways than we than we can imagine I'm not just talking about the fact that cosmic rays the surface of the planet I'm not just talking about the fact that we rely on the song for every a light fix I'm talking about more than that and I'm not talking specifics it seems like strong I don't just mean okay I really do mean that we are children of course I'm in no way reflect the cost look often in some way deep says we resemble it cost us and that means this is a strange thing to say because most resembles us of course if that's not it mmhm I agree of course that that that's a big discussion will spend a year in the day just talking but looking all I'm saying is it's a bit like %HESITATION climate change okay so to be fair to business most companies of walking up to the fact what the climate is changing dangerous Celeste narrow on everyone's agenda taken tying is finally happened so playing that change may be the most issue over time %HESITATION and that's a recognition that our actions have consequences okay %HESITATION and if you apply that to business I'm I'm stating the obvious it's mostly the old businesses actions have consequences I don't know why these people opposed to good business because they know that they are very similar with that you don't have to tell there are many people and businesses still really haven't crossed everything they do has consequences not just on the people who work cells not just on their customers on the whole world or in the case of very big business excell that's good news the case of Google for example Facebook equally all over but it's a place to any regardless of the solders regardless of age it has consequences okay so when I use the term because moss and I'm kind of extrapolating the bruising we do affects the cost okay and that balances back on those that reflects and all I'm saying to you more aware we are thanks the universe is reflexive flex back almost %HESITATION I sing the mole or useful and our lives will be I do like to preach we have come across as preaching but I do believe that stupid so knowing that %HESITATION and climate change it is a huge huge huge topic %HESITATION knowing and I'm gonna play devil's advocate here %HESITATION especially rather because Mrs concerning climate change how much of this yes we have contributed yes we have we are conscious point is based on the things that we have done but how much of it also is a natural evolution of our earth warming and we are contributing to it there's no doubt about it but how much of it isn't also a natural cycle and how does that play in with the cost not the short answer is no one really knows question do people to separate the effect we are having with human race problem natural cycles okay people who don't like to accept my gyms they tend to adopt the owner of the regardless of that regardless of the site sure it's still very clear that you know we're making a big impact on the planet yeah it's not just the client meeting I did research on this you're also and I discover something called life support system it's a technical term hello H. one minute including water biodiversity seems like yeah %HESITATION and it was almost all the finalists life support systems all of are you serious decline I just to complete last I just to complete the sentence them soonest applying cost if you let because of what I'm even again you even activities of the long ago normal daily activities this is this isn't about we even being is doing something special for her to destroy the planet this is our normal daily life courses so if you drive a car cause some problems if you fly in a plane to go to the courts if you have your conditioning prism central heating you're going to cause some problems okay individual level it's not very much of course it's not mmhm but as a collective level use very large but that's not to say you that's not to say we consult well it's not to say that people will suddenly give up your car was totally give up flying for air conditioning they want a new one but at least there was widespread recognition something big has to change got it so I'm curious Chris is your director of a think tank in Scotland and in New Mexico you tell us more about the thing tankless that was a long time ago so the first the first one was in school and it was set up about twenty years ago trying to moment when Scotland regained some self control %HESITATION so the Scottish parliament reopened after three hundred years that was in nineteen ninety nine this call delusion so some of us were repatriated to stop it's a bit like the system in the U. S. each state has its own %HESITATION quite apart from the federal power %HESITATION and because a this was being set top box and you all of this being said someone said we ought to think so we can think about the ideas for the speech grandmotherly in economics and business and health care and education %HESITATION and I was recruited I was had turned over to London to go under your direct turning it lasted a few years and coincided with my travel and I ended up doing more or less the same in a little place called Santa Fe New Mexico in about two thousand to two thousand three but the idea just in case you wonder think tankers ways you do blue sky thinking you have the luxury luxury we'll be able to sing as widely as deeply as possible okay about the big issues of the day yeah I'm curious in this think tank and this is about you know the shows about awakening the possibility one of the things that I talk about is more businesses are sung because they don't see what's underneath the iceberg you know the only to the top of the iceberg %HESITATION the bottom part of the iceberg is basically you know from the neck down okay it's it's our consciousness it's our energy we don't listen to our bodies the aches and the pains that are going on we're all we're you know we're from here up this is what seen above the water %HESITATION this is the practical technological stuff so in these think tanks do they include the bottom part of the iceberg or is it just from the head up I'll give an example of an answer is yes give an example so at that time one of the most buzz words which was still very fresh in the top twenty what is sustainable development or sustainable economic cross okay thank and to be fair your business is trying to move in that direction we set up something called call social responsibility you can do USA school business social responsibility this is same lighting okay okay however I would look it was no surprise that in many cases ended up books to keep exposed okay how do you plan to treat do you recycle your waste this kind we sure enough there's nothing wrong with and and the thing is better than nothing yeah okay but as you imply that woman who tended to ignore the big six we didn't use deep we were really causing why their private jets like this five repeat themselves three hundred times more than their lowest paid employees and things like that I would state or worse to Bruce subjects off limits subjects this certainly couldn't be discussed one was called campaign finance this call can be refinements in the states and other countries right okay see you soon as soon as another group it's in this context was tracks going to pay as little tax as possible which was strange which was strange because the very same company a source of themselves as good corporate citizens okay and yet you and I both know the concept is contribute to society and yet these good corporate citizens in quotation marks we're doing the best to avoid paying so it was a lot to contradictions yes to summarize your %HESITATION prompted me to respond a lot of stuff been niece the surface of the ice grow we simply not being addressed and to some extent but still she yeah I was just gonna say that was my next question %HESITATION do you think it's still trailing you just confirm that and I do believe it's true I think sometimes %HESITATION we want to do the right thing yet other things get in the way of are doing the right thing and they can truly %HESITATION compromise where it is we want to go and it makes me sad because when it comes to integrity and authenticity it's really important that we take here the people who are in our world both in their business and our lives and often times all the things you talk about that's not what they're doing %HESITATION and it makes me sad because to me that's not leadership the poor leadership so let's get back to leadership for a moment making the possibilities you've done an awful lot I know you're going to be doing I'm very excited to announce someone else on the video that Chris is going my my faculty members for our intuitive leadership university which will be launching this spring and it's very exciting he's going to be participating in the leadership with the score for those of you who aren't sure what that is all about %HESITATION we are opening the intuitive leadership university and it's going to have to be different schools leadership within the school the business business school and a life with them full and Chris will be doing some courses in the leadership within school so I'm very very excited about that so Chris as you look at leadership in the world now making a possibilities in the course of that you're gonna be delivering to the university can you tell us what the bottom line for excuse to you in leadership in connection with the cost most in connection with business the connection with humanity and what we leaders need to truly be looking at to be able to influence the world to influence and I don't like to see the world we influence the people who are part of who crossed our attack how how do we do that what is it what you know what is a golden nugget that weakens the possibility okay I'll have to summarize two things okay two things bring %HESITATION I'm very impressed influenced by the W. Jing bye bye the dollar judging by does that %HESITATION %HESITATION and there's even a book called the joke leadership you can buy a book called I think the %HESITATION also stolen hi %HESITATION I mention that because a journalist leader leads wrong both the front and the back he he %HESITATION she leads from the front in the sense that he leads by example so it's almost leader does not expect people to do things that he does not so he he takes a course okay so if for example he wants to the company the changes involved in mental he will be the first to start practicing that and these are my so leading from the front or leading by example okay leading from the front look at me look what type do you most of what I see not that that's a phrase that that kind of user who could use but also leading from the back this long strange history contradiction when I say leading from the back I will be pushing people okay %HESITATION what what what I need is a kind of invisible leadership %HESITATION where you act as a catalyst you know we would wear your sessions automatically stimulates people %HESITATION to behave well your presence brings out the best and that's what I need okay so it is a strange combination China lodging the strange combination over leading from the front leading by example and leading quiet almost invisible from the back okay so the %HESITATION so that your presence is almost enough to stimulate people to do their best that's what I'm trying to go there so I'm I'm not the I would say that the main %HESITATION if the child we could lead to someone who's able to lead from the front and the back this evening one of the phrases that are used commonly when describing the university is we teach leaders how to integrate the practical tactical logical with the emotional be energetically spiritually into it D. bat definitely fit with that rate does it not well by coincidence I've been asked to write a short book ebook by someone you may know that Stephen %HESITATION %HESITATION anyway since you talked clearly show which is effectively a concise of the book I wrote five years ago on intelligence right the last relative to what you just said big cost one of the main themes of this short book is that intelligence is about hello it's about all aspects of the human being not just not just applying not just the emotion not just the intuition not just physical but not just the spiritual aspect it's about all of these elements %HESITATION and the faculty I mean it's strange I'm just going to finish the special and okay but your mind is amazing the one of the main seat is to be able to work on the whole of ourselves rather than just on our %HESITATION exactly and that's what the university is all about having you as a faculty member it's absolutely heart warming and having Dr Hobbs is that also as a faculty member I mean it it that's what this is about leadership at the cutting edge as far as I'm concerned the cutting edge of leadership it's really creating leaders that are completely %HESITATION that they get it that is its whole leadership it's not just what's up here and it's really important that we do that in this day and age that we use all of our guests all ever since all of our tools everything that we have at our disposal to be able to influence upcoming generations S. that they can be because the world is changing and we need to provide the %HESITATION the army perhaps to be able to lead in ways that we can really really make a positive difference in the world well Chris I just want to thank you so much for being here today because every time I talk with you it just gets better and better battery I get more and more excited about having you on board and %HESITATION can I didn't share with folks that a I'm in coral gables Florida you can tell from the %HESITATION foliage in the back I'm a micro game of office and Chris you're in Spain that's correct in Houston right now well I'm in the nose of northeast office Estonian okay %HESITATION and the capital as you may know it's possible I'm in the car right right one to knees right next to the central and hold on just as you're talking an airplane decided to go over a lot of back and helicopter %HESITATION there we go %HESITATION %HESITATION Kay and I you know it's a catch twenty two when you come out here and I love being out here on %HESITATION I'm I DO with all the greenery behind us I kept putting my green screen up and kept falling so that to me was the signal from the universe get yourself outside in the fresh air into this wonderful interview with Chris outside so you have to put up with things like hi captors going overhead she %HESITATION so where were we when I %HESITATION when knowledge after decided to distract this you were we were talking about the importance of the whole process being cold okay and bringing the whole of your soul to your to your life and your work and I was thinking we need to work there used to be terms S. like renaissance man all of the chivalrous knight and these will describe someone who is well rounded they want a well rounded you so they've they've they've they were physically call mentally all emotionally intelligent they were spiritually and bonds they were kind of tunes they will also work to stick because the same people whose waters %HESITATION were expected to write poetry you can use it so I mean you really find that we will be seeing about a you know a specialization I often look at animals for sources of inspiration and she described and the animal that comes to me that %HESITATION it's what you're talking about is the unicorn it's a %HESITATION and here's why in next we've been logo for the program is the unicorn so you're not actually brought me here and here's the reason why first of all they're very mystical magical animal and this you know corn is a winged unicorn if you look at the logo it's a winged unicorn and why wouldn't you know point because many unicorn have four hooks on the ground it is very grounded and you can see what is happening at eye level you can see all around it when it flies up in the air you can see things from thirty thousand feet above so it has the perspective of being able to see a ground level see above and with that fantastic unicorn being part of the horn itself being part of the %HESITATION using it as a gift it's got a mystical quality that a lot of what %HESITATION %HESITATION %HESITATION what did she %HESITATION yeah but the name of the author if you read the book the corporate mystic %HESITATION that should should name is right here and actually his book is what influenced me to open my leadership center in two thousand one from two thousand one to two thousand nine if there's this mystical quality and indeed you do become the mystic and I call them the integrated unicorns because they can really fit it fits everything that you're talking about that land yes %HESITATION I I I like good morning in his two best we believe very much in having their heads in the clouds there's feet deep in the mud mmhm so they're fully grown goods and foodie in the heavens at the same time absolutely and so many of our but one of things I find with a lot of spiritual teachers who come to me their heads are in the clouds but their feet are also up there with them this brings and the thing is they don't want to bring your feet down because when we do when we bring your feet down they end up having to really steal the due and realize that they are human and may need to look at they don't need to do anything but it's the best feeling in a very different way and background in this can be very uncomfortable for them on the other hand we have people who are very practical practical and logical that are grounded but are very %HESITATION concerned and tend to poo poo going up into the spirit of the mountains and understand bad is as important as the practical practical a lot about that do you see that it's very interesting Terry because just recently started doing she'd grown get the local teacher not far from where I live and the other day he showed us an exercise which is designed to do exactly so the purpose of the exercise it used to be very very grounded and very much in the heavens at the same time it's a wonderful feeling is meant when you're that present because you truly are present you feel the clothes on your back you feel the jury on your body you you see very very clearly you see the colors different you are so integrated when you do that and if the image the powerful leader who can really influence only people to where they want to be because they see things that others don't taking Chris I want to thank you so very much for being here with us today and are there any parting words that you would like to share with the a week in the possibilities idea it's nice to see the green wings your I'm sitting here with heavy snow assigned well I will be in the cold not by Friday hi I'm enjoying it and appreciating it and believe it or not it has been a bit cool here and it was it's really %HESITATION if you're in the people watching it is quite comical when it's %HESITATION in the low sixties here watching people walking down the street with their faces covered because the with it all so it's all perspective so thank you again Chris this has been a lot of fun but a lot of insight into %HESITATION it and being an integrated leader working with the customers and understanding how all of that fits in our world thank you to our audience who was listening today and we look forward to seeing you again next time this is Terry will demand of intuitive leadership you can go to intuitive leadership dot com and find out all of our all about our university and upcoming events and Chris how can our audience thank you well we can find we Chris I'm Michael Chris Thompson don't block responding to and headed south Thompson with a P. C. O. T. H. O. M. S. I'm glad I asked one have an amazing amazing we stand next time See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Dissolved Adoption: Shame, Isolation, & Painful Choices

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 1, 2020 55:44

– Adam Bryan And in this, the first time we've talked publicly about this, because this gets a really people get shamed. This is this is a really black mark on many families. And they get kicked out of churches, they get kicked out of neighborhoods, they get kicked out of families where the grandparents or the parents will say, you know, how can you do that to a child? How can you consider that and will kick people out of families in shame? - Allie Bryan I mean, shame, the biggest. INTRO Today’s conversation is a complex one. We are going to dive into the story of Adam and Allie and the little girl they adopted from Uganda. Adam and Allie loved their daughter and brought her over to be a part of their family. She lived with them for three years and is not no longer in their home. On this episode of the Handle with Care podcast, we are giving voice to a dimension of adoption that is difficult to talk about, often layered with a lot of emotion. Even the term for what we are discussing can feel charged. – Liesel Mertes Is the term. So some things that I encounter failed adoption dissolved. You know, this has been an adoption dissolution. - Allie Bryan Yeah. This has been disrupted or dissolved adoption. Okay. Those were the terms that like our lawyer used. Right. Okay. - Liesel Mertes So that was only because I was like, man, even the term failed adoption, you know, all kinds of like connotation. Right. - Liesel Mertes To how you feel and what terms you guys like to use. I say dissolves. Okay. Yeah. Dissolved adoption. Feel like it's the calmest word. - Adam Bryan I don't really identify. I like I don't really even news. Yeah. We had an adoption and we adopted girl. We've transitioned her. I don't really even know because I'm afraid of them. I just don't know. - Liesel Mertes Doesn't feel as maybe emotionally freighted in the same way. This discussion could feel charged for you, the listener. I had my own emotional journey in preparing for the interview. It touches on pain and disappointment and vulnerability. When Adam first approached me last year, it was after listening to prior episodes that talked about adoption. He wondered if I had ever talked with a family whose adoption had dissolved. As we talked, I heard the landscape of pain and isolation that is a part of dissolved adoptions. Whether or not you agree with Adam and Allie’s choice, I believe it is important to hear their journey, the heartache and judgement and love that is embedded in their story. It is important to hear because we all bear complex stories…and it is important to hear because their story will help you empathize more with anyone who is on the adoption journey. You will also hear how faith in God is deeply embedded in their journey. Faith is an essential grounding point for many people as they experience disruptive life events. If you aren’t from a similar background of faith, this perspective might seem foreign or jarring. If that is the case, I invite you to just listen with an open curiosity, embracing the insights that are for you and letting the aspects that don’t apply to simply sit by the wayside. As we begin, I want to remind listeners of our sponsors. Are you a small business owner? An entrepreneur? Growing your business van be hard, but benefits don’t have to be. Let FullStack PEO take care of your people and your benefits plan so you can get back to business. We are also sponsored by Handle with Care consulting, through workshops, conferences, and keynotes, we empower your people to respond with empathy and compassion when it matters most. Let me begin by telling you a little bit about Adam and Allie. I went to high school with Adam. He was two years ahead of me and, in my mind, endlessly cool because he drove a Jeep. Allie grew up moving all around the US; her dad was in the Navy. She and Adam still love traveling together. Allie also sells things on Facebook Marketplace. – Adam Bryan She'll post stuff. And I'm like, wait, I'm using that. Well, no one else. You I use it. One doesn't wait. - Adam Bryan Well, I like your toothbrush, right? Right. I think you're getting really kind, honey. You're getting really good at selling everyone else's stuff but your own. I'm really nervous. She's really good. So you're on to it through. - Liesel Mertes Did you have three children? - Allie Bryan Yes. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes What are their ages and what kinds of things do you most enjoy doing around town as a family? - Adam Bryan So the ages the youngest is four. Our middle is eight and our oldest is 10. OK. - Allie Bryan All of their birthdays in April? No, no, it wasn't planned. It's just remarkable. Consistent, so. Right. - Allie Bryan So they're all gonna be switching here soon. I think we've gotten like I don't really know if we have anything. - Adam Bryan I enjoy family bike rides. The 4 year old has a little trailer bike. And so we. But not in the winter because it's Indiana. We do enjoy that as a family. Adam grew up with just one sister and was always interested in adopting, Allie wasn’t so sure. But that changed when their boys were three and one. - Allie Bryan I never wanted to adopt. My sister always wanted to. And I mean, we'd talk about it all the time growing up. And it never like, oh, I was about like. Good for you. - Allie Bryan And I was rocking. Our youngest at the time, and it just hit me of this. I think we're supposed to adopt and like now, which was so it was not me. I had never wanted to never considered any of it and came downstairs and told Adam and he was like, okay, that be great. Yeah. - Allie Bryan Maybe in like a couple years, you know, and like, no now - Adam Bryan or in like 10 years. Right. - Allie Bryan And so it started on a process of really trying to figure out from what country do we do it stateside, do it, you know, all the things. And it took a couple months for us to get on the same page. But, through a process of discernment and listening, they did get on the same page. The next question was logistical considerations, domestic or international? - Adam Bryan So we were really open to whatever the Lord had at the time, but - Allie Bryan We had our we had savings and we we're like, well, let's get our home study done. And then as the Lord opens the door, we'll just keep moving forward. - Allie Bryan It was one of those. - Adam Bryan It was all of our savings rate. And so was not Dave Ramsey. It was not. - Allie Bryan And so every next step, we. It was that we'll do your money to move forward. And there always was. And the Lord provided all the money for it. Like we didn't because we didn't want to go into debt for it. Minute like he just provided. There are also a lot of logistics to setting up a home study. - Adam Bryan I mean, basically, once they come through your life, I mean, you're getting fingerprinted and blood work and I don't know. Yeah. Just everything. I mean, they comb through everything your life. They come to your house, they meet with your kids, they interview people. You have to send in paperwork from other families that verify that you're good parents. They're so pretty involved. Yeah. - Adam Bryan Really, it's a very in-depth and involved process. I mean, the homestay, the paperwork that we took over, I mean, it was a stack of paper, you know, an inch or two thick of our whole life. Adam and Allie ended up deciding to adopt from Uganda. Allie’s sister was living in country with her country, she could help on the ground and make organic connections. - Adam Bryan And so there's a huge need over there. Right. - Allie Bryan And so we ended up getting our home study done. And it was, okay, let's get over there and see what connections we can get. Like, let's see, - Allie Bryan Because you have to find a baby home and, you know, like there's an a lawyer. Like there's all these things that because we were doing it independently. So not with the adoption agency, - Adam Bryan We tried going through adoption agencies. But it's it's interesting because certain agencies are only work with certain countries and there's certain restrictions. And so it's not it's not really easy. And there's a lot of hoops to jump through. Just even with an agency. And so this was an opportunity - Adam Bryan And we were planning to go to visit them. We had the home study and you have to claim a country or whatever in the home study. And so we said, well, let's just put Uganda since we're going. We'll see what happens. In even talking with the agency we talked with to do the home study. He said you can change it later if you want to. So we just kind of started with that. They get to Uganda and travel out to visit Allie’s sister. Home study in hand, they meet with the director of the baby home. - Adam Bryan And then the next day she called us. - Allie Bryan She texted and said, I think I have a match for you. Which is a super weird text again. Okay. And so we made a scheduled time to go over to the baby home the next day and we met her. And so we have some precious video of getting to meet her. - Adam Bryan And it was also really weird. - Allie Bryan Yeah, it's you don't really prepare for that. - Allie Bryan And then having to go back to my sister's house and we had to sit in on the conversation of how do you even make this decision? - Adam Bryan It's like picking out a puppy at the pound. Except it's a human right. Right. How do you know? Guide for this. - Adam Bryan There is no guidebook for this. How do you say yes or how do you say no? Well, here's this child. She fits. You know, she was of age and we wanted a little girl and this or that. Like, how do you say no? How do you say how do you how do you do this? - Adam Bryan How do you make this decision? After prayer and consideration, Adam and Allie decide to move forward. There was still a lot of paperwork, attorneys on the ground in Uganda. But everything was moving forward quickly, - Liesel Mertes So you you go. You return is the next step that you go again and bring your daughter home? - Allie Bryan Yeah. So we went over and met her in September. And so when we came home, it was that goal. OK, we have to get there's still a good amount. So at that point, we had investigations going on over there making sure everything was legitimate. - Adam Bryan And you had to we had to pay for ads to find if any other, Is this any other family? What her have a claim. And so we had to go through that. We had to. So the attorney and newspaper are in all of this stuff. So there's all this stuff. We're funding that's happening. And then we get a call that a court date is in February and March. - Liesel Mertes How were you learning or preparing? - Liesel Mertes Yeah, right on your own. - Allie Bryan So there was a really at the time, a really big independent adoption group for Uganda, which was super helpful because we were having to do all of it. So is a lot of updates of like paperwork in this and certain judges how long they take it. You know, you you just kind of start to network a lot through there. And that was really helpful. But I would say that's that was the main support. There were also some resources stateside for families that were doing independent adoptions. - Allie Bryan So some of the classes or most the classes were online. And I remember one of them, it was it was preparing us to be white parents with a little African baby in it being a conspicuous ratably, which is, yes, that is a good thing to recognize and to. - Allie Bryan But it, “A” for effort. What I would say. It just doesn't prepare you right. For real life of having an adopted daughter from another country. - Adam Bryan And that's kind of like premarital counseling, right? You don't know what you write. You go through premarital counseling, but you have no idea. No. Right. It's kind of the same thing. Like they're telling you. But you have no frame of reference for this. You have no grasp of this. And so really, there wasn't we didn't find it very helpful. - Liesel Mertes And especially, you know, when you say that I considered it like you are receiving a person right now is just a child. Right. Right. Yes. A entity of this age. Right. This is a this is a personality. This is a set of experiences. Good, bad, traumatic. Right. You. Yeah. - Adam Bryan Well, yeah. And there may be other agencies that do a better job with international culture and things. But we didn't we didn't receive that. We didn't get that. So. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes And I imagine even trauma. I'm right now. Right. My trauma is, you know, a different dimension. Allie and Adam returned in February. - Allie Bryan And so we showed up in February and went to the baby home and they handed her to us. And it was literally like, all right. Like, do we need to sign anything? We're sorry. - Adam Bryan They just handed to us and we just walked out. Had a nine month onesie on. She was almost two. And she had like this dish towel as a diaper like tight around her. And that was it. Like, we just walked out with her. Are you sure you sign it? No, you're good. Go ahead. Allie needed to stay behind in country for some additional weeks before their daughter could come to the US. - Liesel Mertes So, Allie, you guys are in a foreign country in in Kampala. I've, I've been there, I can picture the streets and things like that. And you actually are practiced at parenting a child, right? This age and stage. But what are you finding that you're like, oh, this is so familiar. And what are you finding? Oh, wow, this is different. - Allie Bryan Yeah, I anticipated more of different cause there was just a lot, you know, I. I walked in to the situation. So naive. And I was telling I think Adam a while ago, like I I literally thought within a week she was going to start saying, Mama, like in my head, like, I really. - Allie Bryan And then within because she's two, surely. - Adam Bryan And everyone had said we had like physical therapists look at her and like developmental therapists like over there. - Adam Bryan And it was we had there's, there's like Australian and British in Scandinavia right over there. And so they would look and say, well, I'm a I'm a therapist of this, this and this. Oh, she'll be great. Just give her some love. In a few months, she'll be talking and walking in all this. It'll be great. She's fine. - Allie Bryan So that's our expectation. And then the more he was with us for the first ten days, because he had to be at court and then he flew back to be with the boys and work. And so I was with so I was staying in Jinja mainly, which is where my sister lived. And but it was still extremely lonely with out him. - Allie Bryan And I have this daughter that I don't know. And there's no connection. There's no bond. And yet there's that high stress of you have to bond and no one else, you know. So for two months being over there, it no one else was really supposed to hold her, feed her, any of that kind of stuff. And so it was just a high stress not knowing her. I don't know what makes her tick. I don't know what she's thinking to she even understand everything I'm saying. - Liesel Mertes It's just very, you know, totalizing. Yeah, I would imagine. Yeah. No. - Allie Bryan Yeah. And she was she was also developmentally. She could sit. But if she fell over, she couldn't get herself back up. She couldn't even go on all fours. You know, and she's almost two. And so it was just the rearranging of expectations. And you know, realizing, oh my gosh, this is this is gonna be a lot different than what all the training on the computer, you know, tried to teach us. Right. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. Well, I imagine then there is the next unfolding chapter of bringing her on to integrate with your other two children. Yes. What? What did that look like? - Allie Bryan That looked like me taping masking tape around her chair with enough buffer. Was she eight so the kids wouldn't get her mother? That was literally that that became our world of. - Adam Bryan They just wanted to love her and smother her. And that's great. But it's overwhelming. Yeah. And so, you know, - Liesel Mertes in the midst of an entire context. Right. - Adam Bryan So she was just and and we had been trained on that. Like there's gonna be, you know, different smells and sights and sounds like we get it. Yeah. So look, boys, you have to stay as far away from her. - Allie Bryan I have a picture of them standing outside of the tape and her sitting at her chair eating so that she wouldn't be triggered if anyone got close to her food because it was stolen often at the baby home. She because that was that was a big trigger for her thinking her food was gonna be. - Adam Bryan Which is pretty typical. Right. And that was expected. - Allie Bryan So it was just a lot of a lot of her screaming and being triggered and the kids not understanding why and trying to explain that to them. And it was it was just very high emotion all the time. - Allie Bryan So you. Yeah. And feeling completely ill-equipped. Right. And it was. And she was non-verbal, too. You know, like it was there were just so many things that felt stacked against us. Their daughter’s physical and developmental needs also required a lot of attention. She was eligible for Frist Steps, an Indiana program that provides assistance to children with delays. Each week, she had speech therapy, developmental therapy, and physical therapy. Her progress was sporadic, all of the board. The therapists were confused as months became yeasrs. Why wasn’t she progressing? MRIs didn’t yield anything definitive. - Adam Bryan Yeah, it was really, really difficult because at this stage she's consuming all of our financial resources are physical or emotional or mental. Everything. We are pouring everything into her and everyone else. The children are getting, you know, 5 percent and we're barely even giving each other anything because we're so exhausted and worn out. She's getting everything. And there's no I remember with with one of the a group with the therapist. One of the last meetings was, you know, we went through everything again. - Adam Bryan They said, do you have any questions or concerns? And I said, yeah. There's just no trajectory upward. And they're like, yeah, we we were concerned about that, too. I said, what's the plan? I don't know. I guess we'll just keep doing what we're doing. Yeah, well, that doesn't sound like a really good plan. Clearly, something's not working. This has been two years now. And yeah. In the midst of these diagnosis, there was a whole swirling emotional world of anxiety and shame. - Allie Bryan I was becoming very depressed. I was starting to have a lot of anxiety. And then what you call secondary trauma from living in an in a place with someone that has trauma. And, you know, I was to the point, of course, she was also still in diapers. We couldn't seem to get her potty train. And whenever I would change her diapers, I would start having a panic attack. - Allie Bryan And that was one of the it was it happened a lot. But there was one point we'd had her for three years. And I'm having a panic attack while changing her diaper. She's watching me. And my oldest son comes behind me and it's comforting, comforting me saying like, it's okay, mommy, it'll be okay. And that's for me in my heart when it clicked. This is not healthy for anyone. It's not healthy for her to watch her mom have a panic attack while taking care of her. It's not okay that my son is trying to comfort me in this sense, and it's happening all the time. - Allie Bryan I was a hot mess and was I would. I often said, like, I'm drowning. And I'd gotten to the point. I never had suicidal thoughts, but I'd gotten to the point of I. I'm just gonna run away. Like Adam is a great dad. He'll be fine with them. - Allie Bryan My mother, who was amazing, like in my head, I like I can't do this anymore. I I'm I'm drowning. And then my kids are watching their mom all the time, having panic attacks and crying and not wanting to get out of bed. - Adam Bryan And the panic in the stress was, when will this end? You know, when there's no end in sight, right. If there's an end in sight, you can persevere. Persevere on until you. Okay. Like there's an end. It's gonna be hard, but we can't get to the end. But when there's no end in sight and all therapists and physicians are saying we have no clue, it becomes. And you're already drowning in drowning. - Adam Bryan Literal drowning is silent. You don't see anyone drowning unless you have a really trained eye from a lifeguard to know what a drowning looks and sounds like because it's silent. And so we're drowning individually and as a family and there's no end in sight. - Liesel Mertes And did people did people. No. Did you have voice? Because I think that could be a difficult thing. Yeah. OK, about one. Yeah. How did it feel talking about that? And two, were people able to be helpful to you in that? Or did it feel isolating? Allie Bryan And so it was hard to share how difficult it was. But with our close friends, we did. But it still was like, yeah. - Adam Bryan I do want to say it fell on deaf ears, but there was no context for them either. So when we say which I don't think we did imagine, you think drowning is silent. We don't even know what to ask for. We don't even know what to say. We don't have the capacity to say, I need you to do this for me. We're just struggling and don't even know how to ask. But when we would, we, you know, talk to our close friends. - Adam Bryan They were. To give them a little bit of grace, they were as helpful as they could be, but they had no context for it. And so they weren't helpful. - Allie Bryan It was very isolating. - Adam Bryan Very isolating. Yeah. And I don't say that to throw them under the bus. They had no context. Or even though the vocabulary when we say shows we're talk reactive attachment disorder, she's struggling through RADS and it's really difficult. - Liesel Mertes Tell me a little bit more about what you know, they say, - Adam Bryan OK, so reactive attachment disorder or RAD is when the child in almost every adoptive child will have this and even some biological do when they refuse to attach or a bond to the parents. And so they are pushing you away emotionally, physically will push you away and do things to prove that you don't love them. - Liesel Mertes So you are feeling like you are drowning? Yes. You have three biological children now in the home. What did you what emerged as the available options for you and how did you begin to try to make away Yahoo! - Allie Bryan So it was shortly after I had my last panic attack while changing her diaper. And Adam and I were sitting in our boys room. And I was crying. I was like, I just I can't do this anymore. Like, I know I've said that. But there's some there's a shift of like something else, a change. You know, we had I had randomly talked to some people about this whole dissolving of adoption. - Adam Bryan You found mothers in the trenches or whatever isn't discovered. There's a whole community right about this. And in this, the first time we've talked publicly about this, because this gets a really people get shamed. This is this is a really black mark on many families. And they get kicked out of churches, they get kicked out of neighborhoods, they get kicked out of families where the grandparents or the parents will say, you know, how can you do that to a child? How can you consider that and will kick people out of families in shame? - Allie Bryan I mean, shame, the biggest. - Adam Bryan Very much. And so we found this whole community. Oh, yeah. Other people are struggling through this as well. Okay. - Allie Bryan Yeah. Because before then, I had always had the assumption that the if you were to choose to dissolve your adoption, you know, CPS comes in and they could take your biological kids and it be this huge thing. - Adam Bryan And that's true. - Allie Bryan Right. It can. But I randomly found this. And so for me, I'm like, that's not. Nope, not even an option. And so on this day, randomly found a Facebook group of other families in the same situation as ours. - Allie Bryan And so I just posted our story and said, like, what do you do? And within three weeks of me posting that this family emerged and we face time them. And then that it just kind of snowballed from there as well. - Adam Bryan And the family had adopted other children with similar needs. And it was a we get it. We understand it. We want her. - Allie Bryan Right. There was. There was. And also some other really cool things that like they have connections to Uganda has over us. That was huge for our daughter. Of understanding Uganda and loving it and realizing that she is Ugandan. Like, that's a huge thing 'cause we love that culture and want her to know it. And they also do. - Allie Bryan Which was in the Lord kept bringing in these confirmations. And so we decided to, just like a birth mom would give her biological daughter up for adoption. That same legal process is then what we ended up doing. And so this other family had to do their legal process and we had to do ours. And it took a couple months. - Allie Bryan And in this time, we didn't share it with hardly anyone, because if you if it gets out and someone just doesn't like you or has, you know, makes assumptions, it can be really. - Adam Bryan All it takes is a teacher saying, hey, I heard from one of the children that they're selling their daughter. - Adam Bryan Right. And then all the teacher has to do is call CPS and say, I'm a teacher. Here's what. And it goes down or really dangerous and bad. - Allie Bryan You need one lie and then you get investigated and kids taken out of your home. And if that doesn't happen for everyone. - Adam Bryan But that was scary. - Allie Bryan It was really scary. So we're in a situation where we're not. Our kids don't even know. Only close friends and family know we're still drowning. And at this time that our friends, it's that mentality of like, oh. But now you've a light at the end of the tunnel. And so. - Liesel Mertes And you're feeling this risk, perhaps? Yes. Yeah. Of What could happen with the involvement of the outside agencies? Yeah. - Liesel Mertes I imagine that there's also a risk that you're perceiving of, well, you're still considering moving this child out of your home, really wanting to be concerned that she is well cared for. Absolutely. - Liesel Mertes And that's sometimes, you know, that's the you know, the reasons that those outside Agent Wright exist. Right. How are you mitigating that risk? What steps along the way are helping you? Yeah. Feel good about this. - Allie Bryan So one of the really cool things was I randomly connected with another mom that had also dissolved an older kids adoption to the same family. And so I was able to get on the phone with her. And we had lots of and it was two years prior. So she was two years ahead of me with the same family, same situation, and was able to ask her questions. And she's been and she's been able to visit them and keeps contact with them. - Allie Bryan And so I really got to hear another mom's perspective dealing with the same family as us. - Adam Bryan So we were able to enter, in a sense, interview this family through another family. Right. And get some of the nitty gritty details, right? Yeah, I wouldn't actually find on paper. Right. - Liesel Mertes And it sounds like. Tell me if I am understands that you also were having legal assistance and. - Adam Bryan Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes And that this was this was a transfer. - Adam Bryan Yeah. Clearly a legal right. Yeah. Yeah. So there comes a day that was expensive. Yes. Yeah. - Adam Bryan Legal. So there a lot of expensive attorneys and making sure that it is legal and incorrect in that there's no ambiguity as to what's happening with that. - Liesel Mertes There comes a day where you are telling me this news, your daughter to your boys and you're making the trip young. Tell me a little bit more of that. - Allie Bryan Our oldest son bawled his eyes out and our other one just sat there silent. - Adam Bryan They were six and eight. Yeah. - Allie Bryan And so. So they. Yeah. They don't want to say supportive but. Okay. They also saw like they saw everything that was going on. - Adam Bryan But we end up telling the kids and even you woke up and I mean, were you saying, how do we do this? I'm like one step at a time. And literally the steps were put the bags in the car. OK. Now, what do we do now? We got to get in the car. - Allie Bryan And she loved it because she loves just being the center of attention. And so she was an only child at that time in the car ride. And so we had a long car car ride with her, which was enjoyable. And we drove and met the parents that night and had dinner with them. And she just clung to them, which was bittersweet. And then that night we had one last year. - Adam Bryan She stayed with us. - Allie Bryan We had one last night with her. And then waking up the next morning was really, just really, really difficult. - Allie Bryan And so then we brought her to their house and walked around their house. And we got to go show her her bed. And that's where he and I - Adam Bryan They had they had a whole bed set up for her. - Adam Bryan And, you know, we set her up and talked with her. And that was when we told her, you know, now Nyla's going to stay here. And we were able to express and there was something at that time that happened that we can't articulate it, - Allie Bryan But you know your kids looks, you know, the you know. - Adam Bryan And she got it. She got what was happening. She understood it. There was there seemed to be. And you correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember it somewhat like there was a sadness, but also like a content. - Adam Bryan Like a. Yeah, OK. I get it. Yeah. And then we had to get out quickly before like emotionally we just had to rip it off like a Band-Aid. Okay. - Allie Bryan She was. You said it was going in. Yeah. With one of the parents. I can't remember. Like she was totally she was good for like we were we were the ones struggling. Yeah. She just waved to us and we took two days to come back home and stay overnight at a hotel. - Adam Bryan We didn't need to, but yeah, we did. So that we could just have. We don't want to jump back into life. Yeah. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes What is what words are there. Yeah. Right. - Allie Bryan What that is. It was. And so on. That are - Allie Bryan The day we transferred her over. We had written a long email because that we're like okay this is what we needed. Send it out to everyone that's in community with us so that they know. And so sitting hitting that send button was extremely difficult and vulnerable because you don't know how you're going to be received. - Allie Bryan And so we sent that out and it was just a lot of then interacting with people and having to almost love on other people that. They're just getting this information for the first time. And surprised. And, you know, so - Liesel Mertes tell a little bit more about that. Because I, I think that's an interesting dynamic. So you're in the position. Yes, Emily. What are you expecting yourself to be or what are other people expecting to be in your communication there in the immediate stages? - Allie Bryan Yeah, a lot of people are having a lot of questions. There is a number of people that were super sweet. But like I need to process this, I'm really to which we completely don't expect. But then, yeah, we're also sitting on the other side. I'll speak for myself like just wanted to go into a hole, you know, and just avoid all of that. Thankfully, most everyone was kind and loving. We've really only lost one really good friend from it that chose to separate themselves from us. And so the majority that explicitly because. - Liesel Mertes Yes, they said what? What did they communicate to you for that parting? - Adam Bryan Well, it was for one of the struggles in this situation for us is that we were communicated to on a number levels as A-plus being. We'll see. And if you're not getting C, then you're not doing A or B, you need to either more A or more B, and then you'll get C. Well, we're not getting C, so it must be our fault - Adam Bryan in this particular family. How did it had adopted? And it was phenomenal. It's like the storybook of adoption. So. Well. A-plus B or C. And when they found out they were also going through another adoption and it was really painful for them and it was a painful time. Just the time the timing was just bad. And so there was kind of a I can't handle and process that because of what I'm trying to go through. And so there was a a unhinging with her actually not agreeing with the choice. Therefore, there was an intentional distancing, which was incredibly painful. - Adam Bryan Hurts. It still hurts. - Adam Bryan And so that relationship is, you know, hopefully it will mean that over time. But, you know, there's still there's still distance than there could have been more loss. - Allie Bryan There's no running fully. There is for an after a couple of months. I was probably six months after she had left. We ended up deciding to post on Facebook like, let's make this because I was getting tired of running into random people and then them ask and then I'm stuck face to face having to travel. Right. And so I finally got to the point of I just want everyone to know. So we posted the same e-mail we had sent out to everyone else, made it a little bit less personal. - Allie Bryan And most people were very understanding. But there was one girl that was extremely mean and hurtful. And I was just really bullying us on social media because - Adam Bryan I had known her when I was early 20s to the church and I haven't had contact with her in a long time. And so she started saying all this stuff and it was like judge judgmental of you, like, oh, wait a minute, you've never met my wife or this child. - Adam Bryan You're not at all involved in our life or situation. You're in another state. How how are you speaking as if you haven't talked to you in ten years? How are you speaking? As if, you know, very judgmental. And and she did later apologize. - Adam Bryan It was a month or so later, she said, you know, what I said was wrong. - Allie Bryan Well, then come to find out her dad had abandoned her as a kid. And so for her, that post was a trigger for her. And so whenever I realized that, like, oh, she was triggered, you know. And so you just never know where someone's coming from and still stay. - Liesel Mertes It still stinks. - Liesel Mertes If you are summing up like what the what the kernel is of of what you receive when you're feeling either shamed or blamed, what is what is the primary message that you pick up from people? - Allie Bryan The first thing that comes to my mind is you failed. Yeah. And that's still thankfully the Lord has provided two years of counseling - Adam Bryan And you failed her. - Allie Bryan Right. And that's been something I'm I struggle with as I failed as a mom. It wasn't enough for her. And so then when people kind of project that, that's it just kind of reinforces. Yeah. Because I definitely feel like I wasn't enough because now she is thriving and she's doing amazing and her family loves her and - Adam Bryan Still delayed delays issues, - Allie Bryan though. I'm so, so thankful because that was the ultimate reason. Like we want you to thrive and you're not thriving here with us. It hurts that. Lord, why couldn't she have thrived with us? You know, that's still it's still still a huge pain. MUSICAL TRANSITION - Adam Bryan What's one of the painful difficulties of through counseling as well is this this and this is what so many people don't understand. We're in this state of we've lost a daughter just like death, except she's not dead. She's still alive. - Adam Bryan And so you actually have to see her. - Allie Bryan And we made the choice. - Adam Bryan And we made the choice. Yeah. And so the the loss is similar in that that person is no longer in your life. So there's the loss like death, but not it's different. - Adam Bryan And so the church at large and in your community of people, everyone I don't see anyone knows how to deal with death, but a lot of people know how to. Oh, you bring meals and you're there and you write letters and you do this. - Adam Bryan But when you say this, people are non-existent, then so will you go and you say, I've lost a daughter and they go, oh, so sorry. And then there's nothing else. And they don't know how to. And. And on one hand, I don't blame them. But on the other hand, it was incredibly difficult. - Adam Bryan And so with the kids, everything else. Natalie, we're going to counselling for how do we process loss and grief, which is what we've been working through. - Allie Bryan So, yeah, with the kids, it's just a constant. We try to be really open in our communication. We still talk about her like we'll bring up memories. - Allie Bryan We kept our family pictures up for a while, but then that was becoming a trigger for me seeing that. - Allie Bryan And so it's just being mindful of cause I get triggered a lot even still throughout our house. And I think for me, feeling like there's almost like I only had a small window of time to grieve and to be better. And so that's still the struggle. - Adam Bryan And then even with the kids of, you know, one of them is taking longer to grieve and it's two years later starting to come up and just attempting to being patient with this, because it's yeah, there's there's no rulebook on how this looks. - Allie Bryan One day, our oldest saw writing, filling out some paperwork for something random. And he came later and told us he was scared that he was filling out paperwork for him to go to another family, that there had been tension with him. - Liesel Mertes Yeah. Ali, what do some of those, you know, February 2020 triggers look like for you in any given week? - Allie Bryan Well, even this morning, my daughter was in her room crying and that woke me up. And it sounded just like her because that was one of the triggers that she wouldn't sleep a lot. And so she just lay in bed and like make mindless sounds and noises. And so I wasn't getting a lot of sleep at that time. And so this morning I woke up to that sound. And I had to like, no, that's not. - Allie Bryan Or even seeing any, any little black girls around. That's a that's a trigger for me that looked like her. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes And how does that have a familiar path of emotion that those triggers go down that you you find yourself? Is it sadness, anger that all of the above, you know, sadness and crying? - Allie Bryan It happened one time I was hosting our church like welcoming people in and a family came in and the mom was white and the little girl was black. And like, I just started crying. I had to walk away and leave because. And it can feel so foolish or like it's not that big of a deal. Elie Boyer's altogether. But that was really difficult because I still I'm I'm still sad that we can't have her. And so it's just that symbol of. Yeah, what we've lost. - Liesel Mertes You know, what in this journey, have there been meaningful gestures or people that you were like that man that matter that came in just the right time of people who, even if they didn't get the entirety of it, you know, have been helped more along the way. And what did they aren't like? - Allie Bryan One of the first things. I had one of my good friends. I think it was really one of the only gestures while we were dissolving. So she was still in our home. She came in, just dropped off a meal on my front porch and wrote a little note and left, which was so sweet for my personality. So I'm more introverted and I was the only. - Adam Bryan And that was that was the only like meal or gesture. - Allie Bryan And it was so it was so sweet. - Allie Bryan And I still remember it. I and I remember shortly after we dissolved. And I I had very frank open conversations with my close friends about how they hurt me. Like I need to get this out. And they were very apologetic. And I think we've all kind of learned from that. But they, too, my friends, came over and helped me like deep clean my house from top to bottom. And that was like that was their way of gesture to help. - Adam Bryan But just we had one family give us a gift card to go for. It was like a Chick-Fil-A just, you know, 20 bucks. Yeah. At least that it. It says we see you. Yes. Yeah. See you here. Like, it's not like we're sitting home going we're we're all of our free meals. - Liesel Mertes Right. But it's I see you. - Adam Bryan And so whether it's showing up and mowing their lawn or raking them or just doing something saying, I see you're going through a difficult time and yet I can't fix I can't relax, I don't I don't even know how to process this, but I know it's difficult. And so I'm going to do this MUSICAL TRANSITION - Adam Bryan Was that something they say were some even during even after we transitioned her, there would be weeks and months of nothing. And usually they wouldn't ask us. They would say, hey, how how is she? Have you heard from her? Right. You know, she's fine. But the rest of us are struggling to put our feet in front of it. You know, one in front of the other. Thank you for asking how she is. - Adam Bryan You know, that's the smart ass answer. I'd want to get back to them. But you would just say, oh, she's doing great. - Liesel Mertes But I hear it left. You feeling still. You still uncertain You haven't even given thought, right? Right. That this could be anything more than a relief. Right. - Adam Bryan Yeah. Oh, yeah. The burden is lifted. The sack of rocks you're carrying is now off your back. So you guys would be maybe OK. - Adam Bryan It's not a saga rocks. It's a person that we loved and cared for and still do. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes Yeah, I hear that. You know, you you have reference throughout. You know, there is not a playbook for this. Yeah, not well equipped. What? What words? I mean, on the one hand, adoption can be beautiful. And that's. We still love adoption. The thing. Yeah. - Liesel Mertes What do you what do you wish could have been said to a younger version of you in hindsight, whether that was beginning or in the midst of it, like or or, you know, reframing it for someone that's listening, that is maybe at a, you know, a number of points sharing their own journey. - Adam Bryan I think we would respond differently. But so I'll let you speak first. I'll give you. Yes. Yeah. - Allie Bryan The first thing comes to mind is love does not heal trauma and trauma. Brain doesn't always know that. - Adam Bryan You're going to say run away. - Allie Bryan Yeah. That you you can't out love trauma. In my opinion, no. By a miracle of the Lord, of course. But that was one thing I had to come to grips with. Like, no, there is like there is scientific issues in her brain from trauma as a young child cause she's been through so much. And yeah, you can't you can't out love. I think that's. - Adam Bryan But I also think, you know, we were obedient and faithful to what we were called to do. Right. And we were called to adopt her. And then we were called to transition her. And I could sit here for another hour and go through all of those things. And we were faithful to that. And so what would I say is it's going to be hard, but stay faithful to the calling in what is on your heart and how do we. - Adam Bryan How do I express this? Just love. Well, for however long that is. - Liesel Mertes I think I would also say for anyone, because I get that question from some people like, hey, we're thinking about adoption or thinking. - Allie Bryan I think I would encourage people to make sure you have a strong foundation of support, whether that's counseling or church or friends of like, okay, we're going into battle and we need your support because we came in very naively - Adam Bryan and didn't recognize you not knowing that we were the only people in a large circle that have that have adopted. So. - Allie Bryan Right. And so we were we kind of just started winging it. And then we got really exhausted winging it. And then we couldn't find the tools because there was not a lot of post adoption tools. There's a ton of adoption tools for adopting and. And raising everyone's for you when you're adopting and they're so excited and they're at the airport when you come home with her and and then and then you're home. - Adam Bryan You know, there is not a church. And in society there's not a lot of post-adoption help. Right. It's pretty sparse. - Liesel Mertes Are there any other things that you feel like it's important to give voice to that you didn't get a chance to say? I don't think so. - Allie Bryan You know, I think just speaking for all like the thousands of families on their Facebook, even just in the Facebook group that I'm in right now, that have that have to go silent because of safety and shame. Just speaking out on their behalf, because we are we are not, you know, just a few. - Allie Bryan We are many. And they all deserve a voice and they deserve a voice to be able to share their story without being shamed. - Adam Bryan And that it's this is a part of life and dealing with, you know, sin in the world and just that things are gonna go perfectly. So, yeah, that they're not alone. - Adam Bryan Yeah. You know, when this happened, we discovered how much pain so many people are in in bars. Even though it was painful and difficult and we lost a relationship not near what other people have gone through, we said we want to be a voice and advocate for everyone else to say take care of these people that are having to go silent, love on them. They're grieving, they're struggling. And when they transition, love on them as if it was a death. Yes. Yeah. Love on them in the same way. Yeah. MUSICAL TRANSITION We close with three take-aways from this conversation with Adam and Allie Move towards individuals and families that have experienced a dissolved adoption.These transitions can be full of a lot of pain. Give what you can: a meal, a gift certificate, a house cleaning. Each gesture matters. Be aware that the family left behind will most likely need help beyond the transition.Adam, Allie, and their children are still in counseling, processing grief two years after their disrupted adoption. Ask families how they are doing and offer gestures of support beyond the immediate days and weeks after the transition. Adoption can be beautiful, complex, and isolating.Allie and Adam talked about how they felt without resources, like they were silently drowning. If you have friends who have adopted, reach out, ask them how they are doing, provide a listening ear. They might be struggling and very much in need of a friend. Or point them to supportive resources, some of which are available in the show notes. And this is a bonus, fourth take-away.Adam and Allie described a few people that responded primarily out of their experience: there was the family who had adopted that could not continue to be in relationship. The Facebook commenter who was shaped by her own history of abandonment. We are always responding to other people’s pain out of our own experience. If this episode was triggering, eliciting strong emotion, take a moment to ask the question of what personal experience you might be living out of in your response. Thanks to our sponsor, FullStack PEO, offering comprehensive HR support for small and medium businesses, and Handle with Care Consulting, where we create workplace first responders. OUTRO

Awaken The Possibilities: From Fitness Training to Business Automation Doing Work That You Love

ProdCast: The Personal Productivity Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 21, 2020 24:34

TO READ TRANSCRIPT SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGEIn episode 2 of the new Awaken The Possibilities Podcast, Host Terry Wildemann interviews Brian Kelly Host on " From Fitness Training to Business Automation Doing Work That You Love”. Awaken the Possibilities Podcast features successful entrepreneurs and intuitive leaders who offer insights on how to attract success in business and life._____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ABOUT Brian Kelly Brian helps entrepreneurs and busy business professionals to achieve peak performance through Mind, Body, and Business. He hosts a weekly interview-style live show called The Mind Body Business Show that streams live to 7 platforms and then distributes the show to 25 podcast platforms, along with Roku and Amazon Fire TV. He also holds his signature 2-Day LIVE event called the Reach Your Peak Summit several times a year in various locations in Southern California.As a former Certified Personal Trainer, he now combines his knowledge of physical and mental fitness along with “business fitness,” giving entrepreneurs and business owners everything they need to succeed in both their personal and professional lives._____________________________________________________________________________________________________________About Terry Wildemann:Terry Wildemann is the owner of Intuitive Leadership® and a Business and Resilience Accelerator, Speaker and Certified Executive Coach.Terry's specialty is working with tired, unhealthy, close-to-burned-out entrepreneurs and professionals and helps them leap off the stress hamster wheel. They evolve into unstoppable stress resilient intuitive leaders and practical business mystics. Terry’s timely message guides clients and students to integrate intuition, stress resilience, positive communications and leadership with grounded business systems to achieve success by positively serving and influencing others. Her leadership experience includes owning a manufacturing company, image consulting company, leadership and holistic education center.Terry is a best selling author of The Enchanted Boardroom: Evolve Into An Unstoppable Intuitive Leader. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________TRANSCRIPTwelcome to this episode of awaken the possibility welcome everyone to the show that helps entrepreneurs career professionals and those who want to get there to grow from the inside out today we have a magnificent show with the person called Brian Kelly and this individual is going to Cheryl a lot about transitioning listening to intuition and going to that place where when you listen magic begins to happen right let me tell you a little bit about Brian so I got to put the glasses on folks you know how it works Brian is a professional speaker business automation experts can be found here what that's all about international bestselling co author and founder of reach your peak the entrepreneur training company how exciting Brian Brian helps entrepreneurs and busy business professionals to achieve peak performance your mind body and business he hosts a weekly interview style live show called the mind body business show which I will be on may twenty first I'm so happy that that's happening I am extremely polite to seven platforms and then distributes the show to twenty five podcast platforms along with roku and Amazon fire TV he also holds his signature to the live event called the reach your peak time several times a year in various locations in southern California is a former certified personal trainer and he now combines his knowledge of physical and mental fitness along with business statement giving entrepreneurs and business owners everything they need to succeed in both their personal and professional lives welcome to the show Brian thank you so much Terry how are you doing today welcome welcome welcome so Dr we can make it on Facebook it was a lot of fun actually because that you reached out of branded me and I'm wondering who is this guy and we started on this chat next thing I know we're on each other's shows isn't that a brilliant way to meet people how many people that you want to represent you and you want to have on your podcast that can really make a difference people and their lives but not absolutely I mean social media is amazing if used properly it can be very powerful very powerful which really can and this is an example of that I am I'm curious you were a physical fitness trainer I find that to be extraordinary how did you shift from being a physical fitness trainer into what you do now well that's it's a long story and I will do is my best to be brief but %HESITATION I was %HESITATION in it in the fitness industry for over seven years %HESITATION doing personal training and it was all online based idealized NLP neuro linguistic programming and %HESITATION that was kind of a a a a difference maker big time to help them shift their minds so that they would finish the race because it all starts with the mind that was the first realization that it's all about your physical being it all starts with your mind and then %HESITATION just over time I had a number of friends reach out colleagues my wife in a closed a moment of time is like about a is less than a month period I was getting these what I'd called science messages coming in and %HESITATION I remember one there's two that I would like to bring up one was my wife who said you know every time you start anything new smaller large you oughta might automate the holy but Jeepers out of it I thought well she's right and then another very dear friend of mine gave me the greatest advice %HESITATION his name is Ross slaughter he's of a fitness professional has to to my knowledge yes two locations now in New York and Florida and he just wanted to check if the prime %HESITATION tell me what's going on what do you do you just want to chat just regular chat and in the course of conversation I talked about the fitness business and I talked about automation this is Brian I I think I got to be truthful with you what I heard you when you when you start talking about fitness I didn't feel a passion when you started talking about automation that's where you got excited and if this just happened more and more and more with more people and I just made the decision and it turned out to be really easy surprisingly after all the time and effort I put in and poured into that business of fitness business it was so simple because I was so much happier moving forward I love fitness there's nothing wrong with it just as a business I like automation far better and the beauty of automation is once you automated watch meant to be wash rinse repeat yes okay and it and it reduces stress so tell me how automating everything has reduced stress for you so as you mentioned I do a live show myself %HESITATION and you're going to be on it soon and there is no way that I could do that show without a large amount of automation and I'm running the thing with me is I'm all about absolute high quality everything everything must be perfect quality or my name will go on it I shouldn't say perfect because no one can reach perfection but I've heard so many people say Brian you just do it the simple way you can get more done quicker and they're right but for me that would not align with my values I need to have it a high quality show and the thing is it takes longer to achieve that what you're looking for for the goal but once you get to that point you start feeling momentum then it snowballs in a great way and people start flocking %HESITATION and it's starting to happen right now I've got a major contract in tow %HESITATION just ready to be signed and things are a really opening up now this is this takes time I want everyone to realize this takes time to put together the automations to test them to make sure they're running I refine them every single week and continue to tweak them and improve them so that my processes are easier for me and that they're better for their the recipient like you will be receiving more automations as your show draws near and that's just totally date time for me and for you it also saves you time it saves us both time which is awesome so I'm absolutely I can honestly say if it wasn't for automation of my %HESITATION doing the podcast I would be ripping my hair out he is thank and you can't do it all you really do have to have people in the back and I can help you with certain things that I do agree with that hundred percent %HESITATION I also have a team and %HESITATION you know combined with automation and human beings now now you can make it work and I found a resource that you don't have to you can get help for less than what it would cost you right now to hire a virtual assistant overseas and you can get them in your own local time zone less than what you'd pay for that and I've been doing that for over a year so I currently have a team of four I'll have five by Monday and %HESITATION it's been amazing just been a godsend it really is amazing when you have that kind of came in I know of which you speak because I recently added another I I have to my team and will be adding a third very shortly B. and it to be able to delegate because I I truly believe Russia with what I teach %HESITATION you know I get it adding to the leadership I'd get into the practical practical logical but as well as what a teacher leaders to do with integrate the intuitive with the spiritual and emotional and energetic when you bring him in being then you're doing that you're you're bringing humans then who would love to do those things that you don't like to do so you can focus on what you do best and when you are doing what you do that that's where the magic begins to happen does it not absolutely at a term that was given to me by another dear friend who is one of those telling me that %HESITATION Brian you're in the wrong field is that it's your it wasn't my core competency fitness wasn't an automation was it was one of my competencies but not core and so totally agree with what you're saying there absolutely yeah it would be possible days sometimes a little after J. can you automate routine again took a little detour appear a little detour down there depending on the situation do you have a road map with the GPS I don't know about you but I just automatically get in the car brand being bang boom one does the GPS is my aunt that automation that we do or where I need to go am I going to plan out the GPS in my going to plan out everything what's my role I stick in the cordon it translate to your job getting to where I need to be there you go great analogy there are a so when we work with the GPS is which is the automation in our world we can get to our destination a lot faster love it back okay so how do you require I I do I do really wanna %HESITATION because I believe that everything that we have learned in their past contributes to what it is we're doing right now and I do believe that you work as a fitness trainer have contributed to what it is you're doing now and I know that one of them is mind that the tell me about mindset in regards to automation and getting people to reach their destination to achieve their goal yeah oh boy that that's a big one %HESITATION there's so many things that mindset is the cornerstone of the foundation of where you are today no matter who you are where you are today is one hundred percent on you it's because of your mind it's not because of any external force there's no one else %HESITATION that is causing you to be where you are today it is you have choice and when you're able to use something like an L. P. which is known as the science of success to essentially rewire your brain for better and the cool thing is you are the one doing the rewiring you just follow the easy instructions in each process takes on average like seven minutes it's really quick and once you've done that and you you overcome limiting beliefs those are big one limiting belief would be I'm not technical I can't even think about going into automation well you don't need to if you have the help that can get you to do that just like Terry you were just saying once you have help that does the things that you know you don't want to do or maybe you don't have the skill set in that area to do it and so this is great for opening your mind and telling you that you know you can get help so maybe maybe it's true that you cannot do it right now but you can do it as an extended version of yourself by bringing in help and it was fitness it's just getting over that hurdle you know how many times do we get up and start get regal the genesis you know I'm still a little tired I want to go right now I don't work out it's just too much you know if you if you rewire the brain to say and to realize the end goal instead of looking at what's happening today what about one month from now how you know you're gonna feel better you're gonna look fantastic but the best part is feeling better because when you feel better you operate a higher level of performance then your business will then increase right along so right it's all a beautiful you know just intertwined mash of the related things that mindset is the court to everything we do as human beings in my personal opinion well if I'm listening to you and I'm internally waxing and even laugh out loud because goodness while I'm on a mission I've got a wedding coming up in a few months now daughter number two just got married for crying out loud I want to look at the wedding so I started on a new fitness regimen you should see me trying to walk to the chair however what I did to automated all in this is automation it can be that simple and on the website of the gym that I go to I looked at their schedule and I chose specific times in specific classes and I put it in my phone so it is automated it is in my phone I get the reminders that day I had better be even higher and that that's a simple example of automation and mindset to get you to where you want to pay now two it is the wedding the only reason why I'm I'm getting fit now I'm turning sixty five this year I want to be the best that I can possibly be at sixty five and be an example of that on stage for the people who are in the audience so when you automate those kinds of things such as your physical fitness to get your mindset where you need to go your goals organically occur yes no absolutely yeah and it's about the discipline is about %HESITATION setting habits for going forward it's about making it a priority that's another reason people fall flat I wanna come to fitness they don't make it big enough a priority in their life that's huge that's huge and so treat it like I'm sure you're doing now Terry when you see an appointment on your phone that's like an appointment with a very high end client that you if you miss it you just lost a massive deal and if you don't agree to that level of importance then the odds of you actually meeting with that appointment I II going to the gym and and crushing it in the gym and working out then the odds are you're not going to do that so prioritization is key and that's another mindset type approach that you can use that help you to make it that yeah and I'm going to add another layer to that is when you put that appointment in your calendar because I'm you know I'm all about teaching stress management and resilience and I'm a business relationship all right %HESITATION I am all about becoming healthy from the inside out in terms of %HESITATION honoring yourself first loading map does exercise date in that phone I had the mindset %HESITATION what you were talking about I'm the V. I. P. %HESITATION when I'm healthy I can then be there for my family my client in my business and for the employees that are more that are working with me absolutely you have basically are the example setter you know you're an example for everyone to follow I mean I I worked out I still do on a regular basis %HESITATION route throughout my son's childhood and he caught on and hit you know works out more often than I do and he sucked in a great way not so it's it's a it's a phenomenal habit to form and others just know this others are watching their risky you know Terry when you show up onstage next time you're that slim trim beautiful thing that you're looking to be they're gonna go wow what is she doing I want the kool-aid she's drinking but they will follow you and I'll be impressed because everyone understands it's not a simple process for a lot of people to get to that that ideal what we're calling wait and it's not about weight it's about what's what you're feeling here as you're going yes Ernie to help you get there but they're going to see that and want that inner monologue from you're absolutely right with that and %HESITATION you are correct also were NO P. is concerned I'm also a certified NLP practitioner and as well as you know involved in a lot of other holistic modalities to help people clear there in there garbage the thing with tools like NLP is when we use them and use them well and our top by somebody who really knows what they're doing those tools help to clear the self sabotaging emotions and behaviors that are in our way the key though is to own that to own that we are self sabotaging and there are a lot of folks out there who do not want to look in the mirror and do not want to see that there are cracks in the mere if you talk a little bit about that right absolutely the first step you hit the nail on the head it's it's awareness being aware that it is happening and once you are aware and you recognize that your self sabotage you know you're not doing the things that are serving you best the next step once you become aware of it is to take care of it now you just and you know apply the tools that you've learned or that a practitioner can apply with you and take the next step so it's kind of like you know it's it's a similar thing if you go to learn something you open a book and read it and then you just put it away well did it serve you very well not as well as if you then took action and executed on the steps you learn to learn and then do and then take it even a step further and then teach to learn to teach and it's no no different with this it's %HESITATION you know be aware recognize that you're doing things that are not in your best interest or where families take it out of yourself you know I'd say what what are you doing that's impacting your family if you're not around %HESITATION for an extra ten years what impact does that have on them you know they're gonna obviously be sad and but there are other things that go with it so many emotional things if you take it out of yourself and look at how you're impacting others you're more apt to actually take action it's an amazing thing we look we will do more for others and we will do for ourselves it's just a human trait yep that's exactly right and you know I I I often talk to talk about the story of the a woman in the shoe and we're the last one to take care of ourselves but you know we have to be the first month another example is when you're on an airplane in the flight attendant tells you to put the oxygen mask on yourself first before you help the people next to you you have to take care of yourself first it is it's not selfish to do that extreme self care is not a sign narcissistic value is is a heart centered god given gift that we deserve to be the best that we can possibly big so Brian you talked there are already about mine let me talk about mindset we will be just touch on the automation can you give an example of how you help someone with automation yeah I mean just so a lot of people are doing podcasts a lot of people are doing live shows that's one great example where %HESITATION I put together a comprehensive from eight Izzy program where you can have it all ready to go where you've gone through it already Terry part of it I've gone to yours as well where you can have a form where they fell out and in that form you ask certain questions and that forgets the results get emailed to you the person running the show and you can bet them right then and there and decide yes or no and you can just plug in one value into their contact information and we'll take one of two branches you're approved to get a hold on this leg or you're just approved then we're done I'm sorry here's the email that says sorry and then if they're approved they go down to the next step and say okay now go schedule your show let jumps him into another another tool so I use a lot of despair it tools different tools and glue them all together with different types of automations integrations and it just takes them through and that's what I put here is very complex and the good news is I'm going to give all these automations to everyone who comes on board with us the product and coming up with which isn't complete at the time we're talking that's called karma by marketing it's going to revolutionize how people do live shows and enable them to do so without a massive team at the beginning I still have a great yeah I recommend you still get the team and that's actually the training for that is also in carbon marketing includes everything automation scaling how do you manage your team %HESITATION I've learned over it a year plus and continue to refine as I host say all the different ways of approaching and you know we have weekly meetings and I have a strategy behind that I was dragged behind onboarding new team members I have strategy on all of it and it's all going to be included in this %HESITATION amazing info product I'm really sending it down the list here I've been working on it almost a year every single week all most the year it's coming out because of the quality I'm put in a ton of quality I can't wait to unveil it to people that you know help their lives be simpler to let them be more productive to it so that you Terry someone like you could come on and just be that talent and not worry about all of the other things going on the emails of the schedule reminders everything that's going on %HESITATION great to me you know and it's funny because you were taught not funny %HESITATION and and that that that's the wrong word it's interesting we're talking about the form I have two forms I have a form on my website for people to fill out so those of you who would like to be on the show please fill it out because they missed work days are for people I do not now because that's where they get that it and then I have a second form with a different link that I send to people I do now and I want to on the show because there are certain questions that are different and if I don't need to bat you why am I gonna be asking those questions so what's your thoughts about that I love that %HESITATION yeah I love that eight I do some things based on the the the answers to the questions they don't know that is happening behind the scenes but it takes on the one thank you page what I call thank you pages like this is the result is your next step versus another and I'm so book now and I want to bring in always higher value higher successful entrepreneurs such as yourself and keep raising that bar that I have several questions another strategic and if those by themselves show me that they're not really that successful yet there there may be partially successful I don't mean to demean anybody but then I put him in a different %HESITATION of final and they will be charged to appear on my show others will not god will use that to for help filter and continue to raise the bar %HESITATION it's just it's just applying a man right now I'm booked all the way through I'm six months booked out for now and so I'm I'm opening up another day %HESITATION it's it's getting pretty fun congratulations that sounds absolutely fantastic when we're coming to the end of the show and I would love people to be able to find you can you share with us where they can find you and where they can get tuned in to the new products and programs that you're going to be delivering yeah that's a starting point is to go to the mind body business show dot com it's a long one the mind body business show dot com and just register at the bottom and that its we're not selling anything all you do is you get reminders of upcoming live shows we do it every week that's a great way to start a Facebook is another great way to connect with me directly and my user name is Brian Karl Kelly with a C. the car apart Ryan Carl Kelly and %HESITATION you'll see a picture of meal under you'll know it's me there's a lot of Brian Kelly's out there are those the two best ways and we'll just take it from there just a few reach out say hi I love to interact and %HESITATION also getting more and more heavy on link then because that's another powerful tool %HESITATION yesterday will definitely use all the platforms you can to market yourself as Terry is doing and %HESITATION that's one way that really get great exposure for you and that's all %HESITATION what I'm about is automating all those processes well thank you so much Brian for coming on the show and helping my listeners to awaken the possibilities I'm your show host Jerry will demand and to learn more about what we do please go to intuitive leadership dot com and there you will see our programs are coaching programs as well as our current podcast past podcast and all of our services I wish you the absolute best and we look forward to seeing you next time to your success See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Learning and certification productivity

CRM Audio

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 18, 2020 39:18

This episode is brought to you by Inogic. Check out their new Kanban visualization for Dynamics 365 and Power Platform. Learning is important. Joel has started a bi-weekly LinkedIn newsletter about learning--why it is important to be a life-long learner, choosing a learning goal, and tools to help learning. On the podcast we discuss our learning goals. Matthew Anderson has also been pursuing certification, and he talks about his strategies for learning and test-taking. Other topics in the episode: Smart pens: Neo Smart pen and Moleskine Pen +. https://www.amazon.com/smartpen-N2-Bluetooth-Digital-Smartphones/dp/B00ST8GT8W/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=Neo+smartpen&qid=1582039395&sr=8-4 Edge collections: https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2019/08/20/collections-now-available-microsoft-edge-preview/ Microsoft certification poster that shows the intersection of all Microsoft certifications: http://aka.ms/TrainCertPoster Taking certification exams: how to read the questions and scenarios to optimizing finding the correct answers. Going to testing center vs. online proctored exams Show notes: [00:00:23] And Matthew. How are you doing day, Joel? [00:00:27] I am excellent. Welcome to 2020. [00:00:29] A little bit late in a little bit. Yeah, yeah. But we've been so productive we haven't had time for a podcast. [00:00:36] Exactly. it's prioritization. And I think we both had that silent agreement that we have some things we're focused on right now. [00:00:44] Well, actually, last week on my My Analytics for the first time I hit 42 percent of time for focus. [00:00:53] Oh, congrats on that. I feel like I've graduated to new level. [00:01:00] Yeah, I can say I have that much focused time scheduled. I am not hitting it, but I am getting more and more people to respect that time that I've got out there. So it's a it's a process. We'll say that. [00:01:17] Right. So I've been putting a focus for 2020 on learning, trying to get some certifications as well as learn some other other things. I find that, you know, sometimes you get a little stale and you need to update your skill set, especially working with technology. You can do anything with learning in 2020. [00:01:37] Yeah, absolutely. So the most recent certification I earned is the Azure A.I. Engineer Associate Certification. [00:01:47] That's the A.I. 100. It was the exam. The core exam behind that one. [00:01:53] So is this like super deep data science stuff for what is it? [00:01:58] So it is a collection of cognitive services, including language, understanding and prediction, translation, and getting into machine learning pipelines. And how do you actually build and structure those services together to be able to meet the need for some sort of end user use case? [00:02:22] Cool. So what what made you decide on that one versus all the other many things you could study? [00:02:31] Yeah, so I had a stretch goal for myself around kind of getting outside of the business applications kind of silo within our product cloud, the different solution areas, I wanted to do something in Azure and I looked toward what are those things that are that I talk about the concept of in the biz app platform a lot, but I'd like to be able to go deeper and, you know, chat with folks about what's going on behind the scenes, talk intelligently around what some of those capabilities are and what really comes up a ton. Is these things around cognitive services and kind of improving those experiences using prediction automation around that. So it seemed like a really good fit. And then with the advent of the A.I. Builder Capabilities and power platform and some of what we have inside of customer insights and being able to make predictions about this kind of super set of information about customers, it just seemed like a really appropriate place to put some of that learning effort into. [00:03:43] Definitely a hot area there. So how much time did you allocate to preparing for it? [00:03:53] Yeah, so I have had this on my radar for about the last four and a half, maybe five months. I've been trying to go through some of the Microsoft learn capabilities or rather the learning paths that they have around that just to get familiar. But I really got serious about it when I put the I put my money where my mouth was and I scheduled the certification exam two months out. So it was mid-December. I made the decision to schedule it out for middle of February or rather early February. And just kind of use that as a way to pressure myself and really ratchet up the prep and training work that I was doing. And labs. Yeah. [00:04:41] So that's that's key, I think. And I've been I've been writing a series of Linked-In articles about learning, because my focus has been on that since last year. I got the sales and customer service and marketing Dynamics 365 certifications and he first power platform certification. I didn't have to study at all for those because I've been doing it so long that I could just walk in and pass, maybe with just a cursory review, but the one I haven't had is field service because I just don't have as much experience with field service. I've dealt with it and worked with it. But I've never I've never taken the certification test on it before. So that was sure that was my goal. And my goal with this is just to broaden my reach outside of the normal projects that I work with. So with (the field service exam), that was kind of the first one I really had to study. And like you, I set myself a pretty aggressive goal of actually scheduling the exam. You put some teeth behind it. I've got people that are on my team or my mentor and they set a goal that “I want to get certified in xyz,” and then they never do it because they don't have a date. You got to have a date. [00:05:59] What was going through my head the night before the exam, I was just panicking and saying I don't know if I'm actually ready. I went in and I was one click away from canceling the exam that I had for the next day. I didn't. Partially because I don't want to pay twenty two bucks to cancel this within the window. It's like five business days or something like that. You know what? I've done this much. I've put in the effort and I go take it even if I don't feel 100 percent ready. And I came out on the other side feeling pretty glad that I didn't spend the money to defer on something or I was going to pass it anyway. [00:06:50] Right. I think when you take the more of those exams you take, you kind of recognize patterns. Not that taking more exams makes you more likely to pass another one, but it could. I've developed my own approach to taking a certification exam that helps me be more sure that I'm getting closer is the right answer. Doesn't always give me the right answer, but it gets me closer. I read the question backwards because the questions generally are set up with a scenario and a question. So the question is last and sometimes the scenario gives you extra details that you don't really need. So if you read the question, read it backwards. Read the bottom section to get the questioner and then look for the details in the scenario. You can be a lot more focused and avoid having the extra details throw you off. And then look at the scenario and then I look at the answers. And if it's not if I'm not really, really, really sure of which one's the right one, I start weeding out the distractors, and those are the ones that aren't right. And if you can weed out the ones that you know aren't right, then you have a 50/50 chance and then you can pretty much narrow down if you if you have a cursory knowledge of the topic. [00:08:26] I have a variation on that approach that I use quite a bit. And I think that definitely that that concept of narrowing down the field of possible answers to what's important and also not getting hung up on a bunch of potentially extraneous information is really important. And that's consistent even on the exam that I just took here recently, as well as certainly some of the dynamics ones that I certainly know well, just given my history with the platform and most of those questions you can get rid of to maybe sometimes three and you barely have to read the whole range of what it's going to be. [00:09:18] And the new ones have introduced case studies, which is sometimes a lot of text to then get to the questions. And that can be kind of intimidating. You have, you know, the scenario, the requirements, the details. You've got half a dozen different tabs on that thing. Then you have questions. Here's one thing I found is on the and this is this is for the what is it Pearson view or whatever Microsoft uses for the testing centers as well as the proctored exams. You can ctrl+f to search the text. That's a little tip I found to where if you have a question about “what should the sales managers do” and you go to the scenario, do a ctrl+f to search for “sales manager” and if you find it. That usually leads you to the answer or enough detail to get the answer. [00:10:13] Yeah, that's a good one, I was not familiar that you could actually do that. Very cool. [00:10:19] Do you go to the test center or do you do the the proctored exam at home? [00:10:25] I am a firm believer in going to the test center. That is the way I like to do it. There is no worry of someone walking into the room. I don't have to have the anxiety that comes off like shining a camera around to show that I don't have any cheating materials or anything I'm going to cheat with. And it's just one less thing that I have to deal with. Also, it feels official. I can actually protect that time. I don't have a. Now I have to travel to physically get to the test center so I can tell people, no, I need to be done with this call at 9 o'clock because my exam starts at 9:30 and I have to physically leave and get there. And I like having that little bit of buffer. How about you? [00:11:15] I am the opposite. I do all my exam as online proctored exams, and a year ago when they first started doing it, it was kind of rough because you'd have to have a webcam to show all around the room. They've changed a little bit now where you they text you a little app or a Web page on your phone and you just take pictures of what you're facing, what's behind you. I've got to unplug my my external monitor and flip it around. [00:11:44] But generally, that goes that goes very well. I lock my door. I do it from my house so I don't have co-workers walking in if my wife or kids are home. I make them swear that they will not try and get in the room because otherwise I'll fail. And maybe in Minnesota you have really nice testing centers. Frankly, the ones around me are all like dumps with computers that are 10 years old with desks that are falling apart. [00:12:16] And I've had technical problems going to my local test center, so I think I trust it more doing it from home. And I get more flexibility. Like I have a meeting cancelled tomorrow. I'm going to take a take a certification exam and have more flexibility than when I do a testing center, usually it seems to only have availability a week out.. [00:12:39] Yeah, I'm I'm definitely scheduling mine more in advance, so that part's not an issue. Pearson is headquartered in Minnesota. So we have a million testing centers around here. There there's one that’s a ten minute drive from my house. Then I'm going to be moving soon, and the place I'm moving to there's a testing center one mile from the house. You know, I can walk there in under 20 minutes if I really needed to. And like all of them they have been reasonably nice. [00:13:12] I mean, it's not crazy. You know, hardware quality of the machines that I'm on, but they've physically worked. [00:13:19] The only argument or complaint that I have is I did try to take my customer service exam, which I just for whatever reason, hadn't taken previously. And this was in mid-January. And there was the threat, the threat of snow in Minnesota. Now, it hadn't actually started snowing yet. [00:13:40] So that's like every day in the winter, right? [00:13:43] Right. They were concerned that there was going to be snow later in the day. So they canceled at 8:00 in the morning. All the exams that they had. Now, my exam was scheduled for 9:00 a.m. I showed up at 8:45. They said, sorry, it's been canceled. You know, it's supposedly you get, I don't know, 210 minutes or something like that. Ridiculous amount of time for that exam at least. [00:14:07] I'd never personally taken that long just because I have worked with the material so long. So I literally would have been out there out of there, even if I took that full time, by noon. Not a flake of snow fell from the sky until about 2:00 in the afternoon. I was just I was very, very frustrated with that. That was the biggest chink in the armor for going to an actual testing center. [00:14:42] And people like Shawn Taber have this elaborate routine where he goes to the same Starbucks before he takes his exam and feels like if he doesn't do this he will fail. I don’t have this routine myself, I schedule and just jump in and take it. [00:14:58] Sure. So I don't quite have that rigorous of a of a series of things I have to go through. It's not that regimented. I have a couple of different test centers I go to. I try to make it there about 15 minutes early. But beyond that, I just focus that energy on knowing the material and having that carry me through. [00:15:21] Right. So the series I'm writing on LinkedIn has been a departure from the normal kind of content that I usually write. But it's been kind of an experiment because I got in on a preview of a new LinkedIn feature called newsletters. I like it because it's basically articles that are grouped into a series and people can subscribe to the series of articles. And currently I'm limited to just one newsletter, but I can see once this gets released then that I will probably have newsletters on different topics. And the really cool thing is I have people following the series that don't follow me or aren't connected to me. So it seems to have a little bit more of a life than just writing individual articles or LinkedIn posts. I created both like a WordPress blog and the LinkedIn articles. And by far, the LinkedIn newsletter is getting more traction than the blog version. So I really like that new feature of LinkedIn. [00:16:31] Yeah, it's been great. I. As soon as I saw Joel Lindstrom is starting a newsletter, I said, oh, give it away. I'll try that out. See what it's all about. And yet I've continued reading. [00:16:42] I don't know when they're going to release it as more of a general feature, but I would imagine it's coming soon. Once they do, I think you'll really like it. I think the problem with articles is they've just been kind of one off things. They have good findability because you can find them through Google and other places. But, you know, it seems like this is the missing piece to make articles a little bit more sticky. [00:17:09] Yeah. If you have a topic where you have some authority or want to be able to communicate a lot without just doing a novel in a single post. It gives a way to be able to chunk that out and get good feedback from people, because when you are managing your own blog and that type of thing, you know how many people are going and leaving meaningful comments or interacting or sharing their views. If it's within LinkedIn and doing that, I think it will be a pretty cool feature. I'll take advantage of it once it is a little more prime time. [00:17:50] So you mentioned you're moving. Where and why are you moving, Matthew? [00:17:54] So I am moving within Minnesota. This is not weather driven. Actually, it will only be about a 10, 15 minute drive from where we are now. [00:18:10] But so my kids are going to be in school age, coming up in the near future here. And we wanted to try to think through where do we want to be for them to go through all of their schooling and hopefully, depending on what happens, not have to move because of you need to go to a different school or not thinking that that far ahead. So we started the search. It was about eight months ago at this point that we started casually looking with a timeline of within the next couple of years, we want to try to move in. Sure enough, we found one that we were really excited about, with a good school district that we're excited about there. And a little more space. We like what we have. But as the kids start to get and a little bit more space to themselves, it'll give them that that space that they need. [00:19:17] Great. I'm going to bring back a feature that we haven't done for for a while, which is “is that productive.” [00:19:34] So for today's is that productive, I'm going to review my smart pen. This is something I have been using for over a year. I intentionally wanted to live with it for a while before I reviewed it. We have talked about Evernote and OneNote, and we have talked about physically writing your journal versus electronic notes. The idea of a smart pen is the merging of the two: a physical pen that can easily be transitioned into digital notes. So the pen that I started with is the Neo Smartpen N2, which is a pen that uses a specially coated paper. You can buy notebooks, such as the Moleskin notebooks, the ones that look a little bulbous, the paper sticks a little bit. It works with them. And the idea is you take notes like you would normally take notes, but you can sync those notes to your phone, to your computer, to your iPad, to almost any device. It will sync and OCR your notes. You can sync directly to OneNote or Evernote. And it's something that I found pretty indispensable. And I said my original pen because I broke my original path. I somehow damaged the sensor. [00:21:04] I think I pushed the pen part too far in or something. And so I had to replace it because it actually got in 2018, it was out of warranty. So there's also the Moleskine version, which is the Pen+, which is basically the Neo Smatpen N2 and branded Moleskin. They're shaped a little bit differently. The N2 is more rounded where the Moleskin is kind of flatter. They have the same technology in them. But I find the Moleskine version feels better to hold In some ways, but either one are not are not bad. And I had terrible handwriting. One of my goals has been, over the last year and a half, to improve my handwriting. And I've been successful with that. But it successfully transcribes my handwriting. I'll give you a for instance, I was in a meeting where we were doing discovery and then transitioning the notes into user stories into Azure DevOps. So I intentionally just wrote in my Moleskine with Moleskine Pen + notebook rather than typing them into my computer. Then I was able to very quickly sync my notes, take the text transcrption, wordsmith it, and then copy and paste it into stories. [00:22:26] And it it went very quickly. So I find it I find it extremely effective. Not every note I want to keep, but it's kind of per page I can choose. There's als a little checkbox. If you want email the notes to somebody, you can just check it. And when you sync with the app, it will email it. And what I find very useful about it is I can go into meeting and don't have to fire my laptop. I can be writing in my notebook and it saves me a ton of time transitioning that into OneNote, sharing the notes with other people, or taking an OCR of the notes. There are other things like the Rocket Notebook, where you use a regular notebook with specially designed paper to scan it with the phone. I find that the smart pen is better and there's other smart pens like I think there's one called the live scribe or something. I haven't tried those. But as for the Neo N2 or the Moleskine Pen +, which is basically N2, I would say that for me it is productive and saves me a ton of time. [00:23:32] All right. Well, that's cool. I don't know. I mean, I still like my pen and paper for both journaling and for planning. And I'll call it more limited note taking. And my go to is still the Office Lens app to be able to pull that in, push directly into a OneNote notebook. And I can choose from either my work or my personal one notes or drop it into PDF or any of those kind of things. So that's that's still my go to I haven't graduated to trying that digital pen. [00:24:13] Right. When (the digital pen) syncs, I don't know how it does it, but if I have a red notebook and a black notebook and if I write in the red notebook and I write in the black notebook, it knows which notebook that I'm I'm writing it in. So I don't have to deal with each page necessarily. I can just sync the pen. I've actually got three or four different notebooks, one to use for more of a journal, one I use for just personal to do type things, and one I use for meeting notes, And it keeps them separate. So you could you could do the same thing with Office Lens or whatever. So I’m not saying you have to use a digital pen. I'm just saying for me, it's very productive. [00:25:03] The pen and multi notebook combo. Exactly. [00:25:09] So kind of kind of related to that. Have you tried the collection feature in the chromium Edge Dev? [00:25:19] So I have not tried that yet. [00:25:21] I did write about that in one of my articles on my learning series, and it is something I find to be a very useful learning tool. Specifically, you can have multiple collections, you can drag and drop text and images. It's basically like the clip to OneNote, but having it in the browser and being able to build the collection, and then you can send the whole collection to OneNote or whatever you want to. [00:25:45] I found that useful, especially for learning, because you go through Microsoft Learn, or whatever learning content you want and just grab these snippets, put them in the collections, arrange it the way you want to, and then copy that to OneNote. It could be from different pages versus sending each snippet to one note. It's kind of easier to arrange it the way you want and build the build the collection, then send it somewhere. [00:26:14] Sure. Now, as you're using that, are you finding that you get stuff that's like partially done in transition, sitting in that collection and hot? How do you not have orphaned content that sits out in those collections? [00:26:32] I don’t have orphaned content. For example, when I'm studying for my field service exam, I have a collection for resource scheduling. So as I go through the multiple articles about resource scheduling, I'm grabbing sections or lists, such as the statuses of work items, because I know that's probably going to be on the exam. [00:27:00] And then there's a diagram of the stages of work and I'll drag that over. And so then you can rearrange those pieces, drag them up, drag them down, delete them, whatever. What I'm building is kind of a study sheet that has all that detail that I want to remember on it. [00:27:24] Got it. OK. [00:27:25] And it's live. So if you have part of a Web site on there, you can click on it to go directly to that section of the webpage. Right in the browser. [00:27:37] Yeah, I do like that concept, though, I feel I would have to try it, but I would still be worried that it would be one other thing to manage. I'd be trying to think back to where is that content stored, and I won't necessarily remember it was part of my learning that I was doing there. I'll try to go search one note. It's not there. It's one where I think I'd have to get hands on to figure out what the actual workflow would look like for me. That’s not a judgment, good or bad. I just can't see how that's going to land. Or I've maybe tried too many of those things and thought “oh, this is going to be great.” But it turns out it's just one more place to have to go look for something later. [00:28:25] I don't think I'd make it my permanent home for anything. That's not what I did. I used it when I'm in a session learning things and collecting pieces about them. But I then moved it to OneNote. [00:28:38] Yeah. And that's like a staging area. [00:28:41] But also, I was recently researching mattresses, for example, and going to different pages that had different models and pages like Consumer Reports. Besides learning, I found Collections to be very helpful when compiling research amongst different pages for something you want to purchase as a way to collect all that information arranged the way you want. Maybe you're not keeping it permanently, it might just be for that specific focused time, then delete the collection. But I think if I was going to keep it in perpetuity and come back in and be able to find it a year from now, I would agree with you. I wouldn't keep it there permanently. [00:29:27] Yeah. So it's important then to have that habit of actually moving it somewhere if you want to be able to get it, get it later. Otherwise, you have that challenge of one more place of contact. So either stick a fork in it because it's done or move it forward to a more permanent repository. [00:29:45] The thing about me and taking notes. They're not so much for perpetuity. I have very few notebooks that I need to keep for long term.

Learning and certification productivity

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 18, 2020 39:18

181 : Black History Month (w/ Ade & Zach)

Living Corporate

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 8, 2020 39:35

Ade and Zach sit down and have an entertaining discussion geared around Black History Month, and they both share their experiences in being frustrated by an employer's mismanagement of the celebration. Ade also talks a little bit about the body butter company she started, and she and Zach spend some time reflecting on how far Living Corporate has come since its launch in early 2018. Thank you all so much for your support! We owe it to you.Ade's body butter company soft-launches soon, so make sure to follow them on Twitter and Instagram. Congratulations, Ade!Visit our website!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate. And it's not just Zach. Ade: Ayyyye. It's Ade.Zach: It's Ade alsooo, yo, and we here, man. Look, it's Black History Month. It's 2020. You know, January was big trash, so we're just gonna start over. We're gonna count February as January--nah, just... 2020 is gonna have 11 months, that's all.Ade: Yeah, let's do that. I like that idea.Zach: Yeah, we're just gonna start over. So yeah, you know, it's Black History Month. Whole fresh new decade, and, you know, a few episodes have dropped. Downloads are popping, by the way. Like, they're really good, Ade. The numbers look good.Ade: Yay, that's awesome.Zach: Yeah, pretty good. So we both have a lot of stuff going on. What's up in your world?Ade: God, what isn't up? No, [laughs] I'm just really enjoying the ride. I got--you know, my first bit of code at my job was deployed successfully, went really well. I panicked a little bit near the end of the sprint there, but I got it all the way through, so I'm excited about that. I started my butter company, and my soft launch is February 10th, so I'm also really excited about that, just getting the opportunity--Zach: Hold on. Butter company? Like, what's up? Like, you making animal butter? Or, like, cooking butter? Or--Ade: [laughs] No, although somebody gave me the idea to do that. You know I love cooking and I love experimenting in the kitchen, so that was an idea that hadn't occurred to me. But this is the year of action, so I took action. [laughs] So now I have a company--obviously besides, like, this one--but I'm really excited. I've been connected with a bunch of really great folks within the, like, creative community, and I'm excited to see where this goes. What about you, Zach?Zach: Well, first of all, hold on. We don't have to rush over to my stuff. Excited for you, congratulations on moving in action, moving in intentionality, you know what I'm saying? [air horns sfx] That's great, you know? But anyway, you asked me about myself. Yeah, so look, things are going great. Really focused on getting ready for my wife and I's first child coming in, like... I mean, if she doesn't come early--if she doesn't come early it will be in, like, 6 weeks.Ade: Whoo!Zach: Right?Ade: Oh, my gosh. You're so close to the finish line. And I would like to reiterate here that Ade makes a fantastic first time. I'm just saying.Zach: It's great. I love that, 'cause I'd like to reiterate... [haha sfx] You know? [both laughing] Ade: You are so wildly disrespectful.Zach: Not at all, not at all. I just stay ready, you know? I just stay ready. I think for me it's, like, focusing on, like, the radical change that's about to happen in our family, in our lives, then, like, just doing, like, a reassessment of just everything else around me, right? Because, like, I think initially--and I'm sure most people who are preparing for children, they go through this too--you're kind of like, "Oh," you know, they'll just kind of fit into your plans, and I'm like--as I, like, kind of pause and think about all of the things I have going on, I'm like, "Dang, wait. Certain things are gonna have to shift and change." Like, it's not gonna just be like, "Oh, I'm picking up a new hobby," or starting a new podcast, like, this is a whole new person, a whole person that's about to be, like, active, actively involved and will have active present needs from myself and my partner for at least the next 18 years, right? If not the rest of their lives. So it's like, what does it look like? So y'all, this is not me alluding to the fact that the podcast is about to stop or anything like that, it's just more about life. Like, you know, talking to other fathers who had to make career decisions and think about, like, what did it look like for them to make adjustments, how do you communicate with your teams about being a dad and, like, the new responsibilities as a parent? Those are things I'm really excited to, like, explore and, like, really discover over the next few--you know, over the next months and stuff like that as I get ready for paternity leave and all that kind of stuff. Like, really just, like, being really clear with, like, what does it look like to, like, live in this new world? 'Cause, like, I don't know. Like, I'm 30 years old, so it's not like I'm--I'm not old, so I still have things--Ade: [whispering] Yes, you are.Zach: That's jacked up.Ade: [laughs] I too got shots in my pocket.Zach: That's crazy. I see you. But the thing about it is, like, I still have a few decades more of career to have, and so it's like I don't want to just, like, kind of sit on my laurels because I have kids. Like, what does it look like to still progress and have a career and, like, develop and do all these things while at the same time being a very present and attentive and engaged father? So normal stuff. Like, I think it's a challenge. It's a good problem to have. It's something that is--it's a problem created by growth, so to me that's a--I count that as a good problem. So that's, like, the main--the big, big thing, then the second thing is just, like, continuing to slow down and focus on, like, mental health. Like, my own personal mental health and, like, my mental wellness, right? I think the more and more people I--especially black men--that I talk to who are transitioning out of their twenties, you know, it's like--I've talked to more and more folks who are, black men, who, like, this is the time when they go to counseling, right? Like, if you haven't gone already. And I've gone at certain points in time. We did pre-martial counseling. I've done, like, personal counseling as I got ready to get married, but I haven't really ever gone to, like, see someone, like, a true therapist, right? Like, a true, like, psychiatrist. I think that there's a certain stigma around mental health, right, for black people, and I would say particularly for black men, and so it's, like, getting comfortable with talking to people and, like, really getting help and just talking through things. Like, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I think, like, the road of life has all of these different bumps and potholes. You're gonna have mileage and just damage and disalignment that you just need help with just because of the reality of life and the trauma that life brings, especially in the context of white supremacy and patriarchy. So shoot... and then the last thing, y'all, I think I'm just really excited about, again, like, Living Corporate. Like, yo, we got featured on Forbes, man.Ade: Oh, my God. I just--Zach: What is it? So be honest. When you saw it, what did you--Ade: Okay, I just want to put some context. I am not--I don't scream very often.Zach: Did you scream for real?Ade: At the top of my lungs.Zach: Did you really?Ade: I really did. [Zach laughs] And here's why. Like, it genuinely is a life goal for me to make it on Forbes' 30 Under 30, so when you sent that link to me, I was like, "Surely he is just sharing a link of podcasts that we should emulate or, you know, link up with these people and get a sense of what they do, how they do it, how well they're do--" Nope, there's our name. I was like, "Holy--" I was on top of the Moon. It was a moment for me, okay, personally.Zach: I was curious. Well, 'cause I texted you and we didn't, like--'cause we didn't, like, really react in the moment. Like, I reacted. I texted you. I was happy. But you were in the middle of your work day and, like, I had some time in my day, so I was able to step away and, like, actually hit you, right? And so when you--[laughs] But you didn't, like, react, so I was like, "I wonder if she really cared about that." Like, not that you didn't care, but did it do anything for you. But for me I was like, "Oh, my gosh." Like, I was shocked. Ade: Absolutely. No, I need you to--I just want to, again, reiterate the fact that I don't scream on a regular basis. It's not my personality type to just be out here in these streets wildin'--at least in that way, 'cause I do be wildin'. I'ma just be honest.Zach: Right, you do. That's true.Ade: [laughs] You didn't need to agree with me. I was just--Zach: You know, you put it out there. It's on Twitter.Ade: Okay. All right, this is fine. But really, it was such an honor, and it was something that I would not in the--I mean, if we, like, rewind a year and a half or whatever--it was actually about this time two years ago. Are we two years [?]? Wait a minute.Zach: Yeah, it's been, like, two years.Ade: Holy [bleep?]Zach: Right? It's been nuts.Ade: [laughs] I really need you to understand that I'm literally just coming to the realization that Living Corporate is almost two years old. That's wild. That's so wild to me. We need sweatshirts and hoodies.Zach: We need merch, man. We need merch. We should really drop, like, little collections. Like Popeye's.Ade: We should. We should, like, go through and figure out what our favorites from our guests and from our hosts are and then, like, make some sweatshirts, 'cause I would wear my sayings. That's all I'm saying.Zach: You would wear your own sayings?Ade: Absolutely. What? Absolutely.Zach: Nah, that's the definition of a narcissist. You'd put your own quotes on clothing and walk around in them?Ade: Uh-huh, I would.Zach: Wow.Ade: I would. You know why? Because I have some fire, fire sayings. Zach: [laughs] That's crazy. You do, but it's like... you can't say that though. Like, that's crazy.Ade: What? No. 2020 is the year of big upping yourself.Zach: Wow. You know what though? I respect it, 'cause, you know what I'm saying, if no one else is gonna wear your sayings, you may as well.Ade: Exactly. Precisely. Kobe was a fan of big upping myself, and so am I.Zach: He was. That's true though. You know what? That's a good point.Ade: And the way that I do see it is, like--being a little bit more serious about the subject, 'cause I was kind of making fun of the entire concept, but sincerely, like, we preach that you have to be your own best advocate, right? And we preach that you have to kind of take stock and make sure that you are keeping records of your good deeds when you do them so that you can be able to speak to your managers, your peers and your supervisors, all of these things, but when you are an entrepreneur or you are an individual contributor or anything of the sort, you have to do the same, right? Like, you have to be too, and this was something that I had to get comfortable with. And I'm still not comfortable with it, to be frank. Like, I handed people an 8-ounce jar of my product, and they were like, "Well, how much is this?" And I'm, like, waffling around, like, "I kind of don't want to ask anybody for money for this," but it's a product, right? But being able to, like, stand on your two feet and be like, "No, this is a thing that I've done, and I'm worth the time and the investment that you're going to make in my product or in me as a person." It's all a part of being confident in all of the work that you've done. You're not asking people to buy into a single thing. You're asking them to buy into you as an idea, and if you're not willing to, you know, kind of say it with your chest, as Africans will say. [laughs] If you're not willing to say it with your chest, then who's supposed to be willing to stand behind you and say it with their chest? You see what I'm saying?Zach: Yeah, straight up. Like, you have to be willing to advocate for yourself and, like, promote yourself, because--I mean, the Internet is such a big and busy place and, like, the world is so big and busy that, like, yeah, there--and I was just having a conversation with a guest that I will not reveal yet because I like guests being a surprise week-to-week, but a guest I was having a conversation with, we were talking about networking and how, like, the world is connected, but it's connected via a series of, like, closed loops. So it's not like you can just, like--the world is connected, but you still have to, like, be in certain circles for things to even get started, right? And so, like, the idea of like, "Oh, I'ma just do this thing over here in this corner, and then if it's good it will eventually get seen." It's like that's not really true. Like, you have to really actively promote whatever it is that you got going on. Like, period. That's just the way it is. But yeah, to your earlier point about, you know, it being two years and Living Corporate being around almost two years, right? So, like, April will make two years--or is it June? Golly, I can't remember. Anyway, some time--Ade: I think it was April, but we definitely had, like, our inaugural Skype or, what was it, Google chat in February.Zach: There it is. You're right, we did. We did have our inaugural Google chat in February just to talk about things, and then, you know, we kicked everything off a couple months later, but it's crazy 'cause, like--and shout-out to Dr. Gassam, who wrote the piece for us, the article for us, and shouted us out and, like, you know, put us up as #1. I don't know what those little numbers mean, you know what I'm saying? Like, 'cause I really--what I was really shocked about was everybody else on that list, everybody on that list are huge. Like, shout-out to Side Hustle Pro. Shout-out to Code Switch, dawg. Shout-out to Myleik. I was like, "Yo, we're up here with Code Switch? Myleik?"Ade: Code Switch.Zach: Code Switch! And yo, shout-out to NPR and Code Switch, because I remember when we first started thinking about, like, Living Corporate, like, as a podcast, we were like, "What are the ones that really inspire us?" And me and at least one other person was like, "Code Switch," 'cause, like, the format is so fire. Like, shout-out to y'all, man. So, like, even if anybody--for anybody to think about us in the same vein as them, like, I feel like that's a win on its own, 'cause that lets me know--that affirms me that, like, we're achieving [against?] the vision that we had initially set out, but it's crazy 'cause there's been, like, a lot of ups and downs and, like, a lot of stuff going on, but, you know, [Paul Rudd look at us sfx, Ade laughs].Ade: I'm just over here, like, giddy and over the Moon. Yeah, no, and it's funny because you're not the only person who sent me that link, and that's, like, the other thing that [?].Zach: Oh, you didn't tell me that.Ade: No, like, sincerely, you weren't the only one that sent me that link. My friend sent me that link, and I actually encountered someone--shout-out to you, you know who you are--who I literally had just, like, been talking to him. He's transitioning into tech. I just, like, try to make sure I'm giving people advice and help and checking in with people that I know are making the same transition, and I reached out to him, and he was like, "Wait, are you Ade from Living Corporate?" Zach: What?Ade: 'Cause he literally met me from an entirely separate context. And so to be able to encounter someone who, you know, knows of us and knows me in my best light, not, you know--clears throat--anyway. Zach: Dawg, I'ma tell you something. One day--one day, y'all... hey, listen, y'all. Some of y'all are, like, listening to this with a confused face. Trust me, I'm confused too, but one day we're gonna come on this podcast and we're gonna have a real conversation about the crazy life that Ade lives, 'cause why would you come on here and say, "Yeah, this Forbes article, and someone who knew me, and not in my best--" And then this awkward pause. I hear you audibly gulp in the mic. Like, what? [laughs] Y'all, y'all understand the type of work--like, y'all understand the team I have, right? Like, that's crazy. Y'all, don't treat me like--yeah, now y'all know what I'm doing with. What kind of weirdness is that? Go ahead. This person who hasn't seen you at your best and sent you the Forbes link. What?Ade: [sighs] I'ma just move forward. [Zach laughs] No, no, no.Zach: I wonder, is Ade the Mal of this podcast? 'Cause I'm certainly Joe Budden. I realize that. But Ade might--Ade might be the Mal. She might be the Mal of this podcast. She's, like, a little too cool to pod, but then she'll say [?] things.Ade: I demand we move forward. [both laugh]Zach: Goodness, gracious. Go ahead. Keep going.Ade: Anyway, so I'm just really grateful for, you know, where we are, and--first of all I want to give Zach and our writing team and our production team and our social team all the props, like, every single prop that exists, because you have been put in blood, sweat, tears, money, effort, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseum into this, and it shows in the quality of our partners, our work, our podcast, our newsletters. Like, everything. Like, you've been really intentional about the direction that Living Corporate would take, and I really respect that, and you are by far one of the most aggressive--but you're not gonna beat me up though--type energies [?].Zach: [laughs] It's true though. It's true. [both laughing]Ade: And Living Corporate has enjoyed that energy, enjoyed the fruits of that energy.Zach: I do have "but you're not gonna beat me up though" type energy, and I've come to peace with that. It's true.Ade: It's my favorite thing about you, and also, like, simultaneously your worst quality when you turn it on me, [both laugh] but--[to this day sfx]Zach: [laughing] Oh, my gosh. It's true. But this is the thing, you gotta have "you ain't gonna beat me up though" energy, because boy, the world will beat you up, boy. The world out here tryna come--it coming for your neck, dude. I mean, every day I'm over here like [Cardi B blatblat sfx] with these haters, man. I'm trying to, like, stay alive out here. I gotta fight every day. Every day. All my life, literally trying to fight and then at the same time avoid--[Law and Order sfx]--like, at the same time. [both laugh] I be so aggravated, man. Do you know the fine line you have to walk as a black man? Man, I'm telling you, being black is so exhausting. Being black and conscious, like--James Baldwin, man. He was not lying, dawg. Not lying at all, because you are in a rage all of the time, and you're over here trying to, like, stand up and just speak to the fact that you're worth something. Listen... eugh. You're over here trying to literally raise your voice loud enough to be heard and respected, but not too loud, right?Ade: 'Cause [?], and here y'all come.Zach: Here y'all come, without at the same time going to jail. So it's, like, this fine line that you have to walk. It's just nuts. Anyway, nah, I appreciate that, Ade. And, you know, I appreciate you as well. You know, you're here. The biggest--Ade: Finally.Zach: Finally, that's true. But look, you was gone for a little minute, but you back in town. You know? It's okay. I think the biggest thing--what do they say, "the biggest ability is availability?" It's corny. It's kind of a coach's--coaches say that, but it's a true statement. Like, just be present, you know? I know one thing, and shout-out to Rod from The Black Guy Who Tips and Karen, his lovely co-host and partner, but one of the things he said, like, from the jump--like, he jumped on our podcast early. He was like, "Yo, being consistent--" He's like, "'Cause people come and leave, like, jump on these podcasts and leave all of the time." He's like, "So having some longevity is hard over time," and if it wasn't for our team - Aaron, Sheneisha, Amy, Latesha, Tristan... like, we have a great, great team, and we put out a lot of content. Like, we're posting three episodes a week every single week, and, like, that doesn't happen without a huge team--or, I'm sorry, relatively huge and a consistently dedicated team. So, like, really proud of them, really proud of, like, just what we've been able to do, and just, like, really thankful for Dr. Gassam, 'cause, like, there's plenty of other platforms that are trying to make content. I really still stay that, like, it's us, Trill MBA and, like... that's kind of it right now that's out here really talking about other in majority-white spaces. Anyway, so look, it's Black History Month. Have you seen any--I'm just gonna ask the question. I don't know why I'm trying to, like, play it safe. Have you been on a job where your employer has annoyed you by how they've handled Black History Month?Ade: Let me count the ways. I--[laughs] Whoo, let me take a breath. All right. I have been aggravated by several firms, actually, simply because--Zach: [laughs] Yes, shout-out "firms." Consulting, we're talking about y'all. [laughs]Ade: Looking right at you, friends. Zach: Looking right at y'all, professional services. Yes. [laughing]Ade: No, I just--there's nothing I hate more than double-talk, and by that I mean firms, corporations, whatever it is that y'all would like to call yourselves--active participants in capitalism--who pay lip service, either through, like, their mission statements, their values, their creed, or even their stated employee resource groups that they care about diversity and somehow consistently fail to make a statement or support or do anything of value, particularly during Black History Month. I noticed this during my employment at a firm I will not name in the past where, you know, July 4th came around, Veteran's Day came around. You know, all of those things were celebrated or commemorated by words from the leadership of the firm going out, but when Black History Month came and went there was nary a bleep, and it was so noticeable because, you know, the firm had something to say on MLK Day, but, you know, when ostensibly there would be time for--and to their credit, the employee resource group put on one... ONE program for the entire month of February. I understand that, you know, funding is a thing. It's difficult to organize sometimes around different people's schedules, but, you know, one event over the course of the entire Black History Month? I cannot tell you how deeply bothersome I found that, simply because you have a body of people who are, whether they consciously or not notice these things, are essentially being utilized as resources by this firm. I mean, you are essentially selling our time to all of these contracts, you're making millions off of us, and you can't take the time during Black History Month to care about Black History, but you can, on July 4th, take time to commemorate these things? Or you can during Veteran's Day or Memorial Day or Labor Day and all of these other things. So it feels like a very intentional slight, because, I mean, I know that your calendar functions the same way that my calendar does, and I know that your Google functions the same way that my Google functions, so it's not like you're missing out on the reminders that these things exist. So when there's an intentional exclusion, or what feels like an intentional exclusion, of black people from, you know, your commemorative messages, it's like, "Heard you. We see where your priorities are." And an even further extension of that logic is that when--you know, during these programming sessions there are no, like, leadership in the room to attend these programs or there's no support, you know? People have to come out of pocket for things, to pay for things. It just feels very ugly. I'ma use that word, ugly. Dusty. Musty.Zach: Raggly.Ade: Raggedy.Zach: And there's a difference now, and this is where--so, you know, you and I, I love the diversity just in our pairing, right? But, like, you know, you're an East Coast black and I'm a Southern black, right?Ade: Precisely.Zach: It's interesting, 'cause you said raggedy, and see, what I said was raggly.Ade: Raggley, mm-hmm.Zach: Raggly. Not raggley, raggly. Now, look, I want--'cause every now and then I teach--and if you're listening to this you know who you are, but for the white folks that I trust, the Buckys out there, the allies, or the aspirational allies, that I trust, every now and then I'll teach y'all a phrase called "fifty-'leven," right? You know who you are. If you're listening to this and you actually, you know, rock with me and you listen to this, I've taught you this. [both laughing] I've taught you all these phrases, and this is another one for y'all to take in. So look, it's not raggedy, nor is it raggley. It's raggly. It's two syllables, and that is often times a descriptor for how companies manage Black History Month.Ade: I will make an amendment to that statement, 'cause I don't necessarily agree. There are, uh, regional differences to dialects, you see. [Zach laughing] So while Zach is correct for his particular region of the Souf--notice I said Souf--Zach: That's true. Souf. That's true. That's fair, 'cause Southern is--'cause we live in America. Southern is a huge region. That's true. That's fair.Ade: Take his advice lightly, you know? Do with that what you will. Zach: [laughs] Be careful.Ade: And, uh, if you get run up on, please don't quote us.Zach: Don't quote me.Ade: 'Cause we will not be popping up [?].Zach: Uh-uh, uh-uh. Don't. And honestly, maybe don't say fifty-'leven around everybody. They'll be like, "Who taught you that?" And don't tell 'em it was me. [laughs] Nah, but no, I'm right there with you when it comes to, like--I've been in situations where, you know, either we don't celebrate Black History Month at all, we don't recognize it in any way, or employee resource groups will get, like, the black people to huddle together and they'll go do something, right? It's like, "Um..." Black history is American history. This should be something company-wide. And I'm not saying we gotta do something every single day, but can we do at least one thing? Can we recognize some of the black pioneers in our own firm, in our own companies? Like, we have our own historical marks that we've made, but I think--I don't know. It's tough, it's tough because--and honestly, like, even I say this, like, I get--like, I'm hearing... 'cause there's some executive leaders and folks who listen to Living Corporate, right? And they listen to it for different points of insight or whatever, and so there's a part of me who--and they're like, "Well, dang, I can't even win for losing," 'cause, like, the other part of me is gonna say, "And even if you are doing something for Black History Month, what are you doing for the rest of the year?" Right? 'Cause it can just be, like, an acknowledgement. Like, what are you doing? What are you doing to, like, actually advance having a more equitable and inclusive culture that drives belonging in your place of work? But I do think, like, at just the--I mean, I'm talking, like, floor level, if we could just start with some acknowledgement, you know? Like, you don't have to always quote Martin Luther King. You could actually, like, integrate and be intersectional with your Black History Month if you wanted. [Ade laughs] You can! Like, you can actually, like, quote trans rights, trans activists who happen to be black, and you can tie that in with, like, your LGBTQ ERGs. You could quote, like, Afro-Latinx civil rights activists and, like, historical people, and, like, integrate them. Like, there's all types of ways. You know there's ways that you can actually--you could use Black History Month to drive intersectional conversations and activities for your whole firm, 'cause black people are not just black. Black people are black and gay, black and Latinx. They're black and straight. They're black and female. They're black and disabled. Like, it could actually be something that could be--you know, you could use Black History Month similarly to how you use black and brown people anyway, which is really kind of like just the glue that holds everybody together. You could just use us if you want. You could use the month how you use black and brown people. Like, let me just be super cynical, right? You could actually--like, from a programming perspective, from, like, a networking and engagement perspective, from, like, even leveraging--like, getting more thought leadership, like, you could do all types of things with that month. You have a whole month, and this month you have a whole extra day. So it's like--Ade: No excuses.Zach: No excuses, right? Like, you could do something. And, like, if you need any help with ideas, then, I mean, you could talk to your own leadership. You could talk to--I don't know. There's just so much out there now. There's just so much--maybe we just need to drop an article on ideas for your Black History Month. Maybe that's what we do, 'cause, like, I don't--Ade: You know what? That's a good idea.Zach: I mean, maybe that's what we do, 'cause, like, I'm over here just thinking about it more and more. It's like, "I don't know if I've been a part of any company that I have walked away and felt like, "Wow, I really feel seen this Black History Month." I don't think that's ever happened to me. In fact, I remember last year I tried to quote a--like, I was on a project and there was a quote board, okay? So you put a little quote up there, and I was like, "Oh, it's Black History Month," and I tried to quote--I think I quoted, like, Oprah Winfrey or something like that, and, like, they literally erased it and put up some white man's quote and they were like, "This is more relevant." I said, "But I thought it was a quote board." Ade: Right?Zach: Like, what? What are you talking about? What do you mean it's more relev--okay... and again, that's where I had to make a choice between, like, okay, am I about to die on this hill? Am I gonna go to jail? Like, what am I gonna do? 'Cause, like, I just--I don't--nope. So I had to make a decision, but anyway. So okay, what else do we have going on? So what's the name of the company though? The body butter company. I'm jumping all around now. What's--'cause we didn't talk about that before.Ade: [laughs] Right. So my company is called Solari, S-O-L-A-R-I. It is a portmanteau of my name, or a part of my name, and my mom's name. And on Instagram and on Twitter I'm pretty sure our handle is @SolariBody, so it's S-O-L-A-R-I-B-O-D-Y. And yeah, I'm really excited. I'm kind of blushing right now. [laughs] I'm really excited about just getting started and just being able to expand my reach. So I've been doing a lot of kind of, like, self-care stuff for a very long time, like making my own body butters and making my own, like, lip balm, conditioner, and all these other things--and scrubs--and just the idea of being able to... and this is another thing that happened, but I'll finish my sentence. Just the idea of being able to utilize all of the things that I put into practice because I want to take care of myself and take better care of myself. So, for example, I would, like, make my own hair oils, but when I realized that other people wanted these things and don't necessarily want to go through the process of experimentation to figure out all of the ideal things--and I've already been doing these things for over a decade--I was just kind of like, "You know what? I'm gonna do this, and it's gonna be fun," and the reception has been fantastic.Zach: Well, I'm really proud of you. I'm happy for you, you know? I think--you talked about this a little bit on the last, when we did our season kickoff episode, but it's easy to, like, get in your own way and to like, you know what I'm saying, just let anxieties and different challenges, like, just hamper you or kind of put you in a stalemate, but it's really exciting, like to see you continue forward and build something. Ade: Thank you.Zach: You're absolutely welcome. Man, so, you know, my cadence as I was pausing there, it reminded me of my own Barack Obama impression that I do at the house for fun with Candis just to get on her nerves, 'cause I was almost like... [impersonating Barack] "Uh, Ade, it is, uh... impressive how you have taken the time," you know what I mean? I almost--and then I go into, [continuing] "Every day, there are Americans who get up, they have their challenges--" [Ade sighs, Zach laughs] "If there was any doubt, uh, that you could not do what it is that you're doing today, uh, you have nowhere else to look but in the mirror. Uh, you get up. You put that butter on your dry skin. Uh, you hydrate yourself, and you face a world that is not ready for someone like you."Ade: I'm about to hang up on you, sir. [both laugh] I am so done.Zach: [laughs] Goodness, gracious. So all right, y'all. Well, look, this was just a fun episode, you know, letting you know what we've got going on. Thank you so much. Shout-out to everyone who listens to this podcast. Shout-out to--shoot, I ain't gonna get into all the shout-outs, but just shout-out to y'all. Make sure that you share this with your people. Continue to share it. The numbers are showing that y'all are sharing it, and I look at our stats every single day 'cause that's just kind of the person I am, the obsessive person that I am, but [laughs] we're really appreciative. And then, shoot, I guess we'll see y'all next time. Make sure you follow--Ade: Wait, one last thing before we go. We kind of vaguely talked about it, but I do want to insert a moment of silence here for Kobe Bryant and his daughter and all of the passengers of the helicopter that went down. We actually weren't able to get on this podcast to discuss it because we were just so emotional. I tried, and it's about 7 minutes worth of just sobs and sniffles on that, but I think this is a pretty good time to do it. So if everyone listening could just join us in a moment of silence. [a moment of silence] Thank you. Zach: Nah, for sure. Yeah, we could talk about--we're gonna have to have an episode about trauma and, like, the ways that trauma impacts black and brown people at work every day, and how we're still expected to just, like, show up and perform two or three times better than our counterparts just so that we can keep our jobs. So... but yeah.Ade: And I just also actually--I think we should have a black heroes episode.Zach: I love that.Ade: I think that in an episode coming up soon we're gonna discuss, you know, some of our heroes, and Kobe's one of mine. People who have just shown you how to get through life with dignity and with grit, and that's a term that I didn't used to use so frequently and so intensely until now. But again, it's a topic that we'll be covering later, but suffice to say that was a shock to my system, and I didn't expect that it would be so shocking. I didn't expect just how strongly I would react, and I suspect that so many others found themselves reeling in the aftermath of that news. Our prayers and our thoughts of those affected. And another topic I think we should also explore is, you know, how to disconnect in times of trauma and to kind of reassess and to find your balance in those times as well. That's it for me.Zach: Nah, I love that, and I super agree. And y'all, on that super, you know, emotional, heavy note, we're gonna catch y'all next time, okay?Ade: For sure.Zach: Now, look, you make sure you check us out. We're @LivingCorporate on Instagram, @LivingCorp_Pod on Twitter. We have all the different domains. One day, man, we're gonna get that livingcorporate.com domain, man. Right now we have all the livingcorporate dot everything but com, and then we got living-corporate.com, but shoot, until next time. This has been Zach.Ade: This is Ade.Zach: Peace, y'all.Ade: Peace.

How To Save LIfe on Earth as We Know it.

Wild Alive Living

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 2, 2020 31:13

There are many people focusing on the technical details of how to save life as we know it on Earth. But the technical solutions will always fall short. What is needed now is a spiritual revolution that puts the interconnected-ness of all life at the center of religion and rejects tribalism as the core tenant. In this episode, I cover the main new ideas and beliefs that must be embraced if we are see A vital future for human kind. Transcript Hello, everyone, Mike Stokes Wildlife education. Today I'd like to talk about the most important issue of our time. And I'm the topic that I'm calling this podcast YouTube episode is how to save life on Earth as we know it. So the first thing that I have to say, because I want to speak to those of you out there that may feel like a friend of mine does in that life on earth is going to be just fine and it's really about humans in our life on Earth. That is going to be the real challenge. So what I'm suggesting is there's a way to hopefully mitigate a lot of the negative impacts of human life on Earth. So that we can retain some semblance of the natural world and the way of life that we are used to anyone who's been paying attention ever since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and even before that, the dawn of agriculture but primarily the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, we have begun to destroy the networks of life and the networks of ecosystem that have been on Earth. We simply have taken it for granted now that's Everybody knows that. Some people deny that that's important and obviously, I'm I'm not speaking to them because, frankly, you really have to have your head in the sand and be not thinking critically. But thinking dogmatically. If you believe that the collapse of biodiversity and ecosystems around the planet is not a problem. You know, even if you are not really focused on the climate crisis, and for God's sakes, for any of you that are out there, please call it a crisis. It's not a change. Climate change make wasn't as a term that was invented by a conservative think tank to try to minimize the importance of the climate crisis that we face. I got a little sidetracked there. Basically, the catastrophic collapse of all of the ecosystems on earth is happening at a faster pace. Other than when we had asteroids hitting the planet, the change is faster in biological terms than any other single event throughout biological history on Earth, or the billions of years that life has been evolving. So here's the crux of the point. The point is, is that really the only way that we are going to save life on Earth as we know it to save our life is to have a new spirituality have a new religion, there. So religions are everywhere and everyone has their own particular view of religion and spirituality. And there is, you know, obviously a small subset of the population that consumes themselves non religious and non spiritual and purely empirical. But even that segment of the population tends to turn politics and economics into a kind of religion. So really the only way that we're going to be able to thrive or even survive in the midst of this transformation that this catastrophic change and collapse, which is building every year, is by having a new religion, a new spirituality. And here's the problem, that it doesn't exist yet. Most people adhere to a religion that's 2000 plus years old. Now that religion was consistent with the scientific understanding of its age of 2000 years ago, or more. And those precepts and principles were appropriate. For that timeframe for that scientific understanding, here's the thing that most people don't get. The religions of those times, were completely consistent with the scientific understanding of the day. Now, the miracles and the faith that our spoke of, we're still created in a context of, of a scientific understanding of the world that was of that era. So our new religion and our new spirituality is needs to be focused on two things. One is the sacred beauty and importance of holding up the interdependency of all life on Earth. That has to be number one. And then number two, is to hold up that sacred interdependence of all life, in the context of the vastness of the universe, in a Infinite size and infinite smallness and wild possibilities, that we're only beginning to scratch the surface of its its quantum nature, which so many people use in a very self serving way. But that's not the point. So the point is, is that our new religion and our new spirituality has to be based around two fundamental principles. One is is that all life is sacred. And the interconnectedness specifically the interconnectedness of all life should be held sacred, above all else, that interconnectedness. Now that doesn't mean that thou shalt not kill any life form. That's not how Nature, the god nature works. nature as God is an interplay of all things. And instead of putting God above putting man above nature, we put man in his place as part of nature. So, man, what needs to happen is a new religion that holds man as a co equal participant with the rest of nature. Now, man has this extra ability to foresee forecast and manipulate things in the future. Some animals have that to a limited degree, but we have that to a very high degree. So our we are in a special place in the tree of life. That power to manipulate has been misinterpreted by the old religions as Beat standing somehow above nature. So, what we need now is a new religion in which in a new spirituality, which holds our ability to manipulate the rest of nature as a fundamental stewardship role of stewarding ourselves, this artificial idea of somehow that nature and Spirit are separate, that needs to go away. Spirit and nature need to be seen as one in the same. Now that doesn't mean that you should follow every impulse that you have, because then you're going to fall prey to you know, bad habits and all kinds of vices that will ultimately lead to making bad decisions and more destruction. That does mean is that means that since you are nature since nature You are indivisible, then you must take into account your effect on the whole. Now here's another very important point, the, the old religions, were all centered around these very small tribal groups starting either in the Middle East or in India or China or in the Americas or in Africa. Every single one of those religions were centered around how my group is the chosen group, that all has to disappear to, there can be no one chosen group there can be no one idea about God and nature that is separate from the others. They all have to be consistent. So any belief structure that isn't consistent with All men and women, all humans are co equal participants in the web of life, and that all men and women, the beliefs of all men and women need to be the fundamental beliefs need to be in harmony with one another. There's always room for parochial differences. But the fundamental idea that one, we are all interconnected in the web of life and that web of life is sacred. And we have a spiritual responsibility to care for the web itself. Rather than just an individual, my garden or my tribe, or my brother, or my sister or my child, it has to be a we have a fundamental obligation to do the best we can for all living things. Now, that doesn't mean we need To be a monster and kill individuals, while we're, while we're striving to make the whole good, but it does mean that we need to consider the whole good first in our choices that we make. So, the technical solutions is what people focus on today, we have elevated economics and politics to in some instances, equal footing with spiritual and religious ideas. The fundamental problem with that is is that we are not rational beings. We are fundamentally emotional, tribal, spiritual beings can do nothing but see the world around us. As the world that is aligned with our deepest fundamental beliefs, so we have to start having the conversation we have to start leaning all of the big populations in the world towards an idea of spiritual unity, that you don't have to jettison your old religions, you do have to modify them. If there's anything in your old religion that says, my religion is right and your religion is wrong, when it pertains to these two fundamental factors, every religion has to agree that we are interdependent life forms on Earth, that our interdependent life on earth is intertwined with all living things. And that intertwined nature needs to be honored and respected. Above all else, not above being a good person and being kind and caring and compassionate, those are part of, of living a life that is seen as interdependent. So you don't have to jettison compassion and kindness. But what you do have to do is jettison the idea that man and nature are somehow separate. So any interpretation of spiritual beliefs that sees man and nature as separate, needs to be let go. And that's, unfortunately, many people aren't going to accept that. But those people will either destroy life on Earth as we know it, or they will be destroyed or they will become irrelevant. There's really no in between. They can be a small it's fine for those people to stay in our world. They just need to be a small subset that does not wield real economic, ecological and political power, they must have small amounts of power that are only related to their small parochial interests, because that truly is all they focus on. So, if you hold on to any site type of belief, that somehow you are separate from nature, that somehow you are above nature, you are part of the problem. So, the first thing to do is to let that go and what in whatever means you need to do that, if you need to go into a deep meditation or if you need to do scientific research, whatever it is, you have to embrace this idea that we are all interconnected that the the life the sum total of life on earth is us. It is not separate from us. And then, another key factor that we must Elevate is the idea that ecology ecosystems in their oldest form are our teachers. So the oldest, most pristine ecosystems on Earth, we need to study them. as sacred teachers, we need to follow their example of how they became what they are, and how they have sustained what they are over time. And we need to model ourselves in our society around those principles. And one of those principles is is maximum dial biodiversity within a certain bio region that has a stable balance between different entities. So the the tragedy of life on earth is the mass loss of biodiversity on Earth. It's been is the big story that no one's focusing on no one that most people aren't focusing on the, the wealth that has brought us to where we are, is directly correlated to the mass amount of biodiversity that has been stabilized on planet earth during the last hundred thousand years well during the last billions of years, but has allowed us to evolve into what we are over the last million years. So that brings up a fundamental concept if you're holding on to, or if you know someone who's holding on to an idea that somehow the truth is something that you need faith to follow. That is going it's ultimately not going to save us there's a way that it can save us that can Save life as we know it. And that is that that faith has to be a faith in our ability to work together to find solutions, and to serve this common good, in which we honor all life forms in the internet, specifically the interconnectedness of all life forms, the wisdom of ancient ecosystems, and then combining that with the vast universal possibilities of, of all of the combinations of matter and energy that exists throughout the universe. You know, there is a possible scenario where we technologically turn ourselves into a technical ecosystem in which everything that happens on earth becomes a technical man manage to thing like a greenhouse. But in that moment, we lose our biology. In that moment, we lose the sacredness of our life and become a social technical entity, we literally lose the foundation of our spiritual natural nature and will become an evolved into something else. Personally, I don't want to go down that route, I would much rather see the natural ecosystems of the earth take their rightful place, as the elders in our society, who are to teach us how to move forward in a way that has us retain our nature, rather than being cast into a techno sphere where we all are beholden to some imperfect leaders, and societal norms, which control our fates. And that's really where we're headed. We're really headed to a place where nature no longer We're our nature is destroyed and we become source or some sort of techno, eco political entity. So the the scary bigger picture is is that right now we rely upon an unconscious natural feed of our subconscious which holds all that we find dear and amazing about human beings it is the fundamental nature of who we are and that will be lost. And so we have to create a spiritual religious structure that calls all of us to begin to shift from this place of tribal identities and ancient religions that that really focus on our tribal differences to a cohesive spirit spiritual religious group. That cohesive spiritual religious group can have a huge amount it can be a federation of spirituality so you can have a huge amount of leeway. It need only honor a few basic principles. And I'll say them is simply and precisely as I can want, all life is this interdependence of all life is sacred. All life in and of itself is sacred regardless event of economic value. And under in parentheses under that, that does not mean that you do not take life in any form, because that is simply not the way nature works. It works in a balance. And that does not mean that you become a moral and that you don't follow your heart and your moral judgments because your moral compass and your heart and your judgments and the mythologies of all time, are a product of nature, mythologies and religions are true in this sense. They are true That they reveal the deeper subconscious spiritual meaning of your life. And then you can attach your individual tribal symbols on top of that. But that's not the ultimate truth. The ultimate truth is that every one of these seemingly conflicting religions hold a key thread of truth. And those key threads of truth or what we need to focus on, not the differences, the differences will always be a source of tension, and they should be managed, not embraced. So that's number one. Number two, is, is that the nature of reality in the grand cosmic scheme of things, is truly infinite, and is truly most likely unknowable and will never fully be known by the man of mind. By the mind of man. We are limited in our cup capacity, we there's already much talk about how AI is going to overtake our understanding of all things. And we need to prepare for that day and be ready to deal with those consequences. That is a whole other scary topic, which I'm not going to talk about here. First, we have to figure out if we can truly survive on earth, and then we'll be able to well, concurrently we need to figure out how to manage AI so that it doesn't take over the decision making process of humans. Because again, like I said, we run the risk of turning into a techno sphere in which our fundamental natural spirituality is lost, and we become technological beings. Now, the pundits and the critics will say, like, oh, that'll never happen. But Mark my words, it is happening already. And the only thing that will protect it is a deep spiritual value of the independent sacredness of life and how It, how it lives on earth separate of ourselves, the more we go down the path of trying to manage all nature, the more we will destroy ourselves and we will destroy it. So, number one, interdependence of all life is sacred, to the infinite vastness of the universe is a fundamental part of the equation. We are part of an infinite universe with infinite possibilities, there are infinite possibilities. And an addendum to number two is we need simply to learn how to honor the wisdom of ecosystems, the wisdom of the interdependence of all life, at the same time, that we are learning and discovering new mysteries of the universe. So we hold both of them up with equal, not even equal, I would say that for us to retain our fundamental essence of spiritual religious, that that which we believe ourselves to create us and to call us human, we have to hold the interconnectedness of all life, the natural systems on the earth higher in higher regard than the techno sphere, that techno sphere needs to take second place. Along with that we do not need to be a moral. It's not about being a moral. It's about seeing and understanding that the morality, which you experience deeply as right and wrong, some people don't experience that morality, I'm not speaking to them. They are a whole other problem which will deal with in different topics of conversation. But for those of you that experience a morality that are not trapped in a victim ideology, that morality is a product of your nature, the billions of year old life that has come before you that has evolved into You it brought with it a set of symbols and unconscious values. Those didn't. Those are not granted by some ethereal separate entity that we call God. That's a separate thing outside of ourselves that blasted us with this separate consciousness or blasted us from the outside with some alien consciousness. None of that is real, what is real? Now there may be elements of the universe and there may be elements of alien material and matter and life that has come into our world, but those are not primary. They are secondary. Primary is what we are as Earthlings is our primary relationship to the earth that Earth being our mother, you know, we've all heard that. But the more we embrace truly the idea that the earth is our mother and we shall protect her selfless giving mother we shall protect her with all that we have from a spiritual religious place, not from a political or economic or selfish place. It has to be an altruistic place that sees the whole, and sacrifices the self for the whole, all religious and spiritual evolution demands individual sacrifice. So that in and of itself would be the moral foundation that the Earth has bestowed upon you. The earth is saying, thou shalt transcend your individual greed, for the greater good and that greater good can no longer be the try. It can no longer be the nation, it can no longer be the family, you can hold the greater good and all of those things hold those greater goods, but those greater goods need to be consistent with the greatest good of life on Earth, which is that all life is sacred and all life is interdependent. And then The wisdom of ecosystems is above all else, our guide to how to live in a way that sustains and is truly sustainable. So this idea of sustainability has gotten so mucked up and and turned into corporate propaganda and catchphrases for people who want to justify spending tons of money on consumer goods while they bring plastic reusable bags to the store. Sustainability truly is, it is no longer just sustainability. Sustainability has to be generative. It has to generate more life than it takes. Because we are in such a downward spiral of taking life taking biodiversity, destroying the foundation of what we are in, we have to recreate this idea of sustainability to be one of generation and I specifically don't say regeneration because we will never regenerate to where we were. We will generate a new normal if we survive a new norm. That calls forth a new vitality a new thriving in these new old growth ecosystems to take charge of the natural environment in which we become the Stewart's there is no reason that we don't have armies of people inside ecosystems and in destroying ecosystems which do everything in their power to create an interdependent life between those ecosystems and people. That's what we don't do. What we do is we take from the ecosystem, thinking falsely that it is the only way for people to thrive, it is completely not the only way to survive. One of the greatest examples of that is fair wild. So fair wild is going around the world and creating sustainable, truly sustainable ways. Obviously, there's going to be some impact on the land but truly sustainable ways to increase the biodiversity while harvesting medicine while harvesting products that does not destroy ecosystems on which they rely moving. Back in a sense to a relationship of each bioregion where each community had a sacred responsibility to enhance the life of each bioregion. When it comes to tribalism, this is the only valid tribalism. The only valid tribalism is that each individual community takes responsibility for its bio region and creates a way of living an economy, an economy that is based on a spiritual practice, which gives back to the land at the same time that it gives to the individuals into the community. So the third principle is that ecological wisdom stands above technological wisdom. I think that's enough for now. The the differences between different belief structures people always get stuck on this You must not focus on them. You must only focus on these three, to begin with these three fundamental principles, that the interdependence and sacredness of all life, that the wisdom of the ecosystem should be held as the path forward, and that we as stewards of the earth should co create vitality and abundance with these ecosystems, not against them. And that is entirely possible and simply, the only challenge is is a lack of imagination, the infinite possibilities of the universe and the infinite combinations of matter. And our combined with our creative intellect, mix. It's limitless, the possibilities. Thank you. Thank you for listening. If you please send me questions. If you've gotten value out of this, please support scribe and have a wonderful day and hit the notification bell. notification, vacation vacation. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

china god earth nature climate africa spirit sustainability ai middle east americas primary industrial revolution earthlings infinite personally i'm i'm elevate today i'd transcribed

238 - The Story of LeNell's and Red Hook Rye

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 30, 2020 66:08

Red Hook Rye... that bottling might be what made LeNell a household name among bourbon unicorn chasers, but LeNell has a story to tell when it comes to the spirits industry. Her story is filled with fortunate encounters that propelled her name and eventually put her little shop in Brooklyn on the map. Like any endeavor, her story has highs and lows. LeNell shares what owning a store in Red Hook was like back in the day and how she has gone back to her roots in Alabama. We also touch on secondary pricing of her famous private label. Now, before you go any further, this podcast does contain some explicit language so don't say we didn't warn you. You get to hear the real LeNell Camacho Santa Ana. Show Partners: The University of Louisville has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at uofl.me/bourbonpursuit. At Barrell Craft Spirits, each batch is it's own unique expression of their blending process. Find out more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: Jim Beam Article: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-beams-are-americas-first-family-of-bourbon This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about the Super Bowl. When was your first taste of whiskey? Do you care about Alabama football? Where did you get the idea of LeNell's? What were your early days like? Did your store ever experience any crime? How did you get into the liquor business? Why did you focus on bourbon? Talk about Straight Bourbon. How did Red Hook Rye happen? Tell us about the process of selecting Red Hook. Do you have any Red Hook left? What are your thoughts on the secondary pricing? What hurdles did you face opening up a store in Alabama? Why was this store so important to you? Do you feel like it is better now as a women in whiskey than in the past? Tell us about the success of your store. Are you helping other businesses open in your neighborhood? What is your newest project? 0:00 I love bourbon, but I'm not ready to restart my career and be distiller. I have a bachelor's degree and I want to continue to use those skills in the whiskey industry. So check this out. The University of Louisville has an online distilled spirits business certificate. And this focuses on the business side of the spirits industry like finance, marketing and operations. This is perfect for anyone looking for more professional development. And if you ever want to get your MBA their certificate credits transfer into u of L online MBA program as elective hours. Learn more about this online six course certificate at U of l.me. Slash bourbon pursuit. 0:38 Now hold on Kenny we have to anytime I talk to someone from Alabama. I gotta find out. Are you an Auburn fan? Or tide fan? Neither I don't give a shit. 1:01 This is Episode 238 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your host Kinney, and it's time for a bit of bourbon news. Lou Bryson and acclaimed bourbon journalist and author wrote a captivating story called America's first memory of bourbon, the beams. I'm going to give you a little bit of context about the article and hope that you go read the rest of it because it gives a historical timeline of James bullguard beam, better known as Jim Beam, and distilling bourbon before prohibition, what he did after prohibition ended, and how this family lineage just as tie spreading all across the bourbon industry. Now during Prohibition, he tried other businesses including a rock quarry, and an orange grove that ultimately failed. So he found investors in Illinois to fund a new distillery after prohibition ended. Along with his son and two nephews. They built a distillery in 120 days and open on March 25th 1935. Jim was 70 years old at the time, and before prohibition, the beam family brand had been a 2:00 Old tub bourbon whiskey. To Jim's dismay, he learned that the rights the name had been sold during Prohibition. Despite this setback, he was undeterred. And that's when the whiskey officially became Jim Beam bourbon. The story then dives into this mid 1700s with Johan is Jacob beam. And then from there, the family lineage starts really spreading and talks about how they helped create early times distillery toddies liquor, heaven Hill, and their ties and estates of Weller Maker's Mark Frankfort distillery JW dance for roses, mixers, and so many more. You can read the full story with the link in our show notes to the daily beast.com wilderness trail one of the founding distillery destinations on the Kentucky bourbon trail craft tour has advanced to join the Kentucky bourbon Trail Adventure becoming the 18th stop on the world famous journey that showcases America's only native spirit. co owners Shane Baker and pat heist are recognized globally as leading fermentation specialists to their original company. 3:00 firms solutions, consulting with distilleries around the world to develop products and enhance production. And you can listen to Pat and Shane back on episodes hundred and 21 and 130. They're open for tours Tuesday through Saturday, and the visitor experience includes a 45 minute walking tour and an educational tasting seminar in the tasting room. You can learn more at wilderness trail distillery.com Talladega Superspeedway has announced that Clyde maze whiskey has become its official whiskey. Roy danis Chief Executive Officer of konica brands, which has Clyde maize and its portfolio said the partnership with Talladega Superspeedway is particularly resonant for Clyde maze because they have a similar origin. Stock racing was invented by moonshiners who use fast cars to escape the law. Clyde Mae was an Alabama farmer and a moon shiner who dodged Olam self a few times. They are the official state spirit of Alabama and Talladega is one of the most famous venues in the state. Clyde may himself 4:00 What has been proud to know his legacy continues through this Talladega partnership? 4:06 Now you heard it when we start started the podcast but I want to say thank you to our returning sponsor, the UFL College of Business and the online distilled spirits business certificate. We had a few listeners enroll last time, so perhaps it's time for you to give it a look. Make sure you go check it out at U of l.me slash bourbon pursuit. Now, Red Hook rye. That bottling might be what made l&l a household name among bourbon unicorn chasers over the years. But lamelle has a story to tell when it comes to the spirits industry. Per story is filled with encounters that propelled her name, and eventually put her little shop and Brooklyn on the map. We hear the story of owning a store in that area back in the day, how it was like and Holly she has now gone back to her roots, opening up a store in Alabama. Now, before you go any further, this podcast does contain explicit language. So don't say we didn't warn 5:00 You, you get to hear the real lyndale Camacho Santa Ana. All right, it's that time. Let's see what jover barrel has to say. And then you've got Fred minich with above the char. 5:12 I'm Joe Beatrice, founder of barrel craft spirits. each batch is its own unique expression of our blending process. Find out more at barrel bourbon calm. 5:23 I'm Fred MiniK. And this is above the char. Here we go into the Super Bowl. Oh my gosh, this is a great matchup if you're a sports fan, you get to see two amazing rushers in the San Francisco 40 Niners up against one of the most explosive offenses I have seen and some time. I mean, Patrick mahomes is this guy that you know, he may be down 25 points and he's like, Oh, yeah, I'm going to show you and I gotta tell you, I am so so glad that we have the matchup that we have because it is a 6:00 It is kind of like a football fans dream, great offense against great defense and one really good offense against a really good defense that you know what's going to give here. Anyway, this is not a football podcast. This is a bourbon podcast, so I should probably get to it. The reason why I bring up the Super Bowl, it wasn't until 2017 that the NFL even allowed spirits advertisers, so for years they had a ban on distilled spirits advertising within the NFL. Now, you got to remember to spirits had not been advertising on television until 1996. The industry had put a self imposed ban on advertising from spirits having this kind of notion that you know, if they promoted themselves, they could be drawing the ire of the prohibitionist this this held true until the mid 1990s until a small group 7:00 From Crown Royal that we call a code breakers broke the code of the distilled spirits Council and did a small little test ad in the Corpus Christi Texas market that went into like the spirits council changing their basically changing a lot of their their code. And so now you see spirits being advertised consistently. However, sports teams still struggle to bring in booze advertisers because what happens at these games people get really drunk. They make fools of themselves. I mean, there have been many incidents of people getting hurt. I think there are many people being killed by you know, drunken assholes before. And so it's often a bad look in the eyes of people who on these NFL teams to associate themselves with the liquor brand. Well, in 2019, the NFL actually changed their their belief they relax their policy on alcohol sponsorships, and allow the league to expand this game. 8:00 expand the use of basically allow a brand like Jim Beam to partner with a player. And that's the first time that anyone had ever done that. And if you recall a few years ago, you had Richard Sherman on the podium talking about how the NFL wouldn't allow people to partner with alcohol brands. So I'm glad to see that the NFL has relax those policies. I hope that it will continue because there is not many things better than enjoying a great football game with a good bourbon. So while you're watching the Superbowl, think about it. You're actually kind of witnessing a little bit of spirits history too, because I'm sure we're going to see some cool spirits ads. Let's just hope they're not blocking. And that's this week's above the char Hey, if you want to learn more about the history of bourbon and advertising, check out my book bourbon, the rise fall and rebirth of American whiskey and make sure you're subscribing to my YouTube channel and checking out my new podcast. Just search my name Fred minich. Until next week, 9:00 Cheers 9:04 Welcome back to another episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon getting in Fred here today. And this is going to be talking to really it's it's kind of like two facets of it. We talk a lot about having retailers on the show and sort of what has that meant in regards to the bourbon boom and the business and, and really how they are changing their strategy of going forward and how they're, they're really marketing the products inside of their their walls to these newer consumers. But on the other hand, our guest today also comes with a pretty storied past. She's had her name on sides of bottles and all these things before that has kind of took her to a new level of fame where she's had write ups in multiple magazines and articles and blogs and stuff like that. So I'm really excited to talk to our guests today. Fred, how did you come to know our guests 10:01 Well, I think, honestly, it was through will it like I, I, I learned of her very early on 10:10 when I was writing my book, whiskey women, and she was kind of became like this, like this kind of like folklore legend, within, like, within the legends of bourbon, you know, I, I find 10:30 our guest today to be one of the most 10:35 underrated heroes of bourbon, and I'm a really American whiskey. And I genuinely mean that because she's very humble. She doesn't like attention. She doesn't want to be in the limelight. She just loves whiskey. And at the end of the day, I think that that's why most of us adore her. Yeah, I think I think he's 11:00 said it, right? It was funny when we were when I was talking to our guest lyndale today about getting her on the podcast and I was trying to say like, oh, like, you know, I promise like it'll be good like, here's our number she goes I don't give a shit about your numbers. You know, it's really funny. She's like, I just shy she didn't care. And and most of the time you talked to a lot of people in this industry and they kind of want to know what your reaches like, what are you going to help them and she's she was she's very humble about it. And hopefully that that's really going to shine through as we start talking here. So without further ado, let's go ahead and introduce our guests. So today on the show, we have Lynette Camacho Santa Ana, she is she the boss of one L's beverage boutique in Birmingham, Alabama. So Linda, welcome to the show. Thank you. Well, we're very excited to have you on and kind of before we get into the story of you and Lynn Nels and the Willetts and all that kind of stuff kind of talk about like your introduction to whiskey. Can you were 12:00 Remember that sort of first bottle that first taste, you know, we've had other distillers on and they say oh, we've had my, my grandpappy gave me a wee nip when I was a little little young lad like what's what's your what's your story there come from a teetotaler background so there was no drinking in my youth had an alcoholic grandfather so my introduction to whiskey was him coming home drunk, beaten the fuck out of my grandma. So there's some reality of our business right there. 12:28 I did not drink until I was 21. So my best recollection of like a first whiskey would have been 12:37 probably jack daniels passed around a campfire, like many folks and in the south. 12:43 kind of talk about your, your, you know, where you come from your youth and all that sort of stuff as well, because I think you kind of talked about a pretty interesting background. I grew up here in Alabama, in North Alabama. I left Birmingham 12:59 in 2000 13:00 went to New York. I was in Birmingham for 10 years before I went to New York. I was in New York for about 10 years before I moved to Mexico. And now back in in Alabama as of 2011. Now hold on Kenny, we have to anytime I talk to someone from Alabama, I gotta find out. Are you an Auburn fan? Or tide fan? May there I don't give a shit. 13:24 Would you say you might be the only Alabama that does not care about college football? Well, I've always been a critical thinker. And growing up I never understood why my family were Crimson Tide fans when nobody in my family had graduated from high school, much less gone to college. So I always question like, Where did that start is some kind of like heritage thing, like who woke up one day and said, Oh, Roll Tide. 13:50 That's hilarious to me. So I kind of want to also touch on sort of the history of you and how the 14:00 Brand kind of got started, can you can you really kind of take us back in the history books and and sort of like where did the idea come from to open up the first boutique? When I mentioned in your My goal was to really just deep dive into the industry and fate and figure out my path and I didn't move to New York in 2000 with the goal of opening the store, but I worked in retail, I worked in restaurant and done bartending. 14:25 I had a master's degree in Public Administration, I was in university admin before I left Alabama and went to New York, but it was time to really pursue my heart and just take the risk to jump into the industry with both feet. So 14:41 after work and pretty much all aspects of the business including sales, 14:47 rep five different wine books in New York 14:51 before I opened the store, and I didn't know whether I was going to do the store or bar first. 14:58 But it just fell into place. 15:00 made sense for me to go with the store first my goal has always been to open an on and off premise business situation at some point but the the on premise never happened in New York. 15:12 And in 2003, I opened the store and Red Hook Brooklyn after finding a little hole in the wall that I could afford to. To get started with it was boarded up. storefront actually had concrete blocks in the window. 15:30 It wasn't just boarded up it was concrete blocks. And the neighborhood that was 15:36 pretty rough around the edges. There was a meth clinic around the corner and 15:41 a whole lot of shenanigans in that neighborhood. The median income was $10,000. three fourths of the population lived in subsidized housing. 15:49 But it felt like the right space for me and they turned out it was incredibly successful in red Hook's crazy now with real estate but um 15:58 Wow, it's it's amazing. 16:00 seem to think about this. But, you know, you were part of the story of turning around. Red Hook. Yeah, I was part of that story. I wasn't. Yeah, I can't take credit for all that went on in Red Hook, but I was definitely a part of it. 16:15 Good or bad. I mean, the word gentrification has lots of connotations and I don't ever feel like a ginger fire because I think there's a certain level of income has to come with that. And I've scrapped a whole lot in my life to be where I am today, but I did come with a trust bond open up anything. 16:35 But yeah, I think the same thing here in my neighborhood and Birmingham, I found this property and it felt right and everybody thought I was crazy, just like they did in Red Hook Brooklyn. And I said, why not? What Why doesn't every neighborhood deserve a good liquor store? No matter what the economics are? Yeah. What were those early days like me who was like your average customer? What were you selling? There in Red Hook? What was that like? 17:00 was all over the place and it's really funny to go back and look, one day I run across some some old notes from the like the first few months it was hilarious because it was like 17:14 well painted my nails sold a bottle of Pappy 17:21 was just like slow and sleep because I nobody knew me you know and opening here in Birmingham was just like, night and day like we hit the ground running and we've been just packed from the beginning. But um, you know, our early customers were a lot of neighbors in Red Hook, spanning the demographics, black and brown and young and old and all economics. And then once people discovered what I was doing, it just became like this Mecca destination spot where people came from all over New York as well as you know, when I'd be trapped people be traveling to New York, they make the effort to come out Red Hook was like a 45 minute 18:00 schlepped from the closest subway stop, so it wasn't an easy place to get to people had to really want to be there. 18:07 Now in that first in that first year, like we we see on the nightly news of, of liquor store robbing robberies all the time, and that was certainly the neriah at the time when you you mentioned, you know, some of the shenanigans that were going on when you were moving in. Did you ever have any incidents early on or was there any like times you you like you were afraid to open up or closed or anything like that because of I never had any crime and I fully believe that you attract what you put out. And if you walk in fear, then you attract reasons to be afraid. I walked out of that store many nights with thousands of dollars after midnight and walked in my apartment. I never had anybody bother me. And this is a great story. I love telling this story because there were you 19:00 A lot of people like I said three fourths of the neighbor population lived in New York's biggest housing project 19:05 and there was a gentleman who came in the store in the the early days of it opening and 19:13 you know, the kind of guy that might my warning bells would that you know, you get the racist shit with you grits everybody does it don't matter what how much you gonna say you ain't racist. We all have stupid, runs their heads, he walks in the door and I was like he's backed me up. 19:29 Gold grill he just looked like he was ready to come in there and race somehow with me. I'm 19:36 trying to just suppress all the crap that was running through my head and treat him like I was going to treat anybody else and he became a great customer. He was a man of few words. He would bring his friends in. He bought the banana vodka to begin with. We finally moved him up the Shark Bay so 19:53 he's buying like sharp I blood orange like it 19:56 but the end of that story is 20:00 One night, we got over here him talking to some friends. And he said, 20:06 Yo, man, have you been to that woman's store? She treats you with respect. There's no bulletproof glass, and she's got really nice things in there. Boom. I mean, 20:20 here's a man living in the housing projects. And it looks like he might be the kind of guy who's gonna like, take you down. And yeah, he wants to be treated with respect, just like anybody else. 20:30 Yeah. 20:32 And again, I think that kind of goes back to what we were talking about earlier. And just, you know, the personality you kind of show it through there and what that means. But you know, one thing I kind of want to touch on one more time before we go too much into the your time here in New York. Because you said that you were going to go all in, but what was what was that like? pivotal moment or what was that idea that said, Yeah, I do want to go all in. Because you know, you had you had come from a background that 21:00 Didn't have any any alcoholic you know you didn't drink anything growing up you kind of abusive in the grandfather era. So kind of talk about like what made you want to do that as well? Well, I got custody of 14 year old sister when I was 21 years old and 21:17 I needed like many people who get into the liquor business and some form of bartending to make money and so I was bartending and cocktail waitressing on the side, just have some income to better support our household. 21:32 got bitten by the bug and for years, I just kind of dabbled in that way. I wasn't doing it full on. 21:40 But you know, sitting in my office at university one day pushing a bunch of papers around my desk, I realized I was really spending a whole lot of my office time plucking off and researching drinks. 21:53 I was like, you know, maybe I need to really rethink this had a very cushy job with great benefits, but I'm 22:00 Friend of mine who's a librarian once gave me a book. It's been around for a zillion years in a million iterations called What color is your parachute. And if you actually go through that book and you do all the exercises, which are not easy, it really makes you sit and dig deep. It will give you an idea of what your heart's passion is career wise. And so at the end of that, I was like, I need to be in the liquor business, and I need to move to New York. So I literally just like yeah, I quit my job, sold my house, sold my car, and then packed a moving truck and went to New York. But now 22:33 as there's often in a story that involves involves New York, there's there's a romance aspect of that because I was dating a guy long distance for a long time in Indiana, and he had to said, let's finally get together. We've been together for four years. He's like, you want to go to Atlanta or New York and I was like, fuck Atlanta, let's move to New York together. And he broke up with me before I actually did the move, but I took red lipstick and wrote on my mirror for me and I did it anyway. 22:58 That's awesome. I mean, cuz 23:00 That's actually I was getting ready to ask like why New York of all places, right? Because sometimes, you know, my wife she spent a an internship in New York one year, it's not an easy place to live it'll it'll chew you up and swallow you up because it's, it's, it's very, very expensive to live and some of the parts of it and stuff like that. So, interesting story and just, you know, if you want to be in the liquor business, because everybody wants to be in New York, so you have tremendous access to things but um, I went to New York when I was 18 years old or seven, I was 17 for a high school senior trip, and it was the first place I ever felt like I was home. Yeah, I mean, it's it's a melting pot of all kinds of races and cultures and, and everything right there. And I think the one thing that I love about New York is least when you go is you could go to a different restaurant every day, your life and you could never run out of places to go eat. Yeah, I wish you could run out of money. Yesterday real quick. 23:54 Well, you could live in New York. I mean, yeah, everybody wants talk about rent and real estate, but you can live in New York. 24:00 economically. I mean, I did it for years. Hmm. Alright, so let's get back to whiskey business here. So what was let's let's talk about, you know, it's a package store. And we understand that most of the time that it's not whiskey that sells and keeps the door open. It's everything else that's that's around there as much as Fred, to his chagrin, he has to understand how that works, right. But kind of talk about now, unless maybe unless you live now. So kind of talk about like, was there a, like a niche or a market for whiskey that you saw when you were pushing it, like kind of talk about how you you started getting into that business? My main thing was how I started focusing on bourbon. When I opened my store. I didn't know shit about bourbon. That's just being honest. But it was my Southern connection. And so when I was sitting down and just trying to like, vision board, my store concept was like, it just makes sense for me to make a big focus 25:00 Because of this store be my Southern connection. And so of course, you know, bourbon, why else not? Um, so, you know, those first month the store was incredibly slow and I would, we were open till midnight, things were definitely slow from 10 to midnight. So every night 10 to midnight, I would pop sounds and taste it and I be on straight bourbon calm, like, What the hell was everybody saying? What is this, you know, get out there. Just try to like, soak up as much as I could. And 25:29 it just sort of, you know, I was preaching bourbon before it would became cool. And it wasn't even that, you know, I wasn't like trying to create a trend or whatever. I was just really just trying to be true to myself and raise. Well, I think if you're on straight bourbon, you were one of the early people that were really talking about it. I mean, that's that's the big board, if you will, well, you know, it was General Nelson. Everybody would gather for every bourbon festival and and so did you kind of foster because I know that a lot of people from straight bourbon still hang out there. 26:00 They'd still do the the kbF kind of gatherings and stuff like that. It Were you a part of that that early group in those sort of gatherings too. Oh, yeah. Yeah, you know, I always had rumors. 26:14 Yeah, Sam I met Chuck Cowdery. We had his 26:19 straight bourbon book launch at one of the members houses there in Kentucky and 26:25 but once the store became so busy, it was just impossible for me to stay as active on the board. 26:30 I had to pull away of course, I couldn't, couldn't sit around and fuck off on the computers. 26:38 Absolutely. And so I guess was that just business taking off just in general? Because you had mentioned at the very beginning? Yeah, you painted your nails soda bottle. And then I guess I guess at some point you hit like the inflection point. Yeah, I made. A mentor told me when I opened you're going to think you're dying for three years. And then something magical happens in the third year. 27:00 And that's exactly what happened. It was like, third anniversary came around and then all of a sudden they just took off. 27:08 So you start getting into whiskey. Talk about like the selection that you you started off with and did it grow over time like as you got into bourbon and you tried to 27:20 get my hands on in New York, and there's, you know, a lot of availability there. And it didn't matter what it was. You know, if it said Barban on it up, put it on my shelf. 27:31 We did what we call cats and dogs, tastings and do whatever it wasn't just all about, you know, trying to have Julian Van Winkle come in store. Um, you know, even a funny story. The first time I met Julian was at 27:46 one of the whiskey festivals in New York and I was scared shitless 27:51 I was like, I said, I just gotta rock this I just put on some like pink suede pants and black. Hi Oh birds, Walker Banyan. 28:00 A sea of drunken men and walked up to God and and handed him my business card and said, You don't know me, but you need to and I just walked away. 28:09 We, you know, made friendships over the years. And we tell these stories, and it's hilarious, but he was like, I just like, hell is this. 28:18 So yeah, we came to my store, and we did a bottle signing in those early days. And I had people just like, packed and then the black cars came from lower Manhattan. And he just was looking at me, he's like, what the hell, I've never done an event like this. And I was like, well get ready. It's common. If you don't know it, you're about to just be blown away and he was like, Okay. 28:42 So, you know, I was an early believer in what he was doing with the Pappy label, and when I close the store 2009 I still had I still had Pappy on the shelf. I started right around the show. Wow. You know, it was that in my basement for years. 28:58 So speaking of Red Hook, right 29:00 Let's let's get into that. How did that happen? Uh, much in the same way as anything. I believe it happens. It just happens naturally. That wasn't anything I clamored for drew and I became friends through the industry. 29:16 I remember the first time I met him, he came to one of the whiskey festivals in the room was all a buzz because, you know, Evan had been a hermit for so long. And he was there's a Causeway near Oh my god. Andrew, like me was very Matter of fact, just like, cut through the bullshit, just tell things like it was and we hit it off, stayed in touch. And once I think we were just like hanging out in Bardstown and he said you should do we should do a barrel we should we should do a label for you. 29:45 And we didn't did and wasn't a whole lotta not a whole lot of thought process. Just say Sure. Why not. Let's 29:53 kind of created this iconic label. You know, first of all, Red Hook ride just has such a 30:00 Beautiful name to it. And even if you're not familiar with the Red Hook area, like you could live in Boise, Idaho and not be familiar with that area, you're like, wow, Red Hook is such a cool name. And then you see that and you see that arm with the tat it just was that your idea? I mean, who came up with the name and that art? I came up with the name because I was trying to do something to honor my neighborhood. 30:26 Amanda alliteration, so that was a natural thing. 30:31 The artwork was the the Brooklyn artists who did my postcard artwork, and I don't know if you ever saw him on postcards, but they were incredibly racy. 30:42 He was just hilarious and he would always push even for me would push my boundaries of racy 30:49 that 30:51 I was talking to marketing forums about design and the label and he just showed up and he was like, Can I give it a go? Can I just like, throw something that 31:00 Gather and you tend to whether you like it or not, before you like commit to these big firms to design a label for you. And he showed up at the store one day, and he was like, Well, you know, I'm trying to be you, you're trying to be true to the neighborhood. I call it red and grind like to be true to the history of the neighborhood. And 31:16 this being on the waterfront of Brooklyn and stevedores being a part of the history of, you know, big burly man on the Datsun loading ships and whatnot. And so yeah, he just presented it and I was like, done. That's the label right there. 31:30 I mean, seriously, it is. It is a kind of a showstopper, you're walking around, you see that label, even if you don't know anything about whiskey, or you want to taste it, you want to look at that beautiful piece of art, because that's what it is. It's art. So it's gorgeous. Yeah, he was so much fun to work with and just trying to do things outside the box. I mean, there's so many boring whiskey labels out here. 31:54 I'm working on another one right now. That's going to really make you 32:00 laugh a lot. Oh, they like nails crazy as hell. 32:05 It took a break. She was like, we just got to do this. And it's using a local artist here in Birmingham. 32:11 And I'm keeping it under wraps for that. 32:14 Well give us till the end of the show to get it out of you. 32:19 Take us take us through the process of selecting the whiskey for Red Hook, right because yes, the label is gorgeous. But I've got Red Hook rise one of the top five rise I've ever tasted. I mean, it's it's incredible. So take us through selecting that whiskey. As you know there were four barrels and the first barrel drew a night with a couple other folks are just in the warehouse, literally like just walking 32:50 over barrels and 32:53 popping bongs and tasting whiskey and passing it around like yes, no, yes. No, yes. No. And that number 33:00 One is still my favorite of all four barrels. I mean you know what's really just being able to paint kind of the cream of the crop the the barrel was phenomenal. Do you remember some of the the ages that were on these? Cuz I can't I can't bring up my notes right? That first one was 23 years and the rest were 24 you know, not a lot of people know that to make happy 2030 stocks. I don't even drink it. 33:26 The age of bourbon it at that level is usually mean it's over worded and it won't hold up in a glass. tell people all the time you can spend a fortune on Patrick 23 like let it sit on your counter for half a second come back and it's like, you know, oxidized and cloudy and funky. 33:43 But you know what made that whiskey so special with that he said they had dumped the barrels that they had initially bought and refilled bourbon barrels with the rye so that whiskey could sit there for a little longer at that age. 34:00 not be so over the top with wood. And we didn't really talk about that we didn't market it. But that that's one thing that made those all those barrels so special. And then the, you know, it's been so long I don't remember who was with me on each pit, but at one point I drove down with Don les from New York who had worked with me a little bit in the shop, and he's now you know, cocktail rock. He's like a Barton and God is he's amazing. And I really treasure him. He came down with me and another. Another guy got started just kind of working with me in the shop. We had one at one point. They each came I can't remember which barrel that was. 34:46 It's been so many good barrels. He came. Well, when he was there. I remember you know, we were just passing glass around. We all had to agree on it. It was you know, it was I had to pass my lips first and I thought it was worthy and then I passed 35:00 sit around and we were all like, man, yeah. Or maybe it had to be like a like all out like, Yeah, that one. So very scientific process kind of. 35:09 It sounds like exactly what happens in barrels selections nowadays. So it's just, you just, you know, you just had the luxury of being in there quite early when Yeah, like that was around. Yeah, yeah, that's never gonna happen again. You know, I've had so many people reach out to me. There's a store in Red Hook that asked me if they could buy the rights to it. And I was like, dude, that's not going to exist anymore. I that label is done. There's a Red Hook rye beer. Like if somebody's been trying to launch that today they'd be sued by somebody making beer that wouldn't like that label to be around. 35:43 So now I'm going to be your agent here the the asking price they so they want to come in and they want to buy that the the Red Hook right rights. What do you think and Kenny started out a 15 million. That a good that a good number? That's up there. 35:58 Right. Maybe maybe five 36:00 That's a five. Okay, so we're going I was going to high. Alright, so now we'll we'll come in and negotiate this for you get a 5 million deal. We won't even we won't even take a cut. We just want the whiskey. 36:14 Well, what Red Hook right? Red Hook right? do you have left? I don't even have any. I don't have any left. I'm not I sold all of it to raise money to finish my store. I had such a struggle getting the money I needed to finish construction. 36:30 It took me seven years to get open here. Wow. I really didn't even realize what I was sitting on. I've been out of it for a bit as a new mom and haven't been out of the country for two years. And my ex husband kept saying you have got all this whiskey out. You have no idea. It's like everybody at my bar is asking me if you if you'll sell it to them and I'm like whatever. I come on. Got some Pappy and some record Rob big deal. And then one day I called and talked to drew and I was like, Hey, man, I'm really hurt and I need I need to get this business. 37:00 I've been 37:01 divorced and you know, things were really tough. It's a single mom. And he's like, Well, I know, Doug sold some of his bottles for like 3700 or something. So I know you can can get around that, you know, and I put the whole set of four out 37:17 bottles number two, and I couldn't get anybody to offer me more than 20,000 for all four. And I had everybody under the sun messaging me and, you know, some even like calling me names. It was it was a side of the sex is bullshit in this business that I hadn't been exposed to in a long time and kind of threw me I was so disrespected in that process. And you know, and then you see now like those same guys who were like, call me a con or trying to sell for number two's for $20,000 or turn around now and sell one for 16. 37:52 So I'm like, Okay, well, I'll just stick to my retail and y'all can play around with the bootleg. And I'm done with that. Yeah. 38:00 Isn't for that is unfortunately a really 38:04 nasty side of our culture that you know it's very much very pocketed to the enthusiast side like you don't really see that but I'm sorry you went through that I really am sorry you went through that as as as somebody who loves this community and 38:23 i'd love I'd love it if that would stop but sadly it won't and and i will tell you that they they attacked you for being a woman you know they say similar things to man they just that I've seen this time and time again and those groups is like when it comes to this stuff people go overboard and the private messages and then they get very dirty very mean. And I'm very sorry you had to go so different from the environment of like a straight bourbon com or bourbon enthusiast calm experience I'd had. Well, yeah, there 39:00 Be a TIFF, Aaron there, but it was overall a very civilized and yeah, the level of bourbon mania going on in these secret pages is something that really disgusts me. And here's the thing to live now, how much of those people really know? And what do they really add to the conversation? Yeah, I mean, just wanting money grew, you know, Drew and I've had many conversations about that kind of thing. And you know, I'm grateful. I'm grateful that that exists in many ways. 39:31 Because I did end up selling my bottles and that money put the roof on my store, but at the same time, there's a I don't know, I've always been about building the relationships. It's never been about just the business or barely whiskey for me. And when it gets to this level of just doggy dog, who's who's got the biggest collection and who can get the most money for it. I just bores me. 39:57 Yeah, absolutely. And it's 40:00 And I think you'd kind of hit the are you said it right there. Last time I checked, I think some of those red hooks were 15 even up to 18,000 bottles, something like that. And I guess like what is what's your thought on that valuation or price? 40:19 With the careers of master distiller spanning almost 50 years, as well as Kentucky bourbon Hall of Famer and having over 100 million people taste his products. Steve nalli is a legend of bourbon who for years made Maker's Mark with expertise and precision. His latest project is with Bardstown bourbon company, a state of the art distillery in the heart of the bourbon capital of the world. They're known for the popular fusion series, however, they're adding something new in 2020 with a release named the prisoner. It starts as a nine year old Tennessee bourbon that has been finished in the prisoner wine companies French oak barrels for 18 months. The good news is, you don't have to wait till next year to try it. Steve and the team at Bardstown bourbon company have teamed up with rack house whiskey club rack 41:00 Whiskey club is a whiskey Month Club on a mission to uncover the best flavors and stories that craft distilleries across the US have to offer. Their December box features a full size bottle of Bardstown suffusion series, and a 200 milliliter bottle of the prisoner. There's also some cool merchant side. And as always, with this membership shipping is free. Get your hands on some early release Bardstown bourbon by signing up at rack house whiskey club.com use code pursuit for $25 off your first box 41:30 what is what's your thought on that valuation or price? I mean, is that something that I know you probably never dreamed it would be like that but like what is your What is your really like your gut thought? Do you really think you really think it's worth that you kind of like man, it's just that's just crazy shit. Like, you know, you've heard this a million times is anything worth it? I mean, that's object and if you think it's worth it, you got that kind of cash and it's worth it but you know, I spent 41:58 $17,000 on my 42:00 Business property $5,000 on my house I'm living in. When I say these kind of numbers, it makes me quiver a little bit because I'm like, wow, like that's, that's like a place somebody could live and you're just going to piss that in a couple of hours. So yeah, it's a little disturbing sometimes. But then, you know, if that's the kind of cash flow you have, who am I to judge you for spending that kind of money on? escape? I mean, there's people who had that's just a blip in their bank account. So you know, I bless it and saying, may you be even even better and and more well off to benefit somebody. 42:35 So Kenny, there's a retailer in California selling a bottle of Red Hook rye for $30,000. Well, you say selling they might have it out there, but that doesn't mean it's being bought. And it's just like the guy 42:51 in New York with 50. I mean, Lee Lee taqman bought that set that I just mentioned, the number two's he bought some other bottles. 43:00 For me as well. And then when you put that Red Hook where I set out $475,000 on this website, it went like wildfire. And I messaged him, I was like, like, I like you. You spent less than $4,000 a bottle on some of that stuff. So like, Where's that number coming from? And he just laughed. He's like, Man, it's just marketing. Everybody's talking about it. And it went viral. And he was a marketing genius for doing it. He brought ton of people to his business because they were all like, Oh, my God brought $475,000 That's crazy. But you know, people came to the store to talk about it or see what else he had. Somebody sent me a link the other day Christie's auction house had a Red Hook. Right? Let's starting bed of 20,000. 43:40 Okay, I think we've we've talked about the Red Hook. rhyolite and just the crazy valuation goes, I know bottle for 50,000 Okay, get my checkbook out. 43:51 got here. 60. Okay, well, let's, uh, let's wait until the next. Maybe that should just be like the new index like it's the Red Hook right? 44:00 index to see like how how crazy is the bourbon Richter Scale getting year after year? Maybe that's what you should do with your stuff. Guineans, the just start pricing it 1000 to $5,000 a bottle and then people go crazy for it. See what happens. I'm all I'm all about it 44:16 is Red Hook ride number one I saw bows for $75 a bottle 44:24 but even back then, this was what what year was this? 2008 nine um I think the rennaker I started in what was it? 2007 I can't remember the year but yeah, even back then 75 is a probably might have been a lot for a lot of folks, you know? Well yeah, I mean, it was but a barrel for went up to 350 and people were like, Whoa, she's getting crazy. 44:52 And so let's let's kind of like move that forward because you know, those those bottles help build the business down in Alabama. So kind of 45:00 Talk about you know, seven years to get this this up and running kind of that. That's That's a long time to really work on something I mean, kind of talk about what was there, you know, other than getting money I mean, were there any other kind of like hiccups and hurdles that you had to face along the way to make that happen? Because everybody knows that an Alabama it's really easy to just open up liquor stores. Opening is pretty easy. I mean, it's, it's not difficult to open a private store here. 45:28 The liquor licensing process is not dreadful at all. Um, 45:34 I figured what control states it'd be a nightmare. It's not at all and it was even cheaper to open here than it was to open in New York as far as licensing and everything. You know, the challenges were it was mostly financial. And I said I would never do this again, unless I own the property. I bought the property thought that it would be pretty easy to get financing having done this before, and I learned real quickly that since I'd been closed for so long, it was considered 46:00 At a new startup, I brought my husband here from Mexico and we had to go through naturalization for him. I got pregnant, you know, there was just a whole lot of stuff on my plate, then, you know, it was a great lesson and what a woman goes through when you decide to start life again 46:21 as a single mother, because 46:25 it was very difficult for me to 46:30 one make living while I was trying to open the store and there were plenty of people were like, yeah, we don't mind you know, come up here and Bartana bartended a shit ton of private parties. 46:39 Like, pamper myself out made things work. But the financing like so many people be like, Oh, yeah, you know what you're doing. But you know, once you've been open for three years, 46:50 get money from us. That's the classic you know, like once you're once you don't need it, you can get it and that there's a lot of systemic racism and I call that out regularly. 47:00 And that doesn't go over real well. Neighborhoods who are predominantly African American really struggle with getting investment money from banks oftentimes. So yeah, there was a whole lot of challenges to jump through. But yeah, I just took it. I took it one day at a time, one moment at a time. And it took me seven years, but I did it. 47:21 I'm glad you did. And I'll tell you, I don't know 47:27 the strength that you 47:30 have exuded in that timeframe. Most people would give up. 47:35 Yeah, it was really tough. But you know, it made me go deep. And I think the biggest thing and going through that challenge. 47:45 I, I had become a caricature of myself in New York in many ways. I had built this business and I had built this character called lamelle. And going through what I did to get open again here, I feel like I am more 48:00 true to myself and more rooted and grounded in the core of my being and ever before so that's good there's always some good to come through those difficult times. So I'm just just just thinking about if I were to put myself in in your shoes if I if I were a single parent and having to go through all that and face the banking challenges I probably would have moved on to something else. And and so I kind of like just the human element of us all you know why why didn't you give up? Why was this store so important to you to start? 48:39 Um, I knew the impact this business can have on this neighborhood and I'm I'm very much a believer and impact of business on social justice have always been that way. And this neighborhood when I came to visit it to look at this property just grabbed me by the heart and wouldn't let go and neighbors just were like, We need you here and we're behind 49:00 You here and I had neighbors who said when I first came here 49:05 I didn't even know me while you're trying to figure stuff out here live in my house or here we've got this you know, I showed up here with a suitcase and next thing I know like people had just like showed up with stuff to like help me get through 49:19 that moving from Mexico period. So I felt that in Red Hook to there was a sense of community and so there was Yeah, there I really did feel like I was being pulled 49:32 by higher calling through that whole process. 49:36 And I knew that was going to be bigger than what I even understood and I many times, I've had conversations with beautiful souls like Brit calls me and just sit and say I just in tears, like, I don't know why this is happening the way it is, but there is something on the other side of this that I meant to do. And 49:57 one of my big things with opening the cafe constant 50:00 Next to the store that I feel so strongly about is that this business is ready to be turned on its head. And we've beat up people in hospitality. We overwork them. We don't respect homelife, you have souls like Sean Brock who claim to shit up and he's been really outspoken about this too. 50:21 We've lost a lot of people in this business. People don't want to talk about it, but it's over consumption and drug use and just not taking care of themselves. And I really want my whole business concept with the store and the cafe concept next door to me about hope and healing and and how can you have an alcohol business and I'm still figuring this out, but have the message that you can build community around consumption and it not get to the level where we're fucking ourselves. 50:51 And I know that's deep but that's where I am. That's where we need to go. I mean, in the last 50:57 you know, from Sasha 51:00 kreski to 51:03 you know, the gentleman we lost and Miami to Anthony Bourdain, and we've lost so many iconic people in the hospitality space. And, you know, I've been covering this this industry for a long time. And we're looking at tells you the cocktail. And almost a quarter of the seminars are about taking care of yourself. So the industry knows that we have to change or we won't have an industry anymore, or at least we won't have the talent. Yeah, no, I'm very thankful that you've seen this and you're pushing for it well, and as a mom, too, I see how hard it is for women to stay in this business and raise a family because I don't care how wonderful you are as a dad. Nine times out of 10 the woman is still doing most of the childcare. And so to still be like the one who's taking care of the babies and more than likely doing the laundry and washing the dishes and running a business or staying in you know, as a manager of a restaurant or 52:00 Whatever it is, it's really difficult for women and I, that's another aspect of what I'm hoping to do with this businesses is proved that it can be done in a way that respects and supports women. You know, I was a breastfeeding mom when I was working 52:16 behind the bar and, like, who offers a woman pump breaks behind a bar? Nobody. You know, my breasts are being gorgeous. I'm like, freaking out, like, What am I supposed to do? Like, like, how do I had a breast pump in the bathroom and a paper towel holder. 52:34 Those conversations need to be had, you know, it's not just about young folks that we just like we're out to their bodies won't handle it anymore. We run everybody out of the business that you know, has a lot to contribute to the business. So 52:47 I have a proposal for you. What's that? Let's do a seminar tells the cocktail next year. Oh, Lord, I boycotted towels back in 2008. 52:57 I know it's now. Yeah, it's just 53:02 Kenya, I gotta tell you, it's it's this kind of a passion that is really outside of whiskey. But within whiskey that to me, is is the future of our culture. You know, so our culture cannot live on whiskey alone. It has to it has to come together as a community and this recognition that there's potentially substance abuse problems. That is huge. That is huge. And she brought up Sean Brock, you know, friend of mine friend of yours, and, you know, he is he's had a very public battle with alcoholism. I mean, Sean, that guy can't even go to the grocery store without getting in the New York Times. But yeah, it's covered a lot but I want to come back to you, a little you something you brought up as you is. 54:00 Is the woman angle and I'm very passionate about this of like, you know creating a an environment in the whiskey industry that is women feel comfortable in its big reason why I wrote the book I did. And then I love going back to your label you kind of have a little bit of the Rosie riveter angle feel to it. Do you feel like it is better today than it was 1015 years ago 54:32 as a woman, uh, taking out the the creepy guys on on the bourbon secondary markets, but do you feel like today is better than it was 1015 years ago as a woman in whiskey. Although, of course there's been tremendous progress and we have more women in the business, you know, in leadership capacity than we ever have. Probably. 54:53 Okay, I mean, of course the answer is yes. Yeah. And it's it's made progress. I mean, there's still like a shit ton of rain. Yeah. 55:00 donating 55:02 what are some areas we need improvement upon? 55:05 marketing? It's you know, I'm sure you hear this from so many women. We're all tired of saying the good old boy marketing when Matthew McConaughey got involved with wild turkey there's always Oh, I'm gonna reinvent wild turkey I'm like, oh, it still looks like I got all boy backslapping club. Okay, well how was that? So like groundbreaking. 55:25 I mean, commercials are beautiful but like what what did that what boundary did that push? 55:32 marketing? Yeah, I mean, it doesn't need to be like, Oh, look at this beautiful space drinking some whiskey. And it needs to be real, it needs to be wrong. 55:43 That's one of the in marketing is powerful marketing not only with with real women, but people of color. 55:52 let's let's let's talk about some, you know, LGBTQ up in here to just throw all that up in there. And so we're just starting to scratch the surface of 56:00 Conservative whiskey world. I agree. Do you see a lot of that today and hopefully we can see more of that change in progress you know as as this comes along and I think having a voice like yours being really outspoken in you know, there's there's a lot of industry people that listen this podcast and they're going to hopefully take note of that too and, and kind of see that change. But we are trying to work on website ideas. My website is still a landing page and looks like shit. But I'm, you know, talking to companies about website ideas. And I'm saying the same kind of things. I'm just saying to you like now we need images, images that reflect my customers, you know, why can't we have two black hands toasting or 56:42 two women looking like they're celebrating their wedding? And then the market marketing guys at these website companies are like, Well, I mean, those images don't really exist for us and I'm like, Okay, well then let's take some frickin pictures. Let's create the images. I don't just give me this excuse some light. You don't have those images and some stock model. 57:01 Yeah, that's powerful. Like what we say what becomes the norm? I've seen a lot of those photos, I think you need new marketing people exactly right. This is why my webpage still sucks because I haven't found the right company. 57:13 So we are kind of running up on the top of this out real quick. And I kind of want to circle back to just to your story again to kind of wrap this up and, and so seven years the doors open, kind of talk about what business has been like because you mentioned the first store it was kind of like all right, it'll build up there's an inflection point like and you said this one was just hit the ground running on day one, kind of kind of talk about what what that's been in, you know, and whether it's been a blessing or curse with work and everything else. It's been a huge blessing. I'm very grateful. And it's 57:48 it's just a I'm amazed when I opened in New York, really work the store pretty much by myself for three years, and my boyfriend at the time when he got off work would come in and I put in time and 58:00 Well, 58:01 but it took really in New York three years before I could, I could hire a full on team and I have two full time staff right now and I'm interviewing to hire two more so I have a total of four in the first year I'm already there. I'm at sales and in one year here that it took me four years to get to in New York City. Wow, that's impressive to be able to do that in Birmingham in New York, and you know, I just did my employees annual reviews 58:34 with a sip of Appleton 50. No Berman 58:38 It's okay. You're still speaking to Fred spreads heartstrings there 58:43 15 minute good. It wasn't oh my god is so good. I'm makes me want to definitely go do a staff trip to Jamaica. 58:52 Yeah, one of the things that came out of that it's my staff's like, you know, you have kind of been backslapping that you've not been in the store. 59:00 Managing because in New York It was very very difficult for me to walk away and let employees do their thing. Because I had just like I Uz that store for so long I mean I'm many times I slept on the floor of that store and got up and just kept going. But to see the success and just for me to be at a place of growth to 59:20 I've been able to let go and trust employees already to start managing things. It took me years and New York to get to 59:27 it. So we're going to start working on the cafe concept. That's the next thing and that's going to be probably about two years out but it's a huge project we're taking on a big Greek Revival on the store calm it's right next to the store. That's going to be pretty amazing project. 59:49 JOHN brought come down and play with me Ben. 59:53 sent a few text messages. I did but you know, we haven't snagged him yet. 1:00:00 So we had, we did have one question in the chat that came from Mikey Conrad. And you know, because you've got this history of kind of opening up businesses that are more like in impoverished areas. And he asked a question, are you working with other organizations or partnering with other stores to help in that sort of same socio economic background to help start their business and Kickstarter, Kickstarter it off the ground as well? That's a great question. And it's something that I do feel very strongly about. Um, there's been some talk about trying to form like a Business Association, the Merchants Association in this area, this area, does not have a whole lot of business at all, the old business quarter is pretty much gone. 1:00:39 There's a lot of talk of with connecting our neighborhood, we have millions of dollars of deltan development going on a mile down the road. So there's been a lot of talk of time to connect that and 1:00:51 how we do that to keep mom and pop businesses a part of that and not just the whole bunch of chains. But, you know, my goal, my long term goal is to really get to a point where I can mentor 1:01:00 And help other especially women get started in business in a way that I think is so needed. Women have got to support women financially, and getting our businesses off the ground because we understand each other in a way nobody else is. 1:01:17 As far as the I especially, like, balancing home wife and kids and everything, and, um, yeah, I don't have any definite plans, but that's something that I think a lot about. I haven't had it haven't had a free moment to focus on that right now, but I will in time. 1:01:34 That's great. And so as we close this out, I got one more question to ask of you. So, you, you went and you sold all your red Hook's, you know, I'm sure that there's some part of you that that is that has a little bit of a hole in your heart, but maybe maybe that that whole sort of getting filled by knowing that you're building something bigger and better. And then earlier this year, you had done two more well, epics, you done your light side and your dark side. Tell me you kept at least a few bottles of that, and you're not going to 1:02:00 You're not gonna do the same thing again. I did. I had a few friends here like Don't be stupid this time. And I wouldn't call it being stupid. I mean, I just was like, whew, everybody enjoy the enjoy the whiskey before. 1:02:12 But I didn't keep a lot. I can't bottles one through six of each one. 1:02:18 So what is the what is the new project you have? Remember, this won't come out for a long time. So no one's gonna know for a while. I mean, I've talked about it somewhat. I'm not going to give out all the details. But um, there's a distiller here in Alabama that I'm excited about stuff that link and yeah, he's cool project we're working on together. 1:02:38 No, it's not going to be a 23 year old rye. But I went down and met him and tasted out of barrel and he had it he had one barrel it really pulled my heartstrings that it's going to be fun. You know, he sent me some stuff to that, to me was really reminiscent of a couple honey barrels that I'd had from from 1:03:00 Well it so I can see. I could see I could see like your your heartstrings lining up. They're like no, he's a good distiller. He's a good person. And again, it's I like with Dre, that project just happened because we were building a friendship and happen naturally. So I'm not out here trying to replace a Red Hook ride, that's never gonna happen. I just I felt the butterflies when I went down and met with Seth and so I've told him when I feel this feeling, I gotta follow up on it. So let's make this magic happens. That's fantastic. So as we kind of wrap this up here, at least we got a little bit of teaser. We'll see what's happening next. Maybe we'll get back with you here in a year and we'll kind of see where you are with that project and be good to get a kind of 1:03:44 a whole full circle feedback here. But for anybody that wants to go to the nails beverage boutique and find out more about it, how do they do that? 1:03:54 Like I said, the website sucks. Our Facebook page is very active. All our social media is atla now's the him at La 1:04:01 ls BH am? And what's your address because I have a feeling that someone's going to change the direction of where they're driving right now as you're listening to this more. We're at 12 32nd Street North we're a mile up from Top Golf. 1:04:17 There you go. Get your pint and head on over to Top Golf. Save yourself a few bucks. You're trying to fight that in little 1:04:25 man Come on. Oh, no pints there. Okay, never mind. Never mind. Bad Kinney or boozy, or boozy. We don't sell pints over. I call it cheeky. There you go. 1:04:36 So what I want to say thank you again so much for coming on the show. I mean, for us, I mean, it was a I had met you originally at the the willit bar opening about a year maybe two years ago now. And and really this opportunity to kind of really sit down capture your story, and really be able to spread the message of really what you're doing not only just for whiskey whiskey is one aspect but the human 1:05:00 element and what you're doing to really promote that. I think it speaks a lot for yourself and and what you're trying to do to help impact and change the industry. You know, it's just one person trying to try to really kind of scale that up too. So thank you again for coming on the show and doing that. Thank you for being a gentleman in your chase to get us to sit down together. Absolutely. I do my best for that. And if you want to know more about us, you can follow bourbon pursuit on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, if you liked the show, you want to support the show, you want to ask questions and see this live as we do these recordings, you go and support us@patreon.com slash bourbon pursuit. And if you want some good reading material, make sure you go check out bourbon plus magazine as well. We've got a we've got some things going on with our Patreon community and getting perpend plus subscription. So make sure you go and do that. Thank you everybody that was watching this live. It's been a pleasure. And we'll see everybody next week. Cheers. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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235 - Bourbon Chemistry with Dr. Tom Collins

Forever Exiled - A Path of Exile Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 9, 2020 66:36

Are you ready to geek out? Like super bourbon geek out? Dr. Tom Collins has dedicated part of his career to the details of different spirits and wine. His studies looking at the chemical composition of bourbon as well as the chemical influence from barrels is what intrigued us. We examine, at a scientific level, what char levels create different compounds and reactions, how entry proof affects these compounds, and how bourbon and rye are different in their molecular makeup. Like I said, get ready to geek out! Show Partners: Barrell Craft Spirits has a national single barrel program. Ask your local retailer or bourbon club about selecting your own private barrel. Find out more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: New EU Tariffs: https://www.latimes.com/food/story/2020-01-04/trump-wine-tariffs and https://qz.com/1779258/a-us-wine-tariff-on-the-eu-isnt-great-for-california/ Scotland ankle monitoring: https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/5128975/scottish-criminals-alcohol-ankle-tags/ This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about turning your hobby into a career. What is viticulture and enology? How did you choose this profession? Tell us about your research. What compounds are you looking for from toasted barrels? Are there times where a toasted barrel provides a certain flavor profile in the lab, but not in the real world? Is it hard to get consistency from the barrel? What was the outcome of your research? How do you get a buttery taste out of a barrel? Can you tell different whiskies apart chemically? What are the different compounds in rye vs. bourbon? Do bourbons have more differentiation compounds than ryes? How does each compound contribute to the bourbon? What kind of budget did you get to buy the bottles for research? Where do the fruity notes come from in bourbon? What are your thoughts on barrel entry proof? Do you think you could look at dusty bourbons from the 60's or 70's and see differences compared today? What's a big takeaway from your research? What happens when a whiskey is aged in a wine cask? 0:00 Yeah, I'm excited about today you sent me like beforehand, here's some info, so we don't look stupid. And then I started reading I'm like, well if I'm gonna look stupid 0:20 What's up everybody it is Episode 235 of bourbon pursuit. And this week we are back in action, yet again talking about bourbon. But before we do that we do have some news to cover. Now, we already know that the trade war, it's going pretty strong and bourbon has been hit, and there's no telling if that is ever going to end. But now, there's a new target insight as part of a retaliation effort and we're looking at wine as sort of say more specifically European wine and other kind of European whiskeys. So there's currently a looming trade tariffs up to 100% that would affect all European Union countries, selling wine and other spirits to the United States. Now wine in general is imported as a $20 billion a year industry here in the States. And this follows already an existing round of 25% tariffs that have been levied back in October against Spain, France, Germany and the United Kingdom. American wine drinkers would be faced with fewer wines coming to America from the EU, especially those made by small independent producers. And you can expect higher prices on those bottles that do make it in for those that make a livelihood in the wine trade. The mood is less than stellar importers, distributors, wine shop owners, Somalis and grocery store wine buyers said they fear that would have to impose salary or staffing cuts as a result of dramatically reduced profit margins. Now you might think that this would be good for domestic wine producers like those in California that make up 95% of the US wine market. However, the wine Institute has spoken out against the terrorists, arguing that the EU could just as easily turn around and target us winds in a tit for tat trade war, as much as California vendors want to serve up their wine for domestic consumers. Europe is still their most important export market, bringing in around 460 $9 million in 2018. And you can find the links to these two articles from the la times in QC calm with the link in our show notes. The Tennessee ABC has issued a cease and desist orders from out of state businesses who have been doing direct to consumer shipments of alcohol. Now we talked about shipping alcohol all the time on the podcast, and this one is kind of rolling things back in a negative way. As a quote, wine is the only alcoholic beverage that can be legally shipped direct to consumers in Tennessee, and it requires a winery direct shippers license issued by the Commission, and this is coming from the Tennessee ABC director Russell Thomas. The Tennessee ABC recently discovered the illegal shipments after analyzing common carrier reports compiled by the Tennessee Department of Revenue. It requires common carriers to file alcohol delivery ports. To the Department of Revenue each month, and it also requires that any business that sells and ships wine director Tennessee has to be licensed as well. In other news, the Scottish Government is trying to tackle booze related criminals, and they have given the green light to remote alcohol monitoring in sobriety tags after awarding a multimillion pound security firm contract. The anti booze angle tags can detect if you've consumed alcohol by monitoring the sweat every 30 minutes from your pores. But ministers are still in talks about handling Scottish courts the power to force these criminals whose convictions are linked to alcohol to actually where these tax if this goes ahead, then they can be forced to go alcohol free for a month to tackle the drinking problem which contributed to their crimes. You can find the link to the Scottish son within our show notes. Alright, so you ready to geek out and I mean, like super bourbon geek out. I heard about our guests today Tom Collins, after I learned he gave In Depth talk at tails. It intrigued me to know more about the science behind bourbon. Tom has dedicated part of his career to the details of alcohol in for us, it's looking at the chemical composition of bourbon, as well as the chemical influence from the barrels as well. We examine at a scientific level, what certain char levels create how entry proof affects it in how bourbon and rye are different from their molecular makeup. Like I said, Get ready to geek out. But now let's go ahead and take a break. We're gonna hear from Joe over barrell bourbon, and then you've got Fred minich with above the jar. 4:37 It's joe from barrell bourbon. I know I talked a lot about blending here, but we also have a national single barrel program, ask you a local retailer or bourbon club about selecting your own private barrel. 4:50 I'm Fred MiniK. And this is above the char this week's idea comes from Kyle man on Twitter or at bourbon numbers on January 2, He wrote me and said, Does making a career out of your hobby ever diminish the fun or actually deepen the experience? Do you have a hobby you would not go pro for that reason? Thanks. That's a great question calm, and I actually do have quite a bit of experience with this. See, I initially started my career as a sports writer. Well, professionally I did. So my career starts as like an ag journalist where I was covering crops and cattle futures and things like that. But I always wanted to be a sports writer, because I was a huge sports junkie. I get into sports, you know, in high school, I start writing about, you know, local football games, track baseball. I would also write about anything that anybody would let me write about to be honest with you. But I get to college and I start writing about sports. And I take a job with the daily Oklahoman, I'm on the sports desk there. And I'm writing the headlines for the daily Oklahoman and I start interviewing athletes and coaches and there was one thing that was Pretty common, it did not matter, the level or the sport. Coaches did not treat reporters with the same respect that they did. colleagues or their players or parents even in the players kind of follow the leadership of their coaches. And for the most part, reporters get treated like crap in the sports business. And you don't have to look any further than a Bill Parcells or Bill Belichick. Press conference to see what I'm talking about. They often come with a very much a disdain toward reporters, and I was coming at it from a fan's perspective. And I didn't necessarily like the way that sports the kind of Avenue I would have to go down in order to continue a career in sports. Because as I was covering them, I felt my I felt the fan being ripped away from me. I didn't enjoy that. I want to be honest with you. enjoyed being a fan far more than I did covering sports. Now fast forward to my bourbon career, I start writing about bourbon in 2006 and 2007 and get really serious about it between 2010 and 2012. And I kind of started in a period in which people weren't really writing about bourbon on a professional level. You did have some bloggers and you had a couple magazine writers, but there was not a lot of us. And to this day, there aren't that many professional whiskey writers. But back then there were there were not the proliferation of blogs, social media wasn't around. And distillers were just happy to get attention from anybody really, in the consumer base was, we're all about, you know, people who would crack open this kind of mythical bourbon egg and shine the light upon some of the secrecy and those that was kind of what I was doing. And so I found myself in a where both of the consumer base and the distiller base were very excited to see any kind of writing I was doing. And while that has certainly change my passion for bourbon has not the one thing that has changed in bourbon and it's nothing like it wasn't sports, you you tend to have a lot of people who enter this space and want to make a career out of it or they want to cash in on bourbon while it's big. And those people tend to go away because they don't have the passion for American whiskey like many of us do, and they just see American whiskey as as another check. And I think right now we're seeing a lot of those kinds of people come and go. And those who have the passion, those who want to see this, you know, through the end and enjoy it for the rest of our lifetime. You're going to see us around for a long Long time, even when whiskies not popular anymore, and that's this week's above the char Hey, if you're interested in getting a career in American whiskey, there's all kinds of avenues open for it. You can even find some places to go to school to learn more about it. I think Kenny's got a few ideas 9:19 he'd like to share with you. 9:21 And that's this week's above the char hit me up on Twitter or Instagram, if you ever want to connect. Until next week, cheers. 9:32 Welcome back to another episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon, Kinney and Ryan here tonight we are well during the day. I don't know me I'd be driving right now but we're recording this at night and in this is going to be something that like, I'm gonna I'm going to really, really enjoy because especially anybody out there that has had any background in science or chemistry. We're about to geek out here. 9:58 Yes, yeah. I think the light Last time we really kicked out was when we were talking Easton, like with Pat heist and then from wilderness trail we kind of went well I did anyways like, went down this rabbit hole of like, all these crazy sports talk and all this stuff that's way over a lot of people's head but yeah, I'm excited about today you sent me like beforehand, here's some info, so we don't look stupid. And then I started reading I'm like, Well, if I'm going to look stupid 10:27 we're talking about the very beginning our guests today sent over some some abstracts or some some scientific papers that he had helped publish and stuff like that. And, and one of them I'll just kind of read the title was called profiling a non volatiles and whiskey using ultra high pressure liquid chromatography quadruple the time of flight mass spectrometry. That was the title and like, like 10:49 Mind blown here, right. I started reading through it and have a horticulture degree with terman. Like, I remember having to take organic chemistry and like barely passed it. And this reminded me of a lot of it. So this is brand new, like bad memories of like failing at life in school. And so Tom will be easy on us. 11:11 Yeah, absolutely. So let's go ahead and introduce our guest today. So today on the show, we have Dr. Thomas Collins. He is the or is an assistant professor at Washington State University in the Viticulture and Enology program at Washington State. So Tom Welcome to the show. 11:30 Oh, well. Hi, thanks for Thanks for the invite. I'm I'm looking forward to this conversation. This should be fun. 11:35 Absolutely. Did I did I did I stumble on your the program that you're in there? 11:40 Or did I go I think I got it right. Then I did Viticulture and 11:42 Enology. Alright cool. I didn't put her to bed. So for for people that want to know more about even what that is explained even what Viticulture and Enology is to our our listeners out there. 11:54 So Vedic Vedic culture is the science of grape growing virus. Is the species for grapes. So viticulture is just the study of grape growing. And then analogy is the study of winemaking. So my background is I'm a chemist and I do work in aroma and flavor chemistry of grapes, wines and distilled spirits. Nice. 12:18 Yes. So how did you choose that path? I mean, that would mean if I had a chemistry degree, that any film to choose I would probably it, but how would How did you get involved with that? 12:30 Well, I think you're on the right track there. If you're going to do this sort of thing. It's important to study something you're going to enjoy studying, right? So there's lots of areas of science you can go into, and some of them I wonder how people get involved. But I think studying grapes and Wine and Spirits seems like an area that would be enjoyable. You're going to have samples to work with and samples to all kinds of sensory evaluation. Right? Yeah, absolutely offer research. All in the name of science. 13:03 I'm surprised you don't have a plaque behind you that says that or something like that. Just a banner that says just just for science here. 13:09 Yeah, well, the the license plate holder on my car says Life is too short to make bad wine. So pretty nice. 13:19 So I guess kind of talk about, because I know you do a lot of stuff with wine now, but I know that you know, we had originally reached out to you because I saw it. You had done a presentation at Tales of the cocktails A few years ago, and was really I said, like, there's got to be somebody out there that really knows like the chemistry behind bourbon. And so you had you had kind of been doing that. So kind of talk about your research over the years and kind of what you've been focused on in that category. 13:47 So I guess the way the how I ended up here was I worked for a big winery wine company in California, and I work with them while I was doing my PhD at University of California Davis. And, and the focus of my research at that time was on oak aroma and flavor chemistry because the winery I worked for the cooperage. So they had a company that was making barrels for them. And the focus was really trying to understand how the coopering or barrel making process affects the outcome of the barrel, what what the chemistry of the barrel looks like. And then ultimately, the chemistry of the wine that's aged in those barrels. And so that was my PhD project was really just trying to understand how what happens in the cooperage affects what happens to the barrel and then what happens to the wind start in it. The next step is to look at are the next one of the next steps in my research development was alright, so that's what happens when you put wine in a barrel and it's 15% alcohol. What happens if you then look at a different beverage a different product, what happens is we put whiskey in that barrel instead, now we're talking instead of 15% alcohol, we're at 60 65%. Alcohol, you're going to extract different things, the barrels are made in a different way. So it just was sort of a logical, logical extension to the research I had already done. And also gets me into the working in distilled spirits, you know, an area that I enjoy personally. And here's an opportunity to learn a little bit more about how things are different with spirits compared to wine. 15:32 Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that is cool. And so I guess let's, let's kind of go into that topic a little bit. Right. I mean, I think the first one that you kind of mentioned was, was the oak and the wood and stuff like that kind of kind of talk about some of your research that you did in regards of really what the because I think there was one. One paper you had also written called targeted volatile composition of awkward samples taken during toasting, edit. mercial cooperage. So kind of kind of let's talk about, really, what, what the goal, or the thesis of this was, and then the results and really where you came out of this? 16:13 Well, from a, from a practical standpoint, the question we were trying to answer with the initial research, when I still work with the winery was, the company owns this cooperage. So it gives us an opportunity as a company to have barrels made exactly the way we would like them to be made rather than buying barrels that someone else has made and decided how they wanted to do the toasting. This was an opportunity for winemakers to talk directly to the Cooper's and say, This is what I'm looking for in a barrel and have the Cooper's make them for that. It sounds like a great prospect. But it turns out, it's hard. You need a translator between what winemakers say they're looking for, and what Cooper's can actually do. So if the winemaker says I want a certain kind of tannin or I want a certain aroma, flavor profile. There's that there has to be some translation for the Cooper to understand what they're looking for and how winemakers speak sort of translates into something that they can do in the cooperage to achieve that goal. And so that's where this the genesis for this research project was really just trying to understand. If winemakers are looking for a certain thing, what are the Cooper's have to do to achieve that? And that morphed into really just trying to understand how does the whole process of toasting barrels work? And what are the key factors in terms of where the wood originates from, how it seasoned, how you're going to toast it to get to a certain aroma and flavor profiles that the winemakers might look for. And so that's where you get these studies where we're looking at volatile profiles changing during the testing process because we're trying to understand what components are being generated as you heat the barrel as you toasted, and how they changed throughout throughout the toasting process. So, so it turns out many of the things that we associated with toasted out in terms of the aromas of vanilla and clove and the spicy aroma is sort of the things that we're looking for from our barrels. Most of those are produced during the testing process. They're not present in the untoasted what 18:32 what are some of the things that you're that you're looking for? 18:35 So the actual compounds so yeah, yeah, getting it on us. Yeah. What about on that road? Well, the first one is vanderlin which is not surprising the one that smells like vanilla. But we're also looking at things like huge and all an ISO huge and all which have clove type aromas. Huge and also the primary compound in in clothes. We're looking at firfer awls, which comes degradation of sugars during the toasting process. So, the cellulose and Hemi cellulose that compose the structure of the wood in part, when those when that's heated, you get thermal breakdown that results in the formation of firfer all kinds of compounds that give you these toasty aromas. And other structural polymer in wood is lignin. And when you when you break that down by heating it, you get things like we get vanel in for one you get quiet call and for methyl glycol, which are related, which are the whiskey lacked are related to the whiskey lactones through the kinds of aromas that give you spicy or medicinal characters, depending on their concentrations in which ones you get. So there are a number. I mean, we looked at about a dozen different compounds and looked at how they're produced throughout the toasting process. So we put thermal couples into the staves as the bear before barrels were toasted. So we could measure the temperature of the wood throughout the process. And then we took samples at regular intervals during the process, and took that back to the lab for the analysis. And so while the barrels are being tested, we're monitoring the temperature, we're collecting samples, the wood, and then we can do the analysis to figure out how things changed throughout the testing process. These compounds aren't all produced at the same time at the same rate. So some of them are, some of them take more heat to generate, and so they tend to develop later in the testing process. Some things are produced very quickly. But if you have too much heat, then they get degraded, broken down into other compounds, or they just volatilize and disappear. And so depending on what the winemakers looking for, you might want to toast the barrel for a longer period of longer period of time or a shorter period of time. You might do a high temperature short time toasting to emphasize things that are produced quickly. We might do a slower low heat, toasting protocol to produce things that take more heat to generate. And so by doing this kind of study, we could start to understand how to tailor the toasting process at the cooperage to get the specific aroma compounds that the winemakers were looking for. 21:19 Interesting. Yeah. So with the, how do you control I guess the variables, you know, because you have wood, which is a living thing, I'm just thinking of like turf research and like, you kind of have like a lot of uncontrollable variables because you are dealing with a living thing or was living in so how is Are there times that like, you know, you have like, like you said, we're toasting the exactly the same with the exact same type of wood and it doesn't translate like it did in the lab, you know, out in the real world. 21:48 Right? Well, and you really kind of hit the nail on the head, nail on the head in terms of the problem with the toasting process generally is there's not a lot of control. In terms of how that happens, so the Cooper's all have a protocol, they're supposed to use this many fires. And you're supposed to be on each fire for this amount of time. But one of the things we saw in this process is that there's a lot of variability just in how the how the individual Cooper's manage their fires. And so at this particular cooperage, there were two different Cooper's that did the toasting, and they didn't manage their fires quite the same. And their barrels were different, even though they're following the same protocol, the same number of fires for the same amount of time. Getting the intensity, that fire to be consistent is one of the things that you have to do well to get a consistent outcome. And that's that that's fairly difficult to do, and some are who's really on top of that can do a better job. But if the two if the two Cooper's are not doing it quite the same, then you end up with barrels that look different. We could tell from the chemical analysis which Cooper made which barrels 23:00 really saying it just it just like with whiskey, you know, it's like you do single barrel pics and you have sister barrels on the same exact row like honey barrels that just tastes like significantly different than one that's like right next to it. You're I wonder if those variables in the toasting even though they're theoretically at the same char whatever, you know protocol that like you said there's so many different variables that it right hard to like 23:26 pin that down. Yes, that's exactly right and we and we saw the same thing in you see the same thing in winemaking. If you taste wine from 20 different barrels that are all made, same day, same cooperage, same wood, same forest, you have all those variables controlled, you still see variability in the outcome, and it's because to a great extent it's because of this variation in the testing process that it's really hard to get that well controlled and and most Cooper urges don't necessarily have a lot of instrumentation that says this is what the temperature is it would at this point there, it's not. It's not easy to put that kind of instrumentation in place. And most of them don't have it. And they're relying on the experience of the Cooper to come up with something that's consistent. But I was it, it is a really difficult job to get that level of consistency day in and day out. I mean, we looked for one of the things we looked at is, over a four day period, how consistent were the barrels from one day to the next to the next to the next. And there there were definitely good days and bad days in terms of efficiency. 24:38 I'm kind of looking at some of the data here and you have you have some graphs that basically show the the the type of oak, the the type of toast, and then you have, like the level of vanderlin in regards of like what degree Celsius was the I'm assuming it was either the temperature or was the word at that time. So you can kind of really, you can't actually calculate what's at what temperature you're trying to pull out the most of that particular compound. 25:08 Right? So so we look, again, we looked at about a dozen different compounds. And we measure the temperature throughout the process. And, and so we could start to say, when we get to this kind of temperature, we're going to see formation of these compounds. And as it progresses, certain compounds like glycol, for example, the longer you heat it, the hotter it gets, the more glycol you get. But things like valin, there's some there and the untoasted would, it gets produced fairly early in the process, but as you continue to heat the barrel, it drops off, it's being converted into something else, or it's just escaping. And so the goal of that was really to try and understand what temperature protocols you want to follow if you want to emphasize valen for example, rather than quiet costs, so if you want something that has more of those values, characters, how would you achieve that. Whereas if you want something that's toasty smoky and has a lot of quiet call, you just keep toasting it, the harder you go that the more of it you get. So it's the it those those particular plots are really critical to trying to work with the Cooper's to understand what they needed to do to make specific profiles. 26:23 So what is the what's the outcome here? I kind of of what you were trying to get or what was like the, the general data like what did it really say to you? 26:32 Well, so I guess the the main, the most important takeaway message from that whole study was, there's a lot of variability in this process. And until Cooper's really focus on getting consistent testing protocol protocols, getting that part of the process down all the discussion that we have in the wine industry about the upcoming from French for us, whether it's white, green, oak, or Tiger Green oak or comes from this forest versus that forest, all of that stuff really doesn't matter if the Cooper doesn't have a way to toast the barrels consistently. So what we saw was the variability in the toasting process, sort of trumped everything else. Because until you could get that more consistent, you couldn't see differences between tight grain and open grain, you couldn't see differences between this forest and that, it was really more about how the barrels were toasted. So that was the first thing was the cooperage really needed to focus more on getting the Cooper's to be consistent in toasting. The second thing was, if you can do that, then you have the possibility of making barrels that have specific flavor profiles by by adjusting how you do the toasting, to focus on baneling or to focus on glad calls. Those these things all have distinct curves for when they're produced and when they're degraded. And so you can start to adjust how you make the barrels to Focus on one flavor profile over another. So that was an important key. And then the other thing that came out of the overall process was as wine company, we knew a whole lot more about how to assess barrels, how to make decisions about the composition of barrels, and how that might interact with the wine that we were trying to make. And so we could give the winemakers a lot of information about barrel selection that I think allowed them to do some more interesting things with their barrels than they would have been otherwise. It's it's always good to have good information about the tools that you're using. And this this study did a good job of helping the winemakers better understand the contribution of oak in their in their wine profiles. 28:50 There's Cooper juice out there that not all of them toast their barrels right. So I guess this this is also showing that Yeah, there is scientific research and study here. That You can figure out that you can pour, pull more those types of compounds that you want by toasting it as well. 29:07 Yep. And I think just to jump ahead a little bit, I think there may be some information from this toasting study that could be beneficial for distilleries that are starting to move are interested in moving into these barrels that are toasted and then charred. Because you're you're going to use charred barrels generally speaking for bourbon but there there is a move at least in part towards doing some toasting the barrel first before you before you chart and and I think the potential benefit there is you below the Charlie or you're going to have the opportunity to affect the composition of that, that toasted layer underneath the char. So you may be able to get slightly different profiles from this than you would with just a straight charred barrel. 29:58 There you go. Hello. Once you do To have a buttery taste out of the barrel, so like a sharp knife, for instance, you know real buttery or like, we've had a couple single barrel pics where we taste like, you know, it tastes like real buttery or oily. What chemical compound is that coming from? 30:15 Well, when we talk about Chardonnay and the butter and Chardonnay that often comes from the mouth, lactic fermentation so it's actually a microbial a lactic acid bacteria metabolite diaas. a teal is one of the compounds that is most associated with that character in Chardonnay. And certain barrels may enhance that for a couple of reasons. One is some barrels may produce better conditions for the bacteria to do their thing back in we do see a fair amount of oak sugars that are released during the testing process and so it may make it more conducive for some of these organisms to to thrive. Those compounds in whiskey may be something that comes from the fermentation of the of the mash, and gets carried over during the distillation. So you could have similar organisms producing diabesity and related compounds during the fermentation. So, I'm not sure if it's barrel related but that would be in wine. It's usually a lactic acid bacteria from mal lactic fermentation that's making those kinds of characters 31:32 All right, Ryan, you got that written down? 31:38 So so let's let's talk about you know, bourbon and whiskey in itself kind of kind of break us down here and really school is like, where Where's what's like a chemical composition or a makeup of really what this looks like and, and kind of help me point me to one of these articles you've written to that that can help be also better understand it. 32:00 Well, so the transition to looking at at spirits came from just wanting to continue to work with oak and try to understand how composition affects not just wine but let's look at other products as well. And so we started we started looking into just what's what's in different kinds of spirits. And so we looked at not just bourbon but other whiskies as well. So in one of the profiling in the profiling work, we looked at how do Bourbons and scotches and Irish whiskeys and other whiskeys compared to one another. And, and some of the differences there have to do with with new oak versus oak that's already barrels that have already been used to age bourbon or other products. And and and then one of the other Questions that sort of came along that started the work that I've been doing with with Jake lon at Virginia Tech has been just this question of what's the difference between bourbon and rye whiskeys? And can we? Can we differentiate them? So I guess to break it down is mash bill. Can we see differences in Nashville through the oak that we're using to age the whiskies in? 33:28 Yeah, yeah, kind of start at the top right there like can you can you discern the types of whiskeys by the mash bill after it's been created from a chemical way to do it and kind of talk about the process of like, how you came to your conclusion to 33:44 so it I mean, it started with just a small a small study where we just went to the local liquor store and picked up a dozen Bourbons and it doesn't dry whiskeys and then did our analysis to see Can we see Can we tell them apart chemically? And I think the profiling paper that talks about bourbon Tennessee and rye whiskies shows that when you look at the non volatile composition, so non volatile means, things that we're not smelling. So, to show the things that make it smell the way they do or the volatile compounds, those are the things that we can actually smell with our noses. non volatile composition refers to things like some of these folk related compounds that get extracted during barrel aging, but contribute to color they contribute to mouthfeel they contribute to in some cases to aroma but not not entirely. And so we were using the the LC q two off to do the analysis of the compounds that are extracted into these whiskies and what you what we want, you can see in that profiling is before you go too crazy, what's an L CQ tough. So the LC is the HPLC. That's the liquid chromatography quadrupled time of flight mass spec. So that's the instrument that we're using to do the analysis. So the LC part separates the the individual compounds based on how they interact with the chromatography column. And then as they come out of the out of the LC, they're introduced to the mass spec. And the mass spec separates whatever is coming out at that time it it separates them by mass, so how heavy the compounds are. And because it's a quadrupole time of fight, we get really good mass resolution so we can separate things that are pretty similar to one another. And it also gives us an estimation of what the chemical formula is so that we can then really get a leg up on identifying specific compounds that are involved. And when we look at these kind of compounds extracted from Oh, there's no there's not surprising A lot of overlap because Bourbons and rise generally speaking are aged in very similar new charred Cass. And so you're going to extract a lot of the same things irrespective of what whiskey or you're putting into it. And so Bourbons and rise aged a new cast for example of very different than scotch whiskies aged in reused cast because we've extracted a lot of a lot of things in the first use, and there's not as much left to extract and subsequent uses. 36:34 Can you can you like, without because of course, we can't do it visually. But can you can you explain really how they are, you know, if you were to look at something like how does it look that they're actually different on paper. 36:49 So there's, there's a, several different ways we can do it. One of them is just to look at individual compounds and just measure the abundance or concentration of these individual compounds in the different whiskey types. And when you do that, there's a lot of variability and Bourbons and rise Generally, the concentrations don't vary that much for things like glycol for some of the oak related tannins to get extracted for any of the any of the things that we're looking at, using the LC q Tov, they generally look pretty similar. We don't see a lot of separation. We do sometimes see separation by by producer because they they're using specific cooperage is so that sort of points to maybe differences that are related to the barrels and not so much differences between the spirits. 37:46 What are some of those differences? Like, what what what are the actual compounds that you're seeing that are either higher or lower and 37:54 rye versus bourbon and stuff 37:59 with the careers and math distiller spanning almost 50 years, as well as Kentucky bourbon Hall of Famer and having over 100 million people taste his products. Steve nalli is a legend of bourbon who for years made Maker's Mark with expertise and precision. His latest project is with Bardstown bourbon company, a state of the art distillery in the heart of the bourbon capital of the world. They're known for the popular fusion series, however, they're adding something new in 2020 with a release named the prisoner. It starts as a nine year old Tennessee bourbon that has been finished in the prison or wine companies French oak barrels for 18 months. The good news is is you don't have to wait till next year to try it. Steve and the team at Bardstown bourbon company have teamed up with rackhouse whiskey club rackhouse whiskey club is a whiskey the Month Club on a mission to uncover the best flavors and stories that craft distilleries across the US have to offer. Their December box features a full size bottle of Bardstown suffusion series, and a 200 milliliter bottle of the prisoner. There's also some cool merchant side and as always, with this membership, shipping is free. Get your hands on some early release Bardstown, bourbon, By signing up at rackhouse whiskey club.com use code pursuit for $25 off your first box. What are some of those differences? Like, what what what are the actual compounds that you're seeing that are either higher or lower and 39:17 rye versus bourbon and stuff? Well, so in the, when we look at the UK related compounds, we're looking at things like glycol and Eugene all and we're looking at some of the some of the wood tannins. We're looking at. fennel properties, things like kovarik acid and Saran jaw and ceramic acid things that are oak. They're extracted from Oak, we do we we do so there were several things one is we didn't see big differences between bourbon and rye. We do see some differences between younger whiskeys and older whiskeys. In terms of the kinds of compounds that are extracted, we tend to see simpler Wood related compounds, monomers so things just like the kumbhak acid, ceramic acid for for like acid that are extracted in younger whiskies and then as you get to older whiskies you start to see more tannin you start to see dimers and bigger, 40:20 bigger sort of 40:23 not quite tannins, but somewhere between the simple monomers and the tannins you see the smaller complexes of folk related compounds so like lignans, things like syringe or resin all and Liana resin all things that are more, more complicated probably take more time to extract we also see a number of tried terpenoid compounds that are extracted into the whiskies and again, the longer the whiskey is aged, the more of these things you get extracted, and then the other class of compounds that you see Are our lippitt. So fatty acid kinds of compounds that become more oxidized as the whiskey spends more time in barrel. So they're things that sort of make sense you're going to have more oxidation the longer in the barrel and that's going to be reflected in the profile of the lipids in them in whiskey as well. So what we were seeing was more difference between younger whiskeys and older whiskeys. Not big differences between Bourbons and rise. 41:28 I'm looking at this table to and with bourbon whiskeys. It seems like there's more differentiation compounds in the bourbon whiskey than any other. Is that correct? Am I reading that? 41:38 Right? Yes, you're reading that. Right. And I, I think, in part it had to do with availability of whiskeys at the time we did this study. So we when we were doing this, you could find a broader range of ages of Bourbons and you could for rice This was during that time. At a time when right whiskeys were when it was hard to find older rye whiskeys and so most of the whiskey rye whiskey we looked at were younger whiskeys whereas the Bourbons, we had a full range. And so I think part of the reason there were more compounds in the bourbon that differentiated the bourbon rye was we just had a more diverse set of Bourbons than we did for rise in that first study. 42:24 Gotcha. I thought it was just proving that bourbon is king to everything. 42:29 We could go ahead. 42:31 Yeah, I'm okay. That's my, that's my hypothesis. 42:33 But now that they're older rye whiskey is available. Again, we could go back and repeat the study and see if we get similar outcomes. 42:41 I'm in on that. Let's do it. 42:43 Yeah, right. We'll use Kenny's bar. 42:47 Yeah, I mean, I'm looking at like, again at this table and and kind of, let's talk about some of these like, della hydroxy Benz, and all idle I can't even try 43:02 a Benz aldehyde Yeah, like like that. 43:05 Yeah. So yeah, thank you for saving me they're kind of talk about like, what each one of these are really contributing to the bourbon itself too. 43:18 Well, so I would say the first thing is we don't necessarily know what all of these compounds are doing in terms of their effects on the aroma. So that di hydroxy bends. aldehyde is likely a breakdown product from lignin and it's produced during the toasting slash bile in this case charring process from from the degradation of the lignin that's in the wood. And it's probably got I if I had to guess it's some sort of a medicinal maybe spicy kind of aroma. Nice and so I mean, it's kind of related related to things like Why call in for method wire call? 43:57 All right, what about octane ik acid 43:59 so That's one of the lipids. So actinic acid is a short chain, the eight carbon lippitt. That's probably coming from one of the younger whiskies I'm thinking, man. And then as you get, so you're going to see between eight and 1216 carbon chains are pretty typical for what we see in in these products. And then as the whiskey ages, you'll start to see things like hydroxy October casser, di, di hydroxy actinic acid, so you'll see you'll have more oxygen incorporated just as those liquids get oxidized. And that's going to affect might affect the maybe to a small extent the oiliness it's going to give you some slightly different aromas. Particularly if you start to get a lot of the oxidized liquids president you start to get into what in cognac would be called the run co character. So that sort of character of oxidized lippitt gotcha. 45:06 All right, Ryan, if you're keeping track here, I'm zero for two. I'm pronouncing these correctly, 45:10 but I'm not even trying. So 45:15 I appreciate 45:16 appreciate the effort, right? Yeah. Well, we don't really have to we don't have to do the next one because or the next two because yeah, vanilla and vanilla acid. Vanilla, right. I mean, unless there's something crazy I don't know about vanilla. You can you can school us on that. 45:30 Now that's your you're dead on there. 45:33 All right, then there is that deck cannot depend on acid. 45:38 Yeah. Economic acid. Good. That's no, that's the 10 carbon chain. So you had 45:42 I know that one. No, I'm kidding. 45:46 And then don't economic would be the 12. And then you get into into the longer chain ones. But those are those are part from the wood part from yeast metabolism. 45:58 Cool. So as you listen How about that one? 46:01 And that's a word related. That's one of the one of the compounds that's I mean it's derived from the word it's it's a lignin degradation product as well. I don't know what specific character it would have but you know it's it's going to be part of that set of follow funnels that are that are products of degradation of the wood. So we see similar things would wind as well. 46:27 All right, we got three more to go here Ryan. So we got a leg ik acid or allergic, allergic 46:34 Yeah, logic. So logic, the logic. 46:40 Logic acid is a is a breakdown product from wood tannins, so when you heat would the Alagiah tannins breakdown to illogic acid and then ultimately to Gallic acid. So, it might can contribute some bitterness when it's in before it's broken down when it's still woodturning going to give you some astringency, some some coarseness, some of that woodenness that you sometimes get in Bourbons that may have been at barrel a little too long. 47:10 Awesome. Alright, so we got hepta methoxy flavonoid. 47:16 hepta methoxy flavonoid that's why I'm not really sure what that does 47:22 I'd say stump the chump but man alive there's no way that 47:30 the common theme though I will notice with this is that you keep saying would and so I guess it just proves that 70% of the flavor comes from the wood. 47:40 Yeah, there's some significant percentage of the flavor is wood derived and flavor and a lot of the aromas are wood derived. So that I mean, so that was part of the part of what we're trying to understand is just how critical is would to the character of these products and you would guess going in that it would be And it is now in terms of the aroma. We didn't in this study look at using gas chromatography. So a way to look at the volatile compounds because I mean we you do have different characters and Ryan bourbon in the aroma. And those are not I mean that those are not going to be necessarily wood related compounds, there are going to be some volatile aroma compounds that are related to the mash bill. And that's that's something that we have have looked at in a subsequent paper where we worked with a distiller to produce whiskeys have dealt with different mash pills, different different amounts of corn and rye so that we could try and understand that part of the problem better that part of the equation. But one of the difficulties we have in this kind of work is as researchers we don't have access to what the mash bills are that any of these distillers. Producing and that's fine. So we have to make some estimation about what what they're doing but but then we worked with with a distiller to actually produce whiskies of the mash bills that we that we wanted to try. 49:15 And so on a budget did they give you to like, go buy these bottles? Like, here's how much you got spend. 49:23 The money we use for this came from bits and pieces of startup funds, different sources. Some of it came from our own pockets just because, you know, we wanted to do this work and we're interested in it and we really weren't sure where to turn to to get funding to support this kind of work. 49:42 There you go, right. Yep. Kickstarter, self kickstart. Yeah, 49:45 well, that's it. We we've kicked that idea around of doing a Kickstarter to try and get funding to do some of these projects. Just because they're, you know, it takes money to do this analysis and some of it some of it comes from various startup funds and things that we have a little more control over what we can spend the money on. So 50:09 I'm in for 10 bucks. 50:10 Yeah, man. 50:13 I'm not cheap, like any 50:16 question. One thing that sometimes you get into whiskeys like real fruity notes where those compounds that are bringing that out, 50:24 well, some of those are ethyl esters of some of these fatty acids. Typically, those are the fruity compounds that we see in wine are higher alcohols that are produced during fermentation. And then with the amount of ethanol that's around you, you get a combination of the fatty acid and the ethanol to produce an ethyl Ester. And many of the ethyl esters have these fruity aromas 50:48 yet so while we kind of move on, I've got a lot of questions that are coming in through our live chat through here. So I kind of want to get to some of these because there's there's some good ones here in the live chat. Yeah, I'll send you the link here. So. So as we, as we kind of go through here, there's, there's a really good one. And it's kind of talking about barrel entry proof. And I'm not too sure if you've done any research on that. And this one might just be your best estimate, guess of knowledge here. But can you talk about barrel entry proof in the effect it would have on the solubility of the compounds that are pulled from the barrel? Because many people claim that a lower entry proof like 107 or 110 results in a better whiskey rather than putting in at something like the max capacity at 125? 51:38 Sure. So the first the first thing is we haven't done that sort of research at all. That's something I'm interested in doing. And the whole reason we started down this path of looking at distilled spirits was just to get a wildly different entry proof from what we were doing with wine wine, we're at 15% alcohol. If you're 125, you're 62 and a half. So it's a completely different solvent system, you have so much more ethanol, it's going to affect what gets extracted from the wood. And so we definitely see if you compare wine and spirits, you will see very different things extracted, because ethanol is a really strong solvent. That's the difference between 15 and 6062 and a half. You won't see as wildly different outcomes if you're looking at 110 verses 125. So there'll be some differences. That's still a significantly higher level of ethanol, but it's not going to be as different as what we see between wine and spirits. The higher the alcohol, the higher the ethanol level, the higher the proof. The more organic compounds you'll be able to extract 52:59 you'll die Really, 53:02 you should extract more at higher proof than at lower proof. But you're going to extract different things as well. And so and it's just it's one of the things that we want to do, you're going to see a different set of extraction, you're going to see probably more of the try terpenoids, you're going to see more of the lipids extracted at higher proofs than it lower. But I don't know yet. To what extent that would have what it what impact that would have on the on the whiskey itself. 53:34 Yeah, it's it kind of reaffirms, there was a assumption in the chat that said, somebody that took a few classes over independent stave, and they at least independence Dave said they did some data and did some analysis and said that barrel entry proof of 114 produces the most flavor compounds and they had the data to back that up whereas something that can be higher, can Sometimes extract more of the undesirable compounds. 54:02 Exactly, you're definitely going to extract different things that when 25 then you wouldn't wouldn't 10 and you're going to extract a lot of a lot of it's going to be very similar but you're definitely you have the opportunity to extract some other things at higher proof that may or may not be desirable, you may get better outcomes at lower. We just, we just haven't done the work. We haven't had the opportunity we haven't had access to the whiskies to be able to do that. We are we are starting to work with a local distiller here to to go down these down these rabbit holes to see what there is to see. 54:41 We got whiskey, we can help you out you just let us know. samples. 54:44 Good to know. Good to know. Yeah, 54:46 absolutely. 54:49 In another kind of thing that came up people were kind of wondering, you know, and I think you you kind of talked about it a little bit about not really being able to discern a whole lot of difference between Ryan bourbon based on their mash bill it from a scientific level. But I mean, something that's like a weeded bourbon versus a rye bourbon. Were you able to find any discernible differences between those? Or is it at the end of it, it doesn't look any different in science? 55:19 Well, so some of it comes down to the tools we're using. So when we use the LC cute off, and we're looking at non volatile compounds, what we're really that's a that's a good tool for looking at situations where you have different kinds of barrels, because it's a really good tool for looking at what you're extracting from the barrel. And so we can really easily see differences between Bourbons rise, and scotch whiskies or Irish whiskeys, things that are aged in US barrels. That's really straightforward. Just to see differences in Nashville. We need to look at the at the profile, so we need to use gas chromatography instead. And in this most recent study, we've started to use that as a tool. And then we are able to see more differences based on mash bill. We haven't with that yet looked at Rive versus weeded Bourbons, but that's on the list of things to do. The other thing I would say is using the LC q Tov, we can see we can differentiate between whiskeys of different ages because a lot of those differences are related to what's being extracted from the barrel. We can see some differences between producers based on the barrels that they're using. And, and so it's a tool that could be used for things like is this whiskey really what it says it is, in terms of age or producer, I think with some work and with the right set of library standards We could start to use this as a tool for authentication in case in case there was some concern about a whiskey being what the label says it is. We're not there yet, but I think we, it's a tool we could use for that. The scotch regulatory agencies are are using these kinds of tools to verify authenticity of scotch whiskies, for example, 57:21 do you think that you could look at you know, whether using gas chromatography or HPLC, or anything like that, to sit there and look at and I don't know if you're this deep into the bourbon world, with dusties are basically Bourbons that were from the 60s 70s and stuff like that, versus what's produced today. I mean, do you have any hypothesis on on kind of what that would look like? 57:47 Well, lot Oxygen. 57:50 Oxygen would certainly be one of one of the key things to be concerned about it but assuming that the the package was well sealed and you're not getting a lot of it. oxygen into the folder whiskey. It could be a toll to go back and look at route, for example, the question of entry proof. Because you go back to a certain time when 10 was more common than, then we're where we're at now. So there may be possibilities to look at that. It's also, you know, to look at differences, differences in production practices as well. Some of that would be gas chromatography. Some of it would be liquid chromatography. You know, it's something we are interested in doing. getting access to those kinds of samples is, is not always easy. But we've had some discussions about doing that kind of that kind of work 58:45 need with jack rose, and just go through their whiskey collection. 58:53 Yeah, I'm sure bill Thomas would love that. Yeah. 58:56 All for science. All the name of research. That's how science Yeah, absolutely, 59:01 you know, start to make bad bourbon too. 59:04 Yeah. There we go. Right. We're gonna sell. We're going to sell license plate holders with that on it now. 59:10 That's right. 59:12 So, yeah, so we're kind of we're kind of creeping up to the top of the hour here. And I kind of want to, like finishes on on a strong note, you know, is there is there one thing that you took away from a lot of this research that the average Joe can can make a like a better informed or buying decision or anything like that? Or like, What's it? What's a big takeaway from from everything that you've been doing here? 59:36 Well, I mean, I think we touched on a little while ago that it's, it's a pretty, pretty large percentage of the aroma and flavor in distilled spirits comes from the cast that it started with bourbon, we definitely see some differences between producers we definitely see differences in the age of the whiskey and You know, there's some some really, I mean, it's, as you say, the more you know, the better, the better you're going to be. And it's interesting just to see how these things play out as you look at younger versus older whiskies, and a fair amount of this work has been done during the period of time when the industry was sort of scrambling to have enough. Older, older Bourbons, older rise for the marketplace, there was a lot of demand. And so it's, you know, some of this, it's, you can see some of that challenge and the results that we're looking at in terms of being able to maintain the age of the products that are they're putting on the marketplace. 1:00:41 Fantastic. And I guess I got one more question that came into the chat because it's really going to marry your two worlds here. Right. So what about when a whiskey is aged in a secondary cask like a like a wine or a port casks like envy and some other ones that are out there? Is there a type of like chemical reaction that's happening with this blend? You know, kind of give us your, your kind of take on that. 1:01:09 I mean, we definitely didn't really touch on this because it was more in this in the scotch world. But when you're looking at scotches, there's this big differentiation between scotches that have been aged in bourbon barrels versus Sherry butts. And we can we can pick those out night versus day, the ones that have aged aged and cherry casks look very different from the ones that have been aged in bourbon casks. And I would expect we'd see the same sort of thing if you started looking at other whiskeys that have been finished in Port barrels or Zinfandel barrels or peanut or barrels or whatever other kinds of things that are out there you would see the influence of that other product as well. Some of it is direct influence from the product itself. So the port or the Zinfandel but somebody It is also just differences in wood, you're going to see some differences because of toasted word versus charred wood. There. I mean, there's there there are definitely things to see. And we can also I think, see when we're looking to Sherry casks, we can see differences not just between Sherry and bourbon, but between Spanish oak Sherry casks and American oak Sherry cask. So there's there are definitely characteristics of the ones that shine through in spite of the influence of the Sherry to 1:02:31 it all comes back to the wood 1:02:33 back to the wood. 1:02:34 And we go, I think we can our conclusion or is that we need barrel statements instead of a statements like what barrel was in the char level, that long? You know, the conclusion. 1:02:50 It all comes back to the word. 1:02:52 Yep. This is fantastic. You know, Tom, thank you so much for coming on the show today. And really, like I said, schooling up I've I fumbled on more words than I have, I think in a long time trying to try to get him out here and really, you know, educating our listeners and for us. For myself, I think this was super interesting. Just to kind of see this from a data perspective. In my business, we always say that the data never lies. And so when you look at it, of really what is being influenced by to the whiskey via as we just said, all comes back to the word it's, it's super interesting. In my opinion, we see this but I also want to let you give a opportunity to plug where people can either find out more about you or researching more about you or you're looking at some of your papers. And if we're going to look after this, so hopefully, we'll get some thumbs up and green lights and and you'll be able to find some of these papers on our website when this podcast is is aired. So go ahead and give yourself a plug there too. 1:03:59 Well for Well, it's absolutely been my pleasure to do this, I appreciate the opportunity to come and talk about some of this work. And I'm glad to see there's interest in in this sort of thing because it can get pretty dry and academic at times. So 1:04:11 you feel like you're just like yelling in a cave, like, 1:04:15 good to break it down and and talk to folks who who are passionate about it and appreciate what the implications for some of this might be. So I really appreciate it. And again, if you want to learn more about what we're doing, some of it is posted at the Washington State University Department or medical terminology Program website. You can Google that and it'll pop up and you'll be able to find find me somewhere on that on that web page. So happy, happy to answer questions that people might have as 1:04:47 well. You got it. Alright, so you got questions. Start googling, and good luck. 1:04:54 Good luck. 1:04:57 But But seriously, thank you again for coming on the show. So reach out you can try to find time out there, you can always reach out to us to team at bourbon pursuit com. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram to see what we're drinking, what we're talking about where we are today. And if you like the show, and you want to help it grow, we would appreciate it write a review. And if you want to be part of these, as I mentioned, you get to be here during the live chat. You can support the show on Patreon pa te r eo in comm slash bourbon pursuit. Ryan go ahead and close this out. 1:05:30 Yeah, Tom, thanks, man. That was that was enjoyable. I was trying to wrap my head around these concepts and try to talk intelligently about it. Yeah, I think you know, science you try to you try to do something so you can replicate it and you know, have something that's proven nothing time and time again with spirits and bourbon. You just can't replace that human element. And there's so many variables with you know, nature and then the human element of making a consistent product. So it's interesting And I hope there's more continued research about it because it is fascinating. 1:06:04 All right, terrific. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed it immensely. And thanks for the interest and yeah, absolutely. The human element is a huge part of it. And a lot of this was really focused on what are the things that matter what are the things that the human element can focus on to get a better outcome? 1:06:20 Absolutely. 1:06:21 Perfect. 1:06:22 All right. Cheers, everybody. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

google europe university long california american america life cheers nashville wine port french chardonnay zinfandel spanish uk spirits mind wood european kickstarter france focus scottish phd germany coaches irish united states spain logic press tennessee states pursuit fantastic tales scotland vanilla institute receive revenue kenny generally kentucky european union typically alcohol oak united kingdom viticulture iso commission producing absolutely oxygen economic maker's mark tom collins older oklahoman washington state benz char qc tov famer bardstown lc bourbons fred minnick virginia tech bill belichick gotcha celsius california davis month club i'm i'm right so right well scottish government gallic enology kinney saran right yeah washington state university that you in depth hemi bill parcells tennessee department russell thomas somalis transcribed rive hplc

Be Mighty by Dr. Jill Stoddard Interview

Shelf Aware Books

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 6, 2020 39:38

Be Mighty by Dr. Jill Stoddard is *the* book to start off your reading list in 2020! It's also my choice to start off this podcast. Listen as Jill and I discuss her new book Be Mighty, her writing life, why she wrote this book, favorite childhood books, and how you can live your own life with more meaning! Pick up your copy at Amazon or straight from the publisher, New Harbinger You can find Dr. Jill Stoddard at www.JillStoddard.com On Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/jillstoddardphd/ And wisdom from her book on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/jillastoddard/ And on Psychology Today at https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/experts/jill-stoddard-phd Full Transcript: Today we have Dr. Jill Stoddard, who I'm so excited to talk about her new book be mighty, which if you couldn't have a more appropriate title for a book, I have come away calling myself a lava lady all day long after finishing her book. So welcome Dr. Joe. Dr Jill Stoddard Hi Leann and thank you so much for having me. Leann Thank you. So a quick bio just for listeners just so we can lay the groundwork of who you are. Jill Stoddard, a founder and director of the Center for stress and anxiety management, a multi site outpatient clinic in San Diego, California. She specializes in acceptance and Commitment Therapy act, and cognitive behavioral therapy CBT for anxiety and related issues. Stoddard earned her PhD in clinical psychology from Boston University in 2007. She's an award-winning teacher recognized act trainer and co author of The Big Book of active metaphors. She lives in San Diego with her husband, two kids into French Bulldogs, so I'm going to need see pictures of those French Bulldogs. Dr Jill Stoddard Oh, they're pretty cute. Leann No. So thank you for talking to us today about your new book and process it took for you to get there all about writing it and who this book is for so if you wouldn't mind can you tell our listeners a little bit about your book be mighty Dr Jill Stoddard Yeah, absolutely. So the book is written for women who struggle with anxiety, worry stress. So you know, I sort of joke basically that just means it's written for women. Because who doesn't struggle with anxiety, worry and stress myself included. And I think it really is for any woman who is feeling stuck. You know, I think a lot of us feel the pressure of juggling the multiple demands of work and or school and kids and all of the difficulties of just life and culture and being constantly bombarded by bad news. And it can feel a little overwhelming. And I think it can become easy to get stuck in all of that stuff and sort of lose sight of who we are, who we want to be and the kind of lives that we want. And that's really what the mighty to do is to put readers in touch with the woman that they really most deeply desire to be and to sort of figure out like, what's getting in the way of that, and how you can move past those obstacles and have a big, bold, mighty life. Leann Great. So your book Be Mighty. Do you remember how you came up with the title? Why do I want to be mighty? Dr Jill Stoddard Yeah, you know, that's funny. It's a good question because the title is the very first thing that came to me and I want to say it was at least three years ago. And I had initially wanted to write just kind of a global self help act book acceptance and Commitment Therapy and learned through the publisher that it's important to have a niche so that, you know, people know who the book is for when they read the title. And at the time, it just, that just wasn't really the book I wanted to write. So we kind of put it on Hold for a little bit. And then I decided I wanted to write the mighty for anxiety. And in talking with the publisher, it was actually her idea to write it for women, and it was when she made the suggestion, it was like the skies opened up. And that just hit me right in the feels like this is the book that this was meant to be all along, and it wouldn't have been the right time when I came up with the idea, you know, couple years before that, but I have been on my own journey since 2016, of kind of becoming, I guess, an emerging feminist. And, you know, and I think it's just we're at a time where a lot of women are struggling with the reality of life as a woman and some systemic oppression that still exists. So yeah, it'll it'll just sort of came together organically, but But took a few few years. Leann So tell me a little bit about the organic process that's been going on. What in you made you want to write a book versus start a blog? versus just continue what you were doing in your private practice? Dr Jill Stoddard Hmm, okay. So I had written a book or co written with Nila fari, The Big Book of Acts metaphors, which was a book written for practitioners, you know, clinicians who do acceptance and Commitment Therapy. And it was a very difficult but very rewarding process. And, you know, I've really come to enjoy writing but I've discovered over time that I'm less interested in you know, more technical or scientific kind of writing and was really feeling an urge to write more in my own voice. And, you know, one of my biggest professional values is trying to decide Seven Eight these concepts that, you know I live act in my own personal life. And I 100% credit for the fact that I feel alive and have a sense of meaning and purpose. And it's not because life is easy, but it's, I feel like I've been able to really find my own values driven life because of act even in the sort of swirl of chaos that is life. And I it just feels really important to me to try to get those concepts out into the world and to do so in a way that is accessible to people. So I really wanted to write a self help book that I could use my own voice that I was hoping would, you know, connect well with regular humans, you know, and people who maybe aren't necessarily going to therapy but are wanting to grow So that's really where the desire came for the book. And then, I guess kind of, in parallel with that I had been a professor at University. And in thinking about wanting to write more, it just sort of occurred to me that I was spending so much time editing other people's dissertations, among other things, that there just wasn't really the time to do my own writing. And I loved my job there, but I made the very difficult but values driven decision to leave the university and focus predominantly on my private practice seeing clients but I only need to see clients a few days a week to make the same amount of money. And so I it freed up two full days for me so when I decided to write the mighty I was able to go to my office and sit for eight hours on a Monday and Friday. Just Right, right, right, right, right. And I just loved it so much. And it made it a pleasure rather than a chore or something that was stressful. You know, when I wrote my first book, I had a full time job and a baby and it was just so difficult to squeeze it in. And, you know, I've now tried to kind of architect my life in such a way that I actually have time set aside for writing so that it can be a more enjoyable process. Leann Okay, I have a lot. I want to unpack to that one. So you mentioned a couple times values based living you talk about act. For the first part of the question. How would you break down act and how do you break down act for people who have never heard of this and I realized that this podcast it's going to sound like this is the act fan club, but honestly, it sounds like you're using act the way I do as a philosophy or live or less? How do you break down act? And how do you describe it as being different from other models? Why would I even be interested? Dr Jill Stoddard Yeah, well then the main goal of act is to build psychological flexibility. So psychological flexibility is just the ability to be in the present moment with everything inside the skin box emotions, physical sensations, urges, fully and without defense, and make conscious deliberate choices to do what matters to do what you value. So it's actually fairly simple in terms of what it is, though not necessarily easy in practice. Leann Definitely. So I'm going to quote you back to you as awkward as that sounds. At the end of her book, under the living fears, the finale chapter, Jill writes, one Most definitely stone a perfect work in progress. I credit the past 18 years of learning, living and sharing act for giving me the tools to embrace pain, and live love and labor out loud. Because of act I experienced sweetness when I show up to the small moments with my kids, my husband, my friends and my dogs experience on wonder when I stopped to fully notice the ocean view and breathtaking sunsets right outside my office. And Jill does continue on but one of the things that I really noticed in the book is this is not written from the voice of an expert. Tell us a little bit about why you felt okay. And safe enough to write a book coming more from your voice. Whereas many self help books you read come from I am the expert and you should do this. Dr Jill Stoddard Huh? Yeah, I would say it. It's really coming also from living Act and that my most important or prioritized personal value is authenticity. And that's what I hope comes through in the book. Leann And it definitely does this. The tone in his voice is someone who's sitting down next to you, not someone who's dictating to you from the back. This is not a backseat driver book. Dr Jill Stoddard Well, in one of the in acceptance and Commitment Therapy, part of the therapeutic stance is exactly that. It's that even when we're in therapy with a client, this isn't a relationship where, you know, I am the expert who is psychologically healthy and well and you are the patient who is broken and ill, but it's that we're just two human beings who both struggle and know pain and are trying to grow and you know, get through this and the best way that we can Leann You have a challenge out about that right now. Tell us about. Dr Jill Stoddard Oh, gosh, yeah. So I have this incredible team of women who work for me at my clinic. And we actually went up to Washington to an act for empowering women training with the wonderful Robin Walter and Ashley Leonard curtain. And part of what came out of that was us wanting to brainstorm what we might be able to do to empower women in our local community. And the six of us met. Gosh, it was just a couple weeks ago, actually. And we came up with this idea we were all somehow got talking about how we've noticed this enormous spike in clients who are coming to the clinic, where the source of their suffering really seems to be coming from social comparison and that with social media You know, and this is nothing new. I guess we all know this. But all you know people looking at social media and feeling like everyone else is taking these brilliant vacations and has the perfect marriage and life and adorable kids and great job. And our think they're the only ones who are suffering, like everybody else has it all together, and they somehow don't. And so we came up with this idea to break those social media myths. So we called it the share, don't compare challenge. And we challenge people to post a video, basically saying what you see on social media is and you know, here are all the things that are shiny and nice about me. But the real me also and you know, here are some truths about the ways that I might be struggling that you don't see on social media. And so the hashtags are shared, don't compare and hashtag the real me and we're just trying to get people to jump on board and show a little bit of their True, authentic selves so that we all know that we're in this together, you know that our common humanity is that to be human is to know pain. And, you know, there's a lot of healing and connecting over that. Leann And I really, really like all the responses we've seen so far. We're recording this in November 2019. And so far, it's been amazing to see people that I personally look up to be just as real and fragile and vulnerable as me. I know, you must have read Bernie brown at some point. Dr Jill Stoddard You know, I haven't read a lot of her stuff. But of course, I've seen her TED Talk. I've seen her special on Netflix. And you know, of course, she's a personal hero. She's just amazing the work that she does, yeah, Leann and a lot of these videos that people are sharing to me are like, you know, that vulnerability That she talks about wholehearted living. Dr Jill Stoddard Absolutely. Leann So it keeps talking about acceptance and Commitment Therapy and just for listeners, you know, you write about what acceptance is and what acceptance is not in the book. So when we're talking about acceptance with this, what are you really talking about? We're just supposed to suck it up and brush off our feelings and keep going. Dr Jill Stoddard Right? That's what we do. Yeah, that that is a that is the the popular fear that comes out as soon as you use the word acceptance and the other word that is used synonymously is willingness. And I actually like this word a little bit better. It doesn't seem to trigger the same responses acceptance, but acceptance and willingness certainly don't mean giving up or giving in or resignation. And they also don't mean, you know, liking or wanting things that are painful. You know, I joke in the book that would make you a masochist. And then you need to read an entirely different book, but it's really referring to a willingness to have have what is already inside your skin anyway. So we have thoughts, we have emotions, we have physical sensations, urges, and they show up. This is part of being human and we don't get to choose that they show up but we do get to choose how we respond to them. And it's often not the pain, that is really the thing that's causing the problem. It's everything we do in response to try to mitigate the pain. You know, we are we are creatures who seek comfort. And that's not always a problem. You know, if you take a couple Advil when you have a headache, that's not necessarily a problem. But if you're so unwilling to feel any pain that you're taking, you know, four Advil every two hours and now you have rebound headaches and an ulcer. Now it's a problem. So willingness is about making space to allow for discomfort inside your skin. In so far as biting it causes issues and often pulls us away from the life we want or the person we want to be, or in other words, our values. Leann And I think that's so important and it's one of the things that makes this book definitely different from the 4 million other self help books or psychology based books that are out there. Another quote from the book that I really liked, if you are looking for another book to tell you how to get rid of anxiety and find the key to ultimate happiness, this is not the book for you. She goes on to say we're going to dig deep and feel feelings, you will not learn how to control avoid or fix the anxious feelings you don't want. Nor will you learn how to have more of the feelings you do want. Instead, you will learn to change your relationship to anxiety so it no longer hold you back. So when you say these things to people face to face. I'm sure they do not react with enthusiasm to this. Dr Jill Stoddard Yeah, I think it can be a little surprising because certainly In therapy, people are coming to feel better. So in some ways, it's it's sort of disappointing to find out that I don't see my role as taking your pain away. But I pose it more as if I could, I would. But I can't. That's just not how it works. And anyone who says they can, you know, as I do, and, and then the way to get the buy in is really not. Because I'm an expert, and I'm saying it's true, but to really look at what their experience tells them. So when we look at all the ways that pain and discomfort show up, and we look at all the things that you're doing in response to that, what do you notice? And you know, people can pretty easily come to the conclusion that everything that they've been doing works in the short term in the short term and the book, I say it works or we wouldn't do it. it over and over and over. Because it's true. Everything we do gets us something, it has a purpose or a function. You know, procrastination is a great example. Because that's certainly something we all do. And in that moment, you give yourself permission to put something off, there's a relief there. So it works in the short term. But of course, in the long term, there's just as much to do and not as much time to do it. And so it actually makes everything you know, especially the thoughts and feelings that we were trying to get rid of in the first place, and it makes all of those things bigger. Definitely. And people get that, you know, they understand that it doesn't take long before they go, Oh, geez, you're right. Leann So when they come up to you and ask, Is it okay that I take the bubble bath? How do you respond? Dr Jill Stoddard Oh, it's absolutely okay to take the bubble bath. So, you know, this isn't like therapy that says no pain, no gain or like there's some glory and feeling pain. For pain sake, and if there are self care strategies that make people feel better, and they don't have a cost, then that's 100%. Okay, I love a bubble bath or yoga or meditation. It really is a question of what is it in the service of and doesn't have a cost. So, you know, if you need to take a three hour bubble bath every single evening after work and you're not spending any time with your kids, when being a good parent and spending quality time with your kids is something that really matters to you. Now, the bubble baths have a cost. Now the pursuit of feeling better feeling relaxed, has superseded these other important values of spending quality time with family. Leann I really like that good with and I'll continue taking my bubble bath. Dr Jill Stoddard you absolutely should. Leann And many times you know you hear about well Self Care isn't isn't important. It isn't going to change anything in the world. You know, what does it matter if I'm meditating on the cushion, and I really like how your book handles the broader contextual or all those things that we know are in the environment. So systematic. All those those issues that we know are out there. And she does Jill does address it in the book, and I realized I'm talking third person in front of you, Joe. But I want the listeners to hear this. This other quote, she has a section called acceptance is not. Hopefully it's pretty clear that when we talk about acceptance and willingness, we are specifically talking about acceptance of internal experiences. We're not talking about acceptance of situations. For example, we're not talking about acceptance of sexist behavior, or abuse. We're talking about acceptance of the hurt, anger and sadness that arise when we are mistreated, especially insofar as acceptance as acceptance expands our options for freely choosing what to do and how to do it. And I think that's so important in this day and age is this is not another, improve yourself plan. And if you are in a bad situation well, so sorry. Dr Jill Stoddard Yes, absolutely, critically important. And in fact, if you're in a bad situation, then getting in touch with values will likely help you to figure out what needs to be done or changed in order to remove yourself from that situation. But that's different from trying to do things to to just feel better when when there is, you know, emotional pain that arises as a result of that bad situation. Leann So tell me a little bit broader. This book certainly distills down the work that you're doing when you're not writing a book. Tell me a little bit about the work you do with the center and all those things that you consider to be living. Your values. Dr Jill Stoddard Well at the clinic, we see all people who have you know, anxiety, worry, panic, obsessive compulsive disorder, post traumatic stress, everything that's kind of in the anxiety and stress family. We see adults and kids and couples, I only see adults, but I have a team of other women. So we try to serve as many different types of people as we possibly can an individual and group format. So that's what I do that, you know, that's what I spend most of my professional time on. And then the rest of the time is writing. You know, I'm done with this book, but I already have ideas about the next book I'd like to write. I love doing podcasts and I've done a handful of those and I actually do a fair amount of training not really teaching anymore. I used to teach but I'm a peer reviewed act training. So I will do trainings out in the community that are basically taking the concepts from the book, and doing different kinds of trainings in the community. So I've done trainings for trainees, like mental health trainees, postdocs, and interns and students. So I will do trainings in the community of people who are training in mental health. I've actually given a couple trainings at schools for parents on, you know, identifying values in terms of how you want to be parenting, different different things like that. And then I just recently started blogging for psychology today. So that's more writing but a different type of writing. So things are starting to shift a little bit. Doing a little less clinical work and a little bit more speaking, and writing and training. And I mean, I love doing all of it, and I'm someone who likes To Wear several different hats, all of which point to spreading the word about acceptance and Commitment Therapy. Leann Well, and and that's something I want to ask you about. So, you know, I am seeing a trend in Yes, definitely clinicians, and therapists are doing individual one on one work, but I'm seeing a trend where people are moving to spread this further and outside of the therapy office. So people who have never been diagnosed with anything but feel stressed and overwhelmed and maybe wouldn't identify as anxious, but maybe they have an inner critic, or maybe their mind is always telling them that they're an imposter and they're fake and they should just go back to bed. And nevermind today would know what that feels like at all. This is the work that you are doing to reach people outside of the therapy room. Why is this important to you? Dr Jill Stoddard Yeah, that's a you you hit the nail on the head 100%. And, you know, I have yet to find anyone. If I ask, you know, I'll ask a roomful of people, does anyone not have some version of an I'm not good enough story, and literally no one has ever raised their hand. And the same goes for the imposter syndrome or inner critic. I mean, this really does seem to be a universal human experience. And so irrespective of whether someone has quote unquote symptoms, or a syndrome or something that would kind of count as a diagnosis. I think, you know, we all we all know pain, we all struggle, we all suffer. And I think anything that can reach as many people as possible to say, Hey, there is a way to live, you know, a big bold life to feel alive to feel fulfilled and have meaning Even in the midst of all the things that are just very hard about being human, it's I think you're right, there are more and more people who one on one therapy is amazing. And it's so powerful. And I feel so grateful to be able to do this work with my life. And there's nothing better than when you reach someone who's really stuck. And you see their life change. And I've always believed that has a butterfly effect that if you can change one person, and then that person's changes are kind of positively impacting other areas of your life, you're having a big impact. But there's also you know, this opportunity to reach more and more people who aren't walking through the door. And I think that's especially true when, you know, the stigma around mental health and psychotherapy is certainly improving but it's not gone. And that's true in you know, more true in certain cultural circles than other Others, and there are a lot of people who don't have the resources to afford psychotherapy. And I think podcasts and books and blogs, you know, these are ways that more and more different types of people from different, you know, different cultural groups and different socio economic statuses, you know, we can just get the word out to so many more people, and all people need this kind of these kinds of skills. Leann So you're normalizing that being human can suck sometimes Dr Jill Stoddard 100% a lot of the time. Leann So where are you hoping that your work goes, you know, 10 years from now you look back, what do you hope you will have accomplished? Dr Jill Stoddard Well, it's an interesting it's a timely question, because I'm actually working with a consultant right now. This exact question because I'm I'm really feeling my heart being pulled in the direction of doing more personal writing, writing that really combines my knowledge and skill around act and psychotherapy and psychology in general, but also has a more personal bend to it. I think when when I see what people connect with and the writing I've done so far, the feedback does seem to center around my voice and the accessibility and exactly what you said feeling like you're sitting next to a friend talking and I really love doing that. I really love writing in that way and and after leaving the university and building in time to write and having that work so well. I'm hoping to do even more of that. And then and then to be able to take what I'm writing about and be able to speak and teach and train. You know, these are really this is the direction I see myself. But it's still very much a work in progress. And I'm, I'm actively thinking about it right in this moment in time in my life. But I'm, I'm not really sure, I will say that I am halfway through an application to do a TED talk. So I'm putting that out there in the world, even though I feel talk about imposter syndrome. You know, I feel like Who am I that I could go do a TED talk TEDx talk, right, a smaller TED Talk. But I will go ahead and put it out there because like I said, I do live this act stuff and getting the word out about act feels really important to me, and what better way to reach a lot of people then through a TEDx talk. And so that's, that's kind of a that's a goal that's on the near horizon for me. And I'm actually attending the TED women's conference. Gosh, it's next. Next week, I believe in Palm Springs. So I'm just so looking forward to two days of massive inspiration. And I'm hoping to, I don't know, learn, learn there about how I might improve my chances of being able to follow some of these new pursuits. Leann I love how you are in the boat with us. Just because you are highly trained does not mean that your mind automatically behaves and never gives you anxiety and that you were just like the rest of us, which comes across in your writing. Definitely. So you're working to affect others and affect the future, who have been some of your influences. And do you have any books that you thought of when you were trying to write your own? Dr Jill Stoddard Well, the first person that comes to mind who just is my absolute, Shiro and I even talk about her a bit in the book is Oprah I think Oprah is just such an incredible example of someone who faced sexism, racism, poverty, abuse, I mean, any obstacle you could possibly think of. Oprah has encountered it and she has powered through and persevered and has always been her authentic self. And I just think that that is so incredibly admirable and she continues to be that way and she uses her power for good. You know, she has so much influence. And she uses it, she uses it for good. So she is kind of my number one. I very much look up to Abby won back and her book wolf pack is, I mean, it has to be at the top of my list. It's a quick if anyone hasn't read it. It's incredible. It's only about 100 pages. And it's just very inspiring. Talk about just a mighty woman and someone who trying to encourage other women to be mighty. Even my seven year old daughter read it. And if you asked her her favorite book, she would probably say wolf pack is right. Leann Which is pretty cool. Definitely. Are there other books or you know, before you were a professional, you know, what were some of your childhood favorite books? Dr Jill Stoddard Oh my gosh, well, I am a huge reader I, I read every single night before I go to bed, and I have pretty bad insomnia. So whenever I'm awake at two in the morning or four in the morning, I'm reading, reading, reading and that is the time that I reserved for my fictional pleasure books. So they have you know, very little to do with psychology. I mean, of course, they have psychological themes, but they're not self help books are not psychology books. So let's see some of my favorites. I loved the hell off so good. I don't remember author's names. And in fact, I often don't remember the titles of books because I read on a Kindle. So I never see. You never see the cover of your book. So you don't know what you're reading. I had, I had some friends I exchange, you know, read this book, read that book. And she sent a recommendation and I said, Oh, I'm gonna go download the sample now. And I looked on my Kindle. It was literally the last book I had just read. Leann So I don't remember who wrote right, Amazon should pay attention to this. Right? Right. Dr Jill Stoddard So the help was one of my favorites, the language of flowers. beautiful book, the kitchen house. I just read JoJo, his most recent book, the giver of stars. I think it's called it is the giver of stars. And that was excellent. That was one of the best books I've read in a while. I mean, as a kid, you asked what books did I like growing up? I mean, everything by Judy Blume tells her creative Nothing superfast. Are you there? God it's me, Margaret. I read all the Beverly Cleary Ramona books. my very favorite picture book at that time was quarterly. But now is a mom who reads lots of books. It's Beagle by Dan Santa's best kids book ever. I love it. Leann That is fantastic. And yes, that's exactly why this is a nonfiction book podcast, because I am horrible at finding fiction books and sitting down and reading them. So I always enjoy recommendations, especially strong recommendations. For what I should go and read and fiction. And I'm right with you and I even have the quarter or a T shirt. Oh, yeah. I can walk down any place and people will run up to me. Oh my gosh, I loved quarter. So if you're ever feeling self conscious and shy, but you still want to meet people I recommend you put on a quarter or a T shirt and go wherever you're going that you're intimidated, because people instantly fall on all over you until you all about their love of corduroy. Dr Jill Stoddard Well, now I'm going to have to incorporate that into the next self help book. That would be a great willingness exercise for people to practice, especially people who have some social anxiety. Leann Exactly. Or the other one is bring out a golden retriever. That would be my definitely. Well, I really appreciate all of your time and all of your talents, and your willingness to share all of your wealth of learning with all of us and talking to us today. Is there anything? How do we find you? Are you on social media? Your websites? Dr Jill Stoddard Yes, and everywhere. So my website is just my name Jill stoddard.com. I'm on Twitter. Oh my gosh, I don't even know all my social media handles, but I think it's Jill underscore Stoddard. And those are the two main places. I actually have an author page on Facebook that I'm planning to, you know, make announcements about book signings or podcast episodes. Or if people want to interact with me and have a conversation about the book, I would love to do that and on any of those platforms, Leann and be mighty is available for pre order. At this time, I do plan on this podcast launching just slightly before the book goes live in the beginning of January 2020. But if the pre order is over, by the time you're listening to this, please go to Amazon or your favorite bookseller. And look for be mighty by Jill Starr. Thank you so much. Dr Jill Stoddard Thank you, Leanne. It was fun to chat with you. Thanks. Take care. You too. Leann Big thank you for everyone listening to this episode of shelf aware books. You can find me at www shelf hyphen, awareness. dot com. That's shelf dash aware.com. And you can also find me on instagram@instagram.com. Slash shelf, underscore, aware. underscore. Yes, double underscores. Don't forget I want to hear from you. You can even leave a voice recording asking me anything you want about books or situations and you're trying to read your way out of, you can go to my website, shelf dash aware.com and leave a voice message on speakpipe. And remember shelf care is self care. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Mind, Body, Nutrition and Fitness - Barry Ratzlaff

Everyday Amazing

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 1, 2020 70:59

Connect with Barry Ratzlaff online in the following places:Instagram: @ratzlaffbarryHosted: Andrew Bracewell @everydayamazingpodcastProduced/Edited: Justin Hawkes @Hawkes21Full Transcription of this Interview:Andrew Bracewell: This is the podcast that finds the most elusive people the everyday amazing kind that you know nothing about. I'm hunting these people down and exposing their beauty to the world. I'm Andrew Bracewell and this is every day. Amazing. Barry Ratzlaff: Get off social media. Stop looking at Instagram pictures of people who have perfect bodies and are purveying these perfect lives because that is such a negative thing for your brain.Andrew Bracewell: Happy New Year, everybody. I'm grinning ear to ear because today's guest is one of the reasons I get up in the morning literally. But more on that later, when something is delicious, I mean really delicious. I will often attempt to describe it by saying It's like two tiny humans are having sex in my mouth. Whether or not the metaphor is accurate, my excitement in the moment is effectively communicated, and the person to whom I am speaking knows why I'm losing my mind. That's how I feel about today's guest, but we're not going to eat him or have sex with them. We're going to talk to him because in addition to the fact that he's highly intelligent, he has helped countless people change their lives by shaping the way they view their nutrition, fitness and overall health, including me. Barry Rats Laugh is a gift to mankind. But before I let him speak, I'll give you a short synopsis of what he does in some of his life accomplishments. Together with his wife, Janna, they own proactive transformations, a boutique health and fitness facility operated on their property in the Fraser Valley, their mantra. Helping people achieve their best body in a healthy way. Some of Barry's certifications and accomplishments include a C E certified personal trainer. He's an A C E certified health coach. He's certified in fitness and sports, nutrition certified and overuse, injuries and rehabilitation certified in low back disorders. In 1999 Barry was the body for life champion. In 2003 he was the Ice Atari best body champion in 2000 Very trained The Body for Life, Canadian champion, and in 2001 he trained the body for life. First runner up. That is quite the pedigree, Barry, Welcome to the show.Barry Ratzlaff: Thanks, Andrew. Good to be here.Andrew Bracewell: How does that sound? Hearing all of that that read out. Are you amazed by yourself? Just sell the copilot B s. Well, it's difficult to hear positive things about ourselves. It is. It is. So that is actually quite the ah, the list. And I want to start by asking you a little bit about your journey into the health and fitness industry and how it came to be that you're in the place you're in today.Barry Ratzlaff: Well, I was, uh I'm also a ordained minister. He But you know that. And I spent a lot of time in the church.Andrew Bracewell: You marry and bury people I didBarry Ratzlaff: for a long time. I am married and buried. I married your ah, one of your associates. Yeah. So I did that for a long time. And that lifestyle is not a healthy one. Working with kids. I was youth pastor. I worked with, uh, mostly junior high and some senior high kids. I did it for 15 years, and through the course of those 15 years, we eat a lot of doughnuts and you drink a lot of pop and you have a lot of late nights with Doritos on buses heading to youth events. And it's it's it's a gong show, physically like you're just getting fatter and fatter and more and more tired. And you just keep yourself going with sugar.Andrew Bracewell: This was like eighties and nineties orBarry Ratzlaff: Ah, yeah. I graduated from Bible school in 91 my first church was up north in Fort McMurray in 92 0 wow. I didn't know for a fact or Mac. Two and 1/2 years. Yeah, my personal hell. ButAndrew Bracewell: I have more on that later. Yes, exactly. TheBarry Ratzlaff: place where you could be nothing other than Pastor Bury. All right. It was awful. Anyway, so, uh, through the course of the of my pastor eight years, I just got more and more out of shape when I had a few attempts at getting into shape over the period of time where I would and I didn't know much. I've been lifting admitting the gym since I was 13 yearsAndrew Bracewell: old. Yeah. So you were a child athlete, right? Early? Yeah. I read about these kindBarry Ratzlaff: of won all the athlete of the year awards through elementary and high school. A big wrestler back in the day. And when the B C championships got a scholarship sf you which I turned down, I didn't want to wrestle anymore. It was just It was misery, like physically punishing that I enjoyed the physical punishment. But you're always dieting. You're always restricting your nutrition to keep your weight class right. It's just like boxing. You're constantly moving, moving down away class, trying to be competitive. And so I just did that for all of my high school years and said, I'm kind of done with this now I just want to move on. Where was I going with that? It was competitive athlete. All through those yearsAndrew Bracewell: you're in Fort Mac and for Mr Berry, And the original question was, How did you journey out of the Pastor Berry mode into?Barry Ratzlaff: So it's your today, tried a few times, get to get into shape, And it was always without any nutritional knowledge. And back in the day, like in the nineties, there wasn't a lot of you walk into a health food store. You walk into a bookstore, you didn't see a lot of good information about how to do this. The Body for Life book hadn't come out yet, which was really the very first user friendly book that came out. The first system don't want Hey, I could do this to Before that. It was like Arnold's encyclopedia bodybuilding, right?Andrew Bracewell: But that was only good for the guys. The gym rats who were who were living that lightBarry Ratzlaff: was only good for them. And also bodybuilding, weightlifting resistance training at that time and before was considered an underground activity that was not worth anything and set for meatheads. So if you were Oh, yeah, okay, if you're a linebacker for a football team or you want to be a big, thick, no neck wrestler, then you go to the gym and pump iron. But everyone else in the world should really avoid it because it's dangerous. It'll hurt your joints. It'll make you a meathead. Women will get huge and muscular and disgusting if they lift weights. So that was the common knowledge or the common wisdom of the day. And it was completely wrong, which we know now because everybody's getting into it. But back then, that's how it was. And so, uh, I had made attempts to get into shape. I remember didn't want a 98. My my local gym, too, burnt down shortly after. It wasn't my fault, but he didn't hurt down shortly after it had a get in shape contest. And I'm like, Good Lord, I'm gonna do this because I want Oh, they had a very nominal price. Whatever it was like one month, three membership in a egg of grapes. Suddenly it was just It was really dismal. But I was youth pastor. So if you waved anything in front of me, I'd be gone for it. Like Holy crap, I could win grapes. I'm doing this. And so I I did that and I starved myself down to this. But £215 not a really impressive look. Kind of soft and flat because I was starving for three months.Andrew Bracewell: It should be noted, we need to give people perspective on what, 250lb? Because 250lb for you, Junior 15 215lb for you is actually kind of small.Barry Ratzlaff: Oh, I was a bone rack. Yeah,Andrew Bracewell: because you've walked around before At what? To 265 to 270Barry Ratzlaff: today. Walked around to 265.Andrew Bracewell: And when you are a lean, mean machine, you've been to 235 to 240. 240? Yeah. So to 215 is actually tinyBarry Ratzlaff: way underweight for me. Yeah, So I in a classic fashion which so many people are familiar with, I dyed it down to this specific weight that I thought I should get to it. Not even about anything about body composition, how much muscle I had or just get down to this. Wait. How's how late can I get and quickly snap a picture before I lose my freaking mind? And as quickly as the pictures done, get me in the car and I'm going to in W for, like, five team burgers because I want to get the party started. And so I did that, and so literally IAndrew Bracewell: was actually teen burgers. Did you actually do that?Barry Ratzlaff: I was straight to in w. Had hadAndrew Bracewell: not Big Mac's, not Cooper'sBarry Ratzlaff: to team burgers to teen burgers. And awesome, I think onion rings. That's amazing. A coke it was in. SoAndrew Bracewell: a cool 2500 calories. So this this isBarry Ratzlaff: and this could be will be segueing into this later. But that that waas, that's the microcosm of everyone's diet experience, which is I'm gonna I'm gonna be disciplined, and I'm gonna totally just beat my body and make it my slave and I'm gonna be fantastic and just don't get to my goal and I will fall apart because it's completely unsustainable. And once it's like Frank the Tank and old school, once the beer hits his lips,Andrew Bracewell: it's so good. It's so good. Next thing he'sBarry Ratzlaff: streaking down looks, orders the quad. That's that's most people's that experience, which is ice restrict myself. And then I lose my freakin mind through a season like we just came through. How many times did I hear from people? You know what? I'm just gonna I'm January 1. I'm gonna be back on the wagon. You'll see. For now, I'm eating this entire tray of parties Chocolates. It's like, Okay, I get it.Andrew Bracewell: The highs and lows of New Year's resolutions. Yeah. So backBarry Ratzlaff: to the story, which is I. I won that contest, got my bag of grapes in my free month, and within six months I was back up to 60 to 70. Within 10 months, I was at 2 80 So I just my body. So your body is a very intelligent machine. It knows exactly what it shouldn't shouldn't do. And when you restrict it in a way that's very aggressive. It is lying and wait just like a tiger to pounce on. You mean metabolically and take you back up that that ladder is faster. They canAndrew Bracewell: because it's been starved. And so now it wants to. It'sBarry Ratzlaff: an evolutionary reality that our bodies are designed not to do that. They're not designed to be restricted like that. They will fight back. They fight back with a vengeance. And when they fight back, they come back in a way that we had. You think you feel good again like Oh, yeah, this is fantastic. I do love doughnuts and pasta and breads and entire loaves of bread and one sitting.Andrew Bracewell: This is fantastic.Barry Ratzlaff: But you don't realize within a very short period of time you put on 2030 £40 I'm back to where I started. So I was back to where it started and a little more right and that you hear that story again and again. So I gained all the weight back and a little extra because your body is defending itself. It's just doing what supposed to do. So then I was reading. That year was 98 United States had the body for life conscious back then was called body of work. Bill Phillips, his brother Shawn Phillips. They put this out? Yes. Um, experimental Applied Sciences had this contest out and I was looking through magazines. Saw the article. I went, Ah, I want to do it so bad. But I can't. It's only American citizens because he was giving away a Lamborghini. Oh, so it was only us start $250,000 car and it was this incredible thing. And if you've gotten, if you want, you got to be part of a movie. He was making a movie called Body of Work and he flew Flee down too. Colorado. And it was just crazy. So I wanted to do that, But it wasn't available to Canadians. So the next year 99 I hear from my gym manager a Did you hear that body body for body of work is now available to Canadian soon a Canadian version and I went okay. It is game on, but I didn't have the knowledge to do it, so I thought, OK, on. I've been down to 2 15 before. I'm gonna go hard again So for about two weeks, I started doing the same process. Restrictive nutrition and exercise up the ying yang just overkill. Just cardio, cardio, cardio and, you know, lifting weights and just just not really knowing exactly how it all works. But just throwing as much as I could against my body to see what I couldAndrew Bracewell: publish. Were you in competition like you started immediately in competitionBarry Ratzlaff: as soon as they were playing around with your body to see what you don't know, I wanted to jump right in because all you had to do was take a picture with him with a newspaper. Young people familiar with thisAndrew Bracewell: back in the day. That's what youBarry Ratzlaff: did. You did. You see, it's time stamped. Yeah, and ah, And long as it was a three month window, you could you just start and finish?Andrew Bracewell: It was a body mass index. Was it or was a fat loss, orBarry Ratzlaff: what were they preferred that you do scale weight and body mass index and you send that in and then they would be able to judge from your photos if you were telling the truth or not. If you were just trying to take them for a ride. And so I started, and I realized two weeks in. This is not going well, like I'm not gonna I really want to win this because for me, as a youth pastor, the prize was $10,000 plus a trip to Maui. Let's two year sponsorship.Andrew Bracewell: It's like 35% of your years withBarry Ratzlaff: $3000 ring and a $5000 your package. It was crazy was about $35,000 worth of stuff all together, which for a youth passed.Andrew Bracewell: That's a year. So I'm like, My God, I haveBarry Ratzlaff: to win this! And in my brain, you said you can't win. But my brains always been the kind of Brandon goes. Course I can. I just have to figure this out. So I decided I went around to local gyms, and there's only a few of the time V. R. C. There was Cedar Park Fitness Center, which was Gators after the fact. And then there was, you know,Andrew Bracewell: there are worlds andBarry Ratzlaff: there was, but this world's was long gone, you know? Where the Savoy? Yeah, the world's Jim. Yeah, And what they rose Gold's gym actually, that's right. Yes. Yeah. I was a member of their little while.Andrew Bracewell: That was the real monkey cage.Barry Ratzlaff: It was Don Schultz said that place. And it was Yeah, it was like the guys who consider themselves real lifters. There's chocolate replacing the raps and everything. Like Ruin was grunting and yeah, just a testosterone house, which I kind of like, but they didn't last. They didn't Didn't make money. So So I went around to the gyms that were in the area, and I walked in the gym and I'd look around. I'd pay, though, drop in fee. And I just look and go. Who here is amazing? Like, who looks fantastic. And I pick him up and I'd wait from the finish, their work out. I don't interrupt your workout, and I'd sit by the front door if they had a juice party. But wait there. And I asked him, Can I? And I ask you a few questions and buy you a drink, and they're like, Yeah, for sure. They'd sit down, and so I just asked them. So how did you do this? You look amazing. Like what? What's your routine? What's your nutrition and they'd start telling me they they didn't. Back then, no one was guarding secrets and there was no personal trainers in town.Andrew Bracewell: And no one's asking people those questions back then. Either know today you'd probably get a bit of a guarded response because everybody's doing it. No one wants to reveal, soBarry Ratzlaff: you'd get a little bit of a reference to a website or to an instagram account. Or sure, Do you think this guy's June or I'm doing F 45 Mark Wahlberg?Andrew Bracewell: It is my peach plan. Back off. Yeah, SoBarry Ratzlaff: I saw Mark Wahlberg humping of 45 today. And as soon as I saw him pumping, I said, He's an investor. Oh, and then I saw Yesterday another one comes up on my instagram Gap. Mark Wahlberg, investor and going for investors. Sure, that's last flogging that thing likeAndrew Bracewell: a naked dolphin anyway. But did you know that all dolphins turn? You've never seen that? It's quite the sight. Do you swing it by the tail of the head? How do you do that? Well, we can show you later. That's a live demo. Gonna get letters about cruelty to dolphin. Yeah, keep going very just going.Barry Ratzlaff: I love the dolphins. Love the war when Dan Marino was at the helm, That's okay. So I went to three or four places, talk to three or four guys that I thought were in incredible shape. And then I had one guy in my in my gym Gators Jim. Brian Wong was his name. He was this this Ah, Asian bodybuilder guy. And he was just freaking out A real like, chiseled and just huge. And every time I saw him, I went has got the craziest body like it's crazy. So I talked to him and he kind of laid it out for me. Okay, Okay. All right. And I kind of put it together, But I still was defaulting to my old habits. I couldn't help it. It's like No, no wisdom dictates. Restrict your calories, do lots of activity. That's how it works. So I kept going down that path, starving your body water, working right, So not taking into account any of the clerk balances and intake and, you know, it was crazy. So I didn't remember this date. This changed my life. In essence, this is what set me on a new path of a new career I worked out. It was probably three weeks into the process, and I worked out worked up the way I always do, just also the wall prank, that just sweating till I was dizzy. I could hardly stand up, had no energy, left my body and I went to the juice bar. They're Gators. Jim and I sat down and Brian was there. He had been watching me work out, and he talked to me earlier a couple weeks earlier or a week earlier. And he's so he sat beside me. He goes, Hey, very you're doing the, ah, the body of work contest, right? That's it. Yeah. Hey, guys, how's it going? Said I think I'm doing pretty good, but I don't totally know. I feel just dizzy all the time and weird, and I've told the story many times and the Gators gym at that time. They sold these oatmeal cookies that were literally the size of a dinner plate, like they were huge, probably 800 calorie cookie. He reaches across and he holds it up to the owner, says, Put it on. My tab passes to me and he goes eat that. I said, You're kiddingAndrew Bracewell: me. I can't eat that. He goes. How manyBarry Ratzlaff: calories do you think he just burned in your workout? I watched you. I said, I don't know. He goes. You're probably 800 to 1000 The way you train. I want 1/2 Crazy said, Eat that. You gotta start feeding this system the system and I want. Really? So I ate the cookie, sat there. He made me eat it, didn't give me any pause, ate the cookie and went home feeling just wow. Amazing. Then I started understand all the things that I'd learn from these people that I talk to you, that there's a system that your body wants to subscribe to it and it works. And you can gain muscle and lose fat at the same time. People always say you can't do it. Same time I did. No steroids, no major products. I gained almost £20 of muscle and lost £50 of fat in a 14 week period. It was insane. I was being accused by guys. Watch me going. You're on juice, man. Oh, yeah. He's old juiced up here. I'm talking about me behind my back. Well, he's old. You still man, like No, not eating like a savage and training intelligently.Andrew Bracewell: Wow. So that was the beginning of your health. Fitness journey career. You eventually dropped the pastor thing. We don't have to get into the specifics of what you did there. But what year did you all of a sudden say Okay, Barry, Rats laugh, and it should be noted. Janet does this with you. Your wife? Janet. When did you say we are fitness trainers or health coaches or whatever? You call yourself a the time. Was that 2001 too?Barry Ratzlaff: S o I received. The prize is beginning of 2000. And as soon as I got home from Hawaii, they had a publication in the Muscle and Fitness magazine or the whatever the GS publication WAAS and Ah, my phone started to ring because they just they allAndrew Bracewell: theBarry Ratzlaff: published was named not phone numbers and stuff and contact info. But I started getting calls from all over the world. I'd be sleeping too. Am I get a phone call from New Zealand?Andrew Bracewell: I might have read your article that somebody like you look fantastic. Sort of. You know, it's It's a different top. There's times where and what time. So I too am a bit sorry, man, I didn't mean to do that. Okay? Can you just give me a few tips? Three chips quickly. OK, I'll tellBarry Ratzlaff: you what I did. And they stood, The phone started ringing, and I started having coffee with guys. And it happened, Maur and more and more. And so, Genesis, you need to start. You're taking a lot of time out of your scheduling. This is operating money. Sure. And I'm a youth pastor. Right? The whole idea is service for nothing. Like your life is worthless. Give it to the Lord and you may or may not get something back. We'll see. We'llAndrew Bracewell: rewards are eternal. They are. When you see the crown that you're gonna get, you'll be so excited. Yeah, but I've never worn a crown. I know, but you're gonna love Oh, my God. I love you so much. You put language to things that are in my head all the time. Just do it so much better than me. Well, there you go. SoBarry Ratzlaff: the phone was ringing. I was going out with people for coffees, and I was basically giving them my system and not charging. And then I started charging little money for it. And the first time I charge somebody, I felt so guilty. I think I charged him 50 bucks for, like, an hour and 1/2 and he just There you go the next time. And did I tried for 100? Yeah. There you go. And then I tried for 1 50 Yeah, absolutely. Totally worth it. You know, like, Okay, this is stupid. I have to I have to get certified as a trainer, so I can do this for real and charge these people for real. And so yeah. So the Jan and I decided we put our heads together, said, Let's just get certified and get her personal train certificates. And we did that. And we kind of launched while I was still a youth pastor. But knowing that things were changing in my life, I've been a youth pastor for a long time, and my energy and will to keep up and contend with kids was was kind of coming to a close, and, ah, and then the church I was part of her. That time had a big shake up in it. You know, the leader wasAndrew Bracewell: kind ofBarry Ratzlaff: going down the signs and wonders trail of kind of kookiness. And I just wanted to get out so bad. And ah, and then all the stars align. I said, You know what? I'm done the Remember the day this is this is gonna off topic, But you gotta edit this out.Andrew Bracewell: We're not in Italy on go. Yeah.Barry Ratzlaff: So I got a phone call I had worked at the at this church that I was in for eight years. I had never had a meeting with an elder. Not once, because I just did what I supposed to do. And I had an amazing youth group, a big team of volunteers. That was awesome. We had a great thing going, so no one ever bug me. They said not Leave him alone. He's doing great. Kids love him. The staff love him. It's great. I got a phone call.Andrew Bracewell: Hey. Yeah, Yeah. Berry. Yeah, this is Dave here. Ah, from the oldest board would load up a coffee with you just to discuss a few things to see howBarry Ratzlaff: your ministries going. His voice is cracking. I'm going. You're such aAndrew Bracewell: piece of shit. You You're just I know exactly.Barry Ratzlaff: I don't know exactly where he's gonna go. I knew that what I was because I had been teaching on a certain thing. Brian McLaren. A new tank. Yeah, that stuff called wind. And they're all offendedAndrew Bracewell: that there is no such thing as a new dime crystal. It's awful. So IBarry Ratzlaff: went to the meeting with the elders with my resignation letter in my pocket, walked into Tim Hortons. There they were, these two guys looking pretty nervous. They thought they'd kind of strong hand me a bit and, you know, saying Can we get you back in line? And And they said they talked about McClaren first they talked niceties. I'm going. Just get through. It just gets through that crash. I want to talk to you about my life. Then they got to the second part, which was likeAndrew Bracewell: so basedBarry Ratzlaff: on what we understand, McClaren and a new Christianity all stuff DoAndrew Bracewell: you think you can still work atBarry Ratzlaff: our church and hold those views? Because we'd love to have you as part of ourAndrew Bracewell: team, but we feel like you're shifting. I said Nope, I can't.Barry Ratzlaff: And I pulled my resignation of plotting the table said, There's my two weeks. Thank you, gentlemen. Enjoy your day. And I walked out and they just sat there with white faces because they didn't want to lose me. But they did. And I thought, this is fantastic. So I walked down the street from the Tim Hortons on the corner of South Frazer waiting. Glad when there and ah, I got about 100 feet past store and walk and feel like a 1,000,000Andrew Bracewell: bucks. I just quit a job. Oh, yes. Oh, God, Like it should be noted at that time in your life. You got young Children, four young Children, four young Children. You're you're not floating in money. No, you're you're living relatively paycheck to paycheck.Barry Ratzlaff: When I ever went to take vacations, a few of my client's razz me about this. I would go to the auctions, and at that time, in the most lucrative thing that I could flip was a mobility scooter, and some might find these mobility scooters at the auction. I'd fix them up putting batteries, and I'd sell them at a big profit so I could take my family on vacation. Would have enough money to do that. That's how he funded my fun stuff with flipping things.Andrew Bracewell: Wow. Yeah. So that's quite the story. I meet you in 2007. And so when I meet you in 2007 you've now been operating in a new way For, what, 45 years, then?Barry Ratzlaff: Yeah, we saw. That was 2001. I finished at the church. 2003 for good. And 2003. We hung basically hunger shingles. Got a website going. I remember the first guy. This is crazy. The first guy that walked through my door to be trained, uh, rob deck. He's a helicopter pilot with with chinook. He sat on my kitchen table. He wrote me a check for the full value of 36 session program the body for life program, and watched him signing this. Check this. I'm like, this is one dude, and he just wrote me a check for $1700. That's what I got paid every two weeks ofAndrew Bracewell: the church. Like this is if I could get like, I'm withBarry Ratzlaff: these guys, I'm I'm going golden and my very first client, Rob Dick. He won the Canadian body for life.Andrew Bracewell: That's so so cool because I had no one you coached. You coached him and doing that? Yeah. Okay,Barry Ratzlaff: now he's just another one.Andrew Bracewell: I knew you had done that. I just didn't know who you would coach. But that's the guy you coached to. Yeah, Okay.Barry Ratzlaff: And I coached on the guy in Chilled like Rob, Best former gym owner of gators. And he won the Canadian body for life. So we actually five champions. You're a little old, Jim.Andrew Bracewell: Not everybody in life gets to experience this, unfortunately, But the thing that you just alluded to that ah ha moment that you can have in life where you get paid fair value for the value that you bring her for your time. Yeah, It's quite a life changing moment to experience that not everybody gets to, but clearly for you, that was significant. And and I have experienced that as well.Barry Ratzlaff: So it was huge, and it's very difficult to accept that. Like, to believe you're worthy of that money. Absolutely. It just doesn't seem right.Andrew Bracewell: Hey, you. You touched on something. Really? I want to circle back to because there's a whole rabbit hole that we can go down. You talked about how, when, in the early part of your journey, your old mind thought, work hard, starve yourself And somewhere along the way, your new mind with your cookie story, and then thereafter learned that work hard and actually give your body a bounty. All right, good nutrition. And that is something. If I could explain that, that's a similar experience I had with you. So when I met you in 2007 and we don't have to get into the all of my story, well, maybe we can if you want, but my old brain thought the same thing. Starvation is nutrition, but that is not the case. So can you just dive into that a little bit and then also speak to the significant transformation, or maybe the ups and downs of the nutrition world in the last 20 years of you, as you've observed it from your chair?Barry Ratzlaff: Yeah, the ah, the value of nutrition cannot be overstated. It's easily 78. 80% of any successful short term and long term program is nutrition. It has to be your body's designed to use fuel in a way that makes sense to it. If it doesn't get what it needs, it's gonna basically shut itself down. It'll it'll turn itself off in and you won't get anywhere. Um, everyone has those experiences of plateaus and in their routines, plateaus, and some of them are normal. Some of them are very, very damaging. So the idea of understanding a your metabolic level like Where's What are you burning at rest in a given day? Well, I'm sitting here talking to you,Andrew Bracewell: which is different for everybody, right?Barry Ratzlaff: It's different for everybody, particularly for folks. So when I get people come to the gym doors that I know how it's called metabolic damage. So they have done dieting. They've done Kato. They've done all these horrific things to themselves and some of them not so horrific. Some of them truly are very, very damaging. They really need a start up there. They're burning, you know, 1500 calories a day when they should be burning 2500 calories aAndrew Bracewell: day because they've trained their body to live on starvation. Their bodies furnace is running at such an incredibly low.Barry Ratzlaff: They haven't trained anything. They've just caused a huge reaction in their system. The bodies is defending itself. It's just going into this retreat mode where it's gonna hold on to any calories it gets rather than burn them off,Andrew Bracewell: right? If you only want to give me 1200 calories, then I will learn how to operate off 12. And I haveBarry Ratzlaff: to, and it happens within 7 to 10 days. So so that's why I'm such a huge proponent of Sai clicked. Cyclist. Nutrition and every user were dieting. It's cycling contrition, so eating up and eating down and knowing where the line is and making sure the eating up enough to keep your metabolism stoked eating down enough that if you're trying to get off some body, thought you could do that, but only in a very short period of time. It's it's really a 5 to 7 day window that you can cycle through before your body begins to catch on. So, like, for instance, body for life, I keep referring to that people. It's funny. Whenever I talk to people body for life, they go,Andrew Bracewell: Oh hey, yeah, I did that program back in the day I'm like and yeah, I got I lost, like, £40 I felt fantastic. And I started stopped doingBarry Ratzlaff: it because of the next thing came out. Whatever it was, South Beach came out. And And Tony, whatever his name is in the PX nine year P 90 X came out. You know, the next thing came out and people think, Oh, all these programs revolving the human species must be evolving. So I have to change with the times like and then, uh, didn't you read the title of the book body for life Like It's for life? This works for life. I've been doing it 20 years. When I first had the this Ah ha moment began eating like this where I was eating 5 to 6 times a day on o'clock, measured amounts knew it was going in. It was going out. I was still working in the church at that time, and I go down to the staff room. I had I bought a blender, brought it in there. I have my own box of shakes there in the cupboard and remember is blending. One day one of the secretaries came in. She goes, she kind of looked at me with this sort of not really disdain, but, like, really, really, that's what you're doing. I know all about diets and she goes, How long can you keepAndrew Bracewell: that up? I said, Honestly, well, would Weight Watchers have been a thing at that time? Yes, like that's I remember Weight Watchers. So maybe her experience with dieting was probably something like that, which is heavy restrictionBarry Ratzlaff: going way back. Like you even reference still ity that that Atkins was 1972 started in 1972. Resurgence in the nineties and all the way through James Fix and his running, you know, his extreme running the guy who ran himself to death and had a heart attack. There was stuff all along the way. That was basically they were potholes for people to have these experiences of restriction, to lose weight and then to realize they couldn't do it. They blame themselves, and the diet industry lies heavily on that, that we will blame ourselves for it not working, and then we'll come back again and try harder next time because, well, I failed last time because I am a failure, not the program was a failure. If the program solid it is, does it is supposed to do? And it it has some degree of longevity built into it. It should work for anybody, really. But that's not how it worksAndrew Bracewell: so well, Call it cyclical dieting that fair. So you've embraced cyclical cyclical dieting for the last 20 year. So years. In that time, you've also now observed all of the fad diets, and you alluded to some of them. Whether it's Atkins, Kato, South Beach, I could probably think of a couple others if I scratch my head. Yeah, Paleo Haley. Oh, yeah, yeah. How has that have you? How have you had to deal with that in terms of your clients and your street conversations? And how has that impacted your business and whatever the parties, you're right where you're sipping cocktails and everyone has an opinion on something.Barry Ratzlaff: Everybody has an opinion because everyone has a body and everyone's a mouth and everyone's a smartphone. Put those together and you gotta just a dynamite box for people to have this knowledge about how you know what works and what doesn't the thing about. So let's let's pick on a current one, and I'm not picking on on purpose. I'm picking on it because I've seen too many bad stories or I seen the stories and poorly too many times. So it's Kato. Now People come to me and say, What do you think about Kato? And the thing I always say first is it works. It works like a hot damn if you're trying to get your body fat reduced. If you don't care about losing muscle mass, you don't care about losing your metabolic potential. If you're just trying to get lighter, you can't get better than kitto. You'll you'll lose fat at a shocking rate. But you'll also lose water, which is a big piece of the puzzle, because when you lose carbohydrates, carbohydrates and water bond in your system toehold in the muscle tissue, so you lose water. You lose a big monument that way. But the payoff at the end, or the payout at the end of that process is always always a nightmare. So two stories Ah guy, I know I won't see the place where he's employed, but I saw him at his place of employment about two years ago, and I saw him. And he's normally about £340 for here and £30. And he was maybe 200. I was like, Oh, my goodness. What have you done? He goes a I know, right? Look at this. Crazy. He's touching this. Get on his stomach. It's all floppy in loose and thinking. Maybe he has to have some surgery on that. And I said, So what you do. And he goes, I did. Kato got in a Keogh plan and just dropped 100. And whatever was £140. I'm like, Dude, you look amazing. Like you're You look amazing. And so then I inserted my caveat, which is No, I'm proud of you. Amazing job. Can I ask you a question? Yes. Is this sustainable? Can you do this for the rest of your life? He goes, I don't know if I can eat whole cream and bacon for breakfast every day. And avocados and and steak fat like like I know, I know. So I'm asking you, can you just forever. No, I can't. It's okay. I said, Are you thinking of transitioning into Ah, balanced lifestyle, Ingles? Yes, I am. I said king. Promise me this that you will phone me when the time comes and we can have a discussion. And I can help you set up a plan to get this thing done right? Because I will. I will. I said I won't charge you. I am so vested in this that I want to give this to you as a gift of Don't. Don't do this, man. Don't go down that road. I've seen it too many times. She goes okay. I will. I will. We lost touch. I didn't see him. He got transferred that story to another store. And ah, about a year later, he was then transferred back to the store and I saw him and I went Oh, my goodness. He was 3 50 I saw him and I I walked up and said, Hey, how's it going, man? He goes, Hey, and you could see the look of shame and defeat in his eyes because I hadn't changed at all over that year. But he had put on 100 and £50 and ah, hey, just he was a defeated human being and the chance of him being able to recover from that and get the weight down in a healthy way. Extremely, extremely low possibility ofAndrew Bracewell: that. So I would suggest from my anecdotal experience, which is not as vast as yours but as I've observed many of these bad diets from the sideline, I fortunately, you know, met you years ago when I did and embraced. What I would say is the right long term, holistic, healthy way of tackling the conversation of health and fitness. But what I've seen in the others is that the focus is weight loss predominantly without having to put work in in the gym. Is that a fair statement of a lot of those? Because my experience has been tackled the nutrition piece. But then along with the nutrition piece, is you gotta work your ass off in the gym. And if you're not willing to work your ass off in the gym than long term, it's not sustainable because our bodies are meant to move and work and anything that says you don't have to move and work is a trick that that's my own. Is that fair?Barry Ratzlaff: Absolutely early. Atkins early Kato. Others variations of Kitano called dirty heat or psych like Ito, where people are trying to make it a process where you could do this for life and you can incorporate exercise extreme exercise. And you can break muscle tissue down like we do in the gym and have it rebuild because carbohydrates are a fairly essential process part of that process. Um, yeah, that's a very fair statement to make.Andrew Bracewell: So where I go with this in my brain is that I look at the evolution of, you know, mankind and I think Okay, so let's go back 405 100,000 years ago, whatever we did not have to work to move in, that our body movement and physical activity came as a byproduct of what had to happen. Every day we were connected to the Earth. We had to work the ground, you know, work, work, the livestock. I mean, just to live and eat required physical exertion. And then we go through this metamorphosis evolutionary experience in life, and today we don't have to move. You and I could sit here on a chair in a lethargic state and be just fine with computers and smartphones and whatever else we want to add to that so I find, because of my own health experience and the fact that I was obese at a point time. My life. I find myself having these conversations now with our Children who are growing up in an even more lethargic state than I grew up in. And it's interesting because I don't think working out is a natural thing. I don't think a human just wakes up one day and says, I want to go push. Wait, So I'm gonna go for a run so we maybe have toe work. We have to convince ourselves that we need to do this because of the lethargic state that were in there were naturally living. And I'm having this conversation with my Children and they're even fighting me on it. But my fear is that if we don't train ourselves early that we need to do this, then you know we end up in a place that we don't want to be in. It's just Ah, this is a convo that were in every day, and I think we're here because of where we've come evolutionary on evolution basis.Barry Ratzlaff: Oh yeah, and I mean there's in the last 30 40 years There's been a huge movement in the school system to move away from physical activity as legislated. So my son was here for Christmas, and he's a personal trainer, Victoria. He was reading a book called Spark, and he was very excited about it. He was telling me a little excerpt from it. Basically, it's based on a gentleman's research down in Idaho where it's I think it's Idaho. It's the only state that has legislated physical activity in the states. Still, most of them moved away. They've cut those programs, so they've gotten rid of art. They've got rid of music, and they got rid of a visit. This guy was really interesting to visit because the neurotrophic value of exercise. So in this little enclave in Idaho, where these students air forced to forced to exercise their grades, are off the charts better in some of their math scores than Stan. Chinese schools, like these kids are killing it, and they're discovering that what happens to the brain when it's forced to B e, the bodies used in a way that you know, resistance training, intense exercise. It's the only way you can create these. These neural pathways in these chemicals, your endorphins in your serotonin and all these good things. They're supposed to be part of who we are, and they really helped build the brain in a functional way, an i Q way. And so there were just We've moved away from very, very valuable pieces of who we are as human beings, thinking they were not straws we don't need that would get the car and driver were going. Who wants to walk, well, well, ourselves around the mall, there's escalators. Take us up on the flights of stairs. There's all these things not knowing that we're shooting ourselves in the foot literally, um, physically. And we need to get back to the basics of why it's important for all this work to happen for our bodies. Fascinating for sure.Andrew Bracewell: You have a unique chair that you sit in in what in your vocation and what you do on the way, I'll do my best to describe it, and you can tell me if I've done a good job of it a little happy Speak to it. But my observation of you is that the majority of your clients are high level achievers in their varying areas of profession. And these people sit with you 34 times week for an hour or more, and you get to dialogue with them. And I've often thought that is fascinating that six, maybe five days, a week, eight hours a day or more. You're with high level achieving humans who have chosen to put their fitness and health versus a priority. What is that? What is that like to be in that environment 24 7 IBarry Ratzlaff: would say it's ah, it's encouraging in a in a weird way. You think? Oh, man, you're on these people, these these these humans, they're they're worth hundreds of millions of dollars and they're out there pulling strings. You know, in the real world that they're in control of some really cool stuff and they walked through my door and the door closes and agent, I just see the relief would go across your face there like a They're in a safe place, a place where they could be themselves. They can tell me what's going on inside of themselves because they know I have, ah, counseling pastoral history. And that piece of me didn't die like I still have a passion for understanding, helping and loving human beings in a way that gets them to a new place.Andrew Bracewell: That's the Lord Berry. I know the spirit of peace is in my hut. Gonna touch you in a way you have imagined. Okay, E i e I know it doesn't take much to get you off theBarry Ratzlaff: tangents air their attention there. So these guys come through the door and it's I just trained guys. I do train. Currently, I have one female, which is your wife, and you come together as a couple, but mostly guys and they come in andAndrew Bracewell: they should be noted. Your wife trainsBarry Ratzlaff: My wife trains the ladies? Yes, she works with ladies. Shay works, but the lady isn't at work with the gentleman.Andrew Bracewell: It seems to be the best system we could very old fashioned. Arranged.Barry Ratzlaff: It is. It is. Yeah. Yeah, it just saves us from from issues. Sure, Yeah, yeah. From issues that could be life altering. So we don't want to go down those paths. So they come through the door and the it's it's fantastic because they get to be riel. They love this. The pieces of it that I find very curious. They love me, telling them what to do because in their lives no one tells them what to do. They make the rules. If they can't make the rule, they'll buy a new rule like it's it's pretty cool. So they walk through the door and they kind of go, OK, Dad, what are you doingAndrew Bracewell: today like All right, here we go.Barry Ratzlaff: And off we go on our little journey or fitness journey. But it's way more than a fitness journey for these guys. It's always way more there. Is there so much more? In terms of the they need a place where they can be themselves. They need a place like cheers where everyone knows your name. Or at least one guy knows your name, your true name. And ah, we'll hear you out. You could tell me stuff thatAndrew Bracewell: you get it all right. Like you're you're in the therapist here Stuff? Yeah,Barry Ratzlaff: but every month I hear someone say I not even my wife knows this. Sure,Andrew Bracewell: but except me, honey, I don't talk to bury that way on DDE.Barry Ratzlaff: I'm totally good with it, like and I'd have no no needs toe feel like Oh, yeah, this is great. Having this insider information, it's like, No, it's like you're what you're telling me is in the vault and to guess what, We're all the same. And that's not a piece that makes me feel really good when these guys air coming up. Now what that way is that we are all the same. We all walk the same earth and we have the same issues. It doesn't matter if you have $100 million or $100 you face the same shit and it's how you deal with it that counts. Right now, these guys deal with things very differently. Their minds. So this is This is a note I made earlier in coming into. This is when I see and I was talking to one of my clients essay about this very factor, which is when someone walks through the door of the gym and I can usually tell how they're gonna react to pain. The way a person's pain response is is often how they'll function in life and most Taipei's. When you give them pain, it's sparked something in them. It doesn't shut them down. Most people get pain. They're like,Andrew Bracewell: Oh, that hurts. That hurts that IBarry Ratzlaff: I don't want to do that. That's that's uncomfortable, but a type A or like a really achiever. They feel pain, and it actually sparks curiosity.Andrew Bracewell: Yeah, I don't I don't even not toe push back on your comment. But I think it would be unfair to say Taipei's because there's there's people, maybe who aren't Taipei's who are high achievers. Yeah, I put that you agree not to pick what you're saying, but I know what I know. The spirit of what you're trying to say. People who are capable of a lot respond differently than those that are not. Is that it or not? Yeah, yeah,Barry Ratzlaff: I've had clients that that one is specific. Who every time I put a weight in his hand and he would do a rap as the way it was coming up, he was literally be saying outAndrew Bracewell: loud, out, out, out, out, out, out, and doesn't go down. Oh, out, out!Barry Ratzlaff: And he lasted two weeks and quit because for obvious reasons, yeah, versus a guy who I'll say, OK, this set is 10 wraps. He'll look at me and I like a challenge like 10. I'm giving you 12 and off he goes and he'll get his 12 like it just doesn't matter what number give. It's always more always moreAndrew Bracewell: the pattern in these people's lives just manifesting itself in the It is in the weight room.Barry Ratzlaff: Now on the inverse someone who has had not much success in life, who gets their physical self under control. They begin to see a spill over into all of their life. I heard it again and again and again like I don't know what's happening. But as I'm getting in better shape, I'm way more productive at work. Things were going so much better. My relationship with my wife, my family, is getting better like what's happening to me like it's like your body's doing what's designed to do, the chemicals air flowing. It'sAndrew Bracewell: well, I I'll, so I'll share a piece of my story with you. But I mean, I So I encountered you twice, encountered you first in 2000 and seven, and the things that I learned with you in that moment, I didn't stick with it. And, you know, we were with each other for maybe a year and I went away and I continued in some unhealthy living. But I came back to you in 2012 and the transformation I went through in 2012 I think at my highest I was £235. I was over 30% body fat. I was, by definition I was obese and I was 29 years old and I have been told I was pre diabetic from a doctor who scared the living shit out of me and thank God that he did, because had he not I probably I had this false confidence in my brain. Even though I wasn't amazing, I still thought I was amazing. I still have that to this day. Really. But in that moment I was like a soft bowl of pudding, and I probably thought like I was a middle linebacker, you know? But I needed to have the shit scared out of me. I did came back in 2012 point of the story being the transformation I went through with you in that let's say 6 to 12 month period in that second time back, and I've been with you ever since. But through the fall of 12 the first half of 13 I remember I went from £235 down to 182. I got my body fat index below 10%. I'm not living at that level today, but I went there and it changed my life. It so for me there was, you know, something that occurred in the gym spilled over into into the rest of my life. In the my family health, the health of my career, the way I engaged with humans, just my overall well being mental well being actually snapped in that, you know, in that space that we had together in the gym,Barry Ratzlaff: it's powerful. I mean, the rock calls it his anchor, right? The gym is his anchor. People think it's because he's he loves weightlifting or is addicted to it. Or, you know, he's a huge, muscular guy. But with that guy scheduled the things that he does on a daily basis, the anchor is it gives him his mental stability. It gives him the ability to do all the things he does, comes from his resistance training. Yeah, there's no mystery there and the world is starting to wake up to it. It's taken a while. Like when I first started lifting. That was 13 of 30 years old. When he first got into training, it was still an underground thing. People looked at kind of scoffed at it. Remember talking to people, body for life. And they say, Do I have to do the weight part? Like the weightlifting part?Andrew Bracewell: That's kind of gross. What other partisans? Yeah, I don't want to do cardioBarry Ratzlaff: kind to cardio new body for life. You have to modify it for you. It's not really gonna give you what you want, but okay. But now people are starting to to come awake to it. And unfortunately, as humans always do, they've gone just far, far too extreme with it. Power lifting was never meant to be competitive in the sense of repetition wise, it's Yeah. I want to go there right now because it gets me going real hot when I start thinking about those things. Yeah. WeAndrew Bracewell: don't wanna get you angry, Berry. No, no, no, no. So I had a conversation with somebody else. We're not gonna say names, but somebody else who's a client two years. We're discussing the fact that you were gonna be on the show. We both, you know, admire and love you and the conclusion. So the question we asked herself were like, Well, what? What makes very different wise, Very amazing, Because there's, you know, there's a 1,000,000 trainers in the world. Everybody's a trainer. I mean, you must feel like that in your industry. Literally. Everybody's a trainerBarry Ratzlaff: we started with. There was none in Abbotsford. We're the first ones. People saying Can you actually make a living doing that? IAndrew Bracewell: said, I don't know. I don't know.Barry Ratzlaff: So it worked. But now it's Yeah, everyone's got a personal train certificateAndrew Bracewell: I've got. I've got up European Swiss ball in my basement and I've got padding and I've got dumbbells that range from £3 all the way to £14 I'm gonna get in the best shape of your life. There's people are gonna listen This they're actually gonna feel conviction. Thio Shit. He's talking about me. I might be Oh, and keep doing what you're doing. Cut the air. Beautiful. Just the way. So here's the Here's the conclusion we came to as to why Why is very rats off? Amazing. Why is he not just one of the others? And it was this. You have all the knowledge you have, the physical knowledge nailed. So when it comes to how to lift weights, how to train, how to grow muscle, you know, you know that you know the body very, very well. You also have the nutrition piece absolutely hammered. And the evidence is in the 20 years of proof of successful clients and people who have made significant changes to their body. But more so than any of those two things, it's very obvious that you care the most about the mind. And I don't know if this is something. You just woke up one day and said, I need to care for the human mind more than you know. I don't know what the conversation is. I don't even know if you've ever thought of this or would agree with it. But I would suggest that when somebody trains with you, their brain is as important to you as anything else. What do you What do you think about that?Barry Ratzlaff: Absolutely. I mean, the first thing was, someone walks to the door they're not, Ah, a client in the sense of a person I make money from. I don't even Janet when for the 1st 3 or four years she had to force me to ask for money because I wasn't I didn't care. I get it. We have to pay bills. But I I was so excited to work with people one on one in a sincere it was almost a pastor or a relationship without the religious crap. It was human, really into human. Let's let's just sort of put our minds together and see what we come up come up with here and ah, so yeah, I I really love it. And when I get a client coming through who's not really willing to open on that level, it's kind of disappointing, Like I realized pretty quick on this person. They don't want to go deep. They just want to get their workout in, and often that relationship won't last that long, but fromAndrew Bracewell: because you only have so much time. You don't want to give your time to somebody who's not. It was not all fully engagedBarry Ratzlaff: now, and because we are holistic beings, the mind, the body the spirit, whatever that may be, our completely connected. And so we can't pretend that just lifting weights is gonna make me a healthy human. It's like, absolutely not like your brain is 80% of the equation. If your brain's messed up and it's thinking like some really bad shit about who you are, how you function amongst people boat your relationship with your wife for your kids or whatever, you're not gonna be healthy. That's not health.Andrew Bracewell: And you see that, right? I mean, I can't even say that you've seen that you have to speak about other clients. But in me, let's say there's a direct relation to be in terms of where the person's brain is that and then their physical output. Oh,Barry Ratzlaff: yeah, moments. Yeah, I've seen it in you. When you went through the process over the last year and 1/2 of purchasing the company and the stress load you're carrying, um, the effect it had on you and your wife like put strain on everything and it shows up in how you perform in the gym. And you know what, Jim? Performance as I say the guys all the time. That's secondary just let the weights be the weights every any given Sunday. Give it a week or two. You'll be back up to the weights you're pushing before. Don't sweat it. Do the routine. Get the chemicals flowing. Feel good. This is good. We're doing a good thing here. And then two or three weeks later Oh, I feel fantastic and you're crushing it again. And it's not supposed to be.Andrew Bracewell: Yeah, What's that? You always say this to me. Your cause, your muscles don't know that the weight they don't only whale the resistance. The only No intensity, right, Right, So you could be having a shitty day and whatever doing dumbbells at £70. And you know, you could do nineties or 100 but your your muscles don't know the difference between that. They're under full load and they're maxed out. That's all they know.Barry Ratzlaff: Fibers. They're they're doing that they're doing. They're very, very best for you at that point. And if they're doing their best, that's all they can do. It's your brain. That's the problem. Your brain sees the 60 on the dumbbells or the 80 and you start beating yourself up. What's your problem? look at that. You're a piece of sheer. So weak. Well, you need, sir. Beat yourself up likeAndrew Bracewell: No, don't do that. Like I haveBarry Ratzlaff: days. I tell guys I have days and actually learn this from from Schwarzenegger, cause I remember reading an article way back in the eighties about him and he and he said, Ah, there, days he goes. He's the first proponent that Ah, weightlifting is 80% mental. It's all in the mind. And so he said he'll come to that. He'd come to the gym and he kind of get his warm up, down and get ready in his first sets and realized I'm not here today mentally. And you'd leave. I'm like, What? No, no, no Pushed through. And it started to embrace that idea that Yeah, there's days when I go to the gym when I'm not present, so I'll walk in. I'll do my warm up. Something's not right. My head somewhere else. Go back to the house, live to fight another day. Come back the next day, feel a 1,000,000 bucks and crush it. So but my clients will that prove a can't just showAndrew Bracewell: up like you know what I don'tBarry Ratzlaff: feel so good. I'm gonna go and come back tomorrow, Uh, can't fit you in. But okay,Andrew Bracewell: so if you were to write a memoir or a book, as I alluded to earlier in which he spoken to you, you've spent a lot of time with a lot of high level people in a variety of industries. What would be the theme of that memoir in that? What would be your commentary on? Is there a similar thing that all of these humans do? Or is there a trait where you go? Yeah, they're totally unrelated. Different industries, different professions. But there's this one or two things that are just common. Is that Is that something that exists or no,Barry Ratzlaff: I would say the most pivotal piece and all that would be what they truly believe about themselves or what they truly have embraced about themselves. That someone else has taught them so for, ah, high achiever. For the most part, these people believe a they can do these things. They believe they're worthy of success. Um, when the money comes, they're okay with that. They know how to work with it. They can manage it. And they feel worthy of that. And when it comes to the gym, they kind of think, Yeah, I'm here because you know what you're doing. And if I work with you, this is gonna be fine. We're going to get somewhere vs a mind that's been beaten down. It doesn't believe anything good about itself and sees nothing but negative around itself. And all those things have a way of manifesting too, you know, financial trouble in relational trouble and all down and poured nutritional habits. The all our site Click it so and they'll spiral down in this pool so that you're spiraling up with positive self image or you're splattering down. And so there's one trait these guys would carry and the few women have worked with its Their minds are strong. They have their self image is intact and they believe good things about themselves. Not not cocky, kind of like you're you're just a dick about about yourself, but actually good, positive things that yeah, you're you're a good human, and what you bring to the table is valuable. It's worth something, and you have something to offer. And so they they believe that. And it has a way of manifesting in their life in success.Andrew Bracewell: It never ceases to amaze me how I feel like no matter what the topic in life, everything always boils down to the health of the brain. Oh, absolutely, it's just mind blowing. Absolutely. I think our world has opened up more to that conversation there. We're more aware of it now, so it's getting talked about more. But it's just fascinating to me that you could be talking about something that you think has nothing to do with the brain. And then at the end of the day, just it all boils down. Two to the health of the brain.Barry Ratzlaff: Mental health is it's a burgeoning field. It's crazy to say that because we've had self help books and psychology books around for for 50 years, but it is. It's a burgeoning field, in a sense that people are becoming aware that mental illness. Um, and we used to think mental illnesses like you belong in Riverdale like off to the mental house with you, right? But mental illness has got, you know, so many layers on so many levels, and whatever your level is, it's it's legit. What you're feeling what? The way you're talking to yourself, the voices in your head, the voice of your father in your head, voice of your boss in your head, all conspiring to this sort of ah stew of either positivity or some really, really nasty negativity that old don't have kept your life. It'll make you incapable of doing certain things and achieving certain things.Andrew Bracewell: And it's also possible that you can be feeling really shitty in your brain and down on yourself, and you don't have a mental illness. You're just in a really shitty state. And so what do you What do you say to somebody? Or what would you say to somebody? Because the majority of the world, I think it's not the people that have the healthy self image image right, and they struggle to find their fitness path and have confidence in the gym and eternal life Run. What do you What do you do with that? Like, what's the What's the first thing to try to overcome? If someone's just so they're shit kicking themselves so much in their head that even if they put the right thing in front of them, they're still gonna have a hard time because in their head they're just pieces of shit.Barry Ratzlaff: I think the first action step is get off social media. Stop looking at Instagram pictures of people who have perfect bodies and our purveying these perfect lives because that is such a negative thing for your brain. It's complete horseshit. It iss it's so, so destructive. And I think about our kids, Um, and not just teens. I think about kids. Your your kid's age. Yeah. Who are exposed to this already? Yeah, they're grading themselves from judge themselves against these images and thinking, Well, why don't I look that way? How come I don't have a $1,000,000 I'm 19 years old? You know, like Billy Isla? She's a millionaire and she's 19. Like how come I don't have that? It's so unhealthy. So the first thing I'd say to somebody who's struggling with self image stuff is stopped feeding yourself the negativity and it might come in is positivity like, Oh, this is a This this person has amazing instagram account. You've got all these things going that seems really positive, but you spend it and becomes negative because you're not those things get rid of that stuff. That's that's poison to your brain. Second, find to human beings that you know love and trust and hold on to their evaluation of you. They're the ones that matter so that your mom, your dad, your brother, your sister, your husband, your wife and they've been saying for years.Andrew Bracewell: What are you talking about? You're awesome. I loveBarry Ratzlaff: you. You're perfect. The way you are. Get the other voices out of your head. Hold onto to that. Say you're amazing and hold on to those because that's all accounts we had to pick her life. Who are you? You're you're champions for you. Your cheerleading section, You got everything that's the place to start. And then then once you kind of got your the the the atmosphere around your clear. Now start looking for examples of what you think you could be capable of, Like what I did back in the day when I went gym to gym and said, I want to talk to these guys because they're doing what I want to do. So why would I read a book or try to make it up myself when I could talk to them. They they're doing it right now in front of me. Find people who are doing what you think is, you know, lets your passion and you know that stuff that

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Forever Exiled - 2019 Recap

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 31, 2019 54:34

The end of 2019 has arrived. Let's recap Path of Exile through 2019 and end with a bang! Giveaway information:Twitter Tweet to RetweetReddit Post for Episode 6Join the party! Check out our website for more episodes and be sure to follow us on Twitter.www.foreverexiled.comTwitter @ForeverExiled82Path of Exile WebsiteWrecker of Days Builds ListFull Transcript of Episode:Justin: Welcome to forever Exiled. The Path of Exile podcast. This is technically Episode six, but it's going to be our bonus. New Year's Eve and Day episode. I am one of your host, Justin a k a. TagzTyler: and I'm Tyler Wrecker of Days.Justin: Make sure you check out the rest of this episode right up until the end because we may have a sexy giveaway coming up anyway. Ty, how are you doing? Well, how are you? Good. So this is gonna be our our extra bonus for fun. Super awesome. Episode six I agree. So, uh, path of exile G just released today their best of 2019 video, which was awesome. If you haven't checked it out, make sure you watch it. Maybe we'll put a link in the show notes just so you can find it. I think they're coming up with some more information on there. Accomplishments and bragging tomorrow, which is New Year's Eve will be tomorrow. So hopefully will be out there and live with everybody at the same time. So, yeah, let's let's ah, let's jump into it. So we figured it'd be kind of fun to look back a year at what grinding gear games development plan for 2019 was and assuming like we will continue this for the next 15 or 16 years, we'll be able to do this. We'll be able to do this at the end of each year and kind of see what was announced the previous year and sort of where things went from there. So we've got the development plan for 2019 from grinding gear games last year. 2019. Here's what they say. 2019 will see the release of four significant Path of Exile updates in the form of 3.6 and March 3.7 in June, 3.8 in September and 3.9 in December. These releases will follow the formula we have been using over the last few years, introducing a challenge league, various expansion features, new character, skill, archetypes to play, and masses of other fixes and quality of life improvementsTyler: while working on the 2019 updates. We also hope to make significant progress on the four point Omega expansion, which we now know as path of exile, too likely coming sometime in 2020. For those unfamiliar with our version numbering system, Once we've released Update 3.9, we are forced to number the next 14 point. Oh, for example, the version after 3.9 and March is 3.10 as we do not expect to release 4.0 in the first part of next year. Development of 4.0 is a massive task that is absolutely affected by our desire to continue to release sizable leagues at our usual pace. So we're taking our time and making sure it's ready before we decide on a release date. 20Justin: nine. Teen culminates in the Exile Con Fan convention in November, where we can announce and demonstrate December's 3.9 expansion, as well as a small preview of 4.0, this convention takes place approximately 2 to 3 weeks before the 3.9 release, so you should be able to play a near final build at the show. We expect to put Tickets are for sale in the next couple of weeks.Tyler: We're also putting the finishing touches on the PlayStation four version of Path of Exelon should be able to announce a release date in the near future. It's going to be a busy year.Justin: So that was the development plan for 2019 Fergie and I will say I think they hit all of them. They nailed it. Yeah, I think they did. And they were very good at their ah, super chilled idea of what four point I was going to be in comparison to what we found out November. So we're going to get to that part sort of Indian. Let's let's break down the league's because we've had now a year we've had were in the fourth league for this this year. So it's obviously three have been completed. Ones very, very new. So let's let's jump through each of them. So we'll go 3.63 point six was the synthesis leak.Tyler: Mmm. Do you rember what you bladeJustin: synthesis for me Now? I I don't entirely know. I do remember playing arc totems. Ah, for quite a bit of it, just because so synthesis was a huge cast early there were that was the league of ah, huge changes to spells and just casting in general, mainly kind of got kicked a little bit and just was left alone. But casting was a big one So for me, my main one was, uh, was arc totems and it actually carried me. I think I played it quite a bit. Brill League. And I think that one took me to 97 or so. I think ITyler: lied Well, and I laughed and I laughed. That was the one league where you are. Totems was just storing everything. You could have done it with your eyes closed. You're having a great time. And you bailed on it to make something else because you felt like it was too slow. And you're flying. I mean, it was like a split second. I couldn't even hit like the start stop button fast enough to to say how fast you were laying your total's. But it was too slow for you. And so you respect?Justin: Yeah, I don't remember. I don't remember too much what I did after that. Only because that that was a big league for me. Just in currency. I had the I can't remember the name of it, but the Mir dhe shield that I ended up selling for I remember selling all of my ark totem gear for I don't know, 60 or 70 exults and just playing around and going crazy and then not carrying after that point. What did you play them? You remember?Tyler: Uh, I don't remember playing it, but I had it written down. It was how I do my lists of characters. My 3.6 build was an R f character. Okay, remember playing it, but I'm sure it did. Great.Justin: Nice. So, synthesis. It was not a great release. So it wasn't. Ah, it wasn't my favorite. While we can talk about favorite ones later. But the system wasTyler: confusing. Yeah, and they're confusing.Justin: And there's not a whole lot of it left in theTyler: game. No, no, it definitely went by the wayside in terms of how it could fit into the current court game. Um, you barely ever see. It really only exists for as I've seen it. Um, it only exists in Zana maps. When you see her in a map, you could have a synthesis map as one of your options. And that's really the only way that I've come across it. Naturally. I don't remember any other way that they've tried to infuse it, but that's that's it. I remember. Sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. I was just gonna say I remember it being a league. That was as as much effort as they put into it. I remember it being a leak, that I was completely happy to just skip the content, just go right past whoever was that was doing all the since this stuff and I just play the map and do the atlas. Normally,Justin: the idea behind it when it was first announced seemed really cool to me. The way it actually played out, I found overwhelmingly confusing. It was really difficult to plan out the I don't even know what you would call it. The map type thing that they had. I didn't find it. There were so many issues where ah ah, block the memory segments. Yeah, an area would, like, clear out for some reason, Or you couldn't. I just didn't like how that function work. There was way too much extra added to the game. And can you even go there? Can you see? What was it called? The nexus, I think. Yeah. I think that's what it was called. Can you still together? IsTyler: every Texas not that I know of? No, I don't think you can get the pieces of memory anymore, but you can still get synthesized items. That cannon all within a synthesized map.Justin: Yeah, it was It was It was a I don't know what the word is that it was ah, valiant attempt to try and make something new to the game. But to me, it was way, way, way, way too much. It was like, what was the one in the previous year with the the boards and all the lines and everything that would, uh, go between all of the bosses? It was the one with the change of the craft.Tyler: Um oh, syndicate. No, no, it's not called syndicate. I was calling in to getJustin: the mail. It was to me, it was like that. It was adding way too much of the game, and I just wanted to kill stuff, but so that actually kind of leads into legion. So that was synthesis. It was a fun league, but I did not touch the league mechanics almost atTyler: all. It's It's one of its unique, I think since I've started playing, which was in the early two's, um, it was unique in the sense that there's a lot of the times where they have to make a lot of changes. Right? Remember with synthesis, they had that blue stuff that would be coming in, and it would really start to cave in on us what it was speed game, right? So they had to modify it a lot. And even though this was now 2018 but you mentioned betrayal, they modified betrayal a lot to try and balance it for people that were leveling cleared two people that like Game and so that happens in a lot of leagues, and that's just how it goes. But it was one of those leagues where this bite all the changes that they made to try and balance it properly so that it could be playable. It was the mechanic itself that held a lot of people. That, and just matching the memory fragments, being able to store the fragments, figuring out how they work to the best ability was from what I found from what I read. From what I remember, that was the hardest part about the league.Justin: I had a blast in the league, but I did not enjoy the league mechanic. I loved the castor changes. I love the you know the skill reworks. I really, really liked a lot of the changes that they made for game play, but I did not like the guy just didn't enjoy the synthesis side of of the league. But are we good with 3.6? Yeah, let's move on. So 3.6 goes through, 3.7 comes out in. That's legion. And now legion. I think one of my favorite things about legion the Legion, was it was dummy proof. It was relatively simple. It was very much breach ish. Not obviously the same exactly is breach. But the idea that you would just come across them while you play it. You could do them while you were in a map or in his own, and it didn't require you to really have to do much else. You got to fight additional mobs, and there was obviously other stuff that could happen within that you know how the league was set up. But the overall way that it worked was super simple. Super simple.Tyler: Yeah, You see it in the map, you hit the button, you just kill as much as you can. Yeah. Maybe they'll kill you if you unlock too much there. Too tough. Or maybe you killed them all. And then you move on, you pick up your loot, you keep going. And I loved it. Absolutely loved it.Justin: Yeah. And then so with that league, they also came up with a huge Malay rework, which wasTyler: awesome, especially because the amount of crying melee fans did in 3.6 for the castor league. It was really nice toe. Have those wines dissipate in 3.7? Yeah, andJustin: and while it was a really, really cool mainly rework, which has really a lot of that stuff even now it's still very useful to Malay builds. A lot of the changes that they made are still super appreciated. It also became literally the cyclone leak. It did. It did. And because of the way that legion worked, I loved the legion part where you would just you'd find it in a map, click it, you'd break a bunch of stuff. You kill a bunch of guys and you keep moving on. I wasn't a huge fan of the endgame side of it where you would go to that that I can't remember what it was called the other area. And you could, you know, based on how many you wanted to do, was the domain of the timeless conflict. Look at you. Ah, that part to me was not my favorite. Only because I had seen what people could do in there with insane gear. And it just made you feel like, very weak. Didn't like. Yeah, yeah. What did you play? Do you remember what you played in that in that leak?Tyler: Yeah, that was my blocking build my trigger Happy build that I do. And ah, it was perfect for it. Um, I was using Cyclone with it. Now I've recently changed it. The last leaguer to To what's it called Laid Storm. But I did Cyclone for that league with Max block build. And it would have worked really well except trigger skills had almost 100% reproduction crash associate ID for the first month. So I really tried to play, but because I had all three trigger skills on my on my build, I didn't know and they didn't really know they did. It wasn't fixed for about the first month, so Unfortunately, I didn't get a lot of playing time andJustin: didn't actually last that long. Was it aTyler: month? It was a month before the trigger skills Scott fixed. It takes time to figure out like that for long was the longest time because it was a cyclone build. They were really focused on trying to fix the mechanics and cycle behind the scenes because they thought cycling is causing a lot of crashes. It ended up causing very few, but it was a focus and it's just how it works, so not as a criticism. It's just what was impacting my specific build took quite a while to fix. And so by then, two people that I play with were kind of Douglas Aly.Justin: Maybe. I definitely don't think it was specific to the type of build you play, though, because that was the league where Cyclone became channeling and that made a huge difference to what you could do with it. And so you saw so many of the on effect skills now in used with cyclone, which was cool. Now I played flicker strike on Lee becauseTyler: I don't know why I actually don't remember what made me think A flicker strike. You're trying to make me throw up.Justin: Maybe. Maybe it was my goal. Just 100%. Be sure I wouldn't play with you. I'm not sure, but, uh, I will say it was the first league in I have played since was April 2012 in the in the beta. This was my very first headhunter drop where it actually draw, right? And so that was in one of the Legion things that was actually glacier farming, which was a big thing for me in that league. And I remember it dropped as a unique leather belt. And I was laughing because Ethan, who was who was in my office at the time, and I, you know, kind of just said to him, Of course, it's a tease. I'm not gonna pick it up. What a waste. I know it's gonna be garbage worms, Moulter. Whatever it is, um and so I most over top of it in both of us, just like crap their pants. Because it was it was actually centered, so that that was probably my favorite part of it.Tyler: That's if you were to have a highlight reel. That's that'd be rightJustin: at the top. Yeah, it was cool to have. I've had ahead 100 before, but they've always been through currency, so this is kind of cool to actually have one draw.Tyler: That's awesome.Justin: Yeah. And then So this was also the change. This latte league changed to the five sockets, which obviously allowed you forgetting to That owe me and you were talking aboutTyler: Oh, you mean the map device was able to have five sockets? Yeah, you could find that. I was pretty cool, right? Still in the game, they say still in the game. Is it if this didn't remove it, but I I haven't come across it, YouJustin: know, myself, either. Yeah, it and then timeless jewels were and they were in that the guy didn't play much with, um, they confused the hell out of me. I don't want to see a jewel with just a bunch of numbers, and you have to just put it in to find out what it was just just wasn't for me, But it was fun, Lee. I liked I liked legion. So, Jenny, we're good with legion.Tyler: I believe so.Justin: Legion then leads into blight, So blight comes out. I found it, actually, at little shocking that it was tower defense. It made me laugh when they announced it. And this was the league of monster minion buffs, which I knew you were in love with, obviously, since I readTyler: it. I am a minion. Pet lover, depending. What game you come from. I am hollow vote minions. My league. It was fantastic.Justin: So what did you play that league?Tyler: Zombies. What? Well, I did. They made a lot of I wasn't originally gonna plays office. I was. There's 11 or two of my guides. I've only played on Collins. Wanna have a plate on PC? And so I really wanted to play one of the other ones. But there were so many changes to minions and not just minions like the core gem like zombies was modified substantially from 3.73 point eight. But then they added an insane amount of very different but also powerful. Um, support gems like feeding, frenzy and meat shield and death Mark. And then they changed the values of the corresponding like minion damage and minion speed to accommodate those new additions and how minions leveled and then the whole necromancer ascendancy. It was so different that I had to play it just to see what it was like for the sake of replying to guide responses. But it was really good. ObviouslyJustin: it was the first league for me since again. I want to say it was backing closed Beta. Uh, when I was playing, I think one of my very first builds I ever played was minions. And I remember one of the very first things I ever message the developers to say was there needs to be a counter like the idea that I can't see how many zombies I have out is really difficult to play, how a minion build. And so this was, I think, my first time touching minions. Besides, I played with us rs a little bit, but I don't think I touch onions for years, years and years. Of course, with this league, you really there wasn't I mean, I could have played other stuff, but it just said it made so much sense to play around with with millions, and it was fun. It was the easiest league start I've ever had ever in the history of path of exile. I remember going, but this is something's wrong. This is.Tyler: Well, you didn't zombies for your league start, right? You didn't do any different. Yeah,Justin: No, I went zombies and it was just It was better. It was so smooth. And I remember laughing to you. Maybe a month in just jokingly saying that. Oh, boy, you're zombies are going to take a hit. I think it was actually right after celestial zombies came out. I was like, All you're screwed. That's it. That's the curse. Once you could stay with celestial. You're done. Yeah, So that that actually, for me, blight didn't last a super long time. But I do remember ending it with celestial everything. Of course, I got every single celestial, empty X had a bunch of the minions in the celestial on. Did you? Did you like the blighted leak? Did you like the towerTyler: defense again? I really liked it. I'm I was apathetic to the tower defense part, but I am a huge fan. My favorite leagues are the ones that just let me kill stuff right away. And so I love things like blight. You know, I love it when I have an insane amount of rogue exiles on the map. I just love it. What is it? Reach where they come out of the ground. Just love it. So this one was similar to that? I didn't have to go anywhere else to find my to do the lead content. And they were just comes rushing at you, which is great. Um, I I was apathetic to the tower stuff, so I basically just looked for the closest checkpoint. Her choke point or two made them slow and then let my minions deal with the rest. And Natalie, because zombies were so overpowered, that strategy did work. It was their intense to make towers almost required, unless you had an insanely over powerful built. So, um, I did like it. I love that the minions just came rushing at you, or I guess not passing pod, whatever that was called, but yeah, no, I really liked it. If if it worked, if it worked.Justin: Sure. I think my favorite part about Blight was sister Cassius. Oh, here singing and was listening in. And she just didn't give a damn about you either. Was almost irritated that you were there.Tyler: Yeah, Yeah, she needed you. And that pissed her off. Yeah, it was pretty funny. I do the one thing about blight. It would have been It was very difficult. I primarily play console and it people had to really, really do specific builds that weren't busy for a Minion League. Blight was too busy, right? I mean, everybody's has a lot of minions out, and then there's an insane amount of monsters out with a lot of hit points. And there was It was just a slide show on normal consoles, not just the original P s foreign Xbox one, but the the second version of thumb. Even some people with the Higher and PS four and Xbox one X they they'd run into some pretty big slide. So slideshow stuff, too, depending on it. So for ah, Minion League blight kind of counteracted itself with with what would be overpowered and successful. So a lot of the streams that you would see we're primarily PC, especially as you got later into the league, because only a higher NPC could actually handle a full blight map. The full board of minions. But I really liked it. I just wish it I just wishJustin: it worked, right? I do remember hearing people struggling with the blighted maps in later in game, just with the amount of stuff that would happen on your own screen. And then you multiply that by a 1,000,000,000 with the amount of mobs that were coming outTyler: and they didn't even implement it into console immediately. It was so challenging because of the frame rate issues and such on PC. They implemented it into 3.9 right away. But they didn't don't console and they're fixed on console was to just make less paths less minions. And it's just so easy. Mmm, It's so easy. It's Ah, I mean, I'm glad it's in it. I'm glad it's in it, butJustin: I've actually done them more while I run into them. Yeah, me, too. It's kind of nice It I guess it's nice because they're not so often. I never I never had a problem with the the Tower defense, but I also never cared to do much else Besides the reason ones. I would hit the ice ones and then just sit back in the middle and let my let the minions just do their thing in the middle. Yeah, I rememberTyler: doing. I like I like it. I don't mind. Some people have an issue when they have to stay in a spot and fight enemies. I don't care as long as there's enemies and I really like blight and breach. What's the abyss for those types of ones? I really like them. Overall, I thought it was a great legal.Justin: And then we went into the current league, which there's not a whole lot to talk about, just cause it's so new.Tyler: Well, they nerved one minion from 3.8. Do you know which one mother, actually, too. That's true. It was, in vectors, passions on these songs andJustin: then the support James. Now that being said, we've talked about this in the in the patch notes, ones necessary changes, maybe a little heavy handed. Hopefully, it's adjusted a little bit, but, uh,Tyler: yeah, because I think it was fair. I was pretty broken hearted, and I wasn't overly kind with, uh, my opinion of it, But I do think it wasJustin: after the human stuff. Yeah, it was kind of necessary. Now they did a huge Bo Ri work with 3.9Tyler: 3.9. That was the bowl leak or is the bulletJustin: is in the bowl league? So what now? It's funny that we say it's the bowl EQ. What are you playing?Tyler: Playing about build and I'm playing a build every every boat skill got buffed or modified to be relevant is this league. But there were two to Bo won support and one primary scale active skill that got Ah, I guess nerved would be appropriate. I played elemental hit. I lost a lot of damage compared to 3.8, and I'm playing with its link to the ballistic totem support, which is brand new. Um, they changed that from the attack, told him support which originally you could only lay one at a time unless you invested further in the tree with items. Now it can lay three so and blisters are brand new to the league. This league, too. It's a new type of attack totem that you have to lay within Malay Range as opposed to being able to swell. So But yeah, uh, my my specific build got hit hard, but this is a bow league, and people are going both crazy and they're lovingJustin: it. I skipped Bo's entirely for this league so far. I decided to go a spectral throw. I'm having a really good time, actually. Meta morph. I have struggled a little bit with some stuff. First time with S S f for quite a long time. But it's I like it. The Metamor stuff again. I have found this league more challenging, I think, for in a positive way, Not just like Okay, dump chaos, damage on me, like in syndicate or right, uh, make a stupid area that closes on me within, like, three seconds. As soon as I move like synthesis. This is This is legit. Like, if it's difficult, it's my fault. I made it harder. I love that. I absolutely love that.Tyler: Yeah, me too. I love that you can take You could make it. I mean, it's still gonna be a boss fight if you took all white items. But you can take the easiest body parts and make the easiest boss you can. And if you have a really weak build, you'll you'll do. Okay, right. But if you have ah, pretty good. Not the best billed as you're leveling and you do all the hardest ones, it's gonna be a hard fight, and it's I thought it was really well balanced right off the bat. A lot of the changes they've made weren't to these new bosses. That was really cool. One thing that I love that meta morph added just into the core game was completely was much harder enemies, they added. Armor and elemental increase. Resistance is in chaos. Resistance is they increased the life off bosses and enemies and rare Sze everywhere. And they just made the game. They didn't increase their damage, but they increased their survivability, and it has made the game itself a lot harder. Meta morph is a great league and the changes they made to the core game that they introduced with meta morph and perfect timing. Of course, because you're making a boss league and then you're adding all these extra boss survivability things into the game as well. I was perfect cohesion, and I think they did a really good job. They haven't changed any of it. It's awesome.Justin: Yeah, I don't even remember. Are the changes for that tied to the metamorphosis? Igor, This conquers of the atlas. It's kind of hard to tell which was for what.Tyler: It's well, it's all the same, right? I mean, it's tied two unique enemies. It's tied to this of the very specific map. Bosses were individually tweaked. Yeah, I mean, some of them boss fights were completely rebound anyway. But for those existing ones there, they were specifically tweet so that they were an appropriate level. It wasn't just flat, you know, This this tear all got the same percentage of health increase. From what I remember them saying anyway, so it's all intertwined.Justin: So then tied in with 3.9 and metamorphoses this the big end game change to the atlas of Now we're into the conquers of the atlas. We've got new new endgame. Bosses knew endgame story, and I mean, we're both relatively new into it. I think you're a bit further than I am, but again, I've had a blast. It's made. It's made mapping much more challenging at a lower tier, and that's fun. I like that.Tyler: Yeah, definitely. I'm I think it's it's done a very good job. So far, I've heard that higher up that there's some some issues with people that were David Cook to complete certain quests or boss fights, or that certain items weren't falling within a proper area. But for the most part, this has been this league tied with the new endgame that they've created. To me, it's it path of excels always tried to be a very difficult game. And trying to incorporate what people want in the game and what they want in the game is obviously a very tricky thing. I well, I would assume for them say so in their interviews. And it's, I think this has done just a fantastic job of making the game difficult while keeping the game powerful.Justin: Yep, Yeah, I agree. And it's again. It's a little hard to judge because we're three weeks, two weeks into it, into the league, so it's still got a bit of legs behind it before we see how it all plays out. But so far it's been a positive experience.Tyler: Yeah, the one thing I really like about this new endgame for Metamor are not for many more, but the conquers of the atlas is that you are going to see the same bosses that you're gonna fight it. The end throughout the atlas. Not just that. Yeah, and I think that is so good. G has tried to make this game more accessible to new people over and over without making the game easier. And the huge problem that a lot of new people, if they made it to t fifteens and sixteen's, which they would be able to clear a T 15. No problem. They'd crush the Boston problem than they'd meet a guardian and they get crushed. And this new method that they have of fighting the same boss but then in multiple tears as you get further and further into the atlas. It's nice because you're now familiar with the boss as it's getting harder, and I think it's a lot more accessible to new people. And I think they did a really good job considering that, too.Justin: I think it'll be curious to see how that plays out as we get further into the Alice, because for me, I it's hard for me to say I definitely agree with you. It's cool that you're already hitting endgame bosses in like tear fours and fives, and that's just gonna you know, you're gonna only able to expand on that as you get further along. But I haven't gotten there yet, so it's hard to say, Yeah, I'm loving it It just as much when I'm into your 15th and 16th yet So that's cool. Yeah, it has been good so far. All right, so here's a question for you. We'll start. We'll start with the negative side first just because I know you're a positive positive guy. So, yeah, what was your least favorite league? And why of those four? And it's kind of hard because I know madam, or so new, but I highly doubt it. It will be the one. But which of those we've got 3.6 a synthesis. 3.7. His legion 3.8 is blight. And then the current 3.9 metamorphose, which was your least favorite league. And whyTyler: synthesis was easy to ignore if you didn't like it. Legion. I really liked the mechanics, but my specific build didn't get fixed for a month. I think my least favourite was blight. Now I really liked blight, but there's the common sense of making your meta being capable of doing your mechanic, and they didn't coincide at all and because I'm a console player and G knows about their console games, and they need to be able to make their game for the least efficient platform that they release it on. I think blight was my least favorite because I couldn't play it on my favorite platform.Justin: Yeah, okay, so for me, my least favorite would be It's probably synthesis. But it's kind of unfortunate for me to say that because I played synthesis much, much longer than blamed much longer, I would say almost twice as long as Blake. I played synthesis, and that was because I loved the changes to spells. It made the milk fund to play. But I absolutely hated the league mechanic. I just could not. I didn't like it. It wasn't fun at all. Where is Blight it? Ah, it almost seemed a little bit too easy. And I didn't have any interest in the the the Blight mechanic. So and that literally was the endgame. Yeah. You know, as you leveled, there wasn't anything new that you were introducing towards the end game. And so I found a burnt out real fast, but synthesis for me. If I'm looking at it, from a league perspective, I hated. Synthesis is engaged. I did not like any of the the nexus stuff. I felt completely lost all the time on that one, like figuring it out. So for me, that that was me I loved, absolutely loved the actual plane of that league and the skills and the reworks and stuff. One of my favorites. But the actual lead mechanic to me was the blight wasn't poorly done. It wasn't that the league mechanic was poorly done. It just I didn't interest me, was great. But the synthesis league mechanic, to me was a little bit shortsighted and definitely wasn't one of my least favorite ones. But now let'sTyler: move away from the brightest guys so I could see how synthesis confuses you.Justin: I know I like simple, simple. So let's move awayTyler: from you go. You go first on this one, you go first.Justin: Okay, So this is gonna be our favorite, which was our favorite league. And why you go legion for sure. I'm really liking meta morph. I can't say for sure until the end of this league where they'll line up Legion introduced so many Malay where he works that I've been working for. Well, we're looking forward to forever. And so I tend to lean more towards the mainly type skills. It's just more fun for me, and I loved a lot of the changes that they did and Legion League Mechanic was was dummy proof. It was It was so simple to play. I wasn't a really big fan of that hole. Put the five things and I did it, you know, I played it. I did beat the one with all five, and but I felt like it was so forced to go that the cyclone route, if you really want, especially once the headhunter had dropped it. It made it really easy to go, and I just have a couple swords and put on the belt in the hallway. But the the lead mechanic to me, was a lot of fun. It was within the map. Side is what I'm referring to like. It made it very, very easy to just play the atlas to just play my build. Maley was strong, and so for me, as a Finnish league, it's the only one I can compare it to, because anymore so far has actually been a lot of fun, but we're like 23 weeks in, so I can't really give it the top for me. So what about you?Tyler: Catch for me was it's meta morph. Really, I know we're only that into it, but it's ah, it's harder right now. I know. Adding all the resists in defense for enemies is isn't necessarily for the league itself, right? That's just core. Game change is kind of like the endgame. But coupling that with adding bosses that you can choose how difficult they are you could specifically choose rewards like I want more rare items are away. Should I do, ah, unique item or should I do more currency drops and you're actually guaranteed at least something of what you've chosen. Now you don't know what the body parts are gonna offer you money from all of your options. You you're picking your rewards, which is so great in a game like this, you're picking the difficulty based on the reward, which is so great you can pick the location in the map where you're gonna fight. Um, it's just it's awesome. And I love one thing that, like I mentioned before about G one in this game. Hard, but people wanting to clear it in the blink of an eye. This slows the game down, right? Like we've we've talked who will get to excel con in a bit. But one thing that they really wanted to do with Pee wee, too, was really slow. The game down. And this is a huge step in that direction, even a year before Pee Wee to comes out is you're slowing down these enemies air rough. You need a really good build to destroy the really hard metamorphose and a moderately leveled build. Or one that's still trying to find its gear, still trying to find that right to weapon full of mods that they would boost their DPS quite a lot. It's gonna be a challenge, and you're and you're making tough choices. I love Metamor for that, and it's and it's metamorphose itself is stable, rock solid, stable, right? A lot of the issues that have come out with 3.9 have actually been with a new endgame, not with metamorphosis thing. It's been bug free, but I just think it's been the most stable. It's been the most exciting. It's the most. I'm spending time looking at my screen, choosing what I want to do. It's not just blind. I love it. I absolutely love it.Justin: Who are the 3.9 for you? That's nice. Yeah, alright, it's a legion. I do like metamorphic. We'll see how it plays out. Okay, so you actually brought it up. But let's one of the final things that they talked about in their development plan for 2019 was Excel Con. So x o Khan was obviously a huge deal for people who like Path of Excel. Ah, whether you went or not, just the idea that they were doing it was awesome. The fact that this indie development game was going to be, you know, has grown to the size of holding its own conference or a game. And then not only are they doing it, but they're gonna hold it in literally the for this place, every other country on Earth, that that's awesome. The fact thatTyler: a good turnout they had to increase what they had to upgrade their venue.Justin: I think I heard when we were so we I got to go, which was awesome. I went with my son, who's Ethan and and we I mean, we had a blast. He definitely had a huge, really, really good time when he was there. And I know me and you had talked about possibly going and it just didn't work out. But, ah, the I can't remember the number I want to say It was around 1313 100 people, is what we were told out was there, which is insane, especially given a huge percentage of those were not local. And when I was looking it up just out of curiosity, the closest besides Australia, the closest place that you could fly from was 12 hours away, which is just It just made me laugh because it's yeah, it literally is the furthest place away from everywhere else on Earth. Besides, you know, the people in Australia. But when we were in a cool when we were down there, I'll just quickly throw this in there when we were down there, actually made a reddit post because I was floored at the way that the people that were there were acting towards each other and the community sort of just in general. It really took me back to beta days of P o E. It just was Everybody was friendly. Everybody was hanging out, you know, like they're just was It was a really cool vibe there. And that's coming from, Uh, no, I'm not old, but an older guy. I mean, I think probably the average age I would have guessed was probably 27 28 there. But it was just cool. Like people were Tibor Super friendly. I mean, Ethan, he's 18. He had a blast, so it was a really cool experience. And then, uh, well, I mean, we should get to really the 22 major announcements, I guess maybe three. So we had 3.9, which was obviously this expansion in the whole change to the conquerors of the atlas. A cool, cool announcement that came out mobile announcement. Saving the big one for the mobile announcement was hilarious, because I remember sitting in the theater and watching people figure, you know, are they out of their minds, like, is this is this really is Are they lying? Everybody kind of thought, you know, until you saw how much you know they had the fall guy, which was hilarious. in their video and ah, and then Christmas, becauseTyler: that's his job to raid.Justin: Oh, it was so well done, though. It was so well done. I hope it was his idea, because I think that that it was one of the funniest titles for anybody in theTyler: whole in anyJustin: of the videos. TheTyler: mobile fall guy, Global fallJustin: guy. But it was a good view. And then Chris kind of talking afterwards about how it was hard to announce this last year made me crack up.Tyler: Oh, that he was so nervous. What? Cono Not sure what they were going to do.Justin: Yeah. And then, of course, the huge p o e. To which was, you know, the pre announced four point. Oh, but is actually gonna be path of exile, too. So I'm curious. What? What did you think? I mean, the ex con was so big, we can't cover obviously all of it. But now what? What was sort of yourTyler: overall? So for those listening, Justin, Nathan got to go. I, of course, did not get to, but we were messaging quite a lot throughout the entire conference, and it was really cool to get their perspective of to what was happening when what I could see. And so I was watching on Twitch and YouTube, and I got to see a lot of the interviews that Justin you think you can get to see while they were there because you could just can't see everything live. But they only had one channel that was streaming some of the interviews. And so I think obviously my favorite part of ex Sal Khan was the path of exile to announcement. But the best part of that was when I think it was Chris that came out after when Chris he was almost crying and he was having such a hard time controlling his emotions and his love for his game, his passion for the community that plays. He was so overwhelmed with people's excitement over what they were doing and their excitement to play even more and get more. I just can't imagine what it would be like. They were saying that they, for the longest time there was like four people. Only the people that were allowed in his office without knocking knew that 4.0 was actually gonna be p o. B two and it was only hey was saying that it was just nobody knew and for that to just get off their chests for them to be able to talk about everything. It was one of my other favorite moments along with Chris. Almost crying in a good way was when Jonathan maybe maybe this quick maybe was both. But I think it was Jonathan. He sat down for one of his, um, interviews, twitch interviews, and he was so calm. He was just so exciting, was so relaxed and he just said, Ask me anything. There's no more secrets And he was just so happy to just talk about anything. And I thought that was really cool because there's so much that's still going to come. And I mean, when you compare this to the Deauville for announcement, it just blows it out of the water. And the things that these are even comparable G was thinking about for even longer, It seems. It's just It was It was so exciting. I can't wait for another 19 ascendancy classes while we're on the subject.Justin: Yeah, it's gonna be cool. So I haven't I mean, you know this story and there's There's obviously a few of our friends that we know locally and that our family, friends and stuff no, this story and very few people outside of that would obviously know about this. Besides, there was a picture, but one of my one of my favorite sort of experiences when we were there because there were a lot, I mean, just that being in New Zealand on its own was amazing. That that country is beautiful. Yeah, but we were the day before the exile con event we had run into about, I don't know, we had met just because Ethan wanted to go out and do all of the meet ups and stuff, and I was following along with him. We met quite a few people on Dhe, some really, really cool people while we were out there that we hung around with and, you know, would go for lunch and go exploring with. And so we were. We were walking with three other guys to other guys. I don't remember. There were I think there were four or five of us, but we were walking down one of the main streets right by where X Sal Khan was gonna be taken taking place. And as we're walking down the street, this guy's walking towards us and he's wearing a path of exile shirt and right off the battles I cooled. My God, that's Chris And he's just by himself. He's just walking up. But the funniest part is he kind of looks at our group and he sees that. I think four of the people in our group are wearing path of XL shirts and at this, or jackets or something. And at this point path of exile like or a story? The ex con event hasn't started yet. There's not likeTyler: the next day or something. It'sJustin: gonna be the next day. There's not a ton of people down, like in that area yet that are, you know, path of exile people. And so he looks over at us and he smiles and he's like, Hey, guys! And so you know, will you stop? We're like, Oh, hey, how's it going? And he he pulls his phone out. He's like, Do you guys mind if I take a picture with you and in my head I'm thinking, What the hell? And it didn't seem like everybody else was grasping that it was him. And the thing is, he had shaved like he was freshly shaved, which is not his normal look at all. And so we're kind of like, Yeah, sure for sure. And so he takes his phone, puts it into the selfie and holds it up high and takes a picture of himself with, like the 45 of us standing behind him, smiling and he turns around. He laughs, and he's like he mentioned the fact that, you know, a bunch of us were wearing path of exile stuff and he hit. The comment was, I need to take a picture so I can show people that people give a shit about my stuff. And of course it made his life. And so then he kind of looks at us for a second awkwardly is like, Do you guys want a picture? And in my and I'm like I grabbed Ethan. I pushed him. I'm like, Yeah, of course we want a picture like get in there. And so we take this picture of the four of them standing with Chris Wilson just in the middle of the street, and he's like, Thanks, guys, have a great you know, conference and was so great seeing you. He takes off and even kind of looks a measly and he's familiar. LikeTyler: what? Who is that like, Oh, my God, that's Chris Wilson.Justin: And he freaks out. Like what? It was a lot of fun, and he was So he was so nice. He actually recognized us when he was when Ethan was in line to go and get his signature, he wouldn't. God is like map signed by a bunch of the developers and stuff. And so he took pictures with him again. But, yeah, it was It was fun. It was It was a lot of fun. It was really cool to watch. You know, stuff happened through him as well. So yeah, it was cool. But so your favorite announcement would have been purely toTyler: announcement there was. I mean, there was so much interesting stuff that we've talked about in other episodes and that we have lined up for the future episodes. But my favorite announcement was most definitely peewee to her entire. Do that.Justin: Yeah, it was very cool. It was a fun to sort of hear the reaction, which I'm sure people experienced it anywhere they were if they were listening and cared about path of excel, just the idea that they were coming up with two and that it was gonna coincide with one andTyler: yeah. Oh, just so I have three very specific things that excite me. Ah, lot of appeal. We too. But what is it that you are looking? I mean, we have I know we have, Ah, an episode coming up about this. But what is short, Quickly. What are a couple of things that really excite you about beauty too? Well,Justin: I feel like a lot of it'll safer. Probably a future episode. But I would say right off the top of my head, I just love the idea of a new story line. Okay, you know, just that whole new I've been playing path of exile for a long time. So and as of you and it's it's kind of cool to think that there's gonna be an entirely new storyline to follow. There is way too much for me to say what like my actual favorite stuff is, and we'll talk about that obviously coming up, But yeah, I think just the idea that there's a whole new storyline that's gonna be coming along isn't is very cool. What about you?Tyler: Slower paced game play? New gym system. 19 newest sentences. The fact that they're going to have what was a 38? It was 19. That's currently 19 right yet 631 Yet Okay, so 38 sentences that are going to be different and all have the ability to have multiple place 1000 builds within each. That's mind going.Justin: It'll be cool to see if there's 38 different ones. That's aTyler: lot. Oh my goodness, I e My brain's exploding thinking of voting.Justin: So yeah, so I mean, overall, though with the information that they gave on exile con and and sort of, their announcements back in 20 the beginning of 2019 for it, I would say it was a hit. Think they kind of nailed it? It really seemed to go Well, they seem to be really happy with how it went. And everyone that I ran into and spoke to their just loved it like every single person had a blast. Sweet. Oh, yeah. It was really good.Tyler: What about mobile? You gonna play?Justin: I have played it. You played it while I was there is true. It was It's cool. You know what? They've done a really good job with it. It's It's It's very simple to play very simple to just, you know, play with you with your thumbs. I'm not a mobile game person. I don't tend to play very many games on the mobile. If I was made me, I can't think of maybe flying. I tend to do work that when I'm flying. So I don't know, Maybe if I was maybe if I was just looking for something to do, it's simple enough to pick up and it will be free. So I'm sure I will install it. Uh, hopefully, hopefully by the time that they come out with it, it doesn't try to set your phone on fire because it runs very, very hot. They gave phones that you could test with, so I don't know what what models of these phones they were, but your hands were like, Yeah, it's like you took something out of the oven by the time you had played it for about 2025 minutes. Yeah. Would you playTyler: it mobile I'll download it if my phone can handle it. Um, but I'm I'm just it really impressed. Yeah, I'm excited for it. I'll give it a shot. I'll try and make time for you, But I'm I'm not gonna go out of my way because I play on call. It's a land PC as well, but I'm excited to try it. I hope my phone complaint, and if it does, I'll definitely forced myself. Thio, give us some time and I'm sure it'll be great. One of my favorite lines from Path of exile to, though, was when I think it was, Chris said. We don't care if it's successful, but if it's not, we don't care. If we make money like they don't even have micro transactions lined up for it, they might not. Even I don't think we're going to. It's just a game. It's just free and it's We wanted to be a really good mobile game if it makes money, fine. But they don't even see how it's going to make money. And if it doesn't okay like it's a mobile game for mobile people, that's all it is and I thought that was really cool because it solidifies. I remember the rage when Xbox came out with as the first console, the first non PC platform for Pee Wee, too, and a lot of PC land exploded in rage. And so PlayStation had a much friendlier release, of course. And so it's it's nice for PC players or just console only players to know that that they're not going to be overlooked because of a new focus of income. So if the false really cool,Justin: especially because there could have been that's right now like there is a there's a lot of money that can be made a mobile. So the fact that they're not putting the focus on it is really nice. Well, so yeah, I would say, I would say with their development notes from 2019 I'm really excited to see what the 2020 ones will come out with it in the next few days because they stayed true to damn near everythingTyler: they were spot on. Yeah, I think the only thing that it will be a little bit off and by no criticism at all is just their timeline for Pee Wee, too. I think it's 21. You were reading it. It was like some time in 2020. Maybe early. Maybe not Now they're thinking, but absolute earliest is the very end of 2020 Likely 2021. But peewee to always any time of year. I'm just too excited.Justin: Yeah, I feel like I heard it going all the way up to 3.12. So I'm you know, that gives at least three more leagues. Nine more months. Eso maybe the very, veryTyler: end. Well, we'll see. I don't really care. I'll release it over Christmas Tree. Oh, man,Justin: I hope they do so bad. That's the December release. Oh, merry Christmas. Be a means fixing only p o e one will continue to work on. That would be the best Christmas gift. Oh, we could talk about so much. Yeah, All right. So let's let's end this one off. I think this was this was cool that it was fun to look back. It's sort of what they did in 2019 and and now, and sort of give us an idea of what to look forward to for 2020. So we wanted to do a giveaway. I think it's gonna be fun. We're gonna make it super simple. There's gonna be two ways to enter in a post a reddit post on the show notes. All you got to do is post on that. Tell us what league was your favorite and why we don't care. Which was the your least favorite. Let's keep positive, that's what Red it's four positivity. That's right, you know, show some love as well, if you have you been enjoying the podcast or give us some constructive criticism. But all we need to see is a post showing us which league was your favorite and why, maybe what build you played. So that's one way to enter. Be on Reddit. Yeah, we'll post the link to it in the show notes for for this podcast, so you'll be able to find it anywhere. You're listening to this podcast. The link will be in the description or notes for it. Ah, and then the other way is to Retweet. We're gonna have a tweet coming out as soon as this episode goes live. If you're not following us, check us out on Twitter at forever exiled 82 we will have a tweet specifically for Episode six and Our Giveaway, So make sure you re tweet that if you've got Twitter. So those are the two ways to get entered and which playing for is you get to pick. We've got three options. It's either the bass Lisk core supporter Pack, the grand Sanctum Supporter Pack or the Eternal Damnation supporter pack. If it turns out you, for some odd reason, have all three or don't like them, then we'll just get you the equivalent value in points. Ah, to your account. So yeah, that's it. So we've got Red a Twitter win some goodies, and we're going to announce the winner Jury in Episode eight. So we have Episode seven still coming out at its regular time. This was sort of our bonus, one coming out for New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. So happy, Happy New Year's and, ah, we're gonna have Episode seven coming out of its regular scheduled thing on Sunday night. And with regards to supporter packs, if we can make it work, we'll make it work for whatever account you have. So if you're ah, you're an Xbox player, a PC player, a PlayStation player, we can work with support with G to make sure that those supporter packs are sent to you on your whatever platform you're using. That's right. So that's where it is. Read it. Tweet us sick. What you wanna win will announce the jury in Episode eight, which is two more episodes ofTyler: waste. I'm gonna win. It's permanent. Win.Justin: Yeah, you're kicked out anyway, guys, Thanks so much for listening to Episode six of Forever Exiled A Path of Exile podcast. This has been a really good time. And I hope you guys all have a super safe New Year's Eve and a good New Year's Day following. After that, I am one of your host, Justin a K Tagz.Tyler: I'm Tyler. Wrecker of Days. Oh, was I supposed to finish? Okay, well, it added at something in, um, hang on. Okay, then. I'm Tyler. Wrecker of days. Be safe this holiday week. No, no, no.Justin: What are you talking? You know what, everyone.Tyler: No, no, no. What? I was going to say somethingJustin: about your name again. I'm just gonna cut it anyway. But give me No, don't say that part again. Just give me half a second before you start speaking, but don't make it so.Tyler: No, no, no, no. This isJustin: actually now gonna be our troll. That'd beTyler: awesome. No, I wanted people to be safe on New Year's Eve. Get stupid. And for some reason, people seemed Forget that at New Year's Eve. But anyway, trying to anyone better would you, um, we appreciate all the listen. Some thanks for your time. Have a happy New Year's. Eve was safely safe. You want todo sure record and I know I'm going to say it, but you have all these notes that are distracting me about my filters. All I want to talk aboutJustin: is what is what happens when I throw on our troll on you that you have to doTyler: what you have just playing as I'm still talking about how I'm gonna do a note. True. What? What way would you say?Justin: Listen, I think the intro every damn time you have do you do do it? Yeah, because otherwise, but this is what our ingenuityTyler: I'll do the next time I'll do Episode sevenJustin: you can't recognize or six in You started with five because the intro change in Episode five you started with Rokko, remember? Thanks.Tyler: No, I don't. Yes, it's the widow. I don't remember. Thanks. Yeah, thanks. Uh, well, um, all right, Well, what can I say? Thank you very much for the listens, everybody. We greatly appreciate it. And again, if you have any encouragement or criticisms for us, please let us know on Twitter or on Reddit after one of our posts and we'll see you on episode seven.Justin: Make sure to check out the show notes below. If you've got any questions or concerns, nobody has concerned. I don't care if they have concerns. Heather clarified. Give make sure to check outTyler: Larkin and put this all owed on the same day that you were ready. I was ready. You weren't ready.Justin: I'm not gonna cut any of this is gonna be the longest. Whatever. You just you build like a needy and I'm previously on yourself. I forgot I was loved. Make sure to check out the show notes. For more information about today's episode, you confined us online at www dot forever exiled dot com as well as on Twitter at forever exiled 82Don't forget to find us at www.foreverexiled.com and @ForeverExiled82 on Twitter

Forever Exiled - Atlas Finally!

Forever Exiled - A Path of Exile Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 29, 2019 47:29

We finally made it to the Atlas! Look out white maps, here we come!Join the party! Check out our website for more episodes and be sure to follow us on Twitter.www.foreverexiled.comTwitter @ForeverExiled82Path of Exile WebsiteWrecker of Days Builds ListFull Transcript of Episode:Justin: Hey there. Welcome to Episode five of Forever Exile. The Path of Exile Podcast. I am one of your host, Justin A K Tags.Tyler: And I'm Tyler Wrecker of Days. Well, we made it Number five. Yeah. Good. Good. We're doing the best of episodes, Ari.Justin: Yeah, where we're at, like, take 41. RoughlyTyler: way. Our we've been We've been giggling trying to start this podcast for, like, the last hour.Justin: You know, actually, you saying that makes me want to just quickly jumped the gun a little bit because I noticed, if you're one of your notes was just how incredible your giggle is.Tyler: So I obviously listen to the podcast. Once you've finished editing them, Justin does everything. By the way, I just sit here and giggle and make fun of him. But after he's edited and what we get to listen to it, I like to listen to it to see what it, of course, sounds, likes weak and make it better make the next episode better and better and constructive criticism I have noticed now that I really ate my giggle. I sound so lame. Gable. It sounds totally fine in my head. I feel like a manly man when I giggle in my head. But my goodness, when I giggle when I hear from the outside, it's brutal.Justin: So that just shows how impressive it is that for four episodes I've been editing your giggle just to increase the highs. I'm just kidding. I should think this is going to be, like, really high.Tyler: No, this episode I'm gonna Ha, ha.Justin: That is hilarious. Yes, I am. Anyway, that made me think of it. You said giggle. It's your fault. Uh, all right, So tell me anyway, tell me about your build. You've been doing it. I mean, do refresher on your building where you're at right now. Let's let's hear it.Tyler: All right. Um, I finally had some time to gets maps, which was nice. I finished last few acts quite quickly. I like those last acts because there's very few side quest you need to do for extra passive points and finally got endgame. Tried to do it with my leveling gear, which wasn't special. It's not leveling gears, just whatever dropped. So I was pretty bad on resist. Tried to do. I know 5 to 10 maps with it, and, uh, just before the podcast started. I finally capped my resists, but damage is good and survivability would be good. I'm really liking it. I don't know what people are complaining about a lot of fun. Single target damage isn't great, but the game's a lot harder to so anyway,Justin: where you build when you say people complaining, Are you referring to just in general or specifically to your build?Tyler: Sorry specifically for that guide? I'm referring to the which building I do, and I'm doing my sion build. It's Ah, deadeye and inquisitor. It's elemental hit with attached to What's it called? It's still the list of support the ballistic totem support, Lester told him, Supports really weak. You basically need four totems, even though it only gives you three. You have to go find 1/4 told him just to make it worthwhile. But I'm quite liking it. And because you're constantly moving and laying the totems with elemental hit and with crit and with all the extra ailments that air happening freezing and shocking, it's I I really like it so far. I mean, I have a four, a blue four link, and, uh, I've been fine, so I'm excited to get a a nice five link.Justin: Your survivability, though, seems to be at least reasonable. So far, you're reallyTyler: very easy. It was really easy while levelling, of course, ramps up a bit once you get into the atlas. But, um, I had 19% fire resist, and I think 55 or 60 Ah, lightning resist. And there's a lot more chaos damage and oh, my goodness. I redid the graveyard. I did the new graveyard boss fight, and that's cool. I don't know if that was in our notes somewhere, so I don't want to jump ahead.Justin: I don't think I've actually done graveyard yet.Tyler: Oh, the chaos. I just love how viable chaos is. I feel like it's syndicate, but without needing the crazy nurse that syndicate needed for a month straight, it's There's so much more chaos, damage, um, the new I don't really want to spoil it, but for the podcast tried Well, for you, the graveyard boss battle that used to just be you'd go into that crypt, right? And then to be that I mean, it's changed a couple of times now. I think it's a change it again and Now it's kind of like an open crypt area where you fight one of the skeleton bosses that existed in campaign. But then, once you beat that one whole wave of enemies come. And then a second skeleton boss comes because I think you can do that. Different ones, Yes, and I love it. There's shocking to let crazy. They're throwing chaos, damage at you from from range. I really liked it and especially because it's what. But it dropped for me. I think it was my fifth map. I don't know if it's Tier 12 or three. I forget, but it was when you're not really set with your resists. That's a punishing boss battle, and I really liked it. But back to the build, I just finished capping my resists and survivability was pretty easy before, so it's gonna be a lot better now.Justin: Nice and damage with elemental hit and ballisticTyler: clearing is no problem. Single target damage requires some patients, Um, but not only for the impatient, I guess you could say, um, I don't find that for me. I'm used to a slower paced game, and I don't find it tedious by any means. umJustin: Well, you actually, because under a single target apartment, do you think you'll do anything to change single target? Like, do you have any plans for?Tyler: Yeah, right now I'm using a blue Oh, right. Four link. Yeah. I'm using a blue for link right now. So it all it does, it's giving me 7 18% attack speed and 24% elemental damage. So I knew the second I even even if I had a white five link or a nice yellow four link, I don't think it would be a problem at all.Justin: Nice. Yes. So, me, I am doing spectral throw, still sticking with it, and, uh, I'm into maps. I've gotten past all of the, you know, the levelling, all that good stuff. Ah, it's been decent. It's solar cell. Found for me is a whole new breed of playing this game. I'm just so used to, ah, hit endgame by some of the gear that I want to at least make the maps a little easier to clear. Make sure I've got ah, you know, the right resists. But the build that I'm just playing around with is working. Fine. Now that I've got my gem slots set up. I'm still also only running off of a four link chest, so that'll make a big difference once I can do that. And I'm swapping GMP for ah, slower projectile still, which I probably I probably will do through the whole thing anyway. So it's it's been not bad. It's a little a little slow, uh, had huge hiccups as I was leveling and I'm realizing I think I made that. We made the comment that we were chatting that weapons hold. My gosh, Did they ever make such a big difference? Like,Tyler: Oh, and I love it. I love it.Justin: Yeah, it's It's nice. It's just it's I feel different. It's weird that that's different. I mean, you've always needed to upgrade weapons, obviously toe to scale your damage, but I don't know if it's just spectral throw. I don't know if it's if there was a specific change that's made that different, but I have found that without that, that constant upgrade to weapons which, by the way, upgrading Klaus Sucks is brutal. To find Klaus that have reasonable roles, especially cousin went straight physical, it's really hard to find replacement clause Once I've got something that's rolled plus physical and plus percentage physical, I can't It's really, really hard to find something that will improve that.Tyler: Catch him Well, I mean, I know your pain. I'm still using my blue four links. So, um, but it's I just love. I think it has everything to do with just the changes that they made to defense in the how bosses they're scale. All the extra armor and chaos and elemental resists. And for everyone, I just I just love that update where they made them harder to kill, but they don't hit harder. I mean, some of the boss mechanics had changed dramatically, which makes them a lot harder to, But it just makes weapons that much more important. And I love it because for melee, they're much more dependent on weapons than any other type of, um, build. I would say, like if you're doing spells, you can get away with not needing a fantastic wander staff, right? Or don't whatever also you're using. But when you're doing spells, you don't need something epic. It's just great to have opinions. You don't need anything, but of course, it's just mid. Maxine if you want to get a convicting one with sweet rolls Malays desperate for a good melee weapon. And I love that right after they have a melee league, they come out, they buff stuff to make melee weapons Much more important, I think it's really cool. I love how they did it.Justin: It is, Yeah, I think if I had maybe thought a little differently into ah, maybe it may be a different skill, or I don't know if I could have incorporated different types of weapons, but I just I feel like for a solo cell found I made it harder than I needed to because I've just I've struggled to roll clause that are good to use,Tyler: are you? Claw OnlyJustin: while I'm spect into a lot of the claw nodes just for the the engine for the crit. ButTyler: that's that's one of those things than that, I guess you kind of cornered yourself into then.Justin: Yeah, so we'll see. I mean, I'm now, uh, into maps. I've gotten it. Did the atlas. I mean, maze will just jump a little bit too. That is kind of cool. I've again, I'm not super far into it of ah, unlocked out Zana. So she's back. I've had these weird encounters with the the new the new bosses, like have just spawned And I can remember the name of the one that I've seen, but he kind of just spawned in, yelled at me and then took off and it just got the notification to keep following him. And I'mTyler: like, Yeah, I had that and I couldn't see what was happening. The map was still busy and I heard some dialogue. I didn't really know what it was, and yeah, that's to read it at the same time.Justin: So I'm I've noticed that as I've done more maps in that quadrant, um, he's popped up a few times. I haven't gotten much further into how that whole system works, but what I will say is, on top of the hole, okay? Trying to figure out weapons as I'm going along it further to what you were talking about with your build. My God resists so resist to me has always they've always been king. You get to endgame, you get resists. You just have to. I have never felt Maur than this league like yes, you Absolutely have to capture resists. It is especially getting into these these new bosses. Yeah, I don't know if he just happens to be lightning based or why everything is lightning. But after he popped up the bosses, or just like random rare Tze and just mobs would all of a sudden spawned with additional lightning damage, they would put these things on the ground. They were shooting. It was killing me so quickly and I think was in 40 48% or so, which normally obviously that's not great. But normally in a tear to map, I wouldn't be Oh, you know, I really need to be in 75. I just be working to get gear. And as I captured that cap it, I had no choice but to actually start adjusting my gear and what it made a huge difference, which I'm not had a lead like that before. And I started thinking because the first it pissed me off first thing I was like Oh my God, so tired of dying. And then, as I started to, you know, just the gear and especially with SSF, it makes it a little bit harder. But the the ability to now have to actually plan around capping my resists walk, maintaining life and damage. It's actually made it kind of fun. Yeah, it really has.Tyler: Yeah, I'm really a one thing. I totally agree with you. I completely agree with you. And one thing that I think I already mentioned it. But just in case I didn't turn now, only thought it. It used to be that you could just ignore chaos. Resist for so many of your bills until syndicate came along, you could ignore your your chaos resistant. You could just do your three elements. Now I feel with all the different roles they've done, they've added a lot of chaos, damage to some big, big boss battles and a lot of the metamorphose stuff. Specifically, it's almost like you can't get away. You It's always gonna have some sort of chaos. A we it's really made it so that you need all four. Captain. Oh, I used to just do the three. I'm sure many died. Many did. But I'm really finding the value and crafting some of those chaos rules just to at least get to the baseline of 0%. I think I saw this in a lot of chaos. Damage?Justin: Yeah, I have to. I don't know if I found it as, um it's definitely beneficial. I'm not at minus 60. I think I'm at 35 or something. So it's not. It's not zero, but it's definitely better than nothing but it to me. He was not as bad as the I don't know Lightning. I couldn't believe the difference from 48 to 75 obviously that's always gonna be a huge difference. It's just never been a huge difference. A tear to Oh, yeah, you know what I mean? Like, I've always felt like Okay, I'm getting into, like, six. You're seven. You know, it's time to actually start really paying attention to everything. Yeah, this is like it's cool. It's really cool, because that one of the complaints I've had in the past is just end Game now had become stale, so I think it's aTyler: sexy independence all the way through. Maybe we won't think that in the fifth league of this end game, butJustin: yeah, I don't know. I mean, I don't know enough about how the endgame all works yet, so it's kind of hard to say, but I am enjoying The metamorphose stuff is sometimes enjoyable. I've started to get some of the boss ones the ones that you actually collect. I haven't Not enough to actually do much with them. Ah, some of them have been reasonable. But even still, some of them are very, very difficult, Which is good. I don't mind. I don't mind not being able to kill a boss like a meta morph boss. Yet if I made it too strong and I'm like, Oh, God, this I just can't do it. Yeah, it sucks for me. I gotta learn to the next one.Tyler: I've heard a lot of people. Well, whether it's within my guides air on Reddit complained that it's too difficult And then there's some people of the mentality that a lake just turn. Just turn the difficulty down like you're not forced to do the hardest one. And if your build can't do it, don't do it on. And then there's other people that think. I've heard the complaints that they should be able to do the hardest ones, and I don't like that I like the you know, it should be terrifying to do the hardest. Have you got all the body parts in the map? It should be terrifying. You should expect it to be a long time or you should I don't know. You know what I mean? Totally beat Easy for you shouldn't expect to do it with mediocre everything.Justin: Yeah, I totally agree to me. It goes back to bay two days and like the early release days where there were some builds just could not do it, you just couldn't. And it wasn't It wasn't something broken in the game. It was something you did just didn't work. And you either adjusted or I mean, then it was start over. But yeah, yeah, I don't know. I've been I've been relatively pleased so far. I mean, I'm pretty early into the tears of the palace, but I found the difficulty to be decent. Uh, I mean, for me, for path of Exile, it's rewarding enough. Antemortem is adding the ability to get a lot of cool stuff that you couldn't get in other ways before you had to do specific league things to do it. So that's kind of fun.Tyler: Yeah, it is. It's It's really cool. I think they've done a very good job. I know that there's glitches for people that are a lot farther into endgame. Unlike us, we're still in our white maps. But, um, I think in terms of stability, this was really, really good. I just, um I forget where this isn't a list. So cut me off. If I'm too far ahead of myself. I just really wish that what they did was introduce this next league. But I love the new endgame, and I'm really excited about it. But to introduce a brand new endgame and then go on a skeleton crew for Christmas, it doesn't make sense to me.Justin: Yeah, but I think that's also for you. Somewhat related to other things. Not just specifically the league. The big leaguesTyler: challenges, but they're they're running into they. Some of the stuff that I'm watching this one is a little bit farther down, but the guy that I watch relax r o l a X on mixer. His issues are very different than mine. I'm waiting for cause I play standard. I'm waiting for the map tab to get fixed, but that's not gonna happen till after Christmas, because they have one person that works on the map tapping there on vacation. So but roll axes. His issue is he's getting to engage with every single character that he makes. He's already on. His fourth character is crushing Endgame, and his issue is that there's a glitch with Final Boss. And I've seen lots of stuff in the patch notes about the final Boss is and how they're glitches and they're not dropping this or they're not. You know, this, that another thing and he can'tJustin: What's the alternative? I mean, you're suggesting that they push of a game changing league to a ah, further release so that they don't have it come over Christmas,Tyler: right? I don't think any time you're gonna have a skeleton crew for two weeks, even if it's just one week, I really especially because it's going to be what, a three week point of the league right? Like this came out December 9. I think it was to have Christmas two and 1/2 3 weeks later, after you've completely revamped the entire endgame, I don't know.Justin: Yeah, I don't know what to me. It's hard, though, because if they come up with a league that barely has any changes just because they're gonna have a skeleton crew. That league ends up being garbage. It's people. People may not play it. I mean, the thing is, if they go, if they go skeleton crew, Firth, whatever it is, 2 to 3. I don't even think it's three weeks, two weeks, three weeks. Someone like that. Two weeks to, um, that's better to me than three months of, Ah garbage league.Tyler: Well, but imagine Metamor for the old Atlas. To me,Justin: that's fantastic. Yeah, I don't know. I don't knowTyler: how everything Woods with how it all works, right, Like, it's been a long time since I've worked in the video game industry, and when I did, I wasn't at the top of the food chain making the decisions with all the decisions that the higher ups need to make. But it's just for me. It's every Christmas. I really don't get to play until the new year, when the league comes out and then it's gonna be the Christmas League, as I call it as a standard player. I don't get to play until January, so it kind of sucks. ButJustin: I don't see the alternative to that, though, and I think that I mean, I I can see where you're talking about in the fact that it's ah ah, huge game changing league and it comes out right before they. I don't know how often else in the year they even have skeleton crews. I imagine it's not very often, but ah, I would rather I would rather it affect the I mean, people may really, really be angry about the fact that I say it or that they may disagree with me in some sense. But it's affecting the people who have a lot of time and have power rushed to end game, which is awesome, like That's cool that they have done it. But I imagine that that portion of the player base is small compared to the players who are still working their way up through be Atlas and you're never going to make it perfect. Old big release almost ever has been Yeah, so there's going to be something that goes wrong to me. At least there's nothing game breaking and even the ones I've read night for league players and but I don't care about standard, but I mean, even on center,Tyler: You're in the minority there.Justin: No, I'm definitely. I definitely know for sure. Not on that. Most of them. I might be in the minority that when I'm definitely not. But even your issue, it's still very specific, too. A mechanic not working. Not all mechanics not working now. Granted, it's a pretty I read that they, like, literally turned it off, right, Like they just turned off the convert button. I thought I heard. Yeah, yeah,Tyler: yeah, they did. It turned off, and it's true. I could play it. I could spend 15 bucks and get a new map stash tab.Justin: No, I don't think you should. And I agree, like frustration that comes from that. But I don't think you'll ever have a league release that's going to be perfect off the bat, even 2 to 3 weeks, and hopefully it's as close as possible. But I read the complaints. I've read the comments that they've made. They're not. It works. There's just some stuff. That's your rape. It's kind of frustrating for such is, but it's not broken. I would rather like I said, I would rather have maybe 2 to 3 weeks of Okay, this is stupid. I'm frustrated. I'm annoyed, and then they're coming back, and they're gonna fix it. Uh, and they still have staff working. It's not like a game. Breaking bugs is just going to go on because they want to enjoy Christmas. God forbid. But yet, uh, if if that means that, okay, I gotta wait 2 to 3 weeks for them to fix something that is really just irritating me versus having to deal with three months of a league that I found boring because they wanted to make sure not to get people upset. I feel like that's maybe worse. Yeah, I don't know, but I mean, yeah, yeah. I don't know. I don't mind it, but I'm not there, so it's not affecting me.Tyler: Yeah, way need to. I need to be more familiar with the endgame bugs that are happening to. But you've almost converted me almost. You may have let them have Christmas tie. Just let them have Christmas am. I am. But have Christmas with the old atlas, all right? Just bored again. So remember last episode we're talking about holy and showing up. I was all mystified. I thought it was fantastic that when you click on a crafting recipe, yeah, she just appears Yes, you know, she'd smoke bombs like a ninja turtle on, comes in and says her little piece and then goes away. I thought that was a really cool little thing. Um, so I hear you've been a little disappointed with the frequency of it. Now,Justin: is it just our last time that we talked about with that when this you first brought this up? Yeah, I think it was just last episode. Yes, So it was. It must have been, cause that's when I finally got some free time to play and every freaking recipe I would zoom in my damn camera, click it. And there were times I think I was even streaming at one point so you could watch, and I clicked it, and I I message you and said you're you're freaking liar. She didn't jump up and you said, Oh, it's because you were standing right in front of it. I was like, Oh, okay, maybe it wasTyler: always your fault.Justin: Now I will just say I was about to go into it. I was in a trial when I got that one. So I went to the next one and it actually kind of irritated me a little bit because the next one I found was within just the regular story of the game. So I moved off to the side, clicked it, and sure enough, she popped up. I was like, God damn it, Tyler was right. Yeah, And she did, like, smokes in. And she says, Ah, I think she said the same line every time. Something about this is very interesting. And then she smoke clouds out. But it's only the more I did it, the more I was watching it. She she doesn't so nothing related to a lab. Nothing related to trials will ever show up. Nothing related to delve will ever show up. And once you beat the game, that's it. She's done. She doesn't show up in maps. WhyTyler: do itjust campaign? I was really surprised. That's dumb. Yeah, whyJustin: I don't understand is that there's no Maybe somebody knows some weirdo lower to the game that somehow stopped actin that she couldn't help you with the recipesTyler: anymore. Well, maybe maybe they'll add it more if it's a new thing that we just have If it's new right and we didn't miss it before, maybe it's just they're adding it in and then they'll be able to add it to more. As, uh, maybe you just would have added, you know, to my previous complaint about having a new atlas. Maybe it just would've added more possible glitches when they were going on. No, no. HowJustin: hard could it have been? Toe added toe labs to delve, too. Maps everywhere.Tyler: Every little thing you add. Construe something elseJustin: does nothing. She's she literally does. She is. She's not even an actual like thing that interferes with you. You can walk right through her. She does nothing. It's like she's not there. It's dumb. Just put it into all of them. I irritated me more so than anything that you told me about it, because I remember it took me. It took me so much longer to get through some of the acts because I would run into them and be like, Okay, maybe, Maybe if I stand a little bit over here. No. Yeah. She doesn't show up in those places through.Tyler: Well, I hate you more than you hate me for Helena, Because you're playing solo Cell found this time for the first time in forever. And you couldn't give me the ridiculous Val City way point.Justin: You know it was you this times you I found it almost right away.Tyler: Oh, I don't even want to hear your solo. No. Found luck with a locked. Why did he lock? Hold your hand and show, YouJustin: know, but But something pointed the way I could tell. I could sense it. It was those fireflies they were leading.Tyler: Yeah, fireflies that don't stack in your inventory. Um,Justin: crabby old man. Yeah, I found I found that when I found thanks for not beingTyler: able to give you $2 city waypoint. I appreciate it.Justin: You have to work for things. That's how you enjoy the gameTyler: Can. The Bell City is really enjoyable.Justin: It's annoying because it not only is it probably one of the most frustrating spots to find it for, but then also, the next level that you load into is the freaking longest set of map or area. I think in the whole game that hope Rose is to get down to the spider. Oh, my God, It's exhausting. it's worse than Vow. Pyramid Way Worse, I don't know why. Maybe it's God's going down instead of up.Tyler: Well, it's twice as long. Yeah, well, Pyramid, I think it's three levels and then you're actually at the top. Whereas when you're going down to the spider, it's three levels and then you're just another second section, and then it's another three levels. If I'm correct, it's I don't mind that part, though. That one's relatively easy to navigate. And there's not a lot of wrong turns, not a fan. I don't mind the maps that get me, Um, but that's just because of my concussion. Symptoms and stuff are the maps with trees and the trees that go in front of the screen. Um, what would be one deal? I don't know howJustin: Jungle is brutal. I actually noticed that just today I was thinking to myself, Okay, we're talking about that whole technology of the stuff is cutting. You go through jungle. The trees do not fade it all, they say, right up in your face through the hole. I was like, Why would they not have these ones fade out? I don't know if it's just because it's older, and maybe it's more difficult for them to do that. But it is really weird to me that jungle, the jungle map Jungle Valley. The maps do not fade or sorry, the trees don't fade. Yeah, it's kind of weird.Tyler: Yeah. And you, old atlas. I would never, ever shaped the ones that had those tall trees that will go in front of the camera. It was just too too nauseated for me.Justin: Would it change it if if it had that effect, where they they weren't really? I mean, that kind of see through,Tyler: um Well, there's that. What was it? Is it Lava lake map that had, um I don't know if they're the same. A CZ they used to be. But the lab a lake when they had caught Eva was a tear 14 or 15 last week. That had some trees. Cem, Cem. Nice apple trees. ErJustin: over there. Just little ones rightTyler: there. Well, they were. They were big, They didn't go all the way up across the screen, and it would have that technology where it would fade so you could see yourself on the other side. That still gets me a little bit, but it's nowhere near as bad as something that's crossing my eyes really fast. Like car driving through and, you know, shaded woods Interest. Bang, bang, bang. Just shade hitting. You left, right and center.Justin: Yeah, it's funny. I just I literally just today was doing Jungle Valley and thought of that. Come on. And then I did. I think it was right after we finished Episode four. Maybe that next day I finally got to play, and I'm I'm running through an area goingTyler: the hell areJustin: these things popping up? My screen is unlike running through killing stuff. And yeah, that's the monster parts picking up. Yeah. Is that I'm sure people listening to it Or like what a whiny baby like it's alreadyTyler: faced. I'm sorry. Fix happen hour later, but what do you think of it?Justin: Uh, I I do like it. Obviously, I actually this is just me being a turd. I'm not a big fan of the way it shows up, because it and maybe we'll just take a bit of getting used to playing more to get used to it. But it throws me off for some reason, a little bit And maybe it's just cause I'm not playing a very fast build. I'm not moving super quickly through the map or through the zone. There's something about the way it pops up that just throws me off from looking at what the drops are to the interest at part going up. But I I love it. I absolutely love the fact that I don't care what it does. I don't care what flash my whole screen. The fact that it I don't have to be. Oh, I don't have to go and pick them all up is so much better. Yeah. You like it?Tyler: I like the animation. Yeah, I like it. I don't get distracted with it. I don't get it mixed up with other possible drops. I really like it. And the thing that I I don't know if this was how it used to be, because you and I have progressed slowly, but whether it was added new or not, I love that when you're about to go through a portal or a door. Um, what's his name shows up.Justin: Oh, yeah, kind of warns you.Tyler: Yeah, but I like that, you know, because I'm going to go through and I'm gonna clear the map. How I normally cleared I don't go out of my way for any lead content if it's going to be, You know, if if there's two monsters left and I'm missing one body part, I'm not going for it. So it's nice when I'm vote to go into this or I'm gonna portal. Oh, that he shows up. He's like a Okay, let's use up your pieces. Yeah, I like it. I think it was a very it was a gamer's choice, You know what I mean? Whoever came up with that idea, it was it was the gamer in them that came up with that. That was really convenient.Justin: Yeah, I think it is. Good, cause I would probably forget Maur often than not if if he didn't do that, and I'd probably load the next map and be like, damn it, I forgot to use up those parts. So that's at least good. Now, did you Did you get Ah, Did you get your Christmas gift from G, which I feel like you should take away from you? I feel like people who are complaining about them going to skeleton staff don't deserveTyler: a gift. I don't maybe. Oh, everything. Oh, they deserve a wicked Christmas. Well, old Atlas.Justin: So what you're saying, though, is the people that stay working what I'm saying? That'sTyler: qu'est er of words. No. Um, no, no, no, no. Not at all. Not at all.Justin: Did you get you get from them there? It was one of the boxes. Right.Tyler: Okay, well, you got I do not. What? But it was white.Justin: So I on on that same topic, because I I did get, um, a gift. I got the white, uh, missed, I think for the for your base, The white It's like, OK, but I also I decided I was going to do the grand sanctum pack because I really like the wings. And I like the outfit. That was the thing is the $60 pack. I'm still I'm still boycotting. Currently, there their core packs. I just Maybe I might really I might buy this the snake one just because it's, you know, it's it is a little bit unique, but I just can't I I was like, Well, I don't see myself going this time for there's no shirt. So why spend 240 bucks? But ah, it So I bought the couple of the boxes. I have 55 versions of God. What is it? The blink. Ah, it's one of the skills that they went there. No, no, no, it's Ah, it's not whirling blades. It's something Blade. What is it called, anyway? It's I have five of them. I hate that. That's the one thing that drives me crazy. You know, all I want is a damn portal. I think I've opened maybe 20 boxes, so not like a ton, but 25% of them have been the same thing killing me, G.Tyler: But I got to say, normally I'm I'm portals, is what it kind of revolves around for me. You know, you need to have a nice portal that matches the set. And because it's so much bigger and brighter, that color stands out to the others that you can get away with footprints that don't aren't the exact shade of white or green that you're looking for to match your set. You know what I mean? Because it's much farther away and it phase and it's busy, but portal portals really stand out there there the whole time. You stand next time for a while. The grand sanctum support pack is so nice that I'm gonna get it, even though I don't like at a normal that could match it.Justin: Well, give me a portal that you have because there's portals that mattersTyler: and that really, I don't think so. Well, sometimes it's also it's not just the color. It's also the action that the portal does, or the colors and how it goes. You know what I mean? AndJustin: wings air really cool with it, though.Tyler: I love it. I love it. I'm, uh I'll be getting it as soon as we're done.Justin: I'm actually using some of the white armor that I got from the boxes with the grand sanctum, but, uh, yeah, I I don't remember. I do have two of the white floaty mists. Uh, you can put in your base. I also I don't think you've seen it yet, but I have I did get that new base, butTyler: so did you.Justin: Yeah, the completely I did it mostly because I knew it would drive Ethan crazy. And so I loaded it up. I put it in there with absolutely nothing. And I just spaced the characters out, and I When he walked by my office, I was like, Look, check out how awesome this is. And he was upset right away. And I told him it's going to stay like that All league. I'm not gonna put anything down. If anything, I might put like a fire pit for some random reason. Like one fire pit.Tyler: Well, it's cold in the stars. Yep. It's gonna look awesome. So you can sit cross leggedJustin: and put all of my petsTyler: so they can float around. And don't forget you're missed.Justin: Oh, yeah. I should put down that white mist. I'm gonna put it in a corner just so that when people visit, I'd be like, Hey, did you see there's twoTyler: also you. I'll even give you a discount. But you've got to go in the mist.Justin: There's two of them up there, but I love that they give those little boxes. I think it's fun.Tyler: Yeah, they're very generous company. And every time I realized that we've complained about something in the game that I don't like or you don't like, I feel really bad. I don'tJustin: feel bad, and I think it's good. It's I don't think we're being fixed. It's no, I get it. ITyler: get. It's constructive. But I still when I really when I remember that it's free and everything's free. I feel like a prick.Justin: Well, I mean, you're a prick, but it doesn't mean that they're doingTyler: anything wrong. I'm not the one that went solo. Cell found. You're a prick.Justin: Yeah, but you also said that they don't deserve a merry Christmas.Tyler: No, I said enjoy your merry Christmas with the old Atlas.Justin: I think I think it isTyler: you not being able to give me the Val City waypoint is way worse than anything anyone else has ever done toJustin: me. I think that merry Christmas box makes up for the bugs. So two people complaining about the bugs. At least you got a box,Tyler: right? And he didn't play peewee a Christmas. You're not a real fan. Anyway. It's true, right, Britta?Justin: At least to log in. Get your freaking box.Tyler: You did have to be in game to get it. Well, you couldn't click on it on the website.Justin: Yeah, but you didn't have to be on that day.Tyler: I remember.Justin: I got mine today, I think because I didn't go on you saidTyler: you were on yesterday. Yeah. Yesterday I was able to finish my just for the box. No, no, I was able to finish an actor to yesterday. I think it was yesterday that I got two maps. Who? I think the boxes logging in until January 6.Justin: Oh, yes. I didn't think it was just the single day that that would be a jerk. Move. Geez, like,Tyler: Well, we're a little Bell City. Wait points a jerk. MoveJustin: How? We're at home enjoying our Christmas. If you don't log into the video game on that day, you don't get it. Uh,Tyler: enjoy your family, Bond.Justin: Yeah, I don't think anything we've said is mean spirited. And yeah, I think we're fair. We're now We're nice people in general, right?Tyler: Well, one of us, one of me. That's true. Yeah.Justin: So that's why did I look through the post that they made because they had put up a post about like, uh, some of the known issues that they were going to deal with, But I didTyler: nothing in there really,Justin: like, stood out to me like Oh my gosh, I can't play this. I will be honest. There is one that says the convert maps button in the map stash tab has been temporarily disabled as there were problems converting to the new layout. I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I laughed so hard when I read that. Why fly? What? You've just popped into my head instantly. I don't know why you just made me laugh. I was like, Oh, but they're listening. Listen,Tyler: every time the game updates whether waiting for you and I hate how long steam takes to frickin update a 30 makeup date. But anyway, when I'm I mean, it gives me 10 hours. Thank you, Steam for being able to check the patch notes every time I'm just control f that I see my console game updating him like, Oh, well, maybe because they group their patches together for Consul cause they don't promote us frequently. I don't know how it works in the console back end, but that's really do. And so then I'm like, Oh, sweet, Maybe maybe a new one came out for PC today, and then I control control F on the patch notes for Xbox. You mad? I'm excited. It'll happenJustin: yet to me. When I read through this stuff there was, I think only one that maybe kind of popped out to me is like, Okay, this is actually something they need to work on. And it was releasing legion generals during legion encounters can cause a client crash. I think something that can actually crashed the game, that that's a bit of a problem. And that mostly just cause we both dealt with leagues where I mean you, especially where that was an issue. So I can I can, you know, I can see that a little bit. But when I look at their posts that they put out and this is days before Christmas, I think this one popped up. I don't rember who posted it. Uh, it still impresses me like they're legitimately looking into stuff. They know stuff there, and they're gonna fix it. And the stuff that I was reading was not game breaking. Besides, the fact that the client could crash that that to me is a bit of a big deal. I had an issue with one of the valves side areas. Who cares? It was not a big deal. It took into when I when I exited, it didn't bring me back. So where I had entered into the map, I actually thought it was cool. Yeah, I don't know. The rest of the stuff wasTyler: even something like Metamor. Fosse's not being able to be frozen were used to Boss is not be able to be frozen. It was just chill, right, Right. So I, you know, even with something that was frozen dependent, you're getting a very good chill on them, especially because it was buff. So that's not even a big problem either.Justin: Nothing stood out to me where on and again, that could have been because there have been stuff fixed that were more game breaking that I just never encounter because I hadn't gotten up there. But I didn't really stand out to Mia's thes terrible things.Tyler: Yeah, I can see the There's a There's an issue where the awakened cast on Krit um, is creating cooled elms where when there shouldn't be any, I could see that being a big issue for builds. But at the same time, you don't need the awakened jewel to have a successful build. SoJustin: you're already having a problem with an awakened version of a skill? Boo hoo. I don't feel bad for you. Even a tiny bit. A tiny bit. Put the cast on. CreatedTyler: for not to drop.Justin: Sure, I'm thrilled. If it didn't work on the lake first week of a league lunch, I wouldn't be like you wreckedTyler: my bill. No, you haven't. Go put the normalJustin: one in the one you used all the way up until you found that one. Yeah. Yeah, I saw. I don'tTyler: know if anybody's actually complaining about it, but we did see it on the bug report,Justin: right? I imagine it's probably because somebody complained about it. Ah, but yeah, I just It made me laugh. Yeah, there were. There were some really fun, uh, things that I saw in in red It actually in the last couple of days that made me laugh or not laugh with smile there. Only because I get so jealous I still haven't seen exults this league. Nothing cool has dropped yet besides garbage unique ce which is still fine. But the critic I that posted he did ah ah Contains a valuable gym. He got to You got enlightened and empower both level force. They dropped as a light on level four. Empower little for. And there was other stuff too, but oh, my gosh. I was like, What? The hacky. There was a screenshot of it, and I'm thinking in solar cell found I would leave in a heartbeat. I like buying stuff through a felon. I'm getting stuff, but it was crazy. And then, uh Okay, So there. Did you see? I don't know how often you check credit, but there was a helmet that somebody posted that was crafted. This was It was it was with that the ah, the awaken, her orb. So where you combined the two things? Now I feel like this is a lot because this helmet just Oh, man. Perfect. It's a meat. Well, yeah, it used to be. I mean, it sucks now because zombies are terrible, but Okay, I'm just gonna read through it.Tyler: I don't think they're terrible, ByJustin: the way, we're talking about a bone helmet. Yeah, Minion steal. 20%. Increased is the, uh,Tyler: got Ah. So a max. ImplicitJustin: max. Implicit of minions deal. 20% crease damage plus three toe level of soccer Did Minion Gems socket of gems. Air supported by level 18 million. Life soccer. The gems air supported by level, 18 million damage. Now, if it stopped here, you've already done really, really well. Like, really, really? Well, like last season. Last league. Oh, my God. You could have bought 20 years. It everybody wanted every freaking minion thing. Now, yeah, we're gonna continue on. Minions have 19% increase Max life minions deal 20%. Increased damage, 5% reduced manner. Reserved glow. And he had the intent on it for flesh offering. Granting an additional 21% increase. Attack speed for flesh. And then he had craft. That was insane. Lightning resist.Tyler: But nuts it is. Of course, it's incubating something just to make it even more exciting.Justin: I it just seemed fake when I read it. Yeah, I was like, Oh, my God. I would like last league. I would have liked just two of those options to force their six good things on there.Tyler: I can't tell you how much currency I've spent on console trying to get a plus three to the level of socket 1,000,000 Jim's. I still don't have it. I am trying everything. The craft. I'm going crazy. I make I I can't do it. I can't do it. And then here's this year's this.Justin: Yeah, it's just I don't know what he was crafting. Four. I did Rhea little bit about the threat, and the guy who actually crafted it kind of came on. It was like, I don't know what to do with this, which made me laugh because I would be the same way. I would have been really upset that I didn't have it last league because, I mean, it's awaken. Or that's new, though, isn't it? I mean, you couldn't have really done it, but still,Tyler: no, but it doesn't have to. I mean, I know you're against how zombies were were cut down a bit, this league, but that's not so. I'll be specific by any means. No, I know. But so respect all Dominion buffs from last later still applicable. That thing's crazy but still insane. It's still absurd. That's something like, even if you had a mirror, you would just put that somehow on display just so that you could look at it sometimes,Justin: yeah, It's crazy. I couldn't believe it when I was reading through it. So cool. Yeah, I wanted to just give a quick show boat. We've gotten some pretty cool feedback from people that have been listening and people that have given us some advice and some constructive criticism. You know, the lovely kind, But I want to just give a shout out to all those people and, ah, we don't have a list of everyone, but we're going to start making a list because it's it's a really big deal to us. It really helps us figure out what we should do better for the next ones. And let us know that people enjoy the time that we share together, you know?Tyler: Yeah. No, it's It's been really cool. It's been a lot of fun. We're only five episodes in, but every episode has been listened to more than the previous one, and it's ah, it's exciting to see how it goes, but it's ah oh, we just want to say a big thank you to people that do find this enjoyable, and we definitely would value your feedback for sure. So I know we said at the end of every episode. But just to emphasize, if you tweet us at forever exiled 82. Just positive feedback, negative feedback. Whatever it is, we do want to make this a really good podcast for you and something that lots of path of exile players would really enjoy it here. So let us know what you think. We thank you very much for listening to all the episodes that you already have.Justin: If it's mean we'll start a Twitter war straight up. That's right. Fight to the death of Twitter. All right, cool. Well, listen, Thanks for everybody listening. This, uh, this has been a lot of fun. This was Episode five of Forever Exile. The Path of Exile Podcast. I am one of your host tags, A k a JustinTyler: A key. I'm Tyler, also known as Wrecker of Days......ThanksJustin: Check out the show Notes below. To find more information on today's episode, you can find us online at www dot forever exiled dot com as well as on Twitter at forever exiled 82

How to Change for real!

Wild Alive Living

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 24, 2019 18:18

Today I'd like to talk about what it takes to truly change. Most people don't want to talk about it, because most people don't truly want to change. But most of us want, myself included. I'm not enlightened or anything. What we all want is we want to take our same feelings, our same emotions, our same desires, our same ideas into what we consider to be this new realm, where we're where we have more of the things that we want, where we become more of the person that we want to become But in reality, the only way to truly change yourself or anyone else is to go through a death process. Now death, you know, it's the it's the big issue with humans. We're all aware of our own death and we have 10,000 different ways that we deal with it with many different religions, and many different ideas and philosophies and politics and communities. But most of us who seek any type of change, are unwilling to go through the death cycle to get there. The painful truth is, is that if you want To truly change for good in a way that's going to potentially yield, what you want the change and being or the change in circumstance that you want. If you want to become a billionaire, or if you want to become a political leader, or if you want an amazing relationship, or if you want an outstanding sex life, if you want optimum health, whatever it is, you have to die. And that's the thing that you can actually begin to get better at being willing to face death is the beginning of true transformation. Now when I say death, I don't mean physical dying, because you can have religious belief in which you You see that death is not the end, and believe that when you die, you're going to change and go to another plane, or you know go to heaven or being reincarnated or whatever your particular flavor is. That's not death. True death comes from facing annihilation. So that means facing zero. So if you practice facing annihilation, facing the point at which, sort of in the sand in the fantasy genre they would, there would be sort of monsters that would take your soul and extinguish it. So if you're willing to face or if you practice being willing to face extinction, annihilation, total dissolution, then you'll be better able to make the true changes in your life. That will accomplish what you are seeking. So really that's the core of this talk is that in order to have a true change, and it really doesn't matter how small the changes, the more you practice being okay with Total Annihilation, and that may mean letting go of your family, letting go of that which you hold most dear. The stories throughout the ages are filled with stories of which you have to let go that which you hold most precious in order to save the world or save your humanity or save the community or save life. So Practice facing total annihilation. You are facing an annihilation of your identity. So when I was about 15 years ago? Yeah, no, that was 10 years ago, about 10 years ago. I know that was 15 years ago. I apologize. 15 years ago, I was faced with the opportunity to go live with a wild tribe in the mountainous Amazon region of Peru, which was something that in my youth, I always, always but for many years I had strived to because I had identified with that, that wild life that was completely immersed in nature in which nature was our whole world. that opportunity. And I was getting ready to make that I was making the decision of whether I was going to do that or not. And something happens inside of me welled up. Because I knew in my intuition and in my deep insight that if I went into that forest, my goal was to stay there for at least six months, at least, a seasonal change, if not a year, six months to a year, a full solar cycle, or at least half a solar cycle. If I did that, I knew deep down inside that, me as I knew myself with my likes, and my preferences and my desires and all the things that I wanted to do, that person was going to die in that forest and somebody else was going to come out. So that moment in time, I chose not to go in there. Now I'm not saying that that was the wrong choice. I'm just saying that I wasn't willing to die. And I had more that I wanted to do in this identity in This identity that had the preferences that still wanted to have kids that still wanted to, you know, have a career, still wanted to surf the world still wanted to have some of the youthful desires that still lived inside of me. So what I'm saying is, is that when you're confronted with a true transformation, you will be faced with a very difficult choice to let go of something that you've previously wanted. And that's the big question. The big question is, what can you let go of what are you willing to let go of, in order to find this new place where you say you want to live and another painful truth that we all need to acknowledge is that usually probably most of The time we don't really want what we say we want. We're addicted to the conversation about going and getting what we want. Because that makes us feel consistent in who we know ourselves to be even if that's a painful place. The pain is a surface level pain that covers up a deep sense of security in knowing who we are. It's much more painful to let go of who you know yourself to be, then to experience the surface level emotional pain of staying where you are. Most people never get past that point. So if you truly want to create a new life that is fundamentally new, not just window dressing upon the existing life, but actually is a deep fundamental transformation which will get you you know, the presidency. Or which will get you the wealth at the high high level that you desire or will get you the freedom to accomplish your deepest desires of transcendence or your deepest desires of adventure, or your deepest desires of love and connection, or sexual fulfillment. Any of those things, if they're lacking in your current life, you will have to undergo some sort of death process which fundamentally involves letting go of something that you're holding on to. Now, that doesn't have to happen overnight. You just have to start meditating on that death. On that release, you have to completely let go. Now this is an important important conversation to have right now. Because in our you know, we are Earthlings. We are bound to the earth whether I don't care what all the religious context say you are an Earthling. I am an Earthling, we are creatures that came out of this beautiful blue marble. inside of that blue marble, we are bound to the blue marble cycles. And we are bound to the cycles of the solar system in relationship to this marble. So one of the biggest cycles that we face is the spiral of the Sun around the Earth and the seasonal flow. And an interesting cool way that I like to think about it is it's not it's not a circle. It's a spiral because we're literally catapulting out into space in a circular pattern. So if you think about it, it's like, like a vortex or a tornado. So nature mimics itself all over the place. So you're spiraling still through space. So you, you're kind of returned to the same place, but it's a totally different place a little farther out just in the similar sort of feeling of the earth boundedness of it. So right now is today is the 23rd. And the 21st is when the day stopped getting shorter, and then the days will really start lengthening on the today's the 24th sorry, today's the 24th the days will start lengthening tomorrow. Tomorrow is the birth of the sun. Tomorrow is the birth of the light. The Christians like to think that Jesus is the only symbol that is the birth of the light, but he is one of many that was pre that many, many came before him. But that's another story and another topic doesn't matter what your metaphor is, what your chosen belief structure is as long as you are willing to face total annihilation. If you want to believe in heaven, that's fine believe in heaven, but also practice letting it all go. Practice Letting go of everything and facing total annihilation. And then if you get if you get to heaven, you're so much more ready for it. So this is the time to confront the demons that you're holding on to, to dig deeper, you know, don't get hammered, don't go unconscious. I've fall prey to that almost every holiday but I've just begin to just be gone. Or no, that's not true. I'm I'm in the final stages of purging the negative, narcissistic relationships from my life. So I now finally have the space to actually dig deep into this personal transformation which occurs in this time of the year. Which is possible it doesn't necessarily occur, it's possible. What will happen for many people is it will mutate into a dark form. So what happens is people who are unwilling to make that Dig deep and to see what they need to let go of it this time of year, they will carry that into the new light place. And then they will go completely dark and literally dive into a dark space in order to in order to hold on to all of those things that they're unwilling to let go of. So now is the time to really see it's a very powerful time to see and let go of all of those things that are in your space right now that are blocking you. And it looks like confronting death. It looks like confronting annihilation, not death because death is so many weird things to people but annihilation, you must practice facing annihilation. And one of the ways to practice facing annihilation is to simply list out things you're attached to that you're willing to begin the process of letting go. Just start when you put something on paper, something out chemical happens in your brain, it takes it out of your brain and into a work of art or a structure or system or a business practice. Those are all the same things you're creating in the world, once you start creating in the world with those things that you're transcending and moving from and to, then that has, you know, statistically, with studies that they've done very simple studies that they've done, you have your 90 plus percent more likely to accomplish your goals if you simply write down what you are, have been unwilling to let go of up to this point. So that's what there is to do. Now, once you've done all that, then tomorrow, whatever day it is for you, I would give it a 24 hour period. So you let go write down everything you're going to let go and then the next day, open up and start to create something new. You can even wait longer Just don't forget to do it. Because if you let go and then you don't have anything that you're running towards, you'll kind of go in this amorphous place which you can get lost which is kind of dangerous. It's like the Bardo, the place between worlds you don't want to stay in the body you need to get out of the Bardo. The Bardo has its own seduction kind of wants to put you to sleep. So you want to not be in that sleep state you want to wake up. So you may need people to help you. That brings me to the I'd like to close on this. Don't try to do these things alone. Throughout history throughout time. There are reasons that the archetype of the sage of the mentor of the master are persistent that they don't go away. We all need that in our life. We all have to have entities outside ourselves that hold space for us. When we go in you know, nobody goes into Well, a few people do but they're very reckless. I lost the ceremonies or a bogus ceremonies or, or deep deep transformational work without a guide. So when you're doing this, this is deep transformational work you need a guide doesn't have to be a professional just has to be someone That has made some transcendent progress in the realms that you're seeking, or has a way of being that has transcended towards from something to something that you admire. That you know, can hold space. There are few and far between. But I suspect the not I suspect, I truly believe and this is a superstition of mine, I'll fully acknowledge that that, you know, when the student is ready, the teacher will call them I complained for years. After I got rid of my old character, I transcended my old teachers, that I couldn't find a new one. And it took me a number of crises, to find a new one and he came in a form that I was completely not expecting. So but I was ready. I was ready to start letting that part of myself die that I was holding on to and to embrace something new. So good luck. As always, please send me your questions I will do everything in my power to help you in your transition, and your transformation and you creating what you want to create in the world. I do have to say with one caveat, I will only work with people who truly want to make the world a better place, and who know that we have to look out for all people and all of life on Earth. We have to win those of us who care about the earth, those of us who care about other people, those of us who truly are willing and able to transcend at least some of our personal satisfaction in order to help the rest of the world get where they're going. So I hope you're on that journey. And please, if this is valuable for you, subscribe, press the notification bell visit the website, one The live.net sign up for the email list. And best of luck, I wish you all of the light and power and beautiful transition that is inherently possible in this time of year. Transcribed by https://otter.ai Photo by Luke Southern on Unsplash

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BAH HUMBUG SYNDROME | Finding Your Happy Christmas | BABH S1Ep11

Be A Brilliant Human | Conscious Living with Joel Young

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 17, 2019 33:46

Feeling a bit "Bah Humbug" this Christmas? Or know someone around you who's inclined to go there? In this episode I'm I'm looking Bah Humbug Syndrome firmly in the eye and exploring: What's really going on underneath the hood of a Bah Humbugger? What's the cost of being Bah Humbug How Bah Humbug Syndrome isn't just for Christmas! A route from Bah Humbug to YOUR happy Christmas A healing response to your Bah Humbug Buddy Beyond the Christmas theme, this episode offers some simple yet effective questions and perspectives to take you from misery and reaction to empowerment and freedom... So click that play button and let's get started! ===== Remember to SUBSCRIBE to this podcast to get more encouragement to BE A BRILLIANT HUMAN. And please leave a review! LEAVE ME A MESSAGE AT: http://anchor.fm/joelyoungnpa/message LINKS REFERENCED ON THIS EPISODE: Show notes and more at http://www.BeABrilliantHuman.com Get The NPA Process for free at: http://www.NPA4.me/npasheet Boundary Bootcamp: https://www.thenpaacademy.com/boundary-bootcamp Visit the NPA website: http://www.JoelYoungNPA.com And for my courses: https://www.TheNPAacademy.com ABOUT JOEL YOUNG Joel Young has been developing life coaching tools for years, NPA being one of them. He shares life coaching tools and exercises on his website, especially techniques to stop taking things personally. "I’m interested in inspiring people to an even greater potential. The potential to completely shift the perceptual backdrop of their lives, to massively upgrade their operational relationship with the Universe and help them experience life, in all its richness and diversity“ Joel Young JOIN ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joelyoungnpa Facebook Page – NPA Rocks!!!: https://www.facebook.com/nparocks Twitter: https://twitter.com/joelyoungnpa/ Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joelyoungnpa YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joelyoung Instagram: http://www.Instagram/JoelYoungNPA --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/joelyoungnpa/message

christmas universe i'm i'm bah humbug npa joelyoungnpa

231 - Continuing 84 Years of Tradition at Heaven Hill with Conor O'Driscoll

Get Sellers Calling You: real estate marketing agent coaching seller leads generation Realtor Tom Ferry Brian Buffini Gary Va

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 12, 2019 59:28

Conor O'Driscoll is beginning to make a name for himself. After spending part of his career at Brown Forman and Angel's Envy, he was recruited to fulfill the role left behind by Denny Potter. Conor is now the seventh Master Distiller in Heaven Hill's 84-year history. We spend some time getting to know Conor's past, what the recruitment process is like to find a master distiller, what his role is going to be with the operation side of things, and how at the end of the day he just doesn't want to screw anything up. Show Partners: Barrell Craft Spirits enjoys finding and identifying barrels that contain distinctive traits and characteristics. They then bottle them at cask strength to retain their authentic qualities for the whiskey enthusiast. Learn more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Distillery 291 is an award winning, small batch whiskey distillery located in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Learn more at Distillery291.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about dry January. Where are you from? How did you end up in Terre Haute, Indiana? How did you get into bourbon? Tell us about your time at Woodford. What was difficult to learn about the distilling process? Talk about working at Angel's Envy. Is distilling rum the same process as bourbon? Are distillers in charge of blending? How did you end up at Heaven Hill? Did you have to give up anything to move into this role? Are you looking for ways to improve the legacy brands? Was there a learning curve coming to Heaven Hill? Who determines the increase in production? Were you involved in forecasting at your other roles? How did you learn the Heaven Hill portfolio? Do you have a favorite brand? What was it like to sign your first bottle? 0:00 Perfect timing. Luck of the Irish again, right? 0:03 Yeah. I get to say that one every day. 0:19 What's up everybody? It is Episode 231 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your host Kenny and we've got just a little bit of news to go through. Four roses, like every other distillery out there is trying to figure out what do you do with old barrels and there are all kinds of breweries across the nation just want to gobble them up. And four roses is collaborating with Brooklyn Brewery for a new limited release beer called Black Ops. Now I've seen it before, but this one's a little bit different because this vintage of Brooklyn Black Ops was aged for four months in four rows of small batch barrels that were then selected by master distiller Brent Elliott and re fermented with champagne yeast. This Russian Imperial stout comes at 12.4 ABV. raises a fluffy dark brown head combines big chocolate and coffee notes with a rich underpinning of vanilla like oak. Brooklyn Black Ops will be available in limited quantities wherever Brooklyn Brewery is available. A new development is happening in downtown local with a new website that offers an interactive map. a whole list of attractions featuring downtown distilleries like old forester angels envy Victor's plus a whole gallery of pictures. It's called the bourbon district. There are flagpoles and Information Science going up around downtown around the city that gives information history and directions to all the bourbon related happenings in downtown Louisville. You can check it out online at bourbon ism.com that's like tourism, but bourbon ism.com Ryan and myself we traveled down to Lynchburg, Tennessee this week to go and pick our first ever single barrel of jack daniels. We've heard so much about these single barrels being stag killers that we just had to go out and try it. ourselves, we're really looking forward to bringing this barrel selection along with many others to our Patreon community in 2020. And right now our goal is set at 20 barrel selected for the Patreon community in the next calendar year. With the holidays approaching, it's a good time to think about how fortunate we are that we get to enjoy this great hobby of bourbon. With the help of the bourbon pursuit Patreon community and the fellows on the round table. We've kicked off our first ever Christmas charity raffle, go to bourbon pursuit.com slash Christmas to see all the packages that we have lined up. There's bottles of pursuit series, Episode 17, which was our collaboration with willet distillery of Maker's Mark 46 private selection that we did a Russell's reserve from rare bird one to one a victors barrel strength right Elijah Craig barrel proof the old label, Traverse City collaboration from bourbon or as well as breaking bourbon and even more bottles. There's also apparel glassware tasting sheets, a complete signed copies Of all the books that have come from Fred MiniK, as well as a signed copy from sip and corner, Brian Harris as well. Every dollar raised is going to the USO in pets for vets. Both of these organizations do incredible things for our veterans and their families. Every entry gives you a chance to win any of the prize packages that we have. And of course you must be 21 year old or older to enter entries are accepted until midnight of December 22 2019. So please go visit bourbon pursuit.com slash Christmas to get in on the action and help out veterans in this holiday season. Now for today's podcast, Conor Driscoll he's beginning to make a name for himself in this bourbon world. After spending his career at Brown Forman and angels envy, he was recruited to fulfill the role left behind by Denny Potter. Connor is now the seventh master distiller in heaven hills 84 year history. We spend some time getting to know Conors past, what the recruitment looks like. Even like that whole process. Even Find a new master distiller and what his role is going to be with the operation side of things and how the end of the day, he just doesn't want to screw anything up. Alright, let's kick off the podcast. Here's Joe from barrel craft spirits, and then you've got Fred minich with above the char. 4:17 I'm Joe Beatrice, 4:18 founder of barrell craft spirits, we enjoy finding and identifying barrels that contain distinctive traits and characteristics. We then bottle them a cash rank to retain their authentic qualities for the whiskey enthusiastic next time. Ask your bartender for barrell bourbon. 4:34 I'm Fred MiniK. And this is above the char I as a journalist, I get pitched a lot of stories and over the past 15 years, you know in covering the booze business in one shape or another, I have received about every pitch you can possibly imagine from celebrities, to new nightclubs, you know to the fads like white club and every kind of Vodka flavor you can imagine, and yada and on and on and on and on. One of the latest trends in the booze industry is is one of the more fascinating trends that I have ever seen. And that is dry January and this entire belief that the alcohol industry needs to start preaching and talking about not drinking. And what's interesting about this is that you would say, you could take a step back and say, Well, if you encourage people to not consume alcohol, wouldn't that hurt the industry, but the counter to that is take a look at what happens when you drink too much. People die, people die of liver poisoning. There's certain types of cancers that are linked to drinking too much alcohol. There's all kinds of problems that can be linked to over consumption. And by overconsumption I'm talking five to seven drinks a day. You know, getting drunk. Every day, binge drinking to the point of where you have to get your stomach pumped on a regular basis. I mean, these are real issues that people face and to counter that the alcohol industry has been promoting mocktails and dry January. Now, I'm torn, because I'm a firm believer in drinking moderation. And I'm a firm believer in just being responsible. And it's something in our there's something in our country's DNA that we don't allow ourselves to really have a conversation about what is responsibility, even the brand's they're all saying yada, yada, yada, drink responsibly, don't drink and drive all this but what is drinking responsibly? Well, they'll say, well, it's having two drinks, but but again, what is it? Is it you know, drinking, not drinking when you're emotionally, you know, inspired or connected to something? Is it not drinking on anniversary? Is it just having one drink? And, you know, maybe you just got married or you're celebrating something? Can you have five drinks, then? I mean, no one really talks about what drinking responsibly is. They just have their taglines. And now this whole effort about, you know, mocktails and dry January, it makes me question if we truly know what we're trying to do in this business when it comes to encouraging moderation, because if you ask me, getting people to not drink during January has the opposite effect. That's teaching abstinence. That's not moderation. And that's this week's above the char Hey, if you have an idea for above the char hit me up on Twitter or Instagram at Fred MiniK and check out my new YouTube series on YouTube. Just search my name Fred MiniK. Until next week, cheers 7:58 Welcome back to that episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon, Kinney and Ryan here and this is the this is the first time I think Ryan might have been to this office in this conference room, because no 8:09 you haven't. You've been here. I've been here Barney lovers. We were We were not in this conference room. Yeah, I remember when this read 8:14 Yeah. Cuz I was like we had we had Larry on last time. And, you know, so we're at the the, I don't call it the marketing offices. It's the business offices of heaven hill that are located here in Louisville, Kentucky. It's catty corner to the Maker's Mark offices, so they're always spying on each other to kind of figure out what's happening over there and stuff like that. I guess 8:34 bar sounds just not good enough for him. 8:37 I don't know. I mean, I totally get it. There's way more lunch spots and place to take people. Yeah, 8:42 there's more than maybes. But you know, the other thing is, you know, I also feel bad for a lot of the people that that do have to work in these multiple locations because you are, you're driving a lot back and forth to whether it's distillery whether it's the offices because, you know, we're not going to Bardstown. We all happen to be here and global. So it It made sense to come here but I know that you know our guest today he's got to go. He's got to go to the Bernheim distillery. He's got to come here. He's got to go to the Heritage Center. He's He's all he's making the trifecta of all the places he has to hit up. I guess we'll find out if that's one of the perks you know, your mileage, your mileage gas reimbursement, 9:19 or company car when your masters dollars. Absolutely. Yeah. 9:23 So with that, let's go ahead and introduce our guests. today. We have Connor O'Driscoll. Connor is the newest minted master distiller at heaven Hill. He is also the fifth master distiller that's been crowned at heaven Hill. So congratulations. 9:36 Thank you very much. I think I'm seventh seventh. Is that what it was? Okay, then the era era 9:41 fifth and superior than the heaven Hill. 9:43 See what happens? We get Wikipedia information. Yeah, they're right 9:46 in Google food just wasn't on my side this morning. Yep. So Connor, welcome to the show. It's great to be here. honored to be here. Yeah, I mean, we've we've met before we talked and and 9:57 yeah, we did is we didn't wanna Whiskey and dine with getting Daya 10:01 What was that? Was it was that raw? 10:03 Yeah it was what was it a long time it was that was my debutante get to get to know Connor Connor night is what it was so yep. 10:10 And and you know estimate impression and vice 10:14 vice versa yes yeah 10:16 and I could understand like it's got to be difficult coming into a situation like this and and seeing a product portfolio that's the breath in front of you and saying like okay, now I've got to be 10:27 the face of this Yeah, don't screw it up. I mean, that literally was the the guiding mantra the the first one still is don't screw it up. But you mentioned the portfolio. You know, the other place I've worked or you know, great whiskeys, but it was like one whiskey maybe two or three. And now you come to heaven Hill, and there's a lot and honestly I'm I'm still learning the portfolio. But what a fun facet of the job to learn the portfolio. 10:52 Yeah, well, not only bourbon you have like in I'm not sure if you know that all the different brands are 10:58 wearing well. We're making I'm on the I'm still learning the whiskey anything so yeah, we got our five mash bills that go into multiple different skews. And you know everything from the mellah, corn, corn whiskey all the way up to heaven hell 27 with all the fantastic products in between there. Sure. 11:17 So before we get sorry, not the products that we want to kind of get know more about you because I can't pin it down exactly what region from Texas are you from? 11:26 Very, very far eastern Texas. So Far East across the Atlantic, I grew up in Dublin and Ireland. So the joke is they put an Irishman charged with whiskey. Am I living the dream or I live in the stereotype to be determined. So yeah, I grew up in Dublin, went to school there, got my degree in chemical engineering there and actually started my career with Pfizer pharmaceuticals, in Cork on the south coast of Ireland. 11:52 I've been with them for forgetting quite a year and they asked me to go to Terre Haute, Indiana. I have a 12:03 word for john deere. Yeah. 12:05 They had a actually was kind of cool. You know, for a guy straight out of college the we were using a genetically engineered and our genetic genetically engineered bacteria to make the enzyme to make cheese. And it started was a fermentation based process. So you know again for a kid straight out of college This was bleeding edge technology. And it's amazing that you're like this was exciting like 12:28 these were excited on time product 12:29 was exciting. The process is exciting. Yeah. And it was 12:35 it was supposed to be a six month assignment four months and they asked me to stay and six years later I quit. So it wasn't so awful that I couldn't stay there for six years now the people I worked with the fantastic still friends with some of them. You know, the, the, I guess the real thing that kept me there was I reconnected with some friends from Louisville. I started coming down here on the weekends and probably had enough Been for that the the lore of Terre Haute would not have been strong enough to keep me there but you know gotten older level very well got to know the road from Taro to local really really well. And you know like i said i for six years and Taro and I quit 13:15 and spent that summer riding my motorcycle across the country. Oh, it's interesting. Yeah, still still have it's a 93 CEO Harley guy and I haven't heard they said 93 superlight 13:26 spent seven weeks that summer writing 11,098 miles. As I was heading back towards Indiana, I realized it was gonna be very close to 11,000 miles. I said if I don't make 11,000 miles I'm riding around the block. I do make 11,000 13:42 ended up being 11,000. That's like me with my Fitbit every day. I'm like, all right. Yeah. 13:48 Yeah, it's kind of same thing. But I was in Mexico, Canada and 23 states in between. Wow, the week so it's pretty cool. It's quite an epic road trip. It was epic. It was really cool. 13:57 So So kind of talk a little bit more about the road. Trippler were it was there any like other sites that you're like amazed to see, I know for me personally, people always thought about going and seeing like the Grand Canyon. And for me, I remember going to see in the Grand Canyon and you look, you get there and you're like, Alright, let's get out of here like we've seen it. 14:14 Well, so the the genesis of the trip was 1996 was the 75th anniversary of Route 66. So Harley organized is rolling rally, they call it start in Milwaukee for hardware parties are built, came into Chicago picked up route 66 and then followed it west to Santa Monica. There's not much left to route 66 but they had a historian with us who every evening would talk about, you know what we'd seen today what we're going to see tomorrow and it was 400 and some bikes did it and and I was one of them and it was thousands you could join anywhere along the way. So remember riding into like touken Karina Mexico, and just as far as you could see in front as far as you could see it behind double line of Harley's. So that was Very cool, but you know, got to see, you know, all kinds of the US and especially you mentioned the Grand Canyon. I mean, I've been to the Grand Canyon three times twice on my Harley and one the first time was was on this ride. And yeah, it's it's pretty stunning to see it. 15:17 What did you learn about the US on that trip that like that, you know, before I get to our country, you know, you probably have preconceived notions about 15:26 it and like, I know, I'd been in the, in the, in the states for six years and have taken multiple road trips, you know, West and wherever, but to see it from the back of a Harley and to see it for that long. You know, I wrote every inch of highway one Pacific Coast Highway, you know, from the Mexican border, the Canadian border. I wrote over independence pass road across the desert in Texas, you know, there's one stretch of highway there were, you know, it's 100 miles between gas stations. And Mike's got him out of 30 moderating yeah yeah. So I just I mean the vastness the variety you know to go from you know sea level to 14,000 feet that's not four to 12,000 feet anything's past go from the Pacific Northwest Texas desert yeah just stunning 16:20 was a little bit different than than Ireland to because at least in Ireland if you do that kind of driving least you see castles 16:27 across the US like, not really Oh Harris castle is a Hearst Castle just holiday. 16:31 Just holiday. 16:34 Yeah. 16:35 So kind of talk about what's that that next evolution of your journey? How did you get into I mean, you were doing the cheese thing you stopped. 16:42 What I wasn't, I was a pre chorus. I was doing the the enzyme thing the enzyme is I know it sounds really bad. I'm like, I'm gonna do that cheese thing. Yeah, we were we were. We were in the cheese supply chain. But yeah. You know, the process I worked on in Ireland was fermentation based. This one in Terre Haute was fermentation. And after I Well, after the motorcycle trip, I ended up in Colorado, skied all winter, and then got my career going again. And it's an awesome severance package. I had to save smart I know Sarah respects bed safe, smart. And I learned to live cheeping. And so when I got my career go and again, I said, well, I've tried this production thing, I'll try engineering. And I put the design and things and did that for another six years and that was that was less fulfilling. Let's say it was very deal. bertina is that a word? It is 17:35 already me. I will take the take the new terminology, what it was, you know, sit in a cubicle, that type of thing. 17:43 By this point, I was married and I'd always said that, you know, I was going to stay in the US as long as it was fun. And yet once it was no longer fun, I leave but of course, you know, you're still here. It's still here. It's still fun transcontinental motor motorcycle trip. Pretty fun winter skiing. Pretty fun, you know, I've still fun 18:04 20 years later 18:06 21 years later So, you know, I said it quit being fun, I would go back to Dublin and try and get a job making Guinness because that would be fun. And once I realized that wasn't leaving, and like I said it was getting tired of this, the engineering end of things. So I gotta go What's next? You know, where where should I? Where should I take my career and like I said, the biggest thing was in the back of my mind was that it's not the closest thing but you know, kind of along that arc, this bourbon thing seems kind of cool. So that was in 2002 when I really started thinking about it but you know long before any boom long before you know any any even hint of the boom you know, Woodford had been in existence for what six years at that point. That's That's how long ago it was. So I started knocking on doors and it literally Two years before Geico Leo reading or who had run, what's now the brand form of his salary he retired and ever read ratcheted up one and opened position. And I was lucky enough to get hired into that. And the previous person hired into that. That job was my boss who had been hired 26 years prior to that. That's how slow the industry was that but brown Forman hired me and it was like whew, dream job. And I spent five years in Shively, you know, learning how to learn how to run into Syria how to make whiskey and in 2008, nine runner up then they sent me out to Woodford and again Woodford was tiny then but the boom was probably that's, you know, it was probably starting that our had started and was starting to pick up some momentum. 19:50 Yeah, that's when you kind of start seeing a lot of the uptick and rise of people just visiting, distilleries and stuff like that. Not so much the the craze we see today of bye Just flying off the shelf, but definitely a more of an interest from the average consumer. And probably nearing the time to when a lot of distilleries are thinking like, Oh, we probably need a visitor center. 20:12 So when for did have a visitor center, which is kind of cool, but you mentioned the uptick and visitors that literally was the first thing we saw. You know, Hank, at that point, the visitor center had been designed for maybe 30,000 visitors a year and the bourbon trail came on right around then and really kick things up and you know, there weren't that many visitor centers and Woodford had the newest nicest one. And you know, so to that wasn't quite the ground for the Woodford but it was pretty close to it. So to be there at that point in in the industry's growth and in Woodford growth was just well, perfect timing. Look at the Irish again right. 20:50 Yeah. album to get to say that one had bed every day. 20:56 So the I said from 2009 till What was it say? Two years ago 17 was at Woodford did. Most of that was, you know, running the distillery Did you know Did a lot of cool things were worked with a lot of cool people learned a ton. Kind of was part of it was you know, it's just it was gratifying, Exciting, thrilling to be part of the growth of that brand. Like said when I went out there, it was tiny. By the time I left, we were shipping over a million cases a year. And you know, it had become what it is now. Or, 21:29 you know, yeah, you still had a hand and a lot of the product that's still coming out today, anything like 21:34 that. When I left there are people who said, you know, are you going to do it all the person you've told them what fruit you have? And I was like, what a drink it 21:42 and it's good for at least seven years. Yeah, I have confidence. It'll be good for a long time. It's still a good team out there. So 21:47 yes, what to say speaking of the team, I mean, talk about a relationship or time with Chris Morris or anything like that, because I know that you you probably had some sort of interaction with him and we 21:57 worked very closely together and what a cool guy to work with. I mean His his knowledge of the industry and, you know, he he was clearly the tip of the spear in the in the in the growth of Woodford and in the guidance of its growth you know the Masters collections you know I was lucky enough to have a hand on those and you know make several of those but they are all his brain children and you know to work closely with him and the rest of the team as well. And you know the you know, Elizabeth Nicole who's now the system master sitter, she worked with me for a while Woodford and that was that was a lot of fun. She's She's cool. Yeah. 22:36 A little tight knit family. You guys yeah, Christmas cards. I go back. 22:40 We just exchanged bottles. Yeah. So I'm curious when you get into you know, distilling, like you said you you know you came from the end zone fermentation like, Is there like that when you show up as like art? Here's the training manual. And let's 22:52 go No, no, no, their age or there really isn't. And especially back then because you know, when you haven't hired someone for 26 years, there's no onboarding manual, y'all know new guy manual. So it was you know, kind of seat of the pants stuff, you know, I followed my Glen Glaser was my boss learned a ton from him followed him around every day, like a lost puppy, you know, work with the operator is kind of sadness them quite another, those are the guys who turned the vows and, you know, run the show, so, you know, sit with them and learn from them and just kind of be a sponge, soak it up. 23:27 So it was a kind of like station. So like, this month, I'm going to be focusing on how to turn these valves next 23:33 month. It's guys, it's, it's, it's all inclusive, it's kind of in depth. And I remember, you know, by time I joined bra form, you know, I worked in production for six, seven years, I've done design engineering, you know, across multiple different interest industries for another six years. So, you know, hired in and, you know, Glenn said it's gonna take good two years to really understand this process. And I was like, has 24:01 And literally two years to the day, I was like, I think 24:04 I'm starting to get this. Yeah. But it's just you know, it's, you know, you think about making whiskey you know, you get granny mellet mash it from Anna distill it put in the barrel, five easy steps, but you get a distillery and everything's scheduled on top of itself. And there's you got to do this first, but you got to wait for that. And then you got to worry about byproducts and is your East up to speed and blah, blah, blah, blah. So getting the integration of all those parts and the timing of all those parts and just getting everything to work in concert and understanding all the multiple nuances of flash. That's where the, those are the details and that's what the devil is. 24:41 So it's like Malcolm Gladwell, his role of 10,000 hours. So you gotta do yeah, is 24:47 when I read that book, a lot of it. A lot of it rang true. Yeah, for sure. 24:51 I don't I'm not familiar with the book. 24:53 Oh, it's just had that to be an expert. Really, they've, if you have 10,000 hours, like that's where your achievement mastery in any subject, but so, well, that's good to know. So if you do 40 hours a week, there's, you know, 2000 working hours in a year. So if you're just doing the bare minimum, you know, take you five years. Yes. So, I'm sure you're working more in that accelerated. 25:19 So we got a while until we figure out this podcast. Yeah, 25:23 we're only like 500 hours. 25:26 Well, I mean, that's, it's, it's, it's, it's a good way to kind of see how you grew up in and you learn the industry from the inside with inside of brown Forman because a lot of people we take tours and you go through and they really dumb it down. And exactly as you said, they take the five steps and like this is the process. However, there's so many intricacies with inside of that process that that you that you had just talked about, you know, during your time there what was what was one of those intricacies that you said like, Okay, this is this is going to take more time to figure out Like this is where this is where the variables tend to change a lot, that sort of thing. 26:04 So the, the easiest example of that is, you know, the optimizing the easting mashing fermentation at Woodford, you know, when I got there. They were running for mentors that we were making whiskey, everything was trotting along just fine. And like we talked earlier, this is kind of as the boom was starting up, and I was looking at ways to increase productivity and the and the distillery so one of the easiest ways to increase productivity is to put more grain in the fermenters and still doing everything exactly the same way. There's just more grain in there, therefore, there's more food for the east, therefore, they can make more alcohol therefore, you can fill more barrels. So talking with my colleague, Kevin Smith, down at jack daniels, who for every five minutes that I could talk about Eastern he could talk for five hours and and just he's a fascinating guy and just Fanta knowledge, but remember having a casual conversation with him about you know, increasing The beer gallonage and the amount of grain in the fermenters. And he says, Well, before you do that, thanks very polite about before you die, you're going to have to fix your easting was like nothing wrong or easting that's embarrassing. I spent a lot of my early curriculum. And as I, you know, we, we set it from enter and hours later at bubbles and then days later, we get whiskey out of it. And, you know, he very politely disabuse me of that. And that was step one in a two year process to get from where it was a very crude way of managing East that was actually doing more to hamper the East than it was to optimize it. But I said two years into it, and the fermenter productivity was up for you know, 25% the whiskey quality was off the charts the rates of ferment for metric content. We've had zero, you'd walk in the distillery and just smell how good it was. And from a initial notion of, let's put some more grain on the from Enter to two years later, again, I think we're finally turning the corner here. Yeah. And then of course, there were, there was some short term gains that are immediate gains, like, All right, we're on the right path, but to really, you know, get it from a system that might have been that's got 85% efficient to 90% efficient and 95% efficient, the 98% efficient, you know, to really start tweaking into details there. 28:33 Yeah, so East I mean, I guess you probably have a good idea what it's going to do based on experience, but it's a living thing. So are there times that you're just like, what the hell is going on? Like I did everything right. And it's just like, on the ship. 28:46 If you do everything right, it won't. So if it goes to shit, then something's gone wrong. Okay. Yeah, is the bottom line. You know, the the easiest way to think about it, I mean, the East makes all the alcohol and a good chunk of the flavor. So if you treat the strike, she'll treat you right back. And best quote on that. I was doing a camp run amok group at Watford and I had to give a 15 minute masterclass and easting mashing fermentation three times a day, one of the groups the young lady on it after I gave my East HBS as she said, so Randhir East is queen. I was like, Yes, that's exactly it. That's a perfect way to put it. So again, you treat the stride and she'll treat you right. Right back. And, you know, that's, that's, that's kind of the goal. 29:36 So let's move to the next stage in your journey here. So brown Forman, your time there was done in 2017. And you had a little bit of stint at angel's envy as well. You did talk about that. 29:45 Yeah. So I was kind of plugging along doing my do my thing at Woodford and you know, by this stage, I was running the warehousing and processing so another chunk of the industry learning something new. We were building the new warehouses Woodford So, you know, kind of overseeing that and understanding how to operate these giant warehouses. But once we got that system down, it kind of became road and I was like, all right, you know what else? What else is out there? You know, I've had 14 really fantastic years at Brown Forman. You know, is there anything within brown form? Is there anything without and right as I was thinking these things a former brown former former Woodford colleague who's now an age as me, she called me and said, Hey, we may have a position Are you interested? So I went down there on a Saturday morning, various repetitiously and kind of looked around and they heard they were, you know, less than a year out of startup and the brand new facility but in an older building, you've been to them? 30:44 Yeah, yes. Going to say ran into a lot of issues getting that thing up and running, and they got through them all. 30:50 But just everything about it kind of resonated with me. You're like yes, 30:55 I don't want to drive for sales since I was a 30:57 significant part of it because by this point, we had warehouses in midway so my commute was from level two midway check in with the gang there then come back to sales and generally spend the rest of my day ever sales but occasionally we bump between the two of them and then come home so getting close to three hours a day in the car wow yeah audio book time 31:21 have to say I was like I know people in like LA and they do all those commutes every day in San Francisco I'm like, how do you sit in the car for an hour one way every single day like 31:30 I mean, I was doing highway speed so it was it was relatively benign and for most of that time I was driving to Woodford to make whiskey you know it's not that bad. Yeah. But the you know, the the first several months that I was at angel's envy and I would drive home in 10 minutes, I'd literally sit in the garage and I What do I do? 31:50 How did I get 31:50 here? Like 31:52 What Did you take a walk to listen to? That podcast 31:55 way that are better? It's like I better go to the bar home or go to the bar real quick is my wife's can make me do a lot Georgia 32:02 dinner ready so 32:05 that was that was a big one there but you know love being part of a party. It's interesting that the three companies I've worked for in this industry are all different facets of family owned. But 32:17 was angels me family and when you started I was like I'm a car dealer car. I got, of course the Hendersons to 32:21 ride. But it's you know, it was it was fully owned by Bacardi. Gotcha. And Bacardi bring a ton to the table. I mean, they've been there, truly a global company. I mean, we reported up through Geneva, accounts payable were in Costa Rica and sap support was in the Philippines and stuff like that. So, you know, some timezone juggling, but that global perspective was was pretty cool. And just the cultural diversity within the I was at a meeting in Puerto Rico and I was the closest thing to a Yankee in the room and that way any yo You don't get that very often. Yeah. And those like, they're all speaking English for me, because I'm the only one here who doesn't speak Spanish. Yeah, that's kind of embarrassing. But anyway, that was, you know, lots of lots of positive things. Yeah. And again, just a different way of running running the same industry. But Bacardi have a lot of cool things they do, you know, worked with a lot of really smart, hardworking, fun people there. And of course, you know, see an angel, you know, I think the, when I came in, they were just coming out of that startup mode. And, you know, I was tasked with kind of taken out of that wild west, just run headlong at the prop problem till you fix it. All right, let's slow down. Let's think about it. Let's get a process in place. Let's think about where we want to go and how we're going to get there. And just start, you know, like slapping a process on stuff. 33:53 This is an amateur question, but a is distilling around the same process as Barban, but just different ingredients. Different agree it's basically the same. You ferment molasses Sure, Ryan. But then of course it's it's a shorter faster you don't have to mail anything you don't have to necessarily mash anything. 34:12 And then the aguar DNA 34:16 the letter that I guardia day, what is that? It's funny 34:21 to say it's it's the the new make sense. Gotcha. And then you know it's aged in general use barrels for shorter period and of course it's the heat of the Caribbean versus, you know, the seasonal cycles here. Sure. But I know it's I kind of left before I really could deep deep dive into that process. But you heard the word Bacardi and you're like, 34:44 I got a question, but 34:46 let me throw a curveball over the other. I mean, the fermentation and distillation are 34:50 very, very slowly never talked around distilling. 34:54 I've never been around the city. I saw it on TV. 34:58 But no the gang There are there. The Joe Gomez the master Blender down there is just he is one of those icons of the industry. The nicest guy you'll ever meet will talk all day long about it and just he, he wants to be your friend. You want to be his friend. And to spend time with people that can was cool. But then, like the biggest difference, I guess, is the aging. 35:23 Gotcha. So you talked about how he's the master Blender did do distillers here are they in charge of blending as well. 35:32 With the careers of master distiller spanning almost 50 years, as well as Kentucky bourbon Hall of Famer and having over 100 million people taste his products. Steve nalli is a legend of bourbon who for years made Maker's Mark with expertise and precision. His latest project is with Bardstown bourbon company, a state of the art distillery in the heart of the bourbon capital the world. They're known for the popular fusion series, however, they're adding something new in 2020 with a release named the prisoner. It starts as a nine year old tennis bourbon that is in finished in the prisoner wine companies French oak barrels for 18 months. The good news is, you don't have to wait till next year to try it. Steve and the team at Bardstown bourbon company have teamed up with rack house whiskey club rack house whiskey club is a whiskey the Month Club on a mission to uncover the best flavors and stories that craft distilleries across the US have to offer their December box which will ship in time for Christmas features a full size bottle of Bardstown suffusion series, and a 200 milliliter bottle of the prisoner. There's also some cool merchant side. And as always, with this membership, shipping is free. Get your hands on some early release Bardstown bourbon by signing up at rackhouse whiskey club.com. Use code pursuit for $25 off your first box. 291 Colorado whiskey aims to create a one of a kind, bold and beautiful Colorado whiskey, rugged, refined, rebellious owner and founding distiller Michael Myers built the original still from copper photo gravure plates, which you use to create enduring photographic scenes. From what landscapes to the Chrysler Building. On September 11 2011 10 years after 911 changed his life and the lives of so many others. He pulled the first whiskey off that's still building a future in whiskey off his passion for photography. What defines 291 Colorado whiskey is it spirit passion permeates every sip, find a bottle near you at 291 Colorado whiskey calm, right like you stole it, drink it like you own it. Live fast and drink responsibly. 37:32 So you talked about how he's the master Blender did do distillers here are they in charge of blending as well or generally speaking, so that's you know, it's interesting. You know, in Rome, it's all about the blending. 37:45 And that's why the the focus is on master blenders and you know, if you look at the history of Bacardi, the Bacardi founding members have generally come up through that. That that that supply chain, I guess what do you want to call it? Through that right? beams, you know, yeah, exactly. I mean, so the the people running the business know the business. 38:07 But then on our side of it and the bourbon 38:12 you know, blended bourbon is kind of it's still got that post prohibition nasty connotation. So we're not set we don't focus so much on the on the blending side of things. Although, you know, there that is that is, you know, one stave to our barrel as it were. 38:30 Absolutely. So, I think we're going to see a common theme here because I think this is a, probably an inhibitor to a lot of people that that work in your type of scenario in this type of industry. It's hard to maybe make upward progression, because there's people within these roles that are there for 38:50 10 2030 and there's only a handful of them. 38:54 That or you're in a situation where is it as a family legacy? You Got the nose, you've got the Russell's odds are they're not going to let some outsider come in. Cecil come in. And so you have this sort of like this cap on upward mobility. And so you had your your time at angel's envy. So kind of talk about how this process came to be of interviewing at heaven Hill and making some connections and kind of making your way into this role. 39:28 So I known Alan through the industry on lattes or co I known him for several years, just through the industry, like I said, and you know, I was I was happy at angel's envy. I was planning on going nowhere. I was not planning on going anywhere, whatever. And then the news broke that Danny had left and I mean, I was stunned as everybody else but I never I didn't even think like hot there's an opportunity for me. was like, wow, Danny left. So many Alright, so you were all your agent 40:03 start negotiations, 40:04 maybe I should. But actually, it wasn't long after that. That was Danny reached out to me. And because again, I'd known Danny as long as I've been in this business. And he said, he'd been asked to find some suitable candidates and you know, thought me and I was like, wow, I'm so flattered. You know, I hadn't even thought about that. But 40:26 Wow. 40:28 I thought about it. I was like, You know what, I've got a really good job here. I just made a big move and 18 months ago. I'm gonna stay here. And we chatted some more. Thanks very much. That was really flattering. And it's kind of one of the things as soon as I hung up, I was like, 40:43 Damn, it probably wasn't the right 40:45 answer. And then went home told my wife about it and she goes, Yeah, that wasn't the right answer. So 40:53 I forget if Alan call me next or if Danny call me back or what it was, but either way we got back in touch again. I was like, yeah, let's let's see. Let's talk. And the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. What were the hesitations? The fact that I just made a big move and I liked what I was doing that changes me. I liked being part of a party. 41:15 Yeah, it's it's always tough to be put in a situation like that you feel like you're going to burn a bridge by coming in. It's like 41:21 coaching in basketball. You know, somebody had a mid major, they're happy. They're doing well. And then you're like, but the big leagues you're feeling Exactly. 41:27 And it's funny. You said the big leagues. You know, that was kind of the the catchphrase we will but I bought it down by my office at angel's envy overlooked slugger field. So as I'm thinking through this, it's like I'm, I'm pitching AAA and doing fine pitching AAA and the Boston Red Sox, the New York Yankees just called I just said no to the New York Yankees Don't say no to the New York Yankees. Yeah. So luckily, the New York Yankees were upset that I had said no the first time and you know, we talked back to the forwards and the more 41:58 you played hard to get Wherever you go, you go by 42:03 the throat whatever cliches you want that the more I thought about it, just the more it made sense. So this is a you know, the the legacy of heaven Hill the career progression, the whole thing just kind of came together at that point I was like this is this is a once in a career opportunity. If I turn this down, I'll never get this again. And you know if this if I'm truly going to take my career to where I think it should go, this is the opportunity and so far so good. 42:34 It's kind of like it's kinda like you're also in a position like you're a Supreme Court Judge like you've been placed in a position where like, unless you really screw up like you're pretty like there's unless this this whole thing like tanks and there's a nuclear like breakout like you're going to be pretty well set when it Are you having a good there was a nuclear war. We got bigger things to worry 42:58 Yeah. I'm sure yeast will survive right now it's it's it's not quite I haven't kind of docked the ship and I'm done you know there's there's a lot of work to be done a lot of cool work to be done and I'm not gonna I haven't reached a point where I can you know glide into retirement or even I want to rest on my laurels or anything I don't know just sit on the shoulders of those who came before me there's there's a lot left to be done. 43:24 What are some of the like sacrifices or I guess parts of the job that you know you're I guess when you're working at Brown for and you're kind of behind the scenes you're not having to deal with a lot of stuff 43:34 that hard was 43:37 showing up with these idiots taking up an hour Monday 43:42 samples right now yeah, 43:43 I guess talk about that. Like, you know, cuz when you're you like you said when you go to the big leagues, you're giving up a lot. What what are some of those things? 43:51 I'm so 43:54 much giving up i think but you know there. 43:57 I think in any career as you as you Move up the food chain you've gotta gotta learn to delegate and either hope that you've got a good team behind you are engineered a good team in this case, I don't have to hope I do have a great team. I mean, this is Tara has been running for a long time before I got here making award winning whiskey for a long time. So my job is to kind of slide in pick up the reins and keep that going and on that upward arc. 44:27 Yeah, there was a time period between you and and Danny so seems like York it was still running I mean, that doesn't stop Yeah, 44:36 and nothing good stop and as I say the you know, the supervisors that are there on every shift the the team members on on the shift the maintenance guys the the whole crew, I mean, you know, we're we're lucky enough to have, you know, a painter and a janitor, they're young, they work hard to keep the place look and clean and the air is as important to the operation. him probably more important than I am. But yeah, you know, it's it's they're, they're a good team. They work hard they care and I was I was, you know, when Alan took me in to show me around the salary on a Saturday morning everything was done Saturday mornings, very surreptitious. You know, it could pick up I mean, the crew members who were there that day, we're happy to see him. And, you know, they, they clearly were into what they were doing about me. I went, we run seven days a week, and they they work seven days a week. And they were happy to do that. You know, like I said, so they're, they care, they're passionate. They want to make continue to make award winning whiskeys. 45:40 Yeah. When you when you have said, distiller like heaven Hill, he said, it's such a legacy, great brands, incredible products. And like you're like, All right, here's my baby. And they've been doing it so great. But do you look for ways to like, improve the process or look for ways like to put your own fingerprint on it, or at least two years before it changes 45:58 to do the 10,000 hours Again, hopefully it doesn't reset zero. Now Hey guys, like I said it's pick up the reins and keep things going. There's always opportunities for improvement. You know, go back to what I was talking about Woodford I mean Woodford is making good whiskey before I came along. And I had the opportunity to, you know, start optimizing. 46:22 You know, where the Bernheim distillery now is obviously, further ahead than where Woodford was in those days. But there are still opportunities to, you know, just to continuously improve. And speaking of opportunities, talk about what was that that learning opportunity and learning curve of coming in because Ryan and I, we've we've been to the Bernheim distillery, we've we've toured it and we know like the massive scale of what it's what happens there. And so kind of talk about was that sort of like a bow. This is this is pretty big, because I know it's it. It basically makes angels me look like a dwarf at that point. Compare that to word for that. 46:58 Yeah. So it's actually Talk about that. 47:00 So I mean, the the scale of the Burnham disorder is stunning. I mean, we have 17 fermenters that are 124,000 gallons each. We fill four of those a day. And obviously we empty four of those today. So that's the bones of a million gallons of liquid. We're pumping around every day. We're mashing over 16,000 bushels a day, which is over 900,000 pounds of grain a day. That's about 20 ish loads of grain to unload every day. No, no others like 650 thousand barrel warehouses eggs. Yeah, we have 58. Whereas with over 1.6 million barrels, you know, at the Burnham side, we have 480,000 barrels, and we're building a new 50,000 55,000 Bioware has about every six months. You know, we're we're laying down 1300 barrels a day, and we're probably dumping we I know we're dumping less than that. We're probably dumping the order 1000 maybe a little more than that per day so we're continuing to grow our inventory who determines that the numbers I guess of how like how to increase who determines to increase or decrease numbers very finely calibrated crystal ball so it's a it's a dark art you know as you see the sales are this today they look to be that six months 12 months whatever from now we have this much an inventory of things continue this way we should have that much. So we look at we look at that big picture probably, you know, indeed now we're looking at continuously but in detail for twice a year and make adjustments as necessary. 48:42 Was this this role your first time of actually looking at forecasting Did you do that previously in other roles, um, I would, I was involved another role that the other sites as well. 48:53 Brown Forman, have a have a guy called bill Dietrich and he runs the model and And he would bring out the serie production plan, but I worked fairly closely with him and you know, it changes MV was you know, we were so small, so new, there was no existing data to build on. So I built this very complex spreadsheet that was, you know, I ended up calling it the Wonder file. Okay, they kind of got that nickname but, so yeah, I've been involved but it's it's, you make guesses. You make projections. You know, you hope you got it. 49:32 Right. And it's not just a general longer. Yeah. 49:36 Yeah, hopefully you don't have to age a little less. Right? We plan for x, but you know what, it was actually 1.5 x so like, Oh shit, what are we doing now? 49:45 So to also talk about coming into heaven Hill, and we talked about the, you know, the breadth of portfolio of just the Bourbons and whiskies that are in front of it. And I'm sure that as as the master distiller like that as your that is your front, front line of things. That you, you talk about and you're the face for. So where is there like, like a week long boot camp where somebody sat you down and said, All right, so we're going to go through everything you've got to remember every little nuance and the history of them. Like how did that process go? It was a little bit of that. So I spent a fair bit of time with the brand teams and they gave me the PowerPoint decks and the swag and whatever else been 50:23 flashcards. 50:26 In here, the real learning though, gotta get 10 in a row. 50:29 We mentioned Bernie lovers are here. Yeah, you know, I've traveled a fair bit together already. And, you know, go to the whiskey fest and stuff. And, you know, we've gone and done, you know, trainings at restaurants and bars, and, you know, learning it from him and seeing some of his his presentations. That's that's probably where I did most of the learning. 50:51 Oh, he is Yeah, he's the whiskey professor. Any 50:53 fun to learn. 50:54 He already does. Yeah. 50:56 Well, he was up he was playing stump the chump with us. 51:00 I know he made us look like gentle Yeah, no, he 51:02 is asking us questions we were like we weren't paying attention 51:06 he's he's really good at what he does and but of course tasting the portfolio matter way to learn it. Yeah. Anyway, the the funniest one is Pikeville rye. My neighborhood liquor store on Frankfort Avenue. I'd walk by and see Pikeville rye and I read it as Pikeville Ryan I was like who's making rye whiskey and Pikeville Kentucky and then a month later on the master distiller for that brand and I go 51:30 Yeah, I 51:32 know that and I tasted that I was like holy crap This is good. Yeah, and I known Rittenhouse for a long time I love written as but pikesville kind of takes it that takes the next level the next level. 51:44 Yeah, absolutely. I mean it is so you talked about Pikeville is like is there any other like bourbon line that you kind of look at as like yeah, this is this is gonna be like my staple like this mean you gotta kind of give everyone their level. Like is there one that is there a favorite child out of the group? Well, I mean, the main And she left older children. 52:03 So you know you think about we got five Nashville's, you know I think we're the only ones making those five Nashville so the five American whiskey styles and they go into all the different brands so when we make the our bread and butter is hh reg or rye bourbon and that goes into Evan Williams, Greg Hunter mccanna whatever it might be. So learning that progression, you know, Evan Williams is you know, it's a 2.7 million case brand is the second largest selling barber in the world. And it's a you know, if you look at it, if you compare it to the competition, you know, it's age longer, it's higher proof. I think it tastes better. You know, and I that kind of to see how that, you know, ages out and becomes either mccanna are Elijah Craig and how good they are and either on the rocks or I've had some fantastic cocktails lately with our portfolio. It's It's It's It's been a fun journey but even like the I hadn't had much weeded bourbon in recent decades. When I started when I started drinking bourbon by the first one of the very first ones I had was old fits. So find out the way on offense and then we've got larceny and you know been so used to ride a Suburbans and to realize that you know, these leaders are actually they're pretty good on in their own right they're just not just like a light whiskey they are a really good you know, subset or you know, that different side of the same coin type of thing. And so to and of course the the old fits the the specializations that we bring out that are, you know, 1213 years old are just spectacular. Yeah, 53:47 and that's what I think is probably, you know, everybody always always get there's, there's so many brands inside heaven. Hell, we've been in a label room before. I mean, there's there's hundreds if not, maybe they're 53:57 they're literally dead. 53:58 So I mean, it's, it's it's mind blowing but then you know the as you'd mentioned there's an old Fitz relates there's the heaven Hill 27 year releases and people go crazy for the William 54:07 heaven Hill 54:08 and the partners but you're in a unique position because you get to try and sample and taste all these at barrel proof and you get to choose which ones that coming from so I 54:17 get to be part of the 54:18 Yeah, so it's it's that's always a fun experience because like I said, you get to do like the real unicorn part of it right you know, you don't get might not get to see the empty or the the final packaging of it but you get to see the process from really like where it started up until that point to now it's really good like we were doing a barrel selection for hotels liquors yesterday and to you know, we were tasting some the 12 year old at 151 proof now, 54:47 you gotta change the barrel pics two barrel proof pan. We gotta do. Yeah, it kills me. Let's see, we'll start there. And every time I go to a lot of the correct there's three right like it's always the hardest barrel pick because there's three like yeah, stoners from dedes Phil or whatever. You know, and you're like, gosh, I don't want to water this down. But you know, 55:04 I understand you, you, you, you take it to 94 proof and you're comparing apples to apples, right? You know that it's not just like the proof for the color, right? So you're kind of changing your mind. It's like, all right, I know that. I'm comparing the same thing, the same thing for the same thing. So you're getting, you're getting honest whiskey. 55:21 Yep. And so one of the last things I kind of want to wrap it up with is kind of a fun question. Because I want to understand like what your thought process was when this first happened, so you're going to be in front of a lot of people and I'm sure you've you've gone and you've made your rounds at the whiskey fest. And there's always it's a it's a responsibility of a master distiller or brand ambassador, whoever's the face of the brand to sign the bottles. 55:44 Yeah. So, 55:45 so kind of talk about what it was to like, sign your first bottle and go, okay, I've been here for like two weeks. So yeah, like what was that? Like? 55:54 So? It was it's kind of mind blowing to be honest with you. 56:00 Whiskey fest Chicago, I think it was, you know, we have that partnership with Goose Island. So me and Bernie and Mike Smith from Goose Island were doing a presentation on basically barrel aging and better that and afterwards somebody came up and asked me to sign their their ticket or their program or something. And you know, my first reaction was like, seriously, by the cross, I was in my head. But you know, you play the role and that's this person has spent their hard earned money to come and listen to me yap about whiskey. So like, thank you so much. I'm honored to sign it, but it's it's pretty cool. 56:38 You know, our Evan Williams 56:42 HERO program where we recognize veterans, you know, we were down with Chris cruise at cruise customs flags last weekend, he asked me to sign a bottle and he's put a ton of pictures of it on Instagram. And I'm like, anyway, you're the coolest guy. Stop making me look, I just I just scrolled on the bottle, you know, but so it's It's honestly it's gratifying. But at the same time it's it's a little shocking that right? This year Really? 57:07 Yeah. Because I remember it was, it was at the heaven Hill select stock 18 year release, and I'd saw you there. Yeah. And people were aligning, aligning to get your signature. And it was it was just kind of dawned on me. I was just like, he wasn't here 18 years ago, but it's so funny that like people, they gravitate towards you and they want that as sort of like a recognition of it. Yeah. 57:28 And that's that's the role and it's you know, and I kind of enjoy playing it Yeah, it's pretty fun but like the your celebrity 10 years ago, the What do you call it the two weeks after I start Henry McKenna wins best whiskey in the world. And you know, all these people are interviewing me and say watch it liked him. I was like, I had nothing to do with whiskey. But it's very cool that I'm writer and of course, the original mechanic was Irish and I'm Irish, so maybe, maybe maybe smiling down and look at the Irish there. It is. 58:00 always come back to it. Absolutely. 58:02 It's a great way to kind of wrap that up there. So Connor, I want to say thank you so much for coming on the show today. It was a pleasure like I said just to get to know you i think i think it's it's an opportunity for people to really see the the real personal side of you. You know, we just talked before we start recording we all live in like the same neighborhood. Yeah, we all we all drink the same whiskey now too. So it's, it's always fun. And let's 58:24 go to Red Rock and have a cocktail. Yeah. 58:27 Seriously, once again, thank you for coming on and doing this and you know, Ryan, I think this is a great opportunity for us to a get to know Connor and understand really his background and you know what, he brings the table here? heaven. Hell, too. 58:39 Yeah, it's a cool story. I mean, like, from Dublin to Bardstown. You know, who would have thought? Who would have thunk But no, I mean, it I'm, I'm heaven Hill is like, in my heart, because I'm from Bardstown. My fam ton of family members work there and like just that for me and Todd with the I know, it's in good hands. And, you know, that's, that's it reassuring and so I'm glad that they chose you and you decide to call him back and appreciate you taking the time to spend with us. And yeah, if anyone has show suggestions, comments, feedback, we love hearing from our listeners. So just let us know and we'll see you next time. Awesome. Thanks, guys. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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Press B 11: Linx II Past

Press B To Cancel

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 6, 2019 59:32

The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past. A game that has changed the world of gaming for many fans over the decades. Let's hear how it influenced the game world for the Press B crew! Episode Transcription: The below is a machine based transcription of this episode. Sorta like Skynet if it was 2 years old, and wanted a cookie. Take it with a grain of salt. Jake 0:00 Episode 11 links to past today on path.Jake 0:25 Welcome. Thank you for listening to presby to cancel I'm your host this week sick Jake. Today we're going to talk about my favorite Zelda game well, well maybe second favorite Zelda game. Anyway, I'm not here by myself. I'm joined by my fellow friends and co hosts starting with Polish polish. How are you today?Palsh 0:42 Dude, this is a start to sound like your last time you had this, like I was word for word or using the same intro.Jake 0:48 I like mad hockey. Honestly, to be honest with you, I kind of slacked off on the research. I just didn't last 30 minutes. So cross my fingersPalsh 0:59 do you want to keep In the episode I kind of do sureJake 1:03 whatever there is research, research,Palsh 1:05 research. Okay. Hi, I'm Paul swana nine.Wulff 1:08 Great to see who needs research when you know what you doJake 1:12 not know we're doing I'm also joined by werewolf How you doing? What? Wait that was unintentional burn shit.Wulff 1:20 What? What?Wulff 1:23 Howdy, I'm werewolf.Jake 1:25 Sorry, we'reJake 1:27 What are we doing and to bring us back to sanity for the therapy coach GP How you doing?GP 1:33 I'm doing fine. Thank you.Jake 1:34 It's good to be here. That was more normal than I was expecting. That's great. Okay.Palsh 1:39 Yeah, kind of disappointed.GP 1:44 I had some really good dick and fart jokes, but I decided to try to bring us back to sanity.Jake 1:49 Mission accomplished. All right. We're going to talk about Legend of Zelda Link to the Past. But before we kind of dive into it, I do want to kind of hear for everybody what you're expecting. ends with a Zelda as a franchise just briefly because we could talk for hours about this. Just your favorite movie favorite game for the series and what you like about the series or if you you're like me and you disagree with everything everybody says you hate it, that's cool too. Well, if you want to startWulff 2:14 Yeah, I Gosh, I would have to say that I used to split my favorites up between 2d and 3d entries. Whereas, you know, my favorite 2d game was linked to the past. And my favorite 3d game was windwaker for a very long time up until I played Breath of the Wild and then that one kind of supplanted it and I think it's safe to say now that overall experience like for a proper Zelda experience I think Breath of the Wild is my favorite but Link to the Past is still much more playableJake 2:54 Yeah, I think Breath of the Wild was great for the innovation right, taking the series A drastically new direction and I really I love it too. I'm almost thinking now that for me in the future, assuming they keep making games like breath wild, I have to split up into three, like classic 2d Zelda is your old school 3d Zelda, and then whatever the hell they're doing with Breath of the Wild now going forward, because I find that game so drastically different from the rest of the series.Wulff 3:18 Everybody says that, but to me, it just seems like it took the 3d gameplay and shoved the format into it, you know, the original Zelda just have at the world. Good luck.Jake 3:31 Actually, that's true. It does have that quote that elements and there's just not for me, it's the lack of items, I think is what kind of made it different for me. And just the gameplay being so rely on the physics. It's a great game. I love that one.Wulff 3:42 Yeah, it was a very different entry. It was a lot more limited. There wasn't 40 different items to obtain in the game. It was simpler, in a lot of ways, but also a lot more complexJake 3:56 overall. Yeah, definitely solid title. Alright, GP How about yourself? What's your exposure to zelda?GP 4:04 I personally I love Zelda to The Adventure of Link, not pluralized it's The Adventure of Link. AndUnknown Speaker 4:12 was he not allowed more than one?GP 4:14 No, it was just a single solitary adventure.Palsh 4:17 One is all you need, sometimes.Wulff 4:20 So you think most people refer to that as Adventures of blank.GP 4:23 But now I grew up playing, trying to figure out the first Zelda couldn't do it. And then the internet happened before everybody had a computer in their home. I live next door to the library. And so I would walk over to the library, spend an hour downloading maps for Zelda two, and fell in love with that game at that point in my life. So that one's got a very special place in my heart. I appreciate the newer ones Breath of the Wild is gorgeous. But it is one of those rare games where I prefer to watch other people play it, as opposed to playing it myself, but I love it. Also, aka RenaJake 4:58 Ashley. That's interesting. Make up your mind just so many zealots. I love how you mentioned Zelda two is your favorite though because that's also kind of a How do you say outlier from the series? Right? And we talked before about sequels being so different from the originals, but that side scrolling link game is just quite a bit different than the rest of franchise. That's pretty interesting.GP 5:20 Yeah, I love it. But and one of my favorite things that real quick about the franchise as a whole is the music and how really the music is one of the most cohesive things to tie together all of the entries. I'm sure we'll get to that later on. But you asked about what our experiences and that's that's my two cents.Unknown Speaker 5:39 Paul shovel you What's your what's your fascination with zelda?Palsh 5:42 My favorite I'm not a big like Zelda fan. You monster. Like I'm a freak. I'm a freak. Yeah. And just to prove it. My favorite game is actually in the series in the whole franchise is actually trulyJake 6:00 Yes thePalsh 6:03 Zelda to The Adventure of LinkGP 6:06 we are now almost the majority Good job Paul thank youPalsh 6:09 yeah and I and I'm not doing it just to make this cheeky against Jake but no that's it's literally literally my favorite Zelda game like the rest of them don't compare it to me I know and I understand why people often like rant and say they don't like it but I've never actually heard someone flat out say they don't like it except for a couple of friends that I make fun of for their choices anyway so doesn't matter everybody that whenever I was like playing it or something on stream or you know talking and another stream basically because this you know how I connected with people over games like this. It was always do this my favorite Zelda I'm like, holy crap, me too. So it's it's weird how it's the least favorite but at the same time, everybody I know it seems to be one of their favoritesGP 6:55 is this it's kind of it's that song that comes on the radio, where nobody wants to be like oh, The song so you all just sit there and listen to it and silently jam out. Nobody will change the radio station. Because you would think for a wild, widely, not like game. Everybody shows up when you stream it. Yeah,Palsh 7:13 yeah, that's true.Wulff 7:15 See, I don't know. I think it was a really solid game. People give it a lot of crap as a Zelda title based on the other side of Zelda titles. Yeah, it's a little weird. But as a game, it's really solid. And I think the only issues I have with it personally, are probably due to translation problems. There mirror. Well, no, not not even as simple as that. Like, there's a point where you have to like duck and stab at a table to get into a basement and one of the houses. That's how it's done in real life. Nobody in the game tells you that. And I'm sure in the Japanese version, there was probably dialogue somewhere that gave you the clue.Palsh 7:53 Yeah, the closest you get is like, look under the table or someone says something but table that has no indication on you know which table which were the you know, duck and duck and smack it.Wulff 8:06 Yeah, so it's it's really vague and cryptic about the few issues I have about it because it doesn't teach you these things. It barely even tells you about those things. And that's a problem but otherwise it's a really really good game. And I think that's just a translation issue, not a gameplay issue.Jake 8:23 Well, I mean, if you look at if I were to be locked in a room,GP 8:26 what do you think?Jake 8:28 Thanks to up as you guys were gushing about this, you know, Zelda to being so fantastic. I was gonna just say that I know it gets a lot of hate wolves right. And you know, if I was locked in a room with Mega Man one and Castlevania another hot garbage along with Zelda two I'd probably play Zelda two as well.Palsh 8:45 Take it back.Jake 8:47 I'm only joking it's not a bad game. I actually I actually do like it a lot. For me personally with Zelda I've been a fan for every every game. The only games I haven't played are the crap ones on CBI like a lot of people But I mean, I played the original original NES Zelda on a black and white TV. Like we used to visit my cousin. That was a TV in his room. We used to play Zelda for hours. I love the hell of that game. And it wasn't till I was a teenager when I got a stats I got late. And my dad when he says my dad, he said Zelda and just, he'd want to go play catch outside. He want to go to the movies. me. No, no, I'm not talking you dead. You're not cool. I'm just here to play Zelda. I don't love you. I just love Zelda. I love things of the past. It's, I mean, we're talking about this and we're talking about Zelda and like the past for this episode, but it's funny as we're recording this Link's Awakening remake came out, I think last week or so. And it's playing that, again is reminding me that links awaken is probably my favorite this series, which is funny, but it's, it's mostly because it's a spin off of linked to the past. Like it's very much in that same vein just expanded and better. Right. And but it's the same idea, just something about linked to the past the story The items and helicarrier links awakening both fantastic. I love Breath of the Wild too. But as I said earlier, I almost, I almost think of it as a separate game. It's definitely Zelda. But I don't think it's like the 3d was like our Marina and Majoris mask personally.Wulff 10:15 Well links awakening was very much a passion project, at least for a while it was developed after hours by people who were just screwing around with the Gameboy tech to see what they could make. And I I don't quote me on this because I don't remember who it was. But I want to say it was agio enuma, who actually started it all by himself just messing with it. Either that or he was like one of the first two people I'm pretty sure that jumped in on it. And then that guy was joined by someone else like what are you doing? I'm messing with this trying to make a Zelda game I'm trying to recreate Link to the Past on Gameboy. And they were into it. So they started doing this and it just eventually flow just Didn't do its own thing that pulled in elements from Zelda two and straight away from Link to the Past a little bit because one of the driving ideas behind the development was the ability to have two different like to change both buttons, you didn't always have to have a sword equipped. That was really the driving idea behind it initially. And it just blew up. But eventually it was like a dozen people working on it after hours before they finally took it upstairs and said we want to make this an actual thing. And then they got the Go ahead.Jake 11:35 And see that's actually really cool. Because when I was looking into Link to the Past development, there's actually some parallels there. So I mean, I guess we'll just get right into it then. So then it's super nintendo. I mean, it was unveiled internally, Nintendo in 1989. Right. I mean, obviously the Nintendo was a massive success. Stats had to be better. And there's two game franchises they knew they had to launch very quickly with the system or close to it. And that was very world and then linked to the past. So they actually had development start on both games at the same time or approximately the same time. But from what I've been reading with an interview that mimoto did number years ago, he kind of explained that Nintendo doesn't like to throw whole teams at a game development early, rather just a few people to start with. And then they do what you just described for links awakening, they kind of just tinkering around play with it threw around some ideas. In this case, they're also evaluating the hardware, how far could they push the hardware and see what they could do with it. And after they kind of nail down some concepts of what they thought would be good for a new Zelda game, that's when they started adding in more staff, eventually flushing out staff and then releasing the final game. So that experimentation is kind of like a Nintendo's mo I think for back then.Unknown Speaker 12:46 Raw speechless. That's all good. Okay.Jake 12:51 I'm checking my notes. Hold on one sec, nerd. Okay. Yes, I'm totally a nerd. Okay. So, development link. The past was two names that are being very familiar to people who listened to us before and one of my favorite, it's headed by Shigeru Miyamoto producing and then test tech Ashi Tezuka. I will never say his name right now I'll try I feel bad. I feel likeGP 13:16 he was never say right desicaJake 13:20 It's okay. I'm going to wake up the middle of night and Tesla will be over my bed for the copy of last levels. And he demand they played or I die. Like saw but Nintendo edition. Anyway, it says the cut Did you get for mispronouncing my name? forgiveness please, Jessica. I know he's the one who did last levels. He also had mario maker and that's why I know his name so late much lately as I love mirror maker. He's great director and both him yamoto are the heads of linked to the past. And so when it came to this game, I mean, they already knew that the original Zelda Nintendo was well received, but they want to have to do they have to kind of step it up, do something greater for the news. system, especially if this is going to be like a console seller or an early launch title. I mean, this game came out, I think was just after a year, the console launched. 91 is when Zelda came out was released. So they had to kind of do something new. The original Zelda was well known for its open world. The ability to purchase items from stores was pretty novel for the Nintendo, Nintendo. And the various usable items and you collect it through all these maze like dungeons. So they had to take on that expand it. So they looked in, kind of went back and said, Well, what could we do on Nintendo, that we can now with the stats, so it kind of that's when they kind of looked into things that could do like, more story and more plot better music, right? The idea of having two separate worlds the light world, The Dark World world is stuff that was not possible on the original Nintendo. So there's things like that they were looking at doing. One of the cool things I was reading about was they want to use more water right as an environmental effect. How would you say or gameplay affect the original Zelda there? One dungeon I think it was seven where you can get into the dungeon by basically drain the water on pond but it's Nintendo right there's only so much you can do so it just changed the color of the ground texture so from water to grounds and that's how they did it wasn't very good so when they saw that they want to expand on that link to the past and water and look to the past is all over the place right it's it's a theme in one that one or two dungeons at the very least pluses probably overwhelmed like the idea of swimming I don't think link pass a diving but the idea of swimming changing water lowering water all that's a major facet of like the the past so something to kind of want expand on.Wulff 15:37 As I say I didn't have diving I think it just had ducking to hide under the water from projectilesJake 15:42 Was it because I don't just still pretty close awakening has diving moves the same ideas. Yeah, can I confuse the two so much.Wulff 15:49 So linked to the past just had Ducky talking, but it was it was still a really cool idea of dodging projectile projectiles since you don't have your shield out. You can't just get out of the way so quick The water movement is a little bitUnknown Speaker 16:03 sluggish.Wulff 16:05 sluggish, sluggish. That's a good word for plusJake 16:07 they also they put the Zora monsters the mermaid monsters in the water and they're constantly popping up shooting fireballs at you and their pain on the ground nevermind we're in the water so it's glad there's some kind of defense against that. So I mean there's other things are looking at adding as well. One of them was the idea of fire the original game had the candle which you could burn Bush's right later I think you light up rooms with as well dark rooms that stuff they brought in to Link to the Past. They want to do bit more with it though originally the plan and developing it so that if you set a bush on fire, it would actually spread out to neighboring bushes and just fill the screen of fire wasn't able to do that on the Super Nintendo. They were even trying to just get it down one of the two that the big trees you could burn the big trees down, but they just couldn't get squeezed in there. In interviews memo to set up at six more months at DEF time, they probably could have figured it out. But it's kind of neat because that's the kind of mechanic that later came into Zelda for song. Which I'm not sure if you guys ever played Zelda for swords before anybodyWulff 17:05 I love for swords.Palsh 17:07 Yeah, me and my brother both had it but it was that Christmas time we both got it I think I got a copy of for him he got one for me I think he's have a work we are we we both agreed on getting one for each other and then we tried playing it and then he was gone the next day so I never actually got to experience it properly.Wulff 17:24 Okay, so I'll say that I got to play the whole thing on gameboy advance it was in the Link to the Past initially for Gameboy Advance and that was a really cool adventure. I think it was I got to play it three player. But then there's also the the actual Four Swords adventure on gamecube which was such a cool idea. I loved it, it was think Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles if it were Zelda instead, but then you could also screw with the Players, which often resulted in a lot of salt, and not very long gameplay sessions, so you didn't really get a whole lot of the game done that way. Unfortunately, you just described Bomber Man I'm super nintendo for me. There was too much. There was too much competitive aspect to a game that was supposed to be so heavily cooperative. And I think that was the game's downfall. But I still love the concept. And I I want to beat that game so bad and I don't know if I'll ever get the chance.Jake 18:30 There's gotta be a way we can do it online has to be because I played that as well with friends. I don't know if ever finished it though. But it's one of the reasons why I love couch Co Op games these days like you know, overcooked and, and whatnot because just that same feeling for me right for people on screen, messing with each other. You're supposed to be doing a co op game, but it never goes that way.Unknown Speaker 18:51 But while we're on topic, actually real quick. So the game coke GameCube Four Swords is that different from the 3ds one I thought they were the same thing.Wulff 19:00 3ds What are you talking about?Jake 19:03 Man? Sorry?Wulff 19:05 Oh no, they're very different games the game, the gamecube game is a fully fledged full fleshed out. It's its own adventure. You play it, if you're playing multiplayer, you got to play it with GB, right? That's what I had to do. And it was so cool because every time somebody goes into underground or something, you gotta switch and look at your GPA and play there. And then you go back to the overworld. And then everybody's on the same map again, and it it did a lot of really cool stuff that was way ahead of its time. And I would love to see a Zelda game do that sort of thing. Again, it's just maybe with more accessible control scheme.Jake 19:47 Yeah, well, I mean, that's the thing, right? Nintendo loves. They just love their hardware, right? They're always trying to find new interesting ways to do the hardware. They'll cost a lot of money. That goes back to like the Wii as well right the Wii and the multiple remotes and Just power glad for the or the or the I saw somebody using the force cut months ago that was another trip just so many control options that are bad but it's a lot of fun though I what I played it was really great. I would love to play it again actually okay so I guess I just want to talk a little bit about Link to the Past itself right i mean this is topic the episode and like it's hard for me cuz I do love everything about this game right? I love how there's actually a story to it. I love how it's you know, the tale of evil wizard who is trying to break a seal to another dimension and bring it back Ganon right stealing sages and maidens I think it's fantastic story. I love the music. I love the graphics. So I love everything with this game. So it's kind of hard for me to like narrow it down. So I'm gonna let relined you guys tell me something about the game that you love. And a couple kind of go with it. GPG actually wants start because we're talking about music earlier.GP 20:55 Well, yeah, I think the music is fantastic. Um, one of the things because For context, I just did my very first playthrough of this actually was more of a blind run earlier this year and like February of 2019. So I was brand new to the experience. And so many people have hyped up linked to the past I, I really felt bad for not loving it more until the end, I didn't realize how much I enjoyed it until you know, the credits for scrolling. And I'm like, Oh shit, there's no more I'm not ready to be done with it. But immediately the things that stood out to me, you know, the the more crystal clear, you know, expanded musical tones that they carried over from the older games, but also the clarity of the graphics and the smoothness more than anything. I think smoothness of gameplay is not something that you really associate with the original tues elders. And really see it kind of, I don't want to say perfected but you know, taken to a whole new level. It's such a smooth game and just beautiful There were a couple of things I still take issue with on that game. But on the whole what a What a fun experience. And I My only regret was that I waited 35 years to play it.Jake 22:12 Yeah, it's such a great game. The music is just iconic. For me. It's like there's a handful of composers I think are just great for video games as a whole and Koji Kondo is one of them. He's the one who did like the past, but he's also well known for the merio series as well.GP 22:27 Well, no, I just had his pissed off because the beeping will not stop I suck at the game so I heard I heard more than I heard music.Jake 22:36 Yeah, yeah, that beeping sucks. And that's like an all of them too.Wulff 22:41 Yeah, that's that's a sound that needs to start getting an option. Yeah,Jake 22:46 well, so we'll get to it in a little bit. But the the idea of Zelda randomizers actually have that option. But anyway, before we go into that, the music Koji Kondo Are you kidding me?Palsh 22:55 What? What?Palsh 22:56 Yeah. Oh, why didn't you tell me the lab to play all You know, you have to play Yeah.Palsh 23:02 Now we got to start over. I that is worth starting over for me. Okay, I'm just saying I'm that with the rent. Actually, no, I can't say anything. Yeah, the randomizer I was playing it as research for this. And actually, no, I shouldn't complain about it because the seed that I got for the randomizer I had, like, all but four hearts. I only ended up beating like one dungeon, I think it was.Jake 23:27 Yeah, so it actually has an option to make the beep like quarter beep so it's less frequent. I think you can change it even less than that, or you just turned off entirely. But if you're used to playing the games, and you use that boop, boop, boop, and you're gonna die. When you turn it off, and you're playing with three hearts and you're fighting a boss. You don't even notice you're at one half health or whatever, and you die very easily.Palsh 23:49 If that happens to me, IGP 23:50 very easily no matter what.Jake 23:53 Yeah, yeah, early on in Zelda games is always rough, right until you find that you know, the first few hard pieces to kind of even things out the beginnings are actually very tough. Do hard pieces give you more life. That's how bad the game I don't even know if you want to watch a stream or do a three heart run of any of this all the games, I've seen a few people do that actually. And it just I thought I was good at some of these but now these people are masters at it's insane.Wulff 24:18 I think that would just make me sad.Palsh 24:21 Just be like, no.Jake 24:23 So I wasWulff 24:24 never played Zelda again.GP 24:27 I don't know. I The reason I people say that they're like, I don't like watching masters of games, because it makes me sad. And I think I'll watch ice skating, but I don't kick myself in the astronaut being a master ice skater. Well, you're doing it wrong. Come on. Well, it's mostly an issue with the costumes. I don't look that good in dresses. ButPalsh 24:46 yeah, this is true. I've seen you in dresses. SoWulff 24:50 back to the can bring it back around. Jake's question from earlier. I guess I'll take the answer next. My favorite aspect of this was the fact that it had to overworldJake 25:01 Yes,Wulff 25:01 darker light when I first played it back in, I think, did it come out in 9191? Yeah, I probably paid it in 92 because I don't think I had a Super Nintendo that first year, man that second overworld all of a sudden, just there's a whole nother world in the game. It just blew my mind. I was like, What is this? This is amazing. I was one of those kids who did spend most of his time indoors playing games. I had a TV in my bedroom. I had all sorts of stuff. So when it was that, like, that's not to say I didn't go out and ride my bike all the time and stuff like that, because I did that too. But it was cold or I didn't want to go outside. I could game my friends could come over and hang out with me and we could just play in my room. And this is a game I spent hours on I played the crap out of it. I beat it once I beat it twice. I probably beat it six or seven times in the first two years of owning it. And it was so much fun. This is a game that friends and I would sit Watch each other play and we're doing we're doing the twitch thing well before twitch was a twinkle in someone's eyeJake 26:08 you're watching me through a window andGP 26:11 would have been much better to be able to band people back then to get out of my out Larry go change your name and come back laterWulff 26:20 go home john john. You're pissingGP 26:21 me off you know john.Wulff 26:25 I knew a few of them. I knew a few John's I knew a few Jimmy's. We all hung out. It was weird. And that's not a joke.GP 26:36 Before I forget, I have to ask you werewolf. I have to ask you a question about everything you were just saying that you loved. Because earlier when you were talking all that mess on Zelda to Adventure of Link about the No one told you to look under a table. That was my main issue with Link to the Past. There's so many things that there is no indication that you should look under there or move that Like the bubble walls are the closest thing you get to hince other than that, you know, move this tombstone pick up this tree. Like how are you supposed to know that stuff? So I feel like your thing about that was Zelda two is a good point. But I want you to address how is that okay for Link to the Past? Because that's where all of myself that game came from.Wulff 27:22 See, I don't know I just kind of knew that certain things could be moved, you know, you can move blocks, you start messing with stuff. I do think Sahasrara law might have had a lot of clues hidden on the walls and dungeons and around yes and whatnot. That might have explained it. I don't know. I it's been so long since I played the game proper. I can't guarantee that Sarah Sally said everything.Jake 27:49 Sarasota was a sage or in some respect, please.Wulff 27:55 Oh, I'm sorry sir Sarah Sally.Palsh 28:00 So, I mean, there was also some stuff listed into the mag manual too, soWulff 28:07 that's true. And then if you really got stuck there was that little hint guide that came with the game too. I still Oh yeah.Palsh 28:15 A little was like fold out the black and white folded.Wulff 28:18 Yeah, little two by three fold out pamphlet.GP 28:21 Yeah. Okay, well, that's fair. I guess. If you grew up with the game, and you had a tablet or something like that telling you what to do. That makes more sense. Thank you.Wulff 28:31 That little booklet though. It was sealed when you got it and it made sure to let you know, you know, only open if you get really stuck.Palsh 28:38 Yeah. And you opened it like the first or second dungeon because you didn't know what was going on. You know, you never forget it. ButGP 28:47 let's just like the table. Yeah. Now, you know, look under the table, right?Jake 28:51 Yeah. That's like a Zelda Zelda is all about rewarding exploration. Right. And the idea bottle walls almost didn't make it into the game. So than the original Zelda, you could, you know, bomb walls but they weren't distinguished, I think then we could tell them the original was with the sound of the note that it made when you hit your sword against the wall. I think that's the thing. And they have that and Link to the Past. But Miyamoto experimented with, you know, having the ability to bomb walls because he found that was very rewarding to players if they actually took the time to explore dungeon and four secrets. But then he realized what the original, you know, the problem is, is too easy to miss, you know, some of the rooms that could be there. So if you didn't know to look for the rooms, you'd be kind of missing out on some of the content. So that's why he kind of stuck with the idea bominable cracked walls, so it makes a little more visible to what you're doing. But there's some stuff that like both mentioned, sometimes you just know you need to do something in a room. Like when you're playing a Zelda game and there's like five blocks standing on their own. You just know you're going to push one of them. It's just one of those things that kind of ingrained on you early on with the gameplay.Wulff 29:50 Yeah, or if there's a key door in a room and there's just a bunch of enemies and nothing to do probably kill all the enemies in the Drop a key something like thatJake 30:02 but like it's definitely a game it doesn't actually hold your hands or when your hands that's the thing anyway but you definitely a game where you have to explore I guess to kind of get the most out of it there's items you can miss I think in that game as well. You don't necessarily need all the items to finish the game which I think is amazing. Paul shovel you Yeah, well, yeah, there's the invisible cape is one of the item Oh, yeah,Wulff 30:24 there's the cane the cane.Jake 30:27 Okay, at least a few.Palsh 30:28 Yeah, I found the magic cape. By mistake. I remember that. And I was really proud of myself because neither of my brothers did it. So you know when there's a 10 year gap between you and your older brothers, and you do something they did? It's bragging timeWulff 30:42 I got a little that from my little brother from time to time wasPalsh 30:47 asking them do that still. No, I remember loving the game because Zelda to was probably one of my favorite games because it was one of the few I had like I remember When Super Nintendo came out we had probably half a dozen actual games we rented most of the games. So if I got a game is usually for birthday or Christmas gift and that was it and I mean, Christmas gift we're talking Sears wish book you know there's a lot of stuff besides video games you had to get your hands on so so there's a lot of rentals I got and so when I actually owned Zelda two on NAS I think I got it at a yard sale with a bunch of others like Simon's quest, pro wrestling and something else and it was it was instantly because I owned it is my favorite. And then I played it extra and I was like this is better than I remembered. You know there's only like two years that's probably like 11 years old or something. But because of that I was like instantly a fan of linked to the past and when I played it, this is good. This is good. This gets better. We're getting stuck and getting last and ripping open that cheat sheet. You know, that cheat sheet. Never basically fold it up again because it was always left out. There's no way to You stopped it. You needed it every time. And you wished it was like pages and pages longer. But it was just really fun because it felt like a Zelda game for some reason, even though the only one I actually had experience with was Zelda two never played the first one at this point, and then this one came out I played I was like, okay, cool, played links awakening and not long after it came out, just like, this is great. And I remember buying it for $25 because it was like, not a greatest hits version. It wasn't quite they didn't have the greatest hits kind of thing or the game of the year, whatever. They called it back then. But it was probably around. I'd say 9796 something like that. And I found a copy for could have been earlier than that actually. But I remember finding copy of Walmart for $25 and just begging my dad Can I can I can. I managed to get it and so then I fell in love with it again. So it was just held a fun place. My heart I don't care for it as much now, but back then it it just blew me away because it was just such a good game.Jake 33:08 Yeah for me i think it's it's the influence its had on the rest of series is what I think draws me to liking it still even today like to go back to the music for a minute. Oh good.Palsh 33:18 Oh no, I was going to agree. I mean that's that's I think what makes me feel so good about is how much of an influence it is on games in the future because there's not a lot of game like it's not in my top 10 anymore, which is saying something because this is still a damn good game. The influence of head on future gaming I think it's, it's crazy, like direct or indirect. It's there,Jake 33:42 like the idea of the music even alone. I mean some of the themes that are famous throughout the franchise, things like Zelda lullaby or Gandalf theme, or Hyrule Castle, you hear bits and pieces of those themes in every Zelda game up to the Breath of the Wild even. So like that Music from this game is pretty much through through the entire series. And I mean the idea of the spin slash and then you know, various items and stuff. There's there's a boomerang, there's a hookshot and various sequels to the franchise. They're all kind of used in slightly different ways, especially in the 3d Zelda. But it all kind of comes back to like, the past has been the origin of a lot of that stuff. I mean, the original intent of Zelda. I like it's great. But I think it really just kind of cement the idea of an open world exploration and dungeons. But as links to the past that broke out into the idea of all these very unique items and Collectibles that really excited and exploring things. Right when we talk about Metro veiny is, I think, the past kind of belongs as part of the what we call the makeup or history of that kind of genre is part of like the past as well. It's very much like Metroid, right?Palsh 34:50 Yeah, it's it's like more of a kind of top down version of it as opposed to just like straight up platform, right? But it has the same elements to it, which I think That's probably what appeals to me still is because it has that that certain path you have to take and there's shortcuts you can do their stuff. You can go for extras, but you know, there's a there's a set path and there's a reason behind it.Jake 35:13 Well, and so like, I mean, it's not your top 10 for me, it's probably my top three. If you asked me what my top three favorite games are, it changes every month to be fair, but linked to the past like the past is always on top three. I really love that game quite a bit specially for the Super Nintendo. Again, I'm played as many of this NES games other people have but this one is great. I love this but I think mario world it's like an eight for me Link to the Past is like a two or three if not higher, it'sPalsh 35:42 great. And considering how much you like the Mario games that's that'sJake 35:45 my boy loves me my merioGP 35:50 think I'm culturally and in the history of gaming. The impact of Link to the Past is pretty undeniable. To the point that even if you don't like the game, You have to be able to say well yeah this is this is culturally significant in the gamer universe, right? SoWulff 36:09 you know what that's that's actually I think my brother's position on the franchise is most Zelda games he's not into. But he he like understands why people are into him but they're not for him. Granted right now he's going through the new links awakening and loving it so I don't know maybe that'll rekindle something in him. But yeah, he's he's not been a Zelda fan for most of hisJake 36:30 life. If he loves links awakening, then he'll he should like Link to the Past. I mean, I think links awakening is probably a better game is that remake is pretty good too. But links to the passes permission, same thing. But it's also for me, it's a it's a game I think is very timeless. We've mentioned before that's NES games or 16 bit era era for me will always look great, right? As nice as 3d graphics are, I can still sit down and play an old school 60 big game and love it. Sometimes Nintendo has that but For me, it's always been 16 bit. And Zelda game I still play today I play it quite often. But once you've kind of found all the secrets and you've, you know, you've mastered the route through the dungeons linked to the past, you know, it's not so fun to play anymore, at least in its current state. So, let's go back a couple years ago. I don't know if you guys fell for it. There's this huge fad of roguelike games. You know, raise your hand if you played it. roguelike right. Rogue Legacy was Oh, absolutely. Everybody's playing theWulff 37:30 legacy Binding of Isaac it The list goes onJake 37:33 bunny Isaac is very clearly influenced by Zelda, right? It's like smash TV by Zelda.Palsh 37:37 Oh, yeah.Jake 37:38 So read the idea of procedural games. It's really popular. And then the idea of ROM hacking or modding of old games has been around for a decade or more, right. And there's a lot of people who do amazing stuff with ROMs there's a few notable ROM hacks for like the past even there's one called parallel worlds. It might as well be the unofficial sequel to Link to the Past. It's It's a fantastic run. Mac, it's practically a brand new game. It's amazing. But what's really got me about a year and a half ago now is a group of folks had put together basically a randomizer. What they've done is they found a way to take the ROMs code and scramble various things to randomize it. I guess that's the name of why they call it randomizers. But they would take all the items in the game, and they would spread them around, right? So you wouldn't necessarily get a sword from your uncle and the first part of the, you know, castle dungeon, maybe you'll get a boomerang. Maybe you'll get you know, fuckton get five rupees, right, it was completely random. But the way that was ingenious about it is they would scramble the items. But they would put in logic to prevent you from getting screwed when you go into the dungeons because links to the past requires certain items in certain parts of the game. So they kind of adjusted the game's code and logic to account for that. So Link to the Past, and randomizers it's been a huge thing for me, last year and a half. It's one of my favorite things to do when I have free time is to play round of Zelda randomizer it's at the point now where I can use Beat one in under four hours, which I'm pretty proud of. Because it can be linked to the past fidella in usually two and a half if I'm feeling good. So the randomizer to me just brings this fresh of air to a game that I used to love as a kid. And now I love it even more now because I also love roguelikes I think they're great. The idea of procedural content in games has always been fascinating to me. Like I'm a big fan of Minecraft, but my issue with Minecraft was not of Zelda like influences in it right? You had sorts in Minecraft but you didn't have dungeons Really? I mean, you had kind of dungeons. You didn't really have fun combat but you had this great exploration element. I always wish that it had Zelda like elements. Zelda randomizer manaphy Minecraft but it has anything I want. So the rammers is great. So the recent additions actually they recently changed a bit so now you have boss shuffling so the bosses even change sometimes they can duplicate sums they won't I mean they added in power changes to the dungeons can look different now that have various characters appear to be as as a cosmetic thing. Probably important to polish they got rid of the heart beating Right. There's a lot of options built on the randomizer website that's just fantastic to check out. I asked you guys for the podcast and maybe just do a round or two of the round of the randomizer to see how it is. Pulse you want to start because I know you started a randomizer probably before I did actually,Palsh 40:14 I was probably spending just as much time trying to get the ROM hacked work because I'm tech inept. But once I got it going, I was like, okay, you know, I'm gonna give this a shot. I've seen a lot of friends playing it before and I was like, Okay, cool. The games. Kind of getting old for me. I'm just kind of sick of it. I called it the Mega Man to center my first because it's just like, everybody was playing a randomizer I never sounded like the first time I played the game on stream. People were like, Oh, it's nice to see someone actually playing the vanilla version. I was like, cool. Okay, right now, welcome. But the only time I've ever seen people playing randomizers up until now was watching people race each other or, you know, do PBS and stuff like those speed runners basically and ones that were that knew the game inside and Which is amazing, but it's just not for me. So I just I guess because of that I kind of had this automatic bias towards and I'm like, okay, I don't don't like it. You know, it's not for me. But when I tried it, I mean, I like the original game. It's nothing wrong with it as it's a great game, but just trying and the excitement of actually trying to think your way through it because oh, I don't have a sword. I didn't have a sword for the first like, 4550 minutes. And I was like, I'm in trouble. And everybody in chat was watching me play it and they were like, Oh my God. Oh, you got a hammer. Thank God, you know, like so there was this kind of tension that that wasn't there since I first played the game. And that was kind of cool, because it was like playing the game. You had similar feelings of playing the game for the first time, but still being familiar enough with it that it? You know, it hit the nostalgia button for you. So I gotta say I was very, very impressed with how much fun it actually was when I finally dreadJake 41:58 it. Yeah, like the highs and lows. are fantastic man playing that like you have 200 rupees you know you need to go to Kings or to get the flippers but in a randomizer you don't know what you're going to get. And I think every time I've played one I almost never get something useful from Zora it's almost always something stupid like arrows five rupees a cane something I don't want and it always curses name like every single time.Palsh 42:21 Yeah, I looked it up because I get the flippers It was like one of the first three things I've gotten. And then so I was running around trying to kill things with pots. Yeah, because pots pots and bushes because I couldn't actually swing at them with anything and then I ran out of bombs. So I had bombs and something else I'm still in the same game. I'm still trying to get the damn lantern so I'm kind of stuck. So I think right now I have to just find my way in the dark and I'm kind of scared to.Jake 42:47 I think wolf when I watched you play a little bit. I think you were stuck with the lamp as well trying to find one.Wulff 42:51 Okay, so I played two randomizers this week. The first one was Just the Link to the Past randomizer and right up front it was given me awesome item after awesome item like I had the Master Sword before I even made it into a dungeon. It was that crazy. I had the hammer I had, I had all sorts of stuff. What I what the game just would not give me was that lantern. So it kept it keeps cutting me off from various paths within dungeons. So I can only do so much because I can't do anything without the lantern. I have no book I have no lantern. I'm hosed as far as getting into donePalsh 43:44 it's just thinking of which he's not the Canadian one in here butWulff 43:47 but it's a pretty much off the table for me with that stuff. So today I decided to try for the first time the Super Metroid is linked to the past randomizer because both games I'm very familiar with It's been a long time for both of them, but I, I've played the crap out of them numerous times. Explain how they actually what they actually do. Like the randomizer for that. Yeah, so it puts items from both games in either game. And there are points within both the Zelda world and the Metroid world, where passing through a doorway will take you from one game to the other. You know, samas can find upgrades for Sammis or she can find upgrades for link or items for link or whatever. Same with link out in Hyrule, you can find items for Sammis and so it's, it can be frustrating, especially since with my experience, let's let's This one was less kind to me. Let's Let's start with that. I was super excited right off the bat. You know, it starts you in Metroid. It starts to in Super Metroid. So I jump into the game. Run around on Zabbix for about, I don't know, five minutes you can do anything. And then you just zPalsh 45:10 was it z? No, I No, no no I just call it jeebs cuz was Elvis doesn't sound right to me stillWulff 45:15 number one told us I want to say it was Eric. Someone told us how to pronounce it properly because of other pronounced it.Palsh 45:22 Yeah. And I forget what it is.Wulff 45:25 Yeah it was I went to go through a door and all of a sudden boom I walk out of a house in High Rollers link and I'm like, Okay, cool. So I'll start exploring all sorts of stuff here. I know this world I know there's a ton of treasure chests I can get even with nothing because you have no sword. You have no nothing when you start the game. I start running around. It probably took me about shut up Google. It took me about it probably took me about two hours. To even find the Morph Ball after getting to link so I was reaching for straws trying to look everywhere I could and I think I probably found the last chest I could obtain with the items I had that was finally they Morph Ball and then I could run over into play as Sam us again. Got to do a whole bunch of stuff there. ended up getting my way to norfair struggling my way to norfair let's be honest, because I didn't have a whole lot of help with her. I got no health upgrades for samas finally get to norfair went through a door boom I'm back in high role on Death Mountain. I was like yes, okay, I can do more stuff. And again, I'm still linked running around without a sword. I'm killing things with the hookshot or bombs. That's all I've got to kill things. And most things don't die from the hookshot they just get stuck so I it was a mess. After three and a half hours of gameplay, I finally found a sword for linkPalsh 47:00 Three Okay, I don't feel bad about my 15 minutes now.Wulff 47:04 No, it was and then I had to call it for the day. But that was I will be going back to that one. Because now it's now it's like I have to it's a challenge that has been accepted.Jake 47:19 yet. The first time I did that I've only been at like twice and it usually takes me around 1516 hours. It's, but I've also I love Super Metroid, but I don't know where all the hidden stuff is. Whereas Zelda I know very well. But the few things I'm probably missing in Zelda and Super Nintendo or Super Metroid is probably what screws me through those randomizers but it's really fun.Wulff 47:40 But that randomizer playing it is really what has settled it in my mind that Yeah, Metroid and Zelda are a lot more alike than I think people realize.Jake 47:51 So same with the metro videos as a genre, like the two games are very, very similar in that regard. It's great.Palsh 47:58 Yeah, I never realized until Till recently actually have similar those games actually are so, but first I'm like What the hell are you getting on with you know, combining those two games that couldn't be more different now I'm like, okay, I dig it. I'm scared to play it. But I did.Jake 48:15 I do love wolf how you got screwed but the two hardest to deal breaker game items in those games is the Morph Ball and the lamp. If you don't have those, those games become very difficult to get through.Wulff 48:26 Speaking of which, I still have no lamp in that Super Metroid Zelda randomizer.Jake 48:32 So they do let you do a few. I don't have a speed round tricks. There's a few glitches you can do to get through certain parts or even just tricks like for like the past. There are people who memorized the layers of the dark rooms so you can get through them. I'm not one of them. The game's coded so you don't need to do that. There's left somewhere. But I've seen people just skip it by going to the dark rooms. And then for Super Metroid. Lava diving is probably the big one, right? Because there's you The fire the various various suit virus suit where we say that the presses against that a lot of damage. Yeah, so that's you do need it in Super Metroid. But there's a couple of rooms where if you have enough health, you can still dip in the lava proceed and get what you want and come back out. And that can actually give you a bit of a shortcut and certain certain circumstances. Again the code it's you don't need to do that. But it's helpful if you kind of do those contracts.Wulff 49:24 However, I feel like this can be a very dangerous slippery slope for me I think I'm going to start probably spending more time playing these randomizers and now I'm interestedJake 49:35 Well, I made the mistake See howWulff 49:36 I feel after I beat one but right now I'm I'm totally enticed by the the ideaJake 49:45 of doing a randomizer race and the two other guys I was racing against kicked my ass because they were doing the dark room dark rooms with lamp because they knew the layout because they're that good. And it was hilarious. But he also watched a few Zelda races randomly racers What do you think?GP 50:01 Well, I, I watched them wanting to kind of do the homework as we say, or do the research before playing a randomizer because I know everybody else has played him this week to do the research. But again, having only played each game Link to the Past and Super Metroid once and earlier this year, I quickly realized I'm not going to be playing those randomizers because I don't really know either of the games well enough to be able to formulate strategy. So the first video that I watch, and that was the dual game randomizer. At first, I'm like, this is going to suck because the guys who were racing actually as a race, first thing they found were or God or Silver Arrows, so not being familiar with the game, or randomizer something. Oh, this is just a new way to cheese, these games, but it was almost like the commentator was directly talking to me and my psyche, because it goes that's a great item, but it's not worth shit if you don't have the bow and arrow and you can't do anything the sword or the morphable and I'm like oh my god I've completely underestimated what this is. And so I was between minutes five and six so I think in time I may try to go and learn the vanilla versions so that I could do a randomizer but I'm I feel like I'm still so far off because the guys playing you know as they're getting items in their mind you can just tell Okay, what can I go do now what can I cannot you know, what can't I go do now and the commentators as well are saying I think they're gonna go to lower norfair and I'm like, I don't even know which game that's from know your shit. I don't think I'm sitting here thinking is there a Mario randomizer is there you know is there a randomizer I can try first. So I'm there is dipping my toes into the shallow end of the randomizer pool I can tell you the one thing I wish they had already fast forward button Don't Don't get me started Don't get me started horrible joke and I don't mean that but like I said I completely underestimated how much I thought I would like it. It did give me an appreciation for how little I know about these games. But that did not make the experience of watching the races any less fun.Jake 52:29 Yeah, a good color commentary makes all the difference for watching a speed runner race especially with the randomizers because if they know the ins and outs and explain things It's like watching a basketball game or for me a football game. I know jack about football. But if they commentator can explain what's going on in a click away it's it's all the difference.GP 52:46 Oh yeah, if the if the video was on mute, I wouldn't have lasted 20 minutes but being pulled in and and watching how the two different guys because they're playing the same randomizer like all the locations are the same thing for each racer. But the way in which they strategize in their head ensures that they just route it differently even though they have, you know, I don't know where steps that but it was incredibly enthralling and entertaining. And like I said, I wish I'd had more experience with both those games. So I, you know, I would be able to do them,Wulff 53:22 but we'll get there in time. I want to say it was summer of 2018 that I, when I was doing laundry, cleaning the house, whatever I would put on those selda races because they had a huge tournament that lasted a couple weeks. Oh, man, those were so cool to watch to just check in on them while I was doing stuff around the house, folding laundry, whatever. And, you know, I'm folding three different people's laundry while sorting them and all that so it's given me something to do while I'm just folding clothes, hanging them up, whatever. It is so cool to just see how they play so differently. I watched so many races, it's ridiculous. And these people were like, you'd hear the commentator like, well, this guy's made the choice to go here. And this guy's made the choice to go there. And that's a big gamble. But if it pays off, it'll be huge. And you know, you see him take that chance and all of a sudden, boom, he's way ahead of the first guy because he took that gamble. It's ridiculous just to see these strategies play out.Jake 54:19 Yeah, it's almost like a competitive Sudoku. Right? It's or competitive crossword it's like a logic puzzle that people are figuring out as quickly as possible. But far more exciting, right?Palsh 54:30 Yeah to terrible math to even do a regular Sudoku thing.Jake 54:35 But you know, I was bad at randomizers and and being into it took me forever to beat my first plane Zelda one and the Zelda Metroid crossover one, I still struggle with half the time. But up you're saying that you didn't want to try the randomizers because, you know, you've only played each game once you don't know where everything is. On the one hand, though, that can be fun as well because that comes back to the thing that makes the series great which is exploration right. Playing the Zelda Metroid one especially, it's a whole double world out there of just exploring, right? Is he finished it or not, maybe. But it's fun just playing it, and trying to explore the various nooks and crannies for the items and see how they work together. I think it's great, even if you're not familiar with the base games, butWulff 55:16 there's also the different tiers, you can set the randomizer to where it's not throwing all the rupees around and everything. If it just swaps the items, you know, or something like that. You can you can make it lessGP 55:28 crazy. See, that's the thing I don't want to I don't want to go training wheels and I know that's 100% 100% ego warplessUnknown Speaker 55:37 Right. Yeah.GP 55:39 But I do like that's the thing is by the time I attempted I want to be knowledgeable and I get what you're saying subject and maybe maybe that's enough to change my mind and just dive in. Instead of like I said, Wade in the shallow waters, but pretty pretty much my only my only confidence with that that set of two games is that I could properly Identify, which I didn't goes in which world. And beyond that I really, it just seems like such a massive undertaking.Jake 56:08 It's still, I still want my most favorite things in recent years. I've always loved retro games even, even now in the current next gen systems. I still like going back to the 16 bit era, but to see people so passionately about randomizers and like ROM hacking and just bring a new life to these games, I think is just fantastic. Well,GP 56:24 and you kind of said something like that earlier, which is what gives me the field goods. And lets me know that retro will always be around and that is people are coming up with new ways to play the old games. And so long as we have things like that, I mean, retro. There's no reason for it to die out.Unknown Speaker 56:44 That's a good final thought. Yes. All right. Well, I think we're hitting our timeGP 56:49 and like I said, I just, I picked and picked on air. T moPalsh 56:56 again. Do you wash your hands this time? Nope.Unknown Speaker 57:01 I see no reason it's good time to endWulff 57:03 with a sentimentGP 57:05 in fatik Nope. Why would I start now? I mean come on.Jake 57:09 Alright folks. Well JP we'll start with you. Where can folks find you?GP 57:13 Yeah, I'm right here other than presby to cancel I had to go from the peak of my my prowess with my thoughts to the lowest of the trough. So there we go. No other than press me to cancel you can find me on the retro therapy which is on Twitch Twitter. We got YouTube we got Instagram all the classics.Palsh 57:36 Yeah, the retro therapy. And Paul shovel you Where can folks find you? On GP so my answer because I was seriously but saying you can find me right here. Now. Now I have nothing witty to say. So you can find me here and sometimes on Twitch.GP 57:52 You can you can answer first it'll be fine.Palsh 57:55 Now that's too much trouble now.Jake 57:57 filming this episode need a lot editing. Sorry. Okay,GP 58:01 mostly just because the discord I think discordsJake 58:05 Yes, we'll just we'll just blame it all on Discord. We're will help people find you.Wulff 58:12 I can be found again here. And on Twitter and Twitch at werewolf w ar e w ULFFPalsh 58:22 sounds like a radio station who carryWulff 58:28 cartridge with a wolf like as a wolfJake 58:33 and we're commanded to live here on Radio presby to cancel you listening to us right here and my name is sick Jake you can find me on Twitter or sometimes on Twitch like polish. And you've been listening to presby to cancel. Special thanks for music go to Arthur the ancient found on Soundcloud or the last nation on YouTube. For more episodes, please visit our website presby kancil.com as well Feel free to like or subscribe at Apple, iTunes, Google podcasts or anywhere else you'd like to listen to your favorite shows. As always, thank you. This has been an ad again.Special thanks to Arthur The Last Ancient on soundcloud for our podcast theme. For updates and more episodes please visit our website www.pressbtocancel.com, or find us on Twitter @pressbtocancel and Instagram @pressbtocancel.

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149 : Leadership Profile (w/ Deidre Wright)

Living Corporate

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 26, 2019 40:27

Zach has the pleasure of speaking with storyteller and strategist Deidre Wright about effectively building a leadership profile. Deidre shares what her leadership journey is looking like so far and talks about how staying true to her values helped her become the leader she is today. She also offers her thoughts about what some black and brown folks are doing that could be hindering them in their leadership development journey.Connect with Deidre on LinkedIn, Twitter, or Instagram!Check out her website!Visit Living-Corporate.com!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? It's Zach with Living Corporate. Now, look, you know what we do, okay? We come on the show and we have real talk about real things. These real things are actually fairly benign on their face, right? But we take these fairly real topics, and they're real, or rather we make them real, 'cause we're centering black and brown experiences. So today we're talking about building a leadership profile. Now, in building a leadership profile--you know what? I'm not even gonna do that. I'm just gonna go ahead and get into it with our guest, Deidre Wright.Deidre: Yes, that's right. [laughs] Hi.Zach: All right, come on now. Welcome to the show. How are you doing?Deidre: [laughing] I'm good, Zach. Thank you for having me. I'm really happy to be here. I've lived a corporate life for most of my career, so it's exciting to talk to you.Zach: No, thank you very much. I'm excited to have you on the show. And see, you know what I did is--those are bars, Deidre. So I said, "Deidre Wright," and you said, "That's right." See, I knew--Deidre: [laughs]Zach: Right? So I'm like--anyway, it's wordplay is all I'm saying. Okay, so for those of us who don't know you, would you mind sharing a little bit about yourself?Deidre: Yeah. So everyone, I'm Deidre Wright. I'm a Bay Area native, and I call myself a storyteller and a strategist because I worked across industries, but mostly what I do is empower clients to effectively tell their stories and create strategies, execute goals, and so I say this because I worked in public health, marketing, and risk management, and with all of those fields I can kind of used that skill set and my--that's my passion. So I graduated from Spelman College with a sociology and anthropology degree with the goal to make the world a better place. Graduated during the recession. It was a little challenging, but I was able to help kind of do that. And so I worked for Kaiser Permanente in public health research, working on a study, learning why girls start childhood puberty earlier. So why puberty is starting earlier and long-term [who?] gets breast cancer, and communicating findings with the public, and then I transitioned to marketing because I found that without a clear call to action people don't really make changes. So I was doing internal marketing for McKesson, helping employees sell their services, and then I landed on insurance, really at first advising [?] companies on their risk management and how to improve that for their companies and later now be, you know, an award-winning director of diversity and inclusion helping companies in insurance promote and advance diversity and inclusion.Zach: You know what? You just had so many just Flex bomb moments in there. First of all, you talked about the fact that you graduated from Spelman. Shout-out to all the Spelmanites, the Spelman Women. Deidre: Woo-woo!Zach: Come on, now. Don't--like, let's not play. [ow sfx] Okay? We gotta shout y'all out. [laughs] And then you had some big names in there. McKesson, Kaiser Permanente. That's incredible. So, you know, you talked about--you're talking a little about just kind of your journey. Again, you named some huge brands in there. I'm looking at your profile, and I'm just gonna look at, like, just the last year and a half, okay? So 2018 you got the NAAIA Emerging Leaders co-chair, your 2018 Dive In Festival San Francisco co-chair, and then you were the 2018 Water Street Club Insurance Rising Star and then the 2019 Insurance Careers Month Emerging Leader. Okay? And that's just, again, the last year and change, but it's relevant because like I said, today we're talking about building your leadership profile. I have a theory, right? And I could be--I could be crazy, 'cause I'm--I'm just looking at the field, Deidre. I don't--you know, I'm not a sociologist or any type of scientist. I'm just kind of looking at the space, right? And I have a theory that black and brown folks in corporate America spend a lot of time trying to make sure that we're just strong individual contributors because, you know, we're conditioned and taught to just do that and for a lot of us, like, the first generation of our families being in corporate America, right? But I believe as time continues forward and the millennial workforce increases and, like, its representation increases within the workplace and we age up in the workplace that there's gonna be a continued demand and opportunity for us to continue to really take on leadership positions. So can you talk a little bit about your journey in becoming a leader and, like, what has that looked like for you?Deidre: Yes, mm-hmm. And I'll have to have a little bit more Flex bomb. So, like I said, I work in the risk management and insurance field, but using my platform and my leader standpoint I've done a lot of fun things, including speaking at events where Barack Obama, Colin Powell, and America [Ferrera?] were on the line-up. Zach: Whoa, whoa, whoa--Deidre: Yeah. [laughs, record scratch sfx]Zach: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold on. Let me just pause you so I can do this. [Flex bomb sfx] Okay, continue.Deidre: Thank you. Then having viral LinkedIn, you know, posts, where I have one that has 23,000 views and the other one has 37,000 views, and I say this because no matter what industry or skill set, you can be a leader and use your influence to call attention to the cause that you care about. So what's my leadership journey looking like? I guess no matter what I always focus on setting goals, investing in myself, and taking strategic risks. And, you know, you heard my kind of bio. I've done a lot of different things in different fields, but I always stay true to my values, which was, you know, being strategic and storytelling. And so I say that because what happened was I was, like I said, a contractor for McKesson, and so my contract ended and I had my son the month afterwards. So my vision was take a couple months off, go back to McKesson, do my thing, but they had laid off a bunch of marketing people so I had no job to go back to, and that's when I was like, "Okay, I have a baby. I need to make money. Let me figure this out," and so that's when I kind of got back to my values and my goals, and I was like, "Okay, let me check out insurance and risk management--my mom was in the field, she is doing great--and really think, like, what do I want out of a career and start attacking that." So I started with informational interviews with leaders in the space, because I want to say, like, if you have the secret sauce, I want that recipe, and figuring that out for me. And then taking strategic risks to start and break in myself in the industry of taking jobs, and then once I got the position making the position my own and being a thought leader. The key thing to being a leader I would say that everyone is--figure out your craft and promote it on different channels to help people, whether it's, like, Living Corporate, you know, having this experience and teach people skills, but mostly make strategic moves to always figure out how to promote your expertise and level up by seeing or asking, "What experience in my career is gonna give me the highest ROI for career time?" So if I'm spending three years of my time on this project or 30 minutes speaking on a stage, what is the ROI for this? And that's kind of helped me navigate these different changes in marketing to, you know, insurance, being a broker, from a broker to diversity and inclusion. Having those key processes of assessing goals, being strategic, and, you know, seeing what's worth my time or not.Zach: Let's take a step back though, right? So everything you're saying, 100%. I get it. It makes sense to me. But what would you say to the person who's like, "Look, I don't really know what my focus or passion is. I'm just here. I'm just happy to be here." Like, what advice would you give to that person?Deidre: I would tell them to shift their mindset. Just being happy to be here is--I mean, what are you living a life of, scarcity or abundance? Like, yes, I understand--like I told you, I had a baby and no money. I was thinking like, "Dang," but I had to--I don't know if it was just my maternal instincts or just my hustle, I mean, I was like, "I've got to figure out how to make this work," and so I would just say level up your mindset and think about "Okay, if I'm here, yeah, I'm happy for the situation, but what do I want to do with it? Where do I want to be in three years? How much money do I want to make then? What kind of impact do I want to leave on this platform?" For example, when I was a broker, I always wanted to empower my clients and, like--let me be clear on what I mean by risk management. My clients were Airbnb and Lyft and Starbucks and UPS. Like, big, you know, global clients, and I say that because just like you and me, we want to protect ourselves, [and] we also want to reach goals. And so I would say manage your career like you're managing your risk in yourself and think about, "Okay, if I invest X amount of time in this place, what's the return gonna be for me in reaching my goals?" So I guess I would just say change your mindset to just be more than just happy to be there. Like, think "How am I gonna make this work to be happy and earn my worth?"Zach: I love that. You're absolutely right. You know, it's scary though, and I say this as someone who--I'm trying to put myself in, like, the other person's shoes, 'cause you and I, we vibe on that level because we both are like, "Look, I gotta go get it." I don't have any kids yet, but--[both laugh]--but I get it, right? I am married. It's like, "Okay, look, I gotta--" Like, this can't stop. Like, I gotta keep going, right? At the same time, I ask myself, "Okay, so for the folks who are not necessarily naturally as industrious," right, like, what are some of the, like, just kind of starting steps? And I hear you, right? What I'm hearing is it's about identifying "Okay, what do I want the next 18 months to look like? What do I want the next three years to look like?" And then, like, thinking with the end in mind, then kind of working backwards from there and then asking yourself and kind of asking perhaps a scary question of "Okay, well, then is what I'm doing getting me to that point? Yes or no?"Deidre: Mm-hmm.Zach: Okay. No, that's great. So, you know, it's interesting, what are some of the biggest lessons that you've learned in becoming a leader? And then if I could kind of take a step, like, a little bit below that, as you've been continuing to grow and navigate these spaces, what are things that you see, you know, our black and brown folks doing out there that can hinder them in their leadership development journey?Deidre: Yes. What I learned as a leader--which, it's funny, you know? It's probably like you, Zach. It's like you just do your job and you do it well, and I say that because I consider myself, like, a mentor or a helper, and it's great that I'm a leader, and I'll say that. You know, I take that role, but I just think ultimately it's figuring out what your purpose is and how you can live to that higher calling, but, you know, the real thing is 1. invest in yourself, whether that is taking the time to do the work--for example, like, when I was a broker, I would spend time, hours, reading insurance policies. Now, I don't know, Zach, if that's what you do for fun, but most people don't do that. But I was taking the time so I knew what the heck I was talking about, and I had that confidence in front of my client when I am the only millennial, only black person, only woman in the room. And so you've gotta take time to invest yourself. You know, I had an executive coach who was helping me, you know, through the program and to really figure out what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do and when I was investing that time. Going to conferences, meeting people, networking. You have to do these things if you want to get far, and for us, you know, black and brown people, two things I would kind of say is 1. be strategic and understand no one is gonna invest time in you as much as you. So if you're waiting for your company to tap you on the shoulder saying, "I know you're gonna be a leader," yeah, that might happen passively, but only you can really give all of your effort into doing that. And then two, part of my job is that I organize events and plan them for the industry to I guess really just bond people and give them tools and resources for D&I through events and stuff. So for example, I'm planning a national diversity and inclusion conference that's coming up, and I say that because I look for speakers. I want speakers. I also judge a national woman in insurance award, [?], and so I assess and judge women leaders and their profiles to see who are worthy of these awards. Now, rarely do I see at our events people volunteering who are people of color or whoever to be speakers at events from a technical standpoint, you know? And rarely do I see people nominate themselves for awards. So the biggest thing is advocate for yourself and put yourself out there, because if you don't do that, then who will? So I think that's the biggest missed opportunity. Working hard's not enough. You've got to really advocate and promote your brand, because people want to help you. People want diverse leaders more than ever. I will tell you right now. Companies are investing in diversity and inclusion, and they want leaders. We just had a diversity survey, my company Business Insurance, studying diversity in our industry. We had over 800 people do it, and one fo the questions were what is the biggest barrier to increasing diversity in our industry, and for the second time around it was "we can't find minorities with the right skill set." And I don't necessarily believe that is my case. I just think it's perception. If people don't perceive there are leaders there, then they're not gonna tap you in for opportunities. So speak out and promote yourself to be that leader they see. Zach: No, 100%, and let me double-click on one thing you just said. I'm not gonna lie to you. What a huge pet peeve is, like, the whole "we don't have the pipeline, we don't see [them]." Like, so much of that is, like... if you just open your eyes, like, in today's era, right? So some of it is perception, how you present yourself, and there's a certain level of accountability that we have to take in terms of how we show up. At the same time--and I don't want to speak to insurance, 'cause that is a space that I'm not wholly familiar with, but I will speak to, like, technology, right? So okay, like, Facebook and other, like, larger technology firms will say, "Well, we have this diversity problem because we don't really have the pipeline," but the reality is there are tons of pockets of people, like Black Girls Who Code, Black Code Collective. There's all types of, like, groups out there and pockets, and there's black folks at these PWIs and HBCUs. There's organizations out there that do have the talent. I think the challenge is that what I'm not seeing, like, across the board is, like, a truly, like, intersectional and inclusive talent sourcing strategy when it comes to actually identifying that talent and then making sure that those folks are actually represented in terms of what does it look like for you to go out to those schools or engage these different groups or partner with these various organizations. Like, if you look in the same places for this diverse talent, then yeah, you may not find it, but if you actually just kind of broaden your scope a bit you may actually find the folks you're looking for, you know?Deidre: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. I truly believe it, and that's one of the things I help, you know, my clients with is figure out where do you find this diverse talent. And diversity means so many different things to so many different people, and I know all industries are different, but I will say for us it's typically--they go to the same colleges because they typically want someone with a risk management degree. Risk management degrees are very--you know, they're not that often you find them. There's only a certain amount of schools, and those schools are not necessarily diverse. And mind you, the majority of people that come into our industry don't have interest in insurance or a risk management background. Like, I had sociology, right? But I did my job really well. So I'm like, knowing the statistics that the majority of people come in without this, I'm like, "Why would you narrow the focus?" So I think the first thing is find transferrable skills, companies, you know, and then people, be open to other industries besides your own that could be promising, because insurance is a couple trillion dollar industry. There's really a lot of interesting things going on right now. There's InsureTech, which is infusing technology with insurance. There's all these new risks out there, like with Bitcoin, and, you know, you have, you know, a shared economy and all kinds of fun stuff. So it's a lot of great things. So whether you're a company, find people with transferrable skills. Go to professional organizations, whether it is, like, you know, Ascent, Prospanica, National Black [?], and find people with the skill sets who obviously are leaders in their space but might not be leaders in your space. Also, look and see where else people are at, because--I don't know, maybe technology is a better judge [?] of this, but I'm like, "Are companies really leveraging social media and new forms of communication to find people?" A lot of times no, so that's what you gotta do.Zach: No, straight up. In fact, let me just go ahead and [straight up sfx, both laugh]. Yeah, I agree. Straight up. Man, that's a wonderful soundbite. So you talk a lot about inclusion and diversity within the context of leadership, and these are my questions, right? Can you 1. explain why I&D is important to you and then practical ways you reinforce and you would encourage other leaders to reinforce inclusive behaviors?Deidre: Yes. Why does it matter to me? Straight up I will just say it's because [both laughing] I was working in the industry, and my [?] a generation, so I quote-unquote belong here. We're very--I would say the industry typically is a lot of second-generation or multi-generation people in the industry, but I didn't actually feel like I belonged because, like I said, I didn't really see many people who looked like me. So just having that self-awareness, I'm like--and I was complaining, and someone was like, "Deidre, stop complaining." Like, "Do something." I got really involved in diversity and inclusion work, whether it was from volunteering or being part of organizations. So that was kind of--I had skin in the game, and I had to be the change I wanted to see, and I spoke at a lot of events about that. That's actually how I got my job, because I was on stage speaking at this event for my current company, and the CEO saw me and was like, "Deidre, I like your ideas," and that's why I promote people. If you have great ideas and solutions, go and speak and do that so you can find the right opportunities to be poached for those opportunities. But what are practical and tactical ways to be more inclusive? I would say diversify your network to the point you said of poaching talent or finding talent, but also who you mentor and who mentors you. So think about this. Yes, it is really important to have a person of color as your mentor in this space, but also it's good to have people who don't look like you. I try to, as much as possible, find mentors or colleagues who have different backgrounds, whether it's from they were in the military or they're male or they're white or whatever, but just different people. They give me perspective on things, and I find that very, very helpful, and also feedback on what they're receiving from me and my brand. Also I would say as a leader, if you're a manager or just anybody on a team, learn people's learning styles and how they communicate and bring out the best in them, because not everyone's extroverted, so they're not always gonna communicate how they feel, but maybe they're better in smaller groups or maybe they're great with projects and running with things, but don't assume that your way of communicating and doing things are the best. But I would just ask people, like, "Hey, what's the best to bring out your best so that we can get your A game at the office and that we can make sure you're satisfied?" And then lastly is speak up and speak out. If you're in a place of privilege in any aspect, I would address things, whether at a meeting and a woman's trying to talk and you're a man and someone's interrupting her--call that out, you know? Like, "Hey," you know, "I think Sheena wants to talk," or if you're a person in corporate--like, for me it's like, "Hey, I've been getting a lot of opportunities. How do I make sure I teach other women of color, people who are underrepresented, how to get speaking engagements so that they can have--I can see more diversity on this stage when I'm at events and not be the only one?" So I would just say speak out, diversify your network, and learn people's learning styles.Zach: I love that. And you're absolutely right, like, in terms of diversifying your network. So what I've learned--what I've been learning in my career is to have--as a black man--to have some white men in my network, right? And, like, I love it because--so I'm not trying to brag on myself. I'm just saying I really do like, enjoy, building authentic relationships, and I'm not gonna put--I'm not gonna make the block too hot for my friend so I'm not gonna drop his name, but I have a very good friend. He's a dear friend of mine, and we met at work. White guy, and, you know, a fairly conservative background, and I would just say, like, across the board, like, fairly conservative white man, and at the same time he and I met because he saw that I was being treated inequitably on a project, and he advocated for me, and that's how we became friends, and we've been friends for years now through that. But what's interesting is as I kind of talk to him about challenges I'm having or, like, "Man, I don't know how I would handle this," and I'm thinking about, like, all of these fairly, like, referential ways to do something or just, I don't know, kind of--like I'm choosing certain binaries because of--I don't want to say classically conditioned, but the way that I've been raised, I just think "Well, this is the way to do things." He's coming at it from, like, a different perspective. He's coming at it from a perspective of a privileged white man. So he's like, "Well, Zach, you don't have to do that. Just do this," and it's like, "Oh, my gosh. I would never even think to try that," right? And so it's, like, opening your eyes a bit. Something else you said now. I know you talked about, like, in meetings, right, when you said, like, if there's a woman talking, you as a man saying, "Hey, you know, I think she has something to say." Like, "Please, if you could give it a listen." I would also challenge that, if you're a white woman in those positions and you have, like, a black man or a [?] of color, use that privilege too, Cassandra. Becky. Charlotte. You know, just help us out, please, because we need it as well. I think there's some intersectionality that should be considered--Karen. There's another name. I was just trying to think of some other names. Anyway, so as we continue forward, right, and we talk a little bit about, like, relationships and networking, can we talk about, like, coalition building? You kind of alluded to it already, but its role in developing a leadership profile. So you talked about building this network, but, like, what does it look like for you historically to build mutually beneficial relationships? And do you have any examples of when those relationships have come into play to benefit you?Deidre: Yeah, that's a great question. I would say I always wanted to make things mutually beneficial. I just come from a standpoint--I don't like moochers, and I don't want to be a moocher. I just--I just think that it's kind of tacky, honestly.Zach: It is tacky.Deidre: It just turns me off, and it's bad for my brain to be like, "She's always asking for something but not returning it." So I've always kind of been that way. I will say my trick is--and it's not even a trick, it's really just what I do--I always end a conversation, meeting or whatever, asking people how can I be of service to them, because 1. it helps me know, like, how I can actually help them, and 2. it makes me think of who in my network can also help them. So I've connected a lot of people for business opportunities, job opportunities, just personal opportunities through having this network. "Oh, you want A? I know someone over there who can connect you with that," or "You want this," and so I would just say ask the question. It doesn't cost you a thing, but you might make an impact in how--it's always come back to help me. Like, I've never had a situation where it hasn't. 1. Either I made a new friend or had goodwill or 2. people reached out to me--like, I get a lot of referrals for business, whether it's for my job or for speaking opportunities or just leadership opportunities. I got an award for I guess being myself and being helpful to people and always leveling them up. I find that I'm stronger when I have a stronger circle around me, so I'm always trying to find who those people are, so I build it by--[coin sfx, Deidre laughs]--by, you know, being out there and publicly speaking. A lot of people I meet through Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, you know, just the interwebs, because I put myself out there or I comment on what they're saying because it's compelling to me. And so there's different ways to have mutually beneficial relationships. I just think 1. you gotta be open to them, 2. you actually gotta follow up and do what you say you're gonna do, but when it comes to--like, I come from an abundance mindset. I don't ever think that it can't be more than one leader. It can't be more than one of us. So I think we all have to get out of the mindset of that "I can't help somebody else because I lose something." [and i oop sfx] You only have something to gain by helping somebody else out.Zach: Come on, now. I 100% agree. And you know what? And that's another point--you're absolutely right, like, about following up. Look, [both laugh] people send--Deidre: You know.Zach: I do know. Listen, look, I look at my little emails, and thank God--you know what? This is not an ad. Shout-out to y'all, Gmail, 'cause y'all do the whole thing. "You received this three days ago. Follow up?" That has helped me so much. I be in that inbox--I'm in that inbox like [bratbratbrat sfx]. I'm like--[both laugh].Deidre: Yeah, you're in there.Zach: I be following up. Like, "Hey, we had this conversation. I just wanted to circle back and make sure we're good." Deidre, you did that with me!Deidre: Yeah. [laughs]Zach: You gotta. Hey, you gotta do it. Life is crazy. Life is just so busy. It's important. Okay, so let's pivot a little bit. In your article "Why Strategic Companies Must Manage Diversity & Inclusion As A Business Risk"--it was recently published in Savoy Magazine--can we talk a little bit about the piece and what inspired that?Deidre: Yeah. So, you know, risk management is my background. It's always on my brain, whether it's from personal risk management to, like, company, and I say that because people think of risk always as a bad thing, but risk is--you know, based on the [?]--it talks about, you know, the possibility of a loss, no gain, or a gain. So you can have different levels of risk, and so with diversity and inclusion, it can--if you do it right, it can help you gain [?]. If you do it wrong, it can be harmful. And let's be clear, we see all of these things in the news, all of these headlines, and people are failing with diversity and inclusion, and I just want to help educate the consumer and companies and people about why this has to be a strategic risk and opportunity. So let's look at, you know, the news. So Papa John's, he's going over here saying the N word, you know, during conference calls, had to step down as a leader, and from that incident, you know, within a month their store sales fell 10%. You know, Dolce and Gabbana, they had a situation where they had a model, you know, who was Asian looking like she was eating, like, pizza with chopsticks, and, like, it was inappropriate, and then calling, like--and then what happened was they had to cancel a fashion show. Consumers were, like, destroying their products, and then their products were removed from different platforms in China. Like, Chinese magazines, Alibaba, whatever, and then another case is, you know, the Conrad Miami, a hotel out there, they discriminated--a manager discriminated against a woman. She asked to have Sundays off when she started the job because of her religious reasons. They ended up having to pay her punitive damages of $21 million, you know, and others for lost wages because she was fired as a retaliation for wanting to go to church, and she asked for tha ttime off. And so I say this because when it goes wrong, it costs companies money.Zach: You're 100% right, right? Like, you think about, like, Angry Orchard. So they just recently had a situation where they interrupted this couple trying to get married. This man was trying to propose to his girlfriend. They accused them of stealing merchandise and eventually kicked them out of there. So no, I'm 100% with you. So of course that then draws boycotts and all types of negative press [?]. Now, look, I don't personally drink Angry Orchard. This also is not an ad, but, you know--Deidre: That's some Angry Orchard right there. [laughs]Zach: [?]. People angry at the Orchard, okay? For the wrong and right reasons, mm-hmm. Okay, please continue though.Deidre: No, but that's where I'm coming from. Obviously I know--so when I say I'm hosting and organizing a diversity and inclusion conference, we are concentrating as a risk management community, talking about how we can help the risk management community get a hold on this from a strategic standpoint of either making insurance companies money or saving them through talent acquisition and getting the right talent, because we know if you lose employees you lose a certain amount of money trying to rehire people. We know what these--so think about this. When these companies have lawsuits, how are they getting paid? Typically through insurance. When it's a lawsuit and a claim. Unless it's--Zach: That's right.Deidre: Yeah, so it's really important to my industry strategically, from whether it's their internal practices or what they're paying out, especially if they're million-dollar claims or lawsuits, what's going on. So it's a strategic risk to think about how do we leverage it to grow our revenue and our brands, and also how do we minimize issues so that we're not losing money or losing top talent?Zach: I love it. I think that, you know, it's just interesting because--and I keep saying it's interesting, right? So you know--you know, Deidre, how when you talk to people you have certain things that you say as your pivot word? "It's interesting" is, like, my pivot word slash phrase, but I'm going to work on that. I'm gonna work on that after this interview, because I won't stop right now, but--Deidre: Can't stop, won't stop.Zach: Well, I will stop eventually.Deidre: [laughs] Not today, but you will tomorrow.Zach: Not today. It's about being introspective in the moment. I think that, you know, live introspection can help you actually move forward as opposed to--'cause you may not think about it again, so I'm calling it out right now in the middle of this interview awkwardly. So as I get older and I just pay attention, you know--and I'm bringing this up based off what you just talked about with the business imperative and the strategic imperative of inclusion and diversity--I realize though how much of the world I navigate is catered to white experiences, expectations, and comfort, and that doesn't really--that's not exclusive to--it's inclusive of corporate America as well, and when I think about the work that you're doing, in some way or another simply even bringing up otherness pushes up against some of those levels of comfort. So how do you navigate the fragility that comes with discussing non-whiteness in majority-white spaces?Deidre: You know... maybe that's my pivot word, "you know." [Zach laughs] I've been trained for this job and position--all my life I've been trained for this, because growing up, you know, from kindergarten to half of college I was in majority-white spaces. Like, my elementary school K through 8, my sister and I and maybe three other kids were black. Like, it was just mostly white. So I guess to me--the thing about this is with any idea or concept you're selling people on, you've gotta tell 'em what's in it for them, and I think that's a clear thing. And also don't make people feel ashamed for learning and uncovering bad habits. Like, for ex--and I don't know, think about this. If somebody, you know, for example, like you said, if you're saying a trigger word to pivot things, right? "Oh, you know, Zach, like, every time you transition you keep on saying "interesting." That's horrible." You're gonna be like, "Dang, that hurt me," right? It's just the same thing as saying, "Hey, you know, you always interrupt women." Like, "Why are you doing that?" That would not be my tactic when it, you know, comes to whether it's women issues, people of color, or whatever. So I always try to think of, you know, how to come out of a situation, whether it's for a person or a company or whatever, of how to tell them what's in it for them. So for example, "Hey, Acme Company, you're doing great when it comes to business practices, when it comes to just, like, in general." Like, "You're making money. Have you thought about the strategic risk of not having diverse talent and not really investing that?" "Oh, we have diverse talent." "Yeah, yeah, but do you understand the demographics are changing?" And companies are having either corporate social responsibility plans or diversity and inclusion initiatives that require or ask for diversity and what you're strategically doing. "Let me help you with that. Let me help you formulate a plan, 'cause I want you to succeed," or "Hey, I want you to be a good leader. Do you know about, you know, people are being evaluated now on how they are inclusive leaders? I have tools and resources if you want my help," and then they gotta ask for the help or say, "Yes, I want the help," you know? But at least make people aware of things in a way that you're helping them and less from a point of accusation or you're doing something wrong, because we all make mistakes, but until we're made aware of in a way that's safe and safe to admit--I have people tell me, "Deidre, like, you know, you put these things out there with diversity and inclusion that makes me rethink things, and you say it in a safe way so I don't feel threatened," and I'm like, "Thank you for saying that, because that is very uncomfortable, to say that you feel uncomfortable and threatened by things because you don't know what you're doing, so I'm happy to help you." Now, everyone doesn't have to be that. It doesn't have to be the burden of a minority to educate the majority on their pain or frustration. That is a lot of--it's just a lot of work, but I'm choosing this work, so I'm using my power and my platform to do that. So it's a choice involved, but you've gotta either step up and be open to changing and pivoting your messaging to make real impact.Zach: I love that, and you're absolutely right that it is a choice, and there are different methods to do that. I do love the fact that you said, you know, black and brown folks and just non-white cisgendered folks, non-white male cisgendered folks, we're not obligated to carry the burden of educating people, so I'ma just go ahead and give you this right here. [applause sfx] Just so people--'cause, you know, there's also this narrative of like, "Well, how can they know if you don't teach 'em?" Like, 'cause they got Google. Like, people learn how to code.Deidre: That is what I--I'm like, "You can Google or YouTube anything."Zach: [laughing] You can Google so much.Deidre: Now, Zach, the thing about--I won't deal with ignorance to the point where people, like, trolls and stuff like that, like, I don't have time for Trolls. I'm not a troll collector. I don't really like those dolls or people, so I don't play with them. I don't play with Trolls. Okay, but people who are really open to learning, yeah.Zach: Right, that's the qualifier. They gotta be open to learning, but I like the fact that from the jump you said, you know, you've been--basically you've been molded for this, you know what I'm saying? Like, you've been, you know what I'm saying, like--[to this day sfx]--right? Like, you're doing it, right? [both laugh]Deidre: And I don't know about your background. For me, I also--that's why I strategically chose to go to Spelman College. I went to Atlanta. I visited out there for homecoming. My cousin went to Clark and I was like, "This is poppin'." I transferred in the middle of my college experience. And so I--1. I wanted the experience, but I've never been a majority in an all mostly black woman environment, and it was kind of a reality shock. So I also say on the flip side, if you've always been other, you might want to try to be in the majority because it really is a way to reframe your identity, because on one side, yeah, it's a lot of issues and stress being other and always trying to, like, reinforce what you're doing, but sometimes it's also a platform to make you stick out and people look up to you and whatever versus you blend in. I mean, no one realized I was new for a while. I had to tell people, "Hey, I'm a new girl. I don't know where I'm going," because I was camouflaged. And so I say that because, you know, there's no real perfect spectrum on this and what you can do, so I would just say use your platform no matter what you're doing to help things out. And I also say this because I had a mentor, and she was like, "Deidre--" I was young, this was my first job. She said, "You are a young, attractive black woman in this space, and no one looks like you. You're gonna get people's attention no matter what. Make sure when you do it's for a reason." So minorities people, you stand out, you know, whatever it is that you--if you stand out in your space, actually leverage that as a tool to stand out for a reason and get your agenda across or, you know, use your thought leadership, because, I mean, it is a gift and a curse, so why not use it to your benefit?Zach: No, you're absolutely right. And, you know, for me, 'cause I typically do stand out, right? So I'm a black man--I'm, like, 6'1". I'm a pretty big dude, right? I'm, like, 270, 280. Like, I'm a big guy, right? And so, you know, I know that I'm gonna stick out, and then plus I have this weird, like, Southern/Connecticut accent because my mother was an English teacher, but I'm also very country at the same time, and so I have--it's a unique profile, so when I show up I'm just--look, I'm trying to--I'm trying to make a show, right? And not, like, in a Bojangles kind of way, but I mean make an impact, you know what I mean? I show up like--I show up, I'm like [what it do baby sfx]. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm out here, okay? And, like, you know, I'll bring you in with the jokes and stuff, but then if you're actually trying to challenge me, like, I actually have some--you know, I have some intellectual rigor behind what I'm saying, right? I might hit you with some multi-syllabic words, you know? Whatever. So I hear you is my point. Okay, this has been a great conversation. Any parting words or shout-outs before we let you go?Deidre: Yeah, shout-out to myself. I'm Deidre Wright. I'm here--Zach: Ayo, she said shout-out to myself. Oh, my gosh. Yo, wait a second. [air horns sfx, both laughing]Deidre: Because if there's nothing else you learn this session, it's that you gotta advocate for yourself. You've gotta be your best cheerleader. Man, shout yourself out. There's a way to do it, but do it, 'cause if we don't do it, who will? And I say this because there are so many people I meet, young people, and they're like, "I would never think you work in insurance. You don't look like that," and I give them a different alternative reality and role model. So by advocating for yourself--I tell people it's selfish not to share your expertise. It's selfish not to say who you are and what you're doing, because you could be motivating so many different people by just sharing and promoting yourself and inspiring generations. [chaching sfx] So advocate for yourself, you know? Find me at DeidreWright.com. Also I'm on LinkedIn and Instagram. So at Instagram I'm @DeidreWrite, like I'm writing, you know, my life story, and just holler at me if I can help you with either personal branding, diversity and inclusion, and uplifting our people of all kinds to advance and promote diversity and inclusion.Zach: My goodness, gracious. You know, over 100 episodes we have never had a guest say, "Shout-out to me, yo." Not "shout-out to my mom," not "shout-out to my people." "Shout-out to me." I love it. No, no, 100%, and Deidre, we'll make sure we have all of your links and stuff in the show notes, so no pressure there. Okay. Well, thank y'all for joining the Living Corporate podcast. You know where we're at. Look, just Google Living Corporate at this point. That's right. It's a slight flex, but it's a true flex, okay? You Google--if you go to Google--shout-out to Google, 'cause this is not an ad--Google, Yahoo, Bing... what's another search engine, Deidre?Deidre: AskJeeves I guess is no longer here.Zach: AskJeeves? Yo. [both laugh]Deidre: Ask him. [both laugh]Zach: What you gonna say next, BlackPlanet? Xanga? AskJeeves? [both laugh]Deidre: MySpace. I mean, I still can't get into my old MySpace page. Forgot my passwords, but you can probably find me there too.Zach: My MySpace was fire back in the day. Anyway, the point is we're out here, okay? And we're really enjoying the fact that y'all are listening to this podcast, so shout-out to y'all. If you want to subscribe to the newsletter, again, just Google Living Corporate, you click the link, and there's a subscribe button right there, right when you click on the website, okay? We have new content. Of course we got this dope content right here. We got new blogs. Make sure you just check us out, okay? This has been Zach, and you've been listening to Deidre Wright right now - right on time - she's just right.Deidre: You know that's right.Zach: You know it's right. Not white, right?Deidre: But Deidre's right.Zach: Deidre's right. [both laugh] Deidre: Thanks, Zach, man. I appreciate it, and let me know if I can ever be of service to you.Zach: All right, we'll talk soon. Peace.

Episode # 6: Self-Care is More Than a Hashtag

Discovering Strength

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 19, 2019 30:42

Episode #6: This week on the Discovering Strength Podcast, I'm I'm talking about self-care and how I apply self-care in my day to day life. Let me know how you discovered strength this week! I'd love to share with my listeners on the next episode. If you like what you hear on the Discovering Strength podcast and would like to support, you can do so by simply purchasing a cup of coffee! Head over to https://ko-fi.com/discoveringstrenth to show your support. It's just that simple. Be sure to give this podcast a 5 star rating and don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss a beat! I'd love to connect with you! Let's keep in touch in between episodes: Shoot me an email: erin@iamerinelizabeth.com Follow me on IG and FB: @iamerinelizabeth Catch up on the blog: www.iamerinelizabeth.com --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/discoveringstrength/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/discoveringstrength/support

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Speak Life Randon Thoughts

Maple-shade Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 16, 2019 7:00

Yeah, I say "you know" a lot in this one because well the passion comes and I'm I'm tryin to maintain. I'm dead serious you know (

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How To Be A Better Listener

Influence School

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 11, 2019 13:53

You saw the title of this video. It's how to be a better listener. And I mean what can we talk about in such a short video to actually improve listening. Well Valerie's got 5 strategies that she's going to share on how we can become better listeners. Where do we begin? This is a good topic. -Well, I'm just going to sit back and listen. Right? -What!? -You tell me. No, I'm just kidding. No. So, becoming a better listener is something that I think all of us could really stand to improve upon. It's... It's a struggle, right? I mean anytime there's a lull in the conversation almost everyone in the room is waiting to just jump in and give their opinion. Money and I work with lots of professional speakers. -Yes. -That's what... That's what we love to talk. So, yeah. What's... What are some key strategies that we can really do to be better at listening. -Yeah. Well, so one of the things that I really encourage people to do is to take time. I think if you take some time intentionally to listen, you will get better at it. I mean you will find that you are developing that more and more when you're face to face with people. And when I say take time, a lot of times this means just taking the time to pay attention to what's going on in your surroundings. I like to... I like to make the habit of leaving 5 minutes early from something or for something. So, that I'm not rushing to get somewhere. And that just allows me just a few extra moments to be paying attention to what are people saying around me, what needs doing walk across when I'm walking from my car to the store. When I'm walking into my house. Are there things around me that I'm normally moving so fast that I'm not even paying attention to? In business though, taking time also means paying attention to what's going on and being said without my industry or even my brand. And social listening is actually something that you can pay companies to just do. They will just pay attention and be watching for when your brand is being mentioned. Now usually it's bigger brands that pay a lot of attention to social listening. For smaller brands, this can be as simple as just paying attention to what the comments are, the message is, what kinds of things are being said when you do a search. -I never heard of that phrase. Social listening. -The social listening. Yeah, it's just paying attention to what are people saying. So especially if you're dealing with maybe some bad press related to your brand, you want to be paying attention big-time to what people are saying. Now, if you're launching something new, listening can be really helpful because you can get a pulse on what people are looking for in your service or your product. Pretty cool. So, that makes me think of Google Alerts. Maybe sitting out.... Somebody's put my name or my company name or something out there, yeah. -Yeah. Always have Google Alert set up. And a lot of social media management tools not only allow you to schedule posts but they also allow you to watch for whenever your brand's are tagged or mentioned in social media posts. So, especially in places like Twitter and Instagram where there might be a lot of things coming in you could easily miss, it's really nice to have a software that's tracking that stuff for you. -Okay, so now how does that... Let's just talk about how that applies individual like if I'm having a conversation with somebody. How can I take more time listening? Is it just... You know, white-knuckling it or like i know i want to talk but I've got a busy home I hold my time. -Well, have you ever tried just for the fun of it seeing if you could have those awkward silences? And give that extra split second before you respond to something? It's kind of a fun practice to have. And just to go into maybe one night at a party, you plan to just kind of have that extra little pause. Sometimes that can be really effective because when they realize that you actually say something that you're... Then it must be important. The other thing I like to do at parties and with some social and instances, is I try to go into it where I don't do this all the time. But every once in a while, I will go into a social interaction with someone and say, "You know what? I want to ask more questions to them than they ask of me." I want them to be talking more than they than I'm talking. So, this is really fun in business scenarios or networking scenarios. Because people like talking about themselves. And so if you can get someone talking about themselves, you give them this feeling of, "Wow, they really like me." And you actually leave with a much higher impression or they leave with a much higher impression of you than if you had done a lot of talking about yourself. -So, made me think of maybe I'll go to an event or something with a buddy that we're going to have a competition and you can get that who can be asking the most questions. Maybe we keep tally marks that way we pay attention to it. -Yeah. -You know, it's really fun. This... This works maybe for kids more than adults. But if you're really introverted and shy, this could work for you too. But I was at a party a couple weeks ago and the dad of the adult children all grown and adults now. He said when his kids were young, they had a lot of business types of parties at their house where was a lot of adults and very few other kids. And he told his kids, "I will pay you a quarter for every person you can name and tell me something intelligent about them from your conversation." And so, their kids learned how to talk to adults and engage them in conversation because they were making money from it. Isn't that fun? -All right. So, we spent a lot of time on that first ingredient. What would you say is a second ingredient to listening? -The second ingredient is to go deeper. The reality is you can go deep with anyone. It's just a matter of finding the right questions to ask. And be willing to potentially go into some uncomfortable conversations. Now, of course you're going to make some judgment calls as to when it's the right scenario for that. The deeper you go with someone the more the other person will feel like they have been heard. And so, the more questions you can ask that require them to actually explain themselves versus a yes-or-no question really open yourself up to going deeper with people. -Okay, I like that. Alright. What is key number 3? -Okay. So, the next key is to listen with your whole body. A lot of times people... You know, they like to be maybe on their phone. They've got their arms crossed. They've got their body turned or they're looking beyond you to see who walked in the room instead of looking you straight in the eye. Being fully engaged not being on your phone. Those are all very simple things you can do to show someone that you actually are paying attention. There's a lot that is said without saying any words. And so that nonverbal communication that you're sending to someone is extremely important. So, yeah. Avoid distractions especially with the smart phone. -So, I know a couple people who are experts in body language and anytime that teach me something, I then become self conscious. Conscious of that thing. So one of the things is I guess the direction my shoes are pointing. So, if I'm standing and I my shoes are pointing to you, that means I'm I'm interested. But if my shoes start pointing towards the door it's like, I guess subconsciously I'm telling you, "I'm kind of ready to leave." -Yeah. You know, that's just makes me think of, "Okay. I got to pay attention to what my body is saying other than what I'm actually vocally saying." -Right. -Okay. -Yeah. -Alright. What is secret number 4? -Okay. Secret number 4 is actually to be very slow to respond. So this is very similar to the first one where you're taking time but you by being slow to respond, it tells the other person that you are actually processing the information that they have given you. Whether it's a professional conversation or it's a personal conversation. The slower you can be to respond is really beneficial. And it allows you to actually have some intelligent responses instead of just quickly feeling like you need to fill that awkward silence. So, I know it's hard but be slow to respond. And one of the best things too is being careful about how fast you're responding on social media. You know, comments on YouTube anything like that. We have the ability to take a big deep breath before we respond to something because I don't know about you but every once in a while I'm moving so fastm I miss read some emails. I will miss read comments and I'll go back and look at them and think, "Oh, I'm glad I didn't respond in in anger to that because they actually didn't... They weren't trying to be snarky. But I first read it as..." So, sometimes you need to take a big deep breath and realize, "Okay. I'll come back to this in a few minutes." It's okay. People don't always expect that you're right in front of your phone or right in front of that social media platform. -So, I like that. I find that that's... That's really applicable to me. When I'm in person, I'm typically very kind. But when I am... I get i like the word snarky. When I get a snarky email or comment or something, I feel like, "I got to defend myself." But with social media, I can... I can take some time to like read it. Like "No, I better not say that in a recent. Go back." So, that's... That certainly applies to social media or email. Yeah. -Yeah, for sure. I think we all struggle with it. -Alright. What is method number 5 to listening? -So, this is really important when it comes to building a brand online and it involves monitoring the trends. So, when you're listening and trying to build influence online, you want to be paying attention to what is going on in your industry. What are people talking about, what are people concerned about, what questions do people have. And so if you're monitoring those trends, you're able to know exactly what to speak into and you can be a lot more strategic. And I know you monitor trends that are regular basis by doing keyword research. So, you before you create any videos, you are listening first to see what is trending that we should speak into and educate people on. It's the same thing in any other spot in digital marketing. And as you're trying to build that digital influence, it's really important. And that that brought to mind. Actually when I'm having a conversation with an individual. If I had... If I had gone to their profile say on Facebook and I knew that they had went on an adventure in Europe or there was a family event or something and when were in conversation, I bring it up, I bet they... They're going to feel heard. Maybe, yeah. I bet they're going to feel heard or felt valued that, "Wow, he actually follows me on social media." -Yeah. They're going to know you care if you're paying attention to what's going on. And honestly, Facebook friends lists are one of my favorite tools to be able to do exactly what you're talking about. -Thank You Valerie. I appreciate your showing the 5 nuggets to learn to listen better. Definitely want to recommend her book to you. This is Valerie Morris, We're All Ears. You can find this on Amazon. And you didn't mention keyword research. So I'm going to offer my keyword research guide for free. Keyword research is so important because if you do it before filming, your videos will rank day one on YouTube. So if you click the link below, you can get access to that. And of course, be sure to subscribe. See you tomorrow.

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Ep 124: How a first timer cracked a 100km ultramarathon with Matt Scrafton

Pushing The Limits

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 7, 2019 64:11

This week Lisa interviews one of her athletes from our Running Hot Coaching Tribe, Matt Scrafton. Matt joined Running Hot with the goal to run a 100km trail race at Taupo in New Zealand. Previously he had successfully run a couple of 50km events and really wanted to push himself but as a Dad, husband and having a full on career he wanted to do this challenge without breaking himself. Matt shares his triumphs and struggles on his road to 100km glory in this no holds barred honest and raw account of what it takes to run 100km when you have a full on life and you don't have the luxury of being a full time athlete or having all the talent of a Scott Jurek or Dean Karnazes. Many will relate and find inspiration in this story. Matt describes himself as “An incurable dreamer. An unapologetic introvert. A Husband and father. Just a guy who loves life and running long distances. Since moving to New Zealand 14 years ago, Matt has swapped the rugby boots for endurance sport. He’s completed Coast to Coast, cycling round Taupo and and a few ultra races.” You can follow Matt on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/mattscrafton/ We would like to thank our sponsors Running Hot - By Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff If you want to run faster, longer and be stronger without burnout and injuries then check out and TRY our Running Club for FREE on a 7 day FREE TRIAL Complete holistic running programmes for distances from 5km to ultramarathon and for beginners to advanced runners. All include Run training sessions, mobility workouts daily, strength workouts specific for runners, nutrition guidance and mindset help Plus injury prevention series, foundational plans, running drill series and a huge library of videos, articles, podcasts, clean eating recipes and more. www.runninghotcoaching.com/info and don't forget to subscribe to our youtube channel at Lisa's Youtube channel www.yotube.com/user/lisatamat and come visit us on our facebook group www.facebook.com/groups/lisatamati Epigenetics Testing Program by Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff. Wouldn’t it be great if your body came with a user manual? Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? These are just some of the questions you’ll uncover the answers to in the Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There’s a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the “future of personalised health”, as it unlocks the user manual you’ll wish you’d been born with! No more guess work. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyse body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home Find out more about our Epigenetics Program and how it can change your life and help you reach optimal health, happiness and potential at: https://runninghotcoaching.com/epigenetics You can find all our programs, courses, live seminars and more at www.lisatamati.com Transcript of interview: Speaker 1: (00:01) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati brought to you by LisaTamati.com. Speaker 2: (00:14) Well, hi everybody. Lisa Tamati here at pushing the limits. Fantastic to have you back again. I really appreciate your naughty checking in on the show every week. Today. We've got a little something special for you. I've got actually one of our athletes it running hot coaching has agreed to come on and share his story. So it's a little bit of a debrief, a little bit of a coaching call. Hopefully you guys will pick up some gems of wisdom. We're gonna, she's gonna. She has insights and the journey that he went all to get to a hundred K, which was his ultimate race recently. So welcome to the show Matt Scrafton how are you? Morning, I'm good. How are you? Very, very good. So I met his sitting in Wellington. You got to sunny day down there. Speaker 3: (00:56) Yeah, it's beautiful and it's, there's no wind for once. So yeah, really nice. Speaker 2: (01:01) That's unusual. So I met let's step back at the beginning. So tell us a little bit about yourself, where you come from and then we'll get into the running side of it. Speaker 3: (01:13) Alrighty, Um so I'm British. And I've be, I moved to New Zealand in 2005 where I met my now wife. So I grew up in, in the UK and political Brighton by the sea. And we live in the mighty Waikato in Cambridge and we've been all over the place. You know, Alton, Wellington, Melbourne, but Cambridge is home and some my wife and I have a baby girl, Darcy's four, and we have a crazy eight months old poodle, Daisy. So life is pretty full. But yeah, no, I've been, I'm, I found running probably about six or seven years ago. I've been doing endurance sports or Madi sports, probably longer. But as time went on, it got harder to balance all three disciplines. And then I decided that I really wanted to do something that had an endurance element to it and trail running or running was the easiest, you know, put on your shoes, get out the door and go. Speaker 3: (02:07) So yeah, so I got into sort of trail running proper about six or seven years ago and set myself the goal as I kind of do with, with life of, of running a 50. And and we were living in Melbourne at the time and the North face 50 was a, an annual event in may of each year around the blue mountains. It's just outside of Sydney. Gorgeous rice. Yeah. And so I spent probably about a year building up for that with a few feeder events. But the big goal of running the 50 yeah. And did that eight hours, 39. And that was really tough. It was quite a hard race. But yeah, I was surprised that what I now understand to be that mental state that you there are so important to an athlete. That went, that race went really well mentally for me. Speaker 3: (03:02) So I thought, yep, this is definitely not a one off. So a couple of months later, Darcy arrived and, and life changed. So took a while. Yeah. Yeah. It took a while to find that, that rhythm. We moved back to New Zealand and I then locked in the terror wearer this year, actually, 2019 and so spent it about, you know, another year building up for that. But I was kind of, yeah, so doing the, I'm doing the 50, I did have aspirations to run further, but my wife said, no, no, get another 50 under your belt before you, before you go further. You know, that it definitely wasn't a one off. So yeah, spent about a year building up for the 50 and did that in I think it's February of this year. So came home in about seven hours and yeah, it was just a really hot day. Speaker 3: (03:55) And I thought there's no way I'm running and as our ultra in the middle of summer, it's just crazy times. Which probably discounts the marathon disabler but there we go. But the it was, it was pretty cool race fantastic atmosphere and some really great support crew and aid station folk that rock up and make it a really memorable day. And then I woke up, I got home, woke up the next day and I had this, this kind of overwhelming feeling that it wasn't, you know, it wasn't a sense of mission accomplished. I had done that, but there was more. And I didn't quite know what it looked like. So before everyone else got up, I was looking online for big events or things to do, you know, huge running goals to chase and telco was on in October, so it was always, Speaker 2: (04:45) Let's back up a little bit. So you ran 50 Ks, paid him some seven hours or something and the tank wasn't in thi the next day. Like most people get to the finish line on any race and go, never again. Well that's it. Unless a very experienced one or something, they know that that's, that's going to be temporary. But you in the very next day started looking online. Usually it takes at least five days. Speaker 3: (05:11) Yeah, no, I think I'm really like goal-orientated I I think I, you know, you, we do what we do during the hours of nine to five to make ends meet and pay the bills, et cetera. But running is I've come to learn that it's a, my thing, it gives me that time and space. And it's, you have a, there's a fantastic mental feeling that goes with running. And if you marry that for me with huge, big, hairy audacious goals it gives me that balance. And if I don't have that big hairy audacious goal on the horizon or near, then I start, I start to struggle. Yeah. And my life is a bit out of balance. So I think it was physically I was, I was a bit poked, you know, my legs hurt and you know, I had a few tight muscle groups. Speaker 3: (06:09) But there was definitely a sense of there's more in the tank. And for me it was a case of you've got this base, you've legs, you've come through, okay, yeah, they're gonna hurt, but whose legs wouldn't after running 50 a day and let's use that base as a launching pad for the next big hairy audacious goal. And the counsel or guidance from my, from my wife was find a 70 or 80 K wise woman. This lady, she is, yeah, very, very wise. She's my CEO, my CFO and everything else. But to ignore that, no, she's a lovely lady. See no, I, I did ignore it and as I tend to do with some guidance and I thought, no, let's go a hundred now. Let's lock it in because there was nothing else on the horizon that was closer and telcos on our doorstep and yeah, it was on. Yeah. Speaker 2: (07:05) Well, so Topo 100 K for people who, let's see, from overseas. So taco is universal part of the country in the North Island of New Zealand, and I have a hundred K of the year, which is, can be a muddy, muddy, and hilly fee. So you signed up for that already straight after, straight out of the gate after Tyler WEDA. And what happened then? Speaker 3: (07:28) Literally I text my brother in law and said, what are you doing on the 12th of October? I have a deal for you. And I, then you came back and said, yep, nothing. What have you got in mind? I said, Oh, would you like to be my support crew for 'em a hundred K? It's like, are you sure? It's crazy idea, but let's do it. When Shelly and Darcy woke up, I kinda very casually dropped in conversation and yeah, it, you know, I gave myself a good few weeks to recover. Possibly from what I've learned from Neil subsequent after the a hundred possibly digging it myself long enough to recover which then is how I, I met you Lisa. So yeah, so I started training and, and literally followed the same sort of process and build up that I'd been doing for the 50, but obviously slightly longer distances for the a hundred. And I think it was around may or June of this year that I started to realize that what had got me through the 50 wasn't necessarily gonna get me through the a hundred. And that's when I, yeah, that's when the world changed. Speaker 2: (08:35) And that's when you found us. Speaker 3: (08:37) Yeah. So I was looking for not only coaching but a community that I could connect with. Cause I think when we run, we do a lot of this stuff in isolation. And I think I was looking for more than just a frequent, frequent contact the coach. I wanted to understand how everyone else was doing the trials and tribulations irrespective of distance and just share that knowledge. And yeah, I did my research and I think you and I had a phone call and yeah, gave it a go and yeah. Jumped on board Speaker 2: (09:11) And yeah, so we were, we were start the heavy onboard and we've now got this 100 K goal. And you said, I think it's what's important is a lot of people stand out on their own and they, they, they do fine for a little while. And then you start to either run into injuries or you go weeks bigger or you start to have troubles in some way, shape or form. I begin a bit burned out, maybe lose your motivation. And that is some people often come to us and say, Oh, I need a bit of structure. And it's an, it's not like probably 90% of people who join us have hit the wall in some way or hit a big, big, big scary goal that they know they need to take a little bit more seriously. So it's one or the other. Or they're just starting out that that's another thing and they want some really good guidance and structure. So what was the main difference like when you came to running hot coaching and jumped into our planes, what was the major difference that you found campaign to say and screeching off the internet? Speaker 3: (10:17) Yeah. So I think the catalyst for looking beyond our training in isolation on my own was I wanted a more rounded approach to the a hundred. I realized that I wasn't spending enough time on core strength for example. And I also knew that my own knowledge and experience wasn't enough and that there were people out there who had years of experience and I'd be daft not to tap into that. So recognizing that I had my own limitations. So from a knowledge perspective and actually I, the biggest thing for me is that I was starting to get a sense that I wasn't approaching my long runs fresh. Yup. So I was going into the weekend quite fatigued and I wanted a more, I wanted to know if there was a way to balance training for a hundred so that you didn't feel you know, shot all the time and fatigued. Speaker 3: (11:11) So that was the catalyst. And and then the conversation with yourself and then actually working with Neil, it's on pick the a hundred K plan. I was like, wow, the longest run in the week, mid week is actually shorter than my current longest midweek run. So automatically the, I'm going to start feeling a little bit fresher. Yeah. And then I started getting actually the first core strength session I did, I probably couldn't walk proper for about a day or two. I remember doing the lunges and I was like, Oh wow, I'm going to, yeah, this is, there's a reason why I'm doing this. Speaker 2: (11:46) Oh, that's fine. So, and like [inaudible] that is a key thing. Like you don't know what, you don't sometimes how weak you've gotten to, like when you run, it's a catabolic exercise. So it starts at eight, you eat away at your muscles. And so if you're not counteracting that with strength training, with a, also with your mobility and for, for different reasons then over time you're going to get weaker and more flacid than the, in the, in the core for example, you'll have strong leaks, but that's what, you know, run isn't going to have strong links obviously, but the rest of you will, will suffer from. And that's when things can come unstuck as well, especially if you're not 20 anymore, you know, you need to start thinking about muscle max loss, which is, which we sort of lose around 200 grams a year after the age of 40 on average. So let's say they say so we want to be counteracting that as well as the fact that you are in a catabolic sport that is actually eating away at you and you want to be able to maintain. So, okay. You started into the strength program is think, well this is, this is different. Yeah. And how, how, how was it for you when the mileage, like a lot of people think, okay, I've gone from 50 to a hundred, I have to double the mileage. Doesn't work, does it? Speaker 3: (13:00) Absolutely not. No. So the a hundred, the leap from 50 to a hundred was for me, surprisingly manageable. I'm working in within the a hundred K plan that you guys gave me. So midweek run automatically shorter. So there's some gains there. And actually the, the longest run was actually comparable to my 50 K. Yeah. And I think we added maybe another hour onto it just because I was questioning, well, if I'm going to take 15 or 14 hours, then you know, do I need to run a little bit longer than what I've been doing? 50. And then it was like, you know, if you want to run a little bit longer, that's okay. But there isn't a one size fits all. You've got to just make it work for you. Speaker 2: (13:42) Yeah. Yup. And this is a, the thing that's like, I've said to people sometimes when they think, how the hell am I going to double that? And, and I'm not actually doubling the distance and I say to them like, when I'm running or set of 200 K race or two 50K race, I don't double it again, because you can't double it. You can't keep doubling that. You're training distance to suit your and with, we've come from, you know, most people have come from maybe a marathon,udistance training. We are, you know, from half marathon, two marathon, you steeping up your mileage a lot more and your long run does get a lot bigger and you're doing sort of three quarters, you know, 32, 33 K run as your longer time before Marisol. So people extrapolate that and think that that's what happens when you're doing a 200. Okay. And it isn't, you can't, you cannot physically recover from training intents on this. You kept choking or somewhat [inaudible]. Speaker 2: (14:39) But generally you can't recover. And that's where the wheels start to come off. People if they start to try to do this high mileage, so we're not high mileage coaches. And we get a lot of people coming to us who've come from high mileage coaches and that approach would work at the beginning and it will work when you're younger. When you've got kids in careers and you're getting a little bit older, they had approached that to unravel. If you're a lady, you can often start getting hormone problems as well. And so both sixes adrenal exhaustion is on the horizon too. So those are things that we always very aware of and you're trying to keep you from tipping over there. It's a very fine line to walk sometimes. Okay. So walk us through the next part of the process. Speaker 3: (15:23) So I think we're just on that around the longest run. So I training was going really well. You know, mobilization work, strength work, and then I got through what I turned my apex weekend, the longest run weekend. Yep. And I run it as per the schedule where I may be through one half an hour for mental confidence and yeah, it's about 43 K I think in total. Five and a half hours in the Hills. Yeah. And then that the following week is when it all came crashing down, fell off. The wheels did come off big time. Yeah. Yeah. I, I'm Speaker 2: (16:03) You run into an injury problem. Speaker 3: (16:05) I did. I had basically an absolute awful pain sensation in my left ankle tendonitis. They turned out and that, yeah, that happened literally on the Wednesday after my long run. I could feel it. You know, in the sort of the Tuesday morning and then I went for another run on the Wednesday, which I shouldn't have done. And it was hurting like never, like no other pain I'd had before. So I knew something wasn't quite right. And managed to get to see my awesome physio in Cambridge and and she said, yeah, you've got some, some tendonitis. And we basically worked up a plan where I would, and I, I think at that point, if I don't take it back a step, there was a day, I think it was a Thursday where I was sitting in my office in Cambridge and I was literally in tears because I thought, how am I, how am I going to get to the start line, let alone the finish line and put all this effort in. And you know, I spoke about the balance or the need to have balance in professional life and personal life. Suddenly I could see the Seesaw completely, you know, mounted as broken for overseas friends. And I I was just learning bits because I thought, I can't run. How the, what am I going to do? I can't walk this thing. So I think I flipped you guys a note and said, how do I typo? Speaker 2: (17:35) You were in immediately black spice and you, you reached out and I could tell from the, you know, you asking about specifically about the, the injury I think, which was part of the same, but the what, what, where I jumped in was more the, the meaningful side of it because you were, you were taking the deep dive. So when you've put your heart and soul into something massive and then it starts to unravel and then you're thinking you're fearing not being, because it's not along to the race now that you're not going to get there. And every decision that you're missing in this is very, you know, normal things that though it still starts crashing down around your ears. So how did they, so I, I jumped on a call with you and we started to work through some of the, the mental stuff. How did that help you? Speaker 3: (18:18) Yeah, it was, it was really interesting cause I, I went straight to the physical side. So how do I taper? How do I still do these sessions? You know, I've got an internal session tomorrow. How do I run that with an ankle that I can't run them? And you're like, no, no, no, no, no. Take a step back here. This is you, you, I think you actually said you've got this your legs have got all the miles they need to do to do the a hundred is now about the upstairs. How do you mentally stay, stay in the fight to get yourself to the start line and through the race. And I was, I was actually quite taken aback about that because I thought, well, I'm missing all these sessions or I'm going to be missing all these sessions. Speaker 3: (18:59) And I'm generally fairly confident person, but I guess susceptible to blows from life as, as anyone is. Yeah. And I couldn't, I wasn't listening to you, I think at first. And then you followed up in an email and it, I actually, it took me three or four attempts to reread what you'd written. And then we communicated over the next 48 hours. And you said over the weekend, I want you to read a book if you can. And the book is the biology of belief. Yeah. Bruce Lipton. Yeah. And it was a little too it took me way beyond my, my scoring. Yeah. School level science around biology, but it was the last section that really knitted it all together, which is about how your perception and beliefs influence your physiology or can influence your physiology. And I think that's when the penny dropped for me that this is all about the mind going into these next three and a half weeks. Speaker 2: (20:06) Yup. And that's the key point because the situations happen, the injuries happen. Speaker 3: (20:12) Yup. Speaker 2: (20:13) What we've got, we can, we can, the, the, the, the thing that you're going to do wrong is to keep training over that injury and to try and fight through it when you've got a rise at the other rains. So the panic is that I'm not going to be fit enough when the reality is if you, if you get through 70, 80% of your total training malls, you're going to be fine. And I, and as a coach, you don't, you, you trying to get your people, I'm a bit more than that, but if something happens, you, you will get there. The best race I've ever had in my life, one of the most amazing races put that way, let have, was that one that I did in the Himalaya's, which I shared with you, that 222 K rice. So of the two highest mountain passes and in the world mudroom bubble passes and I ripped the ligaments off my league team weeks out from the rice. Speaker 2: (21:01) I couldn't run for seven weeks and I had a hypoxic brain concussion from doing altitude training. So I didn't have enough oxygen in my body. So of course all these evictions and so on. Some of the listeners would have heard this story, but eh, when I, and I was either I'm going to pull out or I'm going to carry on. And I decided I'm carrying on because I'm put in so much. If it as you know, the effort that goes into training for something like this, we need alone the sponsorship, the foam, the documentary that, you know, the whole works just made that I couldn't just pull out. And so I had to try and face it with only a couple of weeks training at the end of that seven week. So not being able to train on my foot. So I did cross train, I didn't want to cook with my body and I spent the rest of that time on my mindset. Speaker 2: (21:44) And when I got to the stat line, my body was actually in better shape than if I'd smashed it right till the end because I'd actually given my, my body hadn't had a recipe years putting it, you know, mildly. And so this actually was the best thing that could've happened and it was fit. And I did the 222K race mind do like a really hard, tough, long at altitude, extremely dangerous race and, and killed it, you know, was, was briefly had, I've got documentary if anyone was walked,uI'm slightly simplifying it, but the point was you didn't need to do every one of those training sessions that you think you need to do. And when you don't have the choice, it's either you change your mindset to the whole thing and you stay on board with it and you better, or you give up and you pull out or you keep trying and you and yourself even more, and then you might be out for six months, you know? Speaker 3: (22:37) Yeah. And I think the, the biggest thing as human beings, we often always easy to do, is to, is to not learn from the mistakes as we go through life. You know, to the definition of madness is to repeat the same action and keep expecting the same or different outcome. Okay. And, yeah. So, so I think you know, when I spoke to you in that scenario that you described around that, that race, you said to me, the one thing you did do was you asked your support crew and those around you on that day or leading up to the event and through it to be 100% positive that you didn't want any negativity around you. So when I was going through this over that weekend I said to my wife, you know, do I pull out? She said, well, you can't because you, there's no point. Speaker 3: (23:20) You missed the withdrawal date. Yup. No, you might as well just take each day as it comes, see where you are. We're going to go down, everyone's booked in to come down and stay, et cetera. So that's just do it and just see what happens. My wife is a Kiwi. She's her world view is inherently positive. I'm, I'm British and naturally cynical about most things in life. So glass half full glass half, we kind of marry each other out. But yeah, so, so I I got through that weekend and I jumped in the pool and on the bike and I was having physio, physio sessions and I wasn't running and it was a really weird sensation. Weight in the sense I felt like I was getting behind. So that's when I, little things like, you know, I did that accountability mirror exercise where I took post-its and wrote down in a motivational statements or words on a mirror and I took a wee picture and I know it's a silly thing I did just to hold myself accountable going through the next three and a half weeks to do towel pose. Speaker 2: (24:28) And that is not silly. That is really, really good. Anything, any positivity that you can surround yourself with is, is the mental game, is everything in ultra? Speaker 3: (24:37) Oh, it is totally. And this is the biggest, you know, you do these events in life and I've, the one thing I've learnt this time round is that it is all mental. It is a hundred. I mean you're also, you're palsy, you know, needs to be conditioned. [inaudible] Speaker 2: (24:52) Healthy and you need my foot. But the rest is in your head. And Oh man, I'll say next weights, you know, finish races that they shouldn't have been running cause they went far enough to do it, but mentally they were strong enough to get through it. We don't recommend doing that because you're going to scroll your body in the long run, but it is about this up here. How much, how much pain can you suffer, how much can you overcome, how much, what's your why and how big is that? Why and how strong is that? Why you really, really want this? And then you find ways around obstacles. And, and I think having seen what I've seen in other athletes, I've seen people with incredibly bad injuries survive races. I've seen you know, people who are blind run across the Sahara. And I've seen this before. People with, with one leg run across your belly. And a whole bunch of people who carry kids who had cerebral palsy is to give them a cross them a mouth on the Saturdays, you know incredible stories. People who really believed in saving the rhinoceroses and addresses the rhinoceros the entire time across the Sahara. You know, absolutely crazy things that physically shouldn't be now able to do. But they did. Speaker 3: (26:05) But because of their why and their purpose, they did. Yeah, absolutely. Speaker 2: (26:08) In a very, very strong why. And there has to be the, the ultimate. OK. So you, you started to tune your mindset around, so this positivity and surrounding yourself with positive people and your wife's telling you, you could, you know, you got this, we started, we just starting and that is the thing. Get to the stat line, start, see what happens. Speaker 3: (26:24) Yeah. And I think the biggest thing they have along the way, I was training with a guy it lives in Oakland and we've done a few training runs together and I sent him a text set, ah, you know, with start together, but we'll be finishing separately. I don't know if I'm going to finish in my current state. And he phoned me and he, he's a really happy go lucky guy, positive outlook. He said, no, no, we will walk this out together if we have to. And I thought, wow, okay. That's, that's pretty cool. So yeah. Speaker 2: (26:58) Oh yeah. This guy gives us his name. Give them a shout out. Speaker 3: (27:01) Johnny. Johnny, Denise. Yeah. Nice. Good guy. So yeah, so Johnny and I were, we ended up training separately of those last couple of weeks. And I was trying not to look at Strava and you know, get envy about long runs that he was putting in. And I was in the poll in my Emma Speedos. It wasn't good. But anyway yeah, no, so sorry, go on. Yeah, it worked. It worked. Yeah. So we got through that through those last few weeks. I'm in the pool and on the bike and having some fun on the mountain bike. And actually it was really nice just to get out in the Hills and just turn around. And then I remembered actually coming down one single track in, in Cambridge that I was actually doing a race the following weekend, so I should probably take it easy and not go too fast in case it came off. But yeah, no. So I, I started just to test the run walk literally the Monday before the race on the Saturday and that was the first time I'd got back on my feet and it was a really tentative run walk. And then I did another one the next day. And then the final one I think was on the Wednesday and no reactions from the ankle. So I thought, well, yeah, big, big mental hurdle cleared. You know, we're locked in to do this and we're going to do it. And yeah. Speaker 2: (28:18) And that's pretty like, it's pretty ballsy to be fair. You know, like it is hard when you're facing a hundred K and you haven't been able to try and fill the last few weeks and you're in the last phone a week, people before the race and you're like, can I even walk, run, walk, run in a couple of days you can change it. We'll be trying this out. And you're standing on the start line and said, and the morning it a hundred K, you know, it takes a lot of mental strength. So well done. Thank you Chuck it all in. Speaker 3: (28:44) No, definitely not. And I think at that point even I think my physio had said to me you are doing this, you can do this. And that you will break, you will not break anything in your ankle if you do this. And it hurts. It's just, it's not just ligaments, tendons, just tendons and they will recover. And I think that hearing that actually, I was like, okay, so if my body hurts, it's going to have to live with it and my mind is going to tell it. And that was the process I was going through. I think I spoke to you in the buildup and you said to me that this could be the body's way of trying to tell your mind that this isn't a great thing to do. Let's just sit back and watch some Netflix on the Saturday. Speaker 2: (29:20) Yes. Let's dive into that for a sec. The, in my experience in nearly every big race that I've done and the week before or two weeks before, something goes wrong on my body. Like I get sick, I'll get a cold, I get the flu, I get something, some, some single play out. And I, and I S I think it's the subconscious we aiming already actually body because it knows that you've got this big race coming up and it's trying to stop you. We'll throw everything at you. Just stop you. Speaker 3: (29:50) Yep. And that book I mentioned earlier yeah, a lot of it was about using your conscious mind, so not drifting off into unconscious thinking, focusing on the now using your conscious mind. And there's a lot more power in, in, in potential, in the using your conscious mind rather than the subconscious mind. So if you play it forward, then my subconscious was trying to tell me not to do the race because it's going to be tough. It's going to hurt. But my conscious mind was going, no, you've got this, you can do this. It's going to hurt, but it's gonna be fine. Yeah, yeah. We are doing this. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So we got through that last week and you're headed off to Topo and it was just a really interesting segue the night before Johnny and I, we've got a big house in our families came down and my, my mother and father who I love them to bits and my father in law was chatting away with Johnny who was really laid back and Johnny was having a, just the odd beer, one beer before the race. Speaker 3: (30:55) And I'm quite serious about my prep. I was not talking to anyone. I was going through my mental checklist and all that stuff. And my father in law said to me, man, why aren't you more like Johnny lay back and relax? I was just like, nah, we're all different. You know, everyone's got a little different around different ways of preparing. So yeah. So there's nothing wrong. Speaker 2: (31:17) And by the way, cause I mean, I talked to me the night before you know, I'm in the zone, you're in the zone and, but there are people who are just totally chilled out and whatever happens happens when that, the different personality types, unless I wasn't really be confused because everyone has their own way of preparing for such a battle because it is going into Epic bed already. Speaker 3: (31:37) Yeah. I think physically I'd appreciated the difference prior to this race around ultras and running and athletes, you know, we all come from different shapes and walks of life, but mentally as well, I was seeing some really interesting sides of people and athletes. So yeah. So yeah, John and I were up the next day about I think four o'clock got to the start line half five. It was absolutely freezing and telco. And I actually, I've never done this before, but I fell asleep again in the car on the way to the style line is about a 40 minute journey. But for me it was a sign of just how relaxed I was and whatever was going to want to fold was going to one fold, but it was going to do so in a way that was going to have a positive outcome. I was, I was quite relaxed about it. Which was really bizarre. So Speaker 2: (32:27) Thanks. Turn around to the T is three weeks before and the Speaker 3: (32:31) Oh, chalk and cheese. Yeah. Chalk and cheese. Yeah. I yeah, so there's, so we got going and Johnny had forgotten his headlight as usual, so I let us out and I said to John, look, we're going to run, run what I call fifteens, which is you run 10 minutes and maybe walk for five minutes. And I think I said to Johnny that it's going to be the pattern for me throughout the race. And he was like, yep, sweet. I'll run with you would walk this together. You just set the pace you, you'd be mr timekeeper. And we go so we we started off and are we running really comfortably? I think we ran the first 20 miles you know, I don't know, roundabout, just under four hours or something. Yeah. and at one point we were, Johnny was leading in and we were running up the Hill, then we were running down a Hill and he said, Oh, I probably ran that a bit hard. Speaker 3: (33:21) How's that? Yep. So but we were trying not to get too excited and carried away with ourselves. So to got to that first checkpoint, all good. And then I think it, it started to hit home around the, you know, you get into the race and we were running this sort of 15 thing where you run 10 and walk five. And I had this little checklist in my head where I'd come up with four things to think about on a rotation deliberately so that I could focus on the now using my conscious mind. Does that make sense? Yup. Yup. Yeah. So I, I'd ran through this little cycle where I'd go you know, what's my effort? Am I running comfortably? Am I running too fast or too slow check. My nutrition you know, have I eaten in the last half an hour? Have I taken some water in fuel? Speaker 2: (34:11) It's called association. I call that association where you're associating, you're actually checking in with your body. Yeah. And then another strategy, which is just association, when you're in pain that you're actually go off and do your heavy place and might be visualizing, may swimming with whales or something like that, that I'm in somewhere else or I'm renovating my house or I'm doing something like that and I'm taking my mind somewhere else. So these two strategies are really, really good to open to your practice. Speaker 3: (34:37) So now I know that I was doing the disassociation thing around the ADK Mark, but the yeah, so I was, and the other thing I deliberately, I was checking, you know, am I in touch with my environment? Can I feel with my feet and in whatever, my body, the physical environment, just to make sure that I was using my conscious mind. And I would go through this little checklist again, every 20 minutes or so. And so we got through the first 20 miles, it felt quite, quite quickly. And we hit the farm lands, which is a really monotonous physical environment, more walking or hiking than it is running. And it's not fun. It's not inspiring. But we got through that, hit the first major aid station, I think it was around the 50 K Mark. And I said to Johnny I'm now running into territory unknown territory from a distance perspective, even though I've technically run longer time on feet, this is going to be your ground. Yeah. so they'll talk about the different approaches. Johnny and I Johnny got to that big ice station and he had a white bike fritter. And I was like, no, I cannot stand that stuff. Speaker 3: (35:53) So yeah, so I, as, as we left the ice station, my wife said, how you feeling? And I said, honey, I'm really suffering. She said, well, you're halfway. This is all upstairs now. I see the neck see you at 75 K or whatever it was. I was like, Holy moly. So here we go. I'm sorry. It literally felt like I was stepping off an area called comfort and known into the unknown and uncomfortable, and this is going to hurt. It's gonna hurt. And this is where growth happens. Yeah. Yeah. So and we were running together, but we were always about, I don't know, three or four meters apart just because that's how you find yourself. And I think I got to about 65 K in Kinlock or something like that. And I said, I was crying behind my glasses, my sunglasses, because I was going through this dark patch where I was like, if I stop, I'm going to stop and I'm going to let all these people down and I will have this sense of underachievement pressure, yeah. Speaker 3: (36:59) For hanging around my neck. And as we approached, or one of the mini stations, I said to Johnny, Oh, you run on now, I'm I'm close to DNS thing. I'm gonna work through this. He said, no, no, no. We are, we're going to walk. We start if we have to together. Wow. He's doing. Yeah, he is. He's a really good dude. So so then our run at that point became a shuffle and you know, you're tired, you're physically tired. You can't run at that same pace. So we're still running, but it was just a, a shuffle and yeah, Johnny dragged us into the into the Kinlock aid station where we picked up our pacer. And my wife's friend who's training for coast Hannah, so she she signed up to be a pacer and yeah, my my wife took a video. Speaker 3: (37:48) She she asked me a question and she was videoing the response at the, at the 74 K line and a station, sorry. And she said, how do you feel? And I said explicative tired. And she said, Oh do you want to do a another hundred or on 160 after this? And there were a few more expletives that followed. And she she's kept the video and I've, it's a nice reminder, but so then we, yeah, we Johnny had another white bite fritter and I was just like, my God, he's going to suffer in a minute. And yeah, so we hit the Hill behind Kinloch and off we went. And that's, I think when the disassociation came in for me, cause my, my body was really hurt and my feet were really broken, like listers, toenails, just feet were sliding all over the place in my shoes. And it got through Kinlock with a reduced shuffle. And then I think we popped out around the 90 K Mark and into the, off the Hill. And I think that's when I th I finally felt that I was going to do this or sort of finish it. Yeah. Speaker 2: (38:58) That's a good feeling when you think, yeah, I've got this now. Like, Speaker 3: (39:01) Yeah. I mean I think we are our pacer was really good. She, you know, was checking in and if you're pacing someone that you've, you, you know, haven't done that sort of distance with, it's you've got to find your rhythm. And when we got to that last day station, I think, you know, eight K to go or whatever it was that's when we all thought, yeah, this is this, we're on the home stretch here. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And across the finish line and yeah, happy days Speaker 2: (39:30) Come back to like be like you've been in the, in the hurt locker for a good city. K so 25 Ks or something, which is an awful long time by the way. And I always say to people, the rice doesn't really step from Sydney. [inaudible] Usually that's when you know, when you pace yourself, right, with you hydrated, right. Whether your nutrition was right up until that point. And there's always going to be a time in those big long races and that can laugh for hours when you're absolutely miserable and you just want to die every second and give out. And if you can get through that, sometimes what happens is very often as you come into another space where suddenly it's all good again, you don't know how or why, but you, Bonnie sort of comes back. Did you experience that? Speaker 3: (40:09) Yeah, I think so. I took the, I spoke about in that 60 K Mark, you know, where I was close to DNF thing and you know, when Johnny said to me no, we're going to walk this out if we have to. So let's just keep going. I think what I now understand a little bit more about, I was going through a battle with my body and mind and what my body was going. Now let's just stop, you know, there's an aid station, there should, it can come pick you up. We'd go home and my mind was like, no, no, you were going to do this. And it was, it was like there's a little war going on between the two. Totally. Yeah. And Speaker 2: (40:39) Welcome to the, I enjoy the devil, the lion and the snake. Yeah. Louder. And it gets more and more frantic up there. Right. Speaker 3: (40:46) And I, I'd, I'd heard about it from, from you and others around in that war, your, your mind is telling your body, no, we're going to do this. So just shut up and just live with the pain. And that pain that I was experiencing physically actually reached a point and it didn't go any further. It just settled, it dissipated. And and then I got into a happy, happy place where I thought, yeah, I've got a shuffle going on. I'm not gonna run this full bore, full bore. I can't, but I'm moving forward and I'm getting closer to the next stage station and we're going to pick up HANA, you know, 74K and then we're going to do the same from there, up and over. Kinlock. Uand even with my, you know, like going through that,uI found a way to keep moving. Speaker 3: (41:39) It was almost as if the blisters, they were just blisters, they were going to go away. Toddlers grow back. And that's how I kind of quickly processed it. But it was just keep, even if you have to walk up the Hill, walk up the Hill, yeah, it's fine. Cool. so yeah, we got to, you know, from the 63 to Kinlock, which is a 74 and I think I mentally was getting into happy site. You know, like I, my body had quiet and down. The pain had kind of reached a point but hadn't got worse. And mentally I was I was over, you know, picking up the pace of 74 was a significant milestone. And we were, I think I could see the end you know, it was, we were close and it was just a case of getting through it. Yeah. And I was, I was still trying to bring myself back to the now going through my little checklist I mentioned earlier. And it was a way of just kind of putting into a little box the different pains or feelings I was experiencing. Discomfort around my feet, discomfort around my legs, you know, it got worse or sorry I've got bad, but it wasn't gonna get any worse. Speaker 2: (42:58) It's quite funny on that point. That yeah, when the body starts to scream at you, it's a bit like when it does pre-race, you know, when it throws it, you know, a sickness that you at the cold or some something that or try and stop you doing it and also does it arise. We are getting to the point where you like, the pain is so bad. You're thinking, how the hell am I going to carry on? And then when you do persevere, once again, the brain seems to go, Oh well she's not stopping. We've got to keep going. So I better stop putting those signals out. I don't know how it works. And I'd be interesting to see if other athletes have experienced the same thing, but it doesn't actually get any worse than bad. It's already bad, but keep getting worse. Speaker 3: (43:40) Yeah. And you know, it's, I don't know whether it was a combination of you know, mental fortitude or whatever word you wanna use or we'd reached a significant milestone. So getting up and over Kinlock Hill was huge cause it in 90 K there's two little eight stations and hitting the eight, the ice station at 90 K, as soon as you turn the corner off the ice station, it was like a wall of noise from the finish area had made its way up to up. You could hear it. And it was like, wow, we are so close. So any, it was like another wave just picked you up and was going to carry you down this, this fricking mountain. And you know, you could just, where that point, we were kind of walking shuffling and it was in the dark and it was quite wet. Speaker 3: (44:30) So you'd probably didn't have any other choice to be honest. And it was just, you know, you could feel the end. So we just made our way down the mountain. And we were joking amongst the three of us, you know, pace from Johnny about, you know, what we're going to have to, we was our favorite post race mill, just really silly crabs that was just getting us through the finish to the finish. And yeah, so yeah, we, we, we hit that last cause like a sty that you've got to climb over and it's like a physical barrier where you're leaving the trials to a four wheel drive tack that literally throws you out at the finish line and climbed over that STI. And it was just, we've done it. We know we're almost there. Speaker 2: (45:20) And you can see, you know, you can see that you can hear the people and you can feel that you're getting near and you can light at the end of the tunnel after a very dark long tunnel. Speaker 3: (45:29) Yeah. And it was, it was funny. It's like, wow. You know, you crossed the line, we crossed the line together. I had a big of a bit of a hug and you know, like we've, I think it was a realization for me that, wow, we'd, we'd just done this. There's a huge achievement personally, yeah, Speaker 2: (45:48) It is a huge achievement. What did you feel at the finish line? Because some, sometimes in sunrises I felt like, you know, I've just broken down in tears, absolutely with relief and I can actually stop because you dream about being able to stop and other times it's just no emotion because you just like numb. You sort of wanted that beyond anything. What was your reaction? Speaker 3: (46:10) So what I didn't mentioned is on that way up and over Kinlock Hill towards the 80 and 90 K stations, I, I was going through a real roller coaster of emotion, you know, just trying to get to that final eight station. When I'd, I was on the home stretch, I was, I'm really struggling to hold back the tears. And Johnny was in front of me. My pace was behind me, so they had no idea what my facial expression was. But so, so I thought, and I actually Johnny Johnny and I said, look, there's going to be some tears at the finish line, Hannah pacer be prepared across the finish line. And my overall overwhelming feeling was done it job done. And yeah, it was just satisfaction. I think it was w with no tears at the finish line because I think that emotion had passed and I think it was just sheer bloody relief. Yeah. Keep going. And I think it was excitement of now being able to eat real food like chips or dip or pizza or just something other than you know, a gel or you know, the equivalent paleo equivalent. Yeah, Speaker 2: (47:27) Yeah, yeah, yeah. All the horrible stuff. You're sick to death of what in and you thought EEG and it starts really, really interesting. The emotions that you go through. I did a a hundred K rice with Neil, you know, my, my offsider running hot coaching and it was his face on hundred and I mentioned this before, but he got, you know, he's a, he's a strong, tough med, but it's 70 Ks. He was in tears. He was in so much pain and he couldn't see his way to the finish line. You know, when you get into that deep dark space of absolute despair. And it also, and I cried pretty much every race, you know there's this, I don't think there's ever been an ultra where I haven't balled my eyes out somewhere. It's just part of the thing. And what happens is that when you get, when you have given everything at your body, you are so raw and you're so emotional, like everything is like any little thing can sit you off. Speaker 2: (48:27) Hello D and I was like 180 Kazan or something into death Valley, 270 K the same thing guys. And I was in such a world of pain and there was a 60 kilometer strike road that was just blowing my mind. And Neo was running behind me and he exited. We hit my ankle when he was running, just, just a couple of steps behind. And he hit my ankle and he tripped me up. And the adrenaline rush of being tripped and falling just opened the floodgates of the emotions. Like, cause I was holding it together desperately. And when I fell on the drill and came out, I was just bawling for the next hour, still running up, polling my eyes out and just could not control myself, you know. And he was like mortified. I swapped people who are, who are cruising for me. And it wasn't, it wasn't about him. Just that shock of falling just released everything that you are holding on so tightly toe. It's a ultra marathon and doing something like this huge achievement that you've just done is really it's life squeezed into a 50 an hour or 50 narrow or whatever it was, timeframe. Speaker 3: (49:46) It's, yeah, every emotion that you can possibly feel you in a, in a human lifetime, you can, you know, you just go through a roller coaster of emotions. And I think for me that, you know, from 60 K through two sort of 80, 85 when we crossed that last day station that was probably mentally quite tough, you know, just to keep moving one step after another. And then you, it was just sheer, utter relief. Yeah. Job done. Yeah. Speaker 2: (50:21) Yeah. So now you've done your Europe year in the hundred K club, you're an ultra marathon now done, you've done a few FFTs already in this, your first hundred. How are you feeling? You're three weeks out, have you, what w what often happens with runners, and I won't free that with you, but how did you go through a bit of a elation stage and then a ho down the other side stage and a bit of a depression before you started coming out the other end? Are you still in that roller coaster of a post race situation? How are you keeping now? Oh, we lost you there for a sec. [inaudible] Yup, yup, yup. We know on the pool was sorry about that people. So yeah. Did you F what are you going through now? Emotionally? Speaker 3: (51:16) So I I think I, I probably relaxed too quickly post race. I, I'm is my wife's 40th birthday, a couple of days after. So you know, that new, that normal discipline around diet and hydration probably relaxed a bit too quickly. And I suffered that first week not only with like aching niggles and blistered feet, but I had a, a really heavy, bad, nasty cold. So my immune system was absolutely smashed from the race I think. And just my body going, I think know, thank God that's over. But I, I started walking you know, daily on the Monday. So I had Sunday off, started walking and then walk, running again by Wednesday just to keep the body moving. And I got through the cold and I'm back running. But I've, I've seen some advice in the group around from Neal around, you know, try and keep that long, run to no more than an hour. Speaker 3: (52:14) First month I had a chat with Neil actually around you know, what is my recovery looking like? And I wanted to I, I S I swore during the race I would never do this, but I've started to look at what next and I actually, I'm getting itchy feet around. Myla so 160 K so but it's not for, it's not for cause North burn really appeals to me from a sheer physical challenge. I don't think I wanna go back to Tara [inaudible] and do the a hundred or the 160, because the environments are similar to telco. Yeah. So I'm drawn to really challenging races, physically challenging, like really gnarly mountainous, hilly, tight races. So North really appeals to me. Yeah. So that's a 20, 21 goal, I think. I want to, somebody said to me the other day, take some time to smell the roses. And I'm just going to enjoy running and just mountain biking. You're having fun, but my body's coming. Right. yeah, I I'm just gonna still run absolutely by just, I just wanna run for the enjoyment Speaker 2: (53:26) Of it at the moment for my, for my 2 cents as, as when, when after a race, you often do have an immune system because you have knocked the hell out of your immune system. Really. You've, you've used that point every, a lot of your hormones, like your endorphins and serotonin. So you can go into it at depression about usually 10 days out seeming to teen dies yet is when you usually have a bit of a mental job. You can be on a high for a couple of days straight after the race because you're, you saw you're tired, but just so stuck with yourself and you're on this adrenaline. Your body's been in a fight or flight state during that race. And so it's still in that fight or flight state often for a good couple of days. And then you start to come down from it and that's when you can start to get sick. Speaker 2: (54:10) And you also usually ravenously hungry at this time. So you just pigging out like no tomorrow. And your body is actually goes into a repair state after, you know, a couple of days and you come down and often that can be quite a Rocky road for people. Not always, but it is number one, you've lost the big goal that you had that is now achieved and done and there's a bit of an empty space in your life and then you're, you're also, you've had a bit of a trauma, you've gone through some trauma, so there's some post-traumatic sort of stuff going on. Some you're still working through. What the hell was that that I just experienced, especially when you do overseas races and you are out of your actual cultural environment on top of it all. And then after team dies, you might start to come out of it. Speaker 2: (55:01) That sort of adept, which often happens and then is when your mind starts to go, what next? Because you've got a big hole and you sort of need something to be aiming towards again. Yeah. Thing is, and this phase is, it's great to have and I'm glad you say 2021 because that means that you're being like sensible in, in, you're going to let your body get over this experience and then build yourself up again. And you have some other races, no doubt along the way that will build you to Wallington northbound 2021 and North burners approach little tasks a hundred mater. Like if you, if, if you wanted an easy a hundred water, that ain't it, you know, I bet any easy a hundred motto cause a hundred most soccer balls. But that one is a particularly tough, tough, tough one. But super exciting and an amazing, have been really lovely family. Speaker 2: (55:54) I was cofounder of that race and loved it and I sold it last year to the guys teary and Tom and, and they, they've done a fantastic job with it. And it's really a special special event and it's a small family event as opposed to the big Tyler widow. I'll post that. It's a lot more this corporate feel. It's a lot more intimate. And I also think for me that I wanna quite life is so precious. I want to, I want to spend time being as well and not just getting lost, chasing massive goals all the time. Oh, you're so wise. Honestly, like honestly the, a lot of people go into this phase because I've seen it like, you know, after having trained so many people and gone through this process with so many people, you get to camps, you get the ones who say on never even want to do that to myself again. Speaker 2: (56:44) And then they gone out of, out of it. Hopefully if you've prepared people well, like don't actually fall off completely, but often they need a really decent break or you get other ones who go, that's totally lost without the next huge thing. And I, and I fell into that camp for many, many years on this hamster wheel of having to do events because I didn't know what the hell else to do with myself if I wasn't completely, this was my identity and it was very tied up with who I was and my self esteem and my confidence. And so when, like three years ago, and I actually retired from the long staff because my mom but it was overdue, it was overdue to have a break, you know, at least a break if not, you know feminine. Like, because I was just in this hamster wheel of, of trying to outdo myself all the time. Speaker 2: (57:39) And you can't, you know, there comes a point where you can't do more than you did. You know, you can't keep topping it and keep trying and you just blowing yourself out completely and you're not allowing yourself that recovery time in between. And I can even see it in some of the top, top elite, you know, famous super crazy ultra runners out there that I'm friends with who are still doing it as they're getting older and older and older and this like the fifties and sixties, but that, that they, they the obsessive, you know, and then not as healthy as I could be if they actually took a step back now and I'm going to take some time out for a year or two and just reassessed where my body's at. And it's really hard to do that to step away for a while because you know that to get back to that level, why are we're out now and do a hundred K or something. Speaker 2: (58:36) I couldn't go and just do it because I haven't been trained to get back there would be in your mind, the hard part is when you've done so many is that you expect yourself still to be there even when you are not there. And it really hard one for people coming back from injuries for older runners, people who have retired and then we'll come back out or then I they did to get I've got a lady at the moment who's been struggling with a really bad illness and was comparing herself to how she was two or three years ago as to how she is now and rebuilding and keeping and being very disappointed in herself because she still thinks she's back there instead of going, starting from scratch again in moving forward in what was, is gone and not comparing yourself to who you used to be. Speaker 3: (59:27) Yeah, I think, yeah. And I think you know, when I did coast 10 years ago, coast to coast I started and stopped very abruptly, the whole endurance small sport journey and it took a few years to reconnect with running. I don't want to stop running, but I, there's no way I could do why I probably could, but I, I would just, I wouldn't be best prepared. Do you know what I mean? Speaker 2: (59:53) Wouldn't be the best husband and you wouldn't be the best father, the best person you are at work. You know, so it these things and this is what I try to get across to people is that when you take on these message goals, you are sacrificing some other part of your life and it's, it's and that's fine if that's what you've decided you're going to do, but to understand the impact that it's going to have on your husband and wife and your children, what impact, you know, for positive infinitive it can, but if you are doing it back to back to back to back, it can actually have a negative effect on your family and your friends on it. So what's weighing all that sort of stuff up and understanding where we are as my focus going now? It's something I battle with constantly because part of me wants to go back and do all that crazy stuff right now when I have other priorities, it's just life. Sometimes it's very hard to, to knock it down on yourself and to feel guilty cause you're not doing everything. Speaker 3: (01:00:54) Yes. Yeah. And, and life's important, you've gotta enjoy it as you go through it. And if, yeah, I dunno. That's so I, I, yeah, I finished and I'm happy, but I'm actually at peace now with the fact that next year is some smaller races. But the big one is me potentially in 2021. Speaker 2: (01:01:12) Yeah. And you've done this one and what your friends said celebrate and smell the roses. That is a fantastic principal to take away. And it's something that someone told me at the end of a big race when I just went, Oh, what, you know, I wasn't as fast as so-and-so and I didn't, you know, I bet it's a bit a longer race and they went for goodness sake, you know, after I'd just run a mess. Okay. Right. They just said, you know, cannot, can you not just congratulate yourself, celebrate your wins, integrated into your psyche and who you are before you go chasing the next goal. Yeah. Actually type this hundred K telco run and put it in your hat and go, I fricking did that in our religion for doing that. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna suck this, I'm gonna suck this one dry before I go and chase the next. Speaker 3: (01:02:04) Oh, totally. Yeah. So I think I think with the the English get into the rugby world cup final thing, I'm going to have a little beer or two this weekend. Speaker 2: (01:02:14) Yes. I was saved and then I apply. Well they were, they were absolutely amazing. And, and hits off their guys too. You know, you, you can always be no. So, Hey man, thank you very much for sharing your story. I hope this is empowered and lots of other people listening to this. I hope it's made you think maybe I can do it if Matt can do it. And to understand the journey that you go through and then it isn't or you know, roses, it is difficult along the way, but that you can overcome any final words that you'd want to. If you were talking to you two years ago, what sort of advice would you give Mitt Speaker 3: (01:02:57) If you believe in yourself and believe in others around you? And Oh yeah, just if you want something, go after it and, and no, no distance, no goal is too big, if you know what I mean. Life is, you get one lap in life and you've got to make the most of it Speaker 2: (01:03:17) I made to that one. Speaker 3: (01:03:19) Yeah. So thank you Lisa. I really appreciate the opportunity. Speaker 2: (01:03:22) No, it's been absolutely fantastic. It's wonderful to have you in a running hot coaching tribe in. If anyone else wants to join us, of course we'd love to have you come and join us and check us out. I'm sure Matt will agree it's been a a good journey with, with having a bit of structure to your training and having some goals and someone to, to ask questions to and to make sure that you're doing things right. So Matt, congratulations once again on your huge success and your mess of victory. And we'll talk to you again so no doubt. Awesome. Thanks Lisa. Speaker 4: (01:03:55) [Inaudible] Speaker 1: (01:03:55) That's it this week for pushing the limits. We showed her write, review, and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team, at least at www.lisatamati.com.

P048 How great follow up on leads helps Joanna Keskitalo close 120 transactions a year

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 7, 2019 56:52

[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent="no" equal_height_columns="no" menu_anchor="" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" id="" background_color="" background_image="" background_position="center center" background_repeat="no-repeat" fade="no" background_parallax="none" parallax_speed="0.3" video_mp4="" video_webm="" video_ogv="" video_url="" video_aspect_ratio="16:9" video_loop="yes" video_mute="yes" overlay_color="" video_preview_image="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" padding_top="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" padding_right=""][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type="1_1" layout="1_1" background_position="left top" background_color="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" border_position="all" spacing="yes" background_image="" background_repeat="no-repeat" padding_top="" padding_right="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" margin_top="0px" margin_bottom="0px" class="" id="" animation_type="" animation_speed="0.3" animation_direction="left" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" center_content="no" last="no" min_height="" hover_type="none" link=""][fusion_text][/fusion_text][fusion_text] Listen via YouTube video if desired [/fusion_text][fusion_youtube id=" https://youtu.be/TKvtTopIsjI" alignment="center" width="" height="" autoplay="false" api_params="&rel=0" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" /][fusion_text] A significant key to Joanna Keskitalo's is 120 transactions a year is how she follows-up on leads. Read on for details... You've heard it said "the fortune is in the follow through." Well, that's definitely the case with Joanna Keskitalo. Joanna is a high-volume producer, but not for the reasons most people would think. She's driven, but she's not a high-pressure sales person. Her key? It's all in her follow through. If you want to grow your business to a "top producer" level, you master the follow through to convert leads to clients. And on this call, that's one of the things we talk about! Listen as a podcast while driving, or watch the live interview. Transcription (was completed by automated process. Please ignore any speech-to-text errors) [00:00:01] This is the get sellers calling you marketing podcasts for real estate agents. And I'm Beatty Carmichael for simple to do. Proven marketing strategies focus exclusively on finding sellers and getting more listings. Visit our Web site and get sellers calling you dot com. And now let's begin our next session of get sellers calling you. [00:00:23] Hi, I'm Beatty Carmichael, and welcome to the Get Sellers calling you realtor podcast. I'm excited today because I get to interview another wonderful agent, actually one of our clients and a strong producer named Joanna Keskitalo from South Carolina. Did I pronounce last name right, Joanna? [00:00:41] You did well. [00:00:42] Ok. Go. Go. Go. So. Hey, Johnny, I just want to say thank you again for being on the call with us today and sharing some of your insights and growing the business and things that really make it work for you. [00:00:57] Well, thank you. You're welcome. Glad to be here. [00:01:01] Now, which part of South Carolina are you in? [00:01:05] Kind of a upstate, little bit into the mountains where I live is about 15 to 20 minutes from the North Carolina border. So they call it upstate Greenville. [00:01:20] Area. [00:01:22] Well, that's a pretty area I know I used to spend a lot of my time in the mountain side of North Carolina and we would come down into Greenville. I used to I used to paddle rivers. So this is now in grade school, junior high high school. And so we'd go up there and all kinds of beautiful rivers and one of one or two were down in South Carolina. So that's a gorgeous area you're in. Oh, yes. And and just for the listeners on the call. Normally we do these as video podcast, but as the Lord would have it or as the enemy would have it, we couldn't quite get that to work out. So. So this is will be a great call, but it's entirely audio. And so join in. Tell us just if you wouldn't mind, just kind of set the stage. Can you tell us just a little bit about who you are and about your real estate business and and and and who is Joanna Khatalla? [00:02:22] Yes, I I've been in the real estate industry since 2006. Before that, I was a loan officer and kind of grew up in the building industry between and I was born and raised in Florida and then moved up here. The end of my junior year. And then from there I was. Did massage a little while and then went to college. And then. And then I started as a loan officer. And my father was a home builder who actually took me on as his real estate agent. So now it's been about 14 years. Then through a couple of different brokerages and started my own brokerage about eight or nine years ago, I have about seven agents underneath me now and we did about 22 million last year. One hundred and eight transactions and have already closed down six or seven million this year and have about eight million pending. [00:03:23] So is that all your personal volume or is that you and your. [00:03:30] Well, I kind of run it more like a team where it's all my leads and everything, so. [00:03:37] Yes, I'm involved personally pretty closely in each transaction. [00:03:41] So very, very cool. I love it. I just have to ask this question. Don has. [00:03:47] You know, I've always wondered the difference between a loan officer and a real estate agent. Obviously, you enjoy the realtor side more than a loan officer. What's the big difference that you've found? [00:03:59] I mean, I would definitely say the people interaction versus paper work is is probably the biggest thing. And yeah, I wasn't good at sitting behind a desk guy. My my first job out was with G E through Kelly Services, a staffing company, and I was under the admin for probably twenty two male engineers. And I I lasted about a month and a half in this cubicle doing schematic drawing and looking at where they don't meet each other. You know, the schematic drawing. I was like, no, that was not for me. So definitely, definitely being around people and is. Definitely more of a passion and joy than than shuffling paperwork, you know. [00:04:51] And though I love it for my 24 year old son, he was 22 at the time. He got this intern job one summer. So he's he's studying. He was he's already graduate now by the time he was in supply chain management. So, yes, his job at this 200 million a year business. They put him in a cubicle with a computer. His job was to do supply chain management type stuff. He calls me during the first day of the job and said, Dad, I can't stand this. [00:05:22] I never want a cubicle job ever again. You know that he learned real quick that was not him. So I love it. [00:05:29] No, no. And and I mean that from there. I mean, that can commission structure for me and a go getter and someone that can can do things on their own. I mean, I just cannot. I'm way too efficient to be punching a clock. So so like I get it. [00:05:49] So let me ask you a question. Go get getter side. So you've obviously I mean, you've been a go getter is it's obvious you've you started your career. You quickly moved into having your own business, being your own broker, building a team. You're involved with everything. Talk to me a little bit. So, you know, most agents out there. Their biggest struggle is getting enough leads and prospects to talk with and to work with. And it sounds like you've built kind of a machine of some sort, at least some of system. What are you doing? What are you do that you've found to really work well with you guys? [00:06:29] Well, like I said, my father was a home builder and and that really started and I guess that's a blessing. But it was that he he struggled and finding a real estate agent that. [00:06:45] You know, really was proficient enough for him to handle and and, you know, knowing in the construction industry. So I can't say I wasn't blessed in getting, you know, a start, but. Are you do you have to pound the pavement? You have to follow up with people. I would not describe me as like I mean, maybe that's wrong to say, but like a old car salesman type. I'm not pushy, but I am persistent. Like, follow up, follow up, follow up. I mean, that's just what you got to do in that. And then and not only following up once you're in in the transaction is to, you know, follow through and then follow through. Tell that to the closing table. Like it's way easier not to let those go and just wait for the next buyer as fighting every portion that it takes to get them closed. So I would think that the follow up and follow through are two biggies that a lot of people do fail at because it is it's consistent and it's hard work. So I think those are two things that you would need to be to be a successful real estate broker agent. [00:08:14] We know they they say that a fortune is in a follow through. And that is so Treves. I was telling a another guy today. This is a few years back. You know, we had a handful of sales reps and one sales rep. I was to tell him that, you know, you know, first, three weeks after doing a presentation, he had the lowest conversion rate. But within another four weeks, he had the highest conversion rate of anyone because the fortune is in a follow through. You have a. So in terms of the people that you guys work with and the work that you do, are you. And I want to I want to understand who your prospects are and then ask and find out a little bit about your follow up and how you manage it. [00:08:58] Do you do you follow up with different leads differently? I mean, are you. First off, I guess. What type of leaders are you generating? Are they coming to you or are you buying leads or you generating your own? It's your business source coming through. [00:09:16] Well, I handle the I'm a little bit different because the new construction and the custom home side and that is, you know, our main builders. My father and husband. So I handle all of their. Customers. So we're doing a lot of just name building through. Social media and through the Web sites, and so I guess the the follow up or follow through as far as that goes, I mean, just pictures and constantly updating all the Web sites and that kind of thing. In this day and age, a lot of social media on on all the different sites. So I do that through the real estate side and the building side and then the building a lot of times they'll have a house to sell. And so I will get those listings. But then in general, I mean, it's not it's not it's not even 50 percent of my business that comes through the custom and that. And we. I mean, when you're in 14 years. Yes. We have a database system used, top producer. And then you're doing now the postcards and the. And the Monday morning copies and that kind of follow up with past referrals and past clients. A lot of. Again, through social media, I mean, it is easier that way. If you can build a relationship where you can be Facebook friends with them, they get to know you. They feel like they get to know you more personally. You know, if you if you are a little bit more open and vulnerable in that social media, that all all that kind of stuff helps but a ton of a ton of marketing in every way. [00:11:10] So, yes. [00:11:11] So, you know, it's interesting you're talking about Facebook and just being vulnerable. I think it is so important. So you've got all your all your past clients and all your other contacts or all friends and your Facebook and Facebook friends. Right. [00:11:28] I try. You know what I mean? And and do I do hold the private account, you know, personally? And then obviously the the real estate and building pages are public. But I'm still a little bit, you know, hold myself right that I haven't got my personal pages are still held private, but that I think they appreciate where you're accepting or asking them for a friend request. And that is where you can be, you know, more. [00:12:00] I don't know. Vulnerable is the right word, but more personal. In your in your post, in that kind of stuff without worrying about it being on a on a totally public forum. [00:12:10] You know, when you said that the thing hit me and then I'm falling, maybe connected the dots that I've always been spinning back in my mind. So I just set the stage. One of our other clients used us. [00:12:23] And then he was also I did a Facebook community page for it was a fifteen hundred home forum he was in and he was the administrator on the page. So every time someone joined the Facebook page as the administrator, he would welcome them, but then he would also send them a friend request personally from his Facebook account. And this is what he sought to share with me. His name is Nelson. And he said, you share that. You know, he put everyone on as friends on his Facebook account. And then he was just normal, you know, sending all updating things just personally what's going on in his life and those things. And and I think was 18 months he went from basically nothing, no market share and form to like 25 percent market share in other team only has 50 percent. And you connected the dots is when when they know you, they see you all the time. [00:13:22] And now they feel like they're you know, they see you on Facebook. And so they feel like they really get they know you more. And it makes it more personal. Right. So talk to me in terms of follow up. [00:13:34] So follow up. Follow up. Follow what? How did you manage? Okay. So you're working with a lot of people and you get a lot of this is from the construction and a lot of business, I guess, from past clients and just other people. Are you. Do you use. Tell me about your follow up system. Because this is one. I'll be honest. This is when when we work with clients. This is one of the big challenges. They're not. They don't have a good system. What have you what have you found? Doesn't work. What did you kind of do in the early days? It just kind of blew up on you. And then what have you found really makes it all work for you. [00:14:15] I have to think about that one, but. [00:14:19] I mean, I have used. [00:14:23] I mean, a database system. I mean, once it gets messy, it's so I still have top producer because I have those leads in there and then, you know, now I'm pretty strict on my admins and stuff on keeping that database because. You know, if it gets big enough and and a big company wants to look at buying you out or something, really the only thing that you are selling. Is your database. So I went from like not understanding that and caring about. My database as like now is part of closing steps. Where are you? Where? I mean, I'm lucky enough to be able to afford admin help at this point. But if you had it clean from the beginning and people would be from step one. What you can build to sell later. Is so important and it's easier to start that at step 1 than trying to find out and then figuring out if they moved and where. But now it's part of closing steps where we come work, where we get when they go the closing, we get the e-mails and that kind of thing. And it's clean. Cleaner in the process. And it's a much cleaner database. And that than, you know, it's the latter part of of my career. It should have been done from the beginning. But, you know, you just think you're going to work forever. [00:16:01] When you're when you get in the business in the 20s, you just say go, yeah, you does. [00:16:05] And now I'm like, think about retirement someday. And so and then all of follow up and everything can be more that is if your database is clean. So I would preach even more more to database and then follow up because then a lot of stuff can be automated. And I mean, like we talked about, I mean, phone calls are are difficult. I mean, I'm on the phone all day long. But to. I think that and I like. And I can't. I have to admit with our with our last conversation and maybe the people won't know what we're talking about. But I I talked about maybe that maybe we don't need to. When you get to trying to articulate this better, when you get large, large enough and you don't really need the business, the phone calls slack off. So maybe we were talking about looking at it from maybe that person needs to hear from you. We'll make it easier on me to make those phone calls, because if I'm looking at not so much as a business aspect and the next deal, because you will eventually you get so busy and stuff and then you're you you do develop a well oiled machine that kind of generates generate their own leaves and stuff. The phone calls are the easiest thing to go in. And like we we talked about that. Its people are the only thing that you can invest in that will be eternal in that play. So again, I haven't done that and I get busy, but it's definitely it gave me a different perspective on follow up. [00:18:03] I love them. And I love that. Gosh, there's so much I want to try to pull out of you. And I know I want to have time to, but I'm seeing all these rich targets to inquire on. Let me let me take that last comment. And so for those listening to this. Oh, what? What we talked about last time is I was sharing with Joanna that one the most important things you do with your personal lives, especially your personal lives. But any list is they do business with you first and foremost because they like you and they know that the relationship is authentic. And so one of the things that we teach our clients when we provide our agent dominators service is for them to reach out and make a phone call and or drop by. And actually personally engage. And it's not an engagement that says, hey, do you have any more real estate business I can help you with? But it's a hey, how are you today? I was just thinking about you. And this is where, Joanna, you were mentioning you're so busy, you just don't have time. And I said, you know, we're talking about you need to make time. And. And then we talked about on the eternal aspect that the most important thing is rather than calling for real estate, call for personal needs. And I think somewhere in this conversation I was talking with you. In fact, Dwight, this kind of springboard is I reached out to you a moment before our call. This was a couple of weeks ago. And on your voicemail, you mentioned, you know something about it then and be blessed. Do you remember putting that on your voicemail? [00:19:43] I do. It's kind of. Then then what I do for years, because my man life is hard now. You know what I mean? People are mean. You know? And just. If someone needs to. And and our blessings do come from the Lord. [00:19:59] And I want everybody to be blessed. And I'm going to cry. So, you know, I. I do. I just want to spread that if that spreads. Anyone here just listening to my voice, it better than like, hey, leave me a message. And they won't get back to you. At least they've heard that in a cell. So I have done that on my voicemail for years and I will continue to do so. [00:20:24] So, you know, and I do that, too. But but because I come in and I said, tell me about this, be blessed. And we've got in the conversation that you love the Lord Jesus, and he's a real integral part of your life. And this is been where I was suggesting to you when we last talked. Is both make these phone calls to your list. But don't worry about this, since the Lord can take care of it. When you just reach out as a person, say, hey, is there anything I can pray for, you got or just something like that and and use it as a ministry outreach. And that's what you were talking about. I just want to bring people into that loop of of the reference that you were making while we're on the subject. Let me springboard into this, if you don't mind. [00:21:11] So I really want to find out more about follow up, but there are a lot of people that can do a great follow up stuff. I'm real curious. If you don't mind me probing, I look to probe about your relationship with the Lord and how you see it impacting your real estate business. It's OK to kind of a good direction. We can go in. [00:21:32] Yes. OK. [00:21:36] Talk to me a little bit about that. You know, so you're a Christian. First off, let's make sure everyone. What does it mean to you? You're what does it mean to you to say, I'm a Christian? And what is your relationship with the Lord Main? And then and then I won't inquire about how it impacts your business. [00:21:54] You're listening to the Get Cellar's Calling You podcast to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence or from a geographic farm, learn about Agent Dominator. [00:22:03] We guarantee your sales in writing or give your money back. To learn more. Visit our Web site and get sellers calling EW.com and Slike Agent Dominator from the menu. [00:22:13] And now back to the podcast. [00:22:19] Well, I'm probably a rebel in my face, you know. And I guess that stems from. [00:22:29] You know where we come from as far as my background. I mean, it's Apostolic Lutheran was was the original base and and a lot of them turned to legalism and really, really strict things, you know, from no birth controls to hearings, arson and all of this stuff that we're where we totally forgot about Grace. And so not that I'm like we're all sinners, but I'm I'm a rebel. And my faith that that. I don't want anything good I do to come through me that comes through Christ, Jesus. I don't even want to know when I'm doing good or or that I I just it scares me to to fall into legalism because I feel like that is the the devil's way of taking some Christians when they think they're doing good and that that it is all Christ. So for me, when it says Christian, it is Christ. He did it all. He paid it all. And that's where where I want to stay. So if I if I have a glass of wine or I say a cuss word or like that doesn't make me not a Christian. It makes me. Have a savior. So Grace is is where I live and breathe, so in it they come across that like, how can this girl be a Christian? Because she'll feel likes to have fun or do this or. And but that's why I'm so hard, again, you know, not focusing on the sin so much, but at focusing on our savior. [00:24:34] So I love that. And I think there's a lot of a lot of folks that kind of get caught up in this whole legalism. I'm real curious. I'm not getting into big detail, but just kind of conceptually in your mind, what is legal as in and here's what I'm asking for. So there are a lot of people out there that are listening to this that may not understand the difference between grace and legalism and really kind of what that means or maybe what are the things to watch out for. OK. If that's the right term to use, but of where they are. Maybe they think they're doing it right, but they find out they're following a set of laws instead of. Grace, can you give me just, you know, your simple definition of. Legalism versus grace. What does that mean? [00:25:25] I think it probably would come down to works and. You know, when they. It's that personal relationship with Christ that you need to have and realize that we are all sinners, whether we follow this set of rules or we don't follow this set of rules. You know where it where you know there is. Don't. But I think there's a lot of dude. You know what I mean? Like, they do this. Exactly right. And it's almost like a perfectionist path. So either the set of rules of don't or do. We're all sinners. And that Jesus paid that whether what that set of rules is. And so I think breaking of that and living. Knowing that Jesus paid it all brings a lot of freedom because I've seen a lot of people struggle really, really bad when they. Ah. Ah, just like need to be like reminded of forgiveness of sins and that kind of thing where they're so it's hard to explain unless you've seen it. But it's. Can you give me an example? [00:26:46] I mean, just something that comes to mind for someone to struggle because of this legalism approach? [00:26:53] Well, I mean, that I think a lot of I've seen it in people going down past where it where maybe they had it like, for example, like drinking was super bad in in our religion. But it was almost like, well, they messed up. So then they like went off the deep end and got more into drugs and drinking instead of being like, well, if you messed up and got drunk one time, it's okay. You know what I mean? So it brings them when they are pounded in in their head so much that then and you can't sin and you can't sin. You just totally wipe out what Jesus did. And in that grace. So, you know, I don't seen it. Yeah. [00:27:41] Yeah. Yeah. Those came to him. Is Roman J. There? No. [00:27:45] Therefore, there is no no condemnation for those who Jesus. And when you mentioned that I think so late. You know, I guess. Let me see if this makes sense. Legalism. Is that part where you're always condemned. You're you're feeling can do it right. Never do good enough. And great. Is that part says, hey, I understand I'm a sinner, but in Christ, there's no condemnation. And he's going to help me through this. And it's not the writers. [00:28:14] I mean, this is a kind of radical, right? I mean. Yeah, where? Where? [00:28:18] I mean, or like Pharisees and that where the judgment and that it just I've seen that so much and so many problems come from that, that that is where I don't want to. In the end I have a perfectionist nature and I am a rule follower. You know what I mean? But I don't. So I could go down that road easily where I could and then become judgmental and what you're doing and what. But I'm like, yeah, I've seen it mess up people so much that that's why my face. I just want to give it all to Christ and give it to him because it is what he did and and and that's where the focus is. And then it's weird because like if you don't if you focus on the note. Don't, don't, don't, don't, don't. Our human nature wants to do what we're not supposed to do. And if you focus on Christ and then that's where it says like God, don't let your right hand know what your left hand is doing and things like that, that it becomes easier if you're focusing on Christ. You're actually doing good without knowing you are. So I feel like focus on crises that have a list of dos or don't really, really brings freedom. You know what I mean? And you have fun in life and you enjoy life and that of like I messed up again, you know, let me get with what I mean. [00:29:49] So Paul talks about renewing your mind. And and I think, you know, a lot of times we focus so much on. Don't do don't do I have to do it this way? Trying to be good. Right. [00:30:05] But the reality is, what you're talking about is when we have Christ and we focus on Christ, then he lives in us and through us. And we. More and more naturally do good and more and more naturally avoid bad. And it's that inside out as opposed to outside in. How does this how does your relationship. Talk to me a little bit about how you applied in your business. [00:30:28] So, you know, I got your voicemail and you try to should, you know, be blessed. Just helping. What other things do you do? How do you live your Christian life as a realtor and. [00:30:42] And how it impacted your business. [00:30:47] Well. [00:30:50] I don't know if I'm great. I mean, that's I mean, I guess I don't wear my heart on my sleeve. But maybe maybe people see because, you know, Christ is in me. Maybe people see that and I'm not shy. You know what I mean? I'm not totally politically correct or watch and hide my face. But I will share my faith and. [00:31:23] You know, so I don't know if I like I said, because I don't. I'm afraid of a list of do's and don'ts. I just kind of live. [00:31:36] And can you give me an example? And not not to bring attention to you. But here's kind of what I'm you know, for those who are listening, who do follow the Lord and they want to have a more meaningful, you know, a more meaningful impact in life rather than say, well, I'm a real estate agent here. And then I try to do my Christian stuff there. Can you give me an example of just how this flows into your business? Is there anything that comes to mind? [00:32:05] I mean, I guess not hiding it kind of means a lot in this day and age. Not being afraid to say I love Jesus. You know, people do they get fearful of it. They want to they think it's going to hurt someone's. And. And then in building a business with integrity, honesty, like I do, I'm almost honest to a fault. I guess you know what I mean? And I'm I didn't say honest, but I should say for once. But very much. You won't have to guess my opinion. You won't have to guess what I'm thinking. I'm. Very, you know, blunt in that way. I don't know if that is a fault, but I feel like it's good. I mean, I feel like. People appreciate that. And they know where they stand, especially in transactions or something that's not, you know. And I think that it makes me a fairly good negotiator as far as as as deals and stuff like that. [00:33:15] And I feel like people people see my my. [00:33:23] That I'm ethical in that and that I tried to just do my best on every transaction. And and I feel like that should mean something. And I think that people do appreciate that. [00:33:37] So is there anything that stands out where you can look at a transaction for negotiation, for some interaction where? You did it differently than, you know, you would have done it if. You didn't have the relationship with the world. Does that make sense? Trying to contrast. [00:34:01] Yeah, I mean. I mean, that is that would be easy to do in every circumstance. You know, I mean, like. But it gave me an example. [00:34:11] Give me an example. Just just to kind of articulate what this means. [00:34:17] I mean, I feel like you could be so unethical and and real estate brokers are. I mean, in so many ways, I can't pinpoint an example, but I mean, you just lying. You know, I mean, sometimes it's easier to to say you have a multi offer situation or or that's way lower than that other offer or anything like that. I mean, just just being honest in every transaction and a you know, and not even stretching the truth makes your job harder. It really can. You know, so I mean, that's what I'm saying. Maybe I am want us to a fault, but I'm not going to say if there's a multi offer situation or. Oh, yeah, I have an offer on the table or something. If it's not, they are like ISIS, right? I will that my integrity means more to me than that transaction. So, you know, I've never done that. So I don't know what particular transaction, but I'm sure that I could have definitely made things easier on me had I had I fibbed a little bit. [00:35:30] So, you know, I get it. Hey, look, I want to I want to pursue two more questions with caution. [00:35:38] I want to go back, if I can, to the follow up. And then come back to your relationship with Christ. On the follow up. And what you do. So we were talking about your list. Keeping your list clean. And the thing that hit me. Because we do all, as you know, with a lot of folks who might have agents who come to us to help them market to their sphere of influence and past clients. And the one biggest challenge most of them have is they don't have a list or they have a list. It's not been updated because they've never really seen the value of it. And so you putting that effort and emphasis into your list is really great. Can you give any hints or suggestions of how to make that process easy? Did you know what have you found or what have things have you put in place so that it stays updated? [00:36:36] Yeah, I mean, they say if you're a new agent out to start number one, whether it be a notebook paper and write everything. And then I mean, obviously a computer system easier. I use top producer and then they've kind of, you know, 14 years later, you don't really want to shut it down and start over. But now I have a system where when it closes, you know, you just have them fill out a little thing and then ask you if you want to transfer. So if it's a buyer we're working with, that'll transfer to their address. And obviously, you know, it changes. But now then you can automate things and that kind of stuff. But I mean, even if you're new, just get their information. Don't be afraid to ask for their information. So we're working with them. [00:37:32] So. So you have a system. I love this, I think is what I'm looking for. You personally and you and your team, you'll have somewhere in your process where you are specifically asking them for their information so you can get it all in the database within that come Commonwealth. So it at closing his eyes when you're basically making sure you're getting all the information accurate or. [00:37:56] Yeah. And then we've created it with a survey, you know, so we're getting that testimonial or feedback and assistance. [00:38:04] She and I mean, if you worked with them on that and, you know, to bring to the closing table and just, you know, we try the best we can on that. And then we update our database based off of that. So. [00:38:21] And so, yeah, we did. [00:38:25] We do that at closing. [00:38:26] But I mean, any time you feel like some people say it's better to do it upfront, that you know what I mean? [00:38:35] Because they vent through the headache of a transaction and everything. So they like you sebastiano the first day. So in the end, though. But I mean, I feel like we keep pretty good rapport and have them good say good things at closing. So we do it then. [00:38:51] But wherever you felt more comfortable, it's just a matter of getting that information. And then. [00:39:01] And then what do you do mean when? What do you do with it once you have it? So now you built this database. You're getting it updated. Are you do anything special with. [00:39:11] Well, we have different like so depending on where the lead came from. Like I have a site called Upstate bank-owned Homes dot com. So when I did some of my best work when the economy crashed, because I started that site with with the cell site that led to mine and I was giving bank auction list, which I still get phone calls that are like, where's my where's my list this month? I mean, so. So they'll it depends on what you know. Because we have a computer system we can put on, that's where they buy our 2018 seller. 2018 where they did they come on for a bank-owned and they're just getting the auction list on a monthly basis or what. So it depends where where we categorize them, what they get. [00:40:10] So. And then you then follow up emails for past clients, all that kind of stuff. So we we can set up campaigns and do it. [00:40:21] Ballet. [00:40:22] So have you found one or two things among all the things you do to be most effective? You know, so you have the kind of the 80/20 rule, 20 percent of what you do generates 80 percent your business. [00:40:36] Have you found anything like that with with your follow up? [00:40:40] With any of this. [00:40:45] I mean, I still I think that phone calls would do the best, I mean, and and that is where my my fault comes in. [00:40:55] But, you know, I know my buyer's agents are are calling their their past clients on a regular basis, more regular basis than me. [00:41:07] And but that that's where you date the new new agents and that once, you know, you have to go back to the basics. And and. You know, pound the pavement, follow up and call those people. I think they're still especially in this technology age. There's nothing like a phone call. [00:41:33] So true very much. Let me. And then last question on just this line of questioning, and I want to talk one more thing and then we'll wrap up the call. They are off at the beginning to call your time out, follow up, follow up, follow up. [00:41:52] In terms of and I'm assuming these are you're talking about that when you have a buyer prospect or seller prospect, you're following up the whole time or are you talking about. Once you have this database in place that you're following up the whole time. Where do you put first your biggest emphasis on the follow up that you've experienced personally that you do? I don't think we know Phillip is so important. Where where do you find it? What? What part of your follow up is driving your business? And I wanted to see if you could share a little bit about what you do in that follow up. Or how you do it or, you know, just kind of peel back an onion a little bit more and share what you've found, be success. [00:42:43] I mean, where you're kind of basing your company on was founded through like 33 touchin Keller Williams and I mean that it it does. So they remember you. So I mean, just that the emails. And we tried to do even Facebook stuff and Instagram, like I have a social media calendar where it's like, you know, there's a day for everything now. So you just whatever. And then as far as Easter goes or something like that, and then you can do the same thing through holidays and kind of set up a campaign that you're just following up with past clients. And then we just have it set up on an automated. So they're getting on top of the Monday morning coffees. They're getting the Happy Easter, Happy New Year's, all that kind of stuff. So I guess the biggest thing is the more automated you can bring thing, then it just done. You know what I mean? Because it's hard to even in like the social media where we're doing to look at the calendar on a daily basis and get that post out there. It sounds so easy, but when you get busy. [00:44:01] So if you can just automate the posting then or automate the emails and that kind of stuff and people appreciate that just you know, so. But you should probably get on the phone and say happy birthday to you. [00:44:17] So that's the default is really almost so stay in touch with food as opposed to constantly following up on for specific transaction, just staying in touch. [00:44:30] So when a transaction is available, then yeah, I think the follow through once the transaction is where I would say the follow through. So you're not just like, oh, trying to get to the closing table. That's where kind of my loan officer background where I know what to ask for when and I have closing coordinator's now. [00:44:47] But I mean their eyes pounded the pavement. [00:44:52] I mean I many before I could afford admins and all of that. I mean I was up to 3:00 in the morning night. I have four children as well. Like I've I've you know, you've put them to bed and then you you work and then you wake up in the morning and put them to school and you work again. You know, my as you grow. But that I mean, I didn't just yet that 22 million I work. [00:45:17] So, I mean, it's not like you just jump into this and do 22 million in transactions. [00:45:25] So and definitely not for children and being a full time. [00:45:28] No, no. [00:45:31] So, yeah, I remember talking to my best friend many nights at 2:00 in the morning like he's a photographer and she would be editing and doing now all. And now, you know, we're like, when's the last time we've done that? Like, no, we're sleeping now. But before I mean, she would be editing photos and I would be putting in listings and then, you know, doing everything. [00:45:53] So, you know, it takes it it takes a village. [00:46:00] But, yeah, we we did pound our pavement, so. [00:46:03] Hey, let me ask you one final question before we wrap up. Fall back on your relationship with the Lord. Have there been any times we were talking before we saw the call about, you know, life is full of challenges? Is there anything more if you could share a challenge where, you know, just share your relationship with the Lord really helps you through it? And I don't know if that makes sense what I'm asking for, but just kind of a broad question. But, you know, I don't think so. [00:46:33] Yeah. [00:46:35] Yes. And. And I guess I don't know, I joke I joke about God wanting me to have so many anchors in heaven, but. I have lost a lot of significant people in my life, very close. [00:46:55] I lost my brother of cancer when I was eight and he was five in 1988. I've lost my fiance. He was building our house framing and he fell 20 feet and then passed away of a head injury and that I was engaged to be married. And he died two months before our wedding. I lost my baby in the womb at 26 weeks. I lost him and I've questioned God. You know, I mean, it's. [00:47:35] I don't think I would be living breathing without Jesus. I would be a total drug addict or something. I don't know how you get through stuff like that without Jesus, without the hope that, you know, I will see Diana again and I will see Mike again. And, you know, I. I asked. And I asked God in particular about my baby, because I don't understand. How we wanted to put a baby in my room if I was never going to have that joy, you know. And that was he wasn't going to be in this earth. And. He answered me that he he wouldn't have been a soul. He wouldn't have been a bean. He wouldn't be in in heaven if he hadn't put him. In my wounds, he was just meant for heaven. So I I live and breathe and stand going through some. Really, really hard stuff in life. And I'm, you know, I to wake up to live every day, I just don't understand how people do stuff like that without Christ. I just absolutely don't understand. So. You know, so. Tough stuff, but I'm. I feel like. [00:49:07] I won't I'm not for me, I I live, I'm excited. I love life. I, you know, I'm not in I'm not on on any anxiety meds and I'm not on any anti-depressants. I'm not on any of that. And the only way that I can have joy in life after such traumatic events is because of Christ. So I. Yeah. I just don't I don't understand how people do things like that without Christ. Am I? [00:49:39] So you ask me, I'm like, there's just no other way to do it. But with with the hope of salvation. Like, I just couldn't even imagine myself if I didn't have Christ in those. [00:49:51] In my life and in everything he's brought me through and I. [00:49:58] I had like. I guess. Dan, my my fiancee who passed away. [00:50:09] She's lost a lot. His mother and Carl, Dan's brother, passed away and a similar thing and we're thinking it's probably a heart condition of some sort now because even though Dan fell, he was like agile. He's 22 and he was really agile, really fit. And and his brother saw him fall and he fell like a ragdoll. And Carl, now he he she died in the tub. [00:50:40] And they really don't know what what happened. But. [00:50:47] When Coral died, it took me like God hit me because it was like almost a relief, because when you go through such traumatic things, you're worried about what's around the next corner and what what. You know what I mean, what you're scared of, what can happen and you're fearful. And God hit me, like because I was like my heart just went to Jan, which was Carl and Dan's mother. Like, how how could you do this again to her? And he told me, look, tell Joanna that you live, breathe. When I bring you to something, I will bring you through it. And. [00:51:36] You know, that that's that's great to. [00:51:42] You're making me cry, That's a wonderful Jesus to have me that I'm successful. [00:51:53] Yes. But to Britain, to have any kind of joy in life and jahns joyful to unus. I mean, you could probably interview her. She. He's a wonderful woman and she's a real estate broker as well, but man, it's just. That that's grace and that's a wonderful. A ussler where I can live and breathe and be excited about life. Then what is going to happen and not be fearful because. Because he created it all and he did it all and he created heaven and. And we'll see them all again. So, yeah, sorry. [00:52:37] I told you I could go. So love it. [00:52:43] My mind is perfect. [00:52:45] Love cast out fear. And you know, I remember doing a eulogy for a man I had just met a couple of months prior. And the thing that stood out is. You know. Your family's going to stream again. And when you have hope in Christ, then a lot easier to bear. [00:53:09] Yeah. And I mean, I'm not saying it's not me. I mean, it was easy. And I'm like, oh, I'm not one to grieve. I mean, this is horribly painful, you know, but it took even. Take your next step. Without Christ, that's impossible. Where is that where that where it says all things through Christ are are plausible. She's been. When you're in that moment, I don't see any other way that taking your next breath would be possible without Jesus Christ. So. [00:53:45] Well, I. I have always wondered, you know, this is much more my objective analysis. When someone goes through tough times and they don't have Christ, how in the world can they ever make it? Because just what you've experienced in which you share it, you can do all things with Christ. It's not it doesn't mean that the pain is no longer there, but you can make it through. And so that I'm glad you shared that, because I know that other people are going through some tough times and will. And just what an encouragement. [00:54:19] Your story is for them on that very thing else you'd like to share. I mean, this has been we've been all over the board. Anything that you have to share before you wrap up? [00:54:33] Anything more? No. I would just say be blessed. [00:54:39] It's. That's it. And then it all comes through Christ and. And I want it for everyone. So be blessed. Be blessed. [00:54:51] And if you don't know him, know him and and know that the blessings come. And if you if you do know him, I mean, just be encouraged and in your walk in this life, because I mean, maybe I say life isn't easy and maybe now they can understand why I say life isn't easy. [00:55:10] But I mean, yeah, I would just end with the blessed. [00:55:15] Hey, man. Definitely be blessed. Well, Joanna, this has been really a delight. Thank you. I know you're really busy, especially just coming back from travels and you've got a full load on you. So I really appreciate the time that you've taken out to. [00:55:32] Yeah. Yeah. [00:55:34] I thank you for the opportunity because it is. And it's coming as approaching 40 pretty quick here. And it is it is taking those moments and that and what you can put into people is comes more and more important in life. [00:55:53] So, yes, it does. And all of your love, your comment earlier on, you know, invest in people for eternity, double on your exact words. [00:56:01] But just. Well, thank you. [00:56:05] And for those listening, if you've enjoyed this podcast, be sure to subscribe to it. So you never miss another episode in place like our Get Cellar's calling you Facebook page. [00:56:15] Also, if you want to increase sales from past clients, a sphere of influence, dominate a geographic farm or convert home valuation leads. Check out our Agent Dominator program. We create custom content that differentiates you from other realtors, then use it to keep you top of mind with your prospects with postcards, targeted Facebook ads, email campaigns, video interviews and more. And the best part is we guarantee your sales or give all your money back. Learn more. Get sellers calling EW.com. That's like Agent Dominator in the menu. Thanks for listening to the Get Sellers calling you podcast. [00:56:49] Have a great day. 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How Do You Discover Your Strengths And Weaknesses

Influence School

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 6, 2019 12:22

Knowing your strengths and weaknesses is not only as a form of self-reflection but is also helpful in terms of efficiency and helping others. Listen to this episode to know why that is so. So how do you discover your strengths and weaknesses do you want to discover both? why would you want to do that? that's we're gonna answer in this video so let's start out this episode with why you want to know your weaknesses a lot of times I think society and even in church we're taught that you need to discover your weaknesses so you can strengthen them into a degree I agree with that but to a degree and disagree I disagree because the more time and in my opinion the more time we spend working on our weaknesses we're not really building our strengths into great strengths and becoming great at any one thing what are your thoughts on that yeah you know I think the whole point of knowing your weaknesses is really good for self-awareness but it's also realizing that hey those might be areas where I need to bring someone else onto the team so it might be an opportunity for you to either hire someone who has strengths in those weaknesses or bring someone on board like that can just help you out so if you think through the people in your life it's really a fun exercise to think through what their strengths and weaknesses are because you'd be surprised at how much other people compliment and fill in those gaps where you're weak so I think it's a really important thing to pay attention to and obviously you always want to be a better person right you don't want to be just oh well those are many weaknesses I'm just gonna ignore those but it doesn't really lean towards you being your best self when you're focusing just on your weaknesses and you can't focus on those things that you really do well at and things that you can really become even better at so yeah I'm in agreement there I think we need to focus on our strengths a whole lot more and then focus on the weaknesses I'm all about improving and growing changing bad habits maybe that's a weakness but like areas where I look at and I notice you know what this is not an area of strength and this is an area of strength one example is I am NOT a good preschool teacher I'm not good at working with children now I know I could become good because I'm great with my own kids yeah I love spending time with my own kids but when I have opportunities to go and help you know it kids aged three to ten other and other families it's like you know what I'd rather separate myself and part of me is in the past said maybe I should work on that and other people probably think you know what you should work on that but in my mind it's like you know what here's some area where I really have strengths and I focused on that and I really stand out areas that have lots of where I can be really efficient or I can be really organized and really help get results and drive results it's really stood out and I'm I'm happy that I've made those decisions yeah well it can make a huge difference and I think one of the other things too is to think about that when you are helping and allowing someone to use their strengths in your life you are really empowering them to grow and be better themselves so similar example i I'm not good with money but numbers bookkeeping accounting my CPA can tell me until I'm blue in the face all the different lingo for accounting but it's not my strength so but by hiring an CPA help me out I'm allowing him to tap into his strengths and I can focus on the things that I'm really strong in so I think it's also realizing that by giving up some of that power for yourself over a certain area of your life you could be really empowering someone else to step into their strengths as you talk about that it really makes a lot of sense and it brings to mind Henry Ford you know we look at him historically as being a really really successful man mm-hmm and if I were to list off what strengths do I know about him I don't know all I know is he was really good at building a team around him and he had a vision so he had a vision of what he did in creating you know systematizing the assembly line and whatnot but my understanding is he just had a phone with all these different buttons that he could push to get people that were good at another thing when I've done that it's taken me I was doing the filming for all the different channels that I produce I was still a person behind the camera finally I took a leap and I hired people like Aly and Alysha and even when I started working with them in my mind I thought this is going to take a long time for I fully trust them and can hand it over to them but there was an opportunity where I just wasn't available or something like that where both of them went without me and they did such a good job it was actually a blessing in disguise because I recognized that I could focus on other areas where I'm really strong and like I developed a good skill of being behind the camera but at the same time that's not my passion my passion is actually finding influencers to work with and helping coaching them so that they do it right and so they get results yeah and creating these systems I love creating systems and coming up with the ideas and whatnot so so we've talked kind of about the weaknesses we've talked about the strengths how do we discover what our strengths are well I think one of the best things to do is to start paying attention so the more you can pay attention to what's going on in your own life the more effective you will be those four things are we paying attention to well you're paying attention to just first of all what are things that you enjoy doing you know if you had to sit through and do that one task all day long for the next few months could you do it think through throughout your day what if I enjoy doing what am I not and I think you know the more you pay attention to your own desires on that level the more self-aware you are and I think you're gonna know what you enjoy doing what you don't but that I also encourage people to take a look at what do people say about you you know are there certain things that pop up where people are always picking up on hey Valerie does this really well she's really good at that the more you can pay attention to different comments people make the more you will be in tune with some of the things that maybe may be blind to you you might be too close to yourself to realize that you're good at something and sometimes you can just ask people flat out you know ask people that you trust hey what do you think I'm good at you know what are my top strengths what are some things that I am weakened I mean that's a really vulnerable question to ask but it could be a really good thing to ask some people that you trust you know you don't want to ask someone just gonna shoot you down and trample all over you but you know ask some people in your life what am I good at and you know the last thing that I really loved doing which I did not love doing in the past and honestly there's an aspect to this I still don't love but take one of those personality tests there's all sorts of personality tests myers-briggs strikes finder there's all sorts Enneagram just to get a feel for where you tend to lean based on some of these assessments the assessment might be wrong you know and you don't have to evaluate it to the nth degree the more you can take a just a look at what your strengths are at large it can help you understand kind of where you lean and you might be surprised at what the results show and what I love about the strengths finders test specifically is that it can rank all the way down to the very last strengths so you can see what your top ones are but if you wanted to see how you rank for all the strengths in that test you can see what your lowest strengths are so your weaknesses you can see kind of where you lean and that can be really important for you to understand where you might need to find people to fill in the gaps I appreciate that you shared that part because I've taken a couple and they have been extremely helpful and I do remember at the first it's like oh this is where I'm stronger look I am I'm not as strong over here I need to work on that that was that was my thing at first but if I look at it another way of saying this is who I am this is what I'm about and that's why in this type of situation I'm uncomfortable where other people aren't and that's just how I am like oh it's okay to be me as I've learned to accept that it's come in stages but I've learned to accept it's okay to be me I enjoy life a lot more I don't stress about it as much certainly right don't once you step into okay these are my strengths your business changes your your career changes it all changes well and think about if we all tried to be strong at everything we're just trying to be like everybody else and so we're all essentially the same and we don't stand out here's an example I am kind of an introvert I don't know if that's the best word to describe it because other areas I'm not but when we're in a group and they turn on the music and ever supposed to dance to get their energy out it's like I just feel so awkward and so I'm known for the guy who just kind of starts tapping his toe and everyone in the room thinks that's funny let's dance like Nate and they'll tap their toe just stand there and for a while is like alright I gotta learn how to wiggle and part of me wants to because it's I want to get out of my comfort zone and I'm thinking of taking like a Zumba or some type of pop dance class to second but when I'm in those social settings it's like all right I'll just embrace it I'm the toe tap guy yeah and it's mixed you know I haven't haven't totally figured it out but it's it's fun to think about it's a good thing to think through you don't have to face your whole life around a single personality assessment but it is helpful in different situations so let's wrap up this video with what is our potential when we really focus on our strengths okay so when you lean into your strengths you really can attract people who need what you have to offer and you can really attract them to your message so if you have a message that you feel so strongly about and so passionate about I really encourage you to focus on your strengths because then you're gonna be able to attract the right people that really need to hear your message awesome well this is Valerie Morris she wrote a book on influence called we're all ears you can find it on Amazon I talked a lot about keyword research as you know and keyword research is a great great tool for finding that the questions that people are asking that you have the answers for and so I have a guide that I give away it's called the keyword research guide I'll share it with you just click the link below. We'll see you tomorrow.

henry ford aly cpa enneagram zumba i'm i'm alysha valerie morris

Episode #5: Type 1- The Invisible Illness

Discovering Strength

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 5, 2019 42:43

Episode #5: This week on the Discovering Strength Podcast, I'm I'm sharing my story of how I was diagnosed with Type One Diabetes and how I found strength with this invisible illness in honor of National Diabetes Awareness Month. Let me know how you discovered strength this week! I'd love to share with my listeners on the next episode. If you like what you hear on the Discovering Strength podcast and would like to support, you can do so by simply buying me a cup of coffee! Head over to https://ko-fi.com/discoveringstrenth to show your support. It's just that simple. Be sure to give this podcast a 5 star rating and don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss a beat! I'd love to connect with you! Let's keep in touch in between episodes: Shoot me an email: erin@iamerinelizabeth.com Follow me on IG and FB: @iamerinelizabeth Catch up on the blog: www.iamerinelizabeth.com --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/discoveringstrength/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/discoveringstrength/support

ig fb i'm i'm type one diabetes national diabetes awareness month

208: Sex and Porn Addiction - Myths and Reality - with Paula Hall

Relationship Alive!

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 25, 2019 65:38

How do you know if you, or someone you love, is addicted to sex, or porn? What can you do about it? And along with healing patterns of addiction, what is most helpful for the partners of people with addiction? Our guest today is Paula Hall, one of the world’s leading experts on treating sex and porn addiction, and the author of “"Understanding and Treating Sex and Pornography Addiction” - along with many other books on the topic for addicts, partners, and the therapists who are helping them. Although the idea that people can be addicted to sex or porn is still controversial - we’re going to tackle this topic head-on, so you can identify ways that you might be impacted. And, as always, you’ll learn powerful strategies for how to overcome addiction and get back on track to a healthy sex life. As always, I’m looking forward to your thoughts on this episode and what revelations and questions it creates for you. Please join us in the Relationship Alive Community on Facebook to chat about it! Sponsors: Away has created durable suitcases for the savvy traveler, with key features that help you easily get your stuff from place to place. With a limited lifetime warranty, and a 100-day trial period, it’s easy for you to experience an Away suitcase “in the field”. Away is offering $20 off any suitcase if you visit awaytravel.com/relationship and use the promo code “RELATIONSHIP” at checkout. Beautiful jewelry, exquisite craftsmanship, sustainable sources, and affordable prices. Get $75 OFF your purchase at hellonoemie.com when you use the coupon code "ALIVE". With free overnight shipping and free returns, you can see something online today, and try it on tomorrow risk free. Find a quality therapist, online, to support you and work on the places where you’re stuck. For 10% off your first month, visit Betterhelp.com/ALIVE to fill out the quick questionnaire and get paired with a therapist who’s right for you. Resources: Visit Paula Hall’s website for more information about her work, her books, and her public speaking. Check out the Laurel Centre’s offerings for help with Sex and Porn addiction. Read the Paula Hall books that are right for you. FREE Relationship Communication Secrets Guide - perfect help for handling conflict and shifting the codependent patterns in your relationship Guide to Understanding Your Needs (and Your Partner's Needs) in Your Relationship (ALSO FREE) Visit www.neilsattin.com/addiction to download the transcript, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the transcript to this episode with Paula Hall. Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of: The Railsplitters - Check them Out Transcript: Neil Sattin: Hello and welcome to another episode of Relationship Alive. This is your host Neil Sattin. Neil Sattin: We're going to revisit a topic today that we've talked about before on the show and we're going to take an even deeper dive into the question of addiction. Especially as it pertains to sex addiction, porn addiction, love addiction. How do I identify if that's something that's impacting you or someone that you love? And if the answer is yes, what can you do about it? Is there hope? How do you facilitate change in a way that actually leads you to someplace that's healthier, and not being impacted by addiction? To talk about the topic today, we have with us Paula Hall, who is a licensed psychotherapist from the U.K. and whose book, "Understanding and Treating Sex and Pornography Addiction," is a masterful work on understanding exactly where sex addiction comes from and what you can do to treat it. And her words are based on years of practice with clients and seeing what works and what doesn't. Paula is the founder of the Laurel Center which offers treatment programs in the UK for people and they also offer sessions in the UK and over Skype and Zoom for people everywhere in the world. So it's powerful work that they're doing. She's written a couple of other books. Well actually many other books, but a couple others that are notable in terms of sex addiction recovery one for the partners and one for the couple as a whole, and we'll probably get a chance to talk about that as we go. In the meantime, there will be a detailed transcript of today's episode, if you are interested in downloading that just visit Neil-Sattin-dot-com-slash-addiction. And as always you can text the word "Passion," to the number 3-3-4-4-4, and follow the instructions which will also get you the transcript to today's episode. I think that's it for now. Paula Hall thank you so much for joining us today on relationship alive. Paula Hall: Hi! Thanks for inviting me. Neil Sattin: It's really great to have you here. I'm curious to know maybe for starters, what just led you to focusing your work on sex addiction and and porn addiction? How did how did you end up there? Paula Hall: Oh gosh I thought you might start with an easy question, Neil. I guess so I've been a therapist for gosh nearly 30 years, now initially I started in drug addiction, did that about three years and then I trained as a couples' psychotherapist and sex therapist. And it was probably about 15 years ago now I was working in private practice and I had seen a couple of clients, a couple of male clients, coming on their own. Both of them very happily married, young families, devoted fathers but they had these habits. One of them, it was visiting massage parlors. The other one was picking up women in bars basically. And what I noticed was that, being a psychotherapist for some years, I was able to kind of work with these guys to understand why they were doing what they were doing, and in a typical psychotherapy style: How was your relationship with your mother? And you know all of that kind of stuff exploring that. And we were able to kind of find those answers but unfortunately both of those guys, towards the end of the case. they understood why they did it and carried on doing it. I didn't seem to have any tools to help them stop. And then basically what happened was I went to a conference and one of the speakers that a guy called Thaddeus Birchard, also someone in the UK, did a talk on sex addiction. He is one of the very much one of the pioneers out here in the UK. And he talked about a cycle of addiction and having come from drug addiction, all the pennies just dropped into place. I just started seeing how what I had been sitting with those two guys was just like the work that I was doing with drug addiction. But this was around sexual behaviors, and for some reason that penny hadn't dropped before. So yeah, that I guess, failing my clients is what drove me to be so passionate about understanding this problem more, learning more and really developing tools and models and services that could help. Neil Sattin: And can you talk a little bit about your perspective? Cuz I know you also do couples work and you've done sex therapy with clients. I think in the UK, they call it psychosexual therapy. Paula Hall: Yeah yeah. Neil Sattin: So I'm curious where does sex positivity intersect with this question about whether or not we can be addicted to sex? Paula Hall: I think it's a completely different thing. In terms of being a therapist and being sex positive, I think it's a bit like you know being food negative if you work with people who chronically overeat. Of course, I think sex is brilliant. It's great. The problem is addiction robs people of their sexuality. I've never met a happy sex addict. Now you could argue that perhaps they're out there but they're not seeking help. So perhaps I'm the wrong person to know that. But my experience has been that addiction and compulsion robs people of their positive sexuality. It takes away their ability to choose the lifestyle they want to lead. It becomes a place where they feel shame, where they feel dissatisfied, where they feel insatiable or where it feels seedy, it feels stolen. It's no longer a pleasure. And I think treating sex addiction is about helping people get their sex lives back. When I run the group so we do a lot of group work over here with guys, and the guys often think I'm kind of joking when I quite often start off by saying, "I'm going to make sure that your sex lives are better than they have ever been, ever." And they kind of look at me curiously and think that's an odd thing to say, but actually I think that is one of the goals of treating sex and porn addiction is helping people have brilliant sex lives and really enjoying sex again, in whatever shape or form that makes. Whether that's within a monogamous relationship, a heterosexual relationship, whether in kink or whatever your taste is, I think that's irrelevant. Neil Sattin: Yeah. Great. And that seems to touch in to the question about how someone would know whether what they're experiencing is addiction or not. So can we can we steer a little bit towards assessment, and how that how that works. Paula Hall: Yeah, I think it does lead to that very much so. I think a really critical question is do you enjoy what you're doing? Are you still enjoying it or is it never enough? You always gotta go for the next hit? Are you noticing that your behavior is escalating, that you're preoccupied by it? I think a good sexual experience should leave you with a smile on your face, a sense of wholeness and fullness, and you feel satiated, a bit like a good meal. You're not worried about where the next one's coming from, you're not anxious about it. You're not worried that someone's going to find out. So, if it's a positive experience that you've really enjoyed and then you're probably not acting out compulsively. But if you're preoccupied with it. If it's never enough it is nowhere near as much fun as you thought it was going to be. Then perhaps this has become a compulsive. I think ultimately escalation is the, is the real critical sign of compulsivity, it's when it's escalating. Neil Sattin: And so just to really be specific about escalation, what are some different forms that that could take? Paula Hall: So, that might be spending more and more time on the activity or planning for the activity or recovering from the activity or needing higher and higher stimulus. So, that might be more hard core porn or taking more risks with sort of cruising or whatever, in order to get the same kind of impact. I think most of us understand escalation if we think about it around alcohol, escalation might be the wrath of the one glass of wine and it's become a bottle. So it's more and more of it or rather than the glass of wine, it's now become a glass of whiskey, you need something that's stronger and harder to get the same impact. Neil Sattin: Got it and then there's also, right, the potential for certain kinds of activity to lead to other kinds of activity. So you might start out in an online realm and end up chatting with people, end up on dating sites or visiting escorts, and like there's that kind of escalation as well. Paula Hall: Absolutely escalation into... Yeah, I mean there's other forms of kind of higher stimulation but they may be ones that are you know going to cause you more and more harmful consequences. If you're beginning to cross your own boundaries. Things that you always said you wouldn't do. Promised you wouldn't do. Never thought you'd even want to do, perhaps. Then again, that's showing that that escalation is is really pushing into your own value system. Neil Sattin: Yeah. And, is there a point in making a distinction between like, it's an addiction that's pushing your past your values or it's an inability to live according to your values, that's keeping you from sticking with your values? Do you know what I mean? Paula Hall: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. Good point. Yeah. Okay, so I think this is where shame comes in. And shame unfortunately comes up a heck of a lot in this work. If you keep crossing your moral values and actually, Hey you aren't really that bothered about it, you probably won't feel any shame. Also, the experience of shame demonstrates that you actually have strong values. If he didn't have strong values you wouldn't experience it, you just wouldn't care. So, if you know your going against your value system and you feel really bad about it but nonetheless you are unable to stop, then it's likely to be addiction. If you're crashing your value system but you don't really care, you may still be an addict, but you've also got a problem with your moral compass. So you know, classically you have kind of sometimes I have a first session with a guy and he'll go," You know, I just, am I an addict? I dunno if I'm an addict, or whether I'm just a bit of a womanizer and I just want my cake and eat it. Maybe that's what it is." And I often say, "Well you know what. You can be an addict AND a womanizer, who wants a cake and eat it. They're not mutually exclusive. You can be both or one or the other." But escalation is the side where it really is addiction, I would say. Neil Sattin: Yeah so just a quick point of clarification. You've mentioned working with guys a lot. How gendered is this problem? Paula Hall: So, most of the research seems to say, in the research certainly I did for my first book as well on this, suggested that about 30 percent of the people with sex and porn addiction were women. And certainly, if you sort of look at some of the forums, some of the kind of free spaces if you like, you'll see more and more women's voices coming up talking about their problem. But they don't seem to come forward for help and this seems to be something that's international, I've got colleagues delivering programs in other parts of the world as well and obviously there's there's a lot of therapists working in the States. And though, women don't seem to come forward for help as often. And you know, I'm quite curious about that some of that to do with economics, is that to do with different different types of shame that are around for female sex and love addicts? Is it because there aren't enough services offered on a few occasions. We have tried to offer very, very specific female services but still had very little take up. So I think... Neil Sattin: Yeah, that is interesting because there are so many other realms where I think the women lead in terms of you know, couples therapy or even like personal growth work. There seem to be a lot more women on average in terms of like the demographics of people who are writing me and listening to my show just as one sample group, predominantly women. So it's interesting that that that that would be the case that they'd be less inclined to seek help for sex and porn addiction. Paula Hall: Yeah, and my hypothesis would be, well, two. One, is I suspect an awful lot of those women who are addicted or using sex compulsively may actually be working within the sex trade. So for them finding help is also going to get in the way of their income stream. But, I think we do still live in a society where the message is about how, dare I use the old fashioned word "promiscuity." Male promiscuity still viewed quite differently to female promiscuity. So you know a man that is sleeping around, has multiple partners, is a bit of a lad, is a bit of a cad, is you know a bit of a womanizer, a bit of a player. The words we use for women are still tend to be "slut," or so much more derogatory. So I do think it's harder for women to come forward. I think there's, I don't know if it's more shame, but a different kind of shame for women coming forward for help. And as I said, I think it's a Catch-22, because in the media, in situations such as this, I find myself talking predominantly about men because that's who we generally work with. Most of my services are targeted at men because they're the people that come. I think that means a lot of women begin to feel increasingly invisible. So I really hope it will change. And yeah, we are going to launch an online group for women because then at least we don't have to worry so much about the geography. So is anybody listening out there who would define themselves as a female sex addict do get in touch because you could join one of our online support groups. And I hope that might begin to get something going and then as we're talking about it, more and more women come forward, and it will make it easier for more women to come forward and get into that positive spiral. Neil Sattin: Yeah yeah. Great. One thing that I'm curious about is, so we've talked about some of the kinds of behaviors that might fall into this category and in researching for our conversation and also resulting from my conversation with Alex Katehakis before, I've talked to a lot of people about masturbation. More than I've ever talked to people about masturbation before which is in itself been interesting because I think there's so much shame that we hold around self pleasuring. And there's this question about how masturbation can potentially be addictive or can be used as a coping strategy for dealing with emotionally challenging situations or emotionally challenging places in one's life. And so I'm curious about like if someone first, is using masturbation as a way to kind of cope with stress and hardship. I've talked to some people who've said, "Well isn't that normal like, like, that's a mechanism that we have in our bodies to do that." But then if you suggest to someone, "Well how about not doing that?" They would say, "Well why would I not," or, "I could never stop doing that." And then it starts to bridge that question until like, "Well is it an addiction for you to be to be masturbating as a way to cope or is it not?" So there's this gray area here that I'd love to have your insight on because I think a lot of people when I talk to them about it they're like well, "Wow if like that means I'm an addict then I got to think like you know 90 percent of guys out there are sex addicts using masturbation as a way of dealing with their lives and fantasizing and things like that." And overall, I want just people to be pulled toward feeling like whatever they're doing is healthy for them and positive. Can you shine some light on that? Paula Hall: Yeah. So first and foremost I absolutely do not think there is anything wrong with using sex, whether it's partnered sex or masturbation for comfort. I think couples have kissed and made up as we euphemistically call it, for years, centuries people have masturbated to help them get to sleep at nights, masturbating to help them get out to work in the morning, masturbating because they're bored, masturbating because they're sad. That in itself I don't think is a problem at all. It's when he becomes a primary coping mechanism. It's when, if for some reason you couldn't then actually you start feeling worse and worse and worse. And again is when it's escalating. So I think if somebody uses masturbation as a way to get to sleep every night. And if it takes 10 minutes whatever is never escalated it's never got worse than that, it's not getting in the way of their relationship. So let's assume they're single or whatever. It's a habit. There's no harmful consequences, I think the problem is you say, we're trying stop. Well why? Why do that? I you know I watch television quite often to switch off. "Dunno. Well maybe you're addicted, maybe you should stop." Or maybe I just don't have the motivation to try and stop because I don't see why it's a problem? Neil Sattin: Right. Paula Hall: I think that's where we start getting into the realms of pathologizing sexuality. For me you know masturbation, it's a physical comfort. Why is that any worse than having a soak in the bath or putting your feet in a foot spa? Neil Sattin: Yeah. Great. So I think that maybe the question is where it bumps up against your values. And that question of escalation. Paula Hall: I think in terms of addiction it's about escalation. If there's been no escalation then... I realize I'm being quite categoric and there's bound to be some exceptions. But, on the whole if there's been no escalation I'd say there was no addiction in just because it bumps up against your values. That doesn't make it an addiction. I've had a number of clients come and want to work with me. They've been a people of faith where masturbation for them is a sin, it's something they're not comfortable with but they keep doing it. And they will use the language of addiction. And if there's no escalation and the only problem is that it's against their values, then it's not addiction. Now that doesn't mean that you might not work with that person, you might not help them to find other things to do. So let's say my feet somehow became allergic to my foot spa, so I couldn't use it anymore. Let's find some other ways of getting some physical comfort that aren't going to cause a problem in other areas of my life. But let's not call it an addiction because it's just not accurate. Neil Sattin: Great. That's a helpful distinction to have. Paula Hall: And I think it's also important to recognize that as I'm sure you know CSBD, Compulsive Sexual Behavior Disorder has been accepted by the World Health Organization to go into ICD-11. So it will be, we're not calling it addiction yet, it's going to be called compulsive sexual behavior disorder, which will include pornography. This will be an official diagnosis that can be used but that's coming online quite soon. But very, very clearly in the diagnostic criteria is that it can not be purely a problem caused by morality. It has to be causing problems outside of that. I mean another sort of way I often describe this is if alcohol was against your moral values. So for some people of faith of course drinking alcohol is not OK just because you have a small glass of wine every single evening to get to sleep would not make you an alcoholic, if it's never ever escalated. That would not make you an alcoholic. Even though it's against your values. And you need to stop drinking if it's against your values, and something else. So I'm not saying you shouldn't change but you wouldn't call that person an alcoholic. Neil Sattin: Really helpful distinctions. And where this I think also gets interesting is because it plays into the partner dynamic. And that question of like well of course I don't have a problem with you masturbating but what are you thinking about and or you're looking at porn like that doesn't seem like it is you know aligns with my values or that sort of thing. So how does that when you look at addiction and that sense of like is what you're doing is causing a problem for you in your life. How do you how do you separate that from those other kinds of conversations that people need to be having with their partners anyway about what's appropriate what is and how to handle it when they actually have differences. Paula Hall: Yeah absolutely. And of course for up for some couples pornography is just not okay, it's not okay for a partner. And if your partner is looking at pornography something that you are morally opposed to then that is going to create an issue within your relationship. And I would say that's an issue for couples' counseling. So assuming it's not escalating there's nothing to define it as an addiction. This is a couple counseling issue to decide what to do about this. And I think if you're somebody who is just can't stop looking at pornography in spite of how your partner feels about it, then maybe you either need to look at your feelings towards your partner and how much you respect them and their views or you need to look at whether or not this is a compulsion. I think in terms of fantasy, I mean that again is a really interesting one it is perfectly possible to masturbate and not to use fantasy. And of course some partners don't have an issue with fantasy, some partners will thoroughly enjoy sharing their fantasies with each others. Some people use fantasy but it's always a fantasy of their partner so their partner doesn't object. Again and as a sex therapist and I have been a sex therapist for what 18 years now. Talking about fantasies is something that commonly comes up when you're working with couples with sexual difficulties and want to enhance their sex life and every couple is different. Neil Sattin: Yeah. Yeah. You said something... Paula Hall: Did I answer your question? Neil Sattin: Yeah you did. And they're like so many things flying around in so many different directions we could go. I think to ground us, I'm curious like as a partner what are some ways that you might sense that there's something going on that would need to be addressed as an addiction. Paula Hall: Yeah that that is a tricky one isn't it? I think it's uh... changes in behavior. So someone who might be becoming more and more withdrawn from the relationship. Someone who's becoming more and more secretive. Somebody who's finding more and more excuses or reasons to not engage in activities that they previously would have seen as important. So if they've never wanted to go to the parents evening and are making excuses now then it's probably not relevant. But if they you know, if this is a new thing, if they seem to be finding excuses to get out of responsibilities that they would have enjoyed otherwise, then I think you might question that. Struggling with stress more. I think if you've... It's tricky partners often when they reflect back recognize that there have been changes. It's only in hindsight that they realized why. But there are of course 101 other explanations for why somebody might be withdrawing behaving secretively, maybe there are issues within the relationship that need addressing that've got nothing to do with sex or porn addiction. Or it may be something else altogether. But yeah I think withdrawing from the relationship, becoming more secretive and changes in character. Behavior. That's really vague, isn't it? It's tough, it's really tough for partners. Neil Sattin: It's a little vague. And I mean what comes up for me is the sense that if you are sensing something is going on then you want to do your best I think to lean in and to have vulnerable conversations. Paula Hall: Absolutely yeah. Neil Sattin: And so that brings up this question of like how can people in partnership particularly, how can they create a context that allows them to talk about this safely? Especially because in partnership so many of the things that happen are are a violation of the integrity of the relationship. So as a partner, I think you ideally you want to, if something's going on with your spouse or your partner, you want to know what's going on. But then once you find out what's going on, and that of course I think is what often keeps these things in the shadows right. Is that someone might be willing to talk about their struggle except knowing the impact that that could have on their on their partner and on their relationship. Paula Hall: Yeah it is. It is very difficult. I think sometimes as a partner, if you do have a sense that there may be something around this that they don't want to talk to you about, can they talk to somebody else? And that might be the bridge to them talking to you. So, I wouldn't say that that is a lot of alternative of course but that might be the bridge to them being able to talk to you. But it is really difficult and you know I've worked with partners who have you know, tried to say and did that with all integrity and commitment, "I will support you. If this is about this and let me know. Tell me. There's nothing we can't work through." And then they find out something and they are absolutely devastated and the guy feels cheated because he trusted that she wasn't going to react like that, she had no idea what he was going to say when she said that. It's really difficult. It really is. It really is difficult of course that's what couple counseling often comes in, so it may be that you are noticing there are issues within your relationship, there's issues within your sexual relationship. Also your emotional intimacy and you agree to some couple counseling for that and maybe within that environment it comes out. I mean certainly one of the things we're a training organization as well, and one of the things I say whenever I'm speaking to or training couple counselors, is always ask about poor news, always do individual history sessions and always ask about porn use and compulsive behaviors. Because so often what increasingly, that is at play if not the cause of, that is at least a contributing factor to so many issues for so many couples. Neil Sattin: What advice do you have for a partner who's in that quandary of feeling, on the one hand the impact of the betrayal, so that betrayal trauma, and somewhere in there saying, "Well I love this person and I do want to help them but I'm I'm really angry or feeling devastated," or all of those things. Paula Hall: I think firstly be gentle with yourself and give yourself time. It is perfectly okay to be angry. It is understandable to be angry. It is okay to have those feelings, find somebody that you can share those feelings with. Ultimately, if you want your relationship to survive then you need to be at both of you need to get to the place where you're blaming the addiction rather than your partner and you're able to rebuild your relationship from what the addiction has done to you, rather than what your partner has done to you. But that takes time. And initially when there is so much pain around it, and fear, and of course you can't break through that fear unless your partner really is getting into recovery and able to support you in your recovery. But yeah it takes time so often it is just be just be gentle with yourself. Neil Sattin: I know in your in your book you advocate not making any drastic decisions for a period of time so that you have time to kind of think it all through and regain your footing. Paula Hall: Yeah, especially if you've got children. I mean there's you know, there's some decisions that are very hard to take back. I think if you've got children then wait... What I often say to partners is: "Don't let what he has done, his complete and total screw up, force you to make decisions that you're not ready to make, or force you to make decisions that you and your children potentially will have to live with forever." His crisis does not have to create urgency for you. It doesn't have to and that's tough to hold on to that. It's true. Neil Sattin: Yeah. And do you have thoughts for someone who's now listening to this and thinking well maybe I do struggle with that or maybe that is an issue for me. How can they come forward in a way that has the best chance of panning out well for them. Paula Hall: I think for partners, I believe in connecting with others in all kinds of work. I think recovering on your own is incredibly difficult. Whether you'll be on the addicted partner or the partner. So certainly for partners I'd encourage them to find other partners but do find other partners who, trying think how to say this respectfully, who want to move on from this. Occasionally, I have stumbled across some partner forums or partners who've been on certain partner forums where everything's about staying in the same places, it's a year on, two years on, three years on, five years on, and they still feel completely trapped and burdened by this situation. And I think that is so disheartening and discouraging for other partners. You're not trapped. There may be some very very difficult decisions to make and they're decisions that have been forced on you. But you're not trapped, you do have choices about where you move forward so find support from other people who are trying to find ways of moving forward. Whether, that's together or apart. Neil Sattin: Great, great. And I think where I was heading was also, you know, we've been talking a little bit about if you suspect something's going on for your partner what can you do and how do you handle the betrayal and all that. If you are potentially the addicted partner, what are some ways to step forward that help you handle the betrayal trauma that your partner is experiencing, or own what's happening for you? That sort of thing. Paula Hall: Well, you hit the nail on the head there, Neil. Own what's happening. Own the fact that you did cause this and I think that's really, really difficult. I think we've just run one of a couple of weeks ago, a couples' intensive, as the first time we've run the couples program since the book came out for couples and it was so powerful, it was incredibly powerful. And I think the absolute number one tool for helping couples move forward is for the addicted partner to express empathy. As soon as the addicted partner gets into defensiveness, gets into: "Yeah but... " It just all falls apart. Relentless empathy. I think for the partner, if you try and think about it like this, if your partner doesn't believe that you know how it feels and what you've done. How on earth can they trust you won't do it again? And you have got whether it's something was an accident, whether it's deliberate, whatever it was you have got to demonstrate relentless empathy and drop the defensiveness, of course you can't live in a place of constant accusations, two years, three years, five years on. But if you're in the first 12 months post full disclosure and this is assuming that has been the disclosure that's required, and you are fully in recovery. You have got to just keep taking it on the chin and relentless empathy. Neil Sattin: Yeah, yeah. And I like how we're bridging and it's starting to get towards recovery and repair. When you talk about the disclosure just so that everyone understands what you're talking about, what are you talking about? Paula Hall: So, we talk about therapeutic disclosure. We recommend therapeutic disclosure. Unfortunately, there are few partners who know absolutely everything. That's not necessarily because they haven't been told, it may be that actually much of what was told was late at night. It was in the height of emotion, a lot of it may have been forgotten. What I've experienced so often as a couple counselor is that if you don't do a therapeutic disclosure then some additional bit of information that either gets discovered, disclosed or remembered, sabotages the healing process. So a therapeutic disclosure is about getting the facts out on the table. And it's important to distinguish between a therapeutic disclosure and a forensic disclosure. This is not every single nitty gritty of sexual position and cup size and place and whatever, that's forensic and completely unhelpful. But a broad brush understanding of the chronology, the dates, the times, the where's, the when's, the what kind of things, the behaviors, are really important. And really, and in that's between the therapist and the partner to kind of negotiate what's going to be genuinely helpful. Then when you have got that information when you both know what it is you're dealing with, in the couples book I use the metaphor of more of a tidal wave crashing over your relationship. And it's kind of really understanding what that tidal wave is saying, so you know what the damage is so you know what you're repairing from. And I think until that happens you keep getting the aftershocks. So a therapeutic disclosure is a way of putting the past in the past. Assuming of course, no relapses but putting the past in the past so you really can move on from it. Neil Sattin: Right, and I like the support that you suggest for having that kind of disclosure where you know they're supported by a couples' therapist, and also each by their own therapists, so that there are a lot of people holding the container around the information coming out. Paula Hall: Absolutely. Absolutely. And you know for some people that there are extra bits of information or things that are remembered or I mean an example it was... In some respects, looking back on it it's almost quite comical. But my goodness it wasn't at the time. I had a couple where the partner knew the addicted partner often acted out. And he said he often acted out, and I just happened to ask the question, "How often is often?" And her interpretation of "often" was... Let's see I can't remember exactly now, but say once a month. Whereas his definition of "often" was twice a week. They both thought the other one knew what "often" meant, this what really was a genuine miscommunication but it caused such devastation and going almost back to square one for that poor partner, again. So again, this is how a therapeutic disclosure really helps people be sure that they have got the story as it were, the narrative, and doing it in a safe way or safe a way as possible. Unfortunately we can't guarantee it's pain free. But having some way to move forward from that as well, a process of moving forward. Neil Sattin: Yeah and let's let's veer our conversation towards recovery. And what you see as required. I know that you came up with your choices... Is it choice, or choices? Paula Hall: Choice. Neil Sattin: Choice model. And that was a little bit of a departure from there's a model created by Patrick Carnes here in the States, and you did some training with him and then decided there was something more that needed to be there. So how is your model different? And then let's let's dive in, because I want to make sure that everyone listening to this conversation feels like there actually is a pathway forward. Paula Hall: Absolutely. Absolutely there is. And I think that the whole the whole field of sex and politician recovery has grown so much and indeed chemical addiction recovery and the training initially I was doing with Patrick Carnes was oh gosh I think the first course was over 10 years ago that I did and some of his early writings of course a pre internet. Some of those stats still get quoted from a book that was written before the Internet and then clearly the profile of sex and politics has changed considerably. So yeah, I know their training is evolved and their models would have evolved, as well since I did the training. But I think what really changed for me, is understanding how getting into recovery from addiction is about so much more than stopping. There's one of the kinds of sayings of recovery is that recovery is about what you take up not about what you give up. And I think the initial models that I were trained in were all about focusing on stopping your behaviors. And if you stop your behaviors you'll get better, your depression will lift, your anxiety will lift, your relationship...you will live happily ever after. And actually I think it's a lot more complicated than that. I think life is a lot more complicated than that. So for me most addictive behaviors or a lot of them are symptoms of other issues that are going on in life. So you absolutely need to be sure you've identified those, recognize those, and are dealing with those. But even from a simply, from a biological perspective, if you just try and stop your porn use, and you don't replace it with healthy alternative activities that give your life a sense of meaning and purpose, then you just end up with a void. You end up with an emptiness and nothingness. And I work with so many young guys now where the huge chunks of their time is spent on porn, they've never had a partnered relationship and they really need to find a new way of living their life, living unaddicted love. So the "choice model" really is the C, the first is an acrostic, the first C, is all about challenging any unhelpful beliefs, so those beliefs: "I can't change. It's just who I am. I've just got a high sex drive. I'm just a weirdo." The H is about having a vision. And again I think this is something that has really changed for me, understanding how much easier it is to drive people towards something than away from something. Let's focus on what you will gain not what you will lose. The "have a vision." The O is about overcoming the behaviors, now I used to think that was the whole treatment program and now I recognize that's just one part of it. The I is about identifying positive sexuality, as I was saying, right at the beginning of this podcast for me, it really is about reclaiming sexuality from the addiction. The second C is about connecting with other people. And one of the real joys of group work and whether that's within a therapeutic group, a peer support group, a 12 step group, whatever it is, I think is building those relationships with other people breaking through the shame and secrecy and I think you as humans we were created to connect. I think that's so important. And the final E is about establishing confident recovery, that really is building your life well with meaningful other relationships and hobbies and pastimes and career and personal growth and all that other stuff. So I think in my kind of recovery model has become increasingly integrative and has been about changing your life, rather than just changing your addiction. Neil Sattin: Great. Yeah. Paula Hall: That was a lecture wasn't it? Neil Sattin: No. It was perfect. You went right through the entire choice model and of course each of those, you know, we could talk for you know five or ten minutes on and we don't have time to do that. Sadly. I will say that each of your books, they're fairly concise and direct and that's really helpful I think you can dive into understanding and treating sex and pornography addiction and come away with some very practical strategies as well as a comprehensive understanding of what you're dealing with. Paula Hall: Yeah, very much written as a self-help book as well as a research book. So yeah. Neil Sattin: Great. Could we talk for a moment about the cycle of addiction that you've identified and particularly, how that can be a way for people to kind of understand themselves and where they are in that cycle and end and how to make different choices depending on where they are in the cycle? Paula Hall: Yeah, so. Six stages on the cycle of addiction. So dormant phase is where you're not acting out. And some people will might go weeks, months, without acting out. Critically dormant is not the same as recovered. Yeah. A period of abstinence is not the same as recovery. And often what's hiding in that dormant phase are all sorts of unresolved issues that you've not dealt with. You're still lonely you're still isolated you still hate your job you still feel you're trapped in the wrong marriage or feel bad about your sexuality whatever it is. Then, there are triggers whatever those triggers might be, that kind of push you out of that dormant phase and often they're either environmental, and I think we often underestimate just the impact of having the opportunity to act out when it's on the plate and we now really understand some of the neuroscience about why that is so hard to resist, it's not purely psychological. But of course there might be emotional triggers as well so you having an argument, feeling particularly isolated, rejected, whatever it might be. Then there's often a period of a series of triggers and you thinking should I shouldn't I and all those cognitive distortions. "Yes. But, everybody looks at porn. But does it really matter? It'll only be for five minutes." All the lies we tell ourselves for why it will be okay for us to do it, and we all do this. I have fun when I'm doing public speaking, I'll often ask for a show of hands of anybody who's never broken the speed limit in their car. And of course there's always one person and I say do you drive a car and they all say no, and put their hand. I've never yet met anybody who drives the car who's not broken the speed limit and we all believe that speed limits are right and good. But we make excuses for why on some occasions it's okay. I was late. The driving conditions were perfect. I wasn't going fast as that person. I'm a very good driver. We all have our reasons why we break our own rules, so it's no different for addicts. Then of course there's the actual acting out behavior whatever that might be. Really it doesn't matter whether your thing is a porn or cam sex or sex workers or cruising or whatever it is. It's the way that behavior makes you feel that you are addicted to, not actually what it is. Period of regret. I think the sort of big difference between my cycle of addiction and Patrick Carnes' cycle that he refers to, is he talks about despair and for an awful lot of people I've worked with, there isn't despair and shame. If you're single and you've been looking at porn yet again, for another night for five hours, and you're not going to get to sleep 'til 1:00 in the morning, you regret it because you're going to be tired and you feel a bit of an idiot. But despair? No. Often despair isn't experienced until much, much later in the evolution of the addiction. But then often there's a period of time in the reconstitution phase of trying to put everything back together again: "Right. That's it. I'm gonna put those blockers back on. I'm going to make more of an effort. You know, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that, I'm going make sure I don't do that." But, what you're doing then is just going back into dormant because you still haven't managed and dealt with those issues that get triggered and set you off going around again. Neil Sattin: Yeah. One thing that I thought was really interesting you talk about that the preparation phase, like getting ready, that that often is actually what is bringing relief to people. Paula Hall: Yeah. It's not a perfect model, no models are. It's it's really tricky to identify when something is acting out, because I think often in the seeking and searching phase particularly for example people who visit sex workers, they may spend days and days and days looking at the website, reading the reviews, chatting for a few different people. Really, that is all the acting out. I'm not sure that is the preparation phase that I think the preparation phase and the acting out phase kind of blur. Because often by the time they get to acting out, that's just trying to get the damn thing I've done. It's the window shopping as it were, that really has been the addiction, rather than buying, the being at the till and paying for the item. Neil Sattin: That's so interesting right because the dopamine is fueled by the seeking, right? Paula Hall: Exactly. Exactly. Neil Sattin: Yeah. That's where that addictive biologic cycle happens. Paula Hall: Yeah. I think that's where people sometimes, and I think that with assessment, that's why the questions are so important. If you just say to somebody how often do you act out? They might say, "Oh I visit a sex work once a month." And it's never escalated it seems, it's been once a month for the last two years. If you ask how much time do you spend online seeking sex workers, looking at sex worker reviews, sending text to sex workers, exchanging messages and pictures with sex workers. You might get quite a different answer and that might be the piece that is escalating significantly. Neil Sattin: Right. Right. I just want to highlight that you mentioned that along with obviously treating people who have or are struggling with sex addiction and also treating couples and working with partners, that you also train therapists to work with people who are struggling with sex addiction and are impacted by it. So how does that work. Do people come to the UK to train with you or is it online? Paula Hall: Yeah. No. We haven't done anything online yet. Yet. Everything's evolving isn't it. So, we do obviously just kind of you know single day training events and I've done quite a lot in house stuff, as well. So I've been to a few rehabs and done kind of dedicated four-day training programs to really upskill addiction stuff, particularly in sex and sexuality, and working with sex addiction. So I've done that in quite a few places. And we can kind of tailor make those programs, but we also have an accredited diploma. So it's an independently accredited diploma, so one of the professional awarding bodies in the UK has apprenticeships accredited it. And that's a level five diploma and that's three modules of four days. And really what we're teaching therapists is an integrative model. So this is what's also very different from Patrick Carnes model, if you do the Patrick Carnes model, then you're being trained to deliver the 30 task approach. Whereas what we're doing is training you in sex and porn addiction and some of the models we use, but how you then interpret that, there's no set program it's not a manualized system that you're being taught, it's much more about people. For people who kind of work more relationally with clients whether that's in developing programs or one to one to kind of tailor it to the places where they work and their own personal modalities as well. Neil Sattin: Got it. Well, we only have about a minute left and so if you are interested in Paula Hall and her work I encourage you to visit the Laurel Center website, Paula's website to get one of her many great books on the topic. So whether you're a therapist or someone who's impacted, I heartily recommend her work. We will have those links in the show notes for today's episode which you can pick up if you go to Neil-sattin-dot-com slash addiction or text the word "Passion," to the number 3-3-4-4-4 and follow the instructions. Paula, I'm wondering if you have a minute for one last question. Paula Hall: OK. Neil Sattin: And that is, we've talked a little bit about not just stopping things and putting new healthy behaviors in. And there are some great suggestions around that in your book I'm wondering if you can just talk for a minute. Obviously, this is way too short but about the healing aspect of how someone goes about healing the underlying issues that lead to being an addict and acting out? Paula Hall: Yeah. So I think that the model that I used, and I talk about in the book, is now often referred to as "OAT model" there has to be opportunity. And of course this has been the big game change over the years, isn't it, is the fact that we can now access pornography and sex through our mobile phone. Absolute anonymity. It's been the absolute game changer. So there has to be the opportunity for some people there's greater opportunity because of their work because of whatever their personal and private situation is, their financial means whatever they have more opportunity than others. And that in itself of course is a temptation because we all are drawn to sex and sexual novelties, it's part of how we've been wired up. But for some people they're more susceptible to that opportunity, those opportunities, than others are and some are more susceptible because they've experienced issues in their childhood and those issues may be around kind of neglectful or absent parenting. So, they may have been brought up with a sense that nobody will really care for their needs. They can't really trust other people. And what tends to happen in those situations is that you turn to, for comfort, you tend to turn to things rather than people. So, if you've got a history where people have let you down, you may decide to look after yourself in terms of things rather than others. And of course porn and sex are effective comforters but then there's trauma as well. So for some people it's the attachment wounds in childhood, for some people it's trauma. So if you've experienced a significant trauma and that might be in childhood it might be as an adult -- we work with a number of people from the armed forces, emergency services, who had significant traumas kind of later in life and we know that trauma actually impacts the brain directly. So this isn't just a psychological issues then, it's become a biological issue. So we know that the way that trauma impacts the brain makes it harder. You need more comfort because you end up hypersensitive to a lot of cues and triggers. But also it's harder to actually access the self soothing chemicals within the brain because of the trauma, so you're more likely to look to external things to soothe that. But I think there's one other thing I would say Neil, that's why I'm so grateful to people like me for doing these kind of podcasts. And one of the great causes for sex and porn addiction, is naivete, is ignorance, is knowing, is the lack of education. And unfortunately so often we get caught up in the moral debates about pornography and sexuality, and of course those debates exist and I'm not trying to say they're not important ones. But I think often we lose the health issues. And I believe very passionately that we need to start educating people particularly our young people about the potential risks of sex addiction and pornography addiction so they could recognize it in themselves. So many people develop these addictions simply because they didn't know they could become addicted. Neil Sattin: Well we are undoing the naivete right here. And I so appreciate your time and wisdom today and hopefully we can have you back on it. I know we could easily talk for another hour. And I just want to point out to our listeners that we have had Peter Levine on the show to talk about healing from trauma. We've had David Burns on the show to talk about cognitive distortions. We've had Diana Fosha to talk about AEDP, which is an attachment centered therapy so healing early attachment wounds. So all of this is meant to offer you a big integrated package of healing and hope for you. And Paula thank you so much for being part of that picture with us today. Paula Hall: You're very welcome.

Are you single? Or, spoiler alert: the world isn't really meaningless - ACIM

Miracles in Manhattan

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 10, 2019 25:11

...So I fire back: You're always on my mind. Love, the World-Eater ---------------- News! See episode description for this week's rundown, but some news about what's to come for MiM is as follows: This last episode we recorded some time ago. Starting next drop, we'll brbringing you fresh content, taking questions, and keeping a rad schedule with lots of bonus content. What KIND of bonus content? Here's a hint: Stephanie's psychic and it's the spookiest month of the year. We have transcripts being migrated to the homepage. In a weird move, we're going to post this weeks at the very bottom of the notes to see what happens. Buckle up and subscribe so you don't miss a thing! On with the show... This week, the Miracles in Manhattan Podcast talks about the weird things you've been thinking and what the rest of the world thinks about you, We also get into what it means to be single, and, in the offing, Lesson 11 of A Course in Miracles. Things get wavy. Talking points: Your hosts set up a mental chessboard. And then call it a day. Marco is at a loss for any real expertise. And the word, “oxytocin” Are you single, coupled, partnered, avaible or a quantum field? Tell us in an email! What are you REALLY doing at Trader Joe's? Lots of talk about Zen…An A for effort is awarded Spoiler Alert! [The world is not meaningless] We’re taking life-questions. Email us! miraclesinmanhattan@gmail.com Find more content at miraclesinmanhattan.com @Wildmanhattan (t) | #Podernfamily Themes: Advice, ACIM, A Course in Miracles, True Crimes, Comedy, Pain, Politics, The Present, Love, Dating, Race, BDSM, The body, Spirit, Self-help, Spirituality, Zen, http://twitter.com/WildManhattan ---------- Transcript ARE YOU SINGLE? OR, SPOILER ALERT: THE WORLD ISN’T REALLY MEANINGLESS The Miracles in Manhattan Podcast (A Course In Miracles (ACIM), Lesson 11) Marco Maisto [00:00:00] That's right. But oh we should also tell people hey guys and gals we have an email address now. Yes we do. And why do we have an e-mail address Steph? Stephanie Wild [00:00:11]So that you can e-mail us questions with questions. Marco Maisto [00:00:13] We're taking questions. Marco Maisto [00:00:16] We are going to answer your questions in as apt a fashion as we answer one another's here on these yes miracles in Manhattan. Stephanie Wild [00:00:25]Gmail dot com. Easy to remember. Yeah. All you have to do is remember the name of the podcast and then Gee Mary popular. Who called Product miracles in Manhattan at G.M. dot com so just remember that. Well we'll point you in the right direction. [00:00:40] Yeah and yeah Friels do to please e-mail questions and don't feel like they need to be totally pertinent to the episode you just listened to. No no no I need any any of you any lesson yet. [00:00:58] My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world. [00:01:23] Welcome to today's edition of miracles in Manhattan the only show in which two spiritual delinquents start over. [00:01:32] Welcome to miracles in Manhattan where two spiritual delinquents lead you through a Course in Miracles trying to wake up in the city that never sleeps. [00:01:44] I am Reverend Stephanie Wilde and I am Marco. Mr. poet single guy. [00:01:55] Sorry you'd have to listen to him another time. Yes. No I'm not. [00:02:00] I don't know if I'm single I'm Venables With the death. I think it's like well I'm seeing I'm dating. The Lenny Kravitz guy you right. Right. But I'm also. No I think that's means that single. Yeah. Hey I'm not hooked up with a partnership. [00:02:16] Let's let's you know how we can find out the end to that if you know the answer to this question. Email us at miracles and man and G.M. dot com because we are taking questions and airing them in and talking about them on the air and we would really love to hear from you. But yeah you know if you're single and seeing another person is also seeing other people are you single or are you What did you see available available. [00:02:41] OK. Yeah. I mean you know maybe you know you could you know what. I think you could be married. That's not single but also available because you got a partnership with someone but you're also available whereas I don't have a partnership. You know I don't have a life right entwined. I would feel kind of easy asking a woman if she's available. That sound kind of easy. I mean you just have to assume she's available if she's on a date. Yes this is the word. [00:03:10] Yeah. I saw an ad moving English moving and they used the word free. You know you free. [00:03:17] Boy. That's yeah. There's a lot of confusion what happened. Well it had to be in context just like you walking around saying Are you free. Yeah yeah. But it was you know it was if you were sort of I'll try that next time at Whole Foods get you free. Are you free. I had to pay for the tomatoes and now expensive. And yes I said tomatoes. All right. [00:03:39] So lesson eleven goes like this my meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world. [00:03:45] Now this is interesting lesson because it's on page 18 of the workbook for students and on at the end of the first paragraph it says the key to forgiveness lies in it. [00:04:00] So this is the first time. If I'm not mistaken that the course talks about forgiveness. [00:04:10] And so you don't have to say that you're the author of a book called The Art of forgiveness which is quite good thinking forgive the process of forgiveness is the miracle that A Course in Miracles talks about it's dissolving illusion. [00:04:26] So this is this is a this is a big this is a big lesson today because it's it really it starts to get to the heart of the matter. [00:04:34] So this is how we do lesson eleven the exercise of lesson eleven for maximum benefit. The eyes should Wait no let me go back. We need to. With our eyes closed first repeat the idea slowly to ourselves. My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world. Then open your eyes and look around from one thing to another fairly rapidly without lingering on anything in particular. [00:05:14] It should just be done as casually as possible. [00:05:20] That's it. And you keep repeating the idea. [00:05:25] And it says he had three practice periods will be sufficient for the day. But you can do as many as five. But more than this is not recommended. [00:05:35] So it's a pretty straightforward exercise compared to Lesson 10 which had like a few was almost like a little set of mantras. But lesson 11 is just close your eyes my meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world. [00:05:49] Open your eyes move you move your eyes let them rest on this that and the other but nothing in particular in casual unhurried leisurely way and then repeat repeat the idea once more my meaningless thoughts are showing the meaningless world. [00:06:07] It says here that this contains the foundation for the peace relaxation and freedom from worry that we are trying to achieve. [00:06:18] Right. Okay so this extends as men correct me please if I'm wrong. This is how I understand it. This extends on less than 10 which establishes that my thoughts are meaningless. Correct. This goes on to say that so is the world around correct me because we've already been introduced to the idea that our thoughts have determined the world. [00:06:45] Right. Right. Thought from the past we're projecting our thoughts perceptions wishes expectations on the world. But if my thoughts are meaningless then the world that I'm seeing is meaningless. [00:06:57] Yeah in a way this is saying by practicing less than 10. You're not just pretending you're not just pretending that that things around you have no meaning they don't correct. [00:07:07] Absolutely correct that's absolutely correct. Absolutely correct. And you know more will be revealed. [00:07:15] Like spoiler the world's not really meaningless. But at this point in our cause. Yeah. My thoughts are meaningless. So the world that I'm perceiving is meaningless. But we just don't want to get ahead of ourselves. We just practice each step like a brick in the foundation. [00:07:40] That was actually the first time that I put two and two together I think some of these were at least two lessons really mutually reinforcing to make sense that ten is more complicated than 11 11 is basically saying you're not out of your fucking mind. [00:07:57] Yeah you've just been mis perceiving things you've been believing is meaning outside of yourself and there's not it's just your thoughts giving you meaning. [00:08:08] I'm going to bullet point this book did look at hand look look at me. [00:08:12] I understand. Hey. [00:08:15] So no this the question I have that maybe people who were listening might also and this probably explained in the texts. Forgive me if it's repetitive but no no. It's what we hear. Yeah. So lesson 10. Every lesson tells you to do exercises of some kind. Yeah. Nothing hard. Nothing. No. Just a few minutes a day. My question is this is it that on Monday I do the things you talked about in less than 10 and move on leave those behind me. And on Tuesday I I I go on to lesson eleven or two I stick with one lesson and continually practice that before I move on. [00:08:58] No no you just do it one after the other after the other. [00:09:01] Yeah. Really. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. One a day. Okay. Mm hmm. Cool. Yeah. [00:09:09] I mean I suppose you could do it for a couple of days. But but but no more. It's definitely not a week or a month or anything like. [00:09:18] Graduating from one to the other sort of thing you should do them in order. No no no no that's not what I mean by country. You shouldn't feel as if you have to have mastered one to move. [00:09:29] No I know you just practicing saying things in a in a different way but I mean if you get rusty or you have a big break or something yeah then you might want to go back then. But I know it's not supposed to be arduous at all right. For the perfectionist in the audience. Yeah. No. [00:09:44] No. OK. Let's get the three. Wow. That makes cool. Yeah. [00:09:51] OK so what the hell. Into my hair meanings thoughts meaningless world. [00:10:01] I mean I'll jump right. So yeah the first thing that comes to mind is you know kind of meaningless when you hear. No it's it's happening is semiotics is. [00:10:15] Is that you know there is not a natural connection between things and the words that we have for them. Oh. However when I look around this room a lot of the time not all of the time I look at an object and the word for that object dimly pops into the back of my head. Sure. Right. And so that is something seems to me this lesson is trying to nudge you away from doing maybe I don't know or or at least maybe nudge you away from any sort of emotional and experience all attachments that you might have. Yes. [00:10:53] Which is why I don't feel like my you know like. [00:10:58] Yeah yeah yeah. And yes that's right. And I think you pointing out that what I think you really pointed out is that the word does not equal the object. [00:11:07] I mean it's just a tag we put on it and that's what's so cool about letting you know the language you see how the tags for things relate to what one another differently. So it's not that there's an absolute. Meaning for each object we just given them tags. [00:11:26] Yeah and but and in tags can also be even more sort of complicated and all logically or emotionally whereas if I have four photographs on my wall in a row I might look at them and say photograph photograph photograph photograph. But if one of them is of my God forbid dead Mom. That third one is going to stumble on that one not just it's not just going to be a photo. It's going to be my mom. Yeah. So are we asking people in this lesson to to not have feelings about that third photograph. [00:12:06] No that's not what we're asking. We're asking people to realize that our thoughts are giving meaning to the photograph. [00:12:16] Q Yeah you're giving me this look that you sometimes do where you are. [00:12:22] To me it communicates. Are you challenging me. Is that rhetorical. [00:12:27] When I ask snow I will question your projecting that you will thinking that but I'm not thinking that I'm thinking I'm I'm. [00:12:38] My eyes are resting on you but I'm thinking about my words carefully so I don't get it wrong. I did it. It's like chess cool. [00:12:51] Well said all right. Yeah. The last time we spoke I asked you what. [00:13:03] Sort of change. Not necessarily benefit but what change one might expect or even look for after practicing a lesson like this. I don't know if that's a useful question to ask. And so we can have a why not. I mean but a lawyer. What are your thoughts on that. [00:13:19] Well this lesson I think is really getting us to. To the point where we can really separate the like entity that our thoughts create from the reality of the world. [00:13:42] Now we haven't seen the reality of the world yet according to A Course in Miracles. But my meaningless thought showing me a meaningless world. The thoughts make a world and none of that is real. So I think if we can sort of conceptualize the thoughts and the world they make is like a bowl and we can just set that aside. [00:14:01] We used to think that was reality and it meant everything. But at this point we should be I think at the point where we can say oh yeah that's just ephemeral all these thoughts created this world created this experience created my whole life. [00:14:16] Let me just set that aside and see what's really there. [00:14:22] All right. [00:14:29] This makes sense does make sense. And again you know once again it feels like a one to one correspondence. Don't meet with a lot of Zen that I've been exposed to. You'd hear this kind of spoken about in terms of falseness versus form and tell us more about just that. That that boy I'm going to get this really well. [00:14:50] But that's okay. You know if we get it wrong because we're just people trying to get happy and so I'm also a person trying to remember. [00:14:58] But yes and get happy in doing that. But that that that that that that that that objects or things are really no more than forms and in form is itself formless ness so that there is there isn't again no inherent meaning in any thing. Now that doesn't mean that like as a Buddhist I have no respect for something in life you know quite the opposite. Yes. In fact diametrically the opposite. But mental formations I have thoughts or blocks and things like that. These are not external externally provided from the universe to me or settlement. I'm not beset by them right. They're products of an untested mind. Yep. Yeah. I think a lot of misconception that I had and I know a lot of people have about you know meditation in the world that Zen is that you are you. You're sitting hard and concentrating hard on not having any thoughts. And if you think about it. That act is itself. A thought form. And so. [00:16:18] Yeah. No that's not. We can't not have thoughts but we just recognize them for what they are. [00:16:23] Right. Yeah right. That that procession of objects moving by as it's very very very lustrous. [00:16:29] It's kind of cool it's not just a parade of like stuff going back end. [00:16:35] Yeah yeah. I told you about this analogy this guy is Zen guy told me about with a mirror. Yeah. Yeah. Another mentioned I guess I'll say it again. But you know you can sort of in terms. Right. So this this has to do with me. So in Zen this might have to do a lot with detachment or unattached on attaching oneself from things. So imagining a mirror passing by on a conveyor belt even like by your face. There's a moment where your face disappears because the mirror has passed you you have a choice at that moment to follow the mirror and keep seeing yourself or let it go and you have that choice with every thought my mental formation that happens and emotionally to you. [00:17:19] Absolutely and the way I talk about it with this client is. Detaching our our happiness from things that happened detaching our happiness from thoughts you know. So that we're not. Our happiness is not being controlled by external things. Okay. How. So where does happiness come from if it comes from source. God if you want to call it that infinite intelligence the true love which is the stuff of the universe it comes from a higher power. It's spirit. [00:17:50] Spiritual. Okay. [00:17:54] Let let's be nitty gritty for a minute. Oh yeah that's Yeah. So. Is that to say in the world of course in miracles. Is that to say that. Me thinking of somebody and as a result feeling happy is an illusory and sort of dangerous thing. [00:18:20] I don't think it's dangerous at all. It's a mystery. If if you're not if you're not aware that you're in control of it. [00:18:31] Because I can think of someone and feel in love and being in love is a state of consciousness and I and I'm in love with two people right now and I can think of either one of them and just so much fun it's lovely. But but I know that it's a state of consciousness and it's not anything that I can't control. You know it's not. I'm not beholden. My happiness is not dependent on them. It's not dependent on what they do right. But I can enjoy that feeling I can enjoy those thoughts but not be controlled by it. [00:19:13] Does it does it. Do you feel that it sort of cheapens that feeling. No no no absolutely not the way that sometimes when you hear you know kind of like you know really watered down like neurobiologist about love it's chemicals and shit like that you know the sort of stuff that you hear. [00:19:36] No I mean it's I think it's chemicals plus consciousness right. [00:19:42] Yeah I'm saying what I guess what I'm saying is when I hear that sort of stuff and I know yes I get it I get it you know there are chemicals that make you feel good. Yeah. But somebody is saying that in order to sort of again like cheapen or cheapen might not be the right word but to sort of dissociate the experience from from the experience that I want it to be or or believe it to be. [00:20:09] Yeah. No I understand that. [00:20:12] That can engender fear and anger because underneath anger is fear because I think you know where we are at less than a living because all of a sudden everything seems meaningless. Right. It's not you know. [00:20:25] Right but but it doesn't mean that I'm going to treat the other person as disposable. I'm going to treat them as as a child of God. I'm going to treat them as as equal and as valuable as I am and with a great deal of respect. [00:20:42] Right. Right. Do you have to see them as a child of God. [00:20:49] In order to what. [00:20:52] Do that do you. Yeah I think so. Okay. I think so. And that's why spiritualism appealed to me because that's how I was seeing people and when I found the religion that's what they said we are each a spirit in a body we're absolutely equal right. We're absolutely as valuable as each other and we are like drops of water in the ocean we're part of this consciousness we're part of infinite intelligence we're part of source quantum field if you want whatever you want. [00:21:18] Now China this why this is kind of the perfect body cast because at this point this is like a point where this sort of sub dialogue that you and I have about like comparing this to the Zen stuff parts ways a little parts ways I think because they're there is because I'm not even going to try to speak and articulate you know like a Zen Buddhist view of deity after life soul of spirit anything. But it's it's definitely much more downplayed. Yes that all realize that. But in in a way that that I've experienced very positively. And I have to come back in future episodes with more thinking on that but I don't mean to say it parts ways completely but I will say that our atheist listeners should stick with this podcast. [00:22:11] Yeah well I mean and that's why no one path is better than the other. I mean there are as many paths to happiness peace enlightenment or whatever you want to call it as there are people and you find the one that is best for your personality you find the one that's best for you as you are right now on Earth and they all lead to the same place so that you catch you catch him. [00:22:39] Yeah all right. [00:22:41] Okay well no I think any sort of summary or in any kind of parting thoughts on lesson eleven from you Steph. No no. I think we did well here I think I'm good. It's good. Yeah I think we did well it feels like a very functional and reinforcing and not a maintenance can step at a step that yeah that you need because you can't have ten without this. Yeah. Who are your your little maybe two something like that. Yeah. [00:23:10] Listen I stick with it because again. Yeah. Spoiler alert the world is not meaningless. [00:23:16] Spoiler alert I'm looking at Stephanie's copy of this book which lives at my house for her convenience. [00:23:26] It's highly marked up there are posted at the end so that tells me so. And then should you as well. Yeah. [00:23:38] All right so we'll see next time. Oh yeah. In the meantime miracles in Manhattan at G.M. dot com. [00:23:43] Yeah. And I'm just saying that now we know where we're a little young in this podcast. [00:23:47] Still this is this will be the 11th of 12 episode that you will be listening to and we're figuring out if this is going to be a weekly or bi weekly drop and soon we'll find out. So just yeah levitation if you can with us as we work that out because we have to do over 350 so. Okay. But my God we're gonna be happy at the end of it we'll be different. [00:24:18] Beautiful people. Thank you so much for listening. Have a good week or two days. [00:24:24] Bye bye.

P043 How Josh Vernon went from 34 sales his 1st year in real estate to 362 sales in his 8th year

Get Sellers Calling You: real estate marketing agent coaching seller leads generation Realtor Tom Ferry Brian Buffini Gary Va

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 25, 2019 52:12

[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent="no" equal_height_columns="no" menu_anchor="" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" id="" background_color="" background_image="" background_position="center center" background_repeat="no-repeat" fade="no" background_parallax="none" parallax_speed="0.3" video_mp4="" video_webm="" video_ogv="" video_url="" video_aspect_ratio="16:9" video_loop="yes" video_mute="yes" overlay_color="" video_preview_image="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" padding_top="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" padding_right=""][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type="1_1" layout="1_1" background_position="left top" background_color="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" border_position="all" spacing="yes" background_image="" background_repeat="no-repeat" padding_top="" padding_right="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" margin_top="0px" margin_bottom="0px" class="" id="" animation_type="" animation_speed="0.3" animation_direction="left" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" center_content="no" last="no" min_height="" hover_type="none" link=""][fusion_text][/fusion_text][fusion_text] Watch the live interview below [/fusion_text][fusion_youtube id="https://youtu.be/QMyfkeQjFI4" alignment="center" width="" height="" autoplay="false" api_params="&rel=0" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" /][fusion_text] Transcription (was completed by automated process. Please ignore any speech-to-text errors) [00:00:01] This is the get sellers calling you marketing podcasts for real estate agents. And I'm Beatty Carmichael. [00:00:06] For simple to do proven marketing strategies focus exclusively on finding sellers and getting more listings. Visit our Web site, get sellers calling you dot com. And now let's begin our next session of get sellers calling you. [00:00:22] All right, well, hey, this is Beatty Carmichael again. And welcome back to the Get Sellers calling you realtor podcast. I'm really excited today because I get to visit with not only a real top producing agent. One of our early clients, but also another one of my personal friends named Josh Vernon. And what's really interesting, we're going to talk about this a little bit, but this as a real quick background. Josh catapulted into his fourth year doing over 100 transactions a year. And he's done a lot in this business. He's got a great balance and just a lot to share. So, Josh, welcome to the call and thanks for being with us. [00:01:06] Thanks, Beatty. Appreciate the opportunity. And always get to spend a few minutes talking with you. So I enjoy it. I'm glad to be here. [00:01:13] Well, I appreciate you taking the time, because I know how well I was going to say I know how busy you are, but I'm not really sure you're all that busy. I think your team is. But I don't know about you. [00:01:24] It's you know, it's funny. It's it's been busier for probably the last month than I've been in a while. You know, we just recently made a brokerage change and there's been a lot of a lot of fun with that, but also a lot of a lot of extra work. But yeah, the people on our team are definitely be the ones responsible for most of the business now. So we're thankful for it for all they do for. For us. For sure. [00:01:46] Great. Well, I'm also for the listeners and viewers. [00:01:50] This is an Internet interview that I'm doing. So please pardon any type of Internet interruptions that may occur like what may have just happened. Did I lose you, Josh? I think we may have lost Josh. [00:02:08] Ok. [00:02:09] All right. So we're back. And I think, Josh, we just got to pack. I was just reminding everyone that this is an Internet interview and take part in any type of interruptions. And just at that moment, everything idea and shut down. Perfect timing, right? It is perfect timing. So. [00:02:28] So, Josh, I'd love to find out this little bit about your actually, I know a lot about you, but for the folks listening, can you share just a little bit about about who you are and how long you've been in business and just just a big picture overview. [00:02:43] Sure. So I've been in business going on nine years now, about 8 1/2, 9 years. I got in the business in 2010, very end of 2010. I've been in banking for almost 10 years. When I got into this, I was a branch manager at a local bank here. I really loved what I was doing, but I felt like I needed more time with my family and just, you know, really to be rewarded more firm for my efforts that I put in and felt like getting into a business like real estate would would offer me those things. One of the things I and I know you know this baby and you know, I always point to this when I when I first started, I'd been almost 10 years at the bank, had a great career and just felt like I was led to go do something different. And I felt like real estate was the right option. And, you know, I thought that I really fought it for about six months. And the more I thought it, the more I knew that it was what I needed to do. And so obviously, it's been it's been a good run. I had a goal of selling 12 homes my first year just to keep my family afloat. We sold 34. So it was it wasn't too bad of our first year and then while that early been up ever since. So anyway, that's kind of the high level overview of that. [00:04:10] I love it. So. OK. So that's a high level overview. Now, let's fast forward a little bit. Thirty four homes in your first year of business. You were expecting to do twelve. [00:04:21] And last year, which was, let's see, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen. Said last year was your eighth year in business. How many transactions did you do last year? [00:04:31] We rented 62 last year. So you've had quite a growth rate. Yeah. It's been pretty good for sure. [00:04:39] And then I gotta ask you this high level. [00:04:43] Average hours a week you put into your real estate. This is how many hours do you think it is? [00:04:48] I would say, you know, it's different every week, but on average, I'd say around 20 to 30 in 20 to 30 hours a week. [00:04:55] I love it. So. So now we've got encapsulated why people need to listen to this call. [00:05:01] I want to roll the video back just a moment. You felt led to go from banking where you had this secure, secure job, great income, and to go into straight commission sales with real estate. When you say let me give me a little bit more idea of what you're talking about and what you think was the reason for that. Well, sure. [00:05:23] So let me probably take one even further step back from that. I was actually part of a networking referral group, and I most people probably heard of that. I was the banker in the group. We had a real estate agent in the group. And I had been sending her a good bit of referrals. And she kept saying, why don't you get your real estate license so that when you send me referrals, I can pay you a referral fee on those. And I'm sure, you know, I can do that. But, you know, I wasn't really in a big hurry to do it. I'd always dabbled in real estate. And that was kind of right after the time when flipping homes was a big thing. I'd flip a few homes with some family members and had good success with that. And so I always thought about real estate, but never, never as a full time job for sure. So that being said, after she made that suggestion, I went ahead and started the course and started working my way through that. And about halfway through that course, my wife was actually pregnant at the time with our second child. About halfway through that course, I started feeling like I was being led by my my God to to make a career change. And I'll always call it my Moses moment where I argued with God. You know what I mean by that? Know, Moses argued with God saying, I'm not the right one. I can't do this. You know, that's that's kind of where I was. [00:06:42] And, you know, I was I was fighting it from a standpoint of, you know, I've got one child already, one on the way. My wife doesn't work. She she works hard at home, but she doesn't work outside the home. So it's all me. So if I don't make money, we're gonna be in big trouble here. So that's where the whole twelve homes a year came from. I basically was figuring what it would take to really more or less keep our current lifestyle that we had. And anyway, like I say, I I thought God for I would say probably close to six months. And it was literally all I thought about. I couldn't eat without thinking about it. I could I couldn't go to sleep. It was first thing I thought of when I woke up, like there was no question in my mind it was where I needed to be. So I actually mentioned it to my wife. Finally, after about probably four or five months of this personal battle that I was having with myself, and her response was, well, OK, let's do it. And I'm like, are you serious? You know, you're supposed to be the one to talk some sense into me and tell me, you know, we can't do that. We can't afford this. But no, she was supportive. And anyway, so it was. It all has worked itself out. Obviously, I was always say if you're where you're supposed to be, it's all gonna work it. [00:07:54] You know, that's really neat because I actually have a similar story. I won't tell you the full story. [00:07:59] But I we had a young child. My wife was pregnant. She was like, you're your wife. A stay at home mom. Very busy. The only difference is, rather than me having a really successful career and a nice, steady paycheck, we found ourselves at the beginning of that year with me being unemployed and my wife being a stay at home mom. You know, we had the mortgage on the car and mortgage on the car payment and those type of things. And through a series of events, that's when the Lord led me. I didn't realize he was leading me. It's just something I did. And actually it was October of nineteen ninety seven Euro, October 2010. So October of 97 we started this little business and put in perspective how difficult that year was. My adjusted my adjusted gross income for that year was eleven thousand eight hundred eighty two dollars. Okay. So you know, nothing really happened. But let me see if I get this right. So when you when you're in the center of where God's leading you, you mentioned that things just happen. I think it was so two years later, we bought the home that we just moved from that you helped to sell and we pay that home off in five months. Okay. I mean, the thing had just taken off and it was obviously a God thing. And and seeing how your business has been growing, I would say is definitely a good thing for you to know that. [00:09:33] A question. When I started, people would ask me all the time, like, you know, what do you attribute your success to? And I would say lots of prayer. Just kind of get a giggle and I'm like, no, I'm saying I'm serious, you know. But that's that's what I attributed to. So. [00:09:49] Well, let's talk on that for a moment, because you've had you know, you you started your career hoping for 12 transactions. You got over 30. And then the second year you got how many transactions in your second year? [00:10:03] Well, it was mid 40s, I wanna say was forty four. Forty five, something like that. [00:10:07] Ok. And then your third year was fifty. [00:10:11] And then in North Wales, 108. That was the first year I had someone helping me. I had Jamie Reynolds. You know Jamie. Yep. They joined me from outside of real estate. You never sold a home? No. Really? No clue what he was doing. And he actually joined me, I think was March or April, if I remember correctly. And he had actually. He'd been kind of helping me behind the scenes a couple of months. But he really he quit his job and jumped in both feet in March or April with me. And we had a good run that year, for sure. No question. [00:10:44] So I want to you know, a lot of times I think a lot of the interviews will, especially with someone of your track record in growth, will focus on what did you do in the natural. If that makes sense, you know, what did you do as a real estate agent? I want to find out. You know, the battle is won in the spirit realm and the spiritual side before it's won in though natural. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. You know, you mentioned the Moses moment. Moment. Well, there is a really significant Moses moment in the Bible. God had just brought his children out of Egypt. They're battling. I think it's the malachite. Moses is up on the hill with his staff and and down in the valley is the battle going on. Do you remember that? That section of the Bible? Yes, that's right. OK. So here's what's cool. He takes his staff and as long as he holds his staff up. Right. The Israelites win when he lowers his staff because his arms get tired. The Israelites lose. OK. And then Malachi went. So they two guys prop up his arm. All the staff. Right. And I think this is a perfect picture of how life really is, is the activity we do in the natural. That somehow in this spiritual causes victory and then that manifests itself back out into the natural circumstances. Are you following that connection? Yes, definitely. So talk to me in terms of what was your practice in the as. As a Christian. OK, what do what do you contribute? Because you keep focusing this back, you know, is prayer. Talk to me in terms of of what you think, you know, when you say prayer. What do you mean? How did you live your life? What are you what are the things that you feel are really the things that cause you to win in the spiritual realm where God had favor and right. Last you in the natural? [00:12:44] Well, and I think to kind of point back to even my career as a banker, you know, I was I was one of the youngest bank managers they had ever had in one of the smallest branches out of about two thousand in the company. And I think when I went out the year I quit, I was actually number two out of two thousand branches in the company in one of the bottom one hundred branches based on size in the area. Wow. You know, I feel like I always point back to when you do for others that it comes back to you. I've always focused on doing what's right for others. One of our our team models that we talk about, it cost us some money sometimes, but we do what's right. Every time no questions asked. There is not to be any any discussion if it's the right thing to do is what we do. The agents on our team know that and we just put others first is what it comes to. And I feel like that's one of those things. My focus wasn't, you know, God, please bless my business so that I can make lots of money. It was please give me opportunities to help others. And that's what I've looked for throughout the career. And I wish I could say I've been perfect on that. You know, obviously, weight, we're all week from time to time. But that's been my focus and my my prayer since the beginning has helped me to help others and use me to help others. [00:14:03] So, you know, it's interesting as as he said that my mind popped back to Solomon and ah, and God asked him, what would you like Solomon? And he says, Give me wisdom to rule your poor well down. And God said, Well, since you asked for that, I will do that. But since you did not ask for riches and stuff, I will blessed you with even more riches. What a greater great testimony. So you're if I were to look at your daily practice. OK. In terms of your walk with the Lord, your daily attitude as you approach. Things peel back that onion a little bit more, help us help me understand more of what you mean. You know, asking the Lord for opportunities to help people and and what that really means. I don't have. I'm not sure how to couch the question. I'm trying to pull out of the. [00:15:01] I'm really trying to think how to answer that question. I mean, yeah. I think, you know, obviously having a strong prayer life, having having that daily Bible readings, things like that. You know, there's there's there's a lot of good information in that in that Bible sitting on your table, you know, pretty much any answer to life that you wants in there. [00:15:23] You just gotta know how to read it, know how to find it. That being said, I mean, I don't know if that's answering your question or not, if that's what you're looking for. But I do I do make it a point everyday to find time to read. One of the things I made a decision to do. I felt like I kind of slacked off on on those things. And I actually just personally made the decision. I really don't watch TV anymore. We've got TV where we haven't cut the cord. First day I do still watch football on Saturday is when football season is on. But we just we don't watch network television in the evenings and you'll be amazed at how much extra time. You know, I mean, like one of the things we are I personally set a goal for last year was to read 40 books throughout the year or actually read 42 this year. I've got a goal to reach 60. And these are, you know, business, personal development, threesomes, some Christian. And there, you know. I've got some some favorites that I've read recently, but one of them was a rhinoceros success from from you, actually, that I thoroughly enjoyed. But I've just tried to really spend some time working on myself over the last couple of years. And that's made a big difference, too. And I mean, honestly, the the better you do, better you build yourselves, the more you're able to help others as well. So I don't know if that answers your question. That's kind of the model at this time. [00:16:46] Know, and what it also shows me and tells me is you're not just saying, OK, I pray to the Lord and I ask for him to guide me. [00:16:55] And then I do sit back and wait. I mean, just your goal of reading 40 books and you did 42. OK. You're driven. And so let's talk a little bit about if we were to look at. If I were to ask you, Josh, what would you say are the top three reasons you have been successful both and what you did in the banking business and now what you do in business? How would you rank those top three reasons? And and what do you tell us? What those are littlest. Let's start. [00:17:30] There was a. So that's a really tough one. [00:17:36] I mean, I do think obviously the focus on others is is high up there. I mean, I think a strong drive for success is in there as well. You know, I mean, that's something when I was running by myself, you know, you mentioned 30, 40, 50 homes a year that I was selling when it was just me. I would work 20 to 25 days in a row without taking a day off. And my wife would be like, you've got to stop. And I'm like, no, I'm fine. I'm I love what I'm doing. [00:18:02] Like, you know, when you love what you do and love what you do, it's never work. You know, they say it never felt like work. No, I mean, I can even remember. But maybe one or two days in the last nine years that felt like work. But at the same time, she needed to be happy here. You know, she. She needed me to stop and do things around the house and things to help her out. So that being said, like, I would say that that strong drive to to just be successful. I know. I'm not giving you a one, two, three. You know, this is this is Colby's dance around the questions when you ask me things like this. But, you know, I mean, I think it just I think a drive to be better to, you know, to to better myself and to better others. So I think we're all capable. We just have to put the effort in. [00:18:50] Well, let's let's talk about Tom. So you're working all these hours. [00:18:53] You're working all these days without stop and then you started to change your model. Let's talk about how do you go from being that one man show, doing all the work, working all these hours and start to put a team together? Can you guide us on that which you did? Sure. [00:19:13] I can actually kind of tell you where it where it all started. And I'm just going to throw the the the credit on that to Jamie. Jamie, actually, I mentioned before I was part of a bee sting when I left banking. I got that great call. Jamie joins that group a year or two later and his business was different. Like I said, he was he was actually selling carpet for covering artwork, things like that. And he wanted to connect with me being a realtor. Well, he saw I was doing an open house one day, but I wasn't doing one. I was actually doing three at the same time on the same street that I had for sale. Go big or go home. Right. So I was I was doing three open houses at the same time. Jamie stopped by, met me. We started talking and more or less built a friendship. And from there, he had actually read the millionaire real estate agent book. Gary Keller kind of had a vision that this team model would work. Well, I was kind of at a phase, I guess I was around 50 sales where I did not feel like I was really getting great customer service anymore at that point. And it honestly kind of got out of control. And to a point where I really wasn't able to manage it well. So I was doing my best, but I wasn't doing great for anyone anymore. I was getting more complaints than I had ever had before. More disappointing customers than I'd ever had before. And honestly, the reason was just I was dropping the ball because I couldn't I could not manage that many people at one time. So that's when Jamie got his license to kind of more or less be a support system for me. And from there would run into a pretty great partnership and a really, really great friendship, too. [00:20:56] So, you know, I remember in Gary's book, It's Been Fat is fascinating for me because as you know, I have never sold a house profession in my life. Right. All right. And I'm reading this book and it's like peeling back the onion of all the things that people been told. But now it measures that in one of the things that I remember so clearly, because I thought, wow, this is you know, it's it's it should not be it should be common knowledge, but it's not. And that is as soon as statistically when someone hires an assistant, their volume doubles on average in that per share. And and you know, what you're talking about with with what happened with Jamie is know you'd reach that level of you could spin no more plates because they were starting to follow. Fall in customer service. Now you bring someone else on board. Tell me what happened at that point. Not not just by me. I know the volume came up a lot. I would talk in terms of what it meant to you in business to have an extra pair of hands and someone who is capable. [00:22:08] And it's funny you mention spinning plates. We always use the description of juggling balls, but I describe real estate as juggling a bowling ball, a basketball, a tennis ball, a golf ball and a football. All right. Well, there's so many different tasks that you're doing, you know, and so each one is a different weight, a different size, a different texture. You try juggling all those different balls at the same time and see what happens. So that's. One of the things, again, that we took from the real estate model that Jamie believed in so heavily when he joined me that I had to read this book. You just got to do it. So I did. And we bought in. And that's actually what brought us to where we are today. I don't want to get ahead of myself here, but you know, where we do have a specialist model, where we have someone who is an expert at listening and that's all they do. And, you know, our by a team, that's all they do in our admin team. That's all they do. So that being said, when Jamie first joined, we jumped from 51 sales to one hundred and eight sales the very first year. So like you said, is actually just over double, double the business. [00:23:09] And that's with Jamie. And I don't think January would be upset with let me say this. He's never written a contract to date. Never really until he saw how I got. [00:23:18] I got to stop. Got to stop. I've always thought that Jamie was a buyer's agent for you. [00:23:25] He was you know, he's never written sales contract and he's never written a sales contract. [00:23:30] That's not to say he doesn't review every one of them that goes out. But he has never himself sat down with a paper or typed on the computer and written the contract. And again, that's one of those things. Figuring out leverage. We've got our wives involved. And and, you know, it's changed the game for us. You know, I became the listing agent solely Jamie became the buyer's agent solely. And our lives kind of were support on the backside. My wife read all of our contracts, helped support us. Therapist She had learned that over time. Help me. His wife did a lot of our marketing and helped with that stuff, you know, and she was influential when we first started with you designing our postcards and things like that. [00:24:07] So we figured out really quickly that we, you know, and the support of our wives obviously could take this thing to the next level. We really didn't know how far we could take it. [00:24:19] And we jumped 100 a year for the first two years from 100 to 200, 200, 300. And then we can really close to doing it. The third year in a row. We got to 390 for that. That third year. And then, of course, last year we were just under that. Like I said, around 360 to. So we fell just short. We actually we made some big changes last year. And, you know, I mean, obviously, I wish this. I wish it always went up. But eventually it's got got to shift a little bit. So we feel like our our move to Keller Williams recently, you know, we moved last month. [00:24:53] Like I told you and you know, we actually we've hired three new buyers agents in the last 48 hours. So we're about where I to see this. This thing's going back up again. We're pretty excited about it. [00:25:05] Oh, this you're listening to the get sellers calling you podcast to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence or from a geographic farm. Learn about Agent Dominator. [00:25:15] We guarantee your sales in writing or give your money back to learn more. Visit our Web site and get sellers calling you dot com. That's like Agent Dominator from the menu. [00:25:24] And now back to the podcast. [00:25:27] It's real interesting. So. [00:25:29] So when I work with client agents across the country, a lot of times there is a disdain for the millionaire real estate agent because from their perspective, is the competitors book. OK. Yeah. And and I look at it as a great resource. But you just move to Keller Williams. You were not working with you were not a Keller Williams agent back then and all of this was happening. [00:25:54] That's right. Yeah. So it was the competitors book for years. We always knew Keller Williams was a great place. But we for whatever reason, we had great friends in the business that we were working with. And, you know, for for a multitude of reasons, we didn't make the move. But we're seeing the light now, so to speak, in a way. We went ahead, made the move. And I mean, it's been incredible for us, without a doubt. I mean, this is it exceeded every expectation we had so far and where we're right at 30 days and at this point. Wow. I love it. It happen. It was all in our minds right now. [00:26:30] So I love it. I love it. [00:26:32] I don't want to make this a promotion for Keller Williams, but I do as much as I want to make this point. The content in the book is great. And even if it's the competitors book, still learn from. Because what you guys did, you were pretty much modeling your business after what the model was in the book. [00:26:53] Isn't this right? I mean, we're about 95 percent after the model in the book. Very, very little tweaks. Yes. [00:27:01] So it really works how it really works. [00:27:05] And I think a lot of people that I've spoken to, they fight it for. For, again, different reasons. And I've heard some I've heard some some good, good excuses and I've heard some really bad excuses, too, just like anything. I think I think that anything, anything that you buy into an implement properly is going to work to some extent. But why not follow after someone who has the history and the knowledge that Gary Keller has? Right. [00:27:33] All right. So let me ask you and your so you went from into simple numbers, 50 to 100 to 200 to 300. [00:27:44] What were you doing? So I know you're building a team, but somehow you've got to drive business to that team. What? Sure. What's the big rock stuff that you did that drove the business and. [00:27:58] I think a lot of it, you know, to some extent there was a lot of buying zilla leads. They haven't been down leads. That paper like leads. Google stuff like that. Obviously, we did the postcards. Are you guys that worked great. We actually do you we took over a neighborhood that we had never even sold a home in. It was a neighborhood that we wanted to be in. And I pretty much thought was unattainable for lack of a better word. I guess, you know, I called it a day that it was, you know, basically saturated, you know, with two or three who are our really good friends, actually. But they were pretty much only my neighborhood. And I'd never sold a home in there. And I got with you and we teamed up and came up with a plan. And in less than a year, we were number one. Not only in that I report in that zip code had been number one. And there's a sense of 25th through current number one and trustful trust. Alabama's where we are. It's my hometown is where most of our team lives and where up until just recently our office was located. But, you know, we have we have a great reputation in the community now. And I feel like we have a pretty strong base here. It's still where we work. You know, we all who we all work from trustful. It's just our our home base is now in Keller Williams Stadium. But anyway, that being said, yeah, a lot of a lot of purchased advertising like as the Zillow needs, things like that. We've tried a lot of different things. But I think honestly, the thing that's helped us the most is just having a lot of homes for sale and selling them quickly. I say all the time signs that go up and then go right back down are probably your best advertising you can do. The challenge is getting those signs up in the first place. So that was the where where we got some help from you and from two other sources as well. [00:30:00] So let me ask you. So. [00:30:01] So you use a lot of advertising dollars in various forms to drive this Zillow boomtown. Working with us and other things, we want to hit a mass. Do you have to keep that spend up or is just your exposure now driving a lot of business to you automatically? [00:30:24] Well, I mean, I think we have what we've done is we're still spending almost the same amount of money we have pulled back. So no question. Last year we pulled back a pretty good bit, actually. Just there was some market shift in our area. Definitely a lack of inventory. I think every realtor who has been a realtor for more than a year can attest to that. But at the same time, we have we've been able to shift our dollars. I feel I can the more dollar productive areas and I mean, I think we're probably spending 10 percent less to produce about the same results. So we did have about a about a 8 percent drop from 2017 and 2018. And again, I feel like that was as much a lack of inventory as it was some changes that we were making for our team structure last year. We're on pace to do better than that this year already. So that's all right. A little 10 percent reduction in spans. [00:31:19] So what are you finding right now is where your dollars are best spent? What's puts most productive? [00:31:26] I mean, I still go back to the tried and true as the lone boomtown for buyers. As of right now, we're not really spending a lot of money to bring in sellers. We have some things that we think we probably will do over the next six or eight months. [00:31:43] But mostly at this point we're Lionel's sphere and referrals and reputation to drive that ship. And I mean, that's been huge for us to be able to, again, like I say, shift those dollars over to paper, click and Zillow and stuff like that, and let the reputation and sphere kind of drive the listings. [00:32:04] You know, something we're experimenting with. And right now, just to kind of throw Allen in case you have interest, is a video OK? Just like we're doing a video interview here. But video testimonials drive, you know, multiples of, you know, four to eight times more responsiveness than a written word. What you get out of the millionaire real estate agent is that I met list is much more productive than a non met. And so one thing you might want to consider doing, and this is what I've been doing, experimenting on this in a plug for me, I'm just saying that. So I'll interview people like I thank you. You do remember suits Gerard Sutton. Did they reconnect you all together? Yes. Okay. So, like, I did two interviews for him because he's targeting two separate farms. And the interview is basically. I may say so, sir. I live in very critical. Why should I do business with you? And it's a back and forth that then can be promoted into that farm to these people who've never met him. They've seen his signs and now they get to meet him and get to understand more. So as you guys are. Are working with you through referrals and other things. One thing if you can create a strategy around it to work would be to generate know do it through a video of some sort that now vicariously allows you to meet the people they get to get comfortable with you and probably drive even more business. Gotcha. That sounds great. Hey, let me ask you this. Just curious. The best day. KW branch, is that Jenny? Is she the team leader? Jen tumour. Yeah. OK. Yeah. Okay. Because, you know, we have more connections than I realized that you started every day. [00:33:56] Yeah. You started similar to May the Lord led you into it. Yeah. Young child and one on the way. All risk. And now your team leader is the daughter of my pastor. [00:34:08] Right. So she told me so. [00:34:10] So that's really neat. Hey, I want to shift gears real quickly and talk about family work life balance. Talk to me a little bit about that, because you went through that period time where you were way out of balance from your wife's perspective. Now, at the beginning, the call, you said you were maybe 20 or 25 hours a week. Quite a number. What have you done deliberately to manage on that and why? [00:34:36] So I think obviously having a team like I mentioned. So wait, we do have a specialist model. So there are basically three three categories in the specialist model. [00:34:47] Honestly, we truly believe one is not any more important than the other. [00:34:52] So we do have a team of listing agents, only a team of buyers, agents only and a team of admins. A team of admins are probably many, if not the most influential group on our team because they're the ones that keep the wheels of this bus turning. They're the ones that keep our contracts in order order all of our services that have to be done prior to closing the schedule or closings and manage. They they check with the lenders to make sure everything's on pace. And I can keep going for four hours, you know. That to me is by far the biggest, most important thing that we added to the puzzle, because I do take so much time off of our our agents. So the agents on our team get to do what they're best at. We just focus on nurturing leads. People who are interested in buying, selling and get them in homes, decide what they want, help them get the contract ready to write up and then handed over to the admins and then start the process over our listing. Agents were able to go out, meet with sellers, help them get their homes staged, get the home listed, hand it over to the admins, move on to the next one. So it's a it's a great model. One of the one of the highlights of billionaire real estate model is Leeds listings leverage. That leverage to me is by far the most important thing because we can do this over and over and over again and we can replicate it without anyone feeling the burden of of that extra work because it spread over everyone equally. [00:36:23] But I can certainly attest to that because you guys were the listing agent on my home. [00:36:30] We bought this home and then after we bought it, so that one. And it was such a smooth process and everything was you know, everything was I was looking at it from a business owner standpoint a little bit. And I think, man, you know, everything is systematized. Everything happens at the perfect time. I'm dealing with this person for one thing, where I'm dealing with the listing agent for something else. And then even after the sale, there is this process that I'm thinking, wow, this is why you guys have such a phenomenal business, because you have driven a process around that. [00:37:06] So right on that. Thank you. [00:37:10] So talk to me in terms of what I want to go back, if we can. I want to kind of open up the door a little bit more in your relationship with the Lord, with what? That how that drives your behavior. Okay. So real simple. This is kind of what I'm trying to get to. You know, our belief drives the behavior which drives the action. And your belief is up here with your relationship with the Lord. And I want to talk about how does your relationship with the Lord, how is it driven if you can? And I don't know if you've ever thought about it, but, you know, how does it driven what you do in your business, what you do in terms of how you structure it so you have time with your family. Can you talk to us a bit about that? [00:37:58] Yeah, I mean, I I would say a couple of things. I mean, one of the things I mentioned was, you know, in the beginning, I was working 27, 28 days in a row without a day off. I mean, obviously, now I don't work Sundays anymore. It's just one of those things. It's it's a personal thing. I don't work on Sunday. My team knows I don't. I will check messages Sunday evening. Make sure I haven't missed anything important. But otherwise, I spend that with family and just just get my mind focused on the Lord rather than on 20 things at work. And that as far as I think you and I talked about this a little bit before we get started. But one of the things we strongly believe in is do the right thing every time, no questions asked. It doesn't matter how much it cost, doesn't matter what it is. My my desire is to when I get out of this business one day. There can't be anybody that said Josh didn't do the right thing in this instance. And honestly, just I'm speaking about myself here, but I don't know that there is an instance where we haven't done the right thing, even when it meant costing thousands of dollars in costs, because, you know, if we're responsible, we're we're going to take care of it. [00:39:10] So I'd like to I'd like to pipe up on that because I've experienced it. [00:39:16] So you and I are in addition to being personal friends. There's also a vendor client relationship between us under vendor. You're my client. And we've gone through a number of different opportunities to work together in various capacities, each with its own agreement. Well, the thing that's always impressed me with you is doing the right thing. You know, you would follow you. So we were. I remember we were doing something and working with you on a farm. And you wanted to get out of that agreement because there was something else that you felt would be better. But a big conflicting. And this is when you were working with Isaiah, if you remember that. Yes, that's right. And so you called me up and you said, you know, can I get out? What would I have to pay you? Okay. And this is just one example of where, you know, a lot of agents we find when they get to the end of wanting to be someplace. Then at that point, they usually choose to just pull out, OK. And and force their way out. But in every single instance where we would make a transition, you are always there to do the right thing and to make sure that the way it was managed was done properly. And I just really appreciate that that well. [00:40:42] And I always point back to my grandfather. He was in business for years when I was growing up, and he didn't always have the most successful business, but he had the best reputation in the business. And he told me all the time there's more time and make money than there is time to rebuild a reputation. So I try to try to always live that well. [00:41:00] I just think that's really neat. So in what other ways has the your relationship with the Lord impacted besides doing the right thing? [00:41:10] Is there anything else? No, I'm not trying to get to anything specific. I'm just trying to figure out if there's anything else there. [00:41:16] I don't know that anything necessarily comes to mind. [00:41:21] I think that we've I mean, we've sold homes for free before. [00:41:26] I mean, I don't love it. It's not what we're in business to do. But, you know, for instance, I always point to this one because it made sense at the time. But there was a guy moving from our area out of out of state to go start a church. He didn't. He needed some help. He wanted to sell his house and basically I couldn't make a commission. And he said his house is what it came down to. And I said, you know what? I'm just gonna take care of it. We're gonna we're gonna do it. We're gonna sell it for you. But what I need from you is I need a referral like this. That that will help pay me back. Since then, he sent me twelve. I love it. You know, I mean, that's just one of those things. I mean, I don't recommend selling homes for free for everybody. Obviously, we wouldn't be in business for long if we did. But at the same time, it was the right thing to do at that moment. I had no question about it. No. No care or concern. And since then, he's become just a great friend that I followed. And he's now moved out of state again to start another church. And, you know, I mean, I feel like, if nothing else, I was a very small part of him helping reach others for the Lord. And in south Alabama now, now he's out. [00:42:33] So my great job, I am someone I remember someone saying you can't you can never lend to the Lord. [00:42:43] Without getting a whole lot more in return, we don't you know, we don't give to get. But when you give from the heart, you can never be. [00:42:51] It's always in your life is the way I look at it. So, I mean, I'm just doing you know, I'm just trying to show my thanks. [00:42:57] Yeah. Hey, let me ask you something else. And and I don't want to probe too deep that there's something there that you don't want to talk about. But it's an open ended question so you can do whatever you want to with it. [00:43:08] I know a lot of folks who so they they call themselves Christians. OK. They they are. They bash Christ into their life. But maybe their relationship with the Lord is just kind of part time or it's on the side or it's just something Sunday. OK. But they don't really focus on it. I get the impression that your relationship with the Lord is an everyday event and not just an everyday, but it's it's a part of who you are. Am I correct on that? [00:43:40] I would like to think so. I mean, obviously, I still say, like I said, I'm not perfect by any means. I mean, I have my my moments just like everybody else does. But I do try to make it a focus. No. I can always do better. I think we ought to know. But at the same time, I try to try not to just let it, but to show it, you know, and at least try to at least try on a daily basis to do that. [00:44:07] Well, I wanted to say if because, you know, we go through struggles in life all the time and, you know, this is as humans and as Christians. [00:44:17] Is there anything, anything that you can share that you like to share where maybe you or your family went through some sort of tough, challenging times, things that were nerve wracking? Anything that may wear. You can see God's hand really involved. That would just be an encouraging story. [00:44:40] You know, I have. I think of this from time to time and you never know when you do it. I always said I feel like you never know when God's taking care of you until it's done. And then it's like, wow, you know, that was that was definitely God in that. I've got moments. You know, it's hard to just like recall. I mean, I know one of the things that, you know, my first home that I had. It was amazing. Very nice. We loved it, but it was not in the greatest neighborhood, you know. And it was just it was what we could afford at the time. I had my first daughter, and from there we knew that we needed to move just for safety reasons and stuff. I mean, I had a car broken into. Things like that. You know, it just we felt like it was the right place to go. So we my wife actually found a home that she loved while she was out one day. This is when I was working for the bank. I was even in real estate. So she's I come see this house. So I got off of one of them and looked at it. I'm like. Love the house, too. And we prayed about it. We thought we could make things work. And, you know, we. We made the decision to go ahead and do it. And then I realized that's when banking kind of started making some changes. [00:45:46] And I realized I had made some decisions based on bonuses that I was receiving, not off of my paycheck alone. And it was probably not the greatest business decision I could have ever made. Almost a little more expensive. And and it was just it was tough to make payments. But I was actually another bank called and offered me a job. And this was about thirty or forty five days later, you know, and again, we were just praying that we made the right decision. You know, this is what we've done. And we felt we needed to get out of that other other place because it wasn't necessarily a safe neighborhood. The other bank offered me the job and it was a 50 percent pay raise. But what's funny about that is the pay raise was exactly the difference in the mortgage payment from one else to the other. Oh, wow. This isn't this isn't coincidence. You know, I mean, and I've got dozens of stories like that, but like, I don't feel like it was a coincidental thing at all. I mean, it was it was dollar for dollar. The difference in the mortgage payment and the kind of the lifestyle difference there. So anyway, I mean, like I said, I've got I've got plenty of those. But, you know, we didn't we didn't need the bonus money anymore. You know, the the regular salary covered. So I love it. [00:46:58] Well, the Lord is good, isn't he? [00:47:00] Yeah. That's just one example that, you know, I guess I can I could give you many, but that one's the ones by one of my favorites. [00:47:07] I like that a lot. And kind of wrapping up. This has been really a lot of fun. I would love to delve a lot more into some things, but just kind of netting out what I've heard. OK. There just seems to be a reliance on the Lord with your business that he led you there for, you know, even before then with this house and this your new job that paid for, you know, pay for the increased mortgage, you're trying to follow him and you're not doing a perfect job. I get that. In fact, I was just reading in Romans 7:00 this morning where Paul is talking about you got the law of God, which is spiritual, the law of the flesh, which is contrary, and that the sin in me does the things that I don't want to do. So there's constant, constant struggle. Absolutely. And yet you follow the Lord's leading and to real estate. And he gave your wife a wonderful piece about it that surprise you. And he started to bless you. And I think that, you know, a lot of these blessings you guys have had has to be because the Lord has chosen to bless you. He's put you there for a reason. And and to add to that. [00:48:27] It seems like every time I follow what when my wife has a piece about something, it's the right thing to do. I've learned that over time, you know, there's God gives us to help me, as he says in the Bible. So, you know, I mean, she she she is definitely a great partner for life for that kind of stuff, because she gets this pace. And I'm like, well, if you're comfortable, I'm comfortable. You know, I feel like I followed that, that God, every time that works and is. [00:48:54] You're saying how the Lord uses different people in our life to direct us in his will? [00:49:01] Yes. Well, this is really cool. Is there anything else that you'd like to share either on business or personal or spiritual? [00:49:09] Before we close up, I'm nothing I can think of. I'm I'm an open book. I love to share and say anybody has questions. I'm always up for answering them. You know, I get calls from time to time from people that have talked to you. They want to. Want some feedback. I love getting those calls and hand on that and giving you a good testimonial. You've always been great to partner with for us. [00:49:31] I appreciate that. [00:49:33] Hey, I don't do this on these calls, but and I don't know if you're wanting to offer this because this will be out there for a long time. Are you offering that? People can call you. And if so, we can have you tell, you know, how to reach him or. [00:49:51] Yeah. Absolutely. I'm always open for having the conversation. If I can help somebody, I'd love to. So. OK. Wonderful. [00:49:57] So how did they reach out to you? [00:49:59] If they want help in business or help with just maybe they want to apply, you know, serving the Lord and really following them a little bit closer. And they want to talk with you about that. How did they reach out to you? [00:50:14] They can call or e-mail. And I don't know if you can if you can post the information on their phone numbers, 2 0 5 7 0 6 5 2 6 0 email address. Is Josh Josh for an income? [00:50:26] Ok. That's pretty simple. And thanks for allowing that. Oh, very good. Well, I've really enjoyed visiting with you, Josh. This has been a lot of fun. [00:50:36] And for those who are listening or watching, if you've enjoyed this podcast too, please subscribe to it. That way you'll get more podcasts coming out like it also on iTunes and on YouTube. And please go to our. Get sellers calling you Facebook page and in like that as well. And if you want to learn more about what we do. Or maybe there's some services we offer, then feel free to go to our Web site and get sellers calling you dot com. You'll see a link up there that says Agent Dominator and you can go into it from there. My light just went off, so that must mean that the power bill wasn't paid. So this must be the time to close off the call. Josh, thank you so much. I've really enjoyed it. [00:51:22] Thank you, Beatty. Same here. [00:51:26] If you've enjoyed this podcast, be sure to subscribe to it so you never miss another episode. And please, like our get sellers calling you Facebook page. Also, if you want to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence, dominate a geographic farm or convert home valuation leads. Check out our Agent Dominator program. We create custom content that differentiates you from other realtors, then use it to keep you top of mind with your prospects with postcards, targeted Facebook ads, email campaigns, video interviews and more. And the best part is we guarantee your sales or give all your money back. Learn more. Get sellers calling you dot com and select agent dominator in the menu. Thanks for listening to the Get Sellers calling you podcast. [00:52:09] Have a great day. P043 [/fusion_text][/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]

095 FIFM - Evolving Your Bookkeeping With Evolved Finance w/ Parker Stevenson

Freedom in Five Minutes

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 24, 2019 40:43

Following your passion is a grind, and that goes with running a business too. But you just don't run a business based on gut feeling alone. You need to have a sort of feedback dashboard for your know if you're grinding it in the correct direction and doing it properly. In this interview, you'll hear from Parker Stevenson, a partner from Evolved Finance, the usual problems an entrepreneur has, and how having a specific niche and a specific target market can help you solve those problems and grow your business more efficiently. Whether you're a longtime online businessman or someone that's just starting, if you're having issues with bookkeeping, this is the podcast for you. ---------- Automated Transcript Below: Dean Soto 0:01 Hey, this is Dean Soto with FreedominFiveMinutes.com. And we're here again with another freedom in five minutes episode. Today's topic is this evolving your bookkeeping with evolved finance that and more coming up. Alright, cool. So today's podcast, I'm going to go nuts on this one just because this is something that I have needed for a long time and bookkeeping is not the most sexy, not the most exciting thing but but when you have an online business where you're using PayPal, you're paying affiliates and refers different types of commissions. I have a whole boatload of sales coming in from stripe and PayPal and all these different places, depending on where my customer wants to how they actually want to pay. And the big problem that comes up is pretty much every bookkeeper out there that I've ever met has no clue what to do with PayPal, how to reconcile PayPal, how to what to do with affiliate income, the revenue that's coming in, going out and all that other stuff. And oh my gosh, I was I was so happy to find Parker Stephenson from evolve finance because their platform their their service, their agency actually solves this very, very specific problem. So Parker, how's it going, man, I appreciate you coming on. Parker Stevenson 1:39 Dean. It's my pleasure, man. That might be like one of the best intros we've ever had some good bookkeeping. Dean Soto 1:47 Well, it's crazy. It's crazy. You you solve a very specific niche that that literally nobody else business wise, what has this pain unless they already doing a couple of things. They're using PayPal? They're they're selling a service on it or something online. And they're trying they're having to pay pay affiliates. And it is it is crazy, that there's nobody else doing what you guys are doing. And and so, so I that intro is like I literally it's it's just me, like happy as a clam, because you saw me my pain, man. Parker Stevenson 2:28 Well, I think that that's something we talk to our clients a lot about, because I think, especially with an agency business or a service based business, the more you can hone and focus it in the better. And I think with a lot of you know, I'd say financial, just financial professionals, financial businesses, whether it's accounting or bookkeeping, the business model has to be so broad, right? Like the bookkeeper you're working with could be working at on a dentist office could be working on a restaurant and they could be working on your business. There's just more knowledge than any one person could have and have expertise on. Yeah, that. I think it's just such a strength that may seem like it limits your market. And I would imagine for a lot of people in our industry, they go oh, but then I'm not going to have enough clients to work with. But the reality is, there's plenty of all I mean, the online business space is booming. We don't need to do bookkeeping, for any other types of businesses, because we're going to have more business than we can handle for a really long time. Just in this niche alone. So kudos to my business partner Corey for figuring this out back in 2010. Dean Soto 3:33 Yeah, so cool event. it's it's a it's it's great, man. So you, you. So I want to talk a little bit about you. You actually hopped on this bandwagon with Corey, as you were working with a pretty pretty well known company. Can you talk a little bit about that? Parker Stevenson 3:54 Yeah. So before I started working with Korea, double finance. I was working for Adidas golf here in San Diego. It's like the only part of Adidas like their big headquarters for the US is in Portland. And then the corporate headquarters is in Germany. And so I was actually musician back in the day thought I was gonna be a rock star. When I was living in LA and that didn't work out. I went, Okay, what's my other thing I really love and it's like, well, I love golf. I was been a golf addict my whole life. So I'm like, I'm from San Diego. I'm like, San Diego is essentially what Detroit was for the auto industry, San Diego is for the golf industry. So I was like, I'm going to go work for the best golf manufacturer I can find or I can get a job. And sure enough, I got it at Taylor. It was tailor made Adidas golf at the time, and had a really great five year experience there. Like I was saying, before we got started was kind of like my, I'd say like my master's degree and business like I just learned so so much from working there. And especially the position I was in as a merchandiser. And as kind of like a product category manager, I learned so much about how a business functions from all the different places with a lot of it being around numbers to like, there was definitely a lot of financial aspects to what I did that by the time I kind of realized the corporate environment wasn't really my bag, and some doing something more entrepreneurial, was more up my alley, that by the time Corey and I started having serious discussions around how I could get involved in the business, and we could start to become partners, I felt really prepared to be able to not just jump in and help him grow of all finance, but also be able to provide some insights for the clients we serve, that maybe other people who have only been in the online space wouldn't be able to provide. Yeah, Dean Soto 5:40 yeah. See, that's cool that what a what a, what a neat experience, because you're you're literally getting a play with $50 million worth of product and figure out one learn how how to even merchandise and sell and position these things. And then, and it's not like you you're not even, it's not your money. And you you're you're essentially just just learning from literally the best. And taking that from from there. And then going and working with Corey over it evolved finance, how did that transition happen? Where, where? How did you even like, with Corey doing what he was doing? Like, have the aha moment of like, I really want to go and do this Parker Stevenson 6:28 instead? I know, that's a great question too. Because sometimes I'm like, I don't even understand how I don't understand, like how we got to this place. But Corey and his wife, Anna, are actually really good friends with my wife like they grew up together. So I've known Corey Nana for a long time now ever since I met my wife, which was about 12 years ago. And so I knew they had this business. But it was just like, cool. You guys have a business. It seems like it's doing well. Good for you guys. But I was very much into my career. But once I kind of got was getting close to that five year mark at Adidas, I was starting to feel like there wasn't really a next step for me like I was, for my personality. I'm a generalist, I like to know about a lot of different things, which is why I like the merchandising position. But it was so straight. It was a very stressful, crazy job. Like a lot of people that had that role before me didn't stay in it very long. Like there was a lot of people I stayed in that position. And so I sort of realized, like, getting into an entrepreneurial position would allow me to kind of have my business add put to work, because, you know, obviously I'd have to learn bookkeeping. And I started at very humble beginnings with Corey. But the more Corey and I talked, the more we realized, all right, he can teach me the book eat, like the specific intricacies of the service we provide the client, but I'd be able to bring in a new perspective, like being more of a future thinking business development sort of mind, I think kind of felt like hey, like, I just don't, I just can't help but think we'd be able to like double, triple quadruple this business, just putting our strengths together. Yeah. And that was the really good thing that I think Corey, and I realized is that Korea is very different skills than I have. And so that's what's made our partnership so strong, and what's allowed us to work so well together. And so just kind of realizing our personalities match well, him and his wife kind of telling me like, hey, these are all the things we have going on. We have all these clients we can't support right now, if you come on and start supporting them, and then we'll start to hire a team. It just started, I think we just saw, you know, three, four years down the road, like we could build a real team. And I'm really like, he's already had so much demand just happening that I'm like, I don't have a business idea. I have no idea what kind of business I want to start. And I think what I've realized is I'm really good at taking so even being a creative person being a musician. Yeah. But I think I was really good at taking the initial vision they had and be able to add and build upon that because of my experience at Adidas. So it seems crazy. I took a massive pay cut. And you know, it took a couple years for us to really hit our stride. But it's been like so worth it. And the business is really thriving. Now that we have done a lot of the work to make the business more successful. Yeah, Dean Soto 9:19 that is awesome. It is. Yeah. See, I love that. I love that story. The so with. So once once, like, I want to talk. Okay, so there's two things we're going to kind of colliding in my head right now. One is I'm like, you know, what were some of the things that you guys had to do to actually start scaling this business. But before that, I kind of I think, I think I want to give the audience really, they hear why I'm so excited. But I kind of want you to give the description of that. What you guys the big problem you guys solve? Because I know my problems. And I'm sure you mean I'm I'm sure you have kind of a better way of putting out that that that message but yeah, so like, what makes you guys so different from every other bookkeeper that's out there? Parker Stevenson 10:19 Well, that's what got me interested in the business to begin with is exactly what I'm about to explain. We were talking a little bit about it before. I I never thought I'd get involved in a bookkeeping business man, like I that just wasn't my Mo. Like, I've told our clients, I don't try to talk a whole lot about it. But I told her clients like I'm not a fine, I needed to get get a degree in finance. And the reality is bookkeeping isn't rocket science. Yeah, it's not. But just for me, having been a musician, like a guy that was going after my passions, I want to work in the golf industry, I want to work in the music industry, like I wanted to do this stuff that I thought was cool, but keeping the Nazi. But as I got older and more mature, I realized that stuff, you know, following your passion becomes a grind no matter what it is. And so what matters is working with people you like feeling fulfilled from the work, I know, for me feeling of service to other people, feeling like I can make an impact wherever I'm at, like that becomes really important. And so when Corey was kind of telling me about what they were doing it of all fit finance, even though I wasn't like a bookkeeping expert at that point. I was like, Is there anyone else doing what you're doing? And he's like, not really, like we were talking about, like, our niche is so specific, that we are solving a problem that we've seen repeatedly Now, over the years, because we've talked with I mean, I've been on so many calls since I started the business, hundreds of entrepreneurs. And that has taught us so much about what the struggles our clients have had before they start working with us. So over the years, we've just honed down our service more and more like when Corey got started, we kind of did all of the bookkeeping things. And now we're only focusing on the bookkeeping, things that we can be really, really, really good at and make the most impact on and we've built all our systems and processes around that. But this is kind of like if any, if the listeners can kind of take away something from this is that from working with such a specific niche, again, I hear the same problems over and over again, and we understand what our clients are going through number one, because we run an online business, as well. So that helps. But secondly, because we built a service that does fit in niche. So specifically in solves such a specific problem, it's easier to relate to your clients, and it's easier to wow them, and to reduce the stress and create excitement around solving that problem for them, especially because they haven't been able to find a solution anywhere else. So that alone is such a competitive advantage over the experience our clients have had working with other bookkeepers because it just it's it's nothing sexy, just understanding their problem having a service that addresses that problem, like dead on we don't, you know, I think sometimes some small businesses kind of skirt around with their messaging or don't get focused enough on what they're really trying to accomplish with their service or with their product. And that's just one thing that we're very lucky to have figured out a long time ago is this like, taking care of the books for an online business properly, and then helping our clients to understand what those numbers mean? It's simple when I say it like that. But the reality is, if you've worked with an accountant worked with the bookkeeper work with any financial professional, a lot of them just don't get that they don't understand that customer service is important. They don't understand that the relationship with their client is super important. And I'm not trying to like crap on anyone who has a accounting business or bookkeeping business, like, I'm sure there's other ones out there that have good customer service experiences. But our clients, when they come to us, they haven't. And so all those pieces of just no one else serving this niche, us being able to really hone in our service, because we know this niche so well. Like, that was the opportunity. And it's not it's not like we have a new app like this crazy new app, or like it's something super revolutionary. It's just innovating, what's been a very old, sort of unchanged service and catching it up to modern times, essentially. And that, for me was the reason why I was excited to jump in. Because it's like, we essentially have no competition. And we have a super specific target market. Like it doesn't get any better than that. Dean Soto 14:29 Yeah, no, for sure. I love I love it. I still remember, the first time I had so I went from from it was what was it called outright. And then it turned into GoDaddy bookkeeping. And then that was like when that was that was like when I was just starting out in my business. And it was I didn't need QuickBooks as soon as I went to QuickBooks because I had to do when I became a Subchapter S. LLC, and, and I was doing a lot more comments. It's stuff that that online entrepreneurs face. I was like, holy crap, I literally can, I don't even understand how to reconcile, at the end of the month, this doesn't make sense to me, and everything like that, I've hired a bookkeeper to just explain to me how to do all of this stuff for my for my thing, and she, she was literally like, Oh my gosh, like, you're all messed up like this, I'm not used to this. And I'm like, that doesn't help. Like, it doesn't help me at all. And so, so like, and that have almost happened pretty much over and over with people going, just not understanding a lot of the stuff like the affiliate commissions and, and, and PayPal reconciling and things like that. And so even just in your messaging, it's like, bam, like, that's, that's my problem, like, and it's cool how you guys have done that. And, and even though it might be a little scary to do that, you're really speaking to a lot of people just with that messaging and pitching down like that. Parker Stevenson 16:10 Yeah, and that's a key to I think any really successful online business, I mean, there's more competition online than there's ever been. So the more you can find your specific people, like even if it seems like a really small audience, speak to them directly and clearly have the confidence to have your messaging, speak directly there because it's taken us a long, a long time to really build our copy on our website and our messaging, through our content and all that to just be so focused and direct to talk just to the people that need to hear it, right like not the people that are like and maybe take it or leave it, we're talking to people like your team that are like, oh, I've struggled with this, I'm not getting the support we need. And I think that's the one thing I want to explain because like your your situation, I'd like for you to be doing your books in the early stage of your business fine. Like it's an extra expense that if you're just getting started and just trying to make some money, manage it in a spreadsheet, like but we never recommend any like entrepreneur, try to learn how to use bookkeeping software, like you gotta go make money like make, you need to be spending all of your time and energy around finding clients, building your leads, like figuring out how to drive revenue, that keep your finances simple in the early stages. And once money starts coming in. That's when you hire someone else to do the books because that's, that's a skill set that for you, as a business owner to take the time to learn how to do properly, which again, even to find the resources to teach you the way we would want to do it for an online business, it's just the chances are slim, you're going to get the right tutorials. Anyways, it's a skill set that took me it took me a year to get really good at really doing the books for our clients. And that was after the support of you know, Corey and an employee, Susan, that we've had that who's been with the business for a really long time. And now I live and breathe this stuff, I can do it in my sleep. But no one running a business that's on a bookkeeping business should know how to do this stuff in their sleep, they should be outsourcing that to someone like us who actually knows how to do it, right. And the thing is, with bookkeeping, there's so much room for interpretation, like that's kind of the frustrating part is that every bookkeeper is going to do it differently, they're going to set up your chart of accounts differently and your profit and loss statements differently. Some of them are going to do cheats to kind of like sneak around having to do a lot of manual labor to do it raw, you know, like so that aspect of this industry to is difficult because it's hard to find someone that's going to, again, have the understanding of your business well enough to know what needs to be done right? And where can you be a little more efficient. And again, I it obviously works for our business, but anyone else who's listening, especially if you have an agency, a service or anything like that, like, Just don't be afraid to hone that service down to a specific specific problem, like you don't have all of the problems for every business, just have one target market, get in that niche and solve that problem really well. And, you know, we've had nothing but referrals, like we just started marketing, in the last six months really like really trying to push there. And we could still like we don't need it, we just want to grow faster. But when you do such a good job, and you are so good at solving that one problem, people are going to talk about it, people are going to want to share it and especially in the early stages of a new business. It's a damn great way to make sure you start getting you know, more clients down the road. Unknown Speaker 19:36 Yeah, that is cool, man. I Dean Soto 19:37 love it. I love the I love the fact that you went from being a musician, to working at Adidas and wanting to be wanting wanting to be like this. You know, rub shoulders with these really, you know, awesome celebrities and everything like that. And even through just from nicking down and doing what you're doing with the bookkeeping. You actually have literally, seriously like one of my don't tell my wife one of my crushes from from the 90s with the matrix, you as one of your customers, Carrie, boss. I know I as soon as I saw I saw her they're like, Oh my god, this is crazy. What? And so that's pretty. That's a cool little story. Yeah. Parker Stevenson 20:24 Well, and that's the thing is like, I think the world is changing so much with technology and what the internet's allowing people to do and entertain me think about entertainment changing. I mean, she's obviously been extremely successful. But think about goop. You know, and what, what's her name? Who has a group, I'm terrible at names, but Gwyneth Paltrow, you know, she makes a great living as an actress and as a celebrity. And she starts this eat calm lifestyle website that's blown up. Like I think even people who are already in the spot, are looking for ways to connect with their audiences more looking for ways to share maybe knowledge I can carry Anne's situation. She's like this super highly trained meditation perfect professional, she's a badass yoga instructor like she she has this whole other aspect of her life that she's sort of kept out of the limelight that now she's like, starting a business around, right like and bringing in bringing interest in. And in all of our and and what's interesting is like in this industry, a lot of our clients are like little celebrities within their own right, right. Like they all, they all have their audiences that follow them and are looking to them for advice and guidance and buy their products. And that's like, I kind of look at the way our clients run their businesses now, kind of like back in the days of my space when I was in the band, where it's like, everyone's trying to, like, get as many people to like their MySpace page, and, you know, click, click on the page and listen to the songs and see the song count. And in a lot of ways, that's kind of what everyone's doing with the small businesses, because I think Adidas has the power of brand awareness, right, like everyone knows the three stripes and knows what a Adidas logo looks like, or knows what a coke logo is, right? They don't, they don't have to worry, those kinds of huge brands don't have to worry about awareness. But when you're running a small business, you might only have someone's attention for a short period of time. And so during that short period, you need to make sure you're making an impact with whatever content you have, whatever your website same. And inevitably, a lot of especially these business owners we have that have more personality type branded businesses, if they do a good job of that they kind of build fans, they build followers that start to trust them and want to follow them either for entertainment purposes, or educational purposes. So it's definitely been super interesting to see like these people we get to, we get to work with and all that. And it's definitely a huge it's one of the things that's super interesting about what we do and takes what's like, a normally boring subject and bookkeeping, and makes it like so intriguing and engaging, because we're really just looking at like, the core aspects of all these people's businesses and making sure they're running properly. So it's, I'm glad you appreciate it, because I think in some ways we get used to it. I think it's definitely not the way I thought I'd be making an impact on, you know, people's lives and people's businesses, let alone these really amazing entrepreneurs that, you know, in their own rights have amazing stories, amazing experiences, like I love talking with their clients, because they're truly fascinating and accomplished people Unknown Speaker 23:30 now, I love that man. Dean Soto 23:32 It's that is Yeah, it's it just cool. It's, it's just neat how, how, because of solving that that one problem ever. Anyone who is going to be the go from from, you know, being a celebrity or, or from anywhere. Soon as they get into the online space, where they're having these, you know, they're taking things from PayPal, they're doing these very specific things. Boom, now night, you solve that problem. And now you're literally being able to talk to people that are in it and and help them to grow new new things. These and these are people who are almost unreachable in other ways. And it just cool how, through having that very specific niche, you've been able to do that. Yeah, really amazing. The so I always ask this five minute mindset shifts question this five minute strategy, that if someone were to take it and use it, it would change the game for them, because it's changed the game for you. So what's you mentioned? That, that you like to have, like a feedback, like a feedback dashboard type thing? Can you explain that, in regards to how it's helped you to massively change the way your business and other people's businesses? Parker Stevenson 24:59 Yeah, so that's, like, the reality of everyone's business here. Like if you're listening, and you have an online business or small business, the reality is, like, even if you have the most heart centered business, and you're naive, it's not about the money, it's about helping people or whatever your mindset around your businesses, you your business is still a cash machine is this this machine that sucking money in and spitting money out, hopefully keeping some for you, that's the reality of your business. Like that's what truly is going to make it successful or not successful. No matter how happy your clients are, no matter how good you are at whatever it is you do, how many how much volume you sell of your products, if the money side of things doesn't work, then you're not playing the game, right, you don't have your business model setup, and you're not properly you're not focusing on the right things. So the example I use a lot is that everyone needs to know, they need to get feedback on the decisions they're making in their business. And that feedback comes in the form of your financial data. And unfortunately, unless you have someone organizing that financial data for you, a lot of people just ignore it, they don't look at their financial data. And especially even if they're a newer, younger business, and they could be doing it in a spreadsheet themselves. They just I don't think people see enough value in that. And so what I like to kind of use as an analogy is, you know, if you were driving a car without a dashboard, like you just had no idea about the speedometer, you have check engine light, your oil gauge, all of that stuff is just not there, you can't see it, you can still drive the car without it. But you're guessing when you need to fill up on gas, you're guessing when you need to kind of you know, do your oil, change your guessing if like, there's an entity, you have to, you no longer have this direct input to see if your car's running properly. You know, and you know, the check engine light could be on and blinking. Yeah, and it's just you have it covered up and you can't see you have no idea there's this catastrophic problem that could be coming your way. And until your car just breaks down. And that car is symbolic of a lot of our clients, businesses in our own business. If you don't have this financial tracking, and some sort of feedback happening every month to see, hey, am I spending my money on the right things? Am I doing enough to drive revenue to cover the expenses? I have? Is my business profitable enough? Am I saving enough for taxes, there's all these aspects of running a business that I think you a lot of entrepreneurs don't realize they need to pay more attention to until the pain becomes so bad that they have no choice but to figure it out. Which is a lot of times we when we find them, or they just ignore it until they get a huge tax bill, or literally their business breaks down and then it's no longer profitable. And they can't and they have to shut the business down. Yeah. And so that's the power we've seen with our clients with what we do is that as soon as they start getting these hard numbers in front of them, and they're like, oh, like, I didn't realize I could understand this, I didn't realize how important this was, I didn't realize how important feedback was for me to get, they instantly changed the way they think about their business. Because in some ways it does become a game. How do I make sure these numbers stay healthy, and I make these numbers the way I want through the daily activity of myself and my team in the business. And that's something Corey and I have seen tremendously in our own business, we have our own, you know, financial tracking we do for ourselves, that allows us to plan for the future that allows us to make sure that what we're doing on a monthly basis is supporting our team supporting our clients, we're hitting our financial goals. And all of that is just getting comfortable with your financial data, getting that feedback on a monthly basis. So you can just actually know, is this business running well, or is it not? And you can't, you can only go off of a gut feeling for so long. So that's what I would challenge everyone here to do, whether it's going out and hiring a bookkeeper, or just taking managing your finances yourself, like in your spreadsheet, or wherever it is, yourself taking that really seriously and using that financial data to start shaping the future of your business. Unknown Speaker 29:01 That's cool. And I, I Dean Soto 29:05 I can totally so I, I've had situations where, where if I didn't know the numbers, I would have been in a world of hurt. Parker Stevenson 29:13 Yeah, for sure. And Dean Soto 29:15 in any way even like little things too, because if they, you know, I can imagine since I mean, depending on depending on the the tears and stuff that you guys offer. I know some of them, you actually talk with your clients on a regular basis. Once you get the report, sometimes it could be something like, you know, just me seeing Why am I spending so much on this type of software this or are in software in general? And do I have like things that are just that I'm not even using? Or why Why? You know, I don't have anything, like you said for taxes for payroll taxes for estimated taxes, things like that, if I don't have it, if I don't have awareness of how much am I going to actually have to pay? You know, there's a there's a lot of things that that have happened just from seeing the numbers. I mean, just recently I cut, cut a lot of software that I was like, for whatever reason, I was like, I'm going to use that someday we're going to use it someday. And it was like $400 or $500, or the software just sitting there doing it not doing anything for my business at all. And so I'm like, oh, cancel, cancel, cancel, cancel, cancel. Parker Stevenson 30:33 But, but those audits are important that's important to keeping the business is profitable as possible, right? Dean Soto 30:38 Yeah. And I would imagine to it has there ever been any situation where where a client was, say even giving too much like affiliate income or something like that, to where it was actually hurting their business or something like where it was actually hurting their business because they didn't realize too much is going out. And you're not even keeping any for your Have you ever had any. Parker Stevenson 31:01 I mean, we've seen it all man, it's crazy Dean, we're just recently this year, we have this client, a newer client, who I just absolutely adore. He's such an amazing, amazing person, but he had a whole revenue stream that we were looking at going, you need to cut this revenue stream out, it's taking up all of your time. It's called stress and making your business less profitable. And we're not really making any money off of it. So why why do we have this, these two other offers you have are the ones that are easier to manage, provide more value, and we can grow, they still have tremendous potential for growth. So we get in a situation like that, especially on the revenue side, or sometimes clients are trying to sell too many offers, they have too many offers. And a small business just can't afford they know there's not enough time or enough marketing dollars to try to talk about and promote a ton of different things on a regular basis, we've seen quite realize oh, like because there's, there's all these balances, right? Like you're trying to find the balance of keeping the business healthy, while also making sure you're getting paid as an owner and making the money you need to make to support your family and your lifestyle. And then also, and and there's a lot of intricacies between the balance of those two things like building up savings within your business so that if you have a down month, we have cash to get us through that. And it's not a stressful situation. Or sometimes where someone is taking out too much money from the business, they don't realize how much they're taking out. Because they're looking at their business as still their own personal bank account. And then realize that even though the business is would be successful in the eyes of almost anyone probably listening right now, you'd be like, Oh, I'd love to have a business like this. But they're still in financial turmoil, because they're just not aware of how much they're paying themselves how much they're spending on different things. So the bottom line might look good on the p&l, but the reality is, they're still kind of cash poor, there's just not enough cash in the business that if they wanted to hire another person, if you wanted to start running Facebook ads, they have no flexibility to adapt or jump on opportunities in the future. So there's just it's such a delicate balance between being able to invest in the businesses future be able to protect the business in the long run, while also keeping the business super profitable. So you as a business owner can build your own wealth. And the only way you can figure out what that balance feels how that balance works best for you and for your situation is to have that monthly scorecard to have that monthly feedback. So you can make those decisions to give your business the best chance of sticking around for a really long time. And to give you the best chance as a business owner to have a business that will actually create personal wealth for you as well. Dean Soto 33:44 Yeah, dude, I've never been so excited about bookkeeping. It's crazy, man. It's It's awesome. Like it's it's, it's, it's cool. They get you know, my wife is really good with numbers. And she that's all like, for me, I'm like I do it for me to be like, idealist. I can I can just go do my thing. Come back, see what the numbers are. Okay, things are good. Okay, go go do go do my thing. Come back, oh, things are not so good. Let me fix this. And to just like you said, be fully out there. And doing what I do best, rather than, you know, crap. Now I have to spend six hours at the end of this month doing my bookkeeping, and I don't even know if I'm doing it right. And I don't even you know, like it. It's a it's a very painful process in a one that I avoid if I have to do it myself, you know. And which then gives me no feedback, Parker Stevenson 34:42 you know, it. And we don't expect any of our clients to be financial pros. We're not asking them to be a CFO. All we're asking them to do is to, like you just said, take a look at the numbers. See where you're at, realize where you need to make some adjustments, realize where you see your opportunities, or even just pat yourself on the back things are going well. Everything's going as planned. Great. And then you go back into business, we're talking about 30 minutes to an hour and a half a month. Yep, of looking at your numbers and taking that part of your business seriously. We're not running multinational corporations here. No one needs CFO, we don't need controllers or like full time financial reporting, we just need this part of our businesses organized cleanly like Marie Kondo. This stuff right here, you know, Marie Kondo your business and get the financial stuff organized. And so that way, you have a clean, well organized machine, that is giving you the feedback, you need to see, am I doing a good job as a business owner or not. And again, just those reports on their own, most people want to be able to just read a report and know and that's where the second part of our service comes in, which is the education part around understanding what those numbers are. And again, it's not rocket science here. But at the end of the day, if you've never worked in the financial situation, you know, so many of our clients never even worked in a big company before, right? Like they've only been entrepreneurs, or they were more creatives or doing something else that wasn't really business oriented. And now all of a sudden, they're in these businesses. And they're like, what, like, they don't know what they don't know, totally, totally. But they're still fully capable of learning this stuff. Because if you can add and subtract man, defined as a business owner, we just need to step up and get the right information in front of you. I love it. I love it. Dean Soto 36:30 So how can people reach you? How can people if they if they want to schedule a time with you, or just be to work with you? How can people actually get in contact with you and Corey? Parker Stevenson 36:42 Yeah, so the best way is just go to our website of all finance calm, there's scheduled call buttons all over the website to have you set up a time. But I recommend taking a look at the website, because we definitely make it very clear what type of businesses we work with, and sort of where you need to be at to be a good fit for us. But I think I'd spend you a link for really great download as well. So we have a sales forecasting tool that I think is a much longer link than probably makes sense to say over. So look in the podcast details I imagine are on the on the blog page for this podcast upload. But it's the free Sales Forecast Tool that if you're like, new to the numbers side of things, and you want to see the power of taking some time to think about the financial side of your business and the power of using your numbers to shape what the future of your business can look like. And make sure that you're building a business that's going to be profitable, and healthy. Then the sales forecasting tools, just a spreadsheet that we've done all the work for you just plug some numbers in. And it also comes with a free to tour, a tutorial video tutorial that'll walk you through exactly how to use it. I honestly think it's like one of the best free things any business educator gives away, because I just, I would never start a business or get involved in a business. If I didn't have a budget and a forecast in place to see what's the the potential of this business and this tool will get you get you on your way to feeling like your numbers aren't so scary. Awesome. Dean Soto 38:07 Yeah, I love that. I love that. So yeah, we'll put those in that will put that in the show notes. But definitely go head over to evolved finance.com evolved finance, calm, ev OLVD finance.com just in case, just in case you didn't know how to spell that. Or if I'm slurring or whatever. But go check it out. I mean, they're, they're really awesome. If you're, if you're doing anything online, and you're you have affiliates or PayPal or anything like that, you know, do you have to definitely check them out because it is painful, especially as you start being getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and you're getting a lot more things that you're managing and a lot more different revenue streams, it becomes harder and harder and harder. So so all that being said, thanks so much for being on man. I appreciate you, Parker Stevenson 39:02 Dean. I appreciate you having me. It was really fun talking with you. Dean Soto 39:06 Yeah, it's is is awesome. Like I said, this is didn't expect to be so excited about bookkeeping man. So thanks, Parker. Yeah, thank you. So Alright, cool. So that is the end of this podcast episode. But of course, it's not the end of the podcast. If you want to get a virtual systems architect, go head over to freedom in five minutes calm. What they can do for you is you show them a video, five minutes a day, they're documented. They'll do it for you and you never have to do that thing ever again. So go check out freedom in five minutes calm, go check out evolved finance.com as well. And until next time, I will see you on the next freedom in five minutes podcast episode.

detroit boom germany nazi korea portland myspace san diego so i'm cfo marie kondo gwyneth paltrow paypal llc godaddy adidas so i've quickbooks i'm i'm parker stevenson it's it unknown speaker

P039 Three 30-second videos weekly produce 140 transactions a year with Krista Mashore

Get Sellers Calling You: real estate marketing agent coaching seller leads generation Realtor Tom Ferry Brian Buffini Gary Va

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 19, 2019 52:24

[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent="no" equal_height_columns="no" menu_anchor="" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" id="" background_color="" background_image="" background_position="center center" background_repeat="no-repeat" fade="no" background_parallax="none" parallax_speed="0.3" video_mp4="" video_webm="" video_ogv="" video_url="" video_aspect_ratio="16:9" video_loop="yes" video_mute="yes" overlay_color="" video_preview_image="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" padding_top="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" padding_right=""][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type="1_1" layout="1_1" background_position="left top" background_color="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" border_position="all" spacing="yes" background_image="" background_repeat="no-repeat" padding_top="" padding_right="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" margin_top="0px" margin_bottom="0px" class="" id="" animation_type="" animation_speed="0.3" animation_direction="left" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" center_content="no" last="no" min_height="" hover_type="none" link=""][fusion_text]Watch the live interview below [/fusion_text][fusion_text] Transcription (was completed by automated process. Please ignore any speech-to-text errors) [00:00:01] This is the get sellers calling you marketing podcasts for real estate agents. And I'm Beatty Carmichael. [00:00:06] For simple to do proven marketing strategies focus exclusively on finding sellers and getting more listings. Visit our Web site, get sellers calling you dot com. [00:00:16] And now let's begin our next session of get sellers calling you. [00:00:23] So, hey, I'm Beatty Carmichael and welcome to another session of the Get Sellers calling you real to podcast. And I'm really excited today to visit with a friend of mine that I've met several years back. And I've just always been amazed with what she's done. And from California named to make sure. So, Krista, say hello. [00:00:43] Hi, Beatty. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. It's wonderful what you're doing. [00:00:48] Well, I am really thrilled to have you on board. I've worked with a lot of agents and have interviewed a lot of folks. And you're one of the very top in the producing writes that I've worked with. And when you and I spoke a couple of years ago, it was just I was flabbergasted with the volume that you drove and the the ease in which you did it. So I'm excited about what you have to share for our listeners today and what they can take away from it. [00:01:15] Yes. So my goal is just to add as much value as possible. So feel free to ask me any questions. I'm an open book. There's nothing that I'm going to hold back. So you ask away. I will deliver. [00:01:26] I will do that for sure. And just also for those listening. Krista has actually started to share some of this and a coaching program. So we'll talk about that maybe toward the end of the call. But, Krista, I would love to find out real quickly for those listening. This is an Internet call, so just being part in any Internet type of interference. But, Krista, give us a little background on who you are and just to establish why it's important that someone wants to listen to this call from you. [00:01:55] Well, I'm just I'm a mom, number one, and a wife. And I have been in the top 1 percent of real estate agents nationwide for about 17 years running. [00:02:05] So no matter what the market was, I found a way to make sure that I was on top of it. So I sold over two thousand homes in my career personally with me. And that's not a big team of people that was with me and an assistant in a transaction coordinator. So just recently, I've changed my mind the way that I run my team because I now I have a team and they're helping me more so that I can focus on my coaching. But yeah, we're. We love it. [00:02:33] I love it. So I have to ask this question to you, because this is one of the things that really surprised me earlier. How much volume do you do? Do you mind sharing? [00:02:43] As far as numbers. [00:02:44] Yeah. Or just anything. Just to quantify. [00:02:47] So my series sold one hundred and sixty nine homes the year before last. I sold one hundred and fifty one. And last year I sold one hundred and four homes just working on my business five percent of the time. So I literally make my 90 members on my coaching fibrosis on real estate because I want to still make sure I'm on the cutting edge of what's happening and I'm managing my team. But yeah, we sold it over a hundred and four homes last year. Transitioning me out of the business and just being kind of the face of it because of our systems and strategies that we had in place. [00:03:18] I love it. So systems and strategies. [00:03:20] That's what I want to head toward. So long. So you did a lot of volume. You've been able to replicate that volume, having it come in independent from you. Talk to me in terms of what do you do? What what type of systems if. First off, let me ask you this. In the marketplace, are you focused on personal contacts or are you going after more cold market? You're buying leads. What's the general funnels that you work with? [00:03:45] Ok, so let me kind of explain my strategy. Number one, we really, really we utilize social media and video heavily. We we teach it. And that's what's helped me grow my real estate business and help me continue to stay in the forefront. And we focus on sellers primarily, but with that, we get plenty of buyers because we are focused on sellers. So we run. We utilize this video heavily. And what I mean by that is many people will use video maybe, but they won't use it correctly. So they'll do video, but then they'll just put it on their Facebook page or they'll put it on their whatever, but they don't do any kind of marketing behind it. So what we do is we we are I call a community market leader. Right. So my goal is anything real estate or or city related, my city thinks about me. They think real estate or they think community. They know my name. And so we're constantly putting out videos and community videos and we know what's happening in town, what's going on, real estate and not real estate related, but community related without ever asking you to do anything in return. So many times people are always selling themselves. Right. I'm the best thrill driving the number one. I'm this. I'm that instead of just serving. So we teach people to serve and not sell. And by serving you inadvertently will sell, if that makes sense. [00:05:04] And also the me, if I don't mind me interrupting. So you're doing these videos as well. What's going on in them in the space? Where are you sending them? What are you doing with the video? [00:05:15] So first we just try to develop trust. So the first and my initial contact is just to run a Facebook. Right. And just boosting is not enough. You need it. Run your ads to your ads manager account on Facebook because then you can target and retarget. You can create look like audiences. You can really, really know what people are doing and make adjustments based upon what is and what's not working. And we just you know, we utilize the reach objective initially. So we reach as many people as possible in the community and they continue to see us. It's like brand awareness. We're getting them to get to know our brand and we're just giving value. Hey, you know, there's this new subdivision that's being built or versus great new family restaurant that was open. Nor here's here's a new activity that's happening this weekend. Right. Oh, and by the way, interest rates are going up or down or whatever it might be. And then we don't ask for anything. So many people will create funnels and landing pages and they'll ask for people's information or phone number. [00:06:14] But nobody wants to give it to you because they're getting bombarded by ads. But once they get to know you like you and trust you, break down barriers, you become more of an authority figure. They're much more likely to want to be able to want to give you their information. Right. So the strategy that we teach agents is the strategy that I use is we teach you how to get to be known. Right. Because in order to be known, you have to be seen. You have to be heard. So the objective is to let your community get to know you like you trust you be seen as the expert and then you ask for people's information. You know, people are doing it backwards. They're saying, give me your vacation, fill out this ad. Right. Thought this lead form when no one even knows who you are. So you've got to really. It's called relationship marketing, right? It's what I call engagement working. But you're developing a relationship with your community. You're getting to be known as the expert authority and then you're asking for their information. [00:07:07] So we utilize but oh, just say this is brilliant. [00:07:11] You're using you're using Facebook, targeting either custom or look alike or or different audiences. You're building up their recognition of who you are and that built up trust. They're seeing you. And we know that if someone can meet you, they're much more likely to do business with you. So by doing the videos or seeing you, they're getting to trust you. They know like you and Mel, you've won a relationship with them. [00:07:37] Yeah. So then we welcome that listing appointment. They're already hugging me and they feel like I know you. And, you know, I'll be walking around town and everyone's like Krista. That was the marquee doing a, you know, high five. And me, I have no clue who would do whatever is at the time. But they feel like they know because they see me. I'm a I'm a. So you got to think about something like you're losing this. You got to understand how powerful social media is. In 30 days, more video content is uploaded on the Internet in 30 days. Then all of the major networks over the past 30 years, so more networked, more video is uploaded onto Facebook, Instagram, YouTube in one month. Then CBS, NBC, ABC, PBS. I can keep going on in the past 30 years. Right. So it's like you have your own digital marketing platform. You have your own TV right in front of everyone. Because people are not even really watching TV anymore. They're watching like my children do not own cable right there and there. They're going to be a virus very, very soon. People are watching videos or watching YouTube. They're watching Facebook. They're looking at Instagram. They want to know about people. What people are doing. That's the new TV now. [00:08:48] You know, this is brilliant for the sake of our audience who may not be as familiar with Facebook advertising, could you do maybe just a short two, three minute primer on what's going on? You know, you're mentioning Reach, you're mentioning all the different type of campaign objectives and give this little primer and then I want to jump back into where we are. And once that foundation is light and take it a little bit deeper, can we do that? [00:09:13] You mean primer on why you should utilize Facebook? [00:09:16] No, not for those people who may not have done anything with Facebook as manager. OK. So that's kind of new to them. Does that make sense? [00:09:23] Yes. OK. So. Well, first, you have to understand this. The average person goes to Facebook for 51 minutes a day. They go there 17 times. There's two point three billion active users on Facebook right now. This is I'm just going to talk about Facebook, because at the same time, we're not going talk about Instagram and all that. Although Instagram is also a platform that you should be looking into because millennials are more on Instagram and they're on Facebook. Right. And we're starting to see a shift from people buying from Facebook to Instagram. And it's cheaper to advertise on Instagram now than it is on Facebook. Well, let's just talk about Facebook. So the average person, the average agent we have found this is this is true stat. So the National Association of Realtors says that only 16 percent of agents are utilizing Facebook. That's that's a step from the net than they are. We found from our research that less than 1 percent of agents are utilizing it correctly. All right. So most agents are doing is they're posting on their personal page or posting on their business page. But Facebook is an algorithm. They want your money. They want you to pay them. So you've got to pay them to get your ads to show up in front of people. If you're not paying Facebook to show up, to have your ads seen in front of people, you're only being seen by the people who are most likely interacting with you. Right. That's your your best friends and your family members. It's people that are that Facebook is putting your stuff in front of people that are engaging. You're not reaching the rest of your community. [00:10:47] OK. So we create ads and we have anywhere from seventeen thousand one hundred and twenty thousand people that we use that see our ads, which means that we we go into Facebook, we go into our ads manager account. That's step one. Go to Facebook. Set up for ass. Set up an ad up. Get a business page. Right. Then you've got to run your ads through your ads manager account. Many agents will just boost. Now, boosting is not sufficient enough because if you're just boosting, you are not able to do anything with that information. Right. When you set up an ad for your ads, manage your account. You're then able to create lookalike audiences. What that means is you're able to say, hey, this ad ran really, really well. We've got great reach, tons of engagement, engagement, meaning people are liking, commenting and sharing. They're engaging with your ad. So you can say, oh, this ad performed so well. I want you to find more people that are like this. Facebook and the Facebook algorithm will find people that are more likely to engage in your ad. They will create a whole new audience. Right now, the second ability, which is so, so important, is that you're able to reach target and retarget means that you're able to as somebody watches your ad on you, it's it's basically you're creating a funnel. You do a video on three chips to sell your house to get maximum exposure. Right. Then you have, let's say, 50000 people see that ad and then you say, OK, you know, Facebook, I want you to find the people that were the most engaged, the ones that watched more of the video. [00:12:19] The ones that liked are shared. And I want you to send them another video on seven months when selling like make sure you did seven things you have to do in selling to make maximize your investment. Right. And then you can take even for a rookie. Now they watch the first video and the second video. Now I want to send them a link for a CMA. Do I know what your house is worth? Well, yes. These people now, you know, those leads are super qualified, highly engaged leads because they've already watched two of your videos. They're not watching videos on how to sell a house for more money if they're not thinking of selling. So now you take you take you know, maybe you got one hundred leads down to 20 that are super serious, engaged, active sellers. Make sense. So that's the importance of utilizing social media and Facebook, because number one, ninety five percent of buyers and sellers say they search online first. Right. We know according to the National Association of Realtors, that buyers and sellers take a minimum of three to six months. They start looking before they ever take action. Your goal is to show up where they're looking, which is on social media, and B, be there when they finally want to act. So you're developing this relationship with them for months and months and months. And they're they're looking at your step because they're interested. They want to know more. So then when they finally want to act, you're in front of them. And they they've now established you as the expert authority. So when they think about selling, they'll think about you or buying. Right. [00:13:46] You know, this is brilliant because I love the process. You know, I remember when you and I spoke a couple of years ago, you mentioned that when you started to do videos, your business just started taking off. [00:13:59] Do you remember that? [00:14:00] Oh, yeah. That's the one thing people ask me. What's the number one strategy you can tell me to do? And I tell them utilize video but correctly distribute it. [00:14:09] Yes. So this is brilliant. So in real simple. So you're you're taking them, you're pushing content out. You're not asking anything from them. So the content that you're pushing out. Give me an idea. Maybe. You know, I know you meant you rented really quickly earlier. Can you walk me through as an agent if I'm going to do this? What type of content content am I putting out and how frequently am I putting it out into this mass audience? [00:14:36] A here's a nugget right now. All right. You want to number one, if you're going to do anything. Pick a knish. So pick a niche in real estate. Maybe you want to work with a retirement company or you want to do homes on deep water. You want to work in a certain subdivision or you want to work with millennials. Pick Aneesh, and you want to do two content videos initially to start like X, like three, two, three content videos just on that niche. Then every single week do another video on that niche and then take that video, what we call video repurposing. Right. Which means you're gonna take that video, you're going to have it transcribed. There's a thing called red dot com. You're going to upload that video on that transcription and that video onto your Web site. So then you start getting search engine optimization through Google. Now, this is not hard. It's easy. You send your video to rabbits a dollar a minute. Right. You do a three to five minute content video on a specific leash because people are searching that specific need to the videos can be longer. But then what happens is as you start to do this on a regular basis, when someone goes to Google to search, hey, how do I buy a home for the first time or what's the best, you know, interest rates or homes in discovery about deep water? Your information is going to come up like crazy because you haven't reached it. [00:15:54] So meeting is super important and you can really gain a lot of traction really, really quickly if you do it on a regular basis because of the capability for the information that you're putting out there to be seen on Google when you see it. Google loves video. So uploading your videos onto YouTube, right? Get you on to Google, uploading your videos on your Web site, gets you on to Google. So when people start searching that, you're going to start showing up over and over and over again. So that would be my first suggestion is picking each and do it. Now, secondly, you want to do your normal videos that you're going to create for your community and for on a weekly basis. You want to do that to a week and you want to keep them short. Right. Like 30 seconds or or under shorter videos have higher completion rates, shorter videos get watched. More people actually click on the length of a video and they won't watch it. So initially when you're trying to grab someone's attention. Baby, you want to raspberries and quack, quack. And if they're interested, then you can bring them down your funnel and start putting out more content to them. That's similar to the first content. And then you can add you can make it longer. Right. So, for example, you wouldn't say, are you thinking about buying a house this summer? [00:17:03] Oh, my gosh. There's three things you need to know. Remember? Right. Hi, I'm Krista Major. [00:17:07] I sold hundreds of homes and then you're going to buy that. You're the experts. They want to keep listening to you. And then you just give a quick tip or two. For more information and for me to get more details, click on the link below for more. No more explanation. And then they then more. Then they're watching these videos and you're bringing them down your file and they can be longer because you've already grabbed their attention. [00:17:26] That makes sense. So. So you're using the 30 second clips for the mass. You're taking your very narrow niche and you're focusing on that. [00:17:36] And these videos are offering information but not asking for their information, correct? [00:17:43] Yes. Not initially. And then after you've been doing it, then you asked for the information at hand. Having a buyer and seller seminar. Mike, one thing that I'm doing this next Thursday for my community is I'm putting on a local business and professional marketing training free. Right now, I'm marketing it on Facebook. I did a video saying, hey, are you a local business, a professional? I can help you. I'm sure you all know I am right. Why? Because I know how to market. Let me show you how to market your local business and empire. And you're your as a as a professional or a local business. Why am I doing that? Because I'm basically going to be doing a little mini listing presentation without them even knowing it, showing them how we do what we do and how they can do that. But at the same time, showing them, hey, here's an example of how I listen market to house, right? Look, we had one hundred and seventy six thousand people on this on this one housing tour. We had over two hundred and fifteen hours of people watching this one video. Will that help you? So basically, I'm going to be helping them, but also showcasing how we market our homes at the same time to like minded individuals who are local professionals or her own local businesses. [00:18:47] I love it. So when you're doing this video out to just your normal group, these whole 30 second clips and you know, if you if you think about selling, click below. [00:18:56] For those people who are listening, you know, they've done nothing like this before and they're going, oh, my gosh, what do I do? What? Where do I go? Where do I send them when they click below? What's the next step? Is it a Facebook page or what are you doing on that? [00:19:09] So they're through. When you create an app through your ads manager account, you can create this video. Last call to action. There's a traffic objective. There is a reach objective. Brand awareness objective. There is a conversion objective, which means you want them to convert. You're trying to get their information right. There's a video of use subjective depending on what objective you choose. It will change your call to action. So we then take them to a landing page. And if you're let's this and you're going, what the heck is she talking about? I've never heard of a landing page. Here's what I've got to tell you. There is going to be more change in the next six years in technology and there has been in the last 100. That is a true start. You are going to see more change in the next six years than we've seen in the last 100 years in technology and social media. You it's not a matter of should I. I'm thinking about it. You have to. You need to make sure that you are relevant, that you're Zillow proof your recession proof your discount broker, proof. Are you adapting to technology and change? You are going to save yourself from being left in the dust. And if you haven't now, it's OK. Like just start right. It's just like riding a bike or kissing for the first time. You get better and better as you do it. You suck it first. You follow your break your name, nails it, scrape up your face, whatever that is, but then you get better. So it's a matter of you saying, I can do this and I'm gonna do it right. It's scary at first. And everyone hates video. They are afraid of it. They're so fearful of it. But here's the deal. [00:20:39] You look at them, you know, you look at video on and who doesn't like the way you look because that's how you look. [00:20:44] Do you remember? This is me. I like myself. Right. Is video, video, video, video. If I told you the stats on why video is so important, you would die and just not using it. All you need is a cell phone. Everyone's got a cell phone. We all have a camera. This is Isabella's hitting record uploading that and have a go at it. Right. It's not not hard. It's just it's simple. So then you take him to a landing page with the landing page. Then you're then they can you know, you're saying, hey, do you want more information you want to get? What's my home worth or any kind of a market analysis? Do you want to hear a seller guide? You a buyer guide? What do you want? So you're basically continuing to take them down your funnel. The first action is the video. [00:21:26] I love it. So. So. So thanks for this. Really great. What's the next step? How do you. So we're talking about doing the videos. I kind of cut you off to go backwards and say, let's lay the foundation. [00:21:37] Let me let you run again from where you are. Does that work? [00:21:41] Yes. So meaning never was. [00:21:47] So that may be kind of an unfair try to loop back around. So where do we go from here? So I've got I've got an agent and there they're excited that what they're doing, what you're talking about, this has obviously been, you know, this and I've always wanted you know, this is just my personal out of curiosity with you, Krista. When I when we talked a few years ago and you're just doing this amazing volume and it seems like it's consistent. Yes, you're out. The thing that blew my mind is how and now I get it. It's these videos. But there's got to be something a little more that you're doing in terms of the content or in terms of, you know, maybe the question that comes up and I'm I'm trying to get my questions on formulated. You know, you're talking about doing like two videos a week. What do you keep saying on those two videos? I mean, aren't you kind of cycling back around and saying the same thing over and over again or you. [00:22:45] Oh, my gosh. Know, so there's so much to talk about. First of all, you have to understand, it's not just real estate, even though I think we as agents, we don't realize how much people love real estate. I mean, anytime you go to a party and someone knows that you're a real estate agent, what do they ask you? And I'm just going to pause for about 10 seconds here. What do they ask you? They know you're older. What do they ask you? How's the market? Right. So your job is to tell them on a regular basis what's happening in the market, what's happening in their area, what's happening in their community, what's happening in their subdivision. And on top of that, though. Bringing in community related events. What's going on in the community? What's new, what's fun, what's exciting? What are they going to do? What's what's different? What's changing? There's just you can fire. Chips, seller chips, costly mistakes, parts of a contract. What does a contingency mean? How much is a deposit? What does the buyer need to do before even looking? What do you need to make sure once you're in escrow? You do. I mean, you just we can go on and on and on. You know so much about your your subject matter as an agent. But I we think that everyone knows it, too. [00:23:48] They don't. Right. So the trick is not just to be real estate, but also be community. You want to do like one to one wanted unity video. One real estate video. Right. One market update a month. What's happening in the market? How's it changed from last month? All right. Your next video, along with that nation, each nation, nation each. The riches are in the niches. People are afraid of meeting as they feel like they're going to lose out on business. When, quite frankly, you will still have the same amount of business. But if somebody is looking for that specific topic, you're going to show up way more often on that specific topic when you do need. But you'll still show up just the same for everything else. So it's a matter of creating video content properly, making sure it gets seen. Remember Facebook, if you want to have to be seen by your community, by the thousands. Right. Facebook will put your information in front of the people that are more likely to watch it. Their algorithm goes in front of people that already expressed behaviors in liking real estate. Liking realtor, dot com, liking Zillow, you know, liking community events. So they put you in front of them and then you can say, OK, for this ad, I want to try to get video views, go put me in front of people that want to watch my videos, that their algorithm, their Facebook algorithm will do that or it will say, I want you to put this this ad now in front of somebody who is more likely to convert. [00:25:10] So I'm going to use the conversion objective. Right. Right now, I just want to get myself to be seen by everyone. I mean, he is the reach objective. So depending on what your objective what your personal objective is for the ads that you're running is going to change what objective you use on Facebook and what you tell Facebook to do. So it's a matter of creating a video, setting up an ad through your advantage, your account, utilizing your your your choosing, your objective, making sure you have a great call to action and awesome pictures that do not look at Z. The less ads you, the better the more it looks like an ad, the less likely people will clip because they're tired of being sold to and then taking them from clicking on that ad to a landing page, which then will put them right into your serum. So we create Facebook campaigns that go directly from Facebook into our CRM and then we then start marketing. Then I'm putting them on our drip drip campaigns call. [00:26:08] You know, this is you're listening to the get sellers calling you podcast to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence or from a geographic farm, learn about Agent Dominator. [00:26:18] We guarantee your sales in writing or give your money back to learn more. Visit our website and get sellers calling you dot com and like Agent Dominator from the. [00:26:28] And now back to the podcast. So it's brilliant. And as I'm hearing you, the thing that keeps hitting me and I'm going to talk about what you do in coaching, because I'm sure you you teach this step by step. But it seems almost too simple. [00:26:42] Does that make sense? Yeah. You know, it's it's not simple. It really isn't. I mean, it isn't. It isn't. I mean, it is if you just do it, you can really take it to like on steroids. Meaning. Right. So a good example is one of my students just, um, posted in our group. She's like me before the program and showed her Facebook. It was a literally a flat line. OK. That means how many people saw her. And then she's like now cramming. Krista 's program is like way up here because utilizing it correctly. And so it's so powerful, though. Think about this. You go to a open house and you're just hoping to see a couple of people and maybe it's the neighbors. It's a couple of looky loos, like you run an ad on Facebook. I can spend 50 bucks and I can have, you know, seventy five thousand people see me. I can run an ad for fifty dollars and get two hundred hours of people watching my video because Facebook will tell you how many people you reach. How many people saw you. How much time they saw you. So I can show like we teach our students that one guy. We did it after six weeks, already had thirty seven hours of one video being watched. So I was like, that's like 10 open houses, right. That's you doing more than that? More than 10, 15 open houses. Cause it might be. So it's really, really effective because you're constantly being reminded and you're inadvertently prospecting. So instead of cold calling and door knocking, which I do not cold call, I do not doorknock. I haven't an open house like eight years. My community and everyone's still seeing me because I'm showing up or they're looking they are online. They are on social media. So they're seeing me on a regular basis. So they're reminded they can't forget about me. Right. They can't, you know. [00:28:20] So you're taking you know, if you go back to the traditional model of growing a real estate business, you you set aside hours to go prospecting, to drive in business, and maybe those hours or more, you know, like a 30 to twelve. [00:28:34] All you're doing is you shifting. You're not spending prospecting hours. You're doing video hours, running some Facebook ads. And the way I'm interpreting it, you're doing that and then you're going off and playing or doing something else you want. Just letting it drive business to you. I know it's not quite that easy, but it's that's that's what it sounded. [00:28:53] Yeah. And it's it's not that easy. And we all want to make it seem like it's that easy. But you know what it is? I mean, instead of like I don't on weekends, I don't want to buy donuts for the open house. I want to make those with my kids. Right. Well, I want to cuddle with my husband in the morning. And I don't want to have to go to an open house and buy the balloons, put the signs out. I want. And people are there still seeming like crazy. Mean the number one agent for years and years and years. And this is a strategy that I mean, is it's also the exact same strategy that I've used to get agents from across the country into my coaching program. We've had over 500 agents go through our training in the past 14 months. This exact strategy. Right. It's giving information, giving value, producing content, getting them to know me and then say, OK, now I want you by my book. Right or now. Now that you know me. Why don't you let's talk to you about the coaching program. I don't say he signed up for coaching Brigham Young and whatever. They have to know who I am first. But once you develop that trust and respect. It's kind of like being on this podcast right there. People getting to know me. You like me to trust me. You either like me or you don't. You're like, she's way too crazy for me and you're hyper where I go like this crystal girl. Let me learn more about her. That's exactly what as an agent you need to be doing in your community. He's got to get people to know you. And video people are much more. They're sixty 64 percent more likely to buy a product when there's a video associated with it. You are a product. You're a service. So if people are 64 percent more likely to buy you seeing a video, does it make sense that you should be utilizing it? [00:30:23] That's amazing. Now you're an author. Now see some books back there. I want to talk about those. Can you tell me a little bit about the books you've done? [00:30:30] Yes. So I have one book sell a hundred plus films a year, how we use Engage Your Marketing Technology and Legion to sell 100 plus homes a year every year. That's this one. So a hundred percent here. This will be great for agents. Now, here's the thing, too, about what I'm teaching the strategy. You can be a brand new agent. We teach agents that are brand new to utilize this and they may very quickly position themselves as the expert. You don't have cap listings. You don't have to have any experience. You can just start talking about real estate. Right. And people do not know that you don't have any business. Also, here's a little book that I wrote, three clients in 30 days. I interviewed twenty three top producing agents across the country on if they were to lose all their business and they had to start from scratch in a new city with a new note on how they would generate three clients in 30 days. And they gave their blueprint from day one to day 30 of everything that they would do to generate more business. It's called three clients in 30 days. If you had to start from ground zero, no sphere, no contacts, no past clients. Here's your 30 day top racing blueprint. There's that one. And then like this, this is called fire financially independent. I retire early. Your crappy job will quit itself. This basically teaches people how to utilize a lot of Australians that we've taught them in in both the books and and make sure to turn their passion into you, into into their profits, how they monetize it, market it. [00:31:54] I love it. So talk to me a little bit. Talk to me a little bit about your coaching program. So I'm an agent. I'm loving this. [00:32:01] But I'm going I'm overwhelmed. And I know I'm going to need someone to help me walk this through, you know, walk me through it and make it happen. So is your coaching program about this specific or is it larger? Can you tell? [00:32:15] It's much larger. So we've got like three or three or four different programs out there. One is just the Legion program, and it basically teaches you everything I just talked about. Right. How to how to create it, how to create amazing Facebook campaigns that convert into actual clients. Everyone says they want leaves, leaves, leaves. Leaves are easy. And we generate so many leads. But the problem is you want leads that are more tangible that you can actually manage and that are more serious. And we teach you how to create and how to become the community market leader. How to establish yourself, to gain authority and to gain trust. And then how to create marketing campaigns that will get you the best leads that you can get. And then how to put those into systems and processes utilizing CRM so you can be successful. And then we also have more higher level programs where we literally just teach you. I mean, so much more Instagram, YouTube video repurposing other digital marketing strategies. I know. I know. I guess it's pretty intense, you know, because of the listing process, which is if they had it. It's like you're listing presentation on steroids. We get you a marketing campaign and brochures and just tons of stats. We kind of you're almost like buying our higher level programs or almost buying up like a. It was like a little mini franchise that we really helped agents, whether they're brand new or they're in the middle or they're very experienced, how to take their business from zero, you know, to a lot more around. [00:33:44] I was just recently talking to a prospective client and ours and we're talking about different things. And he said now I've also come across this coaching program. Krista, May short coaching. I think you said, do you know anything about that? As a man, you ought to take her up on that because she is amazing in. And what I love about what I'm hearing, Krista, is you've taken what you've applied. This has driven your business sky high and consistently and now you package it where people can really come alongside you. And I really commend you on that, because as you know, before we're talking, we're talking about another friend of mine who once he went into coaching his income, two and a half times increased, you know, two and a half times increase in like two or three years. And just you can't do it without a coach. [00:34:30] And so I'll tell you what, I have coaches. I mean, I have multiple coaches. And the reason I've always been really good at what I do is I constantly educate myself. I mean, it's constant learning and an implementation of what you're learning and creating different habits. And if you're listening to this, you have to understand something. You don't want to be reactive. You need to be adaptive. Right. Do not be reactive. Be adaptive. And you have got to adapt right now. This is where it's going. And the agents that are are utilizing digital marketing strategies and social media. They are adapting to what is no longer a want but a must. In your business, it's a must. And so they take it very, very seriously and know that it's not easy. Meaning we my program is hard. And I shouldn't say that because all of us want to buy it. But you have to work, right? If you're willing to give it the time that it takes and you're willing to put in the energy and efforts. We teach you how to be a 21st century real estate agent. We're not teaching strategies like cold calling or door knocking or open houses. However, if you want to do an open house, we show you how to market. So you actually get butts in seats, right? You can utilize it to your advantage. But we don't teach those strategies. We teach strategies that are actually working nowadays. And we try to open up your mind to think that there is an easier, more efficient or effective way to reach buyers and sellers in the masses. And it's thinking non traditionally, it doesn't mean you can't do traditional things that you've got to start thinking non traditionally and again, not be reactive, but be adaptive. [00:36:03] That makes sense. I want to shift topics real quick for dispersion as we start to wrap this up, but it ties into this. [00:36:10] So at the beginning, you mentioned Europe, your mom, your realtor, your husband. Can you talk to me a little bit about family life, work balance and how you manage that with what you do and taking care of being all these other responsibilities are so important. [00:36:27] Ok. So even before I was a coach, I rarely worked. Weekends or nights and I know some if you are going. Well, no way. Critic is everyone. But here's the deal. Once you develop enough respect from your community and you're seen as the expert authority, people will wait for you. I mean, I just tell people, listen, I've got a family life, work life balance and I do not work on weekends because I need to be the best that I can be Monday through Friday for you. I also don't like to work nights because I'll never be home. So therefore, just like they make an appointment with their doctor or their attorney or their dentist or their CPA. Monday through Friday, 9:00 to 5:00, I'm the same. Right. So I just set boundaries for myself. And occasionally I'll work on a weekend. I mean, very I can count on one hand in the past year how many times I work on a weekend unless it was in my computer at home with coaching. Right. But going to see a seller or a buyer, I just don't do it. I set boundaries. I also have buyers, agents. Now, I'll give my leads to buyers because I don't have the time to work with buyers. So I give my leads away. Take your referral fee and I focus on sellers. I don't have to work as many weekends and nights. I didn't do that for many years. When my coach said, Krista, you're losing a lot of money. And I said, well, why you're not working buyers. I says, you need to give your leads the way I want. [00:37:39] I don't want to lose the money. And they're like, well, you're losing the money because you're not doing anything with them because you don't have the time. And I was like, oh, yes, I'll do that right away. And I also use I use real ball. That's the serum that I use. And we're now kind of dabbling into Katie Couric. We're gonna compare how Katie Core works in conjunction with real love and care. We're sort of testing, but utilizing really good systems and having great workflows. We've got like over and I think of around 200 workflows in real world. And what that means is if somebody takes an action, then there's a workflow behind it. So, for example, somebody request this, request a market analysis, then I've got a workflow. It's OK. You know, pull, pull the cons, deliver CMA, send a postcard, send the thank you card. Right. Make a phone call. A phone call. And it sends it right to our phone and it says, hey, call this person at this time, here's the phone number. So we processed everything in every phase of the transaction. Right. So that way we're not thinking as much. So when you don't think as much, you utilize more time. You have more time. So I definitely have a work life balance. I know it's very, very difficult. I am a workaholic. I'll say I love it, but I do it more, more at my choice than a necessity because my kind of hobbyist sort of work. You know, I love it. [00:38:55] Well, it's definitely shows itself and I commend you on that because so many agents are just working to a frazzle and they lose sight of the most important reason why they're working, which is usually their family. [00:39:09] Yes. Yes. It's difficult. You know, you don't want to go on vacation and not be able to have a break in working every night, 8:00 or every weekend. I mean, you've got to set boundaries. People appreciate them. And also maybe get a help or a partner or somebody another agent can help you with the phone and such that you can't have time. If you take time, you'll you'll save more time. Right. Another really good effect is utilizing the pomodoro effect where you work 25 minutes at a time or your laser focused, then you take five minutes off so that that way what you're doing, you're really, really focused on getting that much more done. Another shows you just love to talk about, which is one thing I want everyone to listen to. It's really, really important is that every day when I wake up, I visualize my day, meaning I'm I see myself succeeding during the day and I see myself having the proper outcome that I have. I also write down six things that I'm grateful for, like I'm good with my family and grateful for my health. I'm grateful for my energy and my business, whatever it might be. I write specifically write down six things, because the more you focus on what you're grateful for, you'll get more of that. Right? So many times people are so focused on what they're not getting or what's not working, they get more of it right. So you want to write down six things you're grateful for every single day. [00:40:18] I also write down six things that I must do that day. So here's an example of it, right? Looks like this. I write down six things that I absolutely must finish today. Right. And then I put the time that it's going to take me. And usually you want to consider about a 10 hour day. There should be six and a half hours of to dos. The other three and a half hours are for the what ifs, the mishaps, the. Hey, can I have five seconds of your time, which turns into five minutes or two minutes. Right. So I time block six things that I actually want to get done. And then at the end of the day, I write down my wins. What works for me? Right. Celebrate your wins. Celebrate your successes. Success breeds success. The more you focus on what's working and the more you focus on your winning, the more winning you're gonna get. Right. Because your brain is a mental roadmap to get you there. So remember, visualize, show gratitude. Write down your six things time. BLOCK them out at the end of the day. Write down what your success, what your wins, what worked because you'll get more of those and then give yourself permission to sleep and get whatever it is you need to work through for the next day and then start over and start again. [00:41:20] This is amazing. It's like I feel like I'm in old firehose of nothing but solid content that I want to go back and listen to this multiple times. [00:41:30] Lots and lots more notes because in you've been calculated in such a short timeframe, so much amazing value. [00:41:38] Thank you. I appreciate it. [00:41:40] Well, you know, successful people are successful for a reason. [00:41:43] And it's like, you know, if this is how much has come out and just a 30 or 40 minute time, I can just imagine how deep that onion goes if I can just dig deeper. But I know we don't have time for all of that. Let me ask you, so back on the books and contacting you. So can you take a. Help me understand if if I'm going to get the books, because me personally, I want at least two of those books, if not all three of them. How do I get them? Where do I go? What do I do? [00:42:12] So the good news is. So right now, I'm giving away gifts and stuff on your train because I can give a free copy of the free copy of Sell 100 homes a year. But I'd love for you guys to go onto Amazon on Kindle right now. The books are selling their homes as 1999, but a fire and three planes in 30 right now. And they'll both help you in saying that I will guarantee it are 99 cents because we're trying to get as many reviews as possible. So we're giving. E-book for 99 cents. You can get on Amazon, the name Kissimmee Shark. You'll see the three looks come out. And then I'll give a free copy and sell 100 homes e-book that you can generate. Give us your your people. I'll give you that. The code is text in code. And that way I'll get there. Their e-mail address. I could markets in later on and I would just pirate what you did. You guys have been on your own. And then it would be great. But if you can give us a review, I'd really appreciate. I know you're going to get mint. Now you read a chapter or two and then go and give us a review. Of course, we're looking for five star reviews because even four stars people don't think is good enough. [00:43:16] Ok. So so for everyone listening, because you speak really, really fast and you throw it out there. Give me the titles of the three books so someone can what? Write it down. [00:43:27] Ok. Can you on and get it? The one you're going to go to Amazon, you're going to say sell the number one hundred plus homes a year with Kristin. Make sure you'll see my book pop up. Sell a hundred plus homes a year. And the subtitle is How We Use Engage Your Marketing Technology and Lead Gen to sell one hundred plus homes a year every year. So sell one hundred plus homes a year. How we use engagement, marketing, technology and lead gen to sell 100 plus homes a year every year. Here's the deal. So you are thinking, Krista, I don't want to sell a hundred homes. I just want to sell one more home. This will help you. This will help you sell one room a month or 20 homes more a year. You know, it's either or you don't have to sell 100, but you'll definitely get some step by step tangibles, things that you can get. The next book is three clients in 30 days. Three clients in 30 days. This teaches you if you had to start from scratch or if you're doing it, you're in your business right now and you want to. [00:44:24] You need to change what you can start implementing in your business right now to generate more deals. And again, you can get all these on. Amazon is going to go to Amazon. It'll give you a Kindle version or whatever the version that you're looking. It's all there. And then lastly, Fire, which stands for financially independent, retire early. Your crappy job will quit itself. Those three books will be very, very helpful. Definitely sell a hundred home would be my recommendation. First to buy as an aged it then three clients in 30. That fire has a ton of marketing information it teaching you how to market as well. And it will give you a lot of tangible strategies. There's also a lot of goal setting and vision and purpose which we all need. We really need to have our clear vision of why it is we want what we want to get there. Fire walks you through that. We've got a great work book to do it. And you can go to Crystal, make sure dot com to find more about me. And also one more thing. Beauty is, baby, I own saying it wrong. [00:45:23] Baby, baby. Either one works if I'm go back and forth. Katie, is it. Yeah. I'm so sorry. It's fine. I get it all the time. [00:45:32] I like knowing you can go to the seven figure ranger blueprint. The seven figure real tour blueprint on Facebook and read them is me and these seven. [00:45:45] Or is it just seven figure? [00:45:46] It's seven figure. Yeah, the number seven. Leave the off. [00:45:50] Yeah, leave the F seven figure. Real true blueprint. And I do two free trainings every single week on Tuesdays and Thursdays in that group. Writers give value when you serve. [00:46:02] Wonderful. So Krista may sure. M A S H O R E coaching dot com and the Facebook group seven figure real term blueprint. [00:46:15] Those are the two places to contact you get crystal, make sure dot com and then the seven figure world, your blueprint on Facebook and yes, go to Amazon, get our book. It's not just it's I actually really read these books. It's a really step by step how to we tell you everything and we don't hold anything back. So many of the people that are in my program actually read my book and then they thought, that's a lot that's going to hire. [00:46:39] I love it. Well, is there anything this has been really great. Is there anything else that you'd like to share? [00:46:44] Before we close out, just implement. Right. I mean, if I can give you any advice at all is just implement and be consistent. It's so important to be as important as it is to implement as much as you can and be as consistent as possible and keep your mind in check. Right minds. It is such a huge part of success. And I don't think people really get that there is a reason why all these great thought leaders like Napoleon Hill and Dr. Maximal Mall and I can just keep going on and on, speak so much about mindset. You've got to have your mind intact to get your business intact. [00:47:18] You know that execution is as you mentioned, that I've read a book not long ago called The Executioner by businessman named Artie McFerrin. It's it's funny, really written because you can tell it to an older man who just put his thoughts down. But what really struck me is it's all about execution. And he made this calm. He said, you know, if I want to make an extra ten million dollars a year, all I do is these things and I'm thinking an extra 10 million dollars. And this guy is worth hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. [00:47:50] But the things he said he did. [00:47:54] It's all about execution. And he goes through his top five or six things that he's built his business with over the years. And it's just grown in multiples like like doubling growth almost every year for a number of years. It's just, you know, I was over there taking notes, taking notes and underlying all these things. And, you know, it's not one of these professionally written books like Good to Great, but it's one of these that it's like this guy's giving you his heart. And he's been super, super successful for many years and has more money than he knows what to do with. And he isn't pursuing more money. He wants to leave a legacy. And that's what he wrote all of his secrets with. [00:48:33] I love it. That's great. Yeah. Education everywhere. Educate yourself in order for you to go from good to great. You need to help. I mean, we all do. The only reason why I'm as great as I am is because in my business it's only wrong. But it's because I'm constantly educating myself, trying to become better, hiring people to help me get there. People that excel in something that I don't and I don't give up. Right. Many people give up way too soon. They don't see results right away. We teach in our program. This is not an overnight get rich quick. This is this is we're teaching you a system. We're teaching your community to get to know you. So the first three months is all about getting people to know you like you trust you before you even start. Literally generations. [00:49:14] Yes, deadly. I had one question, I had one. One asked that's on that. How long does it take with a video approach in the Facebook? How long does it take to start seeing traction? [00:49:26] It's about four to six months. OK. If you do it right now for does it we we have some people that do it in two or three. But I'm going to be really real. It's not around the four or five month mark. And we have people in month three saying, I don't see any results. And then month four or five, I like I am hiring an assistant. We're just on fire. We're going crazy. We've we've seen crazy results going from so doing fifteen thousand dollars in commissions to one hundred and twenty four thousand writer going from selling one month selling well, making an extra eight million dollars of production in one year. It's just crazy numbers, but it's from the people that are the most consistent and persistent and give it the time that it takes it takes time. [00:50:08] That's really amazing. Well I could spend a long time. I know you're busy and you got to go, but this has been absolutely wonderful. So, Krista, thank you so much for being on this podcast with us. [00:50:18] Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. You're great. It's so nice that you get a piece of its value in helping everyone, and I appreciate it. We're listening. And hopefully I didn't talk too fast. You can understand that. [00:50:28] Well, the great thing is as a podcast, as you talk to fans, you can replay it and you can actually slow the audio down and do it step by step. [00:50:36] So. Well, for those who are listening, if you do like this podcast, please subscribe to it. Please like it on iTunes and YouTube. [00:50:45] Real quickly, I was going to tell I'm going to be having a podcast. It's called Fire with Krista, Measure on Fire with Krista Mashore it launches in three weeks. But it should be probably on the time this goes on. Absolutely. [00:50:54] On fire with Krista Mashore. [00:50:57] Yes. On fire records. To make sure. I'll be sure to pump up your your your your podcast when I remind start you on fire. Krista May Shores, if you're listening to this, look for us. We're gonna be doing it. The goal was due Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Will that three a week and just help give you some brisk business strategies? [00:51:13] Well, I'm going to plug it into that one for sure. On par with Krista Mashore. So by the time you get this podcast, go grab that one, too. So thanks so much, Krista. And you have a really blessed day. [00:51:25] You, too. You guys make sure you subscribe to and share his podcast. It helps him if you're listening. You want to help him just like he's helping you. [00:51:33] Absolutely. Thank you so much, Krista. Thanks, Beatty. Be blessed if you've enjoyed this podcast. [00:51:40] Be sure to subscribe to it so you never miss another episode. And please, like our get sellers calling you Facebook page. Also, if you want to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence, dominate a geographic farm or convert home valuation leads. Check out our Agent Dominator program. We create custom content that differentiates you from other realtors, then use it to keep you top of mind with your prospects with postcards, targeted Facebook ads, email campaigns, video interviews and more. And the best part is we guarantee yourselves or give all your money back. Learn more. They get sellers calling you dot com and select agent dominator. [00:52:18] Thanks for listening to the Get Sellers Calling You podcast. Have a great day. P039 [/fusion_text][/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]

EA Radio Episode # 11 - Soft Adventure Travel

EA Radio Travel Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 18, 2019 10:46

Scott Stein, the owner of and travel planner for Extraordinary Adventures (https://www.myextraordinaryadventures.com/travel-podcast.html), explains what "Adventure Travel," "Hard Adventure Travel," and "Soft Adventure Travel" are and looks at whether or not you'll be a good fit for them.Music: www.bensound.com (The show transcript is being provided by YouTube's automatic transcriber. Please forgive any inaccuracies or errors.)[Applause] [Music] hey everybody this is Scott from extraordinary adventures and you are listening to the eleventh episode of EA radio today I am not joined by my lovely better-half Laura she's got a lot of no plate so I'm gonna tackle this one by myself I thought today would be a good thing to talk about would be a topic I think that people are a little confused about it's uh adventure travel what is adventure travel what is a hard adventure travel over what is a soft adventure travel things like that so I think adventure travel you know it kind of brings to mind a thought when I say adventure travel you basically have a picture in your mind hiking biking camping snowboarding skiing scuba diving whitewater rafting etc there's an implication that to participate in adventure travel you have to be very physically fit like I know personally I wouldn't try climbing a straight face cliff I'm just not that fit but that's not all that adventure travel is adventure travel can include soft adventure travel as well I'm gonna give a little quote here that I loved it's as some of us take travel a little further we don't want to watch the world from afar we want to get up close and touch it for some that's embarking on heart racing African safari ziplining through Costa Rican rainforest we're meeting the multi-color inhabitants of the Great Barrier Reef for others it's simply transcending the daily routine to experience the sights and sounds tastes and smells of somewhere new from Close Encounters to distant wonders adventure is going beyond the typical vacation experience to become fully immersed in other cultures customs cuisine of our travels so let me repeat that one little blip adventure adventure is going beyond the typical vacation experience now that can be soft adventure that could be hard adventure here's where I'm here's where I'll tell you about Softimage sauce adventure so you have those those there's hiking's and and skiing's and all those things that we talked about but not quite that fit what if you're fit enough to mildly hike walk around you have no mobility challenges you're you're not disabled in any way and you want to get a little off the beaten path that is more about what soft adventure is than hiking less hard or cycling less hard so I'm not sure it can be about those but it just makes those things more approachable it's also not just out in nature I mean hiking through cities as opposed to taking a cab there's one way you can remain active while taking in the sights to get out of can you know get out of the bus get out and get out walk places when we went to Berlin we walked all over that city DC walked all over that city New Orleans okay normally as we took the look what was that like a streetcar thing that was fun no edit to it but that's you know that's what I mean get out there you know another one is cycle tours a lot of folks who go on river cruises through Germany and France and all the rest that's one of the things a lot of the river cruise ship companies have is cycles onboard for free that you can go out and take a cycle tour a lead cycle tour so you can get all over that town a heck a lot faster you get a little exercise obviously but you get to see all the sights in two hours instead of in four hours because you can get to each site faster another one is a Segway job yes even a Segway tour would be soft adventure I mean you're getting out there you're moving you're exploring you're not just sitting on a beach with a pina colada or or run a spa with a glass of champagne not that I don't love that too I'll be the first to you don't get on a cruise ship and have a pina colada and sit in hot tub but I think for the majority way we like to travel is we're more soft adventure people I could even mean riding in an ATV or yacht I mean getting on Katamari and you know in the Caribbean and getting to Pannell island off of say Martine Betts soft adventure travel sought not being such a venture would be to stay on the cruise ship getting out there you know jumping on that 4-wheel atv and going through the Belize and and seeing things that you could not see that that that goes back to you know this thing of some of us take travel a little further we don't want to watch the world from afar we want to get up close and touch it but unlike adventure travel I will say that for the most part soft adventure is more about the exploration then it is the physical exertion it's about like I said getting off the beaten path it's about not going to the tourist traps so if you go to Venice and you stay within that square over there it is designed to be a tourist trap I mean it's just you can't escape it you go a few blocks to left you lost it all right few bucks behind you've got a few blocks off the beaten path then you start seeing menus that are written in Italian and they're handwritten so now you've got a menu written in Italian tells you what they're not talking to the American tourists and they're handwritten what does that tell you it tells you that that menu changes so that's kind of a fresh restaurant for locals usually the prices are better almost always the food is better almost always the service is better so you don't want to definitely use that trick when you go to betters and that pretty much goes you know for any for anywhere I mean remember when in the Cotswolds and we went off the beaten path to some pubs and it was all bricks it was Brits and us and and that's I love that because then I'm I'm hanging out with the locals you know doing what the locals do I'm not going to the tourist traps but it's also about getting out of your comfort zone you know experiencing new sights sounds tastes smells and feelings not the plastic chain existence of our normal everyday lives here in America you know one one example that comes to mind is when we went to Germany went to a place called kokum and that's in the effect of River Harry the Mosul and Ryan area cochem castle is up on a hill as often is the case Heidelberg you know they're up on a hill and then the townspeople are down below so you're you know you're strolling you see this beautiful castle up there in one day we've decided we're gonna go up the castle apparently we went the hard way apparently there were two ways to go we went away that we had to have burned off three days worth of beer ah once we got up there then we learned uh you know there was an easier way to get up here oh well chalk it up to adventure but that was something that was great again you know when we went to DC and you're you're going Smithsonian hopping for lack of a better word oh my god you were gonna burn you're gonna burn calories you're gonna get out there and you're gonna you're gonna be exploring it's the best way to say again that st. Martin trip you know I remember when we went down to st. Martin we took not a okada man we took a guy named the suit Bob so illega I believe this his name it's soo early the tours forget the full name but it's suleka tours and you look at them on TripAdvisor and they have a bazillion reviews and they're like nearly perfectly five stars and when we went we realized why it was phenomenal they took you to all the spots around the island but they took you there via the boat it was a small little boat I think it held about ten to fifteen of us which is what we do here this company is my company certain adventures is very small private group tours no more than about 10 to 15 and it was perfect because you have a couple couples you know but by time you have four or five couples there's your ten two people you know and get to know each other you have lunch together and it was fun so that's you know that's a soft adventure so basically though what I guess what I'm really all I'm really saying is that if you take any ordinary vacation and you amp it up in the right ways you can have an extraordinary soft adventure travel so how do you do that how do you take that how do you get beyond the typical vacation experience to become fully immersed in cultures customs and cuisines of our tribe I'll tell you one way you give me a call you email me and I'll do it for you you know you just tell them to wife or your travel what you love if you love heart you love adventure you love reading do you love do you love nature do you love history do you love war do the things that you want to see and do that makes it extraordinary for you because extraordinary is a very subjective experience the things that make it extraordinary for you you tell me and I'll make it happen for you that's what we specialize in is isn't if you're a discerning traveler did you just don't have the time the desire or the know-how to book a trip but you want that trip to be extraordinary that's what we do so I apologize for the plug here at the end but that's what soft adventure travel is and then what we basically specialize in here we do do some river cruises and we do some other stuff as well some luxury stuff but for the most part we focus our efforts on the people who want to get out there and experience the world in a deeper broader way well that's you give me a shout and and we'll get you we'll get you a plan so that's it I mean it's a short show for the day when they're 10 minutes which is you know kind of what my original vision was to be was to present one topic quick but when we get Lauren here we banter and goes a little long I apologize for that but but that is the show for today so I hope you enjoyed that episode if so definitely email me Scott at my extraordinary ventures calm that's Scott at my extraordinary adventures calm tell me your name first first name you can tell me your first name or last name but I'm only gonna say your first name on the air and I'll give you a shout-out and and that's it so until next time this is again is Scott it's from extraordinary extraordinary ventures thank you for tuning in reminding you to share this show on Facebook Twitter Instagram Pinterest LinkedIn anywhere that you have the do you spend your time social media wise and then also please give us a thumbs up and subscribe to our YouTube channel that'll help spread the word okay I said guys thank you very much and we'll catch you on the next episode of EA radio stay tuned bye [Music]

212 - The Largest Bourbon Secondary Market with Owen Powell

Goat Wrestling Perseverance

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 1, 2019 72:46

Last week, CNN reported that Facebook and Instagram are shutting down all peer to peer sales of alcohol. This wasn’t a joke. In the span of 72 hours, all of the major bourbon groups were wiped out. The secondary market is synonymous with Facebook. The growth of bourbon’s popularity can be attributed to it as well by those that are in it to flip bottles. Owen Powell didn’t create the first group to buy, sell, and trade bourbon, but he certainly created the largest. The Bourbon Secondary Market group is no longer around on Facebook, but the story of how it was built, the ways discussions were moderated, and how it served as a data gold mine for valuations is told. We uncover the progression of the group from a few hundred members to reaching over 50,000, what leads to certain distilleries being banned on a black market, and if the secondary market will actually end if Facebook groups cease to exist. Show Partners: The University of Louisville now has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at business.louisville.edu/onlinespirits. Barrell Craft Spirits has won a few medals at some of the most prestigious spirits competitions out there, but don’t take their word for it and find out for yourself. Learn more at BarrellBourbon.com. Check out Bourbon on the Banks in Frankfort, KY on August 24th. Visit BourbonontheBanks.org. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about Parker's Heritage Collection. How did you get into bourbon? Talk about the growth of the group. Were there any growing pains? How many members are in the group? How many admins do you have? What do you look for in admins? Why do people have animosity towards admins in these groups? Let's talk about the rules in the group. How did the secondary raffle site become its own thing? How does a dispute come about? What do all the acronyms mean? What is the best way to handle a dispute? Have you ever had accusations of counterfeits? How do you handle that kind of situation? Why did you do an open group? Do you keep a log of all the transactions? You’ve banned a few distilleries. How are rules like that determined? Why do you run the group even though you don't get paid? What do you do when someone prices something too high? What about monthly dues? Do you think groups could end on Facebook? 0:00 Have you thought about a career in the whiskey industry? I'm not talking about being the next master distiller. But if you want a leg up on the competition, you need to take a look at the distilled spirits business certificate from the University of Louisville. This 30 week program will prepare you for the business side of the spirits industry like finance, marketing and operations. This is 100% online meaning you can access the classes at anytime and anywhere so what are you waiting for? Get signed up to make your next career move at business.louisville.edu/onlinespirits 0:35 people add their wives to the group and then immediately regret it because you know their wives mad at them they're always on their phone. wife gets in there sees how much they're spending on it then it's like when you kick my wife out know that you got to do figure that out on your own. I'm not getting in the middle of that. I think I might add my wife 0:52 to it because because being part of the podcast now I'm like, I gotta you gotta have a pulse on what's happening. So you know exactly uninvite. 1:10 Hey, this is Episode 212 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your hosts Kenny. And as usual, a little bit of news. On July 26 2019 beam Suntory broke ground on what is to become the friend be no craft distillery. It's part of a $60 million investment and what will become known as the James be distilling company and that can be located in Claremont, Kentucky. All of the building itself will be fresh construction. The brands that are gonna be produced at this new craft distiller are ones that were already familiar with like Booker's knob Creek and Basil Hayden's all as well as new brands such as little book and legend. Its name for the seventh generation master distiller Fred know which has been on the show few times before, and this new distillery will give know and his son Freddie the opportunity to experiment with new fermentation and distillation techniques. The distillery has also announced that they will be updating the visitor experiences with behind the scene looks at their brands, a new tasting room, and much more. Heaven Hill has announced the 13th release of the Parkers heritage collection, and this will be a heavy char rye whiskey. While 2:22 standard barrels and heaven Hill are a chart three the barrels the distillery used to age this rye our char five, that means they're burned for 50 seconds longer than a typical char three. The heavier char the easier it is for the whiskey to penetrate the wooden staves and take on those heightened open spice flavors. This new ride is going to be eight years old and nine months in these and was aged also in the seventh floor of Rick house why before being non shell filtered and bottled at 105 proof. The Parkers heritage collection is named after heaven Hill master distiller Parker beam, who passed away in 2017. After being diagnosed with ALS back in 2010. portions of the sale are donated to fund ALS research, and sales from the past six editions has raised over $1 million. The retail price set on this is going to be $150 MSRP. Ryan and myself are excited to announce that we are going to begin the process of opening a distribution of pursuit series in three states. You can look forward to Georgia, Texas, and of course Kentucky as the first states that we will be hitting the first barrel has been selected by Justin's House of bourbon with a second one quickly going into liquor barn, we're super excited to be able to bring our single barrel offerings at stores selections at first. And you can look for more information on stores in the States on our website at pursuit spirits.com. Now, don't worry if you aren't even in those states or Heck, even if you are you can still purchase your bottles and have them shipped to your door through our online retailer at sealed box dot com. You can go to pursuit spirits calm and click the Buy Now button and you'll be redirected to the site for that particular single barrel. Right now we only have about 20 bottles, let them stock but we're going to have a brand new September release, so get ready for it. Last week, CNN reported that Facebook and Instagram are shutting down all sales of alcohol, cigarettes and other similar things like e cigarettes. And this wasn't a joke in the span of around 72 hours. Half of the bourbon groups that I belong to were wiped out. Many of the larger secondary groups with 30 to 50,000 members were gone immediately in over the next 24 hours more disappeared. And even some groups that sold or raffled charitable causes for bottles were gone as well. We can't say for sure if this is the end of the Facebook secondary market, but it sure is a swift kick to it. Immediately following the demise of the large groups. Many of the smaller ones with less than 3000 members change their names, they also change the rules. And while multitudes of even more smaller groups started to emerge, it's uncertain if we'll ever see a group with over 20,000 members ever again. And that's kind of why we decided to release this podcast, the secondary market, it's synonymous with Facebook. This can also be attributed to the growth of Bourbons popularity by those that are captivated at some of the values that some of these bottles Dr. ON pal didn't create the first group to buy, sell and trade bourbon, but he certainly created the largest, the bourbon secondary market group is no longer around. But the story of how it was built, the way discussions were moderated and how it served as a data gold mine for valuations is a story that needs to be told. we uncover the progression of the group from 100 members to reaching over almost at the time it was cease to exist as around 50,000. And really, we're also going to talk about what leads to certain distilleries also being banned on this black market and at the secondary market will actually end Facebook's cease to ever exist again. Now you're done listening to me. So let's go ahead and listen to Joe over a barrel bourbon. And then you've got Fred Minnick 6:12 with above the char. 6:15 Hey, everyone, Joe here again. Our Bourbons have won a few medals, some of the most prestigious spirits competitions out there. But don't take their word for it. Find out for yourself. Use the store locator and barrellbourbon.com. 6:28 I'm Fred Minnick. And this is above the char. This past week, I posted a photo of the new Parker's heritage release. It was like a lot of PR release images. It was shiny. It told you all about the new whiskey. And it came with a price tag hundred and 4999. So pretty drastic increase from past Parker's heritage releases past releases were around 89 to $100. So you're looking at about a 50 to 60 you know, dollar price increase depending on what market you live in. People on my Instagram went crazy. I mean, maybe not crazy, but they were very upset with the price increase. And I had people writing me saying that this is solving Parker's good name. As many people know, I was really quite close with Parker been before he passed away. And it got me to thinking about where we are in bourbon right now. There's actually price increases across the board, not just with these really nice bottles like Parker's heritage, and the Buffalo Trace antique collection. But you're seeing it like an everyday Bourbons. I remember when I used to find four roses small batch for like $20. Now it's a $40 bottle. Now, some of that is on the retailer's for selling it to that price. But the fact is Bourbons that are 40 $50, I used to pay 15 to $25. for them. That is where we are. But I'm curious, I've been curious as to how much that might actually impact the retention of consumers. So I did a little digging. And as it turns out, if you are running a business and you are selling a product, one of the best things you can do is increase your price. In fact, they say that people actually grow their profits, and they also grow their consumer base. So according to this thing called the McKinsey report, it suggests that for basically like every 1% of increase in price can yield an 8% increase in profits. But these reports and all these people who are talking who are studying price increases also preach transparency. They say, Tell your people tell your customer base, why you're increasing the price? Did your costs go up? Did you have a bad loss in the previous quarter? And you're trying to make up for it? Why are you increasing prices, if you don't start telling your consumers, especially the bourbon consumers who have been with you from the very beginning, why you're increasing your prices, you will start to see a massive boycott. I'm talking about the kind of boycott you find on social media that ends up trending and people will no longer be buying your bottles. And that new consumer you think you might get because you're increasing the price and you're not coming off as cheap. Well, that person is going to be googling who you are when they're in the total wine or whatever liquor store. And when they Google you and they find out you've been increasing your prices 50 600% they're going to walk away and they're going to go to something else. In today's day and age, you cannot increase a price almost 100% and get away with it. Consider this some free advice to Bourbons everywhere. Keep your prices affordable. So the everyday person can buy them. If you want to have really ultra expensive products, create a new product and brand it to be ultra ultra expensive. But going from $89 to 150. It's just not good. It's a bad optic. So be thoughtful with your pricing and be transparent. You'll be rewarded by customers who love your product. And that's this week's above the char. Hey, did you know that I'm also curating hometown rising a country music festival that's featuring Tim McGraw, Luke Bryan Keith Urban and Little Big Town, go check it out at hometown rising.com. I'll be on the stage and you can hit me up and have a drink with me. Until next week. Cheers. 10:52 Welcome back to the new episode of bourbon pursuit, the official podcast of bourbon, Kinney and Ryan here today talking about us subject that is very familiar to the bourbon culture and the whiskey geek culture. Because if anybody is really getting to bourbon, you've probably gone down your aisles, you see a lot of the regular stuff that's out there, you start getting really influenced by all of it and you want to learn more about it, then you learn about, we've talked about our own journeys into this, you learn about limited releases, and how hard it is to get your hands on limited releases. And when you get down to that path, everything all leads to one one sort of in gate here. And that's the secondary market. 11:36 Yes. 11:38 Well, you start out and you're like excited, you know, you found the Weller, you know, Elijah Craig barrel proof. And then you're like, well, what else is there, and then you gotta get bored with the stuff that you can find, then you're like, then people inches, like you introduce me to the Facebook world. And like, I was like, Oh, my God. It's like a Pandora's box. And that's how I got introduced to dust ease and all the limitations, and it's like, it's the best thing that's ever happened. Yeah, and the worst thing 12:03 is the best, worst thing you know, and we'll we'll talk about, you know, really our guest, because he is he's really the ones that as kind of spearhead and really grown this movement. But you know, just on the topic of dusty, I remember getting into the secondary market. And this is this was like, early 2014 timeframe when I was introduced to it. And this is before I think even this group was around that that became the largest one, he had all these secret code name groups that you got into. And I remember seeing dusty, and people were paying like 100 bucks for some 1970s old grand, I bought an 86 Oh, granted for 75 bucks, like in 2015. I bought, like, I bought like three or four of them. And but I was looking at it back then I was like, What moron is I know. 12:49 There's a 999 sticker on it, like 12:54 10 towns that but now it's like, why didn't about all of them? 12:57 Oh, gosh, I'm sure we all have some of these stories. So let's go ahead and introduce our guests today. So our guest today was one of the founders or is one of the founders of the largest secondary group that's out there on Facebook. So Ellen Pao of bourbon secondary market, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. Well, thank you for coming on. And you know, really kind of giving us a behind the scenes look of, of what really happens here. And, and just to make sure that everybody's clear, like, oh, it is not sitting here like advocating but he does this he kind of just operates a community. Right? And that's really what it is. And it doesn't matter if it was him or anybody else like this is going to thrive and exist no matter what, 13:35 no matter the channel no matter what. Absolutely. 13:38 So before we kind of dive into that, oh, and let's talk about kind of your past like how did you get into bourbon? How did you kind of find your way into into the scene? 13:49 See, I got into bourbon probably around seventh grade, just kind of like parents houses. 13:57 Usually people 13:59 get you're like, 14:01 like liquor cabinet. And, you know, us doing appreciate the corner. Yeah. But that was just, I mean, that's when I first got into it, then there was a pretty good time that I quit drinking it just because I had bad experience in high school and kind of just like, oh, not doing that. So it's usually when people have those 14:21 variances. And 14:22 then I guess freshman year in college, I worked at liquor barn in Lexington, and I was like, I'm gonna go out and get on, try and get back into this, you know, put it behind me got a bottle of Elijah Craig 18 for 50 bucks. It's like, I can't believe I'm spending this much. You know, went home had a party, we mixed it with Coke, you know, did shots of it just, it was, you know, one of those 1980 ones that were really good. Corey Putnam just chugs all the time. 14:54 And, you know, you look back and you're thinking like, Man, I wish I had that bottle of appreciation 14:58 anymore. You know, of course. The whole everybody looks at it, like a stock with they bought it when it first came out. Yeah, you know, but it is what it is. I 15:08 only bought Apple when it first came out. 15:11 Right? Yeah. $10 wouldn't, you know, but, uh, so and then, I guess, getting my education in hospitality, you know, I was managing restaurants and hotels, and in that kind of just the whole food and beverage thing just led me into spirits and naturally just 15:34 kind of evolved and got 15:36 naturally just start a secondary group. 15:40 I mean, we can get into that. And that that was a that was mostly because of back when you like we were talking about 2014. You heard of the group, she if you were in like bourbon info exchange, people will talk about it. But you got to know somebody to get in. I didn't know. I didn't know anything. You know, I was like, screw it. You know, I woke up at like, five in the morning Didn't you know, I was like, I couldn't get back to sleep. Like, I'm just I'm going to do it. Public, you know, all these secret groups. Why do you know why not? and it blew up. And I immediately became the guru and I didn't know it. People send me. They just assumed because I created this group. I knew everything. Yeah. So you know, they send a picture of this to me, what is this? How much is it worth? I have no idea. You know, like, Yeah, what is it? So all I do is Google. What is it? And I got educated, self educated on all the dust DS and fake it to every naked, you know? Yeah. I mean, I wanted to learn myself, I was intrigued by Why is, you know, why are people paying, you know, so? And then it just, it just kept getting bigger and bigger. And, you know, yeah, it didn't stop people rioted, that I let it be not secret, or, you know, and not bringing it to the forefront. And I think it did a lot. I mean, I think it affected the industry a good. 17:01 Oh, absolutely. I mean, I think I think that's what the secondary does. I mean, there's there's 17:05 brands that get like, totally thank the secondary model. Yeah, they're like, 17:09 I mean, yeah, I mean, it helps them evaluate exactly what they have in and maybe they start realizing everything's undervalued. Like, yeah, that was the that's probably the biggest thing. Communities had a huge impact on the black culture like do you think like old scout and like them county would ever be a thing without a bourbon secondary market? like it'd be tough to say yeah, I really would be it even be tougher to say that. Even would would group pics or store pics even have a place to be that are becoming that are, I guess you'd say sought after? Yeah. Because if you see something, and it's it's, it's got a group name on it, you're like, Oh, I immediately have that I've never seen it before. I remember for myself coming on to the secondary market with the first time. I remember seeing the Willett family estate bottles, just, you know, just the regular ones. And this is right as right as when the foil tops started taking over. So they're still wax ones in circulation. And I'm like, I've never seen these bottles before. I've never really seen them before. And so I'm I'm sitting there, I'm always going around the stores, trying to check them out. Trying to find these, you know, 10 910 14 year will family states. And I'm getting one in like Northern Kentucky. Like, I don't know, probably in late 2014, late early 2015 from the party source. But I didn't know like the whole entire time I could have just been driving to Bardstown. I mean, the whole time I could have been doing that. And so it was it was an edge. It's an educational experience as well for people that come into it. And just another education experience. I remember everybody's got their their Blanton story. You find Blanton's, you start learning about he learned about the letters in the horses in the bottle shape, and you come and trade with it. And then you learn out like, Oh my god, there's a barrel proof version. But you can't get the United States. How do I get my hands on it? 18:55 Like, how do you get a whole barrel on it? 19:00 It's exactly I mean, that's exactly like the the curiosity that gets sparked out of a community like this. So kind of talk about the hyper growth of what it was. And were there any kind of growing pains along with it. There were too many growing pains. It was just 19:20 occasionally we get to a point where like, I guess some of that some admins are like, Man, I'm having a baby now I don't have time for this. You know, I think it's kind of weird. Having admins leave because they they they really feel like they're getting noticed that a job. One of them like, Man, I've been trying to tell you this for a month now. 19:43 I don't care what kind of severance 19:45 do yeah, like, 19:47 I need an extra. 19:49 But uh, so yeah, it's only growing pains as as it got bigger. We just had to take on more admins. So what would you say you started start? 20 20:00 1415? And now how many about how many members are roughly? 20:04 About 35,000 35,000? 20:06 Yeah. 20:08 So do you have like a certain amount admins part? Thousand? Do you have like a like ratio 20:14 already have a certain amount of admins and time zones? Okay. That makes looking for West Coast because, you know, and then there's other things that we look for? What do they do during the day? Are you like a firefighter? Are you sitting in a firehouse for hours on end doing nothing but looking at Facebook or your hair? You know, really tech industry? Yeah. But, uh, so that's one of those are some of the things. And one of the things I told everybody, I was like, we don't want to hire anybody that actually comes to us and says they want to do it. Because then, you know, we actually did hire a guy that it you know, there's no wrong, you know, 20:57 some ulterior motive and, 20:59 and we there was, and but, you know, and it's just kind of a, you really got to be level headed, and most importantly, thick skin. Because if I mean, essentially, Europe, a boss of, I want to, I won't say it's a company, but I've, you know, you have to create these rules to keep the riffraff out. And then someone breaks one. And you're like, well, you broke the rules. Sorry, you got to go. But, and they've been drinking all night, and they're pissed. And then they, they've got to, you know, create a spoof accounts of your own Facebook or, you know, I had one admin leave because his kids were pictured him pictures of him and his kid were posted everywhere on their fake account, just like really, you know, sleazy stuff, but, I mean, it's, I mean, I kind of, I don't care what people say, doesn't bother me too much. You know, I just decided to keep doing what I'm doing. 21:57 Yeah, I mean, I guess it is tough. Because you're dealing in a market where these aren't, these aren't grandma's that are just knitting sweaters. Like these are, these are, these are, for the most part, a lot of grown men drink whiskey, and 22:11 it's an online bar, they have 22:13 seniors, and they have opinions. And they're very strong about them, too. And they 22:17 have a lot of liquid courage. That 22:20 in when you when you're behind the screen, and a keyboard that amplifies liquid courage is there's no repercussions really, except maybe a message back. 22:28 I mean, I've gotten into arguments online with people, you know, and then met them in person here. One guy, I, you know, he's his name will call him bow. And he came up here with Jamie from Lincoln Road, and we went to I went to a bourbon tasting that night and hung out with him. And you know, ha, mon, and I was like, Oh, hell, you know, me and him really got into it. And we went out drinking. I was playing Jamie and ping pong. He was cheering me on. He was all on my side. But the third bar was get to He's like, I go up to him. I was like, Can we bury this online hatchet, and he's like, Oh, we have a beef online. I was like, Yeah, he's like, what's your last name? I'm like, pow. Just started cousin. Oh. 23:16 Yeah, man. 23:19 God, I mean, he's a good guy. But so it's one of those things. It's like, Oh, they hate you. They hate you. But if you actually meet them in person, pretty much everybody's good people. But behind that keyboard, liquid current. Oh, yeah. FUFQFU. You know, you're the devil, you ruined bourbon. 23:34 Why do you think why do you think people do like have that animosity? I mean, it's and I know that you end up having to not post under your own personal accounts anymore. You do an inner page account to try and kind of hide and make sure the admins aren't aren't necessarily targeted anymore. So why is it that I mean, at this point, you are the godfather of the BSNV. Like that's, I think it's everybody love 23:59 that title, everybody. Hey, 24:01 everybody kind of understands your name. And when they see it, like, like, anytime it happens, like there's their posts, flurry that happens, but there's also some people that that hates you for no reason. Do you? Any idea? 24:13 I think it now, no, not really. I mean, I kind of see it as like, I know, I guess kind of the culture that everybody's gone through in the last six years of, you know, they don't care what they bought, you know, they've already made up their mind. They they're going to judge you for whatever it is that they think is true. And if they're presented with facts about the actual situation, you know, cognitive dissonance just goes in and they don't, you know, right ever, you know, yeah, I could be Mother Teresa. 24:51 You know, you ruin burden. If mother 24:53 teresa Rana face well, and when you're, 24:55 you're, you know, you're you're separated by a screen and you're not looking and talking to each. It really? Yeah, because you take the human element out of it is that you're like, you know, you can't it's if I'm sitting here Yeah, I'm not gonna yell at you for in person, but it might be a little easier. 25:12 Well, you know, I've never met you. I don't know you. I don't care. Right? Exactly. Yep, for sure. 25:21 So let's let's kind of talk about the rules a little bit because the one thing about bsm is that you're in compared to other groups like it's, it's a lot of like, no nonsense, like, this is what you're here for. You're here to buy bid. And that's it, like, no talk, no discussion. So kind of talk about the rules that that were in place and why they made them place like that. 25:42 So the the no discussions came up in a lot of rules were just formed by some of them sending me a pm saying, why don't you do this. And one of them was, I hate seeing discussions, when I'm only here to buy or look for something in particular. And the group's gotten so big, just, you got rid of it, I mean, then go somewhere else. And I was like, that's a great point, you know, bourbon or, or info, exchange, go there and talk about it. Here. We're one thing. So that's how that that happened. In a lot of the rules just were developed as we evolved. And just, I mean, people wanted it a certain way, it was mostly majority ruled on how things evolved, you know, from other groups and 26:26 stuff like that. And then you also have the secondary site that was doing kind of like raffles and all that sort of stuff. How did that sort of spin out and become its own separate thing? 26:38 saying basically, same thing, it's it's mucking up what a majority of people were there for. So it was like, we were just here for the bourbon, we want to buy it. That's what I want to I don't like gambling. I don't want you know, it's it's mucking up my area. So in the whole gambling thing, aspect, that's like a whole nother of great legal things that's going on. Doing a couple of things wrong there. And so I mean, that's that was just a separate it, you know, kind of 27:07 one of the first ones to do raffling different department. 27:10 I can't remember. I mean, I saw there was there was somebody in the community. I know that ran a group for a while he has since passed on. There not don't name names. Yeah, just for the sake of it. I mean, I remember it was red balls or whatever. Yeah, red balls or something like that. I forget. But there was there was there was those days and it I don't know like for I'll pass it to you guys. What would you rather do? Would you rather sit there and gamble on something or buy it outright if it's something you want? 27:40 Well, at first it was I won like my like first, like, like one out of 30. So I was like, This is amazing. Proceed to lose like 50 X in a row. And so then I quickly realized that let's just not a gamble. And let's just take the money that you would gamble and buy what you actually want and get it so it I'd rather much buy it now 28:02 then do it. I like I don't gamble at all with it. So I mean, I had no interest in in that help separate it too. And mostly the group ran it's the raffle group ran itself. And then people started getting crazy. We'll do a bottle bus was put in a bottle and then and then they're all gambling. So then they start someone owes someone a bottle, then they gamble with that bottle before it's even been shipped. And then it's like a cluster of who owns what where it was, you know, it's just like, so 28:34 it's it's kind of like I'm ready to double down. I didn't ever believe in those randomized. Like, I just still don't like mega ball ones. You know, it's like public knowledge. What's What's the number? Yeah. 28:47 So you were talking about just you know, who has what bottle and whatnot. I know that there are there's always disputes. kind of talk about what happens or how does the dispute come about sometimes? 29:03 A lot of times the biggest popcorn, 29:05 right. Explain popcorn to for people that don't understand that. 29:08 Yeah, remember? Yeah, explain. Because when I first saw you see like coronas and popcorn. And I'm like, What is all this mean? Like, yeah, go over the targets for the 29:17 words just means at the end of five minutes to go and your auction that you've created. If someone bids in that five minutes last five minutes, it extends the auction another five. And it just helps. You know, people are watching TV at home and 10 o'clock at night and they forget. Oh, someone did it. I can get in and you know, so it helped push it along and drive up the price but kind of stops that a little bit of the the eBay sniping kind of riots it does. You know if that happened, kindness, just Continental United State, cheap way to our easy way to say I'm paying for your shipping. I don't know where the the list of all the acronyms were created. came from somewhere before bsm came around and years before that. So you know there's I mean, those groups have been going around for 30:08 Yeah, I love the i's and T's and 30:11 GCS. Yeah, you gotta learn everything. That's I think that's, that's almost like a rite of passage we are getting into the bourbon world is that if you if you go to somebody and you start talking all this vernacular, and they don't understand that you're like, 30:24 welcome to the club. I think I won like an auction. And then I didn't realize what popcorn was. And somebody when I was like, wait a minute, I wanted it's time it went off, you know, but I didn't understand the rules. And it's kind of like read roll 13.0 and I was like, Oh, okay. Not this one in your videos. Another one. 30:41 I just discovered one. Last week, some South Carolina guys came up. And they were calling old Weller antique Ola. And I'm like, I've only heard it. Oh, da, I guess it's a, you know, different level. I've always heard of ODA, but apparently everywhere else they call it Oh, my God. You know, the vernacular, 31:01 it changes. That's for sure. Yep. So So kind of talking about what happens in a dispute, like what Ryan said, If there is, if there is something that somebody bids, but then somebody says like, nope, nope, it's over. Like, how, how does it when does an admin need to get involved in a situation? 31:18 Well, we wrote the rules. So hopefully, that they don't have to get an admin involved. But and they can people can will, you know, show the rules. It didn't, you didn't win it. Because here's the rule. It says, you know, after five minutes, it's over of no bidding. So, you know, you can check the timestamp of someone posting in that and determine if you actually did bit in time or not. So, I mean, things like that. If they're disputed, it might be well, the package says delivered, but it's not on my front porch, whereas Well, I know where it is. Someone stole it, you know, 31:54 who handles that part? 31:56 I mean, and you've even got the the drivers might steal it. I've had that happen. I know. You know, I was waiting for a package and excited that it was coming and got a notification that it was delivered in like, No, it wasn't, I'm literally by the front door. never showed up. So I bitter about that. FedEx. 32:13 Yeah. But I mean, is there is there a reason that admins have to step in the in a situation like that when a package is lost? Like 32:22 a? Not? Yes. Because usually the guy that ships it, they're responsible until it says delivered. And, or if it breaks during shipping, you know, the guy might open the package, and it's all busted. And he's like, Hey, this is broken, or the seal broke, and it's a collector's item, and I want it in mint condition. They'll they'll accuse, you know, the seller might accuse them of tampering with it, they just want a free bottle out of me or, you know, they're lying. This is bowl, you know, 32:54 Haven, they just have blue bears the liability and the Alicia Burton tell 32:58 if it's broken up, it's okay. You threw in, you know, three pieces of newspapers packing material, and it's broken, you know, come over here. Yeah, you know, and then a lot of the packaging suggestions that I gave actually came I used to work in a UPS hub one summer in Lexington. And I mean, I literally saw packages falling 30 feet concrete floor off these conveyor belts that get jammed up, and they just pack just are overflowing and just falling crashing down. So I was like, immediately, okay, I know how to pack a bottle from now, you know, you can't overpack in, you know, you really should you know it. Things like that happen all the time. So, it just, 33:39 I prefer their bottle packs their 33:42 wine wine bottle shipper things. 33:44 Yeah. Cool until I someone's like, showed me a bottle that they just, it kind of gives a false sense of security. Yeah. And they don't they don't throw anything else in there. And 33:54 well, y'all will have one of those in and then I put the popcorn around it or not popcorn, whatever. The styrofoam plate Stockholm, peanuts, peanuts. 34:02 Yeah. So in that situation, it's it's kind of it's up to the buyer to try to make it right. In a situation like that. Now, we've also seen it in some of the How 34:12 do you make it right, though? 34:13 Like, it's it's either reading under. 34:16 So if it's broken, it's refund the money if, if the tech strips broken world, it's kind of like you ask the buyer? Did you buy it to drink it? Or did you buy it to throw it on your massive wall? And, you know, whatever the answer is usually, okay. Well, then we take $50 for the, you know, crack seal, right? or something, you know, because 34:38 you're going to drink up to them to figure out the Yeah. 34:42 Yeah, we direct them to figure it out themselves got 34:45 you're not like the Better Business Bureau where they're like, they're like, have a dispute. And 34:50 you don't you don't have to resolve and 34:52 that's it. I was I was gonna think they're like a mediation court. You will, you know, like, you're going like husband and wife are going through divorce. Let's get together. No room real quick. 35:02 Yeah, I've had that quite a bit, actually. People add their wives to the group, and then immediately regret it. Because you know, their wives mad at them. They're always on their phone. wife gets in there sees how much they're spending on it, then it's like, well, you kick my wife out. Know that you got to do figure that out on your own. I'm not getting in the middle of that. And then divorces have come up. No way. Oh, yeah. Like, those wives know how much that collections worth. And you're getting into a divorce for whatever you did wrong, or whatever happened. That's, you know, needs to be split up. So then they want me to kick their wives out so they can let them know what they're selling or, you know, just like crazy. It's like, I'm not No, sorry. Sorry about your luck. you dug your hole. You know, that's my, my problem. Well, I didn't know that. There's a lot of that's something that I think about I think I 35:51 might add my wife to it because because being part of the podcast and I'm like, I gotta you gotta have a pulse on what's happening. So you know, exactly uninvite jacket. 36:03 I forgot she had it sees. 36:05 So I guess another thing is, you know, there's a, there's another thing that always happens, these groups that people call out other people, they'll say, you know, they'll tag and say like, Jimmy Joe, he's, he's a, he's a shifted, he's not he has a, you 36:19 know, good pair. 36:20 Well, I know that are like, I bought something. And then it's been two weeks, and he hasn't shipped it out. And he's not responding back to messages. Like, is that the right thing to do? Or is it like, 36:32 the worst thing to do? If If there's something going on, sometimes there's something actually happened, man, I've been in the hospital. That happens, it happened to me once and I had to take a picture of my armband and send it to do I'll ship your bottle out, it's just going to be a little while I don't know when. But uh, usually someone's if they might be scamming Omen or something like that. calling them out is the worst thing is he'll just piss them off. And if they have a conscience, and we're going to actually they messed up and they were actually having attention to get get you back, well, our refund you or something, calling them out, just ruined your chances. Best thing is to conduct admin and say, Hey, this is what's going on. And then we can reach up and I mean, I'll just send a message, Hey, yo, this bottle what's going on, you know, not a no accusations, I want to hear your side because a lot of times, there's, it's not their fault or something, you know, whatever. So, I mean, you do have to be diplomatic and not assume whatever you're being told is that the whole story and go to the other side. And most the time, it works out fine. And they solve the problem. Occasionally, someone just, you know, turned into a drug addict and is stealing or, you know, ripping people off. But we've done a good job of like letting people into the group, it tells you when like when someone tries to join the group, it tells you how pretty much everything where they where they live? Are they a member of any other groups that you're a member of? Are they friends with anybody? How windows? When did they create the Facebook page or in just all kinds of things? So if you're just created this in the last year, you're not getting? You know, if you're created the Facebook in the last two years? Why did you just create Facebook? And you know, all right. 38:30 around for a while, I know you're in your mid 30s? You 38:33 should know Yeah, exactly. So the and so we will have them prove their identity. Sometimes if their accounts really, you know, just send us a photo, a picture of your photo, Id block out all your pertinent information, we just need to see you actually who you are, you know, somebody that you're not afraid to. And now these days, you can if you have that information, just like a name and a city. You can find them on their address, every relative for free note, you know, not some search site, white pages. com. It's all 39:06 out there. So it's like LinkedIn work. So if you ever add accusations of counterfeits or frauds. 39:15 Hey, it's Kenny here and I want to tell you about the Commonwealth premier bourbon tasting and awards festival. It will be happening on August 24. In Frankfort, Kentucky. It's called bourbon on the banks. You get to enjoy bourbon beer and wine from regional and national distilleries while you stroll the banks along the scenic Kentucky River. 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And there's been people that have done it that we just thought I like I went to this guy's house and got a bottle off of them. About a single project for 60 bucks or something. And house he's living in a $400,000 house in which in Louisville is pretty good sized house 30,000 square feet or so maybe bigger, nice part of town comes from a wealthy family, well known family. And you just wouldn't think he would be doing that. But I you know, who knows what motivates people to commit fraud? 41:45 So in a situation like that, where people have been wrongs, for say, like buying a buying a counterfeit on the page? Is there any? 41:57 Right? How does it How does it go about to try and make people whole or anything like that it's like, man like this is this is a black market, you get what you get immediate action from an admin is if that accusation is made, we immediately ban you, or stop you from being able to because we don't want to keep, you know, until we find out what's really going on. And there's been times where, yeah, I bought that. Yeah, I sold him that bottle. I got it from this guy who's also in the group in this transaction. And you can see me buying that tree. Yeah, and you know, and then it's like a, these bottles have been passed around for 10 people in the same group in three months. You know, 42:33 that's what I always say about the secondary, it's like, it all just stays in the group. Like, it's, it's like, we're all transferring and firing the same bottles. Like, it's funny how they pass around that. So 42:42 yeah, there's, I mean, there's some guys out there that do incredible work chasing these people down and finding out where the counterfeits are coming and how they're happening. And and 42:55 they're those five fighters or send on 42:58 Facebook every day. Well, I mean, it's just good that there's people like that, that they find enjoyment out of doing it, right. And they they either they find enjoyment, or it's maybe they're doing it to protect their own ass, because they do have a very large stake in bourbon. And they've got to make sure that what they have is still keeping its value as it goes. So two sides of that coin. Now, there's also times that we just talked about that people finagle people out of money. Somebody says buy it now you say sure sounds good. Take your PayPal, Facebook account deleted, I've got my money and run. What do you what do you do to help? Or is there a way to help those buyers either become whole? Or is it kind of like, Man, that's it? 43:41 Sorry? I'm hanging out with PayPal? 43:45 Is there a BSM community pool? where people are refunded like No, I mean, it's interrupt your own risk type of thing. I mean, there's not really a safeguard to protect you. And we tried to hope, prevent as much as we can by screening the people that come in there. But there's, I mean, there's an inherent risk, you're gonna, you have to assume when you go into it, yeah, especially, what's your legal recourse at that point to? Well, we're gonna go, you're gonna, you know, it's kind of like, tell me what, Wise Guys, you know, what are you gonna do about it? 44:19 You gotta kind of look at the history of you know, those trends, 44:22 right, and the whole vouching for what they're building? Yeah, I need a reference Jacqueline, this dude that, you know, yeah, that helps a lot. 44:30 In speaking of something like that, I just kind of thought of this to, you know, when you started this group, you also started in a way that was a lot different than others. Some other ones, like the old days, that's not around, which was BX people would go in there and they would post bottles, and you would, they wouldn't be transparent. It would say, like, you want to sip or you want to taste and that means it's for sale, or if it's for trade, and you would be post in the comments, or whatever it is, and everything what happened through PM, right? When when you built this site, it was almost completely opposite. It's like, full transparency, open market sort of thing. What was the idea of doing that versus kind of like keeping it behind these sort of like, secret code words? 45:15 One I didn't, I didn't know about the code words, because I wasn't able to get into those. And that's the whole reason it was created. And the whole transparency thing, you know, as like, after I started it, and it was starting to take off. I was like, What is Facebook's policy on this? So I found it. And it literally said, You must be at least 18 years old to buy alcohol, you know, sell alcohol and buy it on Facebook? And I'm just kind of scratching my head, okay. Oh, maybe they're just seeing it as an international company. And well, we're not really in it. And then it changed to 21 then it they said, Okay, now you can't do it. On marketplace, and now it's a at all so we'll see what happens. And I think I lot of that most recent changes, probably has to do with the legal trouble. Facebook and Zuckerberg or or in with the Justice Department and their his emails were leaked, and he might be in a lot of trouble. So I think Facebook legal team is just like, okay, no more chicken groups and gun groups, like, whatever, all these crazy little white, there's chicken group. There's like cockfighting and stuff. No, like, what are they like? Not heirloom. But, you know, crazy breeds of chickens that like rednecks are collecting that happened, really, but they don't they don't they don't let it pass for everything. I was like, I remember a secondary market like it like a like a Facebook 46:42 ad that said, like, find your people like there's there's groups for everybody. And I didn't know that. 46:48 So I just heard about that. Because I mean, when groups get shut down there, apparently there really is a history like a what Facebook normally does, and they take out the big one, and then they let it because all these groups, you know, all these little sub small groups, all those people are usually in the biggest group. So take out the biggest group and everyone will find out and maybe they'll go away or whatever. The term. Yeah, now I gotta roll down here. 47:17 I mean, in this also, like, I know, there was a huge opioid crisis that was happening through Facebook as well. I mean, there's people buy sell trade, you know, illegal drugs and stuff. I mean, those those groups go fast. But that's, that's sort of the way that the world works, I guess. And then so another way that those was a lot different from other groups as well. So there was another group that's it's still out there today. So I'm not going to put a name to it. But they always wanted to try and keep a record of, of transactions and sales, and it was all done online. And that's kind of what also fueled bottle Blue Book calm and everything like that. So kind of talk about why you said like, or just said, like, I'm not gonna, we'll just like, if you want to know, something, just research search it, right, instead of having to own a catalog or an Excel spreadsheet. 48:13 Yeah, it won't, I don't want to maintain it. Is 48:18 I mean, it doesn't pay anything to sit here and you know, play around on it. 48:21 Yeah. But the other thing is that also, you know, that that data was also used in some research studies to actually see how the prices of bourbon had been affected from years of just, you know, actually having a particular bottle and seeing how evaluated over the years, seeing how different types of bottles, you know, changed in value over the years. 48:43 Yeah, what was it like the average return was like, 200% on in, like, just a two year span? Something like that. Yeah, 48:50 it was crazy. I mean, some maintenance sucks. That's, 48:53 yeah, I just didn't want to spend time doing it. But in I felt like bottle blue, but does a really good job of you know, I don't I haven't been on there and years and but just because the history and in my group got so big, I didn't need to, and it was probably more current, because 49:09 you can search any, like thing, right? stir the group? 49:14 Yeah, if you can, if you can just run the search button and know you right, or exactly know how to filter. I mean, you can you can find pretty much anything but yeah, there was, I don't know really who's running pooper. So if somebody like us yet, there's another transaction and BSMNE to go and enter this NL 49:29 introduced into the toilet. Like, I'm always wondering, like Wikipedia, like, it's crowdfunding, like, Who the hell goes takes your time to fill out a Wikipedia page? You know, I'm 49:38 sure there's a lot of people out there. I mean, if you have a 49:41 if you have passion towards that topic, 49:43 exactly. I mean, I guess 49:45 it also has with Wikipedia, you get I mean, it's like a credibility and a point system, like, it says, you know, like Ryan Cecil did this, right? So so you get you get a little little badge or a star on your shoulder, I guess you could say, if you want to do that. 50:00 One thing I wanted to bring up and wild turkeys a good example. How the market affect your like, we hinted at it, but how the secondary market helps companies see where their brands going. I was doing a barrel pick at wild turkey several years ago. And I was talking to Eddie about the secondary market. He's like, yeah, I'm in that group. I love watching those bottles and what they sell for, you know, like, really, he's like, Yeah, and I got to thinking, I was like, you know, your name's not in my group. So he's under some, I don't know what he's under. But uh, and then I got to thinking about wild turkey in their high end premium brands that they release. They don't like, they don't work. They're out on the shelf at 350. And they might sit there for up to a year, but it'll finally all sell. He feel like they see these brands nudging up and know, okay, we put it out here, we'll be able to maximize our profits and smart business in my opinion, but 51:01 it is it is a way that companies can gauge what's happening. Yeah, I mean, it's, 51:07 it's totally, totally took off the secondary market to raise raise prices, both heaven hills doing it, everybody's doing it. They see the value? Well, it's the first ones that were like, all right. We don't image that. Yeah, 51:20 well, I mean, the other thing is, is when you look at just what these Facebook groups are able to do in general is is it not only just helps with value, but also helps with prediction of the changing consumer? Like what do what do all these people, what are they gravitating towards? I'm sure you can look at the stats that happens when you sell a pallet to a distributor, and that distributor gets it out to the the stores. But it's kind of hard to kind of track that data and you kind of hard to see like what people are saying about it, however, you go to an online forum. And you see some kind of like, let's take like Bill need honey, for example. Like, I saw honey, and I kind of like whatever, honey, 52:02 yeah, flavored whiskey, and then 52:04 and then all of a sudden, you know, in Nashville is a whole other thing. You get this whole group in Nashville that that seems to kind of create other little like a tornado of, of I don't know what you would call it, but somehow they're able to hype a lot of stuff up. And now bill need honey trades for like four or 500 bucks. And I'm like, how, how is this even possible? Because I wouldn't I wouldn't have find myself like particularly interested in it. But if you look at what the market does and what it's valued at, they're probably like, Oh, shit, we better add some more honey, these barrels, you know, I don't really know, like, that's a process. But it's a way that they can see they can gauge exactly what what consumers are gravitating towards. So yeah, for sure, another way to look at it. So there's a there's another kind of way to if we if we look at the the group that you had built as well, there's particularly one, maybe there's a few others of distilleries that you've banned from being inside the group, as well as like, these bottles are not allowed to be traded. You know, we don't need to give them a platform and say like, let's talk about who that is. But is there a reason why that you would go through and say, I think we need to put our foot down and we shouldn't have these type of bottles be on here or on my market? 53:18 Yeah, so one, we're bourbon secondary market. So we keep it it just whiskey. There, though, I guess one that everybody knows. And it's thinking about, we I, I was getting really pissed off at all the people that were thread shooting on, every time one of these bottles came up, as I got in, and they're just, I didn't even know what they were fighting over. I just got tired of hearing about it. And then I heard there might be market manipulation, and I was just like, screw it band. And then I heard about all these things coming out about someone going in and doing a barrel pic with the secret camera and, and trash cans and whatever. I was like, I didn't know that. And then of course, everybody assumed was that, you know, I was just tired of having to admin, my own group, like shutting people up. And people get in fights and yelling, and just like, We're not here for that, you know, it was just like, just ban it get rid of and then it 54:22 took off and 54:23 be like, what's your motive? 54:24 And then the gifts come out? Right? There's always the gift stream of how 54:30 but only wrong. There's a lot of funny pictures. Oh, yeah, 54:33 kids that are very creative. 54:37 If you can just like add some good laughs Oh, yeah. 54:41 So the other thing is, if we look at the time that's invested into this 54:47 time is time is very valuable time is very valuable to all of all we're 54:51 equal, let 54:52 it all have equal time and it's in it's in for I think a lot of people out there they take it, they take it for granted, the amount of time that you've probably invested into this group over over five years now. And last time I checked, you weren't collecting a paycheck from a warrior. Nope. So what what's the motivation behind going through it and continuing to do this without seeing any kind of upside, per se? 55:21 One, it's, it's a passionate hobby of mine and every other admin in there, there are some incentive or benefits to it. Like someone comes to town they know they know who you are, they know you live here. They want to hang out and share samples with you or bring you some samples or mail you samples. Get that all the time. You know, we don't even we don't pay for it. It's that nice and fun. But 55:50 I mean, there's no 55:53 it's really kind of easy, and especially if you're like working a job. So a lot of I used to manage a liquor store. A lot of time I'd be just it's just sitting there and doing nothing. I mean, it's shelves are stocked, okay, we're good. Now you're just waiting for customers, and it was a slower store. So get your phone out of time. A lot of time here, you know. So, I mean, what else am I going to do? You know, just watch cat videos are 56:21 still fun, but I'm more interested in bourbon. 56:25 Morrison getting yelled at? 56:26 Yeah, nice people in the area. 56:29 Yeah, start fights for out of nothing. It's a bourbon of all things. But just funny and amazing. Like how people getting arguments over bourbon. Like there's, there's just so much like, yeah, we'll get into heated debate, whether it's about a particular bottle or whether somebody prices some sex. Yeah, good question. What do you do in a situation where somebody accidentally prices something? We've seen it, we've seen it both ways. They'll say way to live got this happy? 15 I'm going to put a for sale for 2500. And then the laugh emoji start coming every day that's coming. What do you do in that sort of sense? You 57:06 know, there's, there's kind of a range of All right, I'm just gonna delete your post because you're an idiot, or you're just going to piss off everybody, you know, 2500 for whatever the bottle goes for now. You know, if it's $1,000 too much, you're probably going to get delete, because I know what's gonna. But if you You know, I've seen the opposite where Pappy 23 170 someone you know, 10 people Ben, Ben, Ben, Ben bit, you know, and then they want to hold 57:39 zero 57:40 exactly what was clear that you were not trying to short yourself that much money, you know, 57:44 yeah, so selling it below the cost of even retail, you 57:48 know, I'm not being that nice of a guy and you're being an asshole. So it's like, no, you're not getting your free bottle of Pappy basically. So. But yeah, I mean, so there's a if it's just if it's too much. I mean, I've seen it where it's like $100 too much and they're still losing it and it's then we do actually kind of manage it and just mute everybody. All right. You said something, you know you redshirted me your digital duct tape for three days? 58:14 Yeah. 58:15 Is there actually like a like a thing where you're like you're because I've never actually added a group before? Is there really a like a button that you can say like you're you're cut for 10 days or something? You didn't you're 58:26 just like three options? No way that's awesome. Three days seven days Really? Okay. And depending on how I feel that day, you 58:36 know, it's it's just progressively gotten worse. 58:38 seven day max punishment. 58:41 Alright, you didn't break like Facebook rolls so you're not out of the group, but come on. 58:46 And then there's there's the other side of this where there's somebody that posts like a mixers 20 for will say like 1000 bucks, right when that's easily an 1800 dollar bottle or 2000 or something like that. So what happens if they accidentally undervalue it? And it's not an obscene and it's not an obscene value like a they 59:09 they literally know. 59:12 we owed it to them. And usually when they realize like someone tells them you just lost $800 you could have had 1800 dollars or something whatever. They'll just disappear from the group by themselves you know 59:27 that that point is like no harm no foul like you're you're faster the trigger on their keyboard but that's about all we can give you right now. 59:33 Yeah, exactly. 59:36 And so sometimes hold people hold up themselves to the boat you know all right, honor it Damn it. I don't I don't want to but sometimes they swallow their pride 59:45 now hopefully somebody like returns something in their favor to or if they cry it opens them a sample or something like that that'd be old 59:52 least which is IRA karma. 59:54 That is true thing I mean, there's bourbon karma out there there's people talk about all the time you know, you have somebody find a bottle you ship somebody something you send them somebody a sample, hopefully the karma God's smile down on you and you go walk into middle of nowhere Oklahoma, you stumble upon an old dusty turkey or something, you know, like, that's the truth thing. Now, there was also I think it was maybe a few years back. It was around Christmas time in did the community come together and like by the admins, some, like some Van Winkle or something like that. 1:00:26 I remember that. Yeah, so that wasn't actually in my group. Oh, no, that's fine. So everybody wanted to Dave on the back for being a great admin and he got a bottle of Pappy 29 I didn't know about it. And someone saw that and was like, we should do it for Oh, and I'm like, No, just donate $20 to charity or something. Don't send me a bottle. That's not what I'm quit bother me. I'm done. I'm not trying to you know, I don't need a handout. Not that it was that I mean, but it until after the fact you 1:01:01 know, I just literally and then so kind of going back and looking at this whole thing of you know, in time is time is very valuable for for a lot of people as you start going down this path and in everybody's got careers outside of just bourbon least hopefully most your friends. I mean, well, I mean, I met outside of like flipping bourbon. Right? Right. So everybody's everybody's hopefully has some career and flipping bourbon just isn't it. But that's, that's what kind of go backwards or time is valuable. And you look at it, you say like I built up a network of 50,000 people? What if I was able to charge like $5 per person per year for dues in that would go towards? I don't know what it would go towards, like, if it is to like actually help with the time that value that spent or whether it goes into like an insurance bunker for 1:01:51 bottles? How many people don't think is instantly enough? Sorry, charging depends now and how many active out of 50 that would even know that are? 1:02:00 can probably see that data. But the thing is that would that setting could only work off of Facebook. And so when Facebook bands up, you know, kicks every all of it off the Facebook, that might actually happen. Not necessarily for me. I don't want to do it anymore. But it might I mean, it might be a good vessel. But the problem with that is everybody loves to get up their phone. Look, I mean, me, I don't say they love it, but they do it. They get out their phone, they start scrolling through Facebook, they see grandma, they see someone else's kid. Yeah, I see bourbon in usually my newsfeed that's the only way. I just see bourbon bourbon bourbon. And I'm sure a lot of y'all can. 1:02:45 That's the only reason I keep Facebook Like I loved it when you could only have the group app. And you didn't have to have the Facebook app you could just do. And then they made everything go to the Facebook app. And it was like, you could just totally keep your cool. Yeah, it's 1:02:59 so good. 1:03:01 People off of loan to a whole nother website. It's going to be a challenge. And so setting that up. That's a lot of work. And I mean, you better have some really good reason for people to go there, you know, and how you got to make it worth their while to go there. 1:03:19 Yeah, that's true. I mean, it is it is hard to try and monetize a platform like 1:03:23 this, because it's the path of least resistance you don't face because people are already there. 1:03:28 It's against Facebook rules to actually try that or do that. 1:03:32 No, well, you can't export the group lists, like on the spreadsheet. 1:03:36 You can everyone move over? Well, 1:03:39 knowing that then I guess that rules that out? Yeah, I was just trying to think of a way that you know, you could you could try to try to, you know, make it worth the time. That's that's actually invested. But it sounds like it because granted this This is by far the biggest group. But it is not the only group. I mean, there's probably I mean, there's got to be upwards of hundreds now. Not only just just markets where

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Episode 41 - From Muay Thai to TedX to Co-Founder of Two Companies about Positive Language Mark England is with host Dave Swanson

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 31, 2019 19:40

SUPPORT THIS PODCAST!Mark EnglandAs a martial artist, Mark was driven by his need to succeed. It took a severe injury and knee surgery to help him uncover what was driving him to the breaking point. In the recovery process, he found language as a tool to transform his life and has gone on as a language geek to be a TEDx speaker and help thousands of people better their lives with how they think and speak.ProcabularyEnliftedTed TalkDave SwansonDave SwansonWebsiteBook Free Chapter of my Bestselling Book? MarkEngland[00:00:03] Welcome to Goat Wrestling Perseverance podcast with your host, Dave Swanson. He's wrestled with goats, climbed mountains and bicycled across America. He wants to help you with your dreams and goals with one perseverance story at a time. Dave Swanson: [00:00:24] Welcome to go Wrestling Perseverance podcast. Today's guest is a co-founder of Pro Cavalry. Not only that, he has also been a Muay Thai fighter who is also a coach of that. Currently, he is a 10 X speaker. He does keynote speaking. But he is not just that. He's a relationship coach, a life coach, coach. And I'm so glad to have him on the show today. His name is Mark English. Mark. Welcome to the show. Mark England: [00:00:49] Thank you for having me. For having you on the show, Dave. It's a pleasure. Mark England: [00:00:53] All right. As we know in the audience for wrestling perseverance, we jump right into the story. And so, Mark, I've heard this story a little bit on the Ted X, but love the show. That's what the audience. So mid summer 2002, I'm in the doctor's office once again, post second knee surgery, and the doctor tells me it's over. You're done, buddy. Your career verbatim, your career as a fighter is over. You could could become a very good swimmer. And I'm staring at him dazed and confused. I'm hearing it. And I'm also not hearing it. I'm seeing him. And I'm also seeing my my career, my plans, my, my, my, my, my, my fight skills. Just go out the window. Walked out, limped out. The the front steps of the hospital and gotten a cab to drive over to get another MRI across town. Bangkok traffic, rain coming down monsoon. Bangkok rain coming down. And I I remember it very clearly still because it was a bit surreal. I was looking out the window, the rain coming down like something out of a movie day. And and I'm I'm thinking about what all this means to me currently. And I'm also having another side conversation that's a little bit more elevated than my normal thought process. I'm thinking about all the things I'm losing out on and how I can't go home now because I I I won't go back home and not be that fighter. OK, negations acknowledge. So what will I'd rather stay in Thailand and be a nobody in a strange land and then give up that identity. And and while I'm thinking that about how my life is ruined, I'm also thinking a little bit, a little bit, quote, unquote, higher. This this story, this experience will define the rest of your life. And I noticed that thought show up. And I said to myself, that's strange. That's weird. And what I ended up persevere. Persevering is a horribly entrenched victim mentality, which in my opinion, my personal and professional opinion is the number one thing for someone to unlearn. In order to increase theSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/GWPPodcast)

language thailand bangkok america tedx kickboxing muay thai mri ted talks walked persevering i'm i'm mark england procabulary support this podcast dave swanson enlifted

Interview with Jacynth Bassett of the Bias-Cut.com, on pro-age fashion

Fab after Fifty - Leading the Pro-Age Conversation

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 30, 2019 37:53

Ceri Wheeldon of Fab after Fifty interviews Jacynth Bassett , founder of online pro-age premium online boutiquethe Bias-Cut.comIn this episode we chat about ageism in the fashion industryWhy retailers and designers fail to cater for women over 50.Why some retailers are now recognising the spending power of women over 50Why 'rules' of what to wear over 50 are outdatedWhat items are the best investment pieces for women over 50Where we can find style inspiration over 50How to best shop online for clothes ----more----Full transcript:[00:00:04] I'm Ceri Wheeldon. Welcome to the Fab after Fifty podcast. Leading the pro age conversation talking about all things life after 50. [00:00:16] I have with me today my special guest Jacynth Bassett . Jacynth is the founder of the first pro age online premium fashion boutique the bias-cut.com. And she's also fighting ageism. She's an ageism fighting trailblazer. Hello and welcome to Fab after 50. [00:00:35] Hi Ceri. It's a pleasure to be talking to you. [00:00:38] Now I know we've had lots of conversations haven't we away from this podcast about how the fashion industry hasn't really caught up with reality how women over 50 actually see ourselves and how we like to dress today. [00:00:50] Yes. Yeah well I mean I think we're seeing it slowly changing I think largely because the fashion industry is cottoning on to the fact that midlife women have disposable income but it's still very gradual and it's all quite tokenistic and I think even when we see older women featured in campaigns because we are seeing that a bit more now, we are, [00:01:19] There are more than when I first started. [00:01:20] Yes. And same with me. And so it is getting there. But if we notice they often the models beautiful as they are often look the same. They are often quite tall slim Caucasian with silver hair and a lot of women over 50 are not like that. And additionally as I often say to brand that's the thing that the issue is not just about featuring that woman in a campaign it's got to be authentic and understanding that customer has to be in every aspect of the business. So often you might for example go online and I've seen an older woman the campaign put their whole website is still using younger models. And you've also got the fact that a lot of there's also the lack of understanding of the customer in terms of her body shape her lifestyle. So you can say you're catering to women all you want by putting in an older model in it but doesn't mean actually that the average older woman over 50 wants to want to wear these clothes and that it will really understand her figure. So it is really a deeper issue than the way the fashion industry is treating it right now. [00:02:26] Yes and actually interestingly enough I received a press release today from somebody that these dresses that we know are great for older women as well. [00:02:33] Well I'd wear them as tops together but I think it's so short I might wear a tunic top that is no way I feel out in that particular sort of style. [00:02:41] I mean would be. Exactly. And it's completely misunderstanding really the fact that women want to dress stylishly. They want to feel confident feel contemporary. But it doesn't mean they're going to suddenly wear everything that 20 year olds wear or in the same way that she would wear. And as you say I mean there's often I find it with designers they almost look at me with sort of shock when I say but this isn't going to work. Maybe it's the neckline or you know something to do with it's unflattering around the middle and they just don't understand it. And it's unfortunate it comes down to the fact that there's still I think a lot of it is rooted in education. But even designers at fashion school a lot of them are still only really designing for younger women so they don't understand that there is a different customer out there and that they need to be catered to in a slightly different way. [00:03:33] Oh absolutely. I mean on the same side as I was when I was younger I'm very fortunate in that. [00:03:38] But my body shape has changed. So you have to look at things so you known simply say sleeve length, better sleeve patterns cut for the upper arms . And also things like where the darts are placed. [00:03:49] Exactly. I mean I think is often a problem. Yes. I mean I think that you know busts often with gaping and also sleeves. I mean we talked about that though about the difficulty to find sleeves. And it's just understanding their lifestyle as much as anything else as well. Now you want to be going dressed up nicely maybe to go to dinner or to theatre or something. Now you might go to the club but it's you know fewer women over 50 I think go to a nightclub. So again it's a completely different lifestyle and it's different priorities and values that need to be understood. [00:04:29] And also if you think they should absolutely appreciate the spending power that our generation have now perhaps because the kids have flown the nest et cetera as opposed to younger women who are sort of investing in growing their careers and also bringing up families. [00:04:44] Yeah I think that's one thing that's driving force behind why we're seeing more inclusivity and that is to do with spending power. You know I know quite a few brands who when I first approached so I first first came up the idea of the bias cu in 1212 so really back then we were seeing very little when I started developing the business after university in 2014 it was still an issue and even bigger than it is right now and a lot of designers were very dismissive of me and the concept if you even when I muttered the word over 40 they were horrified and kept saying you about our clothes are pretty cool. They can know a lot of our customers are younger and that's fine. I'm not saying that they're not but why can't you be cool over 40. And interestingly quite a few of them have now completely changed their tune and say that they're very inclusive. They feature older women their campaigns and I think. I think it obviously I don't know personally but I think sadly whether it's a good or bad thing I mean it's happening but it is likely it's because of the spending power. I think you know more younger millennials the young professionals I don't know many people who can spend a lot of money at my age you know particularly with the housing you know they won't get on the property ladder more than anything so they don't have the income that maybe 20 30 years ago even someone younger did have and and also there's the fact that I do think that we have people who their kids have left. And again they want to dress differently to how but in their 50s to how their parents did. So it's all the more to do with I think though spending power. [00:06:38] Yeah I have to say that I mean a few years ago I was I was at a trade show for the fashion industry. Yeah and I was on one particular brand and there was some sort of dress at that I thought was ideal for a feature which I was doing a for a wedding guest special occasional wear. Yeah. And they're really happy to give you me photograph. Until I gave them my card. Right. They said no way. They did not want these clothes as being suitable for the 50s. They said we are targeting that you know the 20s and 30s market. We don't want those women to think that somebody over 50 is wearing the same dress. I think they were against it. [00:07:15] I think as you said it's changing but it's slow to change. [00:07:20] It's an interesting thing because you know with the bias cut the whole thing is that the pieces that we sell can work on any age but our curation is focused on championing the 50 plus woman, So there is a way. Yes there is a way. Yeah but what's interesting is that I still have people who who are younger. We do have customers who are younger but there are customers who are younger who are gonna go oh I could really wear this stuff. In shock and I have friends who have dismissed even looking at the website and then when I'll turn up to a party wearing something that you know we sell they'll be really surprised that it's from the web site. And so there is this divide and this idea that is off putting for younger women to see old women in the same clothes and we need to get to a point where it really shouldn't matter the age of the person wearing the clothes at all. If you just if they're nice clothes and they've stylish that's what you appreciate. And I think we are slowly getting that with other people such as Iris Apfel and Helen Mirren and a lot of fantastic actresses over 50 who are very stylish. And so it is having an impact on the younger generation seeing older women can dress beautifully and get older. But as you say there's still this concern in particular amongst designers from a branding perspective that as soon as they are identified with an older customer that younger customer won't be interested. And I know of designers who have turned down A-list celebrities for wearing pieces at huge award ceremonies because they didn't want it associated with an old customer because they thought it would damage their reputation of being cool . And for some reason and I actually think that the more millennials are coming up to the fact that that's not the case much. [00:09:18] I think it's actually the fashion industry. And often their PR and the branding the marketing advisers who are slightly behind. [00:09:26] I think there's an education process in some ways. [00:09:30] Yeah absolutely. I think at all ages. I mean why one of the things that I get oftentimes is why do you care about ageism you're only 26. And my answer is why shouldn't I care about something. It might not directly impact me right now but it's the same as saying a march in Cairo about women's rights just because he's not a woman. And also ageism is the only ism that actually will affect every single person. So we need to be educating everybody it shouldn't just be a topic of conversation for people over 50 it needs be a conversation for all ages. [00:10:05] Totally agree. So I mean in terms of buying clothes. Why do you think we need to pick sites such as yourself. Easier for us to buy. Why can't we just go into top shop or go to top shop online and buy our clothes. [00:10:22] Well as I said it's a lot to do with understanding body shape more than anything else and lifestyle. I think obviously there are pieces that are out there in other shops but it can be a very long somewhat demoralising experience trawling through them and not finding the pieces that work. And it makes the midlife women feel secondary and that's not right. They should feel just as important and just as empowered as somebody younger. So that's why I think we need websites but I don't want I don't think they should be exclusive in terms of saying you know women who are younger can't wear these pieces. That's my view and similar with other brands and makeup. I don't think they should be exclusive but I think what they need to be doing is championing that woman treating her as the primary customer so that she feels wanted and she feels valued and at the moment because we don't have that in the shops and a lot online. That's why we need to have websites that do do the opposite and actually pioneer change. [00:11:29] And when we look at and talk about that change and the kinds of clothes we want to wear I know that when I go back even 10 years everybody kept calling me about rules things like women over 50 shouldn't wear jeans, women over 50 shouldn't wear skirts above the knee. women over 50 shouldn't wear high heels, women over 50 definitely shouldn't wear bikinis though. Personally I don't know think you should any rules and wear what you feel comfortable with that. Great. Are you finding that when you go to talk to designers etc. they still think there are rules. [00:12:03] I think to be perfectly honest not as much because they are often still not even considering that customer enough. If I'm honest I think if I was presented with designers who say these are the rules I'd at least find that somewhat encouraging that they are even considering that customer. But they do. [00:12:24] there are assumptions made that women won't wear certain things or won't wear prints or a cut. And I do know designers who would point or might cater to ladies but will usher the slightly older customer towards certainly the more boring, frumpier garments I think generally I mean it's like I'm with you. [00:12:52] I don't believe in any of these rules as I think what I find sad is that actually I have a lot of women customers who recite them because they I often hear people saying Oh I know this rule and I shouldn't wear that. And that's what I find quite sad is that they have been led to believe that they have to follow these rules. They don't have the confidence to be able to wear whatever they like and feel good in it and that's I think that's the biggest danger of these articles out there trying to dictate what women shouldn't shouldn't ways actually impacts the customer more than the designers. [00:13:30] But hopefullly though as you said we've got more more celebrities who wore the A-list now who have leading roles like I'm thinking of like Jennifer Aniston you have Sandra Bullock. Yes. But we they're not going to be invisible. they will break the rules I like to be wearing jeans, wearing hair long the the other thing women over 50 shouldn't have hair below their chins. [00:13:54] I've written about that. People think about the hair off as soon as they get older. [00:13:59] Exactly. I mean I think you're very very brave person to actually suggest that to me. [00:14:01] It's just amazing isn't it that these perceptions still exist but as you say hopefully with more more celebrities who are more I guess more mainstream will help again to address that sort of difference in perception. [00:14:21] Absolutely. I think you know these are very bankable people who are going to be still in the limelight for many years to come. Most likely they looked up to by people who were much younger as well. And I think they will completely change perception of what somebody over 50 looks like. I mean even looking at someone like Celine Dion she's had a whole style revolution and I really liked the fact that her stylist or Roach he was his second client and his first client was the Nickelodeon star who I think isabout 20 and then the second line is Celine Dion and she's in her 50s and she's had a complete revolution with dressing in fabulous clothes and that's also really encouraging that a stylist is even wanting to work with people like that. But yeah I think also the other slight issue is that there are lots of people who are starting to speak out against ageism but there are still certain somewhat ideologies as to how to age. And I do know brands influencers who are seemingly champions of aging but they're still promoting a very narrow vision of what ageing looks like. [00:15:42] For example going grey and I think it's great that more and more women feel comfortable going grey if they want to. But again if they want to but there is still nothing wrong with dying your hair. [00:15:53] If you don't want to go grey and not all of us go grey. I was asked by somebody if I would dye my hair color back to grey to showcase their products and their conditioner and then they would get my hair back to whatever I wanted to afterwards. I only have a few highlights in my hair and I said to my hairdresser I wasn't sure I'd want to subject my hair to that sort of very harsh treatment. Yeah that's a lot of chemicals. A lot of chemicals and he said actually Ceri You haven't got enough grey hair. He said that I have to really look for your grey hair. [00:16:28] My hair's got darker as I've got older but it hasn't yet gone grey . [00:16:33] Exactly I mean my mom's similar she she didn't go. She's gotten sort of she had the white bits on the outside of her head that she didn't go way wighty greyy. Well she still isn't really completely. And she's now in her 60s. And as you say I think that it does concern me that I know women have been shamed for not going grey. So it's actually go into the other extreme it's still ageism because ageism is about choice and choice to age. However you want without any external pressure or judgement. And so if we're shaming people for not going grey and seemingly in their view embracing their age it's just as bad. And that's why I think the danger is still with both brands and with communities it's understanding that that should not be the message we're promoting. [00:17:24] No. I mean this is a big issue. I mean we've been where you're not really part of the sisterhood not because you're not very grey. It's not only me. I'm not naturally grey neither with my grandmother my mother went grey quite young but my grandmother didn't you know in fact she didn't go where she she still wasn't very gray when she died. So it's just I guess it's in your genes isn't it. Yes absolutely. But I can't pretend it's been authentic and I don't have the grey hair. I want to go to have my hair dyed Grey in order to be seen to be part of this new movement where it's all about we're all different. Yeah. We have people who go grey in the early 20s. Exactly. I've got friends who have grey hair. I think the consistency of my hair has changed but the colour of my hair, I'm a bit darker hasn't really. Yeah. So yeah. Yeah. I think again that's almost created a new rule. If you're over 50 you should be grey. [00:18:24] Yeah exactly. And it's the same as saying you know I'm I'm a believer that there's nothing wrong with having Botox, plastic surgery if you want to. It's a personal choice. Again I think is sad is when I know often actresses talk about the fact they feel they've had to do it in order to remain looking beautiful and that's what's sad. And it's again people get attacked for using Botox and it actually is their decision how they want to live and it's that same with clothing and I had somebody say to me that they didn't approve of us than what we're doing because they don't believe that women as they get older should care about being stylish. It's about their was like yes. And being timeless and classic clothes and going gray and that's just as bad as rejecting this customer because you're still saying that there's only one way a woman who's older can fit in. And so there's a conflict of views but this person an influencer had thousands of followers. And it really concerned me that her followers were going to listen to her views and consider them to be right. [00:19:36] Because everybody has their own opinion isn't it. And it's just something whether or not you're strong enough as an individual to actually have your own opinion as well and say well that's alright. That's your opinion. But you know I think slightly differently. [00:19:48] I mean I think the thing is is that confidence is a key problem particularly as women get older in terms of their image. Like a lot of women say to me that they've lost that confidence. Maybe they had other priorities children work whatnot. And they kind of want to find himself again. And I think the reason that the rules we mean obviously the ideal is that we can respect people's opinion and we can decide for ourselves for them or not. But because women are being made to feel so irrelevant by the fashion industry. The beauty industry as they get older it obviously damages confidence. You know we see that three to five thousand adverts a day. And if the majority of them promote this idea that youth equals beauty then it's no wonder that as women get older they feel less and less good about themselves. [00:20:40] So I think they some women turn to these rules for guidelines on how to do it how to dress when they view what's right because they're being told this is wrong this is wrong it's wrong and they're afraid of dressing in a way that maybe they just want to do they want to get it right. So I think that's where this confidence issue that we need to turn to once we can eradicate this feeling that women are more visible more relevant then hopefully they can feel more empowered to make their own decision on how they want to dress and look. [00:21:13] And I think also when the right thing I believe can give me more confidence because we all know what it's like if you have a bout of flu whatever you feel really awful. But as soon as you feel a bit better and you sort of look in the mirror you shall put your make on wear a brighter colour you kind of feel better as well. [00:21:30] And to exactly I mean it's like the whole adage of the lucky pants that you put on your lucky underwear and you say properly I'm very unlucky person. Well you see the thing is is that they're obviously not imbued with actual luck. But the fact is you put them on and you probably behave like differently. And I'm a big believer in the strong emotive connection between style and between your mind and your style and how it makes you feel. I think you know fashion is often derided and criticised being superficial and frivolous but in terms of style I think it's actually really important. After all we all wear clothes you put on clothes. It's not you know we make a decision to put on certain clothes in the morning. So there is more of a purpose behind what we wear and a more of a connection. And I really think that it shouldn't be dismissed so readily because even people who say they don't like fashion. Well you do dress in a way that conveys that message. [00:22:36] And so everything we wear conveys the message. And I think it's very important for us to recognise that and not criticise or ridicule people who do like style and fashion. [00:22:47] I think also with more and more women over 50 setting up their own businesses there's also still been very much engaged in the workplace. Yes it's all about personal branding as well. People are very making impressions based on the first few seconds that they see you upset what you wear reflects their opinion of you before you even say anything. So as a woman in business you have to look as though you are a woman in business and what you wear has to really reflect the business that you're in you cant ignore the fact that clothing does play a part in that. [00:23:20] Absolutely. I mean I met a gentleman who said that the reason for gender inequality in the workplace is because women didn't know how to dress properly. And when I obviously challenged him about that he was of the view that women need to be dressing more to blend in when actually lots of women are now want to stand out in business and they need to be wearing that bright jacket that gets remembered. And so obviously I gave him a whole lecture on how sexist his own views were but as you say it's whether we like it or not we are superficial we do judge people by their cover. [00:23:59] And so we do want to present ourselves to convey who we are or that message whether it's you know I mean business or whether you're feeling sexy or whatever it is. We dress in that way. [00:24:13] And one of the things I know when it comes to business and or outside of business is that through the website a lot of people commented on the fact that one of the things they do like to do is wear dresses with sleeves. Now I think I've noticed a lot more dresses with leeves generally out there. But why is it that it is so difficult for people to find these in a variety of dresses the sleeves on the high street. [00:24:38] Yeah I mean I think again it comes back a lot to do with this education. And designers, the problem is is a lot of designers are creative. [00:24:50] They're not really thinking as much about the commercial side of business they're more about wanting to execute their creative vision. And so a lot of the time they might feel that a sleeve will ruin the overall look of the garment without actually considering the fact that somebody is going to want to wear it eventually. So it's to do with a lot to do with the lines that. [00:25:11] And then there's also the fact that they often don't understand again about getting them the right width. I know there are pieces that have sleeves but they could be really tight on the arms and uncomfortable. So again its often to understand the education of designers and how they can incorporate sleeves into garments that will look good and cater to the customer. I think as you said we are seeing more sleeve. I think it's partly a trend thing. Actually at the moment at the moment it's quite trendy to have like a long dress with sleeves and a lot of younger women wearing them as well. So whether we will continue to see sleeves. I don't know. [00:25:54] But I think again it all just comes down to educating designers and brands on how to consider that customer and and not compromise the design but still be able to give her what she wants. [00:26:09] So I mean in terms of what we do want are there key investment pieces that you see your customers wanting to buy that you would recommend to them that they should actually go out and buy to make sure their wardrobes work for them. And also they do look current. [00:26:24] Yeah I mean I think it is with us becoming more aware of the damage caused by fast disposable fashion. I think it's increasingly hard to justify going to buy cheap fashion that you probably gonna throw away next season. So a lot of people suggest only investing in core classic pieces whereas I actually believe that time to invest in starting more trendy pieces as long as they feel authentic to your personal style because then they will still look great nest season. So I think my first thing I always say to people is think about reflects you and that's the pieces to invest in. It's better to shop to buy fewer things but things that will last. But when it but in terms of staples that would be great in anyone's wardrobe a great pair of jeans, dark slim fitting jeans I always recommend I always recommend a good blazer because it's just so easy just to throw on. I think a lot of women struggle with this idea of what does smart casual often mean and we all see that in dress codes and I think it gives a little headache thinking oh god what'dd that going to be and I always remember when dress down Friday started [00:27:34] What do I wear on a Friday and not look as though I'm doing the housework. Exactly. And I always say that the best way to do it is a nice pair of jeans maybe a t shirt and a blazer and you're done. And it's such an easy formula for me so that. And then a few nice t shirts and then obviously I think there's nothing wrong with buying a few pieces that are really beautiful statement garment again if you really love them they will last for years and there will still make you feel good every time you put them on and people there's a lot of women who feel guilty about spending on themselves. Whenever we do pop up shops. Interesting. It;s often husbands who are encouraging their wives to spend and treat themselves when so many of them feel they shouldn't do it. And you know they can see the fact that this makes them feel good and their partner loves that. [00:28:26] So whenever there isn't anything wrong with saying right this is actually quite an out there piece but actually I'm going to I'm going to invest in it because if it makes you happy that's what's important. [00:28:35] I couldn't agree more. I got pieces in my wardrobe that I've had for over 20 years that were expensive with individual items but I bought them in fact I have a whole feature written on my pink leather jacket and I get stopped in the street askong where I got it. [00:28:49] I've had it in 20 years. [00:28:50] And after all trends come around anyway all the time so things are gonna be back in trend anyway so you know I think what animal print at the moment is so popular but let's be honest I mean I've always loved animal print. So I'm there's nothing I don't have any issue with buying into animal print. I know I'm going to want to wear it in the future. [00:29:14] I mean I've got loads of animal prints my wardrobe with this is basically am I a secret Bet Lynch. But I've always got animal prints. [00:29:22] And I think I think also this is this is also a way to shop more consciously and it stops this debate with fast disposable fashion. So I do say yes picking I say less is more in a lot of ways and pieces that just make you feel great. [00:29:44] I love that she is really interesting is I've noticed that more women are going for those special pieces and they may be buying less but they are actually going for unusual designs rather than your staples because they want to actually wear something that can be fun. [00:30:02] Interesting. And where can women find inspiration if you're not everybody is on Instagram are they. I mean it's the perception I think by a lot of PR people that women over if you only want to see the influences on Instagram. But I know a lot of my ladies aren't on Instagram. [00:30:17] No. Yeah I agree I often have this conversation as well. Well I mean I think obviously there is social media Facebook and whatnot. I mean I always encourage going on Pinterest as well. You can. It's a great source of different looks and inspiration. And actually once it fails to give people is if they're worried about making an impact investing in a purchase thinking will this actually go with what got you can even create your own little private boards upload some pictures of your own pieces and work out how it might fit in your wardrobe. So it really is just Pinterest. It's always got so much content on there. I also do encourage looking at blogs and we have a very active blog with ideas and great ideas and inspiration and. I know that a lot of people think print is dead but I actually don't think it is. I still prefer to read magazines and just even looking at pictures of women even on catwalks. It can just give you this little styling idea because often that's what it really comes down to is styling and it could even just be a little tweak with your makeup or a little different way of wearing some jewellery. And I really think that we can use those pictures and imagery and yes we might want to see older women models but that doesn't mean we can't be inspired also by pictures of younger women. So I think there's a lot of inspiration out there. It's just just going and bringing the energy to find it really. [00:31:58] And in terms of deciding what you want to wear and use online dont you and you have the occasional pop up shop. But I guess we've grown up going into the shop maybe have a day out with a friend and shopping and lunch and maybe a little bit more reluctant to actually buy online especially if you don't know the brand . What would you say to women like me and like other people out there that aren't used to buying online. [00:32:25] Sure. Well yeah. A lot of people do obviously ask me about that. The fact that we started online and I'm very much of the view that shopping online can be just as enjoyable as shopping in person. It's just a different experience. You know there's almost the excitement of the item turning up like a little gift on your doorstep. One of the biggest concerns is often do with quality and fit. And there are apps and there's technology being developed that are going to try and show you virtual wardrobe how things are going to work on your body. But I think that's still not really going to perfectly work. I think what it's more about is being open minded to all the pieces. And the thing is shipping and delivery and return so is often free. So actually the money you might spend paying for parking tickets goes to your local shopping center will actually be more expensive than just ordering something online and having free or very cheap shipping. And I think you know there are a lot of websites now that are offering really good advice. Basically we with every garment we offer by sizes measurements and also we fit the garments on different shapes of women. So we are able to say you know this is you might want to take a size up if maybe you're larger on the bust for example. [00:33:45] So you can use the guidelines , quality obviously is a difficult one. Photography can hide a multitude of sins so often that is to do more with understanding the brand you're buying from. But you know if they've got a reputation for quality then you can trust that you can purchase and you'll be happy with garments. Another big concern also is security. I thought that I would always suggest buying for a website that starts with H T T PS which means it's a secure website. Also if they have paypal it's a good indicator of the fact that they've been verified by PayPal. Yes go through company checks with that. I do don't suggest that some people think only PayPal is fine. I actually think you should also look for websites that take card because they have to go through other checks as well, security check. So if you know they take both card and PayPal that you know that they've been really verified. [00:34:49] And you know often you can if you're really concerned do company checks PayPal at least also offers buyer protection so get a refund if the item is not turned up. But I think now that online is so common it's quite easy to spot where there's a Web site that's going to be legitimate or one that isn't. [00:35:17] And I think also as I say in terms of the shopping experience obviously this you can't replace the idea of going into a store browsing picking things out but instead you can shop online in a different way. Know you can easily see the pieces again by having the pieces on models that can give you some styling advice as well. You know our stylist works with celebrities like Pru Leith so she styles the pieces and the people who buy the whole look because they can see that it will actually work. They might not have thought they could put these pieces together so it's just a different experience. And as I say and then you receive the item and it can it's like almost getting a little gift in the mail. So I think with the High Street struggling. I think women are limiting themselves if they don't also look online because there is a vast mall online even with the shops that are in the high street. They sell usually more online. So. And you know there's Click and Collect and things like that too. Which makes it very easy to pick up the garments. So I do think people need to be willing to engage with online shopping but it's it's take some gradual steps maybe even you ask some friends who who they currently shop with online who they rate and that can give you some more confidence and trust. [00:36:40] Right. Well thank you for all of that and thank you so much for joining us today. I think that you know that I think that's so informative and hopefully will inspire women to have more confidence about what they choose to wear and different approaches to where they can buy it. [00:36:55] Absolutely. You know ultimately things can only hopefully get better as more and more businesses become more aware of this customer. And I think that there's a lot more to come. So it's just having an open mind and people like ourselves are championing older women and I think things they say can only really get better. Absolutely. Thank you so much. Thank you. And just once again your website is the-bias-cut.com. And they could find you there. OK. Thank you. Thank you. [00:37:37] Thank you for joining us today. Please do subscribe and also send the link to friends and be part of the pro- age conversation. Life really is meant to be fabulous at every age but especially after 50.

210 - Oversaturated Private Barrel Selections with Michael Gallier

The Today Well Lived Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 18, 2019 59:02

We talk about private barrel selections being the new unicorns on this show all the time. But it begs the question, are we seeing so many private picks that the market is oversaturated? It seems like every week there is a new barrel in our city for sale, FOMO about some sweet sticker, or the secondary market has a crazy valuation on a normal single barrel selection. We examine all the components that go into getting single barrels such as the amount of influence from distributor reps, the amount of available barrels at the distilleries, and if you would buy from a big chain vs a small independent store. Will there ever be enough bourbon to go around and not over bloat the market? We’ll find out. Show Partners: At Barrell Craft Spirits, every release is intentionally unique, and can’t be duplicated. Once it’s gone, it’s gone. Find out more at BarrellBourbon.com. Check out Bourbon on the Banks in Frankfort, KY on August 24th. Visit BourbonontheBanks.org. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about Portugal. What got you into to buying private barrel picks? What's the landscape of private picks in DC? With the increase in stores wanting private picks, are some stores going to get shut out of the program? Do you think distilleries should be taking care of the bigger accounts over the smaller stores that started doing picks earlier? Is there a bias towards certain states? Would you want to buy a private barrel pick from a big box liquor store? Does the local sales rep make a difference? What about restaurant picks? Do you think distilleries are running out of barrels for their private barrel programs? Is the market flooded with private selections? What could distilleries do to give one store an advantage over another? Let's discuss stickers. Do they influence your purchase? Should stores slow down barrel picks? Why are some people spending so much for private picks on the secondary market? 0:00 Yeah, all I think all of our products are, which ones the few that we've gotten are like my daily drinkers. Yes, I'm with you. I don't ever drink the rare stuff by myself. And nobody ever comes over. So. 0:26 Hey, everybody, welcome back. This is Episode 210 of the bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your host Kenny. And we don't really have a whole lot of bourbon news to talk about. In fact, we have none but we have some sort of fun little tidbits information plus some things that we've been working on and what we've been doing. So let me tell you about them. So I had some information sent to me a few weeks ago by Chris Middleton over at whiskey Academy. And he said this after he listened to Episode 207 with Jimmy Russell and I sat down with them. Now, you know, it's not often when you can stump Jimmy Russell and this was one thing 1:00 We had kind of talked about that's really kind of a whiskey mystery. So let's kind of dive into it. We talked about the name Ezra on the podcast, and we did that for a bit and somehow we stumbled on the topic of Ezra Brooks. Now, from my knowledge, I remember this being a fictitious name and brand but we got on the topic and it kind of just spiraled out from there. However, here's some factual information on Ezra Brooks that came from Chris Middleton. So Ezra Brooks it is a whiskey brand that is a copycat brand of jack daniels Black Label Tennessee whiskey. It was created by Frank Silverman of the Frank Silverman and company in Chicago in 1957, or he sourced Kentucky bourbon under the Ezra Brooks distilling company is an NDP filed on July 30 1958, with Herbert Silverman as the chairman. Now this was all also under the Hoffman distilling company in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky. There was no Ezra Brooks no distiller, owner investors, celebrity or a day 2:00 The thief from a whiskey cemetery. He's a trademark Phantom. SO Hockley built the Hoffman distillery on the Salt River in 1880 joined II Kaufman. After prohibition, it was rebuilt with the brothers Robert and Ezra, who were brought in to run it. And those were the sons of Thomas repeat, hence the connection to the wild turkey distillery. Jimmy Russell was probably referencing the name from here and all likelihood It was not where the hazard Brooks name came from. Frank Sillerman unashamedly copied everything from jack daniels, starting with the square bottle to a similar black and white label graphic, the filigree even an image of an old distillery illustration, which jack Dino's had on the back of the label, even the trademark name Ezra Brooks with similar syndication and personalization, so we're men also attempting to replicate jack daniels unique use of charcoal filtration. As an aside, Ezra Brooks was America's second charcoal rectified bourbon was 3:00 Since post prohibition, but the processes were very crude in simplistic it's more of a gesture circulating some charcoal and the whiskey barrel for 24 hours. George decal, the other charcoal was launched in 1964. Silverman also plagiarized jack daniels unlabeled claims and copied some of the Jackie Mills print advertising messages back then. JACK, Dino's went on allocation from 1956 to the early 1960s when the consumer demand exceeded the production under the maturation. So that's a good little whiskey tidbit for you. So make sure you try to write that one down. Now you know the kind of the real history behind Ezra Brooks. So I want to give a shout out to our friends over for castle festival for hosting us this past weekend. We had a great time hitting up the bourbon lodge that was sponsored by Justin's house at bourbon and the bird review to get some dusty pours as well as some air conditioning before heading back out into the crowd the jam with bands like Judah, the lion, the killers, and Nelly 4:00 Put on actually a real good show to bring back some those early 2000 memories for lots of us. You can catch our for castle updates on our Instagram and Facebook pages. Did you catch that thing we released on Tuesday this past week? Well, you can look forward to hearing those every week from now on. We're excited to be launching whiskey quickie to give you a fun update in the middle of the week. The normal podcasts will remain unchanged, and hope you look forward to hearing more of them. If you want to catch the video versions, make sure you subscribe to our YouTube page. And you can see that sweet intro that we've cooked up. We've got no shortage of whiskey to review and we can get through quite a bit with only 62nd reviews. But if there's something that you were dying to hear, send us an email team at bourbon pursuit calm. We talked about private barrel selections being the new unicorns on this show all the time. But that begs the question, are we seeing so many private pics that the market is just becoming over saturated? It seems like every week 5:00 There's a new barrel that's going up for sale in our city. There's fo mo about some sweet sticker attached to a bottle that we want to get our hands on, or the secondary market has some crazy valuation on just another regular single barrel selection. We examine all the components that go into getting single barrels, such as the amount of influence from distributor rep, the amount of available barrels that are even at these distilleries. And if you would even buy from a big chain versus a small independent store, will there be enough bourbon to go around and hopefully not overload the market? will find out. All right, well, let's get on with the show. Here's Joe from barrell bourbon. And then you've got Fred Minnick with above the char. 5:42 Hi, Joe from barrell bourbon here, every release is intentionally unique and can't be duplicated. Once it's gone. It's gone. Find out more at barrel bourbon com. 5:53 I'm Fred Minnick. And this is above the char as I walk into this beautiful store, surrounded by 6:00 port and scotch bottles. I went up to the owner in Lisbon, Portugal. And I asked him a question, sir. Where's your bourbon? He said, Well, there's no demand for bourbon here. Nobody wants it. I love bourbon, he says, but nobody really wants to buy bourbon and Portugal. A few days later, I walked into a lovely bar. There are plenty of ports and scotches and cognacs and the bar owner boasted is like yeah, we have the largest bourbon selection in all of Porto. I'm like, Wow, fantastic. What do you got? We've got bullet bourbon. He said, I was That's fantastic. And then he had four roses and he had a couple of vintage Bourbons and he was very excited to even have jack daniels and Jim Beam. I think he had a redemption here and and an orphan barrel there in for sure. It was the largest selection of bourbon that I had seen in Portugal, and he made some nice cocktails. But at the end of the day, that was not 7:00 Nearly the amount of bourbon that I'm used to seeing, and even a random chilis in Boise, Idaho. Now I guess I shouldn't expect to go to Portugal and see bourbon littered on all the shelves. Not at all. I don't expect that one bit. But I was rather shocked to see that bourbon had not penetrated such a country field with culinary love and wine and port. So perhaps I'm naive to think that bourbon should be served throughout Portugal. But let me tell you why. When I walk into a foreign country, I look for bourbon. It's because I think of the distillers in the 1950s and 1960s, who are trying desperately to get these countries to pull down their tariffs except bourbon overseas. See, in that time frame, bourbon was not a unique product in the United States. And so places like United Kingdom, Argentina, Brazil, Spain, Portugal, they were all terrifying bourbon because there was nothing unique about it and the world. Also want 8:00 Give scotch and easy pass so it could help rebuild the United Kingdom. And so when I look at the shelves throughout the world, I think of the toil of the distillers in the 1950s and 1960s, and those in the 1980s, who were just kind of hanging on by a thread, just trying to bring bourbon back. And while I could easily say that, you know, bourbon and Portugal means less bourbon and Boise, Idaho, it's really not that simple. You see, the more bourbon grows, the more production we will have. And if we can get places like Portugal to carry, I don't know, three to five Bourbons, and every store or restaurant, that's a win for Kentucky. That's a win for bourbon. And at the end of the day, I think it's a win for you too, because that means they're going to work harder to make better bourbon. And that's this week's above the char Hey, 9:00 If you have an idea for above the char hit me up on Twitter or Instagram, that's at Fred Minnick again. That's at Fred Minnick. Until next week. Cheers 9:11 Welcome back to another episode of bourbon pursuit Kenny and Ryan here tonight talking about a particular subject that means a lot to all of the bourbon crazies, the bourbon nuts out there because this is one topic that Ryan and I I think, I mean Gosh, we're we're hundreds of episodes into this now and we start rolling back the the clock and the dials and we go back in time and I remember when Ryan was all like, Well, why would you chase unicorns when store pics are the are the real thing that you want? You know, this is this is a privately selected barrel. It only has a finite amount of bottles in it. And now it seems that the game is even getting ruined for store pics in that all right, Ryan. Yeah, now you got to start your own private label. Rare 9:58 because it's 10:00 I guess I was probably what two or three years ago I said that I was just burnt out by the whole camping and lotteries and all these, you know, limited releases and then the store pics was like my, you know, I was like man, those are the just like you said, but now it's gotten to the point where like you said every stores doing one every groups done one they got a sticker on they got this that that and then it's like, all right, what's you know what's rare about these anymore? But I mean, they are still rare because you are selecting your own barrel but uh, you know, same time I think they've kind of lost their luster a little bit, but I don't know, they're still unique. Yeah. And I think I think again, harder. Absolutely. And I think the good thing is at least with this certain topic, because there's there's a lot of ways that you can take this, you know, we've had, we've had you know, as I mentioned, Ryan talked about this a lot. We had Matt Ray, Walt Aiden, English the WWE wrestler talk about it. We had we had Brett from brick 11:00 banter on here we talked about sort of, you know, who can you trust when somebody's actually picking out a single barrel we've also had Jamie Ferris on the show before where he's had over 70 single barrels at one time in the store. So the single barrels they're not nothing new however, the craze is starting to really rise in popularity amongst you know, everywhere to the point where people are quickly selling out a single barrel pick that their total wine just got somewhere in Houston because somebody posted they're like, Oh, can I go get that let's go run and go get it real quick. So it craze the craze is starting to reach capacity. Yeah, and the crazy thing is not to keep going on a banter on our our banter. 11:46 The the the people that have been doing these are you know, for so long and that started doing these to bring interest in these single barrels are getting squeezed out. And that's kind of the the crazy thing about it. It's because there's such a demand. 12:00 The groups that you know, really bought into this and kind of made distilleries famous for it. 12:05 Because they're just a group, they're not really had the buying power of big liquor stores. So we can get into this a little more, but it's just, it's an interesting environment. It's still unique and very cool environment. But there's a lot more at play now. And so you kind of gotta weave in and out how you can end it. Alright, so we've talked enough. So let's introduce our guest, Michael. 12:27 So our guest is Michael Gallagher. Michael is a bourbon enthusiast and brought this topic to us as a way to kind of spark a conversation of what's the market going to be like now and what's it going to be like, even in the future? So Michael, welcome to the show. Thanks, guys. Thanks for having me. So before we start diving into the topic, you know, I we always have to get your bourbon story kind of where did you come from? How did you grow up in this? This this brown water wasteland or whatever it is nowadays? Well, when I was growing up by my parents and really drink it off, so I didn't really start getting 13:00 into it and probably until like, five years ago, and, and I didn't live it up here near DC for about eight years now. And being right across the line, the wild west of DC until I have a couple of liquor stores actually like the frequent because it's a lot easier to get stuff. And that actually helped me broaden my horizons as far as like the range of, you know, flavors and tastings that you can get from it. I mean, I'm not an expert in any means when it comes to figuring out like, whether these are way marzipan or what you know, we just play one on the podcast. 13:35 We ride on Fred's coattails on that 13:39 so yeah, I built a collection of myself it's just been a nice happy that I've enjoyed so what's your your collection up to this point? I probably got around 150 bottles which is probably like nothing compared to what you get but dang that's about there with me. The problem is I drink on like, like this slowly keep diminishing but Kenny Hello 14:00 He's a hoarder he's got that's not true because every time you come over I crack one open and then you just leave and so I'm I'm always stuck with all these bottles and only have like two pours poured out of them because you invite you don't invite me back. 14:14 There's a reason why that happens to for sure. I guess Michael kind of give us a little bit of an indication of like, What got you like looking into buying Perino private selected barrels that have been done either by stores or by groups or anything like that versus, you know, either regular offerings or trying to chase after unicorns. I think it was when I started collecting deeper it was more about availability I guess, because like you get to a certain point you can't, you're not going to find that many more new bottles. So it became more about the different flavors in like a four roses. You know, private select the different kinds of flavors you can get from you know, different recipes they have, which I usually found through the 15:00 Single barrel program that you know liquor stores and guys like you have done 15:07 and so what's what's sort of the landscape in DC as well because I know I know we've got friends that own stores around there and I know the way that as you'd mentioned the wild west of laws happened but what's the like the landscape of private pics because I'll tell you about the landscape of private pets here in Kentucky after you're done 15:29 as far it's just I think the the stores 15:33 if I'm understanding your question correctly did stores just happened to do as many pics as they can. I mean, I don't they don't usually get that many in they probably do like four or five years especially the my favorite store is that about which is good. Yeah, I mean, because the one thing that we you know, we kind of see around here is that there is 15:52 there's an abundance. Right? I mean, I think I think there is something to be said about having this. Everything in your backyard. A lot. 16:00 These stores have had these relationships with the distilleries for a very long time. So when they want to go and do a private pic, it's like yeah, sure. Come on in like we've been doing business forever. And then now it's starting to the point well, okay, well, bourbon, the craze is starting to go up. So now we've got stores in California and Oregon and Washington and Iowa, New York. And I everybody wants to do them now. And so there's, there's this. They're feeling this pressure. Yeah, there's tension and the pressure. And so and with that pressure, I mean, we're going to start seeing some people potentially get booted out and stuff like that. And I know Ryan, you've you've kind of seen it firsthand by you know, Guthrie, that's been on the show before. with Todd he's down in Bardstown. So, tell us a little bit about what that looks like. Yeah, so got there. A good friend of mine owns today's we talked about before, but he's been doing private pics for Gosh, I mean, it seems like it's 17:00 least seven to 10, maybe even 10 years, ever since they've been first having it. And so, yeah, he goes to plot for Russell's pics this year and four roses and they're like, Hey, 17:13 we don't have room for you this year. And, and it's based because he's a small store, you know, he doesn't do a ton of volume. And so they're basically catering to the bigger liquor stores that push the volume. And so it's kind of like squeezing the little guys out, they kind of, 17:31 you know, embrace them at first and so it's kind of like, all right, well, that doesn't seem 17:37 very fair. Very right. And we seen it with good friend of ours. Read with 17 out be I mean, they've been doing pics for ever and Campari just told them that they weren't gonna be able to do a Russell's pick. And they I mean, gosh, they've done. I mean, how many barrels that we picked that day with them six out of how many I mean, we probably 18 maybe you could just tell read and emulate it. 18:00 relationship with Jimmy and Eddie. And it was like, you're just going to shit on this relationship that's like been there forever just because they're a group and they're not a big liquor store. And so there's just been so many groups and so many liquor stores now interested in it that like, the way that these 18:19 bourbon companies are kind of determining who gets what is kind of alarming and shocking to me, and I'm not too happy about it, but I understand it is what it is. And it's like you said at pressure, squeeze markets, so they do what they gotta do, but I think I'll will All right. Well, remember that, you know, when about five, eight years, and all this stuff's out again and there, you know, calling us back up. Yeah, Michael, kinda want to get your take on that. Like, what do you kind of see is the, 18:51 the anti, I guess you could say happening, of being able to say, well, we're going to push out all these people that took it 19:00 The dance and we're going to take care of the Benny's and you know liquor barns in our backyard and going me wrong like they they get the cream of the crop for some reason I've seen liquor barn just regular like Buffalo Trace old Weller antique pictures that show up on Facebook. Holy God, I'm not I'm not kidding. They have you know, when we go we do our Buffalo Trace barrel pick they have four barrels when they do it. They have 12 1518 It's insane, right? So they treat customers a little bit differently to do you agree that these distilleries should be taking care of their bigger accounts rather than everybody that kind of has been keeping them in the dance for a while, but is as bad as it sounds. I mean, it's probably Money Talks, right? And it's almost like, to the point where to get certain bottles, like comfort like they've done in the past is these liquor stores have to push the cheaper stuff or the bottles they want to get off their hands in order to get the chance to get into the selections what it almost seems like in and so I guess another question that that we kind of 20:00 Bringing around that you know it does go by location to. I'm reading a few things that are coming here in the chat. Bill Nall says that location matters. He was in Detroit and there's a liquor store that had a barrel bourbon private pick. And it was, quote the only one in the state. However, here in Kentucky, you can go around to five or six stores and probably find one. Matt said the same exact thing he said in Iowa. There is only one for roses single barrel private selection pick for the entire state. He never saw it. He only saw there is only one Weller 107 barrel for the whole entire state of Wisconsin this year. So there is there is this sort of demographic, I guess, bias? I don't know. Maybe that's what it is like, what do you what do you all think? Do you think there is a demographic bias or is it because there's there's another underlying motive there? I guess it could be the idea of population density areas. I mean, I was not exactly a DC nuts. 21:00 DC is like this big city. But you know, DC, even DC like a liquor store that I usually go to only gets like four bottles, like a year, like four selections a year from different cup, and they're usually the big one like whistle pig for roses and stuff like that. But 21:14 I'm not around with. Yeah, I mean, I think where these distilleries are aiming, they're kind of probably starting to squeeze out the group's more so than stores. Because a group doesn't necessarily help them, 21:28 I guess, expand their brand or expand their reach. You know, we're us whiskey geeks were already in we're already buying their product. And so I think smaller stores and groups are going to get squeezed out first because like that, they just want to reach new customers and get into new markets and a group just not going to offer that especially one that's here in Kentucky. I mean, because we're going to, we're going to buy them if they're available and it's 21:57 kind of, you know, limits the reach if 22:00 just selling to so I can understand that. But at the same time we've are the ones that are, you know, like, I hate to hate hate to keep saying bring it to the dance, but we're the ones that brought you to the dance and so, so Hey, come on, give some love. No, Andy, just comment in the chat. He said, Well, groups don't sell cases of fireball. Exactly. 22:22 Exactly. And so 22:25 there's still a ton here in Kentucky. I mean, like you said, You got a liquor barn or total wine. I mean, they got the everyday Buffalo Trace and, like, even Barrow I mean, they're pleather but well when I said it, I mean they fly off the shelf like crazy. I mean, it's a it's just a different landscape than it was two three years ago. Do you think they have like deals with those like when I was in I was in Kentucky and I went to the old forester their new area where they have their you do I guess you do your single barrel select there and they had like the plaques on the wall for the people that have done pics, and like total wines has like 20 stars. 23:00 Any star was like 10 bottles I mean 10 barrels. So yeah, yeah I mean there's it's amazing right? I look at it from from a business perspective and yes it does make sense that you you help the people that sell cases upon cases upon cases of just old forester 86 or 100 or the new right or whatever it is right it's great to be able to take care of those people. 23:31 The flip side of it is is that when we start thinking about these big stores the the liquor Barnes the Benny's 23:40 you know, talk about some some massive change the total wines now when you go into one of these liquor stores, and you know, we have him around here, I'm sure that you've got a a Costco around you as well. Even though I don't know how big the Costco private barrel program is, even though they sell a shit ton of liquor but 24:00 What is what is your take? Like? would you would you feel comfortable buying a private barrel pic? Because it is that total line and you have no idea who did it? Or are you going to? Are you going to pass on it? Michael? What kind I want to get your ID on that. That Yeah, I've had that discussion in my own head a lot. As far as Do they really care about the taste? Or are they just doing the private select because it's a private select and I know it's going to sell more. I do like to tend to go to the to the groups but like you guys and that I trust like the you know, we kind of have the same flavor palette I guess you would say and I tend to stick to the smaller ones and stay away from the larger ones. Yeah, we do have costumes here in the DC whiskey read it is crazy about always posting like an update of what they have gotten each day. Yeah, I think the I guess the crazy thing about just Costco in general what's what's happened to the liquor sales because the words out that 25:00 It's, it's the cheapest, you're going to find any state that you're going to live that you're going to live and be they they get allocated items. So I'll never understand why they don't have a bunch of barrel selections or anything like that going on, because I know that they're running through a lot because that's the anomaly. That's the difference of a liquor barn and a total wine where they do have a lot of private selections, and they're trying to really put that as a differentiator. I was gonna say, I didn't even know Costco had or they don't have private selections, right? Is that what you're saying? You don't see I've never seen any or, I mean, so I will take that back. There was one that happened here, I think it was or maybe it was another location, but they just had like a knob Creek, you know, nothing, nothing crazy. But that's something that you typically don't see. And so I guess another way to kind of look at this, you know, Matt FE says in here it says, Why should you crap on the little stores, you know, you still get a single barrel into the store and it's still drives business. 26:00 But why why are you not going to help those smaller stores out? You all have a kind of take on that. 26:07 Well Could it be more about supply and demand kind of thing where they recognize that they got it they have to give these stores the largest stores their pics, but they're running out of not necessarily they're running out but they you know they probably allocate barrels of for their single barrel selection program and maybe they know that the big stores they have to take care of so that they the less store the smaller stores have less to go off of you know what I mean? Like you were saying earlier how you don't get that many barrels to choose from. Right What do you think that algorithm is? A figuring out what like, what do you have to sell to make sure that you get access to buy something that's way over my pay grade. 26:45 And my shareholder as bourbon pursuit. 26:49 podcast host but uh, yeah, I don't know. I mean, 26:54 it all makes sense when as a business fan, I mean, you 27:00 Do this too. I mean, you have those accounts that do everything for you. They're great customers, they pay on time. They, they, they're just easy to deal with. And I'm sure it's kind of like that with, you know, your bigger stores and with your district, you know, distributors and your bigger stores because it's, it's an easy relationship. It's an easy flow. And it's like, here's a reward for versus smaller store. Yeah, it might be, but they might pay slow, they might do that. I don't know. I'm just thinking outside the box here, but it you know, 27:30 it's like the 8020 rule. You know, 20% of your customers bring 80% of your revenue and so maybe they really focus on those 20% and kind of squeezing out that 80% that right now, just because they are in such a squeeze. Yeah, yeah, I definitely see that as being a motivation factor in you know, you owning your own business. You kind of have a different take on this then I think a lot of other people will to where were you do you follow the money trail? 28:00 Then you've probably have people like me who are like, well, I want to I want to have this personal connection with my, the small little local store. You know, I know them I know who's selecting the barrels, you know, when you go to a larger chain, you don't necessarily have that connection. Right? You're you're talking to hourly, hourly employees that are just sitting there stocking shelves, like, you know, it's very rare that you actually know who picked that barrel in the store behind it. Yeah, I mean, I think it's just the business landscape or in in general, it seems like more and more small entities are either being gobbled up by the bigger ones, and it's just become more in this business in more than any other it's, as we've seen with pursuit series. It's an economies of scale like none other and so, 28:53 you know, the local store, they might be, 28:57 you know, grave in heaven, but they might be you know, there 29:00 You're going to be picky, they're going to be a pain in the ass. And like, you know what we don't like these four barrels are really words, total wine, they're like, I just gives whatever, you know, it's like an easy transaction for them, then they're like, you know, it's like, we like dealing with you all, because you're not paying the ass and you're not like, bitching about us on the forums, and you're not doing this. So it's like, you know, so I can totally see it from it's all coming back. Megan says to me, because, like, but how long, you know, how motors are great, and I love having the relationship with God, they're picky, and like, they will nitpick the shit out of you. Whereas our big commercial clients, you know, they're like, as long as it looks good for the road, you know, and here's your money. And here's everything, you know, easy peasy. So let's, I that's the only way I can kind of relate to it in and you know, there's there's other thing that Matt kind of put in the chat and he says, Does it have to do it the representative that's in those states too. And, and we've seen this firsthand, at least on the podcast side as we've been doing our own private barrel selections is that the rep actually plays a huge role in this like they Yeah, they are 30:00 They are got a bottle for you. Exactly. And that's exactly what happens. Typically how this this works is that 30:08 depending on what region state of the of the nature of the US that you own, your allocated X amount of barrels, and you get to choose where these go and so it's it's a i don't know i mean i guess if you've been a boss and then you've come into the into the year and you're like, Okay, you've got 28% of raises that you can go you can figure out who gets 2% who gets 6% who gets whatever and so that is that is one thing is that a lot of these stores they they continually have to be really good to their reps to make sure that they're always going to be on deck to be able to get one of these private barrel pics because that is a that is a real thing. That is it's it's all business and shaking hands at the end of the day to guess what else would tie into the with the reps is also the restaurants increasingly increasing number 31:00 restaurants around DC have done private slicks that I've seen, like even Blanton's and Buffalo Trace and just for their just for mixing drinks to? Well, I think like I said earlier with the restaurants and bars, you're, you're putting your brand out there and exposing it to the public. And so like a high end restaurant like that, you know, diners are going to go for a high end experience, and they're going to spend money on something like that. And it just helps expose the brand versus, you know, small store small groups doesn't really do that for you. It seems like the distributor 31:37 because that is their role, which we don't really truly understand what the role is, but 31:43 it's a new it's a continually moving target. Yeah, so like, but it would make sense that the distributor would, you know, the distillers like, all right, these distributors get so many barrels and then the distributor decides who they go to 32:00 Based on like you said relationships or sales or ease of business whatever and that's I think that's how it is but maybe not I don't know and the way it should be probably 32:12 no I'm totally with you another angle to look at this is just the the boom of the bourbon market and what it is and you know we've talked about people getting pushed out just having the big guys come in and kind of small and the sort of stuff up and we've kind of heard it before firsthand that like oh like the there's not enough barrels to go around. I kind of want to get you know Michael your take on this. Do you think that's a cop out? 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And try a bottle of beer barrel bourbon and beer barrel rye use code pursuit for $25 off your first box. 34:31 You really think that four roses, the you know the Russell's the everywhere, whatever the world's here are actually running out of barrels for this particular program. I highly doubt that they're running out of barrels. Maybe for the program. Maybe that is what they already said. Like they at the beginning of the year. They were like we're not going to go beyond this. And they didn't expect the increasing number of groups and like getting with these retailers to buy more and more 35:00 And maybe it will adjust over time over the next couple years, maybe they'll realize that this is a big business opportunity for them. So they will increasingly I know that will it you know, pause a couple was it a couple years ago or their private selection? So as I pick that back up yet, but you know, yeah last year the first I guess re entry to the they're going along with the the their own distillate now, so yeah, yeah, for sure. I think they did, like 97 of them last year, which is still small compared to a lot of people that Yeah, I don't think there's I think that these brands are just so using all their resources to, 35:45 I guess, fund all their everyday brands that they're pumping out into the public is that and to be honest, single barrels are a huge pain for them. They take a lot of resources. They're getting people, you know, they have a have a coordinator. They got to take a 36:00 lunch, they got to spend four or five hours with you, then they gotta dump that one barrel and make sure all the stickers are on that bottle and make sure they got to keep track of that barrel. And it's like, like, probably just like the hell of this. I mean, this is 36:14 it's actually bad business. Yeah, I mean, it's just, it was probably something that got into like, because nobody wanted anything. They're like, Oh, this would be great. We have all these extra girls, you know, come pick your own, like, and but now they're probably like shit, why do we ever come up with that? You know, we're shooting ourselves in the foot. But uh, yeah, that's probably one way to look at it. It's probably a huge labor burden to them to make it happen. And that's why they're probably not growing the amount of barrels that are allocated to more or less Selenium then because they're growing their everyday brands and they just don't want to put the resources towards it. Yeah, there is there is a lot of resources. I do mention that that really go into it. I mean, it kind of just reminds me of, so there's a there's a farm around us. That's 37:00 button 3045 an hour away whatever it is called huber's and it seems like people always want to go there and pick their own apples. And I'm kind of like Why don't you want to go pick your own apples that's it's a weird thing for me to think of as like I just go to go to our grocery store and find a really good honey crisp apple. And I think that that's probably like the flip side of what the everyday consumer sees versus what what we see because there's probably some like person that's really an apples and they want to go and choose their own apples and they it has a unique taste profile. But however the the better side of the businesses and well let's just dump them on a truck and push them out and and get them out in the grocery stores because it's just a better way to look at it. Well they only if they only put trailers of apples like two miles before you get to, you know, huber's they have like two they have trailers of apples and pumpkins that you can buy before you can for like $1 to dollars less. If they only did that with barrels, you know, like for you get to the distillery. These are 38:00 thousand dollars cheaper discount girls right here? 38:06 Oh man, that's that's actually hilarious the way you look at it like that. So we kind of talked about the market of how big guys are kind of getting in squeezing the little people out of it. We're looking at the business opportunity from the distillery side and trying to figure out you know, what is the algorithm of who gets to to get what however, I kind of want to kind of switch the angles here a little bit because one of the things that we've seen is that a lot of this has become pretty prolific. There's everybody that's trying to get into single barrels, whether it's stores out of West Coast ne se wherever it is, everybody wants to come and do this because they they want some sort of differentiation or differentiation offering for their stores be able to sell to their customers. 38:55 And so Michael, I kind of want to take it to you is like do you see this as 39:01 Where it is becoming a flooded market of private selections that are out there? 39:09 Do I think there are too many I mean, 39:12 how how much how different Can I guess the question would be how different can like whistle pig pics be if I have five stores in DC area and I go to each one each one has a whistle pig pig because that is a bigger one than yeah it does it does get a little tiring. So that's why I like to look towards the I like I'd like them to look towards the smaller ones like I love to go into Joseph Magnus and doing that pic because I mean even though it is MTP, it is nice to have a little something different than the you know, the bigger companies. And so I'll will refute that a little bit because I did and I did a whistle pig barrel pick. I had I had five barrels. We chose two of them. We chose two of them that had two different taste profiles. And I think that's just I think that's the difference between 40:00 Maybe and 40:02 and maybe I guess I when I when I think about this maybe that's what most people also don't recognize is that yet they they're not going to send out probably a bunch of barrels that they all taste the same like everything is these unique differences these these minute profile differences or anything like that. 40:20 So I've had the chance to be able to do it and whistle pig and I think there is some some variation against looking at it towards more of the collection aspect. As far as you know, if you're collecting different models, I wouldn't want 20 whistle pigs. It's a so I guess that's where I was coming from. Yeah, that totally makes sense. Because Yeah, you don't want to I mean, it's it's hard to spend 80 to $100 on every single one of those bottles, like you've got to you've got to make sure it goes back to the fundamentals of Do you trust who's picking it? Do you know who's picking it? What's the story behind it? But you know, Michael, I kind of want to put it to you in a different way. 40:57 You know, you had mentioned that, you know, you have all these 41:00 That that could be the same and maybe, maybe because they come from the same distillery but what could a distillery be doing differently to be able to give the stores one advantage over the other? When you say, Well, I'm going to go to a different store and I choose different things do you think you think it's on the stores to not try to choose the another barrel from a, the same distillery and there should just be multiple variations or is it is it something beyond that? I guess it can be I love the way that four roses as their, I guess, their single barrel. I forgot which different program it is, but the fact that they have recipes, it's nice to see. I guess it's a telling thing for the consumer like this is going to be a different recipe. But otherwise, you don't really know until you buy it and taste it. Because I mean, it's not like you're going to go to liquor store and they have a tasting tray for you to try. There's compared to the store down the street. If you have like, you know, two different with whistle pigs. So you 42:00 You kind of like to just go forward, I guess if you were going to go do it that way, but 42:06 I mean, I kind of like the way the four roses has their recipe stuff on there. Yeah, yeah. And then you have someone like makers, you know, where they allow you to blend your own unique profile, which I think is very, very awesome. But you have to get 250 bottles out of it 42:25 in spend eight hours with them to get to that point, but uh, yeah, I mean, I don't think it's on this is still I think it's on the store to pick the you know that that's what it's all about, you know, they gotta 42:41 let me they're not going and picking unique barrel like they're not saying like, well, let's pick three different ones and send it they're like nope, here's the allocate ones. Here they go. Have at it. You know, they're going to try to make this as less complicated as possible. But, you know, 42:56 but I'm worthy. I mean, the four roses and makers are the most unique experiences. 43:00 You know, we go to the Buffalo Trace and the knob Creek and it's, they're awesome. But you know that there's very subtle differences in each barrel that you're tasting. And so it's it is hard to kind of distinguish that, except that me and Kenny have superior palates to anyone now I'm kidding. totally kidding. But uh Yeah, and it's Yeah, it's tough because they're there is a ton of them. And I guess the only way you know people are talking about stickers. That's one way to differentiate themselves. But then, like, I wonder if these distilleries in the sticker game it's like, all right, well, it's all about the stickers now. And it's become less about our brand. And it's more about the sticker game and it's kind of taken away from our brand. So like, 43:44 in the stickers are cool, but they're starting to get a little excessive as well. But uh, I don't know. I'm just rambling. Sorry. That's okay. Yeah, there is one thing I wanted to kind of mention that you would, Michael would say it like Well, let's let's go put 44:00 I'll go buy a bottle from the competitor down the street and I'll sample at my store man that's that's the craziest form of guerilla marketing there probably could be just like take a dump on your competition there. Yeah. But you know Ryan does bring up a good point I think we should we should talk about stickers because stickers or why would you even buy a barrel nowadays or buy a bottle if it doesn't have a sticker on it? That's that's the mean it's like fundamental at this point. So kind of you know, Michael kind of talk about you know, your experiences with the stickers and if it actually has any sort of influence on your purchasing habit. I mean, I won't lie I can't be a sucker for bottles especially I've the the old Fitzgerald decanter bottle back there for which is you know, it's an okay, it's, it's okay, but there was $300 sleep bottle. Yeah, it's asleep. 44:52 I mean, I enjoyed going I wouldn't did the magnetic for you guys and I enjoyed naming it and coming up with the name and whoever did this. 45:00 Design stick I didn't know who exactly what did that that was really cool as far as the Pentagon on it with the Department of bourbon but so it it's got a cool factor to it. 45:11 But I mean do you think it's you think it's starting in the point where it's jumping the shark or do you think we still got a week this is this is going to go strong still on to 2020 I think it's gonna probably keep going strong. I think people like to have their their little spin on it. 45:26 Yeah, go ahead, run well, and I was gonna say it is play out. But Michael made a good point. It is fun to come up with names because that's what I do. And 45:35 most of ours I tried to name that. Not all of them, but it is fun for the group to have their own unique name and, and because otherwise, it's just, you know, they used to be laying like you got a little tag on the Russell's bottle where you got like a little gold medallion. You're like, well, that's stupid. Like that doesn't differentiate us so it is kind of cool. And I guess that I just don't like when they take up the entire bottle. 46:00 Like, and they look all like goofy and like bright and I don't know, like kind of take away from the bottle. That's when I don't like more work on the distilleries and have them make a special bottle for every single barrel pick. Yes, exactly. Now you're talking my love language. Oh, yeah, just yeah, keep keep doing these little custom things every single time. Yeah, no, I mean, I'll kind of talk about the sticker thing a little bit because, you know, I kind of I kind of look at what you all said and I think it's, I think it is fun. I think it's, it's a unique way to be able to give something a name and and ultimately, when I look at it, I like to name stuff after that that kind of like put some sort of sentiment into it. I don't I don't name something because it just sounds cool. You know whether it has a Shawshank Redemption sticker whether it has all a Holcomb mania sticker on it or anything like that, because that that doesn't necessarily mean anything. 47:00 It just probably just sounds cool. Like it has to have some sort of story. And that's, that's really what I love. Because when you when you're able to talk about it when able to drink about and drink it again, you can look at that sticker and you can kind of reminisce on that day. And you can tell the story to people you share it with, you know, like, this is why we came up with that name. This is what happened, you know, like, case of the Mondays, it was a Monday. And like, I was super hung over from a member guest and I was like, I'm really I'm in a case of the Mondays. You know, that I can tell people that, you know, it's like, yeah, I guess the sentiment and Yeah, I agree. And what do you think it's giving more sentiment to us? Or for people that have actually where they are picking it than it does for the consumers that are getting it? 47:43 Yeah, I can see their point. Yeah, I could definitely say that. Don't you want to know why I was named that or maybe? 47:50 Well, I guess I want to know like, if I'm buying something like I was unable to make the tasting room confessions, pick from New Roof, but 48:01 They came with a name and I was like, Well what Tell me about the name? Why did y'all come up with that? And you know, and I wanted to know because I wasn't there and so it was like I got to experience it through them because of the name. I don't know. Sounds kind of dorky. You like the lore of it. Yeah, school. Yeah. No, I mean, there definitely is two angles to it. I think there are you know, there's some that that definitely just speak to people because it's a cool sticker. Like it just to take another new riff for example, like people are putting all the plays on the riff name like you've got, like, I've got a bottle called Ken Griffey Jr. It's not like like Ken Griffey had anything to do with it. It's not like the group were sitting there talking about baseball stats, when it happened. They just thought of a funny name and, and put it on a sticker, like that's all it is like it doesn't actually have any sort of connotation to the day or memory or anything like that. 48:53 However, there's another slide of this when it comes to the marketing aspect when it goes on to the Facebook forum. 49:00 When people started learning about it i mean this is a real differentiator like do you all see that like if it wasn't for going smash on a four roses bottle? Like what would that even be a thing that people elevate it to be in this 300 $350 private pick and it's just another bottle for rose or the tipsy buffalo rather exactly 49:24 if somebody comes over and is trying like a Buffalo Trace especially like the one like your pic and they point out the fact that that stickers on there it's different than the other and then I go into telling them out oh as group I'm part of that actually went and picked it so I mean non bourbon you know enthusiasts actually 49:44 get a kick out of it kind of story so yeah, not an hour like sharing all the barrel pics sweet like when people come over that's the first thing I do is like our guys what barrel pics Do you want to drive because that's like, I don't know. I think that's cooler to share those then 50:00 Just like I'll try my Pappy 20 or whatever 50:04 I'll take the Pappy 20 50:07 that's what most people want they're like I don't give a shit about you 50:14 know as a you know, as an enthusiast it's fun for me to share with people nothing they like like it to that I could be wrong 50:23 absolutely and so I kind of want to close this out on a on a another note when we're talking about just you know private barrel pics and you know whether the markets saturated or not. 50:36 Is there a reason that anybody should slow down with with these when you're when you're thinking about a company's or anything like that because it seems like there is demand it's going to be happening. And I guess maybe not. I'll rephrase that maybe not slow down from a manufacturing perspective 50:56 should should store slow down in regards of what they should be. 51:00 What a offer because maybe they're trying to push other products just to sell just so they have these opportunities. And, and just to be able to sell a bottle. I don't know like 51:11 I think bourbon enthusiasts are just increasing the numbers daily, so I don't think we're at the peak right now. So I think there's still plenty of people to come into your liquor store and buy, you know, four bottles of fireball to go get drunk, and there's a guy that wants to come in and get as many privates like the guys he can that you earn. 51:33 Yeah, no, I'm with you. I mean, 51:37 I think they should keep doing because I mean, they are fun and they, they're, it's the only way to get a unique kind of experience and bottle then, you know, the limited release game has just gotten so out of control. Like where it's just, it's always camping, it's emails. It's this it's that and it's even the store pics are kind of going that way. And so that's what's nice about 52:00 What we're offering, you know, to our people, it's fun for us to do that and offer to our Patreon people, but being in a bourbon group to like having access to this, so I mean, I don't think they should slow down. I mean, the people are talking about new riff and you know, compared to like, bigger distilleries, and what I think this sounds boring, but that they should do a cost benefit analysis and maybe, you know, Russell's and all the big boys, it's really not beneficial to them to keep doing these. And whereas someone like new riff or a newer guy, they're gaining a lot of exposure around it. And it's really helped catapulting their brand and they should really embrace this. And it kind of reminds me of like, when I went to Napa, and like you go to like cake bread or Opus one, and it's like, oh, these are these great, distinguished brands and you go and it's like the lamest experience ever. But then you go to this like mom and pop winery, where you meet the proprietor and you like, and they're like, it's real intimate and, and I think that's just how it's going to be with 53:00 bourbon kinda as it keeps evolving is that you're gonna have these big boys then you're have all these little small guys and they're going to have to offer unique experiences through private pics or coming to the distillery hanging out with you know the the distiller and creating that connection 53:17 yeah i think that this should keep on rolling with them as much as possible because I love them all right. 53:24 I lied I have I have one more question because because I keep thinking about this and I It reminds me of like a post I saw earlier. And I see I see things in the secondary market that are then just single barrel pics that are being sold for the extraordinary amounts. I kind of want to get your all state Michael first like are people dumb? Like do they need like a reality? Do they need to reality check to say like, this is just another barrel pick like That's all it is. It's not going to change your life. yet. People are spending exhausted amounts, maybe because of the sticker or maybe 54:00 Because it came from a particular group, like I want to kind of get your take on one of the same people that are paying $900 for CYPV was that it's it is ridiculous. 54:11 Yeah, I don't I can't imagine ever buying products like going to a secondary market myself. I mean, I have a hard time buying other models in the secondary market. I just kind of take my chances in DC. Yeah, yeah. 54:24 Yeah, I'm with So Bill Nall says private pics play to the fo mo and fo mo is like, bourbon is fo mo it's like the perfect product for fo mo it's 54:35 you know, there's in single barrels or even more of that because it's like we only have this one barrel. There's never going to be another one like it and this whoever picked it and it's like it's the perfect product for that and people. They like Rarity and scarcity and like if it's the more rare and scarce it is, the more irrational they're going to be about it. You know, it's we are all done in this game. 55:00 We all got our like our bad habits This is like I shit for mine. Like there's no rational reasoning behind this hobby or it does that 55:11 mean we go Kenny you go on these pics you go at even like we do pursuit series I mean there's barrels of whiskey like, like, just like you don't believe I mean there's so much whiskey out there and you're like and it is just another barrel whiskey but there is that connection to is there's that Rarity about there's that specialness about it that people just go ape shit over and it's it's just like anything you know, it's like getting you like Porsches and you know you really want a Porsche or Mercedes and it's like, well why the Volkswagens made by the same people and it says same shit you know that it's a Porsche you know, it's got the branding and everything behind it. It's just, it's marketing at its finest. You know, it's, that's that's what we deal with. So that is the fun part about this because 56:00 It makes it unique, right? It makes it a it makes it a an experience that you're able to buy a bottle and have a connection to it have a story behind it, you know the person or you know the group that that, that purchase that or that anything like that. And so you do have this connection behind that particular bottle and I think that is fun. I just think that we need to kind of like dial the height meter back, maybe maybe 20 decibels in regards to this because people just need to understand and Ryan, you said it best. You know, we have the opportunity. Anybody that goes and visits, any distillery anyone and you look around you look at all the warehouses. Just understand, it's just another barrel of whiskey. It's another one. Yeah, there's there's always going to be another one down the road. So don't you worry about that, but not that one. But not that let's see, that's what you get. That's that's what that's the hook. That's what keeps you not your suit series. 56:59 You need all the 57:00 Rose yes absolutely but that's that's kind of what keeps you hooked in is like you like what if I miss out it is and the thing is Kenny we know that and I know that but it's still I still can't get past it and I don't care because it's the Chase is the fun that's you know it's just part of the fun hobby we were enthralled with no no, I'm totally with you. So let's go ahead we'll end it on that note because I think we we did enough insulting of pretty much the whole industry at this point. So this was this was a really good conversation So Michael, please 57:34 make fun of everybody including myself. Mike want to say thank you for coming on and giving you this. This this topic to talk about it was it was really good and I want you to kind of give a plug if people want to get in contact with your or anything like that. If they can find you any kind of social. How they can follow you there. I'm on Twitter. I don't you know, not that funny but MIKG 316 1989 58:00 There we go. It's all good. Yeah, follow him there. Follow us on all the social media channels, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, at bourbon pursuit. And always make sure that you leave iTunes reviews too, because we love iTunes reviews and only share with a friend because that's what helps grow this show more. And All right, I'll kind of hand it off over to you, buddy. Yeah, reviews are great. But telling your friends even better, because you can share this wonderful experience and call them down to you know, 58:29 after they get involved with it. So now Michael, appreciate the time appreciate the show suggestion. That's what we'd love about the show is hearing from our fans and interacting with them. So if you have any things you want to talk about or hear about, let us know. And just we love hearing from you guys and we'll see you next time. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

088 FIFM - Perfecting and Scaling a Web Development Business w/ Adrian Rodriguez

Freedom in Five Minutes

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 4, 2019 54:40

Over the last 2 decades, web development businesses pop up and die off faster than you can say "HTML". But, building and growing a development company that stands the test of time is much harder to do than start one. In this episode you'll hear how Adrian Rodriguez from Anchored Web Solutions (https://www.anchoredweb.com/) has been able to not only sustain his web development business over the long haul but grow it into a company that serves private and government customers in one of the biggest counties in the United States. ----- Automated Transcript Below Dean Soto 0:00 Hey, this is Dean Soto, founder of freedominfiveminutes.com. And we're here again with another freedom in five minutes podcast episode. Today's topic is this perfecting, scaling, a web development business, that and more coming up. All right, well, welcome, welcome. Welcome, everybody to this episode, really cool episode super excited about this one we get to be, we get to talk about something that's near and dear to my heart, because I used to have one of these, but it was not nearly as good as, as this gentleman who we're going to be interviewing. So I get the pleasure of having Adrian Rodriguez, on this podcast episode. He is the founder of anchored web, anchored web.com. And he has he can't wait to talk about what he does that what he's been doing. But he has a really cool Web Development Agency. That's that's very, very, very, I want to say that it's, he's able to create these very simple but but powerful websites that have been in the commercial, as well as the government side of things. And so I just want to say a warm welcome to Adrian Adrian, how's it going, my man, Adrian Rodriguez 1:26 very good. Dean, thank you for having me. And it's pleasure to be here. And Dean Soto 1:30 so let's talk about this. So I found you and reached out to you to be on this podcast, mainly because you you know Juma and Ed, which is always near and dear to my heart, I used to use Juma a lot. And on top of that your sites are, they have a they have a very beautiful yet very simple look to them. And, and so I just wanted to to reach out to you and have you come on to talk about how you got started, how you're able to do what you do, and and you've made some very, very big impacts, even on the government side of things, which is very, very hard to do, which we'll talk about in just a little bit have a cool little surprise for everyone to hear. It just it's it's something that was that blew me away. So how in the heck did you get started with web development in the first place? Adrian Rodriguez 2:27 Well, I mean, if you know, there's, there's a few different timeframes in my life that I could go into that kind of explain how I got into web development. I guess the first proper website that I ever worked on was in about 1996, or 1997. I probably aging myself, but I was at the time. And my friend had a band called 41 height. And he had just started it in high school. But we were best friends at the time. We still are moving to France now. And so I just put together some HTML code that I had taught myself over the summer previously, and show him something that not really in a way of trying to get him to have this as his website. It was just something I thought this could be an interesting direction for your site. He took a look at that. So yeah, let's I want that. Can that be my website? Wow. So I said, Oh, I guess yeah, I mean, it does work. And so that was his website. And it was, at the time, there wasn't many websites in general. I mean, there were a lot, but there weren't a lot of people doing it. And so when we put it up online, we had things like samples of his music on there. And of course, at the time, there's this thing called frames that nobody does now in HTML, but it was all about frames. So you'd have like a frame was like a little mini window within a window on your website, we have all these frames worked out. It was like the big, you know, trend at the time. It was fun. And I wish I wish I wish I had some sort of a screenshot of that website back then. Because all the way those are from those years ago till today, I still maintain that website. And it's obviously got a lot of changes since then. Been what I did back then, or at least show other people look, I was doing this Netscape. Dean Soto 4:20 Oh, my gosh, that's awesome. That's crazy. That'd be I was gonna say we do you still have just frames for that website? Adrian Rodriguez 4:28 I know, well, I just I feel like somewhere, maybe there's a fight because they tend to keep things you know, organized even 20 years ago. So I feel like maybe there was something I, I have somewhere that on a disk or maybe a floppy drive, maybe in the garage, but I don't know. But I will say that it was funny, because that was not something I was trying to do at the time I get into web development. And I really just did it for fun. And then about 2007 2000, an eight, I started doing website for myself. Because I was a journalist before that before I before today's business, which is a good web, I was a journalist. And so I sort of saw the way journalism was moving, which was it away from print journalism into the digital age, I didn't think the industry was moving fast enough. So I had all these great ideas about putting embedded maps in in articles or crowdsourcing, journalism and things like that. So I put together this website, while these cool tools and things that I just thought were really neat. And so what happened was, even though I really felt like that was a passion project, for me, it wasn't making a lot of money, partly because I didn't think journalism should make money, in a sense. So there's the whole discussion there. But I wasn't really trying to make money advertising way. So I had to make money. Somehow, since I was doing this, I just decided to take the leap and start my own business. Well, I wasn't really paying much attention, but people would say, Hey, I like your website. But you know, that piece there that you have on there where the event calendar automatically adds to a dynamic nap and and already changes colors and things like that. I wonder if you could do that for me? And I would say well, I guess I mean, what do you want me to build you some sort of a program for money or something where you get a money for it or something? And then it started just kind of like, I at one point, it was like six months or nine months into these calls. I said, Wow, I really obviously have missing the boat on something that's happening. I started leaning into that. And I found Yeah, that was very much needed service that people would call me for. So. Yeah. So yeah, then I started kind of evolving. And eventually, I found it a third web solutions in 2009 2010, somewhere in there. And so we're coming up to the 10 year anniversary of my business. So I'm really proud of that. And I'm really excited about how things have evolved since those early days of not even realizing this was a business. Dean Soto 7:11 Great. That is awesome, man. Well, congratulations. That's awesome. Yeah, I love that. I love that story, especially when it's like, you have all these people who are kind of slapping you upside the head saying saying, Hey, can you do this for me? Can you do this for me? Can you do this for me? You're like, yeah, maybe there's a market here. I'm not sure I've only been asked by 20 people. Adrian Rodriguez 7:33 Right, and I, you know, I do feel like a lot of the care that type of that start was interesting. Because even today, you know, I don't see myself as a hard sell hard salesman, you know, the type of person who's really going to push for you to sign on the dotted line or anything, I tend more to be more of a consultant or a collaborator with people. So if somebody calls me and they are interested in my services, that's great. And I really appreciate that tone. So but I also don't take that call with some sort of agenda. Well, this person's calling me, so therefore I need to make money off of them. Said, I just sort of give them the time that they have to tell me about what they have going on. Usually, it's a problem. And I'm sure usually I can solve it somehow, with what I do. But sometimes it doesn't make sense for me to help. I mean, you know, I could, I could do a lot of things. But I sometimes I find myself asking people will call me if they've tried just doing the Facebook page or just trying an Instagram account. So sometimes, you know, and I can help them set those things up. But they're really easy to do for a lot of people. So I mean, most people have that stuff these days anyway. Yeah. So that's kind of like, an interesting characteristic of my businesses. I'm sort of like, the soft sale, I guess. Yeah. Dean Soto 8:57 Which is cool. We got to talk about that prior to to get in on the podcast and how important that is. And I love that because, yeah, you get you, you know, right, when right away when someone's trying to sell you something like, That happens a lot. Adrian Rodriguez 9:14 Well, I do understand that people do not like to be sold anything, but they do love to shop. So you know, if you can change the dynamic with people to where they feel like they are having a shopping experience, that is a lot different than if they're being sold something No, yeah, there's some subtleties in there. But I definitely don't want I want to present the menu and give them the chance to kind of run the show. Because I'll be doing enough running of the show. Once we get started, I'll be doing the project, I'll be building all the technical stuff, you know, putting it all together for them. So love that. I love that. Dean Soto 9:50 So I'm so encouraged web, you'd mentioned on the when we were talking prior to this, that there's a there's a reason for the name? Adrian Rodriguez 10:01 Yes. Dean Soto 10:02 So what is why Why did you call it anchored web? Adrian Rodriguez 10:07 Well, you know, when I started my business, the first thing, you know, I know the very first thing but one of the things I was interested in was making sure I created a brand that reflected the kind of business I was going to do also gave some people, people who saw a reason to think about it beyond just glancing at it and moving on. And I wanted it to also be available as a domain name online and as a property on Facebook, Instagram. So I mean, one of the things I do when I help new businesses that are starting out is I tell them, we need to come up with a good name, right? But it needs to not only be a good name, but it also needs to be available on Facebook and Twitter's when you see things like Twilio, or you know Asana, all these different web apps, Google even, you know, maybe not that so much. But a lot of these names are kind of weird. A lot of it has to do with the fact that there's just not that many names that are out there. And yeah, so incurred web came along. Because first of all, my I've been programming since I taught myself the program when I was seven. And the internet came along. In the mid 90s. And I, I saw that there was a huge power of the internet. And so I was already learning about the internet from a philosophical standpoint. And one of the things that I learned about the internet early on, and it's kind of stuck with me is that the internet is very powerful. Because it it does something that books can do for instance, which is you can link from one page to another. And even though that sounds like a very simple concept that hyper linking from one area of knowledge to another area is very powerful. And you can do so many things with them, it's actually built the internet. So in web code that is called an anchor tag, and it's represented with a little brackets and there's a in there, that means I'm going to give you a link or it tells a browser show this link here. So the anchor tag is really the essence of the internet, in my you know view of it. So anchored web is a double entendre that not only speaks to the fact that I understand that the essence of the internet is the linking between different pages, but also that one thing that I found is that a lot of web developers, at least at the time when I started and it probably still the case, to some extent, they kind of would be a younger person who would be really excited about putting together websites, but then would maybe next year, they're excited about being in a band or maybe then they're getting started college or getting out of college. So I found that a lot of times I would be approached by people who say I had a web web person and that person, I can't even call them anymore, I don't know where they are or they're not interested anymore. And so anchored web solutions is meant to also speak to the fact that I'm a reliable, steady, responsible and knowledgeable expert for clients. And so anchor web solutions, it speaks for both. So, you know, again, if you can come up with a name for your business, and it can kind of have multiple meanings that are wrapped up in one, it's great because somebody ever asked you like you do a whole spiel that sounds impressive. And when they talk about Dean Soto 13:33 No, it's, that's actually really cool. I get because, um, because so for a so with my business, I had the name pro sulim, which was and it literally for years, almost a decade, I had personal them, and I still use it for my kind of b2b business to business side of things. However, nobody knows what that is. It was it was I picked it because I couldn't think of anything else that didn't have that that that had a that did have a domain and that it basically no one was going to ever think of at all, but it did not. Nobody knows what that is. And that was a huge mistake. And it it it literally cost me now thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars. Because because they don't even know what it what you have to sit there explaining it. So it's not going to just grab someone's attention or anything like that. And so, so yeah, it's just that alone. Having that, that having that good brand name like you like you have, you know, what it what you already get these images of what it's supposed to be? Right? Adrian Rodriguez 14:50 Right. Exactly. To me, I believe, you know, before I was a programmer, in my current career, I was a journalist. And I was a writer. So words and how how words fit together was really important to me and still is. So I do feel like, yes, you the words you use the name of your company will imprint something in somebody's mind, you know, even if it's unintentional. So it could be that it's confusing could be that it's hard to spell. It could be that it sounds like another word or maybe start with something that another word and all those things to me, they kind of, you know, I'm not going to say that any business name is not potentially good. After all, we have things like eBay, as I said, all these crazy names for for businesses, and they, they some of them do break through and become mainstream known entities. Yeah. So I wouldn't ever say that, you know, anything you pick is not worth trying, if you will love it. But, you know, for me, I was really interested in making sure people understood what they were reading and kind of could derive some sense of an understanding of it. Dean Soto 16:00 Yeah. Oh, no, I love love. I just, yeah, I love that. Because because there's someone like me, I'm more of a systems like behind the scenes guy. And I never really put an importance on that at all up front. And if I flipped it around, it would have been, there would have been, it would have been a lot easier. Right. And so so it just cool. It's, it's just neat seeing that, that was so important to you. Because literally, I had to I had, I had not only did I have the opportunity cost, but I ended up having to have someone help me do that and pay them to to help me to brand and help me to do all that stuff. Because I didn't put an importance on it up front. And so that's it just is really cool that that that you did that. So with. So with Ingrid web right now. So what walk me through the process of how how you actually run your business, when it comes to you, I'm a new prospect, I just came to you, I need help with a website. In fact, let's just do the the common, I had this guy over here. And he wasn't very good. And he wasn't dependable yada, yada, yada. I need I need help. What do I do? Adrian Rodriguez 17:27 Well, you know, the first thing I want to do is understand a little bit about the person that I'm talking to and a business or organization that that they're representing. So it's not, to me, it's not a small part of the process to kind of get a sense a little bit about, about the background. So it could be that they are, they're in need of something that day, because something fell through and they just look me up and they follow me and they're saying it's an emergency, I need to something on my website, or else I'm in trouble for something. Well, that's fine. And I can try to get those things done. But usually I can take a few minutes to say okay, so tell me about your business. How did you sort of like what we're doing right now you're telling me you're asking me about my business? It's kind of what I do. Because I think businesses about relationships. And if I don't understand where they're coming from, or if I don't think that they are interested in where I'm coming from, but I'm not sure that we're going to be a good fit. That's, I get along well, with a lot of people like Dean Soto 18:32 just with just like with that, for example, like with that process are you? A lot of because a lot of I know a lot of web companies, I know a lot of companies in general, myself included. So back in the day, and I'm getting gotten a lot better at this is that what happens if it's not a good fit? If you feel like you know, this person is just not going to be like, what do you do? What do you do in that particular situation? Adrian Rodriguez 18:57 Well, you know, it's, it's hard for me to hell, if somebody is, I mean, it's, I'm not going to take your call, and then I don't see myself concluding during the middle of that call that this is not a fit. There have been times where I have told people, you know, I appreciate that you're calling me and stuff or that we're talking about it, but I think it's a good fit. And so usually what I would do is I would try to figure out so safe, where the reason why we would not be a good fit would be because they have a different idea about how much it should cost or what the value is what I do, or their timeline is different than what I can manage things like that, where it's more of an incompatibilities for practical reasons. If it was just a personal way compatibility, I don't I get along with people pretty well that I even you know, I'm actually good with working with people were very challenging personalities. So I don't think it would be that but yeah, so usually, that's what I'm trying to suss out as well. What are you looking for? Well, I need a website. Okay, when you need it right now? And how much are you willing to pay? $20? Well, let's see, you know, I still wouldn't you know, if somebody said to me, I need a website, and I only have 20 bucks, what do you got for me? I'm not I don't need the $20 per se. But I would probably say, well, that's interesting, I think you could do these things. Maybe you shouldn't pay me. But if you're really at that level, you should probably you could do this that. But um, so what i what i what I'm looking for, though, is there's and this is where again, I say it's about relationships, because even though I'm a very skilled and experienced web developer, one of the things about me is, as you can kind of hear from my background, I didn't work, maybe it's not obvious, I didn't go to school, formerly to learn programming, a lot of what I know, and everything I do, which is for June was sites and WordPress, and HTML, and all these other I can be Davis, database management, and SEO and all that good stuff. But I picked all the stuff up on my own over the years. And I feel like I probably could say that I have some level of education about it at this point, but certainly experience. But I do want my clients to understand that I, I am a unique, at least Unknown Speaker 21:35 I have my Adrian Rodriguez 21:36 own, I created my own path to where I am today. So if if there's something that pops out that maybe a educated, formerly educated programmer should know, I may not know that thing. But it's not because I can't understand it. It may be that I just haven't encountered in the last 10 or 20 years, I've probably encountered it all. Yeah, or most things. But that's one of those things where I kind of want to tell people, hey, so what I do is I solve problems for you. And I usually I learned to do it in the most efficient and, and proper way as possible. But it isn't 100% because I can't go back to a textbook that I read in college about how to do that. So. So that's what I want them to understand about me. And as long as they're like, hey, well, that's great. I mean, you seem like you know what you're talking about, and we're putting our trust into you. Yeah, great. And then then I can start looking at whether they're trustworthy, and whether I can put trust in them to pay the bills and stuff like that, or keep up with me, things like that. So, so the things that I'm really looking for, you know, actually, this morning was doing a bunch of the cold calling, as well. That was really interesting. Let's talk about that. Dean Soto 22:55 Because, okay, everyone, obviously, every single business needs that as so need you to do some kind of sales, marketing, things like that. What's your what's your what's your sales and marketing strategy? So it sounds like you do some some cold calling, like, give me an idea of how that goes? Adrian Rodriguez 23:14 Yes, well, okay, so cold calling is one of those things that you have to go in with the right mindset. Otherwise, you can feel really bad after a short amount of time. So the idea that I started with is that the rate of success, I mean, depending on how you define success, but the rate of success is generally, and this is not a hard number, this is like in my head so that I can approach it of a mental state that works is like 3% or 123 percent out of what I call 100 people, maybe three of them will become a website, me maybe just one or not even that. So yeah, what I do is I have all I have my sources going to get it business listings from and then I call them one after the other and I, I, I, I have a certain pitch. But the first and foremost thing I'm trying to do is find out if they have a website, or are looking for a website, what value do they put on a website in their mind at least and then if they are interested in getting into a conversation about it. And so for me, at least with my approach is not to go from never talk to this person report to the selling, or to signing on the dotted line. It's having that conversation, getting to know all of these people out here. And if they're interested in will have further conversations, and I'll plug them into my customer relationship management system that lets me follow up in a week or two weeks or six months, or whatever it is. So if I talk to somebody, they say, you know, I am interested in just getting off the ground. And I really don't need a website. I might need one in six months, but I'm not worried about it right now. Yeah. Again, I'm a I'm an easygoing guy. So I feel great. All right, well, just remember these things about me that you can remember, hopefully you take my info down, I will call you back anymore. If that works for you, or I will call you back in August. And like I like it that you Dean Soto 25:25 frame that that way too. Because I've been guilty of it with my with my my cold calling, warm calling in and so on of just saying Okay, no problem. Thanks. And yeah, it's not framed as in, I am going to call you march, or I'm going to call you in April, and see how things are going. Because now you're not really a bother, you're, you're literally and if they say okay, they've given you permission. And it's a much different frame, obviously, they can completely ignore you. But at the same time, you're going to have a much higher success rate. I would imagine doing that. Adrian Rodriguez 26:02 Yeah, a little bit more, because I look at it as planting seeds, more so than you know, making sales or making a touchdown. So the metaphor I use is planting seeds. So if I let somebody know about me, and they seem receptive to the idea, even if you're just being nice, at least they got it, they gave me a chance and see where I am. And then I always plan for that at the end where I say, you know, we're going to have a follow up with not whether you like it or not, but we're going to, I'm going to talk with you, if that's okay with you at x point in the future. Yeah, so even if I like this morning, I one of the people I football, it just so happened that she knew one of my clients. And so there was a folly in between us or in common with us. And so that totally greases the wheels or whatever, it totally helps when they go oh. Now I know you're somebody. But she was I feel very interested by the end of that call. She had some other things that she had to, you know, think about or whatever, which is fine. But she said, I'll give you a call in like a week. Right? She said that to me. So I you know, I said to me, but what I told her, and this was somebody who already is interested, already committed to call me back. I said, if I don't hear back from you, in a week, I'll maybe I'll follow up. If you don't mind on Thursday, or something like that. She said, Oh, yeah, great. And so again, we're sort of already in that collaborative mode that we need to be in, if I'm going to work on her website anyway. Yeah. Like, Hey, I'm not trying to tell you what to do. You're your own person. And you know, after all, I'm I'm hoping to help you out. But I have my end of the bargain, of course, I want to selling a website, or I want to be able to make money. So if I don't hear back from you, you can expect that and if you don't ask me, then maybe at least at that point, you kind of have the idea that i'm i'm not just calling and seeing if you're interested, I'm also working with you, and then going with you to that, so you can take it. And anytime you want to work with with me, then our I appreciate that, you know, I never want to sit there and think well, I'm such an established successful business, that people are knocking down my door, and I don't have to do anything, I just wait for them to come in. And it kind of happens a lot. When you you become successful, you have a lot of referrals, but I never let that tell. That's why I do cold calls, I have plenty of business. But I like to always have more and more of these little seeds that go out and get planted so that they can come to fruition. And in three months, six months, two years, I had I had a client emailed me this morning, who is a local politician here. asked me if we could get started on on a new website. And this was somebody that I hadn't talked to in four years, I think maybe three or four year yeah. And so it was just one of those things where I always six months or a year at a time, I would kind of know her just letting her know. I still around, I'm still doing things. And I here's the latest and I still think about you not like that. But I mean, I still, you know you're not you're not forgotten. And I just think it helps a lot because there she is calling me up or emailing me and asking me, how's it been going? Okay, so you're looking for a new website. Community. love that. I love that. So, Dean Soto 29:43 so kind of going into this one particular case that I wanted to I wanted to share. Yeah. I want to make sure Okay, cool. I have this so you share it an audio from from within me from actually my Fresno County Sheriff. Who the person who was interviewing her was it was it was really surprising to hear what they said about the Fresno County, the sheriff's a website. So two things real, real quick, I'm going to ask you the first and then I'm going to ask you the second and I'm going to play this thing. One, how in the heck did you even have the opportunity to build the Fresno kids to Fresno County Sheriff's that I mean that that's a pretty big area, and it's government to very big thing like difficult things to get? How in the heck did you do that? So that's, that's question number one, ask question number two right after that. Adrian Rodriguez 30:49 Sure. Well, okay, so that was Yes, that was a, that was one of the that is one of my biggest clients. Now you can answer the sheriff's office came about, interestingly, an interesting story. So my, my first connection to the sheriff's office was that I wasn't the newspaper journalist. Before I was a, I was a programmer and I had been reading a story about a company that was a tech company, a satellite internet technology company here in the valley. And so I kind of find these interesting technology companies that that were under the radar, I guess, and I would bring them to light in my in my reporting. And so that was really fun. And I would, I would make a good impression for some reason or another. So one of the companies for this company, was a husband and wife and the wife was the sister of the public information officer. So the reason why this is it took about a year of toss with you over there just to for him to understand and what I could do, how I could do it with Alan might be able to structure a deal. And so what they needed and what I ended up being able, the reason why it ended up happening was what they decided they needed was they wanted a website that was not only fully secure and ready at that level, but they also needed they were they were interested in doing was having a media outlet that was not didn't necessarily compete in the market. The first will be or was the local newspaper, but they didn't want their clothes to only be found in a newspaper reporter Oh, yeah. So if they wanted to talk about crime that happened, and they wanted to talk about whatever they wanted to say they wanted to have a platform online, that could serve as a media outlet from their from their agency. So my background in journalism came to me in a huge advantage for me, because I could, I could describe to them and I could write out a proposal like like, technically create kind of website that would produce the media outlet impact on our community. So I created a site. On top of that they had a lot of other requirements, because that was one of the big ones that made them sort of say, Okay, if we work with you, we're going to get anywhere else. Dean Soto 33:33 Yeah. That's cool. I mean, and I also like a year for, for a government organization. That is that is pretty quick, if you think Yeah. Adrian Rodriguez 33:49 Well, you know, and then the guy who hired me, he's, he's retired in the last four years or so three or four years. So I think he was wanting to create a legacy for his time. At Yeah, sheriff's office, at least in terms of that department. So there was some urgency there a little bit. But, you know, yes, it's a short amount of time. And it's a long amount of time, from different perspective. But definitely, I also had to qualify to actually work there. I mean, I was hired as an independent contractor, but I have taken a lie detector tests, and background checks and things like that. So there's a lot of security there. So that also helps with your if I don't have a record, I guess. You could find you to be trustworthy, we can work with like big agencies. But you know, I know much of my like, like that, too. So much of what I do has to do with the fact that I have a writing background that explains all these things. And it becomes not just me personally convincing people but what a document I created. Also some convincing people and I don't have either you Dean Soto 35:00 Yeah. And then on top of that, is you know how from that, from that experience, you know, how people digest information visually. And that's a that's a huge thing. And in fact, in this particular thing that I'm going to play that was that was a big that was totally, totally unsolicited. So where is this? This quote front? Like, where's this, where's the, Adrian Rodriguez 35:27 that's a radio show. It's called Chris Daniel in the morning. And it's just a, it's a regular show for a long time. And so they'll interview the sheriff once in a while, and it just was funny because somebody was listening to it. And then we know that it was on the air. So I went really quickly to the, to the web, and I went with an archive of that. That clip and I cut it out audacity, maybe Dean Soto 36:03 I can tell that audio is like, awesome. So so I'm gonna I'm gonna play this real quick. Now keep in mind you listening to the context that this is a radio show host. And this is a government website. And if you put those two things together one no radio show hosts is good a good a good at literally drool over a government website, because government websites tend to be really, really just absolutely horrid. horrendously bad, and nobody likes them. And there, there's a ton of money spent on these websites. And they end up being really crappy. So take a listen at this, and it just tells you tells you how good not just the the builders of the of the actual sites, but also how the information is digested, check this out. Unknown Speaker 36:54 And by the way, where we at Unknown Speaker 36:57 backlog these days on CCW, we're doing much better. And in fact, an update on that Christmas is the latest, we the process is actually even easier, because now you can actually apply on line, you don't have to print out the forms and bring them in and it actually eliminate one of the interviews, you can apply online, I get your appointment automatically when you do that on our website, it Fresno share.org o RG and you click on the second amendment icon and the application process will walk you Unknown Speaker 37:33 right through it online. And Unknown Speaker 37:35 speaking of that website, I've got to throw this out before we get to our next call sugar. Unknown Speaker 37:42 Perhaps honestly got it, you know, I love you. But this is this is like you have a government website like I have ever seen in terms of the ease of access. And Holy cow, you start doing some of those pull downs, how many things are out there to keep you safer to get people behind bars, behind bars and so many other thing. It's just it's everything house watches. I don't know what the reading posse console the questions for CCW, the Explorer program. I mean, it just goes on and on. I don't know Unknown Speaker 38:17 who the people are that are involved in keeping this thing up to speed. But it's got to be a lot because Unknown Speaker 38:23 for as much as you have on there. It's not. Unknown Speaker 38:26 It will. Thank you, Chris, we have a great website. And again, it's all one word.org o RG and there's so many resources and kudos to Chris Curtis who really started the process he worked with Unknown Speaker 38:41 a doing as our consultant and he's still with us and Tony body is keeping it going. And it really is a great website. I'm really proud of that app. Dean Soto 38:50 That's crazy. So absolutely crazy. Just thinking of that radio show hosts, these are just in general. Why are they you never hear that first government site. So yeah, it was really cool to hear that like, like, what what am I like? Next question with that is is what is that? How is that like helped your business in general? Working with government agencies? How did you do? So I, we talked about that. But do you? Do you see yourself doing more for local government agencies like that? Adrian Rodriguez 39:29 Yeah, I mean, well, yeah, I I pitched a few ideas. I was sort of in the running for a little bit of time with the the Fresno Police Department on the basis of the fact that every sheriff's officers Yeah. So there's there's that I can't say that I've done a lot of political some websites I've done politician in this area. totally open to it. But I am, I'm talking to the city of focus about a project right now that might be doing it up for their official. But there's a couple things there in I'm also working right now currently with Travis County, on a overhaul. And that should be launching. And so yeah, you know, it's helped so much, because there's just so much that is said by by telling the people that I work with the sheriff says that I, at least to a law enforcement agencies, work with large government. And it isn't untrue. It's totally true that working with law enforcement officials is not as easy to work with them, because they're used to tackling people on the street. But they tend to, if they want something, they don't mind being loud about it or being forced, you know, it's part of their job description. So for me, to be able to be diplomatic with them is something that I find something I'm good at. And I think that all those things are wrapped up in saying, Hey, I work with this shirt on their website, and I kept it up all these years. So yeah, that's, that's how it's helping me. And in terms of doing government jobs, yeah, it is monumentally harder, because you have, there's so much ready to deal with. And, you know, there's bidding and things like that to do. But if you understand it, to me, it's just a scaling. Same thing I do. When I bring my phone calls, I do a call to discuss private business and sort of like, let me understand their situation and what you guys are trying to do. And if there's a way I can solve it, I will let you know. And so for the sheriff's office, or any agency that I work with small businesses, small business, it might be like, hey, you give me this content. And I'll be done with the website, and in a week or two, maybe every week, and then we're launching the website, you know, it's not that hard, right. But you know, it's the same approach was taken for a large agency this week, it can be nine months or something, you know, totally. But I just lay it out. And I say, Hey, this is what would it take, and this is what I'll have to end with, he's going to be our challenges. And these are things I'm not good at that I might, you know, I might not be good enough to do these things. And then just by laying it all out there in a very precise way, gives them the champion for finding out in their head. And like I said, there's a lot of environments that government agencies have, but it's not impossible to get into those actually, really, stay authentic to the goal. I love it. I love that. Dean Soto 42:37 So always ask this question. It is the the anchor question to the podcast, no pun intended, no pun intended. So what is one five minute mindset shift or decision or something that really was it didn't take much time for you to actually say, Hey, I'm doing this, and that has delivered just a massive amount of results for you? Adrian Rodriguez 43:06 Well, there's a lot of things like that, you know, and but I think something that I look at is, when I decided some years ago to change my just my businesses made a huge difference. It only took me a few minutes to kind of realize I need to do things differently. And then I started putting those in action. And it made such a difference. And that is that I used to say me, when I first started business, I was very as I was described to me, I got into it for journalism reasons. When people asked me to do websites, I was sort of sort of used by the idea that, like software, I was just doing it for fun. So for me, it was about when I first started my web development business, the first thing I was trying to you were saying, Hey, I don't like to nickel and dime, people, I only want to sell a website people at a, at a railing at a price to simply see that we're at a high price tag, you know, I'm just I was very, just very against business, the type stuff that I just wanted to do my cleaning. And yes, money was important. And we all know that. So I knew that hadn't been part of it. But I was really trying to avoid money. Yeah. But at some point, again, all these things are coming along. For me, I realized some years ago that I needed to change my thought process about what it would what I was calling legally and diamond people was not necessarily the only way to look at it. And and so now I look back and with my current businesses, what I do now is I don't focus so much on the website, project rice, as much of what I do on the ongoing continue continuing services. what that translates into from a top down more residual income more passive than Unknown Speaker 45:14 having to work work, right. Adrian Rodriguez 45:15 So I enjoy working for the money and going out finding getting incompatibility, Vincent, get a website, things like that. That's all enjoyable. But when I decided to change my attitude about small amounts of money, it it really opened a lot of things up. Because really, I work with customers that are nickel and dimed. It's that conversation. Hey, you built my website. And Something's Weird About it now. Unknown Speaker 45:48 And then I'd have to say, Adrian Rodriguez 45:51 we're Who are you again? Dean Soto 45:56 awkward conversation. I totally I used to do web development. I only know that like I've had people where, where it's been like two or three years. They do they do that? And I'm like, sometimes they're just like, okay, I'll fix it if it's really quick. Adrian Rodriguez 46:12 Right? Yes. Because sometimes I've had that moment where they say, this is how the conversation went. Now, I don't know if this was one of the conversations, I haven't maybe realized I hadn't changed my mind. But the conversation you're having is like, Hi, Adrian, Adrian, you build my website. I really liked what you did. And now it's doing something weird. And I'd say, well, what's happening is I'm looking at your website, anger, your SSL, your beard and your your database storage is the I say all these things. Yeah, I don't know anything, what you're saying? Are you saying that? You gave me this thing called the website? No, well, you know, the world changes, and Google changes their algorithm. And so then they would say, Well, I, how do I lead me? You just always know how to make my sights better Enter. And I go, Well, I always make it better, I guess. And then I just realized, okay, that's not they don't want that. And I didn't want that they didn't want their websites, they go down. And I want to have a weird conversation, right? Explain to them a bunch of stuff about why their website changing first. It's just the nature of websites, right? So it was just a paradigm shift for me to say, No, this is a living, breathing thing. And, and realistically, we need to work on this. The work start with you. And it didn't just change in the sense that I changed the business model when I was under. And actually I am. I also, it also forced me to get into all the web services that are that are very important, like SEO and Google AdWords, things like that. So I kind of knew that stuff before and a half no one global competition for AdWords. But But I was it was really trying to push that end of the deal. I was really happy to be able to make make cool websites. I love it. I love it, man. Dean Soto 48:14 So how so how can people reach out to you if they need to get a site if they need to? Do any update their site? If they're, if their last web developer was suddenly left? And they need something? How can people get ahold of you? And so that they can work with you? Adrian Rodriguez 48:31 Yeah, and all the ways they usually would that mean, my website is at he or he web.com, my phone numbers 559-372-6887, which you can text me as well probably want to email me first, go to my website, just so that I can call me again. And yeah, I'm on Facebook and Twitter and, and all that good stuff right now on Google, I have a, an offer available to people that last till middle of July, that gives them a free month of service, if they sign up in the way that you sign up there. So I'm really really right now what I'm wanting to do is is get some more, what I'm what I'm looking to do right now is offer my like world class, enterprise level services verse really small companies as well. And I really want to try to get that level of professionalism and be able to package it and make it a smaller price. That small businesses can also use it because I would I have these great services that are larger scale, and I have have my basic services that are for the small scale, I'm trying to breed skills, so that way I can offer good value to businesses. So right now I'm doing doing included is with hosting and domain names or hosting service or domain name, SSL, SEO, things like that. So if you if you need anything with the web, even if you just have, if you call me and you get me into a conversation, I really, really do my best to try to give you as much information as I can and teach you about what you need to do. For me, my business philosophy in terms of technology and kind of things that I built or, or any any new innovative system that let people have had more information available then so they can make better decisions on a daily basis with the right way. So I've worked with nonprofits a lot on like things like click to share, which would help help people finding food opportunities, like maybe at the end of the day, Starbucks has to throw away all your bakery products, those sorts of things being listed on the website in a lane. by foot, he said help help feed the homeless for experts. So those kinds of projects are ones that I really like lab dashboards, because I care a lot about our community as well. So but in general, if you call me about anything, I'm going to do my best to help you try to help you understand and what I understand about the internet, internet, to me, this is all real funding. And I really just appreciate the fact that I get to give a living. And so I like I enjoy it. Unknown Speaker 51:30 That is awesome. Dean Soto 51:33 I love it, man. And it's true. With with us being on the phone, I could tell how sincere you are I We've been in business for I've been as almost a decade as well. And you very quickly tell when somebody is is the type where they're just, they're good. They want to give value. And so when you were on the phone with me, when we were just talking back and forth, you can tell when someone wants to make a possibly make that sale, and so on. And so for you is like, if it happens, it happens. We're just gonna talk because we talked to we were talking for like 45 minutes or something like that. Yeah. And so it's really, really cool what you're what you do and how you do it. Because you can tell that you really care about the other person's well being. And it's it's pretty awesome. So So yeah, guys, don't first off. Thank you so much for being on. I appreciate it. Thank you. Adrian Rodriguez 52:28 Yeah, really appreciate you holding me down and asked me to be on that. You know, it's really great. I love loving what you're doing. Dean Soto 52:36 Thanks, man. Yeah, it's It was my pleasure, for sure. And so if you want to just definitely seriously massively increase your web presence, go check out a good web.com anchored web.com You can also give Adrian a call. And that is the end of our show. It was awesome. It was just I love the tip that Adrian shared the especially when it comes to the cold calling that was kind of an unexpected little treat. So I appreciate you sharing that because because that's that's something that every business has to do at some point in time, whether it's now or in the future, and nobody likes doing it. Yes. Just having that little reframe, so I appreciate that. But But yes, this is the end of the podcast episode. If you want more of these episodes episodes, definitely go to Google type in freedom in five minutes podcast, or you can go to freedom in five minutes. com You can also if you want a virtual systems architect that will take what you're doing right now. document everything step by step, go check out freedom in five minutes calm but for now. We will see you on the next freedom in five minutes episode.

045 Glassell Park Therapy

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 3, 2019 62:33

Drew, Luis and Pablo Meet up in Glassell Park. After a long week the guys come together and are happy to record because it feels like therapy.Social Media LinksToday Well Lived PodcastInstagram @twlpodcastTwiter@twlivedpodcastWes MartinezWebsite: thewesmartinez.comInstagram: thewesmartinezDrew GarciaInstagram: @mrdrewgarciaTwitter: @mrdrewgarciaPablo BarronInstagram: @pblitoo @thetiregarageYouTube: youtu.be/a0BvbNDC9_kMusic“Topher Mohr Alex Elena – Hot Heat”https://instrumentalfx.co/topher-mohr-alex-elena-hot-heat-no-copyright-music/Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported — CC BY-SA 3.0"Topher Mohr & Alex Elena – Mr. Pink"https://instrumentalfx.co/topher-mohr-alex-elena-mr-pink-no-copyright-music/Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported — CC BY-SA 3.0Key WordsIntermittent fasting, Keto, Paleo, Juicing, Fitness 19, 24 Hour Fitness, gym, swimming, jump rope, heavy, fat, fat shame, Boston, Los Angeles, Santa Ana, Postmates Salad, beer, podcasts, podcasting, Joe Rogan, The Church of What's Happening now, 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California Donuts, The Donut Man, La Verne, Glendora, San Dimas, Claremont, Rancho Cucamonga, Alta Loma, Fontana, Ontario, Montclair, Pomona, Chino, Chino Hills, Eastvale, Riverside, Corona, Laker Elsinore, Corona, Redlands, San Bernardino, Mira Loma, Norco, Anaheim, Santa Ana, Irvine, Stanton, Disney Land, Long Beach, Carson, San Pedro, Torrance, La Habra, Brea, Fullerton, Improv, ComedyTranscriptwow clear it out Hey everybody this is it today well live podcasts coming to you today from glass cell park California not far from our regular recording studio slash apartment %HESITATION Mister Martinez %HESITATION yeah this is gross apart we're on it eagle rock Boulevard here video rockets technically over there in Colorado which doesn't make any sense right okay is almost but anyhow welcome to the show %HESITATION you might not be used to myself Dru Garcia starting the podcast usually Wes is their front man but what can you make it to the he's off doing the acting gig ignoring us and %HESITATION neglecting his fellow fat asses and %HESITATION that's okay we'll get him next time and so I've got my good friend here to my left %HESITATION a let him introduce himself hi everybody this is Liz moralis %HESITATION very happy to be here %HESITATION this is our second %HESITATION recording I actually don't like our first recording does a person was elected teaser just introducing herself and so happy to be here hopefully you guys are enjoying our talking as well and of course not we got one more voice today and that's our good friend Mr problem here what's up big boys you guys with me and I really I know you did I guess you're looking for and I was missing that's what I wanted here so welcome to today all apart cast a podcast about a bunch of friends now used to be just two guys now now that that you guys were my friends before but now you have to be my friend yeah right %HESITATION but %HESITATION but about two guys who are really just in the hunt trying to make better versions of ourselves so that we can enjoy this life right life is fleeting and you have to enjoy every day of it and so we've put together this program this show this podcast because number one we want to be accountable to each other but the number two we wanted we we know that everything is easier when when you have help right absolutely that's one thing the struggle in silence but it's when you have help when you're surrounded with people %HESITATION that are trying to do to get to the same place it's easier to get there and especially because weight loss and this is primarily our goal is to lose weight %HESITATION over the next year or so or for a lifetime yeah %HESITATION but when you're losing weight it's it's easy to get off track it's easy to be like wow man I I didn't I don't feel good today and %HESITATION you know maybe I don't know right I do that today yeah and so it's not about being perfect it's about being as good as you can for as long as you can and you know going back to the theme of today will live %HESITATION what are you working for right what what why are we having the struggle to eat really clean is it just to be clean is it just is it is it or is it because Hey I want to be able every once in awhile to have a beer with my buddies how are you Donna or go to a wedding and not have to worry about what they're serving right is an asking like Hey is there %HESITATION any starts in that %HESITATION for her I don't I don't really worry about yeah well you know what I was gonna say person in a waiting room just look you think we worry about that my first question is is buffet or what how much of the drinks yeah so years ago my family one of my family members had at a wedding and %HESITATION my family is my family but when I see my family like me and my siblings were notorious we have fama for sneaking bottles into weddings that's what you do and but so will we we do it is we buy those little gift bags and we bring it as it is a gift of hope he had a we put it on the table problem is if the lying to your table is longer than the line at the bar they're going to figure it out yeah right so sneaky and have like control and is a thing of people like I'm getting through a link at one time where they threaten the likes at the party then okay and my poor cousins you know they're like what the hell's going on they they have no control over this it's family do this everybody at the table who is doing this activity more than a for their own drinks it's not that's not what it's about since beating it's been in the place with yeah so anyways %HESITATION so let's introduce ourselves %HESITATION let's go Sir going over that trick I learned that trick from my dad if you're going to be sending the dozens integration in general you had it always under the table you know what when he was younger used to drink a lot he doesn't that much anymore FAQ doesn't at all anymore %HESITATION but yeah the trick was taught to me by my father nice I took my two liter sodas out make some already might specially square with the killer and bring along with it and say this is a special special soda the special drink specials the %HESITATION so %HESITATION my name is drew Garcia and for my two friends here they laughed because they know me is on the S. main real name is on this made my legal name but as I've said on the part can really more I don't know the answer yes %HESITATION somebody else to me there's two actors name well there's an actor name on that is going to see in Spanish so yeah and then there and then there's a bigger CO it's because I you know I home I go by Andy right yeah you know my name was it actually and I I'm dressing tolls like eight and %HESITATION and so drew when I drove there I went on so these guys %HESITATION for every me a hard time about it but I'm okay the %HESITATION that's what we do to each other yeah so %HESITATION bubble a total about yourself man Miley properly though well I was born I was actually born in Mexico brought to this country beautiful country in the age of two souls boarding see the log with it on to the law and %HESITATION but at the over to the US at the age of two and been here's the ever since Orange County so %HESITATION lived in garden Grove Santana back to CNN %HESITATION back to an arm for a little while but does it India grown up with the school year would go back to Mexico though every year I love it over there so banks was like my home away from home I guess so I'm is Mexican and Canadian but American is can be as well so got a little mix of both six threes on big guy and %HESITATION yeah they're lovable removable I agree to that level good good good but you loose you for Jeez well my name is Jose Luis moralis I go by Louise all my friends call me please %HESITATION receipt the receipt the receipt of what can you %HESITATION I was born in may he Kylie %HESITATION all my family back on the scene a law %HESITATION click on cassette me to show you know you know that yep you know those places well %HESITATION currently can I follow I was brought here when I was %HESITATION bio thirteen twelve or thirteen %HESITATION I did my %HESITATION junior high high school some college %HESITATION I have into the country and into what we said the culture of it but without letting go my roots %HESITATION I feel I'm more into the Mexican side and the American side I still kind of like like to be in touch with what's going over there and political stuff %HESITATION but you know I like I grew up here %HESITATION I have my family here I got merry here so I mean you know I'm I'm kind of the American side as well in me %HESITATION and so far the known to us been living the normal life you know I don't pay them nothing excited %HESITATION putting a bunch of pounds let MSL blow in feel free and I think we all would donuts and hamburgers and hot good luck would you do well %HESITATION I was born here my parents are from the eighty %HESITATION but my like my canalis my brothers my oldest brothers and my sister are from there %HESITATION the actually born a local morning but in a yeah my parents moved there can't member why am a member the story now but the %HESITATION they were left my ID %HESITATION to go they had a house that Walter had land that they were building a house and then my dad came to work typical story into work one year and what an account going back on the right yeah I thought that don't exist everybody's everybody's on some of the house on so many of the staff back in the in the Vatican in year out of your parents that the civic center yeah they were supposed to be here for a year but dad was a butcher right so in Mexico they were being you the whole cal pretty much in the hole yeah you would have to chop it up here they bring it up it up they bring it already chopped up on the side yeah he just was much is easy zero inches %HESITATION he was making he started making good money so why leave when you got a good thing yeah funny my dad came here is a truck driver at the time working in the US and he got injured and in order to be able to get a medical attention he had a live here because he was leaving in the medical %HESITATION so we just can supposedly a months maybe a year later so we're supposed to be here just not if you get surgery and then we're going to be bounced back and you're still here and I'm now I have kids and they're here yeah I got a little into they have %HESITATION my parents %HESITATION our near for damn near fifty years here hello one of the other life do at that point most of yeah well if you're more than that they live in me because I'm I'm sure I'm not sure there %HESITATION memories you know that when we were young and you know this funny what they look like to go back to make on this yeah the most of their lives you guys are grew up here in it yeah I mean my brother my brother my older brother was like five when he got here and %HESITATION and then there were three more of us so total of six and %HESITATION you know what you're referring to pretty proud that they they they they got to live their American dream right they came here with nothing right just like here it over Norian they came with nothing to lose %HESITATION was you had to get into debt just to get here my dad got deported three times and %HESITATION he can come back in the last one he didn't want to come back but my mom was like like you got your to figure it out but I'm not leaving right so you better figure out how to get back right and so %HESITATION but anyways %HESITATION now we're Americanized than we do much and when we do we give our country that the mental it's a our goals Rios sung as excessive to the to the Max code yellow here at the we have that mentality of working hard playing hard you need a hard I mean we we bust our asses and when it's time to enjoy we really enjoyed our our time and our money well you know what's interesting about the group that we're that that we have here right you two guys plus Wes is you know we've all worked together and we've all worked like outside and and different projects and different companies in I'm like if I had a job like if I was to sell some sort of business and I had to hire some people and I can hire you guys I wouldn't even think twice about it because I know I will discuss %HESITATION angle if something was wrong those guys are gonna figure it out right yeah I would have to worry like like if I was a high you're an event and I say all right here all the things that you know how it is when with the van planning yeah things go wrong and sometimes people don't don't know how to like they freak out they freak out Friday night I don't think it comes with experience you notice we had situations where we're going we have no idea what it what we're doing and we just kind of like %HESITATION the owner which is John does it you know I just jump in order to see I hope this works the you know and and sometimes you know it works well do you live %HESITATION shoot you know then you get confidence in your real life all right the next you know that if it didn't work you're like fuck cuddly fix this stuff yeah yeah and I got two problems but I had a great attitude is and I got a couple friends and and you know as well that when they're like should I do this should I go into that and I'm like look I'm not worry about you not being able to do the job because I know you can figure it out yeah you know would work starting with that kind of personal yeah and and that's what I'm trying to get at it it's not so much %HESITATION like that that what I'm gonna get is not is that it's uncommon it's uncommon because I've I've worked with enough people were like oh now something went wrong they're in trouble yeah they're not gonna be able to figure it out right so they think there's like a common %HESITATION them a thread amongst all of us that you know it's like it's not just about working hard because I've seen you know I've seen twenty people that they work hard but they just did not get they don't think through things right yeah true some that's why I think that we all get along so well and this is going to be a project because we'll just you know find a way to do great work I agree and the fact that Wes is in here also I mean it's I think it's going to be for our audience I think that's how it may be you know sometimes maybe was will be missing maybe I'll be missing receipt though it just depends the R. weeks or roots are daily life today were recording on a Tuesday yeah I'm really glad that we got to get even though it's very late so so the audience doesn't know because we haven't told him but we met at eight o'clock it's nine thirty right now falling out and and I need to go home even though so in terms %HESITATION even though we got even though I was tired you know before this thank I feel good now good I guess the the changing like I feel like this is an energy kind of %HESITATION you said you said it before I think you said it I know I thought it this is a little bit like therapy right like there's another route there's like a stress release in doing this process so anyways %HESITATION so let's talk about this week when you said you had some ideas yes our good days are a is a man you're both a composite okay sorry about that guys %HESITATION Suria %HESITATION we're talking about %HESITATION Wes being fat yes yes now we all these factors affect so I think he's out trying to get a federal tonight that's why you %HESITATION trying to get a position to win I think it's trying to break into the well the whole situation %HESITATION you know series about not eating you know what he's nothing close to yeah I think that's what we think is out there having a real favorite yeah we had plans in touch is going to look into it but yeah this situation so we might you know want one of us might be missing one of these days and just as always yeah our daily life may get in the way you mean maybe two of us will get together you know maybe one day it'll be just draw dies so %HESITATION by the way the show continues it we're gonna try to stick to once a week even if it is a Monday but if it is Tuesday and %HESITATION that way you don't bring bring it and keep continue to show of the Kansas and we can't use you guys like it I told drew in the west before you guys had a good thing going last year in this funny I didn't listen to it last year you told me about it last year but one by a I started listen to and to it this year and I've been just listen so I started work because I have my own %HESITATION tires arms and and so I have a dumb got music all day and instead of the music I start having to show up and that's how we start intention and listen to it over and over again in a in a meeting listening to the show's repeatedly doesn't yeah what it was entertaining so that's why I like is it on the teaser I'm happy to be here this is I'm actually I was fans of you guys before before I was even here my my personal experience was %HESITATION I was I was trucking at the moment but I would listen to the podcast and %HESITATION the worst thing is for me is that I wanted to give an opinion or be part of it and I couldn't you know I just had to listen to you guys and I'm like Bob and I will just be there so you can make a joke of this of making a comment about and %HESITATION I know I got again it is because I feel comfortable with Andres would last now we obviously you to hear the %HESITATION at the we really close as our friends and what a friend like brothers yeah you know %HESITATION in the sense of you know we trust each other I guess a lot in in our personal lives and our surroundings %HESITATION so it was for me which is kinda like man I wish I could be there and the when you it sounded for right yeah so you want to be the yeah yeah I'd like to have some beers and in a what what don't know yeah yeah it's like you know but but that's why but as much as that you know I I felt that we have so much stuff in common you know yeah they sometimes we don't talk about you know when we're going through as in like I'm losing weight in the business card and I'm you know what asked is on my doll this weekend and I just I don't care you know or sometimes I'm like doing really well and I I just wanted to check share that with somebody and I don't have it I don't have that person you know and then just wear whatever it's there yeah and at the open up this space in order for us to speak and share with each other and you know sometimes you know give you eight that them up you know and say you did a good job or when you gonna let loose track and be like Hey you know get back on track you know like a what is it what are you said we're kind of all of your of your stuff so we went we went to back in line yeah so it's interesting right because if you look at any like %HESITATION self help program or like even like the Alcoholics Anonymous stuff like that where the E. X. support groups one of the very first steps at all and it's just a meeting you the meeting you have a problem right if you can out loud say Hey I have a problem with my weight I have a problem maybe eat eating too much %HESITATION maybe I have a problem with sugar yep but you know there's all these objections is fitted actions and yet that are out there you may not know you may not and maybe you know but you're in denial about it right and so just being able to open up about it like today it's funny because when we were sitting at %HESITATION we're in a we're in a conference room today and we're walking I've known and the the daughter of the the gentleman that they own this place having to be here and with his %HESITATION with her %HESITATION husband and we say what are you recording as a social equipment on the go or doing a podcast and and nervous I really do what I don't know I was like never served in what we're doing yeah what year is it kind of was she pretty though you got my so but you should get nervous is something that people what does want to see the one way I mean I guess one night when I used to somebody coming Hey what what what is it about you know yeah it was I think that's that's wanting to be like okay we've we've admitted were fat in front of each other yeah but now there's like this third party that this police this is a quality just call may get symbol in weight loss but because I mean look at this it's a you're talking about its weight loss you're talking about something that relates to yeah a lot of a lot of people whether they admit it or not what is it that first or second the season in the US I mean you know whether they admit it or not yeah they they they can relate to it yeah it is not only fat people there's people that are not over weight but they feel like they want to lose some weight and the cat they don't they are they're not able to so the this the fact that I'm intermittent fasting was doing the carnivore you're doing the keto you're doing the choosing yeah those are four options that they can probably pick they can pick from and damn it may work for them just as of may work for us it could work for them too and they're not overweight well I got I put as example my girlfriend she what she's not overweight but lately she's lost a few pounds and she saw me lose the weight and she started because you got into it %HESITATION she looks even all of them for it I would I never saw it I never thought she was over it at all so there's people in she deals with that she loses she gained a pound she loses a pounds you gain a pound it's the same journey that you would %HESITATION are having maybe it's five pounds in ten pounds yeah but it's a pound for her is just as difficult as to ten twenty pounds for us yeah you know him so it's the same it's the same situation for us as for any a lot of people can relate to it yeah and so one of the things I want to bring up a really just touch on is what kind of a commitment we are going to have not not to the show so much but just like I feel like when I was thinking about was just listening to you guys talk about how you guys look forward to it and even though you're listening to it later in New yeah we have somewhere in the in the neighborhood between fifty to two hundred listens depending on the episode last year looking at the numbers last week and I wonder if you know I know some of those people that were listening were were were %HESITATION %HESITATION people that I knew but they could not be people I know and I wonder if there's people out there that we're just like depending on not depending on the show but looking forward to the show and then when we in west kind of trailed off to I feel like we we let them down I think this is right you let me down sorry I was listening to that and so I cry with a box of donuts I'm sure we use it all those guns either of them you know I just eight one well I could because really the whole white one box thanks again there was only one box and got three of almost and gather that was what eight SO you do not yeah so I think what what I'm trying to say is that I really want to make sure whether it's with their it's all four of us or it's two of us or just even one of us that we have some consistency and really some commitment to deliver the content right because %HESITATION salute even if it's even if it's us like coming in and being like you know what we had it we took an al this week all of us yeah right yeah it'll happen %HESITATION we did terribly but we're here talking and we almost have to pretend like there's if there's a fifth person in the chair that we're we we have to support that makes sense yeah %HESITATION does the listener listener %HESITATION so anyways %HESITATION let me let me touch a little bit on this week we were supposed to win no we didn't really and what we are I needed when I went in myself okay but I I wish we can do it all here so we can keep track because every skills different everything on my team to pound into but at least we we get one scale which is going to be like %HESITATION industry scale number one is that in those rules those well we have one here in the office %HESITATION the one for the truck drivers now it has to be I'm serious at regular skilled close up to like probably three hundred pounds no no no four hundred they're all right yeah so yeah so you have room to grow taking at you can test the limits on it I want to see because over four hundred announced worldwide in the breaks the funny thing is they're made of glass I want to make it a error the one of my house it's me that this could be a and he goes above three hundred okay so above three hundred the way that I that I got this %HESITATION this week it was three east I was set at I thought it was two sixty three seventy okay %HESITATION seriously I'm really like I was three seventy three years ago okay and that's when I tested using it because I got diagnosed with diabetes okay right and but I was like and it really helped shaped like a really bad like really bad hell shape I had problems with asthma then %HESITATION obviously the overweight and the deputies %HESITATION they want to give me medicine and all the stuff that comes with it I mean you know like an order also I don't know I refuse everything I walk out of the office %HESITATION and I started to them is it enhanced to cry about it no I went home and nice them like it was kind of like a click on my on my brain said that that you know I'm done how much is this and I did I did I did for %HESITATION you flip the switch on yeah it was it but it was but are you able to back off yeah but it was weird because it was just something that nobody can get me out of it I was so stubborn about it like nothing is gonna stop me it doesn't matter who comes you got scared into it pretty much I got a scare into the my health and yes sometimes that's what it takes in this time back then which is I have only my daughter and I'm like no I'm not going to do this I want to be able to play with her and run into these things you know I did it and two months I drop like a bottle of like two months and a half seventy pounds which is a lot in a maintain and maintain myself well like I came pro like I can probably end up with the three hundred pounds and I probably picked up after going back to eating everything in and not just %HESITATION the the choosing %HESITATION pride like twenty pounds SO three twenty I meant to myself I that like for almost a year which I was very happy and then I become a trucker and do that with the way that like you know three twenty three twenty five three thirty five you know it I start jumping numbers and I'm like shit I need to go to Walmart and buy juices and things you know like I'm not gonna you know make any but I was doing all over the %HESITATION all over the road on the on the US so my choices of food was very limited everything was called junior I swear there's the there's nothing but colleges and using some weights can help the bull shit nothing tastes everything to the sent the letters the tomatoes and cucumbers pickles they all taste the same the bread tasted slowly all come to a plastic bag I don't know do but it's his right I got so tired of it since I stopped I stopped doing %HESITATION long haul for it's going to be two years and I haven't stepped my foot in a kart Yunior or the subway I gained the weight music I don't do anything with it without collision with the subway you know but the first two years like I like I really I really got a head on on the food and it's just there was no other options because I all but you can take a salary what is just you don't understand salads out in like but even by Sullivan call yourself the same way about his C. C. S. it is as a brick in out on the dressing I personally don't like dressing you gonna be like yeah right you know that resting is and %HESITATION I don't like rattling Dennis that if I do it's like all of oil would %HESITATION vinaigrette you know it or lemon juice lemon by itself would be a little salt pepper and that's why I throw myself out but I just it was just crazy how the food was just feeling like my I was to getting waiting and waiting and I got a point when I'm like fuck this you know I fail I feel big time I did this big effort for two months and you know I just I just I just lost it in a can I hit me to certain point on on my personal level like you know like broke me a little bit as in like shit you can keep it up you could keep you did you did all this you were folk is you were going for a you were getting at and they you just what happened you know and right now it that's what I'm I'm having a hard time right now is just really does is switch the switch from like focus in and wanted to do I think that's what this part because we'll do that switch for you I think because you're gonna come in here we're gonna talk shit to you because you have it yeah sort of make you and that's the idea that's all therapy like two was saying it was that's what this podcast can be comes in for our listeners that's gonna same idea whether you're not there listening to it I think part of it too is it's very hard to maintain that the Spartan style diet like running running that light on union couldn't weren't know what what I say smart and I mean like yeah maybe maybe that's what you meant %HESITATION like you're gonna be perfect can you do this thing that's really hard to do but the second you you let it go then it's like I go the other way still swing the other way I I know this because I've done it like I've been we all have I've done some crazy like like feats to get to get like a down you know ten pounds right like I think early on in the episode and the episodes I was down eight pounds yeah the first week yeah yeah yeah I mean I was not allowed to give one week it looks like twelve pounds yeah yeah something stupid like that right %HESITATION in the car got me right back here with the fat asses are you know are you back to the way you said you were when I and ordered back them exactly where I started okay yeah so you raise all of last year people I'm just gonna start over I'm gonna delete those episodes and like this isn't over yet the only thing the only thing I I notice on myself as I'm back to two seventy but I'm not as sick that's the only thing I I notice this this time from the first time that I was there so maybe that's why you're not scared yet that's why you have a flip the switch yeah that's probably %HESITATION I mean I don't know if that's what it is like I don't I don't have any like I'm on my last night you know I don't have I'm still not taking any medicine for diabetes %HESITATION I mean I do get check every year to the doctor like it's mandatory for me and I bouncing Eichel can hi imminent and drop in or whatever but yeah but it's just it's just out of control you know this this month what I do really good in this month's where I'm like completely out of control and I mean I'm I'm sure our daily life comes to play as well you know there's a little so it took choices already like it starts from the very beginning right like I know that when I if I wake up and I make the first a bad choice the first meal down like I forget the stays over mmhm but if I make a good choice then I have you know for that first you know breakfast or whatever you feel good know what I what I'm just trying to say I do feel better about myself because I made a choice in it it does that really make me feel better but then if I'm not really paying you know like being mindful of what I'm doing then there's a fifty fifty chance that the next meal will be a good choice or a bad choice but if I make that for but what I'm trying to say is if I make that that very first decision in the morning to make a bad choice then it's about almost a hundred percent guarantee that I will make a bad choice for the next room that makes sense just like that first meal they say it's the first the first meal of the day is the most important right I think we should do is get up into your bed I should be here first thing to do you know what I mean I bet every day but I don't do it right away I do it after I get a better what that's what that does not see it so so speaking of which I case how does the bed come here have you ever thought of not because I heard somebody whose is like the first thing you need to do in order to feel kind of like sorry %HESITATION that positive energy like all I'm doing things right the first thing you do this to you but like I did it because I don't like I reach the goal right away I think I don't book I don't do the you don't do your butt the you don't do so to make when you do it does it make you feel better now what is what does it mean that he might work for him you know I wake up and I do my bit for the most part I do my bit yeah my wife deals in the every single day but I have a bunch of little yeah if you don't have the only really awesome if she does a better what I don't do that badly get up before her that way we're gonna just recording and when we go back to sleep when my brother and I were thinking having like an hours yeah and he has a rebate of up this week can you read that the idea that when you're going to bed your your %HESITATION negotiating with the person that with the person that's waking up in the morning like like that this happens to me even if I'm tired rated tonight I bet you I get that then I'm gonna set my alarm for four in the morning for yes for informers on it I I it's just one of the things that I I what I've been trying to do for you here this week for some it like five times in the past you get the point is not working it is I think the person I am in the morning is like %HESITATION no that's a terrible way do we think in the yeah it's like you're negotiating like insulate the negotiation is like %HESITATION how bout four AM and then my you know for him drew is like %HESITATION now and then and now that I can't I can't you at six AM morning ruins the negotiations a lot I put my number six thirty and then another one at six fifty and then another one at seven ten and I don't get up to seven thirty he's a small right now my life is I don't have a I wake up you know twice a night because I have a one one half their injured one is a pain that I mentor and and I can I can I completely straight out but I have a one one and a half and attitudes diapers so I have to wake up at least twice a night change a diaper and go back to sleep but then usually throughout the day no don this is what you're actually I read your ad hoc actually to Cassie you caught the call me somebody call me one of you guys call you called and I I was completely up you know yeah yeah I call you know the you're always yeah I work a great guy what is I'm not used to people take naps because I've never taken it up and if I take a nap during the day I wake up in the bitch as mood I'm pissed the %HESITATION is that that doesn't make me feel that's weird I love naps the high heat of I guess take them now you know I'm working full time the only yeah the only thing is if I take a nap I can I can go to sleep early I studied it in its own right okay pushes my clock the person not me a little in this several hours fresh okay so %HESITATION so listen I think to to the listening audience we middle we made a commitment to that I think we couldn't really keep this week but %HESITATION for for a couple of different circumstances one is that we recorded the %HESITATION but %HESITATION I say which we try again next week %HESITATION wait what could we keep we said we're gonna wear away but in problem in a way that we don't have with your so yeah %HESITATION this move again or something and then have you guys chose and what you can and what plan you're gonna give up I know well I'm I'm injured you to go back to the Jews Jews okay and and a good thing what I liked about it is that we're gonna be able to show it on the on the Instagram that's what a lot of people just like the thing when when I say Jews it's a liquid and it's not so at least I would have a chance to show exactly you know like look this is my lunch and I'm not actually just drinking liquids you know it's like half and half you eat soup see it I mean you guys are gonna see it then and that's something that I'm I'm really excited about it you know being able to polls show it yeah posted and then seeing your stuff and then see injures stuff and then see %HESITATION west %HESITATION so that's one thing that I've been yeah the one thing that I've been push this week for example if your if you follow the instability W. O. podcast go follow it we're on Instagram %HESITATION we have others socials also but that's the one we're gonna use mainly Twitter all that stuff you guys never posted anything on there so I use it mostly to %HESITATION like %HESITATION harass is plus seven ten okay to change the name just doing yes I make I use it to like they give my regular account makes a point then your heart this is like yeah okay said they gave him one of theirs it must be a genius and and so by next week we'll pick something out west I know you listen and picks up that are you too and %HESITATION I've already I'm already doing in investing in fact I'm down in weight I've been doing admin fast already for how long how long you been in it about two months to months so what was I'm sorry %HESITATION I I could not really sure what my starting weight was I think was like three twenty six because I weighed myself at the gym scale okay and then I would keep weigh myself on that scale that scale and it would be pretty consistent but then I will one day they try to weigh myself again when I started fasting and it was broken it said like three eighty I was like yeah this is a wrong this is wrong so when I try to take the I think it was broken the first time you they came back and I like this girl at home but it is that when the house is two ninety five so actually this morning %HESITATION nine oh five edited out right from the amount of three hundred islands okay from from %HESITATION I started the year I mean it doesn't hurt to I started the enemy vesting two months ago and I am fact input posting everything on you tube so I've got to you too Jen that's all I know that's how I've been tracking my weight so how can they find that you two ten on the well you've got to search for me Pablo but roan and I've it's intermittent fasting blog what I'll do for the can we put on the description can we put links up looks for on night I think we can only put one link okay what don't put that in fact disco follow me on Instagram and I have it on my bios entry or with her we're gonna do is have a is going to have a landing page and to to be a podcast dot com okay just has all the links for like the podcast and different at different %HESITATION others of the reservation will you have your stuff up there we should do that because we've got the I mean Wes is got his stuff we for the audience to be able to connect with those were four guys them in all four of us of actors to the to the user which I've been acted on active on it this week as you can see it %HESITATION was drinking going to out eat meat and stuff like that yes like that has interrogating part is that he's out there drinking at the end is losing weight and I still I love the poem this week and I I went out drinking Saturday we went out drinking on %HESITATION Sunday and I'll pull it out so it doesn't appointment how much are you drinking I probably had to I don't know %HESITATION do that'll cal beers with a drinking %HESITATION I'm trying to people's I'm guessing you had like fifteen there's less than a fifteen dollars Sundays I we went to the to the was a because the improv in braille just remember that he's a six three yeah six three handsome well I'm talking about if I'm talking about your your volume of of your manners the mass media are there we are yeah we can we can take a lot of your yeah I would like somebody who's like I don't know how much beer I had because it's I don't count %HESITATION Armida guesses the made eight maybe and yours yeah during the show a baby had four and then afterwards we had the bar maybe have another five Jesus greatest nine yeah that's right his manner of billions I still like fifteen hundred cal yes that's a that's a long look I was doing the math last time we were sit at a table were all discussing because my cousin is also I never thought about the bug is my cousin was also is also doing I forgot we met the cheese use I think it's got to cut also but we were discussing it in I I started doing the math of what I used to eat right before the fasting when I was maybe at three twenty six sure I was I was pretty concerned about six thousand calories a day holy crap about six thousand gallons a minute that's about and I do the math that's about what it is yeah do the math some do it at least and he's a thousand five hundred per meal yeah and I do like for meals is %HESITATION do math love your today I started well I did my choose you know how many calories in the juice what is was it a very smart this is like probably not not not even a hundred thousand hello which is something is %HESITATION so you drink the juice in ten minutes you're hungry again so they would not honor it actually because my that's my appetite but what what what I was going to say it is I did that and then a the %HESITATION another kind of like a one of those origin %HESITATION drinks that are I can remember that is I've been a %HESITATION %HESITATION so nasty I like them a lot of people just hate them the vinegar the cabin anger out assigning %HESITATION double check drinks so have you heard of them I've heard of them never tasted it okay so early you your problem like it I like them the anyways so I did data dilute Jews %HESITATION and then this afternoon you know my wife make lunch which is very like chicken brass and bury lean and you know some rights for the kids a survey number I'm not gonna get the rice meat chicken and can a plane it and she's like you know what she's pregnant she's almost all at the end of the rope right now you have a bigger believed her you have a bigger but I think we're like about this my my voice lately because because because of the big big no no no that is a must in every room of my in the end he let you know that I just when he knows the joke about %HESITATION I don't know what he can to give because the billing they've been there what is wrong and but anyway so she's like you know what I cook and everything but I don't I don't feel like you need this food is a can you go to foster freezing give me like a burger with fries and I'm like shit and we're going one there and I went to get %HESITATION the you brought one back in of course I mean you had with in a way it was just like %HESITATION you know because I'm like I know I'm in it Louise if I'm going to my buying her something I'm by myself something sherry subjects of the system is not because and I already dinner and I'm like right when you heard the news waiting for her ordered I'd like to it on the spot you don't have it under this is like a teacher's aide up like I know but I just want to tackle stand alone can stop myself and only that I've been working for myself and I speak of listening to a common thing there's no depth control yeah it's got a very it's like but also if you live like within like a a football fields distance of a foster's freeze it has a light you're gonna eat some Fosse's trees because I used to live in front of one in front of Berkeley when I walked in front of it I used to live in when when I lived in Berkeley an apartment it was literally across the street well that's exactly you see nowhere and the smell of them like I could see the the smoke coming towards us and I'm like we are it doesn't matter how does that our dogs yeah and the corn dogs anyway looks you live we all live in the pretty densely populated area yeah there is this going to be for the quarter mile not even have about a quarter mile kind of ten and rest and you've got restaurants all the time please bottom up one five star restaurant that was it yeah right yeah we have like it that's like less than five minutes where I parked here walking distance is a toggle truck out there and then cross the street does not listed as an owner so don't tell me you know this because there's there's axis there's always acts yeah it's %HESITATION it's difficult to control symptoms of ma'am not something that I that I I was the other day that's my sister she's %HESITATION she's like all faded into like sports in the heat well another stinks and she sent me a %HESITATION due to %HESITATION link in the talks about how we know for certain people like certain drugs are addictive and how food is addicted to yes Sir certain people as well it's kind of the same thing like sugar stylings of silver and in nineteen listening to it in and I'm like you know is it because a lot of people just like fine sometimes a trauma into their food my goal I've I I live through this and I feed refugee into the food and I just you know because this happened in my life and she explained to you when that happens and when it's an addiction and I'm just listening to her all of the points and I'm like yep I'm addicted dammit I'm addicted to food I'm addicted to food and it's just not alert was also sugar did I eat anything the I. wheat bread need vegetables is this for my problem I think this is just more value I'll eat much of out of anything if it's healthy food I still had to control myself because even if it's even if his the Jews or what I can you know Pat of you know a stew of babies no it's just more about controlling the amount I I take it into a disease using could help you control it yeah yep this is this is this is just a certain amount of you know the liquid or when I'm gonna do a soup a certain amount of vegetables that I need to do or if I may do a salad this in a modest salad that I meant to do and that's how many at all and that's it what we get good well I was gonna say %HESITATION part of it is Tuesday if you're eating stuff like like sugar there's jurisdictions a real thing because not only are things that are sugary bad for you but your body starts just to say %HESITATION %HESITATION I like I the the the very things you're eating make you want to eat more of it yeah well yeah say %HESITATION as that's where the the fun is that they see Kenny one chips mmhm it's because there's literally stuff in it that makes you want to eat more of it right some anyhow that's one thing I think we got a task each of the with any if he's doing the choosing please the news got a he's got educate us and the audience on using on on before doing ki K. kilo then you got to educate us and because there's a lot of stuff I don't know about you lots of I don't know about you see yeah I've never tried any of you so yeah you know I'm I've been learning a lot about in the mean testing because I've been doing it so I can I can talk to you know I can never know because I'm an asset is within our fasting have you feel did you you said like about two months right yeah have the fear how do you feel your stomach shrinking yet your intake even if you want more like you in techselect dammit I'm already full blade tech is different and I've I've done the research on this and in fact hi on one of my you to allow you to channel one of the episodes is about this your stomach doesn't actually shrink so your stomach physically does not shrink it's an organ so what happens is just the communication between your brain in your stomach resets when you first it resets so then you're not able to intake is much your you communicate to your stomach communicates easier with the rain and says April stop eating because when I got in my personal experience when I finished using the first time what it does to month and a half I Sears they can eat only two tackles and that's what that's that's your site my my stomach feel like bad it reset and then just exactly what the hell I was the I lost a lot of fat on the belly but you know I was shocked when I try to go back in to the stack of sand and be like you know let's let's see how much I can hit I had two tackles and I was satisfied I was just like not hungry yeah that's the thing use you look at what you eat because that's what you used to eat right so your order for you order six whatever you eat because as we usually yeah thank you you too and then you're satisfied and then you look at the other four or five or six whatever the left or the playing and I don't want to wait I gotta eat those yeah I used to eat those I cannot but near stuffing faced with food that you don't need you don't even know what you just you're used to eating so again to %HESITATION area so %HESITATION before we wrap this up above the least talk during the week and you mentioned you had some ideas that you want to share yes a few segments and stuff like that but %HESITATION I'm gonna bring something for you guys next week so %HESITATION we'll talk about it next week that we we can expand little by little okay %HESITATION there's a few things that I wanted a just adding to the reservation or when you know how far we along right now we're at forty or fifty minutes fifty rooms yeah yeah it'll will look good I want it I want to share look tired around this or this idea where we're at when we weigh in right away and next week then we'll have the next week will be are like how we do right yeah yeah and whoever this is the least amount away by percentage maybe is the flag of the week and we get the call they ordered you know what I have never seen yeah in my family when I left the seventy pounds my brother Tommy it's like a little so he would have to look for the for the better but I don't know but you still want to it's getting fat I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw you at you at your lowest %HESITATION three hundred he just put a picture of them you just show me a picture on Instagram we're going to post a picture of the date that we we get a is it see we it's funny because we're going to use them let me start out of her but my ski mask you pictures in a B. before and my fat face gonna be and a river rivers that I used to mean I'm good at and I look at her just be fat scheme where he used to be fat no he's better so can you %HESITATION yes so %HESITATION that was just an idea throughout the because it be fun to do a lot of it you know it's like when you call somebody I a look at the same time yeah that's a good it's going to be difficult for me though because I'm not losing weight for us and I'm not trying to rather than that with us so okay that will never never because like when all dobby the judge for you guys I don't need to tell you guys I'm gonna gonna dissolving did you face this is lotus by the way I'm just give your one here so yeah yeah good luck with this apartment block with this we know see that is the opposite of the flood this is the the flag of the yeah the the one that is so %HESITATION I guess I would be back in maybe that's not gonna work I lost the power of this week you guys gave five weeks so yeah but you guys on the floor and yeah good idea is a good idea to all right so %HESITATION you guys want to touch anything else you think it's good for her now happy fourth of July people yeah before yeah this is the fourth week of fourth of July the we can for July and you guys have got a red light my mom is coming to town so it's gonna be fine I'm still planning what the hell am I going to do fireworks no I mean yeah but where you know where to go I did a little fire was all over there in your house yeah they do but I like to go to the beach the pier or something if you're a %HESITATION going to go up towards it %HESITATION your sister's area or my area yeah the Claremont colleges to really nice show later like big fireworks for for a small okay yeah is it a we don't need the fireworks there's no worries every mortar everybody buys although the weather was in theirs everybody has I spent %HESITATION fourth of July in Baldwin park on time I thought I was I thought it was a war going that's what is so great leader I didn't believe call like he was just like don't don't don't don't don't I mean it was just everywhere and then when they rented a fireworks the people I was in I won't say who they were now I know them because since then but they started putting mental's and and and coke bottles louder than the players well is it is like it goes right when I was in high school there was on the corner of where I live now we're not in the corner like in the neighborhood but do it it's on the main street there is there is a parking lot and people used to get together and do fireworks there well we used to go there every year and we'd start throwing them at each other that's right so what do we would start like there's that making is that tell you how to do it with the link that I want to give people ideas but there were big like you would put it on the floor in the fly in in in any direction so in a random direction and you just have to get the fuck out of where your skin yeah and then at the end the explode and I had one burn my eyebrows really the side of my eye part of my eyebrow hi I have a the ones that we can embody test was the one that has like a little long stick and if he's gonna go though but these explode louder no no yeah they burned part that's how I learned I grew up throwing each other on the street like the yeah what are you smarter by beard got burned because I was in high school I had a beard and mustache I would like to put this half my field I was like structures that explains it explains a lot well yeah well how ugly your well I mean I always I mean a million for the better part of ten years when I was a what happened then use the flag with a week well it was a pleasure to see you guys I'm really was a pleasure fourth when entered please make up a minority but I get away I got ready my hug listen my number is already you're not just seven the Lakers and we're still waiting for court and then to make up his mind kind of you guys even follow yeah yeah I'm excited but hopefully hopefully guns in over here all right so that's it that's so that they're going to slowly build the team yeah this code and that's why I wasn't pissed that they were winning lesser it's okay yeah first name is expected to do everything it's funny how like they're like okay %HESITATION this can be as first year it's gonna be a building year we don't expect anything well by the way why the hell aren't you leaning yeah where the hell do you know what I think everybody in the lease the because the water jet we all wanted to be separate to come up yeah it's been ten years ten years now let me tell you this if there's a championship next next year I'm gonna be at that parade because that will take the parade over the world record put all that yeah it will record the part goes from the parade right that's our goal that's our goal yes I keep of yeah the keep this he doesn't had I'm not gonna have a recently I don't think I can agree to that as to what the I don't know I know you're gonna have risen I I'm gonna have to make so many points in order to go look at the link or you start building points start building point well taken with this yeah yeah you can go yeah let me get a family very well by the crowd is deadly mers and everything when you take your kids to this thing I've been to the ones in two thousand men just take him with pretty lazy older pretty crazy get is very easy I would love to go and you know go yeah you can babysitter and then you can take your wife %HESITATION yeah there you go yeah yeah yeah but not all your mobile yeah just for the weekend one one during the we're already let let let him first our plane and see we get close to that area and then we do if you need Grossmont to start listening to first of all first of all is that it is fair game first of all you should misstate the friggin eleven o'clock at night last night which is great yeah okay yeah this you listen you got to get her to listen because this is a listen we're not we're not looking for a last time you were with this thing great %HESITATION lied to her but I don't like we're gonna have beers once in awhile here so I know drew's that into that but welcome and only having one or two beers it eight but that's true it's the early years that yeah that's a problem yeah what can we cannot do that it was gonna come gonna have three two beers I'm down Sunday's cheat day now yeah now I am eventually lose weight I need to be like sharp focus on it and I don't want to be doing cheating shit decided to it the first time I ninety five %HESITATION your juices shot it but I I yeah and by the time you're in your third beer people are ordering more beers yeah that wasn't me that we know what was it that was what I was less that was was and I and I brother we're looking good fate you know license yeah that was done yeah %HESITATION I was very naive that's what I want to record it was terrible yes was it but anyway we have to that you greet that we need to keep records like I can I can drink a lot agrees under the control of the non that's fine but I mean we can I do it every Sunday like I'm not okay we skip this and this is gonna be next now what once a month okay enough for that but of those as well is you know is a lie those last two this is we'll see you can go anywhere below won't stop you okay in order for me all right well as we are here we're on a good night you know that the Ford stay safe people please don't do stupid things like I used to yet under driver Lisa yes we did make sure to get a drink you know you're gonna be the same %HESITATION train drives available cops out there but I'll get drunk with strangers or people you don't trust first of all there's a lot of cops at their second well first of all don't hurt anybody yeah so second mother's love because of their tickets are not cheap so and we're not talking the just for talking we've been in the beer industry we see yeah a lot of it will get ruined blues careers yeah Liz their career for a for loop or something really stupid money one indeed on the night you know yeah lives lives so don't don't don't be safe don't spend forty Bucks on a new over and %HESITATION don't spend ten grand and don't don't access killed yeah exactly looking within your life in prison yeah so all right very good good way to end the show downers %HESITATION I think we give you all of it yeah yeah that's basically what it does %HESITATION all right you can find us on Instagram at at T. W. L. podcast and %HESITATION we will get the person with whom %HESITATION I am in the oneMusic“Topher Mohr Alex Elena – Hot Heat”https://instrumentalfx.co/topher-mohr-alex-elena-hot-heat-no-copyright-music/Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported — CC BY-SA 3.0"Topher Mohr & Alex Elena – Mr. Pink"https://instrumentalfx.co/topher-mohr-alex-elena-mr-pink-no-copyright-music/Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported — CC BY-SA 3.0 See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

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P035 Carrie George's ONE letter sent responses through the roof!

Get Sellers Calling You: real estate marketing agent coaching seller leads generation Realtor Tom Ferry Brian Buffini Gary Va

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 1, 2019 50:34

[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent="no" equal_height_columns="no" menu_anchor="" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" id="" background_color="" background_image="" background_position="center center" background_repeat="no-repeat" fade="no" background_parallax="none" parallax_speed="0.3" video_mp4="" video_webm="" video_ogv="" video_url="" video_aspect_ratio="16:9" video_loop="yes" video_mute="yes" overlay_color="" video_preview_image="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" padding_top="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" padding_right=""][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type="1_1" layout="1_1" background_position="left top" background_color="" border_size="" border_color="" border_style="solid" border_position="all" spacing="yes" background_image="" background_repeat="no-repeat" padding_top="" padding_right="" padding_bottom="" padding_left="" margin_top="0px" margin_bottom="0px" class="" id="" animation_type="" animation_speed="0.3" animation_direction="left" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" center_content="no" last="no" min_height="" hover_type="none" link=""][fusion_text]Watch the live interview below [/fusion_text][fusion_youtube id="https://youtu.be/IMEWAY-hdgI" alignment="center" width="" height="" autoplay="false" api_params="&rel=0" hide_on_mobile="small-visibility,medium-visibility,large-visibility" class="" /][fusion_text] Transcription (was completed by automated process. Please ignore any speech-to-text errors) [00:00:22] Hey I'm Beatty Carmichael and welcome to the get sellers calling you real true podcast. And I'm excited today to visit with another wonderful agent actually a client of ours named Carrie George from Crimmins Colorado Carrie. Say hello and tell us where cribbing is. [00:00:40] Hi there everyone. Crumbling is located in the northwest portion of Colorado. So oftentimes I tell people we are in between Silverthorne and that's where the ski resorts like Breckenridge and Keystone are. so in between there and Steamboat Springs. Really beautiful valley of the Rocky Mountains. [00:01:03] Well you are definitely in God's beautiful green earth and I guess sometimes White Earth out there during the wintertime. So all of that I'm over here in short sleeves and it's warm outside. Well I'm really excited to visit with you Carrie because I know you got a real strong stable business. We talked and you got some really great balance in your life and I think there's a lot of things to share because having a stable business having balance still handling this challenges but managing them in a really great way is there's a combination that you don't always find. So I'm really excited about that. Thank you. And also just for a reminder of those who are on the call watching or listening. It is an Internet call so please pardon any Internet interruptions that may occur. So I guess to get started Carrie can you tell me a little bit about yourself as a realtor maybe. How long you been in business and just anything that gives people an idea of understanding who is this person we're talking to and why should I listen to you. Right. [00:02:18] Perfect. So I've been a realtor for 15 years. I got my license back in 2004. I kind of came into this business sort of by chance I never really thought that a real estate career was something that I'd want to do. But at the time I was transitioning from being the Chamber of Commerce Director here in our little town which was a very fulfilling job. But it was very hard and I got paid very little money. But I met a lot of great people and learned a lot about our area. So in hindsight it was a really nice segway to go far from in the Chamber of Commerce Director and moving into real estate because I already had connections with so many people. One of the things that I love most about real estate is the creative aspect of it the marketing the photography that the new technology that we are always seeing coming down the pike. I love that kind of ever changing aspect of our business. I work in a small community. Others for full time realtors in our town which is which is unusual. I think most people are. And bigger cities where there's a lot more saturation. [00:03:30] You don't have hardly any competition there. Right. [00:03:34] Really downs. I mean I have to pinch myself sometimes and thank God because a lot of ways there's parts of it that are really easy. And then a lot of ways there's lots that are very hard. I feel like sometimes a big fish in a small pond where I have sort of this one little area that I do real estate and that sometimes is hard to branch in to other parts of our county. So it comes with its bonuses and negatives being in this small community mainly mainly positive so well know what type of markets do you typically do. [00:04:10] I know we were talking a little bit before the call but what have you found to be kind of the real staple niche or focus that drives your business. [00:04:21] So lots of residential I'd say about half my business is second homeowners. And the other half is primary residence. I love doing residential real estate the most. I will also do vacant land and commercial but selling houses and photographing houses is way more fun than taking a picture of a piece of dirt. So I so because they're two very different markets the primary residence and the second homeowner you know you have to kind of have different marketing approaches to deal with those two different clientele. So you know my primary residence These are people that I know that I see all the time our kids go to school together. You know just building really strong relationships with them that have to do with real estate. And then I don't have to do with real estate. And then with the second homeowners finding other ways to reach them I'm usually through direct mail and in farming certain areas is is the way that I'm reaching out to those people. [00:05:19] I'd like to talk on the second homeowner Mark. First because it's kind of a unique niche. And for those that are in that niche there is always the question how do I grow it. OK. And and I know that there's probably going to be folks listening to this saying Well oh she's only competing with three or four other realtors so doesn't matter what she does she's going to. You know it's easy to get business. Let me in. Let me ask that question first. Is it really easy to get business because there's not that many realtors or are you still kind of find that there are things you have to consistently do if you want the business to keep coming in. [00:05:53] Oh there definitely is. You know one of the agents here in town she was born and raised in this community. She knows everybody and everybody knows her. And so you know even though there are just a few of us you still have to have your game. You know you still have to you cannot take a back seat to this business. Everybody who is in the business knows that when you're in sales your effort is 100 percent related to your success. So it's very much still and my personality is that I don't like doing a job halfway. I really care about what I put out there. I care about what my voice sounds like through my marketing and how my voice sounds in person. And so being authentic is very very important to me. And that has got to come through in the marketing as well. [00:06:47] Well let's talk about that because I know that was in our conversation before the call. That was the number one thing you mentioned is just that authenticity or being authentic. I'm not sure what the word is. I was trying to fill up. So talk to me about being authentic and talk to me. So after 15 years you've found you've gone through those things you You've experimented I'm sure with things that just didn't work and those things that did. What is the how does the impact of being authentic impact your business and what are you doing to be authentic. So people actually will come to business with you and repeat business. [00:07:27] So I have a perfect case study for this exact example. There's a couple of area subdivisions that are nearby and you know I'd have a buyer who hey I really want to be in this one particular area and say OK great Look send a letter out to all of the homeowners and see if anybody's been thinking about selling. So I'd write a nice letter. Hi Mr. and Mrs. So-and-so. I have a buyer looking in your area. Have you thought about selling your home. And I literally got zero response from these letters that I would send out. But I would still do them because I thought well you never know somebody might really be thinking about it. Just recently we have a new pastor coming to town and he found an area that was really attractive to him. And I thought you know what. I'm going to do a little bit of a different strategy this time I'm going to be really specific in my letter I'm going to use his name. I'm going to use his wife's name. I'm going to say that he has two kids. I'm going to say he's the new pastor at our church and I put all of that in the letter. I had him review it before I sent it out and off it went well I had 400 times more response from that letter than I did from all of my subsequent letters. Well I'm wondering how does what does that have to do with being authentic. [00:08:44] Well I think what it has to do with being authentic is. I think if I would have put my head in to a sellers head but just received a very generic letter from me it's possible they might have been thinking that I'm just fishing for listings and that is not part of my personality one of the things I pride myself on is integrity and honesty and so I knew I had a buyer for that specific area but those sellers didn't. And my letter sounded exactly like everybody else's letter Hey I have a buyer. Are you thinking about selling your house. And until I was using specific examples I was not getting the kind of traction that I wanted and so now I have totally changed my strategy with this. I've got another guy who's looking in the same area. I said Brian I'm going to use your name. And he said OK go ahead tell him exactly what I'm looking for. And I feel that that being authentic being honest being straightforward being what using the most integrity that you possibly can is a way that you will kind of bridge that gap from sales person to seller and actually start to create a real connection and a real relationship with somebody you know that's interesting because in marketing what we find is if you're very specific you're believable. [00:10:06] Yeah. It seems to me that what you're doing is you are being very specific with not I have a client but I have this particular client. Here's what he's looking for in so the more specificity you give the more believable in your words more authentic it is. And now they know this is a real solicitation for a real prospect who really wants to move in this area and is very legitimate. Yeah. [00:10:33] I love it. Yeah I was really pleased. I thought Wow it took me 15 years to figure this out but now this is my new strategy. [00:10:42] Well very good. Very good. So let's talk about is there any other examples or any of the things that you can share on what you do. You mentioned earlier and I want to come back to this your voice. OK. When you talk about your voice What are you. For those are listening. You. What do you mean by that. [00:11:00] So anyone who's in real estate or is then thinking about getting into real estate you'll if you google any of that like how to be a successful realtor you'll start to see some of these kind of bullet points like. Well you should call a call. You should call for sale by owners you should work the expired list. And to me all of those things are they probably do work. I don't think they work for me because they don't feel authentic to me. I am a very not pushy person and that has actually worked to my benefit because I have clients all the time who will tell me. Thank you for not being pushy. They also put that in their reviews that they do for me after a sale. And so I think then people choose to work with me because they know I'm not going to be pushy. I really feel that buyers and sellers are decision makers. I'm there to guide them to counsel them to provide as much information as possible so that they can make the decision that is most appropriate for them and their family. [00:12:08] I had me on mute. And that was great. I love it. [00:12:12] So now talk to me in terms of driving business from your second home owners. What type of things are you. Do you find that really the things that work those things that don't and and are you. So let's go down that road a little bit can we. [00:12:28] Because second homeowners OK so for a second homeowners I mainly do direct mail. I know a lot of agents are totally moving away from some of the old school marketing styles. I personally think that direct mail still works very well. If you use the right pieces I still really like giving an envelope and hand addressing it because I think people will then open it. So that's if I have something really important and specific to send to somebody in a certain area. like a second homeowner I will take the time and hand address envelopes. It well your hand is your hand is sore. Don't get me wrong but I think the open rate goes up so much when you take that extra time to to hand address on the loaves. So again I will sometimes do a market update if there is something that's been recently sold I'll do a quick analysis for them because again I think just sold and just listing postcards have their place but I know that sellers get a lot of those. And so instead of maybe sending a just sold postcard why not break it down and say you know here's a less for sales and why are these sales significant. Are these the highest sales in this subdivision in you know X number of years that's what we're finding in our market is that it's so strong that that's a great pitch that you can send out to sellers to say did you know in the past twelve months we've had the four highest sales that your subdivision has ever seen as a as a homeowner that would be something that would be really important for me to know I'm not just hey our market's really hot and everything's really great but give me something specific that I can work on so I'll do things like that and then I also try and do things that are really visually and design wise very appealing because that's another thing that's very important to me I'm I'm kind of like a marketing geek. [00:14:29] I love anything to do with marketing and the way something looks is really important to me. I recognize that sometimes I have analysis paralysis where I'll work so hard on something and I wanted to be just perfect. But then I heard a quote the other day that perfectionism is actually procrastination in disguise and I'm like Yeah oh that's me. That's totally me. So I've let go of some of that but I do really care about how how something looks because I want to be proud of what I send out. And I also want sellers to see a piece for me and say this person put a lot of thought and care into putting this together and then I equate that to the fact that I would also put a lot of thought and care into marketing their home. [00:15:17] So out of curiosity these. So you're talking about sending out sold or you know less for sales. Is that that's not a postcard you're actually doing that in an envelope. [00:15:28] I am. So those I do in a letter where I'll highlight you know I just did one for a condo complex actually at a little bit outside of my market but I thought what would be something that I would want to know about my area. And I did a little bit of research and saw that over the past 15 years we had the four highest sales in this complex in the last 12 months. And I thought well that's something that's really useful that I could write a letter about. [00:15:53] So now are you sending these to your past clients that are out of town owners who are using these to just prospective clients prospective clients. Yeah. Okay okay. Very cool. And so when you're sending in the letter are you are you putting photos of those sales or just kind of outlining it. I mean when I get the letter. OK it's going to be handwritten I'm going to open it. And then what's in the package. So I have a little paragraph at the top and then the sales are bullet points because I know that. [00:16:25] Our attention span is about eight seconds even if you get something open. I have about eight seconds to catch their attention. So I put the sales in the middle of the letter as bullet points no photos but just listing the sales what they sold for how big they were what the sales date was because I thought if they look at that and then they also see the name of their complex. I mean it hopefully hook them and they're going to read the whole letter because I still think at the end of the day if you own a property in any given area and somebody provides you something of value about the value of your property they're going to be interested. [00:17:04] So now in terms of. So is this one of the primary things you're doing for their second homeowners just mailing out these letters are you doing postcards with it as well. [00:17:13] At times I do a mix of postcards sometimes as well especially if I want to do something really big and I don't want to have to dress 500 on both camps right. I'll do a postcard for that but then sometimes I'll just like try and pick a really visually beautiful photo something that's maybe unique to our area so they know like oh yeah I know that mountain that's right in my backyard. So some kind of hook something where they say this is relevant to me that this is not just something that's gonna go in the trash. [00:17:43] So then help me help me quantify. You can you may or may not be able to but your mailing generally speaking to about how many people each time and what type of return is that producing in terms of people calling you say Hey Carrie I want to sell or I want to buy what are you what what do you get out of it. [00:18:03] So I there's two areas that I farm regularly and I'd say I send out about a hundred to one hundred and fifty pieces per area I reckon nice too that there are people who get my letters on a consistent basis who put it in a folder and say when I'm ready to sell I'm calling her I had a sale last year and that's exactly what the person told me. I've been getting your letters for years and I knew when the time came for me to sell you were going to be the person I called. So you know if you think of it some of this stuff you're filling a pipeline for years down the road. But I think consistency is also very important. I would say in general on average my response rate from those is maybe like three to four calls or emails per mailing which I think is still pretty good and well worth it to me now. They're not always ready to sell at that moment. It might be Hey I got your letter. I have some questions because you do a market analysis for me. You know I'm not ready to sell yet but I'm thinking I'm going down that road so they don't always turn into an immediate client and an immediate contract. Sometimes it's just the beginning of nurturing that relationship and making those connections. [00:19:22] Yes. So that's really good though. Three four calls for mailing because now you kind of identify who it is in the pipeline yet they get a chance to engage with you. I would assume that those people who are calling you when they do go on the market. Have you ever lost any of those to another agent. [00:19:42] I don't think so. Yeah. So really think about it but I don't think I ever have. [00:19:46] Well so that's the most important part in my mind is if you can just get them to engage with you even if it's early on then you pretty much have a habit. I want to switch topics real quick to your primary homeowners there in the because you're actually you're doing both types of marketing right. And I'm assuming that the marketing is different that you do for secondary home versus what you do for primaries correct. [00:20:11] It is. So one of the things that we've been I work in a small office and I have a couple of colleagues one of the things that's been really important to us is is supporting our community in any way that we can. So we do a lot of events sponsorships throughout the year. I'd say we prep locally we host a couple of our own and then we sponsor a couple of other events that the community does. So for instance we sponsor the summer reading program and my colleague and I will go to the library and do a craft with the kids and send them with a little gift when it's all done. We sponsor our local community festival every year we do a parade float and hand out popsicles to everybody. We sponsor our own pumpkin giveaway in October where we fill our office with hundreds of pumpkins and the kids come to pick out a. And for free we sponsor the mutton busting at the fair so we we really try and get our name out there with community events. We mainly focus around kids because my colleague and I both have young children. So it's something that's very very important to us. And so we're doing these events that have nothing to do with real estate but supporting the community that we live in and love. It's not just to generate sales. [00:21:33] It's something that we truly feel is important to give back to the community and in any way that we can. [00:21:41] And so if that because it is that about. So I'm curious because this is really cool. Are you doing besides has been involved in the community or are you doing anything special and either reaching out to people personally or marketing to them or is it simply just kind of being present. [00:22:01] Well it's kind of twofold. So I think there's sort of a natural residual good feelings that people get by knowing that you know Keller Williams top of the Rockies sponsors these great events in our community. Like it makes people feel good about what we do for a living because let's face it there are we get compared to all kinds of. not nice industries and some people are. not great realtors but most of them really are good realtors and they're good people. So we have that aspect of it where people feel good about what we're doing and feel good about us giving back to the community. And then in terms of like actual marketing to primary residents I do a combination of direct mail with them as well. I do handwritten cards to a J. I'm really getting disciplined about it Good job parts per day to my sphere and then a little bit even wider than my sphere doing Popeyes. That's been a little bit hard for me because it feels a little more pushy than I'm used to but I find too if I'm bringing something of value that I don't feel awkward about it. Let's see what else am I doing. Well the Monday morning coffee which is fantastic and I'm absolutely loving it and my clients are loving it too. [00:23:25] I guess I'll tell people because a lot of folks listening to this won't know the background of your handwritten notes or Popeyes or Monday morning coffee. So can you enlighten a little bit more on that so people know what you're talking about. [00:23:38] You're listening to the get sellers calling you podcast to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence or from a geographic farm learn about Agent dominator. We guarantee your sales in writing or give your money back to learn more. Visit our website get sellers calling you dot com. It's like Agent dominator from the. [00:23:56] And now back to the podcast. [00:23:59] So Monday morning coffee is a program that Beatty does through MailChimp and there's a little blurb at the top about real estate because that is what we do but it's short it's easy to read it's nothing super technical and that this. Thirds of it really nice feel good story something inspirational something really you know touching about it just other human beings that are on the face of the planet with us. So I get feedback every single week. People say to me I love having Monday morning coffee with you or this made my day. I hear from people I haven't heard from in years that they reach out to me and say wow I'm sitting here reading your your email and crying like because it's such an emotional story that I've resisted doing like a newsletter for so long because I didn't want to send emails about how to clean your gutters and when to change your your furnace filter because again that feels so inauthentic to me. And so sales and so typical real estate nothing against anybody who does that. I mean if it's if it's your cup of tea that's fine. It wasn't something that I wanted to do. And so Monday morning coffee was such an amazing fit for me because it had a little real estate blurb but more than anything it was just something nice to read. And in this day and age where you get so much bad news and you're just bombarded with all kinds of garbage constantly. I love that there's one e-mail that comes out for me per week that is just a really fantastic story. [00:25:36] So these are just some great touches into your personal lives and you know I've got to ask you you did you just start doing pop bys from our conversation a few weeks back. [00:25:47] Yeah. And I had something that was kind of in the works too. But then our conversation sort of prompted being like I really should just do this. People are scared of me and I you know I don't know why I thought like they won't want to see me but they do. And I created a business and and B by being authentic I am friends with many of my clients after the sale we hang out on a social level we'll get coffee together so I think it was my own personal hang up about they won't want to see me. They won't want to talk to me. And that was really the complete opposite of what it really was. [00:26:21] I love it. I love it. Well I want to ask a crazy question or an unusual question out of everything you've done. What are the one or two things that just absolutely did not work for you that you tried it was just a bomb. Anything you can share with folks on maybe what not to do. [00:26:40] Well I would say that when you get those calls from people who are going to promise you a bunch of Facebook ads by pushing your listings out there and creating the ad for you personally I have found those to be a complete dud and be very very expensive. So. And again going back to being authentic I think if you want to do a Facebook marketing and you want to be reaching people that way I think it's so much more important for you to just create really valuable content versus paying somebody to build ads for you. So you know offer a you know you would host a free clinic at your office to talk about the market or to teach people about different loan types and invite a lender to come in and teach that class with you offer something of value. People see listings they can go anywhere. Real Talk on Zillow Trulia they can find listings anywhere if they're on Facebook and you they want to provide value and make clients client connections there. I would say offer something of value offer some kind of content. So that debt that tanked for me I spent a lot of money on those and I got nothing from them. [00:28:00] Local I. That makes sense. Well let me shift gears I want to talk about work family balance. Now you have a family is that correct. Yep. So tell me a little bit about your family. Just so we kind of have a perspective. [00:28:13] Sure. My husband Bill and I have been married for almost 15 years and we have two daughters. Elizabeth is eight and a half. And Ashley just turned five. [00:28:24] I love it. So you've got a busy household for sure. [00:28:28] We have a second grader and a preschooler so we're not like entrenched in those school sports yet. Like I know parents of high schoolers are but we're still pretty busy and the work and family life balance has always been a struggle for me. My husband is also a Realtor. He sells bigger properties so we're both in sales which is which is difficult. You know in a lot of times you know one spouse will be a realtor and the other one will have a real job where you get paid every two weeks and we don't have that in our in our home. So that sort of fear of missing out and feeling sort of very attached to your phone and feeling a little paranoid about not answering your phone call is a real thing for both of us both struggle with it. And I think setting really good boundaries for yourself and for your family life is very important. But it's it's hard. It takes work. It takes discipline. It takes. [00:29:32] You trying to be in the present in that moment and it's that's really hard for us to do in this day and age for always thinking about something that's already happened or something that's going to happen instead of just being here right now. And so it's almost like a habit you have to form. [00:29:50] Talk to me about those boundaries. What have you what have you and your husband put in place and I'm sure it's tempting to kind of break the boundary periodically and how do you hold to it. Tell me what it is a little bit more. [00:30:03] Well we're not always perfect of course but we do try and have a certain time of day where you know the business phone calls stop and you know replying to emails stops. I am really particular about my Sunday mornings. We go to church and I do not show property or meet with clients from ten to twelve on Sundays. Now after church is over I'm happy to catch people because I know a lot of my clients. That's the only time they're available so I do trying to accommodate them in the afternoons but I think you have to decide you have to decide what's important to you have to decide where your priorities lie. And when I look at my two young daughters and I know they still really like me and they still really want to hang out with me that might not always be the case when they get to be teenagers they might rather be with their friends and so and all of this that I do and real estate is still going to be here. So I need to as a mom and as a wife make sure that I make my family my priority. But like I told you earlier it's like we're training for a marathon. It does not happen overnight and you have to just really work at being disciplined and and creating really good habits for the health of your family and yourself. [00:31:16] I agree. It really takes a discipline and what I've learned for me is it takes scheduling it out you know knowing specifically I'm going to take this time off from where you cut off the clock at this point and literally almost putting in your calendar. And so the answer is No. During these times. Does that make sense. Yes exactly. So you mentioned church talk to me about. Talk to me about your spiritual life. [00:31:42] So my spiritual life has been kind of a crazy road. I grew up in Denver and my grandma my great great grandfather is actually the founding one of the founding members of the largest synagogue in Denver. I was actually raised Jewish but then I moved to the mountains and there's really no synagogues in the mountains. And so my spiritual life kind of like really just was very dormant for a really long time. And then I had some personal struggles and some business struggles that had come into my life and I was just kind of out of options like I don't know what to do here. One personal struggle in particular there was really no right answer to what I was going through. It was just extremely painful and extremely difficult. And I found myself just kind of on my knees like all right God if you're out there I really need your help right now like this. I don't know what else to do. And that was when my spiritual life like almost like a seed that goes dormant started to just blow up is not the right word but completely flourish and and grow. What started to happen at that point to say it again maybe what started to happen at that point. [00:33:04] What what were the things that just started to flourish. Can you give me some ideas on that. [00:33:09] So. I have like in my life dealt with a lot of anxiety and so and living in fear and this particular situation created a lot of anxiety and fear for me. And when I finally got to my lowest of lows and and asked God please you help me not only did he answer my prayer for what I really was praying for. but the amount of peace and calmness that he brought to my life was I can't even really compare it to anything. It was like almost like a light switch went off like oh I know what to do now I have peace I have calmness and I knew that he was in control and he was in charge. And then from there I just started to find the Lord and find my relationship with him. And you know the judeo christian religions very much cross over each other. But what I think is so amazing about being a Christian is having a relationship like a real relationship with the Lord. And like anywhere that you might be you can sit down and talk to him and tell him what's on your mind. And it doesn't have to be formal and structured. You can just say whatever is is going through that go at any kind of struggles you might be going through any kind of painful moments you might be going through guidance advice like what should I do about this. [00:34:38] And and that part of it has been so amazing because growing up Jewish. A lot of it was very hands off very much like just ceremony and and praying but not not having relationship. And that's just such a different ballgame. [00:34:57] If that makes sense for me it makes a lot of sense. You know some people is oh holy God. Yeah. For others it's dead. God. Right. Exactly. And having that relationship where you can just bring anything to him even the little things and the big things. So how has your relationship with the Lord impacted if you look at your business OK and how you live your life. What are the things that is impacted that if you did not have that relationship with the Lord you would probably do things differently. Does that make sense. Trying to ask. [00:35:35] I think so yeah. Well I think first of all like I've always felt like I was a person of integrity but knowing the Lord and knowing truly knowing the difference between wrong and right and knowing his way has guided me in so many different ways. [00:35:57] Like I'll use an example of sometimes you know what the right answer is it's not really what you want to do but you know it's the right answer. And when you have him by your side making that hard decision is so much easier because you just you you feel differently about your interactions with people. [00:36:19] It's not just so much about how much money he can make going to make. And can I go on this vacation or that vacation. I would say that through my relationship with the Lord my giving has expanded tremendously that I realize now how important that is to not just give money but to give time as well. There are situations that I pray with my clients. Yesterday I was at a listing appointment and I asked. I said Can we pray. And they said absolutely. And so we just prayed for God to light their path because they're not really sure if they want to sell or not. Would he guide them. And if their home does sell that the new people that live here that they would have peace and harmony and safety in this new home. So it's just it's like it's opened up a new sort of chapter of my business. I found connection with a lot of people because of our our spiritual values align with each other. Sometimes it will come up very randomly. I met a gal yesterday morning and she asked where my kids went to school and and I said they went to the local school and she said Oh yeah I know there's a couple of kids that go to the Christian school and so then that started us talking about oh where do you go to church so I go here you know. And so then then then you know like that you have that special connection and that you maybe see things somewhat the same personally. [00:37:43] So although the idea that you're praying at the listening appointment when we put a contract on our house and our realtor was a Christian you know first thing we did is we prayed over the contract. Yeah really cool. So in terms of your interaction with your clients from a Christian standpoint just like praying at that listing appointment are there anything else. Anything else for your relationship with the Lord kind of model. Is your behavior or how you reach out to people in those interactions. [00:38:16] I would say one thing that's been really cool about working with other Christians is their disappointment level when something doesn't work out. Is is is actually really graceful and beautiful. They understand that you know that maybe wasn't the right house for them because God's got something better. And I I try and be sensitive to other people's viewpoints and spiritual backgrounds and so I will have that conversation and maybe a more secular way with with clients that are not Christian AND I'LL I'LL SAY YOU KNOW EVERYTHING HAPPENS FOR A REASON AND AND YOU KNOW MAYBE THAT'S that house isn't for you because there is a better one coming. But I know when I work with Christians that they recognize that right off the bat that we don't even really have to have that conversation there. They're acutely aware of the fact that that there's something better in fact I spoke to a lady yesterday. She has her house for sale in Estes Park and she said that our house has been on the market for three weeks and we haven't had an offer and that's so unusual. And she said but then my husband and I realized well God doesn't want us to sell our house yet because they don't have anywhere to go. They can't find a rental here and crumbling. So she said it makes perfect sense now that he's waiting for us to find a rental before he makes us homeless. [00:39:35] Totally a little bit of in your own personal life because there is that level of peace that was with your client the sense of being able to look at things and say it's OK because the Lord is guiding it. Do you share anything in terms of your business or how you manage life as a realtor where there's just that overwhelming sense of peace. [00:39:57] Yeah. And because most of my life I live with a lot of fear and a lot of anxiety. Again it's kind of like a heart that you have to break a bad habit. But knowing every day in any given moment that I'm not alone and that he's always there it's it's hard to describe. It's like what kind of blows my mind as I see people all the time that are searching they're searching for some thing that one thing that's going to bring them X Y and Z happiness fame fortune love whatever it might be. [00:40:38] And the one thing that's actually going to be the cure for what ails them is right there. And it's free. It's for the taking. It's it's there for anybody who wants it but I also recognize that I had to go on my own journey to get where I am right now and that in God's perfect timing all of that came about in the way that it did and that if it would have happened artificially or if I would have been pushed into something that I wasn't ready for it wouldn't have been him and it wouldn't have been what it is now. So I know his timing is perfect and I try and encourage and and blessed people as I can but I also recognize that that he has the ultimate plan and that he will bless people in the appropriate way. [00:41:28] Hey I'd like to ask you I don't know if there's an answer to this either because you may not have something to share or you may not want to share but is there been is there something specific you can share that you know that if you did not have the relationship with the Lord and this event happened in your life you would have responded just totally different. Is there anything like that that you can share and then what was the outcome of it ultimately. Does that make sense. I'm looking for kind of a testimony so to speak of how has the Lord and really good man in a time frame that someone else would have panicked. Yeah. [00:42:06] Well I do have one specific example and it was actually kind of in the midst of my of my spiritual journey. I mean we'll always be in our spiritual journey but it was at the beginning of mine. I had a situation come up at work in my own professional career that was very maybe very anxious. It was it was very difficult to kind of wrap my head around. It was scary. It was something that I couldn't really talk to anybody about it because of its confidential nature. And again and I found myself kind of on my knees like God I need your help I. I don't know what else to do. And I was just I couldn't eat. I was so nervous. I was just I was miserable really. And I remember that night I I I drank some calming tea it was like you're in the grocery store or they have all those that are for different ailments. And I found one calming tea so I drank this tea and I prayed and I got on my knees and I said God please help me through this situation. And when I woke up the next morning my first thought was. Wow t really works because I feel so calm right now and then I realized I was like oh no it wasn't the tea it was it was God and Holy Spirit descending on me and bringing me peace and I wouldn't necessarily say that immediately my problem was solved. It did eventually resolve itself but what was brought to me was just an overwhelming sense of peace and in the sense that it's going to be OK. Like I don't have to beat myself up about this problem. I can take it to him leave it at his feet and walk away. [00:43:49] They say because the Bible says the perfect love cast out fear. Yeah. And when we are in those situations where we can be afraid then you know God's love can push it out and we're no longer afraid in the outcome. If we're trusting the Lord is always always good. And you may not be easy but it's always good. [00:44:14] Exactly and that's what it was for me. I just took a deep breath and I said thank you God this is gonna be OK. And that was actually then that Sunday was the first time I ever stepped into a church. I had been a Jewish girl my entire life. And I thought Oh this is gonna be really weird. And it wasn't weird at all. It was exactly where I needed to be. It was beautiful. It was welcoming. And I've been going ever since and it was probably six years ago. [00:44:42] Well so you're just a six year old Christian. [00:44:46] I am. That's what I tell my pastor all the time I'm like you've got to treat me like a kindergarten I should be at Sunday school with all the little kids. [00:44:52] I love it. I love it. Well in wrapping up is there anything else you'd like to share either from your relationship with the Lord and how that's been in your life or anything in terms of your business that would help somebody. [00:45:07] Yeah I would say that my my pastor asked me to open prayer at our next service. [00:45:15] And at first I was super anxious about it. I don't like to speak in public. And he said I understand Carrie. But consider this you're speaking in front of family and you're speaking to God. And when you put it that way I thought I can do this. I would say to anyone out there who is maybe struggling who is doubting themselves who is who you may be in a hard hard place with your business or your personal life. [00:45:45] That then at the end of the day you have the fortitude inside of you and with God's grace and his strength and his love. If you keep putting one foot in front of the other that's all we're asking you to do is just don't give up. Keep moving forward. Challenge yourself sometimes step outside of your comfort zone of where you think that you need to be or want to be. Sometimes that's where our greatest growth is happening and then also to just one thing that's helped me so much and in my business and in my personal life to try and live everyday with gratitude to look around and see how we have been so blessed. I mean not just to to be able to live in this country and be one of the richest people on earth. [00:46:38] I think they said if you own two cars you're in the top eight percent of the richest people on the planet. Not just that but when you look outside and you see God's beauty the mountains the valleys the forests the ocean the deserts the plains that he put all of that here for us. I mean the fact that you can go to your sink and turn on the water and clean water comes out. I mean I kind of geek out about this a little bit because it's one of the things I'm super passionate about that we have so much bounty and so many blessings. And if you can hold on to those things the things that we ought to be grateful for instead of all the problems in your life it will turn I think turned things around for you almost like the snap of a finger because that is what perspective and gratitude can do. [00:47:28] You know I had to share a story so it's not my story third party but you know in the Bible it says that whatever is good what is your pure repute whatever is honorable you know all these things dwell on that. And there was a couple I was listening to teach many years back they'd gone through a almost certain point of divorce. He was always gone. He was always brash he was always go go go. She wanted him home and wanted more loving and compassion. And it got to be a real rift to the point that she was literally she had if I remember the story correct. She had the divorce papers in hand and the Lord put on his on her spirit just a little check in her spirit that this is not the rule to go. And she went back to the scriptures where it says to just like you you know focus on those things that you're that you can have gratitude for. Focus on those things that are good. She's actually made a list of everything that she loved about Bob and Bob and Cindy Harrison many years back. What she loved about Bob that she fell in love with. [00:48:39] What was interesting. Is those were the same things that she was now frustrated with. Right. But she started to focus on that. And every time she would get upset she would thank the Lord for these great traits and qualities of Bob. And she said it was just a matter of I mean so fast. She fell back in love and their marriage has been really super strong. So this whole attitude of attitude of gratitude and thanking the Lord and just being appreciative of all that he's done is really powerful. So I appreciate that. It really is. All right. Well I think we're pretty much at the end of this call. So Carrie thank you so much for sharing. And for those who are watching or listening if you do like this let me courage you to subscribe to our podcast. Be sure to like it on iTunes and on YouTube and in place also like our guest sellers calling you Facebook page if you want to learn more about us and how to grow your business. Just visit our website get sellers calling you dot com. So Carrie thanks again. And it's a real pleasure to visit with you. [00:49:50] Thank you. You too. All right. You'll be blessed. [00:49:55] If you've enjoyed this podcast Be sure to subscribe to it so you never miss another episode. AND PLACE LIKE OUR get sellers calling you Facebook page. Also if you want to increase sales from past clients and sphere of influence dominate a geographic farm or convert home valuation leads. Check out our agent dominator program. We create custom content that differentiates you from other realtors then use it to keep you top of mind with your prospects with postcards targeted Facebook ads email campaigns video interviews and more. And the best part is we guarantee yourselves or give all your money back. Learn more at get sellers calling you dot com and select agent dominator in the minute. [00:50:35] Thanks for listening to the get sellers calling you podcast. Have a great day. 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Introvert Traveling Solo

The Traveling Introvert

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 11, 2019 5:47

Shownotes: For a frequent flyer, my decisions are usually based on the situation that I’m in. My choices when it comes to the mode of transportation and accommodation usually depend on whether I’m all alone or traveling with someone. But aside from this, the majority of my choices depend on which would take me less time to do even if it means I’d have to spend a bit more. Hello and welcome to the Traveling Introvert. Today I am going to talk about the differences traveling alone and the differences you make with the decisions that you make and traveling with somebody else. I'm currently figuring out some travel and one of the options I had and I'm going from New York to Washington or Alexandria area and so, I know Alexandria very well and everything is kind of expensive in Washington. And so, I decided that I was going to go to Alexandria instead. Now as I'm traveling by myself, I looked at the differences between going by train or going by bus. And if I go by train, I have to remember that depending on how long it is, and that generally I'm I'm probably not going to go the restroom because when you're traveling alone it's extremely difficult if you're traveling with luggage or stuff that you want to go to the restroom and feel that your stuff is safe. Yes, you might be on a train and no one can go anywhere but at the same time these things happen. I've definitely read about, even on planes where people have had things stolen. So when I'm looking at distances and how long a trip is going to take I could take a bus which I think would take me four or five hours. I say four or five because the registered time is about four but we all know traffic is a thing. I could take the train so that was fairly easy enough for me to think about. And then I'm going to stay in Alexandria and then I'm going to go up to Philly for the day. And I again was looking at that Philly. It's funny with the flights and the trains. One train was $39 and that was to go from Washington, Union Station to Philadelphia and to go from Alexandra was $51. And you your mind you're like, "Ooh, 30 to 50, that's a really big jump.", but actually it's only $11 difference. But, beside the point. The big thing that I had to do was go from Alexandria to roughly the Springfield area in Massachusetts. Now I could take a train and I love taking trains because you get enough personal space and you can get some work done because most of the time the internet is on. Slow as though it may be, you still get to get stuff done and you get enough personal space which for me is a really big thing. However, the cost was about $100 and it was a seven hour train ride which is great until you consider the fact that you have to get your own food beforehand. There is apparently a buffet cart in there or a food cart, catering cart and after you like to get up and pee. When's the best time? You can ask your neighbor to look after your stuff but do you feel jittery? And going, finding where the bathroom is on the toilet, on the train ... or my other option which I didn't think was a possibility was to catch a flight. There's a flight from Dulles to Hartford for $90 and it takes like an hour. It really doesn't. I've been on that flight before and it's kind of an up, down sort of a thing. And so I'm going to take that. I would love to take the train. I would get a lot more done but at the same time it's a one hour flight and I don't have to worry about bathroom stuff. The other thing that I find that I do differently when I'm traveling with someone, towards traveling by myself, is the type of accommodation I will pick. If I am by myself I'm more likely to pick a hotel with 24-hour room service or 24-hour reception so I can drop my stuff off and it can be looked after while I go and do other things and just that feeling of I have a place to go. There's probably going to be a door person there and I don't have to be in an area that I'm not ... even if I'm in an area that I'm not familiar with I feel slightly safer whether that's legitimate or not. Whereas if I'm traveling with somebody and I'd be quite happy to take an Airbnb room for example. Whereas if I'm traveling with somebody else I'm more likely to want to have the whole space rather than an Airbnb room and will probably do Airbnb over a hotel unless the hotel is really nice in an area that we want to be in or is not as expensive as we would have thought between the two of us. So it really does depend. But for me, a lot of it is about personal space and personal safety. And for me it's also about cost and time. I'd rather do something quicker so I'm happy to spend more money to take the train and take a flight then to do something that will take forever and be cheaper. That's just not something that I want to do. For example, to go to Philly I could definitely catch a five buck, $5 train. Sorry. Let me start again. To go to Philly from Alexandria I could catch a $5 bus. Actually I can only get that from Washington but ... and the train is actually going to cost me more like $40, but then I have to get to Washington and then change from bus to bus and then get on and you know, the personal space on buses is a little less, a little more cramped and you just don't feel as comfortable. Do you eat? Do you offend the person if you don't eat? If you drink, whatever it is. So I am more likely if I am traveling by myself to take the train or the plane. Thank you for listening. This is Janice from the Career Introvert. I look forward to helping you with your business and your career alongside your introversion.

new york washington philadelphia massachusetts springfield hartford airbnb union station ooh i'm i'm dulles

Lemonade & Pet Pigs

Unexpected English!

Play Episode Listen Later May 31, 2019 4:54

I saw some kids! I interviewed them! This is the podcast, with a guest appearance by a listener! A rough transcript is here below to help you... ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OK I am walking in the neighborhood and as I was walking by I saw a couple of kids here on the sidewalk so I thought I thought I would ask them what they were doing — hi guys hi what's your name — Harper and I'm Finley McNally — and how old are you —9 years old and I'm eight and I was the one who thought of the lemonade stand —I 'm sorry you have to speak a little slower because what what is it that you doing right now — mmm I'm I'm eight and I and I'm the one who who decided we should do a lemonade stand — a lemonade stand is that what you're doing — yes and we're doing buy one get one free —so you're selling your selling lemonade is that right — yes you want to try some —yeah I think I’ll try It when we're finished is it good? — yes it's very good very good— Oh it’s very good hey OK well I guess I better try it right now hey here we go I'm gonna try it —Oh that's good lemonade I've gotta tell ya —how much does a lemonade cost— it cost $.25 — .25 for a glass a big glass class that's a pretty good deal it's only $.25 and and and it’s buy one get one free if it if you want to have two like those kids they just bought one and they got one free — OK I want to ask a different question what's your favorite food — my favorite is a bean and cheese burrito with sour cream — OK and you? my favorite thing is tofu — tofu? — yeah. — wow OK and tell me this hmm last question do you have a pet and tell me about your pet — I have two pets actually three pets I have one name Leon he's a brown lab I have another that's a labrador retriever yeah ok and I am he's a boy and then I have a girl named Bubba and she's like she's yellow well she's blonde and she's a mix of a boxer and a Labrador — also a dog — yeah and then I have this pig — a pig? did you say a pig —yes a pig named Pooty — oh my goodness! OK well I want to thank you for your time. do you have anything else you wanna add? oh OK — What um um are you having fun today? — I'm having fun yeah I'm having fun interviewing you guys! — You guys have a good day, byeeee!

bubba labrador i'm i'm ok what

S1E12: Fixing the World, One Error Message at a Time

Technically Religious

Play Episode Listen Later May 21, 2019 24:49

Acts of hatred in our most sacred spaces. Curable diseases going untreated. War tearing countries and families apart. Global climate change threatening our very species. It’s enough to make anyone feel that this world is broken beyond repair. As people with a strong religious, moral, or ethical point of view, we are sensitized to inequality and injustice, but these problems leave many of us feeling both frustrated and hopeless. However, our work as IT professionals has conditioned us to look at problems, breakdowns, and error messages in a very particular way. In this episode of our podcast, Leon, Josh, and special guest Yechiel Kalmenson will look at ways in which our IT mindset helps us approach secular, existential, and religious challenges in ways that non-IT folks ("civilians" or "muggles") typically don’t. Listen to the episode, or read the transcript below: Doug: 00:00 Welcome to our podcast where we talk about the interesting, frustrating and inspiring experiences we have as people with strongly held religious views working in corporate IT. We're not here to preach or teach you our religion. We're here to explore ways we make our career as IT professionals mesh - or at least not conflict - with our religious life. This is Technically Religious. Josh: 00:25 Today is May 6, 2019, and while we try to keep our podcasts as timeless as possible, in this case, current events matter. Leon: 00:35 It hasn't been a good week, and that's putting it lightly. The US political system continues to be a slow motion train wreck. Measles cases in the US are at levels unseen since the disease was eradicated in the year 2000. A report on climate change shows over 1 million species are now at risk of extinction. And just over a week ago, a gunman stormed into a synagogue in Poway, California. This is the second attack in a synagogue in the last six months. and part of a horrifically growing list of attacks in sacred spaces nationwide. Josh: 01:03 News like that leaves most people feeling hopeless and adrift. And even folks who are part of a strong religious, ethical, or moral tradition who are sensitive to injustice and seek to repair the world - we're also left uncertain on how to proceed. Leon: 01:18 Which is why an article in the "Torah & Tech" newsletter caught my eye. In it, the author presented the idea that we as IT professionals may be predisposed to view these kinds of problems differently, and to address them the same way we deal with blue screens of death and abend messages. I'm Leon Adato and the voices you're going to hear on this episode are the always-effervescent Josh Biggley Josh: 01:40 Hello. Leon: 01:42 And also our special guest and the author of Torah & Tech, Yechiel Kalmenson, who provided the inspiration for this episode. Welcome to the show Yechiel. Yechiel: 01:49 Hi. Thanks for having me. Leon: 01:51 So before we go any further Yechiel, I want you to have a chance to tell all of the listeners about Torah & Tech. I think it's perfect for the Technically Religious crowd because it merges those two things - tech and religion. So where can we find it? How did it start? Just give us a little bit of background. Yechiel: 02:09 Torah & Tech was an idea of a friend of mine, Rabbi Ben Greenberg, who's also like me, an Orthodox Jew now working as a developer in Israel. We came up with the idea to merge, you know like you spoke about in the first episode to have the synergy between these two worlds, which mean a lot to both of us. So we started this weekly newsletter, which features a Torah thought every single week that relates to tech and also tech news that relate to Judaism or to Torah values in general. You can find it, you can subscribe to it in the link which will be provided in the show notes. I also cross post a few weeks - those that I write - I cross post them on my blog, which you can find at http://rabbionrails.io Leon: 02:51 Fantastic. I guess we'll dive into this. What is it about IT and working in IT that makes us think differently about these types of world breaking world, you know, horrific events that that just shouldn't be? Josh: 03:08 You know, I think what makes me think about those things, and I have an interesting story that I'll share, but it's that desire to fix things, to see them resolved and in order to do that, you have to understand where they came from. I remember quite distinctly when I had this first realization that I was a "fixer". I was in 10th grade. I was in a class and we had a presenter from the community - or who I thought was from the community - who came in, and she talked about the genocide and that had happened in East Timor. She was East Timorese and she had talked about how the Indonesian had invaded East Timor and killed off a third of the population. And I thought, "Man, I've never heard of this before. How can it possibly be that such a tragedy has happened? And no one's talked about it." And it was in that moment that I realized I wanted to do something. And it's only been with 25 or 30 years of retrospect that I realize that that was that transitional moment where I knew I wanted to be a fixer. So I dunno, I, maybe it's something that happens to us by nature, by nurture. I don't know if I want to fall down on either one of those sides, but for me it felt very natural. Speaker 2: 04:28 Excellent. Now Yechiel in the newsletter, you actually mentioned something about the fact that, you know, we as IT professionals - and certainly as programmers and developers - error messages... We don't respond to error messages the same way that I'm going to say "normal people" (Muggles) do. Can you, can you elaborate on that? Speaker 3: 04:46 Uh, sure. It's actually, I noticed that it's one of the first things, one of the first like switches I had to go through in order to learn development. Before I was a programmer, I did tech support and I can't tell you how many times I got a phone call where someone calls up and says, "Yeah, there's something wrong. The machine is broken." I'm like, "what's wrong?" "Like I don't know, it has an error message on it and like...", "Well what does it say?" "I don't know" And I was like, "I can't really, you know... Can we go through the transaction again and see which error we got?" "I Dunno, it's just broken and it got an error message." As, I mean, ever since I was a kid, I always had this curiosity where I would, you know, try to figure things out. We know when something broke to try to take it apart. And when I learned to program, so that was one of the first lessons I had to learn because error messages pop up all the time. You make a small typo, I make a small, you know, you add an extra semi colon or you're missing a semicolon and the whole thing blows up at you. And as a "muggle", as you put it, whenever our computer throws an error message at you, it's always this scary thing. You know, it almost feels like the computer is, like, shouting at you and you know you probably did something wrong. And now everything is broken and nothing is working. But as programmers and in general people in IT, error messages are actually, that's what we're here for. That's what we do. We fix error messages. Error messages show us where the code is broken. What has to be fixed. Some are easier and more helpful than others of course. But that's basically what we do. Our whole approach to broken systems is different. You know, I mentioned the quote from Steve Klabnik in the newsletter he said that "...programming is a moving from a broken state to a working state. That means you spend the majority of your time with things being broken. Hell, if it worked, you'd be done programming!" I mean nobody's hiring programmers to take care of working stuff. So that's what we do as, that's our job description. Leon: 06:43 How many of us have said, as you're sort of struggling with a problem or you know, "how can you keep working on this? Hour after hour?" (and we respond) "that's why I get paid the big bucks." Josh: 06:55 I just want to call out that the blue screen of death. I think that that was invented to BE scary. Like really, you know, suddenly everything fails and you get this dump of data like that (gasps), I don't know, when I see the blue screen of death on the server and I haven't... knock on wood, I haven't seen one in a long time. I'm always afraid, Leon: 07:18 Right. But of course you have to remember that the blue screen of death came after a long string of operating systems that gave you nothing more than like the "sad mac". Like that was all you got. You didn't get any other error messages. So perhaps the pendulum swung a little too far in the other direction of giving more information than you wanted, versus just, you know, "I'm not happy now," but even that is, to Yechiel's point, is a way of of trying to fix things by error message, I mean, you know, this error message is actually not useful. And so I'm going to fix the error message by giving more information, but they just went perhaps a little further in that direction. Josh: 08:01 So I learned last week, or two weeks ago about this great Easter egg in an error message. So you know when you're in chrome and there's no network connectivity and you get that pop up that says that there's no network connectivity? There's a video game in that popup message! Leon: 08:21 Trying to make it less scary by looking for firewall things in the middle, Yechiel: 08:25 I will not admit out loud how many hours I wasted with that dinosaur. Leon: 08:32 But it is some number greater than zero. Good. All right. So I like this mindset. I like the fact that as IT people, we are, as Josh said "solvers" and that we approach brokenness in a very different way. We see brokenness not as simply, like a broken pot, a Ming vase on the floor that is broken and will never be the same, but more as IT folks we're, "Oh, that's just, that's how everything starts," And now, now we have the work of the work. I'm curious about whether being people from a religious, moral, ethical point of view. Are we predisposed maybe to see these errors or these patterns differently than folks who are from a more secular point of view? Josh: 09:27 I'm pretty convinced that the answer to that question is yes. I think about the... in case you haven't been paying attention, I was raised Mormon and I'm now post Mormon or ex Mormon or no longer Mormon, whatever. You wanna do this, do you want to call it Leon: 09:46 The artist formerly known as Mormon? Josh: 09:48 The artist formerly known as Mormon - I think actually, that is every Mormon because the church doesn't call themselves Mormons anymore. Anyway, that's a, that's an entirely different episode. But the entire premise of Christianity at large is this realignment or uh, yes, realignment is the best way to describe it, of ourselves with God. So God being perfect, the idea of there being an atonement means that we have to, that there's something wrong with us. And so there's, you know, scripture is full of indicators when someone goes wrong. So one of the great indicators in the book of Mormon, which is the, the book of scripture that is unique from the rest of Christianity inside of Mormonism is when Jesus is crucified and when he dies on the cross, and while there's been people who've said, "Hey, you know, things are, things are not going well. You know, this is going to happen." Suddenly the, you know, the earth shakes and the ground breaks and there's darkness and there's, you know, cities fall and they burn. These are all these warning signs that something has gone wrong. And those people who are astute to that, they recognize that something has gone wrong and they're the ones who, you know, who raised their voices up and, um, you know, then there's goodness that rises. Yes. I know it's a bit of a stretch to say that in that mindset, we also become good engineers - so that when we see the warning signs, we know we're looking for them, we start to see, "Oh my goodness, there's error messages popping up. Like that's, that's kind of weird." And then when the thing ultimately fails, we're the ones who are there to say, "Okay, all right, it's failed. We got this, we can bring this back." I don't know that that's necessarily how people perceive it, but I certainly, I'm certainly a big pattern person, and in patterns, you know, whether you're talking about the book of Revelation or you're talking about Nostradamus, or whatever it is you're talking about, those patterns all exists and I think they're powerful for us. Um, both personally. Um, but also from a technical perspective. Leon: 11:57 So I think that Judaism approaches things differently. Obviously, you know, Josh: 12:02 yes... Leon: 12:03 it approaches things very differently for a lot of things. That's a true statement. The brokenness of the world is sort of built into it and I don't know that it's worth going into the, the whys and wherefores, but there's this concept in Judaism of Tikun Olam, which translates to "repairing the world." And because that's a thing like the fact that that phrase exists, tells you that the world needs repair and that's built into the system. Otherwise that phrase wouldn't be a thing. Now there's two ways of looking at Tikun Olam, the, the sort of, bubblegum pop way of looking at it. And I probably just offended to thousands of people and I apologize. The first level view, or the easier view of Tikun Olam is just doing good deeds to make the world a better place. Donating money and helping people out if they need help and things like that. But there's a deeper, slightly deeper level of it, which is that there are these hidden sparks of holiness and it's almost like a scavenger hunt. And that our job is to reveal these sparks of holiness to collect them up. And the way that you do that is by doing these good deeds. Yechiel, I don't know if you have a take on that. Yechiel: 13:18 You did pretty well. It's stressed a lot stronger and Chasidic philosophy, which, which I'm trained in. But yeah, when God created the world, He created it with His goodness, with His kindness. And that kindness is everywhere. Everywhere in the world. Even in the darkness. When we find the spark of goodness in the darkness, we're actually revealing the purpose of creation of that part of the world and bringing the world closer to its ultimate reason for creation, which was to become a place where godliness and goodness, out in the open rather than hiding in dark corners the way it is now. Leon: 13:57 One of the parts of Judaism that I like so much is that certain... these good deeds, these acts, are labeled as Mitzvot, which, you know, a lot of people say, "Oh, that's a good deed, right?" No, no, no, no, no, that's, that's a commandment. That's an obligation. Why are you giving charity or tzedakah is what it's called in Hebrew. Why are you giving that? You know, because it makes you feel good? No. Because it's a good deed? No. Because I'm obligated to, I am commanded to. The commander in chief gave me an order and I'm just being a good soldier. I'm just doing it. And I think that that also, as somebody with a religious point of view, lets us look at these these broken moments, these broken times as, "Nope, that's part of the job." This is a hurdle that was placed here so we could try to overcome it. Moving forward just a little bit. I think that because we see these errors, do we, do we feel compelled to address them? I mean, like, do we have to? Josh: 15:07 Something that I'm I'm told very often is "Josh, stay in your lane," and I'm not good that at all. Leon: 15:14 "Keep your nose out of it. Just deal with your stuff!" Yeah. Yeah. Josh: 15:17 I mean, I'm really, really bad at it, so I'm going to say that yes, I feel very compelled to fix problems, much to my own detriment though, sometimes. Solving my own problems is challenging, but solving my own problems and other people's problems? That's, that's a weighty thing. Sometimes I feel like I'm better at solving other people's problems than my own. Yechiel: 15:42 So yeah, do we feel compelled to justice? I feel like that's part of what we spoke about our different approach error messages in tech. You know, when a nontechnical person sees an error message, yeah, he's compelled not to do anything about it. And it just shut the whole thing down and turn it on and hope for the best. But as a developer, if I see an error message and figure, "Okay, it's broken. That's it. That's how that, you know, that's how it is." Then I'll pretty much find myself without a job very soon. Speaker 2: 16:13 Well there's one phrase that I think I've quoted on the show before, but it's so good, I can't let it go. Do we feel obligated to address these? And in one of the books of Mishnah, a section called Pirkeh Avot, there's a phrase that gets quoted a lot. "You're not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to desist from it." And I think that's a big part of the mindset. Yechiel of the three of us, you are the most "a programmer". I'm more of a systems guy. Josh is more of a systems guy. And I know that when you're looking at one of these big problems, like you said, you can't walk away from it, but at the same time, I don't think you go into it thinking, "Well it's me and it's only on me and there no one else who's ever going to do this", I think, you know, going into it that there's a team behind you, there's people that you can rely on, there's people you can go to or who will pick up the work if you have to take a break or put it down. Yechiel: 17:20 Very true. The stuff I'm working on now, you know, it's problems that were around for a lot longer than I've been on them. And they will still be problems way after I'm off the team already. And yeah, it's, you know, you're part of IT, you're part of a much bigger picture. You are not the be all and end all the project will go on without you, but at the same time, you have an awesome opportunity to improve it and to move it one step forward and another step and another step. Leon: 17:51 And, and I, I have to put this in here because I said I'm a systems guy. Really, you know, my great love in IT is monitoring, and I consider myself to be a monitoring engineer more than anything else. And I think that I feel compelled to address things because usually I'm the one who sets up a monitor to watch for that condition - to check and, you know, is it healthy? No. Alright. Why? And once you have that, once you have that error message, that alert, "Hey, this is no longer within the boundary of what we would consider healthy or good or up or okay." At that point, if you haven't put in something to try to fix that problem, that alert that you've just triggered, then you haven't done the full job of monitoring. You know, monitor, collect the data, alert when it goes out of your specification, and then act. And if you're not acting, then you haven't done a full job. That's from a monitoring standpoint. But again, I feel that it translates into the real world. So now that we sort of identified it, I wonder as IT folks, do we have anything to offer non IT people (again, muggles) to approach these problems. Is there a mindset that that non IT folks can adopt that would make it easier when they see these big problems in their community, in the world to not feel so overwhelmed? Josh: 19:20 Oh, me, me! I've got one. I've got one! There's this great, there's this great idea in Mormonism, about having one foot and Zion and one foot in Babylon. And I don't know if it's strictly from Mormonism, but I feel like I'm one of those people, because I was afraid of error messages in my early IT career, I was absolutely horrified. To me when they broke it felt like I had done something wrong. Like, "Did, did I, did I make it do that?" To quote Steve Urkel, "Did I do that?" Leon: 19:56 Another great voice in Geekdom Josh: 20:00 The great geek of all Geeks, right? Steve Urkel. So I think that I would love for people to take this: Don't be afraid of, of of error messages. When you see them, first decompress a little because you're freaking out because things just broke. But then read what the error message says. You know, this is not like the Twitter fail whale. It's not like the spinning pinwheel of death on your brand new Mac book. Like these things are generally helpful. And if not, shame on you coders for not putting in helpful error. Messages. Leon: 20:37 Uh oh, he's throwing shade at you. Yechiel Josh: 20:39 I maybe.. I mean a little.. Yechiel: 20:40 No, that's actually a very valid point. And our last tech conference I was by, it was a Ruby conference, but almost every talk I was at was trying to discuss how to make our error messages better. And I think in general, just teaching people that it's okay when things are broken, it's not okay when they stay broken for us, but it's okay when they are broken. And that just shows that there's room for us to get in here and help things out. Josh: 21:12 And I love that idea of making our error messages better. Going back to Leon, your love of monitoring, my love of monitoring, the big push now in the monitoring space is that everything is telemetry. It's not just time series data, like everything, your error messages, the strings that get vomited out of your code. That's all telemetry. So, yeah, please, if you're a developer and you're listening make your error messages something that we on the monitoring and event management side, that we can take in as telemetry and use it to help people to go and do things to bring the systems back. Leon: 21:53 Right now I'm not about to go in and approach God and say, "I'm not sure your error messages are comprehensive enough. I'd like things a little clearer." Partially because it's a little egotistical to think that I have anything to tell God about how to run the world. And second of all, when I've asked for clear messages, I've gotten them and they're usually very sort of blunt and brutal. So I don't do that. But as far as having non IT folks approach these world issues, these sort of error messages around, one of the things - and we hit on it earlier is remember that you're working in teams that very rarely in IT are you an army of one. That there's people that you can fall back on. There should be people that you can fall back on. Find your tribe. If you have... there's an area of the world that really bothers you, that you're sensitized to, then find your tribe that's addressing that. Whether it's the #metoo movement or you're fighting climate change, or you're looking for creating lasting peace in your neighborhood or anywhere else, find that group and work within it so that you can pick up your piece, but you don't have to try to pick up the whole piece. So that's one thing that I think IT folks sort of intuitively understand. Josh: 23:16 So I love that, and I want to build on that. My son today, who's in high school, he came home and he said "Hey, just so you guys know, today's the first day of Ramadan and I'm going to be participating in Ramadan with my friends." And I thought, "Whoa, like, whoa." We're like, "Where did that come from? That so awesome." He's feeling very connected. And so I love that idea of finding your people and working in teams. I have this wonderful old lady who lives next to me. She's been around forever. And whenever her computer breaks she calls me and says "Josh, can you come fix my computer?" She knows how to do the things that she knows how to do, but she also was very willing to admit that "I can't do this. I can't fix this thing." And to me they're very rudimentary. Like, okay, yeah, I'll help you with that. But to her, it's something foreign. And don't be afraid of foreign things. Admitting that you don't know something is just as good, if not better than faking that you know something when you don't, I mean, our last episode talked about that, that fake it til you make it. You don't have to fake this and it's okay to say, I don't know. Destiny: 24:26 Thanks for making time for us this week. To hear more of Technically Religious, visit our website, http://technicallyreligious.com, where you can find our other episodes, leave us ideas for future discussions and connect to us on social media. Josh: 24:40 To quote Five Man Electrical Band from their 1971 classic, "Thank you lord for thinking about me. I'm alive and doing fine."

200 - Juleps, MGP Chasers, and High Dollar NAS on Bourbon Community Roundtable #32